Daughter of Ancients (55 page)

As Aimee engaged the guardsmen in conversation about the best route through the tense city and whom she should contact about taking her Horsemaster friend directly to Je'Reint in the battlefield, I scratched some nonsense about grandmothers and horse-breeding on the notepaper and tried to sort out what she had just told me. The bold plan hidden in her sideways conversation finally emerged clear and sharp, leaving me in awe.

Imagers could weave a witness's knowledge and memories into a visual testimony to be presented at a judgment. The impact of such vivid testimony was inarguable. Paulo's knowledge of Gerick's case against D'Sanya, of her use of the oculus, of Gerick's beliefs and fears about the Zhid would be a mesmerizing tale. But of course, the integrity of the image was valid only so far as the integrity of the Imager and that of the witness, and in serious cases a Speaker would be called in to judge their veracity. Aimee believed enough in Je'Reint and enough in Paulo and enough in herself to risk her life to bring Je'Reint the truth.

As I gave her the folded paper, her hand brushed mine, and in my mind appeared the faintest of voices, a mind-speaking that the most skilled Dar'Nethi spy would have difficulty detecting.
If he agrees, have him meet me at the north gate of the city when the bells ring third watch. Bring a fast horse that can carry two. If we're to win this race, we must ride faster than I can manage alone.

And while her words yet gleamed in my mind, she kissed my cheeks. “And now, dear Jen, give your grandmother a kiss for me, and consult your brother about my idea. He is so very brave and honorable, and I delight in his company. I look forward to meeting him again soon.”

“I'll speak to him. And I'll set the door wards as I leave,” I said, bending casually over the hearth and making curling sweeps of the hand as if to cool and bank its flames. “Be very careful on your journey, Aimee.”

“I've no worries. Zhid would find me a poor bargain.” She swept her cloak over her shoulders. A vase crashed to the floor. “Goodness, what a mess! Well, perhaps those who come searching this house for the devil Lord tonight will clean it up for me. Come, good fellows, let's be off before the streets get crowded. May your own Way be safe, dear Jen!”

No sooner had the front doors shut firmly behind the three than Gerick emerged from the draperies and Paulo popped out from under a couch.

“Demonfire,” said Paulo, staring at the door through which Aimee had departed. “She wants me to come with her?”

“Why would she want Paulo to go to Je'Reint?” said Gerick. “And we can't wait until next week. Her heart is good, but—”

“She's going to convince Je'Reint to send troops to Avonar,” I said, still marveling at what had just occurred. “Tonight, if Paulo's willing to take her and be her witness . . .” I told them the pieces of Aimee's plan that they could not have known. “. . . and so she's taken this upon herself and Paulo, leaving you free to deal with D'Sanya and her oculus and her avantirs and whatever else she's made.”

“My good lord,” said Paulo softly. I'd never heard Paulo address Gerick so. Yet this was no mere formality of address. Never had I imagined that a statement formed of three simple words could bear the weight of a loyalty and friendship so far beyond my understanding. I surmised that it had been a very long while indeed since Paulo's Way had left him anywhere but steadfastly at Gerick's side.

“Stormcloud is the strongest,” said Gerick, answering. “He'll carry two and still outrace the wind.”

Paulo dipped his head and turned briskly to me. “How far will we be needing to ride?”

Though Aimee would need to direct him to a specific destination, I found paper and sketched out the route to the Wastes north of Erdris and the Pylathian Vale, reviewed the questions Paulo might be asked at the city gates in time of war, and stuffed every other warning and precaution I could think of into his head.

Without interrupting, Gerick found us a flask of wine and brought cold meat pastries from the larder. Paulo and I ate and drank as we talked. Gerick unwound the dirty bandages from his hands and threw them into the fire, then sat on the hearth stool, sipped wine, and watched us. His own meal remained untouched. Just as the clocks chimed nine times—the hour before third watch—lights flared and a clamor of voices rose on the far side of the garden wall. I hoped we hadn't waited too long.

“Sounds like I'd best be off,” Paulo said, pulling on his long, dark cloak. “Can't keep a lady waiting.”

“I can't make a portal for you,” said Gerick. “I would, but—”

“You need to save everything for what needs doing. You know I'd rather ride anyway. You know. . . .”

Paulo extended one hand, but Gerick had already moved to the garden door and cracked it open, alert to the moving lights and activity beyond the garden walls. After a moment, he motioned urgently to Paulo. “Go now. They've moved around the corner to the street that fronts the house.”

“Have a care, Paulo,” I said, taking his hand and squeezing it. “We'll do the same.”

He tore his gaze from Gerick's back and transferred it to me. His worried expression communicated a great deal more than his words. “You do that, Jen. I trust you.”

I followed him to the door and watched as he hurried toward the back of the garden and vanished into the night. As the stableyard gate clicked shut, I cast a small diversion spell, the most powerful enchantment I could work, a child's favorite, easily countered by alert parents. But the watchers abroad tonight would be looking for Gerick's lanky friend who had been seen frequently at Aimee's house and the guesthouse in Gaelie. I didn't want him followed.

Gerick spun around and stared at me. “What did you just do?” he snapped. “If you've harmed him . . .”

“Nothing! Only a child's diversion spell. If anyone notices him as he rides out of the alley, they'll think he's much smaller than he is. More my size. And if that observer allows himself to be distracted and look away, he'll forget which way Paulo's gone. Those two guards weren't happy about leaving me here, and I'm thinking they might have left someone to watch.”

I went back into the house and dropped onto the couch, muttering as much to myself as to him. “What do I have to do to make
you
trust me?”

He followed me in, stopping just inside the door. “I'm sorry. Of course I trust you. Paulo trusts you.”

He shut his mouth and I thought that was all he was going to say. But after a moment, he leaned his back against the door, brushed back a lock of dark hair that had fallen into his eyes, and ran his fingers through his hair. “It's just . . . ever since I've come to Gondai, Dar'-Nethi enchantments have felt wrong to me, distorted, like hearing music that's too shrill or biting into a sugar cake to find it salty and bitter. I've assumed it was just me; Zhev'Na skewed my perceptions of sorcery, of people, of the world. But I hoped that now I understood more about the Dar'Nethi . . . all I experienced with you in the desert . . . things might feel right here. But it's even worse. Something is wrong in this city. Every enchantment here is wrong. The air is wrong.”

Well, something was certainly wrong. My spirits, lifted by daring plans and successful diversions, had fallen as flat as street paving. I felt angry and irritable, and I wanted to yell at him that he was indeed a Zhidmentored bastard, because no one else would send a friend like Paulo into mortal danger without even looking at him.

But we didn't have time to explore Gerick's peculiarities or his megrims or my own. The street noise was getting louder.

“I've too little sensitivity to enchantment to tell you anything,” I grumbled. “But I do know we need to be on our way. Are you ready?”

He threw me my cloak, stepped to the center of the room, and picked up a kitchen knife from the tray of dishes, turning the blade over and over in his hand and staring at it. After a moment, he looked up at me. “Will Paulo and Aimee make it to Je'Reint, do you think?”

“Nothing's certain. But Aimee will watch out for him, and he for her. They are two people easily underestimated. A good match, I think.” Unlike certain other incongruous pairings.

I drained my wineglass and stood up. “So where are we going first? The Lady or her device? By foot, horse, or will?”

The last was one of those smug Dar'Nethi expressions that avoided asking,
How talented are you?
Those who could travel at will, of course, were those powerful enough to make portals. Those who could do magic enough to keep such fragile, beautiful beings as horses would travel that way. Those like me traveled on foot . . . unless they were in more talented company.

Gerick squatted down in the middle of Aimee's bright blue rug, extended his arm, and touched the point of the knife blade to the weaving. “The hospice first. The oculus is there. And perhaps we can find something to give us a clue about any other device she's made. She told me many times that she could work only in her own lectorium.”

Pivoting smoothly on his feet, like a clock spring unwinding, he scribed a circle of split stitches in the rug with the blade. “We'll have to hope
she's
not there. I didn't do so well facing her last time. Even with a bit more power to hand . . .”

He threw down the implement, and I watched his mind turn inward and focus on the task.
Mark the lefthand orientation. Then the right. Stand exactly between, in the center of the circle.
He had learned well, even remembering what I'd told him about making tight circles and quick progress through the steps if you wanted a portal that would open and close quickly. No trace of the portal must remain for D'Sanya's searchers to find.

Ah, good Sefaro, you fathered an idiot!
I had forgotten to set the door wards as I'd promised Aimee. Anyone in Gondai could walk into this house without warning or hindrance. Leaving Gerick to his work, I ran through three dining rooms and the silent kitchen, where tall ovens and broad tables, ghostly in the dark, stood sentinel for their brave mistress. Not daring a handlight, I hurried to the end of the back passage. There I passed my hand over the thick wooden door—two half-doors, as it happened—hunting for the ring or knob or swatch of fabric that would hold the protective enchantments. During the war years every householder in Gondai had ready door wards, available for the least talented occupant to set. There . . . a loop of braided silk that felt cool and prickled my arm when I touched it. A tug, a word of attachment, and it was done.

I raced back through the house, glancing through the sitting-room doorway as I passed. Gerick's dark form was scarcely visible in front of a dark oval outlined by a silver thread. His hands stretched toward the developing portal, palms facing each other and slightly apart. Not long now.

But too long perhaps. Fists hammered on the great double doors that led to the street. Frantically I searched for the ward trigger.

“Open in the name of the Heir of D'Arnath!” yelled a man outside the door.

“Just push in,” snapped a woman with a voice like a stone grinder. “She's harbored the devil.”

While one of my arms swept carefully over the expanse of the door, my other hand fumbled around the elaborate door frame. Ridiculous, I'd thought when I first saw it: birds, beasts, dips and swirls carved into the wood; smooth pieces of ivory, faceted gems, and rounded nubs of brass, inlaid as eyes and tusks and the contents of magical treasure chests.
Come on, Jen, where is it?
Surely they wouldn't have put the trigger at the top of the door, out of my reach. The metal inlays were cold, chilled by the outside air leaking around the doors.

“But this is Gar'Dena's house,” the man protested, “one of the oldest families in the city. Just one of his daughters—the blind girl—lives here.”

“The devil was seen here,” said the harsh-voiced woman. “His mother, too. Old families can be turned, and the Lady commands us search this house in particular.”

My hand stopped on a small faceted knob that felt like glass or gemstone, colder by far than all rest of them. It moved at my touch.

Hands rattled the door latch.

I slid the glass knob left, spoke an attachment word, and the door panels grew warm.

“Ouch! By the holy Way, it's burnt my skin off!” The man outside was growling. “Bring G'Ston to deal with the door wards.”

I relaxed, sighing with relief and resting my back against the doors, just warm to one on the inside. Now if Gerick would just hurry.

“We don't need G'Ston,” said the woman. “See who's coming!”

“Make way!” someone cried amid a welcoming clamor.

“Your Grace, the door is warded. It will burn—”

“Is anyone inside?” You could not mistake the Lady's voice. Her speech floated through the air like gossamer, telling every listener that he or she was the most important person in the world.

“We've had no answer, Your Grace. But I've—”

“Stand aside.” Her mind's fingers reached through the door and through my skin and bones, searching for a beating heart or thinking mind—powerful, angry fingers, belying the kindness in her voice. My spirit drew up into a hard little knot and shrank into the darkest corner of my soul as if I were a slave child again. The fingers grabbed nothing and passed on. But Gerick was focused on enchantment, not defense. She would find him.

I wrenched my back from the door and ran, resisting the urge to scream for Gerick to hurry. Distracting him at this point was the last thing I wished. He just needed time to finish. I paused for a moment, peering about the dark entry hall. Across the cavernous place stood a bronze statue of Vasrin, a sinuous body half again Paulo's height, the head cast to show the traditional opposing male and female faces. In the right hand was uplifted the flame of the Creator and in the left was the distaff of the Shaper—a nice long rod that stood loosely in the graceful bronze hand. The bronze winding of “wool” at one end would make a nice club.