At last the rattling vehicle turned into a narrow alley and came bouncing to a halt outside the merchant’s house. Skarash growled something inaudible. There were too many legionaries milling around there, too many horses, too many citizens excited about something.
Suddenly apprehensive, Inos followed him down and ran ahead, awkward in her city shoes, not waiting for Kade. Then she heard a familiar voice and stopped abruptly.
In a moment she located him. Centurion Imopopi. He was barking out orders, and again she felt an uncanny unease. She had not seen him since the previous morning, but she had thought about him several times without deciding why he had so disconcerted her. His voice was arousing the same mysterious alarms as it had before. The soldiers were gathered in a group, with the djinn workers emerging from the big loading room to cluster around them. What were they all looking at?
She began to push her way through the crowd, even shoving at the leather and bronze of legionaries, and suffering a few pinches and fondlings in the process. She saw Elkarath himself appearing, large and hot-looking in his scarlet gown, his skull-cap perched awry on his white hair, his ruddy face ruddier than ever. Everyone was staring at something on the ground.
She reached the center before the sheik did. Azak lay flat on the cobbles, obviously unconscious. His face was battered, his clothes tattered. He was red with blood. As she dropped to her knees at his side, a hand closed crushingly on her wrist and hauled her back upright.
“You know the man, ma’am?” The centurion’s black eyes were fearsome with suspicion.
“I … Yes.” Shocked by the pain of his grip, Inos tried to pull free, but she might as well have tried to uproot an oak. “Sheik—I mean, Master—Elkarath employed … employs him. You ’re hurting me!”
Imopopi ignored her complaint, directing his attention to the far side of the circle, where the legionaries now moved apart to admit the portly Elkarath, glowering like a thunderstorm.
“He was one of my guards, Centurion.”
Imopopi released his painful hold on Inos, leaving white bracelets that slowly flamed red.
“Was, Master?”
Elkarath shrugged. “He may not be any longer. May I inquire?”
The centurion folded his thick arms. “He ventured where he was not supposed to.”
“He appears to have suffered for it.”
“He is lucky to be alive. You want him, or shall I dispose of him elsewhere?”
Still scowling, Elkarath glanced around the ring of armored men. Then he shrugged again. “I suppose I can take him in until he recovers. Is the matter closed?”
“There will be a fine.”
Elkarath sighed. “Five imperials, I expect?”
“And damages of ten more.”
The sheik pouted, then nodded resignedly.
“Plus a bond for future good behavior … say, another twenty?”
Now the old man glared, ready to rebel. “He still has some wages due, but he is not heir to an emir’s ransom! I may summon a litter and have the fool taken within?”
Imopopi nodded, satisfied. Most of his men were openly smirking as they calculated their share of that neat extortion. Elkarath turned to growl instructions. In the center of the gathering, the cause of it all twitched and groaned, and then became still again.
Idiot! Had he thought the imps would allow a djinn to go spying around their barracks, or naval base? Served him right!
Of course Elkarath could cure his injuries, if he dared exert his powers within Ullacarn itself.
“A friend of yours, Mistress Hathark?”
Inos jumped, and turned to the sinister centurion at her side. Why sinister? Familiar? Not the face, the face was totally strange.
The voice?
The eyes! Recognition struck her like a fist.
She reeled back, and cannoned into a nearby legionary, who felt as solid as a stone pillar. He chuckled and steadied her and continued to hold her as she stared at Imopopi.
“Something wrong?” Mockery danced in the centurion’s hard face.
“I think we have met before,” Inos said, and her voice was a croak. Olybino! The warlock himself. He had grabbed her wrist earlier because she had been about to lay a hand on Azak and would have been burned by the curse. He knew! She squirmed, and the man behind her tightened his grip. But her eyes stayed locked on the centurion.
“Yesterday?” He knew! He knew she knew! He meant her to know.
“Before that, sir!” Inos pushed away offending hands and the young man at her back sighed loudly. Soldiers chuckled.
Imopopi looked around his men and then leered. “I don’t recall. How could I forget such a lovely face? Were we in the dark, perchance? Or were there other things visible to distract me?”
The legionaries barked with laughter. Inos felt her cheeks flame red as a djinn’s.
“Perhaps it is I who am mistaken, Centurion.”
Imopopi considered her, his head on one side. “Perhaps. But we could discuss the matter elsewhere. At length.”
“No … er … no!” She tried to back away and was again gripped firmly by the man behind her. She squirmed, and he squeezed warningly, tethering her to bear his leader’s baiting.
The warlock licked his lips and stepped closer. “You are enjoying your stay in beautiful Ullacarn, mistress? Or are you too impatient to be on your way to Hub?”
Oh, Gods! It was so obvious now why she was going to Hub! Why he would send her by ship instead of by sorcery was a mystery, but she knew now why she was going.
She shook her head and managed to say “I am enjoying my stay, sir.”
“We could make it more enjoyable for you, I’m sure.” Imopopi glanced around the group, and his men laughed obediently. He was playing to two audiences at once, and enjoying it.
Two husky warehousemen had arrived with a stretcher, and Elkarath close behind them. Inos caught a glimpse of Skarash peering at her over shoulders, and his face had paled to a sickly salmon shade. So Skarash knew! He had not known the previous day. That must be why he had been so jumpy—because he had discovered that there was a warlock involved.
She glanced back to meet the terrible mockery in Olybino’s eyes.
“You should have gone to Hub sooner, ma’am.” The first time we met.
Inos swallowed a few times and then found her voice. “My aunt was unable to accompany me sooner, sir.”
“Unfortunate!” The warlock shrugged. “Well, I bid you a safe journey, Mistress Hathark.” Reverting to his pretense of being Centurion Imopopi, be nodded to the man holding Inos to release her and turned to accept a heavy bag from Elkarath. Hugging herself, Inos backed away into the crowd, her knees still knocking with terror.
And just in case she had any doubts, the warlock had cured her headache. It had gone completely.
Male hands were lifting Azak onto the litter. Azak had been given a lesson, and a warning. Escape would be impossible now.
All Inos could do in Ullacarn was to wait for a ship to take her away.
5
Chains rattled and Gathmor opened his eyes, or tried to. He groaned and licked his lips. “Rap?”
“I’m here,” Rap said calmly, jingling fetters in his ear. The two of them were jammed into a very small box. “You have a broken finger bone and you’ve lost a tooth. Your nose looks as if it will straighten all right. The rest is bruises, and cuts—you got those when the chandelier came down.”
“You?”
“Broke a few bones in my hand and cracked a couple of ribs.” No need to mention that they seemed to be mending very quickly.
Gathmor tried to move, and groaned louder. After a moment he said softly, “ That was a very fine little fracas.”
Remembering the devastation. Rap shuddered. “Then I wouldn’t like to experience a big one.”
“Who would have thought that imps could be so much sport?”
“Numbers and motivation, I suppose.”
“Darad?”
“Not prese
nt.” Probably Darad had called Thinal at the end, or possibly Andor, and he had then escaped in the confusion caused by the fire.
Again Gathmor groaned. He tried to sit up and thought better of it. “I can’t see.”
“There’s not much light, and you wouldn’t see too well, with those shiners you’ve got. We’re in a cell. About gnome size, so it’s a little snug. Three sides stone, one side timber.”
“Smells like gnome, too.” Gathmor smiled, or tried to. “Better than Blood Wave, anyway. This is becoming a habit, me waking up like this. But that was a very satisfactory bumping. Do you happen to know the final score?”
“No!” Rap bit back some angry remarks.
The cell was two floors belowground, and one of a hundred or so similar cells, all overcrowded with men and chains. The air was a foul, dead brew that had not been changed in centuries.
Gathmor gritted his teeth and sat up noisily. He leaned back against the wall, wincing as he tried to straighten his legs.
“I think we’ve got a visitor coming,” Rap said. Jailers went by outside all the time, but now an elf was being escorted down the stairs at the end of the corridor, and Rap was the only elf in the cells. In a moment light flickered in the judas hole, and bolts grated.
Rap moved his knees aside to make room as the newcomer ducked into the cell and stopped, blind. The door boomed shut behind him and he flinched. He was slight, yet he could not straighten under the roof, and overall he seemed so like an adolescent that he might even be one. His clothes had a very homemade look to them, his golden curls needed trimming, but his fingernails were neat and clean.
“Rap’rian?” he said warily, peering straight ahead.
“That’s me,” said Rap at his feet.
The visitor jumped and banged his head. “I’m Quip’rian.” He choked and slapped a hand over his mouth. “I think I’m going to throw up.”
“I shall certainly kill you if you do,” said Gathmor.
Another shock. “Who? There’s more of you in here?”
“My associate, Captain Gathmor.”
“A jotunn? They locked you up with a jotunn? How can you stand this place?”
“I don’t have much alternative,” Rap said, beginning to feel better already. “Your name—Quip’rian?—we’re related?”
“I doubt … I’m an Aliel, cadet branch of the penultimate Offiniol sept. You?”
“No.” Rap was even further out of his depth than he’d thought.
For a moment the conversation failed. The youth reached out and felt for the walls. His face twisted in horror when he realized how small the kennel was.
“Master Rap’rian?” he whispered.”Are you crazy? Will you plead insanity?”
“No. Would I be any better off if I did?”
“They might just cut your head off.”
That classed as better off? “I did it right, didn’t I?”
Quip’rian shut his eyes and shuddered. “You can’t believe that!”
“Well, it came unstuck later,” Rap admitted. “But I said the formula—‘I spit on Valdonilth!’ That was right, wasn’t it? And then I slapped his face. I didn’t hit very hard. And the old boy said whatever it was he was supposed to say: ‘Foul varlet’ and so on. He did it rather well, I thought, as he couldn’t have been expecting anything like that. And then I said, ‘I kneel in the shadow of Lith’rian.’ That was all that was supposed to happen, I thought.”
The real elf wiped his streaming forehead. “How should I know? Nobody does things like that nowadays! If you’d picked anyone but Lord Phiel’, he probably wouldn’t have had a clue what you were raving about. I know I wouldn’t.”
Rap grunted noncommittally. When the silence became oppressive, he said, “ Who’re you? How do you get involved?”
“I was the nearest male kin when you challenged.”
“How old are you?”
“Fifteen. I’m a trainee waiter! I was clearing plates off the next table.” He seemed ready to weep.
“And what does the nearest male kinsman have to do?”
“You mean you don’t know all this? You utter the Sublime Defiance and you don’t know how it works?”
Rap thought a few unkind thoughts about Sorcerer Ishist and his sense of humor. “Tell me.”
Quip’rian’s lip trembled. “You’re really asking me? I only know what they’ve been babbling upstairs. I have to be your escort. I have to accompany you to Valdorian, if you get to go.”
Rap’s insides lurched. “You mean there’s some doubt?”
“Doubt?” the elf yelled. “The lictor himself has a broken arm! The hall was wrecked, utterly wrecked! No one’s died yet, but eight legionaries were injured, and two or three dozen civilians. Poor Master Arth’quith had a fit. It was awful, just awful! There’s an almighty argument going on upstairs. It’s going to cost millions!”
Gathmor sighed happily.
Rap scanned and eventually discovered a meeting in progress on the third floor. He could not hear the words, but the ten or so men up there were doing a lot of arm-waving.
“Well, I admit the fight wasn’t part of the plan,” he said sadly. “I was told—I mean, I intended—to find an important elf with other elf witnesses. I didn’t realize that imp witnesses might not understand what was going on. I should have chosen a time when there were only elves present. I’m truly sorry, because of course no elf would have spoiled a solemn ceremony like that by trying to hit me with a bottle.” It had been a sorry blow, and Rap had dodged easily, but … “My friends thought I was in danger, you see.”
Gathmor and Darad had come to his rescue like twin avalanches.
Quip’rian sniffled. “Well, the lictor himself was there. He was hurt, and his wife went into labor, and half his guests are still hospitalized.”
Now Rap began to grasp the enormity of the problem. “And he doesn’t recognize ancient elvish customs?”
“They don’t apply within the Impire.”
“No. I see.”
“He says he’ll bypass normal procedure with a summary edict—to save time, because you’re so obviously guilty.”
“And then?”
The boy moaned. “You’re going to be flogged to death in Emshandar Plaza at noon. The notices are being posted.”
Rap recalled Kalkor’s odious cat-o’-nine-tails and his throat felt as if it were being squeezed. “And my friend here?”
“Him first, you second.”
“Then what’s the argument about?”
“Lord Phiel’nilth says his clan honor is involved. He’s delighted! No one’s uttered the Sublime Defiance in three hundred years, he says. He wants to go through with the whole ritual.”
Nothing was ever simple where elves were concerned, Rap remembered. “Can he swing that?” he asked hopefully.
For a moment the kid just wrung his hands. Then he whispered, “ If they can find the lictor’s price.” He was looking sicker by the minute. What sort of a fifteen-year-old was he?
“I’d have thought,” Rap said, “ that the chance of a free trip to Ilrane would appeal to you. Better than dirty dishes, surely?”
Quip’rian shuddered convulsively. “Go on a ship?”
“No? Well, cheer up! They may flay me yet, and then you can polish all the glasses in Noom in celebration.”
“Don’t mock me!” the elf snapped, showing a little spark at last. “I didn’t ask for this.”
“True! I’m sorry,” Rap said, and meant it. “I suppose I’m just trying to whistle up some courage. Will the lictor blink?”
“How should I know? I’m a nothing … But that way the damage would be paid for. I think some important people like that idea.”
In Milflor Rap had cost Gathmor forty-six imperials. He was going to be considerably more expensive this time. “Who pays for all this?”
“Lith’rian, of course. You knelt in his shadow.”
Well, a warlock could create gold to order. If he wanted to.
“I get taken t
o Lith’rian for judgment?”
The elf nodded, looking sorely puzzled again.
“Then what?”
“Then he judges, of course. If he decides you were wrong to spit on the Nilths, then he sends your head to Valdonilth.”
“Literally?”
“In a gold bucket is the tradition.”
“And if he doesn’t? If he thinks I was right?”
Quip’rian sniffled loudly. “Then you’ve started a war.”
6
Either the execution scheduled for noon was postponed or there was a last-minute change of cast, because arguments over the elvish affair continued all day in the lictor’s office. Rap watched the crowd there grow, but for information on what was being said he had to rely on Quip’rian.
The young elf was a loose ball in the game. The ancient rituals gave Nearest Kinsman a major role in all proceedings, but senior Imperial officials preferred not to discuss confidential financial matters in the presence of a trainee waiter, so they sent him off to attend Rap.
A short time in the cell was enough to make him nauseated, palsied, and likely to faint. At that point Rap would suggest he go and gatecrash the meetings again, and after some shouting for the jailers, he would be released. In an hour or so, someone would notice him in the lictor’s office and toss him out again. Then he would force himself back down to the dungeon to report to Rap, for he had an elf’s compulsion to perform duties conscientiously.
He told all he could, but young Quip’, while he was sensitive and willing, was clearly neither well educated nor especially intelligent, and he had no inklings of finance or politics. He did report that the entire elf community of Noom was involved now, rallied around Lord Phiel’nilth. If the distinguished visitor chose to regard the insult paid him as an honor, then he must be given every assistance. Arcane rites had an undeniable appeal for elves.
The imps were seemingly divided between those who saw the practical advantages of accepting compensation, and those who insisted that the law must be upheld—meaning that the two culprits should be disassembled as soon as possible, in public. Rap began to suspect that the contest was unfair, that the elves were outmatched in the bargaining, caught between two grindstones that opposed each other to a common purpose. As the day wore on, Quip’ was gasping out numbers even Gathmor could not comprehend.
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