Shadow Of Sanctuary tw-3

by Robert Lynn Asprin

  For a long moment Lalo stared at the oddly attenuated features of the man before him, then bent over his work. For several minutes only the scratching of swift penstrokes competed with the clamour of the room. He must capture the glow of those strange eyes, for he suspected that when he looked at his companion again, nothing but the eyes would be the same.

  But what matter? He had his payment now. With his free hand he reached for the mug and drank again, shaded a final line, then pushed the drawing across the table and sat back.

  'Well - you wanted it...'

  'Yes.' The stranger's lips twitched. 'Everything considered, it's quite good. I understand that you do portraits,' he went on. 'Are you free to take a commission now? Here's an earnest of your fee -' He reached into the folds of his garment, laid a gold piece shining on the table, quickly hid his misshapen fingers once more.

  Lalo stared, reached out gingerly as if expecting the coin to vanish at his touch. Fortified by the wine, he could admit to himself how very odd this episode had been. But the gold was hard and cool and weighed heavily in his palm. His fingers closed.

  The stranger's smile stiffened. He drew back suddenly, away from the light. 'Now I must go.'

  'But the commission!' cried Lalo. 'Who is it for, and when?'

  'The commission ...' the man seemed to be having trouble enunciating the words. 'If you have the courage, come now... Do you think that you can find the house of Enas Yorl?'

  Lalo cringed from his snarl of laughter, but the sorcerer did not wait for him to reply. He had cast his cloak around him and was lurching towards the door, and this time the shape the cloak covered was hardly human at all.

  Lalo the limner stood in Prytanis Street before the house of Enas Yorl, shivering. With the setting of the sun, the wind off the desert had turned cold, although there was still a greenish light in the western sky. Once he had spent two months trying to capture on canvas the translucent quality of that glow.

  The rooftops of the city made a deceptively elegant silhouette against the sky, topped by the lacy scaffolding of the tower of the Temple of Savankala and Sabellia nearby. Insulting to local prejudices though the new temple might be, at least it promised to be magnificent. Lalo sighed, wondering who would paint the murals within - probably some eminent artist from the capital. He sighed again. If he had gone to Ranke it might have been himself, returning in triumph to his birthplace.

  But that consideration forced his attention back to the edifice that loomed before him, its shadows somehow darker than those of the other buildings, and the job that he had come here to do.

  Terrors coiled like basilisks in the corners of his mind. His legs trembled. A dozen times during his journey across the town they had threatened to buckle or turn in the opposite direction, and the wine had been sweated out of him long ago.

  Enas Yorl was one of the darker legends of Sanctuary, although, for reasons which the episode in the Vulgar Unicorn had amply illustrated, he was rarely seen. Rumour had it that the curse of some rival had condemned him to the existence of a chameleon. But that was said to be the only limit on his power.

  Had the sorcerer's offer been some perverted joke, or part of some magical intrigue? I should take the gold to Cilia, he thought, it might be enough to buy us places in an outward-bound caravan ...

  But the coin was only a retainer for a service he had not yet performed, and there was no place he could flee that would be beyond the reach of the sorcerer. He could not return the money without facing Enas Yorl, and he could not run away. Shaking so that he could hardly grasp the intricately wrought knocker, he let it fall upon the brazen surface of the door.

  The interior of the building seemed larger than its outside, though the colourless mists that swirled around him made it hard to be certain of anything except the glowing red eyes of Enas Yorl. As the mists curdled and cleared, Lalo saw that the sorcerer was enthroned in a carven chair which the artist would have itched to examine had anyone else been sitting there. He was considering a slim figure in an embroidered Ilsig cloak who stood twirling a mounted globe.

  Seas and continents spun as the stranger turned, stared at Lalo, then back at Enas Yorl.

  'Do you mean to tell me that sot is necessary to your spell?'

  It was a woman's voice, but Lalo had already noted the fine bones structuring the face beneath the scarred tanned skin and cropped hair, the wiry grace of the body in its male attire. So might a kitten from the Prince's harem have looked if it had been left to fight its way to adulthood in the alleys of the town.

  Abruptly perceiving himself through the woman's eyes, Lalo straightened, acutely aware of his stained tunic and frayed breeches, and the stubble on his chin.

  'Why do you need a painting?' she asked scornfully. 'Isn't this enough to purchase the use of your own powers?' From a bag suspended around her neck she poured out a river of moonlight which resolved itself into a string of pearls which she cast rattling upon the stone-flagged floor.

  'I could ...' said the sorcerer wearily. He was smaller than he had been, an oddly shaped mound in the great chair. 'If you had been anyone else, I would have given you a spell worth as much as that necklace, and laughed when your ship outran the land winds that carry the energies I use, and your beauty became. ugliness again. The natural tendency of things is towards disorder, my dear. Destruction is easy, as you know. Restoration takes more energy.'

  'And your power is not great enough?' Her voice was anxious now.

  Lalo averted his eyes as the sorcerer's appearance altered again. He was feeling alternately hot with embarrassment and chill with fear. Risky as involvement in the public affairs of wizards might be, to be privy to their personal affairs could only bring disaster. And whatever the relationship between the figureless sorcerer and the disfigured girl might be, it was obviously both extremely personal, and an affair.

  'There is a price for everything,' replied Enas Yorl once he had stabilized. 'I can transform you without aids, but not while continuing to protect myself. Jarveena, would you ask that of me?' His voice was a whisper now.

  The girl shook her head. Suddenly subdued, she let her cloak slip to the floor and seated herself. Lalo saw an easel beside him - had it been there before? He took an involuntary step towards it, seeing there a set of brushes of perfectly matched camel's hair, pots of pigment finely ground, a smoothly stretched canvas -tools of a quality of which he had only been able to dream.

  'I want you to paint her,' said Enas Yorl to Lalo. 'Not as you see her now, but as I see her always. I want you to paint Jarveena's soul.'

  Lalo stared at him as though he had been struck to the heart but had not yet begun to feel the pain. He shook his head a little.

  'You read my heart as you see the lady's soul...' he said with a curious dignity. 'The gods alone know what I would give to be able to do what you ask of me!'

  The sorcerer smiled. His form seemed to shift, to expand, and in the blazing of his eyes Lalo's awareness was consumed. / will provide the vision and you will provide the skill... the words echoed in Lalo's mind, and then he knew no more.

  The stillness of the hour just before dawn hushed the air when Lalo again became conscious of his own identity. The girl Jarveena lay back in her chair, apparently asleep. His back and shoulder ached furiously. He stretched out his arm and flexed his fingers to relieve their cramping, and only then did his eyes focus on the canvas before him. -

  Did I do that? His first reaction was one he had known before, when hand and eye had cooperated unusually well and he had emerged from an intensive bout of work amazed at how close he had come to capturing the beauty he saw. But this - the image of a face whose finely arched nose and perfect brows were framed by waves of lustrous hair, of a slenderly curved body whose honey-coloured skin had the sheen of the pearls on the floor and whose delicately up-tilted breasts were tipped with buds of dusky rose - this was that Beauty, fully realized.

  Lalo looked from the picture to the girl in the chair and wept, because he could
see only blurred hints of that beauty in her now, and he knew that the vision had passed through him like light through a windowpane, leaving him in the darkness once more.

  Jarveena stirred and yawned, then opened one eye. 'Is he done? I've got to go the Esmeralda sails on the early tide.'

  'Yes,' answered Enas Yorl, his eyes glowing more brightly than ever as he turned the easel for her to see. The painting holds my magic now. Take it with you and look at it as you would look into a mirror, and after a time it will become a mirror, and all will see your beauty as I see it now ...'

  Shaking with fatigue and loss, Lalo sat down on the floor. He heard the rustle of the sorcerer's robes as he moved to embrace his lady, and after a little while the sound of the painting being removed and her footsteps going to the door. Then Lalo and Enas Yorl were alone.

  'Well ... it is done .. .'The sorcerer's voice was fleshless, like wind whispering through dry leaves. 'Will you take your payment now?'

  Lalo nodded without looking at him, afraid to see the body to which that voice belonged.

  'What shall it be? Gold? Those baubles on the floor?' The pearls rattled as if they had been nudged by the sorcerer's current equivalent of a toe.

  Yes, I will take the gold, and Gilla and I will go and never set eyes on this place again... The words were on his lips, but every dream he had ever known was clamouring in his soul.

  'Give me the power you forced on me last night!' Lalo's voice strengthened. 'Give me the power to paint the soul!'

  The laughter of Enas Yorl began as the whisper in the sand that precedes the simoom, but it grew until Lalo was physically buffeted by the waves of pressure in the room. And then, after a little, there was silence again, and the sorcerer asked, 'Are you quite sure?'

  Lalo nodded once more.

  'Well, that is a little thing, particularly when you are already... when there is such a strong desire. I will throw in a few extras -' he said kindly, 'some souls for you to paint, perhaps a commission or two ...'

  Lalo jerked as the sorcerer's hands closed on his head, and for a moment all the colours in the rainbow exploded in his brain. Then he found himself on his feet by the door with a leather satchel in his hand.

  'And the painter's gear ...' continued Enas Yorl. 'I have to thank you not only for a great service, but for giving me something to look forward to in life. Master Limner, may your gift reward you as you deserve!'

  And then the great brazen door had shut behind him, and Lalo found himself in the empty street, blinking at the dawn.

  The desert shimmered glassily with heat, appearing as insubstantial as the mists in the house of Enas Yorl, but the moist breath of a fountain cooled Lalo's cheeks. Dazed by the contrasts, the limner found himself wondering whether this moment, or indeed any of the past three days, were real or only the continuation of some sorcerous dream. But if that were so, he thought as he turned back to the echoing expanse ofMolin Torchholder's veranda, he did not want to wake.

  Before the first day after his adventure had passed, Lalo had received requests for portraits from the Portmaster's wife and from Jordis the stonemason, newly enriched by his work on the temple for the Rankan gods. In fact the first sitting was to have been this morning. But yesterday's summons had taken precedence; and so it was that Lalo, uncomfortable in worn velveteen breeches that were loose in the shanks and pinched his waist, his embroidered wedding vest, and a shirt which Gilla had starched so that it scraped his neck every time he turned his head, waited to be interviewed for the honour of decorating Molin Torch-holder's feasting hall.

  A door opened. Lalo heard light footsteps above the plash and gurgle of the fountain, and a young woman with precisely coiled fair hair beckoned to him.

  'My Lady?' he hesitated.

  'I am the Lady Danlis, ancilla to the mistress of this house,' she answered briskly. 'Come with me ...'

  I should have known, thought Lalo, after hearing Cappen Varra sing her praises/or so long. But that had been some time ago. As he followed her straight-backed progress along the corridor Lalo wondered what vision had made Cappen fall in love with her, and why it had failed.

  A startled slave looked up and hastily began gathering together his rags and jars of wax paste as Danlis ushered Lalo through a door of gilded cedarwood into the Hall. Lalo stopped short, taken aback by the abundance of colour and texture in the room. Figured silken rugs littered the parquet floor; gilded grape vines laden with amethyst fruit twisted about the marble columns that strained against the beamed ceiling; and the walls were draped with patterned damask from the looms of Ranke. Lalo stared around him, wondering what could possibly be left to decorate.

  'Danlis, darling, is this the new painter?'

  Lalo turned at a rustle of silks and saw hastening across the carpets a woman who was to Danlis as an overblown rose is to the bud of the flower. She was followed by a maid, and a fluffy dog spurted ahead of her, yapping fiercely and knocking over the pots of wax which the slave had set aside.

  'I'm so glad that my lord has given me permission to get rid of these dreary hangings - so bourgeois, and as you see, they are quite faded now!' The lady went on breathlessly, her trailing skirts upsetting the pots which the slave had just finished righting again. The maid paused behind her and began to berate the cowering servant in low fierce tones.

  'My Lady, may I present Lalo the Limner-' Danlis turned to the artist, 'Lalo, this is the Lady Rosanda. You may make your bow.'

  'Will you take long to finish the work?' asked the Lady. 'I will be happy to advise you - everyone has always complimented me on my excellent taste - I often think that I might have made an excellent artist - if I had been bora into another walk of life, that is ...'

  '

  'Lord Molin's position requires a worthy setting -' stated Danlis as her mistress paused for breath. 'After the initial ... difficulties ... construction of the new temple has proceeded smoothly. Naturally there will be celebrations in honour of its completion. Since it would be impious to hold them in the temple, they must take place in surroundings which will demonstrate whose genius is responsible for the achievement which will establish Sanctuary's position in the Empire.'

  Lady Rosanda stared at her companion, impressed, but Lalo scarcely heard her, already abstracted by consideration of the possibilities of the place. 'Has Lord Molin decided on the subjects that I am to depict?'

  'If you are chosen -' answered Danlis. 'The murals will portray the goddess Sabellia as Queen of the Harvest, surrounded by her nymphs. First, of course, he will want to see your sketches and designs.'

  'I might model for the Goddess ...' suggested Lady Rosanda, twitching an improbably auburn curl over one plump shoulder and looking arch. '

  Lalo swallowed. 'My Lady is too kind, but modelling is exacting work -1 wouldn't consider asking someone of your refinement to spend hours posing in such uncomfortable positions and scanty attire ...' His panic eased into relief as the lady simpered and smiled. His own vision of the Goddess was characterized by a compassionate majesty which he doubted Lady Rosanda could even visualize, much less portray. Finding a model for Sabellia would be his hardest task.

  'Now that you understand the work, how much time will you require?'

  'What?' Lalo forced himself to the present again.

  'When can you bring us the designs?' Danlis repeated tartly.

  'I must consider ... and choose my models ...' he faltered. 'It will take two or three days.'

  'Oh Lalo ...'

  The limner jerked, turned, and realized that he had come all the way from Molin Torchholder's well-guarded gatehouse to the Street of the Goldsmiths without conscious direction, as if his feet were under a charm to carry him home.

  'My dear friend!' Puffing a little, Sandol the rug dealer drew up beside Lalo, who looked at him in bewilderment. It had not been 'my friend' the last time they met, when Sandol had refused to pay the full price for his wife's portrait because she said it made her look fat.

  'I have wanted to tell you h
ow much enjoyment your painting brings us. As they say, a work of art is a lasting pleasure - perhaps we ought to have a portrait of myself to balance my wife's. What do you say?' He wiped his brow with a large handkerchief of purple silk.

  'Well of course I would be happy - but I don't know just when

  - my time may be occupied for a while ...' answered Lalo, confused.

  'Yes indeed -' Sandol smiled unctuously. 'I understand that your work will shortly grace a much more august residence than my own. My wife was saying just this morning what an honour it was to have been painted by the man who is decorating Molin Torchholder's feasting hall!'

  Suddenly Lalo understood. The news of his prospective commission must be all over town by now. He suppressed a grin of triumph, remembering how he had humbled himself to this man to get even a part of his fee. Perhaps he should do the picture -the rug merchant was as porcine as his lady, and they would make a good pair.

  'Well, I must not discuss it yet...' replied Lalo modestly. 'But it is true that I have been approached... I fear that an opportunity to serve the representative of the gods of Ranke must take precedence over lesser commitments.' Interested commentary followed them like an echo down the busy street, apprentices telling their masters, silk-veiled matrons whispering to each other as they tried on rings.

  'Oh indeed I do understand,' Sandol assured him fervently. 'AH I ask is that you keep me in mind ...'

  'I'll let you know,' said Lalo graciously, 'when I have time.' He increased his pace, leaving the rug merchant standing like a melting icicle in the sea of people behind him. When he had crossed the Path of Money into the Corridor of Steel, Lalo permitted himself a discreet skip or two.

  'Not only my feet but my entire life is charmed now!' he told himself. 'May all the gods of Ranke and Ilsig bless Enas Yorl!'

  Sunshine glared from the whitewashed walls around him, flashed from polished swords and daggers displayed in the armourers' stalls, glittered in myriad points of light from linked mail. But the brilliance around him was less dazzling than the vistas opening to Lalo's imagination now. He would have not merely a comfortable living, but riches; not only respect, but fame! Everything he had ever desired was within his grasp ...