“So this is Tak Tuzap’s house?” Najud said.
Dzantig, who had kept up a running commentary ever since they crossed the bridge and entered the densely populated main city with its busy morning traffic, wound down to a stop and gaped.
Penrys replied, “Can’t say for sure, but this is where he is, anyway.” She had followed her link to him, allowing Dzantig to steer her to wider roads whenever the direct route was blocked.
They stood together at the entrance to a samke compound that occupied a full block, just around the corner from another one of Gonglik’s many broad markets. The gates were open, and a steady stream of people passed in and out, and crossed the inner paths to the various buildings. Only a small portion of it was a family dwelling, the rest appearing to be warehouses, workshops, and even a substantial stable and freight yard.
“No point waiting,” Najud said, and he walked up the stone steps to the family door and tapped the wanbum with his knuckle. The little gong made a mellow but penetrating sound.
He spoke to the servant who answered, and then beckoned them all to join him.
The small hall was graciously proportioned, its floor tiled with stylized hunting scenes, but Penrys noted empty spaces on the walls giving evidence of missing decorations, and the surfaces of the tables and benches that lined it were curiously bare.
Stolen, or removed for safety?
The servant led them to a back room on the ground floor, tapped on the door and cracked it enough to consult, then opened it wide and ushered them in, Najud in the lead.
Tak Tuzap rose from his chair at a long table, his brush hastily laid down and still rocking on its rest. “I heard about it, everyone knows.”
His excited smile took in Najud and Penrys, then lingered on Dzantig. “I found her where you said she was. I’m glad to see you again. Maybe you’ll tell me your name, this time.”
Dzantig bowed and introduced himself. “No one else knows of your involvement that night, nor Kor Pochang’s.”
Najud said, “I should tell you both—“Zandaril” was just a name I took for this journey, while I learned my craft. I have presented my masterwork to a master, and now I am free to take back my name. Please call me Najud.”
Tak eyed Penrys. “Wizard stuff, I bet.”
Penrys noted a tidily-made cot in one corner, and Tak, following her glance, said, “This is my room, for now. The rest is occupied.”
At her frown, he continued, “No, it’s all right. They’ve recognized my title to my uncle’s business—it’s mine now—and they let me run it. We even dine together, very civilized. These aren’t the men who killed him that night.”
He gave her a brief grin. “I have a lot to learn, but we’ll manage.”
“I’ve brought you new business, Trader-chi,” Najud said. He explained his caravan plan to Tak Tuzap, and the role he saw for Dzantig in it. “I look to you to help Dzantig learn the trade, as your uncle taught you.”
Tak glanced at Dzantig and nodded. “That’s easy enough, as long as he can spend some time with me, learning. Nothing too hard about adding more traffic to the perimeter runs in the southern cove, in Song Em, that all the annual traders take. You should just make your base on our side of the pass at Jaunor with an outpost here in Gonglik, or maybe in Kunchik, in case you want to expand west to Linit Kungzet or east out the Gates. Your letters can be carried along the trade network, and accumulate in your posts until someone can carry them to the next stage. And the uncertainty about how much to commit to get started—that’s a common problem. We can help with that. We finance many of the small circuit traders, you know.”
He ran his hand over his face, making him look instantly a decade older, and Penrys hid a smile.
Must be his uncle’s gesture. I wonder if his uncle had a beard?
She’d seen a few beards in Neshilik. They were thicker than the ones in the squadron. Was it Rasesni blood?
“No,” he said, “The real problem is politics. I don’t know how to help with that. I know my uncle’s friends, but they’re not my own friends, not yet.”
“I have an idea about that,” Najud suggested. “What about Kor Pochang? How can we get a message to him requesting a meeting?”
Tak sat down again, laid his pen aside, and took up a brush and a fresh sheet of papyrus to compose a formal message.
He’s so young, gangling in his clothing that’s he’s not yet grown into, but he looks prosperous and here, in his element, he knows what he’s doing. What will he be like in a few years?
Tak blotted the ink, picked up a small hand bell and rang it, then rolled the papyrus and dripped turquoise wax on the join, sealing it with a ring that he removed from his thumb.
He caught her eye on him and held it up. “My father’s ring. He was my uncle’s partner. Too big for me now, but I’ll grow.”
“I don’t thing anything will be too big for you long, Takka,” Penrys said, approvingly. “Najud, tell him about Len-len.”
Following a knock on the door, a head popped in. “Get me a messenger boy for the central district,” Tak told him, and the door closed again.
Najud told Tak Tuzap how the little girl was doing and what he’d done for her. “I gave her guardian information about how to find you. Perhaps you’ll meet again sometime. You saved her life, you know—that makes you responsible, though maybe you are too young to just adopt her.”
Meanwhile, Penrys pulled Dzantig aside to thank him for the books.
“It was my honor, brudigna. I could not just give you books from our library—I hope you understand—but the grammar and dictionary, that’s no more than any student would have, and my own god, Dzangab, he would want his word spread, even to unbelievers.”
He coughed apologetically at the term, but she waved it away.
With another knock, the door opened and a boy of about Tak’s age popped in and bowed to his master. “You needed a messenger, Tak-chi?”
“Take this to Kor Pochang—you know where his compound is? Bring it to the kitchen door and wait for an answer.”
The boy tucked the scroll into his tunic, bowed again, and walked out of the room. As soon as the door had been carefully closed, Penrys could hear his running steps receding down the corridor.
Najud took this moment to walk up to the table before Tak could rise again, and he summoned Penrys to join him.
“Tak Tuzap,” he said, “we have yarab mar-uthkahi, honor gifts, for you, to thank you for your rescue of Penrys and the weapons of your house.”
He reached into his robe and brought out the two empty sheathes, with the blood dried upon them. He gave them to Penrys.
But I don’t know what words they expect.
She cleared her throat. Awkwardly, she laid the knife sheath onto her deceptively full gloved palm.
“This knife was my only shield in the final combat. It served me well until I was overwhelmed at last.”
She took it back into her right hand while she removed the glove to show him the wrapped remnant, then put the glove back on.
He blanched but otherwise heard her in dignified silence.
“After the fight, this sheath carried away all that survived of the Voice.” She lay the knife sheath on his table, tucked the ax sheath under her left arm, and reached into her inner tunic pocket to pull out and show him the three-link fragment of chain.
She put it away again and transferred the ax sheath back into her right hand.
“This ax, an heirloom of your house, killed the Voice, saving my life and many others. All honor be to it.”
She lay that sheath next to the other one.
“I apologize that neither survived what followed the Voice’s death.”
Najud reached again into his robe. First he drew out the new knife in its sheath and laid it before Tak Tuzap.
“May this simple tool have as glorious a career as the one it replaces. May it always remind you of your daring journey alone through Seguchi Norwan, the saving of a little child, the warning you carried, and the help you provided us.”
It was a fine example of military smith work, Penrys saw, stamped on sheath and blade with the wolf that was Chang’s squadron’s emblem.
Next, Najud pulled out a small sheathed ax. He held it in balanced on both hands and bowed with it, as if it were a sword in miniature.
“I cannot replace an heirloom of your house. I can only hope this may find your approval as a new heirloom, to remind you of the old.”
He unsheathed it and displayed both sides. One was marked with whirlwinds similar to the ones she had described to him. The other bore a single eight-spoked circle engraving in the upper center of the blade.
“The zamjilah, the eye of heaven— it’s the mark of my clan, to remind you of our debt to you.”
Dzantig had stood off to the side respectfully during this ceremony, and Tak was speechless. He fought for control of his features, while Najud and Penrys backed away to give him some privacy to recover.
Finally, he rose and bowed deeply to them both, one at a time. “My house is honored by these gifts, and they will occupy a place where they are always under our sight.”
A tap on the door brought welcome relief to the charged atmosphere in the room, and Tak waved in the messenger who bowed and handed him a scroll, then bowed again and left.
Tak cracked the yellow wax seal and read it quickly, surprise on his face.
He looked up at them. “He wants to see us now, we’re to use the main entrance. ‘Walk right up to the door,’ he says.”