God Stalk

by P. C. Hodgell

  Marplet, with a somewhat whimsical air, had since offered her as much a week if she would work for him; and Jame had surprised herself by turning him down with sincere thanks. She now knew that she had the rival innkeeper to thank for Bortis's absence. Some said that the maimed brigand had been driven away because he had disobeyed orders. Jame suspected, however, that Marplet had done it to protect her, since Bortis clearly blamed her more than Bane for what had happened to him. In a way, Jame thought, Marplet himself was acting much like his former henchman in transferring his hostility from her, its proper object, to poor Tubain.

  "Why do things always get so complicated?" she said out loud, interrupting Dally.

  "It's a confusing system, all right," he said, adding, " the Thieves' Guild, I mean," when he saw her puzzled look. He had, she realized, gotten off on an altogether different topic.

  "Most people don't realize that there are actually two elections," he continued. "In the first, late this coming autumn, the landed masters choose their two representatives for the Guild Council. In the second, next Winter's Eve, the Council votes for the new Sirdan. The bribery market is very lively already. Even Mendy is making arrangements with someone very important for a big loan, although I shouldn't think," he added loyally, "that he'll have to buy as many people as Theocandi will. But you see, all this makes a lot of extra work for the spies and, well the Creeper told me yesterday that he couldn't spare men any longer to search for your dancer friend. I'm afraid there's nothing more we can do. She's probably dead of old age by now anyway. I'm sorry."

  "Well, you tried," said Jame. "Word may come yet through other channels. Meanwhile, it mustn't ruin our holiday. After all, by this time next week I may be gone."

  Dally bit his lip at this, but said nothing.

  Soon after, they met Canden in Antiquarians' Row, where the Tai-than expeditionary headquarters were located, then walked north together. Canden talked with great enthusiasm and considerable expertise about the maps that he was helping to collate for the expedition's leader, the renowned explorer Quipun of Lefy. Jame gathered that Quipun had given this task to the boy originally to keep him quiet, but suspected that he was now beginning to realize his eager young helper's potential.

  They came to the River Tone and walked along its bank, buying from street stalls fresh grilled shrimp and venison rolled in almond dust. The setting sun cupped between the white slopes of Mounts Timor and Tinnabin spilled its crimson light down the hidden paths by which the first caravan would travel the next week. For the first time, the imminence of her departure struck Jame. It seemed impossible that she would be leaving so soon with so many questions still unanswered and her researches in the Temple District barely begun. She hadn't even really decided what it would be like to rejoin her people. Since the night of the near-riot, events had simply carried her forward, smoothing the way to a leave-taking that now seemed all too sudden. She almost wished that something would happen to prevent it.

  Just then, Edor Thulig, the Tower of Demons, came into sight on the left. Its foundations rested on the largest privately owned island in the city, which lay between arms of the River Tynnet and the River Tone. The high wall that girt it was topped with barbed spearheads and torches that threw their light on the swift water below. Its gate, however, was open, revealing the full sweep of the stairs that reached from the Tone's edge to the threshold of the Tower itself, and there too the doors gaped wide. Inside, firelight set monstrous shadows leaping over the ceiling and walls of the vaulted entrance way. Outside, obsidian sheathed walls soared up one hundred and fifty feet to the clawed toes of the four stone demons whose interlocking wings encircled the top of the edifice. Above their outthrust heads was a band of high, clear windows, brilliantly lit, then a balcony, then more windows, this time of richly hued glass, and finally the stone tracery of the dome under which Ozymardien's great collection was kept.

  "There'll be quite a party up there tonight," said Dally, staring up at the stained glass level.

  "I suppose so," said Jame. "I've been ordered to attend it."

  She told them about the summons. They both agreed that, intriguing as the opportunity was, it would be wisest to forgo it. At this, Jame merely looked thoughtful, and Dally, regarding her with sudden apprehension, quickly proposed that they see the Feast in with a glass of ale at the Moon.

  The tavern was swollen with apprentices, but a friend of Dally's named Raffing called them over to a side table where he and several other of Master Galishan's pupils, including his roommate Scramp and Darinby, were sitting. . . . .

  "Lit up like a shrine and open as a whore's legs," a lanky, pimple-faced thief was saying. Jame recognized him as Hangrell, the apprentice of a rather disreputable master, whose territory abutted the Lower Town on the west. "He's mocking us, he is. Tower of Demons indeed! Everyone knows he only has one."

  "One is quite enough," said Raffing with a grin. "Look at its record: in the thirty years since the Tower was raised, no thief has gotten so much as a clay pot out of it yet."

  "Exactly what does the Prince's pet devil do?" asked an apprentice new to the city.

  "Mangles souls," said Darinby laconically.

  "But how?"

  "How do you think? Look over there." He pointed to a small table in the back of the room where a single man sat facing the wall. His shadow was black on the stones before him, all except the shadow that should have been cast by his head. There was nothing. His hair seemed to be falling out in strips with the skin still attached. Underneath, the flesh was brown and wrinkled as a rotten potato.

  "Poor old Jubar won't be with us much longer," said the journeyman dispassionately. "He ran into the demon up in the lit levels during the last Feast of Fools. The idiot thought that because the gods slept, so would Thulig-sa."

  "Why didn't it?" Jame asked.

  "You don't outwit a demon that easily, or any other being with even part of a human soul. Gods never have them, their worshippers know better. But a true demon has only victims, and therefore needs a soul as badly as we do bones. Some tear off whatever they can get through the shadow, like Thulig-sa; others suck it dry, bit by bit, like the Lower Town Monster. Either way, it means a slow, withering death for their prey."

  "Sometimes not so slow," said the pimple-faced apprentice with a sly smile. "Remember Master Tane."

  "Here now," said Darinby sharply. "That was never proved. You remember present company, Hangrell."

  They all looked at Canden, who was staring fixedly at his cup.

  "Just after the last Guild Council," said Dally in Jame's ear, "the Sirdan's chief rival died suddenly. Theocandi was suspected of using soul sorcery—a shadow thief, to be exact —but as Darinby says, it was never proven. Speaking of souls," he said out loud, "don't the Kencyrs equate them with the shadow too?"

  "More or less. With us, though, both are more . . . uh . . . detachable. Some of the Highborn and, I think, all of the Arrin-ken, have the ability to carry other Kencyrs' souls. The only advantage this seems to have, though, is that a man who has voluntarily given his soul into someone else's charge is very hard to kill."

  "That sounds desirable, anyway."

  "Not always. We like to keep death as an option."

  "Sometimes it's easier than running away," said Scramp.

  "Your terms are beginning to confuse me," said Darinby, as though Scramp had not spoken. "What's an Arrin-ken?"

  "The first of the Three People, our judges. The priests give the laws, the scrollsmen record them, the Kendar enforce them, and the Arrin-ken temper them . . . or at least they used to. Two thousand years ago they got disgusted with the rest of us and withdrew to consult. As far as I know, they're still at it."

  "For two thousand years?"

  "Time doesn't mean much to that lot: they're as close to immortal as makes no difference. I didn't say, you know, that they were human. In fact, they look rather like big cats —tiger size—can move things without touching them and, on occasion, have been known to walk thr
ough stone walls. The rest of us used to be much closer to them physically and mentally than we are now."

  "Marvelous!" said Scramp with a giggle. "I love bedtime stories. Tell me, have you ever seen one of their beasties?"

  "I think I have," said the new apprentice unexpectedly, "or at least its tracks. Anyone who's ever lived on the slopes of the Ebonbane can tell you about the Mount Timor Cat and how it's outwitted generations of hunters. Its even been known to help caravans caught by the snows."

  Scramp snorted. "I liked the first story better," he said. "It sounded more . . . convincing."

  Jame regarded the little Townie thoughtfully. She was fairly certain that he had been trying to gain acceptance among the others all these weeks by baiting her—the only one more an outsider than himself—so she had tried to be patient. There were, however, limits.

  "One would almost suppose," She said mildly, "that you didn't think I was telling the truth."

  Scramp gave her a quick, frightened look. Unlike some of his colleagues, he had never underestimated this odd, silver-eyed creature—but he also knew that whatever level of impudence he reached he must then maintain, if he was not to lose everything he had gained. Even now, he could feel the men at the other tables watching him out of the corners of their eyes, silently goading him on.

  "What does it matter if you are or aren't?" he said, wondering if his voice was really as thin as it sounded. "Who are you anyway? The penny pickpocket. The rotten fruit thief."

  There was dead silence. Everyone was staring at them now, all pretense of indifference gone. For a moment, the Talisman's eyes went very hard and metallic. Then, slowly, they cleared.

  "Not a very distinguished record, is it?" she said in a brittle voice. "Still, there's a little time left to make amends. Your master Galishan holds the Tynnet Branching District, doesn't he?" Darinby nodded, suddenly very serious. "Very well. With your permission, I hunt there tomorrow night. . ."

  "Don't say it, don't say it," Dally plead.

  ". . . in the Tower of Demons."

  Men-dalis's brother put his head on the table and groaned. Outside, bells began to ring, people to shout, fireworks to explode. Inside, everyone except those at his table stood up and, to the horror of the innkeeper, began with great solemnity to smash the furniture.

  The Feast of Fools had begun.

  * * *

  FROM GATE to gate, Tai-tastigon blazed with lights. The midnight sky bloomed suddenly with scarlet flowers, emerald vines rising, golden fountains dripping fiery sparks on the rooftops below. Candles thronged every window. Bonfires threw their fitful glare on the façades of houses, on the fantastic figures that leaped and whirled around them. Down River Street came the effigy of a major fertility god borne on the shoulders of its shouting worshippers. Its priests ran on ahead with robes tucked up, snatching flowers from passers-by, weaving them into garlands, and dashing back to throw them over the figure's jutting phallus. Those who followed loudly kept score. In all that great, exulting city, only the Temple District was dark, and now the Lower Town as well where no joy ever survived the fall of night.

  Two figures stood in the shadows on the shore of the Tynnet, across the water from Edor Thulig.

  "If anything happens to you," one said with considerable violence, "I'll break that Townie's neck."

  "No, you won't," said the other. "You know perfectly well that he didn't push me into anything that it wasn't already in my mind to try. I've had a good master, Dally. He hasn't asked for anything but loyalty, and it won't disturb him at all if others call him a fool for having bothered with me. Just the same, the man who stole the Eye of Abarraden deserves better than a petty larcenist for an apprentice. Anyway, maybe I'll feel better about leaving Tai-tastigon if I can do it with a bang."

  "It may be with a loud screech if Thulig-sa gets its paws on you," said Dally gloomily. "That is, of course, assuming His Glory doesn't add you to the jade screens and stuffed fantods first."

  "Don't worry," said Jame with a grin. "I'd look silly under a bell jar. Just pass on my message to Sparrow, if you can find him . . . and Dally, if something should go wrong, please be kind to Scramp. You don't know what it's like always to be an outsider."

  Before she realized his intent, Dally caught her by the arms. His kiss was so sudden and fierce that for a second she thought her front teeth would be knocked down her throat. Then he was gone. She stared after him, incredulous, then pushed the incident to the back of her mind. Putting on her dancer's mask, she crossed the bridge.

  Inside the outer wall, beyond the open gate, a wilderness of white roses glowed faintly in the darkness. Jame followed a tessellated walk through them to the still-unguarded river steps. There really was something arrogant about all this openness, she thought as she climbed the steps, a kind of contemptuous challenge thrown down to the whole mad city, now reeling into its last four hours of carnival. The passage way was some thirty feet long and lined with a mosaic of Metalondrian devils doing unspeakable things to intruders. Ahead, an open hearth fire roared up the central well of the tower. No one, guest or servant, was in sight, all having long since either mounted to the upper levels or retreated into the honeycomb of rooms between the outer wall of Edor Thulig and the inner one of this shaft.

  Jame started cautiously up the spiral stair. The wind, whistling in the open door, rose with her, tugging at her cloak, running cool fingers over what skin the Senetha costume left uncovered.

  The costume . . . what a time they had had making it. Tight black cloth, some leather, much skin showing in unexpected places . . . how pleased Kithra had been with it in the end, and how shocked the widow was. Jame hardly knew what to make of it herself except that, for what she did, nothing else would serve. And she had worn something like it before. She was sure that part of her mind remembered where and for what purpose when she danced, but that knowledge always slipped away again when the trance ended. It was the trance itself that worried her now. If it fell on her again, here, she would be stripped of all control while it lasted. Anything might happen. Too late to fret about that, however; here was the end of the stairs and the threshold of the demon's true domain.

  The lit levels varied from three to five. Ceilings differed in height, stairs sprouted in odd locations, passageways—all gleaming white—dipped and swirled in a more or less concentric fashion. It was not a true maze in the Tastigonian sense, but it was designed to confuse anyone in a hurry, and doubtless had done so many times in the past. Light spheres illuminated every corner, throwing multiple shadows at Jame's feet.

  Several times as she prowled this area, fixing its major patterns in her mind, she heard something moving stealthily behind her but tried to ignore it. With the Prince's invitation but none of his property in her possession, there should be no danger. That would come soon enough.

  Guests were normally conducted through this region blindfolded. One broad staircase led from the upper level to the chamber above where, from the sound of it, the party was still in progress; none, however, gave access to the servants' quarters below in the honeycomb. Internal stairways must service that. When she had satisfied herself as to the area's layout, Jame fitted together bits of metal taken from various pockets in her cape and clipped a thin, strong rope to the resulting spidery form. Then she opened a window and stepped out onto the broad shoulders of the southern stone demon.

  The wind buffeted her in savage gusts, filling her cloak, making it tear at her shoulder. She released it. It whirled away, a boneless night bird homing. For a moment it was hard to stand. Then came a lull. Jame swung the grapnel cautiously, paid out more line, and threw it upward. It disappeared over the balcony railing above. She tested it, took a higher grip on the rope. As her feet left the stone image, the wind came again, pushing her sideways into space. Far, far below, the spear-lined wall, the steps, the river. She began to climb. An immeasurable time later, her hand closed on the railing. She stepped over it into a pool of ruby and amethyst light on the balcony floor. Inside, the
re was a burst of laughter and applause. Shadows moved across the magnificent windows, dark, very close. Jame retrieved the grapnel. The narrower floor of the upper gallery was perhaps twenty-five feet above her, forming a partial roof. She threw the hook over its railing and climbed quickly up. As she had suspected from the presence of this rim walk, both the outer tracery dome and the inner one of amber glass were fitted with sliding panels. One on the north side was partially open. Jame slipped through it into the heart of Prince Ozymardien's treasure trove.

  The cavernous interior, dimly lit with spheres, suggested the nave of a cathedral in its dimensions and a museum in its content. The faint light fell softly on the sheen of silken tapestries, on the marble limbs of statuary arching out of the gloom, on furs, gem-encrusted weapons, ivory miniatures on black velvet, cups of gold, and feather capes, all spread out ready for the touch of their master's hand. Jame walked among them, marveling at their splendor. She longed to spend hours here simply looking when she knew that minutes must suffice. Then, on a little table just beyond an incredibly lifelike figure reclining on a couch, she saw what she had come for: the Peacock Gloves.