The Tenth Power

by Kate Constable

  ‘Samis was here,’ he said. ‘No doubt of it. The old woman recognised his description at once. He moved into this lodging-house at the beginning of autumn, and filled three rooms with his baggage.’

  ‘Then we got him!’ cried Tonno.

  But Darrow shook his head, his face grimmer than ever. ‘He’s gone, and all his boxes with him.The housekeeper didn’t know where, or said she didn’t. But he’d made preparations for a long journey. He had a sled, and enough supplies for three turns of the moons.’

  When did he leave? asked Halasaa.

  Darrow’s mouth twisted. ‘Four days ago.’

  Tonno cursed, and spat into the gutter. Even Halasaa bowed his head in frustration that they’d come so close to their quarry, only to have him slip through their fingers. Four days! It was such a short time, but with Samis’s gifts of chantment to speed his sled there was no knowing how far he could have travelled.

  He could not have left this crowded city unseen.

  ‘Halasaa’s right.’ Tonno looked up. ‘The Guild mans the watchtowers night and day, even now the harbour’s frozen over. Someone must’ve seen where he was headed. A few coins in the right pockets – ’

  ‘Spoken like a Gellanese,’ said Darrow wryly. ‘But there is something else.’ He glanced over his shoulder and lowered his voice. ‘Samis shared the house with another man, a chanter called Tragg. The two of them were as close as two coins in a purse, according to the old woman. The day Samis left Gellan, she went up to cleanTragg’s room as usual, and found him – ’

  Dead. Halasaa finished the sentence.

  ‘Murdered,’ saidTonno. ‘So, Samis had secrets, did he? Did the old one know what they were up to?’

  Darrow took his companions by the elbows. ‘People are staring. Let’s walk on. She was too frightened to tell me much. But she did say that she overheard Samis and Tragg arguing about the lazar-sickness, and something about a wheel.’

  Tonno snorted.

  ‘They were excited, speaking loudly.’ Darrow hunched his shoulders inside his jacket. ‘It’s not much,’ he admitted. ‘But it’s all we have – ’

  Without warning, a group of half a dozen uniformed men burst from an alleyway. All were dressed in skirt-coats of muddy green and brown, and brandished long whips. Before the three friends realised what was happening, the Protectors had surrounded Darrow, separating him from the others, and two whips were twined around his arms to hold him fast. Passers-by drew back. In a city filled with chanters, no one but the Protectors would touch a lazar.

  ‘Hey! Hey!’ shouted Tonno. ‘Let him go!’

  The captain shrugged. ‘Darrow the ironchanter? You’re under arrest.’

  ‘You’ve made a mistake.’ Darrow’s voice was calm. He could have used a chantment of iron to free himself from his bonds, but the Protectors were clustered close around him, and would soon overpower him. ‘You have no authority to detain me. I’ve broken no law, and I am no lazar.’

  ‘Look at his skin, you fools, you can see he’s not sick!’ cried Tonno.

  ‘Guild orders,’ said the captain impassively. ‘He’s going to the Lazar-House.’

  At that, Darrow did open his mouth. But before he could begin to sing, one of the Protectors viciously jerked his head back and stuffed a gag between his jaws. With a cry, Tonno drew out his short, sturdy fishing-knife and launched himself at the soldiers. But the tip of one whip flicked the knife from his hand, and a second curled around his legs and brought him down. The crack of another whip knocked Halasaa to the ground. No one moved to help them; people hurried on as Darrow was half-dragged, half-shoved away.

  Tonno struggled painfully to his knees. ‘Got to follow em,’ he panted, groping for his fallen knife.

  ‘Not tonight, my friends,’ came a musical voice beside them.

  Halasaa looked up at a woman with emerald-green eyes, her face thickly painted and powdered in the Gellanese fashion. She wore a brightly coloured turban, and her dangling earrings clashed and jingled as she held out her hands to help the two men to their feet. ‘My name is Matifa. Come, I live across the way. It’s almost curfew, and I can help you.’

  ‘Help us how?’ growled Tonno, rubbing his head. Twelve days among the tricksters and liars of Gellan had made him suspicious of any friendly advances.

  ‘Come on, come inside!’ Matifa’s wide striped skirts rustled as she ushered them along the empty street. ‘This is my house. Your friend gave someone cheek, did he?’

  ‘He’s done nothing.’

  Matifa clucked her tongue as she propelled them into the narrow house. ‘The Protectors think they rule the streets these days, it’s a public disgrace! Look at someone sideways and they clap you in the Lazar-House. That’s what happened to my cousin’s husband’s sister’s boy – I was too late to help him, but I can help you! Not tonight, it’s too late tonight, but tomorrow.Tomorrow, we’ll have your friend out of the Lazar-House, easy as winking!’

  ‘Why should we trust you?’Tonno scowled.

  ‘Why should I trick you?’ countered Matifa, stretching her green eyes wide. ‘What profit would there be for me? Only trouble if I’m caught. You know what they say: no profit, safe promise!’

  ‘They don’t say that where I come from,’ saidTonno sourly. He and Halasaa exchanged a glance.

  Halasaa’s voice sounded in Tonno’s mind. We must trust her, my brother. At least for now.

  ‘If you say so,’ grunted Tonno, and gave the beaming Matifa the grimace that, for him, passed for a smile.

  THE NEXT MORNING Tonno and Halasaa were in the dark cellar of Matifa’s lodging-house, tugging at a trapdoor in the floor, while their new friend held up a lantern. Tonno couldn’t help thinking that, with her powdered face, she looked like a little girl who’d fallen into her mother’s flour bin.

  All three stepped back as the trapdoor flew open and the putrid odour of the sewers erupted into the cellar. Tonno gagged, Matifa covered her face with an embroidered handkerchief, and Halasaa’s face paled beneath his spiralling tattoos.

  ‘Sure you won’t come with us?’ asked Tonno wryly.

  Matifa blinked above the mask of her handkerchief, and her turban shook vehemently. ‘No, I’ll stay,’ she said in a muffled voice. ‘But I wish you all speed and profit! You remember the directions?’

  Halasaa nodded, and replied in his silent mind-speech. We should reach the Lazar-House by midday.

  ‘And you’re sure this is the only way in?’ muttered Tonno.

  ‘Poor man!’ sighed Matifa, and her wide striped skirts rustled as she handed the lantern to Tonno. ‘Locked up in that place! Off you go now, and fortune go with you!’

  Thank you for all your help. Halasaa could never remember that the Gellanese did not thank each other. It was considered a shameful loss of status, an admission that you had not paid a fair price for something.

  ‘Goodbye, goodbye!’ mutteredTonno as they descended the slimy ladder into the knee-deep stream of filth that ran through the tunnels. ‘I won’t deny she’s helped us, but that woman can’t keep her mouth shut long enough to take a breath.’

  The sewers of Gellan were almost as old as the city itself, and they were in an even worse state of repair than the crumbling red buildings above. For hundreds of summers and hundreds of winters, the waste and filth of the city had slopped through the ancient tunnels.The contents of chamber pots, blood and entrails from the slaughterhouses, murk from the famous Gellanese dye-pans and paint shops, vomit, rancid food scraps, animal droppings, all washed into the gutters with every fall of rain.

  The sewers followed the line of the most ancient streets above, more or less, and Matifa had given Halasaa and Tonno detailed directions to the Lazar-House. Occasionally a faint splash echoed through the tunnels, or a steady trickling sound marked the place where a gutter flowed in. Always, they heard the squeak and skitter of rats. Far above their heads came a distant rumble of carts and tramping shoes, while their own feet sloshed through the sludge below.

  �
�Glad I didn’t wear my best boots,’ muttered Tonno. ‘How does Matifa know so much about the sewers, anyway?’

  She said her husband was an engineer before he died.

  ‘Lucky for us.’

  The Gellanese do not believe in luck. Halasaa’s voice was serious. Everything must be paid for.

  ‘I’ve paid plenty, listening to her yabber on till my ears ache,’ growled Tonno.

  Take the next right turn. Halasaa’s words sounded serenely in Tonno’s mind.

  ‘Can’t be far now, thank the gods.’ Tonno’s lantern threw grotesque shadows up the curved walls of the tunnel, which was partly carved from sheer rock and partly built from reddish bricks. Something large and sodden swirled past them on the stream, and Tonno’s lantern dipped suddenly as he jumped out of the way.

  Peace, my brother. It is only a dead dog.

  Tonno grimaced. ‘Hope Darrow’s grateful for this.’

  Left here. This is the last turn.

  This tunnel was the narrowest yet; both men had to bend their heads, and the river of filth rose until it almost reached their thighs. The floor of the tunnel was very slippery, and only Tonno’s quick hand prevented Halasaa from plunging under.

  Look there. Halasaa pointed to a set of steps cut into the wall ahead. They must lead to the Lazar-House.

  ‘I hope so,’Tonno grunted. ‘I’m a sea-man. I wasn’t meant to creep around underground like a rat.’

  Halasaa smiled. We won’t return this way. Darrow can open the locks with chantment, and you and I will shield him from the touch of the lazars. We are not chanters, the sickness cannot harm us. We will all walk out together.

  Tonno looked down at himself. He was spattered with muck, and his legs were caked with foul slime. Halasaa was even filthier. ‘I never walked the streets of any town, looking like this. And even after a turn of the moons at sea, I never smelled so bad.’

  Steadying themselves against the slick, mossy wall, they scraped off as much dirt as they could then squelched up the steps.The door had been installed for the use of the sewer engineers; it was bolted on the inside, and obviously had not been opened for many years. With a mighty effort, Tonno forced the bolt and peered out into the Lazar-House.

  As soon as the door swung open, they realised there was no need to be quiet, nor to worry what they smelled like. The place stank almost as much as the sewers, though the smell was different, a fetid waft of stale bed-linen and urine and musty air.Trouble-makers and sick chanters alike were dragged to the Lazar-House by the Protectors, and once imprisoned the lazars could earn greater comforts by acting as guards. There was no one to care for the ill, to change their sheets or strew sweet herbs.

  Halasaa and Tonno had been expecting the hush of the sickroom or the grim silence of the dungeon, but the Lazar-House rang with shouts and groans. Somewhere nearby, a tin cup scraped against stone, while someone screamed ‘Shut up!’ A tuneless song echoed through the corridors. There was a tramp of boots and a clatter of plates, and a handbell clanged while one of the guards bawled, ‘Dinner! You miserable worms, wriggle out and get yer dinner!’

  Tonno touched the hilt of his knife. ‘Ready?’

  Halasaa nodded, and they moved off down the corridor, leaving the door slightly ajar.

  The Lazar-House was heavily fortified on the outside; the walls were made of thick stone, and the high windows were all barred. But every internal door gaped open, and the inmates wandered freely about the place. Listless men and women shambled down the corridors and slumped in doorways.

  Halasaa spoke into Tonno’s mind. Do not walk so straight, my brother. You must try to look ill.

  ‘That’s not hard,’ muttered Tonno, queasy from the stench that clung to them.

  Anyone who looked closely would have seen that their faces were not pale enough for lazars, especially Halasaa with his coppery skin, but they were filthy and bedraggled enough to blend in with the other inmates, and no one gave the pair more than a casual glance as they shuffled through the Lazar-House. The green and brown uniforms of the Protectors were nowhere to be seen.

  ‘Where’s Darrow, I wonder?’ muttered Tonno.

  Halasaa grinned. Why not ask?

  Tonno snorted, then shrugged. ‘Why not?’ And he thrust his head around the nearest doorway.

  A group of four men, wrapped in striped blankets, sat on dirty straw, playing clumsily at knucklebones. They glared at Tonno. ‘You want something?’

  ‘Prisoner called Darrow,’ growled Tonno, just as surly. ‘Know where we could find him?’

  A man with thinning hair and a sly face like a weasel looked up with a faint spark of interest. ‘Darrow, the iron-crafter? What’s it worth?’

  Tonno grimaced. Nothing in Gellan came without a price; they were prepared for this. ‘Two silver bits.’

  ‘Make it six, that might jog my memory.’

  ‘Four.’

  The weaselly man shrugged, and Tonno handed over the silver pieces.

  ‘They got him gagged and guarded, up in Traitors’ Tower. That way – the tower in the south, overlooks the grave-pits. Where they keep the dangerous ones.You won’t get in there just by asking.’

  Tonno began to thank him, then stopped. Instead he said, ‘If you want your freedom, there’s an open door to the sewers.’

  The four men looked at one another. One of them chortled. ‘Freedom?What’s that worth?There ain’t nothing for the likes of us out there. In here they feed us and give us a dry place to die.’

  ‘Your friend know you’re coming for him?’ The weaselly man gave a ghoulish grin. ‘Maybe he’d rather stay here.’

  ‘He’s not sick,’ said Tonno through clenched teeth.

  A sour-faced man chuckled. ‘Maybe he weren’t sick before. But I’ll bet you a gold bit he’s sick now.’

  With one swift movement, Tonno jerked him to his feet. ‘Liar!’ he snarled.

  Halasaa laid a hand onTonno’s arm. Peace, my brother!The man is ill.

  Tonno gave the sour-faced man a shake, like a dog with a rat, then threw him aside. As he and Halasaa made their way down the stinking corridor, he said fiercely, ‘Darrow wouldn’t let himself get sick.’

  Darrow is strong, and quick-minded. Do not fear for him.

  Tonno grunted and they walked on. But both were more anxious for their friend than they were prepared to admit. ‘All these Gellanese are liars, curse them. Can’t trust a single one of em.’

  There is good and bad inside every Gellanese, my brother, just as there is inside every other person.

  ‘Every person? So there’s good inside Samis, is there, may his bones rot?’

  Even Samis is not wholly evil. He wishes to unite Tremaris, and for the lands to help each other. That is a wish we all share.

  Tonno snorted.

  A group of lazars were shuffling into a cramped dining hall where some kind of slop was being ladled out of vast cauldrons. Half a dozen Protectors in their green and brown skirt-coats, and some lazar-guards with chequered armbands, lounged against the walls, looking bored and yelling abuse. One of them glanced up asTonno and Halasaa passed the doorway. His eyes met Halasaa’s.The man stared at him, unblinking, then his eyes flickered away, as though he was willing them to disappear.

  Strange, mused Halasaa, as he hurried afterTonno. He seemed to know us, and yet he let us pass by.

  Tonno walked faster. ‘Mebbe they don’t care if anyone breaks in. Everyone inside these walls is going to die, no matter what.’

  We will not die, my brother. And nor will Darrow.

  They made their way cautiously through the Lazar-House, until they emerged onto a bare, windswept terrace. The dull red flagstones underfoot were slippery with snow, and the edge of the terrace dropped away steeply, with no wall or guardrail. Far below spread a bleak field, dotted with stones and ringed by a high wall. The sky was a leaden canopy above the city, almost low enough to touch.

  Fighting the wind, Tonno peered over the edge of the precipice, then recoiled. At the foot of th
e cliff were dozens of bodies, sprawled where they had fallen. The deep cold had preserved their flesh; no one had collected the corpses for burial or burning. ‘These Gellanese don’t respect the living, nor the dead. Look at that! Just throw the bodies over and leave them there to rot!’

  Halasaa looked sombre. I wonder how many throw themselves down, rather than wait for death.

  Tonno turned away with a shudder and stared up at the round tower that reared above the terrace. It was a grimy reddish-brown, the colour of dried blood. ‘This must be Traitors’Tower.’

  They found a blackened door; it was locked, but Tonno’s sturdy fisherman’s boot made short work of the rotting timbers. The two lazar-guards inside were taken by surprise. Tonno felled one with a well-aimed blow to the jaw, and Halasaa wrestled the second to the ground.WithTonno’s help, he deftly bound both guards with the lashes of their own whips and used their gloves to gag them.

  ‘That was easy,’ panted Tonno. ‘Thought there’d be more guards.’

  Yes. Halasaa frowned. Very easy.

  Tonno was already thudding up the stairs. Dozens of tiny cells honeycombed the tower. The knucklebone players were right: every door was bolted shut. One after another, Tonno and Halasaa flung open the doors and pale, wretched figures stumbled out. These were true prisoners, the enemies of the Guild, and they didn’t wait for explanations.Those who could walk staggered down the stairs, barely glancing at their rescuers in their haste to be gone.Those who were too weak to move cried out feebly, but the stronger ones ignored their pleas for help.

  ‘Darrow? Where’s Darrow?’ shouted Tonno.

  ‘At the top!’ came the reply, and Halasaa and Tonno sprinted up the winding stairs.

  Tonno yanked back the last bolt and threw open the door. Darrow was sitting upright on a bench beneath a high window, unbowed and seemingly unharmed. Chains bound his wrists and ankles, and he was gagged with a grubby strip of cloth. Darrow’s grey-green eyes came alive with a mixture of delight and anxiety. Tonno’s knife flashed from his sheath and with a single cut the gag was gone. Darrow rasped out a chantment, the chains fell away, andTonno pulled him into a glad embrace.