by Paula Volsky
The current quickened, the tight-packed throng loosened, and she could breathe—and even see—again. The wharf was littered with fallen Lanthians; wounded or dead, she couldn’t judge their condition or their number, for the press of the crowd swept her along irresistibly. Gunfire popped, panic flared, and the mob convulsed. A violent shove from behind sent Luzelle crashing against her nearest neighbor, who thrust her violently aside. She staggered, but stayed on her feet. Should she fall in the midst of that stampede, she would not rise again.
The retreat accelerated. She glanced back over her shoulder and saw a grey-clad squadron ranged across the wharf, advancing steadily to drive the mob from the site of the execution. Those citizens unwisely attempting resistance were being shot or bayoneted by the dozen. Those so unfortunate as to lose their footing were simply trampled.
Murderers. Barbarians. Even in the thick of that chaos she did not dare so much as whisper the words aloud. How easy it was to learn fear, but then, how proficient the teachers.
The crowd was streaming along the dock, driven on by the bullets speeding inches overhead and by the staccato commands of the Grewzian shepherds. To the right, an alleyway running between two warehouses beckoned, and a human torrent poured into the opening.
She was off the wharf and running along some nameless little avenue. As she went, the way widened, divided, turned itself into a little market square, broke into crossroads, greened into a public garden, then narrowed and re-formed as a path edging one of the countless canals. At each intersection the fleeing mob split and thinned until at last there was no more mob, no more rage and terror boiling through the streets, and she found herself walking alongside the water through a world miraculously tranquil.
Luzelle paused. A few feet away a stand of flowering trees shaded a public bench, currently unoccupied. She went to the bench and let herself sink down upon it, noticing for the first time that she somehow retained her death grip upon the valise containing her passport, clothing, and money. Throughout the upheaval some unnoticed corner of her brain had apparently retained practicality. She set the valise beside her on the bench, and saw that her hands were trembling. Her heart raced and her lungs screamed, but she could hardly draw breath, for the steel stays of her corset compressed her mercilessly. Ridiculous that women should submit themselves to such torture, ridiculous and not to be borne. She herself would certainly rebel, should have done so years ago, but now was not the time to be planning sartorial revolt, not now when her head swam, her vision dimmed, and she felt herself on the verge of fainting. Absurd, she never fainted, she wasn’t the type, and yet the world around her was oddly fogged and distant, and it might not be a bad idea to shut her eyes for a moment or two.
Elbow propped on the arm of the bench, she rested her head on her hand, allowed her lids to fall, and drank deeply of the springtime air. Soon her giddiness subsided, but the closed eyes were a mistake, for the images blazing through her mind sharpened. She saw the old man sink beneath the harbor waters, saw the grey soldiers firing upon the crowd, heard the Grewzian guns speak, heard the screams of pain and terror, saw the dead and wounded fall, smelled the blood and fear.
There was moisture upon her face, cold sweat and hot tears. Her shoulders shook. She would break down completely in a moment, another weakness she could not afford, so she sought refuge in anger.
Those Grewzians—the filthiest scum of the world, guilty of atrocities beside which the innocent savageries of the Bhomiri Islanders paled to insignificance. Cruel, murderous, pitiless, relentless—the very worst of humankind. Today she had learned how to hate them.
“Miss Devaire? You are ill?”
The words were spoken in Vonahrish. The voice was concerned, foreign, and familiar. She looked up and blinked, momentarily dazzled by the sunlight lancing through her tears, to behold the wavery outline of a tall figure topped with gold. Wiping her eyes with the back of her hand, she muttered in disbelief, “Karsler?”
His face changed a little, and she wondered if her free use of his first name surprised or offended him. Certainly the Judge would have deplored such impropriety, but it had slipped out and she couldn’t apologize without looking worse than ever.
Perhaps the presumption failed to annoy him, for his look of concern deepened and his query transmuted to a statement. “You are ill. Allow me to assist you.”
“No. Thank you,” she returned, torn between gratitude at his kindness and anger at the sight of his grey uniform. “I am quite well, truly.”
“I think not.” He studied her. “You will recover presently, but for now you should not be alone.”
She had nothing to say to that. She did not really want to be alone, sick and faint on a park bench in a foreign city. On the other hand, she hardly relished the society of a Grewzian officer, although she found herself tempted to make an exception in his case. But the point was academic, for he clearly did not intend to leave her.
“There are smelling salts in your valise?” Karsler inquired.
“No. I never thought I’d need any. I’m not usually so wobbly.”
“Wobbly? My Vonahrish is imperfect, but I believe I understand you. Today, however, you are wobbly, and surely not without cause.” He was eyeing her very intently, as if to read the mind behind the face. “There was a riot breaking out upon the dock, just as the Grandlandsman and I departed. Were you caught in the midst of that disturbance? Roughly handled and alarmed, perhaps?”
“Yes.” Raising her head, she met his gaze squarely. “Your countrymen were there, drowning an elderly civilian.”
“A convicted saboteur, I have heard. Such terrorists murder indiscriminately, and their suppression—harsh though it may seem—ultimately saves lives.”
“Perhaps. But many present believed this particular sacrificial victim innocent. When they ventured to object, the soldiers fired on the crowd.”
“As I understand it, my compatriots were attacked by an armed mob. This being so, they were obliged to defend themselves. I do not mean to discount the importance of this matter, nor do I deny its tragic nature. But it is certain that the troops had no choice.”
“The Lanthians were armed with pebbles and refuse, nothing more.”
“It is reported that many carried firearms.”
“Reported?”
“The news has spread through the city in a matter of minutes.”
“But you were not there to see for yourself?”
“No. I did not see for myself.”
“How did that happen, Overcommander?”
“You knew my name, a minute ago.”
She repressed a smile at that. And what sort of woman would even think of smiling at such a time? No doubt the Judge could have told her. Without acknowledging his remark she continued, “I don’t understand how you got away so quickly. I know I was one of the first off the Karavise to reach the customs office, and I didn’t see you there, but you’re saying that you passed through before me, and were already leaving the wharf, when—”
“No,” he told her calmly, but a shadow of constraint darkened his eyes. “I was not obliged to pass through customs. In view of our nationality, the grandlandsman’s title, and my own commission, the requirement was waived in our case.”
“I see.” She looked away. Unfair.
“Unfair.” He nodded. “Yes, it is quite unfair, and yet I believe that these inequities of political fortune may yet balance themselves, before the race is run.”
“Are you always so telepathic?”
“I am not telepathic. Only sometimes, I can make a fairly good guess.”
“Better than fairly good. How do you do that?”
“As you have asked me if I am always so telepathic, I think I may ask you if you are always so inquisitive.”
“Afraid so.”
“I am glad to hear it. You satisfy my hopes, along with my expectations.”
Tell me your hopes, your expectations. She stifled the natural response. He was a Grewzian, after all.
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“I cannot account for all of this,” she compromised.
“All of—?”
“This. Such a meeting, in the middle of a great city, by mere chance. It’s improbable.”
“You are displeased?”
“Only surprised.”
“The surprise does not appear to disagree with you. The color has come back into your face. Your eyes are clear and bright, very bright indeed, like night signals. You are looking quite wonderfully alive.”
“I am?” she asked, absurdly pleased, then recollected herself. “But why are you here at all, Overcommander—Karsler? Shall I regard this meeting as coincidence alone?”
“No,” he replied, to her surprise. “Not quite coincidence. I was attracted to this place, at this time, for reasons I can hardly define. Sometimes it happens that way—that is, there is the pull, the sense of nameless demand that draws me where it will, when it will. The purpose of such a summons is rarely apparent, but when it comes, it is not to be denied.”
“But how extraordinary,” she replied noncommittally, and sat silent for a moment, trying to decide whether or not she believed him. His remark bordered on the fantastic, yet he had no reason to lie, unless he simply sought to impress a credulous female.
“Yes, I agree—it sounds a very idle claim indeed,” Karsler conceded.
Luzelle managed to repress her guilty start, but felt the telltale color heat her cheeks. He’d needed no telepathy to divine her reaction—she knew from dismal lifelong experience that she had a face all too easy to read. She forced herself to meet his eyes, and saw that he was smiling—a smile of amusement that had nothing at all of mockery or superiority about it, unlike the sneers wont to bend the formerly-Exalted lips of Master Girays v’Alisante.
“But I wouldn’t presume to dismiss it,” she told him, and found that she meant what she said. “However it may have happened, I’m lucky to meet you here. But now I need impose on your patience and generosity no longer, for I’m quite recovered.”
“I believe that you are, or nearly so. I hope I do not presume too greatly in asking what you will do next?”
“Do?” She frowned, taken aback. “Why, I hadn’t really thought about it. Go back to the waterfront, I suppose. I need to buy a steamer ticket to Aeshno, and then—”
“It is not yet safe to return to the wharf. Quite likely, all civilians have been barred from the area. In any case all commercial enterprises there, including the ticketing agencies, are certain to be shut down for the next several hours, at the very least.”
“Well, then there must be someplace in town where I can book passage. Perhaps through one of the better hotels—”
“I do not think so. I have already inquired at the Prendivet Hotel, without success. May I offer a suggestion?”
“Of course.”
“I left the grandlandsman in the restaurant at the Prendivet. Come back there with me now for lunch. The nourishment will do you good, I suspect. By the time you have finished eating, the wharf establishments may have reopened for business. If they have not, you may contemplate your next move at leisure, and in comfort. You lose nothing by the delay, for all the Grand Ellipse contestants present in Lanthi Ume are equally inconvenienced.”
Quite right. Everyone was in the same boat, or rather, not in the boat. There was some comfort in that. And lunch in Lanthi Ume with Karsler Stornzof—not an unattractive prospect, even if he was Grewzian. But he wasn’t like the rest of them, she told herself firmly. Karsler was different.
“Is the Prendivet Hotel far from here?” Luzelle inquired.
“Not at all. A hired boat could carry us there in ten minutes. Or perhaps you would prefer to walk?”
“Yes, let’s walk. That’s always the best way to experience a new city. You just sort of absorb it through the soles of your feet.”
“I will take your word for it. I must confess, I’ve little experience in traveling for pleasure.”
“Oh, then you find such things frivolous?”
“I find such things—astonishing.”
“You sound like a visitor from some other world.”
“That is not such a bad description.”
“What do you mean?”
“Ah, that is a solemn subject, best left for another day. For now, let us enjoy the city and its sights, let us—absorb through the soles of our feet.”
For a moment she half expected him to offer his arm, then reminded herself that the occasion was quasi-social at best. They moved off together, and the city around them was splendid in the sunlight, despite the conspicuous presence of foreign troops. Their conversation was innocuous—for by mutual unspoken consent they avoided potentially dangerous issues—but enjoyable, easy, and, to Luzelle, distinctly novel. She had encountered a variety of celebrated men in the course of her travels, but never one so genuinely unaware of the power of his own fame and appearance as Karsler Stornzof. He didn’t seem to regard himself as a hero, as a celebrity, or indeed as anything more than an ordinary officer of the Grewzian Imperium. Hard to believe, yet she could detect nothing of false modesty in his attitude. Similarly he appeared unconscious of the countless feminine eyes following him as he walked along the path.
And his effect on Luzelle Devaire?
This head is not easily turned, she assured herself. And I have a race to win.
They came to an intersection and he guided her to the left, along a narrow way lined with odd, old-fashioned little shops and booths. Her feet stopped of their own accord before one of them, and it took her consciousness a moment to understand why.
It was an ordinary pawnshop, small and dingy, indistinguishable from countless others of similar ilk infesting every major city. Certainly there was nothing distinctive to be glimpsed in the window display. Just the usual sad and dusty collection of other people’s lost treasures; plenty of jewelry, watches, silver, china, crystal, musical instruments, expensive monogrammed shaving implements, ornaments, fancy spurs and whips, ornate ceremonial swords and daggers, a couple of big service revolvers …
It was the revolvers, she realized, that had halted her. Suddenly she was back again at Glozh Station, and the two Grewzian soldiers were dragging her from the platform. She could hear their voices and feel their hands on her, she could taste her own outraged fear, and she remembered her promise to herself that she would never again travel without a loaded pistol. Now was the time to fulfill that vow.
“You wish to enter?” Karsler asked.
“Yes.” She turned to look up at him, and forced herself to add, “I mean to purchase a gun, for my own protection.”
Now she would have to endure his disapproval, or worse, his patronage. Beyond doubt he’d inform her that possession of a lethal weapon could only maximize her own danger. She wouldn’t know how to handle a gun properly, or if by any chance she managed to learn, then the knowledge would hysterically flee her mind at some critical moment. She would end up shooting herself or some innocent bystander. Or else some male aggressor far stronger, quicker, and more resolute than she would simply take the weapon away from her, snatch it right out of her hand before she could remember to squeeze the trigger, and then where would she be? She had heard the entire condescending lecture more than once, and she was not inclined to listen to it again.
Karsler surprised her.
“That is a sound thought,” he observed, almost sadly. “In such a world as this you must stand prepared to defend yourself. I cannot deny the necessity. Do you know much of handguns?”
“Not a great deal,” she admitted. “But I’m thinking that those two there in the window look pretty useful.”
“The revolvers—yes, very useful indeed. But a little large and heavy to suit your needs, perhaps. Would you not prefer a weapon that you can carry easily and inconspicuously—in a pocket, or possibly in your reticule?”
“That’s just what I need.”
“Then let us see what this shop has to offer.”
They entered, and found the musty
dimness within inhabited by the wizened proprietress, a woman with a face seamed and shriveled as a desiccated apple. There were no other customers in evidence, and it was easy to fancy that no other customers had set foot on the premises within the past decade or so.
Luzelle stated her requirements. Following a brief, astonished glance, the pawnbroker produced a tray of assorted handguns and set it down before her.
She studied the collection with an air of businesslike competence designed to camouflage total ignorance. What was there to choose among them? They all fired bullets, didn’t they?
“This one looks … convenient,” she decided, attracted to the smallest and most decorative of the weapons. It was tiny enough to fit in the palm of her hand, very light in weight, with a mother-of-pearl grip laced with golden traceries. A woman’s gun, unmistakably.
“You might carry it easily,” Karsler agreed, “but you would find it effective only at the very shortest range, and then only if you hit the target in a vital area. Otherwise—a flea bite.”
“I see.” Luzelle returned the pretty midget to the tray and chose another, an interesting six-barreled piece with a pierced butt. “This one seems quite formidable.”
“Perhaps, in some respects. But that design is awkward in its action, it is seriously muzzle-heavy, and you would find it difficult to hold an aim.”
“Oh. Muzzle-heavy. Yes.” She put it back.
“If you will permit me to offer a recommendation—”
“Please do!”
“The Khrennisov FK6.” Noting her look of incomprehension, he pointed. “This one. An excellent short-range weapon designed for self-defense. Compact, small enough to carry in your pocket, shoots accurately, and with great force. The Khrennisov should serve your purposes admirably.”
“You think?” She hefted the pocket pistol experimentally. It lay small but assertive in her hand, and it made her feel brave. She decided that she liked it. “I’ll take it, then.”
“You will not regret your decision.”
She paid the pawnbroker’s price without haggling, in appreciation whereof the old woman threw in a small box half full of ammunition, presumably furnished by the Khrennisov’s former owner.