5

 

By the time Jasbur reached the waterfront, rain was falling in barrelfuls, accompanied by sleet, lightning, thunder, and a baby hurricane. So much for dawn on a summer morning! All on its own, such freakish weather suggested Ogoalscath influencing. Combined with the runaway wagon and the collapsing house, it left no doubt at all in his mind. Ogoalscaths were unnerving. Anything could happen around a Cursed of Ogoal, for Ogoal was bringer of fortune, good or bad. There could be danger, therefore. There could also be opportunity.

Trusting that Ordur had enough wits to stay close to him, although that was by no means certain, Jasbur pushed his way through the rain, wrestling the wind aside by brute force. Water streamed in his eyes, his teeth were chattering. The rags he wore were useless; he might as well be bathing naked in ice water. This was crazy! This was well beyond the call of duty. He fought to a standstill as the wind ducked around behind him and tried to hurl him off the wharf, into the cold khaki flood of the Flugoss. Boats bobbed and rocked at their moorings, ropes groaning. Visibility was negligible.

Suddenly the wind let go. Jasbur staggered backward into Ordur. Ordur failed to catch him. The wind neatly reversed direction and sent him sprawling headlong in the cold, muddy street.

Ordur blinked in surprise. “Whatcha doin’ down there, Jasbur?”

“Drain-brain! Moss-wits! Help me up, you wall-eyed toad!”

“You too!” Ordur hauled him to his feet.

“Now let’s get out of this storm so I can think!”

The storm cooperated, with all the eager friendliness of a yearling bull. An empty barrel came rumbling out of the curtains of rain. It bore down purposefully on Ordur and bowled his legs out from under him while he still had hold of Jasbur’s arm. Jasbur was hurled sideways like a stone from a sling. Suddenly there was no world under his feet.

He dropped about a span, sprawling on a heap of wet straw. While not exactly soft, it broke his fall more gently than the wooden deck would have done. The barrel exploded nearby in a shower of staves.

He caught his breath, then raised his head warily to see what impossibility was coming next. He noted he had just boarded a barge tied up alongside the wharf. The wind was considerably less violent than it had been up at street level. In consequence there even seemed to be less rain, although dirty torrents of water were streaming down from the road, much of it falling on him.

River craft were long, ungainly vessels, shaped more like boxes than boats. Most had a single mast, set well forward, to maintain steerage way when going downriver. Oxen on a towpath pulled them upstream, so they usually carried their own oxen. There were none present at the moment, but the state of the deck nearby told him that they had been present recently. The straw would be for them.

To his left was a rail; to his right a cabin wall, with a door in it. The woodwork was scrolled and carved, bearing faint traces of the bright colors it had sported in its heyday. River craft this size were invariably very old, dating from imperial times. Nobody built them any more. How sound could its timbers be after all these years? With an Ogoalscath using influence, no timbers were reliable. Jasbur heaved himself painfully to his knees, planning to return to dry land as soon as possible. Surely someone would have heard his arrival and would soon come to investigate. Then he wondered if there might be something to eat here…

The cabin door opened. He took one look at the woman standing there, and instantly his desire to disembark became much more urgent. Discomfiture became open fear.

It was Labranza Lamith herself. Labranza was an Ogoalscath, which explained why he had been brought here, but she was also president of the council at Raragash, and quite the most intimidating woman he had ever met. Most of the time she frightened him; the rest of the time she scared him witless.

For a moment he wondered if she could have come to Tolamin to check up on him, but he dismissed the thought at once. He was not nearly important enough to drag Labranza away from Raragash. She had sent him here with Ordur, but their mission was far too trivial to involve the president herself. So his best course of action was to give her a very wide berth and ever afterward deny having seen her.

He knew her, but she could not know him. The one advantage of being an Awailscath was not being recognized.

“Beg pardon, Saj!” he bleated, struggling to his feet. “Just fell off the wharf. I’m going, I’m going!”

Labranza frowned. She was very large—taller than he was at the moment, and bulky in a very masculine way. Her age was indeterminate, for there was no gray in the thick black hair neatly coiled on top of her head, but her hard, solid face was wrinkled around the eyes and mouth. She wore a full-length silvery gown, a Nurthian garment that did not belong here in Da Lam. It was barely moving, as if the wind did not affect her.

Before she could speak, Ordur peered down from the road and bellowed, “Whatcha doin’ down there, Jasbur?”

Labranza raised thick black eyebrows. “Jasbur?” She pursed her lips in distaste. She looked up at Ordur and blinked disbelievingly. “And I suppose that’s Ordur? My sympathies! Well, come in here, both of you.” She turned away, never doubting they would obey her.

Thunder roared overhead.

 

The cabin was large and low. It was also dim, the rows of ports along both sides being covered with glass too grimy to admit more than a vague daylight. It smelled of mildew, oxen, people, old cooking. The carpet was scruffy, a row of chests lined each side. Labranza’s carefully coiffured hair almost touched the roof.

Ordur limped in and the wind blew the door shut behind him Then he just stood in silence close to Jasbur, and they both dripped on the rug. Ordur was having a very bad transition. His face was badly lopsided, with lank blond hair plastered over a blue eye on the right side. On the other side he had a dark eye and tightly curled black hair. Nothing else matched; his nose was not remotely symmetrical.

Labranza regarded him with more disgust than pity. “You’ll catch your deaths standing there. There may be towels in one of these boxes, certainly something you can dry yourselves with, probably clothes too. Get those wet rags off.”

The two men glanced at each other uneasily.

“Fates!” Labranza boomed in her most imperious manner. “You’re the last ones who should worry about that! Do you think I’ve never seen naked men before? Don’t be ridiculous.” Nevertheless, she stalked over to the river side to rub a clear spot on a port and peer out.

Jasbur stripped with relief. He advanced cautiously to the nearest chest. There was no telling what he would find in there with an Ogoalscath at work—a box of deadly snakes would not surprise him. He threw the lid open and jumped back quickly.

“Food!” Ordur yelled, rushing past him. The chest was half full of hard biscuit. The two men fell on their knees and began to eat greedily, their wetness and nudity forgotten.

Thunder rumbled in the distance. The ovation of rain on the roof slackened abruptly.

“This weather is your doing, Labranza Saj?” Jasbur mumbled with his mouth full.

“Some of it,” she said coldly. “I probably started it, but you flatter me if you think I could do so much without help. There must be at least one other Ogoalscath out there, probably several. They sensed my influence at work and reacted with their own.”

That was typical of Labranza. She seemed to have a gift for enlisting other persons’ powers to further her own ends—she had demonstrated it many times in Raragash. Others beside Jasbur had noted that gift, but whether she used mere personality or some sort of fatalist influence was something no one seemed to know.

“Who?” Ordur demanded, crunching noisily.

“A good question! People you were supposed to find and help.”

About to protest the injustice, Jasbur thought better of it. She was being very unfair, though. He and Ordur had been given an impossible mission. There was no way to identify an Ogoalscath. A Jaulscath, yes. They were easy. Ordur was very obviously an Awailscath at the moment, but transitions were usually much less obvious. Other Cursed could either suppress their powers or use them without revealing their own whereabouts.

“And what are you doing in Tolamin anyway?” she continued. “You were sent to Daling.”

“Daling drove all the survivors out, whether they were Cursed or not. We thought some of them might have come here. They must have.”

“What’s left of it. Obviously you haven’t been eating well. What happened to all your money? No, don’t bother explaining. I can guess.” She began exploring the chests, banging lids. In a few moments she snorted. “Blankets. Well, they’ll do. Here, dry yourselves.”

She tossed a bundle over to the men and then continued her investigations. Jasbur decided he had blunted the edge of his hunger and could not eat any more of the sawdusty biscuit without something to drink. He stood up and began to towel himself.

“Report!” Labranza said. “How many Cursed have you contacted?”

“Three, Saj. A Jaulscath, an Ogoalscath, and an Ivielscath.”

“None of them had arrived when I left.”

It was a long way to Raragash. The last Jasbur had seen of the Ivielscath, the poor devil had been barely a stone’s throw ahead of a killer mob.

“We shall have to forget the rest of the refugees now,” Labranza announced, completing her trip along one side of the cabin and crossing to the other. “There is a more important emergency.”

Much as Jasbur would like to be relieved of his mission, that was not good news. “Yes, Saj?”

“Tibal Frainith. Do you know him? Ah, here’s some clothes!”

“The Shoolscath? Tall, lanky? Middle twenties?”

“That’s the one. He left Raragash about a month ago, without any explanation. He’s been heading this way.” Labranza came over to Jasbur and handed him a smock and breeches. “These will fit you, I think.”

He took them without a word, dropping his blanket. Then he remembered that he was male at the moment and she was not. He turned his back hurriedly.

Why was Labranza Lamith pursuing Tibal? The residents of Raragash were free to come and go as they pleased, or so he had always believed. She might or might not be willing to explain.

“Saw him,” Ordur growled. He was still drying himself.

“You did?” The Ogoalscath eyed him intimidatingly.

“Don’t believe him, Saj,” Jasbur said. “He’s dumb as a dead pig just now.”

She turned her glare on him. “But it would explain why my influence brought you to me. When?”

Ordur scratched his woolly hair, then pushed the other out of his blue eye. “Um. Two days ago? Maybe three.”

“Did you speak to him?”

“Um. No.”

“Why not?”

He recoiled a pace. “Well, he wouldn’t have known me, Labranza Saj!”

She exchanged glances with Jasbur. “But you could have told him who you were!”

“No, Saj. He was on a boat.”

“Ah! Going which way?”

Ordur scratched his head again, the blanket dangling from his other hand. He was quite oblivious of his nudity. He probably didn’t recall what sex he was. “Don’t remember.”

Labranza shrugged angrily and went back to the clothes chest.

“Was the boat being towed, Ordur?” Jasbur asked patiently. “Were there animals pulling it?”

Ordur thought, screwing up his unmatched eyes. “No.”

“It had a sail up?”

“Yes.”

It had been going downstream, then, but Labranza was capable of working that out for herself.

“There’s nowhere downriver except Daling,” she said. “So that’s where he’s heading.” She tossed garments to Ordur. “No shoes here, that I can find. We go on to Daling. It is essential that we find Tibal Frainith!”

Perhaps feeling more confident now that he was dry and decently clad, Jasbur took a deep breath and said, “Why, Labranza Saj?”

She gave him a look to melt his bones. “The Karpana have crossed the Nildu.”

That was certainly bad news, but why was it relevant? Fortunately Ordur, apparently managing to listen and lace up his breeches at the same time, said, “Huh?”

Labranza looked at him with slightly less menace. Perhaps she was capable of feeling pity after all. “That means war. The Karpana are as bad as the Zarda ever were, probably worse, especially to us.”

Jasbur shivered. He had heard of the Karpana’s attitude toward the Cursed. The Zarda had spared Raragash when they overthrew the empire, but the Karpana would not be so well disposed. But what did that have to do with Tibal Frainith? “The Nildu’s a long way away.”

The ports on one side brightened. The noise of rain had stopped altogether. Did that mean that the Ogoalscaths had stopped influencing, or was something worse going to replace the storm?

Labranza stalked toward the door. She stopped when she reached it and turned around. “We have reason to believe,” she said, “that Tibal has foreseen the coming of the Renewer.”

Jasbur groaned. “Balderdash!” Before he could stop himself, he added, “No one believes in that nonsense any more, surely?”

He had earned another of Labranza’s dangerous glares.

“No?” she murmured.

“The empire’s been dead for a hundred years! I mean… Well… Of course, if it’s true, then it’s wonderful news!”

“It may be. Or it may not be. It certainly means war and upheaval.”

She spoke as if Shoolscath prophecies were reliable, which they never could be. Or could they? What did she know that he did not? “What do the other Shoolscaths say?”

“Nothing, of course. As little as possible.” She smiled a reptilian smile. “But we are working on them.”

Did she mean Jaulscaths? Again Jasbur shivered. Labranza was hinting at something very nasty indeed, but she was capable of anything. It was her ruthlessness that made her so frightening. Most Ogoalscaths were chary of using influence, for it could harm them almost as easily as it could help their cause. Ogoalscaths died in bizarre ways—being struck by lightning, or swallowed bodily into cracks in the earth. All fatalist power was two-edged like that. Labranza never seemed to hesitate. She did what she wanted, apparently without a thought to the cost.

She opened the cabin door and peered out. Her snarl of annoyance brought Jasbur to her shoulder at once.

The sun was shining, the storm had gone as fast as it had come. The barge had broken loose from its moorings and was drifting sideways down the great river. Already the burned ruins of Tolamin were disappearing into the early-morning haze.

“I hope we are right in assuming that Tibal Frainith has gone to Daling,” she said crossly. “We seem to be on our way there whether we like it or not.”

Obviously that was her own fault. Only her Ogoalscath influence could have produced this outlandish result. But even Labranza Lamith could not guarantee good luck, so they might be heading in entirely the wrong direction. She moved over to the rail to peer around the corner of the cabin.

Jasbur thought unhappily of the long winding river and the desolate countryside that flanked it. They would reach Daling only if they did not run aground first. Meanwhile he had a couple of days with the fearsome Labranza to look forward to. He wondered whose barge this was, and where the crew had gone.

“Jasbur,” muttered a sorrowful voice at his ear. “I’m sorry I’m so stupid.”

He winced and turned to put an arm around his confused friend. “You can’t help it, and I shouldn’t be so snappy.”

“You still love me?”

At the moment Ordur’s own mother couldn’t love him—and she certainly wouldn’t know him—but Jasbur managed to say the words. “Yes, I still love you. And one day soon, everything’ll be all right again.”

Ordur nodded glumly. “Yes, then it’ll be all right.”

“Jasbur!” Labranza called. “You must hoist some sail and make sure we do not run aground. That is man’s work.”

“We’re not sailors, Labranza Saj. But we’ll try.”

“That would be very wise of you.”

“Ah, yes.”

“Jasbur?” Ordur whispered. “Why does she want Tibal Frainith?”

“I don’t know.” There were many Shoolscaths in the Academy. Why was Tibal Frainith so important that Labranza herself would leave the sanctuary of Raragash to find him? Jasbur was certainly not brave enough to ask her.

“Oh.” Ordur shrugged, puzzled. “Labranza Saj? Why do you want Tibal?”

There were advantages to being stupid.

She eyed him with the sort of expression emperors must have worn when condemning close relatives to death by torture, but she answered him, which she probably would not have done for Jasbur. “I strongly suspect that he is on his way to meet the Renewer. I want to meet him too.”