by Gregory Ashe
Chapter 12
Ilahe rounded a bend of the road, heart pounding from the run and from sudden fear. If Ticar had been robbed, it would be her fault, and she might lose her best chance to enter the city unobserved. She pushed herself forward, her braids and the black mourning cloths soaked with sweat, and cursing her own indifference earlier. If she had just done the job she had promised to do . . . She could no longer afford the casual indifference of a high-born, Ilahe reminded herself.
The wagon came around the next bend before she could reach it, and Ilahe stopped to catch her breath as it approached. Everything looked to be alright, although Ticar’s normally cheerful face was set in a glower. She had let him down. He’s a blind-fool man, she thought, and a smuggler and Khacen on top of it. His good humor, though, and his kindness had kept her from starving on the road. She should have done what she had agreed.
“You’re back,” he said as the wagon passed Ilahe. She turned and started walking to keep pace.
“Just wanted to scout and see if there were any ambushes,” Ilahe said. Let him think that’s all she had meant to do.
Ticar shook his head and cracked the reins. The horse broke into a faster walk, and Ilahe found herself trotting to keep up. “Gamid never went ahead unless we discussed it first,” he said. “There are risks to that; we always discussed it first.”
Panting, Ilahe said, “Don’t suppose you’d mind slowing down?”
Ticar did not answer.
Ilahe trotted alongside, a stitch in her ribs burning as she tried to catch her breath. “I’m sorry,” she muttered, barely audible over hoof beat and wagon wheel.
With a small smile, Ticar pulled back on the reins and the horse slowed to its regular pace. They went another hundred paces in silence. Ilahe sucked in air and wiped sweat from her face and neck. She hated that foreign sun.
“I suppose you did come back,” Ticar said. “I’d thought you gone for good.”
“Need my pay,” she said.
If she hadn’t been watching for it, she would have missed his slight flinch. “Not regular, my girl,” he said. “This is not regular at all. Gamid would have been paid once we were safely inside the city. You have already run off once.”
“Scouting,” she said.
“Yes, my girl, scouting,” he said, although his face remained skeptical.
Ilahe slowed and let the wagon pass her, then jumped in the back. Ducking under the canvas cover, she maneuvered her way between the crates. Ilahe sat on one crate, drew a dagger, and wedged it under the crate’s lid.
“Here now, my girl,” Ticar said, his face aflame to match his red-gold hair, “what are you doing? Those are my goods, my girl.”
“Yes,” Ilahe said. “I think I’m going to take my pay from here.”
“Grain?” Ticar said and let out a short, breathless laugh. “Just a little grain and winter vegetables, my girl, nothing of worth to someone like you. Surely not to one who has studied so many skills, a woman as accomplished as yourself.”
“You don’t have winter here,” Ilahe said, prying at the lid. The nails squealed, as she had hoped. She had purposely chosen a different crate than the one she had seen Ticar put the cloth in. His nervousness told her this crate held something valuable as well. The wagon slowed, and Ticar clambered back toward her, under the canvas cover, hands stretching out as though to pull her away.
“Of course not, dear girl,” Ticar said, pressing lightly on the lid that Ilahe had pried halfway open. Ilahe waved at him with the dagger, and Ticar rose onto the balls of his feet, only the tips of his fingers still in contact with the crate’s lid. Ilahe resumed her work. “Not so hasty, dear girl, not so hasty. We do have winter vegetables, though—squash, it travels so well, and the city will be glad to have it. I will pay you well at the city!” His voice rose into a pleading screech at the end, although he remained on tip-toe, fingers barely pressing down on the wood.
Ilahe leaned back and sheathed her dagger. Only after a long moment did Ticar relax, sinking back to the balls of his feet, and then settling himself down fully. He continued to lean over, as though the delicate pressure of his fingertips would keep the lid in place. Ilahe repressed a smile. Blind as the black, this man, and weaker than she could have imagined. But a good heart.
“Do not lie to me, Ticar,” she said. “I saw the cloth that you tried to hide when we first met. You do not carry vegetables or grain. What is it? Celan silk?”
The flush vanished from the merchant’s face, and for a moment Ilahe thought he might faint. He collapsed onto another crate. “It is not silk,” he whispered. “It is Setin velvet.”
“Blindness,” Ilahe said, a cold smile coming onto her face. She had him now. “In all these crates?”
Ticar nodded. He looked like he had been struck a mortal blow.
“No wonder you’ve been so jumpy,” Ilahe said. “What possessed you to travel this far with a single guard?”
“I hoped to find anonymity,” Ticar said. “No one looks much at a lone man, or at a single guard. Bandits are rarely interested in food; the land is too fertile to make it worth their while. But those three men searched the crates, desperate for something they could sell, and Gamid was so angry; I would have made him a rich man if we had made it to Khi’ilan.” He looked up at her and asked, “What will you do now?”
Ilahe recognized the question behind those words; he thought she was going to kill him and take the cloth. It would be worth a small fortune, true, but she had more important things to worry about than money. “Me?” Ilahe said. “I’m not going to do anything. I imagine you’ll run into a bit of trouble when you get to the new gate at Khi’ilan. They do not look eager to let anyone through, and I cannot imagine they will believe your story about the foodstuffs. This is a city preparing for war.”
It was part exaggeration, part supposition, but her words did their job. Ticar’s eyes grew thoughtful, and he glanced from her to the crates. “And you have come back,” he said. “Because you could not pass the gate either. Or you do not wish to risk the gate.” He pursed his mouth, and for the first time, Ilahe saw the cunning in his gray eyes. Perhaps he was not as blind to the world as she had thought.
She grimaced, and his eyes lighted up with triumph. Ilahe cursed herself. “Perhaps,” she said. The word tasted foul in her mouth.
“And you have an idea,” Ticar said. “Else you would not have come back.”
Ilahe nodded again. The man was too quick, his guesses too accurate. She wondered what else he had figured out about her, and Ilahe wished she had kept more than her name from him.
“Well?” Ticar said.
“How much cloth do you have?” Ilahe said.
“These crates are perhaps three quarters cloth, and the top quarter is vegetables and grain. Hundreds of feet of cloth, my girl. Enough to make us both rich.”
Ilahe shook her head and said, “We will need to use some of it, I’m afraid. Do you have needle and thread?”
Ticar nodded, a smile coming onto his face. “What will you sew for us, my girl?”
Sewing; another skill that she had at least learned the basics of. Ilahe had thought that part of her life—her life as a Cenarbasin woman—was over; she had been happy that it was over. And it seemed she could not go a day without returning to the traditional Cenarbasin skills. She gritted her teeth before she answered.
“You, merchant, will need to dress a little better. I imagine you have some clothes hidden around here that you’ll wear when you go to sell your goods.”
He nodded and said, “My girl, the guards will not buy the cloth; they will not act like civilized men. I fear that if we try to bribe them, they will slit our throats and take it all.”
“No,” Ilahe said, “you will not be a merchant when we enter.”
Ticar glanced at her in surprise.
“You will be the servant of a great lady, traveling in disguise to avoid the violent passion of her lovers.”
The small man let out a guffaw
. “You spin tales like an Istbyan romancer,” he said.
“Exactly,” Ilahe said. “You have guessed correctly. I will be an Istbyan high-born.”
Ticar’s laughter dried up as suddenly as it had begun. He stared at her, his merchant-eyes evaluating her as though she were one more bolt of cloth. For the first time since leaving Cenarbasi, Ilahe was reminded of her too broad, mannish shoulders, of hands calloused from hours with the sword, of chest and stomach muscled and thick. Her cheeks felt hot, and she hoped her dark color would hide the blush.
“You?” Ticar said.