The Steel of Raithskar (9 page)

Keeshah, glad to be home at last, went directly to a thick round post, in the center of the room, that I had taken to be a roof support. But Keeshah put first one front paw, then another against it and stretched upward, then back, clawing it joyfully with claws as long as my fingers. It was the trunk of a tree larger than any I had yet seen—and it had been hauled in and placed there as a scratching post for Keeshah.

I unwrapped the meat, and Keeshah, his homecoming ritual complete, attacked it hungrily. I brought water for him from a cistern beside one of the storage buildings, moving automatically and not stopping to wonder how I knew where things were.

Soon I was walking up the stone pathway to the rear of the house. There were lots of windows back here on both floors, letting plenty of light into the interior. They were made of lozenge-shaped panes only as large as my hand, joined together with thin strips of wood. Even the three doors had wood-latticed windows in them.

I came to the central door and stopped, frozen. What was I doing?

Up to this point, I had been merely following a logical line. It had seemed the most natural thing in the world to come here to “my” home, where “I” had always lived. I had begun to accept this world, to feel almost comfortable in it. But all familiarity vanished now in a wave of alienness.

I was Ricardo Emilio Carillo, elderly American gentleman, walking around in what some might regard as a stolen body. I had been about to walk, without invitation or by-your-leave, into the house of a stranger, a man whom I had never seen before. This wasn’t
my
home at all. It was the home of a near-human,
not
-human being, a native of an alien world who spoke a language I had never heard before. The mores, laws, customs, and civilization of this world were unknown to me.
I
was the stranger here.

What the hell had I been thinking of?

I wanted desperately to turn and run—but there was no place to run to. Only danger waited beyond the walls which surrounded me. A man named Worfit who might slit my throat for welching on a debt. One Zaddorn who might throw me into prison, or worse, because of some sacred bauble I knew nothing about—or because of his jealousy over a woman. And the woman herself, a promised marriage to a girl who, though she seemed sincere enough, was hardly a rock of strength.

No, I didn’t want to stay here, but where else could I go? What could I do? How could I live? Illia seemed to think I had a lot of money with me, but how long would that last, especially when I couldn’t tell if I was being cheated? I had strong doubts about the existence of unemployment offices, welfare checks, and food stamps in this world. How could I support myself and Keeshah?

For I knew that I could not leave the great cat behind me if I fled. And the thought increased my despair. I would be instantly recognized anywhere with Keeshah in tow. And that would lead all the dangerous people directly to me.

I had to stay here. I was safe here—for the moment. But I just
couldn’t
walk into this house and face a man who was supposed to be my father. What would I say to him? How would I act? He was sure to see through me, to realize that, although I looked just like Markasset, I was
not
the person who had grown up in his house.

In that moment, torn by fear, unable to make any decision, paralyzed by the whole situation, I came as close to total panic as I ever have in my life.

Then the door opened, and the man who had opened it said: “Don’t just stand there, son. Come on in.”

For a moment I just stared at him stupidly. The only clear thought in my mind was a question: how had he known I was out here?

This was the man whose face had flashed through my memory when Balgokh had first told me who I was. It was a strong face, the brows a little more prominent than mine and a faint white scar running from forehead to cheek beside his left eye. The hair on his head had thinned and darkened with age, and fine lines rayed out from his eye-corners and along his mouth.

The tone of his invitation had been neither welcoming nor rude. His voice had held only exasperation. I had a sudden intuition that some of those lines had been put there by Markasset—that Thanasset disapproved of his son in some ways, but still loved him. Very much. I was beginning to like Markasset less and less.

“I don’t know why you’re back so soon,” the old man continued, in a somewhat lowered voice. “I suppose you’ll tell me when you feel like it. But have the courtesy to keep your tongue civil until we’re alone. There is a guest in the house.”

He turned on his heel and walked before me into the house. He was taller than I, with wide shoulders and a brisk stride. He was wearing a sleeveless green tunic that reached to his thighs and his body, though thinning, was still muscular and strong.

We had gone only a few steps when Thanasset turned and looked at me coldly. I stopped hastily, just in time to keep myself from colliding with him.
Have I already goofed?
I asked myself, and the answer was quick in coming.

“As long as you are a son of this house, Markasset, you will not bear arms under its roof!”

“Oh, of course,” I said in confusion, and pulled the baldric off over my head. I dislodged the scarf tied around my head, which fluttered to the floor. I bent and retrieved it and stood there with the scarf in one hand and the baldric in the other, feeling utterly foolish.

Finally, Thanasset took the baldric from me and walked back to the door to hang it from a rack mounted on the wall. I took the moment to look around the room, and I was impressed.

Everything about the room bespoke wealth. Not ostentation, but quality. The floor and the walls were finished with fine parquetry in a light, richly grained wood. The floor, highly polished, was a regular pattern of small diamonds, but the walls were random mosaics. Each piece of wood had been cut and matched by hand by some brilliant craftsman.

The room in which we stood was like a wide hallway that led straight through the house. Across from me were the doors I had passed in the street before reaching the garden entrance. Directly to my left was a short, narrow hallway leading to a small door and to a flight of stairs; the outer door at the rear of the house which I had passed opened at the foot of the stairs. On my right were two doorways and, against the front wall of the house, a second staircase.

The walls were decorated with sketches and small tapestries, most of which depicted animals. There was one, quite good, of a sha’um—not Keeshah; its markings were different. On the right wall, between the doors, the mosaic pattern seemed to be less random than elsewhere, but it was not until Thanasset passed me again and led me toward the front of the house that I could see what it was.

Standing opposite that wall, the pattern plainly was the outline of a sha’um. Darker woods had been used here to emphasize a line or to suggest a fur marking. Nothing had been placed on the wall to cover that exquisite mosaic portrait, but mounted above it was a sword—not bronze, like the one I had been wearing, but a gleaming gray-white metal. Steel.

I had time for only a brief glance, then we were walking through an open double-doorway on our left. This room held a comfortable array of armchairs and small tables of different shapes. Their surfaces, too, were parquetry, some of the fitted wood pieces mere slivers. Wood, I thought, must be very precious here; every smallest fragment seemed to find use.

In here, the stone of the walls had been left unfinished. A ledge that served as a bench ran the length of the room along the outside wall, beneath two tall, latticed windows that admitted both daylight and the beauty of the garden. And my earlier question was answered: the windows looked out on the pathway where it entered the garden. Thanasset, sitting in this room with his guest, had seen me as I passed by. When I hadn’t come in after a natural interval, he had gone to the back door to find me standing there uncertainly.

Thanasset’s guest was a man a little older than my father, a small man with laughter around his eyes. The smile he gave me in greeting wreathed his face in wrinkles.

“Chief Supervisor Ferrathyn,” said Thanasset, “I present my son, Markasset.”

Chief
Supervisor? The old man made no move toward me, so I bowed as I had done to Balgokh and said what seemed right. “Our house is honored by your visit.”

Thanasset flashed me a strange look, then turned away to fetch a stoppered glass pitcher with a dark liquid in it.

“Come, come, my boy—you needn’t be so formal,” said the Chief Supervisor. “Sit down, please, and tell us—what news? What rumors reached you in the marketplace?”

Thanasset refilled Ferrathyn’s glass, then his own. Then he brought a third from the stone-and-glass shelves that formed one wall of the room, filled it and handed it to me.

I sat down and took a sip, then a deep draught. This, I realized, must be faen. Good it was, too, but not like beer as I knew it. For one thing, it wasn’t carbonated. It reminded me of Japanese
sake
lightly mixed with Mount Vernon rye whiskey—but it was cool and tasted much better than such a mixture would have tasted.

Besides liking the stuff, I was stalling for time, trying to think. Was I or wasn’t I supposed to know about the theft of the Ra’ira? Illia said that Zaddorn suspected me. Did my father and Ferrathyn know of his suspicions? And what did
they
think?

A frightening realization swept over me, almost causing me to choke on the faen. I don’t know myself whether I—Markasset—was guilty or not!

I set my glass down on the small square table beside my chair. “The marketplace is churning with rumors,” I told them. “It is said that the Ra’ira is missing, and that the Peace and Security Department is looking all over for it.”

Ferrathyn looked at Thanasset. “I knew we could not keep it quiet for very long, old friend. We’ll have to make an official announcement soon.” He looked back at me. “Is that all? No mention of how it was stolen, or by whom?”

I hesitated, then said, “No. Not that I know of, sir.” That was technically true. Illia had said that everyone seemed to know of the theft, but Zaddorn had spoken to her privately when he mentioned his suspicion of me.

I thought to myself,
If it’s all that secret, and I’ve been out of the city
… I took a chance. “May I be told what happened?” I asked them. They glanced at each other, and Ferrathyn nodded.

“Please do tell him, Thanasset. Perhaps, after he has heard everything, he may be able to help us.”

“Very well,” Thanasset sighed, and took a long drink from his glass. Then he spoke directly to me. Ferrathyn, obviously, had heard the story before.

“It happened on the night you left—Kryfer before last.”
Kryfer. Day Two
, Markasset’s memory said. “As you know, I had Guardian Duty that night, beginning at midnight. I went to the Council Hall, relieved Ferrathyn, and formally took custody of the Ra’ira.”

I
didn’t
know. I tried to dig a memory of that day or night out of Markasset’s storehouse, but with no success. Thanasset might have been reading
Little Red Riding Hood
for all the personal connection I felt to what he was saying.

“Ferrathyn left me in charge,” Thanasset continued, “and I locked the Security Room. I was there alone with the stone.

“About an hour into the watch, the door opened, and two men came in.”

He looked at me, waiting for me to bring up the discrepancy I had already noticed.

“Through a locked door?” I asked.

Ferrathyn sighed, but said nothing.

Thanasset stood up and began to pace the room, making little noise on the green carpet that almost covered the floor. “That’s the whole trouble,” he said. “I distinctly remember locking that door. But they came in as though it had never been locked.” He threw open his arms in a very human gesture of hopelessness. “I can’t explain it.”

“Can’t it be unlocked from the outside?” I asked, and instantly wondered if I should already know the answer.

“No,” Ferrathyn supplied. “That is part of the whole security program. It is unlocked
by the Supervisor on duty
when the next man arrives. The shift changes every third-of-a-day, and the new man re-locks the door.”

“As I did!” Thanasset almost shouted. “For fifteen years, I have
never
failed to lock that door. And yet they came in!”

“Go on with your story, old friend,” the Chief Supervisor said in a kindly manner. “We will worry about the locked door later.”

Thanasset came back to his seat, and refilled our glasses. “Well—as I said, two men came in. They were armed with truncheons, not swords, and both of them were wearing hoods with eyeholes. I couldn’t identify them if I saw them again, except that one of them had the little finger of his left hand missing.

“Neither of them said a word. One came at me, and the other went to the desk where the jewel was resting on its pedestal.” His hands clenched and trembled with recalled frustration. “I fought them, of course. I would have given my life to protect the Ra’ira. But even that small dignity was denied me. I was knocked senseless. I lay unconscious on the floor of the Security Room until Supervisor Noddaran came to relieve me at the end of my shift. He found the door ajar, the Ra’ira gone, and me … asleep.” He took a deep breath and lifted his glass again. “That’s all. That’s exactly what happened.”

“Are you well now, Father?” I asked. He looked strong enough, but I knew what it was like to wake up from a clobbering like that. And his body was older than mine.

Thanasset looked at me so long that I lowered my gaze in embarrassment. “Yes,” he said then. “Yes, Markasset, I’m fine now.” A short, awkward pause. “Thank you for asking, son.”

I tried to bring the conversation back to the point. I remembered a scrap of the discussion I’d heard among the cops on the trail south the night before. I decided it was worth quoting. “Why would anyone steal the Ra’ira?” I asked them. “Its value would be destroyed if it were cut up, and, if left intact, it would be recognized anywhere for what it is.”

“Prestige, for one thing,” Ferrathyn answered, and sipped from his glass. “Are you aware of its history?”