Fanuilh

by Daniel Hood

  The color and texture of the pages did not match, and they differed in size from spell to spell. Sometimes the inks varied, though most of the writing was in black, in Tarquin's clear, blocklike script. As he flipped idly through the tome, he noticed a page covered with red in a wildly different handwriting.

  Another mage's spell, Fanuilh supplied, its back to Liam, still intent on the meat. They can trade them back and forth, or steal them. It is the instructions that matter, not who wrote them. That book was only stitched together very recently. It contains all the important spells he had collected over his career.

  Liam tried to lift the heavy tome, and found he needed both hands. The chain clanked.

  "These are all the spells he collected? What about the books on the shelves? And in the library?"

  All the important spells, the dragon qualified. The books behind you are instructions for mixing and preparing the elements of the spells, and one or two lengthy reports of experiments. The library contains thirty or forty texts on the enchanting of objects; the rest are histories, or poetry, or philosophy or collections of fables. Master Tanaquil liked to read a great deal.

  "I gathered as much from his conversation."

  Fanuilh did not respond and Liam turned to the shelf, leaning back against the lectern to examine the books. There were few with marked spines, most of them unadorned leather or wood, many cracked and beginning to fall apart from long use.

  He wondered which described the uses of virgin's blood. The empty bottle and its crossed-out label annoyed him.

  "Tell me, Fanuilh, what spells do you know?"

  The thought was a long time in forming.

  I know very few. Only those appropriate to an apprentice, as they do not generally require speaking and use few precious ingredients. Master Tanaquil taught them to me from the spellbook he had when he was an apprentice.

  "What can you do?"

  Put a man. to sleep, light a fire, stop blood flowing if the wound is fairly small, cause itching, or uncontrollable laughter. Maybe a dozen others. Useful things, and some that were merely for practice in the discipline.

  "You can cause uncontrollable laughter?"

  Yes.

  Shaking his head with a smile, Liam left the lectern and walked to the door. He stood there and stretched luxuriously.

  "How are you feeling?"

  Better. The soreness fades. Soon I will be able to fly again.

  Liam received the news with an approving nod.

  "I'm going to go to sleep now, if you don't need anything else. Wake me two hours after sunrise, will you?"

  The dragon's head bobbed gracefully and Liam left the workroom, suppressing a yawn.

  He did not go right to the library, but wandered curiously through the house he had accepted as his own. The light was even throughout the house, but the empty, echoing sound was gone. The parlor, the kitchen, the trophy room all felt comfortable, almost welcoming. He did not disturb anything, just entered each room briefly and surveyed the furnishings, smiling the lightly bitter smile that even after ten years of use had not creased his face.

  It's not Rhenford Keep, but it will do, I suppose.

  Still smiling, as much at himself as at his house, he went into the library to sleep.

  Fanuilh woke him precisely at the hour he requested, though there was no accompanying illusion of stone cities from his travels. The call in his mind felt normal, proper in a strange way.

  I used to wake Master Tanaquil this way, came the dragon's thought as Liam sat on the edge of the divan, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He did not comment, but went to the kitchen and imagined another platter of meat for it. He brought the food to the workroom and laid it on the table.

  "Eat your fill," he said cheerily. "I want you well and whole soon, so you can begin holding up your end of the bargain."

  You think you can fulfill your end soon.

  Liam thought for a moment, his eyes on the intricate model by the window, and on the jagged Teeth that dominated it.

  "Yes, I do. Today will answer a number of questions." They were silent for a while, Liam lost in thought, his eyes unfocused on the model. Fanuilh did not eat, but stared at him. He grew aware of the dragon's gaze after a moment, and started with a guilty smile.

  "What was I thinking?" he challenged.

  Nothing. Your thoughts were diffused.

  "What is that like? Looking at diffused thoughts, I mean? How does it appear to you?"

  The dragon's stare impaled his, holding it till he grew uneasy, wondering. Finally, the block formed in his mind, and he realized the creature had been searching for a way to express the idea.

  Like a flock of birds that explode suddenly from a city square, so scattered and intermingled that you cannot follow any single one. It is confusion.

  With even more surprise, he saw that the idea was his, drawn from a memory he had of the birdsellers and their flocks in Torquay.

  "I was daydreaming, not confused."

  No, but you allowed your thoughts to fly apart. You do that often, letting many lines go their ways, not following any particular one. Master Tanaquil never did that. His thoughts were orderly, like the steps in a ritual. It was easy to follow them.

  "Well, then, it's a good thing you won't have to look into my head much longer. We'll finish this business in the next few days, and you can teach me. Now, if there's nothing else, I'll be on my way." The dragon shook its head in wide, sweeping arcs. "Fine. I suggest you study up on what you have to teach me while I'm gone."

  The dragon stopped moving its head, and tucked it down between its forelegs, like a dog preparing for rest.

  "Good boy," Liam muttered, and went to get his horse.

  The morning was colder than the night, and his breath plumed out in clouds that the sharp breeze tore to tatters. Diamond was not cold, but restive, unhappy with the cramped confines of the shed. He tossed his mane and snorted when Liam led him out onto the beach, kicking up spurts of sand that the wind caught and whirled, stinging, into Liam's eyes.

  He calmed the horse with a soft word, and once they were up the cliff path, gave him rein. Thundering over the frozen ruts of the road, they passed fields dusted with frost, and Liam had to duck his face down into his cloak to escape the bite of the wind.

  Cheeks tingling and scarlet with cold, he gave the snorting horse over to the boy at the stables, and set off briskly for the Aedile's house. The sun was bright and the sky a pale blue that reminded him of summer, but there was no warmth in the light, and a deep chill lingered in the shadows cast by the bleached gray stone and wood of the city.

  Coeccias's servant let him into the house and directed him to the small kitchen at the rear. The Aedile was there, using a ladle to stir a large pot hung on a swivel hook over the fire.

  "Rhenford, y'are here just in time. I'll have you test this brew, and escape it myself if it's foul." He filled the ladle with steaming liquid from the pot and shoved it in Liam's face. "Go to, go to! Drink!" he commanded.

  Inclining his head, Liam sniffed suspiciously and then hazarded a small sip. It was mulled cider, and though it scalded his tongue, it slid down his throat smoothly, to form a warm, spiced ball in his stomach. He nodded appreciatively and took another sip.

  "It's not just cider," he accused, to the Aedile's amusement.

  "And should it be?" Coeccias pulled two pewter mugs from the mantel above the fire and filled them from the pot, which he then swung further away from the fire. He gestured Liam to a seat at the cluttered wooden table that filled most of the kitchen, and placed one of the steaming mugs in front of him.

  "It's a hint of the very water of life, to add the inspirational tone. I've to make a greater batch for Uris-tide, and this is but a test." He took a sip of his own mug and smacked his lips with closed eyes. "It'll do."

  A scent of cinnamon rose from the cider, mingled with the hint of liquor, and Liam sipped again approvingly. Coeccias called his servant, an
d when the man appeared, gave orders for his breakfast.

  "You'll eat?" he asked Liam, and without waiting for an answer, told the servant to double the breakfast. Liam smiled into his mug as the heavy man took the seat across from him.

  The servant busied himself cutting · up bread and bacon and setting them to cook by the fire. The seated men sipped at their mugs for a moment. Liam let the spiked cider warm his hands and stomach, looking around the kitchen. It was messy, but well stocked, with bunches of herbs and vegetables hanging in no particular order from the rafters, pots and utensils scattered everywhere, mingled with half-eaten loaves and scraps of cheese and meat and dirty dishes. Reflecting on the Aedile, it did not surprise him, but it did not bother him either. The suggestion was not of filth, but of comfort and a relaxed attitude towards cleanliness. Liam liked it, in the way he liked Coeccias—with tolerance for obvious faults.

  "I thought we were going to look for the bannaid."

  "Truth, so we are. But we needs must be fed, eh? And the cider calls for tasting. It'd be blaspheming to offer good Uris an untested brew. It likes you?"

  "Yes, very much. But why do you have to make a bigger batch?" Liam gestured at the large pot, obscured by the servant's back as he knelt before the fire, prodding the crackling bacon. "You have enough there to last a while."

  Laughing, Coeccias said, "Enough? I'll swear there's little enough there for the first libation! Why, there'd be none left for the worshippers, if that was all I put up. Know you nothing about the uses of Uris-tide?"

  The servant began laying out dishes on the table.

  "No, in the Midlands we never made much of Uris. She was a city god to us, of little use to fanners and husbandmen. There are not many mechanics or apothecaries there."

  "What of your vintners, tanners, smiths, armorers, tinkers? Have you no brewers or candlers in the Midlands? Y'are yourself a scholar, and from the Midlands. Uris is patron of all these—how can Midlanders ignore her?"

  "I suppose the trades just seemed less important. We paid more attention to the harvest gods."

  Coeccias snorted and frowned his way through the rest of his mug. Liam decided not to mention that there were hundreds of places that had never heard of Uris, and that credited her gifts of craft and trade to other gods.

  The bacon and toast were ready, and the servant placed. them before them in silence, taking their mugs to refill them at the pot. Butter and salt were brought and Coeccias dug in, making huge sandwiches thick with butter. Liam, made hungry by the smell, copied him, and the kitchen was filled with the sound of their chewing.

  The Aedile's frown deepened at each bite, and then broke out into a question.

  "Truth, you know nothing of the rites of Uris-tide?"

  "Very little," Liam admitted.

  "And you a scholar," Coeccias marveled. "Well," he went on, carefully putting his third sandwich to one side, "the true rites are complex, and the sole sphere of the priests. Only the divines are allowed in the fane when they are performed, but there're numerous lesser rites for the common run of worshippers."

  Solemnly, he described the lay rituals that led up to the actual day of Uris-tide. Daily processions through the streets began six days before, and every true worshipper was supposed to walk on at least one of the days. Some, the very devout, made more than one. Viyescu, the Aedile pointed out with no hint of sarcasm, walked every day, displaying an unparalleled devotion. Each day's procession was led by a progressively higher-ranked priest, and so more worshippers attended the later ones. The procession Liam had seen was one of the first, and consequently one of the smallest.

  "Today's is the most important. I'll be marching, as the Duke's man, and the richest of Uris's images will go forth as well, gilt and jeweled. It was gifted the temple by the Duke himself, and cost a fortune. The Duke subscribes the old ways and worships right strongly."

  Beginning at midaftemoon in the square at the heart of the city, the procession would go from there around most of Southwark, offering Uris's blessing to all and particularly to artisans and craftsmen. It would be led by the second most important priest in the local temple and include the highest of the city's officials and the richest of her artisans, as well as a large number of commoners. The last procession, scheduled for the next day, would be comprised only of clergy, led by the hierarch of the temple, and carry a very simple image of Uris, and ancient relic handed down from the earliest days of her worship. That night the secret ceremonies would begin in the temple, and the common worshippers would eat only the simplest of foods. Unleavened bread, sauceless meat, milk and water, to symbolize life before Uris gave her arts to the world.

  "The cider is reserved for Uris-tide itself. It's a strange brew, liquor and cider and spices, but it goes well with the stuffs served. Look you, on that day, we eat fancifully, with sauces and pastries and dishes that are long in preparation and complex in design, like unto the arts Uris herself gave us, and we offer portions of all to her as grace. I'll bring the pot to my sister, and celebrate with her. She's a large get of children, and many others'll be there from her husband's family, so I needs must make a greater punch than this test here."

  Coeccias stopped and picked up his sandwich again. He chewed absently, calculation in his eyes as he looked at Liam, who stared into the rich brown depths of his mug, wondering at his companion's obvious belief.

  "Look you," the Aedile said at length, "would it like you t'attend the feast? At my sister's?"

  Liam was surprised, but immediately interested. "I suppose, yes, that would be nice," he answered, trying to conceal the attractiveness of the idea.

  "Come, come," Coeccias blurted impatiently, "Uris-tide is no time to rest alone. It'd be improper for you to spend it in that empty house. You'll come to my sister's."

  There was no room for objection, so Liam simply nodded his agreement

  "Good, then," Coeccias said gruffly. "We'd best get to it, if we're to find this barmaid before I must prepare for the procession."

  Gulping down the rest of his cider, Liam followed the Aedile out of the house.

  There were seventeen inns, taverns and public houses in the Point, as well as a few private clubs and special establishments that Coeccias . thought worth checking.

  Though the streets of this quarter were as narrow as those in the rest of the city, the area was much better laid out, with something approaching a plan. They were able, therefore, to follow an orderly route, covering. the relatively straight roads one by one. Further down in the city the roads twisted and angled in mazelike complexity, joined by uncountable alleys and hidden courts, all of which could harbor an eating house or wineshop, and Coeccias explained that his men had had to spend a great deal of time to cover a small area.

  "I should have thought Tarquin unlikely to frequent the lower haunts, but it struck me not. Happily, there're not so many up here. We'll be through by an hour after noon, and if this Donoé exists, we'll search her out."

  Polished ,paneling and expensive fittings, gilt and silver, foreign hangings and crystal goblets, intricately painted signboards—the inns and restaurants were expensively decorated, the rich accouterments proper for the neighborhood's merchant princes and giants of trade. Some even had their offerings painstakingly painted on large boards, for those customers who could read. The proprietors were quiet, polite men, singularly colorless, who could scarcely be bothered to remember the names of their wives, let alone their serving girls.

  It was early in the day, and most of the places they stopped had not even opened yet, but Coeccias's title gained them entrance at every one. It was unfair, Liam knew, to compare these sophisticated restaurants and taverns with the Uncommon Player, but he could not help it. Two hours before noon, they could not be expected to have customers, but they still seemed unnaturally somber, depressing in the stilted formality of furnishings you were afraid to touch and proprietors who acted like courtiers in a tyrant's court. He silently praised the Player, and vowed
to avoid the rich quarter if he wished to enjoy himself.

  They were most of the way through Coeccias's mental list when they came to a stone building that fronted a stretch of street that was inordinately large for the quarter. It had a full portico with fluted columns a foot thick above which rested a triangular frieze, and broad steps made of carefully fitted blocks of white stone. There was no painted sign or nameplate to announce its purpose, and Liam laid a hand on the Aedile's arm as he started up the steps.

  "What's this? It's someone's house."

  "No house this," he muttered, and surprised Liam by flushing. "Come along."

  Bas-relief panels adorned the double-leafed doors, but Liam did not have a chance to examine them, because the Aedile pulled one door open hastily and ushered him inside.

  White and pink marble greeted them, totally at odds with the gray exterior, and Liam paused, unable to believe what he saw. A sweeping flight of marble stairs curved up and away from a huge foyer, lined with niches holding amorously entangled statues and potted plants. Banks of exotic flowers bloomed in vivid reds and oranges, filling the air with heady scents. Water danced and splashed in a. fountain at the center of the room, two stone lovers entwining in the pool. Two young women appeared far away at the top of the steps and then fled, giggling.

  "Gods, Coeccias," Liam exclaimed, "it's a whorehouse!"

  The Aedile silenced him with a staggering punch to the arm and a frantic "Hsst! Not so loud!"

  "Why 'Hsst,' milord Aedile?" The speaker appeared smoothly from behind a heavy arras concealing a doorway. She was tall and bore herself proudly, with an elaborately curled headdress of gleaming black hair and an artfully painted face. "Though we glaze it over with 'house of pleasure' and 'night palace,' we are indeed a whorehouse: The man has the right of it."

  She stepped in front of Liam and gazed with imperious amusement at him. "He needs must have seen one before to recognize it so quickly." She held out a ringed hand coolly, and Liam bent over it, suddenly embarrassed.