A History of Magic
Page 15
“We cannot...” Sylvia was getting paler by the moment.
“There’s someone with a lot of power against us so we quit? Surely that’s the reason why we have to continue.”
“Continue what?” Thacker said. “What lead?”
Sylvia nodded. “Rawk has convinced me to assist him in finding out who is opening portals to let the exots through.”
“Who says someone is doing that?”
“A sorcerer that Rawk knows.”
Thacker grunted. “How can I help? A Path-knows-what appeared out west the other day and ran riot for a while. Of course there were no Heroes anywhere about so five good dwarves died.”
“Some dwarves working on the sewers died Tewsday as well. A work gang killed the exot and I told the boss I’d get the claim to him.”
“I heard that. I know the men who died, so if you get the money to me I’ll see that their families get it.”
“Thank you. I’ll organize it.” Rawk cleared his throat and pulled out the sheet of paper from Valo’s house. “Well, if you know who everyone is...” He blinked for a moment until his eyes adjusted, then started reading out the names.
Thacker nodded his way through the whole list. “Masten Mad is the name being used by someone called Layla Pro. Up until couple of days ago she was staying in at the Hen Peck.”
“Was?”
“Yes. She moves fairly regularly and it sometimes takes a few days to find her again. And Shef Leeker is calling himself Hagen something, or something Hagen, and living on the Deep Green Harpy. I think he and the captain have got something going on.”
“The Harpy still has a captain?”
“It’s got to have a captain if it’s registered and it’s got to be registered to be berthed.”
“But why?” Rawk hated ships. He couldn’t imagine choosing to live on one.
“Berthing for a ship is cheaper than rent for a house. And the Harpy is quite a bit larger than a lot of houses.” Thacker pointed at Rawk’s sheet of paper. “Of the others, I know Balen is over in the west of the city somewhere but he’s careful. I don’t know any of the others.”
Sylvia shook her head. “I would much rather talk to Shef than Balen anyway.”
Rawk shrugged.
Thacker straightened some more papers. “So, is there anything else I can help you with?”
“No. Well...”
“What?”
“I need some stairs built at the Hero’s Rest. And the quicker the better.”
“You need them built?”
Rawk looked at Sylvia. “Yes. I do. I own the Rest.”
Thacker gave a grunt and pulled on his beard. “Well, I didn’t know that.”
“Only a handful of people do, and I’d like to keep it that way.”
“Of course. Where do these stair need to go? Won’t be easy if you want them to match the rest of the building.”
“To the basement, direct from the outside.”
“Oh. Right. That might not be too bad.”
“Good. Can you send someone around to talk to Travis?”
“I can’t send anyone; I don’t own any businesses, I just try to keep everything running smoothly. I’ll talk to few masons and see if they’ll go and give you a quote.”
“Don’t worry about that. Just send the best around and if they rip me off they’ll never work in Katamood again. Not north of the river, anyway.”
“All right then. I’ll see if Gabbo’s available.”
“Thank you.”
“There is one more thing,” Sylvia said.
“Yes?”
“I have read the stories about Rawk in the newspapers. And I have seen the pictures.”
“Are you checking up on me?” Rawk said with a smile.
Sylvia ignored him. “I would like to make sure that I am not mentioned. I am taking a risk as it is, just being near Rawk, but wearing a scarf will not help if my name is mentioned. And the scarf may not help if there is a picture and Weaver is paying attention.”
Thacker nodded. “I think we can manage something.” He glanced at Rawk and cleared his throat. “I’m heading down to the newspaper offices now. You can come and talk to them with me as well, if you want. It’s just a couple of buildings down.”
Sylvia nodded. “Thank you.”
“I’d like it if they didn’t have those pictures of me, too. They make me very uncomfortable.”
“I think I can get them to stop with Sylvia, but it isn’t going to happen for you.”
“Why not?”
“You sell advertising, Rawk.”
“No, I don’t. I’m not a salesman.” He wasn’t sure if he even knew what advertising was, in this instance.
“No... If they have a picture of you they can put an advertisement next to it and charge twice as much as usual.”
Rawk had no idea what the dwarf was talking about.
They walked to the newspaper office and Rawk could hear it before they made it inside. He stopped in the doorway and stared. The room was huge, almost the size of the main hall at the Veteran’s Club, and it was buzzing with activity. There were about two dozen people— dwarves and elves, mainly, but a couple of other races as well— and they all seemed to be involved in what must be the most important activities in the world. Everyone seemed to be having three conversations at once but it was doubtful if any of them could be heard over the rattle and clank of machinery.
“It’s done with machines?”
“Of course. Did you think they wrote them out?”
Rawk quickly looked back at the machine. “Of course not.”
Thacker pointed and gave a quick explanation of the printing press. Raw was rather pleased that he managed to understand most of it.
“And the pictures?”
“Photographs? Well, I’m afraid I don’t know much at all about them. There’s a bright light and chemicals...”
“A bright light? And a popping sound?”
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“I’ve been wandering what that was. I thought it was magic.”
Thacker laughed. “Well, now you know. You’ll have to make sure you do your hair every morning.”
Rawk grunted and ran his hand over his bald head. “How do you pay for it all?”
“Taxes.”
“Weaver pays for it?”
Thacker pursed his lips. “He’s your friend, isn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“Then yes, I guess he does. Very nice of him. They are trying to make it self sufficient though.”
“So Weaver doesn’t know he’s paying?”
“Not exactly. We haven’t yet worked out a way to convince him that it was his idea.”
“Pardon?”
“Weaver won’t listen to anyone else’s ideas, so you have to make him think everything is his idea. It took us about two years of hints and nudging before Weaver came to us with the idea for the sewers.”
“That was your idea?”
“Of course.”
“What about the canal? He never stops telling me how he had to convince you the idea would work.”
Thacker laughed. “I’m pretty sure he still doesn’t understand the details. Now if we can just get him to come up with the idea for public housing we’ll end these riots.”
“I thought the riots were about the exots.”
“What? No. That would be like rioting to stop the wind from blowing; it’s just nature.” He paused for a moment. “Well, we thought it was. Either way, we can do something about the exots, even if Weaver doesn’t help. But we had to knock down a few hundred houses to make the canal; the owners were supposed to be compensated but they are only the lesser races, after all.”
“Why didn’t you just go around the city?”
Thacker shrugged. “We wanted to but the ground south of the mountain is basically sand. We could do it, but there is no way Weaver would want to pay for it. Even with special accounting practices.”
Rawk raised an eyebrow.
“The reporter’s wife?”
“Yes. She and her daughter are staying with the newspaper’s editor at the moment, but I’m not sure how long that will last.”
Rawk had no idea what an editor was, but he smiled. “I have a place on Terring Road she can have.” He saw the look on the dwarf’s face and held up a hand. “It isn’t charity; she can just pay what she can for now and we’ll work it out later.”
“I’m not sure.”
“Well, ask her, and if she wants she can go up and talk to Travis and he can organize for her to have a look.”
“You can ask her yourself. That’s her over there.”
Rawk turned so quickly he stumbled and hurt his leg. There was a young dwife sweeping the floor between two huge, noisy machines. While she worked, she was keeping an eye on a small girl who was playing in the corner. “That’s her? She works here?”
“She didn’t use to. She’s normally a cook, but the tavern she worked in got knocked down as well.”
Rawk nodded and swallowed. He almost stayed where he was but Sylvia and Thacker had suddenly wandered away so he was on his own and looking sillier by the moment. With a quick look around, Rawk hurried across the room. Then he was standing behind Biki and still didn’t know what to say. He would have stood there until he looked silly again, but Biki saved him the wait by poking him in stomach with the end of her broom as she continued to sweep.
Rawk grunted in pain and surprise and Biki spun around.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t see you there.”
Rawk held up his hand as he hunched over and tried to get in a decent breath. “That’s all right.”
“Perhaps you should sit down.”
He did the opposite and stood up straighter with a deep breath. “No. Don’t worry.”
“Rawk?” she said, finally recognizing him.
“Yes.”
“What are you doing here?”
Rawk looked around. What was he doing here? “I...” He cleared his throat and looked down at his hands. “I knew your husband.”
She looked down as well, then across at where her daughter played with a ball. “You knew Jargo?”
“Yes.”
There was a moment of awkward silence. It was obviously the time when Rawk was supposed to say how he knew Jargo. He cleared his throat. “He... I was being attacked, out in the Old Forest. He saved me. He came out of nowhere and distracted the exot.”
There was silence again. When Rawk looked up, Biki was crying. The little girl came across and wrapped her arms around her mother’s legs, understanding that something was wrong, though she didn’t know what, exactly. Biki held her daughter. “Where is he?”
“Nobody else knows any of this. I told Weaver there were no exots out there...”
Biki nodded. “I understand.”
“We buried Jargo in the forest. Galad is there too. We— Fabi and I— were injured. We had no way of getting them back.”
She swallowed. Nodded. “Can you take me?”
“I...” He was going to say no, but he should never have looked at her face. “Not now. It takes a while to get there.”
“Tomorrow?”
Rawk looked across at Sylvia. He wanted to find who was opening the portals, but after losing Maris, even if he was about to end the relationship, he didn’t think he could deny Biki. “Yes, I’ll take you tomorrow. Come to the Hero’s Rest early in the morning.”
“What is happening?” Sylvia asked.
Rawk jumped. “Don’t sneak up on me.”
“I surprised the great warrior?”
“Biki and I were talking.”
“Rawk is going to take me to where Jargo is buried.”
Sylvia raised an eyebrow. “He is?”
Biki nodded and Rawk sighed. “You might like to come too, Sylvia.”
“I do not think...”
Rawk was looking at her. “Yes, I think I will.” Rawk nodded to Biki then headed for the door. “But first, we have to visit Shef.”
“We are not really going to find Shef now, are we?” Sylvia said once they extracted themselves from the newspaper offices.
“Of course we are. Should we wait until someone else dies?”
“We should take a moment to make a plan.”
The Deep Green Harpy was legend in Katamood. It was a ship that had been tied to a dock on the Bay of Kata, just south of the river, for just about as long as anyone could remember. It was probably joined to the dock by several colonies of limpets by now. It probably wouldn’t take long to walk if there was a tunnel out that side of the mountain. He asked Sylvia if they needed to catch a tram but she didn’t answer.
“Did you not hear me? We need a plan.”
“What are you worried about? Shef is better than Valo, but he’s no match for you.”
“And Mistletowe is no match for you. All it takes is one warrior lurking around the corner.”
“Well, if you’re handling the magic side of things I can take care of any lurkers.”
Seeing Sylvia wouldn’t tell him, Rawk came to a decision on his own and started walking east. He dodged a tram and a wagon, tried to ignore the dwarves. They seemed much more relaxed here and, he had to admit, they didn’t smell nearly as much as the ones he was used to.
The tunnel out of the valley wasn’t hard to find. It was narrower than the last one and wove a lazy course through the stone. There were dwarves there, but they all stepped aside to let him pass.
At the far end, Rawk found himself in a small park with flowering trees and paths that wove much like the tunnel had. He tried to get his bearings but that was difficult seeing he’d only once been further south than Sylvia’s shop, and that was just the previous day. And before he’d started going to the shop he’d barely been away from the edge of the river. But it couldn’t be that hard. All the had to do was head down hill until he could see the bay. Easy.
He started walking.
Sylvia reluctantly followed as she rewrapped her scarf. “I am the one who will probably die, you know.”
“Yes, but I promise to avenge you swiftly. I’ll tell stories about you. Kids love a tragic death to get the Hero all emotional.”
“You would get emotional if I died?”
“Of course not.” He smiled. “But most of the stories I tell are half made up anyway, otherwise they be so boring nobody would want to listed. ‘How did you kill the makajeet, Rawk?’ ‘Well, I snuck into its cave when it was sleeping and stabbed it.’ Nobody wants to hear that.”
“The makajeet? I have heard that story. Is there not something about a mountain of skulls and a pit lined with spikes?”
“And there were skulls. About five of them. I think they were from rabbits. Or squirrels. Three or four of them might have been mice. They were damn big mice though.” He held his fingers a couple of inches apart.
“Well, that is practically a rat.”
“I know.” Rawk laughed. “I didn’t know you had a sense of humor, Sylvia.”
Sylvia shook her head. “Perhaps I only acquired it after you stopped trying to kill me.”
“You know I was joking with the whole stabby sword thing, right?”
“I must have missed that bit.”
“See, if you’d had a sense of humor back then you would’ve know.”
His view of the bay didn’t arrive until he was halfway down the hill, but Rawk was pleased to see that he was heading in the right direction. He could see a ship entering the mouth of the river, doing some of the strange, arcane things that ships did when sailing into the wind. He could also see some of the docks and what could only be a small corner of Fek Bazaar, which was as good a landmark as any.
-O-
Some people claimed the bazaar was the largest market anywhere in th
e world and Rawk had never seen anything to make him disagree. It was a sprawling, twisting maze of a place that seemed to be never ending. Daza Parade ran more than a mile down the middle and the entire length of it was filled with four rows of canvas stalls and pavilions that, as far as Rawk could tell, had been there as long as the buildings along the sides. There were dozens of side streets filled to overflowing with goods from around the world. He heard a dozen languages in the first five minutes. The scent of spices striped the air as he walked; sweet, bitter, sharp; hiding the stench of people.
Rawk picked his way through the crowd. He avoided eye contact, but still seemed to shake every second hand and wave to everyone else. There were some children trailing along not far behind and it was only a matter of time until...
“Rawk,” a girl tugged on his arm, “tell us a story.”
“I can’t right now, sorry.”
“Oh.” The look on her face made Rawk feel as if he snapped her pet stick and thrown it on the fire.
“Sorry.” He shoved a coin in her had and kept going, past Thif’s Well and up the gentle slope to a run down tavern called Happy John’s. A fight spilled out onto the street, two men rolling, arms wrapped about each other, too drunk to do anything that required coordination. Rawk danced around the commotion and slipped through the gathering crowd. Sylvia complained about humans as they started down the far side. But a moment later she came to a sudden stop and fell silent mid-sentence. She had her hand on his arm and he could feel the tension in her grip.
“What is it?”
“A portal just opened.”
“Where is it?”
“Close.” She looked around and a moment later a dozen creatures, like two-foot high, feathered monkeys dashed from an alley in pursuit of a terrified dog. The dog continued down the street, ears back, tail low, but the creatures stopped. They looked around, chattering amongst themselves. The crowd backed away, clearing a space around them. Then, as one, the monkeys seemed to pick the weakest target. The young elf boy, basket of fruit in his hand, didn’t stand a chance.
Rawk swore. He drew Dabaneera and charged forward, cursing his knee and the fleeing people, but had barely halved the distance when the boy was torn to shreds.
Sylvia could have done something, Rawk thought as he let out a battle cry.