God Stalk

by P. C. Hodgell

  Ishtier, Highborn priest of the Kencyrath, stood in the shadow of his god, watching her with hooded eyes. His nearly fleshless lips were raised in a faint smile, and tongues of power from the outer corridors licked eagerly past her, spiraling into the center. She got quickly to her feet.

  "Who are you?" It was a thin, dry voice, not exactly rusty but like the hinges of a door infrequently opened.

  "Jame of the Three People."

  "That is but half a name. Tell me the rest."

  "With respect, my lord, it does not concern you." She did not realize until she saw his slight smile deepen that he had asked and she replied in High Kens. More power swirled into the room, tugging at her mind. It was getting harder to think.

  "Very well. . . for now," the priest said, "Why have you come?"

  Jame tried to answer, struggling with the unaccustomed clumsiness of mind that prevented her from shielding herself against this man. Much more of this and not even her namelessness would protect her.

  "I-I want to join the Thieves' Guild," she said, hating herself for the stammer.

  "You, a Kencyr, wish to steal? You would sell your honor so cheaply?"

  "I would sell nothing!"

  "Then you are a fool," said the priest coldly. "Nothing comes without a price ,. . not even this conversation."

  Jame caught her breath as power whipped past her face. A second bolt of energy clipped her shoulder, numbing it and spinning her around. Two more quick blows took her off-balance again, her jacket had begun to smolder. She ripped it off, twisting desperately, futilely, to avoid the invisible assault. Ishtier watched, the thin smile again on his lips.

  "Dance, fool, dance," he said softly,

  Sudden anger made Jame reckless. Defiantly, she raised her clenched fists in challenge, not to the priest but to the statue towering above him. "Lord, a judgment!" she cried to the three faces of her god.

  Ishtier drew himself up with a hiss of outrage. Then, abruptly, his expression changed. "Steal not from your own kind," said the god-voice through his unwilling lips. "Do with others what you will, so that it be done with honor, until in your thoughtlessness you destroy them." The voice ceased. Wiping spittle from his face with a shaking hand, Ishtier said hoarsely, "There, brat. You have the answer you sought. Now get out."

  Jame bowed and went, not trusting herself to speak. She had her answer indeed, ambiguous in part as it was. Now it was time to go home.

  The moon rose over her shoulder as she walked westward, thinking over the day's events. Twice within the last few hours a priest had humiliated her. She had never liked the breed anyway, not since she had realized as a child that it was because of a priest that Anar had gone mad. It had taken a continual effort to protect the keep from the deadly influence of the Haunted Lands. Before Jame's time, this had been the responsibility of the scrollsman's older brother, a priest of great power and knowledge; but one night this man had fled with a female companion, leaving his inexperienced kinsman to assume the terrible burden alone. By the time Anar had become the twins' tutor, his mind had already begun to crumble under the strain. Soon he was more like a child himself, except that he still kept their home safe and continued to do so until sword's edge and arrow's point had destroyed everything for which he had sacrificed so much.

  Indeed, it was a terrible thing to wield the power of a Kencyr priest, to stand between the people and their god. The best, like Anar, were often destroyed by it, while others became so warped in time that allowances had to be made for them, even with the rigid structure of the Kencyrath.

  Jame, however, forgave nothing, especially not now, now that she had met Ishtier. Old grief and fresh resentment kept her simmering all that long walk home until, in the early hours of the morning, she turned onto the Way of Tears beside Marplet sen Tenko's inn.

  There was a burst of raucous laughter from the courtyard of the Skyrrman as she approached its gate, and a slim figure darted out into the street ahead of her, closely pursued.

  Cloth ripped as hunter and hunted converged. The slighter of the two reeled into the opposite wall, clutching the remains of her bodice over small white breasts. Jame saw that it was the black-haired servant girl. Niggen was standing in the middle of the road with the torn fabric in his hand, giggling.

  Before the boy even realized that she was there, Jame had spun him around. The heel of her palm caught him under the chin with a blow that snapped his head back and practically lifted him off his feet. A moment later, it would have been hard to say who was more startled—the men at the gate, Niggen on the ground spitting teeth, or Jame herself, who had acted purely on instinct.

  "If you touch that girl again," she said to Marplet's son, "I shall gladly knock out whatever teeth you have left."

  Not until she was crossing the square toward the Res aB'tyrr and heard someone shouting for a guard behind her did she realize what she had done. Marplet had his excuse at last.

  "I'm sorry," she said, pulling her cap off in contrition to the astonished Ghillie who met her at the door. Then she turned to face the small group approaching her from the Skyrrman.

  Marplet was in the lead, with two burly guards behind him, and Niggen trotting eagerly at his side. The innkeeper stopped short, however, when he saw Jame's face framed with her mane of black hair. For the first and last time, she saw him pale with anger as he turned on his awkward, bewildered son.

  "Do you mean to say," he demanded, pointing at her, "that you were beaten by that. . . that girl? You spineless booby!" Without another word he whirled and stalked back to the Skyrrman.

  The guards looked at Jame, at each other, then shrugged simultaneously and walked away.

  "Something told me you were home," said Cleppetty wryly behind Jame. "Come and have some supper."

  By then, it was very late. The widow had apparently been in bed before the disturbance but showed no sign of returning to it even when Jame had finished her bowl of warmed-over stew.

  "Can't sleep yet," she said in answer to Jame's question. 'I'm waiting for something."

  "What?"

  "With luck, you'll never know."

  But Cleppetty had hardly finished speaking when a shriek brought both women to their feet. It came from across the square. Jame was halfway out the front door when the widow grabbed her arm and hung on grimly.

  "Let me go!" she cried, trying to dislodge the older woman without hurting her. "I said I'd break that slime-ball's teeth if he hurt that girl again, and so help me God I will!"

  "It isn't Niggen," said the widow. "Did you seriously think that Marplet would accept a humiliation like that without revenging himself on someone? Wait."

  They stood listening to the cries until the door of the Skyrrman suddenly opened and a figure was thrown out. Even then Cleppetty wouldn't let Jame move until it had staggered halfway across the square toward them. Then they both ran out and helped the sobbing, half-naked girl into the kitchen where the widow brought out a jar of ointment and began to dress the whip cuts on her back. Fortunately, the girl was more frightened than hurt, but there was still a great deal of blood, wailing, and general mess before Tubain arrived in his nightshirt to survey the damage.

  "Tuby," said the widow, "we will have to keep her."

  From the moment the innkeeper had entered the room, he had been surreptitiously trying to leave it again. At Cleppetty's words, however, he suddenly stopped fidgeting and looked squarely at the weeping girl for the first time.

  "Of course, we will," he said.

  Jame wondered if she herself had been adopted in a similar fashion.

  The bandaging done, Ghillie and Jame helped the newest member of the household up to Taniscent's room. They had just tucked her in and quietly retreated to the gallery when the dancer herself slipped into the courtyard below through the side gate. Ghillie took one look at her and fled. Clearly, something had upset Taniscent badly, and Jame, meeting her at the head of the stair, immediately learned what it was. After weeks of cooling ardor, Bortis had finally ca
lled her an old hag and gone off with a fifteen-year-old from the next district.

  Jame nearly said "good riddance." Instead, respecting Tanis's distress, she concentrated on putting her friend to bed. This proved difficult. She was just beginning to think that she would have to sit on the dancer until she settled down when the widow's voice rose from the courtyard in an exasperated shout:

  "Now listen to me, all of you: Shut up and go to sleep!"

  "Yes, Cleppetty," six voices meekly chorused from all over the darkened inn.

  Taniscent sighed and closed her eyes. With kohl running down in streaks to puddle beside her nose, she looked, if not hag like, at least thoroughly grotesque, and closer forty years old than twenty-four.

  Jame took a blanket and lay down on the gallery floor. It was hard to believe that the long day was over at last. She had a premonition that she had started something—several things—during the course of it that might have alarming consequences later, but was too tired to sort them out now. Besides, here was Boo, lumbering out of the shadows purring loudly. Knowing that if she didn't humor him the cat would probably sit on her face, she opened the blanket and let him curl up inside it against her. Dawn was just beginning to touch the eastern sky as she fell asleep.

  Chapter 4

  The Heart of the Maze

  "PENARI!"

  The echo cracked back from the stone walls of the entrance way, unsoftened by any furniture or trappings.

  "Where are you? It's me, Jame . . . the Talisman!"

  Something rustled in a far corner, disturbing loose debris with scurrying claws. There was no other response.

  "Damn," said Jame.

  She was standing just inside Penari's home, that huge, circular edifice known as the Maze. It had been easy enough to locate from the rooftops, but now that she was here it was obvious that her problems had just begun. Many thieves before her had matched their wits against this intricate building, searching for its heart; only a handful had ever been seen again. That was what she must risk now if the old thief would not even come out to greet an invited guest. With a sigh, she resigned herself to the inevitable.

  Three doors opened off the entry hall. Jame tied the end of a large spool of thread to the post of one, kindled the torch she had brought with her, and crossed the threshold. Inside, the confusion of small rooms and narrow passages began at once, choking off all outside light and sound within a few turnings. Still and close as the ways of a tomb it was, and very like being buried in one. Leaping torchlight held back the darkness, but between its flickers the walls themselves seemed to close in.

  Surprisingly, there were several small streams running through the building and a number of stairways going up but none leading down. Jame wandered about the ground floor, shouting at intervals but still getting no response. Then she began to climb. The levels became less complex the higher she got, although there was still no way to tell exactly where she was at any given moment. Penari's hidden apartments could be anywhere. By the time she reached the fifth and final level, her thread, voice and patience were all beginning to run out. She had just decided to give up when the floor underfoot suddenly gave way.

  She fell, the thread snapping, the torch plummeting down ahead like a falling star. Then it vanished. A moment later, the water slammed into her.

  Black, choking, not alone . . . her hand found the edge of the pool, and she pulled herself out in a near panic, barking her shins on the rim without even noticing it. Behind her, something surfaced with a liquid chuckle and dove again.

  Jame crouched in the dark, shivering, listening. What had she just escaped? Where was it now? If only the pool would confine it. A rustle, a rasp of scales on stone . . . it was coming after her.

  She sprang up and backed away. A wall brought her up short. Eyes were no use in this almost tangible darkness, but her ears caught the sound of something very large, very heavy, fumbling at the pool's rim, slowly drawing its immense bulk out of the water. The close air filled with a thousand small noises, multiplying as the walls gave back their echo. With a choked cry she whirled and leaped. Her fingers caught at the rough stone blocks and she scrambled blindly upward until one hand closed on a wooden beam. She was hanging there in midair when a dazzling light seemed to explode in the room.

  "Well!" said a voice. "No one's ever done that before."

  As her vision cleared, Jame saw Penari standing below with a torch in his hand. Behind him, light gleamed on a huge mound of flesh, white, convoluted, and quivering. Pink, lidless eyes stared back at her over his shoulder.

  "Too bad it's you, boy," the old man said, "Monster hasn't been fed so far this month."

  "From what I can see, Monster hasn't any teeth."

  "Being a moon python, he doesn't need 'em," said Penari with more loyalty than truth. "Twenty years ago he had a fine set."

  "I'm sorry I'm late," said Jame, rather incoherently. "I was ill. Uh . . . if I come down, will I get eaten?"

  "After scaring the poor bugger half to death? He'd be more likely to throw up on you . . . or on me," he added, glancing up mistrustfully at the swaying head.

  Somewhat reassured, Jame dropped to the floor. Leaving the giant snake to recover himself, Penari lead the way through a bewildering series of corridors to the heart of the Maze. To Jame's surprise, this one large room occupied the whole core of the building, extending from the second level basement up to the ceiling of the fifth floor. Spiral stairways led from the bottom, where they stood, to screened alcoves and shelves of books and scrolls that extended up out of sight into the shadows. A huge chandelier full of guttering candles provided the chamber with its only light. Wax from it dripped steadily on the red and gold patterns of the carpet and on a massive table laden with manuscripts. Everywhere there were rich things dimly seen and covered with dust.

  Penari showed her the various entrances to the central room and took her out into the Maze to demonstrate how one reached the outside world from each. He apparently expected her to remember every unmarked turn after one sight of it. When he had trotted her from cellar to attic and back, the old thief fished a small greasy coin out of his robe and gave it to her saying, "Right. Now go buy a pig for Monster's dinner."

  For the next few days, Jame went to the Maze early each morning, after a night of helping at the inn, and for the next six or seven hours ran errands for Penari. She began to wonder if she had misunderstood the nature of the job that the old man had offered her. Then, on the fifth afternoon, Penari snatched up his staff and went with her when she left the Maze. They turned north at the gate, east at the Tone, and soon were in sight of the Sirdan's Palace, already gray in the dusk, rising up behind its exultant figurehead.

  The outer courtyard was again full of lights. This time, however, they shone on the nightly thieves' bazaar, where the spoils of the day were being sold or bartered to the sound of ferocious haggling. Jame felt many eyes on her as she followed Penari through the crowd. Word must have gone before them, for as they entered the Guild Hall, all faces turned in their direction and many voices stilled. The Guild secretary was at his post beside the throne dais with a small group of people waiting to see him. Penari cut in at the head of the line, drawing Jame after him.

  "This is the Talisman," he announced, presenting her. "I want to enroll him as my apprentice."

  The secretary peered at Jame, his face an odd mixture of bewilderment and suspicion. "Master Penari, this is not—"

  "A Kencyr? Of course it is. You think I'd trust my secrets to any of this rabble? Go on, Master Secretary, record it.

  Under Guild law, no one can dictate my choice, or interfere with it once made—as much as some might wish to."

  The triumph in his voice was unmistakable, and so was his determination. The secretary shrugged and wrote in the huge book on the table before him.

  "Talisman," he said to Jame, "do you swear to obey the laws of the Thieves' Guild of Tai-tastigon, to uphold its institutions, to conduct yourself to its credit and to that of your m
aster?"

  "I so swear."

  "Very well. Bare a shoulder—uh—'boy.' "

  One last chance, Jame thought. If this fails, I give up. And she stripped off both tunic and shirt.

  The secretary looked stunned. Penari, however, after a moment's impatient wait, picked up the brand—red with ink, fortunately, not heat—and pressed it against her skin, muttering something about dithering officials.

  That was it, then. He's too blind and I'm too flat, she thought despairingly, and put her clothes back on.

  The episode was apparently over as far as Penari was concerned, for he was already halfway down the hall when she turned to follow him. A hand on her arm stopped her. The nails of the index and middle fingers were filed to sharp points. A man with almost luminous gray eyes set in a dark face was looking down at her. "Someone wants to see you," he said softly. The grip on her arm tightened, meaning to hurt, succeeding. "Now."