The Stone Key

by Isobelle Carmody

  The night grew steadily colder, and I worried again about Rawen, but hearing my thoughts, the mare sent equably that she was content. Turning to look at her long face, silvered by moonlight, I saw her prick her ears at the sound of the waves breaking on the shore, and then she turned her head and sniffed the air blowing across the open plain. I was close enough to sense that her mind was truly untroubled, and I marveled yet again at the ability of beasts simply to be. Rawen was not wondering what would happen next or regretting the pampered life she had led in Morganna. She was simply being.

  Envying her serenity, I knew that it was not in me to emulate it. I turned my eyes to the waves and found myself thinking of the null. Lark and Elkar had both told me that Ariel chose his nulls from among the in-take of novice boys, so I had to suppose that he had deliberately chosen an older null specifically for this task. It made sense, but why a null at all? Why not simply someone who could be infected by the plague? Or had Ariel wanted someone with no personal desires or intentions to interfere with whatever he had been bidden to do?

  There were no answers, and at last Rawen’s warmth and the song of the waves lulled me to sleep. I woke not long after dawn, feeling deeply refreshed. Turning out the last of the oats, I left Rawen to her meager firstmeal while I set about digging a hole deep enough to accommodate the saddle. Once it was buried, I tied the ornate bridle under my shirt and ate an apple with pleasure, giving the other to the mare.

  She crunched it up, then nuzzled me and bade me be careful before she cantered away along the beach. I watched her until the sunlit haze of sea spray swallowed her up, and then I rolled the empty saddlebag tightly, wrapped my cloak around it, and set off toward Halfmoon Bay.

  2

  “WHERE HAVE YOU come from?” the soldierguard asked the older man.

  He was first in the short queue of people waiting to enter Halfmoon Bay at the gap gate nearest the water. Like the three before him, he had come from a grubber farm in the badlands, whose crops had mutated after a series of storms that had blown in from the Blacklands. I knew from conversations with Seely, who had lived most of her life on the west coast, that although the strip of land that ran along the Blacklands was slightly more fertile than most of the west coast, there was a high incidence of mutated crops and livestock. Anything abnormal was supposed to be destroyed, though in practice, life on these farms was harsh enough that many mutations were passed off as normal. When it could not be concealed, the grubbers had no choice but to burn their crop or livestock and abandon their farms to travel to the nearest city. Some never went back, but most tried to earn coin enough for new seed stock and untainted livestock before returning.

  I had thought to be a grubber in search of work, but now I feared my tale would sound too similar, so I invented a sick grandfather in need of medicine. My story thus refined, I turned my attention to what I could see of Halfmoon Bay through the section gate, which was little more than a guarded opening between two sections of wall. Instead of the well-stocked stalls and the bustle of trade inside the gate at Morganna, the open area beyond the gap was narrow and dirty, and the buildings appeared to be on the verge of tumbling down. A group of ragged-looking men playing a card game on the back of a cart stopped occasionally to cast furtive glances toward the gate, and a swift probe told me that they were keeping watch for a traveler wealthy enough to follow and rob in the maze of narrow streets leading away from the gate. I was glad my clothes were simple and that I carried only an empty saddlebag and cloak. Even so, I wished that I had gone into the city a different way, for clearly this gate led to one of the city’s poorer areas.

  The older man was admitted, and as the soldierguard turned his attention to the two men before me, a group of soldierguards strolled up and lounged against the wall. I could not probe any of them because of their demon bands, but I needed no Talent to realize they must be drunk, for their eyes were glazed, and they laughed often and foolishly at nothing. I half expected the soldierguard on duty to reprimand them, but he merely cast them a frowning look before returning to his questions.

  The two men claimed to be tailors from Port Oran come to buy special cloth from a weaver. The soldierguard admitted them and shifted his gaze to me. I offered him my story demurely, suddenly very aware of Rawen’s bridle tied around my waist.

  “Medicine, she calls it,” crowed one of the drunken soldierguards. “That’s a good one, Pyper.”

  “What skills do you offer?” asked the soldierguard, ignoring him. It was a question he had asked the others, and I had an answer prepared.

  “I am hoping to cook in a tavern or maybe tend horses in a public stable, for I am good with beasts,” I said.

  The soldierguard nodded, and just as it seemed he would bid me enter, the other soldierguard said, “She don’t speak like any grubber I ever heard, Pyper.”

  I was dismayed to realize that he was right. I had not thought to affect the slow, almost singsong speech of the grubbers who had gone before me.

  “My mother was city born,” I said quickly.

  “Did she come from Halfmoon Bay?” asked the soldierguard named Pyper.

  “What is her name? Perhaps I knew her,” called one of the drunken soldierguards with a leer.

  I ought to have been afraid, but suddenly I was angry. I was seeking to save the lives of these men as well as the lives of my friends, and I had no time for their foolish hectoring and sly hints. I gave my mother’s true name and said that she had come from Morganna. As I spoke, I reached out to beastspeak a thin, swaybacked horse standing placidly by the cart where the men were gaming. I identified myself as ElspethInnle and asked if she would rear up and create a diversion so I could slip into the city. She said that she would be beaten unless there was a good reason for her alarm, so I beastspoke a dog drowsing in a doorway. He agreed at once to help, and he even offered with a sparkle of mischief to froth at the mouth so the funaga would think he was rabid. Without waiting for me to agree, he sprang up and catapulted across the street, barking wildly.

  The soldierguards swung around in surprise to see a snarling dog worrying an apparently terrified horse, and while everyone was thus distracted, I slipped through the gate and down the nearest lane. It was empty, and I sped along it and turned into another intersecting lane. There were people here, so I slowed to a walk, listening for the sound of pursuit.

  Continuing on, I noticed that the houses were less dilapidated than those about the gate, but they still had an unkempt, neglected look. Crossing a square, I spied a public well and stopped to drink. Only then, as I refilled my water bladder, did I remember my midnight encounter with the other Misfit mind. Incredulous that I could have forgotten, I sat on a stone bench beside the well, closed my eyes, and sent out a probe. I searched for some time, concentrating hard, but to no avail. My spirits plummeted, since the probe had most likely failed to locate because the person it sought had left the city.

  I shook my head and told myself that the sooner I could get out of the city the better, for it had an unlucky feel about it. Setting off again, I found myself in a street where an open gutter ran down the middle, streaming with privy water and all manner of refuse; it was all I could do not to vomit. The stench was vile, yet people passed along the street or stood by it talking to neighbors, and children screamed or fought or played next to it, all of them apparently oblivious to the noxious mess running by their feet.

  I left the street with relief, only to find myself in another just the same, save that the people here all wore rags, and several gave me looks of sullen resentment that made the hair on my neck prickle. I was dressed so plainly that I had given no thought to being robbed, but now it occurred to me that the poverty here was advanced enough to make me a worthy mark. As if summoned up by the thought, a big dull-faced man and a squint-eyed woman stepped out to block my path. Before I could even begin to shape a coercive probe, the dog I had farsought at the city’s entrance came charging past me to snarl meaningfully at the pair.

  “‘Er
’s got a doggie,” the big oaf said, beaming down.

  “Shut yer neck, yer gollerin’ sheep,” hissed the woman, and dragged the big man back into the doorway from which they had emerged.

  “Thank you, but I could have managed,” I beastspoke the dog when we had passed out of sight of the pair.

  “Of course you could, ElspethInnle, but it is an honor to aid you,” he sent so amiably that some of my tension abated. I asked if he would lead me to the sea, and as we went on together, he shared, in the highest of good humor, what had happened at the gate. One of the soldierguards had tried to club him, but he had given the funaga-li a bite for his trouble, and instead of being whipped, the horse had been praised by her master for defending herself so bravely against the vicious mad dog. Best of all, he said that as far as he could smell, it was assumed that I had fled in terror, and no one had seemed to care if I had run in or out of the gate.

  “Won’t your human be angry?” I asked, for a description would be circulated of a rabid dog.

  “I call no funaga master,” he answered with cheerful contempt.

  “A wild dog who lives in a city?”

  “I am free, not wild,” he said, adding that a city offered good pickings for a smart, free beast. Then he told me that his name was Fever.

  “Fever?” I repeated aloud. He barked assent so pertly that I laughed and shook my head. Then I sobered and sent, “I am surprised to hear that there are good pickings here, for this funaga settlement seems poor to me.”

  “Pickings are not good for your kind,” the dog agreed. “But there is plenty of good rubbish for a dog to eat, and water and lots of fat rats as well.”

  I shuddered, realizing that of course a dog’s notion of a good place to live would differ greatly from that of a human. We came to another street running with filth, and, sickened, I asked Fever if we might go some other way.

  “This is the quickest and the safest way to the waves,” he assured me, untroubled by the squalor.

  I struggled on, batting flies away from my mouth and eyes with my free hand and wondering that this city had not sprouted its own plague. Thinking of plagues made me remember the frail teknoguilder Pavo, who had once told me that the Beforetimers had used sickness as a weapon. He had said that they harvested the seeds of sickness and preserved them, just as one would with fruit or maybe seed and grain, so that they could be planted long after and still germinate. Pavo would never have imagined that Ariel would un-earth some of these dire seeds and try to unleash an ancient plague in the Land.

  I wondered where the Beforetimers had discovered seeds of sickness in the first place. It was hard to imagine plague in the Beforetimes of my past dreams, where everything seemed so smooth and clean and shining. But maybe there had been places like Halfmoon Bay in the Beforetime, where the squalor and poverty had produced a crop of sickness for the taking. It was a strangely horrible thought.

  A breath of fresh air blew into my face, redolent with the sweet, clean smell of the sea. Moments later, we came out onto a boardwalk. The dog turned to follow it, and I noticed a scattering of small fishing vessels anchored in the water ahead, but no greatship. On the shore, a large sea market thronged with traders and buyers despite the early hour, and Fever sent that he had a funaga friend who worked on the far side of the market. He offered me a mental picture of a big, powerful-looking man with springy black hair, a direct searching gaze, and a ready smile.

  I was startled to hear Fever describe a human as a friend, for it was seldom that unTalents cared for beasts that they did not regard as their possessions. Perhaps this man could tell me whether the Black Ship had recently called at Halfmoon Bay. If I failed to learn what I needed to know before I reached the other side of the market, I decided I would find and speak to Fever’s friend. I would buy provisions and a tinderbox, and with luck, I might even manage to sell Rawen’s bridle, all as I sought information.

  Pushing my way into the crowd, I was struck by the festive attire and jewels worn by many market-goers. Half of them looked as if they were going to a ball, which was strange, because under normal circumstances, the wealthy did not shop for themselves; they sent servants to do it for them. Yet here they were, shopping in a sea market and showing every sign of enjoying it.

  “What is going on in this city?” I muttered under my breath.

  Fever must have smelled my confusion, for he said, “It is not always like this.”

  Before I could ask what he meant, he spotted another dog that bristled and offered an immediate challenge. “My friend is on the other side of the market where the trees are,” the dog sent, and abandoned me unashamedly to take up the other dog’s challenge.

  I edged and elbowed my way laboriously toward the end of the market, where two trees grew close together. I tried probing a couple of passersby to find out if the Black Ship had put in recently, but none were thinking about the ship. I did learn in my probing attempt that the city was preparing for its moon fair.

  I was in the process of exchanging some more transformed copper coins to buy a tinderbox, a pack to carry it in, some food, and fodder for Rawen when I spotted Fever’s friend. He looked exactly as Fever had shown him to me, save that his cheeks were smeared with soot. He was sitting at a stall set up between two trees, wearing a leather blacksmith’s apron and stoking a small brazier. Not until I was right in front of the stall did I notice that he had one leg thrust out stiffly, showing a wooden knob instead of a foot.

  “Do you want something mended?” he asked in a pleasant, rasping voice.

  “Will you buy a driftwood bundle if I gather it?” I asked, saying the first thing that came into my mind, since I could hardly say that Fever had sent me.

  “Driftwood is not the right sort of wood for my fire, lass,” he told me. “It burns too swift and bright. Metalworking wants a fire that will burn very hot and show little flame. There is an art in the making of fire for metalwork.”

  “Where do you get wood for such a fire?” I asked.

  The man gave me a speculative look that made the hair stand up on the back of my neck. “You are not from the west coast,” he said softly.

  “I was born in Rangorn,” I said, letting myself sound slightly defiant. I could imagine people might not be too willing to admit they had come from the other part of the Land, but there must be many on the west coast who had not been born there.

  “Don’t be afraid,” he told me. “I am not one of those who thinks every person born the wrong side of the Suggredoon ought to be reported to the Council as a spy. But for your own sake, I would not tell anyone else here where you hail from. You ought to get some boot-black or hoof polish and rub it over your skin to darken it a bit. It is your pallor that gave you away as much as your accent.”

  “Thank you,” I said. I hesitated and then forced myself to smile a little. “To tell the truth, I am more afraid of Herders than soldierguards.”

  “There are stories enough about Herder doings to freeze the blood of any maid or man,” the metalworker said soberly.

  “I came here to buy medicine for my grandfather,” I said. “I have a bridle to sell, but it is a family treasure, and I fear that I will be charged as a thief if I go to the wrong buyer.”

  “A wise apprehension,” the man said gravely. “I can recommend a good buyer, but he will not do if the bridle is stolen.”

  I felt my cheeks redden, and he continued expressionlessly. “There is also a man in a closed tent farther along the boardwalk. He will cheat you but less than other such men, and he is discreet.”

  I entered his mind to see that he took me for a woman who had fled an abusive bondmate or possibly a brother or father, because he had noticed faint bruises on my face and arms. He thought the stolen bridle belonged to whoever had hurt me and that I had courage to have stolen it and fled. Far from despising me for the theft, he was trying to think of a way to help me without frightening me. He had thought of his sister, who sent him off each morning with a cheerful smile and “Have a plea
sant day, Rolf.” He grimaced at the thought of someone mistreating her. As always when I had steeled myself to face darkness and hatred, the unexpected sweetness of compassion undid me. I withdrew from his mind, determined not to enter again, for he was no foe.

  He said, very casually, “As you might have noticed, I am crippled. If you will take a coin and buy me a bannock or two for my firstmeal from that stall yonder, there will be enough remaining for you to buy one for yourself. You can leave whatever it is that you are carrying so I know you will return.” I did not have to read his mind to know that he had added this last sentence because he felt I would fear his intentions if he seemed too generous. I laid down the cloak and saddlebag and took his coin, wondering what this man’s spirit would look like, were I to see it through spirit eyes.

  I made for the stand he had pointed out where the smells made my mouth water, though the woman behind it had a sour expression. I ordered the bannocks and watched her take them hot from the little oven on wheels beside her. She wrapped them and named a steep price. I told her the man at the metalworking stall had given me the coin and that I would have to go back and tell him it was too little. I was backing away when I noticed a wry smile twisting her thin lips. She glanced toward the metalworker and shook her head.

  “Aro sent you, then. And I suppose you’re to keep one of my bannocks for yourself, for fetching them for a crippled man, even though I always take them over to him?” Dry amusement tinged her voice.

  “I…He is very kind,” I stammered, more taken aback by her transformation than her words. I also found myself confused by her calling the man Aro. His sister had called him Rolf.

  “He is that, the dear fool. There is not a stallholder in this wretched place for whom Aro has not done some kindness. Indeed, if gratitude were coin, he would be a rich man. Well, have the bannocks, then, and give me the coin.” Her voice had gone back to being cool, but there was now humor in her eyes.