The Crown Tower trc-1

by Michael J. Sullivan

  “Leave him. He’s not a threat anymore.”

  “He bothers you again, and he won’t be anything anymore.”

  They trudged on through the rain, back to Artisan Row. Each quarter had better and worse areas, and the block that backed up against the entrance to the Lower Quarter was the artisan’s version of Wayward Street. The Row they called it, a line of narrow two-story shops so tiny that much of the work was done on the street. Usually this jammed traffic, forcing people to maneuver around cutting tables, looms, and racks, but the rain was keeping everyone inside, where little appeared to be getting done.

  The signboard on one of the buildings read WILLIAMS BROTHERS BUILDERS. Beneath the words were a hammer and saw.

  “How’s this?” she asked Dixon.

  “One’s as good as any other, I guess.”

  She nodded and paused under a porch eave to twist the water out of her hair and skirt before entering. She drew looks. The rain had kept the men from working and a dozen stood, sat, or paced the interior, which was a bed of sawdust and woodworking tools. She marched to the counter, straightened up to make certain to look the man behind it in the eye, and said, “I want to hire you to build a house at the end of Wayward Street in the Lower Quarter.”

  No one answered.

  “Lady here is speaking to you,” Dixon said, his voice a low growl.

  “Ain’t no lady here, friend,” a man who’d been seated on a stool said. He was blond, thin, wore a leather apron, and had a stick of graphite tucked behind his right ear.

  “Ain’t no friend here neither,” Dixon replied.

  Gwen pulled the little bag from between her breasts, fished out the last gold coin, and held it up. “How much will this buy me?”

  The man on the stool got up and took the coin from her, scratching it with his thumbnail. An eyebrow rose as did the tone and volume of his voice. “Depends on the price of lumber. What were you looking for?”

  “I want a house, like the one across the street from the office of the assessor in Gentry Square, to be built on the foundation of a mess presently at the end of Wayward Street. I want two stories and lots of bedrooms plus a spacious parlor, a drawing room, and … and a small office-yes, a main floor office as well. Oh, and I want a porch that wraps around the front and sides with fancy spindles holding up the handrail.”

  The builder stared at her as dumbfounded as if she had been drinking paint.

  “It’ll take a lot more than this.”

  “I suspected as much. But I’ll settle for one room for now.”

  “A room?”

  “Build me one room inside that ruin-just four walls and a door. Oh, and fix the roof so it doesn’t leak. You can reuse whatever you salvage from what’s there. Can you do that in return for this coin?”

  The man looked at the coin, thought a moment, and then nodded.

  “Good. Do that first and we’ll be able to start earning more. As coins come in, I’ll have you do some more. Deal?”

  “You’re that Calian whore. The one who works at the Head?”

  “I was.”

  “Was what? A Calian or a whore?”

  Dixon took a step forward, but Gwen stopped him with a touch of her hand.

  “Both. I’m from Medford now, and I’m a business owner.”

  The man narrowed his eyes. “What business?”

  “Medford House, the best damn brothel in the city.”

  “Never heard of it.”

  “Strange-you’re the one building the place.”

  CHAPTER 9

  THE PROFESSOR

  Hadrian stayed five days in Colnora while the rain poured, sleeping most of the time. The rest he spent wandering the streets, visiting taverns and inns, looking for that familiar hooded head. He never found him but saw Vivian’s face everywhere. Just about everything from his journey since leaving Vernes had been erased. If not for the horse, he might have concluded it had all been a bad dream. When the rain finally relented, he was glad to get on his way. He needed to put distance between himself and the strangeness, to add miles to separate him from still more ghosts.

  He had a new mount, thanks to trading the heavy tow horse for a pretty rouncey named Dancer, who sported two rear white socks and a white diamond on her forehead. He had new clothes too-wool and leather, sturdy and warm. In no time at all the rain made them feel like old friends. For two days he had traveled, hood up and head down, but never lost the haunted sensation.

  With the city far behind, he entered farmlands of brightly painted barns that faded to gray the farther north he went. Soon the barns disappeared, as did the fields, and he found himself on the third morning in a thick wood. The tunnel of oak, thrashed by another storm, cast a leafy bed of red and gold over the road. Big leaves, bright and beautiful against the black mud. Something about the wet always brought out the best colors. Trunks and branches became ink-black, but the otherwise dull leaves were yellow as gold and red as blood.

  Hadrian drew his horse to a stop and waited. He was alone, but it didn’t feel that way.

  The air was still. He could hear the patter of water dripping from the trees, the deep breath of the rouncey, and the jangle of the bridle as she shook her head. She didn’t like stopping. Dancer felt uneasy too.

  This was how bad things always started in stories told at campfires or around small tavern tables. The young man rode deep into a forest. He was alone in the gray stillness, and all he could hear was the sound of dripping water, the hush of leaves, and then … A hundred things could follow. The man would see a light in the trees and follow it to his doom, or he would hear the pursuit of some creature stalking him.

  “You think I’m crazy, don’t you?” Hadrian asked Dancer. “Ask Sheriff Malet in Colnora and he’ll agree with you.”

  He gave a gentle nudge and the rouncey started forward again. The moment she did, Hadrian caught sight of movement. Not a falling leaf-something big, something dark, moving somewhere behind the bright colors. He turned and stared. Only trees.

  “Did you see that?” he whispered.

  Dancer continued to plod forward.

  Hadrian kept his eyes fixed on the spot but saw nothing. Soon he was carried too far down the road to matter, but he continued to cast nervous glances over his shoulder. In the stories the stalker would be half-man half-wolf, a troll, or a ghost. And if it were one of Packer’s tales, it would have been a goblin wearing a waistcoat and a tall hat. While his imagination could conjure many possibilities, at least he knew it wasn’t a goblin. Perhaps a highwayman? A lone rider like himself, with new clothes and tack, would prove a tempting target. He continued to travel, keeping an eye to the wood and an ear to the breeze, but nothing ever revealed itself.

  What little geographical information Hadrian retained from his nights before the hearth with Packer ended mostly with Colnora, as did his personal travels as a soldier. He was still in Warric, still in the kingdom of Ethelred, though near the north end. Sheridan was north of Warric-he knew that much. Somewhere along the road, but exactly how far he didn’t have a clear idea, and he wasn’t certain if there would be a sign or indication of the school along the way. He had passed several trails, which he ignored, guessing a university would be along the path most heavily traveled. The only thing north of Sheridan that Packer had ever mentioned was a land called Trent. The old tinker had described that place as a mountainous realm settled by violent people. Hadrian didn’t think he’d overshot, but he’d done stupider things.

  By midmorning he entered a small village of simple thatch-roofed homes, zigzagging fences, and stone-cleared fields. No inhabitants were visible in the drizzle. He considered tapping on the door of a house that had smoke rising from the chimney when he spotted a man wheeling a manure cart.

  “What village is this?”

  The cart driver looked up slowly, as if his head weighed more than most. Hadrian recognized the body language. He’d encountered it often, usually in the company of a well-armed troop. Fear. The reaction was no less
irrational than a deer’s flight, and Hadrian was certain that if this man and his cart could bolt with the speed of a whitetail, he would have already been gone. Hadrian had been in the employ of many armies, and none had questioned the right to seize such a village. The commander would take the best home for his headquarters. He’d give the others to his lieutenants, driving the previous owners out into the elements, keeping even their blankets. Pretty daughters were allowed to stay. Should the father object, he might receive only a beating-if the commander was in a good mood. But commanders of war-faring men were rarely in good moods. Hadrian could not recall if he’d ever stayed in this particular village. They all appeared alike, just as all the battlefields blurred meaninglessly together in his mind. Fear was a taught lesson, though, and Hadrian guessed this man had seen or felt the pain of men on horseback before.

  Hadrian dismounted and softened his tone. “Pardon me, sir, I didn’t mean to startle you. I am merely passing through and hoped you could lend me directions.”

  The man stole a peek at his face.

  Hadrian smiled.

  The man smiled in return. “Windham.”

  “Is that the name of the village, or yours?”

  The man looked embarrassed. “Ah, the village, sir. My name is Pratt, sir.”

  “Nice to meet you, Pratt. And what river is that?”

  “The Galewyr, sir.”

  “And that would make this what kingdom?”

  “We’re standing in the province of Chadwick, in the kingdom of Warric.”

  “Still in Avryn, then?”

  The man looked surprised. “Of course, sir. But that far bank begins the kingdom of Melengar.”

  “Still in Avryn?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The man set the cart back on its haunches and wiped his face with the crux of his sleeve. “Are you headed to Trent, then?”

  “No, to Sheridan. I’ve just been traveling for several days and thought I might have overshot.”

  “To Sheridan? Oh no, sir. You have half a day’s ride before you.”

  Hadrian looked up at the leaking gray sky. “Wonderful. Anything you can tell me of the road ahead?”

  “I don’t cross the river, sir.”

  “Are there hostilities between the banks?”

  “Oh no, Ethelred and Amrath have been peaceful neighbors for years. There hasn’t been a guard on the Gateway Bridge as long as I’ve lived here, and I’ve lived here all my life. I’ve just never had an occasion to cross. Bib the Potter, he’s been over. He sells his clays in the city of Medford. Goes twice a year, he does. That’s the royal seat of Melengar. It’s just up that way.” He pointed across the river and slightly to the left of the bridge. All Hadrian could see was vague gray shapes curtained off by the rain. “On a clear night in winter when the leaves are gone, you can see the lights of Essendon Castle, and on Wintertide morning you can hear the bells of Mares Cathedral. Bib, he brings back salt and colored cloths, and once he even came back with a wife. A pretty girl, but”-he lowered his voice-“she’s lazy as a milkweed. He can’t get her to fix a meal, which is just as well since she also can’t cook any better than a woodchuck. Bib’s place is a wreck now.”

  “So to get to Sheridan, do you know how I would go?”

  “Certainly. I ain’t never been, but plenty of folk going both ways through here. I talk to a few. Not many as nice as you, but I’ve talked to some. Seems the road splits just past the river. No sign or nothing Bib says, but the left heads to Medford-that’s the King’s Road. You want to stay right all the way up through East March, past the High Meadowlands. Bib’s never been that way-he only goes to Medford-but others say the school is near the Meadowlands, off to the east a bit.”

  “Well thank you … Pratt, is it?”

  “Yes, sir. Where you coming from, sir?”

  “Colnora.”

  “I heard of that. Big city they say. Not sure why people would want to live so close to one another. Unnatural really. And it’s people like that who come up here to escape Maribor’s wrath when he lets them know it. That’s what happened when that plague came through here six years ago. Plenty good folk died, and it was them that brought it. If it weren’t for Merton of Fallon Mire, we’d all be dead, I suspect. How are things down there now?”

  “Strange, Pratt. Wet and strange.”

  By evening, the sun managed to cut holes in the clouds, and slanted shafts of light streamed into Sheridan Valley as Hadrian approached. That Maribor-chosen look gave Hadrian hope his luck might have changed, but he wasn’t holding his breath.

  Hadrian had been on a miserable streak ever since receiving the letter. How it found him in the wilds of the east was a miracle-or a curse. He was still working that one out. He had been deep in Calis in the city of Mandalin-the big arena with the white towers-which always had the best crowds. He performed three fights that night but remembered only the last one. Maybe he would have felt the same way afterward even if he hadn’t read the letter. He wanted to think so to restore some of his self-respect, help ease his guilt. The notion that it took his father’s death for him to quit suggested a connection and made him culpable. The idea was irrational, but sometimes those were the best kind. He wasn’t responsible, but he wasn’t innocent.

  Pratt’s directions proved accurate, and the moment Hadrian spotted the bell tower to the east, he figured he had found his goal. He couldn’t remember a more pleasant valley. University buildings circled the shaded common like the stone monoliths in the jungles of the Gur Em. The tribal shrines had the same mystical quality, both sacred and inscrutable. These were just a lot larger. At the center stood a huge statue of a man holding a book in one hand and a sword in the other. Hadrian had no idea who he might be, perhaps the school’s founder. Maybe it wasn’t a statue at all but the giant who had constructed the mammoth buildings, somehow turned to stone. At least that would explain the stone halls. Hadrian hadn’t seen any exposed rock for miles, and it would take ten heavy horses and a greased sled just to move one of the blocks, much less stack them four stories high. If it wasn’t a giant, he couldn’t think of any other way to account for the place.

  As he ambled into the circle, he spotted dozens of young men all dressed in gowns. They moved along walkways, careful not to get the hems of their robes wet in the lingering puddles. A number paused to look his way, making Hadrian uncomfortable, as he had no idea where to go. He had expected the university to be a single building, likely no more than one room, where he could just knock and ask for the professor. What he found was a good-sized town.

  Reaching a bench, he dismounted and tied Dancer to the arm.

  “Are you intending to be a student here?” one of the older boys asked, looking him over.

  Hadrian got the impression from the wrinkled nose that the student didn’t approve. The boy had a haughty tone for someone so young, small, and weaponless. “I’m here to see a man by the name of Arcadius.”

  “Professor Arcadius is in Glen Hall.”

  “Which one of these…” He looked up at the columned buildings that appeared even taller with his feet on the grass.

  “The big one,” the boy said.

  Hadrian almost chuckled, wondering which ones the boy thought were small.

  The student pointed to the hall with the bell tower.

  “Ah … thanks.”

  “You didn’t answer me. Do you expect to attend this school?”

  “Naw-already graduated.”

  The young man looked stunned. “From Sheridan?”

  Hadrian shook his head and grinned. “Different school. Easier to get into but literally murder to pass. Hey, watch my horse, will you? But be careful-she bites.”

  He left the boy and three others standing bewildered by the bench, watching him cross to the big doors of Glen Hall.

  Inside, the architecture continued to amaze him. Hadrian had spent most of his years since leaving Hintindar living in military camps. His scenery had been limited to tents and campfires, forests and
fields. He’d seen a few castles, usually while storming the walls, but remembered little. A hundred men swinging sharpened steel and firing arrows made it hard to observe the subtle nuances of chiseled stone and carved woodwork. The closest thing to what he saw here would have been the arenas-the ones he fought in near the end after he’d left the jungle. Grand amphitheaters with ascending tiers filled with stomping feet and clapping hands. They had some of the scale but none of the quality. Glen Hall made him feel he should remove his boots.

  The ceiling was three stories above the entrance, where a chandelier holding two dozen candles burned pointlessly, given that tall windows cast radiant spears across the marble. Voices echoed down from a grand stair that was wide enough for five men to walk arm in arm. He moved across the polished foyer, his boots clacking, and peered around corners. The only face he saw was that of an old man captured in a painting as tall as himself. He paused, wondering how a person went about making a portrait of that size.

  The bell in the tower began to ring and the pensive mood shattered, replaced by scuffling feet and excited voices. A herd of young men rumbled down the stairs. Gowns of various shades poured through the front doors or peeled off to the side corridors. Hadrian pressed himself against a wall as if caught in a canyon during a stampede.

  “No, that’s not right. Professor Arcadius said Morning Star was the stone that glowed,” one boy said. He was either tall for his age or one of the oldest.

  “It was magnesia,” replied the one walking with him, holding a book to his chest. He was shorter and thin as a willow; Hadrian almost mistook him for a girl.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Care to wager?” The boy with the book took hold of the other’s arm, causing the flow of traffic to break around them. “You take my chores for a month?”

  “I’m the son of a baron. I can’t scrub floors.”

  “Sure you can. I’ll teach you. Even the son of a baron can learn how to scrub floors.”