The Burning City (14 page)

It was well past noon and they were ravenous again before they reached the redwoods. They were a thousand paces outside Lord's Town.

These trees seemed different. They were not taller or larger, but none of them had ever been cut. Perhaps the Lords protected their view of the forest from the woodsmen.

At Shanda's urging he kept moving until the city couldn't be seen at all. All was shadows and wilderness and the huge and ancient pillars.

“This won't hurt you,” he said. “Watch your feet!” He walked a crooked path to a twisted trunk that was half bark, half glossy red wood.

“Freaky.”

“Yeah. Firewand. This's all right too.” A pine tree loomed huge next to children, but tiny beneath the redwoods. Whandall plucked a pine cone and gave it to her. “You can eat parts of this.” And he showed her.

Pelzed had been impressed with his knowledge of the forest. Would Shanda's father?

Serana's packed lunch was clearly superior, but Shanda picked another pine cone to keep.

They were late starting home. Whandall didn't worry at first. He only gradually saw that as shadows grew long, the world lost detail. The sun was still up there somewhere, but not for them. You couldn't quite tell where anything was: paths, morningstars, touch-me, a sudden drop.

He found them a patch of clear ground while he still could.

There was a bit of lunch left over. No water. The leathers had been too hot during the day, but they were glad of them now. He and Shanda still had to curl up together for warmth.

He felt stirrings, remembering the clumsy coupling with Wess. Wess was older. He'd thought she would know more than he did. He might have been her first—she wouldn't say—and he still didn't really know how.

The plants were very close—the thought of getting touch-me between his legs made him shudder—and Shanda wasn't at all interested. Instead they lay looking at stars. A meteor flashed overhead.

“Lord Qirinty keeps hoping one of those will fall where he can find it,” Shanda said. “But they never do.”

Deep into the black night, when he felt her uncoiling from him, he made her piss right next to him where he knew it was safe. He held his own water until the first moments of daylight.

They could take off the masks when they got closer to the wall, but it wasn't safe to remove the leathers.

When they came in over the wall, Miss Bertrana was waiting by the rope. She took Shanda's hand. Whandall tried to run away, but two gardeners grabbed him. They didn't hurt him, but he couldn't get away. They followed Miss Bertrana and Shanda into the house.

Lord Samorty was sitting at a table talking to two guardsmen. Miss Bertrana brought Shanda to the table. Samorty eyed Shanda's leather leggings. “Where did you sleep?” he asked.

“In a clearing.”

“Do you itch?”

“No, sir.”

He turned to Whandall. “So you know the chaparral.” He got up to inspect Whandall's earlobes. “Interesting. Who did you learn from?”

“Woodsmen.”

“They taught you?” Disbelieving.

“No, Lord; we lurked.”

Samorty nodded. “I've seen you before. Sit down. Miss Bertrana, I'll thank you to take Miss Shanda to your rooms and discover her condition.”

“Sir?”

“You know very well what I mean.”

“Oh. Yes sir,” Miss Bertrana said. Shanda started to protest. “Father—”

“Just go,” Samorty said. He sounded weary and resigned to problems, and his voice was enough to cut Shanda's next protest off before it began. She followed Miss Bertrana out.

“Where have I seen you, boy?” Samorty demanded. He didn't seem angry, just annoyed by the distractions, and very weary.

Whandall didn't know what to say, so he stared at the table and said nothing. There was something carved into the table, lines, some curved, a big square shape with smaller square shapes in it…

“You like maps?” Samorty asked.

“I don't know,” Whandall said.

“No, I guess you wouldn't,” Samorty said. “Look. Think of this as a picture of the way the city would look if you were high above it. This is the Lord's Town wall.” He indicated the square. “This is this house, and right here is where you two went over the wall.”

Whandall's terror warred with curiosity. He bent over the carving to study it. “Is it magic, Lord?”

“Not now.”

Whandall stared again. “Then—that's the sea?” he asked.

“Right. Now, how far from the wall before the chaparral gets really nasty?”

“Two hundred paces?” Whandall said. “Two hundred and it will hurt you. Five hundred and it kills.”

“How far did you take my daughter?” Whandall's voice caught in his throat.

“We know it was a long way because we saw you coming back,” Samorty said. “And you were a lot more than five hundred paces out, far enough that nobody would go out after you. Where did you take her? Show me on this map.”

“We had to go around a lot of… bad places,” Whandall said. “So I'm not sure. Are these the trees?”

“Yes.”

He put his finger into the forest. “About that far.”

Samorty looked at him with new respect. “Is there hemp out there?”

“Yes, Lord, but it's dangerous.”

“How?”

Kreeg Miller had told him a tale. “We heard the woodsmen say that once they found four men dead with smiles on their faces. They'd let one of the hemp plants catch them. They went to sleep and it strangled them.”

Miss Bertrana came in without Shanda. “She's fine,” she said.

“You're certain.”

“Oh, yes sir, intact—no question about it. And there's no rash either.”

“Good. Thank you. You may go.”

“Yes, sir.” Miss Bertrana escaped happily.

“Let me see your hands,” Samorty said. He recoiled from the dirt and clapped his hands. “Washbasin,” he said to the kinless who came in answer. “Now. Wash up,” he told Whandall. His voice was almost friendly now.

Whandall washed his hands carefully. Whatever Miss Bertrana had said seemed to have calmed Samorty and given him some new energy, as if one of his problems didn't matter anymore. When Whandall was done washing, Samorty inspected his tattoo.

“Serpent's Walk,” he said almost to himself. “I remember you. You brought Pelzed to see me.”

“Yes, sir—”

“For which I thank you. What's your name?”

Whandall was too afraid to lie. “Whandall Placehold.”

“Well, Whandall Placehold, there's no harm done here. You want those leathers? Keep them. And here.” He went to a box on a table in the corner, and came back with a dozen shells. “Take these.”

“Thank you, sir—”

“Now don't come back,” Samorty said.

Whandall had never had a dream ripped out of him. It hurt more than he thought anything could.

Samorty clapped his hands and told the kinless servant, “Bring me Peacevoice Waterman. He should be just outside.”

Peacevoice Waterman was big and almost certainly Lordkin.

“Peacevoice, this is Whandall Placehold. Take Whandall Placehold to the gate. Show him to the watch, and tell them he's not welcome here any longer.”

“Sir.”

“Tell him too,” Samorty said.

When they reached the gate, Waterman took out his sword. “Easy or hard way, boy?” he demanded.

“I don't know what you mean—”

“Don't you? It's simple. Bend over, or I'll bend you over.”

Whandall bent. Waterman raised the sword…

The flat of the sword made a loud whack as it hit Whandall's buttocks, but he was still wearing the leathers and it didn't really hurt at all. Not compared to the loss he felt. Waterman hit him five times more.

“All right. Get,” Waterman said. “Go gather somewhere else.”

“This was all given to me!”

“Good thing too,” Waterman said. “Boy, you don't know how lucky you are. Now get out of here. Don't come back.”

Tras Preetror was both disappointed and intrigued. “For what that soap cost me,” he said, “I could have got a dozen stories from that wizard. From you it's all hints at something bigger.”

Whandall had not spoken of the map. He had to keep
something
back. He asked, “Wizard, Tras?”

“Morth of Atlantis. You must know him.”

“Yes.” Whandall didn't say that it was Morth of Atlantis he had seen at Lord Samorty's dinner.

“You have to go back, you know,” Tras said.

Whandall felt his buttocks. He wasn't hurt this time. The leathers hadn't been interesting enough to attract attention from the Bull Pizzles, so he'd gotten home safely with the shells Lord Samorty had given him. Would woodsman's leathers help him win a fight or only hamper his swordplay?

But he remembered the sound of that sword hitting him. It was sharp, and if it hadn't been turned to hit him flat, he'd have lost a leg. Whandall was sure that even the flat would hurt dreadfully without the leathers. “No.”

“Think of the stories,” Tras said.

“They know me. They won't let me in.”

“The tree—”

“They
know
about the
tree
. Tras,” Whandall said.

“There has to be a way,” Tras said. “Nobody talks about the Lordshills.
Not the Lords, not the people who live there. There have to be stories.”

“Morth has been to Lordshills, and he knows things he's never told the Lords. He brought water to Tep's Town,” Whandall said. Maybe he could interest Tras in Morth and then he'd leave Whandall alone.

Whandall had forgotten Pelzed.

Ten days later he was summoned to the Serpent's Walk meetinghouse.

Pelzed was all smiles. He poured from a teapot and slid hot hemp tea over to Whandall. His eyes commanded. Whandall drank.

They drank hemp tea at Serpent's Walk meetings, but it was never as strong as this. Whandall was sweating and hungry before he drank half of it. His head—he heard things, pleasant sounds.

“The teller says you won't go back to Lord's Town,” Pelzed said.

“Lord? You talk to Tras Preetror?”

“That's not your business.”

“Did he tell you I got caught?” Whandall demanded. “No. You look all right. Any broken bones?”

“No, Lord, b—”

Pelzed waved it away. “What did you see?”

“Redwoods,” Whandall said. “The inside of a Lord's house, a big room where he calls people and gives orders.” And a map. If he told Pelzed about maps he'd have to draw them for him. “A big Lordsman with a sword beat me and told me never to come back. So I won't, Lord.” They would beat him, but worse, they would send him away again. Whandall had tried to forget Lordshills and the Gift of the King.

“Tras says he will pay for a new roof on the meetinghouse,” Pelzed said.

“Tras is generous.”

“If you take him to Lord's Town. Have some more tea.”

“I can't go there!”

“Sure you can. Tell them I sent you,” Pelzed said. “Tell them you have a message from Lord Pelzed of Serpent's Walk. They know me!” he said proudly.

A Lordkin should have guile. “They won't believe me,” Whandall said. “You're important, but I'm just a boy they already threw out.” Inspiration. “Why don't you go instead, Lord?”

Pelzed grinned. “No. But they'll believe Tras Preetror,” he said. “He'll tell them. Have some more tea.”

They'd told him never to come back. Maybe this way would work,
Whandall thought. His head buzzed pleasantly. This time he would watch, do nothing, learn the rules and customs.

The gardener's clothing wasn't fine enough for an emissary of Lord Pelzed. Pelzed sent gatherers to inspect the kinless shops. When they found something Tras Preetror thought might do, Serpent's Walk built a bonfire at the street corner nearest the shop. Others began making torches. Then Pelzed offered a trade: new clothes, and there wouldn't be a burning. The kinless were happy to accept.

Tras hired a wagon to take them to the Lord's Town gate. The kinless driver was astonished but willing so long as he didn't have to go further into Tep's Town than Ominous Hill.

Whandall took the opportunity to examine the ponies that pulled the wagon. The beasts tolerated Whandall's gaze but shied from his touch. Bony points protruded from the centers of their foreheads.

They passed the Black Pit. “You want to be a teller, you have to look for stories,” Tras said. “There must be stories about the Black Pit.”

Whandall gaped as if he'd never noticed the place before.

“Fire,” the kinless wagoneer said. “Used to be fire pits, my grandfather said.” His voice took on the disbelieving tone kinless used. “Fires and ghost monsters, until Yangin-Atep took the fires away. Now the Lords've put up a fence.”

The guards watched with interest as they came up the hill. A quarter of the way up, the ponies slowed. The driver let them go on a few more paces, then stopped. “Far as I go.”