The Shadow at the Gate (14 page)

“Well, cat,” she said, “where is your elder?”

The little gray cat stopped washing and looked up at her.

Drythen Malkin has seen near fifty years, Mistress of Mistresses. Think you he can run over roofs in haste?

She cuffed the cat for its impudence and then scratched behind its ears. It purred ecstatically.

A large black cat appeared, almost as if the shadows had woven themselves together to make his form. He padded across the roof peak, and the other cats drifted aside before him.

“Drythen Malkin.”

Mistress of Mistresses.

The cat sniffed at her hand and then settled down at her side. Even in the uncertain moonlight, age lay heavy on the animal. His whiskers were gray, and old battles had left their marks on notched ears and the weal of a scar arching across his nose.

Your presence brings us honor. Thrice have I seen you. Once as a kit, many years ago, when my sire held sway in Hearne. Then, at his passing. And now, near my life’s end.

“You are so sure of your own passing?”

The cat rumbled comfortably.

Death is no stranger, that I would not recognize his scent. Surely, you know him better than I with the few years I possess?

She said nothing to that. The cats around them attended in silence. Only their lord purred.

“I seek news of your city, Drythen Malkin.”

The cat inclined his head courteously and waited.

“My sleep has been troubled and my dreams reached blindly to Hearne. Has trouble come to this city? Is there anything in these streets that has gained your notice?”

There was a pause before the cat spoke.

One thing, Mistress. There is one thing that might give you pause, though I know nothing of your dreams. These humans live blindly. They cannot scent death and evil, where a month-old kit could readily mark the trail. Several weeks ago, a sceadu came traveling to Hearne.

“A sceadu?” she said sharply. “Are you certain of this?”

Aye. Our kind bears memory of one such from the old war that ruined this city. A fell creature that did traffic with the evil wizard Scuadimnes. My sire’s sire and his sire before him all bore the memory, and so now do I.

“Remember with care, Drythen Malkin, for this is no slight thing.”

Though our memory does not run the length of your years, Mistress of Mistresses, it is clear, for darkness does not dim the sight of cats and we do not easily forget.

“Then speak. I will listen.”

We caught his scent at the eastern gate and so followed him to a tavern within the city, where he vanished into the tunnels.

“The tunnels of the thieves,” Levoreth said. She petted the old cat and he purred.

Aye. This Guild that lusts for gold and ferrets out hidden things for gain. They are fools of the worst kind, for if the sceadu so easily gained the tunnels, then perhaps they do business with it in hope of profit. But I grieve, Mistress, that I cannot tell you what this business may be, for my kind never venture into the tunnels. Danger lurks there that is beyond our ken. The tunnels are woven with magic from centuries ago, when the true wizards still lived.

“And this creature then left the city,” she said. “You and yours saw this?”

Several hours after the sceadu descended, it emerged again, from this same tavern. It made its way back to the eastern gate and so away. Three of my blood kept pace with the thing until it left the city walls. We thought it the last of the creature, but—

The old cat paused, as if marshalling its words.

“Speak, Malkin.”

—it returned.

She knew, as soon as the cat spoke. The thought had been nagging at her mind.

“Two nights ago?”

Then you already know. It was when the strange storm passed over the city. A fear came on my subjects and none ventured out into the night, but in the morning the creature’s scent lingered in the streets and near the main gate. If a cat’s nose cannot be trusted then there is little left true in this world.

“Aye,” she said slowly. “I felt something strange that night but was not certain of its cause, for it has been many years since I’ve had the misfortune to encounter a sceadu.”

The little gray cat inched forward cautiously and spoke.

The thing felt cold, Mistress.

Instantly, the black cat raised a massive paw, but Levoreth touched him.

“Nay. I would hear this.”

The old cat sank back and rumbled.

This scamp takes after his dam. Both are quick with their tongues.

“What do you mean, little one? Were you near enough to touch the thing?”

Avert!
The small cat shivered.
I would not touch such a thing, for it smelled of an evil worse than death. Only, when it came the first time to the city, it passed down a street before me. I ventured near to know its scent better. A chill like winter’s ice breathed from the thing, and I came away sick and trembling.

“You were foolish to venture so close,” she said sternly. “A single touch would have killed a small one such as you.” She scratched its ears. “But brave too. Your sire’s mark is on you.”

The old cat cuffed the little gray fondly.
I beat this litter soundly in their first year, for they all proved scamps and scoundrels, every one.

The little gray spoke again, emboldened by the praise.

Perhaps one other thing, Mistress.

The old black unsheathed a pair of claws and tapped them impatiently on the tile.

“Speak, little one, before I turn you over to your sire’s graces.”

I saw a boy climb up into the ruins of the university
, said the little cat.
A great height he scaled, up sheer walls that would trouble even a cat. There was something odd about him. No one enters the ruins, Mistress, besides the old humans that work within its confines. They dig and seek for lost things.

A swift cuff to the head sent the little cat sprawling among the others watching. It yowled once and then shot off into the shadows.

The boy was probably just some witless thief. There are humans looking for that which was lost years ago. Scholars from the Stone Tower. They seek knowledge, not gold. A lost book. They would have no hand in whatever disturbed your dreams, for I myself have hunted the ruins there and scented them. There was no evil in them. Forgive my foolish son.

Levoreth smiled. “Boys and sons are capable of great mischief, but they are not sceadus.”

They sat for a while without speaking, she and the old black, with all the other cats in polite silence around them. The little gray crept back into the circle and lowered its head meekly.

“I thank you, Drythen Malkin,” she said, “for your attendance on me. You have given me much to think on. A sceadu within the gates can only mean the Darkness has bent its thoughts to Hearne. Be certain, though, that you and yours rest within my protection.”

The old black rose stiffly and nosed her hand.

We are honored, Mistress of Mistresses.

The cats vanished across the roof and into the shadows. She called after the old black just before it disappeared.

“And the name of the tavern the sceadu entered to gain the tunnels?”

The humans call it the Goose and Gold.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

A CONVERSATION OF STARS

After the incident on the roof, Severan tried to be more attentive to Jute. He popped up without warning. Jute would be prowling through a hall, and around a corner would come Severan, trying to appear nonchalant and just as surprised to see Jute as the boy was to see him (though after a while, Jute was no longer surprised to see him). He turned up in the evening without fail, as well as in the morning for breakfast.

“It’s rather odd,” said the boy, “that you turn up everywhere. I thought you were hard at work with the others, digging things up.”

Severan looked somewhat embarrassed. “Well, things have been slow. We struck a bad spot in the lower level. There’s a ward proving a vexing puzzle. It’s taken days to understand the first thing about it and we’re still far from unraveling the cursed thing. The others are down there now, arguing over how to beat it. I decided to take a breather. Besides, I know you could do with some company.”

“Rubbish,” said Jute. “You’ve been prowling about just to keep an eye on me.”

“If you weren’t such a nitwit,” said Severan. “Climbing out windows and swanning about the city as if you didn’t have a care in the world! You have no idea—”

“I’m bored!”

They glared at each other. The sky outside the window was deepening into purple, flecked with stars emerging at first as suggestions and then, as the purple darkened into velvety blue, gleaming in earnest. It had grown dark in the room. Severan sighed and fumbled in his pocket for a flint and tinder. The candle flickered into life under his hands.

“Why can’t you just say something,” said Jute. “Say whatever the name is for fire and light it like that? I thought you were a wizard.”

“A wizard?” Severan sighed. “No, I’m just a scholar. Besides, there’s just as much magic in how a flint works as there is in the true name of fire. A different kind of magic, yes, but magic nonetheless. Look here. You strike a flint and a spark is produced. This can be done with some stones but not with others. If the candle is lit by uttering the true name of fire or by the sparking of flints, a question is revealed behind both actions. How was it ordained that there are two paths to fire, that two disparate means result in the same end? Questions like this are more interesting than using so-called magic or not.”

Jute shrugged. “They both work. There’s allus more than one way to rob the duchess.”

“A dangerous attitude. Just because something works doesn’t mean it should be done. If you start thinking like that then, sooner or later, you end up doing all sorts of horrible things to achieve your goal. Nio was not always the man you had the misfortune to meet. Once, he was a good man, but somewhere along the way he must have decided that what he desired outweighed the constraints of what should and should not be done.”

“I hope he falls down that hole in his cellar and breaks his neck,” growled Jute.

The old man smiled sourly. “If you have to eat, you steal, right?”

“Of course.”

“It is said that life—and by that I mean all of everything that exists—is like a mosaic made of countless tiny stones. Each person’s life comprises a part of the mosaic, and each person can only see their part of the mosaic. Birth, death, love, and hate—all the pain, sweat, and grief that are the lot of every man—those are the stones man is given power to place. Our choices dictate how our own few stones are laid into the larger pattern of the mosaic.”

“But if each person can only see their own part,” said Jute, frowning, “then surely the whole mosaic would end up in a mess.”

“Perhaps,” said Severan. “But if enough people seek to do what is right and true, then the mosaic of their lives is in harmony with the mosaics of all those who choose in like fashion. Some people, however, choose the darkness, even though they do not realize what they have done. There are only two colors of the mosaic: darkness and that which is not darkness, and the two can never exist in harmony.”

“Has anyone ever seen the whole mosaic?”

“I’ve read that it stands in a room within the house of dreams, where no man has ever been, where no man has ever set foot. At least, I hope it’s there, for if it isn’t, then it is nowhere and life has no meaning.”

He paused and eyed the boy for a moment before continuing.

“No one has seen it,” he repeated, “but there are those who fly higher than others. The heights afford a better view, and I think such people can see a great deal of the mosaic. Much more than an old man like myself.”

“Someone else said that to me recently.”

“Who?” said Severan sharply.

“The hawk,” said Jute, and then he stopped, appalled at his own words.

“The hawk?”

But Jute would say nothing more. The candle slowly burned down. The wax ran and pooled on the table. Outside, the wind blew through the starry night, smelling of selia blossoms and the sea.

“I’ve been thinking,” said Severan. “For several days I’ve been wondering. Up until now, I dismissed it as the uneasy dreams of an old man. It began when I first saw you, lying unconscious in Nio’s house with him pacing the floor, maddened and muttering, for he had lost something of terrible value in the box you stole. He never said what was in the box, and though he claimed he never could open the thing, I suspect he had a good idea what it contained.”

“Did you know also?”

“From what he let slip in unguarded moments, I had a suspicion. As the days went by, I began to think that perhaps what was in the box was no longer there. And now I am more sure of it.”