He decided to go see if Melan was released from the hospital, rather than walk directly back to the Guild halls.
In the hospital he found the injured construction worker sitting upright, on the edge of her bed. She was surprised and pleased to see him.
“I’m getting ready to check out!” She told him. “Thank you for coming to see me one last time. I think you came to see me more than anyone else,” her smile faded for just a moment as she commented.
“Can I help you?” Silas asked, seeing the small bag of belongings by her feet.
“Yes, if you can carry that,” she acknowledged. “And if you can walk slowly enough to settle into my pace. I don’t move fast,” she warned.
Silas nodded in acknowledgement, and shuffled along behind Melan as she left the room and slowly maneuvered to the staircase, then winced as each step slightly jarred her still tender rib cage.
When they reached the door of the hospital and stepped out onto the sidewalk, Melan made as if to take the bag from Silas’s hand.
“I can carry it further for you,” he protested, raising the satchel out of her reach. “You tell me where you want to go, and I’ll take care of it.”
“I want to go home, but I want to see my husband; he hasn’t visited me in the hospital the past two days,” Melan spoke in a clearly irritated voice. “I can walk there if you’ll carry my bag for me.”
“Wouldn’t you rather just go home and rest, and wait for him to come home to you?” Silas tried to offer a more sensible option.
“No,” Melan said flatly. “Give me the bag; I’ll carry it myself.”
“I’ll carry it for you,” Silas conceded. “Just let me know if you need to stop or rest.”
They proceeded to start traveling through the city streets, Silas staying close to Melan, ready to assist her if she needed assistance or a rest stop along the way, while she doggedly continued to labor forward, in obvious pain from the exertion.
Minutes after they began, Silas realized they were headed towards the neighborhood of the Movers Guild. As they progressed, he realized they seemed to be on a course that would take them right to the armory where Mata practiced so often. And sure enough, they turned onto the street near the Guild gates, and then stopped in front of the door of the armory where Mata worked, and where Silas himself had practiced a time or two, as his former suspicions began to rise.
“This is where he spends so much time,” Melan’s voice had a sad, plaintive note to Silas’s ear, and he felt sympathy for the woman. She reached forward and pulled the door open, then stepped inside, with Silas carrying her bag.
Inside, they both stood at the edge of the floor as their eyes adjusted to the shift from bright daylight. Silas spotted Mata, practicing once again, on the far side of the gymnasium, battling hard against the same foe Silas had seen her battle before, the man who he believed had stolen her affections from him.
“There’s Tiller, over there,” Melan pointed across the armory, towards Mata and her opponent.
“That’s your husband? Sparring with Mata?” Silas asked incredulously.
“You know that girl?” Melan turned to look at Silas.
“She used to be my girlfriend,” he spoke the words aloud, in the past tense, for the first time, and knew what he had done as he spoke.
As the two observers spoke, the two athletes on the practice pad suddenly entered an extended exchange of sword thrusts and parries, which ended with Tiller using the advantage of his heavier weight to once again force Mata to the floor, as he dropped on top of her.
“Get off now,” Silas faintly heard Mata speak forcefully to the man as he lay down and kept her pinned below him.
In response, he thrust his face at hers and began to kiss her aggressively, before she turned her face to the side to avoid the unwanted attention.
“Tiller!” Melan called out sharply. She started to storm across the armory floor, heedless of the other practice matches she interrupted as she made a beeline for her wayward husband.
“Is this what you’ve been doing while I’ve been in the hospital?” she shouted as she walked.
Silas hastily set down the bag of the woman’s belongings and started after her, heading for another confrontation with Mata, one that would be compounded by the presence of her paramour and the man’s wife. Silas felt his stomach tighten with anxiety in anticipation of the coming confrontation.
Tiller rose to his hands and knees, removing his press upon Mata, who began to struggle to slip to freedom as her opponent looked up at his wife.
“What are you doing here Melan?” he asked in confusion.
“I was released from the hospital today, and my only visitor was the man who’s been to see me more than you,” Melan gestured vaguely towards Silas behind her.
“This fool?” Tiller sneered. “Why was he visiting my wife?” the man tried to turn the course of the conversation.
“Because I saved her life, and I wanted to know she was healing well,” Silas spoke up.
“You stay away from Mata,” he added in a growl. “No married man should be cheating like you are.”
“Silas!” Mata spoke up. “Tiller? What is he saying? You’re not married! You told me so. What is this all about?”
“Not married?” Melan erupted. “You villain! I’m in the hospital, and you’re out wooing young girls, telling them you’re not married?” she reached forward and shoved the man with both hands, delivering a shot to the chest that forced him back a step.
“Enough of you!” Tiller replied in a violent voice. He raised the practice sword he still held and began to swing it towards Melan.
“Enough of you!” Silas spoke in reply. Before Tiller could strike his wife, Silas shoved his own hand forward, and delivered a bolt of telekinetic energy that thrust Tiller several feet up into the air and several feet backwards, so that he violently slammed against the rear wall of the building, then collapsed.
“You were cheating with my husband!” Melan turned towards Mata.
“No, wait,” Silas stepped between the women, facing Melan. “She didn’t know he was married. She’s been here in this city alone and lonely, and he lied to her and took advantage of her loneliness. She isn’t at fault.”
“It’s true, my lady,” Mata cried sincerely from behind Silas. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I just felt so alone in the city, and he was so friendly and charming and attentive. It was like I wanted to have a companion in the city, someone who would keep me here contentedly.
“But I don’t feel that way anymore,” she added. “I don’t know why.
“Please forgive me for my ignorance of his black heart,” she added.
“You left a better one to accept the lesser one,” Melan told Mata, looking at Silas’s face as she said the words. “I’ll be leaving the worse of the two now, and for good,” she looked from Silas over to where Tiller remained slumped against the wall, then turned and began to walk towards the exit.
“Wait,” Silas called, then trotted after the woman.
“I’ll carry your bag for you, if you’d like,” he offered.
“I’m going to take a hackney cab back, I think,” Melan replied. “I’ll go stay with a friend for a few days, then figure out how to put my life back together and be rid of that sack of turds. Thanks for all your kindness,” she leaned up to give Silas a kiss on the cheek, then lifted her bag, groaned, and walked out the door.
Silas watched the door for a second, then turned and looked back into the interior of the armory.
All eyes were directed at him. All practice matches had ceased, all noise had diminished, and all attention was focused on him.
Including a wary Mata, he saw.
“Silas?” she spoke softly from across the room.
Her eyes displayed wariness, but also regret.
He remembered the long-ago conversation under the stars, when they’d become fast friends in Amenozume, and he remembered the nights of all-consuming passion they had briefly shar
ed in Faralag. And he remembered the way his thoughts about Farah had seemed to alter dramatically, as if a lantern wick had been snuffed out.
He held out his hand to Mata, a gesture inviting her to come to him.
The girl smiled. She stripped off the protective padding she wore, dropping it to the floor, then glanced once over her shoulder at the unconscious Tiller. A moment later, she ran to Silas and grabbed his hand on the way to pressing herself against him in a tight embrace.
“I’ve missed you,” she said.
Chapter 22
“Let’s go to the apartment,” Silas suggested.
“Could we get something for lunch first? I’m hungry,” Mata commented.
Silas looked at her, trying to not appear critical as he apprised her appearance after her extended physical exercise at the armory.
“Okay,” she immediately understood the meaning of his glance. “I’ll go clean up. Or you can go pick up food and bring it up the apartment while I start bathing,” she suggested with a grin. She stood tall and kissed his lips lightly. “I’ll be waiting for you,” she breathed the words in a way that set Silas’s heart racing.
“You get going and I’ll be there soon,” Silas agreed, and watched her head down the sidewalk towards the Guild.
The world had turned one hundred and eighty degrees! He’d gone from having an unshakable sense of captivity and gloom in Faralag to feeling that the best news was just around the corner. He felt his alienation from Mata evaporate, and his freedom to leave the city as he wished had expanded.
A minute later, he paused his cheerful stride at a food vendor and bought several items of food, then turned to go back to the apartment, where he found Mata stepping out of the bath, freshly clean, and smiling at him once more. They remained together in the apartment for the rest of the afternoon.
“What happened to us Silas?” Mata asked languidly, later, when they lay together on the bed. “It feels so different now; until this morning I think I felt like I was being lured or forced or tricked to want to stay apart from you.”
“I know what you mean,” Silas agreed, as his hand gently massaged her neck and scalp. He thought of the time he had spent with Farah; though it hadn’t gone so far as Mata’s near dalliance with Tiler had gone, it had diverted his attention away from the girl he was with. And then it had suddenly disappeared.
“Can we leave here soon?” Mata asked.
“After I dance with the sprites tomorrow,” Silas grinned at the phrase.
“What are you talking about?” Mata didn’t take him seriously.
As Silas explained the predicament with the damaged section of the platform, and his assignment to stand atop it and exercise his telekinesis to maintain it in place atop the broken tower-top beams, Mata sat up and clapped with glee.
“You’ll be up close and personal with the sprites, right where they’ll practically have to dance around you,” she foretold.
“There’re are no such things as sprites!” Silas insisted through clenched teeth.
Mata’s eyes crinkled with delight. “I know! I just like to tease you.” Silas responded by reaching out to begin to tickle the girl, and they grappled in a friendly contest.
The next morning, Cover arrived in the apartment early in the morning, once again before the breakfast tray had arrived to start the day.
“Let’s go! There are sprites practically hovering in the air waiting for you to complete the platform,” the instructor called from the living room of the apartment.
Mata swatted Silas’s bottom affectionately as he blearily rose from the bed.
“I’ll come soon to watch you dance,” she promised softly, though she pulled the sheets back over her recumbent body with no signs of rising from the bed.
“You’re going to go out looking like that?” Cover exclaimed as soon as Silas emerged. “The whole city is going to be watching.” He thrust a wrapped bundle he was carrying at Silas. “Here, these are your robes for the ceremony. Put them on, comb your hair, and look presentable. And hurry,” the small man added.
Silas silently returned to the bedroom, grumpily explained the situation to Mata and changed, then re-emerged from the bedroom and silently followed Cover to the construction yard for the last time.
They went to the frame where the final piece of the tower top platform lay, and walked around it, examining it as it received the last few touches of completion from a crew of workers who had raced to meet their deadline.
Farah was waiting there for Silas. “Will you need a guide today, my lord?” she asked deferentially.
“I’ll be his guide today,” Mata’s voice rang from the entrance to the isolated piece of the construction yard, and Silas grinned as he turned to see Mata striding towards them.
“I thought I ought to come so that I can see you dance with the sprites. I’d like to know how he dances, since he’s never danced with me,” she grinned back at her companion.
“It’s time to move on,” Cover interrupted the exchange. “Silas, it’s time to finish this great project. You’re about to give the greatest gift of our lifetime to the entire city of Faralag.”
Silas bit his lip and turned to look at the last piece of the platform. It looked exactly like all the others he had moved. The last woman working on the piece lifted her tool away from its surface. She looked up at Silas, smiled, and gave a positive hand gesture, then backed away with her toolbox in her hand.
“It’s all yours; just waiting for you,” Cover said.
Silas grasped a hand around the slight bulge in his belt, then pointed his other hand at the waiting triangle. “Rise and fly,” he commanded.
The piece shivered, then smoothly rose in the air, as the small crowd around the yard began to clap at the successful completion of the platform’s components. Silas watched his object rise until it was far above the ground, safely above all the surrounding and intervening buildings, and he moved his hand to the right, to begin the journey.
Mata began to lead him out of the yard, then through the streets of the city, slowly pacing their progress to match the movement of the flat object in the sky, until they reached the park that Silas always stopped at, the park that gave the unobstructed view of the platform overhead.
A throng filled the park, a festive gathering of spectators who wanted to see the appearance of the sprites that no one had seen in one hundred years. Mata slowed on the outskirts of the throng, as Silas moved the component into place, so that it hovered just above its expected resting place.
There were no constructors atop the tall towers, no one waiting to connect it and bolt it into place. Silas was to be left alone to deliver and hold the piece of the platform in its location while the sprites came and danced for the city. Silas wondered how long he would have to hold it before the citizens of the city would give up on waiting for the non-existent sprites to arrive.
“Silas,” Cover spoke from nearby. “There seems to be one small problem.”
“What’s that?” Silas asked, stumped by the comment.
“You are down here, and the platform is up there. How can you see it to know if it is correctly in place? You need to get up there,” Cover pointed out.
Silas’s head twitched, as he realized that he had somehow managed to miss the obvious matter. He had known he would have to personally maneuver the piece into its place in order to hold it secure, and he had known that he would stand atop it. He had just never considered the matter of how he would arrange his own transportation to rise to the crown of the tower.
“Let me help you,” Cover offered.
And Silas felt his feet leave the ground.
There was a cheer from the crowd, a cheer that grew and grew as more and more people saw him rising in the air. Although there was nothing but air beneath him, Silas trusted Cover to lift him safely and correctly. But he didn’t look down at the receding ground beneath his feet either; instead, he continued to watch the platform draw closer.
Cover lifted him above the
still-disconnected piece of the platform, the one that Silas himself was still holding in place, then Cover lowered Silas to just a few inches above the surface. It was difficult to judge the proper place to release an object while viewing it from the ground, Silas knew well.
Cover released Silas at that moment and he dropped to the surface of the platform, falling the few inches so that his knees momentarily buckled before he steadied, and stood firmly up at the top of the buildings.
There was a consistent, steady breeze blowing, making the fine fabrics of his outfit ripple. Silas heard the sound of the crowd below raise a renewed cheer. He walked to the edge of the platform where he could see the full collection of the eager audience and then waved to them all, focusing on the quarter where he knew that Mata and Cover were standing.
He was tempted to dance a quick jig, an acknowledgement of the hoped-for purpose of the platform, to see the dance of the sprites, but he was too shy to do such a thing. Instead, he walked to the seams of the piece, where it hovered inches above the rest of the platform. Silas walked the two triangular sides of the piece that was destined to match the other pieces, examining the distance the piece needed to drop. He was proud to see that he was holding it an even and steady foot above the fixed platform; he could lower it all evenly and it would fit in place, as long as he remained engaged and held it in place above the weakened beam beneath it.
He spread the fingers of one hand wide as he held the hand in front of his body, then he gently lowered the hand as he willed his energy to lower the piece, and it settled into place along the seams, leaving no raised edges. No one would trip or stumble or fall as a result of his work now; the platform was temporarily complete and ready to be used.
Silas smiled at the result. He walked to one of the seams, then stepped across it. His energy continued to hold it in place as he left it and began to amble about the entire structure, walking the platform perimeter that extended to cover a wide area between the lesser towers and the taller tower that rose above the center of the ceremonial dance floor.
The Pearl Diver Page 25
