Imager's Challenge

by Jr. L. E. Modesitt

  “Rhennthyl.” He used my name as an epithet.

  “Master Dichartyn, sir . . . you cannot have it both ways. You cannot tell me that you do not want to hear what I cannot prove and then object that I have not told you what I cannot prove. I was trying to discover the connection between Mardoyt and Harraf and found that there was one between Mardoyt and Youdh. Oh . . . I forgot one other thing . . . two other things. The day I was attacked, three of Youdh’s toughs watched me on the patrol round. It was so obvious that Alsoran asked me what I’d done to offend Youdh, but I’ve never met Youdh. I wouldn’t know what he looked like if he appeared here in the study with us. Again, this afternoon, two more toughs were watching Lyonyt and me when we returned to the station. One of them might have been the imager-tough, but I couldn’t be sure. I never saw his face, and he didn’t have shields.”

  “You’re certain that there was an imager?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “That’s all we need—a renegade imager in the taudis, and one we cannot identify or find. And you said nothing?”

  “You weren’t here, and what exactly could anyone do until he acted again? No one knows who he is or where he is.”

  “Rhennthyl . . .”

  I just waited.

  He shook his head.

  “What happened to Lieutenant Mardoyt, sir? You never told me.”

  “Why do you care? You don’t seem to have a good opinion of the man.”

  “I don’t, but I also don’t want him dead. So long as he’s alive, we might be able to find out more of what he’s been doing.”

  “How did you manage to mangle him with a tree branch?”

  “Sir, I’d like to point out again that I had no intention of killing the lieutenant. Since I had no intention of doing so, why would I attack him with something like a tree branch, which might not injure him at all or might easily kill him? How is he?”

  Master Dichartyn sighed, mostly for effect, I thought. “The physicians think he’ll live. If he does, he won’t ever use his left arm for much, and he’ll need a cane and a leg brace to walk.” He looked at me. “Didn’t you know that?”

  “No, sir.” I knew what I’d done, but not whether it had worked out as I planned.

  “Mardoyt said that he heard a crack and that he couldn’t move, and then an oak limb fell on him. His wife found a scrap of purple cloth in his hand.” Master Dichartyn’s eyes narrowed. “You know, Rhennthyl, taking bribes isn’t that unique an offense, and it’s not one of particular concern to the Collegium. Besides, and more important, his place will be taken sooner or later by someone else who will take bribes.”

  “Given the structure, that’s a possibility, sir. But it’s not the bribes that concern me the most. What bothers me, and should bother you, is that both Captain Harraf and the lieutenant have a link to a renegade imager in the taudis, and it’s highly likely, proof or no proof, that they have been paying off that imager to kill Patroller Smyrrt and to attempt to kill me. Or that they’re trading favors or worse. I also find it interesting that all of the displeasure with me gets filtered through Subcommander Cydarth—who was the one who assigned me to Third District where there is an imager-tough who seems to have connections with two other officers. On top of that, there are more than a few indications that more is going on, possibly including the Equalifier priests. Otherwise, why would there be so many attempts to kill me? Also . . . I’m rather curious about one other thing, sir. You say that a tree branch fell on the lieutenant. Isn’t it a bit strange that the commander immediately expresses his displeasure at me? Especially through the subcommander. Why would he even consider that I might be involved?”

  “You should have asked that question first.”

  “It’s still a good question, sir. I don’t have near the experience that you do, but I know that you and Maitre Poincaryt keep telling me that part of my duties are to be a lure. That may be, but I’m being accused of causing an accident that happened to a Patrol officer who is taking bribes and tied to a taudischef, and probably to attempts to kill me, and I’ve done nothing but look into a real problem.”

  “Rhennthyl . . .” He shook his head. “Are you suggesting that I tell the commander we have a renegade imager who’s being paid off by his officers, possibly even his subcommander, with no proof whatsoever?”

  “No, sir. I’m certain that you could tell him something far more palatable. But you might point out that there have been three attempts on my life since I was named as Patrol liaison, and that doesn’t reflect very well on what’s happening in the Patrol.”

  He smiled, if coolly. “That’s exactly what I did tell him. He was even less pleased. Next time, if there is a next time, and I do hope that there isn’t, you should start your explanations where you ended.” He looked at me. “It would also help if you could find a way to resolve these . . . difficulties before too long. It would also be good to have more than your word about a renegade imager.”

  “I’m doing the best I can, sir.” And that didn’t even take into account my problems with High Holder Ryel.

  “You need to do better.” He paused. “That’s all, Rhennthyl.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Close the door on your way out.”

  I did.

  Once again, I’d gotten another lesson, if not the one that Master Dichartyn had intended. Still, he knew I’d injured Mardoyt. The fact that he’d gone through the motions meant that he didn’t think much of Mardoyt, either. He just hadn’t cared for my way of handling it. What else was I supposed to do? Keep looking for nonexistent proof until I got killed?

  I stopped by my quarters, leaving my patroller’s cloak behind, and then headed to the dining hall. Because I was a bit early, I stopped by my letter box, not that I really expected anything. But there was a letter there, and it held the red stripe. Who would be sending me an urgent message by private courier? I looked at the writing . . . and swallowed. It was Khethila’s—and that was anything but good. I didn’t quite rip the envelope open.

  Dear Rhenn,

  I am writing this because Father and Mother did not have time to. We have just received word that Rousel has been badly injured in a wagon accident in Kherseilles. We don’t know how it happened, but his legs have been crushed, and he has other injuries.

  It seems so unfair. He had just written that he had managed to get a stonemason to rebuild the wall on our property. He had worked all night and day with the mason to meet the deadline stipulated by the legal agreement in order to avoid a 500 gold penalty, and there are other problems as well.

  You cannot do anything, I know, but you should know. Father and Mother have already left on the ironway for Kherseilles with Culthyn . . .

  I lowered the letter. I had no doubts that Rousel’s injury was anything but an accident, and that Ryel had been behind it. Then I slipped the letter inside my waistcoat and left the dining hall, heading across the Bridge of Desires, because that was the closest place to find a hack. The mist had turned into a light rain and I was damp, but not soaked, by the time I was inside a coach and headed to see Khethila.

  Why Rousel? Even as I asked myself that question, I knew the answer. Because he was Father’s heir to Alusine Wool and because Ryel was a typical sadistic High Holder who wanted to prove that he could destroy my family, slowly and deliberately, without a shred of proof to link anything illegal to him. Everything he’d caused to happen would show as either perfectly legal or connected in no way to him.

  The rain was heavier when I left the hack, and I gave the driver a few extra coppers for his trouble, then hurried up under the portico roof, where I gave the knocker several sharp thraps. After several moments, the door opened slightly, and I could see the chains.

  “Khethila . . . it’s me. I just got your message, and I came immediately.”

  She opened the door. “Oh . . . Rhenn . . . you didn’t have to.” The tone of her voice contradicted her words.

  I stepped inside, closed the door, and put my arms arou
nd her.

  She sobbed silently for a time, then stepped back and blotted her eyes. They were blotchy. “Thank you.”

  “It’s all I can do right now.” That was more than true, unfortunately.

  She looked at me. “You didn’t eat, did you?”

  “No. Why?”

  “You’re pale. We can go into the kitchen. You can eat, and we can talk. There’s some cold fowl and cheese and some fresh bread. I didn’t have cook fix a supper . . .”

  “Anything would be fine.” I followed her through the family parlor and into the kitchen.

  Before long, I was sitting on one side of the table in the breakfast room, lit by a single wall lamp, and she was on the other. I had slices of bread, cheese, and fowl on a plate, and we each had a glass of Grisio. She needed it more than I.

  “What happened?” I asked, after taking a bite of the sharp white cheese. I was hungry.

  “I don’t know much more than I wrote. Rousel was hit by a horse that spooked and knocked him under a brewer’s wagon that was moving. Remaya sent a dispatch by ironway. Father talked to someone he knew to get a compartment on the afternoon train.” Khethila took a healthy swallow of the Grisio. “It’s almost like the Nameless or the Namer is after Father.”

  “Or some commercial rival,” I suggested.

  “Could anyone . . .” She let the words die away for a moment. “Of course they could. Some people will do anything. But who?”

  “It could be someone with an old grudge, who just waited until the time was right to hurt the family the hardest.” That was as close as I was going to get because, with what I planned, no one in my family, especially Khethila, could afford to know why it was happening.

  “It could be Rousel, too,” she said softly. “He hasn’t always been as careful as he should be.”

  “You need to think about it. So will I. You’ll keep me informed?”

  “I promise.”

  After that we talked, first about Rousel and the factorage in Kherseilles and then about less consequential things, but I did mention I’d been required to attend the Autumn Ball, and that led to a few questions about Madame D’Shendael, none of which I could really answer.

  Then, as it got close to eighth glass, I rose to go.

  “You can’t stay tonight . . . can you?”

  I shook my head. “I can’t stay anywhere at night besides the Collegium.”

  “That’s a stupid rule.”

  “No. Unhappily, it’s not. Imagers can image in their dreams, and dreams aren’t always under control. Especially at a time like this.” I’d never been told I couldn’t say that, and she needed a real reason, tonight more than any other.

  “Oh . . .”

  “I’m sorry. Please don’t tell anyone else that. It’s not something the Collegium likes known, but tonight I didn’t want to just say that it was a rule.”

  That brought a shaky smile to her lips. “I won’t . . . but thank you.” After a moment, she said, “Charlsyn can take you back. I’ll let him know.”

  I didn’t argue, even if it meant that Khethila would end up paying him more for the week.

  I didn’t sleep well on Mardi night, not with nightmares about more fires in the factorage, and runaway wagons, and lightning striking the house while Khethila was in it, but at least I didn’t image any more fires in my sleep. It was a relief to get up and deal with the simple physical tasks of exercising, sparring, and running. For that time, at least, the effort kept me from dwelling on my worries about Rousel and Father. I was quiet enough at breakfast, but no one noticed because Ferlyn was talking about how the Northern Fleet had destroyed another Ferran flotilla.

  When I finally got to Third District station, I didn’t see either the captain or the lieutenant, and that was fine with me.

  Lyonyt was waiting, bouncing from one booted foot to the other. “Master Rhennthyl.”

  “Good morning, Lyonyt.”

  “A good morning it is, sir. Not a cloud in the sky, and but enough breeze to keep a patroller comfortable on his rounds.”

  I hadn’t brought anything with me, nothing to stow in the cubby that was temporarily mine. So I gestured to the doors, and we headed out. As had seemed to be the case in all the rounds in the area of the taudis, we saw very few people on the first round—and none of Youdh’s toughs. Their absence bothered me, because it suggested the time for observation was over, and I resolved to be as alert as I could be throughout the day. I did have to make an effort not to get distracted by worrying about Rousel.

  We were finishing the second round, heading down Mando, the unofficial boundary, Alsoran had told me, between Jadhyl’s territory and that of Youdh, or the bad part of the taudis and the really evil section. West of Mando, the ground rose, not a great deal but a good two or three yards over the next block, so that when I looked westward up the alleys opening on to Mando I couldn’t see the end of the alley. This section of the taudis had to be ancient because the alleyways were barely wide enough to fit a single large wagon.

  The row houses were all old and weathered, and the faintest odor of elveweed drifted unevenly in the air, an odor that would strengthen with each round in the day. But none of the houses on the east side of the street had empty windows or those that were boarded over. Admittedly, many of them had crude shutters, often only of oiled wood, but they did have shutters. I thought that reflected well on Jadhyl, or at least better upon him than the shabbier conditions of the area to the west did upon Youdh. Youdh was truly an old-style taudischef of the sansespoirs.

  We walked down the east side of Mando, and I glanced up the next alley, only to see a large wagon, its wheels blocked in place at the top of the rise, and so broad that there was less than a hand’s width between the wagon bed and frame and the high brick walls of the courtyards adjoining the alley.

  “Help! Help!” A frantic high-pitched scream echoed down the alleyway.

  We both turned.

  A dark-haired woman, scarcely more than a young girl, was pressed against the rough bricks of a second-level terrace by a man in shabby clothing. She struggled to get away, then ducked under his arm, but he grabbed her blouse and ripped it open, leaving her mostly naked from the waist up. I couldn’t help but notice she was well formed and most attractive, before she tried to wrench away from the far larger man once again.

  “Help!”

  It was too far to image anything accurately, and they were moving about so quickly I might hurt the wrong one if I tried. Even as I hurried across Mando and up the alley, followed by Lyonyt, I kept looking in all directions, although I thought it was probably early for most taudis-toughs. I saw no one anywhere, except for the screaming half-naked woman and the man trying to assault her. Even so, I checked and strengthened my shields.

  Lyonyt’s knife was out, shimmering in the midmorning sunlight.

  When we reached the courtyard wall below the terrace, a good twenty-five yards from the street, I discovered that the high side wall to the courtyard below the terrace had no gate.

  “Help me!”

  Up on the ancient roof terrace, the attacker was ripping away the girl’s skirt.

  “Help!” Her voice rose into a shriek.

  But there was something wrong . . .

  At a low rumbling sound, almost like thunder, I glanced up the alley, only to see that the enormous wagon was rolling—more like hurtling—down the stone-paved alleyway at us, less than ten yards away and already moving far too fast for us to outrun it. I could also see that it was loaded with stone and rocks, and that the axles and the wagon bed were too low to dive under the middle and let it pass over.

  “Down, flat, against the wall!” I snapped and dropped to the alley pavement, carrying Lyonyt down as well, so that we lay stomach down beside the brick wall. I strengthened my shields and tried to tie them not to me, but to the cracked stone pavement beneath us and the brick wall against which my shoulder and side were pressed.

  The rumbling thunder crashed over us, pressing us down,
and then passed.

  “Stay down,” I hissed, not moving.

  The next sound was that of the wagon impacting something, most likely the stoop or the front of a house on the other side of Mando, and wrenching and splintering wood and the diminishing lesser rumbles of stones coming to rest.

  “Keep still . . .” I was wagering that whoever had set up the attack would want to check out the carnage, and I wanted them close—very close—before I moved. I was getting very tired of being attacked, especially when I hadn’t even been chasing or investigating Youdh, but Mardoyt.

  I didn’t move, but kept my eyes open.

  After a time, it could have been as long as half a quint, two figures began to walk down the alley. Both wore the purple jackets.

  I wasn’t in any mood for fairness. I just waited until the pair were less than five yards away when I imaged oil and grease under their boots, and a blast of air to unbalance them. They both went down, but not as hard as I would have liked. I scrambled to my feet, glancing around in all directions, but seeing only the two toughs nearby . . . but several near the part of the alley that was the top of the rise.

  The taller one immediately did something I didn’t expect, not exactly. Rather than even get up, he just looked at me, and then five rusty knives impacted my shields before dropping to the pavement. The shorter one scrambled to his feet and fell again, then regained his footing and raced away from Lyonyt, yelling something to the two taudis-toughs farther up the alley.