CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

 

HORSE MADE HER departure from the ferry early, a mile before the port. She suddenly heaved up to standing while they were packing their bags and sharpening their blades and announced she must get out. The Shelliac, fearful of having a crazed centaur aboard the boat and concerned for the reaction at the Port authority, were quick to pole to the nearest available bank and put out the boarding planks.

“I will begin my work on the hills above the city,” she explained, shouldering her shield and picking up her javelin. “I will be heading west along the cliffs to the barren hills. I’m sorry I can’t go with you.” She looked down at Kula and smiled softly.

Kula was not surprised. She’d watched Horse’s connection to the forest gradually dwindle as they went further from it. Even before the centaur said anything she knew that there was no way she could stray beyond the reach of roots and the soft webs of fungi that stretched the limits of the Draeyad’s perception beyond the woodlands to the edges of the saltwater shore. It was better Horse leave now, while she was strong.

Kula wasn’t sure about Murti but she was sure that she didn’t like Deffo, who was never about unless it was a meal time. Murti was easy to see. Deffo snuck around, in and out of sight, and he was pleased that Horse was going. It was one more person less to get in the way of any manoeuvres he would have to make in his one-step-ahead of whatever was going on style of planning. Anxiety about the mission had meant that his watching for any mischance had been focused very sharply on Lysandra the last couple of days and now Kula felt he was fishing about for ideas as to what to do about her, how to control her, how to get her to listen to him. This she must thwart.

As Horse stepped regally off the ferry and onto the bank Deffo was there to watch her go and make sure she was really leaving. Even Celestaine was relieved, though mostly because she couldn’t think of a way to shepherd the centaur safely through the hubbub of the Freeport. Since nobody had seen one lately she would have created so much trouble for them that this problem had occupied Celest, Heno and Nedlam all the way here from the island. Now they were watching the problem walk out of their lives and a great relief was on them. Kula was sad though. Horse had been such a warm, comforting presence. She had vowed to come back and see her as soon as whatever business they were being dragged around on was done. As the centaur turned to wave at her she found herself in tears, but sort of glad at the same time. She didn’t want Horse hurt and the steady, approaching roar of the port promised a chaos that was filled with danger. As they poled off into deep water she watched the figure of her friend receding and becoming smaller and she wished they weren’t going.

It never occurred to her that she could object and not go herself. Lysandra had told her that she felt a sense of purpose in going with Murti on his journey and Kula was now a part of Lysandra, under her wing; where one went the other must. She wanted to be a good daughter. She felt kinship to the lost family even though they were forgotten and even though they had deliberately hidden her and cut her off so she could never remember them. They must have had a reason and as long as she lived they weren’t entirely gone from the world. What they had been could find its way again through whatever she did until she had to leave and maybe by then there would be others and other ways forward. Their presence was so strong she was sometimes stretched to imagine that they had been ended in any way at all. Only the pitying looks of the adults reminded her that it must be so.

She stroked the black feather of the creature from the river. She remembered it very well. It lived within her. She could feel its sleeping weight, a soft, single-down brush of awareness waiting for her to find a place to let it free again and she reassured it that she would, as soon as it was safe and away from where stupid people could harm it. Then they were all arranging themselves for the end of their voyage, emerging on deck, clothed, packed, armoured—which for her and Lysandra meant no change at all as they had only ever had the clothes they stood up in.

Just prior to their arrival at the Freeport Celestaine took her aside and handed her a share of the jewels they had taken off Lysandra’s dress. Kula was impressed by being given the same share as everyone else and hid it inside a deep pouch of her belt which she was sure was secure, her faith in the tall, blonde warrior bolstered by a fresh responsibility to her. Lysandra didn’t have a pocket so they paused to sew her one, concealed by the dress’s still-magnificent extravagance of skirt. What the others did with their share she didn’t know, but she did see Nedlam biting on some gold wire and holding it up to the light to see if there really was such a thing as a metal you could just chomp into shape. When it moulded to the contours of her jagged teeth she chuckled and wound it around one of her jutting tusks. She saw Kula looking at her and winked.

“We’ll see who comes get that, eh?” she said and looked very pleased with herself.

As well as loot, they were divided up into two groups. Murti, Kula, Lysandra and Bukham were to obtain the food and clothing they would need for a journey into colder weather—quite a short journey, Murti insisted.

“We’re going to Galdinnion Island. It is a two-day sail or so, around the whirlponds, and then it will be a day or more to hike the Wayfarers’ road all the way to the northern circle on the glacier.”

Kula didn’t know what that meant but it sounded grand. It gave her the courage to face the Freeport itself, which she didn’t really want to because even from the outskirts she could see Ilkand was a big place, built both around the river mouth and up on the overlooking hills. It reminded her of the camps and their crowded strangeness full of despair and hunger. The only plus side to it was that Deffo and the others would be about a separate business finding a ship so she didn’t have to keep an eye on what he was doing.

At last it was time to say goodbye to the otters. They came up with a trout and deposited it in a sly, proud manner on her foot, scattering water from their whiskers and chirping as the Shelliac whistled them back to their cots. Kula picked up the fish and held it with a finger through the gills like she saw the Shelliac do and gave them a shy wave. They all waved, to her great surprise, and seeing them smile at her made such a sudden tender feeling that she had to rub tears off against Lysandra’s sleeve on the way down the planks to the docks.

Once aground and with a mission to the marketplace Bukham soon had them organised with himself at the front and Murti bringing up the rear. Celestaine dealt with some long and tedious business involving guards and identifications and a lot of talking that made people bored and long in the face. Kula waited it out with patience, watching other people come and go, her hand firmly in Lysandra’s grasp as both of them stood amazed by the sheer variety of all that was to be seen in such a small area. It felt as if it was raining with people of all different sizes, colours and customs. On the headland above them a tall silver tower stood. The sight of it made Kula shiver. She tugged Lysandra’s hand and drew her attention to it.

“Powerful dead things,” Lysandra signed to her, confirming her senses. “Not going there.”

There were many worse threats than some empty tower though. People with dragonish looks and scales, people with peculiar oily skins and clothing like beetle bits, people with all kinds of decorations and armours, clothing and weapons. Things that may be weapons or agricultural implements or both being carted away in stacks next to firewood and cages full of small animals. Everything was strange. Everyone was peculiar to her. She saw no faces like hers and Lysandra’s anywhere, and the group she’d been in, which had seemed only people, now felt like it was more than people. They were stared at. People recognised Celestaine with mixed feelings, but mostly saluted; they saw things in Heno and Nedlam to hate and fear; they welcomed the Shelliac; they tipped their hats politely to Murti and Bukham; they looked long at her and at Lysandra, with narrowed eyes, thinking things that Kula could see weren’t very pleasant. She returned their stares and made them break the gaze first but inside she felt as if she wanted to cry and this made her angry and the anger, first hot, was almost instantly cold and hardened to a shell. This was like the camp again and she would have to put on her armour inside to make it through.

She felt Lysandra copy her in that way she had of always knowing exactly what Kula was doing. Lysandra made a noise of surprise in the discovery. She asked Kula—do these people really hate us?

“Fear us,” Kula said with the hand speech. “That’s our edge.”

“Our edge?”

“Some people have a sword made of metal. Some people have edges in other ways. Fear is the best edge for control but it cuts off one from another completely.”

“So, they hate?”

“No. Hate binds. Fear separates. Combined they are a trap.” Kula didn’t know how to say what she wanted to say, but Lysandra could feel how it worked. Kula felt her surge with brightness, as she always did when she was learning new things. Every time it happened the brightness lasted longer, spread further. She understood what Kula saw but also through their connection Kula could see what Lysandra saw. Lysandra could do a task or use an insight better, further, faster, once she had mastered it. She could connect it to everything and see how it fit. Kula relied on her now for gaining the bigger picture of things. So it was in a few moments that she felt a shift in her perception of the Freeport and its people. They were no longer things divided up by their looks into incomprehensible groups of strange and unknowable freaks. They became things divided up by their behaviour and their motives. In that they were all equal. Her sense of people vanishing and being replaced with hostile creatures she didn’t understand shifted. They became an influx of ordinary beings like herself, moving in a single sea of circumstances and moments, easy to understand, easy to see.

She squeezed Lysandra’s hand. This was much better. Now everyone was the same and she didn’t have to be afraid.

Ahead of them the big, slow-moving hulk of Bukham was moving forward, trailing the warrior group in through the dockyard gates on the roads that led into the port’s heart, his head up and his purpose clear. He was like a different person to the sombre, brooding figure that had sat on the ferry. Now he was like she remembered him at the trading post, big and full of confidence and charm.

They agreed a meeting point and time and then the two huge Yorughan and the smaller warrior between them vanished into the crowd, trailed at a short distance by the anxious figure of Deffo who attempted to walk tall as if he owned the place and Celest was merely his bodyguard, but somehow managed to give a distinct impression of both limping and slouching in the most craven way. A guard went behind them, to help them reach some important place which they clearly already knew how to reach by themselves. Kula scowled but she was being moved in a current heading in a different direction. For a moment she felt a clear sense of danger, that they would not meet again.

 

 

CELESTAINE WAS HEADED to meet with Governor Adondra, to make a formal greeting and to ask her advice about gaining passage on a trustworthy vessel. The delicate ins-and-outs of politics could have shifted the weight of influence enormously even in the few months since she’d last been here and she didn’t hold out much hope for figuring it all out by trial and error, at least not in any timescale that would be useful. Adondra had dished her a sharp but useful lesson in presuming to know anything about port business and she felt a certain desire to make amends for what had happened on that visit, when the Archimandrite had heard the gods’ farewell and Adondra had seen the prospects of her town full of refugees go from mere survival enforced by religious zealots to something with a much larger potential for expansion—the future looked more interesting but the difficulty of her position between an enlightened Temple and a seething mass of human interests far beneath that had been expanded a hundredfold. Celest was hoping that some of Lysandra’s wealth was going to help with whatever was now going on. And hoping they would not all be put to the stake again.

This time, instead of getting an audience by trading on her power as a Slayer she petitioned in the usual way and lubricated the process with just enough gold that would seem auspicious but not so much it would cause undue suspicion—as if coming into the city accompanied by two Tzarkomen wouldn’t do that, but they were mild, shopping-only Tzarkomen, not even tattooed with the markings of the necromancy, and they were with an Oerni trader and a Wayfarer priest. A more harmless bunch there couldn’t be.

“How long d’you think before we’re arrested?” Nedlam asked from behind Celest’s right shoulder as they waited in the yards of the Governor’s mansion. They were already attracting plenty of attention.

“Not this time,” Heno said with confidence.

“Wait, don’t we know that guy?” Celestaine pointed to a stake placed high on the walls overlooking the yard. Upon it was a head. Although it was discoloured and puffy its death-snarl of surprised disgust was still in place.

Nedlam shrugged—her eyesight was not that good at very long range, but Heno sighed.

“The Templars we saw before Hathel Vale.”

“Yeah, he’s the dead one that was on the horse,” Celestaine agreed. “And you said you liked them.”

“They had a dead Templar with them, it was difficult not to like them, as any Templar dead is obviously a good thing, even if the others remained alive,” he objected. “But now that looks a lot like Termaghent Phylanstery justice to me. Perhaps even they can do right sometimes.”

“Maybe we should skip this and go to the dockhouses at the sea end of things,” Nedlam said. “No need to bother the Governor. She doesn’t like you anyway.”

“Bit late for that,” Celestaine replied. Through the milling people a man with the Templar and City surcoat on was coming purposefully towards them, accompanied by guards trying to look like they weren’t out for an arrest and failing.

“Fernreame,” the official said carefully, assessing the Yoggs with an eye that was pretending not to notice that they were Yoggs at all. “If you would accompany us. The Archimandrite would be pleased so see you now.”

“I only wanted to pass on my good wishes to the Governor and ask her advice on a minor matter,” Celestaine said as they were casually surrounded. She deliberately took her hand off her sword hilt.

“You have a way of precipitating major change and that is not welcomed today,” the man said. “Please attend.”

With a sigh Celestaine fell into line and followed him into the mansion, Heno and Nedlam behind her, making her think of innocent hounds following their master into a ridiculous position of danger without any idea of what they were doing, which wasn’t true but it felt true.

They were ushered into a major room where Celestaine recognised Adondra, and was in turn recognised with a glower. The Governor was seated behind a large and imposing desk. She sat behind one end and behind the other, the figure of a much weakened and aged Archimandrite was upon an upholstered throne. A woman with the kind of grimly practical haircut that smacked of self-loathing stood rigidly upright beside him, wearing the pale wool robes of some variety of abnegating low-ranking priest. She was so clean and exacting and the Archimandrite’s gaze so dreamy and vacuous that Celestaine had no trouble placing who was the power at that end of the table.

“To what do we owe the pleasure of another delegation from the house of heroes?” Adondra asked, but she was more weary than the last time they had met and she lacked bite.

“I came to ask your advice about safe passage to Galdinnion Island in the Golden Isles. Who takes ships that way and are there any disputes that I might fall foul of.”

“Really? That seems so unlikely, and yet… I feel there’s more. Go on. What is the purpose of this monumental quest. You have saved the Aetherni and now you are going to save someone else lost in a terrible place without hope except you and your crew of one-time genocidal maniacs?”

Celestaine looked at the discomfiting, flat gaze of the dark-eyed priest and then at Adondra, surviving on sarcasm alone these days. She decided to chuck some truth under the wagon. “Yes. You know me so well. I am off to seek my fortunes and discover what has happened to the gods.”

Heno made a disappointed noise, as you might make if you had just seen someone score a magnificently unanticipated own-goal.

The Archimandrite sat forward, awake suddenly. “You’re going to find the gods? What a lovely idea. But I must tell you they are very far away and have said they can’t come back. If you find them, you will not come back either. On the other hand, I rather like the sound of that.”

“I…” Celestaine began but was cut short.

The very serious looking priest with the bad haircut who had been looking at Celestaine without affection broke in. “Do you have any idea how difficult it is maintaining the peace and the rule of law now that being a Templar means enforcing a godless generosity on all and sundry?”

“Does it mean putting the heads of bad soldiers on pikes?” Celestaine hazarded.

“That is one of its less appetising results,” the priest said. “I am Carzel, the Archimandrite’s moral advisor. It falls to me to judge what kindness means, in any particular dispute. And there are many disputes. Almost as many new ones about kindness as there are old ones about vengeance and robbery and whose land is it. Now we must deal with all the imaginary slights of unkindness in words, deeds and thoughts. And all the omissions of words, deeds and thoughts, whose absence cuts a hole in the hearts of the pure.” If it was possible to kill people with contempt via enunciation Carzel would have been guilty of multiple counts of genocide.

“People are very touchy,” the Archimandrite said in a mellow manner, and Adondra rolled her eyes in search of patience, as if it was stored under her forehead.

“Those displayed on the poles have been slow to come to the new teachings of the Temple. They don’t give up god easy around here,” Carzel said. “Which is why, Slayer, I think it would be best that you take the swiftest ship to the Golden Shore and be very prudent about returning, especially if you were to, let us say, inadvertently bring some lost beings with you.”

“You don’t want the gods back?” Celestaine asked and the whole room sucked in a breath between its collective teeth.

“Heaven forfend, I have never said and never will say such a thing,” Carzel stated flatly and with loud, clear diction. She looked fit to spit a tack. “I say that I would not want to see you involved in such a thing.”

Adondra leaned forwards, composing her hands. “You want a Drake ship. There’s a captain in town I suspect of smuggling ora root among his trades and other materials of similar properties so he won’t be averse to paying passengers. Vakloz is his name. He taxes me and I want to tax him, especially on his ‘secret’ imports. I think you and he would get along very well. I believe he has connections on the Golden Coast that reach well inland and as far as the Islands of the Guloss Archipelago which is where you are headed. There is no end of territory out there in need of great heroism and mighty deeds. You can find him near the docks at the house of his mistress, the Lady Demadell.”

Celestaine glanced at Carzel who was drawing one finger slowly across her throat as the Archimandrite smiled and tapped his toes to some unheard music. Her gaze was flat and its meaning crystal clear. But to be sure she said, “Whatever you do, don’t bring anything back with you. Customs would take a dim view of anything they can’t quantify. We have lately appointed a young man of great ambition from Cherivell and he has firm views on paperwork. We however are very grateful—very grateful—for the gods’ final words. And we will do our utmost to see them carried through. People who fail to do so are clearly lacking in the most basic piety and will have to be regrettably detained or made examples of. Since the new rules have come into place the benefits to commerce and daily life in this city have been immense. I hope I’m being as clear as possible.”

“Better not come back at all, really,” the Archimandrite said dreamily. “Although if you could send them a message with our best wishes I would really appreciate that.”

Celestaine was dumbfounded. She hadn’t expected them not to want the gods back at all but it seemed that this is what was being said, or not being said. She’d been ready to fend off all kinds of demands and arguments, all kinds of pleading and hope, every situation under the sun, except this one.

“Pop along,” Adondra added. “There’s a good girl.”

Celestaine stepped forwards and put her hand down on the table with a loud clack. When she withdrew it several gemstones lay there, winking and glowing in the lamplight and shooting the odd rainbow ray thanks to a sudden shaft of late sun. She gathered her wits. “We do apologise for troubling you. I hope that this goes some way to assisting with city business.”

Carzel leaned forwards and picked out two gems, pushing the third towards Adondra. She looked at them, and then handed one back to Celestaine. “I will see that this goes to help the needy. Those are the people the Temple works for now. We are devoted to service and good works in honour of the departed gods and their final, very clear and explicit wish.”

“Be kind to each other!” the Archimandrite said, raising his hand and pointing at the sky with a beatific grin before lapsing back into a blissful doze.

Celestaine blinked. Had these people really gone all out for a godless world of service in such a short time? Even if it was enforced by draconian rule, was that so bad? She hesitated, then gave the spare gem to Adondra. “It’s for whatever is needed.”

Adondra took both jewels on her side of the desk and pocketed them. “Your good works are noted. Well, I’d like to be snarky about your generosity but there’s so much to be built that I won’t. Feel free to come and go as you please. Especially go. The longer you stick around the more people will think about Guardians and gods again. The Widow Demadell has a very good table I hear, and she likes to start at dusk. There. Is that enough niceness to satisfy you?”

“I just wanted…” Celestaine felt Heno kick her ankle. “Yes. Thank you.”

They were escorted out. In the narrow hall Carzel caught up with them and snagged Celestaine’s arm. “Listen, Slayer. It’s not that we’re not all grateful but I’m just going to put this out there for you to think about. ‘Be kind.’ In your experience is that the sort of thing that the gods who left here, and left the Guardians, you know, like Wall and the Kinslayer—d’you think that ‘be kind’ is what they would choose for their lasting legacy? D’you think that’s really who he heard through Cinnabran’s skull? I’m just saying. Think about it.” She put her finger on her nose and then pointed at Celestaine and then at the Yoggs, one at a time. She gave them the thumbs up sign plus a very exaggerated wink and then spun back into the state room.

“So—she’s saying they weren’t kind,” Nedlam said.

“Yes,” Heno said.

“Why is everyone talking like they aren’t saying what they’re saying all the time?” Nedlam scowled.

“In case the gods are listening, or someone with an axe and a grudge,” Celestaine said, thinking about it with a growing sense of unease and complicity. “The last two much more likely than the first.”

“It does my head in,” Ned said and shifted her hammer to the other shoulder.

Another delegation of quarrelling Cheriveni were already filing in two by two. The corridor smelled of too much perfume and nervous farts. Before the door closed they heard Adondra’s voice and the rap of her gavel calling them to order.

“What’s happening?” Celestaine asked them as they came back outside into the yard. She felt as if she had been summoned to see her mother for a dressing down and while she was all right with falling slowly out of favour as time passed, not able to trade on old glory, she was deeply irritated by the way they resented her when she had come, well, to be kind. A grinding sensation in her stomach made her wonder if she were right about kindness and doing the right thing. Amkulyah’s people—that had been better than terrible, when she had done all she could to return the wings. Hadn’t it? And here she was, not expecting thanks, but this all felt very unnecessarily resentful. She looked up at the kindly severed head of the unreformed Templar on its pike. “It’s just like before, only… very slightly different. Is everyone mad?”

“Dunno,” Nedlam said, “but she said something about dinner at the Widow’s house. Do you think they can cook like Bukham?” She licked her tusks.

“I think that went as well as you could have hoped,” Heno said, clearly having hoped it wouldn’t happen at all. “They said we could have a ship. They didn’t ask for explanations. They even told us where to get one.”

“But I gave them a fortune,” Celestaine said, still puzzled.

Heno put his hand on her shoulder as they walked out of the building. “At least they didn’t ask where it came from. Smarter than that. But also, smart enough to wonder if someone’s coming to find you for it, you not being in possession of a mighty fortune all by yourself and having a reputation for killing things,” he said and shifted his shoulders uneasily inside his long dark coat. “Let’s get moving while we’re lucky. That priest might already be sending a word to this Widow about getting rid of us permanently.”

The grinding sensation eased. Heno was right, Celestaine realised. She’d been so focused on thinking of what she might do for the best she hadn’t thought about what could happen for the worst. “All right,” she said. She felt quite back to herself; positive, focused, all because of danger’s thrill and it occurred to her for a moment, that all her works may in fact be aimed right at creating these situations, so she could be what she was, free to move without second guesses. It was a fleeting thought and it flitted fast, swept away by necessity. “But first we need to find the others.”

 

 

BUKHAM WAS STANDING in the low roofed room that was Rofuel’s Ilkand Bank, his mouth half open as he looked at the table where the ruby he had placed down was being examined by a series of experts in a deathly silence. He was awed by the order, the precision, the books and the sense of authority of the place.

There were actual walled vaults, with iron barred doors guarded by uniformed men bearing pikes and axes. There were scales of different sizes—some for coins, some for grain, some for raw metal nuggets—all of them in use, their arms tipping lazily one way, then another before the contents of a pan were bagged and labelled, then carried away by small men in a different uniform to the guards, but similar, cloth jerkins instead of leather over mail, their hands neat and clean, inked in places, their hair tied back or cut short and orderly. He felt a little bewildered, but in a good way. He was following what they were all doing and had realised that a bank was an amazing thing.

At Taib Post the wealth was kept by individuals and regulated by the honesty of their relationships with the matriarchs. It was all rather vague and only the patriarch had a clue as to what the totals might be at any one time. Here there was an incredible order and an exacting system of valuation. Bukham had become expert at understanding the value of a vegetable at any point in the year—depending what it was, its condition, its scarcity and its popularity. He had considered the future value of vegetables only as far as his sense of the weather’s consistency ran. He fondly remembered the day he had understood how money worked, and how he could translate the value of a coirib bean into the value of crabapples directly through copper scits.

Here in the bank they were not only able to say what his jewel was worth in terms of scits and pollys but in terms of anything at all, and any combination of things—they had a ledger, continually adjusted by their reviews of supply and demand. Here, at the bank, he saw them talk in terms of things called futures and the values of land and buildings as collateral. He saw them chat over ten ways to consider lending and whether interest was robbery and how to tailor loans carefully to any kind of customer, whatever they thought about interest.

He was so absorbed in this incredible expansion to his repertoire of trading techniques that as he watched his jewel turned he lost track of Lysandra and Kula, thinking them paying attention like he was. It was only when Murti tugged on his sleeve and murmured, “I think we’ve lost some of our party,” that he looked up and realised they were nowhere to be seen.

 

 

THEY HAD BEEN bored as soon as they entered the bank with its quiet and order and had gone out the doors to wait in the much more interesting street. At first they had walked up and down, looking at the windows—Kula had never seen a glassed window before and they amused themselves pulling faces at their reflection until a woman came out yelling and chased them away with a broom. A few doors down a delightful smell revealed a bakery and they went inside, watched other people hand over coins for what they wanted and then looked over what they had in their pockets. Lysandra could only find a ring with a green stone in it which looked like it was close to the copper and silver coins. She held that out when their turn came.

Outside in the warm afternoon sun they sat together on a bit of grass at a corner where four streets somehow turned into five streets and tried to share a pie so large that even with a huge chunk in both hands for each of them there was still most of it left. The pie was meats in a fruit-rich, thick sludge of a gravy, and so good that they stuffed themselves, smiling at the people who paused to stare at them and point and laugh. When some ragged little children turned up they gave them pie and Lysandra also broke up the crusts and handed this out to passing rats, who ran off at first as they were used to fleeing for their lives but then, sensing a moment of rare fortune, stayed to gorge themselves and leap for new treats. Lysandra soon discovered that a rat would jump very high, even somersault, if there was a piece of beefy pastry in it for them, and that they would also run up her arms and sit on her head or hide in her pockets. Soon there was quite a crowd.

“Here, what’s going on?” A small, filthy man in leathers pushed his way to the front. At the sound and sight of him the children fled, laughing and shrieking, shouting things as they went. He was Ilkand stock, with a grubby Temple badge stuck upside down to his jerkin. “Stand back, I’ve vermin to collect. Get up there and stand away.” He had a net on a stick and a long rod with a sharp, poking end much stained with mud and gore. There was also a wriggling sack on his back and he had a smell which gave him all the room he wanted far faster than his vocal demands. He peered suspiciously at Lysandra.

“Soft in the head, eh?”

She smiled and held out to him the last chunk of the pie which had been resting on her knee. It was as big as two hands. A gob of the filling dropped out of it and landed on the ground, immediately seized on by three rats who had been investigating the bizarre tangles and lengths of her skirting.

The ratcatcher’s eyes bulged, torn between two conflicting imperatives.

“An entire Hunter’s Bludgeon,” a woman said from the crowd with great envy. “An’ they’ve eat the whole thing. Enough for a family of five.”

“What’s she wearing though?” asked another. “She must be a lady.”

“Not any lady behaves like that,” said a man with disgust.

Lysandra got up suddenly with a single motion, like a doll being lifted by strings. She held out the pie to the ratcatcher as rats sped in all directions, causing a few bystanders to squeal as their feet were dashed over. “Well, perhaps they should,” she said in a pleasant tone.

He took the pie silently and brought it to his mouth as if he expected it to explode with rats but it was clean enough and there was no room for a rat. In a moment he was too busy eating to bother with anything else, although he looked this way and that with ferocious intent, as if marking every scurrying body’s whereabouts for later.

Lysandra bent to wipe her hands in the grass and to flick a crumb of pastry off Kula’s chin. “We need winter clothes,” she said, bringing her hand up with gems in it. A particularly large grey rat was still riding on her shoulder, sitting on its hind legs, hands composed in cleaning its whiskers, ears perked. Lysandra addressed everyone, “Where do we buy those?”

“I know!” A young woman stepped forwards quickly and beckoned. She was dressed in handsome leather gear with a brown knitted scarf around her head and neck through which long, dark hair came in uneven tufts. Her belt had a dagger and a purse on it and she wasn’t as dirty as many who were grumbling now the street was blocked. “Kifti Fulp’s Furs and Leathers. It’s not fancy but it’s really well made. And she has some Ystachi working for her. They do the best light mail underlays. Are you going far?” As she moved in closer to Lysandra she hissed quietly, “You need to get moving, words are all over town by now that a rich madwoman is handing out jewels for nothing. Let’s go. Quickly!”

Lysandra took the arm she was offered and Kula picked up her other hand. Suddenly there was a loud screeching beside them that made everyone jump. A boy who had tried to pick Kula’s pockets as she was watching their new friend was leaping around with a rat attached to his gloved finger. It let go as he waved it about and used his shoulder as a springboard to dive back onto the girl’s dress and scurry back down where it had come from. Kula turned and thumbed her nose at him as he yelled about being bitten. He had a knife out in his hand in an instant but a squeaking at his feet made him pause as rats appeared and seethed in a mass suddenly, surging towards him in an arrow shaped wave, whiskers angrily raised over yellowed teeth. He turned and fled as the ratcatcher, still chewing, started to flail around with his net in a big show of determination that captured not a single beast.

Meanwhile a small but fixated entourage was trailing them. Downstreet and upstreet they went at a barely respectable distance. Their new friend took them past streets of modest homes, along the paths where canals were thick with narrowboats overhung by tottering tenements and vast warehouses. They went along narrow ginnels between fenced gardens and wealthy estates, crossed several broad squares with riverside moorings attached where day sailboats and dainty yachts were moored alongside splendid merchantmen and then across the great arch of the Temple Bridge with shops all the way along its length and a tiny temple at the peak, draped in flowers and messages that travellers left to name and search for people lost in the war. Every step brought a new gawker. At last they went up the winding tailor’s ways, through the bolt market, the retinue gathering mass from retters and linenmakers, buttoneers and lacemakers, spinners, carders and tanners until they reached the furriers’ store at the end with its heavy, iron-studded door. Then Lysandra, Kula and their new friend who introduced herself as Mags Broadaxe of the Ilkand Broadaxes, (smiths and ironwrights, do call in if you need any metalwork doing or are in want of weapons), went inside beneath the heavy wooden plate marked with various runes and letters declaringthem welcome to Fulp’s Skins and Hides in several languages, all misspelled and, in one case, offensively so.

Inside the shop Mags carefully closed the door and clicked her fingers in the face of a staring shop boy. “Fetch the Mistress!”

Lysandra looked about. “Mags,” she said. “How does shopping work?”

 

 

KULA STOOD, AMAZED as the women talked over her head. She had never thought there were this many animals in the entire world. Every wall and surface was covered in piles of fur, leather and scale. Some of it massive. The walls held entire suits of clothing made from these things in various sizes and there were open chests filled with knapsacks and harnesses, gleaming with buckles and studs. Everywhere she looked there were finely made things she didn’t even have a name for.

The entourage gathered outside to look through the open shutters. A disgusting reek of boiling leather from the vats in the back yards wafted around them, causing a few to abandon the post while the more tenacious pressed inward at the door to get a better view. At the back various officials and guards craned their necks and pushed people around for lollygagging and other unprosecutable offences against the public wayfares.

 

 

IT WAS THIS sea of backs and the back of heads that Bukham found when he finally tracked them down, Murti and the ratcatcher chatting behind him all the way. There was no way to get closer and although he was tall and imposing as an Oerni, taller than most, nobody was bothered about giving him a special view, so he had to crane and peer until Lysandra and Kula emerged from the door. They, he noticed, got a kind of hopeful avenue opening before them which let them out.

They were wearing long, fur-lined coats and carrying heavy packages wrapped tightly and bound up with cord. Without a second thought Lysandra dumped these into Bukham’s arms and then looked around, casually picking at her teeth with a forefinger. She seemed satisfied that her work was done.

“Where’ve you been?” he asked, not sure it was going to be answered as so far—and he only noticed this now—everyone had always talked about and around Lysandra and the girl, and never to them. They hadn’t expected her to understand or answer, because when they first met her she had shown no ability or interest in doing so. But here she was, in a white arctic fur coat that couldn’t have been handed over for nothing. With nearly a shop’s worth of heavy, oiled and treated gear that weighed enough for a good few people.

She glanced at him, “Shop’n”. She was looking at him as if he was a bit slow. Her gaze roved around, searching for a new interest. She smiled vaguely at Murti and tapped the top of the corded bundle, pointing at him to show she’d got him something.

“This man says…” Bukham began, turning for support to the ratcatcher only to find he was gone. “You were…” He looked at the number of people following his every word raptly. “Did you spend everything?”

“Mmn,” Lysandra continued to fuss with a recalcitrant piece of something in her molars.

“But…” Bukham felt weak, physically weak. The wealth. The value. He didn’t know how to explain it to her. He wondered what Celestaine was doing and where she was but in that he didn’t have to wonder long because he heard her shout them from the corner and turned to see Nedlam giving him a wave.

“Lysandra, is this a friend of yours?”

He turned back and found a small human woman looking up at him. He looked at Lysandra and back at the woman who held out her hand.

“Broadaxe,” she said. “Mags Broadaxe, of the Ilkand Broadaxes.”

“Bukham of the Taib Gathering,” he replied automatically, shaking her hand.

“We thought you were never coming back,” she said, as if she knew him. “Your caravan still wandering?”

“We are, although we have been…” He was cut off by Celestaine’s arrival. The two Yoggs had got most of the street traffic plastered to the shop walls on either side, making a show of looking anywhere but at them.

“Hey, Bukham,” Celestaine said, affecting not to notice Heno’s coat was clearing the area on its own because of the way it marked him out as a Heart Taker, only the truly drama-loving able to stay within earshot of them now. “Who’s your pal?” She smiled at Broadaxe and bent down to greet Kula and offer her some kind of sweets which the girl took shyly but with distinct gratitude.

“Broadaxe,” said the woman and they shook hands in some complicated way that made them both laugh. “Ironwork and swords. Fine weapon you have there, Slayer.”

“It’ll do,” Celestaine grinned. “Got all the coats already, Buk? Fast work.”

He was about to explain what had happened when a carriage came along the lane at a fair speed, drawn by a dashing pair of lunnox whose beards and foot feathers flowed like white water around them as they pranced. They drew a small buggy with two large wheels and a towering canopy of purple silk beneath which a lady in emerald green and mink was seated and wasted no time departing as it drew level with Celestaine.

“You must be the Fernreame Champion. Celestaine the Fair!” The woman had a powerful voice, strongly Ilkand accented and with the plush tones of someone used to getting their way. “My dear, how splendid to see someone of your stature and experience at one of our finest institutions.”

Bukham remembered to close his mouth as he surveyed this extra person. She was tall and well-built, strength and flesh combined in a way that had an authority of its own, like the great cattle of the Demri Plains. She had dark hair, curled and combed in lush coils that lay heavily over the deep emerald green of her fine, fur trimmed coat. Mink frothed daintily in veiling an immensely impressive bosom and extended the breadth of her hips below her corseted waist. Her skirts were almost as thickly pleated as Lysandra’s dress.

“Permit me to introduce myself,” she said. “I am Vantari Demadell. The Governor has appraised me of your arrival in our delightful city and mentioned your need of a vessel.” Her gaze swept them all up, like a civilising broom, and under her appraisal Bukham felt himself taller, better, surprised at his own agreeability as though he had always been a fine fellow and only now noticed it. Heno and Nedlam straightened. Celestaine’s chin lifted. Lysandra smiled vaguely, Kula giggled. Murti cleared his throat and went pink about the ears. Bukham saw Deffo sidling out of the crowd and edging forwards though he wasn’t spared a look.

“In the light of the great generosity shown to the citizens here I would like to extend my hospitality and the use of my connections in obtaining a vessel and crew for your occasion. Please, when you are ready, do join me at my home. I will leave my servant with you. He will show you the way. Good day, Ms Broadaxe.”

She didn’t wait for a response but used the gangway given to Lysandra to sweep majestically back to the carriage, not a second glance at the Yoggs or Bukham, as if she saw their like every day. Her presence allowed the bystanders to come closer, and the tension in the air lifted.

Bukham looked around. Nedlam was grinning, for some reason.

“Care to explain?” Celestaine asked, looking at Bukham, curiosity in every line of her face. She peered at Murti. “Is this your doing?”

Murti shrugged and held out his empty hands. “Things fall in place when the time is right.”

Celestaine’s nose twitched. “If you’re on homily time then we are in trouble. I think things fall in place when the Governor can’t wait to see the back of you. Bukham?”

“I was in the bank,” he said. “But they couldn’t change the money because they didn’t have enough so… she, they, came out and…”

“Got the things,” Lysandra said, successfully flicking a piece of fibrous vegetation off the end of her finger into the road now that she’d got it out of her teeth. She patted the parcel Bukham was holding. “All there.”

“But I think she spent all the money,” Bukham murmured to Celestaine as quietly as he could. “On a pie and some coats.”

Celestaine glanced around Lysandra to where Kula had got into a game of jacks with some local children, all of them crouching in the dirt in complete focus as the adults around them went on with whatever boring things they were doing. They were betting coloured pebbles. She was using diamonds and pearls. “I see?”

Lysandra frowned. “I did. I bought a bakery and a leather shop and an ironwrights.”

“What?” Bukham said.

Lysandra took a deep breath with an air of fortifying herself for a difficult explanation to the mentally challenged. “I bought a bakery. All the people will run it just as before and deal with all of the things, but now every time we come here, we can have pie. And I bought a leather shop, so we can all have clothes and a smithy, so we can get metal things. Not just once. Always. Mags told me how the things work. She will be running my metalworks.”

“But what about the profits?” Bukham said, with the keen sense that the day was escaping him. It had started out quite well, but now it was definitely outpacing him.

“I can’t be doing with any of that,” Lysandra said. “I’ve no time for it. But as long as these people can manage I can get pie, clothes and whatevers. Now we will go buy a ship. Then we will have everything. Demadell knows a lot about ships if she speaks true. I will give her this coloured rock of no use at all and I will have a ship.” She grinned and her teeth were shockingly white against her plum coloured lips. Her gaze left no doubt that she was using simplified terms for Bukham’s benefit.

“But how… a few days ago you…”

“I was with you in the bank,” she said. “And in a minute I saw everyone was so busy trying to change the stone for coins and papers and gold and people’s goodwill and badwill. That’s all right for you and your money. But I don’t care about it. So I got the things. I thought it would save you a job.”

“…he said you had given them an emerald ring for a pie,” Bukham said.

“How many pies make a ring?” she asked and Murti started laughing so hard he had to hang onto his knees.

“A… lot?” Bukham suggested.

“Yes, I think a lot of pies,” Lysandra said and looked away from him, dismissing him kindly but firmly. He felt himself in his place and it was not where he thought it had been. He was supposed to be shepherding the mentally unsuited and now he was being organised by… he didn’t know what she was but the cautious way that Celestaine trod around her suddenly started to make more sense. “But you didn’t know anything about trade yesterday,” he persisted, not sure why he had to have answers but he did.

Lysandra glanced at him. “Yesterday.” She seemed lost in thought. “It was so long ago.”

There was enough distance in her gaze that it might have been an aeon ago. The sight of it made Bukham shiver. He watched her crouch down and gently tap Kula on the shoulder to get her attention. Kula left the pearls and diamonds on the ground, got up, a filthy piece of ribbon twirling about her fingers, and put her hand in Lysandra’s hand, ready to go.

“We’re off to see the Widow?” Nedlam said hopefully. “The one with the table.”

“I would never have picked you to want to live the high life,” Celestaine said to her, nodding and casting suspicious glances at Murti, who was intent on retying his sandal and showed no sign of even hearing the conversation.

“Heh,” Nedlam chuckled. “No harm in having a little taste of it though. You: show us the way!” She pointed at a man in grey livery, so quiet and still that he could have been a statue until this activated him.

He bowed and made a beckoning gesture. Nedlam picked up Lady Wall and gave a grin of satisfaction, Deffo just behind her, leaving Bukham to carry the purchases all by himself.

 

THE ENTOURAGE FOLLOWED the servant, and them, all the way through the town. By the time they reached their destination at a three-storey house overlooking the waterfront, the news of a Slayer who had brought wealth and patronage was on every other tongue within the walls. It had to compete with a story about a rat-charming witch who had conjured an infinite amount of pie from thin air and a child who would change pearls for stone. As Celestaine and her party were being welcomed as honoured guests of the Lady Widow Demadell, Governor Adondra was closing the last hearing of the day and listening to a fifth rendition of these tales with the strong, almost unbearable urge to slam her face onto the sturdy wooden table in front of her.

“Shall I send for her?” the Guard Captain of the Temple asked, wringing a glove in his hands as he felt the tension.

“No, no, don’t do anything to impede a speedy exit,” Adondra said. “And think of something that will discourage everyone within a hundred miles of coming here to seek their fortune. We have enough bother with those who are already present.” She glared at the deputation in front of her from the ferry service that ran between Ilkand and the strings of little islands that swung out to the Westerly Ocean. They were thrilled with the stories and pleased to see someone as important as the Governor and the Archimadrite with their problem but as she studied them more closely their worry and discomfort made her irritation with Celestaine began to fade and turn into a fond memory. She rapped her gavel upon the board and nodded to the Captain to begin.

“It’s about this hole in the world,” he said, awkward with having to say things he expected not to be believed. His hoarse, damaged voice was careful on each word. “I don’t think exactly that the sea is draining into it. But. There’s definitely things coming out of it.”

“Where is it?” Adondra said. “Is it a threat to Ilkand?”

“It’s out to the West of Varkadia Mountain, the one that’s always spoutin’. Big. Like the biggest whirlpool you’ve ever seen and it turns, but slow. It’s not water turning. It’s more like something inside the water. Below. And on the shore nearest to it, on the Varkady shores, we found this. It was among the wreckage of a big ship.”

He placed a signet ring on the table, respectfully.

Adondra picked it up. It bore the clear mark of Ilkand and the crest of Captain Neveth. “The Moon Runner,” she said. “The ship that the Kinslayer stole.” It was their largest and most well-made craft, a ship intended for crossing oceans and discovering worlds in order to bring most of them back in the hold.

“Aye,” said the Captain. “Matchwood now. Varkadians have been all over it, and their animals, so there’s no bodies to speak of.”

Adondra sighed. “Thank you, Captain Voran. I will convey the news to the families of the lost. You will be compensated for your find.”

“But what about the hole?” he asked and she met his gaze steadily.

It occurred to her that here was the stone for two birds. Maybe fortune was turning her way, she thought. “Mark its location on a chart and have it sent to this address with my note,” Adondra said and signalled for parchment and a quill. Under her breath she muttered, “If this doesn’t get rid of her then nothing will.”

The Archimandrite watched her with a comfortable expression. “The island is far away.”

“Far enough,” she agreed. “We will be sure to send no ships that way and lose almost nothing. Those who choose to go for the sake of adventure and discovery will do so at their own account. Voran, if you would keep me informed of any changes of state the hole may make the city would be glad to pay you for the trouble. In the meantime, your silence on the matter would be appreciated. Until we have more information.”

“Yes’m,” he said and took the paper she handed him. “I’ll do it right away.”

When he had gone Adondra turned to Carzel and the Archimandrite. “You are not to speak of this. Are we agreed?”

“What if she doesn’t return?” Carzel asked.

“She will,” Adondra said. “Those whom the gods wish to destroy they first make run a very long chain of errands into terrible dangers, and one dragon and one demigod slaughter is hardly a chain. There has to be a third link for that. She’ll be back.”

“Mmn,” the Archimandrite murmured reprovingly as he got up, leaning on Carzel, “I don’t think our gods would do anything like that to someone. Not very kind. In fact it sounds very much like spiteful envy to me.”

The gavel hit the table smartly. “Anyway, the day’s business is adjourned,” Adondra said. She paused, and sighed. “I suppose we could give her supplies.”

“Yes, I think that would be the least we could offer,” the Archimandrite said. “If we wanted to stay on the right side of things. Not to mention there is the hole that needs fixing.”

Adondra looked at him with caution. “What things? You mean you. And the Temple.”

“I mean the things,” he said. “All the things.” From a doze of negligent beaititude he was suddenly wide awake. There was such a presence about him, such a certainty—and she knew he wasn’t talking about gods. If there were more things about than gods, guardians and Ilkand city’s populations she didn’t want to know about them at that moment. Put it down to an old man’s fancy.

She closed her mouth in an uneasy line. “Well we’ll give her supplies and a ship if that tosspot Vakloz decides he can’t be bothered.”