Wizards’ Worlds (64 page)

Wowern laughed, giving Erlia a tiny push toward Thasus. “Over this one at least. You
need have no fear for her, brother.”

Erlia did not respond to his gentle attempt at teasing. Her head turned away and on
her face lay again a shadow of distress. I had caught it, also, stronger, more determined—that
echo of darkness and all evil.

This time it was as if I had actually picked up a foul
scent—the kind that clung to swamps, places of death and decay ruled by tainted water.
Then it was gone, and I wondered if I had only made a guess without foundation. There
are those who sell reptiles and crawling things, yes. But they are set apart from
our beasts and have their own corner. One which I, for one, did not spend time in
exploring. Yet I was sure this was no stench of animal or of any living thing—

It was gone as quickly as it had come, leaving only that ever-present uneasiness.
Still, I dropped a little behind and tried in a very cautious way—not really Calling—to
pin upon that hint of evil.

“What is with you, Kara?” Wowern matched his stride to mine.

“I do not know.” That was true, yet deep within me something stirred. I was certain
that never before had this unknown touched me. Still . . .

Once again I caught that rank stench. It was stronger, so that I wavered—and, without
being aware of what I did, steadied myself by a touch on Wowern’s arm. He, in turn,
started as might a horse suddenly reined in.

“What—” he began again as I swung halfway about to face an opening between two smaller
stalls.

“This way!” As certain as if a Calling drew me, I pushed into that narrow opening,
heedless whether the rest of the Kin followed or not.

Ahead was a second line of booths fronting another lane. From these came the chatter
of smaller animals, squawks and screams of birds. This was the beginning of the area
where merchants and not showmen ruled. Yet it was toward none of these that that trace
of need—for need did lie beneath the overlayer of evil—drew me.

I entered the section I had always hitherto shunned—that portion of the mart where
dealers in reptiles and scaled life gathered. Dragons I knew, yes, but they are warm-blooded
in spite of the scaled bodies and in their way sometimes far more intelligent than
my own species. But
the crawlers, the fang-jawed, armor-plated creatures, were to me wholly alien.

“What—” Again Wowern broke my preoccupation. I threw out a hand, demanding silence.

The afternoon was nearly spent. Flares outside booths and stalls blazed up—adding
their acrid odor—not enough to cover the ill smells of the wares. A deep, coughing
bellow drowned out whatever protest my companion might have uttered. Whether the others
of our company still followed I did not know nor care.

I stood before a tent perhaps a third the size of ours. But where the leather and
stiff woven walls we favored were brilliantly colored, gay to the eye, these walls
were uniformly a sickly gray, overcast with a yellow that made me think of decay and
pustulant nastiness.

Over the tent-flap the light of a torch brought to life a device such as might be
the mark of a noble house. However, even when one stared directly at this (it was
as dull as tarnished and unkempt metal) it was difficult for the eye to follow its
convolutions. This might be a secret seal only a mage could interpret.

Shivering, I looked away. There was an impression of dark shadow angling forth, as
might the tentacle of an obscene creature questing for prey. Still, I must pass under,
for what I sought lay within.

No merchant stood to solicit buyers. Nor was there any glow of lamp. What did issue
as I walked slowly, more than half against my will, toward that dark opening was the
effulgence of a swampland wherein lay evil and death.

There
was
light after all—a greenish gleam flaring as I passed the flap. I could see, fronting
me, a short table of the folding sort, some lumpish stools, like frozen clots of mud.
Around the walls of the tent were cages, and from them came a stealthy, restless rustling.
Those within were alert . . . and dangerous.

I had no desire to walk along those cages, peer at their occupants. I had no wish
to be here at all. Still, my
body—or an inner part of me—would not allow me back into the open air. Out of the
gloom, which pooled oddly in corners as if made up of tangible hangings, emerged a
figure so muffled by a thickly folded robe, so encowled about the head, that I could
not have said whether I fronted man or woman.

The green glow that filled the tent, except in those shadowed corners, appeared to
draw in about the newcomer, forming an outline, yet not illuminating to any great
extent. There was an answering glow of dullish light from the breast of the robe.
A pendant rested there—gold, I thought, but dull. I could make out (as if it were
purposefully expanding and drawing color just to catch my eyes) the shape of a head—beautiful
but still evil. The eyes were half-covered with heavy lids, only I had the fancy that
beneath was true sight, so I was being regarded by something reaching through the
metal—regarded and measured.

“Lady.” The voice from beneath the hood, shaped by lips I still could not see, was
clear. “You would buy.” It was not a true question, rather a statement, as if any
bargain we might make was already concluded.

Buy? What? I wanted nothing from any of those cages whose contents I still could not
see. Buy? . . .

My gaze was pulled—away from the robe-hidden seller—until I looked over his or her
left shoulder. There was one cage apart from the rest, a large one. And within it—

As one walks in one of those troubled dreams wherein one is compelled to a task one
dreads, I moved forward, though I still had enough control over my shivering body
to make a wide circle, not approaching either that table or the one who stood by it.

The cage was before me and here the shadows were thick curtains—the light did not
reach. Nor could I discern any movement. Yet there was life there—that I knew.

I heard a sound from the merchant, out of my sight
unless I turned my head. Did he speak or call? Certainly what he uttered was in no
tongue I knew.

In the air above the cage appeared a ball of sickly yellow which cast light—no flame
of any honest torch.

A creature crouched low upon the floor of the cage, so bent in upon itself that at
first it was difficult to see any exact shape. Its skin was a dirty gray, like the
tent walls, not scaled, but warty and wrinkled, hanging in folds. There were four
limbs—for now it uncoiled to rise. When it reached its full height, it stood erect
on hind limbs, its feet webbed and flat. It was taller than I, matching Wowern’s inches.

There was a thick growth of ugly yellow wattles about the throat and a ragged comb-crest
of the same upon its rounded head. The forelimbs reached forward as massively clawed
digits closed about the bars of the cage, scratching along the metal. There was no
chin, rather a wide mouth like that of a frog, above that a single slit, which must
serve it as a nostril. Only—the eyes . . .

In that hideous nightmare of a face they were so startling that they brought a gasp
from me, for they were a clear green—like wondrous gems in an ugly and degrading setting.
Nor were the pupils slitted as one would expect in a reptile or amphibian—but round,
somehow as human as my own. Also . . . in them lay intelligence—intelligence, and
such pain as was a knife thrust into me when our gaze locked.

What the creature was I could not tell. Certainly I had never seen its like before.
A flutter of movement to my left, and the robed merchant moved closer. From one of
those long sleeves issued a hand as pale as that of any fine lady, very slender and
long of finger. This waved in a surprisingly graceful gesture toward the still silent
captive.

“A rare bargain, lady. You shall not see the like of this perhaps again in your lifetime.”

“What is it—and from where?” Wowern’s voice was loud and harsh. He moved in upon my
right and I could
sense his growing uneasiness, his desire that we both be away from this hidden-faced
one and his or her strange wares.

“What is it?” the other repeated. “Ah. It is so rare we have not yet put name to it.
From where? The east.”

Then I felt cold. All who roved knew what lay to the east—that swampland so accursed
that no one ventures into it—about which all kinds of evil legends and tales have
been told for generations.

“A bargain,” the merchant repeated when neither of us made comment. “All know of the
Quintka—that you delight in your trained beasts—that you seek ever new ones to add
to your company. Here is one which will bring many flocking to see it. It is not stupid,
I think you can train it well.”

Those green eyes—how they demanded that I look upon them! That feeling of pain, of
sorrow so deep that there were no words to express it—flowed from them to me.

“It is a monster!” Wowern caught my arm in a grip so tight that his nails near scored
my flesh. I could sense fear rising in him—not for himself but for me. He strove to
pull me back a step or two, meaning, I understood, to take me out of this place.

“Five silver bits, lady.”

The caged creature made no sound; I felt rather than saw its compelling gaze shift
a fraction. It looked now to the robed one, and within those green eyes was a flare
of deep and abiding hatred. Within
me
arose an answer.

Those eyes, did they trouble me with some fleeting memory? How could they? This was
an unknown monster. Yet at that moment this feeling of emotion was as much a true
Calling as if mind-words passed. Our meeting was meant to be.

I brought out my purse. Wowern’s hold on me tightened. He protested fiercely but I
did not listen. Rather I
jerked free, and, without the usual bargaining, I counted forth those bits. Not into
that long-fingered graceful hand; rather, I turned and tossed them on the tabletop.
I wanted no close contact with the merchant. Nor did I want to linger here, for it
seemed those heavy shadows reached farther and farther, drawing out of the tainted
air any hint of
freshness, leaving me breathless.

“Loose—” I got out that part order, past a thickening of my throat, not sure that
even a Quintka could control such a creature. Still, when I met again those eyes so
wrongly set in that hideous face, I was not afraid.

The robed one uttered a queer sound, almost as if he or she had choked down jeering
laughter. There was no move to draw any bolt or bar locking that cage. Instead, the
slender hand went to the pendant lying heavy on the robe, fingers closed tightly about
that, hiding the beautiful, vile face from view.

There sped a puff of darkness from that hand—thrusting outward to the bars of the
cage. The creature had retreated, standing with shoulders a little hunched. I smelled
a sickly sweetness which made my head swim—though I stood well away from that black
tongue.

It wreathed about the bars and they were gone. For a long moment the creature remained
where it was. From all the other cages about uprose not only a frenzied rustling,
as if the other captives aroused to demand their own freedom, but also gutteral grunts
and croakings, hissings—

That thing I had so madly purchased shambled forward. I was aware, without turning
my head, that the robed one moved even more quickly, retreating into a deeper core
of shadow. That retreat pleased me, made me less aware of my own recklessness. Did
this merchant fear the late captive? If so, no such fear was mine. For the first time
I spoke to the monster, using the same firm tone I would with any new addition to
my team.

“Come!”

Come it did—treading deliberately on hind legs as if that came naturally, its taloned
paw-hands swinging at its sides. I turned, sure within myself that where I went it
would follow.

However, once outside that tent I paused, for whatever compulsion had gripped me faded.
Also, I realized that I could not return to our own place openly. Even though the
twilight gathered in, this creature padding at my heels, as if he were a well-trained
tree cat, was far too obvious and startling. Though it was often the custom for one
of the Quintka to parade a member of his or her personal team through the fair lanes
as an inducement for a show, none of us had ever so displayed a creature like unto
this.

Wowern wore his trainer’s cloak hooked at the throat, thrown back over his shoulders.
I had not brought mine. The feeling that we must attract as little attention as possible
made me turn to him. There was no mistaking the frown on his face, the stubborn set
of his chin.

“Wowern . . .” It irritated me to ask any favor; still, I was pressured into an appeal.
“Your cloak?”

His scowl was black, his hand at the buckle of that garment, as if to defend himself
against my snatching it from him. Behind him the monster stood quietly, his eyes no
longer on me, for his bewattled head was raised as he stared at the device above the
tent-flap door.

At that moment I swayed. What reached me was akin to a sharp blow in the face, a blast
of raw hatred so deep—so intense—as to be as sharp as a danger Calling! Wowern must
also have been struck by it. Hand to knife hilt, slightly crouching, he swung half-about,
ready to defend himself. Only there was no attack, just the creature, its arms still
dangling loosely at its sides, staring upward.

His eyes narrowed, his scowl fading into something else, an intentness of feature
as if he strained to listen, Wowern surveyed that other. Then, with his left hand,
for he still kept grip upon the knife, he snapped open cloak
buckle and swiftly spun the folds of cloth about the creature in such a skillful fashion
that its head was covered as well as its body to the thick and warty-skinned thighs.

“Come!” He gave the order now. Again he seized upon my arm with a grasp I could not
withstand, propelling me forward to the opening of the same narrow side lane that
had brought us here, taking no note of the muffled creature, as if he were entirely
certain it would follow. Thus we came back to the place of the Kin, Wowern choosing
our path, which lay amid such pockets of shadow as he could find. I allowed him this
leadership, for I was in a turmoil within myself.