Weight of Stone

by Laura Anne Gilman

  And then the cabin, the others around him, the sense of the water underneath, any awareness of himself at all was gone.

  THE FOUR TRAVELERS had barely been gone half a day when the Guardian gave Malech the bad news.

  Riders coming over the ridge.

  There was no cleared road through the forest that covered the ridge, intentionally so; the ancient trees had stood longer than the vineyard had existed, and Malech’s master Josia had often gone in among them to clear his thoughts and find inspiration. Malech felt no such need, but he respected the memory. For riders to come through there, rather than using the easier, but longer road around, meant one of two things. Either they were in a terrible hurry, or they did not wish to be seen approaching.

  Or both.

  Rising from the workroom—the first time he had used it since Jerzy’s misapplied attempt at spell-crafting and the resulting cleaning of the poisoned air—Malech went up the narrow stone stairs, moving quickly but without undue haste; his much younger student might take these steps at breakneck speed, but he had slipped and fallen on them some years before and had no wish to repeat the incident. Vineart heads were hard, but stone was harder.

  “Detta!” His voice echoed throughout the House, suddenly so empty feeling, after the onslaught of youngsters. Malech pursed his lips, amused at the thought. The House had never felt empty—or quiet—before, but then, in all the years he had lived here, there had never been so many strangers coming in and out. Change, after so long. He wondered if the vines would sense the difference, if the Harvest would change as well, or remain the same.

  The thought made him sigh. The Harvest would be difficult, without Jerzy’s assistance, but the incipient guests proved that his decision had been the right one. Even if they were not part of the greater danger, the Washers were no friend to them now. Malech needed to keep them off balance and uncertain—at least enough that they did not strike against the House itself—and ensure that there was a Harvest to worry about.

  “Detta!”

  “She’s gone out to the icehouse, Master Malech.” Lil appeared, her pale skin flushed from the warmth of the kitchen, wiping her hands on the oversized apron tied around her frame. “Is there aught I can help with? Should we fetch her?”

  “Straightaway,” he agreed. “And bring the rest of your staff inside, out of sight. We have company coming.” He paused, and said words he never would have believed could come from his mouth. “I do not know if they are friend, or foe.”

  That question was not immediately answered when the riders came into human sight: Washers, five of them in their red robes, and two solitaires riding with them, brown leathers and short swords strapped to their horses’ saddles, their womanly faces grim even at this distance. No bullyboys this time, but impartial fighters. So impartial, they were often hired to carry out sentences of death among the highborn or important.

  They had come for Jerzy, then.

  Malech went to the front of the House and waited, deliberately forcing them to dismount and walk up under the archway to meet him, rather than the other way around.

  “Where is the boy?” the leader asked, before Malech could utter a word in welcome. “Bring him here to us, for binding.”

  “He was cleared by one of your own,” Malech said quietly. He had dressed himself in his most formal robe, taking the time to tie his hair back, and ensure that his tasting spoon and knife were properly hung on his belt, rather than hanging on the back of his chair. These Washers were strangers, not the same three who had visited before. Like the presence of the solitaires, Malech thought that was not a good sign.

  “Events have countered that decision, as you are well aware, Vineart. Bring him here and do not interfere … or risk implication as well.”

  Malech sized the Washer up. Tall, burly, and young. All of them were young, and worried; they did not like what they were here to do. Not because they disbelieved the charges, but because they were frightened. Of him? Or of whoever had sent them? Or of something else entirely, perhaps. Washers, like Vinearts, rested in tradition. They did not enjoy change.

  Was it possible they were guilty only of trying to resist the inevitable, holding on to the past even as it tumbled down around them? If so, Malech could empathize. But he would not falter. With a light touch, he gathered the quiet-magic from within his many years of exposure, holding it ready, just in case.

  “My student is not here,” he said, still quiet, keeping his hands clear of his belt, his palms forward. “You are welcome to enter my House and see for yourself. But remember”—he added, as the first Washer stepped forward—“that you are a guest within these walls. And that they are, by Sin Washer’s Command, my walls.”

  Washers had no authority over Vinearts, and the same in return, unless a triad—Lord, Mage, and Brother—determined their guilt and bound them over for judgment. He had not been accused of any crime, merely suspected of a poor student. Any act against him was as much apostasy as what they accused Jerzy.

  The Washer seemingly in charge nodded, then made a curt gesture to the solitaires, who came forward with him, while the other four Washers remained behind, making themselves comfortable on the deep green grass.

  * * *

  FEELING CAME BACK to Jerzy slowly, first pain, then a blessed numbness washing away the agony, and then a slow return to normal, with only a slight tingling left in his arms and legs to prove that he had not, in fact, been turned into stone. The newly returned awareness of his flesh also brought the awareness that he was facedown in grass.

  It took some effort, but he raised his head, feeling the strain in his neck and back, and saw boots.

  Boots that were attached to legs wrapped in dark red robes that were attached to a man’s body that lay staring up at the sky through the branches of the fruit tree in front of the House of Malech. Another lay at an angle to him.

  Both bodies were unmarked, but unmistakably dead.

  Beside him, a woman groaned, more a noise of confusion than pain. Mahault.

  Jerzy could not pause to wonder how he had been returned to the vineyard, much less why or how Mahault had come with him. He got to his knees, willing the dizziness to go away. “Guardian?” He wasn’t sure why he was whispering: the body wasn’t going to hear him.

  Inside. The mental voice did not show emotion, but there was something in the weight of the word: worry, sorrow, rage …

  His legs wobbly, Jerzy left Mahault where she lay and staggered inside, only to be met by Lil, wielding a massive wooden rolling pin, her pale face even paler than usual, her eyes wide with fear but her mouth set in determination. When she saw it was him, a little color came back to her skin.

  “Jerzy? How—”

  “What happened?” he demanded, ignoring her question. “Where is Master Malech?”

  “He told us to stay in the kitchen. We heard shouting from his study, and then … nothing.”

  Jerzy’s stomach sank, but he was already moving toward his master’s wing of the House, his legs still uncertain with the aftereffects of whatever magic the Guardian had used on him—and it had to have been the Guardian, it was impossible but there was no other explanation, so he accepted it and moved on, barely aware of other people following. Lil, and Roan, and Per, the yardman who never, ever came inside.

  There was no time to wonder at any of it. The door to Master Malech’s study was open, and the Vineart was on the floor, staring up at the ceiling the same way the Washers out front had been.

  “Master!”

  The feel of the taint lay on his master’s skin, mixed with the acrid stink of sweat and piss. Jerzy ignored it, going down on his knees beside the older man, looking anxiously for some obvious wound or sign of distress. There was no blood, no visible damage, and Jerzy had a moment of hope, but Malech’s skin was waxy, and his eyes were not focusing.

  “Master?” Jerzy’s voice cracked the way it did when he was younger, and heat prickled behind his eyes. Malech did not respond, did not seem to have h
eard him, or be aware of anything happening in the room.

  Outside. The word carried with it the rustle of leaves and the feel of dirt under his skin, and Jerzy knew what he needed to do.

  “Outside. We need to get him outside.” Even as he spoke he bent to slide his arms under his master’s shoulders, Lil joining him to take those long legs, trying not to jostle him as they stood. Malech was tall but not bulky, but the years of working in the vineyards, first as slave and then Vineart, had given him ropey muscles that were surprisingly heavy.

  “Back the way we came,” Jerzy said. Roan led the way, shoving open doors and warning Detta and Per away when the two would have rushed up to check on Malech.

  Outside, Mahault had recovered enough to stand, her color still ashen and her expression worried—a worry that only grew when she saw the burden Jerzy and Lil bore between them.

  The entire Household followed Jerzy and Lil down the path and across the roadway, down the slight incline to the vineyard. Despite the shock of his master’s condition, and the aches and disorientation of whatever the Guardian had done to draw him back here, Jerzy took a deep breath of the air and felt something inside him unclench, just a little. Part of him still believed that nothing bad could ever happen here, in the main vineyards. Nothing could ever happen to Master Vineart Malech in his own yard. It was impossible to imagine.

  The slaves, seemingly unaware that anything had occurred across the wide road and sloping hill that separated them from the House, gathered to see what was happening, too shocked and too frightened to speak. The overseer, a burly man who had once terrified Jerzy, came up to demand an explanation for the slaves’ behavior.

  “Not now,” Jerzy snapped at him, catching Lil’s attention and indicating, with a jerk of his chin, where he wanted to go. They moved through the crowd of slaves, many of the younger boys dropping to their knees when they saw what—who—was being carried, so motionless. With a tilt of his head, Jerzy indicated to Lil where he wanted her to go, and they placed the Vineart gently on the ground in the nearest row of vines, Jerzy carefully lowering his master’s graying head to the dark soil. Surely this would be magic enough.

  The leaves rustled, although there was no wind, and far overhead a banded tarn soared, the sunlight catching its wings as it banked and turned.

  “Guardian!” Jerzy cried the name like a decantation, the plea he had never let slip since he was taken into the slavers’ camp finally escaping.

  A weight of sorrow and loss lodged itself at the back of his throat, bitter as unripe fruit, and he tasted the dry flavor of cold stone and salt in his mouth. The Guardian could do nothing to stop the inevitable.

  “Ahhh …”

  The noise was barely a whisper, more an echo, but Jerzy heard it. “Master.” He wasn’t sure if he was asking a question, or demanding action.

  But there was no response.

  * * *

  “YOU CANNOT STAY.”

  “I must! There is”—

  “Jerzy, listen to me!” Detta rarely raised her voice, and then only within the confines of the kitchen, where the din often required a loud tone. Here, in the stillness of Malech’s study, where she had tracked him down, the noise practically rocked Jerzy off his feet. “There were five Washers, Jerzy. Five, and two solitaire.” One of the women had been found in the courtyard. Unlike the others, her ribs had been crushed, causing death—but there was no sign of any other struggle, and the ties on her scabbard had not been touched, her sword undrawn. Whatever took her took her by surprise, and killed immediately.

  “Where are the others?” Detta asked. “Two dead Washers, one dead solitaire … where are the others? Their horses are still here, none saw them leave….”

  “You think something took them.” Disappeared. The same as the slaves, in Mur-Magrib. The same as Vineart Sionio, when this all began … He should never have left. His leaving hadn’t protected anyone.

  Detta had heard no sound of struggle; the Guardian could say only that magic had been done. Who or how … still unknown. The books and journals in Master Malech’s study spoke at length about spellvines and legacies, but nowhere did they mention what might reach out and kill a Vineart without leaving a mark, or steal away bodies, living or dead.

  All knowledge said that it was impossible to decant a spell out of line of sight. It was impossible to animate dead flesh to live again, as the serpents had been. Impossible to transport living creatures over a day’s distance instantly. And yet their enemy had done the former, and the Guardian had done the latter. The impossible, the untraditional—nothing was certain anymore. Nothing was safe. Nothing was secure.

  “I don’t know what to think.” Detta’s eyes were red-veined and swollen, but she had not cried yet. “Master Malech is dead. He told me only a little of what he feared, of where you’ve been, but I see and I hear and I know something’s gone wrong. Something the Washers are part of, maybe.” She wasn’t asking for confirmation, so Jerzy didn’t say anything.

  “I have to—” Jerzy stopped. He didn’t know what he needed to do, anymore.

  “He sent you off for a reason. You need to go, as you were, and find who it is. Stop them.”

  “Master Malech is dead.” The words didn’t feel real, not when she said it and not when he said it, not even with the body resting on the soil of the vineyard while the slaves built a proper bier. “I need to stay, to …” To do what? He was still a student, he had not learned enough. His head ached, his eyes burned, but the deep sense of loss, like a cut from a sharp knife, had not yet begun to hurt; he was only aware of it as an observation: my Master is dead.

  “There will be no Harvest this year,” Detta said, and the words were like another blow across Jerzy’s shoulders, the taste of ashes in his mouth. “But we can survive that.”

  He wanted to protest, but she kept talking.

  “I know enough after all these years, the overseers know enough, to maintain the vines for a season, to ensure that they are healthy for you when you return. But you must ensure that there will be a Harvest after that, and again after that, Jerzy. If this continues, the Washers: whatever else is happening, they will blame us for the death of their brothers; they will try to take the lands from us, salt the earth, and break the House of Malech. You must go and put an end to this before they do.”

  It is true.

  Jerzy shook his head, refusing both her words and the Guardian’s echo.

  You must go. There was a sensation, like the lifting of heavy stone wings over the vineyard. I remain.

  Only then did Jerzy, reluctantly, nod. The moment he agreed, only then did Detta’s tears begin to fall.

  * * *

  BEFORE THE DAY had reached evening, word spread, via messenger pigeons and means more exotic, to those who had developed an interest in the doings of one Vineart, far away.

  “The Vineart Malech is dead.”

  There was a pause while the man addressed tried to recollect who that was and why he was being informed. Ah. The troublemaker in The Berengia. “Good. Has the bounty been paid?”

  The aide, a man who had been with the land-lord of Évura since he came to his title, shook his head, looking perplexed. “It has not been claimed, sahr.”

  The land-lord raised his attention from the parchments on his desk at that information. “Not claimed.”

  “No, sahr. Nor have any of the others reported a request for payment, with or without proof of the deed.”

  While some men might be pleased to keep their coin, the thought disturbed Sar Diogo. If the offered reward—a not unsubstantial sum—was not claimed, too often that meant another price would be asked.

  Diogo did not like surprises. He leaned back in his chair, and thought. The others—land-lords from across Iaja—had joined him in offering the bounty, worried by the reports they had been hearing from trusted and valued sources. Whispers of a man who did not know his place within the Commands, who sought to take more power than he had been granted, who sought to meddle in thing
s that were not his concern. They had known it was a Vineart who caused them such misery, but they could not determine who—not until they were approached by a Washer worried by the same things as they, who gave them a name.

  House Malech.

  Diogo had wondered then why the Washer had been so forthcoming—it stunk of maneuverings, for reasons unknown, and reasons unknown were reasons to worry about—but the intelligence was true. Master Vineart Malech had gone beyond tradition, was overstepping his bounded concerns.

  It had seemed wrong, somehow; Vineart Malech was respected, valued by his people, and his own land-lord seemed to have no problems with him … but that in and of itself was also worrying. Was there collusion?

  A bounty had been set—high enough to attract those who had an actual chance at succeeding, not so high that word might spread beyond the society of such folk who might be useful. He and his fellow lords all knew what they did was against the Command as well, to move against a Vineart … but had a Washer not given them the name? And were they not merely protecting themselves against one mage’s arrogance and greed, not striking a blow for their own aggrandizement? Where one Vineart went bad, could not others—others closer to home?

  It was only logical, and just, to act on the small problem before it became a larger one.

  “You are certain he is dead?” he asked his aide.

  “They are building a funeral bier even as we speak.”

  Then it was done. There were no second thoughts to be made. “Excellent. And even more excellent if someone has done our work for us, without requiring payment. Send word that the bounty is no longer open for the taking.”

  The aide saluted, and then paused at the door, as though struck by a sudden thought. “What about the student?”

  His gaze was intent on his liege-lord, coaxing the proper response from him.

  “Oh, yes.” Diogo stroked his beard, as though checking that his man had trimmed it properly that morning. “The entire kennel should be emptied, should it not, else risk the pup growing up to bite us as well. Half the original bounty, then: for proof of the boy’s unfortunate demise. And then step back, show no interest in what happens to their lands. Let the others squabble over it, if they will.”