A closed door should have impeded all words.
Which meant, of course, that Rath—as if he were Arann or Lefty—was listening for them, straining to catch them even as they annoyed. It had been many years since he had killed a man. He had killed two a week past, and for what?
A crowded, noisy home.
He set his pen down; work was almost impossible. Instead of pen, he lifted pipe, packing the bowl with damp leaves. Everything in the air was damp. The farmer thought the rain would stop in a day or two, and Rath was inclined to believe him. How much of that inclination was wishful thinking, he let be. Other thoughts disturbed him.
If he had left his sword beneath his bed, if he had chosen not to become involved, Jewel would have gone with Lefty. She would not have returned.
Perhaps he could have found her; finding things of value was his specialty. But what he would have found, he couldn’t say. Had she been injured, he might have brought her here, and it might be she who lay abed. She might learn, the harshest possible way, what life on the streets entailed for far too many.
But the glimmer of understanding, the stiffness of posture, that she had showed on their first meeting implied some understanding. He had never asked. Did not intend to ask now.
Restless, he got to his feet. Upon his desk, carefully wrapped in cloth padding, were two plain, gray bowls. Their basins covered both his palms when spread side by side; they felt delicate, but like so much that appeared fragile in this city—above ground or beneath it—they had had to be more; they were almost whole. One was seamed with a crack, the other was perfect. Both held a single carved rune in their center, and both were adorned with a longer series of similar runes around the edge, a circlet of words. He thought they were offering bowls, and he was not certain of their manufacture; they were so smooth, they might have been glass—but the fracture was not the type of crack that glass took.
It was a pity that they were of a single color. Still, they would certainly be of value; how much value depended on his ability to retrieve meaning from the fragmentary writing; time had worn key letters, changing their shape and meaning.
He set his jaw, sat, and began his work again.
He had traced the letters with care, choosing to use eye and hand rather than to take a rubbing. Five times he did this, substituting single characters where they were not distinct enough. In the magelight, their ridges cast short shadows; he worked by these.
As he did, he heard the whisper of a name: Kalliaris. His pen stopped; his chin lifted, as if he had been momentarily touched. Perhaps he had; the door surrendered syllables, mute but distinct.
Jewel was reciting the list of gods. She always started with Kalliaris; Kalliaris was the goddess of Luck, both good and bad, and it was upon her smile or frown that Jewel’s life depended. He could hear neither of the boys. He could pretend that they did not exist, and perhaps that was for the best.
Rath was a rather good liar.
He woke in the morning to a sharp knock. A very sharp knock. He was out of his bed, pale blue sheets on the floor, before he realized where he was. Nightmare had come and gone; it was a graceless visitor.
“What?” The curt word was not an invitation.
Jewel knew it. Through the door, she said, “I’m going to the Common.” She paused and then added, “I’ve been to the well. It’s not raining hard. Can we get a barrel?” and then, before he could reply, “Can you watch Arann while we’re out?”
He was tired enough to say, “No.” He was awake enough to say it quietly. “I’ll check in on him.”
She didn’t answer. He heard, instead, the slight shuffle of her feet as they receded. Only hers; Lefty apparently hadn’t accompanied her down the hall.
Rath was surprised that the boy was willing to accompany her to the Common. But as he was awake, he picked up the blankets, dumped them on the bed, and groped his way toward his chair. It was in the same position as he’d left it when he’d finally dozed off for the third time; the light in the room, never bright, streamed gray from the window well above.
He was hungry.
This was the first morning that Jewel had actually allowed him to be hungry.
Lefty’s gaze was glued to the door. Jay pushed the chair to its usual position, and opened it; she pushed it aside, and waited. Lefty still stared, but his gaze now traveled down the empty hall that Rath didn’t own.
“Lefty?”
And turned to the door behind which Arann slept. He slept like a dead man. It made Lefty uncomfortable. But not so uncomfortable that he hadn’t thought to warn Jay about the dangers of being too close if she was going to try to wake him.
“I’m not throwing things at an injured boy,” she said sharply. But she didn’t try to wake him. “He needs to sleep. The doctor said so.”
“Where are we going?” Without Arann.
“To the Common.”
“Why?”
“We need food.”
“Oh.” He looked at his feet. He was more than passingly familiar with them, and with the boots whose soles flopped open with a squelch in the wet weather. He had no socks. He hadn’t had ’em for a year.
But his toes looked funny.
“And you need clothing,” she added. “And boots.”
“Boots are hard to steal.”
She nodded, expression serious. “They are. If you want them to fit.”
“You can usually only grab one.”
She nodded again. As if she’d had to. Or had to think about it. Her boots, on the other hand, were in one piece. “We don’t need to steal them. Not yet.”
“And clothing?”
“Not that either. But we need to get to market before everything good is gone. It’s late.” She handed him the basket that he hadn’t really noticed. Given how big it was, that said something. “I’ll carry it when it’s full. If you’re going to stay here, you have to be useful.”
He shrank a few inches.
“Lefty,” she said, drawing closer, her height greater because she wasn’t slumped, “you can be useful. You can’t be Arann. Don’t try.”
“But he’s big,” Lefty said, swinging the basket as he followed her. His leg hurt, but it was only bruised. His knee was swollen. He didn’t tell her. “And he’s smart. Smarter than me.”
“You told him to listen. To me. The first time. And you came here,” she added. “You saved his life twice. How is that stupid?”
The hall got shorter; the front door got closer. Jay pulled keys out of her pockets; they were shiny. New. Lefty stared at them as if they were coin. He stared, as well, at the door itself; it was thicker than any door he’d lived behind, and it seemed new. The walls here were straight. And dry. He couldn’t see holes between them and the floor.
“Not stupid,” she said, as he caught up with her. The rains weren’t so bad, this morning. But the air felt colder. He was shivering by the time they’d gotten most of the way down the block and had hit the intersection marked by limp trees and flattened weeds.
“No,” she said softly, her breath a cloud. “Why’d you come?”
He shrugged. “Don’t know.”
She shrugged back, motion part of the conversation.
Lefty twisted the basket’s handle between his hands—his good hand, and the hand that he was ashamed of. Ghost fingers ached. There were still days when it felt like the fingers were there, even if no one else could see them. “I thought you could save him,” he said at last. He didn’t look at her face. But he wanted to. He wanted to see her eyes.
It frightened him, the wanting.
“And we did,” she replied, careful now. The streets weren’t as crowded as they were when it was warmer or drier, but the wagons still passed by, and there were always larger groups of men that had to be avoided. “You were right. And you did what Arann couldn’t. Remember that.”
“I did it for me,” he told her. “Not for him. I did it because I can’t live without Arann. He’s big. And he’s smart. And he protects me.”
She nodded. “You protected him.”
“But I didn’t—”
“You didn’t use your fists. You didn’t use a dagger. You didn’t wield a sword. You ran, yes. But you ran to something, not away from it. You’re not Arann. He’s not you. If you were both the same, you wouldn’t be friends.” She paused, waiting for a wagon to amble past. Not looking at his face, not looking at his hands.
“I’m not big,” she told him softly. “And I’m not as smart as Rath. Maybe I never will be. But I don’t believe that big is everything. I think—I think that you can be stronger. Just different strong, is all.”
His toes were wet. “What if I don’t?”
“Believe it, or want to be?”
“Either.”
She shrugged. “Doesn’t matter what we want, does it?” This time, there was a familiar bitterness in the words. “Only matters what we do.”
They walked. Jay was quiet for a long time. Lefty noticed the buildings on either side; noticed faces in the open windows, where shutters had been pushed back for air. There weren’t many.
The trees that ringed the Common were dark, the leaves hanging like wet cloth. Some of them. The rest? They covered the ground, making the dirt less muddy. When had they dropped? Why did he notice?
“We’re going to meet Helen,” she told him. “That’s her name. I know you don’t like to talk to strangers. She doesn’t either. But she talks to them. She’s a bit harsh, and she can’t hear all that well, but don’t tell her that; it makes her grouchy.”
“Who’s Helen?”
“Seamstress. Or something. She makes clothes.”
“Jay?”
She nodded.
“Why are you doing this?”
“It’s going to get cold, and you need new clothing. Not as bad as Arann does, but he can’t walk, and you can.”
“I mean why are you helping us?”
“Do I need a reason? Why did Rath help me?”
Lefty frowned. “Because you can see things.”
“See?” Her voice was soft, still visible. “You are smart.” Sad.
Lefty didn’t want to upset her. Wasn’t certain why, although he should have been. She was going to feed him. And Arann. She was going to buy clothing. Upsetting her might take that all away.
“I want to help,” she told him. “And you need help. Shouldn’t that be enough?”
He shook his head.
In the streets, there were no gifts. There was what you could steal, if you were clever or fast enough. There was what you couldn’t. There was barter, and some things—some things you had to pay for in ways you couldn’t imagine, if you were lucky.
Lefty had never been lucky.
But he wanted to trust her. It frightened him, the wanting. He needed Arann. He needed to ask Arann why.
And he couldn’t. Silent and obedient, he followed Jay like a shadow.
Helen was smoking a pipe.
Jewel almost closed her eyes as the scent drifted in the still air, wreathing her face. Lefty coughed. The cough caught the old woman’s attention. Her eyes narrowed in her perpetual squint. “That you?” she asked Jewel.
“It’s Jay,” Jewel replied.
“You said you’d be bringing a large boy.”
Lefty lost a few inches.
“I will. But he had an accident, and he can’t walk much right now. Or the doctor will kill the rest of us.”
“Doctor, eh? Rath called a doctor?”
Jewel nodded.
“I guess I was wrong. He is good for something. You, boy, come here.”
Lefty, having no one else to look to, looked to Jewel.
Jewel nodded.
“He’s not simple, is he?” Helen snapped.
“He’s really, really shy,” Jewel managed to reply. Some hint of anger colored the words anyway, and Helen straightened slightly, unfolding. She wasn’t actually that small a woman, but years spent hunched over needlework made her seem smaller and older than she was.
She waited, imperious, while Lefty approached; at the last minute, he caught Jewel’s sleeve in his left hand, and dragged her with him into the stall. Out of the rain. There wasn’t a lot of room, and Helen’s son frowned at them both—but as his mother was smoking, and as her lips were pursed in that “don’t argue with me or else” frown, he said nothing. Loudly.
“Shy,” the seamstress said. She reached under her chair, and brought up an old wooden box with a cracked leather strap as its only lock. She undid the knot that held it—and the faded lid—in place, and opened the box. Needles shone in the sparse light, stuck to the sides of spools and spools of colored thread. These weren’t what she wanted, and her hands were callused enough that the pricking of careless fingers didn’t even register.
Instead, she pulled out a long, flat piece of cloth. Or leather; it was thin and supple, worn along the edges; it was obviously meant for something other than making tunics or shifts.
“What in the name of the Mother are you wearing, boy?”
Lefty pulled Jewel’s shirt. Jewel answered. “The only clothes he has. They’re a bit small,” she added. She wasn’t at all surprised when Helen snorted; pipe smoke streamed from her nostrils, as if she were a dragon gutted of flame.
“Aye, they’re small,” Helen said at last. “And cheap.” She snorted again. Lefty did not, clearly, find this comforting. But he didn’t find it so threatening that he fled, and Jewel considered this a good sign.
“We can’t afford expensive.”
“Aye, you can’t. But you can afford better than temple castoffs. Unless Rath’s been gambling again.”
“Rath doesn’t gamble.”
A gray brow rose. “I suppose he doesn’t drink either?”
Jewel shrugged. She couldn’t remember Rath drinking much of anything but water, and even that, he seemed to prefer to do without.
“Does he still smoke?”
Jewel nodded.
“Good.” She lifted the thin strip, and motioned to Jewel, who stepped forward, dragging Lefty along. She wondered if he was ever going to let go.
“He’s a small one.”
“Name’s Lefty.”
“Is it, now?”
Jewel nodded. “That’s what he calls himself, at any rate.”
“Lefty, come here.”
Lefty dragged himself forward. He stepped on Jewel’s foot as he passed her, and Jewel’s arm went with him.
“This,” the woman said, “is a measure. It was given me by my uncle. I’m going to slide it round your chest, and along the back of your shoulders. And here, from your neck down to your butt. Oh, and your arms, too—so you’re going to have to let go of Jay sometime.”
He looked at Jewel, and Jewel nodded, encouraging. When he didn’t budge, she added, “It’s going to get cold.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“But Arann—”
“When he can come, we’ll bring him, too. His clothing is worse than yours, but he’s still too small for Rath’s.”
Helen was businesslike and curt, but not so curt as she was with Rath. Her voice was almost gentle as she turned Lefty round; she moved quickly, but all of the movements themselves were deliberate and obvious.
“You have to stand straight,” Jewel whispered.
And watched as he tried.
Helen wrote things down on the slate she also pulled up from under the chair. The chair was her cave. And her throne. Jewel had only really seen her stand up once or twice, to measure Rath.
She finished quickly, and when she was done, Lefty pressed himself into Jewel’s back, waiting.
“I can do it for four silver pieces,” Helen said. She lifted a hand and glared at her son. “Rath’s business is good, and we charge him a lot more. We can do this for his friend.”
The son’s lips disappeared in a thin line. He muttered something about joining the beggars, and his mother muttered something about cutting his leg off so he’d look right at hom
e.
“How long will it take?”
“Three days, unless it’s urgent. You said these were the only clothes he had?” When Jewel nodded, the woman sighed. “Two days, then. I can’t do better. And I can’t promise you a decent color; I’ll use the ends for things, so it’s going to look a bit of patchwork.”
“If it’s warmer than this, and it fits, who cares?”
Helen laughed. “You’d be surprised,” she told Jay. She emptied the bowl of her pipe and looked at it, eyes still narrowed. Not looking away from its fine wood grain, she added, “You’re not like Rath, girl.
“But you’ll be good for him, in the end. He shouldn’t be alone.”
“He likes it that way.”
“What we like and what we need aren’t always the same. Like the clothing,” she added softly. “Go on, now. Basket’s empty, and Farmer Hanson will be waiting.”
Jewel nodded and reached into the satchel she carried on the inside of her tunic, just above her belt. Then she paused. “You know Farmer Hanson?”
“Aye, it happens I do. I make clothing for his useless sons.” She chuckled. “And his daughter, if it comes to that. You want to bargain with those sons, if you’re short money, though. Daughter’s a dragon.”
“How did you know I—”
She waved a curled hand, brushing the words away.
“Pay me when I’m done. You’re good for it. And if you’re not,” she added, with a grim smile, “Rath is, and I’ll charge him more.”
She was humming as they retreated; humming and smiling, the pipe upside down in its bowl. Jewel smiled as well.
“Jay?”
She nodded at Lefty.
“You like her?”
“Yeah, I like her.”
“Good.”
She paused a moment, breaking stride, her feet getting a little wetter, his reminding her that she had at least one more stop before the farmer. “Why?”
“She’s scary,” he whispered. “And she smokes. I don’t like burning things.”
Jewel touched his shoulder, slowly and gently, as if he were an injured dog that she had almost earned trust from. She didn’t speak, but she understood, then, why Arann had kept him safe all these years. Because she certainly wanted to.
The Hidden City Page 18