The Complete Ivory

by Doris Egan

  He handed over a coin—I didn't even have to advance it to him—and all the way up to Catmeral Bridge I carried a huge bunch of lavender bells in my sweaty hands.

  Midway over the bridge we stopped and looked southeast, down the canal. The waters were dark and still. Not many folks used the canal these days; farther up, the neighborhood watch had had to institute stiff rules about garbage dumping. That was ten (Ivoran) years ago, before my time. "The Year of the Big Stink," they called it. Kylla was just entering her teens then, staying with friends in the capital,

  and she told me she'd gone the whole summer drenched in perfume, like every other person who could afford it. The street vendors had all had little shelves set underneath their carts, covered with cologne bottles for passersby to purchase if they ran out of supply.

  I watched a ragged boy play in the dirt near the edge, ignoring the glare of noon sun. He looked down at the water, then went back to his play—it wasn't the sort of water you felt tempted to swim in, regardless of the summer heat.

  I glanced over at Ran's left hand, where the cadite ring sparkled. He'd scared me when he put it on, but he'd said shortly that (a) it was necessary and (b) he could handle it. His mood hadn't exactly been upbeat, so I didn't press my concerns.

  "So far, nothing," said Ran. He said it grimly. His tone went beyond the temperature and a walk through the less glamorous parts of the capital. He hadn't been at his best since we stepped into Grapefruit Alley, in fact, so I turned to him and touched his arm to get his attention.

  "What's the matter?"

  He sighed, and said gently, "I suppose you mean beyond the fact that Kylla's unhappy and I've been taken for the assassin of a first son of the Six Families. And beyond the fact that Stereth Tar'krim is another possible suspect. And beyond the discomfort of this entire morning."

  "Yes, beyond all that." Those were all things I had every faith he could handle.

  "All right," he said, "I'm angry. I've been thinking about this ever since Loden Broca told us about his ring, and getting angrier with every step."

  "Angry?" It took me completely by surprise. "What is it, what are you angry about? You've always taken this kind of thing in stride!" Whatever I meant by "this kind of thing"… sorcery, assassination, the general distrust of humankind.

  "Whatever sorcerer did this—" He took a deep breath and let it out. "Whatever incompetent fool—" Another breath. "It wasn't enough that he acted in public; he targeted the wrong man, too. And not because it was one of those accidents that 'happen because we are in this world.' Because he was careless and stupid and didn't give the same thought to this you or I would give to planning a dinner menu—"

  "But he couldn't have known Loden would lose the ring. Loden said it himself: Who would have the nerve to ask for a family heirloom?"

  "What difference does it make?" His face was slightly flushed; he really was angry. "Using an object like a ring is brainless to begin with, when you're dealing with something as permanent as death. I've been training to be a sorcerer since I was eight years old, and seeing negligence like this—something I would have avoided when I was eight—" His fists came down on the railing, and he let the rest of the sentence go. Finally he said, "What's he doing being a sorcerer? Throwing mud on all our reputations, leading clients to distrust us. And beside that—besides that, it tramples over the field itself. The beauty of sorcery is based on symbol and function being allied, on everything having its proper aspect, on dancing the dance so carefully— Theodora, sweetheart, it's so beautiful when it's all done the way it should be done. I know you're not a practitioner, but you've studied it now; you must see that."

  I saw that not agreeing at this moment would be tantamount to a divorce. And truly, I did almost see. I nodded.

  "And this fool thought he could do it as crudely as pointing a gun at someone. Even that takes experience and training."

  I didn't know what to say, so I took the safer route and said nothing. A moment later Ran took hold of my arm and said, hoarsely, "Let's finish the sweep of the bridge and find this kanz." We started down the midpoint of the arc.

  Dancing the dance, he'd said; like "The Other Side of the Mirror," that I'd danced (granted, with several errors) on the afternoon that Kade died. Dances on Ivory are complex and never spontaneous, unless you're a trained and acknowledged artist; great sorceries, too, I supposed.

  He stopped suddenly a few meters away, with the look of someone who'd been punched in the stomach. The fact that he wore the ring still bothered me; I ran over to him and grabbed one arm, in case he had a sudden desire to dive in the canal. "I've got it," he said. "Gods! I didn't think we'd get a trace this quickly. I figured he was proba-

  bly just some stranger Kylla saw." He looked over at where my hands still gripped him. "What are you doing?'

  I let go. "You made me nervous."

  He blinked and shook his head slowly. "My dear tymon. Really."

  "Be that way, then, but don't expect me to dive in after you if you end up in the canal."

  He smiled. "This way." He pointed southwest, back in the direction we'd come.

  We walked down the bridge, with me still watching him narrowly. No point in not being careful. For some reason my suspicious nature seemed to cheer him up, because he slipped one hand around my waist, beneath my outerrobe (so no one would notice and be scandalized), and said, "I haven't asked you to recite the hundred and ten laws of magic in a long time."

  "Don't tell me we're going to have a review quiz now."

  "Just a hypothetical problem, Theodora. If you were going to assassinate Kade, would you have used a ring?"

  "Considering your strong views on the matter,.as you've only just expressed them, I'm not likely to say yes, am I?"

  "Humor me, and give me your best answer."

  We were off the bridge and getting farther from the dark waters of the canal, so I put my mind to the problem. "No. I would treat it as a variant of the search hierarchy, using inside and outside traits. I would place the spell on the person himself, and tie him to it by definition."

  "The definition being?"

  "Well, I'd have to research who Kade was. Rings, clothing, and general appearance would be outside traits; I'd leave them for the icing on the spell. The heart I would base on inside traits, where you're less likely to go wrong. In Kade's case, I don't know—greed for money is an inside trait, and he seemed to have that, though probably half the people on the boat that day did, too—"

  He interrupted. "Never mind, tymon, you've made my point. You're already ten times the sorcerer this idiot is, even just in theory. It's a pity you don't have the gift."

  "I read your cards for you well enough."

  "Because the virtue is in the deck. You'd be a top-rung professional if you were gifted yourself."

  It was nice that he thought so, since the Cormallons lived and died by sorcery; it was their vocation and avocation; they followed it like an art and a sporting event. But I had no desire for the gift. I got pleasure from reading the cards (for reasons too voyeuristic to do me credit), but beyond that magic held no great allure for me. Maybe I'd seen them all working too hard at it for it to keep its romance. Or maybe it was just that there were so many other horses crying to be ridden—the scholarship of folklore and storytelling, my training in tinaje, even the recordkeeping and accounting expected of me at Cormallon—for me to want to submerge myself in artistic obsession.

  Still— "You think I'd approach magic with the proper flair?" I asked, pluming at the compliment.

  "Well, you'd be patient and careful," he said, dwelling instead on my grayer virtues.

  There you are: You can't bother my Ran with murder or sabotage, but carelessness upsets him. Ah, well, we must take our compliments where we find them in this world. We continued, following the sorcerer's trace back the exact route we'd taken, till the street we were on emptied into the noisy expanse of Trade Square. Here open tents and awnings sprouted in multicolor abundance and vendors sold rugs,
pots, fruit, weapons, live fowl, themselves, challenges at gaming contests, lucky names and numbers, promises of expertise in any field wanted, tickets to the Imperial Dance Company, baths in battered old metal tubs, displays of balance and agility, feats of memory, lessons in spoken Standard, recycled car parts… I'd set up daily shop here myself, back when I'd first gotten stranded on Ivory without money or work, and with no connections to supply either.

  We stepped into the controlled chaos and my gaze went at once to the spot by the wall where I used to sit beside Irsa, who sold fruit from a cart. But it was the height of the day; there were too many people passing for me to see if she was there. "Irsa!" I yelled, hoping to see a face pop up from the mass of strangers. As I squinted, Ran tapped my arm and pointed to the ring. "We're getting closer," he said loudly, against the noise. I squinted at the ring instead. It didn't look any different to me than it was before.

  "How can you't—" I began.

  The crowd in front of us parted, and a groundcar made its way slowly through. I stopped in my tracks and stared at it. Who would be fool enough to drive a groundcar through Trade Square? Even wagon and carriage drivers took care to detour to the streets around. The unlucky car was low-slung, covered in durasteel, with no way to peer inside at the no-doubt impatient face of the driver.

  Suddenly it accelerated sharply, causing the knot of people remaining to jump aside; there was cursing, and somebody gave a piercing scream, in apparent pain. I stood, rooted, for an eternal millisecond, before my fear seemed to pick me up bodily and toss me out of the way. The groundcar barreled through. I rolled on the ground, not the only person down there, and the noise of the marketplace dwindled to a distant hum backing the main sound of my beating heart. I put my hands against the ground to push myself up, and felt how shaky and weak they seemed. Hands on either side of me helped me to my feet. Long-taught reflexes reminded me that nobody in Trade Square takes hold of you unless it's to distract you from their pocketpicking, and without thinking about it I tried to shake them off.

  They wouldn't shake. I looked left and right, at two men in faded robes who were pulling me away. I opened my mouth, and a length of white cloth was dropped over my head, pulled tight between my lips, and tied in back. I felt the fingers behind my head, tying it, ruffling my hair—an unpleasant feeling, even aside from the fear. So there were more than two of them. My legs were still free, and I kicked out at the men on either side, but unfortunately I was not at a good angle to do much damage. I aimed a vicious one behind me, but that unseen gentleman had prudently dropped back a pace.

  We were only a few steps from a small, jury-rigged tent by the wall of a building on the edge of the square. I was hustled toward the opening. One of the few fully covered tents in the marketplace; once inside, nobody would know I was there. I could be within a few inches of Ran and he'd have no way of knowing. Assuming he wasn't going to be dumped inside next to me. I half-hoped that he would be.

  It had all happened in seconds. I was pushed inside, where I stumbled in the sudden gloom. Hands shoved me down onto the ground; at least there were some cushions scattered there. I turned, awkwardly, to look up.

  A knifeblade glinted in the dim light. As he dropped to one knee, one of the men pulled it from a sheath on his belt and drew back to—there was no mistaking this—get a good angle when he shoved it into my body. There had been no hesitation, no stop to rest, no attempt to talk to me. I'd been walking in the square thirty seconds ago, chatting with Ran. I was paralyzed with terror and disbelief.

  The knife was drawn back to strike. The world turned a sharp, sickening corner and shrank to this few meters of space, the dirty tent, and the man with me. I wasn't thinking about Ran, or anything else. If you'd asked me my husband's name, I doubt I could have told you. I doubt I could have told you my own name.

  Then the blade paused. By whatever incomprehensible rules the universe used, that had got me to this tent, the weapon hesitated. I no more expected to understand a reason for it than I expected to understand why I was there. The man turned. I followed his glance to the tent flap, where the other two were waiting outside. Except that one of them seemed to be lying on the ground, taking a nap in the sunlight. The man with the knife—the only important person here, from my point of view—twisted around, launched himself to his feet and out through the opening. I lay there, pretty much at my limit in handling simple breathing, and picked up scuffles and yells from the world outside as my ability to hear turned itself back on.

  A fat, gray-haired woman with a mountainous chest appeared in the tent flap. In her hand she held a heavy brass lamp with blood and hair on one end. She peered in and grinned a wide grin that showed teeth were a minority population in her head. "Theo, love," she said. "I thought it was you."

  Irsa, my old mate from the days of no money, who sold pellfruit and red pears to support her innumerable children. I mumbled something. She came farther in and knelt beside me. "Are you all right, child?"

  I nodded. But logical speech felt a long way beyond me, as did getting up. She puckered her lips in sympathy. "I yelled for the protective association, and last I saw your friend was being chased over Kymul's Table of Pleasurable Devices. He won't be coming back, you know." She put a hand on my forehead, like a young mother testing for fever.

  "I hope you didn't want to question the one lying out front; I don't think he'll be rising from where he is."

  "Uhh. Irsa____"

  "He didn't hit you, did he, sweetheart?"

  I shook my head. "I'm sorry… I don't know what's wrong with me… I just can't seem to…"

  "Had the life frightened out of you, I 'spect. We shouldn't be surprised; that groundcar nearly did the job, too; did you realize it was coming straight at you in particular? Jumping two skulls in a row is more than anybody ought to have to put up with, at least in the same five minutes. The body's not made for that sort of thing, you've got to rest up in between. Do you think you can sit? I can get you water from the bottle on my cart."

  She helped me sit, and a shadow crossed the opening of the tent. Ran. Irsa turned; she knew him, and satisfied herself with a mere disapproving look. "You could keep a better eye on her, you know," she said. "You're the one who got her to leave the market, where she was safe."

  His clothes were covered with dirt. "Safe," he repeated. He made a sound that could have been a laugh, but wasn't.

  "Safe I said and safe I meant," said Irsa. "Nobody tried to kill her in all the time / knew her."

  Ran knelt down, more as if he didn't have the strength to stand than as a convenience in talking to me. "You're all right," he said. He seemed to be telling me.

  I nodded. "He had a knife," I said. My voice embarrassed me by suddenly coming out like a child's.

  "Mine probably had one too, but they got separated from me when a couple of angry people tried to run after the groundcar. Pure luck."

  Pure luck. Three minutes ago we were walking across the market like a pair of innocents.

  I made out a mound of pillows in the dim light behind me; they weren't much help in trying to get to my feet. Not that it would have been so comfortable to stand up anyway. Ran and Irsa were both stooping under the low roof.

  "What are you doing?" asked Ran.

  "Trying to get up."

  "You're the color of new paper. Stay where you are for a while. We're not late for anything."

  It was a bit embarrassing how my body had just switched off. I'd been in tight spots before—you can't really hang around professionally with the Cormallons and not be in tight spots—but the wall of eternity had never thudded down so forcefully in front of me. So quickly. While I was alert and conscious, and yet without any time to prepare for it.

  The other side of the mirror is a skull.

  I admitted, "Maybe a couple of minutes' rest isn't a bad idea."

  He put his arms around my shoulders, and since there was nobody but Irsa to see me snuffle on his robe I let him do it. As a matter of fact I was quite glad about
it.

  After a moment, Irsa said, "Children, who's the fellow back there?"

  At once I tensed. My alarm systems were apparently still quivering. But her voice had been casual, and Irsa was no fool. "What fellow?"

  "Behind you there."

  I stopped snuffling and turned to the mound of pillows between me and the wall. In the gray light I could just make out some sort of non-pillow shape on the far cushiony slope. Irsa got up and held open the flap of the tent a little farther.

  The pillows were wet, I now realized. "The fellow's" throat had been cut.

  Without speaking, Ran and I pulled the top cushions off and tossed them aside for a better view. I think we each had the same idea.

  The bar of dim sunlight showed a man of middle age, completely bald, still wearing a green felt cap to protect his skin. He was pale for an Ivoran, but not sunburnt; he'd probably taken good care of himself, didn't go out much in daytime, stayed in his tent when he plied his trade. Assuming this was his tent. Well, he'd escaped sunburn. The bloody crescent under his chin was dark and already starting to cake. I couldn't swear as to what color his robes had been originally. The pillows beneath him were soaked.

  Ran extended his hand toward the other side of the pile. He still wore the cadite ring. There was a bruise on the fingers on either side of the stone, probably from when he'd thrown himself away from the car. His hand stopped a few centimeters from the man's face. He turned to me.

  "Our sorcerer," I said.

  He nodded.

  It was a pretty gruesome sight, and added to it was a fecal kind of scent I'd only just become aware of; but I found there was no more space left in me to be shocked, or even surprised. And in terms of luck it was all of a piece with a miserable day that had gone before it.

  I glanced around the tent and saw a torn sign tacked to one canvas wall:

  LUCKSPELLS… 5t.-15t.

  LOVE FILTERS… 10t.-25t.

  CURSES… 2t.-8t.

  DELIGHTFUL ILLUSIONS… 17t.-30t.

  YOUR PAST AND FUTURE,