by G. Howell
The revelation just hit me out of the blue. Leaving me staring at Chaeitch with my mouth hanging open and the frustration screaming inside me like a single grating note.
“What?” he squeaked. His head was twitching, his eyes darting around my face. “Mikah? What are you talking about?”
I looked at him, then past him, at Rris faces looking our way as crew started to noticed something going on with their weird passenger; at a Mediator whose fear was obviously turning to bristling fury. And I deflated, the rage running out of material to burn and dwindling to a dull, hot lump. “It’s... nothing,” I croaked as I turned away.
“Nothing?” He sounded incredulous, and when he moved I could hear a ticking of his toe claws above the creak of ropes and sails and wood. “Nothing? You’ve… you just insulted a Mediator; you were snarling about someone using you... And your face has gone a peculiar color...”
“Chaeitch,” I said quietly. “I think if I told you, they would kill you.”
His mouth shut with an audible clop
I flexed my hands and heard my knuckles crackling as I clenched fists. “But I can tell you this: when I see that bastard Shyia again, I’m going to break his nose.”
His ears were flat. “You’re right,” he said. “I don’t want to know anything about that.”
Water slipped by under the hull. The lake wasn’t big: little waves were all the wind had time to coax from the surface and they spattered against the prow. There was some shouting of orders and the deck tilted slightly as the steersman brought the ship around a little, the sails and booms turning as the bow pointed a little more south. I stared back at the smudged line on the receding skyline and snarled in an expression that any Rris would recognize instantly.
“You should calm down,” Chaeitch said quietly.
“I am calm,” I choked. “I’m very calm.”
There was a pause. “Sometimes… sometimes I really don’t think I understand you,” he said.
I looked. His ears were still down and he was eying me with the expression I was accustomed to seeing on Rris who’d just met me. I sighed. “I am calm,” I repeated. “I’m not going to do anything.”
His head twitched, his eyes going past me. I turned, expecting a problem. And it was there, in the form of Rohinia stalking around the wheelhouse. I tensed as he approached, padding across the deck, but he looked… relaxed, quite placid. When he stopped it was a respectable distance, and he nodded to Chaeitch, “Ah ties,” he acknowledge him, then regarded me calmly and finally raised a hand to beckon me. “Mikah, if you would please,” he growled in his rasping tone and gestured for me to come with him. “We need to talk.”
I didn’t move.
“Please,” Chaeitch whispered to me, his voice almost a squeak. “Don’t. Not here.”
I nodded slowly, then gritted my teeth and followed the Mediator back along the deck. We rounded the rear cabin, to the deck space where the huge spar of the rear mast was set. Jenes’ahn was there. She watched me with her eyes almost pure black and her ears trembling. That was a good sign, I thought: if I’d been due a grilling then she’d be a good deal more self-satisfied. Wouldn’t she?
“See we’re not disturbed,” Rohinia told her. She gestured acknowledgement and then she and a few curious crewmen watched as I ducked my head through the hatchway and followed him below.
The cabin at the end of the hall was a great deal more spacious than the little cupboard I’d got. Across the rear of the cabin, across the stern of the ship, were real windows of lattices of small diamond-shaped panes. There was polished wood paneling everywhere along with glass-fronted paintings and charts on the wall and colorful rugs on the floor. Cabinets fronted with bottle-green bullseye-panes contained books and a huge range of little knick-knacks: a brass spyglass, little figurines and carvings, polished stones and silver combs, a magnifying glass in a brass mount, various books and small boxes… trinkets really. A white and grey tapestry woven to depict what looked like winter hunting scenes partially concealed a box-bed recessed into a bulkhead while over in the light coming in through the windows was a small writing desk. All around items clicked and rattled and there was a constant low creaking as the ship moved beneath my feet. It smelled of wood and pitch and dampness and Rris living in close quarters and there still wasn’t quite enough overhead for me to stand upright.
“Close it,” Rohinia rasped at me, gesturing to the door.
I slapped it with a hand, hard enough so it slammed shut and the brass latch clicked into place. He sat himself down on the desk, sitting cross-legged and for a few seconds we stared at each other.
“And just what was that about?” he asked.
“Did you know what he was doing?” I asked right back.
“He?”
I took a deep breath, to keep the anger back. “Your protégé, Shyia.”
Rohinia just tipped his head, just a couple of degrees, as if showing polite interest. “And what has he been doing that has upset you so?”
“You were his mentor. I think you know damn…very well what he’s done. You probably taught him.”
“Quite likely. However, these lessons were quite extensive. Perhaps you could be more specific?”
He was laughing at me. The fucker was actually patronizing me! I twitched as I tried to stop my hands knotting into fists again. “Does the Guild know what he did?” I hissed through clenched teeth. “Does the Guild know he set everything up? That he was setting one faction against the other? Do they know he gave me over to them? That he used me to get to them?”
“Ah,” he said mildly. He held up a hand, inspecting the claw of his index finger. “Used you? How?”
“He thought I would solve a problem.”
“He did defend you.”
“Only for his own profit. He nearly started a civil war!”
“Huhn. That does not seem to have happened, so it may be fairer to say he prevented a war, a?”
“No…”
“In fact, there was a most unfortunate accident which seemed to remove some individuals who had some radical ideas about the direction the Guild should have gone. Are you saying this was arranged? That it wasn’t, in fact, an accident?” If he’d been human, perhaps he’d have raised an eyebrow.
“I didn’t say that,” I said.
“Huhn,” he rumbled again and those eyes just regarded me with inhumanly dispassionate amber appraisal. “If such a thing was suspected,” he said quietly, “then things could get confused. There would almost certainly have to be an investigation; a formal enquiry. There would be questions asked. The death of so many Mediators was a terrible thing. If anyone was implicated, then what they would go through would make your past meetings with the Tribunal seem like a pleasant talk in the garden.” That was how I translated it, at least.
He flicked his hand in something that could be a dismissive gesture. “Not likely to happen. But, sir, it would be best if you didn’t frighten Jenes’ahn like that again. She is young and can also be impulsive. It could be dangerous for you.”
I stared, incredulously. “Before or after I pitched her over the side?”
And he reacted to that. Just a quick twitch, but I saw it. And he was quiet for a few long heartbeats before lowering his muzzle in a gesture that wasn’t a nod. “I start to see what he meant,” he said quietly. “I don’t think most people would say something like that. Not to a Mediator.”
No. I suspect it’d have been like a 14th century human telling the local archbishop he thought this whole God thing was a load of poppycock and he’d just get along with living his life and being good to people on his own, thank you very much. It just wasn’t something normal people would do.
“You might have noticed I’m not most people,” I retorted. “That’s the way your Guild does business, is it? Following the law when it
suits them?”
He grinned briefly, flashing me a jaw full of gleaming white fangs. “Perhaps when the criminals write down rules they will follow, then we will do the same. Until then... well, our methods have worked for hundreds of years.”
“What’s good enough for my great, great, grandsire is good enough for me.”
He dipped his muzzle a little and said, “Exactly.”
I was being facetious, but it didn’t seem to translate. I snorted. “I’ve heard that before. From individuals and institutions. A lot of them follow their traditions into history when, for example, their grandsires’ bows and arrows meet some new upstart’s guns.”
“Hun,” his muzzle furrowed and he rumbled thoughtfully, a sound that was echoed in the low creaking of the ship. “We have found that often the best bonds are the ones that people build for themselves. It is an established method, an old method, and I believe the solution addressed the issue at hand. In fact, while I’m not privy to the Tribunal’s decision making, I do believe that allowances were made for you. In fact, they still are: there are more than a few in the Guild who don’t have much patience for upstarts like you.
“And Shyia, for all his faults, is an excellent Mediator. And I don’t think you will ever know exactly what he’s done for you.”
“For me or to me?”
He stared, then without blinking continued: “He’s had his own orders. Somehow, he was not able to fully execute them because you escaped. That hasn’t often happened to his assignments. Later, that situation resolved itself in ways that meant you received a stay of execution. Do you understand this?”
“And that was all because you were incapable of keeping your own house in order,” I snapped. “You spread lies and fear just to try and cover the fact that your Guild was falling apart. People died because of that. There are two women who aren’t going home because of your little games. There were fires that destroyed peoples’ homes and livelihoods. And then he drew Chihirae into it! He threatened her! He called her… leverage! Something to use against me!”
“Huhn,” he growled and his head went back while he still watched me. “Huhn, so that’s what this is about, is it? Your teacher?”
The slow burning rage was abruptly drenched by an icy chill. I wondered if I’d said too much.
He made a sound that might have been a smothered chitter or just a snort. “Even I could see that reaction. But he was right, wasn’t he: you would put her ahead of your own safety.”
“It’s not something I’d expect you to understand,” I growled.
“There are people saying it’s because you owe her,” he said. “She helped you, so you feel you are obligated to her. A simple transaction.”
I didn’t answer.
“But that’s not it, is it,” he continued thoughtfully. “You would do it because, it’s something you feel. Not something you can explain. Perhaps in the same way a mother might protect her cubs.”
Again I didn’t say a word, but he could probably see the muscles in my jaw clench.
“It would seem to me that the best way you could protect her would be to cooperate with us,” he said. “I’m not threatening her; we have no intention of involving or harming her, but if you cause disruptions and prove to be unruly, then that could result in the involvement of people who would.”
“You would call them?”
“No. The Guild would replace us with other options. I think you have to realize that while you have relied upon her for so much, she is just as reliant upon you.”
I remembered what I’d been told in the Guild. “If I’m not there, then there’s no reason for her to be there?”
He cupped a hand. “A. I don’t think the Land-of-Water government would think twice about simply withdrawing any sponsorship she may have. No home, no money, no support…I would think it would be very difficult for a mere teacher to find her way in a strange city without it. It’s not something we have control over.”
“But you could,” I said.
He inclined his head slightly. “A, we could. There would have to be [something].”
“That is a word I don’t know. [something]?”
“Huhn, extraordinary; special; not usual. [something]. Does that make sense?”
Extenuating, I guessed. “Yes. Very well, then; what would these circumstances be?”
“Perhaps an agreement,” he said, looking like there should be some yellow feathers poking from the corner of his mouth. “A deal.”
It didn’t take a damn genius to see where this was heading. “A deal,” I echoed.
“A. We will not involve the teacher. She will be free to do what she wills and no member of the Guild will use her as leverage.”
“And I will…”
“In exchange, scenes such as the one that just occurred, won’t. You won’t argue or fight with us, especially not in public spaces.”
I stared, hard. “Do you have authority to offer that?”
The Mediator hesitated, then waved a shrug. “For now, a. I can offer that. While our results are favorable this will stand. Should we be seen to be failing, though, then I cannot say what directions attitudes will take.”
Guild politics again. If Shyia’s decisions were seen to be not working, then the Guild would try another approach. I wondered how that sort of approach worked for long-term issues. “So in fact you can’t promise anything.”
The deck tilted as the ship made an adjustment in its course. I heard timbers creaking and all around the cabin accoutrements clinked and rattled. I shifted my weight and Rohinia also moved easily, not even seeming to notice as the light coming in the rear windows shifted a little. “I can assure you that while we are assigned to you, this will be guaranteed,” he rumbled.
“But nothing beyond that,” I said dryly. That sort of contract was about as watertight as a sieve.
An ear flicked. “It was a suggestion that may make this situation easier for all. We are assigned to you, so anything that can reduce the scratching and arguing seems to be a good idea. And I think we may be a better option for you than some of the other suggestions that have been put forward.”
I had a good idea of what those suggestions had been.
“If you are capable of tolerating our presence and cooperating, then I think that would be the best thing for the teacher as well. What do you think?”
I gritted my teeth. “I think that you are Shyia’s teacher. There is something else going on here.”
A languid shrug. “There could well be. I did teach that one his skills. He does what is required, but his… mannerisms are his own.”
I stared at him, trying to read something. His furry face was broad and grizzled, the fur coarse and speckled with grey and there were a couple of patches where it didn’t lie quite right. Scars of some kind. The one across his throat was far more conspicuous, but half my face was a damned scar so that didn’t impress me. He regarded me with a calm, composed expression, blinking placidly, and I realized it was that mask that all the Mediators wore. His may have been more refined, but it was there.
“I have conditions,” I said. “Three of them.”
“I will listen,” he replied. “There are no promises though.”
“First, Chihirae is left out of any dealings. She is not to know of this; she is not to be involved or drawn into business proceedings in any way. I don’t even want to hear her name mentioned or her alluded to in a manner that may be considered threatening or coercive by the Guild or its associates. And this agreement will be made with the Guild, not just with you. If someone else takes your position, then this contract will continue.”
His eyes narrowed slightly. “That will have to meet with Guild approval, but I believe... it will be acceptable. Second?”
“If anything happens to me, for whatever reason, m
ake sure Chihirae is looked after. I mean, give her protection, money, shelter, food, transport… whatever she needs to get back to Lying Scales or whatever else she desires. Keep her safe.”
He scratched at a wrist. Thoughtfully, it looked like, but his expression didn’t change. “That is agreeable,” he said. “And third?”
“I want to punch Shyia in the face.”
Now he tipped his head and for a few seconds he just stared before saying, “That is… not so agreeable.”
I shrugged; just a jerk of my shoulders. I hadn’t expected much more. “It was worth a shot.”
“Huhn?” his ears flicked again and then he snorted. “Huh, no. That I will not agree to, but the former we can do. Do we have a deal?”
How much of this was a setup? Had it been planned? Good cop, bad cop? That would be their style. But even if it was, it was something that could help Chihirae. The ship creaked quietly, footsteps pattered overhead and sailors’ cries drifted in through the windows while I thought, then nodded. “All right. Deal.”
“Would you like to have that agreement in writing?” he asked, a little patronizingly I thought.
“Is there any point?” I enquired. Words are cheap, I knew that: a verbal agreement is worth the paper it’s written on, but when dealing with an organization that has the power to veto government decisions... what would be a guarantee? “If you did break your word, who would enforce it?”
A crease formed in his muzzle and a caught a glimpse of white, a flash of an incisor as a side of his muzzle twitched up. “You know, that is part of our charter. We are [obliged] to adhere to official contracts.”
“It would be official?”
“A,” he said. “It will be notarized and sealed and copies will be held by the Guild and by any government archive you choose.”
I didn’t know if he was blowing smoke or if it was true. It would be something to find out, but for now… “Okay. All right,” I growled. “Do it.”