The Book of Athyra (5 page)

“You can’t know that.”

“Master Wag can tell.”

Coral looked doubtful.

“And there was no wound, anyway,” repeated Savn.

“Well, okay, so he didn’t kill him with the sword. Doesn’t it mean anything that he carries one?”

“Well, maybe, but if you’re traveling, you’d want to—”

“And, like I said, he did come from the east, and that’s what everyone is saying.”

“Everyone is saying that the Easterner killed him?”

“Well, do
you
think it’s a coincidence?”

“I don’t know,” said Savn.

“Heh. If it is, I’ll—” Savn didn’t find out what Coral was prepared to do in case of a coincidence, because he broke off in mid-sentence, staring over Savn’s shoulder toward the door. Savn turned, and at that moment all conversation in the room abruptly stopped.

Standing in the doorway was the Easterner, apparently quite at ease, wrapped in a cloak that was as grey as death.

H
E STARED INSOLENTLY BACK
at the room, his expression impossible to read, save that it seemed to Savn that there was perhaps a smile hidden by the black hair that grew above his lip and curled down around the corners of his mouth. After giving the room one long, thorough look, he stepped fully inside and slowly came up to the counter until he was facing Tem. He spoke in a voice that was not loud, yet carried very well. He said, “Do you have anything to drink here that doesn’t taste like linseed oil?”

Tem looked at him, started to scowl, shifted nervously and glanced around the room. He cleared his throat, but didn’t speak.

“I take it that means no?” said Vlad.

Someone near Savn whispered, very softly, “They should send for His Lordship.” Savn wondered who “they” were.

Vlad leaned against the serving counter and folded his arms; Savn wondered if he were signaling a lack of hostility, or if the gesture meant something entirely different among Easterners. Vlad turned his head so that he was looking at Tem, and said, “Not far south of here is a cliff, overlooking a river. There were quite a few people at the river, bathing, swimming, washing clothes.”

Tem clenched his jaw, then said, “What about it?”

“Nothing, really,” said Vlad. “But if that’s Smallcliff, it’s pretty big.”

“Smallcliff is to the north,” said Tem. “We live
below
Smallcliff.”

“Well, that would explain it, then,” said Vlad. “But it is really a very pleasant view; one can see for miles. May I please have some water?”

Tem looked around at the forty or fifty people gathered in the house, and Savn wondered if he were waiting for someone to tell him what to do. At last he got a cup and poured fresh water into it from the jug below the counter.

“Thank you,” said Vlad, and took a long draught.

“What are you doing here?” said Tem.

“Drinking water. If you want to know why, it’s because everything else tastes like linseed oil.” He drank again, then wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. Someone muttered something about, “If he doesn’t like it here . . .” and someone else said something about “haughty as a lord.”

Tem cleared his throat and opened his mouth, shut it again, then looked once more at his guests. Vlad, apparently oblivious to all of this, said, “While I was up there, I saw a corpse being brought along the road in a wagon. They came to a large, smoking hole in the ground, and people put the body into the hole and burned it. It seemed to be some kind of ceremony.”

It seemed to Savn that everyone in the room somehow contrived to simultaneously gasp and fall silent. Tem scowled, and said, “What business is that of yours?”

“I got a good look at the body. The poor fellow looked familiar, though I’m not certain why.”

Someone, evidently one of those who had brought Reins to the firepit, muttered, “I didn’t see you there.”

Vlad turned to him, smiled, and said, “Thank you very much.”

Savn wanted to smile himself, but concealed his expression behind his hand when he saw that no one else seemed to think it was funny.

Tem said, “You knew him, did you?”

“I believe so. How did he happen to become dead?”

Tem leaned over the counter and said, “Maybe you could tell us.”

Vlad looked at the Housemaster long and hard, then at the guests once more, and then suddenly he laughed, and Savn let out his breath, which he had been unaware of holding.

“So that’s it,” said Vlad. “I wondered why everyone was looking at me like I’d come walking into town with the three-day fever. You think I killed the fellow, and then just sort of decided to stay here and see what everyone said about it, and then maybe bring up the subject in case anyone missed it.” He laughed again. “I don’t really mind you thinking I’d murder
someone, but I am not entirely pleased with what you seem to think of my intelligence.

“But, all right, what’s the plan, my friends? Are you going to stone me to death? Beat me to death? Call your Baron to send in his soldiers?” He shook his head slowly. “What a peck of fools.”

“Now, look,” said Tem, whose face had become rather red. “No one said you did it; we’re just wondering if you know—”

“I don’t know,” the Easterner said. Then added, “Yet.”

“But you’re going to?” said Tem.

“Very likely,” he said. “I will, in any case, look into the matter.”

Tem looked puzzled, as if the conversation had suddenly gone in a direction for which he couldn’t account. “I don’t understand,” he said at last. “Why?”

The Easterner studied the backs of his hands. Savn looked at them, too, and decided that the missing finger was not natural, and he wondered how Vlad had lost it. “As I said,” continued Vlad, “I think I knew him. I want to at least find out why he looks so familiar. May I please have some more water?” He dug a copper piece out of a pouch at his belt and put it on the counter, then nodded to the room at large and made his way through the curtain in the back of the room, presumably to return to the chamber where he was staying.

Everyone watched him; no one spoke. The sound of his footsteps echoed unnaturally loud, and Savn fancied that he could even hear the rustle of fabric as Vlad pushed aside the door-curtain, and a scraping sound from above as a bird perched on the roof of the house.

The conversation in the room was stilted. Savn’s friends didn’t say anything at all for a while. Savn looked around the room in time to see Firi leaving with a couple of her friends, which disappointed him. He thought about getting up to talk to her, but realized that it would look like he was chasing her. An older woman who was sitting behind Savn muttered something about how the Speaker should do something. A voice that Savn recognized as belonging to old Dymon echoed Savn’s own thought that perhaps informing His Lordship that an Easterner had drunk a glass of water at Tem’s house might be considered an overreaction. This started a heated argument about who Tem should and shouldn’t let stay under his roof. The argument ended when Dymon hooted with laughter and walked out.

Savn noticed that the room was gradually emptying, and he heard several people say they were going to talk to either Speaker or Bless, neither of whom was present, and “see that something was done about this.”

He was trying to figure out what “this” was when Mae and Pae rose, collected Polyi, and approached him. Mae said, “Come along, Savn, it’s time for us to be going home.”

“Is it all right if I stay here for a while? I want to keep talking to my friends.”

His parents looked at each other, and perhaps couldn’t think of how to phrase a refusal, so they grunted permission. Polyi must have received some sort of rejection from one of the boys, perhaps Ori, because she made no objection to being made to leave, but in fact hurried out to the wagon while Savn was still saying goodbye to his parents and being told to be certain he was home by midnight.

In less than five minutes, the room was empty except for Tem, Savn, Coral, a couple of their friends, and a few old women who practically lived at Tem’s house.

“Well,” said Coral. “Isn’t
he
the cheeky one?”

“Who?”

“Who do you think? The Easterner.”

“Oh. Cheeky?” said Savn.

“Did you see how he looked at us?” said Coral.

“Yeah,” said Lan, a large fellow who was soon to be officially apprenticed to Piper. “Like we were all grass and he was deciding if he ought to mow us.”

“More like we were weeds, and not worth the trouble,” said Tuk, who was Lan’s older brother and was in his tenth year as Hider’s apprentice. They were proud of the fact that both of them had “filled the bucket” and been apprenticed to trade.

“That’s what I thought,” said Coral.

“I don’t know,” said Savn. “I was just thinking, I sure wouldn’t like to walk into a place and have everybody staring at me like that. It’d scare the blood out of my skin.”

“Well, it didn’t seem to disturb
him
any,” said Lan.

“No,” said Savn. “It didn’t.”

Tuk said, “We shouldn’t talk about him. They say Easterners can hear anything you say about them.”

“Do you believe that?” said Savn.

“It’s what I’ve heard.”

Lan nodded. “And they can turn your food bad when they want, even after you’ve eaten it.”

“Why would he want to do that?”

“Why would he want to kill Reins?” said Coral.

“I don’t think he did,” said Savn.

“Why not?” said Tuk.

“Because he couldn’t have,” said Savn. “There weren’t any marks on him.”

“Maybe he’s a wizard,” said Lan.

“Easterners aren’t wizards.”

Coral frowned. “You can say what you want, I think he killed him.”

“But why would he?” said Savn.

“How should I—” Coral broke off, looking around the room. “What was that?”

“It was on the roof, I think. Birds, probably.”

“Yeah? Pretty big ones, then.”

As if by unspoken agreement they ran to the window. Coral got there first, stuck his head out, and jerked it back in again just as fast.

“What is it?” said the others.

“A jhereg,” said Coral, his eyes wide. “A big one.”

“What was it doing?” said Savn.

“Just standing on the edge of the roof looking down at me.”

“Huh?” said Savn. “Let me see.”

“Welcome.”

“Don’t let its tongue touch you,” said Tuk. “It’s poisonous.”

Savn looked out hesitantly, while Coral said, “Stand under it, but don’t let it lick you.”

“The gods!” said Savn, pulling his head in. “It
is
big. A female, I think. Who else wants to see?”

The others declined the honor, in spite of much urging by Savn and Coral, who, having already proven themselves, felt they wouldn’t have to again. “Huh-uh,” said Tuk. “They bite.”

“And they spit poison,” added Lan.

“They do not,” said Savn. “They bite, but they don’t spit, and they can’t hurt you just by licking you.” He was beginning to feel a bit proprietary toward them, having seen so many recently.

Meanwhile, Tem had noticed the disturbance. He came up behind them and said, “What’s going on over here?”

“A jhereg,” said Coral. “A big one.”

“A jhereg? Where?”

“On your roof,” said Savn.

“Right above the window,” said Coral.

Tem glanced out, then pulled his head back in slowly, filling the boys
with equal measures of admiration and envy. “You’re right,” he said. “It’s a bad omen.”

“It is?” said Coral.

Tem nodded. He seemed about to speak further, but at that moment, preceded by a heavy thumping of boots, Vlad appeared once more.

“Good evening,” he said. Savn decided that what was remarkable about his voice was that it was so normal, and it ought not to be. It should be either deep and husky to match his build, or high and fluty to match his size, yet he sounded completely human.

He sat down near where Savn and his friends had been seated and said, “I’d like a glass of wine, please.”

Tem clenched his teeth like Master Wag, then said, “What sort of wine?”

“Any color, any district, any characteristics, just so long as it is wet.”

The old women, who had been studiously ignoring the antics of Savn and his friends, arose as one and, with imperious glares first at the Easterner, then at Tem, stalked out. Vlad continued, “I like it better here with fewer people. The wine, if you please?”

Tem fetched him a cup of wine, which Vlad paid for. He drank some, then set the mug down and stared at it, turning it in a slow circle on the table. He appeared oblivious to the fact that Savn and his friends were staring at him.

After a short time, Coral, followed by the others, made his way back to the table. It seemed to Savn that Coral was walking gingerly, as if afraid to disturb the Easterner. When they were all seated, Vlad looked at them with an expression that was a mockery of innocence. He said, “So tell me, gentlemen, of this land. What is it like?”

The four boys looked at each other. How could one answer such a question?

Vlad said, “I mean, do bodies always show up out of nowhere, or is this a special occasion?”

Coral twitched as if stung; Savn almost smiled but caught himself in time. Tuk and Lan muttered something inaudible; then, with a look at Coral and Savn, they got up and left. Coral hesitated, stood up, looked at Savn, started to say something, then followed his friends out the door.

Vlad shook his head. “I seem to be driving away business today. I really don’t mean to. I hope Goodman Tem isn’t unhappy with me.”

“Are you a wizard?” said Savn.

Vlad laughed. “What do you know about wizards?”

“Well, they live forever, and you can’t hurt them because they keep their souls in magic boxes without any way inside, and they can make you do things you don’t want to do, and—”

Vlad laughed again. “Well, then I’m certainly not a wizard.”

Savn started to ask what was funny; then he caught sight of Vlad’s maimed hand, and it occurred to him that a wizard wouldn’t have allowed that to happen.