by Jay Lake
I was surprised to hear the echo of hammering from where Septio had just passed. None of the priests seemed troubled, so I held my tongue.
The door opened with a horrid creak I could hear all too readily. Of course, who would oil the hinges that closed such monsters out?
Visible in the pool, Septio stood in Skinless’ way. His face was also masked with the horizontal leather strips, and he held a narrow iron rod high in one hand, where the avatar could see it. I realized the hook on the end was bone. Which made a kind of sense, since I had already learned at great cost that this thing could not be touched or turned by ordinary weapons.
What froze my heart was that Septio’s other hand grasped the long blond hair of a nude boy who was covered with small red scabs. The boy’s eyes were shut and his mouth hung open.
Tapping Skinless with the rod, Septio turned and walked out of the view. He dragged the boy with him. The avatar followed, dragging the Dancing Mistress. I heard the footfalls from the darkness beyond us.
The temple language echoed loudly. Septio made some prayer or address to Blackblood. The words were harsh to my ears, a tongue fit for pain. A great, slow syllable rumbled in reply, from a voice so deep, I felt the sound in my ribs and gut.
Around me, the priests sighed. Then there was silence.
I waited for whatever came next. The small pool was now so much dead silver, no different from the large one at the center of the sanctuary. The priests still stood as if expecting more.
After a while, Septio walked out of the darkness. His hands were empty-no iron rod, no Dancing Mistress, nothing. My fingers slipped down to the haft of my knife. Where is she?
I must have growled, for when Septio slipped off his mask, he seemed surprised. He turned the leather over nervously within his grasp before looking up at me. “Your teacher lives,” he said quietly. “Can you find a healer of her people?”
“Yes. I would see her now.”
“No.” This was the one I had assumed to be the Pater Primus.
The other priests stepped away on business of their own as he stripped off his mask as well. Underneath was a slightly overfed face, skin shiny and pale in the northern fashion, his eyes hazel flecked with gold. Without the robes, he might just as easily have been a fruitier from the market.
“You are a great deal of trouble, young woman.” His voice was ordinary, too. No hint of the god’s nature possessed him now.
Keeping my veil in place, I answered, “The world is a great deal of trouble. I will see my teacher now.”
“Our black moon sacrifice was taken up.”
That did not seem to be an answer. I tried not to think about the boy, and what taken up might mean. “Where is she? Or shall I search for her myself?”
His hand twitched. “Do not go wandering in the shadows of this temple if you wish to leave as whole as you came in.”
“Then bring her out to me.”
“She cannot be moved yet,” Septio said beside me.
“I will not let you see her in any case,” the Pater Primus added. “Your path is different. I think you will have more dedication if you set your feet upon it now.”
“You hold her hostage.” My grip on the knife was firm, though in truth, I had no notion how to fight a temple full of priests. Especially as they’d inured themselves to pain.
“No. She will be bound over to Federo and the Interim Council, once she is ready to be moved.”
This was his house. There was little I could do but seethe. “Then I will be away, to speed her escape from your dungeons.” I itched to find the Tavernkeep and beg a healer of him. Later I might see if I could set fire to this temple.
The Pater Primus looked thoughtfully at Septio. “Is this one with us?”
“I will not be your enemy once my teacher is free.” In truth I wasn’t sure of that, but this was no moment to argue.
“She is with us,” Septio added. “For reasons of her own, not just because her hand has been forced.”
The Pater Primus turned back to me. “I hope you carry the old spells within you, girl, because one more blade in a woman’s hand will be as one more stalk of wheat before the scythe.”
“My blade reaches farther than you think,” I snapped. Then, to Septio: “Show me the way out.”
We walked back through the hall without further ceremony. “This is more than we have done for anyone before,” Septio said.
“I suppose I should thank you, but gratitude is not in me now. Not with your Pater Primus holding the Dancing Mistress so close, like a child hoarding a festival toy.” I thought on the boy again. “Besides that, we have traded life for life. I cannot feel so well about it.”
Instead of turning into the gallery from which we had entered, Septio led me to a tall set of doors that seemed oddly familiar. I realized this was the black-faced temple that the Dancing Mistress and I had passed by.
“You do not understand. Once again, do not presume to judge.”
We passed down the wide steps, which were made each too small for ordinary walking. That would cause the building to look larger, and make supplicants who approached uneasy. More clever architecture. Recognizing that the thread of my thoughts sought to turn away from guilt, I refused to distract myself. “You killed a child to retrieve the Dancing Mistress,” I told him, letting my voice grow hot. “I, who have sworn a hundred silent oaths to stop the trafficking of children, allowed this to happen.”
He paused at the bottom of the steps. “Which way will you find this healer?”
So much for an answer to my pain. I led him west up the Street of Horizons, following the quickest path out of the Temple Quarter and in the general direction of the Tavernkeep’s quiet house.
The great room of the nameless tavern was empty, though I smelled Selistani cooking. I ignored Septio with the hardest set of my shoulders that I could muster. I would have preferred to ignore him with my knife.
Following the scent into the kitchen, I found Chowdry stirring something in a shallow sizzling pan, much in the Hanchu manner. He saw me and smiled shyly. “The master of the inn has found me decent seasonings in the market,” he said in Seliu. “The meats are wrong here, but close enough.” He took up a little bowl and flicked some food into it.
Possessed by a strong desire to purge even the memory of Septio’s spiced meat from my mind, I tasted of what Chowdry had made. Goat, or possibly mutton, thin sliced and fried with sesame oil, chickpeas, red rice, and a heavy dusting of coriander. I closed my eyes and pretended for a moment I was in the refectory of the Temple of the Silver Lily.
When I opened them, Septio was also eating. I nearly dashed the bowl from his hands. He didn’t deserve this shard of Selistan.
“Where is the inn master?” I demanded of Chowdry. My tone was far rougher than it should have been.
Chowdry dropped his eyes. “He is out, mistress. Meeting with the brewers, I think.”
Which likely meant the Tavernkeep was not far away. I had no way of knowing where amid these surrounding blocks of breweries and malting houses he might be. “I require a healer of his people. For our Dancing Mistress.”
The Selistani’s eyes widened. “Has she come to harm?”
I did not realize Chowdry held any love for my teacher, but then, she had been kinder to him than I. “Terribly so. If the master returns without having spoken to me, tell him a healer is urgently needed at the temple of Blackblood.”
Septio stirred at the mention of his god, for I had not made an effort to render the meaning of the name in Seliu. He set his bowl down.
“Our man is out,” I told the priest. “I do not know where to look for him.”
“Will you leave a note, so we can go about our business?”
“Two years this problem has been unfolding, and now you are in a hurry?” I turned back to Chowdry. “Is there paper and pen at the bar out front?”
He shrugged.
“Then tell him how urgent this is, and no mistake.” As I turned away, I stopped
. “Chowdry. I did not know you cooked so well. This fry is nicely done.”
Another smile. “Who do you think fed Chittachai before you came aboard?” The memory of his lost ship chased the smile from Chowdry’s face. The ghosts were visible in his eyes.
Not trusting myself to speak in that moment, I gave him the first few degrees of a bow, then left the kitchen for the great room. There was still no one about, but Septio and I searched beneath the counter until we found a tally book. I tore an empty page out of the back and wrote out what I could, taking care to emphasize the seriousness.
The Tavernkeep would not mistake the urgency, and I could only trust in the good faith of Blackblood’s priests. Which would not last any great time, most likely, but at least so long as they thought they needed me.
You must summon the greatest healer of your people who can be found, I wrote in conclusion of the explanation I’d tried to make on the tally page. Her soulpath may be badly damaged. Her body certainly is. Also I advise you to go with many strong friends. They are very difficult in the temple.
Septio read past my shoulder. “We are sheltering you and her both from worse hurt,” he told me.
“Your concern is a balm upon my heart.”
Then, because I could not stand to sit and do nothing while she suffered, we went out on the fool’s errand of finding the Tavernkeep somewhere in this quarter of the city.
We called at every brewery and loading dock within six blocks. I touched back at the tavern between efforts, as we crossed and recrossed the neighborhood. Wherever the Tavernkeep was, we could not locate him.
An hour or so before noon, as I was becoming almost violently frantic, Septio plucked at my elbow. “Look there,” he said. “Is that your man?”
A pardine stalked along Gollymob Street. Not the Tavernkeep, but I knew their numbers were few enough. This one might have what I sought so desperately. I pushed after him, wishing I knew any words of their tongue.
He must have known I was behind, because he turned before I reached him. I stopped cold.
I had met only two of the Dancing Mistress’ people in person. They favored robes or togas in the style of Petraeans, which allowed their tails to be free. I’d seen them wear sandals. Pardines seen in public were groomed sleek and clean, and seemed to be able to slip through the human life of this city like eels through a reef.
Not so this one.
He was even taller than the Tavernkeep, and broad-chested in a way that made me immediately think of some rangy tomcat on the prowl. He wore no robe, carried no sword, only a small satchel woven of tight-plaited leaves. The fur of his chest was matted into little shapes-squares, hexes, more irregular patches-each drawn up into a clasp that I recognized as knucklebone. The net of skin this exposed showed both the shifts of supple muscle and a goodly number of scars.
His eyes were feral, too, a deep liquid gold where the Dancing Mistress’ were like water flowing on a summer day. His ears stood a bit larger and longer than hers, ragged-edged as if they’d been shredded by fighting.
Claws out, he flicked open one hand. A flower was crushed within. For a moment, I thought this another sending of the Lily Goddess, but it was an orchid. Likely one of the pale blossoms of the highest forests.
We studied one another. Where the Dancing Mistress flowed through the people of Copper Downs, the street avoided this one. Few stared, and no one tried to meet his eye, but everyone knew he was here.
“He is from the Blue Mountains,” Septio said quietly. “Somewhere high in the ranges, where they still keep the older ways. Such a one rarely comes to the cities of men.”
The pardine answered in the Dancing Mistress’ language. I recognized the sounds, but could say nothing in reply. Perforce I used Petraean, though I doubted he spoke it. I made my words slow and clear.
“I have urgent need of a healer of your people. The Dancing Mistress is at the edge of life. Can you render aid, or do you know one who can?”
He stared at me a moment longer, unblinking. This is like talking to a bullock, I thought.
“She is the one who sits on the Interim Council?”
I could not keep the startlement from my face. His accent was a bit off, but his command of the language was perfectly clear. “Yes.”
“I was told she had gone across the sea.”
“She came back. Now she is in great pain, at risk of dying.”
“Risk? We are all at certainty of dying.” His face split open in what I knew had to be a smile, though several people passing by broke into a run. “Where is she?”
“The Algeficic Temple,” said Septio.
“You will show me.”
I was torn. I wanted to follow him, to see her over his shoulder as the Pater Primus would not let me go myself. I was certain I must still find the Tavernkeep, and pass the word among those of her people for whom this city was home.
“Will you go with this priest?” I asked.
“I find priests delightful,” the pardine said. His voice was a deeper rumble than I’d heard before. His claws plucked at several bones knotted across his chest. “I keep my favorites very close by.”
“Take him to the temple,” I told Septio. “Once I find the Tavernkeep, I will go to the Textile Bourse on Lyme Street. Seek me there when you are done.” I jabbed his gut with my finger. “Send word of whatever becomes of her, if you value any goodwill from me ever again.”
Septio nodded, then looked up at the pardine.
“I am the Rectifier,” the big cat said, then showed his teeth again.
It was just as good to be away from them. In the course of time, the Rectifier would become a great friend, and there was something of the rogue in him that I liked even then at the first, but I was so distracted in the moment of our meeting, I did not pay sufficient attention to his words. His friendship is like the friendship of fire to a man-it will burn a house down as readily as it will warm winter stew.
If not for his kindly nature, his killing ways would have made a terror of him.
As is so often the case, I eventually discovered the Tavernkeep where he belonged-in his tavern. I passed breathless through the front door for what must have been the dozenth time. He held my paper before him with a thoughtful expression.
“You are back!” I shouted. “We need a healer! Well, needed. I have found some help.”
“I am pleased you located aid,” the Tavernkeep said mildly. “I can seek more at need, but whom did you send?”
“Some great brute of your people. He is called the Rectifier.”
The Tavernkeep’s ears stood up tight, in a manner I recognized from arguments with the Dancing Mistress. “You sent the Rectifier into a human temple?”
I paused at his tone, and thought on what the huge pardine had said about the bones woven into the fur of his chest. Not that I had any great loyalty to the Pater Primus and his little band of finger-choppers, but I had not intended to send violence into their house, either. “Was that ill done?”
“Possibly.” The Tavernkeep seemed divided between alarm and amusement. “It will be a day for them all to remember.” He folded my note. “What is the nature of her injuries?”
“She was battered badly in a fight with a sending of the god Blackblood. It then dragged her some distance. I fear both the breaking of a hard combat lost, and damage to her soulpath for being taken into the depths of the Algeficic Temple.”
He frowned. “I will fetch Healer and several others, that we might run together at need. Are you coming?”
“No.” I hated saying that. “I am charged to go before the Interim Council, in part as a requirement by the priests before they will release the Dancing Mistress. If I go back to the temple, I will not have filled that commitment.”
“Go, then. I will have what is needful to her within a few spans of minutes.”
“Tavernkeep?…”
He paused in his busyness. “Yes?”
“Will the Rectifier hurt her more?”
“No. Yet
his help may not be what she wishes for most.”
I fled. Regret warred with shame in my heart. I should have stood by the Dancing Mistress. Could have. Except now I did the bidding of two deities. And what she wanted, of course. I had to hold on to that idea. This was what she wanted.
From the nameless tavern to Lyme Street was a quick enough walk. I passed out of the warehouses of the brewing district and through a few blocks of crowded houses before I made it onto the street. There had been tanneries there once, before they moved out to the eastern edge of Copper Downs. Some of the huge old buildings now held coach barns and stables. Others had been made into mercantiles for lumber and other goods that needed space.
Beyond them, Lyme Street was home to cobblers, tailors, and weavers, as well as to several felt works. The Textile Bourse, unlike many guild buildings either in this city or Kalimpura, was proudly close to its roots. I had not been within, and we had not passed by during our tours of recent days for fear of being called in, but the Dancing Mistress had pointed to it from a distance several times.
A facade of carved granite seemed intended to provide gravitas to the trade. The stairs were flanked by a statue of baled wool on one side, and a stone replica of a felting vat on the other. Someone had planted flowers in the vat, though now it was mostly weedy stems and dead leaves. The banner of Copper Downs hung from the roof, blocking the central windows-a copper shield in four parts, with a coronet and a ship. As I had been so carefully taught to read such symbols, more properly it was quarterly, in the first, on a field tenne a ducal coronet surmounting a ship on the sea proper; in the third, a field tenne; second and third, a field sanguine.
Somehow I was surprised they had not stricken the coronet.
A pair of guards stood before the entrance atop a half flight of steps. They wore the same raw leather as the fool at the treasury had, and each held a pike. As I walked up, one dipped his weapon to stop me.