Stonecutter's Story

by Fred Saberhagen

  Kasimir sat up, scratching and rubbing his head. “Now—after we raided that warehouse—after you sent me into the Red Temple—now you think it necessary to warn me that our task is dangerous?”

  The Magistrate had seated himself in a nearby chair. “Yes,” he said, “I do. There were certainly dangers in those places that you mention. But the risk to be faced now may well be of a different order of magnitude. The fact is that I have been able, through some difficult and indirect negotiation, to arrange a deal with the Watch-station murderer.”

  Despite himself Kasimir was aware of a chill. “Well, I won’t argue that he doesn’t require a special warning. I suppose this deal involves the Sword?”

  “Of course.”

  “What makes you think that the Juggler has it now, instead of Natalia and her group?”

  “You misunderstand, Kasimir. The fact is that our friend hopes and expects to obtain the Sword from us, in return for a down payment of cash, along with his pledge of cooperation in other matters.”

  Kasimir, who had just got to his feet, slowly sat down again. “However did he get the idea that we have it?”

  “I fear someone must have provided him with misleading information.” The Magistrate’s eyes twinkled slightly.

  “How?”

  There was no answer.

  “So he wants Stonecutter from us. What do we hope and expect to get from him?”

  “I have told him that we want a thousand gold pieces as a down payment, and a pledge, plus his co-operation in future operations.”

  “And what do we really want?”

  “I want his head,” said Wen Chang simply.

  There was a little silence. “I see what you mean,” said Kasimir at last, “about the danger.”

  “Yes; about that. Understand, Kasimir, that I would not ask this of you if I thought the part I wanted you to play was truly suicidal. But I will think none the less of you if you—”

  “Oh, yes, you would.” The physician got to his feet. “That’s all right. I, on my part, would think something the less of myself if, having come this far, I were to fail to see this matter through to a conclusion. Tell me what you want me to do.”

  The Magistrate, smiling and obviously relieved, leaned forward to exchange a firm handclasp with his younger associate. Then he sat back in his chair.

  “Seldom have I made any plan for the express purpose of killing someone. But I think that in this case it is essential. I have already spoken to Almagro on this matter and he sees no objection. I have spoken also to Lieutenant Komi, as Prince al-Farabi’s deputy, and he agrees with me. You and I will have help—but so will the Juggler, who has obviously recruited people from the underworld of Eylau.”

  “I am sure our allies are at least as capable as his. Tell me what you want me to do.”

  “You will have a special part to play tonight. You will carry to our meeting with Valamo a wrapped bundle of the proper size and shape to persuade him that we are indeed bringing the Sword. He insists on seeing it at our first meeting, before our negotiations are carried any further. There are good reasons why I cannot undertake to play the part of the Sword-carrier myself, but be assured that I shall be nearby.”

  “I had assumed you would be.”

  “Almagro and Komi and myself, with additional help, are going to be as close as we can. But we cannot guarantee your safety should our enemy become suspicious.”

  “Which he can hardly fail to be. But I understand. I tell you I mean to see this business through.”

  At this point Lieutenant Komi appeared at the head of the stairs. The officer was carrying under one arm a weighty bundle, definitely the wrong shape for a Sword. When this was placed on a table and unwrapped, it proved to be a mail shirt, the steel links as finely wrought as any Kasimir had ever seen.

  “This is for you to wear tonight, sir,” Komi informed Kasimir, somewhat grimly.

  “Indeed. Under the conditions, I think I will not refuse.”

  In response to Kasimir’s questions, the officer informed him that the garment belonged to Prince al-Farabi himself, but Komi did not think his master would mind its being loaned out in the present circumstances. Komi also stated that the mesh of the shirt, magically reinforced, was so fine and tough that it ought to be able to turn the point of even the sharpest poniard.

  While Kasimir was preparing to try the garment on, he asked Wen Chang curiously: “How did you manage to establish communications with Valamo?”

  “Only indirectly, and with considerable difficulty.” The Magistrate was spreading out a coarsely woven, dull-brown cloth almost the size of a blanket upon the largest table in the apartment. Kasimir’s view of this operation was cut off for a moment as Komi helped him pull the mail shirt over his head; then he could see the Magistrate holding up a sword in a plain leather sheath.

  “Also borrowed,” he said, “from our friend the Prince.” The weapon had a brown wooden hilt and an ornate guard; its overall size looked the same as Stonecutter’s, but no one able to get a good look could mistake this blade for one of the Twelve forged by a god.

  Wen Chang put the sword on the table and began to bundle it up carefully in the brown cloth.

  Kasimir asked: “Do we expect the Juggler to accept his treasure without taking a close look at it?”

  “We expect, if all goes well, to complete our business with him before he has had a chance to do so.” The Magistrate tied his bundle lightly shut and stood back, surveying the effect. Then he hoisted it in one hand, as if testing the weight. “As long as the bundle remains closed the likeness is certainly good enough.”

  “Where is the meeting scheduled to take place, and when?”

  “The time is tonight. The place is the small bazaar at the end of the Street of the Leatherworkers. Rather, that is where you are to carry the Sword, and await further instructions.”

  “I suppose I am to go alone?”

  The Magistrate shot him a glance of amusement, tempered with concern. “You would be willing to do that? No, fortunately our rivals in this matter are too realistic to demand any such foolish behavior on our part. You will have two companions when you arrive at the bazaar, and for some time thereafter. We must expect that at some point an attempt will be made to separate you, the sword-bearer, from your escort.”

  Kasimir sighed. “Naturally I suppose we must expect treachery from the other side.”

  No one bothered to answer that. Komi was making certain adjustments in the shirt, which hung with a depressing weight upon Kasimir’s shoulders.

  “And speaking of treachery,” Kasimir insisted, “how do we plan to effect our own?”

  “The details of that must wait upon events,” said Wen Chang. “Your responsibilities will be, first, to carry this.” The brown-cloth bundle was thrust suddenly into Kasimir’s grip. “Second, to take direction from me; and third, should that no longer be possible, to use your own wits to the best advantage possible.”

  * * *

  Two hours after sunset, flanked by the Magistrate and a sturdy Firozpur sergeant, Kasimir was standing at the south end of the Street of the Leatherworkers, where an intersection with two other busy though narrow thoroughfares had created a square of modest size. One of the city’s innumerable open-air markets had grown up in the space thus made available, and was doing a thriving business on this evening, despite the occasional brisk shower and the threat of a real downpour conveyed by heavy background thunder. Again Kasimir found himself in a part of the city no more than a hundred meters, he estimated, from the Tungri and the energetic life that clustered around the river and the docks.

  “Why did you decide to give this thing to me to carry?” he asked in a low voice, turning his head slightly toward the Magistrate, who stood at his right hand. “Not that I am unwilling—but I should have thought you’d prefer to have it in hand yourself.”

  “At the most crucial moments of negotiation,” said Wen Chang, “I prefer to have both hands free. Also I chose you because I c
onsider you—after myself—the most quick-witted person available … ah. Here, if I am not mistaken, comes our next contact.”

  An urchin only a little older and bigger than the child who had carried Natalia’s message was approaching them steadily through the random traffic of bodies in the bazaar. His eyes were fixed on Kasimir, who held the sword-shaped bundle in his hands. In a moment, as soon as the boy was sure that Kasimir was watching him, he turned sharply and led the way down Leatherworkers’ Street.

  “Slowly and calmly,” said Wen Chang. “After him.”

  Moving single file with Kasimir in the lead, his bundle held tightly under his left arm, the three men followed.

  They were led beneath the flaring oil-lamps of Leatherworkers’ Street, and into another bazaar at the other end of the short, crooked thoroughfare. Kasimir, glancing up just as they reached this second marketplace, saw something that almost made him stumble—a small, dark shadow flitting just above the brightness of the nearest lamp. It had to be one of Komi’s—or someone’s—winged messengers. The lieutenant must be nearby, and must be somehow trying to use one of the creatures to follow their progress through the maze of streets.

  On entering the second bazaar their youthful guide had suddenly turned aside, darted under one of the vendors’ carts, and in an instant disappeared from view. It was not to be thought of that men of affairs carrying a Sword would follow him in this maneuver; the trio came to an uncertain halt, watching and waiting for further instructions.

  The smells of dough frying, and of meat and peppers roasting on a skewer, enlivened the air here. Somewhere in the background, men clapped hands to the rhythm of a drum, and female dancers whirled in torchlight. A small caravan of laden load beasts urged other traffic momentarily out of the way of their slow progress.

  Then, unexpectedly, their guide was back, walking out of the kaleidoscopic churn of moving bodies, coming from the direction of the dancers. This time the urchin moved past the three men purposefully, and walked straight on through the outer gateway of a low stone building at the start of the next street. Once inside the gate he paused, looking back just long enough to make sure they were following. Then he walked on into the building’s courtyard.

  The Firozpur sergeant, hand on his sword hilt, followed. At Wen Chang’s gesture Kasimir followed two or three paces behind the sergeant; and he could hear Wen Chang’s soft footsteps coming along at an equal distance behind him.

  The open passage leading into the courtyard went round a right-angled corner, so that now the busy street was out of sight. The torchlit enclosure in which they found themselves was small, no more than five meters square, closed on three sides by the mortared stone walls of a low building, each wall containing one or two heavily barred windows. There was one door, even more impressively fortified, in one of the walls. Save for themselves, the courtyard was empty. Kasimir caught only the briefest glimpse of their guide, small bare feet vanishing onto the roof at the top of a fragile-looking drainpipe.

  “Now,” said a sepulchral voice, moderately loud, speaking from within the darkness inside the barred window on Kasimir’s right. Nerves triggered by the sound, he spun that way.

  “Show us,” added a tenor from the window that was now behind him. He turned again, seeing Wen Chang and the Firozpur sergeant at his sides turning more slowly.

  “The Sword,” concluded a voice that Kasimir had heard once before, in the courtyard of his own inn. This time it came from within the window Kasimir had originally been facing.

  Kasimir held up the weighty bundle.

  “Unwrap it,” ordered the central voice, its owner still invisible behind a protective grille.

  “Not so fast,” interposed Wen Chang. “We should like to know who we are dealing with. And that our path of retreat out of this courtyard is still secure.”

  “Stay where you are,” said the Juggler’s voice. “Show me the real Sword, and you will be able to retreat fast enough.”

  “First you will identify yourself somehow.” The voice of the Magistrate sounded as firm as that of a judge seated on the bench. “Or else this dealing proceeds no further.”

  There was a pause. Then something, a small, harmless-looking object came flying out of the darkness of the barred window to bounce at the feet of Kasimir. Looking down, he saw it was a juggler’s ball. The energy of the small sphere’s bounces died away, and it came to a full stop almost touching the toe of his right boot.

  Kasimir glanced at Wen Chang, who shrugged and with a confident small gesture seemed to indicate that Kasimir should undo the bundle he was carrying. Kasimir hesitated marginally, then set one end of the wrapped sword on the ground, and pretended to be trying to untie the cord that held the wrappings together. He could only assume that Wen Chang would manage some interruption at the last second.

  The sounds of the bazaar, the music of people blithely indifferent to villainy, drifted into the three-sided enclosure.

  “Hurry, get on with it!” the voice of Tadasu Hazara urged, from out of darkness.

  “I’m trying,” Kasimir protested, endeavoring to sound irritated rather than frightened. “These knots—”

  “Cut them!”

  From somewhere, almost lost in the noise of the open street behind Kasimir, a low whistle sounded. In the next instant, as if coincidentally, Wen Chang stepped forward to give Kasimir a hand. “Here, let me.”

  Kasimir let go and stepped back—and recoiled as from the murderous lunge of a madman. Wen Chang had grabbed up the bundle, still tied shut as it was, and lunged with it straight against the white stone wall in front of him.

  There was a minor thunderclap of impact. Wen Chang drew back his arms and thrust again with the concealed blade, slashing and sawing with demonic energy. Stones and their fragments burst from the wall, showering and bruising the astonished Kasimir, while the hammer like sounds of Stonecutter rose into the night.

  Inside each of the three dark rooms behind the window bars, pandemonium burst out. Someone fired a crossbow bolt out of the window at the right, a dart that by some sheer good luck missed the Firozpur sergeant, who was near its line of flight. Kasimir was not quite so lucky. The impact, just under his right armpit, felt like that of an oaken club swung in a giant’s fist, and for a moment he staggered off balance.

  Now there were cries and the clash of weapons in the rear of the central room, from which the Juggler’s voice had sounded. Someone was beating down a door back there, and torchlight shone through, even as a section of the front wall went down before Wen Chang’s continuing assault with the Sword. The inside of the room was suddenly open to inspection, but Valamo was gone.

  Kasimir looked down at the pavement near his feet; the crossbow bolt was lying there, a wicked-looking dart whose needle point was barely tipped with red. His own red blood. The physician put a hand under his outer shirt and felt the fine mesh of the heavy mail beneath; there in one place the perfect pattern of the links was slightly strained and broken. There was a wound in his bruised flesh, but it was superficial.

  And how armed men were swarming everywhere. It appeared that most of Valamo’s support had evaporated on the spot. An outcry went up; that gentleman himself had just been spotted trying to get away over the rooftops.

  Inside the otherwise barren room from which the Juggler had been speaking, there was a ladder and a trapdoor. Kasimir, halfway up, saw Wen Chang, still on the ground, throw the Sword, still wrapped, up on the roof ahead of him, where presumably some trusted figure was waiting to take it in charge and keep it safe.

  And now the Magistrate was on the roof himself, leading the pursuit, shouting: “We must not let him escape!”

  The pursuit led in the direction of the river.

  The buildings in the neighborhood were mostly low, the streets more often than not mere pedestrian alleys, narrow enough for an active man moving at rooftop level to leap them with a bound. Kasimir’s wound did not much trouble him, and he forgot about it once he was caught up in the excitement o
f the chase.

  The moon, perversely from the point of view of the fugitive, was now out, near full and very bright. The broken clouds that would have dimmed its light seemed to avoid it wholly. The figure that must be the Juggler was moving on, leaping and running, in the direction of the river, keeping half a roof ahead of the nearest pursuer.

  Kasimir was gaining ground slowly. In a moment the man, one of the Watch, who had been closest to the fleeing Valamo tried to jump too broad a gap, and disappeared with a cry of despair.

  Now Kasimir himself was closest to the enemy. Glancing off to one side, he was astounded to catch a glimpse of someone else running in the night, moving away from Valamo rather than toward him, and carrying some object. Light, timing, and distance were all against Kasimir, but he thought that he might have just seen Natalia. Or perhaps it was only that he expected to see her now in every scene of action.

  He had no time now to try to puzzle the matter out. The river was very near ahead; the quarry was being brought to bay.

  Someone’s slung stone whizzed past Valamo’s head; the shot had been too difficult in moonlight. The white-haired figure turned on a parapet, two stories above the water’s edge. Kasimir, running up, knew that he was going to be too late. There were men rowing a small boat in the stream just under the place where the Juggler perched, men who called up to him with urgent voices.

  Valamo turned toward Kasimir, and made a graceful gesture of obscenity. The acrobat’s body crouched, then lunged out in an expert dive that ought to land it in the water just beside the boat.

  Running out of shadows, the figure of Wen Chang appeared beside the leaping man at the last instant. Moonlight glinted on the faint streak of a bright rapier.

  The Juggler’s body, pierced, contorted in the air. A choked cry sounded in the night. The graceful dive became an awkward, tumbling splash into the river.

  Wen Chang, panting with the long chase, his own sword still in his hand, stood watching beside Kasimir. No one saw the submerged man come up.