Trickster's Choice

by Tamora Pierce

  “Hello, Kyprioth,” Aly said drily. “I take it all this is your idea?”

  Most certainly, the bejeweled crow informed her in the god’s crisp, kindly tones. You asked for help, my dear. I have wagered that these crows will not be able to keep you safe from human predators until the autumn equinox. They will teach you their language, so they can spy for you.

  Aly scratched her head. Somehow, when she had dreamed of one day creating her own spy network, a flock of crows had not been part of her imaginings.

  The crow who’d run afoul of a mage jumped from her lap to her shoulder. Gripping her flesh through her tunic with his powerful claws, he ran his beak through the inch-long brush that was her growing hair.

  “That tickles, too, you know,” she told him. The crow continued to preen her. To Kyprioth she said, “If I have a wager with you, and the crows have a wager with you, where’s the trick? Whenever there’s a trickster about, there has to be a trick, everyone says so. What’s yours?”

  You don’t have to worry, said Kyprioth, his tone entirely smug. You’re only here for the summer, remember? This is going to be my greatest trick ever, pulled off under the noses of mortals and gods alike, but it will take some time to put it in place. In the meantime, your new friends here will teach you useful crow sounds. You in turn will teach them to understand necessary human sounds. He preened his chest feathers. At least, I think the crows will teach you. Do you accept the wager, my cousins? he asked the crows.

  Will you keep your word about food? A crow’s voice sounded in Aly’s mind. It sounded like the speaker was a senior male. There’s barely enough in this high, flat place to keep two small flocks fed, let alone fifty more of us.

  I will ensure that you are all fed, Kyprioth reassured them. You can’t win the wager if you’re starving.

  One female said, I am not certain. You know how stupid two-leggers are.

  We are two-leggers ourselves. That voice was light, young, and male. It came from the crow on Aly’s shoulder. Or are you standing on your wings? We know they use counting words, just like us, and they have words for different kinds of predators. They are as much kin to us as Kyprioth there.

  You have always been too fond of those creatures, Nawat, said another female crow. It isn’t right.

  This seems like a lot of trouble to go to for a wager, added a new male crow.

  If it’s too much for you, I suppose I could take my wager to the ravens, Kyprioth remarked, cocking his head this way and that, as if he weighed up the crows. Or the magpies. I thought you would find the stakes worth your while, but perhaps the ravens will like them better.

  We want the wager, snapped the female who had said she was uncertain. Even if it takes forever to teach a stupid human.

  The crows shrugged their shoulders. That means “very well,” Nawat told Aly. It means they agree.

  “What are your stakes?” Aly inquired, thinking they must be something special to cause the crows to jump when they saw their chance of winning slip away.

  Nothing that concerns you, the stern female snapped. So don’t start thinking you can steal it for yourself. Now. We begin with numbers.

  Aly looked around for Kyprioth. He was gone. She shook her head and paid attention to her lessons.

  Aly rose at dawn, her head buzzing with crow sounds. She scavenged a lunch from the yawning kitchen staff and went out to take charge of her goats. She had some experience at herding, from working with her friends who herded the Swoop’s animals when she was younger. Time and education as her father’s daughter and as a lady had put an end to the friendships, but at least she could manage fifteen goats.

  The air was cool when she left Tanair, but she could tell the day would be warm, even hot. Except for puddles and damp grass, no traces of last night’s thunderstorm remained. She led her charges up into the rocky ground just north of the point where the road entered the Tanair plateau. Grass sprouted everywhere between the granite boulders, which made the goats happy. Perched on the rocks, Aly could see the road and the palisade that enclosed castle and village, which made her happy. She could also see the two-man guard Veron had placed to watch the road and alert the castle if anyone came that way.

  Once she was settled, Aly put aside her pack and walking stick. In all the stories of gods she had heard, she had learned that if a god wasn’t somewhere else in the world, and the speaker was of interest to that god, all that person needed was to speak the god’s name. “Kyprioth, I need to talk to you,” she said quietly. “We are overdue for a private conversation.”

  “I’m touched,” the familiar crisp voice remarked.

  Aly turned. For the first time she saw the god standing on his own, not covered with someone else’s form. She had seen the outlines of this shape in the matcher’s body, so she guessed it was one he liked. He was only two inches taller than Aly, lean and wiry like a dancer, shoulders erect, bearded chin up. He had very short salt-and-pepper hair that was more salt than pepper. It extended all the way down to frame his mouth and face in that trim beard. His nose was short and broad, his eyebrows shaped in pointed arches. Leagues of mischief gleamed in his large brown eyes. He wore a Kyprin-style wrapped coat of green cloth. It was hung all over with charms, pins, brooches, and bits of jewelry. The native sarong covered his legs, the material made of intricate patterns woven in many-colored threads. The patterns shifted when Aly looked at them, making her dizzy. Even the knot over his left hip appeared to move in its many turns and folds. It seemed to be intertwined with fine silver, gold, and copper chains. His sandals were leather studded with copper. There were rings made of copper and studded with gems on all of his fingers and several of his toes. His lone earring was a copper hoop with beads on it made of colored stones.

  “Well, here I am,” he prodded. “Speak up. I can’t do this often. I don’t want my divine siblings to learn I’m suddenly spending more time here in the last few weeks than I have in the last couple of centuries.”

  “I don’t understand,” Aly said, frowning.

  “You don’t need to,” replied Kyprioth. “Too much information is bad for you mortals. Just look at your history if you want proof.”

  Aly made a note to ask the raka servants about Kyprioth and his relationship with the other Great Gods. She had a feeling it might be important. Changing the subject to keep him off balance, she said, “You’re a god. Why not make yourself young and handsome?”

  “I like myself this way,” he informed her as the goats crowded around, sniffing him. “I look amiable and inoffensive, like an elder statesman, don’t you think?”

  “No elder statesmen I know,” Aly retorted with a grin. “Ours all wear breeches or hose, like decent people.” To the goats she said, “Get along with you! You’d think you’d never seen a god before.”

  “But they haven’t,” said Kyprioth, his voice smoothly reasonable. “And I like goats. They have so much talent for trouble. Aren’t you happy with the crows?”

  “The crows are delightful,” Aly told him. “But they won’t be enough. We need a mage, a real one, you know. Rihani’s sweet, but mostly she knows healing. There’s another healer in Tanair village. We’ve got a few who can shed light or start fires among the people who came up from Rajmuat, but if a real mage attacks, we are cooked cats. Unless you can make a mage out of me. A good one, of course.”

  “But you said it yourself, no one notices a slave,” the god said reasonably. “You would be noticeable as a mage, particularly to other mages.”

  Aly scowled at him. “You were listening.”

  Kyprioth grinned at her. “Don’t you wish you were a god? We can eavesdrop wherever we like and no one knows. Think how useful that skill would be for you. You don’t need to be a mage, my dear. Your particular, peculiar array of talents is what interests me,” he explained. “You really are quite exceptional, you know.”

  “Piffle,” said Aly. “Da has dozens more skilled than me.”

  “Not necessarily, Alianne of Pirate’s Swoop,” K
yprioth replied. There was kindness in his voice. “You come of exceptional people, and you are a fitting heir to them.”

  “They don’t think so,” Aly pointed out. “And I agree. I’m the family layabout. Don’t those four children deserve better?”

  “Now you talk as if you believe all that nonsense you’ve been told about your unwillingness to work. We both know you aren’t unwilling at all.” The god lifted Aly’s chin with a strong brown hand. “You were marked by fate from birth, just like your parents. Accept that, and see what you can accomplish here, on your own. It’s going to be an interesting summer.”

  “Speaking of that, what am I here to protect them from?” Aly wanted to know. “You never said.”

  “All sorts of things.” Kyprioth’s voice was tart with exasperation as he released her chin. “Really, Aly, you have an imagination, and a sense of the real world. You shouldn’t have to ask. Their family is out of favor with a monarch whose grip on sanity is loose, they’ve been sent to live in country far from any serious kind of defenses . . . would you like me to add a flock of hurroks or a herd of robber centaurs? Spidrens, perhaps? Rival nobles looking to gain favor with King Oron?”

  Aly sighed. “No, thank you, the normal run of perils should be enough—”

  He was gone, as if he’d never been there. Aly looked at the grass that had been under his feet: it wasn’t even bent. “He’d be impossible to track,” she told the kid that was leaning against her leg. “Aren’t you supposed to be frolicking, or something?”

  The kid butted her thigh.

  “Shoo,” Aly ordered. “I need to map this ground.”

  She was eating her lunch of bread and cheese when a crow flew down and lit a few feet away. Aly sat up as he stared at her. When he flicked his wings out in a settling-down gesture, she saw the white rippled streak on his feathers.

  “Nawat?” she asked. “That’s what they called you, isn’t it?”

  He replied with the wing shrug that was crow language for “yes.”

  Aly tossed him a chunk of the heavy brown bread. “So are you here to test me on what I learned?” she asked.

  The crow gripped the bread in a talon and gulped down a piece. He answered with a rattling caw that startled the kids so much, they leaped over one another. Aly shook her head at the silly youngsters and searched her memory. “Five?” she guessed.

  A wing shrug. She had gotten it right. Nawat voiced another sound.

  “Hawks,” Aly said with more confidence. “What’s ‘men’? Two-leggers, like me.” She looked down at her chest. “Only flatter.”

  Nawat finished the bread and walked over to her. Gently he stretched his head forward and pecked her lightly on the bosom.

  “Stop that!” Aly said, pushing him away. “I don’t let males of my own kind do that, I’m not about to start with you!”

  Nawat replied with a croak that Aly recognized.

  “Men?” she asked.

  The wing shrug. Nawat spoke two sounds that Aly correctly identified as “five men.” At least I’m learning a new language during my summer holiday, she thought humorously. So Mother won’t be able to say I wasted my time completely. She handed the crow some more bread.

  That night she ate with the slaves and the six bandit men-at-arms in the castle courtyard: the soldiers refused to let the new recruits eat with them, blood oath or no. The servants ate in the kitchen, since they ranked higher than the slaves. The family and their attendants ate in the great hall.

  Summoned to carry messages for the duke and duchess to people in the village, Aly slipped her first map to the duchess for recopying in ink. In return she took Mequen and Winnamine’s messages and carried them down to Tanair village. Most were invitations to visit the Balitangs at the castle, written to the headman, the town’s artisans and healers, and the priests of the different temples. It was nearly dark when Aly returned to the castle to take up a chore of her own.

  As she passed through the castle gate, she saw that Sergeant Veron was in charge of the night guard. Tonight she waved to him as she trotted through the gate to the inner courtyard.

  Veron frowned down at her, his gray eyes puzzled. “You are the slave Aly, are you not?” he called down to her.

  “I am, Your Honor,” Aly called back cheerfully. “Just taking messages about for Their Graces. Don’t mind me.”

  She suspected that he was one of those people who was not happy until he could fit someone into a proper category, after which he could ignore them. He confirmed her suspicion by nodding and turning back to talk to one of his men.

  Aly walked on through the open gate to the inner courtyard, where she stopped and bent to retie her sandal. As she did so she gave the courtyard ahead a quick glance. The slaves with no work to do lounged around a small fire, gossiping with a handful of off-duty men-at-arms who weren’t too proud to be seen in their company. No one else was in that courtyard. A look through the gate to the outer courtyard showed no change since she had passed through. Soldiers paced the walkway on top of the wall, keeping their night’s watch. Veron stood there, too, staring at the village below.

  Straightening, Aly scratched her head, stuck her hands into her pockets, and strolled into the shadows at the base of the inner courtyard wall. No one had seen her. Moving noiselessly but casually, as if she had every right to be there, she walked in the shadows to the guards’ barracks.

  The nice thing about sergeants in command was that they had ground-floor rooms, often with windows. Because it was warm for spring, Veron had left his shutters open for the cool evening air. Silently Aly pulled herself up onto the sill and swung her legs inward, waiting to make sure she wouldn’t bump anything before she lowered herself to the floor. As she straightened, she did that inner twist of mind that let her Sight adjust. Now the room was as well lit to her gaze as it would be to a cat at night.

  At first glance she found none of the safeguards that a wary man would set to alert him that someone had broken into his things, like a hair over the crack where the lid met the bottom of his chest, or a powdering of chalk or flour in front of it, or across the doorway. The lock on the chest was child’s play. It required only three of the picks she’d stuck into her loincloth before the mechanism opened. Aly ran her hands gently through the folded clothes without disturbing them, checking for anything unusual. Da had taught her this trick, along with the art of picking pockets, using things with bells attached until she could search without ringing a bell. All she found were letters from Veron’s home, neatly bundled and tied up with ribbon. Aly undid the ribbon to scan the letters. They were ordinary missives from parents and siblings, full of home news. Her Sight found no signs of code spells; none of the letters themselves was in code. She folded the papers as she’d found them, and retied them in the same way. Next she tested the depth of the chest against its height on the floor to check for hidden compartments. There was none.

  She searched the room as she had the trunk, checking each possible hiding place on the bed before leaving it as she had found it, unwrinkled and straight. Quickly she moved on to the sergeant’s shaving gear, chair, and table. She rapped the legs of the furniture to see if any held secret compartments. About to give up, Aly noticed a darker spot over the shadowed door.

  With the hearth stool to stand on she could reach the area. She took down a slim, dark wood box that had been set on the door’s thick frame. The lock was simple. Aly had it open in a trice. Inside were sheets of thin parchment, a reed pen, and ink that glowed with some kind of spell. With them she found a stick of clear blue sealing wax and a seal: a tiny eye over a spread-winged osprey, symbols for the intelligence service of the Copper Isles.

  Gingerly Aly returned the box to its proper place. She placed the stool in the dents in the earthen floor where it had stood before the fireplace. Then she eased herself through the window and into the safety of the shadows outside.

  Her suspicions about the sergeant were right. He was King Oron’s spy in the Balitang household. He might
not even be the only one. Should she let the duke and duchess know? Or should she keep that information to herself for now? They might insist on getting rid of Veron, and that wouldn’t be practical. Aly knew from her upbringing that the spy you know is present is always preferable to the unidentified spy. Veron could be watched. He might lead her to other royal spies within the Balitang household, or even help her to locate spies sent by enemies other than the Crown.

  It was the kind of thinking that always gave her mother headaches, a way of looking at several different possibilities for each situation. To Aly and her father it was a fine game, but Aly had learned early on that Mother hated it. That was a shame, because it was far more interesting that anything her mother might play at on horseback.

  Still turning possibilities over in her mind, Aly drifted through the gate into the outer courtyard. A glance at the stables revealed that a lamp burned in the chief hostler’s quarters. Why wasn’t Lokeij out with his boys, among the group in the inner courtyard? The old raka was a sociable man, much given to telling fireside stories until moonrise.

  Aly padded into the stables. They were empty but for the horses, who drowsed as she passed. Silently Aly walked into the one-story addition that housed the tack room, the stable boys’ dormitory, and the chief hostler’s quarters. She kept to the wall, where there was less chance she would step on a loose board. The murmur of voices from Lokeij’s room was too low for her to make out what was said. Aly hesitated, then shrugged and opened the old man’s door.

  Lokeij, the cook Chenaol, the man-at-arms Fesgao, and the head footman Ulasim all sat inside. They had the look of old friends having a nice evening’s chat, complete with drinks and a bowl of dried fruit and nuts to share. Aly blinked. All four were pure raka. She had known before that it was unusual to have so many pure-blood raka in the best positions in a luarin household. Only now, seeing them, did she realize that all four main servants here at Tanair were purebloods. Was that a nod to the older girls’ heritage, or was it something more? Perhaps it was both, she thought.