Magi'i of Cyador

VII

A COOL MIST shrouds Cyad, a mist that holds the tang of salt air, the fragrance of the late-blooming aramyds, and the faintest odor of the bitterness that reminds Lorn of chaos, an acridness far stronger within the Quarter of the Magi’i, but omnipresent throughout the great white city. Occasional drops of rain slither through the silvery mist, and the white stones of the buildings and roads of Cyad are gray with moisture.

Lorn slips along the covered portico on the upper level of the dwelling and then down the outside steps to the garden,staying close to the inside wall. In his left hand is a loosely rolled bundle that appears to be a towel. Once in the garden, he takes the path by the wall toward the postern gate, for that is directly under his mother’s window, and unless she leans out the window, she could not see him pass below.

There is a bench outside the rear gate, where Elthya and the other servants often gather to talk, but no one will be there while dinner is being prepared. After he eases the gate closed, in the afternoon dimness, he quickly pulls off his green-trimmed student whites and dons the shimmering blue merchanter tunic and trousers, then switches his white boots for the dark blue boots, before adding a blue belt. He rerolls his own clothes and places them and his boots into the pitchcoated basket that he had left earlier and replaces the basket back under the feathered conifer beyond the gate.

He walks swiftly down the alley and across the Road of Perpetual Light, still taking the alley downhill past two other roads until he turns westward on the Road of Benevolent Commerce. The heavy heels of the merchanter boots barely whisper on the stone pavement. His stride is that of the other junior merchanters who scurry to the beckoning of others.

As he passes the Empty Quarter-a coffee house, almost a cafe, that caters to the most junior of merchanter apprentices-and outland sea-traders-he nods to the two apprentices sitting in the near-vacant establishment, giving them a perfunctory smile of acknowledgement.

“Who’s that …?”

“Some junior enumerator … friend of Alyet’s and Ryalth’s … saved Alyet from Halthor one night when he guzzled too much ….”

“ … can’t figure Halthor drowning …”

“ … anyone’ll drown … drinks and walks the piers …”

“ … looks young for an enumerator …”

“ … Ryalth says he’s good …”

“ … at what?”

Lorn represses a grin as he hurries westward along the Way of Benevolent Commerce until it intersects with the First Harbor Way. The corner is identified by the greenletteredplacards inscribed in the angular Anglorian script on the walls of the warehouse that stands on the southwest corner. Only in the trading district of Cyad do such placards exist. Elsewhere, one must know where he goes.

On the northwest corner, a woman in shimmering blue waits for Lorn under the awning by the Honest Stone-the unofficial merchanter coffee house for the warehouse district of Cyad.

Lorn waves and smiles as he nears.

“I was afraid you weren’t coming.” Ryalth snorts angrily. “After all you said.”

“I’m sorry.” Lorn offers an easy and fully apologetic smile. “I got here as quickly as I could.”

“We’d better go. Aljak said at the eighth bell.” Ryalth heads toward the harbor, walking on the right side of the white-paved First Harbor Way, as much by custom as to avoid the near-silent cart on the left drawn up the gentle incline by a white pony.

Lorn inclines his head to the bearded carter who walks beside the pony, leading him, then says quietly, “We have some time.”

Ryalth glances behind them, as though she fears they are being followed.

“Don’t worry,” Lorn assures her. “All we’re doing is buying cotton.”

“With our own coins-not clan coins-and there’s no one to back us if it’s not good.”

“That’s why I’m here, remember?” Lorn says.

“You can slip back into that mighty house if this doesn’t work.”

“It’s worked before. Why would today be any different?”

“Because it’s Hamorian cotton. Or that’s what Aljak has let it be known. You can’t trust him, not even so much as Jiulko.”

“He was the one who had the oils-Jiulko?” Lorn touches Ryalth’s arm, gently, offering reassurance.

“I don’t know why you talked me into this,” Ryalth murmurs.

“So that you can start your own merchanter house. Merchanter women can refuse to consort, or consort by choice if they have a business worth more than five hundred golds. Remember?”

“Don’t remind me.”

“My sisters would like that kind of choice,” Lorn says softly.

“Why would they need it? They’re protected women.”

Lorn smiles faintly, deciding against arguing. “If we take this Aljak’s cotton … If we take it, did you arrange for a cart?”

“Sormet has the next warehouse … he’ll let us use his hand cart and charge me a silver for storage until I can sell it, if it’s less than a season.” Ryalth grins. “The oils … he got a silver for an eightday. So he’ll be happy.”

“If the cotton’s good.”

“Some of it will be good,” predicts Ryalth.

The two swing to the left and around a two-horse wagon that lumbers uphill. The wagon bed is covered, as required in Cyad, but the covering does not totally block the acrid odor of dyes carried in the small demicasks.

“Green dye,” Lorn murmurs.

“You’d think you’d been born a merchanter, sometimes, and then … other times.” Ryalth shakes her head.

“That’s why we work together.”

Ryalth laughs. “No … we work together because you want to sleep with me, and it’s the only way you think I’ll keep seeing you.”

Lorn smiles, slightly more than faintly. “Well … you’re still seeing me, and you have a lot more golds.”

“Alyet says you’ll leave me once you become a full Magus.”

“More likely that you’ll leave me,” he counters, laughing again. “I’m too young for you. You’ve told me that more than once.”

Ryalth turns again, this time along the Road of the Second Quay, which is the second street back from the stone piers where the trading vessels tie up.

Although the road is spotless, for it could not be otherwise in Cyad, an air of disuse permeates the road that appears narrower than it is, running as it does between the high and largely windowless warehouses of gray stone. The acrid scent of ancient, chaos-carved stone drifts up and around Lorn, a scent that he has discovered few others discern.

“His place is on the next corner, away from the harbor.”

“Are any of these used any more?” Lorn gestures to the warehouse to his right.

“Most of them are empty. Aljak probably doesn’t pay a gold an eight-day to rent the space. It belongs to the Jekseng clan, but they only have two ocean traders and a coaster left.” She adds wryly, “I wish I had just two ocean traders and a coaster left.”

“Is that it?” Lorn nods toward the half-opened timbered door framed by weathered granite that had faded into a whitened and dingy gray shade more attractive from the hillside above than from where he viewed it.

“Yes.” Ryalth squares her shoulders, her hand brushing her belt wallet as she steps toward the open door.

Lorn follows Ryalth through the opening created by a heavy wooden sliding door being rolled back perhaps five cubits. He enters the warehouse a step behind her, his posture conveying that he is indeed her lackey-or hired enumerator. His chaos senses flick across the racked items, stopping for a moment on the barrels of seed oil stacked in a cube to the left of the doorway. He does not nod, but his eyes sparkle, as he takes in the other items-a pallet of dark timbers; five tall amphorae, one slightly cracked, with darkness seeping from the crack; a stack of what appear to be bales of wool; another set of nine curved canisters, half again as large as the amphorae ….

“Ah … the lady merchanter from the House of the Lesser Traders.” Aljak steps out of the gloom at the rear of the cavernous structure toward the comparatively small groupings of goods just beyond the open warehouse door.

Lorn focuses on the heavy-set but massively broad traderwith the oiled curly black hair and the bush-like beard. Heavy bronze bands girdle overlarge wrists.

“Trader Aljak.” Ryalth inclines her head. “Sormet said you might have some cotton … some good Hamorian cotton.”

“That I do. That I do, lady merchanter. Aljak has what others lack.” The big trader offers a rolling belly laugh that echoes falsely through the big warehouse, then turns and walks a good fifteen cubits before pointing at five bolts of off-white cloth, each hung on a rack above the stone floor of the warehouse. “Here ye be. Five full-length bolts of Hamorian first rate cotton, thread count guaranteed tighter than sixscore to the span, ready to bleach and dye. Twenty-five for the lot or seven and a half for each bolt, and I pick the bolts.”

Ryalth nods, then moves forward.

Aljak steps back, his eyes flickering toward the darker section of the warehouse to the east.

Lorn sees the other two men, nearly as big as the trader, with blades, iron blades, in the scabbards at their belts. His eyes flick back to the barrels of seed oil, then to Ryalth. As Ryalth examines each bolt of cotton, Lorn studies each with his chaos senses.

After looking at the last bolt, Ryalth straightens and steps toward Lorn.

He steps forward and murmurs, “The first two, the ones closest to the door, are garment class cotton, close to it. The other three are leavings or burlap or something wrapped in the good cotton.”

“He’s asking five golds a bolt, if we take all of them.”

“What’s a bale of garment class run?”

“Bales are for raw cotton. Bolts are finished. I could sell it at ten a bolt to Guvell.” She frowns. “Maybe fifteen if it’s really good.”

The two burly men, each topping Lorn by a head, appear just behind the trader.

“What say you, merchanter?”

“Offer him eight for the first two bolts,” Lorn suggests, noting the short timber leaning against an empty rack. Hedoes not let his eyes even register its presence as he bends toward Ryalth. “Tell him we’d love to buy his cotton, but that it’s far more than we need.”

“We’ll take the first two bolts for eight golds total,” Ryalth offers firmly.

“Eight golds for that which will bring twenty, or perchance thirty. Ah … my friends … Well … perhaps you don’t wish to buy my cotton after all. Sooner or later, you will. You merchanters won’t have the golds to keep buying shimmercloth from the Hamorians, not with the barbarians pushing at your borders.” Aljak and the two guards ease forward. Each guard bears a heavy club, besides the blades in the scabbards. Aljak has a coil of velvet rope in his left hand, and the teeth that his smile reveals are crooked and yellow.

Lorn hides a frown, his attention on Ryalth-and the two thugs.

“And lady merchanter … perhaps you would like to spend some time with a real man, not a girlish enumerator.” Aljak laughs harshly. “To seal a bargain, shall we say.”

“When I tell you, dash toward the oil barrels … all right?” Lorn murmurs to Ryalth.

“You won’t pay me twenty-five? How about twenty-five just to leave here?” Aljak laughs again, and the two guards step away from him, as if to flank Lorn and Ryalth.

“Now!” Lorn says.

As Ryalth bolts for the oil barrels, the student magus concentrates-hoping he can pull chaos from enough places-then flings the firebolt into Aljak.

Hsssttt!

“Aeeeeiii! Dung-devil …” Aljak’s words are cut off.

The two guards freeze as they see the pillar of fire. Lorn uses the interval to cast two more firebolts. Hssst! Hssst!

The other two figures writhe, screaming, momentarily, before they topple into charred heaps.

Lorn scans the rest of the warehouse, but the space is empty, as he expected. Aljak had not wanted witnesses. So far the student magus cannot sense the unseen presence of someone scanning the warehouse with a chaos glass. That isgood, since he has used chaos in ways reserved but to upperlevel mages. He wipes his damp forehead, ignoring the sudden headache. “Ryalth, I need some help.”

Ryalth’s eyes are wide as she steps away from the oil barrels. “What … what … did you do?”

“A small firelance, like the emperor’s guards have,” Lorn lies. “I’m not supposed to have one, and it would be best if you didn’t mention it.” He steps toward the small table behind the last stack of goods, nodding as he sees the small chest on the table. His fingers and his chaos senses deftly work a thin stick, and the lock clicks. He opens the chest and nods.

“Who … who would I tell?” asks Ryalth, looking over her shoulder toward the door as she hurries toward the young magus.

Lorn picks up a two-cubit length of greenish cloth from the samples on the table. Then, after pocketing perhaps fifty golds, he wraps the small strongbox in the cloth and hands it to Ryalth. “Here. It’s yours.”

“What?” Ryalth steps away, not taking the wrapped chest. “Aljak’s family will be looking for anyone with more golds … they’ll know it’s stolen.”

“Maybe not.” He glances at the three charred figures. “Take it, please.”

“What?” She reluctantly accepts the cloth-wrapped and heavy oblong.

“Come on.” He tugs her toward the warehouse door, then gestures. “Stand right inside the door. Be ready to run. Tell me if anyone’s watching.”

Ryalth raises her fine reddish eyebrows.

“Please.” Lorn follows her, but halts a dozen paces beyond the rack oil barrels, his eyes on the redhead in blue.

When she reaches the timbered door, she glances out, and then back at Lorn. “There’s no one near. Some people at the cross-street up the way, though. They’re coming this way.”

“They’re not near now?”

“No.”

Backing toward the door where Ryalth waits, Lorn concentrateson summoning chaos right into the middle of one of the center barrels of oil, ignoring the headache that builds even more.

Whhhooossshhh! The wall of flame is so sudden and massive that he stumbles out the door, dragging Ryalth with him.

Turning toward the figures less than a hundred cubits north, who have already turned toward the warehouse, and gesturing toward the blaze, Lorn yells. “Fire! Fire in the warehouse!”

“Fire! Fire!” Ryalth’s voice adds to the clamor.

The heads of three others at the corner turn.

From a narrow doorway across the road, a tall man runs toward them. “It’s the clan warehouse! You! What caused it?”

“Oils, I think. We were talking about cotton, and all of a sudden there were flames everywhere.” Lorn glances at Ryalth. “Excuse me, ser. I think she’s a bit faint.”

“Who are you?” demands the trader, studying the two young people in blue. “What clan?”

“I’m an enumerator.” Another whoosh of flame flares from the warehouse, and the merchanter looks at the flames, then back at the two. Ryalth leans, almost dramatically, on Lorn’s shoulder. The trader dashes past them toward the flaming section of the warehouse, gesturing toward the three men who have piled out the opposing warehouse as well. “We’ve got to get the water on the next building. Don’t let another one go.”

Lorn takes Ryalth’s arm. “Let’s get out of here. Don’t drop that.”

They hurry back along the road until they reach the Second Harbor Way and turn uphill.

Ryalth glances back toward the increasing pillar of smoke. “Did you have to do that? That could burn a whole block.”

“It won’t. The roof’s slate, and there’s nothing to burn but the oils. Maybe whatever was in the amphorae.” Lorn pulls Ryalth to the side of the Way as a fire brigade wagon careens past. “Aljak was ready to kill both of us. That’s why no one else was there-except he would have spent longer withyou.” He offers a crooked smile as they walk swiftly uphill and then eastward along the Lower Hill Road away from the warehouses. “Not that I fault his taste.”

“You’re frightening sometimes, Lorn.”

“Me? I’m just a student.” He grins disarmingly.

“That’s hard to believe at times.” Without stopping, Ryalth looks down at the wrapped cloth. “This is heavy.”

“You’ve got your five hundred golds, more or less.”

“I can’t take all that.”

“You have to. I took what I dared. If I had more, my family would find out in days, if not sooner.”

At the corner of the Second Harbor Way and the Road of Benevolent Commerce, the unofficial border to the merchanter quarter, they stop under a tall feathering conifer, shielded from above by the spreading dark green branches and by the afternoon mist. Lorn is breathing heavily, but the worst of his headache has faded. He stands there silently for a moment, thinking. Abruptly, he turns to Ryalth. “Do you have any scent? A vial of what you use?”

The redhead frowns. “Why?”

“Just dab some on me.”

She fumbles in her belt wallet, her arm still around the cloth-covered strongbox. “You know that the City Watch wouldn’t be pleased with this.”

“They don’t care about scent,” Lorn jokes.

“They care about people setting fires,” she whispers as she dabs some of the scent oil on his wrist.

“Better fires than outland traders assaulting Cyadoran merchanters,” he counters, adding, “More of the scent.”

“More? What’s on you will cover any scent of smoke.” Her eyebrows lift. “You want your family to know you’ve been with someone?”

“It’s better than having them ask what I’ve really been doing,” he points out. “Remember, when you live in a Magi’i family, questions are dangerous.”

“People say that … is it true?”

“Only a handful of Magi’i can truthread, but the Lectors can, and my father is a Lector.” Lorn gestures. “Dab moreon my skin, my neck,” he suggests, “as much as you can spare.”

“You already reek.” She wrinkles her nose.

“Fine. Then, they’ll all be ready to condemn me.”

“And me,” Ryalth points out.

“They don’t know you, and they’d have to know your name to ask a decent question.”

She shakes her head, then glances along the road. “I think I’m glad I’m not from the Magi’i.”

Lorn straightens the blue tunic. “You said I could always retreat to my mighty house.”

“It sounds as bad as an inbred clan house.”

“It’s not that bad. My sisters are nice. So are my parents.”

“I’m sure they are.” Ryalth pauses, then adds, “I’ll save your share of the coins.”

He shakes his head. “They’re yours. I took some, but you took most of the risks,” he exaggerates.

She frowns, but says nothing.

“I’ll need some favors before everything’s done. Call the coins advance payment.” He smiles broadly.

“I can’t afford favors that expensive.”

“I won’t ask for anything that big.” He leans forward and touches the line of her cheek. “Use them to get yourself free.” Then he squeezes her hand and steps from under the conifer, hurrying uphill.

After a moment, Ryalth swallows and begins to walk eastward.

There is no one near the postern gate as Lorn quickly changes into his student whites, leaving the blues and the blue boots in the basket tucked behind the small tree. He readjusts the square of cloth in his belt wallet to ensure the coins are muffled, and then walks briskly through the garden and up the steps.

“You’re late, Lorn.” His father stands at the top of the steps. “Your mother is worried. It would be kinder if you let us know when you’re going out.”

“Yes, ser. I’m sorry. I know. I lost track of time. I didn’t expect to be so late.” Lorn’s statements are all true, and hemakes sure he doesn’t look anywhere close to the billowing smoke that rises to the southwest of them.

His father’s nose wrinkles, and he shakes his head. “That’s a merchanter scent, isn’t it?”

Lorn tries to look bewildered.

“Don’t dignify it with a falsehood, Lorn.”

“Yes, ser. I mean it is. A merchanter fragrance.”

“Do you know what you’re doing? What if …?” His father doesn’t finish the question.

“I’ve been careful about that. There won’t be any child,” Lorn says absolutely truthfully.

“Lorn …” His father shakes his head again. “I trust you have not attempted a chaos compulsion with the girl.”

“No, ser. I wouldn’t do such with her.”

“Chaos compulsions are odious, and over time, they weaken those who use them, and make them susceptible to the compulsions of others.” Kien’s voice is stern.

“I have not with her, and I will keep your advice, ser.”

“Good. Would that you will be so amenable to showing greater interest in your studies. If not, perhaps a time in the lancers will settle you down … though this is not the best time.”

Lorn knows he cannot manifest any greater interest in his studies, although he has come to enjoy learning for its own sake, feeling the sense and the power involved in transferring chaos from the tower outlets to the firelances, and in seeing just how much’chaos he can press into each weapon. He also is less than enthused about the thought that he could be posted to the frontiers and use a lance or blade in earnest, even if his skills with the blade are among the best among the students, including those like Dettaur who had been born with a blade in his hand. Using a blade in earnest would definitely increase the odds of an earlier demise than Lorn would wish.

“Vernt was right, then … about the barbarians?” he asks his father.

“There have been more attacks than in any time in memory-or in the records,” his father admits. “And they haveeven used archers in the far northwest.” A faint smile appears on Kien’elth’s thin lips. “All the attacks have been repulsed, and most of the barbarians killed.”

“But they keep attacking?”

“Yes … Enough … we can talk about it at dinner. After you wash off some of that scent. I’ll tell your mother that you’re here.”

“Yes, ser.” As he hurries toward the wash chamber, Lorn can sense his father’s unease, as though there is far more left unsaid. Yet, Lorn does not wish to push, not when he has apparently misdirected Kien’elth’s inquiries about his actions of the afternoon.