When he climbed into the tree he was glad he hadn’t tried to get over the wall. There were sharp things, thorns and broken glass, embedded in its top. One bough of the tree not only grew over the wall but was low enough that it had scraped the top smooth. That must have taken a long time, and no one had bothered to fix it.
Mother’s Mother had told him that kinless believed in a place they called Gift of the King, a place across the sea where they never had to work and no Lordkin could gather from them. The other side of the wall looked like that. There were gardens and big houses. Just over the wall was a pool of water. A big stone fish stood above the pool. Water poured from the fish’s mouth into the pool and flowed out of the pool into a stream that fed a series of smaller pools. Green plants grew in those pools. There were both vegetable and flower gardens alongside the stream. They were arranged in neat little patterns, square for the vegetable gardens, complex curved shapes along curved paths for the flower beds. The house was nearly a hundred yards from the wall, two stories tall, square and low with thick adobe walls, as large as the Placehold. The Gift of the King, but this was no myth. The Lords lived better than Whandall could have imagined.
It was late afternoon, and the sun was hot. There was no one around. Whandall had brought a dried crabapple to eat, but he didn’t have any way to carry water, and he was thirsty. The fountain and stream invited him. He watched while his thirst grew. No one came out of the house.
He wondered what they would do to him if they caught him. He was only a thirsty boy; he hadn’t gathered anything yet. The people outside the walls had glanced at him, then glanced away, as if they didn’t want to see him. Would the people in here do the same? He didn’t know, but his thirst grew greater.
He crawled along the tree branch until he was past the wall, then dropped into the grass. He crouched there waiting, but nothing happened, and he crept to the edge of the fountain.
The water was sweet and cool, and he drank for a long time.
“What’s it like outside?”
Whandall jumped up, startled.
“They don’t let me go outside. Where do you live?”
The girl was smaller than he was. She’d be eight years old or so, where Whandall was already eleven. She wore a skirt with embroidered borders, and her blouse was a shiny cloth that Whandall had seen only once, when Pelzed’s wife had dressed up for a party. No one in Whandall’s family owned anything like that, or ever would.
“I was thirsty,” Whandall said.
“I can see that. Where do you live?”
She was only a girl. “Out there,” he said. He pointed east. “Beyond the hills.”
Her eyes widened. She looked at his clothing, at his eyes and ears. “You’re Lordkin. Can I see your tattoos?”
Whandall held out his hand to show the serpent on the web of his thumb.
She came closer. “Wash your hands,” she said. “Not there; that’s where we get drinking water. Down there.” She pointed at the basin below the fountain pool. “Don’t you have fountains where you live?”
“No. Wells.” Whandall bent to wash his hands. “Rivers after it rains.”
“Your face too,” she said. “And your feet. You’re all dusty.”
It was true, but Whandall resented being told that. She was only a girl, smaller than he, and there was nothing to be afraid of, but she might call someone. He would have to run. There wasn’t any way out of here. The branch was too high to reach without a rope. The water felt cool on his face and wonderful on his feet.
“You don’t need to be afraid of me,” she said. “Now let me see your tattoo.”
He held out his hand. She turned it in both her hands and pulled his fingers apart to bare his serpent tattoo to the sun.
Then she looked closely at his eyes. “My stepfather says that wild Lordkin have tattoos on their faces,” she said.
“My brothers do,” Whandall said. “But they carry knives and can fight. I haven’t learned yet. I don’t know what you mean by ‘wild.’ We’re not wild.”
She shrugged. “I don’t really know what he means either. My name is Shanda. My stepfather is Lord Samorty.”
Whandall thought for a moment, then said, “My name is Whandall. What does a stepfather do?”
“My father’s dead. Lord Samorty married my mother.”
She’d spoken of her father to a stranger, without hesitation, without embarrassment. Whandall tasted words on his tongue: My father is dead; we have many stepfathers. But he didn’t speak them.
“Do you want something to eat?”
Whandall nodded.
“Come on.” She led him toward the house. “Don’t talk much,” she said. “If anyone asks you where you live, point west, and say ‘Over there, sir.’ But no one will. Just don’t show that tattoo. Oh, wait.” She looked at him again. “You look like someone threw clothes at you in the dark.”
Huh?
“Miss Batty would say that,” she said, leading him south around the house. “Here.” Clothes were hanging on long lines above a vegetable patch. The lines were thin woven hemp, not tarred. “Here, take this, and this—”
“Shanda, who wears this stuff?”
“The chief gardener’s boy. He’s my friend, he won’t mind. Put your stuff in that vat—”
“Is anyone going to see me who knows who we gathered it from?”
She considered. “Not inside. Maybe Miss Batty, but she never goes to the kitchen. Wouldn’t eat with the staff if she was starving.”
A band of men carrying shovels came around the house. One waved to Shanda. They began digging around the vegetables.
The gardeners were kinless, but they were better dressed than Lordkin. They had water bottles, and one had a box with bread and meat. A lot of meat, more than Whandall got for lunch except on Mother’s Day, and often not then. If kinless lived this well, how did Lordkin live here?
A Lordkin should have guile. Watch and learn…
Shanda led him into the back of the house.
CHAPTER
4
The house was cool. Shanda led him through corridors to a room that smelled of cooking. A fat woman with ears like a Lordkin’s stood at a counter stirring a kettle. The kettle frothed with boiling liquid. Whandall stared. The smells went straight to his hunger.
The counter she stood over was a big clay box. The top was an iron grill, and flames licked up through it, under a copper pot.
A fire, indoors, that didn’t go out. Squinting, he approached the yellow-white glare and lifted his hands to it. Hot. Yes, fire.
Shanda gave him the funniest look.
The fat woman looked at them with an expression that might have been menacing but wasn’t. “Miss Shanda, I got no time just now. Your daddy is having visitors. There’s a wizard coming to dinner, and we have to get ready.”
A wizard! But Shanda didn’t act surprised or excited. She said, “Serana, this is Whandall, and he’s hungry.”
The fat woman smiled. “Sure he’s hungry. He’s a boy, isn’t he? A boy’s nothing but an appetite and trouble,” she said, but she was still smiling. “Sit over there. I’ll get you something in a minute. Where do you live?”
Whandall pointed vaguely west. “Over there… ma’am.”
Serana nodded to herself and went back to the stove, but then she brought out a bowl and a spoon. “Have some of my pudding,” she said. “Bet your cook can’t make pudding like that.”
Whandall tasted the pudding. It was smooth and creamy. “No, ma’am,” Whandall said.
Serana beamed. “Miss Shanda, this is a nice boy,” she said. “Now scoot when you get done. I’ve got my work to do.”
After he finished the pudding, he followed Shanda down another corridor. The house was built around an interior courtyard, and they went upstairs to a long outside balcony over the atrium. There was a small fountain in the center of the courtyard.
There were half a dozen doors along the balcony. Shanda led him to one of them. “This is my roo
m.” She looked up at the sun. “It won’t be long until dark. Can you get home before night?”
“I don’t think so,” Whandall said.
“Where will you stay?”
“I can stay out in the chaparral.”
“In the thorns?’ She sounded impressed. “You know how to go into those?”
“Yes.” He grinned slightly. “But I don’t know how to get out of here. Will the guards stop me?”
“Why should they?” she asked. “But if you don’t come home tonight, won’t someone worry about you?”
“Who?”
“Your nurse… oh. Well, come on in.”
The room was neat. There was a closet with a door, and there were more clothes hung up in it than any of Whandall’s sisters had. There was a chest against one wall, and the bed had a wool blanket on it. Another blanket with pictures woven into it hung above the bed. There was a window that faced out on the balcony, and another on the opposite wall. That looked out on a smaller interior courtyard crisscrossed with clotheslines and drying clothes, more rope than Whandall had ever seen in one place. He eyed the clothesline with satisfaction. It looked strong, and there was so much they might not miss one piece. It would get him up to the tree branch. If he could take it home, it would make Resalet happy. They always needed rope at the Placehold. But he didn’t know the rules here.
“Could you really sleep in the thorns?” she asked. “How?”
“Without leathers you can’t go far into the chaparral,” Whandall said. “There’s a lot worse than thorn. You have to know what plants are safe. Most aren’t.”
“What are leathers? Where do you get them?”
“You need a leather mask and leggings, at least. Some kinless have them, and the foresters use sleeves and vests. I don’t know where my uncles got them. They must have gathered them.”
“But you don’t have any with you. There’s nobody in the room next to this. You can sleep there tonight.”
They ate in the kitchen at a small table in the corner. Serana put food in front of them, then went back to her stove. Other servants came in and Serana gave them instructions on what to do. Everyone seemed to be in a hurry, but there was no shouting, and no one was frantic.
There were more kinds of food than Whandall had ever seen for one meal. Serana arranged trays of food, eyed them critically, sometimes changed the arrangements. When she was satisfied, the servants came and took the trays out to another room where the adults ate. It was like… the gardens here, and the neat little fence around the Black Pit… it was orderly. Serana was making patterns with her cooking.
Whandall couldn’t take his eyes off the stove.
Once during dinner a tall woman with serious eyes and dark clothing looked into the kitchen. She nodded in satisfaction when she saw Shanda. “Did you study your lessons?” she demanded.
“Yes, ma’am,” Shanda said.
She fixed Whandall with a critical eye. “Neighbor boy?” she asked.
“From down the road,” Shanda said quickly.
“You behave yourself,” the woman said. She turned to the cook. “Did she get a good dinner?”
“I always make a good dinner for Miss Shanda, even when I’ve got guests to cook for,” Serana said huffily. “Don’t you worry about that.”
“All right. Good night.”
After she left, Shanda giggled. “Miss Batty’s not happy,” she said. “She wants to eat with the family, but they didn’t invite her tonight.”
“That’s as it may be,” Serana said. “Miss Bertrana’s all right. Not like that other nurse you had. You be nice to her.”
Miss Batty was kinless. Whandall was certain of it. He wasn’t quite as certain that Serana was Lordkin. And neither seemed to care much.
A servant came carrying a tray of dirty dishes. Some were piled high with uneaten food.
After dinner they went back to the balcony. The adults came out to the atrium to finish their own dinner. Whandall and Shanda lay on the balcony outside her room and listened to them.
The courtyard was lit by a central fire and by candles in vellum cylinders. There were four men and three women in the courtyard. Lazy wisps of steam curled up from the cups they were holding. One of the men said, “I thought that wizard was coming to dinner.”
“He was invited, Qirinty. I don’t know what happened to him.”
“Stood you up, did he, Samorty?”
Samorty had a deep and resonant voice, and his chuckle was loud. “Maybe. I’d be surprised, but maybe.”
When Placehold men talked in the evenings, there were usually fights. These men smiled, and if anyone was angry, it was well hidden. Whandall came to believe that he was watching a dance. They were dancing with the rhythm of speech and gestures.
It was a thing he could learn. A Lordkin should have guile.
Qirinty’s voice was feeble; Whandall had to listen hard. “We need a wizard. The reservoir’s getting low again. If it doesn’t rain pretty soon we could be in trouble, Samorty.”
Samorty nodded sagely. “What do you propose we do?”
“It’s more your problem than mine, Samorty,” the other man said. He picked up two cups, interchanged them, tossed them lightly in the air. The cups were chasing each other in a loop, and now he’d added a third cup.
“Lord Qirinty has such wonderful hands!” Shanda said.
It enchanted Whandall that Shanda already knew how to lurk. He asked, “Are those Lords?”
Shanda giggled. “Yes. The big man there at the end is Lord Samorty. He’s my stepfather.”
“Is that your mother with him?”
“Rawanda’s not my mother! Stepmother,” Shanda said. “My mother’s dead too. She died when Rabblie was born.”
“Rabblie?”
“My little brother. There. With her. He’s five. She doesn’t like him any more than she likes me, but he gets to eat with them because he’s the heir. If she ever has a boy, he’s dead meat, but I don’t think she can have children. She had one, my sister, and that took a week. It was almost two years ago—”
Whandall tapped her arm to shut her up, because Lord Samorty was talking: “… Wizard. Can he do it again?”
“Would you want him to?” one of the others asked. “The iceberg damn near wiped out the city!”
The women shouted with laughter. The man with the clever hands said, “It did not, Chanthor! It crossed your farm.”
Samorty chuckled. “Well, and mine too, and left nothing but a plowed line three hundred paces wide and longer than any man has traveled. That cost me, I admit, but it didn’t cross much of the city, and it sure solved the water problem.”
Chanthor snorted.
Qirinty snatched his cup and added it to the dance.
Samorty said, “A mountain of ice from the farthest end of the Earth. Don’t you sometimes wish you could do that?”
“That, or any real magic. But he said he could do it only once,” Lord Qirinty said.
“He said that after we paid him. Did you believe him? I’d say he wants a better price.”
Qirinty set the cups down without spilling a drop. “I don’t know if I believed him or not.”
One of the servants came in. “Morth of Atlantis,” he announced.
Morth? Whandall knew that name…
He stood tall and straight, but Morth was older than any of the Lords, fragile and perhaps blind. His face was all wrinkles; his hair was long and straight and thick but pure white. He tottered very carefully into the circle of firelight. “My Lords,” he said formally. “You will have to forgive me. It has been twenty years since I was last here.”
“I would think Lordshills is easy enough to find,” Samorty said. “Even if you had never been here before.”
“Yes, yes, of course,” Morth said. “To find, yes. To get to, perhaps not so easy for one in my profession. I came by the back roads. The ponies I hired could not climb your hill, and as I walked up, this change came on me. But you must know all this.”
> “Perhaps we know less than you think. A dozen years ago a Condigeano wizard offered us a spell that would let cook fires burn indoors,” Samorty said. “Cheap too. He didn’t have to cast it himself. Sent an apprentice up to do it. It worked, but since then the only horses that can get up the hill are our big ones. The Lordkin ponies can’t make it. We don’t know why.”
Morth nodded. He was amused without making a point of it. “But surely this—spell—has not lasted a dozen years?”
“No, he sends an apprentice to renew it. He’s done that twice since. We’ve discussed having him cast it for other areas, but we decided not to.”
“Oh, good,” Morth said. “Very wise. May I be seated?”
“Yes, yes, of course. Dinner’s finished, but would you like tea and dessert?” Samorty’s wife said.
“Thank you, yes, my lady.”
Rawanda waved to a servant as Morth sat with an effort.
The fourth Lord was older than the rest. The others had come out with women, but he reclined alone on his couch. The servants treated him with as much respect as they treated Samorty. He had been quiet, but now he spoke. “Tell us, Sage, why is it wise not to cast this spell in the other parts of the city? Why not in Tep’s Town?”
“Side effects,” Qirinty said. “The Lordkin need their ponies.”
“Yes, that and the fires, Lord Jerreff,” Morth said. His voice had changed slightly. There was less quaver.
“Could you cast such a spell if we asked you to?”
Morth cut off a laugh. “No, Lord. No wizard could do that. Only apprentices cast that spell, and I’ll wager that it’s never the same apprentice twice, either.”
“You’d win that wager,” Samorty said. “Is this spell dangerous?”
“Confined to a small area, no,” Morth said. “Cast throughout Tep’s Town? I am certain you would regret it.”
“Fires,” Lord Jerreff said. “There would be fires inside houses, anytime, not just during a Burning. That’s what our Condigeano wizard told us. He wouldn’t tell us what the spell was. Just that it would keep Yangin-Atep at a distance. Sage, I don’t suppose you will tell us either?”
The Burning City Page 4