Thieves World tw-1

by Robert Lynn Asprin

  'Molin had business with his kinsman the Prince, and spent the night at the palace. His wife, the Lady Rosanda, stayed home, retired, later came out and complained she could not sleep. She therefore had Danlis wakened. Danlis is no chambermaid; there are plenty of those. She's amanuensis, adviser, confidante, collector of information, ofttimes guide or interpreter - oh, she earns her pay, does my Danlis. Despite she and I having a dawntide engagement, which is why I arrived then, she must now out of bed at Rosanda's whim, to hold milady's hand or take dictation of milady's letters or read to milady from a soothing book but I'm a spendthrift of words. Suffice to say that they two sought an upper chamber which is furnished as both solarium and office. A single staircase leads thither, and it is the single room at the top. There is a balcony, yes; and, the night being warm, the door to it stood open, as well as the windows. But I inspected the facade beneath. That's sheer marble, undecorated save for varying colours, devoid of ivy or of anything that any climber might cling to, save he were a fly.

  'Nevertheless ... just before the east grew pale, shrieks were heard, the watch pelted to the stair and up it. They must break down the inner door, which was bolted. I suppose that was merely against chance interruptions, for nobody had felt threatened. The solarium was in disarray; vases and things were broken; shreds torn off a robe and slight traces of blood lay about. Aye, Danlis, at least, would have resisted. But she and her mistress were gone.

  'A couple of sentries on the garden wall reported hearing a loud sound as of wings. The night was cloudy-dark and they saw nothing for certain. Perhaps they imagined the noise. Suggestive is that the leopards were found cowering in a corner and welcomed their keeper when he would take them back to their cages.

  'And this is the whole of anyone's knowledge, Illyra,' Cappen ended. 'Help me. I pray you, help me get back my love!'

  She was long quiet. Finally she said, in a near whisper, 'It could be a worse matter than I'd care to peer into, let alone enter.'

  'Or it could not,' Cappen urged.

  She gave him a quasi-defiant stare. 'My mother's people reckon it unlucky to do any service for a Shavakh - a person not of their tribe - without recompense. Pledges don't count.'

  Cappen scowled. 'Well, I could go to a pawnshop and - But no, time may be worth more than rubies. From the depths of unhappiness, his grin broke forth. 'Poems also are valuable, right? You S'danzo have your ballads and love ditties. Let me indite a poem, Illyra, that shall be yours alone.' Her expression quickened. 'Truly?'

  'Truly. Let me think ... Aye, we'll begin thus.' And, venturing to take her hands in his, Cappen murmured:

  'My lady comes to me like break of day. I dream in darkness if it chance she tarries, Until the banner other brightness harries The hosts of Shadowland from off the way-'

  She jerked free and cried, 'No! You scoundrel, that has to be something you did for Danlis - or for some earlier woman you wanted in your bed -'

  'But it isn't finished,' he argued. 'I'll complete it for you, Illyra.'

  Anger left her. She shook her head, clicked her tongue, and sighed. 'No matter. You're incurably yourself. And I ... am only halfS'danzo. I'll attempt your spell.'

  'By every love goddess I ever heard of,' he promised unsteadily, 'you shall indeed have your own poem after this is over.'

  'Be still,' she ordered. 'Fend off anybody who comes near.'

  He faced about and drew his sword. The slim, straight blade was hardly needed, for no other enterprise had site within several yards of hei-s, and as wide a stretch of paving lay between him and the fringes of the crowd. Still, to grasp the hilt gave him a sense of finally making progress. He had felt helpless for the first' hours, hopeless, as if his dear had actually died instead of - of what? Behind him he heard cards riffled, dice cast, words softly wailed.

  All at once Illyra strangled a shriek. He whirled about and saw how the blood had left her olive countenance, turning it grey. She hugged herself and shuddered.

  'What's wrong?' he blurted in fresh terror.

  She did not look at him. 'Go away,' she said in a thin voice. 'Forget you ever knew that woman.'

  'But - but what -'

  'Go away, I told you! Leave me alone!'

  Then somehow she relented enough to let forth: 'I don't know. I dare not know. I'm just a little half-breed girl who has a few cantrips and a tricksy second sight, and - and I saw that this business goes outside of space and time, and a power beyond any magic is there - Enas Yorl could tell more, but he himself -' Her courage broke. 'Go away!' she screamed. 'Before I shout for Dubro and his hammer!'

  'I beg your pardon,' Cappen Varra said, and made haste to obey.

  He retreated into the twisting streets of the Maze. They were narrow; most of the mean buildings around him were high; gloom already filled the quarter. It was as if he had stumbled into the same night where Danlis had gone ... Danlis, creature of sun and horizons... If she lived, did she remember their last time together as he remembered it, a dream dreamed centuries ago?

  Having the day free, she had wanted to explore the countryside north of town. Cappen had objected on three counts. The first he did not mention; that it would require a good deal of effort, and he would get dusty and sweaty and saddle sore. She despised men who were not at least as vigorous as she was, unless they compensated by being venerable and learned.

  The second he hinted at. Sleazy though most of Sanctuary was, he knew places within it where a man and a woman could enjoy themselves, comfortably, privately - his apartment, for instance. She smiled her negation. Her family belonged to the old aristocracy ofRanke, not the newly rich, and she had been raised in its austere tradition. Albeit her father had fallen on evil times and she had been forced to take service, she kept her pride, and proudly would she yield her maidenhead to her bridegroom. Thus far she had answered Cappen's ardent declarations with the admission that she liked him and enjoyed his company and wished he would change the subject. (Buxom Lady Rosanda seemed as if she might be more approachable, but there he was careful to maintain a cheerful correctness.) He did believe she was getting beyond simple enjoyment, for her patrician reserve seemed less each time they saw each other. Yet she could not altogether have forgotten that he was merely the bastard of a minor nobleman in a remote country, himself disinherited and a footloose minstrel.

  His third objection he dared say forth. While the hinterland was comparatively safe, Molin Torchholder would be furious did he learn that a woman of his household had gone escorted by a single armed man, and he no professional fighter. Molin would probably have been justified, too. Danlis smiled again and said, 'I could ask a guardsman off duty to come along. But you have interesting friends, Cappen. Perhaps a warrior is among them?'

  As a matter of fact, he knew any number, but doubted she would care to meet them - with a single exception. Luckily, Jamie the Red had no prior commitment, and agreed to join the party. Cappen told the kitchen staff to pack a picnic hamper for four.

  Jamie's girls stayed behind; this was not their sort of outing, and sun might harm their complexions. Cappen thought it a bit ungracious of the Northerner never to share them. That put him, Cappen, to considerable expense in the Street of Red Lanterns, since he could scarcely keep a paramour of his own while wooing Danlis. Otherwise he was fond of Jamie. They had met after Rosanda, chancing to hear the minstrel sing, had invited him to perform at the mansion, and then invited him back, and presently Cappen was living in the Jeweller's Quarter. Jamie had an apartment near by.

  Three horses and a pack mule clopped out of Sanctuary in the new-born morning, to a jingle of harness bells. That merriment found no echo in Cappen's head; he had been drinking past midnight, and in no case enjoyed rising before noon. Passive, he listened to Jamie: '- Aye, milady, they're mountaineers where I hail from, poor folk but free folk. Some might call us barbarians, but that might be unwise in our hearing. For we've tales, songs, laws, ways, gods as old as any in the world, and as good. We lack much of your Southern lore, b
ut how much of ours do you ken? Not that I boast, please understand. I've seen wonders in my wanderings. But I do say we've a few wonders of our own at home.'

  'I'd like to hear of them,' Danlis responded. 'We know almost nothing about your country in the Empire - hardly more than mentions in the chronicles of Venafer and Mattathan, or the Natural History of Kahayavesh. How do you happen to come here?'

  'Oh-ah, I'm a younger son of our king, and I thought I'd see a bit of the world before settling down. Not that I packed any wealth along to speak of. But what with one thing and another, hiring out hither and yon for this or that, I get by.' Jamie paused. 'You, uh, you've far more to tell, milady. You're from the crown city of the Empire, and you've got book learning, and at the same time you come out to see for yourself what land and rocks and plants and animals are like.'

  Cappen decided he had better get into the conversation. Not that Jamie would undercut a friend, nor Danlis be unduly attracted by a wild highlander. Neverthless -

  Jamie wasn't bad-looking in his fashion. He was huge, topping Cappen by a head and disproportionately wide in the shoulders. His loose-jointed appearance was deceptive, as the bard had learned when they sported in a public gymnasium; those were heavy bones and oak-hard muscles. A spectacular red mane drew attention from boyish face, mild blue eyes, and slightly diffident manner. Today he was plainly clad, in tunic and cross-gaitered breeks; but the knife at his belt and the axe at his saddlebow stood out.

  As for Danlis, well, what could a poet do but struggle for words which might embody a ghost of her glory? She was tall and slender, her features almost cold in their straight-lined perfection and alabaster hue - till you observed the big grey eyes, golden hair piled on high, curve of lips whence came that husky voice. (How often he had lain awake yearning for her lips! He would console himself by remembering the strong, delicately blue-veined hand that she did let him kiss.) Despite waxing warmth and dust puffed up from the horses' hoofs, her cowled riding habit remained immaculate and no least dew of sweat was on her skin.

  By the time Cappen got his wits out of the blankets wherein they had still been snoring, talk had turned to gods. Danlis was curious about those of Jamie's country, as she was about most things. (She did shun a few subjects as being unwholesome.) Jamie in his turn was eager to have her explain what was going on in Sanctuary. 'I've heard but the one side of the matter, and Cappen's indifferent to it,' he said. 'Folk grumble about your master - Molin, is that his name -?'

  'He is not my master,' Danlis made clear. 'I am a free woman who assists his wife. He himself is a high priest in Ranke, also an engineer.'

  'Why is the Emperor angering Sanctuary? Most places I've been, colonial governments know better. They leave the local gods be.'

  Danlis grew pensive. 'Where shall I start? Doubtless you know that Sanctuary was originally a city of the kingdom of Ilsig. Hence it has built temples to the gods of Ilsig - notably Ils, Lord of Lords, and his queen Shipri the All-Mother, but likewise others - Anen of the Harvests, Thufir the tutelary of pilgrims -'

  'But none to Shalpa, patron of thieves,' Cappen put in, 'though these days he has the most devotees of any.'

  Danlis ignored his jape. 'Ranke was quite a different country, under quite different gods,' she continued. 'Chief of these are Savankala the Thunderer, his consort Sabellia, Lady of Stars, their son Vashanka the Ten-Slayer, and his sister and consort Azyuna - gods of storm and war. According to Venafer, it was they who made Ranke supreme at last. Mattathan is more prosaic and opines that the martial spirit they inculcated was responsible for the Rankan Empire finally taking Ilsig into itself.'

  'Yes, milady, yes, I've heard this,' Jamie said, while Cappen reflected that if his beloved had a fault, it was her tendency to lecture.

  'Sanctuary has changed from of yore,' she proceeded. Tt has become polyglot, turbulent, corrupt, a canker on the body politic. Among its most vicious elements are the proliferating alien cults, not to speak of necromancers, witches, charlatans, and similar predators on the people. The time is overpast to restore law here. Nothing less than the Imperium can do that. A necessary preliminary is the establishment of the Imperial deities, the gods of Ranke, for everyone to see: symbol, rallying point, and actual presence.'

  'But they have their temples,' Jamie argued.

  'Small, dingy, to accommodate Rankans, few of whom stay in the city for long,' Danlis retorted. 'What reverence does that inspire, for the pantheon and the state? No, the Emperor has decided that Savankala and Sabellia must have the greatest fane, the most richly endowed, in this entire province. Molin Torchholder will build and consecrate it. Then can the degenerates and warlocks be scourged out of Sanctuary. Afterwards the Prince-Governor can handle common felons.'

  Cappen didn't expect matters would be that simple. He got no chance to say so, for Jamie asked at once, 'Is this wise, milady? True, many a soul hereabouts worships foreign gods, or none. But many still adore the old gods of Ilsig. They look on your, uh, Savankala as an intruder. I intend no offence, but they do. They're outraged that he's to have a bigger and grander house than Ils of the Thousand Eyes. Some fear what Ils may do about it.'

  'I know,' Danlis said. 'I regret any distress caused, and I'm sure Lord Molin does too. Still, we must overcome the agents of darkness, before the disease that they are spreads throughout the Empire.'

  'Oh, no,' Cappen managed to insert, 'I've lived here awhile, mostly down in the Maze. I've had to do with a good many so-called magicians, of either sex or in between. They aren't that bad. Most I'd call pitiful. They just use their little deceptions to scrabble out what living they can, in this crumbly town where life has trapped them.'

  Danlis gave him a sharp glance. 'You've told me people think ill of sorcery in Caronne,' she said.

  'They do,' he admitted. 'But that's because we incline to be rationalists, who consider nearly all magic a bag of tricks. Which is true. Why, I've learned a few sleights myself.'

  'You have?' Jamie rumbled in surprise.

  'For amusement,' Cappen said hastily, before Danlis could disapprove. 'Some are quite elegant, virtual exercises in three-dimensional geometry.' Seeing interest kindle in her, he added, 'I studied mathematics in boyhood; my father, before he died, wanted me to have a gentleman's education. The main part has rusted away in me, but I remember useful or picturesque details.'

  'Well, give us a show, come luncheon time,' Jamie proposed.

  Cappen did, when they halted. That was on a hillside above the White Foal River. It wound gleaming through farmlands whose intense green denied that desert lurked on the rim of sight. The noonday sun baked strong odours out of the earth: humus, resin, juice of wild plants. A solitary plane tree graciously gave shade. Bees hummed.

  After the meal, and after Danlis had scrambled off to get a closer look at a kind of lizard new to her, Cappen demonstrated his skill. She was especially taken - enchanted - by his geometric artifices. Like any Rankan lady, she carried a sewing kit in her gear; and being herself, she had writing materials along. Thus he could apply scissors and thread to paper. He showed how a single ring may be cut to produce two. that are interlocked, and how a strip may be twisted to have but one surface and one edge, and whatever else he knew. Jamie watched with pleasure, if with less enthusiasm.

  Observing how delight made her glow, Cappen was inspired to carry on the latest poem he was composing for her. It had been slower work than usual. He had the conceit, the motif, a comparison of her to the dawn, but hitherto only the first few lines had emerged, and no proper structure. In this moment -

  - the banner of her brightness harries The hosts of Shadowland from off the way That she now wills to tread - for what can stay The triumph of that radiance she carries?

  Yes, it was clearly going to be a rondel. Therefore the next two lines were:

  My lady comes to me like break of day. I dream in darkness if it chance she tarries.

  He had gotten that far when abruptly she said: 'Cappen, this is such a fine excursion, suc
h splendid scenery. I'd like to watch sunrise over the river tomorrow. Will you escort me?'

  Sunrise? But she was telling Jamie, 'We need not trouble you about that. I had in mind a walk out of town to the bridge. If we choose the proper route, it's well guarded everywhere, perfectly safe.'

  And scant traffic moved at that hour; besides, the monumental statues along the bridge stood in front of bays which they screened from passers-by - 'Oh, yes, indeed, Danlis, I'd love to,' Cappen said. For such an opportunity, he could get up before cockcrow.

  - When he reached the mansion, she had not been there.

  Exhausted after his encounter with Illyra, Cappen hied him to the Vulgar Unicorn and related his woes to One-Thumb. The big man had come on shift at the inn early, for a fellow boniface had not yet recovered from the effects of a dispute with a patron. (Shortly thereafter, the patron was found floating face down under a pier. Nobody questioned One-Thumb about this; his regulars knew that he preferred the establishment safe, if not always orderly.) He offered taciturn sympathy and the loan of a bed upstairs. Cappen scarcely noticed the insects that shared it.

  Waking about sunset, he found water and a washcloth, and felt much refreshed hungry and thirsty, too. He made his way to the taproom below. Dusk was blue in windows and open door, black under the rafters. Candles smeared weak light along counter and main board and on lesser tables at the walls. The air had grown cool, which allayed the stenches of the Maze. Thus Cappen was acutely aware of the smells of beer - old in the rushes underfoot, fresh where a trio of men had settled down to guzzle - and of spitted meat, wafting from the kitchen.

  One-Thumb approached, a shadowy hulk save for highlights on his bald pate. 'Sit,' he grunted. 'Eat. Drink.' He carried a great tankard and a plate bearing a slab of roast beef on bread. These he put on a corner table, and himself on a chair.

  Cappen sat also and attacked the meal. 'You're very kind,' he said between bites and draughts.