“Such as Pug of Stardock?”
Again John looked discomforted, though Boldar hadn’t so much as blinked at mention of Pug’s name.
“If you seek Pug, I may not be able to offer you much by way of encouragement.”
“Why is that?”
“He passed through here quite a few months ago, ostensibly on his way to some odd world I can’t remember, to do research, but I fear that is a ruse.”
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“Why do you say that?”
“Because he hired several of Boldar’s friends to prevent anyone who asked for him from following after.”
“Who?” said Boldar, looking around the room.
“William the Gripper, Jeremiah the Red, and Eland Scarlet, the Grey Assassin.”
Boldar shook his head. “Those are three likely to cause some trouble.” He leaned forward to Miranda.
“I could most likely best Jeremiah; his reputation is built mostly on rumor. But William and Eland both possess the death touch, and that makes it dicey if they’re working together.”
Miranda said, “Do I look like a Pantathian?”
John said, “My dear, after as many lifetimes as I have spent in the Hall, looks are the last thing I would depend upon. You, for all your evident charms, could turn out to be my own grandfather and it would barely surprise me—though I fervently hope the old boy is dead, as we buried him when I was fourteen years old.” Rising, he said, “Pug of Stardock is another, like Macros, who is not of the Hall, but utilizes it occasionally. But his word is good and so is his gold. He paid for protection, and such he will get. My advice is not to let anyone else in this room know you seek him and to find some other means to trace his whereabouts, or be prepared to meet two of the Hall’s most reputable mercenaries and one of the most feared assassins, no less than one minute after you leave this place.”
He bowed. “Please have refreshments as my guest.” He signaled a small man and said something to him, indicating that a round of drinks should be produced. “Should you need quarters for a time, 52887_Shadow of a Dark.qxd 9/3/02 3:49 PM Page 341
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you’ll find us reasonable. If not, I trust you’ll enjoy yourself as long as you’re here, and return to us soon.” He bowed, tipping his white hat, and left to return to the bar and his conversation with the four-eyed man, who had just returned from whatever errand he had been on.
Blood let out his breath in a dramatic fashion.
“What do you choose to do?” he asked.
“I intend to keep looking. I mean Pug no harm.”
“Would he think that?”
“We’ve never met. I know him by name only. But he would not think me dangerous, I know.”
“I’ve never met him, either, but John recognized his name instantly. That means his reputation is spreading, and for that to occur in the Hall, one must possess a significant level of gifts. For him to worry about being followed . . .” He shrugged.
Miranda was inclined to take Boldar at face value, and nothing he had said was inclining her to suspect him; still, the stakes were too high for her to take chances. She said, “If he doesn’t want to be followed, enough to take such precautions, how would one follow his trail?”
Boldar blew out his cheeks. “There are several oracles . . .”
“I’ve consulted with the Oracle of Aal.”
“If she doesn’t know, then none of them do,” he observed. “There’s the Toymaker.”
“Who is he?”
“A creator of devices, several of which may be used to spy out people who don’t wish to be seen.
But he’s somewhat mad and therefore undepend-able.”
“Who else?”
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The waiter appeared with a round of drinks, placing a frosty mug of something that looked like ale before Boldar and a large crystal goblet before Miranda. He made a show of unfolding napkins and placing one in Miranda’s lap and the other in Boldar’s. He said, “Compliments of my master,” and withdrew.
The wine was delicious and Miranda drank deeply, discovering she was quite thirsty—and hungry.
“There’s Querl Dagat,” said Boldar. “He deals in information; the more improbable, the better he likes it . . . as long as it’s true. For that reason, he’s a full cut above the average rumormonger hereabouts.”
Miranda picked up her napkin to blot her lips, and a folded piece of paper fell to the floor. She looked down, then at Boldar, who bent over and picked it up.
He handed it to her unopened.
She took it and unfolded it to find a single word.
“Who’s Mustafa?” she asked.
Boldar slammed his hand down upon the table.
“The very fellow we must see.”
He glanced around and said, “Up there,” pointing to the gallery.
He rose and Miranda followed; they wended their way through the press of tables and alien bodies.
Reaching a stairway, they climbed to the first of the two overhanging galleries. Miranda was surprised to discover that the gallery was but one side of a wide promenade, which had large corridors stretching away. “Is all this part of the Inn?”
Boldar said, “Certainly.”
“How big is it?”
“Only Honest John knows for certain.” He led her past booths offering all manner of goods and servic-
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es, several lewd, a score or more clearly illegal anywhere Miranda had ever been, and many incomprehensible. “Rumor has it that John was a barkeep on his homeworld who was run out of his birth city over some dispute. A roving band of some sort of aboriginal people chased him, and he blundered into the entrance to the Hall. As fate would have it, he appeared in the Hall in the midst of a battle. It has been said that, not knowing any better, he jumped into the void opposite the door he had entered, discovering the first entrance into the stable place in which the Inn is now housed.”
Boldar moved down a side corridor. “He blundered around in a strange darkness, then somehow found his way back to the Hall, moving back to his homeworld once he was certain the aborigines were gone and returning to his birth city. Over the years he came back to the Hall, exploring and trading. When he finally had some sense of the society within the Hall, he decided the Inn was what would make him rich. He made some deals, hired some workers, and returned here to establish his small inn. He’s added onto it over the years, until now it’s a small township.
Whenever he adds onto the building, he encounters no limit to the size he can increase his holdings, or at least not so far.”
“Has it?”
“What?”
“Made John rich?”
Boldar laughed, and again Miranda was struck by how boyish the mercenary looked. “I suspect that by any reasonable measure, John is the richest man in creation. He could buy and sell worlds should he choose. But like most of us, he’s found that after a 52887_Shadow of a Dark.qxd 9/3/02 3:49 PM Page 344
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while riches are only a means to keep oneself amused or to keep tally on how well one does in the various games and transactions in the Hall.”
Reaching a doorway hung with a curtain, Boldar called, “Mustafa, are you in?”
“Who wants to know?”
That got a laugh from Boldar, who swept aside the curtain, indicating Miranda should enter. She did and found herself inside a small room with but a single table, upon which a solitary candle burned.
Otherwise, the room was without distinction—no wall hangings or other furniture, just another door in the wall facing the one through which they’d entered.
A man stood behind the table,
his face nearly black, like aged and oiled leather. A white beard adorned his cheeks and chin, though his upper lip was shaven, and his head was covered with a green turban. He bowed. “Peace be upon you,” he said in the language of the Jal-Pur.
“Upon you be peace,” answered Miranda.
“You seek Pug of Stardock?” he asked.
Miranda nodded. Glancing at Boldar, she raised an eyebrow in question.
Boldar said, “Mustafa’s a fortune-teller.”
Mustafa said, “You must first cross my palm with gold.” He held out his hand. Miranda reached into her belt and withdrew a coin, placing it upon his hand. He put it in his own belt pouch without looking at it. “What do you seek?”
“I just told you!”
Mustafa said, “You need to say it aloud!”
Fighting off irritation at what she thought was needless show to convince gullible travelers, Miranda said, “I need to find Pug of Stardock.”
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“Why?”
Miranda said, “That is my business, but the need is great.”
“Many look for this man. He has taken precautions against being followed by those he would rather not encounter. How may I know you are not such a one?”
Miranda said, “One may vouch for me, but he is back upon the world of Midkemia: Tomas, friend of Pug.”
“The Dragon Rider.” Mustafa nodded. “That is a name few would know who meant to harm Pug.”
“Where might I find him?”
“He seeks alliances and goes to speak with the gods. Seek him in the Celestial City, in the Hall of the Gods Awaiting.”
Miranda said, “How do I get there?”
“Return to Midkemia,” answered Mustafa, “and get you to the land of Novindus. In the great mountains, the Pillars of the Stars, find the Necropolis, the home of the Dead Gods. There, atop the peaks of the mountains, there is a hall in which those gods waiting to be reborn abide. Go there.”
Miranda didn’t wait, but rose and left, leaving Boldar standing alone with Mustafa. After a second, Boldar said, “Is this true? Or are you doing one of your carnival acts?”
Mustafa shrugged. “I don’t know if it’s true.
That’s just what I was paid to say.”
“Who paid you?”
“Pug of Stardock.” The old man took off his turban, revealing a nearly bald pate. Scratching his head, he said, “I suspect it’s probably another false lead. I have the distinct impression this Pug is a man who doesn’t wish to be found.”
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Boldar said, “This gets interesting. I think I’ll catch up with her and see if she needs help.”
Mustafa shook his head and said, “Find him or not, I have a feeling she’s going to need a great deal of help before this is over. Some idiot left open a critical gate to the demon realm, and a couple of realities could be in jeopardy as a result.” He yawned.
Boldar was about to ask what that meant, but considered Miranda getting too far ahead, so he said nothing and left.
A moment after Boldar left, the other door opened and a man stepped through. Small but striking, he had dark hair and eyes and a closely trimmed beard, and wore a simple robe of black. He reached into a pouch at his belt and pulled out some gold coins. Handing them to Mustafa, he said, “Thank you. You did well.”
“Anytime. What are you going to do now?”
“I think I’ll go set up a small test.”
Mustafa said, “Well, enjoy yourself. And let me know how the situation with the demon realm turns out; things could get busy around here if they get loose.”
“I will. Good-bye, Mustafa,” said the man as he began to move his hands.
“Good-bye, Pug,” responded Mustafa, but by the time he had spoken, Pug of Stardock had vanished from sight.
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14
Journey
Erik ddismounted.
Roo grabbed the reins of Erik’s and Billy’s horses and led them away. Erik and Billy ran forward, weapons at the ready, while the maneuver was repeated up and down the line.
Since leaving Brek’s at Shingazi’s Landing two weeks before, Calis had been drilling the men con-tinually. They were now being trained as mounted infantry. At the first sign of attack, one man in three would lead the horses to be staked behind the line while the other two made a defensive position where instructed. The men had complained about this, saying it made no sense to leave a perfectly good horse and get down to fight, but the complaints had fallen on deaf ears.
Nakor had laughed it off, saying only, “Man and horse gives a much bigger target than man on foot hiding behind a rock.”
The drills were becoming second nature to Erik and the others, who now waited to see what would happen next. Sometimes, nothing; other times, Hatonis’s company of clansmen from the City of the 347
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Serpent River would “attack,” and the results could be painful. The drills were conducted using heavy wooden swords, weighted with lead rods, that were twice the heft of a normal shortsword. Erik swore his own sword was feather-light in his hand after weeks of drilling with the false swords, which he supposed was the point of it all, but the wooden swords could leave heavy welts and even break bones, and the clansmen from the City of the Serpent River seemed to take delight in embarrassing Calis’s company.
Erik didn’t understand the politics of this strange land; he knew that Calis and Hatonis were old friends, or at least friendly acquaintances, but the other men from that distant city seemed either suspicious or contemptuous of Calis’s men. He asked and was told by one of the soldiers from Calis’s last voyage that clan warriors simply didn’t have much use for mercenaries. Erik took this to mean that only a few leaders, such as Hatonis, knew of their real purpose in coming to this distant land.
Erik heard a rattle behind him and knew that Roo had returned and was laying down the odd short spears they had picked up at Brek’s. Soft iron, they were designed to be thrown at charging opponents, either injuring them or fouling their shields. Once they struck something, they were useless, as they bent easily, so the enemy couldn’t throw them back. A shout went up from a crest nearby and suddenly it was raining arrows. Erik raised his shield, crouching low behind it, and felt two shafts strike and shatter on the heavy metal and wood. A curse nearby told Erik that Luis hadn’t been as fortunate, and had been struck by the dull point of a practice shaft. Not lethal, these shafts nevertheless stung when they struck, and occasionally they could cause real injury.
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Then another shout signaled the charge, and Erik rose, gripping one of the heavy iron spears. “Ready!”
shouted de Loungville. As the charging clansmen came near, Erik tensed, and as if reading his mind, de Loungville shouted, “Wait for it!”
As the clansmen bore down upon them, the men of Calis’s company waited until de Loungville shouted, “Throw!” and Erik and the others motioned throwing the pilum, as the short soft spear was known in the Quegan tongue. Having no practice pilum to use, they couldn’t throw the weapon, so after pantomiming a cast, each man dropped his spear next to where they waited and, with a few audible groans, readied the ponderous practice swords.
Erik recognized the man bearing down on him, a large somber fellow named Pataki. Erik braced himself and let the man throw the first blow, which he easily caught on his shield. He stepped slightly to his left and threw a roundhouse blow with his sword that got over the top of Pataki’s shield and caught him behind the head. Erik winced, for he knew the blow must hurt, despite the helm the other man wore.
Glancing around, he saw that his companions were easily repulsing the attackers, and within a minute the clansmen threw down their swords and removed their helms in the mercenary’s sign of surrender. A few of Calis’s company cheered the victory, but the majority were content to stand motionless for a few minutes. Riding most of the day, then suddenly fighting a battle—even if only a mock skirmish—took its toll; most of the men learned to steal rest whenever it was possible, even if only for a minute.
“All right,” shouted Foster. “Pick ’em up!”
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Erik got his practice sword under one arm and was starting to retrieve his pilum when he heard Billy say, “This one’s not moving!”
Erik saw that Pataki was still lying facedown in the dust. Roo was the first to reach him and rolled the bulky man over. He then leaned over and after a moment said, “He’s still breathing, but he’s out cold.”
De Loungville hurried over. “What’s this?”
Erik picked up his pilum. “I caught him on the back of the head. I hit him harder than I intended, I guess.”
“You guess,” said de Loungville, his eyes narrowing as if he was about to launch into another repri-mand. Suddenly he grinned and said, “That’s my lad!” He told Roo, “Toss some water on him and get your kit together.”
Roo rolled his eyes heavenward and hurried to where the horses were picketed. He fetched a waterskin and doused the motionless man. Pataki came awake, spitting out the water, and once he had regained his feet, returned to his own company.
Erik carried his set of pilum, practice sword, and shield to where the horses were waiting. He loaded up his equipment, then waited for Roo to catch up.
When the shorter man returned, he said, “You really caught him with that head shot.”
“You saw?”
“I was unoccupied at the moment. The fellow who came at me was blindsided by Billy, so I had nothing to do.”
“You could have lent me a hand,” Erik said.
“As if you needed one,” said Roo. “You’re turning into something of a terror with that practice sword.
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