“Cynnalee, darling.” The old man rose and pressed his whiskery lips to her work-reddened palm. “’Twas your beauty what brung me, and nothing else.”
Snatching her hand away, the woman buried it under her apron, her lined face managing to look both scandalized and pleased at the same time. “Go on with you,” she scoffed. “It never brung you this early before.”
Cittar pulled off his battered hat and smiled up at her. “It’s true I resisted for a long time, Cynnalee, but this year it seemed I could hear you calling just as clear as morning.” He gave her dry cheek a gentle pinch. “Would you be having a bit of your best ale for an old man?”
She nodded and picked up a tankard.
In his dark corner, Jarid laid a coin on the table and slipped his hood down lower over his face. Although he’d rendered the old man unable to recognize him during their meeting on the road, it did no good to play with the Fates. He paused at the door just long enough to see the peddler draw the woman into his lap and nuzzle her neck.
Outside, late arrivals drifted into town for the fair, carrying the awkward lumps of their trade goods on their backs or towing plodding, heavily laden ummits behind them. Jarid surveyed the thatched roofs in the moonlight across the small town, and the straggling rows of people headed for the common.
Tomorrow, he thought with a sense of satisfaction, she would come straight to him.
* * *
Kevisson lifted the saddle to the back of the flighty black mare, still puzzling over the brief mental contact that had touched him earlier. After a brief skittering against the edge of his mind, he’d sensed nothing more, but he hadn’t imagined it; someone had traced him. For a moment, the young Tal girl crossed his mind, but he dismissed that idea. She hadn’t even felt his touch when he created the subliminal line of contact between them.
Tightening his shields, he swung up on the compact black mare and turned its nose on a path which would lead them deeper into the forest. If the girl and her companions remained stationary again today, he would finally catch up. Then it would only be a matter of biding his time until he could spirit her away.
He pulled the jet-black obsidian band out of his pocket, a birth gift from the girl’s maternal family line, Birtal Senn had said, and slipped it over his sixth and smallest finger. Then he pictured her face as the chierra sister at the shrine had seen her. A sense of unease crept over him as her somber face floated in his mind . . . stomach-wrenching fear . . . shame, bitter as gall . . . suffocating black terror.
In the name of the Blessed Light! He snatched the glass ring off his finger and stared at it, the blood roaring in his ears. The searing emotions remained, although not as intense. He took a deep, steadying breath, then ripped a bit of cloth from the hem of his tunic, wrapped the ring and stuffed it into his pocket.
His hands still shook as he gave the mare his heels and let it pick its way around the deadfall and snags. The arching forest of redthorn and spine-wood gave way to gnarled old giants that shut out the sky, and he kept a careful watch for chierra minds up ahead. Finally, he caught a faint glimmer of light reflecting on water up ahead in the cool, impenetrable shade beneath the oversized trees. The thirsty black mare nickered softly.
Kevisson dismounted and led it under the low-hanging branches, ducking his head. Pulling eagerly away from him, the mare buried its muzzle in the secluded pool. He waited a few blinks for his eyes to adjust to the dimness. Leafy vines trailed from the branches of the trees, mottled with yellow-green, and to his surprise, the sides of the pool were formed of quarried white stone blocks. A set of broad steps led down into the water on his side.
Kevisson shivered suddenly and pulled his cloak more closely around his body. It was much colder here where the sun didn’t reach, and oddly quiet. A fine mist steamed off the water’s mirrored surface.
He walked closer and knelt, peering into the still water. Five oddly-cut ilsera crystals had been set into the white stone border below the waterline. Their faint pale-blue glow brightened as he watched.
The whole effect made him think of some sort of portal, but that was ridiculous. No one would ever build a portal in water. Then his skin prickled; perhaps it was ilseri.
The mare raised its dripping muzzle and pricked its ears. Kevisson reached for the trailing reins. He had never seen an ilseri, of course. The Old Ones, as some called them, had retreated into the deep forests long ago when men had first come to Desalaya. No one had encountered one within living memory. It was quite possible they were all dead now, but occasionally an artifact was found.
As he tugged the reluctant mare away from the pool, a faint hum began in his head, like a cloud of nits, growing louder by the second, and painful. The reins slipped through his nerveless fingers as the mare snorted and trotted away through the trees. He fell to his knees, weaving his shields tighter, but the sound knifed through his brain as if he had no shields at all. A numbing cold swept over him. He doubled up in the grass, clamping his hands over his ears in a useless effort to keep his head from bursting. Try as he might, he could not shield against it.
A boneless hand slipped under his arm and pulled him to his feet. Kevisson sagged against a smooth cool body, struggling to walk, unable to open his eyes.
The overwhelming, echoing vibrations began to recede . . . he felt the warm dance of sunlight on his face. His very bones ached with cold. The supporting arm propped him against the rough bark of a tree, but his legs would not hold him, and he let his back slide down the trunk until he rested on the ground.
He hunched there, hands tucked under his armpits for warmth, and tried to stop shivering. The alien vibration in his head continued to fade until it was . . . gone. Forcing open one heavy eye, he looked blearily around and saw that this blessed patch of sunlight was at the edge of the forest. Broad fields swept toward the horizon. He tried to get to his feet, but fell back as dizziness overwhelmed him.
Closing his eyes, he leaned back against the comforting solidness of the tree trunk and let the sun bake the bone-deep cold out of his body. When he finally stopped shivering, he took stock of his situation. Although he seemed to be at the edge of the forest—that couldn’t be. From any direction, the forest’s edge had to be at least forty miles from the secluded pool.
He cast his mind about for the mare, but it was nowhere to be found. He reflected ruefully that it was probably on its way back to Lenhe’ayn, along with his saddlebags and every scrap of clothing and provisions he had brought with him.
Dusting his hands off on his brown breeches, he stood up. He would just have to finish his assignment, then return to Lenhe’ayn and reclaim his belongings. Squinting up into the cloudless green sky, he tried to calculate the hour, and then stopped. The orange sun hung midway between the horizon and its zenith: Third Hour or so.
But when he had found the pond, the day had already progressed well beyond the Sixth Hour.
He backed against the tree. What had happened at the pond must have been a shock to his mind. He could have understood if he had lost an hour or so, but it seemed to be earlier, not later.
Finally he shook himself and checked for his link to Haemas Tal. It was still there; in fact, she seemed quite close now. If he had traveled forty miles between one breath and the next, at least it seemed to be in the right direction. He started hiking down to a road just visible below the forest’s edge. Whatever the truth of what had just happened, he still had a job to do.
* * *
Eevlina smeared a last dab of dark stain across Haemas’s cheek and stood back to survey her work.
Haemas rubbed her nose with the back of her hand. “Stinks.”
“Humph!” Eevlina wiped her hands on her tattered homespun skirt. “No one will suspect anything amiss with a natural smell like that. You be still until that stain dries or I’ll take my stick to your other end.”
Arms held out from her sides, Haemas backed away
and wandered over to watch Cale pack instead. At least her head didn’t hurt any more. The old woman must know something about herbs. All this fuss just to steal some horses, she thought, leaning against a tree trunk, and for what? She’d bet her own weight in ilsera crystals that these chierras didn’t have a supply of old-style grains, and without that, the horses would eventually sicken and die. Non-native stock simply couldn’t survive more than six months on native plant life.
“Enough laying about.” Eevlina limped over to the nearest ebari and glared back over her meaty shoulder. “The morning’s half over. Are you worthless excuses for human beings going to piddle the whole day away here on your backsides, or are we going to go get us some horses?”
Mashal whooped and launched himself up into the saddle, his scarred face split in a fierce grin. His ebari squealed and tossed its horned head. Holnar smiled too, as he accepted his reins from Jassfra and pulled himself one-handed up into the saddle.
Cale leaned over and cupped his hands to give the old woman a hand up. His brows furrowed as he took Eevlina’s weight and then strained to boost her on up into the saddle.
Haemas waited over by the beast she’d ridden up to this point, but Cale swung her up on his own ebari to sit in the saddle in front of him.
“I can ride by myself!” She twisted around to look at him as he settled behind her.
Reaching forward to tuck a bit of stain-darkened hair back under her hood, he shook his head. “Not this trip, prize. Today, I’m keeping a close eye on you. And don’t forget to keep those inhuman hands of yours out of sight.”
He kicked the ebari and reined it into the file of riders in front of them as they started for Dorbin.
BLUE and red and yellow banners waved gaily above the entire width of the town common as customers wandered from stand to stand in search of a bargain to entice the coppers out of their purses and pockets. The smell of baking bread filled the air, as well as roasting pullets and fresh spice cake.
Jarid Tal Ketral sauntered unrecognized through the laughing people, listening to the music and waiting for events to take their scheduled course. He had the peddler ready to leave the inn and primed for action at his first sight of a certain young Kashi face.
And as for his cousin, he had already picked up the first vague thought patterns of the thieves as they entered the town’s dusty streets.
A glimpse of glossy dark braids framing a round, pink-cheeked face caught his eye. Jarid stopped at a booth made of a rough-hewn plank over two barrels. The buxom girl, dressed in a red smock covered by a crisp white apron, turned back to the counter. Her cheeks blushed a bright crimson when she caught him watching her.
She dropped her dark liquid eyes. “Ale, sir?”
“All right.” Jarid fished in his pocket and flipped her a silver that mirrored the sunlight as it spun.
She caught the glittering hexagonal coin between her palms, then gazed at him with wide, troubled black eyes. “I haven’t enough coin to change this, sir.”
He reached out a hand and cupped her chin. “Did I say I wanted change?”
Backing away, she began to protest, but he slipped past the outer surface of her mind and stilled all thought of fear or resistance. The tiny crease down the center of her forehead relaxed; her even white teeth smiled at him. “That’s most kind of you, sir,” she said with a trace of Lowlands lilt in her voice.
Jarid traced the smooth curve of her neck with his finger. Not bad. A little soap, the proper clothes, and this one would clean up very nicely. Maybe he would have her brought up to Tal’ayn when—
“Get your bloody hands off me daughter, you backwoods scum!” A massive hand gripped Jarid’s shoulder and whirled him around to face a tight-lipped father’s rage. The dark-haired girl just laughed and passed Jarid a foaming tankard of rich golden ale. Jarid laughed, too, as he maintained his hold on the girl’s mind and snaked a tendril of thought into the hot red core of the man’s anger.
The hold on his shoulder eased into friendly pressure and in a minute the father was thumping him on the back and laughing with them. “I didn’t know you was coming, lad,” he said. “Why didn’t you send word?”
Jarid sipped at the tart ale. “And spoil the surprise?” Abominable stuff, he thought, far too bitter for his taste. “Now, perhaps—” He hesitated while he sifted through the girl’s mind for her name. “Perhaps Mairianda could go with me to look through the horses. I have my eye out for a likely beast.”
The thought that he couldn’t spare the girl flashed through the man’s mind, but he found himself saying, “Sure, lad. Go on ahead. I’ll watch the booth.”
Jarid slipped his arm around Mairianda’s plump shoulders and drew her down the row of food booths. Her black eyes sparkled as she looked shyly sideways at him.
Too bad he still had business to take care of, Jarid thought regretfully.
* * *
Kevisson’s link to Haemas Tal grew stronger with each passing moment—she had to be in the gray-walled town just ahead of him. He eased down onto a large boulder on the side of the dusty road and took the weight off his aching feet. He hadn’t walked so much in years.
You’re getting soft, he told himself. Usually, the Andiine Brothers of Shael’donn worked with the mind, not the feet. Well, after this assignment, he should certainly be back in shape.
An old woman limped past trundling a pushcart heaped high with round whiteroots and leafy greens. She glanced at him, her lively brown eyes almost buried in the deep network of sun-wrinkles. Then making the four-cornered sign of the Mother over her heart, she spat into the dirt at his feet and moved on.
Evidently Kashi faces weren’t too popular around these parts. Kevisson sighed as her stooped figure stopped at the gate and waited for the guard to search her vegetables. Then she dropped a coin into his outstretched palm and passed on through.
Well, he didn’t like to do things this way, but neither did he want to have his head smashed in some alley before he could find the girl. Kevisson closed his eyes and concentrated. It shouldn’t take much, just a heightening of his natural coloring, and these people should perceive him as chierra.
The guard watched him with a bored expression as he approached the gatehouse. “What be your business in Dorbintown?”
“I want to buy a horse.” Kevisson watched the guard closely, suddenly conscious of the warm sun beating down on his shoulders.
“Any iron to declare?” The guard’s eyelids drooped with boredom.
“No.”
“One copper.” The guard yawned and held out his sun-browned hand.
Kevisson felt through his pocket, but felt only silvers, much too rich for a chierra farmer attending a rustic fair. He dropped one of the shiny hexagon into the man’s hand, projecting the impression it was only a copper.
Glancing at the coin with an indifferent expression, the guard waved him on into the town. Kevisson smiled to himself as he crossed the boundary. He wished he could be a skivit in the woodwork later when someone found a silver hiding among the day’s proceeds.
A considerable number of riders, as well as foot traffic, surged down the street, mostly headed in the same direction. Kevisson fell into the flow, catching excitement from nearby minds. A fair . . . they were thinking and talking about a fair in the center of the town.
He tested his link to the girl; sharp and clear. She was very close.
The pair of young men in front of him turned aside at a two-story inn, waiting at the door as a middle-aged woman with a worried expression and an older man, tugging on his tunic, emerged. The man jammed on a worn hat, then jerked his arm out of the woman’s grasp, arguing with her all the while.
Kevisson dodged around them and continued down the street, following his link. Their angry voices carried behind him.
“What do you mean you have to go now?” she cried. “Go where? You’ve barely just ar
rived.”
“Leave me be, wench. No one owns Cittar!” he replied loudly. “I has to go. That be all there is to it. I just has to!”
* * *
The trip into town proved uneventful, although Cale paid six coppers to the guard at the town wall over Eevlina’s protests. They followed the swelling crowd of would-be customers to the common where the horses, along with the rest of the animals for sale, were tethered in a long curving line.
Flags snapped in the breeze and everywhere there was laughter and singing. Haemas twisted in the saddle and glanced back wistfully at the savory smells coming from several booths as they rode past.
“Turn around and quit gawking.” Cale dug his heels into the ebari’s sides and it lengthened its bone-shaking stride. “Folks’ll think you never been to a fair before!”
Haemas turned back around, amazed by the sheer numbers of strolling, exuberant dark-haired people. “I haven’t.” She caught a scrap of music on the breeze and pushed herself up on the saddle so she could peek over the ebari’s branching horns. The horses’ glossy backs gleamed in the sun up ahead, blood-bay and golden chestnut and ebony and iron-gray, and she’d never seen so many people together in one place in her whole life. “It’s too crowded,” she said uneasily. “We’ll never get away with it.”
“You just do your part.” He reined the ebari in. “Let us worry about the rest.”
Clinging to her saddle with both hands, Eevlina eased her bulky body down to the ground. Jassfra dismounted too, and they both passed their reins up to Holnar. Eevlina tugged her stained gray bodice down over her sagging bosom, then pointed her stick at Cale. “Meet us back at the same place we camped last night. I’m not about to go traipsing over the whole countryside just to find the likes of you.”
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