Swan's Braid and Other Tales of Terizan

by Tanya Huff

  "Oh, this place can't do people. People have substance."

  "But the Hunter…"

  "The thing I destroyed?" He smiled down at her. "The Hunter, that's a good name for it." His voice did everything but pat her on the head. Terizan found herself wanting to slap him which was probably not a good idea all things considered. "The Hunter came from Zafran's anger, created over his years of exile. He'll be glad it's gone." A soft, condescending clucking of his tongue acted as punctuation. "He always did have trouble controlling his anger."

  They were at the gate, almost to safety. Terizan glanced back over her shoulder and nearly tread on the edge of the wizard's robe as she followed him through the gap in the wall. "What about the third wizard? What happened to him?"

  "Her." His expression contained only gentle admonishment. "You're very curious. You do know what curiosity killed?"

  "I thought you liked cats."

  Thief-mouse-cat.

  "That's right, I do."

  ***

  They stepped through the mirror together.

  Ahmalayz clutched at her apron pocket with one hand and jabbed an indignant finger toward Terizan with the other. "You stole the amulet!"

  Terizan shrugged. It seemed pointless to deny it with the proof draped around the wizard's neck.

  "You stole my amulet?"

  Stealing from wizards. Not a good thing. Getting caught stealing from wizards. A worse thing. She walked over to the window, trying to look as though the possibility of going out it hadn't even begun to cross her mind. "If I hadn't stolen the amulet, we wouldn't have made it back. The Hunter would have taken me and… the other guy would have re-taken you."

  "But your intent…"

  "Was to get us both out of the mirror in one piece."

  "You're not lying to me." He sounded pleasantly surprised. "All right then. How much do I owe you for… stealing me from Zafran."

  She stared out the window, comforted by the sounds rising up from the city. "You don't. I did it for the challenge."

  "She's the best thief in Oreen." Ahmalayz had a sneer in her voice, but the wizard only nodded.

  "Then because debts are an uncomfortable thing to have hanging about, let me give you a bit of advice in exchange for your rescue. My rescue. The rescue."

  With one last look at the cloud cover between her and the stars, Terizan turned to find the pale grey eyes locked on hers. The sweat running suddenly down her sides had nothing to do with the oppressive heat.

  "Zafran," he said, one hand lightly touching the mirror, "was believed to be the best wizard in Oreen."

  ***

  "You didn't get it? I thought you were the best?" Two sneered.

  Terizan shrugged.

  "Council won't pay for your failure!" Three snapped. "We'll have to send someone else to get the anchor."

  About to point out that no one else stood even half a chance at success – or she'd have never gone in the first place – Terizan found her words drowned out by a sudden crash of thunder. It echoed down the long, narrow stairs that connected the Inner Sanctum with the world above, it vibrated in the shelves of scrolls and it brought with it a cool breeze and the sound of rain.

  One steepled her fingers and frowned. "It seems the spell has been removed regardless."

  "We could tell them our thief was successful, thus the rain."

  Terizan frowned. Did Tribune Three just say thus?

  "No." Jowls wobbling, he continued, negating his own suggestion. "The Council wanted the artifact themselves. They have a minor spell caster on staff; she was going to test it. It's sad, but they don't trust us."

  "Then we could…"

  Terizan left them to their arguing. In the end they'd tell the Council that they'd been unable to complete the job because, in the end, thieves couldn't also be liars or the whole system fell apart.

  It wouldn’t be long before the rest of the guild knew she'd failed. She hadn't been caught, but neither had she stolen the item she'd been sent to steal.

  That the item didn't exist was irrelevant.

  Terizan could have asked for a minor artifact from the wizard's workroom, a trinket the Council would have believed was the anchor, but then the Council would have assumed things could be stolen from the wizard and the next time they suspected him of interfering they'd have had another commission for the Thieves' Guild. And the guild would have come to her.

  Now they – Council and guild – would leave the wizard alone.

  More importantly, they'd leave her alone. At least as far as stealing from wizards was concerned.

  From the speculative glances that followed her across the common room, the whispers of her failure had already begun.

  After a nap, she'd console herself with some shopping, having stopped on her way back to the Guild House and fenced the string of gold skulls and thumb-sized emerald she'd taken from Zafran's workshop. By now, the skulls had been melted down and the emerald become part of a jeweller's inventory on the Street of Glass.

  "Zafran was believed to be the best wizard in Oreen."

  And look where he ended up.

  Sometimes, Terizan stole to make a point.

  Sometimes to right a wrong.

  Sometimes because she really hated to be dicked around.

  And, sometimes, just because she was the best thief in Oreen.

  Even if only she and Zafran knew it.

  AUTHOR'S NOTE ON "THE THINGS EVERYONE KNOWS"

  When asked to write a story for the theme anthology, Under Cover of Darkness, a Terizan story seemed to be the obvious choice. Thieves, after all, work mostly at night. This story, the last story in this collection, links back to “Swan's Braid” – the first story in the collection – at a couple of different points. Not only does a character essential to the plot of “Swan's Braid” reappear, but there's a thematic congruence as well. When Swan asked Terizan if a thief could steal through sentry lines, she was acknowledging that thieves, particularly good thieves, can steal much more than merely pretty baubles. And, as everyone knows, Terizan is a very good thief.

  THE THINGS EVERYONE KNOWS

  "But I'm a thief."

  "Why so you are. It's interesting that never occurred to us, what with this being the Thieves' Guild and all."

  Terizan's lip curled in spite of all efforts to keep her expression neutral. Tribune One's lip curled in return. Tribunes Two and Three shuffled their seats out of the direct line of fire as surreptitiously as only master thieves could shuffle. Gaze locked on One's face, Terizan's right brow flicked up.

  One laughed.

  When that was it for confrontation, Two and Three exchanged nearly identical expressions of chagrin.

  What they'd missed, and what One hadn't, was that Terizan had no intention of becoming part of the Thieves' Guild Tribunal, at least not yet. Granted, she'd been taking reading lessons on the Street of Tales but she wasn't ready to make an irreversible challenge to the Tribunal's authority. Besides, the thought of spending any significant amount of time in close proximity to Tribune Three and the scent of sandalwood oil he'd recently started rubbing into his skin turned her stomach. Tribune Three had a lot of skin and that meant an overpowering amount of sandalwood.

  "The job you're talking about," she continued, scratching her nose to keep from sneezing, "is a job for a spy."

  "And what is a thief but one who steals in and then steals out again holding something belonging to another. In this instance, the something is information. Otherwise there is no difference." Tribune Two sounded more emotionless than usual – probably in an effort to make up for the earlier reaction.

  "It's simple," Tribune One sighed, lacing ringless fingers together. "If the rumours are true and there actually is a conspiracy to overthrow the Council, you steal into one of their meetings then you steal out with the names of those involved."

  "If," Tribune Three snorted.

  "The Council is convinced…" Two began.

  "The Council has its collective head so far up i
ts collective ass that it’s run out of air," Three interrupted.

  "Tribune Three has a point," Terizan noted. "What if the Council's wrong? What if there is no conspiracy?"

  "Then bring them proof of that."

  "Proof of nothing?"

  "That should be no problem for a thief of your skills," One said, not bothering to hide her smirk. "Unless your failure at the wizard's tower has shaken your confidence."

  She was never going to live that failure down. That she'd succeeded at the wizard's tower was beside the point since no one could know of it. "I'm not questioning my skills; I'm questioning the Council's requirements."

  Two's pale eyes narrowed. "Rumours of conspiracy make the Council understandably paranoid. If this matter isn't settled conclusively, they will begin making random arrests. They've already hired another two dozen constables."

  "We don't need to tell you that increased security will adversely affect our membership," One added. "Of course, you may refuse the job…"

  Terizan held up a hand and slid off the pile of stolen carpets that seemed to be a permanent fixture in the Sanctum. "If I turn down the job, you'll offer it to a thief with lesser skills who'll get caught and probably killed and I'll be responsible and blah blah blah. We've been through this all before."

  "If you turn down the job," Two told her, voice cold, "we'll offer it to a thief who might be less than scrupulous about the names he or she offers the Council. Who might add names to the list for personal reasons."

  The pause after this declaration was triumphant.

  "Did the council give you any idea where I should start looking for this conspiracy?" she sighed.

  "They've heard rumours of meetings in the Necropolis. You have three days."

  ***

  The Necropolis was haunted. Everyone knew that. From all reports, the winding paths that lead from the gate to the top of the hill were as busy with the restless dead as Butcher's Row was with the living on market day. Only the lowest plateau down by the river where the very poor were buried in trenched graves remained untouched by ghostly activity.

  Terizan figured the very poor were probably glad of a chance to finally rest.

  She'd never seen a ghost. Mostly because she never went to the Necropolis, a decision of a very early Council having made sure the dead had nothing worth stealing.

  "When it has been decided by a physician of Oreen that in death the citizen shall pose no danger to the city, then the body shall be wrapped in an unbleached cotton shroud and laid to rest in that part of Oreen designated for the dead."

  The City of the Dead; where the wealthy built mausoleums like mansions and everyone else marked their family's place with as much ornately carved stone as they could afford. The Thieves' Guild, like many of the city's professional organizations, had an area in the catacombs for their members without family although, for obvious reasons, thieves' funerals were seldom well attended.

  If an organization intent on overturning the Council was meeting unseen in the Necropolis, they were probably meeting in the catacombs. Cut into the lowest level of the hill, the narrow passageways and chambers carved out of the rock would provide a perfect hiding place for any number of secret societies – underground in more ways than one.

  As the wall around the perimeter was low enough that any reasonably determined adult could easily get over it, and the Necropolis was large enough that there wasn't one single place to watch all access points for conspirators sneaking toward a clandestine meeting, Terizan decided she might as well go directly to the catacombs.

  The catacombs' black, iron-bound doors were securely locked.

  They were the kind of locks a merely competent thief like Balzador could get through, but even by fitful moonlight it was obvious to Terizan no one had. At least, not for some time. If the rumoured conspiracy was meeting in the tunnels under the Necropolis, it was getting in another way. She peered up toward the crest of the hill, past the hundreds of tombs cut into the walls of each terrace. Any one of them could hold a secret entrance to the catacombs below. She couldn't break into all of them. Well, she could, but there was no time and less need.

  Moving away from the doors to a less visible position while she considered her options, she crouched in the velvet shadow cast by the cracked sandstone box that held the remains of Hanra Seend, Wife, Mother, Weaver and something else too worn to be read in the moonlight. She could climb to a better vantage point and hope she spotted one of the conspirators skulking about the graves, waiting to be followed. Or she could just pick these locks and go through the front door then decide on her next step once she got inside.

  "He'll let her use my loom!"

  Terizan pivoted slowly in place to find her nose barely a finger's width away from the nose of the pale, distraught, and translucent woman crouched beside her.

  "He'll let her use my loom," the woman repeated. "She won't take care of it, I know she won't. You have to tell him not to let her use my loom."

  ***

  "…and then she touched my arm and I bolted."

  Poli raised a delicate arched brow higher still. "Everyone knows the Necropolis is haunted, Sweetling."

  "That's not the point." Terizan paced across her best friend's bedchamber and back again to stand at the foot of the bed. "She was dead, Poli, and she was talking to me. She wasn't just moaning and wafting about, she was interacting. And when she touched me, I could feel a flash of despair."

  One elegant shoulder lifted and fell. "Well, as you said, she was dead. That's a valid reason to be depressed."

  "Poli!"

  He sighed. "So the poor woman carried the concerns of life over into death; you just got in her way, stop taking it personally." Moving a fringed cushion aside, he patted the edge of the bed. "Come and sit and tell me why you were in the Necropolis after dark. You know you're going to anyway so you might as well get it over with. That way we can both get some sleep."

  "It was Guild business…"

  "Anything said in my bed, stays in my bed – or my guild wouldn't have much business." He patted the blanket again. "Come on."

  So she told him how the Council had heard rumours of a conspiracy and how rumour had placed the conspiracy in the Necropolis. She told him how the Council had come to the Thieves' Guild and how she was to steal into a meeting and out again with the names of those involved. "Although how I'm supposed to get the names of those I don't recognize, I have no idea. I doubt they do a roll call before every meeting." She deepened her voice. "Ajoe the Candle-maker?" And up again. "Aye."

  "Don't tell me Ajoe the Candle-maker's involved!"

  "I was just using him as an example because I was at the Necropolis and his wife's just died and that's not the point," she sighed. "The point is, I have no idea how I'm supposed to steal these names."

  "You'll think of something. You always do." He spent a moment staring at his reflection in the hand mirror he'd taken from the tiny table by the bed. "What will the Council do with the names when you get them?" he asked at last, tucking a strand of hair behind his ear.

  She shrugged and plucked at the blanket. "They'll arrest everyone involved, probably execute them."

  "People are always complaining about the Council." He lifted a thoughtful gaze up off the mirror. "Taxes are too high, the constables are never there when you need them, there are holes in my street deep enough to swallow a donkey – but it's never come to action before. I wonder why now. This lot's certainly no worse than any other."

  "Better than some," Terizan allowed. It hadn't been that long ago that the Council had executed three of their own who'd been taking bribes from a bandit chief.

  "The rumours could be wrong."

  "Could be." Rumour moved through Old Oreen faster than weak beer through the Fermentation Brotherhood. "But then they want proof of that."

  "Proof of nothing?"

  "That's what I said," she snorted. "What do you think I should do, Poli?"

  "I think you should have sex more often, let your
hair grow out, and wear brighter colours."

  Her hand went involuntarily to her cap of short dark hair. "I have to get into the catacombs," she said. "But I think I'd best check the place out in daylight first."

  "Well, if you knew," Poli sighed, "why did you ask?"

  ***

  The maintenance of the Necropolis was handled by acolytes of Ayzarua, the Gateway. She wasn't exactly a death goddess – two hundred years ago, after trouble with competing death cults, the Council had made the worship of Death illegal. Ayzarua represented the passage from life to death, a definition just vague enough to get around the law. She had no temple. Her followers believed that all living creatures carried her temple within them.

  Terizan thought the whole thing was kind of creepy, but she had to admit the Ayzaruites took good care of the Necropolis. The paths were raked, the cracks in the rock were weed free, and the small amount of vandalism she could see appeared to be in the process of being either repaired or removed. The Ayzaruites were a definite presence in the Necropolis. Something to remember.

  In daylight, the locks on the catacombs looked no more difficult than they had by moonlight and just as infrequently used. Shooting a nervous glance toward Hanra Seend's resting place as she passed, Terizan started along the first terrace trying to look fascinated. Apparently, the City of the Dead was a popular destination for visitors to Oreen. Took all kinds, she supposed.

  The basic design of the wall tombs consisted of four shelves on each of three walls with a stone crypt in the centre for bare bones when they were ready to be removed and the shelf refilled. Tombs in the Necropolis were used for generations and they were all variations on the theme. Individuality showed up in the ornately carved facades and in the narrow gates that lead through them. Steel gates, stone gates, wooden gates; bolted, mortared, chained in place; every one of them, even the most solid, with a small horizontal window just at eye level. The reason for the window had long been forgotten, but, as newer tombs copied the oldest tombs, the window remained.

  Approaching the first gate, Terizan hesitated, afraid that when she looked in, something would look out. Bodies were no problem, she'd seen plenty and robbed a couple, but Hanra Seend's ghost had prodded her imagination, and imagination was a deterrent in her line of work.