by Victor Poole
"He had taken the things into a hole in the city wall," Isacar said. "He had attempted, unsuccessfully, to bribe a guard. He has taken several valuable documents," Isacar added, his lip lifting a little in distaste, "from his father's office."
Ajalia looked at Coren, and she liked him even less than she had liked him before.
"Isacar," Ajalia said, and the young man met her eyes. "Do you have any particularly horrible ideas in mind for the disposal of this young creature?"
Isacar's eyes flashed, and Ajalia thought she saw the hint of smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
"I have had a few thoughts on the matter," he admitted quietly. Ajalia felt a strange glee in her heart. Isacar and she, she thought with satisfaction, were going to get on well together.
"What did you take?" Leed asked Coren. Coren, who had stood very quietly throughout this exchange, looked down his nose at the shorter boy. Coren, Ajalia thought, was only a little older than Leed, but Coren clearly felt that his elder status conferred nearly endless wisdom and superiority to him. The new Thief Lord's little brother wrinkled his nose at Leed, and pretended not to have heard what he said.
"Are you going to let him talk to me like that?" Leed asked Ajalia, a smile haunting the corners of his mouth. Ajalia folded her arms, and watched Leed. Leed grinned, and drew back his foot.
"Now, Leed," Ajalia said to the boy, and Leed hesitated, ready to kick Coren sharply in the shins. Coren kept a distant and superior look on his face; he curled an eyebrow at Ajalia.
"I don't have time for this," Coren told her in cool tones. "I'm sure my brother needs me."
"Which brother?" Ajalia asked. She gave Leed a warning glance; she wanted to hear what Coren would say for himself, before Leed laid into him thoroughly. She could see Leed itching to start a scrap with the older boy. Ajalia was quite sure that in such a conflict, Leed would win, though she suspected Coren would cheat heavily.
"My brother Wall is going to be the new Thief Lord," Coren said loudly. He looked scornfully at Isacar, and wiggled under that young man's hand, which still clasped him firmly on the shoulder. "Let go of me, servant," Coren said haughtily.
"Isacar is my particular young man," Ajalia said mildly to the boy. "I would rather you didn't speak to him that way."
"Oh, and I suppose that this little boy is your trusted counselor," Coren said, in a voice that was drenched in sarcasm.
"Where is your brother Wall?" Ajalia asked. Coren glanced at her sharply.
"Why would you need to know?" Coren demanded. "You're nobody."
"Your father is dead," Ajalia told the boy. "Did you know that?"
"Of course I knew that," Coren said, sniffing with disdain. "Everyone knows he's dead."
"And did you know that your mother is dead as well?" Ajalia asked. Coren's expression of jaunty disdain faltered.
"No," Coren said slowly, "she isn't dead."
"Is too," Leed said loudly. Ajalia guessed that Leed, who picked up information in mysterious ways, had caught up on almost all the happenings of the city by osmosis, as soon as he had entered the white stone streets. Coren glared at Leed, and Ajalia saw his hands curl into hardened fists.
"My mother is alive," Coren spat at Leed. "And you don't even have a mother," he added, in what he evidently expected to act as a crowning blow.
"Do too," Leed said easily, twisting the coins around his fingers. "Your mother's dead," he said. Leed's eyes went swiftly up to Ajalia, and then back to Coren. "She got thrown in with the garbage," Leed added softly, a cruel smile on his lips.
Isacar, who was holding Coren's shoulder, grabbed onto the boy as he surged forward, and attempted to throttle Leed. Leed stayed where he was, a smile dancing in his eyes.
"I have money," Leed said softly, his voice taunting. Ajalia was sure that Coren would have held up well enough under her own questions, and he looked as though he had been fairly sturdy, in response to whatever pressure Isacar had brought to bear on him, to get him to reveal his hidden treasures, but Leed seemed to act upon Coren like poison. Coren, who had maintained an aloof hauteur throughout his encounter with Ajalia, had now begun to froth a little at the mouth. He wrestled wildly with Isacar, and flung his arms out, grunts of inarticulate rage leaving him, as he tried to get at Leed.
Leed stood still and watched Coren writhe with a satisfied smile on his lips. Isacar, as he fought to subdue Coren, pulled free the long bag, and passed it swiftly to Ajalia, who took it away, and sat down some distance away. She placed the bag on the floor, and opened the mouth of the fabric.
"You give that back!" Coren shouted, his voice wild with fury. Isacar wrapped one arm around the boy's shoulders, and picked him up with the other. Coren was kicking and fighting like a wild cat. Isacar deposited Coren down on the ground, and sat on him, wrapping his long legs around the child's wild limbs. Coren grunted, and grew red in the face.
"Let me go!" Coren raged. Isacar put an arm around Coren's neck, and put gentle pressure on him, until he gasped for breath. "Stop!" Coren sputtered, his face bright red. "I'll hold still, stop," he gasped, and Isacar let go a little. Ajalia, who was examining the collection of items in the bag, told Leed to go to Denai's room, and look for a rope.
"I don't know where Denai stays," Leed said. Ajalia had forgotten that Leed had been gone when she had moved into the dragon temple, and brought Denai to stay with her. She pointed out the tiny room off the main hall where the horse trader slept, and Leed went away.
"You won't know what any of that stuff is," Coren told Ajalia viciously. His eyes were narrowed, and his jaw was thrust out. He looked like a drowned snake.
"I know what most of it is," Isacar told Ajalia. "I lived with Tree, and knew what he had, and I made the boy tell me about the other pieces." He looked down at Coren with his lip curled. "The boy doesn't know what half the documents say," Isacar told her. "He can hardly read."
"I can too read!" Coren shouted, writhing again, and Isacar pulled back the boy's arms. "Stop hurting me, you stupid man!" Coren wailed. "My brothers will kill you for this."
"Where's Wall?" Ajalia asked, without looking up. Leed returned with a length of rope, and helped Isacar to tie Coren's wrists and ankles together. Coren was soon lying on his side on the floor, his cheek pressed flat against the white stone. He looked quite murderous.
LEED'S WISH
"Wall's going to be the new Thief Lord," Coren told Ajalia spitefully, "now that my father's dead." He glanced with ire at Leed, who had tied most of the knots.
"He tried to bite me," Leed told Ajalia. Leed looked as though he were thinking about kicking Coren again. "I was beaten lately," Leed told Coren scornfully, "and I didn't scream about it. I took it like a man."
Ajalia reminded herself to find the man Wesley, and to make his life hell. She had arranged the items Coren had collected into a neat cluster, and put the papers, and a slim leather book that was very like her own book of magic, to one side. She had felt a sharp pinprick of interest, when she had gotten this book out of the sack. She suspected that it would hold great secrets, and she knew that Delmar would want it very much. She had peeked inside, and seen that it contained the old Slavithe, and some diagrams that were similar to those in her own slim leather book. Ajalia would have put the slim leather book discreetly into her own bag, which still hung close around her body, but she knew that Isacar had looked over the things, and would know that the book was missing, if she took it now.
When Isacar had finished with Coren, he left Leed standing over the boy, and came near to Ajalia. Ajalia patted the floor, and Isacar squatted down, his heels lifting up, and his elbows resting on his knees.
"Tell me about these things," Ajalia said, waving at the collection of objects. Isacar took a deep breath; Ajalia told herself that he had been preparing for this moment, because he began an efficient and precise litany of each item. There were close to two dozen items. Most of them looked like knick knacks, or like carved paperweights. Isacar touched each item as he spoke, and explain
ed the item's history, why it was valuable, and where Tree had gotten it from.
When Isacar had wound through many of the lined-up items, his fingers came to rest over a curious dagger that lay within a blackened leather sheath. The sheath was dark with age and neglect; the fastenings on the sides looked almost ready to fall away from the dried leather.
"This is the weapon," Isacar said hesitantly, "of the dead falcon."
"It's Delmar's?" Ajalia asked.
"No," Isacar said quietly, and glancing at the two boys, who were glaring at each other in what seemed to be an epic battle of silent wills, he turned a little closer to Ajalia. "The people here will not tell you the truth about the dead falcon," Isacar told her. "They believe in the stories, but they have learned that outsiders do not believe, and they do not speak of it much, outside of the temples, or the wild places."
"What is the dead falcon?" Ajalia asked. She felt as though she were finally going to learn the truth of the matter. Delmar had started to tell her bits and pieces of the legend, or story, or myth, but he had always broken off, and found some way to clear away from the salient details.
"Long ago," Isacar told Ajalia, his eyes shining a little, "when Bakroth was dead, and Jerome had taken power in both Slavithe and in Talbos—"
Ajalia opened her mouth, and Isacar stopped at once. Ajalia reflected for a moment. If she interrupted, she thought, she would learn many interesting things, but would likely still be in the dark about the dead falcon. She waved Isacar on in his story.
"When Jerome had taken power," Isacar said, "he drove out the children of Bakroth, and they fled, with the king, into the mountains."
"Who was the king?" Ajalia asked.
"After Bakroth was dead," Isacar said, "one of his servants ran away with his daughter, and came back later, declaring himself the king of Talbos. He was persistent, and in time he got his way." Not unlike Simon, Ajalia told herself, and she settled in to listen. A slight scuffle came from the boys; Ajalia looked over, and saw that Leed had finally gotten his kick in. Coren was glaring with silent fury at a far wall, and Leed was standing in the posture of a valiant hero over the hog-tied boy. No further violence appeared to be imminent, and Ajalia turned all her attention onto Isacar.
"The people said, who had run away, that someday the dead falcon would arise, and unify the peoples," Isacar said. "They said that he would bear the knife of the first falcon, and lead the people into the city in the sky." Isacar was looking at the knife with some measure of reverence; he did not say anymore.
"Who was the first falcon?" Ajalia asked.
"Some people say it was Bakroth," Isacar said. "The first falcon was the man who ascended up into the sky land, and brought the water and the plants down. He drew the white stone up from beneath the earth, and built the city. He brought the animals and the birds down from the sky, and made the fertile places you see here."
"The falcon could fly?" Ajalia asked. Isacar made a face, as though he was not sure he wanted to commit to the word "flying."
"It was not exactly flying," Isacar said, his forehead wrinkling, "but he did travel up to the sky, and because he went so high, the people called him the falcon."
"And now there are people in Slavithe, and in Talbos, who hope that Delmar will be a new falcon?" Ajalia asked. Isacar nodded.
"The falcon is dead," Isacar said, "because the power to ascend into the sky died with the first falcon. We speak now, and we look, for the dead falcon to arise."
"And the sky angel," Ajalia said. Isacar interrupted her.
"The sky angel comes to Slavithe from above," Isacar told her, "and she teaches the dead falcon to fly again."
Ajalia picked up the old dagger, and turned it over in her hands. Isacar glanced at her, and she knew he was thinking of the way the people had chanted at her, saying "sky angel, sky angel," when she had stood in the receiving room next to Delmar. With a slight blush on his cheeks, Isacar turned back to the rows of items that Coren had taken, and told Ajalia what they were.
There were two other items of interest, aside from the knife, the papers, and the slim leather book. Ajalia was sure that Delmar would be highly interested in the documents, and she knew he would nearly lose his mind over the discovery of a second old book that was like the one she carried. He had wanted her book for weeks, and she had not yet given it to him to read through. She thought that Delmar would take sure possession of this slim book, and tell her that they were even now. She hid a smile, and drew the dagger a little from the blackened sheath. Isacar watched her doubtfully, his words slowing down, and his eyebrows drawn close. The hilt of the dagger was similarly darkened and dry, but the blade, though it was not sharp, looked strong and bright. The dagger was a little longer than her own knife, and followed a gentle curve, so that it resembled a crescent moon.
The two other items that caught Ajalia's eye were a roughened stone of pure white, flecked through with specks of purple, and a small ring that held within its center the initials G. E., and the number 4. The ring she took up; Isacar paused in his recital, and watched her look at it.
"Coren took it only because it was made of gold," Isacar told her, and Ajalia nodded. She recognized the initials, and the script in the golden ring. It was just like the writing on the golden knife that she had found in Lim's secret box weeks ago. She had kept the small inscribed golden knife in her bag, after Delmar had taken it up from the floor after Lim had thrown it. The golden knife, she was sure, was inscribed in just the same way as this ring, and with the same initials.
The white stone with purple flecks, Isacar explained, was the last remaining piece of the sky. The first falcon, he told her, had brought down many pieces of the sky, and they had been placed throughout the city, to ward off evil, and to protect the spirits of the people, but over the centuries, Isacar said, they had been destroyed.
"Witches used them up in dark spells," Isacar said, "and our kind took them for healing tokens, or to protect us in war against Talbos."
Ajalia had seen that Isacar wore a white brand; she was sure that was what he meant, when he said "our kind."
When Isacar had finished describing the items, he glanced at the pile of papers.
"I can't read it," he said frankly, and she was sure he meant the old Slavithe writing, which covered many of the documents, and filled up the slim leather book. "And that book," he added, hesitatingly, "will have to be burned."
"Delmar will deal with it," Ajalia said, without looking up from the papers that she had lifted into her lap. "Leed," she called, and Isacar, sensing that he had been dismissed, changed places with Leed, and took up guard over the bundled-up Coren. Coren had taken up a kind of mutinous silence; when Ajalia looked over at him, it looked as though the boy was pretending to be asleep.
Leed came bouncing over, and he sat down when Ajalia waved at him to do so.
"That boy is a stinker," Leed told Ajalia.
"Can you read this?" she asked him, holding out one of the sheets of paper. Leed looked up doubtfully at Ajalia.
"They're probably secret," Leed suggested. Ajalia nodded.
"Probably," she agreed. Leed examined her through narrowed eyes.
"I told you I was a spy," Leed said guardedly.
"Can you read it?" Ajalia asked. Leed shifted a little, and looked down at the page. He read out, in a halting voice, the first paragraph.
"I don't know that word," he said, pointing to some of the old letters.
Ajalia had Leed read the first parts of several of the documents. They mostly appeared to be details of business transactions between the Slavithe merchants and the landowners in Talbos. A few of the papers were written in Slavithe, but these Ajalia found to be dry and gossipy letters from Simon to Tree, and from Tree to Simon. Ajalia put the papers, and the slim leather book, into her bag. She did not try to hide what she did; she saw Isacar watching her. She took up the white piece of rock, the dagger in its blackened sheath, and the curious ring.
"You said Philas would send t
o me?" Ajalia asked Leed, putting the ring into a pocket of her bag, and keeping the stone and the dagger in her hands.
"He wanted to get money from you," Leed said, "from the sale of the horses." Ajalia had decided not to say anything to Philas about the two thick papers she had found in Lim's box, or the golden knife, but now that a ring with matching symbols had been stolen by Coren as a precious thing, she was pondering on the matter anew. Philas, she knew, had originally come from Saroyan, which lay just across the sea from Slavithe and Talbos, and she thought that Philas must have an interesting reason for remaining in Talbos, since the bulk of the caravan had begun the journey East, and since his own home country lay so close by. Philas had claimed to love her, but, she reflected, Rane and Ocher had said the same thing, and they had been after her power. Her particular boy from the East, Darien, had told her that Philas wanted her around to do all the work of the caravan for him, and she was not sure if this was true or not, though she suspected it might be. She had stopped trusting Philas after he had gotten her to open up to him, and then turned back into himself, like an old drunken man. Philas was not an old man, but his heart, Ajalia thought, was shriveled, and hard. He was selfish. She did not think she would be giving Philas any money from the sale of the horses; Denai had not yet sold any horses, and he had spoken to her about saving some horses to breed. Ajalia wanted Delmar to ride, and she was thinking of crossing her black horse with some of the Eastern mares; she had told Denai so.
Ajalia went towards Coren, who had been looking surreptitiously at her. She saw Coren close his eyes quickly, and pretend to be asleep. Ajalia nudged Coren with the toe of her shoe. Coren let out an unconvincing snore. Leed began to pile the rest of the stolen things into the sack again.
"Coren," Ajalia said. The boy spluttered sleepily. "Coren, where is your brother?" she asked. Coren cracked an eye up at her, and scowled.
"You would know better than me," Coren said sourly. "He stays with you now, doesn't he?"
