by Daniel Hood
He found a tavern on a side street only a few blocks from the Golden Orb, between a house like his landlady's, where the fourth and fifth stories leaned precariously out over the street, and a building with a crudely lettered sign that announced the school of a private teacher of rhetoric and grammar. Liam noticed with amusement that the sign had three misspellings. The tavern was called the Uncommon Player, and the wooden board that swung creakily over the door was painted with a figure in motley juggling three balls of flame. Noise trickled out, like the murmur of the sea from far away.
Inside, the common room was long and narrow, and the noise swelled to a din like battle. The tavern was packed to bursting with laughing, shouting, singing men and women, hectically enjoying themselves. Behind the bar, three men were busy trying to serve enough beer to keep the huge crowd happy. It was hot, and sweat streamed freely down many of the faces, but the smell was oddly pleasant, even with the thick banks of smoke that hovered overhead. Close, but not stifling, and fresh. The evening had only just begun, and the odors and the fun had not had time to sour. He wondered distastefully what it would be like in a few hours, and looked around for a place to sit.
There were only a few tables, inadequate for the large groups that were crammed around them, and all the standing room was taken by the raucous clientele. Even as he stood uncertainly in the doorway, however, four people stood up from the table nearest him, and Liam recognized them as actors from the rehearsal. One of them, a man, shouted loudly and waved towards the rear of the room, while the others settled with the harassed serving girl.
"Fitch! Fitch!" the man called, gesturing urgently. "Call!" Liam followed his pointing and saw Knave Fitch's flushed face nod comprehendingly towards the door and then resume talking with the group gathered around him. The man shook his head and led his three fellow actors out of the Uncommon Player.
Liam instantly installed himself at the vacant table, amazed that the four actors had managed to fit around it. He thought it barely adequate for one.
An earthenware tankard suddenly dropped to the table before him. He caught it instinctively and looked up at the hard-pressed serving girl, who nodded in approval at his quickness.
"I didn't—" he began, pitching his voice above the roar. "All the drink we serve, master," the girl cut in, ,and turned abruptly to waltz away into the mass of thirsty customers.
Shrugging, Liam tested the drink and found beer, remarkably cold and far better than merely drinkable. He downed nearly half of it, looking idly around the room. The customers were not the same dour, quiet types as those in the White Grape, but they seemed better off for it, laughing and shouting and drinking hugely, unaffected by the cramped space or the din or the smoke from dozens of cheap tapers and even cheaper pipes. He liked it, assuming a blandly smiling expression while he wondered at the number of people and the pleasure they seemed to take in each other's company.
The serving girl appeared again, dancing gracefully through the unmoving crowd with a huge platter balanced above her head. She slammed the platter down on his table and breathed a huge sigh of relief before holding up her hand to stop his question.
"I know you did not order it, master, but you needs must take it, for that y'are at a table, and at the tables you needs must pay for food, even though y'eat not." She waited for a second and he smiled. She nodded and whirled away again to fight her way to the bar.
He had seen the public houses and taverns and restaurants and saloons of hundreds of cities, and had learned to be comfortable eating alone, so he turned his attention to the platter without a qualm.
Pleasantly surprised, he saw that the Uncommon Player offered nothing cooked, relying instead on quantity to make up for heat. There were three huge wheels of cheese, each spiced differently, and large loaves of flat bread. Cold mi::at, nuts, apple slices and butter were arrayed around the ·cheese and bread. in workmanlike profusion. There was even a small pot of honey, and he remembered the knife at his belt with relief. The Uncommon Player apparently saw silverware as an unnecessary item.
As he ate, the crowd grew smaller, drifting out in a hail of noisy farewells, until it seemed there was only the small group gathered around Knave Fitch, He held court raucously, shouting witty obscenities and insults at his companions, who rewarded him with gusts of laughter and refillings of his tankard. Liam smiled at some of the clown's jokes, and noticed that there were three musicians at the far end of the room, playing furiously on lute, pipes and a small set of skin drums. They could only occasionally be heatd over Fitch's constant stream of filth, mostly when he stopped to take monstrous gulps of beer.
Liam stared at the platter, which was still more than half full, and gave up. His stomach strained uncomfortably, and he felt short .of breath; it was by far the most food he had eaten in a long while.
He pushed the platter carefully away, as though afraid some of the food might leap off it and try to run down his throat, and gave Fitch his full attention.
The clown managed two or three more rude jokes before the door of the Player burst in and Kansallus appeared like an angry god.
A short, angry god, Liam amended,· and watched the proceedings with even more interest.
"Fitch, you bastard!". Kansallus screamed, his face purple with anger. "Call was an hour since! You've less than ten minutes to be on stage, you damned, double-damned, triply-damned ass!"
The little playwright stormed over to the clown, who was draining his tankard unperturbed, and clamped his fingers on Fitch's upper arm in a way that made Liam wince, remembering an old tutor who had done the same thing. With the thumb and forefinger pressing into the meat of the muscle, it could be exquisitely painful, but Fitch took it in stride, handing his empty tankard to a barkeeper and allowing himself to be dragged to the door. Kansallus propelled him through it with a vicious kick to his ample behind, and slammed it closed behind him.
Liam applauded softly, and Kansallus turned, his face suddenly calm and amiable, and bowed deeply. When he rose, he smiled agreeably.
"How now! It's the gentleman of the afternoon that appreciates true art! Might I?" He gestured at the empty chair across from Liam as he sat in it. "I know you not, sir, but you strike me as a man of some discretion, of some taste if you'll allow me to say so."
"I will," Liam said, and signaled the serving girl.
Kansallus laughed loudly, and then again when the girl brought two fresh tankards to the table.
"Is it a problem when Fitch drinks before a performance?" Liam asked as the playwright downed most of his beer.
"Not in the least," Kansallus answered, smacking his lips and beaming happily. He had sharp eyes, Liam noted, but there were shadows in them, a sort of defensive mask. "He'll outshine the stars tonight, and send the groundlings to their knees weak as babes with mirth. He's best when pickled."
Noting the way Kansallus's eyes dropped to the half-full platter, Liam pushed it across the table and bade him eat, if he was hungry.
"As a rule, I don't sup on the leavings of men to whose names I'm not privy," the playwright said with a smile, though the defensive shadows were thick, ready for rejection. "I'm Kansallus, scripter and part owner of the Golden Orb."
"Liam Rhenford." He held out his hand, which the playwright took briefly and with unshadowed eyes before digging into the platter like a starving man. "You seem hungry, Kansallus of the Golden Orb. Is it not so profitable?"
"Profitable enough," the little man muttered around a huge mouthful, "but not so luxurious that I'll refuse a freely offered meal. Pray you," he said after washing the mouthful down, "if I'm not too bold, what brings a man who walks the day with an Aedile to the Unco' Player at night?"
"I thought I might see your performance tonight. I enjoyed the other one I saw very much."
"Ah, then, y'are as much caught by Rora as any other." Nettled by the man's amused tone, Liam feigned indifference. "Rora?" The other smirked, spilling a handful of nuts into his mouth, and Liam smiled
guiltily. "You must admit, she's a beautiful woman."
"Oh, aye, passing fair, until you know her well. She can be hideous as a witch, if you take my meaning. I'll disappoint you further: she's not on tonight."
"No?"
"She's this night free and the next, for that Uris-tide is nigh. She's a very zealot," he added, with a wink that suggested the opposite.
"No great temple-goer?"
"Not by half. Though no sinner, mind. Pure as the unsunned snow, our Rora." Strangely, he seemed to mean it.
"Then the way she dances is ... "
"Intuitive," Kansallus supplied with malicious humor.
"An imposture of a knowing wench. And all the more impressive for it, if you see."
"I suppose I do."
They fell silent, Liam pondering the idea of Rora's dancing while Kansallus wolfed down the rest of the platter. When he had finished it, he pushed away from the table and began picking his teeth with an immaculately clean fingernail. He was startlingly neat; though his artisan's smock was a little ragged and his thin, reddish hair unshorn, both were clean, and a slight smell of soap arose from him.
"If you do," he said, as though the conversation had not been interrupted, "I'll thank you for the meal with advice: stay clear of Rora. Any fancies you have on her she's sure not to fill, and more like to box your ears or scratch the jelly from your eyes."
"I'll keep it in mind," Liam said, laughing at the transparency of his interest. On the other hand, he imagined that Kansallus and Rora's fellow actors must be used to men showing that kind of interest.
"I'm no wagerer, friend Rhenford, but if I were, I'd have one for you." The playwright was looking at him with friendly appraisal.
"What?"
"I'd wager—though I'm neither snooper nor gossip— I'd wager that whatever else brought you to the Orb this afternoon revolved 'round a certain rich merchant's wife." Kansallus was indeed the man he should have talked to when he first began investigating.
"And you might have won, had you phrased the bet properly. She was not the focus of the business, but a part of it."
The playwright nodded judiciously. "Lons is an arrogant, silly ass. He deserves to have panted after her, puppylike, for the whole summer. Strange, now, isn't it, that Lons, handsome piece of work that he is, should have such trouble getting what he wants, while his sister has so little getting what she doesn't?"
Liam agreed, and bent forward at the playwright's beckoning finger.
"Though there are some," he whispered furtively, "knaves and caitiffs all, mind, but some nonetheless, who say that Rora may get that trouble she wants, but only from a certain individual troubler." He nodded again and leaned back, finishing his tankard with an air of having imparted a great secret.
"And that troubler?"
Kansallus shook his head and sighed regretfully. "A cypher, a mystery, an unknown quantity of indistinct parts. None of the caitiffs and knaves and vicious gossips who say it can warrant it, and I'm of a mind t'ignore it, but there you are—it's been bruited about."
"I see." He rose to go, and dropped a handful of coins on the table. "It's been fascinating, friend Kansallus, if disappointing as regards a certain dancer. I think there's enough there for another few tankards, if you don't have to go back to the theater."
"I don't, bless you," the playwright said with a broad smile. "And for it, I'll tell you this—have ever seen Knave Fitch scratch at's ear while on the boards?"
"No," Liam admitted. He decided not to mention that he had only seen the clown three times, one of them within the last few minutes.
"Well, he does, from time to time, and the common run think it a pose of comic thought, but's not." Kansallus paused and smiled secretly. "It's a scar he's scratching from the teeth of a maid."
"Rora," Liam supplied, and was rewarded with a firm nod.
"I know, to look at, Fitch's no rake—but he's a fair number of maids under's belt, and we all at th'Orb give him first crack at any wench. So it chanced when Rora was newly with us as a dancer out of some house on the Point and on her brother's vouching, we stood back and let Fitch go to work. The very next day he appears with a bandaged head, and tells us all she's a hellcat for her virtue, and to stay away. So, that's the dancer—and my warning. Go for tamer flesh."
"I'll bear it in mind. Now I must go."
"Say, friend Liam," Kansallus stopped him again, "one last. I note a writing case at your side. Y'are not, by chance, a scripter as I am?"
"No," Liam answered, looking curiously down at the playwright. "Only sometimes a scholar."
"Excellent news," Kansallus said, the smile deepening. "There's enough of scribblers 'round the Orb, and I'd hate to find this meal a sop for your taking away my livelihood."
Still laughing, Liam made his way through the darkened streets, guided only by the stars and the occasional torch. Kansallus made an excellent source of information, as well as an interesting companion. Not that Coeccias was a bad sort, but he lacked the playwright's good-natured but malicious tongue.
The night was cold, even colder after the warmth of the inn, and he had to fight now against the freshening sea breeze. The doors to the Golden Orb were still open, but he passed them by, wondering what Rora was doing with her evening off.
Sounds were few and far between, the streets empty, and he started once at what he thought was the sound of feet behind him. Then he heard the coo of a pigeon and the flap of wings and smiled with relief. Coeccias might not be very good at searching out murderers, but in four months of frequent night walks he had never been accosted, and that reflected well on the Aedile. The streets were clear of the common run of villains, if private houses weren't safe from the uncommon run.
Nonetheless, he found himself looking over his shoulder more than usual, unable to shake the feeling that he was being watched. Try as he might, he was on edge for the length of his walk, and reached the stables with· a genuine feeling of relief.
The boy let him stand inside, out of the cold, while his mount was saddled. Once on Diamond, he felt better, and, trotted quickly out of the city towards Tarquin's house on the beach.
My house on the beach, he reminded himself, and smiled at the thought.
Chapter 10
ONCE AGAIN THE house was lit before he arrived, and the warm yellow light spilling from its windows helped him find his way down the narrow path in the moonless night. The surf was unseen but loud, crashing in the blackness like the shouting of giants. He tethered Diamond in the small shed, apologizing for the cramped quarters. He thought about bringing out a blanket to keep the chill off, but noticed that the air of the shed had already grown warmer. Tarquin planned for everything, he thought, and patted the restive horse soothingly before going back to the house.
You are home earl, Fanuilh thought at him as soon as he had closed the door. Liam bit off a retort and waited until he went into the workroom.
"Yes, I'm home early," he said pleasantly when he could see the tiny dragon's face. "I decided that even murderers must sleep, and that if they'd been avoiding me with as much energy as I've been searching for them, they must be tired."
That is not why.
"No, of course not. Why would I bother lying to you, when you can read my mind? I'm joking, though that seems to be as useless as lying, since you don't have a sense of humor."
I find different things funny.
"I'm sure you do." There was a long pause. Liam frowned, wondering what Fanuilh would find funny, and the dragon simply leveled its yellow cat's eyes at him. Dragon humor was beyond him, he finally decided, and thought back to his meal at the Uncommon Player. "Are you hungry?"
Yes.
"I'll get you something."
The dragon's head snaked in a sinuous nod, and Liam went to the kitchen and desired raw meat as hard as he could, discovering with a mixture of satisfaction and disgust that it was no longer so difficult.
Fanuilh tore into the meat with its us
ual gusto, and Liam watched for a few minutes before beginning to wander absently around the workroom. The empty crystal bottle still lay alone on the empty middle table. He picked it up.
'Virgin's blood.' It no longer held the same repulsion for him; it had become simply a relic, devoid of meaning, a jumble of letters that he should have been able to decipher.
He wondered why it was empty, and why the label was crossed out.
What is important about the beaker? It is empty. What can be important about—
"I don't know, but I might if you'd let me think," he said, and though he could not hear the words over the silent block of Fanuilh's thought, the dragon accepted it, and the block lifted. Liam crossed his arms and tipped· the beaker at the dragon.
"The vanishing spell does not require virgin's blood, correct? It's not mentioned in the text of the spell. But he had it out on his table, and he never left things lying around; you said so yourself. This must be important."
The number of spells that require virgin's blood is enormous. Tarquin must have over a hundred of them in his catalogues. The uses to which they can be put are a hundred times a hundred.
"How can you read my mind and be so stupid? Maybe one of those was the one Marcius came about," Liam shouted, tired of the dragon's apparent obtuseness. "And Tarquin cast it—the bottle is empty—but not to Marcius's satisfaction!"
Why are you so certain the merchant is the killer?
"Because he could be a murderer!" He shouted louder, trying to justify what was really only a feeling.
Many men could be. You could be, the dragon pointed out. Though he knew the creature was incapable of real irony, Liam could not help feeling that its impassive face and toneless thoughts masked a greater sarcasm.
"But you know I'm not!"
Not of Tarquin, yes. But you have killed, and you could kill again. I know, as well as you do. You would regret it, to be sure, but you could kill.
"Enough! I'm in no mood for you to be my conscience. Did you do this to Tarquin? Small wonder he ordered you away so often. And that's not a question you're meant to answer!" he added hastily, and the dragon obliged by staying out of his head. He went to stand by the lectern.