The Crystal Variation (68 page)

THE PATH
the apprentice scholar set through the twisting hallways of the lower tower would have made his head spin had it not been doing so already, Tor An thought. As it was, he was most thoroughly lost and in terror lest his guide, whom he had at last convinced to relinquish his arm, should outpace him.

The hall opened abruptly into a wide, high-ceilinged room, six of the eight ceramic walls were cast in graduating rows, like seats in a theater. Here, his guide all but ran, and he forced himself into a trot, narrowing his focus to her figure, fleeing and clanking before him. She vanished into another narrow hall. He, perforce, pursued—and very nearly ran over her where she stood, just within the narrow walls, facing a man in beige robes, his sash supporting various fobs and tablets, as well as a naked blade and a pair of smart gloves. The scholar was frowning down at the ‘prentice, who had abased herself. He looked up at Tor An’s arrival and his brows lifted high.

“Who, may I ask, are you?” The voice was pleasant, though carrying a slight edge—whether of bemusement or outright irritation, Tor An couldn’t have said.

However, the attitude of the ‘prentice suggested that this was a person whom it would be best not to annoy. Tor, An therefore, bowed as deeply as he was able and straightened with a care he hoped would be seen as respect.

“My name is Tor An yos’Galan, esteemed sir,” he said seriously.

“I see.” The scholar paused. “And what might your business be in Osabei Tower, Tor An yos’Galan?”

The scholar had an open, pleasant face. Surely, so exalted a gentleman, who was in any wise apparently someone of rank in these halls, could be trusted with his—

“Prime Chair!” the ‘prentice scholar had straightened out of her bow and was wringing her hands in agitation. “This is the pilot whom Scholar tay’Nordif expects, bearing the data necessary for her proof! Her word was that,
immediately
he arrived, he and the data were to be brought to her. Her
word
, Prime Chair, which I, as her grudent, am bound to obey!”

The scholar—Prime Chair—turned his attention to her, his head tipped to a side, long brown hair cascading over one shoulder.

“Ah! Scholar tay’Nordif’s pilot!” he said, in tones of broad enlightenment. “I confess I had not expected to see him so soon!” He stepped back, moving a graceful hand in a sweep along the way they had been traveling. “By all means, Grudent tel’Ashon, deliver the pilot and his data to our good scholar!”

“Yes,” the ‘prentice breathed. She bowed hastily and Tor An once more had his arm gripped as she hurried him with her.

“Be well, Tor An yos’Galan!” the Prime Chair called as they rushed away. “I look forward to deepening our acquaintance!”

“Quickly!” the ‘prentice breathed in his ear.

“Why?” he demanded. “We’ve been given leave to go.”

“Because,” she hissed, and without lessening her pace, “scholars are mad. It is the business of scholars to be jealous each of the others’ honors and position. You may be assured that the Prime Chair means to get the advantage of Scholar tay’Nordif and punish her for rising in the esteem of the Master as he has not. And if his punishment is to be depriving the scholar of yourself or your data, then he will take you from
her
, and not from
me
.”

Rushing along at her side, Tor An thought that perhaps it was not the scholars alone who were mad.

“Why do you serve here, then?” he panted.

“I have one more local year of service, after which I shall have my journeyman’s certificate. And you may well believe I shall receive it with joy and forthwith seek a position as a mathematics tutor. Here!” She halted before a door exactly like the others lining the hall, and touched the plate with the fingers of her free hand. A chime sounded and she said, loudly, “It is Grudent tel’Ashon, Scholar! Your pilot has arrived!”

There was small delay before the door whisked open. The grudent all but shoved him into the office beyond, letting go of his arm with a will.

He staggered, barely sorting his feet out in time to prevent a spill and stood, breathing heavily and head a-spin three long steps into a small office. At his right hand, a man in dark leathers sat on the floor, back against the wall, his brown face lean and inscrutable. Before him, a woman in the now-familiar robe of a scholar frowned from behind a too-clean desk, a data input wand held between her palms, her green eyes cold in a stern golden face.

“Well,” she said, her voice high and unpleasant against his ear. “At least you had the grace to make haste from Shinto, sirrah!” She pointed her eyes over his shoulder. “Grudent, you have done well. Leave us now.”

“Scholar.” The ‘prentice’s voice carried a unmistakable note of relief. Tor An glanced over his shoulder, but she was already gone, the office door closing behind her.

“So, Pilot,” the sharp voice brought his attention back to the scholar, who had put the chording wand down and stood up behind her desk. “Approach. I assume that you
have
brought the data?”

Tor An blinked, feeling the datastrip absurdly heavy in its inner pocket. It came to him that it was—perhaps—not wise to have embarked upon this deception. This stern-faced scholar was expecting, after all, a
particular
pilot bearing
particular
data with
particular
relevance to her work, and if the grudent were to be believed—

“Come, come, Pilot!” the scholar said impatiently. “Have you the data or not?”

“Scholar,” he bowed, head swimming, and straightened carefully. “I have data. Also, I have information.” He cleared his throat. “The Ringstars are gone. What I bring are the measurements and the logs describing the section of space which is—missing. This may not be—”

“Yes, yes!” The scholar interrupted, holding out an imperious hand. “That is precisely what you have been paid to provide! Bring it forth, Pilot; I haven’t all day to stand here trading pleasantries with you!”

He swallowed, and glanced to one side. The man sitting against the wall was watching him from hooded black eyes.

“For pity’s sake, Pilot! Have you never seen a kobold before? Come, the data!”

In fact, he
had
seen kobolds before, and the man on the floor bore a superficial resemblance to those of the laborer class he had encountered. But such a one would never have looked at him so measuringly, nor paid attention so nearly . . .

“Pilot?” the scholar’s voice now carried an edge of sarcasm. “Am I to understand that you do not stand in need of the remainder of your fee?”

Abruptly, he was exhausted. Perhaps after all, he thought,
he
was mad. In any case, this woman, whom he had never seen before, was asking for the very data he carried. How she came to want it or he to have it was immaterial, really. And if a second pilot had been commissioned to gather the same readings, then—surely—that was cause for hope?

He slid the ‘strip out, stepped forward and placed it on the desk before the impatient scholar.

She smiled, and peered into his face.

“You are tired, I see,” she said, suddenly gentle— “and so you should be, having come so quickly from Shinto! Jela will escort you to my quarters, where you may rest yourself. Only allow me to access the data and you may go . . .”

She plucked the ‘strip up and slid it into her work unit, fumbling the wand in her haste, but at last she chorded the correct commands, and stood watching as line after line of coordinates marched down the screen.

“Aha!” she said and manipulated the wand quickly before bending to the unit. Eyes on the screen, she pulled the ‘strip out of the slot and put it on the desk.

“Jela!” she said, loudly. “Stand up!”

At the back of the room, the leather-clad man slowly and stolidly got his feet under him and rose, rather, Tor An thought, like a mountain rising out of an ocean. At least, until he was fully afoot, when it could be seen that his height was more hill-like than mountain.

“Now,” said the scholar, “you will—”

From somewhere—from everywhere—an alarm sounded. Tor An spun to the wall, snatching for the grab-bars that weren’t there. Face heating, he turned back, to find the scholar pale, her mouth set into a hard, pained line.

“Your pardon, Pilot,” she said with punctilious politeness. “I am wanted elsewhere. A matter of honor, you apprehend.”

She came ‘round the desk, moving stiffly, her hands tucked firmly into her sleeves. “Jela!” she snapped, as she passed Tor An. “Escort this pilot to my quarters.”

The door opened. “Pilot,” she said, in a slightly less snappish tone, but without looking at him. “Please follow Jela.”

Tor An snatched the datastrip up off the desk, slid it into an inner pocket, and turned to see the man Jela moving purposefully toward the door. He bethought himself of the twistiness of the Tower hallways, and hurried after.

Eleven

ELEVEN

Osabei Tower

Landomist

THE THIN CORRIDOR
was awash with scholars, all talking and laughing, moving with one purpose in the direction, so Tor An believed, of the wide, tiered foyer.

Jela was well ahead of him, apparently invisible to the chattering scholars, who jostled him rather roughly, until at last he flattened himself against the wall, where he waited with a bland, intelligent patience no kobold ever bred could have mustered.

Scarcely less jostled, and tender, besides, of his wounded arm, Tor An came to rest at his guide’s shoulder, closed his eyes and took stock. On the debit side of the trade sheet, he was tired, his wound ached, and he was certainly bewildered, while the credit side showed a head more firmly anchored to his shoulders than it had been earlier in the day, and a stomach no longer in open rebellion.

Progress, he thought. Eyes still closed, he put himself to trying to filter some sense from the echoing noise.

It seemed, if he rightly understood the bits and flotsam of conversation that fell into his ear, as if Scholar tay’Nordif were about to fight a duel. What the cause of this might be, he did not quite grasp. He sighed, and settled himself more comfortably against the wall, letting the voices rise and fall about him without trying to net any more sense. He allowed himself to hope that the hallway would soon clear, and that the scholar’s quarters were neither far removed, nor Jela disposed to run . . .

He felt something touch his hand, where it rested against the wall. He blinked out of his doze to see Jela already moving down the hall in the wake of the last straggler scholars, walking slow and heavy. Something about that nagged at Tor An, as he pushed away from the wall and followed, then faded.

At the foyer, Jela paused again, in the shelter of the risers, and Tor An did too. Looking over his guide’s sleek head, he could see a wide expanse of empty floor, and the seats rising up the walls across. The noise of voices was not so loud here—not, Tor An thought, because the scholars were talking any less, but because their words were not confined by the hallway.

Carefully, he placed a hand on Jela’s shoulder. “Let us go,” he murmured, but there was no sign that the other man heard him.

For the third time, the alarm bell sounded, bringing silence in its wake. Tor An leaned against the riser that shielded them, and resigned himself to wait.

The tall, brown haired scholar Grudent tel’Ashon had addressed as “Prime Chair” strolled out onto the floor, a dueling stick held in each hand. Behind him came Scholar tay’Nordif, head high and shoulders rigid, and a slim, delicate scholar with cropped sandy hair, and a long timonium chain hanging from one ear.

Prime Chair stopped in the center of the rectangular dueling area marked out by rust colored tiles, the two scholars flanking him, and brandished the ‘sticks over his head.

“What we have before us today is a personal balancing between Scholars tel’Elyd and tay’Nordif. Scholar tay’Nordif admits to having struck Scholar tel’Elyd for taking certain liberties with the construct Jela, which she maintains is necessary to her work—” There was a murmur from the audience at this. Prime Chair shook one of the dueling sticks toward the offending section of seats.

“This action of Scholar tel’Elyd was witnessed by Scholar vel’Anbrek, nor does tel’Elyd deny it. However, it is the judgment of the Prime Chair that in striking Scholar tel’Elyd in punishment for those liberties taken with the construct, Scholar tay’Nordif has placed a scholar on the same plane as a base creature. This affront to Scholar tel’Elyd’s honor must be mended.”

With a flourish, he brought the sticks out and down to shoulder level. Each scholar stood forward and armed themselves, then spun to face each other, dueling stick held in the neutral posture.

“These two of our worthy colleagues shall contend as equals. The point goes to whichever counts to six upon a fallen opponent. This duel is not to the death. As it is a personal matter, truth-blades may not be employed.” He gave each of the combatants a long, grave look, and dropped back to the outside of the rectangle.

“You may engage upon my count of six,” he said. “One . . .”

Scholar tel’Elyd spun his stick, getting the feel of it, Tor An suspected, that having been the route advised by those who had sought to instruct him in self-defense:
Always test the weight and balance of an unfamiliar weapon, conditions permitting
.

In contrast, Scholar tay’Nordif stood gripping the stick tightly in the neutral position, her stance stiff and awkward. He wondered if the scholar had ever received self-defense instruction and hoped for her sake that the Osabei Tower weapons-master kept the charges on the dueling sticks toward the low end of match range.

“Three . . .”

Scholar tel’Elyd took up the stance; legs slightly apart, knees flexed, right foot pointed at the opponent, left foot at a right angle, primary hand at the bottom of the handle, off-hand above, spine relaxed and slightly curved. Tor An was slightly heartened to see Scholar tay’Nordif arrange herself in a similar configuration, though she stood too tall and too stiffly, her feet were placed awkwardly, and her hands were too close together.

“Six,” said Prime Chair.

Scholar tel’Elyd snapped his ‘stick sharply, releasing a heavy blue bolt in the direction of the hapless Scholar tay’Nordif. To Tor An’s mingled surprise and relief, she managed a credible parry, the sizzle of mingling energies loud in the sudden silence, finishing her move with a neat little twist that sent a glob of red speeding toward her opponent—who destroyed it with a sneer and shook another heavy bolt from his ‘stick, and a second more quickly than Tor An would have believed possible, had he not seen it for himself. Scholar tel’Elyd must have a supple wrist, indeed.