by Doris Egan
nose. "Now," he said, in his precise voice, "this is what we're going to do."
"I'm not—" said Ran.
"You'll have your chance to talk in a minute. Since neither of you seems willing to approach the pool of truth even at gunpoint, we'll skip the issue. Fine—you don't know each other."
A voice said, "Does this mean I can court the barbarian?"
"Shut up, Des." His glance didn't even waver. "Now we're going to come at this problem from the opposite angle. Tymon."
I looked away from Ran, startled. "What?"
"I'd like you to do a job for us."
"I'm not a sorcerer."
"You don't need to be. We've got twenty head of cattle in the outbuilding. If we keep ten to slaughter as needed, that leaves ten to dispose of. I want you to take them to Kynogin Market Town and sell them for us."
"You want me to sell stolen cattle? I wouldn't know how to go about it."
"Carabinstereth will fill you in. She did it last time."
I thought about all the reasons why this was a bad idea, and the pause lengthened. Apparently he was going to keep us all standing here until I gave the right answer. I said, "I wouldn't know how to control ten head of cattle to get them anywhere—"
"Carabinstereth will fill you in."
I didn't know whom to sell them to, or for how much, or whom not to approach, or what to say… I knew the reply to those objections, too. "Will somebody come with me to help?"
"No. You'll be alone." I opened my mouth and Stereth added, "Sokol will stay here."
Ah. Stereth's little way of letting us know that he understood the situation—that I'd have to come back if he kept Ran.
Still, that wasn't to say he would kill Ran if I tried to leave the Sector. He wanted a sorcerer, after all, and maybe I could get to a Net link and call for help… I looked at Stereth, standing there calmly. How many people had he killed already in his career? Then I looked at Ran, and
plain as anything I told him telepathically, "Come on. Let's just admit it and get it over with."
Ran's eyes were stubborn. I sighed and said, "So. Cara-binstereth will fill me in."
Later, when we were walking in to the wash line, Ran said, "Have you run the cards?"
"How could I? The only privacy I've had since we got here was just now. And we were occupied."
"Do it. Do it as soon as you can. And then come straight to me."
Half an hour beyond that, while I was toweling down, I went to Ran and said, "What happened to the cook before Herel?"
He looked blank. "I beg your pardon."
"You said you took Herel on as cook the next autumn. What happened to the first cook?"
"You do get caught up in side issues, tymon."
"I just like to know how the story comes out."
Ran is willing to humor lunatics as long as they're in the family. He said, "The first cook died. She opened a jar of konoberry poison instead of a jar of blackberry jam. They look just the same, you know. And organization is especially important when it comes to poison."
"I suppose it was a lesson to everyone in keeping labels straight."
"It was. The most annoying thing from my father's point of view—aside from having to find a new cook—was that we now knew that somewhere in the rows and rows of konoberry poison jars there was one that was actually blackberry jam. It made you think twice about using any of them."
Possibly there was a moral in there somewhere. I said, "So what did you do?"
"Do? We didn't do anything. I suppose they're all still down there in the basement, unless Herel threw them out."
Carabinstereth, it will not surprise you to learn, filled me in. She also accompanied me as far as the main road to Kynogin Market Town. We walked side by side through the cold, rough plateau grass, the strap of one lead in my
hand, the other, to another mod, in hers. Eight more steers plodded docilely behind us.
Her blue eyes were inlaid in her pure Ivoran face like mosaic chips, alien to the rest of her features. They sparkled with mischievous energy. "You don't look too downcast, Tymon. I guess your lover must be good in bed, for a man."
"I, uh, we barely know each oth—"
"I know that, my dear barbarian, you've made it very clear. Are you married? What's your real name?"
It's not the custom to ask anyone in the Sector what their real name is, but I should have known from Carabinster-eth's hair and clothing, not to mention her outlaw eyes, that she paid little attention to rules.
"What's your real name?" I returned.
She stopped and bowed with a dramatic expanse of arm, nearly causing a three-steer pile-up. "Lesrenic Beredar Chaniz, honored by this meeting. I used to be a captain in the Imperial Honor Guard."
I stared. "I didn't know they let women in the Imperial Honor Guard."
"Oh, they prefer it, Tymon, when it comes to escorting the young and innocent daughters of the Six Families. Guard and escort oftentimes become quite close, you know, and as far as the families are concerned, a bit of female intimacy is all to the good—preparation for life, you might say. Whereas a trip over the mattress with a strapping male guard would be a nasty thing. You see the subtle difference."
"Yes," I said. "They don't have good contraception on this planet."
"Got it in one, light-eyes."
"But your manners—" I stopped. Are so provincial, I'd been about to say. Country was written all over them.
"Yes?"
"Nothing." I felt my face turn warm. "Did they really expect you to bodyguard all alone? Without any backup?"
"What backup would you mean, Tymon? Not old-fashioned muscular male backup? Really, I would have expected a more forward-looking attitude from an outworlder—"
I had the feeling she was laughing at me, but I also had
the feeling I may have offended her. "I'm sorry, Carabin, I don't know much about that sort of thing."
"Never mind, light-eyes. Five years of dirty tricks in the Provincial Women's Auxiliary, and you'd never feel the need for backup again, trust me. That's where I used to— ah. Here we are." She stopped and pointed down the long gray slope to a dirt track that curved away through the mist and sunlight. "It'll take you straight to Kaytown. When you reach the track, I advise you to turn around and look at this hill. Fix it in your mind so you'll know where to leave the road on your way back." She patted her steermod com-panionably, slipped the lead up into its collar, and said, "You are coming back, aren't you, Tymon?"
"So far as I know," I agreed.
"Because Stereth can be a bit overly severe at times. I like him, but the truth is the truth."
"I'll make every effort to be back by dark."
She handed me a waterbag and said, "Best of luck. I'll stake out the hill after sunset, in case you get lost."
So the blue-eyed outlaw troublemaker went one way, and the barbarian using the assumed name went the other. I felt very funny walking down the slope, and I realized with some surprise that this was the first time I'd been left totally on my own since Athena.
Ninety minutes later I reached a grove of those objects that on the plateau pass for trees; I stopped and tied the leads of the two collared mods to some branches. "Keep this to yourselves, fellows," I said, and I knelt down and took my deck of cards from the pouch around my waist.
The grass was cool and not as wet as I'd feared. I shuffled the cards and thought about our present situation. Then I drew out the first, Ran's identity card.
A picture of one of the branches of the Silver River, far to the southwest. A dam holding back the natural force of the water, creating an artificial lake. Spear Dam: I'd heard of it before. Trees on either side, very pastoral. I touched it with my finger.
The dam groaned. The water pounded against it, the lake rose, and rain fell from the sky in sheets, worse than the spring outpours. The great blocks of stone moved slightly from the enormous pressure. So far no great devastation had struck, but it was only a matter of time.
I sat back and watched the picture become stationary again, the sky return to painted blue with fluffy cotton clouds. I'd never come up with an identity card like that before. In fact, I'd never turned up that particular card at all. Ran must be under a greater strain than I'd thought— unless this card was the future. The deck did not always pay attention to tenses.
I could always comfort myself by interpreting Spear Dam as simply representative of Ran's stubborn nature. It's not that he was always as immovable as those giant stone blocks, but there were five or six topics in the universe that it was pointless to argue with him on, and his family honor was one of them.
Let's see what else we had… I put down a second card.
The Hunter. A man in brown holding two bloody groundhermits by the neck, gazing out past the borders of the card as though in search of further prey.
Stereth, looking younger and more conservatively dressed in a leaf-colored robe and boots, was moving through the darkness of a southern town. The trees lining the streets were lush and green, not the orphan children of the plateau; you could almost smell their fragrance, the rich scent of Ivory summer. The sky was clear and full of stars.
He moved quickly from one shadow to another. At the city wall he was joined by two other shades. One of them limped; both carried bulges that suggested they were armed. Stereth pointed to the top of the wall and then to his left, and they all moved off that way. Was this his escape from Tammas? It was always a strange sensation, viewing the past… from what I'd heard, the men with him were doomed.
Suddenly the colors changed: Stereth was older. He wore the purple jacket with gold thread that I'd already seen. He was standing in a white stone room—not the fort—and Ran walked into the frame of the card. They were arguing. Stereth had hold of Ran's arm.
I bent over, as though that could let me hear better, moved my finger and lost the window. The card turned back into the Hunter with his catch.
And what did that mean? That scene had to be the future, and Ran was definitely alive—although Stereth was
not pleased—which meant either that I would make it back from Kynogin, or Stereth wouldn't kill Ran anyway.
This didn't really help me, I decided. I turned up a third card.
The damned cliff again. Beware of heights. Disgusted, I scooped up all three cards and replaced them in my pack. I untied the leads and brought my stolen cattle out again to the track. "Come on, friends," I told them. "You know as much as I do." The docile followers lined up right behind their misled leaders, all trudging to the butcher together. Misled was the right word, I decided. And we all went off to Kynogin Market Town.
Chapter Eight
In the Sector, even the most permanent of market towns are temporary. Kynogin was the dowager of these, being all of fifteen years old, at the juncture of three main roads, and with structures of actual wood and stone.
I saw it first from the hillside—a carpet of colored roofs and tents, ropes of lanterns, and tall decorated pillars signifying two clean wells. It was just as much a patchwork maze once you got down into it. Aside from the three roads that cut through, there were no streets to speak of; just clusters of tents and small buildings that sat where their owners had decided, on the spur of some moment ten years back, to put them.
Cattle were a normal, even boring, sight in a market town. I passed a farmboy with three mods for sale, and notices on the walls about auctions to come. Stereth's contact was supposed to be in the blue-roofed cabin at the edge of town, where a small tacked paper said, "Ocel For-mix, dealer and auctioneer/' I hit the flat of my hand against the door.
A plump man wearing the beaded cap of a na' telleth organization poked his head out. "May I be of service, gracious visitor?" Then he peered down at me and said, "Cantry!"
Let me repeat: Cantry and I look nothing alike.
He frowned. "You're not Cantry."
Now he seemed wary. I said, "Ocel Formix?"
"He's away at the auction in Dace."
Oh, splendid. How is it that plans always work out this way? No one had told me what to do if Formix wasn't there.
I said, "I have ten steermods here." A bare statement of fact couldn't get me into too much trouble.
"Yes, so I see." Apparently he was going to confine himself to pure observation also.
I sighed. "How much?"
"Uh, do you have statements of ownership?"
I was tired, I had had a bad week, and I refused to bring these damned animals back with me again. So I looked him in the eye and said, "Cantry has the statements of ownership. She must have forgotten to give them to me."
He licked his lips nervously. I waited. Then he said, "Well, I suppose I could give you twenty tabals apiece. As long as this Cantry can get the statements to me in the next few days."
"Terrific. Let's do that."
So he counted out two hundred tabals, and I re-counted them, because anybody who belongs to a na' telleth organization is a little funny in the head to begin with. Then he said, "Will you be staying for the Governor's speech?"
"I hadn't planned on… what speech? Is there a Net link in this town?"
A Net link! I could call Kylla. If anybody could get us out of this mess discreetly, it was Ran's remarkable sister.
The dealer chuckled. "A Net link on the plateau? Who would ever spend the money?"
"But you said the Governor—"
"The Governor is here. Surely you didn't miss the platform they set up at the crossroads for his speech."
I was glad I'd gone no farther into town. The Governor had never actually seen me; still, I'm a great believer in keeping a low profile. "I'm not sure I can stay, gracious sir," I said, throwing in the honorific a little belatedly. There was no point in forgetting our manners just because we both seemed to be criminals.
"Ah, that may be so… gracious lady." He appeared a little hesitant to award the title to a barbarian. "But I think you'll find the Governor's speech of interest, if I might recommend it."
"I'll see if I can fit it into my schedule," I said, and we both bowed. Then I left, still not entirely sure I'd done the right thing.
I came out of the dealer's house facing the rust-colored stone wall of the building opposite, and stopped short.
A poster of Ran's face hung there. Not even a sketch,
but a full 2-D repro, and I could see the top of the robe he was wearing when he was arrested in Shaskala.
"Great gods of scholars and fools, protect and preserve us." I said it out loud, and stepped toward the poster. The words STERETH TAR'KRIM were big enough to see from here. Also the amount, ten thousand tabals.
"It's sort of ironic, isn't it?" asked a voice by my ear.
I started and saw Des Helani standing there in a somewhat less flashy tunic than was his usual wont. He smiled his slow, dry smile and said, "Considering how hard he's trying to disassociate himself from our little group."
"This isn't funny, Des."
"I didn't say it was funny. I said ironic."
I looked him up and down and said, "Aren't you ruining this little loyalty test by your presence?"
"Oh, piffle—" said Des.
Piffle?
"Everyone knows you're in love with that sorcerer boy. Although all things considered, you might prefer a man." He leered in a friendly way. Des was probably all of three years older than Ran.
"Does Stereth know you're here?"
"What our glorious leader does not know need not concern him. Tell me, Tymon-of-mine, as long as we're alone… have you ever attended the races in the capital?"
And here I'd thought he was working up to a sexual proposition. "Which ones? —Not that I've attended any."
"The flyer races, of course, in Goldenweed Fields. Half the city goes there, sweetheart. Are you telling me you're not a follower of the Silver Stripe or the Jade Bar?"
The Stripe and the Bar are the "two sets of flyer teams. He was right about half the city going there, especially when the rainy season was past, but I'd alway
s felt that I'd lost enough money in my time.
"Gambling doesn't appeal to me, Des."
"What a waste. So I take it your friend Sokol doesn't go either? You spend your time together instead, tripping through fields of flowers, enjoying the fruits of innocent love?"
"We spend our time working, mostly." This was the truth. "You have a point here, Des?"
"I was wondering—in an abstact way, I mean—about the effect of sorcery on a flyer race."
I stiffened. "The people in the capital are dead serious about their flyer races. They live and die for them."
"So I assume, from the amount of cash that changes hands."
"Great gods. I have no idea what the penalty for fixing a race is, but I would bet—"
"Decapitation, after being given to the flyer pilots. The decapitation is merely a formality at that point."
"Gods. And you bring this up like it's a trip to market—"
"Trips to market are dangerous, too, Tymon. That's why I'm here."
"I can see why you're here. And you can forget it. Ran has no intention of—"
"Ran?"
Kanz. Kanz. Kanz. Born idiot, got stupider as you got older.
At least I hadn't said any last names.
"See here, Cheater-at-Cards," I said, scrambling his road name to bring out the meaning, "do you want to be friends or enemies?"
"Friends," he said at once. "I never want to be enemies."
"Then I think a little understanding, from one friend to another, would be in order here. All right?"
He smiled. "You only have to ask, Tymon. And I'm sure I can count on you to be understanding, too—"
"Pay him no mind, whatever he says," called a new voice. I turned and saw Sembet Triol walking toward us, holding a stripped sapling branch as though it were a weapon of noble antiquity. In his case, that meant he held it comfortably and tapped it against the wall of the dealer's house. He wore a dark blue-green hood and must have left his sword at home.
"Did the whole crew come?" I asked Des.
"I asked Sembet to keep me company," he answered reasonably. "I don't like to travel alone." Des didn't like to do anything alone; he got nervous without an audience.
