Magic Casement (18 page)

Then
the silver mane nodded. “Can you read?”

“No,
sir. But I am to learn.”

“It
will have to wait, though. Ready to start helping me now?”

“Yes,
sir. “

“I’m
told there’s a whale beached on Tanglestone Point. I need to know if it’s
fresh enough to harvest. Take a good horse.” Tanglestone would be a long
ride. Rap took Firedragon, returning that evening weary and content, having
achieved what he set out to do. And even Firedragon, had he been gifted with
speech, might have reported enjoying the outing. It had been years since any
other man had attempted to ride the stallion. No one else ever succeeded in
staying on him very long, but Rap he never minded.

Three
weeks later, Rap and Foronod fought their way through a blizzard, following the
last caravan to cross the causeway. The big one had come at last and Krasnegar
was now closed for the winter... or, as the inhabitants put it, the world was
cut off. The two rode in weary silence through the town. Foronod halted at the
foot of a long flight of steps. He slid stiffly from the saddle and handed his
reins to Rap. “Tomorrow, then,” he said, and headed off on foot-to
family and warm bed, to a long rest that no one had earned more, and possibly
even to a hot bath. Rap took the horses to the castle stables, wondering where
he would go afterward. Dim and warm and rankly smelly, the stables themselves
were more home to him than anywhere else was now. Cobbled floor, rough plank
walls, shabby untidiness... they all offered a welcome familiarity, but after
so long out of doors -he also felt oppressed by being confined. He felt as if
those walls were leaning over him whenever he turned his back-and there was
always a wall behind him. He rubbed down Foronod’s mare and was still
working on his own pony when old Hononin appeared out of the shadows as if one
small patch of darkness had just decided to solidify. He looked grumpier and
surlier than ever. He grunted a sort of greeting.

“It’s
good to be back, sir,” Rap said. .

Another
grunt. “Is it? Where are you living now?”

“I
was wondering the same. “

Neither
said the obvious-that Rap was too old for the boys’ dormitory. It might
even be full, anyway. But a factor’s assistant would presumably be paid
more than a stableboy, and perhaps almost as much as a driver. Rap had not
asked.

“I
shall find lodgings in the town, sir.”

The
little man scowled and snatched the wisp from Rap’s hand.

“I’ll
finish this; you look beat. You know the garret next the drivers’ office?”

Rap
nodded, surprised.

“It’s
been cleaned out. There may even be a bedroll in it. A man could stay there
until he found somewhere better. “

“Thank
you, sir. That was kind of you. “

Honinin
just grunted.

Krasnegar
might be battened down for the winter, but the factor still had much to do, and
much of that he could delegate to his new apprentice. Rap was partly diverted
by his morning lessons in the arts of reading and writing and summing, squeezed
unhappily into a desk at the back of a schoolroom filled with children who
giggled and found him an amusing giant. He chewed his knuckles, ruffled his
hair, and wrestled with the mysteries of knowledge and the vagaries of a quill
pen just as stubbornly as he had battled Firedragon.

The
royal appointments of Rap as assistant to Foronod might have been well
intentioned, but it greatly widened an already extensive moat. Of necessity, as
the accounts were closed on another season, the king’s factor must
investigate many matters that had been pushed aside in the summer rush. A wagon
crash, unpaid taxes, unexplained injuries, and mysteriously vanished goods-all
of these came under review. Every year brought its accountings, to attribute
blame or malfeasance, and that year had no more and no less than others.

Yet
where the respected factor could rush in, his juvenile helper must tread with
care. Rap found himself asking questions whose answers were not readily at
hand, testing memories suddenly at fault. He spent a whole week in quest of a
certain valuable keg of imported peach brandy that had vanished between the
dock and the palace cellar; and he gained no friends thereby.

When
he finally made his glum and quite negative report, Foronod scowled and asked
grumpily, “You can’t just see it?”

“No,
sir. I tried.”

That
was a lie. Rap had tried very hard not to see it in his wearying treks through
town and castle. Always he tried very hard not to use his farsight, if that was
what he had. Yet he had an inexplicable conviction that the missing-and now
empty-keg was located under the staircase by the armory latrines. He had
already passed beyond the populous domain of childhood, but the well-settled
realm of manhood still lay ahead. The borderlands are thinly inhabited and
never easy going, being roamed by monsters that prey most readily upon the
solitary traveler-and now Rap had no companions.

When
he set about a search for lodgings, he discovered what old Hononin had already
guessed-that rooms were in short supply. Rap smelled now of the uncanny. An
odor of sorcery hung about him, and while no one was so unkind as to snub him
for it openly, his friends would drift in other directions when given the
chance. The brand was unobtrusive, but it was there. He was human and he
suffered. Women suspected that he could see through their clothes and they
shunned him even more than men did. And no one wanted a lodger who could spy
through walls. Of necessity, Rap’s temporary residence in the garret
above the stable became his permanent abode. He moved his scanty possessions in
and squandered most of his savings on buying a bed and was miserably content.
He ate in the castle commons, but he did not sit at the drivers’ table.

His
work for Foronod might lack the romance of being a man-at-arms but it was a
challenge; it implied that he was trusted. The factor was a hard
master-demanding, saturnine, and slow to praise-yet he was fair. Rap respected
him, did his best, and strove to be worthy.

The
blizzards came more frequently, the days dwindled. Wagons rolled no more, even
within the town itself. Yet Krasnegar had been built for its climate and
pedestrians could travel by covered alleys and staircases. A man could walk
from castle to deserted harbor without more than a half-dozen brief dashes out
of doors. Peat fires glowed. The business of life continued safely below the
storms, and pleasures continued, also. There was food in plenty and drink and
companionship; singing and dancing; talk and fellowship and romance-but not for
Rap.

He
was not completely without friends. He did have one, a sophisticated man of the
Impire, for whom the supernatural held no terrors; a man without visible
occupation to fill his hours and yet of apparently unlimited financial
resources-well spoken, much traveled, sympathetic, and even proficient in the
use of swords.

“Fencing?”
he said. “Well, I’m no expert, my friend, and I would not venture
to draw at the imperor’s court, where any young squire may turn out to be
a swordsman of prowess, but I am probably as competent as any of the
wood-chopping rustics I have noted here in the castle guard. So if you want a
lesson or two, lad, I shall be most happy to oblige. “

Rap
said, “Thank you very much, Andor.”

Krasnegar
had never before met anyone like Andor. He was young, yet as poised as a
prince. A gentleman and apparently wealthy, he mingled freely with both the
lowly and the high.

He
was as handsome as a young God, yet seemed unaware of the fact. One day he
could be found wrapped in filthy furs in the common saloons, trading vulgar
ribaldry with sailors; the next he would be seen in satin and silk, holding
respectable matrons spellbound at an elegant soiree; or with Kondoral, laughing
heartily at the old seneschal’s interminable, threadbare monologues. The
very candles seemed to burn more brightly near Andor.

It
was rumored that the king disapproved of him, and certainly he was never seen
in the king’s company, not even at the weekly feast for the palace staff,
over which the king presided. As the days shortened, however, his Majesty
stopped appearing at those functions, and then Andor began to attend-sometimes
sitting at the high table with Kondoral and Foronod and the other dignitaries,
sometimes squashed in with the servants near the squeaking spits of the
fireplace, his arm around a wench.

His
success with women became an instant legend; it verged on the uncanny.
Resentment was inevitable and he was an imp--some jotunn would have to educate
the intruder. Very soon after his arrival, while Rap was still on the mainland
following Foronod, one tried.

It
happened in a bar near the docks, and the details were never very clearly
established. The volunteer enforcer was an enormous and ill-reputed fisherman
named Kranderbad, who tersely invited the stranger outside. Reportedly Andor
first attempted to talk his way out of the challenge, then yielded with
reluctance. The imps in the group sighed unhappily, the jotnar grinned and waited
eagerly for Kranderbad’s return. But it was Andor who returned, and very
soon. It was said that he had no bruises on his knuckles or sweat on his brow,
and apparently none of the blood on his boots was his. Kranderbad was not seen
in public for many weeks thereafter, and the extent of his injuries impressed
even that rough frontier company.

Another
attempt occurred a few days later and now the challenger had a friend waiting
outside to help. Both joined Kranderbad in the infirmary, and one of them never
walked again. That one had a brother who was a barber, and the same evening he
was overheard vowing vengeance. Before morning he was found in an alley without
his razor, his tongue, or his eyelids, and thereafter Andor was left in peace
to woo whom he pleased. He established lodgings at the home of a wealthy widow.
Her friends censured but were too intrigued to ostracize. They whispered among
themselves that she seemed to have shed ten years. Soon he knew everyone and
everyone knew him. With very few exceptions, men found him irresistible and
were pleased to call him friend. What women called him was less easily
established, but none seemed to bear grudges, as they would have done if they
had felt jilted or cheated. He was discreet-no match or marriage failed because
of Andor.

He
showed Foronod a better system of bookkeeping. He gave Thosolin’s
men-at-arms tips on fencing and he advised Chancellor Yaltauri on current
politics in the Impire. He could dance superbly and play the lute well by local
standards. He had a passable singing voice and a bottomless store of stories,
from the literary to the scatological.

Krasnegar
fell at his feet.

Yet
even Andor could not be in more than one place at a time, and he spread himself
thinly. He rejected any efforts by his admirers to become followers, for the
young men of the town would have flocked along behind him like baby ducklings
had he given them the chance. He roamed Krasnegar from palace to docks, and
none of the hundreds who called him friend could claim to know him well or see
him often... with one exception.

Why
a sophisticated man of the world, a wealthy gentleman, should be interested at
all in a solitary, awkward adolescent-a minor flunky lacking grace, family, and
education-was a major mystery. But for Rap, it seemed, Andor had unlimited
time.

Thousand
friends.

He
who has a thousand friends has not a friend to spare,

And
he who has one enemy will meet him everywhere.

Emerson,
Translation from Omar Chiam

Demon Lover

In
the whole of the Northwest Sector of Julgistro Province, there was no grander
social event than the Kinvale Ball. There were many balls at Kinvale during the
season, but the Kinvale Ball was the one held each year just two nights before
Winterfest. It alone supported half the costume and jewelry trades of the
region. Being added to the guest list had been known to induce bankruptcy among
the lesser nobility. Being dropped from it was generally regarded as
justifiable cause for suicide.

Thousands
of candles sparkled amid the crystal droplets of the chandeliers. Hundreds of
guests danced in a whirl of opalescent finery-silks and gemstones, satins and
lace, color like shredded rainbows. The wine, the food, and the music were
unmatched anywhere in the Impire. Amid the dark and cold of midwinter there was
gaiety and happiness, laughter and light.

Ekka,
the dowager duchess of Kinvale, was long since past indulging in dancing
herself. She walked now with a cane and as little as possible, but the
Winterfest ball was a Kinvale institution that she guarded and cherished. She
had probably attended seventy of them herself-she could not remember how old
she had been when she saw her first-and she would let nothing diminish the
tradition. She could not improve on the pattern, for as far back as she could
remember no expense or ostentation had been spared to make the ball as grand
and enjoyable as possible, and she took care that it never dwindled by as much
as a fly’s eyelash. Every year she watched the youngsters swirl past in
their quadrilles and gavottes, and she was remorseless in her intent that they
would enjoy themselves as much as she had done in her faraway youth. Ekka was a
tall and bony woman and had never been a beauty, although she had always had
presence. She still did. Her nose was too large, her teeth too prominent, and
age had increased her resemblance to a horse until she half expected her
reflection to neigh at her every time she looked in a mirror. Frail now and
unsteady on her cane, white-haired and wrinkled and ugly, she ruled Kinvale
tyrannically, knowing that she terrorized everyone and gaining secret amusement
from that fact. She had no power except the power to send them away, so what
did they fear? That, she supposed, was presence.