Trapped

6: BLADES AND SADDLES

Myoko and I headed for Sebastian's room. We walked in silence the whole way… and I could feel rage building up in her, a seething fury utterly unlike the cheerful drinking buddy I knew. I couldn't remember ever seeing her the least bit angry — not in the middle of bar brawls, not when complaining about the most idiotic of students. The worst I'd witnessed was when she'd walked past the mirror in our faculty lounge and noticed a gray hair on her head; as she yanked the offending strand, she'd embarked on a curse-laden diatribe bewailing the cruelty of a universe that made gray stand out so glaringly amidst "youthful black tresses." Only the initial burst of annoyance had been genuine: the ensuing tirade was comic relief, purely for the benefit for those of us watching.

That was the Myoko I knew. Funny. Fun. Playing off the disparity between her outward appearance (dainty, demure) and her joyfully wicked mind. She was one of those rare women who could truly be "one of the boys" — joking more crudely, swearing more colorfully, belching more forcefully, and always with exquisite timing. Best of all, she never went too far: everyone has seen women act more loutish than men, but only gentle-ladies with a feel for the game can make one laugh rather than wince. Myoko had made me laugh a lot; I'd felt comfortable with her from the first day we met.

But not now. Not with her walking tensely beside me, arms crossed tight against her chest, her mouth a severe line. As if the two of us had just had a fight.

Maybe in her mind we had: the ongoing fight between psychics and everyone else. It wasn't something she ever discussed in public; but now that the subject had been broached, Myoko didn't suppress her long-simmering resentment. Though she'd told us how low-powered she was compared to "real" psychics, she must have lived her life in constant fear someone would decide she was worth enslaving.

Her fear was well-based. Naive old Pelinor might have been surprised about psychics being treated as cattle; but that just proved he wasn't really a high-born knight. Those of us who'd truly been born under a famous coat of arms knew what powerful families did behind closed doors.

We Dhubhais had always equipped our houses with "resident psychics." They were treated with respect, fed well, dressed well, and provided with suitably eye-pleasing companions — but they were never allowed off the grounds, and one could often catch them staring into the distance, their expressions carefully blank. Other rich families in Sheba mocked us for our softhearted ways. Those neighbors ruled their "chattels" with an iron hand.

Was that what was waiting for Sebastian?

Myoko clearly thought so: that's why she'd concealed the truth about the boy, even from those of us who thought we were her friends. She'd wanted Sebastian safe; and what place was safer than Feliss Academy? No one expected a gifted psychic at a school like ours. If you truly wanted to conceal a person's talent — if you wanted to pretend your powers weren't worthy of attention — the academy was an excellent cover.

Which brought up the question of Myoko herself.

I'd always assumed she was like the rest of us — competent enough to teach students the basics, but an utter mediocrity compared to real professionals. Even a small chore like levitating Impervia seemed to require Myoko's full concentration, not to mention a plenitude of preliminary brow-furrowing. However: after tonight's squabble at The Pot of Gold, Myoko had chatted casually while holding Impervia aloft… and for a brief moment, it appeared as if Myoko wasn't exerting herself at all.

Could she be stronger than she pretended? Could she too be using the academy as camouflage?

Things to think about as we walked unspeaking through the halls.

I was carrying an oil lamp, borrowed from Chancellor Opal. When we got to Sebastian's door, I handed the light to Myoko while I got out my pass key. This broke some wordless barrier between us, because Myoko shuddered and said, "There's something in the air tonight, Phil. Something big."

"Is that a psychic premonition?"

She shook her head. "I don't do premonitions. Just TK. Sebastian, on the other hand…"

"He did premonitions?"

"He did everything," she said. "TK. Telepathy. Remote perception with all five senses. I've never seen anyone like him." She paused. "My teachers at psionics school would say it was impossible."

I gave a weak chuckle. "Imagine that! Teachers being wrong about something."

"Granted. But it's the nature of psionics that…" She broke off. "Phil, you've studied science. Do you know how psionics work?"

"I've heard many theories… but they're all hot air and hand-waving. The only thing scientists agree on is that psychic powers come from outside intervention. Alien high-tech. And sorcery's the same. Someone a lot more advanced than Homo sapiens decided to get cute."

Myoko didn't look at me; she let herself lean back against the wall beside Sebastian's door. "You think the League of Peoples did something? To Earth? To humanity?"

"It's the only sensible conclusion. Maybe they thought it would be a good joke to make human myths come true. Or maybe they thought they were doing us a favor — fulfilling our oldest fantasies. Maybe they had some secret agenda we'll never figure out… but it's no coincidence everything changed at the exact moment they showed up."

Myoko didn't answer; she'd turned her gaze toward the oil lamp, watching the flame's soft glow. Finally, without looking at me, she said, "You know something, Phil? You're right."

I waited for her to go on. She didn't. Finally I asked, "What do you mean?"

"I mean… psychics know. The teachers who taught me — they know exactly what happened." She turned her eyes toward me. "It's a deep dark secret, but…" She shrugged. "Do you want to hear?"

Her voice was nearly inaudible. I said, "Do you want to tell me? If it's a deep dark secret?"

"Sure. Why not."

She was right about there being something in the air. A night for revelations. I fell silent as she began to talk.

"Do you know what nanites are, Phil? Nanotech? Microscopic machines the size of bacteria… or even smaller, viruses, single molecules. You've heard of such things?"

I nodded. OldTech fantasies had predicted nano would solve all the world's problems… provided the stuff didn't destroy the planet first. But before nanotech had progressed beyond a few rudimentary prototypes, OldTech civilization disintegrated to the point where we couldn't even make steam engines, let alone microscopic robots.

"This may surprise you," said Myoko, "but thirty percent of all microbes on Earth today — things that look like bacteria and viruses — are actually nanites in disguise."

"What?" My voice was suddenly shrill: loud enough to wake half the boys on my floor. I lowered it immediately. "What are you talking about?

"Outside intervention, just like you said. Someone covered our planet with nano: land, sea, and air. The nanites are designed to replace natural microorganisms, then work together to make sorcery and psionics possible."

A door opened behind me. The future Duke Simon Westmarch peered out to see who'd been shouting. He wore his stethoscope around his neck, like a medallion dangling over his pajamas. "Go back to bed," I told him. "Everything's under control."

He nodded without a word and shut the door — more proof that this was a night when miracles could happen. I turned back to Myoko. "How could anyone replace thirty percent of all microorganisms without scientists noticing? We still have microscopes; not fancy electron ones, but the best you can get with ordinary optics. When I was at Collegium Ismaili, the biology department examined bacteria every day, and I never heard them mention nanites."

"Two reasons for that," Myoko answered. "First, the nanites superficially resemble conventional microbes. Elementary camouflage. Second, the nanites are smart… at least some of them are. Some are like brain cells, coordinating other nano activity. If the brainy ones notice a biologist getting out a microscope, they tell their fellow nanites to clear out. If worse comes to worst, they send in nano-stormtroopers to crack the microscope lens."

"Nanites are strong enough to do that?"

Myoko put her hand on my arm. "Phil, they're strong enough to lift Impervia. That's how it works. My psionic powers are just a hotline to the local brain-nano. The brains summon other nano from the surrounding environment to act as microscopic sky-cranes… and up Impervia goes."

I tried to picture the physics of how that would work. If lifting Impervia was the action, where was the equal and opposite reaction? I couldn't figure it out and didn't want to display my ignorance, so I changed the subject. "So how did you get this psionic hotline?"

"There are nanites everywhere, Phil — in the food we eat, the water we drink, the air we breathe. They get inside us, the same way normal microbes do. Our lungs, our bloodstreams, everywhere. Some drift inside by accident; others deliberately target humans and work into specific areas of their bodies. Particularly into the wombs of pregnant women."

"That doesn't sound healthy."

"Consider it a mixed blessing," Myoko said. "Some types of nano — and there are thousands of different breeds, each designed to perform a specific function — some types target the brains of developing embryos. They embed themselves shortly after conception so they're incorporated into the child's gray matter."

I winced. "How many children are infected like that?"

"All of them, Phil. Every last child bom on Earth for the past four centuries. Animals too — the nanites are everywhere, absolutely inescapable. You have them riddling every part of your brain; so do I; so does everybody."

For a moment, I thought I was going to throw up. "What are the damned things doing in there?"

"Mostly waiting. For instructions."

"From whom?"

"Psychics and sorcerers." She gave me a pallid smile. "Even I don't like to contemplate that fact too long. But how do you think telepaths read minds? It's not tricky once you realize everyone's brain is full of nanites that have been linked into your mental processes almost since conception. They know what you're thinking… and they transmit it to receivers in the telepath's brain. As simple as OldTech radio."

"Simple." I made a face. None of this was the least bit simple. Were all the nanites in my head taking up space that should have been used by brain cells? Did they actually replace brain cells, the same way they'd replaced thirty percent of the natural bacteria and viruses in our biosphere? Were all my thoughts partly running on alien-built nanites rather than regular neurons?

And how did they get enough energy to transmit radio waves? Only one way: they must tap into the body's energy, sucking nutrition from blood just like normal cells. Parasites. Extraterrestrial parasites in the brain. Though I'd lived with them all my life, I still felt close to vomiting. "If we all have these things in our heads," I asked, "why aren't we all psychics?"

"Ah," said Myoko, "there's the trick. The nanites most people have in their brains lie dormant till they receive an outside stimulus… but as I said, there are different types of nano. One particular type — extremely rare — also plants itself into people's brains; but this type has the ability to initiate action. For example, it can tell the nanites in other people's brains to send it signals."

"And that's the difference between a telepath and everyone else? The telepath has one of these initiator nanites?"

"That's it. That's the whole secret." She gave a self-conscious laugh. "Of course, there are plenty of complications." Myoko lifted her gaze to meet my eyes. "Do you know what it feels like when I use my telekinesis?"

I shrugged. "I don't know… maybe like you've got a phantom arm?"

"An arm? Hell, I'd kill for an arm." She rolled her eyes. "You know what I've got, Phil? A phantom knee. My right knee, to be exact. When I picked up Impervia tonight, I visualized tucking my knee under her, then shoving her up, up, up… the feel of it, which muscles would move when, picturing everything exactly. Of course, I couldn't lift Impervia with my real knee — I can't keep a full-grown woman perfectly balanced with just my kneecap jammed against her back. My psychic knee can do things my physical knee could never pull off. But in the end, it's still just a knee; exasperatingly limited. When I think what I could do if I had a hand: the joys of manual dexterity, Phil, the joys of manual dexterity!"

I had to laugh. Myoko did too. "The thing is," she said, "it all depends where the initiator nanite plants itself in a psychic's brain… and how far outward it sends its pseudo-neural connections. My initiator landed in the part of my brain that controls my right knee. As simple as that. So when I focus my attention on my knee in a particular way, the initiator responds."

"Hum." I thought for a moment. "And it responds by sending radio messages to nearby nanites in the air. It tells those nanites to get together and lift Impervia… or to do whatever else the initiator wants."

"Exactly!" Myoko gave my arm a squeeze. "A psychic's power is entirely determined by where the initiator settles in. If it lodges in your visual cortex, you'll be able to see psionically. Maybe you'll be clairvoyant: your initiator can link with nanites half a continent away and see what they see. Or maybe you'll perceive auras… which means your initiator communicates with nanites in other people and presents their emotional states as colors. You might even be able to project optical illusions; your initiator sends images from your visual imagination to receiving nanites in other people's brains. Voila: they see what you want them to see. There are lots of variations — visual processing occupies great swaths of our brains, and you get different effects depending on where the initiator lands within those swaths."

"I suppose if the initiator lands in a hearing center, you can hear things happening far away… or project sound illusions, or maybe hear other people's thoughts, transmitted by their own mental nanites."

Myoko nodded. "That's the idea. Things get weird if the initiator plunks down in an exotic corner of your mind; there was one guy at school whose initiator lived in his primary pleasure center and he could transmit the most…" She suddenly stopped in embarrassment. "Figure it out yourself."

"Lucky guy," I said.

"No," she replied, "very unlucky. He disappeared one day when he left school grounds. Now he's probably chained in some brothel where he has to make sure the paying guests have a good time… or he's playing gigolo to someone like Elizabeth Tzekich, who'll beat him if he doesn't give her orgasms on demand."

Myoko's voice had suddenly filled with bitterness… and her hand on my arm was an eagle's claw, fingernails digging fiercely through my sleeve. "Come on…" I began; but she gave me a look that made me hold my tongue.

"Don't try to comfort me, Phil. If you do, I might ram you through the wall. It's…" Her voice trailed off for a moment. "The threat hangs over every psychic's head. Always. Forever. The only protection is being too weak to interest the sharks. In a lot of psychics, the initiator attaches itself only loosely to the brain. You get a small intermittent power that isn't much use… or a power that takes a lot of strength and effort to activate. People like that — like me — are usually safe: more trouble than they're worth. But if you have a good strong power…"

"Like Sebastian."

She nodded. "Like Sebastian. Then you'll be a target your entire life… until someone finally gets you." She glanced at Sebastian's door. Her grip on my arm eased and I thought she might be ending the conversation; but I still had more questions.

"How do you know all this?" I asked. "About the nanites. How do you know things that scientists don't?"

"Oh, that. Forty years ago, there was a psychic man named Yoquito — came from a five-hut village near the Amazon, never learned to read or write, died young from chronic tuberculosis… but he had a hellishly powerful initiator in some analytic center of his mind, and he was undoubtedly the greatest genius ever produced by Homo sapiens. He didn't just think with his own brain; he could use all the nano around him like extra neurons. Yoquito wasn't the first person to have a power like that, but he was far and away the strongest: he claimed he could draw upon the power of every brain-nanite in the whole damned rainforest."

"So he was smart enough to figure out how psionics worked."

"He didn't just figure it out, Phil; the nanites literally explained it to him. As if they'd been waiting centuries for someone to ask, and were thrilled they could finally spill the secret. They told him about psionics and sorcery—"

"Sorcery?" I interrupted. "He knew how that worked too?"

"Sure," Myoko said. "It operates through the same nanites… just invoked a different way. Sorcerers don't have initiators in their brains; they initiate effects through gestures and invocations. If you say certain words or enact certain rituals, it triggers the nano to do specific things. Picture the nanites as trained dogs: if you say, 'Sit!' in the right tone of voice, they'll do what you want."

"Or," I murmured, thinking it over, "picture them as library functions in an OldTech computer. You invoke the correct subroutine and the nanites behave in accordance with their programming."

"All right," Myoko said, "if you insist on getting technical. The nanites respond to people performing certain actions… and those actions are intentionally bizarre so the nanites aren't triggered by accident."

"You don't think the aliens just invented crazy rituals so they could laugh at stupid humans dancing naked around a goat's head?"

Myoko nodded. "Maybe that too… but weird magical rituals date back thousands of years, well before sorcery became real. The aliens may simply have designed sorcery to match existing Earth folklore."

She was right — lots of human cultures had developed mythologies about what sorcery should look like, long before nanites made magic a reality. Those myths could easily have inspired the nanite-designers when they were deciding how sorcery would work. "What about the way the Caryatid controls fire?" I asked. "She never performs any fancy rituals."

"She must have when she was younger. When you're starting, you need exactly the right rigmarole; otherwise, you can't catch the nanites' attention. After a while, though, they begin to follow you around and pay attention to smaller and smaller signals. Like a trained dog again: at first you have to say, 'Sit!' very clearly and firmly… but once the dog gets the idea, you don't have to be so formal. Dogs even read your body language and anticipate what you want. The nanites are the same way. Think of the Caryatid's premonitions — they didn't start happening to her until that ritual with the pony and the calliope. After that, the premonitions began to trigger themselves spontaneously."

"And hauntings?" I asked. "The harp in the music room was more nanite activity?"

"Right. Rosalind had nanites in her brain, just like everybody else. Under certain conditions, especially traumatic death, the brain nanites imprint some portion of the dying person's personality on nearby nanites in the air. It's not an accident — the aliens who set this whole thing up wanted to create ghosts, in accordance with human ghost stories. If Rosalind suffered enough emotional turmoil when she died, her nanites were almost certain to create a ghostly manifestation. The ghost isn't the real Rosalind, of course. It's just an artificial reproduction of some part of the girl's psyche: deliberately manufactured for melodramatic effect."

I chewed on that a moment. What I'd seen in the music room had definitely been melodramatic — choreographed for heavy emotional impact. The soft weeping, the harp playing in an empty room, the blood… in a way, it was almost too faithful to the cliches of ghost stories. A real ghost (if there was such a thing) would probably be more original. Still… "These nanites are good at playing out scenes," I said. "Very smart."

Myoko shrugged. "What can I say? There are trillions of the little fuckers everywhere. And they were constructed by aliens who knew a lot more science than the OldTechs ever did. The nanites are smart and very powerful."

"Is there any limit to their power?"

"They're only present here on Earth, so you can't use them to travel off-planet. Apart from that, they seem to up for anything humans can imagine. Transmutation of lead into gold… teleportation… time travel…"

I gulped. "Time travel?"

"Think about it," Myoko said. "How can the Caryatid get accurate premonitions if the nanites don't play fast and loose with time? Information travels from the future back to us in the present. And Yoquito said the nanites could make physical objects do the same thing. I don't know of cases on record… but then, the records would have changed, wouldn't they?"

Ouch. Time travel always gives respectable physicists the screamie-weamies. Not that we're totally convinced it's impossible… but we know enough about the universe to realize just how much of the natural order time travel would screw up. The cliche of killing your grandfather isn't nearly as serious as killing the second law of thermodynamics. "I don't suppose," I said, "your analytic genius Yoquito ever mentioned how to avoid time paradoxes?"

Myoko shook her head. "Yoquito didn't live long enough. When the nanites explained all this stuff, he decided he had to tell someone… and the nanites directed him to a school that housed people with powers just like his. My old alma mater: the school for psychics. It took Yoquito years to make his way out of the jungle and reach the school. After that, he told what he knew, and died from his tuberculosis within a month. One of those cases where a man with a terminal illness keeps himself alive by sheer willpower until he accomplishes what he wants to do. Then he just lets go."

A short silence. After a while I had to ask, "If your school has known this for forty years, why haven't they told anyone else? Scientists would kill for this kind of information."

"That's the problem," Myoko said. "Some scientists would kill for it. At least we're afraid they might. In case you haven't noticed, we psychics don't trust outsiders. The school where I trained has no incentive to divulge the truth, and every reason to play things close to the vest. If scientists understood how psionics worked, maybe they could use that against us somehow. We didn't want to take that risk. Anyway," she said, her voice suddenly brisk, "scientists will find out soon enough. Every psychic who goes through the school is taught what's really happening; when that many people know something, it doesn't stay secret for long. I'm surprised it's lasted forty years."

"As you say, psychics don't confide in other people." I looked up and met her eyes. "Which makes me wonder why you're telling me."

She dropped her gaze quickly. "Because Sebastian is missing. Because he might be in trouble and I want to save him. You're a smart man, Phil, and who knows, maybe if you understand the truth you can use it to help."

"I'll try," I told her. "What did you say the boy's powers were?"

"Everything. As far as I can tell, he's got every damned power in the book. Clairvoyance, clairaudience, telekinesis, telepathy… some more powerful than others, but he's got it all."

"How can that be?" I asked. "Could he have initiators all through his brain?"

Myoko shook her head. "Yoquito said that was impossible. If a baby already has an initiator, other initiators stay away."

"Hmm. Did you ever ask Sebastian to describe what his powers felt like?"

She nodded. "Like the world was filled with happy puppies, eager to do tricks for him. If he wanted something, he asked the puppies and they fell all over themselves to help him out… whether it was lifting heavy objects, displaying pictures in front of his eyes, or telling him the answers on exams. They'd even act without being asked — like once, he almost got kicked by a horse; but the air between him and the horse's hoof suddenly turned into a solid wall and stopped the kick before it made contact."

"Okay," I said. "So the boy's happy puppies are actually nanites. And they want to do him favors: help him, protect him. Maybe the initiator landed in some part of his brain that deals with social relations. Friendships. Every bit of nano on the planet has become Sebastian's loyal pal." I pondered the idea a moment, then made a face. "No: that doesn't sound right. I'll have to think some more." I gave a sideways smile at Myoko. "Though it sure would be nice to have thirty percent of the entire world as my doting chum."

Myoko gave my arm a squeeze. "Sorry, Phil, you'll have to make do with me." Quickly she turned away, toward Sebastian's door. "Let's get this over with, shall we?"

When I'd entered the room in the dark, I'd thought the place had been cleaned up. Now that I had more light, I saw it was not so much "clean" as what the maids called "boy-tidy": clear in the middle of the floor, with clutter shoved against the wall and arranged in balanced stacks. This was still an improvement over the usual state of the room; Sebastian must have spent hours picking things up (or having his nanite friends do the work). That showed the boy hadn't run off on the spur of the moment — he'd put things in order first.

Myoko, standing in the doorway, surveyed the piles of oddments around the edge of the room. "What do we think we're looking for?"

"Clues to where he went," I said.

"Like what?"

"Coach schedules perhaps. Or a note from some priestess willing to many two teenagers without parental consent."

"No one in Simka would perform such a wedding," Myoko said, "and if any kid asked, the church would inform the academy. Opal makes hefty donations to all the local chapels to keep them on our side." Myoko shook her head. "If I were eloping, I wouldn't make wedding arrangements ahead of time; I'd just hightail it to a big city, then look for someone bribable. Heaven knows, Rosalind has enough cash to smooth the way — I've heard kids talk about how much gold she carries. Almost as much as you do."

I thought about that. "It would be nice to know where Rosalind's gold is. Is it still in her room, or has it gone missing?"

"The only way to find out," Myoko said, "would be to search Rosalind's room for her money-belt."

"And entering Rosalind's room," I said, "is an unhealthy thing to do." I turned back to the jumble heaped around Sebastian's dorm. What were we looking for? The boy was too smart to leave obvious hints of where he was going. If we did find a coach schedule with a destination circled, it would likely be a red herring to send us in the wrong direction.

Still, we couldn't give up without looking. Maybe we'd be brilliant enough to deduce where he'd gone from the things he took with him. If, for example, he'd left behind all his warm clothes, we could assume he was heading for the sunnier south.

Either that, or he was a typical teenage boy who didn't think ahead when packing.

Myoko and I began to search: she rummaged through the closets and drawers, while I checked miscellaneous stacks of paper. Five minutes later I was scanning some barely legible history notes when Myoko called, "Phil, can you give me a hand?"

She was kneeling beside the boy's bed. Tucked underneath was a polished wooden case, half as long as the bed itself and thick enough that it just fit between the floor and the bed frame. The case had bright brass handles, gleaming in the lamplight; I grabbed one handle, Myoko took the other, and together we dragged the case out.

There were no markings on the exterior… and no lock either, just a small hook-and-eye to keep the box shut. Myoko slipped the hook and lifted the lid to reveal an interior lined with plush green silk. A light fencing foil lay in a pre-shaped cradle amidst the silk; beside it were three more cradles, empty but obviously intended to hold other swords. Judging by the size of the cradles and the indentations in the silk, I guessed the missing weapons were a saber, a rapier, and a broadsword.

"Pretty," Myoko said, looking at the foil. "Nice workmanship." She tapped her finger on the button at the end of the blade, the little nubbin that prevented the sword from impaling opponents during a friendly fencing match. "Odd that Sebastian would have such a good weapon. I thought his family was poor."

"Only in comparison to the rest of our student body. The Shores run a local metalworks… and they make good money catering to the lordlings of our academy. Custom weapons, repairs, that sort of thing." I gestured toward the case. "When Sebastian was accepted at our school, I'll bet his family gave him a set of their best blades. So he wouldn't feel outclassed by the other kids."

"Hmm." Myoko looked into the case again. "Where are the other three swords?"

"Good question." I ran my fingers over the empty silk cradles. "He probably took one with him — a reasonable precaution if you're wandering the countryside at night. Maybe he brought one for Rosalind too."

"Surely she had a sword of her own," Myoko replied. "People talk as if her mother armed the girl with every weapon under the sun."

"That was the real Rosalind. A false Rosalind might not have access to the real one's arsenal."

Myoko gave a grudging nod. "All right: one sword for Sebastian, possibly one for Rosalind. What happened to the third blade?"

I shrugged. "Maybe he hocked it. He often complained about needing cash to keep up with the other kids."

"He said the same to me," Myoko agreed. "That's why I thought he was poor. But he despised himself for feeling that way, and refused to go on spending sprees to impress what he called those rich nobs."

"But what if he needed money for something special?" I asked. "Like eloping with Rosalind."

"Yes," Myoko said slowly, "he might pawn the sword then. If he needed money to get away. And he'd want to pay for everything himself, without using Rosalind's gold."

I nodded. Sebastian might have been a psychic prodigy, but he was still a teenage boy. Romantic, proud, and stubborn — to prove he was a man, he'd want to finance the entire elopement by himself. So why wouldn't he decide to sell a sword or two?

Again I looked at the box's empty cradles: a saber, a broadsword, and a rapier. Sabers and rapiers were practical weapons, but broadswords were too heavy for anything but ceremonial combat. (Of course, the academy trained its charges in ceremonial combat as well as normal fencing — many of our students were destined for ceremonial lives.)

If I were Sebastian, I'd sell the broadsword first. But where? Not to another student: too much risk someone would blab to a teacher. Selling the sword to a store in Simka would also raise problems. People there knew the boy; if he tried to hock a high-class sword, word would get back to his family. Sebastian was smart enough to avoid such trouble. So where had he…

I smacked my head with my palm. "What?" Myoko asked.

"Those fishermen tonight," I said. "That Divian with the broadsword — he had no idea how to use it. As if he'd never had one in his hands before. And it was a fancy-looking weapon: more ornamental than practical."

"You think he got the sword from Sebastian?"

"Maybe."

I closed my eyes to think. The sword was easily worth enough to purchase passage for two on any fishing boat in the Dover fleet. The boat captain involved would demand payment in advance — well in advance — so Sebastian must have gone down to Dover immediately after classes ended in the afternoon. He'd just have time to go to the docks, hand over the sword to pay his fare, then return to the school for supper. Meanwhile… as soon as the boat captain got the sword as payment, he'd send away any crew members who wouldn't be needed for the trip. That would be about five o'clock: plenty of time for the fishermen we'd met to make their way to Simka and get rip-roaring drunk before they showed up at The Pot of Gold.

And why had the Divian been carrying the sword? My guess was that the captain wanted the little blob-eared swamp-rat to sell the blade in Simka — hock the weapon and turn it into cash. Either the Divian hadn't found a buyer, or he wanted to swagger around for a while with the sword in his hand before he had to part with it.

Yes. It all made sense… and the timing held together.

"Let's find Pelinor," I told Myoko. "He saw the weapon close up… and our noble knight knows about swords."

"Quite right," Pelinor said. "The sword was unquestionably from the Shore metalworks. Distinctive etching on the pommel: their top-of-the-line model." He sucked his mustache. "But every sword in Simka comes from Shore's. They're the only weaponsmiths from here to Feliss City."

We'd found him with Annah in the academy's vast stables. Following the chancellor's instructions, our armsmaster and musicmaster were searching for Sebastian… and naturally, Pelinor had wanted to check out the horses: "Just to see if one's missing."

Pelinor was a maniac about horses. He didn't own one himself — he told everyone he was "between mounts" — but when he wasn't drinking at The Pot of Gold or shouting at less-than-eager students not to let their foils droop, he was in the school stables badgering the grooms.

We had a lot of grooms. Every paying student at the school kept at least one horse, and most had more: a hunter, a traveler, a "steed" who looked pretty on official occasions, a war-charger, a pack-animal or two, and perhaps several others of varying colors, to make sure one always had a mount that matched one's clothing. At times, we had more than five hundred animals under the stable roofs, many of them high-strung, and all in need of pampering — heaven forbid if a single stallion showed the least little mange. Therefore we employed an army of stable-staff, all of whom gritted their teeth when they saw Pelinor coming.

Pelinor asked questions. Pelinor gave advice. Pelinor wondered if that roan in Stall 42 was favoring his right foreleg, and if they should add minced chestnuts to the fodder of that pregnant palomino. He was correct often enough that the stablemaster didn't lock the old boy out… and Pelinor was happy to shovel stalls or do other gruntwork, so workers didn't chase him away. Nevertheless, the hands paid for the help he gave; they paid by putting up with the old duffer's enthusiasm.

There were no grooms in sight at the moment: just hundreds of stalls filled with quiet horses. The nearest animals stared at us with equine curiosity — they seldom saw people in the middle of the night, especially people they didn't recognize. One beautiful chestnut gazed at me with particular soulfulness, no doubt hoping I was the sort of person who carried carrots in his pocket. Alas, I wasn't; I was the sort of person who had to investigate a murder.

"So," I said to Pelinor, "could the sword have been Sebastian's?"

"Perhaps. He owned one like that. But so do a dozen other people in town."

"Unlikely for a Divian slave to be one of them."

"Yesss," Pelinor said with another mustache suck, "it does seem strange. A broadsword decorated that much would be quite pricey… and impractical in a street fight. Better to buy a rapier or saber. Then again, the Divian may not have bought the blade himself. He might have stolen it. Or won it playing Beggar-My-Bum."

"I still think the sword was Sebastian's." I glanced at Myoko. "We'd better tell the chancellor."

"We'll come with you," Annah said softly. "We've discovered something too."

"What?"

She didn't answer. It was Pelinor who said, "Two of Rosalind's horses are missing. Her favorite mare and a nice quiet gelding. And Rosalind's saddle is gone from the tack room. Also the saddle Sebastian used in his riding classes."

Myoko made a face. "How can two kids walk off with a pair of horses in the middle of the night? Don't the stablehands keep watch?"

"The horses weren't taken in the middle of the night," Pelinor answered. "The head groom says Sebastian and Rosalind went riding this afternoon — the same time as every other student." That made sense to me; they probably went down to Dover to pay the captain for their boat trip. "With riders coming and going," Pelinor continued, "none of the grooms noticed that the two children never brought their horses back. On evening rounds, the hands saw the animals were missing; but someone had put notes on the empty stalls saying HORSES ON LOAN. The staff didn't know what that meant, but there was no reason to raise an alarm."

"So Rosalind and Sebastian might have disappeared this afternoon?" Myoko asked.

"No," I said, "they were both at dinner. In the afternoon, they must have taken the horses and tethered them somewhere. Sebastian's a local boy; he'd know hiding places where the horses would be safe. Then he and Rosalind walked back to put those notes on the stalls. That way, they wouldn't have to smuggle out their mounts later on."

"These kids planned ahead," Myoko muttered.

"So it seems," Pelinor said, "but there's one part that bothers me." He was looking toward the chestnut who'd been eyeing me earlier; he might well have been speaking to the horse rather than us humans. "If these students prepared so meticulously, why was Rosalind in bed?" He turned to me. "That's how you found her, correct? So why did the girl go to sleep instead of getting ready to elope?"

We thought about that in silence. Myoko finally said, "Rosalind was poisoned with curds-and-whey. Eventually, she'd start to feel sick… so maybe she decided to lie down. Hoping a rest would make her feel better."

"That doesn't quite fit," Annah said. "When we found her, Rosalind wasn't wearing clothes. Would she undress completely just to lie down? Especially when she planned to go out later?"

Myoko shrugged. "Maybe she wasn't thinking clearly. If the disease was making her delirious…" She stopped. "No, if the disease was making her delirious, Rosalind would just flop straight onto the bed. Too much trouble getting undressed. Unless she was burning up with fever and thought she could cool off…" Myoko shook her head. "That's not too convincing, is it?"

We nodded. Something about Rosalind's nudity didn't add up — one more out-of-place detail to confuse the picture.

"Let's go back to Opal," I said; and because the others didn't have any better suggestions, they followed me out of the stables.