Torian

I had braced myself for more stares when we joined the steady stream of people heading for the city gates, but oddly, we were largely ignored. I supposed part of that was the way my clothing now masked my obvious physical differences, but I was conversant enough with the Infomancers’ socio-political data to see it in another light.

These people expected to encounter strangers. This wasn’t their home. Furthermore, based on my observations from the hillside, the city was orders of magnitude larger than Corvel-on-Byrne or even Market Spinney. I doubted its inhabitants knew everyone else who lived there any more than the citizens of the home world metropolises were acquainted with other residents in a meaningful way.

As we neared the gate, Zal led me away from the edge of the road and more toward the center, where we were flanked by a boisterous group of young adults on one side and an older couple leading a smallish quadruped that resembled the donkeys from the home world data files, its panniers loaded with rough-skinned tubers, a hybrid of potato and yam that the Originators had propagated across the continent before introducing human inhabitants.

I wondered at Zal’s tactics at first, but then I realized what he was doing.

Camouflaging himself.

Not from the other visitors, but from the guards. A pair stood on either side of the wide main gate, one with a red surcoat secured with a wide amber sash, and the other in leather-belted brown. According to what Zal had told me about the way the capital’s magical and non-magical populations shared jurisdiction, it meant that both mages and seigneurs were represented at the gates.

One of the guards in the red mage livery was the J-4 strain like Zal, but the others were all A-3, like the inhabitants of Corvel-on-Byrne or Market Spinney. I knew from the Infomancers’ files that the J-4 population was smaller than the A-3 control strain, and of course there were no remaining C-28 specimens other than me. Perhaps it wasn’t possible for the mages to completely staff their guard complement with J-4 citizens, since the majority of them were destined for mage work.

Also—and apparently unknown to the Infomancers—as many of the J-4 were celibate, the breeding pool would be even more limited. I wondered briefly if that was why the Lab directors had resorted to something as scientifically unsound and borderline unethical as the quick genetic manipulation of the C strains. After all, the A strain only had three iterations, the J only four. The C had twenty-seven before its extinction with C-28.

That made me wonder about the missing letters: B and D through I. Had they all been unviable genetic manipulations? Or had the Originators simply chosen the letter designations for other reasons?

I shelved that query for later. We were nearly at the gates and I couldn’t afford to be distracted, especially by another null result.

Beside me, Zal had moved closer, hunching his shoulders, as though attempting to make himself smaller and less obtrusive. I grimaced inside the shadow of my hood. The sheepskin lining of Zal’s cloak seemed to glow amid the duller homespun or cured leather clothing of the other travelers, even in the shadow of the tall city walls. It caught the attention of the guards, I had no doubt, because all of them squinted at Zal.

None of them unhooked their thumbs from their belts, though, or made the least move to approach. In fact, for guards, they didn’t seem to do much guarding. Their belts held nothing more lethal than the equivalent of a police baton. No bladed weapons at all. The only projectile-type weapons this world boasted were heavy, rather unwieldy spears and the bow and arrow. However, those were only used for hunting, and infrequently at that.

Zal had explained it over the fire one evening, the flames glinting in his dark eye, explaining that the populace considered such practices immoral, since prey animals didn’t have any natural way to protect themselves against an arrow fired from a distance.

“If I lay a trap for a coney, or bait my hook for a goldenfin, they have a choice whether or not to step into the trap or take the bait off the hook. Shooting a pointed stick at them from inside a bush doesn’t even give them the choice to run away.”

Even hunters who used spears always shouted before their throw to give the prey a chance to bolt. From their perspective, if a hunter couldn’t bring down an animal on the run, he didn’t deserve it.

I didn’t think the Infomancers had any notion of how deeply the consent liturgy permeated this culture. I sincerely doubted it was anything they set in motion themselves, considering their entire installation here was the antithesis of consent, tinkering as they did with the very engine of evolution.

If my efforts had been successful, that wouldn’t happen any longer. My system conflict monitor pinged an alert at that thought, and I winced. Had my choices—to kill Edric, to destroy the shuttle, to warn the Infomancers off—been tantamount to the same type of tampering?

Another worry for later. Particularly since I couldn’t do anything about it now.

We’d drawn even with the gates, and although the J-4 guard continued to observe Zal with a perplexed frown, the others had lost all apparent interest and turned back to scan the wide avenue again.

Once we’d passed the gates, the sounds hit me like a blow. People calling, metal clanging, animals bleating, neighing, honking, squawking.

A line of brown-robed Earth-born priests paraded past, droning one of their interminable chants, the last priest in line banging a wooden drum in a funereal rhythm, apparently to keep them in step and on chant amid the surrounding cacophony.

And the stench. Zal had warned me that the capital would be worse than Market Spinney or even the noisome Corvel-on-Byrne gaol. But the sheer variety of smells overwhelmed me, sending my evaluation and classification subroutines close to crashing.

Smoke was everywhere, making my eyes burn. I managed to identify not only wood but peat fires as well, commingled with the stench of burnt organic materials, both meat and vegetation.

Fur and feathers and human sweat added their pungent notes, although oddly, no animal dung, or at least not much. I realized why when the donkey-equivalent lifted its tail not far from us. Almost before the droppings hit the paving stones, an A-3 person wearing a flat leather cap and sturdy boots, their workaday breeks and jerkin covered with a heavy canvas apron, scurried over and scooped the manure into a battered metal bucket.

I supposed continual refuse removal would be necessary for even marginal comfort in a city this large, and I was grateful, but I still adjusted my olfactory sensitivity, throttling it down to its lowest setting. I was tempted to disable it altogether, but if I did that, I could miss something critical.

More critical than donkey-equivalent shit, anyway.

We moved forward along with the wave of people entering behind us. Once we got farther from the gates, the main avenue branched off in a sunburst of smaller roads, and the crowd thinned as people went their separate ways.

When Zal led me down the road at two o’clock, we weren’t precisely alone, but the people striding along with us were in less festive attire than those who’d headed in the nine o’clock direction. I assumed that meant we were aiming for an inn in the less affluent section of the city.

I braced myself for accommodations similar to the gaol in Corvel-on-Byrne, but instead, Zal stopped in front of a neat brown-shingled three-story building with green-painted window boxes sporting what I recognized as herbs rather than flowers. The wooden sign swinging above its matching green door held a faded but surprisingly accurate painting of a Terran rooster and a thick-necked longhorn steer with a stylized ampersand between them.

I choked back a laugh. “Is this… Are we truly staying at an inn called the Cock & Bull?”

“Aye.” Zal peered down at me. “Why? Do you not like the look of it?”

I sucked in a wheezing breath and waved a hand. “No, no. It’s fine.” If Zal didn’t react, probably that colloquialism hadn’t made it into the planet’s lexicon. I was beginning to think that linguist had not only been a prude but totally lacking in humor.

“Okay, then.” He grinned at me, and as he opened the door, I wondered how long it would take for okay to permeate the language.

Zal led the way inside into a low-beamed room with a high wooden counter across the wall opposite the door. Behind the counter, a sturdy Earth-born man in a bibbed green apron, loops of grizzled braids flopping out of his messy topknot, was dispensing ale from a cask into a wooden flagon decorated with the carving of some kind of winged creature.

“‘The flagon with the dragon,’” I murmured, and added The Court Jester to my list of films to introduce to Zal.

The aisle from the door to the counter was flanked with long plank tables, their benches possibly a quarter full, although the smaller tables under the windows were all occupied.

I nudged my olfactory sensors up, the better to assess the environment. The aroma of roasting meat and the hoppy scent of the ale was overlaid by the citrusy scent rising from the bucket of water that a young woman in breeks, her braids bound up in a length of linen, was using to scrub the floor in the corner.

Another young woman, this one with both an apron and knee-length kirtle over her breeks, braids coiled in an intricate knot on the back of her head, was weaving through the tables, balancing a tray holding at least half a dozen steaming bowls on the flat of one hand.

The bartender smiled at us and wiped his hands on a bit of toweling. “Good morning, my fine citizens. Welcome to the Cock & Bull. I’m Ibb, your host. How may I serve you today?”

Before he had a chance to set the toweling aside, an even sturdier looking Earth-born woman pushed through a swinging door behind the bar, scowling like a thundercloud. She snatched the toweling out of Ibb’s hand and placed a fresh one on the counter.

She nodded to us, her scowl morphing into a tight smile, and then disappeared behind the door.

Ibb just chuckled and picked up the clean towel. “My wife, Jocosa. She keeps me honest, she does. Now, how may I serve you?”

“We’d like a room, please, if you’ve one available.”

Ibb’s jolly demeanor faded. “You’re not staying in the mage’s quarter? Most of the Sun-born lodge there, even though a fair few grace our establishment now and now.” He patted the cask. “For the excellence of the ale as well as Jocosa’s cooking. But lodging? Never.”

Zal tensed next to me. “So you’re not able to—”

“No, no! Don’t mistake me. We’ve a fine room free that I’m pleased to offer your honor. It’s only that I was surprised, seeing as Sun-born housing is provided by the House of Mages around Judgment Day.” Ibb’s voice rose on the last words, so it didn’t take my sentiment analysis sensors to deduce that he was asking how we intended to pay.

“We’ve our reasons.” Zal pulled his wicker fishing creel from under his cloak, as well as the string of coneys. “Will this do for payment? We’d like a meal and baths today, and perhaps breakfast tomorrow.”

Ibb’s eyes widened and he all but snatched the offerings from Zal’s hands. “That’s a gracious plenty. We can arrange the baths and a nice luncheon for you right away.” He winked, brandishing the coneys. “And you’ll enjoy the magic Jocosa can work on these beauties with supper tonight, just you wait and see.”

As though her name conjured her, Jocosa barreled through the door again. “What are you— Oh!” With an expression that combined reverence with avariciousness, she took the coneys.

Ibb tipped the lid on the creel. “Goldenfin too, and fresh as fresh. They’d like a room, baths, and a meal or two.”

The way Jocosa studied us with shrewd eyes, I had no doubt who truly managed the inn. “The payment’s ample, but we’ve had trouble before. I won’t let a room to anyone I can’t look in the face.”

Zal straightened, jaw tightening, and reached for the game. “Then we’ll go elsewhere.”

I laid a hand on his arm. “No. It’s all right. We have to start somewhere.”

I lowered my hood, keeping my gaze fixed on the polished wood of the counter until I’d settled the folds on my shoulders. Then I looked up and met their gazes with what I hoped was confidence.

They both gasped, eyes and mouths rounding in almost identical unison. I was prepared for questions about my Moon-born nature, but instead, Jocosa whispered, “What did you do?”

I frowned, blinking. “I… Do?” Had my actions, Edric’s murder, somehow marked me so that anyone could see my guilt?

“They did naught but fall ill in the north, at the foot of Star Mountain,” Zal growled.

For some reason, that made both of them relax. “Ah, I see,” Ibb said. “Those folk out in the hinterlands don’t understand the two-natured. Probably treated you like you’d poisoned the well, eh?”

“Something like that,” I said faintly.

“You needn’t worry about that here. Our youngest is two-natured. My sister’s child too.” Jocosa turned toward the door and bellowed, “Darej.”

A person, probably in their late teens, stuck their head out the door. “Yes, Mam?”

“Take these folk up to the back room.” She winked, just like Ibb had. “Quieter back there, away from the street, with a nice view over the kitchen garden.”

Darej looked at me, wonder in their eyes. “You’re like me, aren’t you?”

Although I wasn’t really like anyone anywhere, I nodded. Darej hurried out of the door and around the counter to gesture toward a claret-colored curtain in the far corner.

“Stairs this way, if you’d be pleased to follow me.”

Zal rested a hand on my shoulder. “You go ahead, love. Have your bath and eat a bit. I’ve our audience to arrange, but I’ll be back as soon as may be.” He nodded to Ibb, Jocosa, and Darej. “I thank you for your hospitality. Please take good care of Torian. They’re very dear to my heart.”

My own heart felt as though it were lodged firmly in my throat as I watched Zal stride for the door.

“Zal!”

He turned. “Yes, love?”

“Leave your cloak. You can take mine if you’re cold.”

Zal met my gaze, understanding what I was saying. “I’ll be warm enough without.” He shrugged out of his cloak and handed it to me. “Don’t worry. Everything will be fine.”

And he vanished into the street, leaving me alone among strangers for the first time since Edric’s death.