by Lynn Abbey
The Torch nodded. “You and a handful of others. You kept more than your hearts, Cauvin, you kept your lives. Arizak, Zarzakhan, and I questioned every orphan we pulled out of those filthy pens. We saved the ones who hadn’t forgotten what it meant to be human, and they were the only ones we saved. Are you listening to me now, Cauvin? We scoured the palace, Arizak, Zarzakhan, and I. We put out the poisoned meat and we set the fire afterward. Except for you and a handful of others, we spared no one. No one, Cauvin, not a priest, not a slave, not an orphan, no matter how young.
“The Bloody Hand was a plague on the soul of man. If we had the slightest doubt about an orphan, we did not send him—or her—to the safe rooms. We judged them, and we killed them. All of them.”
“Not quite all,” Soldt corrected. The stranger had been so quiet, Cauvin had forgotten him.
The Torch sighed. “No, not all of them. Some got away and stayed hidden for ten years. Damn. That’s a long time for a man with red hands to wear gloves and plot vengeance. Or a young woman with those particular features, for that matter. Someone should have noticed. Where’s she been?”
“Hiding in the Vulgar Unicorn,” Soldt answered.
Soldt was a foreigner, so he probably thought that was explanation enough. When sheep-shite foreigners came to Sanctuary, they didn’t know which way to the froggin’ ocean, but they’d heard of the Vulgar Unicorn. Cauvin could think of several Hillside taverns whose reputations were so unsavory he wouldn’t cross their froggin’ thresholds on a gold-coin bet, but from sunrise to sunset, the Vulgar Unicorn was the stuff of froggin’ legend.
The Torch was a foreigner, too, but he didn’t think like one. “Not for ten years, Soldt. No woman works the Unicorn for ten years—not without my knowing that she’s got Imperial looks. She wouldn’t survive.”
“Leorin survived the pits. She survived the Whip. There’s nothing at the Unicorn she can’t handle. And I didn’t say she’d been there for ten years.”
“That’s true, you didn’t. Where did she hide herself?”
“Not in Sanctuary. I told you, the Whip pulled out right before you arrived, and took Leorin with him. As soon as they were clear of Sanctuary, she killed the Whip with his own knife, then took his plan, his disguise, his money for herself. She wound up north of Ilsig city, but the dreams followed her, and when she ran out of road, she turned around and came back. Our paths crossed two years ago—a little more than two years. She said she’d been back since winter.”
“It fits, Lord Torchholder—some of it. I made inquiries. The woman calling herself Leorin showed up about three years ago. She told a story about Ranke, kidnapping, and a family that wouldn’t take her back. With her looks, it was believable enough.”
“So, what doesn’t fit, Soldt?” the Torch asked. “What did you see that you didn’t like?”
“It’s not the way she looks. Leorin’s got a Rankan face, yes—but Kadakithis was before my time. His face means nothing to me. It wasn’t who she looks like that caught my attention; I learned that afterward. It’s how she acts. She carries a shadow, Lord Torchholder, a cold shadow. She looks at a person and sees a thing. Even Cauvin. She took another man upstairs while he still sat watching her.”
“Jealousy,” the Torch said. “Women think it’s an aphrodisiac, men, too.”
“Jealousy without passion, Lord Torchholder? She led him past me. I looked into her eyes and felt her shadow. Leorin has no heart, my lord. Her soul’s burnt down to ashes—”
Before Cauvin could call them both liars, the ruins echoed with the sound of Bee’s small feet slapping across mud and gravel, headed gods-knew-where.
—“It is not for me to question,” Soldt continued. “But whatever the truth of this woman’s past, she’s trouble doubled and not to be trusted—”
“You don’t know!” Cauvin found his voice. “You weren’t there. You think you know what went on in the pits, Torchholder, but you don’t know the froggin’ half of it. Shite for sure, Leorin’s not like other women. The Whip didn’t choose another woman, the froggin’ bastard chose her. You think you sent me and the others to sheep-shite safe rooms. You think you did us some great froggin’ favor. Do you know how many are left? I can tell you how they died. Harl hung himself not two months later. Canissi, the next spring. It goes on—Pendy gave up and slit her own throat last winter. Not counting the five who left town, there’s three of us left, and since I met you, pud, now I’m having nightmares!”
“That’s the point, Cauvin. Everything I see and hear from you tells me I was right to separate you. Everything I hear about Leorin tells me I’d have sent her back where they found her for her final meal.”
Cauvin turned his back on the two men. Bec had gone to ground beside Flower and was feeding the mule frost-dried weeds. Their eyes met, then Bec darted out of sight on the far side of the cart.
“All right,” he conceded, returning to the men. “All right. Leorin’s cold. She doesn’t get happy, but she doesn’t get angry, either. Life’s all the same to her, and only money matters. She can count money and lock it in a box—” A thought crossed Cauvin’s mind, “and it’s hard and cold, too. You, Soldt, you watched her go upstairs last night—you think that doesn’t stick in my froggin’ gut? But Leorin doesn’t care about them, and she does care about me. When we’re together, it’s different; and if we weren’t together, we’d both be alone.
“You must think I’m one great sheep-shite fool, too stupid to come out of the rain. I froggin’ damn sure knew Leorin didn’t walk out of the palace. I figured she was dead, but I didn’t know that, any more than I froggin’ knew what happened to the Whip, or Baldy, or the rest of those Hand bastards. I hoped they were dead, and I’ll go on hoping as long as I live. So, listen close, Torchholder—when I spotted Leorin one afternoon and I hadn’t seen her for eight froggin’ years, the first thing I did was ask her how she’d gotten away when practically no one else had and where she’d been hiding.
“That’s when she told me about gutting the Whip and lighting north on her own. She said she came back ’cause here at least she knows why she has the nightmares.”
The Torch gave Cauvin a chance to catch his breath before saying, with his sharp tongue: “I think I’d have nightmares, too, if I’d given my heart and soul to Dyareela.”
“She didn’t!”
“She’d hardly tell you if she had, now, would she, pud? You wear your heart for all to see. What would you have done if she’d told you she’d decided to take the Whip’s place along with his disguise?”
Cauvin had wrestled with the question two years ago. “I believe what she told me,” he said after a moment, and realized his belief wasn’t as strong as it had been an hour ago. “What else could I do? She can’t prove anything. Shite for sure, I can’t froggin’ prove that I’m not in league with the Hand right this very moment.”
“He’s got a point,” Soldt commented. “You can demonstrate that something is, but how do you demonstrate that it isn’t?”
“The Savankh,” the Torch replied quickly, as though he’d been interrupted.
“Which is?” Soldt asked, betraying his foreign roots.
Even Cauvin knew what the Savankh was—a slender bone rod that stood for Imperial power in the hands of a prince or governor. The rod would fry the hand of any sheep-shite fool who told a lie while holding it, at least it would, if Savankala were paying attention. But that wasn’t all Cauvin knew about the Savankh. “Nobody’s seen a Savankh in Sanctuary since last prince lit out.”
The Torch nodded, lost in his thoughts.
“All gods can hear the truth, can’t They? And whatever a god can do, so can His froggin’ priest, right? So, Torchholder, can’t you say a froggin’ prayer to prove her and me right?”
“In a temple with an altar, an acolyte beside me, and a bowl of flaming unguents, assuming I had an altar, an acolyte, and unguents that haven’t been seen in Sanctuary since before the Savankh disappeared. And assuming your Leorin isn’t sitting snug
under her goddess’s protection. The gods aren’t active in Sanctuary these days, especially when it comes to meddling with the devout—which is a good thing, pud, until you need justice or information. I’d do better with holding a rod of red-hot iron under your ladylove’s bare feet than I’d do with a prayer—but I don’t suppose you’d stand for that.”
Cauvin blinked. “You can’t be froggin’ serious—”
“No,” the Torch assured him. “Torture’s not perfect. Most people say what they think will end the pain, and of the rest, you can’t be sure if they’re telling the simple truth or they’re simply true believers.”
“We’re back where we started,” Soldt said. “Strong suspicions but no way to get past them.”
“You could believe me,” Cauvin shouted. “I’m telling you: I know Leorin, I know the Hand—Frog all, I’d know if she was one of them!”
Cauvin would never know if it was his shouting or something else, but Flower chose that moment to get ornery. With an echoing bray, she kicked the cart with her hooves then reared up in the traces. Bec—who was the likelier cause of the mule’s outburst—dangled from the bridle.
There were no questions in Cauvin’s mind. His feet were moving as soon as his eyes perceived the danger. It was his own sheep-shite fault: Once he’d seen the Torch fallen against the cellar way, he’d abandoned Flower—left the mule harnessed and standing in mud. Flower didn’t like mud and with good reason, considering the froggin’ damage it could do to her hooves. She could have hauled the cart ten steps to drier ground, but Flower was a mule; she’d take care of herself, if she froggin’ had to, but it was Cauvin’s job to take care of her and she had ways to see that he did.
“I was just trying to lead her to grass,” Bec insisted, once his two feet and Flower’s four were planted.
The mule was giving Cauvin the evil eye. Her left rear hoof flashed out when he unbuckled the harness. Another finger’s breadth and he could have hired out on Red Lantern Street. But that would have been an accident. In the ten years Cauvin had known her, Flower’s hooves had never struck his flesh, except by accident.
She stood patiently while Cauvin undid the other buckles.
“You’ve got to unharness her first,” he explained to Bec.
The boy was staring at him.
“You heard everything?” Cauvin asked.
“Not everything. Almost.”
“You’re doing a good job of keeping your froggin’ mouth shut. Don’t change.”
“I don’t like her, Cauvin. I try real hard, but I don’t. She’s mean, Cauvin. She treats you mean.”
“I’m mean, too. Comes from how I grew up.”
“You’re not mean, Cauvin, but you’re in trouble, aren’t you?”
“You stay here with Flower,” Cauvin replied, not answering the question.
Soldt and the Torch were talking deep until Soldt saw Cauvin coming closer.
“There is a way to settle this about Leorin,” the Torch began. “If you’re game.”
“Tell me how, first.”
“None of the paths of sorcery are available—not prayer or magic, and witchcraft would require Leorin’s presence in some form, if not her cooperation—”
Witchcraft, Cauvin thought. Wrigglies and Imperials could agree on at least one thing: no witches in Sanctuary. It was froggin’ odd that the Torch would even say the word aloud.
“And we’ve ruled out torture. That leaves the S’danzo.”
“Fortune-tellers!” Cauvin sputtered. If witchcraft was forbidden, then the S‘danzo and their froggin’ painted cards were fit only for sheep-shite fools. “You won’t believe me, but you’d believe some greasy-hair, fat, and addled woman sitting in the dark?”
“If you could find her,” Soldt said, as froggin’ surprised by the notion as Cauvin had been. “The fortune-tellers in this city’s bazaar may be calling themselves S’danzo, but I’m not taking their word for it. According to the S’danzo up and down the coast, Sanctuary’s still cursed as far as they’re concerned, and they’re not coming back until the children of their enemies, and their children’s children are dead and gone.”
That was a revelation about Soldt, and while he was trying to make sense of it, Cauvin nearly missed the Torch’s reply.
“—wil! they know that?—Unless they’ve got eyes and ears in place.”
Soldt hissed through his teeth, which meant Cauvin didn’t have to.
“The Sight’s real,” the Torch insisted. “There’s not many who’ve got it, and few of those can use it, but the Sight’s a gift the gods Themselves envy—The S’danzo won’t worship a god. Clever women. They take their money up front and won’t leave a debt owing past sundown, either. Beyond their cards, there’s nothing they need. No tokens. No powders or spirits. Just ask the question and wait for the answer. I knew a seeress—” he stopped talking suddenly and stared at the ruins. There was nothing there that Cauvin could see. Then, just as suddenly, the old pud started talking again. “She said a question and its answer were twins, born together and inseparable. She heard the question, then looked at her cards and saw the answer.”
“Where can we find this woman?” Soldt asked.
“She died, but there’s another. She won’t scry for gold or silver, but I’ve got a gift that will tempt her. I’ve kept it hidden, waiting for the right time.”
“Where will we find it?” Another question from Soldt.
“Buried in a box beneath the bazaar—”
“Frog all, not another sheep-shite box!”
The Torch paid no attention to Cauvin’s outburst.
“Get me parchment—the boy brought a sheet the other day. I’ll draw you a map … and how to find Elemi. She won’t be glad to see you, but you’ll manage …” The Torch leaned back against the cellar wall. “You’ll manage.”
His eyes fluttered and closed.
“Froggin’ shite—”
They opened.
“You want the truth, don’t you, pud? Get me parchment.”
Chapter Eleven
There was a game Bec had made up at home in the stoneyard when he was left to himself—
In truth, all of Bec’s games were games he’d made up for himself and games he played by himself. His momma didn’t approve of the other youngsters on Pyrtanis Street. She didn’t let him out the gate unless he was with her, or Poppa, or Cauvin. And she would never let him go out with Cauvin if she knew half the places Cauvin took him. The only reason Bec knew anyone his own age was because of Cauvin. Cauvin knew people in every quarter of the city and let Bec roam while he visited with them.
Sure, sometimes Bec broke the rules and sneaked out of the stoneyard when Momma was distracted, but the Pyrtanis youngsters called him a momma’s boy. They teased him with words and sticks. So, mostly, he was a momma’s boy, keeping her happy, waiting for the chance to tag along after Cauvin, and making up games like Are you the one?
The object of the game was simple: pick who among the men and women who visited the stoneyard actually bought stone. Since Bec both made the rules and kept the score, it was easy, but not challenging, to be the champion. To keep himself amused, Bec made the game tougher and tougher until Poppa started asking him, after a potential customer departed—
Is he coming back? Is she going to buy?
Bec hadn’t been wrong in over a year. He’d learned that watching Poppa was as important as watching the strangers. It wasn’t just what people said, it was how they reacted—how close they stood, who leaned forward and who backed away, who told jokes, who laughed, and how. One man’s laugh might sound the same as another’s but mean the opposite because of how the man moved while laughing, or how Poppa stood while listening. Above all, an Are-you-the-one? champion had to pay attention to the little things and keep an open mind. An Are-you-the-one? champion also learned that the game would answer questions that had nothing to do with selling salvaged stone.
At the beginning—before Bec decided he really didn’t want to hear the
conversation—Cauvin, Grandfather, and the stranger named Soldt stood so far apart that they couldn’t have touched fingertips if they’d tried. After Flower got ornery and Cauvin had returned from calming her, the men were, if anything, farther apart than they’d been when Bec ran, but gradually, as their conversation got quieter, they closed ranks. Before long, Cauvin and Soldt were practically rubbing shoulders, as if the two of them made common cause as they talked with Grandfather, who pressed himself against the root-cellar doorway until the very end, when he leaned forward and backed the younger men off.
No surprise, then, that when Grandfather settled back against the doorway as if for a nap, Soldt and Cauvin peeled off together. They headed straight for Bec.
“Get in the cart,” Cauvin ordered when he was close enough for conversation.
Bec leapt to his feet. “Where’re we going?”
“You’re going home.”
“Home?” Bec protested. “I didn’t do anything wrong. I was just trying to help when Flower acted up; you said so yourself. It wasn’t my fault!”
“I didn’t say anything was. We’re not staying out here today, and you’re going back to the stoneyard.”
“That’s not fair! I want to come with you!”
“Forget it.”
“Then, let me stay here—If I go home now, Momma and Poppa will wonder where you’re going when you should be working. Let me stay here, and we can pretend we were all together.” Cauvin didn’t answer immediately, and that got Bec’s curiosity burning. “Where are you going? You’re not going to miss supper, are you? You wouldn’t leave Sanctuary, would you?”
“The boy made a good point,” the stranger said. He had a deep, yet soft, voice, an accent Bec couldn’t place, and a manner unlike any he’d encountered before.