by Andre Norton
“I hurt,” Sphix said. He should not go closer. But to let the friar go his way and lose supper and a bed—to face Coss without a coin . . . “Father, I’m sick.”
“Are you?” The voice was only concerned.
“I think—think I’d like to find shade and sit.”
They sat. They sat and sipped fine ale at a booth, for a coin the friar had.
All the day was like that.
And in evening, when Sphix was limping in dead earnest: “Father—wait—”
“Coming?” the friar asked.
Sphix looked. A brass-hat was looking his way, just standing there leaning on his staff and looking at him in the twilight. A chill went up his back.
He came, in all haste, limping all the way.
“Is it Nosca’s?”
“You want a place to sleep?”
He stopped dead; not for nothing he read human faces, knew humor at his expense. Begging, the old man wanted. He would have said no.
But there was Tok to think of. He had only a copper coin. He had clothes that marked him thief for any witness. And Coss—Coss had that opal, enough to get him hanged.
“I guess,” he said, victim of his pride, “I guess I can find one.”
“Boy.”
He looked back, mouth open. Saw a sorrowful smile.
“Want supper?” the friar asked.
They shopped among the counters. They sat in evening in the benches of the pastry booth; ate pies; drank ale.
“This being a priest,” Sphix said in deep contentment, “pays—”
It was Tok. Coss. Standing beyond the rail.
The friar turned his head, or started to.
“Hey.” Sphix put his foot up onto the bench opposite. Sweat broke out on his bruised sides. “Father. ...”
“You worried about something, son?”
Sphix took a sip, studied the ale in the mug. His heart beat triple time. He looked up again. “Maybe.” (Lords, the old man was a fool. Never saw. Helpless. Frail as aged bone.) “Maybe we ought to stay here a while. Walk real careful. There’s something over there I don’t like the look of.”
“Someone that you know?”
“Don’t look, for lorssakes. You stupid?”
“No,” the friar said. “Never was.”
Sphix stopped in midsip. Just froze, alarms banging away in his heart and gut. Resumed the sip. “That so, Father? You know them?”
“Man named Coss. Who doesn’t?”
“You do know the fair.”
“Ought to. I work it, too.”
“You really a priest?”
“In the sense you mean. Yes.”
He did not look at Coss. They were waiting for their payment. Waiting for what he would have stolen in the day. But hassling Coss: that was asking for a knife. Weapons never passed the gates. They were made secretly. Inside.
“Got an idea?” the friar asked.
He looked at the old man. Sweated. “You got money, Father? How much?”
“A few coins—” The friar reached for his purse.
“Lorssakes, don’t hand it me. Not in front of them. I’ll get it.” He took his feet from the bench, set the ale mug aside, drew the friar to his feet, and palmed his own small razor. “You want to take those mugs back, get our coin, huh?”
“Son—”
“I’ll be here.” He brushed close, severed the thong in the same motion. “Go on.” He walked on to the rail and laid the hand with the purse in it on the post. Tok came up.
He lifted his hand. Tok’s maimed hand replaced it, and the purse was gone. “Light,” Tok said critically. “Ye c’n do better, chick.”
“I’ll do better.”
“Old man got money; priests allus got money. Ye gots yeself a religious, eh? Ye don’t goes an’ drinks it all, eh, chick?”
“Get!” Sphix hissed.
“Wants a big purse t’morrow, we does. Eh, chick?”
Sphix pushed off from the rail and walked back into the crowd, caught up the friar.
“My purse is gone,” the friar said plaintively. He had a coin between his fingers, what he had gotten for returning the mugs to the counter. He seemed not to know what to do with it. “Here.” He handed Sphix the coin. “You manage it.”
“Father—” He was disgusted. Harried and terrified. “Let’s go.” He caught the friar’s arm and dragged him on through the crowd, past laughing folk, past an escaped pet, a shrieking child.
Tok and Coss were gone.
There was time left at Nosca’s tent; the nighttime with the carousers and the nonsense, the counters drawn in and the flaps thrown down (for Nosca sold no cheap thing): the fair went by outside; and there was tea, and talk, and the blankets removed from Nosca’s great loom, which she worked and thumped away at; while Tiggynu and Olf spun yarn and young Stynnit carded the loose wool.
So did the friar work at carding. And handed a carding-comb to Sphix.
Sphix worked at it with a vengeance, listened to the merry talk: Tiggynu laughed and flashed her enameled teeth, supervised Stynnit a bit in spinning. “This lad might learn,” she said of Sphix. “He has good fingers.”
Sphix forgot his ready grin. Remembered it too late and felt not at all like laughing, for he had looked over everything in the shop, measuring with an eye to value; and truth—there were valuables all about. But none for his kind of talent.
“Here,” said Tiggynu. “I’ll show you.”
It did have its tricks, this spinning, sending the yarn out just so. “He has an eye,” Tiggynu said—for artist that Sphix was, he rejected his own mistakes, worked and worked ’til he had done one perfect string. “Well,” Tiggynu said. “Well.” It was the first thing ever he had made, that he could remember, that little red yam. He felt a small glow of pride for it and so wadded it up with the rest of his mistakes. “Not enough of it, is there?”
The loom stopped thumping. Nosca left her bench, clapped her hands. The outside had grown quiet, or quieter. “Bed, bed, bed,” she ordered.
So they went there.
“It’s not fair,” said Stynnit. “He got it first time.”
“His hands are older,” Nosca said.
“Not as old as yours,” said Stynnit, cozener, being shoved off to bed in the maze of hanging blankets. His voice diminished. The light persisted, reflected along the tent-top.
The friar reached their comer and started making his bed.
So did Sphix, with complete attention, back turned. He sat down, pulled off his boots with a vengeance, determined to be beneath blankets, cover his head up, try to forget Coss, and avoid the friar’s questions.
“Son,” the friar said, behind him.
He said nothing, but loosened his belt, half turned to seize a blanket comer and arrange it.
“Son.”
“You’re not my father.”
“You ran away from him.”
“I did.”
“Coss, I mean.”
He was surprised into looking. Met the old man’s eyes, as sad as before, as crazy soft. He flung himself around in the friar’s direction, knees up, arms clutching the blanket to his chin. “Look, old man.” He kept his voice down, mindful of Nosca’s folk. “They think you got money. That Coss is crazy. They see you get money, they see you pass it out, they think you’ve got plenty.’”
“I__”
“Do. Sure. Lorssakes, Father. They’ll cut your throat for a copper. They think you’re rich.”
“I__”
“Am. Lords! You’re a lunatic!”
The old man grinned, a boy’s grin, all laughter.
“It’s not funny. That Coss isn’t funny, Father. They know you’ve got money.”
“Do you want to know?”
’’Have you?”
“Better.” The friar reached within his collar and drew a cord over his head, which held a small pierced stone veined with blue.
“That? That’s a river-rock!”
“It’s a wish-stone. A holier man than I
am blessed it. It’s good luck.”
“I’m no fool, Father. It’s still a river-rock.”
The slyest smile touched the old man’s eyes. He took Sphix’s hand and closed the fingers on it. “Coss won’t be interested in it. But I want you to have it. Who knows? Maybe you’ll walk down the street and things will come to you.”
“That’s not why; it’s that by-the-Lords priest’s habit. And Coss—’’
“Wear it.”
He put it on, defeated. Thrust it inside his shirt.
“See,” the friar said, “already someone’s given you something.”
“Father. Listen to me. I got to get money—”
“How do you do that?”
He had his mouth open. He shut it, quick, before something got out.
“Where will you find it?”
“Hey. I thought it was supposed to come to me, huh? Look, Father—you hang around that Olf tomorrow. You don’t leave this tent. Let Coss forget you.”
“Where will you find it?”
He sat very still, trapped in the old man’s sight. “I’m a thief. You’ve known it from the start.”
“I was there in the aisle. I saw it. I couldn’t stop it. Where are you going to get the money?”
“That’s my business.”
“Where do you work?”
“You one, too? You conning me, Father?”
“No. I’m not a thief.”
“Brass-hat?” His muscles clenched up, aching around the ribs. “You after thieves?”
“No.”
“You’re not my friend, hear me? You go being my friend, old man, Coss’ll cut your throat for sure. I’m getting out of here.” He rolled over, snatched his boots, and flung the blankets off.
“You don’t have to worry over me.”
“Sure, sure.” He pulled the right boot on, shoved down on the heel, and struggled with the left. “You stay by Olf, old man. Coss figures I talked, figures you can finger him to the brass, you’re dead. Dead, old man.” He jammed the right heel home and got to his knees.
“You’re not like Coss. Why work for him?”
“I got no choice, I got no choice, that’s all.” His ribs hurt, his bruises hurt. He mourned lost meals, lost bed, lost comforts. Anger made a lump in his throat, and memories welled up, Khussan’s face. “They hung my master. I’m good, Father. I’m a good thief, an’ they’re not.”
“What’s a good thief?”
“Lissen—” He hunkered there, held up the hand Tiggynu called agile, worked the fingers. “You ever feel that purse go? No. That’s just a thing I can do. I’m not even good at that. Not like the other things. I can lift things no one sees, things drop into my sleeve, you’d never see them go—”
“Never hurt anyone.”
“I never hurt anyone.” He dropped harder on his haunches, planted himself, arms between his knees, furious at this pursuit. “Father, I’m a thief, Coss is dirt, real dirt. Come on, you believed that gentleman I played.”
“It’s a good speech you can do.”
“I got the manner, got the moves. Old man, I know stones good as the jewelers do.”
“You must.”
“I can—” He remembered the family, caught his breath. Lords, the lights were not blown out, and it was quiet elsewhere. Listening, they were. Huddled terrified. Or Olf . . . But the friar’s eyes were dark, absorbing wells. “I can tell a fake, tell the best, Father.” He lowered his voice: he wanted, Lords, wanted Khussan back. “And I never take the best; likeliest that’s got a spell on’t. I never break a set; these merchants, they got their ways to remember, patterns, how they set the stones out—” The eyes drank on, dark and wide. All his wounds ached. “I tell you something else, Father; it’s a game. They know there’s thieves; I know they know; I never, never—took nothing they’d grieve for. I could take something big. Really big. Take one of them lord-jewels, I could; but that’d bring down the brass on all of us thieves, stir up the law, get me hunted— Smart, Father. That’s the difference between me and Coss. I never hurt no one I take from.”
“But that’s the thing, son. You do take.”
He blinked, drew in his breath. It hit him in the gut, that the old friar wanted a sermon after all. “Huh,” he said. He was not even angry, only hurt. He reached out and patted the old man’s arm. “You tried, priest. You’re quick. I give you that.” He put on the gentleman again, stood up, faked a grin. “’Night, Father. Mind what I said. And you bring the brass on me I'll cut your throat. Huh?”
With that, out of the corner, through the blanket maze, out the tent-flap.
He looked sharp, then—a quick dart of the eye to the shadow, still slightly nightblind from the faint light inside. He stood still in that condition, missing the watchers outside and wishing they were in sight.
But he imagined the stir behind him, too. Lords, the eavesdropping family would be at the priest in short order, angry and apt to bring down the watch. How could you bring him here?
So maybe the friar would lose a bed for it. He, Sphix, he lost a whole part of the fair he would never dare walk: the weavers knew his face.
Should have taken the blanket. Fool.
He had lost his edge. The priest had dulled him, that was what.
He started walking, no slink, but the walk of anyone going through the aisles; time enough to run if they raised the hue and cry and the brass-hats got into it. He was good at crowd mingling, if the tents turned out.
A shadow flowed into his path, in the dim glow of inward-lit tents, the torchlight persisting from down the way. It waited for him. He spun half-about and cast a look behind.
More shadows. Bad news. A dive off this strip into any between-tents space would find others: Coss was stupid, but no fool.
He walked on. More shadows flowed outward to join the one. Lords, Lords. He hurt already. Another beating he could not take; it was time for glibness.
He held his hands outward, approaching Coss, for Coss it was, centralmost of the thugs. Grinned charmingly. “Dear master.”
“Master, be I? Where’s the money?”
Rough hands searched him, bypassed the stone, got the coin; pulled him aside to shadows to do the job more thoroughly—he hoped only that. He let them. There was nowhere to hide, not in all the fair, if Coss was after him, and he had no connections.
The search got rougher. They jerked off his boots and turned them out; held him by both arms.
“Come on, Coss, my feet are cold.”
It got him a belly-blow. His breath whistled out. He doubled as best he could with his arms locked on either side and came up with Coss’s fingers in his hair.
“You got real cozy with them folk, eh? You talks to that religious, does you?” (A knee to the groin. A jerk upward on his hair.) “Admits you’s a thief?”
Oh, Lords, they’d been up against the tent wall—
“You’s a fool, boy.” (To the gut this time.) His knees went. He sagged, beyond controlling his legs to fight; Coss jerked his head up again. Dinner tried to come up. “A by-the-Lords real fool. Now we gots two ways to shut them folks up. One’s killing you. But boy, you’s trained real good, real nice, nice face, nice manners . . . killing you’s a waste. We just solves your problem for you, ain’t that nice? Then you knows who your friends is.”
Another blow, to the gut again. The wind went out of him, the light next, and he came back with his face against the dirt, such a numbness all over that foretold pain when it stopped.
Fool, Khussan said.
And it was the friar’s face. Tiggynu’s enameled grin. His knees were moving, driving him up on his hands. The earth met his face; he pushed up again and vision came back in a muddle of dark and light.
Lords, no time to be sick. He numbed himself and held his gut and ran a few off-course steps, fell, and heaved up, one spasm after the other—got to his feet again and drove his legs to movement.
“Murder!” he yelled down the aisle of tents. “Wake up! Murder in weavers’ row!�
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He kept going, barefoot. Panic rose in the tents, no word that he could hear. It was a fool would come out to mix in trouble: it was for the watch he cried.
Fire blossomed orange in the dark ahead, Lords, fire in the tents, a spark at first. “Fire! Fire! Fire!” voices yelled ahead; shrill and deeper screams.
“Father!” he yelled. The light blurred on dark figures. He sucked wind, drove pain away, and ran.
Folk came pouring out of the tents. “Fire, fire, fire!” the shout went out across the fair. Shadows struggled in the light, one tall man laying about him with a stick at a ring of three that darted at him. Tongues of fire went up the tent-side. “Buckets! Water!” the cry went up. “Wet down the tents!”
“Olf!” Sphix cried. It was the tall weaver so beset: Tiggynu, too—she laid about her with a pole, braids flying, shrieked something foreign and defended Olf’s back, but not her own. “Tok!” Sphix screamed, and hit the knifeman full on. They both went into the dirt, Tok squirming beneath him. He found the knifehand, pinned it with both hands, used knee and elbow at groin and throat ’til Tok stopped struggling. There was a great hiss: another: “More buckets!” the cry went up.
He staggered for his feet. “Here’s one!” someone yelled, and he was grabbed on either side. A brass-hat moved in, gathered Tok up.
He blinked, saw one fire dying, another waving—torches of the Watch, the gleam of light on brass helmets, brass-bound staves. He twisted his neck: two such had his arms and dragged him over to stand with Tok and Coss and One-Eared Fix.
He kicked, never mind his ribs. He wanted free, not to hang. Pain exploded across his ear. He went half to his knees. “Hang on to that one,” someone said; and Coss broke away, went pelting through the night. Sphix lurched up, tried to run, but they had him fast. Faces showed in torchlight, figures in the swirling smoke—Olf and young Stynnit reunited; Tiggynu unharmed—
“Father,” he cried. The fair-ward pulled at him to take him away. “Father—” For he saw the friar nowhere, and he twisted in the brass-hat’s grip, trying to look behind him, in the crowd that rallied there. “Father!”
The crowd came between. They hastened him through the gathering mob that shouted for rope and hangings.
