Fire and Dust

by James Gardner

  Or else they knew everything, and I'd get a poniard in the back the moment I went outside.

  I quaffed off the last of the beer, wiped my mouth in what I hoped was typical Plague-Mort fashion, and eased away from the bar. There was a strong temptation to glance at Qi and Chi to see if they were following; I resisted the urge. Still, as I ambled past tables of irritable customers, most simply looked up in annoyance, then looked down again as soon as I passed. Qi and Chi couldn't be trailing along behind me – otherwise, there'd be three people's worth of glaring instead of just me.

  The doorknob was under my hand and I was building up to a sigh of relief, when suddenly the latch snapped away from me. I took a step back, unnerved… and there, outlined in the doorway, stood Kiripao. He hissed softly and pointed at the musicians in the corner of the room. «The flute is mine.»

  «What are you talking about?» I whispered.

  «The flute is mine, it's mine, it's mine.»

  «It is not,» I told him. «It probably doesn't even belong to the flute player. She's so bad, she must have found it in the gutter on her way over.»

  «Have you no ears?» Kiripao hissed. «She is playing blasphemies.»

  «It sounds more like The Maiden and the Hungry Pigboy.» I put my hand on his arm. «Why don't you come along —»

  He shrugged me off, glared at the flautist, and screamed, «Blasphemer!»

  «That's enough!» I said sharply… but the tavern had already grown quiet behind me. The small of my back itched at the thought of Qi and Chi staring at us. Even so, I couldn't turn around – Kiripao might notice me look at them. The two thieves shouldn't recognize him, but the elf knew them well enough; he had followed them back in Sigil, from the Mortuary to the Vertical Sea. If he caught sight of Rivi's two henchmen, I didn't know what he'd do. I just knew I didn't want him to do it.

  «You're coming with me,» I told the elf with all the command I could muster. Since the tavern was silent, every patron listening to our conversation, I added, «Your mother has been distraught since you chewed your way out of the straitjacket. Come home now, or Doctor Uvula will feed you more quicklime.»

  A few people behind me laughed. That was good.

  Brother Kiripao had no sense of humor. That was bad.

  I remember grabbing the collar of his robe and tugging him toward the street. I remember going, «Whoof!» as Kiripao's fist connected with my solar plexus. After that, I don't remember much of anything, but I hope he hit me a few more times, and maybe landed some flying drop-kicks to my head – it would be embarrassing to get knocked out by a single punch.

  * * *

  The process of «coming to» spread itself over ten seconds: first a muddy emergence of my brain, then other parts of my body checking in to complain about how much they hurt. Several ribs spoke the loudest, followed by a diffuse throbbing around my left cheek and eye.

  There was a rough wooden floor beneath me, with splintered furniture scattered all over it… and let me assure you, it hadn't been the kind of furniture that splinters easily. No tavern in Plague-Mort, not even an upscale one in Rich Man's Row, would buy bar stools that had to be replaced every time people played fast and loose with their fists. All the chairs, all the tables, had been thick, heavy oak; and now they were thick, heavy sticks of firewood, littering the floor around me.

  Knowing it would hurt, I sat up. Yep… it hurt. I wasn't the only person laid low by the brawl – unconscious bodies sprawled in undignified poses everywhere I looked – but I was the only one moving at the moment, which I took as a tribute to my constitution. Perhaps I hadn't been out long at all; for one thing, I still had my money-purse, which meant there hadn't been time for thieves to go through my pockets. It was still dark outside too, as I could see through the open doorway: somehow, the door had got knocked clean off its hinges.

  I tried to struggle to my feet… but the moment I moved, gravity suddenly increased by a couple hundred per cent, and I sat down again abruptly. Just what I expected in a place like Plague-Mort: natural forces playing dirty tricks on me. I resolved to try again in the near future, this time leaping up fast to catch gravity offguard; but seconds turned into minutes, and the time never felt right.

  A figure appeared in the doorway – a lean woman with bony ridges protruding from her arms. Sitting on the floor I waved to her, then found that very funny for some reason and started to giggle.

  «Britlin?» she whispered.

  «Hello,» I said in a loud voice. «Hello,» I repeated more softly, then wondered how it would sound in a deep voice. «Hello,» (deep bass). «Hello,» (falsetto). «Hell-o-ohh!» (an unsuccessful combination of both).

  Yasmin knelt beside me. «What are you doing here?»

  «Having a concussion, that's what I'm doing.» Those were the words in my mind; but all that came out of my mouth was a jumbled syllables. My incoherence struck me so funny, I laughed out loud. Flashes of purple light exploded in front of my eyes, with a pain like a mace pummeling my head from the inside; but I couldn't stop laughing, no matter how much it hurt.

  «Shh,» Yasmin said.

  She laid a hand on my lips, then immediately jerked away again. I guessed she'd made some vow not to touch me, and I was going to tell her how stupid that was as soon as I could remember how to string words together intelligibly. Another thought struck me and I pulled myself together enough to say, «Qi and Chi.»

  «Shh,» she said again, as if I was babbling.

  «Qi and Chi,» I told her. «Qi and Chi, Qi and Chi, Qi and Chi-di-dee-di-dee.»

  Yasmin showed no sign of paying attention to my words. She looked around the ruined tavern as if one of the other unconscious patrons might offer advice on what to do next; then she slid a hand under my armpit and jerked me to my feet. The room spun and more of those purple flashes burst in front of my eyes.

  I remember thinking, If she gives me a good fast twirl, I should feel something really worth remembering. But she didn't. The Doomguard can be so repressed.

  * * *

  Yasmin half-dragged me out of the tavern, my feet bouncing along like a marionette's. A few more crumpled bodies lay outside on the cobblestones, but none I recognized. Kiripao must still be on the loose… as if Plague-Mort wasn't a dangerous enough place already. Qi and Chi were also gone; I wondered if they had slipped away from the fight, or bashed in heads until no one was moving.

  All these thoughts seemed very lucid to me; and yet, when I tried to speak to Yasmin again, all that came out was, «Qi Chi there-there.» Even I had to admit that probably wasn't helpful communication.

  Perhaps to keep me quiet, Yasmin started talking herself. «It took me an hour to find you,» she said in a low voice. «The town's quiet tonight – absolutely no one on the streets. Maybe people heard the Hounds were out on a raid, so they're staying indoors.»

  «Rivi Qi Chi,» I answered. «Here, Rivi Qi Chi.»

  «Hush,» she said, «you're delirious.»

  «Run, hide, Rivi Qi Chi —»

  Yasmin clapped her hand over my mouth. «No noise,» she whispered. «The Hounds may prowling. Please, Britlin, please… don't talk.»

  She said those last words staring straight at me – the first time she'd allowed me eye contact since the Sea of the Drowned. I tried to meet her gaze clearly, despite the dizziness coating my brain… tried to be the man she had kissed in the darkness of the umbral village. She must have seen something in my eyes because she quickly turned away again, and whispered, «Don't.»

  I didn't say anything. At the best of times, I probably couldn't have found the right words.

  After a while, she started helping me along again. Without looking at me, she murmured, «I told you I had a brother. Well, maybe two brothers if I count you… skip that. My brother Jadon was eight years older than me, and always in trouble. Drinking, gambling, bashing old bubbers for fun…»

  She kicked at a pebble lying in the street. It clattered over the cobblestones, then splashed softly into the rain-filled gutter.


  «When I was ten,» Yasmin went on, «my mother died. Found floating in the Ditch. No one knew if it was suicide, murder, or accident, and apart from me, no one cared. After that, Jadon 'took care' of me. You know what I mean? My own brother. Put me on the streets at ten years old, and used me himself whenever he felt like it.»

  I thought of my mother. I shuddered.

  Yasmin didn't notice. «Four years of hell,» she said. "Until one night, Jadon roughed up a woman who turned out to be a succubus in disguise. So much for Jadon; and praise The Lady for making Sigil a city where such things can happen. Anyway, I joined the Handmaids of Entropy the same night, thinking they would turn me into a remorseless killing machine… which is what I dearly wanted to become at that moment. I was all wrong about how the Handmaids actually worshipped Entropy, but I was all wrong about wanting to kill people too. The Handmaids gave me what I needed, and here I am.

  «But Britlin… if you really are my brother, half-brother, I can't let those old wounds open again. I can't. It's not your fault, it's Jadon's… and maybe mine too, maybe it shouldn't make a difference to me. You and I were happy yesterday, why should it make a difference? But it does. When I think that you might be my brother, it wrenches my stomach and I feel so sick… I can't breathe. And the only reason I can even say this in front of you is you don't understand a word.»

  She bent in and kissed my cheek, a kiss thick with good-bye. Even as she continued to help me down the street, Yasmin had left me – as surely as if she had stepped through a portal and disappeared forever.

  * * *

  In minutes we were back at the smashed-up house. Hezekiah had found an old wash-tub and Zeerith was dipping herself in it to soothe the pain of her burns. Her serpent's body was much too long to fit inside the tub all at once, so she was immersing a bit at a time, the rest of her body hanging out over the sides. It looked uncomfortable, but the soaking had clearly eased the pain on her gentle face.

  Wheezle sat propped against one of the kitchen cupboards, his hands folded placidly in his lap. Missing a year from his life, paralyzed from the waist down, he was still as tranquil as death… but when the gnome caught sight of me, his eyes opened wide and he cried, «Honored Cavendish!»

  «I found him in the remains of a brawl,» Yasmin said as she lowered me to the floor. «I don't know how Britlin got involved… maybe Kiripao was there.»

  «Qi Chi,» I told everyone. «Rivi Qi Chi.»

  «He keeps saying that,» Yasmin muttered. «He must have a concussion and it's making him delirious.» She let out an exasperated snort. «If it weren't for the sodding dust in my lungs, I'd have the magic to heal him!»

  «Is he very ill?» Zeerith asked softly. The naga raised her head three feet off the ground and gazed down at me as I slumped on the floor.

  «He's incoherent,» Yasmin replied. «Conscious but incoherent… and that scares me. Something's seriously wrong with his brain.»

  I wanted to tell her I could think just fine; but my tongue couldn't put the words together. It occurred to me, maybe there was something wrong inside my head – some rupture in the conduits connecting thought and speech. Very bad, very very bad.

  «Perhaps,» Zeerith murmured shyly, «I could…» She lowered her eyes in embarrassment. «People have suggested I can work magic, but I never… still, now that I have molted…»

  «It is worth a try, honored snakeling,» Wheezle said. «And perhaps we can offer you some small advice for focusing the energy…»

  «We'll help,» Yasmin assured the naga. «If you have the power inside, we'll show you how to draw it out.»

  «This'll be great,» Hezekiah enthused. «A magic lesson!»

  «Rivi Qi Chi,» I said. But nobody paid attention.

  * * *

  With deep concentration, Zeerith stared into my eyes. The rest of her green-scaled body had coiled around me, not tightly but with a firm grip that held me solid. It took all my self-control not to squirm – not just suppressing fear of being crushed by a constrictor, but also a frisson of arousal at this embrace from a girl just entered into womanhood. You're delirious, I told myself; such feelings are beneath you. But her face was the only thing I could see… her solemn, beautiful face meeting my gaze with the intensity of a lover.

  «Stay relaxed,» Yasmin whispered in the naga's ear. «Think of a time when the world filled you with awe.»

  Zeerith bit her lip, a child's gesture. «Do you want me to talk about it?»

  «If it will help you remember.»

  She closed her eyes, then opened them again, staring directly at me… into me. Her face was not just as beautiful as an angel, it was equally profound.

  «Years ago, when I was small,» she began, "a storm struck the town – not one of the fire storms that leaks over from the Bad Place, but a rain storm, with a fierce and terrible wind. That's what I remember most, the wind: roaring through the streets, rattling all the shutters, ripping leaves off the trees. Candles and lamps kept blowing out, even inside the house… because drafts gusted through every chink, and the chimney sucked up a steady breeze. People ran about, trying to plug the holes, keep the shutters from banging; and in the middle of it all, the front door blew open right in front of me. The open door, right there.

  "I had never ventured into the street before. The family told me there were people out there who would hurt me; and I knew they were telling the truth. But the door was open, the street was empty, the wind was blowing so hard that the rain made horizontal streaks… and before I knew it, I was down the steps and sliding along the cobblestones.

  "The wind pulled at me, but I stayed low. I stayed low. And the feel of the pavement was rough and wonderful against my belly, the sting of the rain beating on my skin, the howl of the wind tearing at the shingles of every roof… I was the only one out that night. Legged creatures would have been knocked off their feet by the wind, but I could move freely. I had the town to myself. The dark and stormy town, not a light to be seen.

  «All mine.»

  Her voice was a whisper and her eyes shone. She still gazed at me, but I knew she was seeing the blackness of that gale-battered night.

  «You are touching the magic,» Wheezle murmured. «Now, invite it into your soul.»

  He spoke so softly, I wondered if the naga even heard him. Suddenly, however, the hairs of my skin bristled, tingling with the presence of unseen energy. Zeerith's eyes widened and her mouth shaped into an O: surprise, wonder, awe. Her breath caught in a small gasp; then a creamy warmth gushed around me, pouring out of her body, streaming from every scale. It flooded into my brain, so powerful it turned into a fiery pain, just for a moment. Purple flashes burst inside my eyes once more, a single moment of explosion quickly dissipating into relaxed sparkles.

  Zeerith's body loosened around me and slumped to the floor. Yasmin leapt forward to prevent the girl's head from slamming down; but the naga stopped herself without help and offered a weak smile. «Was that magic?» she asked.

  «Yes,» I told her. «I assure you it was magic.» For the briefest of seconds, I let my fingers twine quietly through her hair. Then I forced myself away. «Thank you, but now we have to get out of here. Qi and Chi are in the area; it's not safe to stay in one place.»

  «Sod it all!» Yasmin growled. «That's what you meant by Rivi Qi Chi?»

  «That's what I meant. Let's get moving before —»

  «Hello, my wee darlings,» called a gloating voice from the street. «Have you missed me?»

  16. THREE SOUND SLEEPERS

  «Grab Wheezle!» I shouted to Yasmin. Then in a much quieter voice I asked Hezekiah, «How many people can you teleport at once?»

  «I've never tried more than two,» he answered, «but I should be able to… gahhhhh!»

  The boy keeled over, squealing and pressing his hands to his face. «She's trying to blank me again!» he shouted. «I hate this!»

  «Fight it,» I growled as I snatched up a heavy crockpot lying on the floor. «I'll try to break her concentration. If you get a chanc
e to port the others out of here, don't wait for me.»

  Without giving time for an answer, I sprinted into the dark front room of the house. Through the broken windows, I could see the damned albino standing outside on the cobblestones, her face more painted than ever: crimson stripes down one cheek like claw marks, and blue bands radiating out like spokes around both eyes. She still wore that filmy sheath of black silk, sheer enough to reveal intimate details of her flawless body beneath; yet the sight aroused nothing in me but the ardent desire to bludgeon her slaggish skull with the crockpot in my hand.

  Rivi held her fingertips lightly to her temples, eyes half-shut as she tried to crush her way into Hezekiah's brain. Wights flanked her left and right, at least a dozen of them; I didn't stand a chance of getting close to her. Still, I had a clear shot for heaving the pot straight at her face… and I only spent a moment taking aim before I hurled it through the broken window.

  The pot sped swift and true, too fast for the clumsy wights to react… but as the crockery hurtled through the darkness, a blur of motion intercepted it, smashing it to the ground mere inches in front of Rivi's feet. The blur snapped around to block any more projectiles that might fly out of the building; and I saw it was Kiripao, a look of ecstasy on his face.

  «Peel it off,» he said, staring straight at me. «Peel away the shell.»

  With one fluid motion, he tucked a toe under the lip of the crockpot and kicked it back at me with the speed of a cannonball. I dove for the floor; the wind from the passing pot whisked coldly against my neck. A moment later, plaster spattered around my legs as the pot gouged a chunk from the wall behind me.

  Expecting Kiripao himself to barrel through the window any second, I whipped out my sword and rolled to my feet. He might be fast, but I had the advantage – he'd have to land gingerly to avoid the broken glass on the floor, giving me time to impale him straight through the heart. The question was, could I really do it? I'd never really liked Kiripao, but he'd been on our side to begin with. Even if he worked for the enemy now, he wasn't responsible for his actions: the umbrals had infected him with their twisted mentality, and perhaps Rivi had done some tinkering too. Did Kiripao deserve to die?