Turning, Mar discovered that Waleck had not been as successful in his own contest.
Swatting impotently with his jacket, the old man attempted to extinguish the fire, but the intense, furnace-hot flames had all but consumed the book and were spreading to the tabletop with a frighteningly unnatural speed. In the scarce moment Mar watched, the entire length of the table caught fire, the reaching sears licking against the shelves to either side. Billowing smoke began to fill the air as the fire spread, shooting up in a broad, crooked column to the dome high above.
Waleck was driven back a step by the heat, then a reluctant pace, then forced to retreat farther and farther until he was compelled to relinquish his futile efforts altogether. The old man cast down the smoldering jacket and darted back from the scalding heat, hurrying to where Mar and his prisoner stood.
"It is beyond control," the old man announced unnecessarily, stopping a moment to register the sex of the figure at Mar's side. Other than this short pause, the wasteminer evidenced no great surprise at this development.
"Bring her, Mar. She has the information we need, and we have no time to question her now. We must be away before the Guard arrives." With that, Waleck started off at a swift trot in the direction of the entrance.
Caught off guard, Mar's first step left him a dozen behind.
The girl dug in her heels. “Release me!”
Unthinking, Mar eased his grip to get a better one. The girl immediately rolled her wrist and broke one of her hands free. Spinning, she struck at Mar with the back of her fist.
Reflexively, the he blocked the blow with his forearm, and followed with a hard punch to the girl’s short ribs. The air driven from her lungs, the girl collapsed backwards onto the floor, gasping hoarsely.
He yanked the girl to her feet to face him. Though her disarranged hair mostly hid her features, her intense eyes locked with his challengingly.
"Do you want me to carry you?” Mar demanded.
"I want you to --"
Before she could finish her request, which Mar was certain to have involved acts condemned by the followers of Shurzha, God of Purity, he grabbed her waist with both hands and threw her head-down across his shoulder. Breaking into a bone-jarring run, he fled after Waleck.
Initially, the girl bucked and kicked madly. When he smacked her wool-clad buttocks half a dozen times with all the force he could muster, she contented herself with muffled profane comments concerning his ancestry, habits, social life, personal hygiene, and several other qualities that he had not been aware he possessed.
Waleck was by no means fleet, but burdened as he was Mar was unable to do more that keep the old man in sight. Hurtling down the stacks, they changed aisles at nearly every intersection as the erstwhile wasteminer sought the most direct route back to the main hall. The air in the great chamber had already begun to grow thick with the smell of smoke, and the patrons by whom they fled cast confused, bewildered, and finally horrified glances after them. A heavy patrician in archaic robes raised his beefy palms to halt them, but Waleck, and Mar in turn, simply dodged about the man. His and others’ franticly shouted questions they ignored as well. In the wake of their passage, panic began to take hold, so that the aisles both ahead and behind them soon filled with agile footed students and aged doctors alike, the latter often sprinting with their robes held high to expose their bony feet. Increasingly, sounds of alarm carried from one end of the vast chamber to the other, but the crackling roar of a growing fire could now be heard above the din.
When finally they were free of the stacks and racing down the broad main aisle toward the exit to the entrance hall, they joined a cresting flood of frightened people. The scene was chaotic. A churning mass of struggling men, mindless in their terror, clogged the portal. The constraint of servitude had dissolved; bondsmen thrust aside masters in desperate efforts to flee. Likewise, teenage students trampled teachers as they strove to reach safety.
Waleck slammed into the bottleneck at full speed, bulling his way through by raw strength alone, and vanished from sight. Mar, fettered by his captive, could not resort to this tactic. He waded into the seething press, ducking flying elbows and wrenching hands. A grossly fat man fought his way by them, slapping Mar stunningly across the eyes with a massive forearm. Simultaneously, something, no way of knowing what, struck him across the back of his legs. To save himself from falling, he hurled the girl into the purple clad back of the man in front of him. Instantly, she threw herself desperately away.
Mar lunged and managed to snare a fistful of her hair before the crowd could pull them apart. The girl squalled like a wounded cat but yielded to this living leash and was quickly secured within his grip once more. He locked his arms about her waist and staggered to keep his feet as the surge washed them into the main hallway.
Half dragging the girl, he ran on lest they both be trampled. Already the other great chambers were emptying and filling the hall as the full population of the Library’s patrons joined the panic. The girl was pinned against his side in the narrows of the entranceway, pressing the breath from his chest.
Abruptly, the crush of bodies against them fell away, and they were outside beneath the portico. Mar opened his arms and the girl took an unsteady step away, gulping huge breaths.
All about them, people were running. Scattered fruit rolled underfoot from a vendor's overturned cart. The armsmen, Korhthenr and otherwise, had already abandoned the portico.
And Waleck was nowhere to be seen.
Mar quickly caught his own breath and then grabbed the girl's shoulders and spun her to face him.
"The old man seems to have left us for the moment, girl," he told her brusquely. "So we have to get to the docks by ourselves. That means that you will have to cooperate."
The girl twisted her upper body angrily to break his hold, but did not retreat. With an impatient gesture, she swept the errant stands of her hair behind her ears, and Mar got his first clear look at her.
She was not as young as he had first thought, probably his own age or perhaps a bit older – there was something in her face, an absence – or perhaps denial – of innocence. She was his height, less a span and, now that he knew what he was looking at, more full of figure than slim. Her eyes were the highlight of her face, large and dazzling in a disconcerting way, but other than those no single aspect stood out. She had a small, well-shaped nose, a full bottom lip, and traces of sunshine in her cheeks. She was not strictly beautiful in a classic sense, but she might have been very good to look at if she had not been sporting such a nasty expression.
"Cooperate?! You have had your wits addled by Bhurghrah!” She grinned murderously. “I would sooner cut your throat!"
"Listen, girl --”
"My name is not girl! Whatever sewer spawned you, you worthless piece of filth, you need to dribble back to it!"
Mar ignored her insult. Quite a few of her earlier curses would have sparked a brawl that would have left someone dead in any tavern in the Lower City.
"What is it then?" he goaded. "Wench?"
"TELRIY!" The girl pelted him with the name. There was pride there, and anger, with other less identifiable emotions grinding underneath.
"Well then, Telriy, shut your mouth and listen. The Imperials will swarm into the Plaza in the next few minutes. Do you realize that?”
The Viceroy’s Personal Guard was charged with dealing with all public disturbances, including fires, and the priests would certainly make no objection in this case.
The girl did not answer, not even a nod, but Mar could see in her eyes that she knew this to be true.
“I’m wanted by the Guard,” Mar said flatly, then grimaced.
“Two nights ago,” he lied, having no trouble finding bitterness and hatred to load the statement with, “I strangled Zeph of the house of Bhradyn in his own bed for violating my sister. Do you want to be caught with me?"
As Mar had hoped, the rebellion slid from the girl's face. In Khalar, common murder normally brought a sen
tence of lifetime servitude or simple hanging, but the killing of a member of the merchant families, the Army, the Guard, or the Office of the Prefect rated a punishment of excruciatingly slow dismemberment. The executioner started with the fingers and toes and worked his way up, joint by joint. Physicians were drafted to insure that the offender did not attempt to cheat justice by expiring before the full sentence had been administered. Normally, only one compulsory attendance at such a public execution was required to convince any rational person that the Viceroy's Justice was to be avoided at all costs.
Accomplices (a term with a very liberal interpretation, as far as the Guard was concerned) as often as not received an identical penalty as the actual perpetrator.
Scowling, Telriy shook her head slightly.
"Then come with me."
Mar grabbed the girl's hand and ran.
Guard whistles cut the air.
The news of the fire had spread upon the heels of the panic. The Plaza, if anything, was more crowded than before. Other citizens of the Imperial City were joining the scholars, students, priests, and worshipers in increasing numbers. All were gawking at the tumult and many shouted as several of the high windows on the southern corner of the Library burst outward, spewing rich black smoke into the sky.
As Mar and Telriy reached the bottom of the stairs, the first of the fire brigades – a double quad of guardsmen dragging the yoke of a high wheeled cart loaded with vats of water – arrived and parted the onlookers. Mar bolted up this path before the crowd could close up again.
Once they had reached a relatively open section of the Plaza, he ran east toward the Avenue of Trade. The main Guard barracks was south of the Plaza and he expected the Avenue of Rhwalkahn’s Ascension to be overrun with guardsmen. Telriy sprinted easily at his side as he wove amongst the scattered religious and civil obstacles, her grasp of his hand steady. The mouth of the avenue opened before them and he put on a burst of speed.
And nearly ran full tilt into a fugleman leading a file at a dead run.
"You there! HALT! Halt in the Viceroy's Name!"
Mar dodged to the left as the man swung his truncheon. The fugleman stopped to brace for his swing, but the following guardsmen, unprepared for the sudden change, did not. In the confusion ensuing from the trampling of the sub-officer, none of the Imperials attempted to impede Mar and Telriy’s escape.
They fled unhindered down the Avenue of Trade. Pedestrians and wheeled traffic alike had been forced to a halt in the wake of the advancing file. Curious looks followed them, but none of the citizenry made after them.
Realizing that it was an error to be seen running, Mar slowed to a walk some blocks from the plaza, gasping. Telriy kept hold of his hand, but did not speak, chest heaving.
“We’ll have to find a place to hide,” he told the girl. The Viceroy’s Guard equated the act of running with an admission of guilt. The fugleman, when his men revived him, was certain to send a patrol after them.
He looked south along the avenue and sighted an alley he knew. “This way.”
A dozen paces down the alley on the right in an otherwise featureless brick wall, a broken latch let them into a dark storeroom. Without slowing, Mar pulled the girl around a stack of barrels to a large crate set against the interior wall. Behind the crate was a cranny that he had hollowed in the soft brick many years before. He had intended the space for one, but he thought two would fit. Releasing the girl's hand, he took hold of the crate. It took all of his strength to slide one corner away from the wall -- as it should. He had added nearly two hundred weight of pig iron to its forgotten contents.
Telriy looked at the dark, irregular space thus revealed and began to shake her head.
"No time for argument," Mar told her. "In!" The distant, muffled sound of Guard whistles punctuated his order.
With a foul look hastily cast in his direction, Telriy eased into the cranny. As the girl quickly discovered with a choked-off curse, the space was not high enough to stand in. Mar pressed in against her back.
"Wait!" she hissed, rubbing her head. "There’s no room!"
"Turn around and sit down!" he ordered. "I have to pull the crate back against the wall."
They almost did not get in. Mar finally had to pull the girl, protesting, into his lap, before he could be sure that all arms, legs, and other significant body parts would fit into the hole. He grabbed the steel strap that he had long ago bolted to the backside of the crate and strained. It did not move. Thus entangled, he had no leverage.
"Help me!"
Twisting, Telriy slipped her hands beside his and heaved.
A fingerbreadth at a time, as they pulled in unison, the crate skidded toward the wall. With a final bump that left them in almost complete darkness, the crate struck the wall.
Sighing, Mar relaxed. At least, he tried. His back rested against the broken brick behind him, every sharp point and fractured edge searching for his spine. He had been somewhat smaller when he had last sheltered here.
The girl crouched rather than sat in his lap, her not insignificant weight bearing down on his knees and her elbows digging into his shoulders as she held herself, with a distaste Mar could almost feel, above him.
"If you’ll turn around and lean back,” Mar suggested testily, “I think we’ll both be a lot more comfortable."
The girl's face was a bare span from his own. She could move no farther from him; the back of her head pressed against the cantilevered brick that roofed the cranny. Her breath was a flushing warmth against his neck, and her hair dangled against his shoulders and chest. He felt the pace of her breath quicken.
"If you touch me," she told him evenly, "I will kill you."
"So kill me. I’m already touching you."
"You know what I mean."
Wondering if he did, Mar repressed an urge to be flippant. "Look," he explained in what he hoped was a reasonable tone, "we’ll have to hide here for an hour or so. At least until the Guard is fully occupied with the fire. Can we have a truce?"
The girl was silent for a few moments in what Mar took to be indecision.
"A truce," she said at last. "For now."
She had to lean forward against him to roll over, and her lips and cheek slid inadvertently across his chin as she twisted awkwardly. She must have felt him tense, as she seemed to take special care thereafter to poke knees and elbows and shoulders into any tender spot she could find.
With a few mumbled curses and minor contusions, they finally contrived to settle into what he thought of, but dared not name, as a lovers' embrace. She reclined against his chest, legs draped over his, her head resting on his left shoulder, their cheeks almost touching. His arms, perforce, circled her, the right wedged against the crate and the left against the interior brick. There was nowhere to put his hands but across hers as they lay against her side.
"Move your hands."
Mar shifted about.
"Not there either."
"Where then? There’s no extra space here."
She took his hands, one in each of hers, and folded them across her chest to her left shoulder. Her grip was light, but firm, and she did not release him. Though it seemed she wished to keep his hands in her control, the main effect of her tactic was to tighten his arms about her.
“Why did you burn the book?” he asked abruptly.
At first, he thought that she would not answer, but presently she said simply, “To destroy it, of course.”
“But why?”
“To keep anyone from following me.”
“Following you to what?”
“Why do you seek the Mother of the Sea?”
Mar realized that any truthful answer would reveal too much and any false one would introduce unnecessary complications, so he let his silence end the conversation.
Waleck had said the shelved books were copies, which Telriy apparently did not know, but even if the original survived the fire, getting it would likely be impossible. This meant that Telriy would be indispensable to t
he continuance of the old man’s quest. Mar was sure that the old man had realized this. He wondered if the girl had also reached that conclusion.
With a mental shrug, he moved slightly to settle his back against the brick, stretched his legs as far as he could, took a deep breath, and closed his eyes.
"What are you doing now?” Telriy murmured. There was no need to speak any louder; her lips were right against his ear. She had just a trace of an odd lilt in her voice and some of her words rolled in a way that was not Khalarii’n. Mar wondered where she was from.
"If you’ll be quiet," he said tiredly, "I’m going to do what I always do when I’m hiding in here."
“What’s that?”
“Sleep.”
"How will you know that it’s safe to leave?"
"When I wake, we will leave."
"Hmmph."
Nevertheless, he did not doze. Telriy remained restless and her slight movements seemed magnified to irritating proportions by her proximity. Not since he was a small child, when he had huddled together with other street children for warmth in the harsh Ice Valley winters, had he been forced into such close contact with another person. He was not quite certain what he thought of it in this instance.
After a considerable time, Telriy spoke again.
"You never told me your name."
"What?” Mar asked groggily.
"Your name," Telriy insisted, rolling her head to look at his face in the dimness. "You have mine. I want yours. Names have power."
The last was superstition. Mar had about as much faith in such as he did in the Forty-Nine Gods. He almost offered her another lie, but finally gave her the truth.
"That’s all of it?" she asked doubtfully.
"Should there be more?"
Telriy was silent for a moment. Perhaps unconsciously, she stroked his hands as she thought. "It would seem so. Men of import must have many names."
Key to Magic 01 Orphan Page 17
