As we walked along to the lodgings she said: “Tomorrow is the funeral.”
I wasn’t stupid enough to ask her if she was going.
I said: “Probably the others from the caravan will be there.”
“Possibly.”
“Yes. I think I will mingle with the crowd.”
“As you please.”
I said: “Aron the Ferry saw you coming. You were a pigeon, plump for the plucking. No, it does not please me to mingle with the crowd. But I fancy we’ll stand a better chance if both of us are not stuck out like sore thumbs.”
She swung about and halted. “You! Cabbage — remember who—”
“I remember very well — Pigeon,” I said, and walked quietly on.
She did not speak to me again until we had eaten and sat back in the upstairs room to contemplate what was left of our first day in Makilorn.
Suddenly, she said: “Cabbage!”
I looked up. “Yes, Pigeon?”
She breathed hard through her nose, very hard. Then: “You were looking at my arms.”
“Aye.”
“I suppose I must tell you, then. Anyway, I must eat a great deal now.”
“I noticed you were stowing it away.”
“I must replace the lost tissue as quickly as possible. I expended just about all my bindles.”
“They were what stuck all over their faces?”
“Naturally.”
“And in the eye of that Rapa, and what stung Hangol by the tree?”
“Down there by the river I was startled, I was extravagant. I shot off far too many. Far too many.”
“You did rather make a mess of the cramphs.” I picked up a paline and turned the yellow berry in my fingers. “May I—?”
“I suppose so. Here.” She held out her right arm. The smooth and silky skin ended at wrist and elbow. Between lay a pitted skinscape, rather like a honeycomb. There were only a dozen or so of the deadly little sticks, her bindles, remaining in their slots. These gave the granular effect. She went on: “They are shot off by blood pressure. It makes it easier if I’m angry; usually I am. More often than not I’m frightened.”
“Join the club,” I said.
She pulled her arm back. I own I was fascinated by this fresh glimpse of the way nature had developed on Kregen. Still — maybe this was not natural evolution but another example of the way the ancient savants had interfered with nature?
“Everyone is like this back home?”
Her wide mouth widened into a smile.
“Oh, no. Only the females.”
Well, that explained some of her hoity-toity ways, then.
“Tell me, Mevancy, where away is this land of yours?”
Truth to tell I didn’t expect her to answer. But I suppose some dam had been released by what had occurred, for she said simply: “I come from Sinnalix. We were once as advanced in culture as any nation of Kregen; but we were overtaken and now we are little better than barbarians. It is a great shame.”
I’d heard the story. The Sinnalixi inhabited a portion of Loh south of Murn-Chem, north and west of where we were. So she wasn’t too far from home, then. The country had been part of the Empire of Walfarg; evil days had fallen on the people and whilst there are barbarians and barbarians, I knew what Mevancy meant. I hadn’t known about this remarkable ability of the Sinnalixi women to defend themselves by shooting miniature darts with great accuracy into the eyes and faces of evil kleeshes who attempted them. I found that, in general, I approved.
She’d come, she said, from a good family who had fallen on bad times. Well, by Zair, and who hadn’t! After the spread of barbarism over Sinnalix, a barbarism of material and spiritual significance, the country had gone wild. Life had been hard. Mevancy’s father, and I gathered he’d had some holdings in the local community that demanded obedience, had prospered, married a wealthy girl of a friendly tribe. Perhaps the seasons-old blight of ignorance across the land might be lifted. The legacy of Walfarg’s empire might yet yield good.
“I attracted notice as a person not dealt with lightly.” She spoke without looking at me, playing with a paline around and around her plate. “My mother died in a raid on our hold, and that was the beginning of the evil times.”
I thought of Jilian Sweet Tooth. The two girls were remarkably different, one from the other, yet they might have been sisters in adversity.
“Suringlas had a job to do and I helped him. One thing led to another and eventually I was overjoyed to be taken on full time for the Everoinye.”
Such a flat matter-of-fact way of describing being taken up by the Star Lords astounded me more than anything else she said.
“So you’ve just been working for them ever since?”
“Ever since Suringlas came to Sinnalix.”
I decided not to ask how long that was. I judged it was not long.
She said: “How long—?”
I said: “I have not always seen eye-to-eye with the Everoinye. Sometimes I have disobeyed them and they have punished me.”
She sniffed. “Well they would, wouldn’t they, cabbage?”
There was no arguing with that statement, by Krun!
Choosing my words with some care and speaking as casually as I could, I leaned back in the chair, and said: “Now that Pondo and Nafty have chosen to return to Larishsmot, the question of employees has come up.”
It is, of course, a gross exaggeration for me to say that had she shot off her remaining bindles at me I’d not have been surprised. As it was, she stiffened up her back and gave me a piercing look. Then she said: “You mean, had we had them down by the wharf I wouldn’t have fallen in the water?”
“Possibly.”
“H’m.” She looked away and played some more with the paline. Just before she popped it into her mouth she said: “Very well.”
“That’s a relief.”
“My purse is not bottomless, you know.”
Taking this as a matter of comment and not of criticism I could say easily enough: “I suppose the Everoinye provide you with funds?”
“From time to time.”
This casual attitude to what were marvels to me still took a bit of getting used to.
“Well, you shouldn’t starve, then.”
“As you are my assistant, then neither should you, cabbage.”
“Thank you, pigeon,” I said, humbly, and I really had to screw up my face not to allow the smile plastered all over the inside to show on the outside.
“You feel sick?”
“No. No, thank you. Just a passing fancy.”
“Well, let it pass off, if that’s what it does to your face.”
“Quidang!” I rapped out in best military style.
“Yes,” she sniffed. “Oh, I’d guessed you are a paktun ages ago.” She eyed me meanly. “More likely a masichieri — bandits pretending to be honest mercenaries.” She was working herself up now. “And I suppose you are high and mighty and way above a mere mortpaktun — oh, no! You are a zhanpaktun, a hyrpaktun, and wear the golden pakzhan on its silken cords at your throat!”
I admit I felt not so much embarrassed or annoyed, or even sorry for her, as an acute puzzlement. There was one highly unsavory explanation for her behavior. I dreaded that. Dreaded? Well, then, by Vox, did not welcome, did not welcome one little bit. I’d developed a keen sense of self-preservation when it came to dealing with predatory women lusting after what was not theirs. And so, then, wondering if that was the explanation, I did feel sorry for her.
Her eyes were bright. Her breast rose and fell. And her color was high — very high. That color, evidence as I’d thought of a somewhat unhealthy blood pressure, was now explained. And she did eat! Her body was hard at work growing fresh bindles to take their places in the clustered slots on her forearms. I knew very keenly that I wouldn’t like that little lot of nastiness chinking into my eyeballs, no, by Djan!
That afternoon I went down and found Mistress Quincy and asked her a few pertinent questions and
then went back to Mevancy. I said to her: “Will you lend me four gold mings, please?”
“Oh?”
“I need to buy an outfit suitable for Makilorn. A fawn cloak—”
“Popinjay time is it, now, cabbage?”
Patiently, seeing the way her red lips quivered, I said: “I intend to mingle with the crowd at the funeral and I shall keep a sharp eye on you, pigeon. It will be easier if I am not marked as a foreigner.”
“Yes, yes, I see that. Here, cabbage, here.” She fairly flung a handful of gold and silver coins at me. They rang and chingled in the upstairs room.
I began very moodily to think that maybe I was going to have trouble with her. What a tragedy! We ought to be a smoothly functioning team working for the Star Lords. So, of course, this had to rear its ugly head.
Deliberately, for I really couldn’t believe what I’d just been thinking, I said: “We shall all miss Leotes.”
She was clearly brooding on something else, for she spoke without thinking. “Oh, he’ll be about, he’ll be about.”
Chapter fourteen
The funeral of Leotes li Ningwan, Vad of Sabiling, turned out to be entirely different from what I’d unthinkingly expected.
Given that Kregen is a huge conglomeration of peoples with widely varying customs, one would still expect rituals and respects, however oddly at variance one with another they might be. Leotes, it seemed to me, standing in the shadow of a squat pillar in a gloomy domed hall, was just shuffled off.
His body still wrapped in the canvas in which he’d been laid in the caravan was brought in by four slaves and placed on the pyre. His children walked up and looked — I thought perfunctorily — and walked away. San Hargon was there, astringent as ever, apparently in a supervisory capacity. Strom Hangol was not present. Mevancy stood to the side, pale, tense; if Hargon attempted violence now, I had already decided to be as ruthless as he was. Tuong Mishuro and his apprentice, Lunky, stood near Mevancy. There were no signs of anyone else of the caravan. So much, I thought then, for the camaraderie of the journey.
Slaves waited deferentially. Hargon gave an impatient sign and torches were thrust between the thin scattering of wood. Flames bit up, blackening the canvas shroud, flickered and died.
Clearly there was nowhere near enough fuel to form a pyre to consume a human body. Smoke lifted thinly. No one spoke or moved until San Hargon lifted the little golden staff he carried. Instantly the slaves hustled forward, took up the singed canvas bundle, and marched out.
A voice spoke breathily in my ear: “They used a lot of wood on him. A lot. Well, they would, wouldn’t they, him being a rich vad an’ all.”
Without turning around, I said: “Are you in one piece?”
“More or less. It’s been touch and go, what with dodging about an’ everything.”
“What happens to him now?”
“Why, they’ll take it across the river and just put it in his cave.”
“Just like that?”
“Well, by Lohrhiang of the Five Palms, it’s only his old used-up body.”
“I’d have thought they’d show a little more respect.”
“Well, they have, haven’t they? Look at all the wood for the funeral pyre.”
I saw I wasn’t getting anywhere here. Still without turning, I said: “I’m keeping an eye on Hargon. I think he will seek to harm Lady Mevancy.”
“I’ll shaft the shint first.”
“We were sorry to have missed you on the ride in. I know Lady Mevancy will be overjoyed you are safe.”
“Safe, aye, and hungry!”
His attitude to Hargon intrigued me, and I filed away my ideas on that. Now the slaves carrying Leotes’s body had left, San Hargon followed. He did not look at Mevancy, and he did not see Llodi and me in the shadows. He went out.
Mishuro moved towards Mevancy. His voice was low but clear.
“You are brave but foolish, my lady. I believe you to be in great danger.”
“I believe you are right, san.”
“Well, then?”
“If I am foolish it must be because I am a foreigner and not used to your ways. I wanted to look on Leotes’s face once more.”
“I shall soon be arranging that, as I have informed you, since you are in a privileged position. The trouble is that Hargon will be the guardian.”
“I do not know — I am not sure — what I can do about him.”
In my ear, Llodi whispered: “Shaft the shint!”
I said: “Perhaps later. Now, would you shaft those fellows creeping—”
“I see ’em!”
I heard all the sounds of a man drawing a bow, letting fly, reaching for the next shaft. The arrow flew true. The first of the men in dark clothes creeping from the shadows past the far doorway screeched as the arrow punched in. There were four more of them and these leaped forward, still silent despite that they had been discovered. Swords glittered in their fists.
Llodi let fly with his second shaft and took one of the assassins out temporarily, the arrow through his arm.
Buying the new fawn robe gave me the ability to move among these folk without attracting attention. I had to keep the rapier hidden, of course. So I ripped out the lynxter Mevancy had given me and jumped forward.
The first assassin was pawing at his eyes. Blood and muck spattered his cheeks.
That left two for me to deal with.
These assassins were not dismayed by their losses. They were real professional stikitches. Their dark clothes, their silence, their swift onrush, all proclaimed that. The one with the arrow through his arm had now recovered and as I closed with the two before me I lost him beyond them. Their blades flashed before my eyes.
Mevancy screamed: “You onker, cabbage! Keep out of it!”
She’d drawn her dagger and she knew how to use it. Of course! She hadn’t believed I’d knocked over Hangol’s guards to rescue her and she thought I was still as weak as a woflo, a camouflage I intended to keep up. But, here and now, with Mevancy’s life in danger? Not likely, by Krun! No subterfuge was worth the life of this hoity-toity little madam for whom I cherished a lively affection. She had to be saved, no argument.
I slid the first blow and twisted and thrust and so recovered, the lynxter glistening red.
Mevancy hurled her dagger. It whistled damn close past my ear and went twunk! into the face of the second assassin just about to engage me.
As this black clad unhanged villain collapsed I saw past him the fellow with the arrow through his arm now sported a second arrow through his neck. Llodi had finished what he had started.
“Well!” snapped Mevancy in an exasperated voice.
I said: “These stikitches are professionals. They are not high quality—”
“Because they failed, Walfger Drajak?” said Mishuro.
He looked unruffled, calm, in control of himself. Lunky hovered.
“Yes, as well as their lack of masks and body armor.”
“Assassins vary over Kregen,” said Mishuro, somewhat sententiously. “These five were quite good enough for me, thank you.”
And Mevancy laughed.
“You were right, san.” She caught my eye and I frowned and then gave the universal expression of questioning. I meant — was she the target, or was he? Was he the person the Star Lords wanted us to protect? I was more and more convinced that he was. She did not stick her tongue out at me; her expression indicated that she had done so, and I deserved it.
“I think they would have slain me, into the bargain,” said Mishuro. “Stikitches do not respect much in this world of sin.”
“Nor does that shint Hargon,” I said, somewhat heatedly. “He and that cramph Hangol sent these hired killers. You know, san, it was Hangol’s men and Hargon who pushed Leotes and Lady Mevancy off, don’t you?”
“This is what Mevancy says. It is her unsupported word.” As I was about to let rip with a volley of invective he went on: “I believe her. But nothing can be done in any legal way.” He let it
hang there.
So, all right, then! He might look like an ancient Buddha, serene, selfless, above petty mortality’s envy and strife; he wanted something done here. I am not an old leem-hunter for nothing. I sensed immediately the wheels of plots turning here. San Hargon might have been pleased San Mishuro was killed in the unfortunate assassin attack; vice versa operated here, and no mistake, by Krun!
People were coming in to find out what the commotion was about. We left them to sort out the bodies and clean the place up. Mishuro insisted we go with him to his villa.
As we walked along, Mevancy in a most serious tone of voice said: “You were fortunate that fellow rushed straight onto your blade and skewered himself, cabbage. Otherwise your head would have rolled.”
“Very fortunate.” So my footling and petty-minded disguise of still having no strength remained! Very well, then. Let it remain!
I’d cleaned the sword on the black clothes of the corpses. I noticed that Llodi retrieved two of his arrows, the third being broken. His bow was the great Lohvian longbow. In the continent of Loh as I was, that is not a stupid remark, for flat and compound bows are prevalent there as elsewhere in Paz. As to Llodi’s skill with the bow, a strangdjim as he was, I could only surmise. Had he been a bowman of quality, one would think, he’d be employed as a bowman, not a spearman.
If he could be persuaded to take employment with Mevancy, I, for one, would welcome him.
Mishuro’s villa was a place of cool arcades and walled gardens and high comfort. He had a small army of servants and slaves. This did not agree with the appearance he had made in the caravan. Then there was only Lunky, his apprentice. Now there was a villa full of people. I did notice that he employed only a token force of mercenaries under a cadade, fat and sweating, whose chief function appeared to be superintending opening and closing the big front door.
“Naturally enough,” he said in reply to my query. “No one would even dream of harming me.”
“It’s unthinkable,” said Llodi. “Why, Diviners are like the Todalpheme. Sacrosanct.”
We sat down to a splendid meal and I came to the reluctant conclusion I must insist on having a few answers to the questions I wanted to ask, questions I feel sure you who listen to my story have already asked yourself, questions to which you have already found the answers. I can only say in mitigation of my blindness that I hadn’t really sat down and thought the situation through.
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