The Book of Athyra (52 page)

I sat next to him and stared at the hearth. It was getting a bit chilly; maybe I should get a fire started. Back where Savn had come from, they were harvesting flax about now. They probably missed him.

“All right,” I told him. “I’ll go find a minstrel, and I’ll see what the word is about Fyres, and about the investigation, and about the banks. Maybe I’ll learn something. At least it’ll keep me busy.”

I stood up. “I’ll talk to you later, all right?” He didn’t object, so I headed out the door. The old woman was sitting on a wicker chair in front of the house, Buddy curled up beside her. I had the uncomfortable feeling she’d heard everything I said. I wondered if her whole reason for having me talk to him was so she could listen in, but I dismissed the thought; if there was one person in the whole mess who wasn’t devious, it was her. But this affair was enough to make anyone paranoid, so I acquitted myself of paranoia and wrapped my cloak a little tighter around myself, because it was getting cold. Why is it you notice the weather more when you’re out of town? I don’t remember paying much attention to the weather when I lived in Adrilankha, even though I spent a lot of time walking around outside.

Minstrels, I’ve found, are rather like boot hooks—you keep running into them every time you go into your closet to find something else, but the minute you realize you need one they vanish without a trace. After walking all the way into Northport, I must have spent three hours going from one inn to another, and nowhere was there anyone singing for his supper, or telling stories in exchange for a room, or even sitting passed-out in the corner with a reed-pipe on his lap.

But diligence is sometimes rewarded. Seven times I asked locals where I might find some music. One didn’t know, three didn’t bother talking to me, and two were rude enough that I felt obligated to give them some minor damage as a lesson in courtesy. The seventh, however, was a pleasant young Teckla woman with flowing skirts and amazing black eyes who directed me to a public house about half a mile away, with feathers on its sign. I found it with no trouble (which surprised me just a little, as I’d become pessimistic about the whole adventure by that point) and I made my way into the small, smoke-filled little inn, in amongst a large crowd
of mostly Teckla, with a couple of Orca and Chreotha surrounded by the entourage the minor nobility invariably attracts in such places, and, at the far end, a middle-aged Teckla playing a fretted gordstring as softly as such a twangy instrument can be played, and actually fairly well.

One part of a bench in the middle of the room was open, and I took it. Loiosh was with me, which may have accounted for some of the looks I got, but more likely they just weren’t used to Easterners in there. The singer’s voice was high and probably would have been unpleasant, but he picked songs that fit it—I suppose that’s part of being a minstrel, just like part of being an assassin is knowing which jobs to take and which ones to leave alone. Eventually someone came by and brought me some wine, which I drank quickly because it wasn’t very good, and some time later the minstrel stopped playing.

He stayed where he was and drank, and after a while I approached him. He looked at me, looked at Loiosh, and seemed uncomfortable, which was only natural. I said quietly, “My name is Vlad,” and watched his face very closely for any sign of recognition.

“Yes?” he said. No, he didn’t seem to recognize the name, which was good news. The first time a minstrel recognizes my name is the last time I can pull this stunt.

“Can we talk for a few minutes?”

“About what?”

I showed him the ring, then quickly put it away. The ring, by the way, represented one of the last things I arranged before I left Adrilankha; its design is a recognition symbol for the Minstrels’ Guild, so when I showed it to him, he just said, “I see” and “Yes.”

“I’m going to walk outside and cross the street. Meet me in twenty minutes, all right?”

“All right. Yes. How much—?”

“Ten imperials, or maybe more if you can help me.”

“All right.”

I nodded and left the place, walking around for a little while and eventually circling back. Loiosh flew around to look for signs of someone setting something up, but I didn’t expect anything like that, and there wasn’t.

After twenty minutes, he left the inn and crossed the street, and I stepped up next to him. “Let’s walk together,” I said, handing him ten coins. I’d said that to someone earlier that day, too.

We strolled together through the dark and quiet streets. This part of the city was far from the docks, and very narrow, and looked nothing at
all like anywhere in Adrilankha, which I rather liked. I said, “What have you heard about Fyres?”

“The Orca?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I mean, you know that he’s dead.”

“Yes. How did he die?”

“An accident on his yacht.”

“Are you certain?”

We walked a little further. He said, “I’ve heard rumors, whispers. You know.”

“No,” I said. “I don’t. Tell me.”

“Who are you?”

“A friend of the Guild.”

“Is there going—? That is, am I—?”

“In danger? No, as long we aren’t seen together, and probably not even if we are.”

“Probably not?”

“That’s why we aren’t talking inside, and why we’re staying to areas without much light. Now, you were saying?”

“There’s been talk that he was murdered.”

“By whom?”

“People.”

“What sort of people?”

“Just people.”

“Why do they think so?”

“I don’t know. But I’ll tell you something: every time someone famous dies, however he dies, people say he was murdered.”

“You think that’s all it is?”

“Yeah. Am I wrong?”

“I don’t know. I’m trying to find out. I’m asking you questions to find out. And I’m paying you. You have no reason to suspect—uh—foul play?”

“Not really, no.”

“All right. What about all these bank closings?”

“It’s the Empire.”

“The Empire closed the banks?”

“No, but they allowed it.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean they aren’t supposed to do that—let banks just close, anytime they want to; they’re supposed to protect people.”

“Why didn’t they?”

“Because the bankers paid them.”

“Are you sure about that?”

“Yeah.”

“How do you know?”

“I know.”

“How?”

He didn’t answer. I said, “How much did you lose?”

“Almost eight hundred imperials.”

“I see. Is that how you know?”

He didn’t answer. I sighed. I wasn’t getting a whole lot that I could use. I said, “What about the Jhereg?”

“What about them?”

“Are they involved?”

“With the banks? I don’t know. I hadn’t thought of that.”

Oh, good. I was supposed to be tracking down rumors, and instead I was starting them. What I wanted to say was, “Can you tell me anything useful?” but that wasn’t likely to produce results. I said, “What can you tell me about the people being kicked off their land?”

“Just what everyone knows,” he said. “It’s happening a lot, and no one knows why.”

“What do you mean, no one knows why?”

He shrugged. “Well, it doesn’t make any sense, does it? You get a notice of eviction, and then you go see if you can buy the place, and the owners have gone out of business.”

“That’s been happening a lot?”

“Sure. All over the place. I’m one of the lucky ones: we’re still on Lord Sevaana’s land, and he’s still all right, as far as anyone knows. But I have friends and relatives who don’t know what’s going on, or what to do about it, or anything.”

I don’t know why I’d assumed the old woman’s case was unique, but apparently I was wrong. That was certainly interesting. Who could stand to gain by forcing people to leave their land so it could be sold and then not selling it? And why force them to move before offering
them
the chance to buy it themselves? And how could Fyres’s death have set all this off? And who wanted Loftis dead, and why? And—

No, wait a minute.

“Has anyone actually been made to move off his land yet?”

“Huh? Not this soon. No one could move that quickly, even if they made us.”

“Yeah, I suppose you’re right.” But still . . .

“Is there anything else?” said the minstrel.

“Huh? What? On, no. Here. Vanish.” I gave him another ten imperials. He vanished.

“What is it, boss?”

“The inkling of the germ of a thread that might lead to the beginning of an idea.”

“Sure, boss. Whatever you say.”

“I think I might have a piece of something, anyway. Let me think for a minute.”

He was polite enough not to make any of the obvious rejoinders, so I thought as I strolled. It isn’t all that easy to just think, keeping your mind concentrated on the subject, unless you’re talking to someone or writing things down, which is one reason I like to talk to Loiosh as I’m putting things together, but what I had right then wouldn’t fit itself into words because it wasn’t precise enough—it was just the vague, unformed notion that I’d, well, not exactly
missed
something, but that I’d been putting the wrong slant on things.

After a while I said,
“The trouble is, Loiosh, that the way Kiera and I got involved in this was through whatever oddity is involved in this business of putting what’s-her-name’s land on the market and then making it hard to track down, followed by impossible to track down. Just because that’s where we started doesn’t make that an important piece of whatever it is that’s going on.”

“You knew that already, boss.”

“Sure. But knowing it is one thing; being aware of it as you work and taking it into account whenever you look at new information—”

“What are you saying?”

“Heh. That I’ve been looking at this thing skewed by what I knew about it. I have to look at it straight on. And I have a theory.”

“Oh, good. Only that was missing. All right, then, where to now?”

“I don’t know.”
And, in my mind, Loiosh spoke the words as I did.
“You’re funny, Loiosh,”
I told him.
“Do you have any great ideas?”

“Yeah. Let’s get out of here.”

I looked around, but didn’t see anything.

“
No
,” he said.
“This city. This area. It isn’t good, boss. They’re still looking for you, and when you’re in a city like this, you’re too easy to find. I don’t like it.”

Neither did I, come to that. “
Soon
,” I told him.
“As soon as we get this settled.”

“You can’t do Savn any good with a Morganti knife between your shoulder blades.”

“True.”

“If I’d known we were going to be here this long, and that we’d be going around stirring up—”

“Okay, okay. I get the point.”
I’d thought about it, of course. Loiosh was right: a city, even one as small as Northport, was not a good place for me to hide when the whole Organization was looking for me. And, if what I’d just figured out was true, then I’d pretty much done what I’d agreed to do—the old woman would be able to stay on her land, and everything was fine.

“Where would we go instead?”

“The East.”

“We’ve been there, remember?”

“It’s big, there are lots of places. And no one would find us.”

“Good point.”
There really wasn’t any reason to stay here, if I could be certain that what I’d just figured out was true, and I could probably find that out.

Except that someone had cut Loftis down right in front of me, and there were neighborhoods full of people who had to leave because they no longer had any work, and I didn’t understand why any of it was happening.

I said,
“The old woman is doing so well with Savn, it would be a shame to take him away so soon.”

“Boss—”

“Let’s just take a few more days, all right?”

“You’re the boss.”

I wondered what you were finding out, Kiera; what would we learn about Fyres from the Jhereg? And, come to that, how heavily were the Jhereg involved? And if he’d gotten the Jhereg into it, why did he need the banks?

Did he need the banks at all?

There was only one banker we knew for certain was involved with Fyres, and that was Vonnith, and we knew she was bribing Imperial officials, which almost made her a Jhereg, too. Did I know of any legitimate banks that had made loans to Fyres? Did I even have any reason to suspect there were any?

How could I find out? Walking around pretending to be someone else has its uses, and we’d gotten some information that way, but there’s a
time for just being who you are. Had we reached it yet? Who was I, anyway?

Hmmm.

“Could work, boss.”

“It’s worth a shot.”

“And even if it doesn’t work, I’ll enjoy it.”

“Yeah, you probably will.”

“And you won’t?”

It wasn’t easy finding a tailor’s shop that was open at this hour—in fact, there were none. But after disturbing the tailor, it was easy enough to get what I wanted just by setting an appropriately large number of coins in front of him. My reserves of cash had been getting a bit low lately, and I wasn’t excited about going to any of the places I’d need to in order to retrieve more of my wealth—for one thing, I’d have to remove the gold Phoenix Stone in order to teleport—but I could do it if I had to.

However, I was able to put in the order and he promised that he’d have what I needed early in the morning. That done, I wandered for a while, thinking over the plan and refining it in conversation with Loiosh.

I discovered that my feet were taking me back toward the cottage, and I decided to let them have their way, now that I had a plan for tomorrow. I walked, and I thought, and Loiosh flew above me, or sometimes sat on my shoulder, but kept watching so that I had the freedom to let ideas roll around in my head and turn into conclusions. I thought about stopping and performing a quick spell to make my feet hurt less, but I’d have to remove one of the Phoenix Stones or the other, and Loiosh gave me the benefit of his opinion on the wisdom of that, so by the time I reached the cottage I’d come to the conclusion that I was very tired of walking. I explained this to Buddy when he came out to greet me. He wagged his tail and sneezed in sympathy. Good dog.