Pathfinder

by Orson Scott Card

“They all have large inner courtyards, and their windows look out into their private garden. They’re like little castles.”

  “They don’t look so little to me,” said Umbo.

  “That’s because you’ve never seen a castle.”

  “And each one of these houses is just one family?” asked Umbo.

  “One family, plus their servants and guards and guests, their treasuries and libraries and animals. Each one of these houses contains a hamlet’s-worth of people.”

  “A burglar would have a hard time getting his second-story boy up into that window,” said Umbo.

  “Even so,” answered Loaf, “please have the wit not to be seen looking up at it.”

  Suddenly the road opened up to a park with broad lawns and low flowers and shrubbery, with only a tree here and there. Even the drainage ditch that kept the raised land dry was lined with grass that was kept close-mown by goats. Several huge buildings—not taller than three stories, but broad and finely made, faced with bright white stone—were widely spaced among the gardens.

  “Here it is,” said Loaf. “The Great Library of Aressa Sessamo.”

  “Which building?”

  “All of them,” said Loaf. “If it was just one building it wouldn’t be all that great, would it?”

  “Are we going inside?”

  “Are you joking?” asked Loaf. “Do we look like scholars? They’d have us run off to an asylum as madmen.”

  “I can read!”

  “But how recently have you bathed?” asked Loaf. “No, I’m just thinking that if Rigg has any freedom at all, he’ll try to get here so he can learn more about his gift or about the history of the royal family or about contemporary politics—and by walking near here we’ll improve our chances of his noticing our paths.”

  “So we’ll get to a place where I can piss pretty soon?” asked Umbo.

  “Oh, you can do that here,” said Loaf. “Against any of these walls.”

  “Rich people’s houses?”

  “You’re pissing on the outside. The street side. They lime it white every six months anyway.” As if Umbo had given him an excellent idea, Loaf was lustily hosing down the base of a stucco wall.

  Umbo saw that there were dozens of yellow-stained patches. “I would have thought Aressa Sessamo would be more civilized than this,” said Umbo. “In Fall Ford—”

  “In Fall Ford—just like Leaky’s Landing—everybody can easily find a bush or a privy, so they can afford to be fastidious about never doing a bodily function in public. But this is a city in a swamp—every scrap of ground is valuable, and they’re not going to waste it on public toilets just for urine.”

  Umbo wondered what women did. He was reasonably sure it did not involve walls, but he preferred not to discuss this question with Loaf, since it would only trigger a long series of jokes that would mortify Umbo, more because of their crudity than because he was the butt of them.

  “The only reason this system works,” said Loaf, “is that everybody pretends not to notice what’s going on. You don’t watch, you don’t stare, you don’t talk about it, you try not to even see it.”

  “So far I’m not at all impressed with Aressa Sessamo,” said Umbo, looking again at the pattern of urine stains along the wall. The fact that he was making one of the newest ones did not stop him from feeling disdain.

  “We’re standing here with our backs to the greatest library in the history of the world,” said Loaf.

  “But they won’t let us inside so what do I care?” asked Umbo. The job done, he rearranged his clothing.

  “Well, if you want to get inside, we can buy the kind of clothes that will gain us entry,” said Loaf. “But then we’ll have to live in a different part of town—the kind of place where the police and the government spies will notice us and keep track of us.”

  “I thought the police would pay more attention to the poorest people.”

  “Why?”

  “Because that’s where the criminals would be.”

  “That’s where the beggars and cutpurses and such would be, yes, but what do the police care about them as long as there isn’t a riot? As long as they prey on peasants and workers and tradesmen, the police aren’t interested. But if you have money enough for finer clothes and high-toned lodgings, then you might be planning to cozen the rich or insinuate yourself into society or spy on the powerful or throw money around without necessarily making sure some of it goes into the pockets of the powerful. You matter, you see.”

  “Then let’s stay out of the library. I’d rather remain invisible,” said Umbo.

  “You’re getting closer and closer to being smart, the longer you stay with me.”

  Loaf made it a point to gawk at the gardens and library buildings and to point things out to Umbo, without ever making the slightest attempt to enter the grounds or linger too long at any one spot. Then they moved away to the south, and soon from the noises and smells they could tell they were getting closer to the river, closer to the part of the city where they might blend in. On the way, they again passed a policeman, and again Loaf made it a point to go up to the man and ask a stupid question. “Was one of those fine white buildings the royal palace?”

  This policeman actually smiled, though the smile was derisive and cheerless. “Library,” he said. “There are no royals now, in case you haven’t heard of the Revolution.”

  “Oh,” said Umbo, in his best idiotic-privick voice. “Did the Council finally have them all killed?”

  Loaf glared at him—and it wasn’t just part of his impatient-father act. “Are you going to waste this officer’s time with stupid questions?” he demanded. Then he cuffed Umbo across the head—a move they had actually practiced, so that Umbo knew to turn his head and duck mostly under the force of the blow while still making it look as if Loaf had hit him with some real force.

  “Move along,” said the policeman.

  Loaf dragged Umbo across the street and reentered the filthy, busy, noisy, lively, angry, happy part of Aressa Sessamo, the place where the real people lived.

  They found a tavern that looked to be a likely place to have rooms to let—there’d be no charming boardinghouse on the outskirts of town like the one they found in O, because the outskirts of Aressa Sessamo were too far from the center of town. The tavern was no taller than any of the three-story rich houses they had just walked past, but it managed to jam five stories into the same height, each story jutting out a foot or two farther over the street than the floor below.

  “Do you think it’ll be too flamboyant if I pay extra to get us a room on the third floor?”

  Thinking of the stairs they’d have to climb, Umbo said, “Why not the second?”

  “On the second story you can still smell the street.”

  “Whatever you think is best,” said Umbo. “I’ve never been here before.”

  The taverner was cheery, though he didn’t seem to care a rap when Loaf mentioned that he himself kept a tavern upriver. “Rivermen are riffraff,” said the taverner, “and I don’t let them in.”

  “Good thing we’re not rivermen, then,” said Loaf. “I see enough of them upriver. We came into the city on foot.”

  They made their price for a room two flights up, and paid extra for a bath. The taverner looked them up and down, and with a wry look said, “You’ll want two baths, or whoever takes the second dip will be bathing in mud.”

  Loaf chuckled and agreed. “Your food smells good,” he said.

  “After you bathe, I’ll let you into the dining room,” said the taverner, “since you’re a third-floor customer. Or if you want to eat now, the common room will take you, though some will grumble.”

  “Well, son, what will it be?” asked Loaf.

  “I’m right hungry, sir,” said Umbo.

  “Common room then, for now,” said Loaf. “Tomorrow we’ll be dining room customers.”

  “I’ll have the boy take your . . . bags up to your room.”

  The “boy” turned out to be a twelv
e-year-old girl with an insolent look. Loaf tossed her a sheb, and she answered with a sneer. “If you think tipping so much gets you under my dress, you can think again.”

  “I was hoping a sheb would get our bags up to our room safely, and you not minding too much how dirty they are from the road. But if you’d rather have half a luck instead of a queenface, I’ll be glad to trade.”

  In reply she tucked the sheb into a pocket of her apron, hoisted both bags, and, holding them out from her body, began to trudge up the stairs.

  Umbo followed his nose and ears to the crowded common room—it was early suppertime now, getting dark outside, and it was clear that this place had good enough food—or cheap enough—to draw more customers than were taking rooms at any given time. And it wasn’t a rough crowd—some of the tables had families with small children. Even the red-nosed drinkers didn’t seem particularly noisy or coarse, and the noise was cheerful rather than surly.

  The food, when it came, had flavors Umbo wasn’t familiar with, but it was good and it was hearty and there was plenty of it.

  “Aressa Sessamo isn’t much for architecture,” said Loaf, smacking his lips after a particularly spicy breaded fishball, “but it’s best in the wallfold for cookery.”

  “I can see why this place is crowded,” said Umbo.

  “In Aressa, the peasants eat like royals,” said Loaf.

  Unfortunately, he said it rather loudly, and one of the drinkers overheard him. “The royals would do better to eat like peasants!” the man proclaimed.

  Eyes turned—his tone was belligerent and that wasn’t something that anyone would welcome, it seemed.

  Loaf merely smiled and said, “Well said, sir!”

  “And now they’ve got that bastard boy pretending to be a royal,” the drunk said.

  Umbo met Loaf’s gaze and smiled at him. Rigg was alive.

  “What’s their plan, do you think?” the drunk was saying. “To have the royals back again, drafting our sons into the army and making more wars! To take the food out of our mouths and the taxes out of our pockets!”

  Loaf smiled even more broadly—but Umbo recognized that smile as the start of a quarrel. He could even guess what Loaf was about to say: So you pay no taxes now? So the Revolutionary Council have no army?

  But instead, Umbo heard a voice coming from under the table, and felt a hand on his knee. “Don’t say it!” said the voice in a harsh whisper.

  Umbo hardly had time to look down before the speaker disappeared. But in the moment he had seen him, Umbo recognized himself—dressed exactly as he was right now, except the clothes were torn and he had a black eye and a swollen lip.

  Umbo looked up at Loaf and saw that he had also received the message—indeed, the message had been directed at him. Loaf looked at Umbo in perplexity. “I was only going to say—”

  Umbo made his eyes big and raised his open hands just a little from the table, trying to signal Loaf to say nothing. If some future beaten-up Umbo had felt the need to come back in time and tell Loaf to shut up, then Loaf would have to be six times stupid to go ahead and tell, out loud, what he had just been told not to say.

  By now, though, the drunk had noticed Loaf’s hesitation. “Are you a friend to boy-royals then?” he asked. “You want to have a boy-king? Hagia the non-queen is all we need, for nostalgia’s sake. She does no harm, she has no ambition. But the boy! He’ll be in our pants pockets and under our skirts before he’s done!”

  The drunk was standing now, and a couple of others were standing as well.

  “I’m as loyal a citizen as you’ll ever find!” cried the drunk. “But by Ram’s left elbow I’ll not have you touting that Rigg-boy!”

  “I’d as soon flog him!” cried Loaf, standing up with another fishball between his fingers, which he held up high for all to see. “I’m for keeping the queen around, like you, my friend, as long as the Council pleases, but right now I’m mostly hungry, and I say, Up with the fishballs!”

  The belligerent drunk, along with the others who had stood along with him, raised their glasses solemnly, as other customers laughed and a few clapped their hands. Within a few moments all was calm again.

  When their meal was done, and the girl came to carry away their plates and cups, she leaned over to Loaf and said, “Well done, sir. Master should have warned you this is a queen’s room, most nights.”

  “You should put out a sign,” murmured Loaf.

  “And get the police on us, for being royalists? No, thanks,” the girl said. “You kept the peace, sir, and I’m grateful.”

  Up in their room, the first bath was waiting, and Loaf ordered Umbo to strip off and use the water. “And the soap. And scrub everything twice, you filthy mud eel.”

  As Umbo stripped, he said, “Aren’t you going to thank me for warning you to hold your tongue, and save us both a beating?”

  “I’m not,” said Loaf, lying down on the floor.

  “Why are you lying on the floor when there’s a bed right there?” asked Umbo.

  “Because after my bath I’ll want to get into a clean bed,” said Loaf.

  “If you won’t thank me for my warning, you don’t deserve a clean bed,” said Umbo.

  “First, it wasn’t you who warned me,” said Loaf, “it was a future version of you that now will never exist. Second, you probably only did it because future-me told you to, so I thank myself. Third, as far as I could see the only person who got a beating was future-you; I’ll wager that future-me didn’t have a mark on him, and I only sent you back to give warning because the taverner threw us out and I didn’t want the bother of changing rooms.”

  “You’re lucky I don’t come back in time and pee on you as you lie there on the floor.”

  “No doubt you’re peeing in your own bath instead,” said Loaf.

  “Why? Is that the custom here in the big city?”

  “Scrub harder.”

  Next morning, they ate a fine breakfast, though Umbo realized they couldn’t live in this style forever. Months, yes—they had plenty of money for a few months. But what if Rigg didn’t notice them, or couldn’t get out of the house he was in?

  “I think we need to hold a council of war,” Loaf announced.

  “If by that you mean we need to figure what we’re going to do,” said Umbo, “I’m with you.”

  “On the one hand,” said Loaf, “we could go looking for Rigg. But that seems to me to be a dangerous course—at least if that’s the only thing we’re doing, and it’s the first thing we do after entering the city. I’d rather be busy at something else, and along the way pick up information about what house the royals live in, and whether he’s in the same one as the rest.”

  “That was one good thing about last night’s ruckus,” said Umbo. “We found out for sure that Rigg is in the city and alive, even if some people aren’t happy about it.”

  “We found out for sure that people think he’s in the city and think he’s alive,” said Loaf. “But it’s better than not knowing anything at all.”

  “So what other business can we be after?” asked Umbo.

  “Do you happen to remember the banking house to which Rigg’s letter of credit was addressed?”

  Umbo thought back. “That was a long time ago, and Rigg was doing all the talking.”

  “I just wondered if you were doing any of the listening.”

  “Were you?” asked Umbo.

  “I heard the name, and I might know it again, but I’m three times your age or more, and my brain is worn out and full up. I don’t have much room to tuck new things square inside. They just cling to the outside for a while and drop off.”

  “There was Longwater . . .”

  “Longwater and Longwater,” said Loaf. “But that was the house that discounted Mr. Cooper’s notes.”

  “If you remember so well—”

  “It’s the name that I forgot,” said Loaf. “Try again.”

  “Potatery and Sons.”

  “Almost,” said Loaf. “But it’s still
not right.”

  “Rudodory,” said Umbo.

  “Yes, that’s the house that took Cooper’s note without discounting it,” said Loaf. “And we might try there to find more information. But we’re not Rigg, and that doesn’t get us much closer to our real goal.”

  “Which is what?” asked Umbo.

  “The jewel,” said Loaf.

  “They’re not going to hand it over,” said Umbo.

  “But once we know where it is, if we can get you into the same place, you can go back in time and steal it right after they hid it there.”

  “Wherever they put it, it’s bound to be a place where they won’t let me come.”

  “Let’s find out where it is, first.”

  “So you think that asking questions about the famous royal jewel that got Rigg arrested in the first place will cause us to attract less attention than if we asked about Rigg himself?”

  “Yes,” said Loaf. “Because we won’t ask outright, we’ll be smart about it.”

  “Oh, yes, because we’re both famous for being subtle and clever,” said Umbo. “That was Rigg, remember? He’s the one who knows how to talk their fancy talk—and even he got caught at it, didn’t he!”

  “We’ll do what we can do,” said Loaf. “The whole city can’t be like this—there’s got to be places where people who favor the male royal line might know something useful.”

  “And talking with those people won’t attract any attention from the Council,” said Umbo.

  “So you think we should do nothing at all?” asked Loaf, clearly disgusted.

  “Oh, I think we should get the jewel, if we can—I liked it when you called me your second-story boy. I just think we shouldn’t forget that anything we do is going to be dangerous.”

  “I’m a soldier, son, I know what danger is a lot better than you do.”

  Umbo stood up.

  “Get back into the water and scrub again.”

  “I’m as clean as my body knows how to get,” said Umbo. “And in case you didn’t notice, you’re not my father and I don’t want one.”

  “Then get some less-filthy clothes on and go call for my bathwater, if that ugly smart-mouthed girl can be bothered to carry it up. And then while I’m washing, go find out about where to get our laundry done.”