The January Dancer

An Craic

Evening has come to the plaza in the Corner and the stones of the fountain have grown chilled, for the blank-faced buildings have tossed their shadows across the square and pinched the sunlight into streams pouring from the narrow passageways. Down those arcades and alleys, plaster and stucco walls glow a golden red, as if they led to fabulous palaces just out of sight. The scarred man grunts and, leveraging himself on his knees, pushes to his feet and offers his arm. “Come,” he says. “The Corner is not a good place to be at night.” As if to underline his point, the harper hears the sounds of shutters closing, of locks tumbling, of bars sliding into place.

“I will buy you a dinner,” she says. “At the Hostel.”

But the old man shakes his head. “Such fare’s too rich for the likes of me. I’ll dine one day at the frozen center of Hel, and I’m saving up my appetite.”

She slings her harp case over her shoulder and takes his arm. “No,” she insists. “There is a meal I’ve always wanted to buy, and I’ll not be denied.”

The scarred man says nothing and the two walk slowly down Merry Weather Alley, toward Greaseline. After a moment, he pats her hand gently. “Thank you,” he says. “We’ve always wondered what came of it in the end. Whether it was all worth it.”

The harper fears to respond. Matters are too delicate; the most hesitant of touches could shatter them. Instead, she returns to the story. “Your Other Olafsson was too fortuitous. I thought her appearance bad art.”

“Oh, her appearance was bad enough without bringing art into it. There was nothing sudden to her. She’s been there all along, lurking in my prepositional phrases and subordinate clauses. It’s not that you haven’t been warned. She’d been to see the Committee of Seven; she followed Greystroke into and out of the Corner. She directed Micmac Anne to the Fudir’s table. She has loitered now and then in the background of my tale.”

“I don’t understand why she saved Hugh from the ICC assassins.”

The scarred man chuckles. “Oh, listen to the sound of your assumptions rattling! Your head is like a castanet. You’ve forgotten that she and Qing were sent with a mission. She wanted to remind her colleague about that mission, and the sniper threatened to damage the medium she planned to use for the message.”

“She didn’t know Greystroke was Greystroke?”

A slow shake of the head. “We think not. But she is the one player in that dance that we’ve never spoken with, so who knows what she knew?”

“But why so roundabout? Why not approach Greystroke—Qing, as she thought—directly?”

“Because her task was to kill Qing if he failed in his duty. That is an intimate relationship, and like the bride and the groom, it isn’t seemly for the one to see the other before the day of consummation.”

“But…Donovan’s task was routine. An investigation of cross-Rift traffic. Next to the Dancer…Ah. Ravn didn’t know about the Dancer.”

“Or she didn’t care. Couriers are remarkably focused. She must have known from her own visit to the Seven that the Fudir was the key, and the Fudir had gone to New Eireann for his own reasons. So she didn’t worry when ‘Qing’ also went to New Eireann. She waited on Jehovah, knowing he’d be coming back with his quarry. But then, instead of forcing the Fudir to take him to Donovan, ‘Qing’ hared off to Peacock Junction with him. That didn’t add up—unless Donovan had also gone to Peacock—so she followed them on what you might call ‘yellow alert.’ Then when he continued on to Die Bold, it began to look like he was shirking his duty. Hence, the reminder. A courier doesn’t jump to conclusions. It might be that the best place to learn about cross-Rift traffic was near the Rift, and Donovan might have gone there ahead of them.”

“Wouldn’t Ravn be suspicious that ‘Qing’ was associating with a Hound?”

“Again, it’s hard to say. She followed ‘Qing’ but may have reached Peacock Junction after the two had conferred. So all she saw was a Hound’s ship following Qing onto an uncharted ramp.”

“And so she followed. That must have taken nerve.”

“Nerve has never been short rations among that lot. Here. Let’s go down these steps. There’s a restaurant at the edge of the Corner, on Menstrit. They serve a delicious chicken tikka. If you want to buy us a dinner, it’s cheaper there than at the Hostel.”

“The cost doesn’t matter.”

“Good. Then you won’t mind spending less. Perhaps there we can bring this squalid tale to an end.”

The harper laughs. “In what way?”

“What do you mean?”

“You said there are three ways in which a thing may reach an end, and so far you’ve mentioned termination and perfection. What is the third way? Surely, the story has not perfected itself! Too many pieces are yet missing!”

“Ah. The third kind of end is purpose.”

“You mean the tale must achieve a purpose, a moral.”

“No, that a teller may have a purpose in telling it.”