The Coming Of Wisdom (32 page)

He grinned at her surprise. “Quicker than swords!” he said. He looked rather embarrassed, but obviously pleased with his native skill.

“I thought those were about the worst abomination in the canon, adept? Have I missed a new sutra?”

“My suggestion, mistress.” That was Shonsu. He was sitting up now, leaning back against a heap of cushions, still very thin and wan, but certainly on the mend. Every day he was visibly stronger. “You know what the sutras say about sorcerers?”

If she confessed how many sutras she knew, Adept Nnanji’s ginger hair would turn white instantly. “Can’t say I’ve ever thought about it.”

“Nothing! They’re not swordsmen, so the ways of honor do not apply. They’re armed civilians, an abomination in itself—so anything goes.”

“But knives?” Even a water rat could feel uneasy at the thought of swordsmen hurling knives. Worse, Jja was sitting quietly in a corner, stitching at one of Shonsu’s boots, and there was one of Nnanji’s beside her. Concealed knives were worse yet.

Shonsu shrugged. He looked tired. Thana was kneeling attentively at his side. She had been playing nurse ever since Shonsu recovered consciousness and could appreciate her efforts. Brota did not think her daughter would succeed any more with Shonsu than Nnanji was succeeding with her, but a Seventh was worth the effort.

“When I met the sorcerers in Aus,” Shonsu said, “they made me stand back from them. I wondered if they might need time to chant their spells, or whatever it is they do. And everything we’ve heard about them suggests that speed is the only effective attack. So—knives!” He sounded defensive about it, though.

“I’m not arguing, my lord! Thana, I need you to come ashore with me.”

Thana turned solicitous eyes on Shonsu. “You can spare me for a little while, my lord?”

“I think I’ll manage,” he said politely.

Thana patted his hand, rose in a leisurely display of long, brown limbs, and sauntered catlike to the door. Her sashes were becoming quite indecent these days, hardly more than ribbons, and Brota caught a whiff of musk and violets that would have choked a goat. She would have to explain subtlety to Thana.

Nnanji threw.
Thud
! Bull’s-eye. He smirked and reached for another knife.

Jja rose and went across to her owner, receiving a smile of welcome that spoke more than a dozen sutras. Then he looked to Brota again. “Mistress? I’ve been trying to make sense of what happened in Wal. You, Sailor Oligarro, Nnanji, and the captain, none of your stories are quite the same. The thunderbolt—you said the man vanished in the smoke, but you saw no flash. Oligarro says he fell off the gangplank, and there was a flash. Nnanji could not see . . . ”

She had told him three times. Of course eyewitnesses would never agree. “What does Novice Katanji say, my lord?”

Shonsu and Nnanji exchanged surprised glances. “I was not aware that he was present.”

Demons! She had just thrown away her guide to the source of illicit rugs. “Oh, yes! He was there, my lord.”

Nnanji sprang off the chest and headed purposefully for the door. Brota followed him out on deck. Katanji was standing by the forward gangplank, wearing kilt and sword and boots. How had he managed . . . 

She hurried after Nnanji, dodging rolls of carpet being carried aboard.

“I need a word with you, protégé!” he said ominously.

Katanji opened his eyes wide. “Of course, mentor.” The only trace of his slave disguise was a faint oily smear on his nose. His face had been smeared that night in Wal, too. “Did you ask Mistress Brota about that sutra?”

Nnanji hesitated, then turned to Brota with a grin. “Can you explain one thousand and forty-four to me, mistress?”

Fortunately, a Fifth need only know up to nine eighty-one. “I’m not familiar with it, adept.”

“Lord Shonsu threw it at me. He says he doesn’t understand it, either, but I’m sure he’s fooling.” His eyes went blank and he quoted in a voice very like Shonsu’s: “ ‘On Lack of Footprints: It is better to give a blunt sword than a sutra to those beyond help.’ ”

Brota shrugged. Landlubber piffle! How was she going to extract Katanji, or even get a quick word with him? “It doesn’t seem to make much sense, does it? How can you give anything to someone who’s beyond help?”

Nnanji nodded glumly. “I thought it might mean that it’s better to give any help you can, even if it’s not much, rather than just advice?”

“Where do the footprints come in, then?”

“Well . . . even if there’s no fame or honor to be gained?”

“Could it have two meanings,” Katanji said, “so you could take whichever one you wanted?”

“What’s the other one?” his brother demanded cautiously.

Thana drifted out of the fo’c’sle door, wearing her best satin wrap and yellow sandals. She had her sword on her back. Nnanji’s eyes wandered in that direction.

“Pirates leave no footprints,” Katanji muttered, as though deep in thought. “Not like brigands on land. And ‘blunt sword’ could mean . . . a foil? And the frees can’t help sailors . . . ”

“That’s it!” Nnanji shouted. “You’ve got it! It means you can teach fencing to sailors! Thanks, nipper!” Sorcerers forgotten, he spun around and ran for the deckhouse.

Katanji watched him go, shaking his head pityingly. Then he smirked at Brota. “Let’s get the hell out of here!” he said.

Brota chose the largest gondola she could see, but it heaved mightily when she clambered in. She seated herself facing the gondolier to keep an eye on him. He was a skinny, sun-dried man with wide shoulders, about the right age to have many mouths to feed. Thana and the boy sat in front of him, facing her.

The gondolier pushed off, and the boat slid out toward the harbor. He sang a short welcome, tourist stuff, and then said, “Where to, mistress?”

“Into the city to make a few purchases and bring them back to the ship.”

He guessed at once. “Rugs,” he said, and his face went wooden. Thana helped in the negotiations, leaning back to smile up at him and let him peer down the top of her wrap while she wheedled. It was an article of faith in the family that Thana always got her own way. Wide-eyed and damp on the forehead, the gondolier settled for a lot less than the port officer had.

The boat glided forward again through sheets of light coming off the water. Misty towers glimmered in the distance. “Where to?” asked the gondolier again.

“Where to, novice?” Brota asked. The rugmaker would think he was furnishing a barracks when he saw three swordsmen arrive.

Katanji tore his eyes away from stately tall ships, the graceful galleys, the scurrying small craft. He smiled angelically. “What’s my share?” he asked.

The boat flowed onward for a few minutes, and the only sounds were the music and port noises drifting over the harbor.

“What did you have in mind?” she demanded, deciding that five silver was tops.

He grinned. “I get first choice, and you transport mine free of charge to
Sapphire
and on
Sapphire
to wherever I want and unload for me.” Then he paused, and his face grew serious. “And you promise not to tell Nanj. He says trade isn’t honorable for swordsmen!”

Thana began to snicker. Brota didn’t know whether to be furious at herself or amused at the lad.

“We don’t allow private trading on
Sapphire
,” she said grimly. “The crew all know that they have a share, and if anyone wants to leave he can take it then.”

“With respect, mistress,” Katanji said, not looking very respectful, “I’m not crew.”

She surrendered with a wry smile, conscious that Thana was enjoying this and would love to tell the story to the rest of the family. “No, you’re one of the Goddess’ men, aren’t you? All right, it’s a deal. But don’t you tell anyone, either. Or you, Thana!”

He leaned forward and held out both hands for the traders’ shake, which amused her even more. Then he told the gondolier the Canal of Seven Temples and went back to eyeing the busy port.

Suddenly Brota remembered that this First had at least fifteen golds in his pouch. She’d been thinking that “first choice” meant one rug. He wouldn’t dare . . . would he?

Before she could ask, Thana beat her to it. “How much are you planning to spend, trader?” she asked.

Katanji gave her a big, toothy smile. “Sixty-four golds,” he said.

†

Casr, next city after Dri, lay also on the right bank, swordsman country. The Wind God continued to perform His duties apathetically, and when at last Casr came in sight, one hot and tranquil afternoon, Wallie was sufficiently recovered to be out of doors. Wearing nothing but his kilt, he sprawled on a hatch cover with his head on a pillow, soaking up sunshine like a millionaire on a private yacht. The boards were warm beneath him, and sails filled the sky.

By him lay his crutch, made for him by Sailor Holiyi. On his other side sat Jja, clad now in sailor breechclout and bra sash. They had to be black for a slave, of course, but they showed off her delectable figure in a way that Wallie found thunderously provocative. From time to time he would squeeze her hand, or she would squeeze his, and then they would smile to each other in silent contentment. Thana, praise to the Most High, had at last become discouraged in her wooing and was nowhere around.

The World crawled along at its leisurely preindustrial pace. It was a very peaceful way to go to war. Wallie was being given time to recover his health and apparently he was going to make a full recovery. The pious might class that as a miracle cure.

Sailors sauntered by upon their daily tasks, tending ship and children, clothes and food. The glances they sent his way were at best friendly, at worst respectfully polite . . . and that was another miracle. Their former hostility had vanished, being replaced by a grudging acceptance of the passengers. Brota had even found cabins for them, doubling up youngsters and clearing out storage.

Up on the poop, steel clashed on steel as Nnanji coached Mata. Since his mentor had uncovered that curiously ambiguous sutra, ship life had been transformed for him from a hell of boredom to a heaven of day-long fencing. No longer was he restricted to teaching Thana, Katanji, and Matarro. The sailors welcomed the instruction. On the River, it was wise insurance.

Wallie was still savoring that thought when a shadow warned him and he raised his eyes to see the humorless face of Tomiyano like a dark cloud in the sky. He sat up.

“Casr in sight . . . my lord.” Tomiyano no longer thought murder when he looked at Shonsu, but neither did he experience ecstasies of brotherly love. “Just wondering if you felt able to recruit some swordsmen yet?” He was obviously resigned to a negative reply.

Wallie shook his head. He tried a smile, but it was absorbed and not reflected. Moving the crutch out of the way, he gestured to the hatch beside him.

“Not yet, Captain. But sit a moment and let’s discuss it.”

Tomiyano shrugged and perched on the edge as if not planning to stay long. His bruises were gone now, the scrapes healed. The burn on his face had developed white strands of scar tissue. A proud man—proud of his ship, now appropriated by the gods; proud of his physical self, eclipsed by the titanic presence of Shonsu; proud once of his independence . . . 

“I’m not fit for duty yet,” Wallie said. “But one day, Captain, you’ll get your ship back. One day I’ll have cleaned up the sorcerers. Then we’ll both be free agents. And perhaps, when that day comes, you and I can meet in a bar somewhere and clean that up together? Or clean up each other, if you prefer. I’ll spot you one friend or two chair legs, and I’ll flatten the furniture with you. After that’s over, we could tear up the whole dock front? Go wenching and start a legend? Build the sort of hangover that makes a man suicidal? Riot and pillage and . . . ”

Tomiyano’s face stayed wooden. He laid his hands on the hatch as if about to rise. “Anything else, my lord?”

Wallie sighed—wrong approach. “Yes. After Casr, I believe, comes Sen. But that’s left bank. Next swordsman city is Tau . . . a week, maybe?”

“If we get some decent wind.”

“Well, I should be mobile by then.”

“You’ll be disembarking in Tau?” The sailor’s expression was cautious.

Wallie knew what was bothering him. “As soon as I’m fit and we reach a city with some reasonable swordsmen, then your obligations are ended, the contract fulfilled. We’ll disembark. Fair enough?”

The sailor was also a trader. “Define ‘reasonable swordsmen.’ ”

“A pair of Thirds? Able-bodied types, of course. Yes, I’d say that two Thirds would do to start with. They, at least, could cover my back.”

The sailor nodded and again seemed about to depart.

“Stay awhile,” Wallie said. “If you have a minute? I’ve a problem you may be able to help me with.”

Tomiyano settled back, his face revealing nothing, but at that moment an outburst of laughter came wafting down from the fencers and their audience on the poop, with Nnanji’s the loudest of all. The captain glanced that way, and his eyes narrowed.

“Now there’s a miracle for you,” Wallie said softly.

“Miracle?”

“Nnanji. Not many men can overcome their own prejudices as he did, Captain.”

Tomiyano scowled. “Prejudices? Prejudices would be opinions not based upon experience, would they not?”

“Or on experiences not relevant.” Wallie found it hard to be patient around Tomiyano. “Think what he started with—years of consorting with almost no one but swordsmen. Of course he regarded civilians with scorn—it was how he was trained to think. He was also taught that assassination was an absolutely unforgivable crime, the ultimate atrocity—”

“You disagree with that oath he swore?”

“Not in the slightest. What I mean is that he found that his training was inappropriate and he rose above it. Few people ever do that, Captain. The old man swears he played no part—it was all Nnanji’s idea. When we first came aboard, he believed that you and your family should be proud to serve him, just because he was a swordsman. Now he regards you as friends and allies. That’s quite a feat of adjustment, is it not?”

“It’s an improvement.”