The Wanderers

by Paula Brandon

  But Songbird, don’t try to be too brave. When you’re questioned, don’t defy or deliberately provoke the Taerleezis. Her own recent words echoed in her mind, along with the familiar question, What would Father do?

  “What happens,” Jianna asked, “if I do sign?”

  “Then—unless additional facts are directed to our attention—there will be no need of further interrogation. You’ll bide among us until the next court session, at which time your fate will be decided. During that time, you’ll receive treatment no worse than that meted out to any other ordinary prisoner. It is by far your best choice.”

  He was undoubtedly right about that. She had been taken in the very act of engineering a prisoner’s escape. There was no possible denial of guilt, and no legitimate defense.

  “If I sign, will it worsen matters for Dr. Rione?”

  “It does not affect him. He has been questioned, and returned to his cell. He’ll be permitted no more visitors.”

  She nodded, picked up the quill, and affixed the signature of Noro Penzia to the document.

  “That is best.” Lorcchi took possession of the confession. “You have spared yourself much unnecessary unpleasantness.” He addressed the guard. “You may remove her.”

  “One question, if I may,” Jianna requested.

  He nodded.

  “What has become of the young girl arrested along with me? She hasn’t been harmed?”

  “Young girl?” The first inquirer appeared uncomprehending.

  “Yes. Songbird, she called herself. I know her by no other name.”

  “Girl? Bird? What is this?”

  “We were together in the cell, and then she was taken out. You must have questioned her just before I was brought in here.”

  “If you are hoping to avoid trial by passing yourself off as a madwoman, it’s too late. I’ve spoken to you long enough to know that you are in full possession of all your wits.”

  Jianna stared at him.

  “Your three accomplices escaped. You were alone in the holding cell for some hours. I questioned nobody before you were brought in. Come, have done with childish flights of fancy. This invention of an imaginary companion is absurd. We both know full well that no such person exists.”

  Lorcchi’s attention returned to the documents on the table before him, and the guard led Jianna from the room.

  The door opened. Falaste Rione rose to his feet as a very large guard entered his cell. He looked up into the newcomer’s hailstone eyes, and prepared himself for a beating or worse.

  “Sweetmeat days are over,” the guard announced. “Say good-bye to your palace.”

  “You’re moving me to another cell?”

  “If it was up to me, I’d move you six feet under. Get over here.”

  Rione reached for the folio on the table before him.

  “Leave it,” the guard commanded. “No more goodies.”

  Rione advanced a couple of paces to stand before the guard, who towered over him by half a head or more.

  “Hands.”

  Rione hesitated, momentarily uncomprehending.

  “Hands.” A blow punctuated the command.

  Rione drew in his breath sharply, and stretched forth his hands. The guard clapped irons on his wrists. He stared, almost surprised, for this was the first time in many weeks that he had found himself subject to such restraint.

  “Move out.”

  Rione obeyed. Along the corridor he marched, the guard’s hand unnecessarily heavy on his elbow, and he sensed an almost palpable hostility smoldering at the point of contact. He said nothing. Curiously, it was the other who seemed impelled to communicate.

  “Not so good being treated just like everyone else, is it?” the guard inquired. “Not what you’re used to, eh?”

  Rione did not reply, and the grip on his elbow tightened.

  “Deaf, are you?”

  “I’ve never asked for special treatment.” Rione wisely curbed the impulse to wrench his arm free.

  “Oh, you’ve asked for it, all right. You’ve asked for a prime workover. If you’ve any doubts on that score, just have a chat with any friend of Chesubbo’s.”

  “Chesubbo’s?”

  “Remember him? The poor fool whose goose you neatly cooked? You and your pack of trick bitches.”

  “Is Chesubbo in trouble?”

  “You might say so. When he’s slept off the funny drops your women slipped him, he’s in for a formal reprimand. Going to lose all his merit points. And he’ll be cleaning out latrines for the next month, at least. He has plenty to thank you for.”

  “I’m sorry to hear it.”

  “Trust me, you’re going to be a lot sorrier. The gov won’t always be looking out for you. When he turns his back—and he will—there’s a score to settle.”

  They walked on in silence for a little while, until Rione ventured, “I know that two of my visitors were arrested. I hope they won’t suffer at the hands of Chesubbo’s friends.”

  “What do you think?”

  “It wasn’t their doing, you know. The entire plan was mine alone—I thought of it, I put it into action, I’m solely responsible. The girls just did as they were told.”

  “Sounds like you got them well trained.”

  They halted before a heavy door indistinguishable from all the other doors lining the gallery. The guard opened it and shoved his prisoner through into cramped, malodorous space.

  “The women—what sort of treatment will they receive?” Rione’s manacled fists were clenched.

  “That I leave to your imagination.”

  The door closed, and Rione was alone with his thoughts.

  Jianna’s guard did not return her to her former cell, but instead conducted her deeper into the labyrinthine old pile, along branching passages dark as tunnels, the route impossible to fix in mind, until they came to a tall, massive door, heavily strapped with iron. A cheeping and squawking of high voices could be heard on the other side. The guard unlocked the door, opened it, and pushed her through.

  Jianna stumbled forward a step or two into a new place. The door behind her closed, and the big lock snapped.

  She stood in a stone room waveringly lit with the glow of a single grease lamp suspended from the vaulted ceiling. A number of heavy columns blocked her view of the space as a whole, but she could see at a glance that it was large and well populated. Patches of straw straggled everywhere about the floor, and upon the straw piles lay women—some of them unconscious, others wakeful. It flashed across her mind that many hours had passed since her capture, and outside the Witch, in the real world that already seemed distant, night had fallen. But she could not focus on that thought, for the overwhelming stench of the place seized her by the throat and for a moment drove all coherent thought from her head. The miasma of filth, bodily wastes, stagnation, dampness, mold, and decay was all but visible. She gagged violently on it, and for the next few moments, struggled to control her immediate physical reactions.

  “Stow that squawking,” some impatient neighbor advised. “If you’re going to heave, just let it go.”

  Jianna coughed and retched. A clod of excrement and straw sailed out of the shadows to burst ripely against her cloak.

  “Stow it!” the neighbor repeated, adding upon a lower note, “Finicking sow.”

  She did her best to oblige. Presently she regained control, fought nausea down to the level of manageable disgust, and resumed the inspection of her surroundings. The big room was windowless. No wonder the effluvia of years weighted the dead atmosphere. The air was not only motionless and foul, it was cold. There was no fire or stove, not so much as a brazier of coals to furnish warmth. The floor was wet, and the big stone pillars were brocaded with rich growths of mold.

  She took a quick survey of her fellow prisoners; all of them women, ranging in age from fresh-faced adolescent to grizzled beldam. Some of them might have been pretty beneath their rags and filth, but the general impression was one of malnourished misery. Most of the wo
men slept, without benefit of blanket or covering, heads pillowed on moldy straw. But many remained wakeful and talkative, and of these, several were eyeing Jianna with undisguised interest.

  A new inmate, a new story. With any luck, something colorful.

  She was in no mood to talk, relate her history, answer questions. Perhaps tomorrow, but not now. She was, she realized, tired to death. The disastrous events of the day, culminating in failure, capture, arrest, and interrogation, had drained her to the point of exhaustion. In the morning, she might be ready to face her altered world. Right now, all she wanted was to crawl into a burrow and achieve immediate unconsciousness.

  There were no burrows in the women’s dormitory, but there was plenty of straw, and it would have to do. An unoccupied heap, lying at the base of one of the pillars, whose tall bulk afforded a blessed patch of deep shadow, seemed a promising prospect. Crossing to the pillar, she nudged the straw gingerly with the tip of her shoe, in hope of dislodging resident vermin.

  No sooner had she done so than a female voice near at hand spoke in discreetly muted tones. “That’s Odilline’s spot. You even think about laying down there, she’ll pull your guts out through your mouth.”

  Jianna nodded, and moved on. Two more similar ventures were similarly thwarted. The choice spots along the walls or near any of the pillars were all occupied or spoken for, but at last she came to a stingy heap bordering a reeking puddle, and here she was permitted to repose.

  “If you got any goodies on you, better sleep on top of ’em,” came an anonymous voice.

  “I’ve nothing,” Jianna returned, and it was true. Her purse, containing all the money that she carried, had been confiscated by the guards.

  Despite her extreme fatigue, she lay down with some trepidation. The straw beneath her was damp, smelly, cold. She wrapped her big wool cloak closely around herself, hood up to shield her face, and it helped a little. But the chill of the chamber, the incessant babble of female voices, and above all, the vivacious insect presence—all precluded slumber. The women about her—some of them, at least—displayed a limitless appetite for conversation. And the insects infesting the straw bedding displayed a limitless appetite for body heat and blood. They were upon her almost at once, with their tickling little legs and their stabbing little proboscises. At first she beat and slapped at them; thrashed about, sat up, displaced her garments, and tried to hunt them down. Sometimes she succeeded in killing them; sometimes, she simply drove them off. But the effort was exhausting, and ultimately futile. She could not hold them off indefinitely—she was too tired, and they were too numerous.

  She lapsed into a miserable sort of stupor. She hadn’t the energy to fight the stingers, stabbers, and suckers, but their activity kept her from sleeping.

  And yet, she did sleep. Somehow, gradually, the varied horrors distanced themselves, she lost awareness of them, and of everything else. Her slumber was light, fitful, and brief. It ended abruptly.

  She woke, terrified, in darkness. She could not see, she could barely breathe, and scarcely move. Thoroughly confused, she loosed a panicked cry that seemed muffled, and fought wildly against invisible, incomprehensible restraint.

  “Hold her down,” someone directed. Woman’s voice, low-pitched, commanding.

  The restraint tightened. Heavy weight pressed her hard against the straw. Her struggles were useless, and she realized that human hands confined her; she could not judge how many. Some sort of rough cloth covered her face, blinding her, but not altogether silencing her.

  “Help!” squalled Jianna, half-suffocated, but still audible; evidently too audible.

  “Swallow it.”

  Somebody punched her ribs, and Jianna gasped, inhaling dust.

  “Another yelp, and it’s your last.”

  Something hard poked her neck. A knife? Somebody’s thumbnail? Perhaps her assailant bluffed; perhaps not. She hardly dared put it to the test. Her struggles ceased.

  “Better. Now see what’s there.” The commanding voice again; evidently a leader of some kind, with one or two underlings.

  Their hands were all over her, running brusquely along her limbs and torso, even sliding up under her skirt to subject her to a search more thorough and objectionable than she had ever imagined. It was intolerable. A muted exclamation of outrage escaped her, and she squirmed violently. Somebody hit her.

  “Well?” demanded the leader.

  “Nothing on her or in her,” a squeaky, common little voice reported. “Not so much as a trumpery brass ring. Guards must have cleaned her out. Pigs.”

  “Cloak’s not bad,” suggested a third voice. “Get some use out of that.”

  Then there were hands at her throat, untying the strings of her cloak. The garment fell open, and was forcibly pulled from her body.

  “Look here—handkerchief. Real lace on it, too.”

  “She’s a high-pricer, for sure.”

  “What else? Chemise? Shoes?”

  “Now girls, let’s not be unkind,” admonished the leader. “Decent pair of stockings wouldn’t hurt, though.”

  Jianna wriggled and kicked in vain as they removed her shoes and stripped away her knitted stockings.

  “Anyone check for hairpins before we bagged ’er? Oh, well, let it go. All right, I think we’re finished here.” With that, they left her.

  She was free again. She sat up on her dank straw bed, choking on dust and fury. Her hands flew to her face. They had pulled a burlap sack over her head, drawn it shut around her neck, and knotted the strings securely. For a moment or two she strove in vain to pull the bag away, then her fingers sought the drawstrings. The knots were tight and large. It took some minutes to worry them loose. At last the tangle yielded. She loosened the drawstrings, tore the sack off, and flung it aside.

  Jianna looked around her. The grease lamp still burned overhead, casting its anemic light on a collection of seemingly slumbering women. Her assailants lay among them, but identification was impossible. It might reasonably have been supposed that the sounds of struggle must have awakened at least a few of her nearest roommates, but such was not the case. If appearances were to be believed, each and every one of them was utterly dead to the world.

  ELEVEN

  She shoved her bare feet back into the shoes that they had left her. Then, against all likelihood, she must have fallen asleep again, for the next thing Jianna knew, the room was astir and a very loud male voice was bawling out:

  “Up, NOW!”

  For a moment she was confused, then remembered where she was, and longed to relapse into unconsciousness.

  The guard withdrew, and the door banged shut. Jianna’s bruises ached, her countless insect bites itched, and she was shivering with cold. Of course; her cloak was gone. It all came flooding back to her—the surprise nocturnal attack, the blows, the unspeakable search, the theft of her few, precious articles of clothing. Her resentful glance raked the room. At least three of these female delinquents were responsible, but which three?

  Any of them. Some of them. All of them. She beheld a group of yawning, rumpled, bleary-eyed women, lining up to use the buckets placed along the walls. She stood up, brushed the clinging straw off, scratched the raised red lumps on her wrist, and joined the nearest queue. The line advanced, and the sewer stench of the atmosphere intensified. She used the bucket, and retreated hurriedly. She wanted to wash—she had never, in all her lifetime, wanted it so much.

  There was no water for drinking, much less washing. Her lips and the inside of her mouth seemed coated with putrid glue. She ran a finger over her teeth, and it helped a little, but not enough.

  Miseries notwithstanding, she was hungry. She had eaten nothing since morning of the previous day, and her body craved food.

  “They’ll feed us, won’t they?” she inquired of her nearest neighbor.

  “Depends,” came the discouraging reply.

  She hardly dared request additional explanation, and soon there was no need. The door opened, and the stentorian gu
ard reappeared, laden with buckets, this time accompanied by an assistant bearing a wicker basket.

  “Line UP!” roared the guard.

  The prisoners obeyed, and the resulting queue snaked from one end of the room to the other. The women moved forward, each receiving in turn a small tin bowl and cup from the basket, then a ladleful of gruel and a dipper of water from the buckets. This activity proceeded in a quiet and orderly manner. But Jianna could not avoid noticing that several late-arriving inmates marched straight to the head of the line, casually elbowing their predecessors aside, and nobody breathed a word of protest.

  Her own turn came at last. She received a cup and bowl, but no spoon. Neither vessel appeared to have been washed in the recent past, and bits of dried food, hard as cement, speckled the tin. No matter; she was too hungry to care. Retiring to a vacant patch of floor space, she gulped the water, then applied herself to the gruel, scooping it up with her fingers. The stuff was inoffensive in taste, but cold, thin, very watery, and there was not enough of it. She tilted the bowl, drank the remainder of the contents, licked the last traces from her fingers, then glanced around her. Nobody seemed to be asking for second helpings; neither would she.