by Glenda Larke
They walked upwards, through the almost deserted lower levels, into the more prosperous parts of the city, now tattier than they had once been. She smiled grimly; one good thing about the city was that there was plenty of work for those who wanted it. They entered a tavern on Level Fourteen, and found a vacant table. Umber and Jade sat while she and Elmar elbowed their way to the bar. Elmar leaned on the counter and lowered his voice. “See the brown man over there?” he asked the barman.
The man nodded without interest as he busied himself filling flagons. “Gibber grubber, is he? Don’t see many of them these days. What’s with them bleeding funny tattoos on his face?”
Elmar leaned in close and dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Eh! Watch your language, my man! That’s the new stormlord, bringing you every drop of water you’ll be getting through your spigots. Living up there in the hall he is, bringing clouds for the whole Scarpen. Name’s Lord Umber Grey. Came here to save our hides. Nice fellow, too, would you believe? Not the ordinary upleveller with his wilted nose held so high he’d trip over his own knees. But then, Gibber folk are mostly humble, to my mind.”
The man looked back at Umber with renewed interest. “Gibber, is he? Looks like one, ’cept for those tattoos. But I heard tell the priests are worrying about stormlords coming in from the heathen land on the other side of the ’Baster place. Blasphemers there, they say. In the temple on Sun Day the priest reckoned we ought to nail them all to the gate if they come here preaching their heresies.”
“Don’t know anything about that,” Elmar said cheerfully. “Haven’t heard any preaching out of this fellow. Looks like a Gibber grubber and speaks good Quartern, just like you and me, too.” Well, he does when he remembers… “All I know is there’s been rain over the Warthago every bleeding day he’s been here. So I reckon I don’t care where he’s from, so long as he wants to help. Do them priests think we ought to kill folk decent enough to come to aid us? Blighted eyes, are they sun-fried?”
As Elmar counted out the tokens, the innkeep put the filled mugs on the counter. “Reckon you’ve got the right of it, armsman. Anyone who brings us water ought to be respected, right enough. Gibber is he? The Cloudmaster’s Gibber too, after all. That’s good enough for me.”
Elmar handed two of the mugs to Terelle with a wink. She grinned as they walked back to Umber and Jade. “You’re getting good at this, El.”
“Secret is to tell the truth and imply the lies. Sounds as if the waterpriests might have figured out where Umber’s from, though. Pity.”
Over the next run of a sandglass, they watched while the barkeep passed on the gossip to everyone who entered. Appreciative looks were sent in Umber’s direction, but no one approached the table.
Elmar bent to murmur in Terelle’s ear, “I think we’ve won this one, at least. Lord Gold is going to find it hard to get approval in this city for a pissing stupid idea like bad-mouthing stormlords.”
“I hope so,” she said.
It was already dusk when they stepped outside.
A large crowd of boisterous men had just entered the outer courtyard, and they had to step aside to allow them to pass into the inn. As she stood there, Terelle swayed, suddenly dizzy. She put her hand out to steady herself against the wall, but misjudged the distance and almost fell. Her vision blurred. Pain stabbed her skull. Disoriented, she tried to cry out, but made no sound. Something pulled at her. Pulled at her skin, at her body. Her heart started to pound against her ribs. She panted, startled by the need to do so. Clutching at Elmar’s arm, she tried to tell him something was wrong, but her mouth had dried out and her tongue was sticking to her palate. Sweat ran down her forehead into her eyes, gummed her hair to the sides of her face, dripped off the end of her nose.
Elmar looked down, then his eyes widened in shock. “What’s wrong?”
She increased her grip on his arm, but her muscles cramped and she couldn’t speak. Nor could she let go. Jade and Umber loomed up at the edge of her vision. Terrified, she wanted to scream.
Vision.
Something was wrong with the way she was seeing. Her eyes felt wrong. Dry. She started blinking, rapidly. Her arms and legs were tingling. She staggered against Elmar.
Jade clutched at her wrist to keep her upright, but her grasp was slick and her hand slipped. “She’s sweating,” Jade said. The concern in her voice was alarming. “It’s pouring off her.”
What’s wrong with me? She wanted to ask the question aloud, but the words wouldn’t come.
Then Umber answered anyway. “Dear God, someone’s taking her water!” Then he was gone, beyond her vision.
Oh, she thought, with a remote calm that astonished the panicked part of her mind. I’m dying. I bet it’s Senya. The little bitch.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Scarpen Quarter
Breccia, Level Fourteen
Breccia Hall, Level Two
“Drink this.” Jade forced the mouth of her water skin between Terelle’s lips. “Small sips. One after the other. Don’t stop. Whatever you do, don’t stop.” Her consternation, badly concealed, terrified Terelle.
She was cold. And the woman was covering her with wet cloths. Blighted damn, that is withering icy! Can’t she see I’m shivering?
Sip, more sips, pushed against her lips.
Mustn’t stop. Hold on to my water. Hold on to it. I can do it. I did it when Jet tried to kill me. Waterlords can hold on to their own water. Stormlords can. I can. If I try.
Sip. Some more.
Jade cradled her tight, murmuring in her ear. “Hold on, Terelle. Just a little longer. Hold on to your water. You can do it. You have to because I won’t do that painting. I won’t, I swear. You have to. You have to live to do it.”
Her brain wouldn’t work. What painting? There was something she should understand…
She swallowed more water. Hold on to her water, that was it. Don’t let it go. Fight it. Fight whoever was doing this to her.
Then, suddenly, it was all over. That horrible, deadly pull was gone. Vanished, as if it had never been.
She took a shuddering breath and gulped more water, long draughts until she had finished all Jade had. “I’ll be all right now,” she whispered as Elmar pressed his water skin into her hand. “I think.” Trying to sit up, she was surprised to find how weak she felt. And was surprised again when she realised her head was resting in Jade’s lap. “They stopped. And I’m alive.”
“I’ve heard that taking a waterpainter’s water is tough. I guess you just proved it to be true,” Jade said, speaking in her own tongue, but keeping her voice low.
“She just fainted,” Elmar said, shielding her from sight with his body as he answered a question from some of the inn’s patrons. “Nothing to worry about.” He waited until they’d gone before he turned back to Terelle. “Keep drinking.”
“I am.” She looked at Jade. “I don’t think it was me that stopped it. It was you—by deciding you wouldn’t do that second painting.” She took Jade’s hand and squeezed it. “Thank you.”
Before Jade could reply, Umber reappeared. “I think ye, um, you’d all better come and look,” he said in a low voice. “This is not good.”
Elmar helped her up and they all crossed the courtyard to the side of the building. Empty barrels and casks were stacked there in a narrow laneway, hidden from view. Tucked away out of sight behind one of the stacks was the body of a man.
“Dead?” Jade whispered.
Umber nodded. “Stabbed him. Quickest way to stop him. I was scared she’d die if I wasted time arguing about it.” He shrugged. “I’m no military man, but I don’t make mistakes when I slaughter an animal.”
“I’ll keep watch to make sure no one comes this way,” Jade said and went to stand at the corner of the building.
“He was a rainlord waterpriest,” Elmar said quietly. “They’re the only men who wear that kind of robe.” He knelt by the body and went through the man’s belt pouch and clothing. “Nothing much. A handfu
l of coins. A water skin. A kerchief. And this.” He extracted a small piece of folded parchment from the pouch, sniffed at it, read the words it contained, made a face and handed it to Terelle.
She raised it to her nose and said, “Senya.”
“Not Laisa?” Elmar asked.
“No. That’s Senya’s perfume. Nothing to say Laisa didn’t use Senya’s scented note paper, though, I suppose.” She unfolded it, held it up so it caught the last of twilight and read the contents aloud. Her own name was written in large, childish letters, followed by the address of the rooming house where she and Elmar were lodged. “Definitely not Laisa’s handwriting. I don’t know Senya’s.” I don’t need to. Laisa didn’t know about this. Not her style. But it is Senya’s. She shivered, reaction setting in. She’d almost died. Senya had given her address to a priest and told him to murder her at the first opportunity he had. And he’d obeyed. Which meant that Lord Gold had sanctioned it.
“Now what?” Elmar asked. “Not good if it gets known that a Khromatian killed a waterpriest. Not weeping good at all. In fact, we’d all be salted.”
“Then no one must know,” she said.
Elmar tapped a barrel on the lid. “They’re empty,” he remarked. “Good. Probably waiting collection to be taken back to the amber brewery.”
“Nice and large,” Umber added.
The three of them exchanged looks.
“I’ll strip the body of everything so he can’t be identified,” Elmar said. “We’ll bring his clothing back to our lodging and burn it in the fireplace tonight.”
Umber said, “I’ll take his water and then we’ll stuff what’s left of him in the barrel. I doubt the men who’ll come to pick it up will notice the extra weight.”
“And once it’s one of hundreds at the brewery, they won’t even know where it came from,” Elmar said. He began stripping the corpse.
“Thank you, cousin,” Terelle said. “I owe you my life too, it seems.”
“Terelle, that alone makes my whole trip here worthwhile.”
For a moment it felt as if they were the only two people in the world. In their silence, within their gaze, a connection was made and approved; her heart lightened and her tension eased.
“It’s good to have family again,” she said. “Especially since I like you much better than my great-grandfather.”
His smile broadened into a grin. “Me too.” And he turned to attend to the corpse. She watched and thought of Jet Verdigris. Another man who just disappeared. Yet I know what happened to him. I’m standing next to his mother, who doesn’t know—and I can never tell her, not about Jet or Hue. Why does necessity sometimes make such liars of us all? I never want to hurt anyone, but I do.
And then she remembered that both Jet and this nameless priest had tried to kill her, while Hue had participated in Feroze’s murder, and she was glad they were dead.
When finally the dried-out skin and bone of the priest was stuffed into one of the barrels and his water was stored in their respective drink containers, Umber raised his water flask towards the barrel in macabre homage. “May God forgive us all,” he said cheerfully, then winked at Terelle—and drank.
Two sandruns later, Umber was surveying the new set of rooms Elmar had rented for Terelle. “I suppose it’ll do,” he said to Elmar, but he hated the idea that he couldn’t keep an eye on Terelle. “Ye pull your truckle bed across her door so anyone entering her room will have to go through ye first.”
Elmar rolled his eyes. “M’lord, are you teaching an old spear how to fly true?”
“I’ll see ye demoted to camp-pot scrubber if anything happens to my cousin.”
“Oh, for goodness sake,” Terelle said. “I’m sure my main problem will be lack of sleep because Elmar snores. Jade, take Umber away. I have enough problems with Elmar clucking over me without him as well!”
Still, she gave him a hug before he left for Breccia Hall. He didn’t like living under Laisa’s roof, but there was nothing much he could do about it. He needed the facilities of the stormquest rooms.
Damn it, when water-power is so valuable, Umber thought, you have to lie down with whoever has it, be they pious or pernicious. It’s ridiculous that Senya can’t be brought to book for her crime.
He looked across at Jade as they entered the hall. “Do you think we could tackle Laisa?” he asked. “I’m feeling in a fighting mood.”
“Gladly,” she said. “Although I suspect this will be another time when I’ll regret my lack of proficiency in the language.”
They found Laisa in her sitting room, and Umber wasted no time getting to the point. “Someone tried to murder Terelle this evening.”
Laisa paled. There was no doubting her shock. “You don’t think—” she began, then had to clear her throat and start all over again. “If that’s so, it was nothing to do with me.”
“The murderer was found to have this note on him.” Umber gave her the folded parchment. “The address is the place where Terelle was staying.”
She opened it up and read it. When she raised her head again, she was even paler. For a moment he thought she might faint, and Jade came across the room to hold her by the arm and lower her into the nearest chair.
Umber looked at her with more interest than pity. “I assume the handwriting is Senya’s.”
If Laisa had any thought of denying the idea, it didn’t last long. She nodded.
“The murderer was wearing priestly garb. Which leads us to believe this may have been part of a larger conspiracy.”
“I’ll talk to her.”
“Talk, Lord Laisa? Where I come from attempted murder is dealt with by more than conversation.”
“I am the highlord here. This is my concern.”
Her voice was calm, her tone even, but she’d clutched at the chair arms until her knuckles were white.
He said, “May I remind ye that the protection of Terelle Grey is also your concern? Ye were given a direct order by your Cloudmaster. The watering of your land depends on Terelle and Jasper and myself and Jade’s son. Ye’d do well to be remembering that. And at the moment, none of us are happy with you. Ye’d also do well to be thinking very carefully about your next move. Do ye think ye’d get support even from your own guards if the water were to stop flowing through your pipes?”
“Jasper always puts the welfare of the people of the land first.”
He leaned towards her, thrusting his face unpleasantly into hers, forcing her to press back against the chair. “Maybe. But I’m not Jasper. And right now ye—you are this far away from death.” He held his thumb and forefinger the width of a pea apart, right under her nose.
“You’re a guest in this land, this city and this building! How dare you speak to me like that. And Senya is Jasper’s wife.”
“Ah. So she is.” He straightened but didn’t move away from her. “All right then. Show me that she has no contact with the priesthood nor anyone else until such time as Jasper arrives in Breccia once more, and Jade and I may allow her to continue breathing. Perhaps ye’d also be kind enough to send a message to this Sunpriest fellow, suggesting he tread carefully, because if he doesn’t, ye’ll get no water. Jasper may have scruples. I don’t. And at the moment, it’s me that’s bringing the storms. Oh, and just to make sure ye understand the whole situation: ye do know about the power of waterpainting, don’t ye? Er, you?” Damn it, I think I’ll give up with this ye or you stuff.
“A waterpainter can make the future?”
“Think about what that means, if ye will. Terelle can paint Senya dead in her bed. Or you. Or both of you. And ye wouldn’t wake up tomorrow morning. I wouldn’t annoy Lord Jade, if I was you. Because she can do exactly the same thing. And she is seriously annoyed at the moment.”
Laisa ran her tongue over her lips. She glanced at Jade and then rose to her feet. “What happened to the priest who—?”
He smiled as unpleasantly as he knew how. “What do ye—you—think?”
She hesitated momentarily and th
en left the room without a backward glance.
“I think you just ran the highlord out of her own sitting room,” Jade remarked, amused. “You must tell me what you said to her.”
“I was very polite,” he protested, “and reasonable. Though I can never remember to speak like a Scarperman.”
She snorted. “You may have the smile of a frog in a water jar, my friend, and jokes to match, but you have the teeth of a river gharial. And I think you just bared them.” She took him by the arm. “Come, let’s leave this room so you can tell me all about it.”
Livid, Laisa bundled the maid out of Senya’s apartment into the passageway and stormed inside. She slammed and barred the door and stood, hands on hips, glaring at her daughter.
“Were you out of your tiny mind?” she raged. “Trying to kill Terelle when the very water you drink in the future may depend on her? When Jasper made it quite clear we’d suffer if she was not welcomed?”
Senya looked up from the table where she was toying with her jewellery. “Oh! You mean Lord Scriven didn’t kill her? The stupid man!”
Laisa felt her rage swell inside her. She’d hoped there would be an explanation; instead here was confirmation of her worst fears. “No, he didn’t, Sunlord be thanked. How did you get him to do it in the first place?” Nausea warred with her despair as her fury built.
“I sent one of my guards to Portennabar to tell Lord Gold about Terelle and the other two blasphemers. He ordered Lord Scriven to speak to me. So when Scriven came, I told him Lord Gold wanted the blasphemers dead, and the way to do it was to have them blamed for Terelle’s death.”
“And he believed you?”
“Why not? I am the Cloudmaster’s wife! I have the ear of Lord Gold. And Lord Gold told him to speak to me. So I gave him the order to kill her.”
“Lord Gold didn’t order Scriven to kill her?”
“No, of course not. He wants her to stand trial for blasphemy or sorcery or something. But I was afraid Jasper would rescue her if that happened. My way was better. But now you’re telling me Scriven mucked it up, confound him.”