The Thief (7 page)

As he dabbled his toes in the water, Ambiades looked over at the magus and Sophos, who were already stepping out of the stream, finished with their quick wash. His eyes narrowed, and the hair on the back of my neck started to rise. I’ve seen envy before, and I know the damage it can do. Ambiades caught me staring, and his envy was replaced by righteous contempt. If one thing was perfectly clear to him, it was my worthless place in the universe.

“What are you looking at, sewer filth?” he snarled.

“The Lord of Rags and Tatters,” I said with a false smile as I bowed elaborately and gestured to his ratty cloak.

A moment later I was on my back in the cold water of the stream with the sun in my eyes and my ears ringing. Ambiades stood over me shouting something about his grandfather’s having been the duke of somewhere. He would have kicked me, but Pol was there and put a hand on his shoulder to pull him back. A moment later the magus was standing between me and the sun.

“A little circumspection might be wise for someone in your position, Gen,” he said mildly. “Not to mention an apology.”

Well, my position was not a good one, I was willing to admit, but it was easily changed. I pulled my knees up to my chest and rolled myself onto my feet. “Apologize?” I said to the magus. “What for?” I walked away, nursing my swelling lip and licking the blood from the corner of my mouth. I paused to filch a comb from an open saddle pack and then sat on the stump of a dead olive tree to get the tangles and maybe some of the prison lice out of my hair. Pol packed his coffeepot into a bag, and Ambiades and Sophos put saddles on the horses.

The magus stood watching me. After a moment he opened his mouth to comment, and I expected him to suggest I cut the hair off, but instead he asked sharply, “Where did you get that comb?”

I looked at the comb in my hand as if perplexed. It was a nice one, probably very expensive. It was made from tortoiseshell, and it had long teeth and was inlaid with gold at the ends. “I think it’s Ambiades’s,” I said at last. I’d taken it out of his pack.

Ambiades turned so quickly that the horse he was saddling reared in alarm. He left it pulling at its head tie and crossed the clearing to snatch the comb out of my hand. He swung his fist toward my face, but this time I was ready, and he hit my shoulder as I turned away. Still, he knocked me backward off the stump where I was sitting and I landed in the dirt on the far side. I landed safely, but I yelped that my arm was broken.

For the second time that morning the magus was standing over me, this time looking concerned.

“Did you land on it?” he asked, bending down.

“No, the one he hit,” I said. “He’s broken my arm,” which was a dreadful lie, and when the magus saw that, he stalked away in disgust.

He explained to Ambiades, loudly enough for everyone to hear, that if I’d fallen on my arm, I might very well have sprained a wrist and I would then be no use to him at all. “I thought I’d made that clear to you a moment ago.” He punctuated his next few comments with blows to the head with that seal ring of his while I lay and listened to Ambiades yelp and resented being treated like a tool, even a valued one.

Once he had delivered his lecture, the magus left Ambiades to finish saddling up the horses, and went to repack the soap and his razor into his saddlebag. Several times I saw him look up with a puzzled expression, not at me but at Ambiades. If he thought he’d pounded good nature back into his apprentice, he was wrong. I saw the poisonous looks Ambiades sent back.

When Sophos was done saddling his horse and Pol’s, he loaned me his own comb. I told him to his face that he was much too nice to be a duke. He blushed deep red and shrugged.

“I know,” he said.

“So does his father,” snarled Ambiades, leaning down from his horse as he rode by.

It was not a propitious start to the day. Ambiades sulked for most of the morning, and Sophos rode with his shoulders hunched, trying to ignore the tension in the air. I reached up occasionally to check the size of my lip.

At one point I muttered, “You learn something new every day.”

“What are you learning?” Sophos asked.

“To keep my mouth shut, I hope.”

“You mean not bragging in wineshops that you’re going to steal the king’s seal ring?”

“That wasn’t exactly what I was thinking,” I said, “but you can bet I won’t do that either. Tell me, if Ambiades has an exalted grandfather, why doesn’t he have a better cloak?”

Sophos checked to be sure that Ambiades was riding ahead of the magus and out of earshot. “His grandfather was duke of Eumen.”

I had to think for a minute. “Of the Eumen conspiracy?” I asked. I was quiet myself. Ordinary people didn’t talk out loud about the Eumen conspiracy.

“After he tried to return the oligarchy and was executed, his family forfeited their lands and titles. I think Ambiades’s father did inherit some money, but he lost most of it gambling. Last winter, when Ambiades wrote to his father and told him he needed a new cloak, his father sent him one of his old ones.”

“Ah,” I said. “Poor Ambiades.”

Sophos looked at me sideways.

“How can he look down his aristocratic nose at the unwashed masses when he’s as poor as anyone else, and landless to boot? I bet he wakes up every morning and can’t stand it.”

We stayed away from roads. Although we crossed many dirt tracks, we picked our way carefully between the trees and moved mostly at a slow pace. From time to time the magus checked the compass to make sure we stayed on course.

We stopped early in the evening as no moonlight would penetrate the crisscrossed leaves, but we were far enough from the nearest town that the magus approved a larger cooking fire, and Pol used some of the dried meat in the provisions to make a stew. There was no conversation around the fire as we ate. After dinner the silence was strained. Finally the magus spoke. “If Gen can take a few liberties with the old myths, I suppose I can, too,” he said, and began to tell Sophos another story of the old gods.

“Well done,” I said when the magus finished.

“Why, thank you, Gen.”

Did he sound genuinely flattered?

G
OOD FEELINGS PERSISTED BETWEEN MYSELF
and the magus until the next morning, when Pol discovered that most of the food was missing from one of the packs of provisions. He called the magus over to him, and they talked quietly, throwing glances in my direction. The magus looked into the saddlebag himself and swore. He said something to Pol under his breath, and they both crossed the clearing to stand in front of me. The magus was carrying his horse crop in one hand. I stood up warily as they came.

“I hope you ate well?” said the magus.

“Not lately,” I answered before I realized that another response might have been better.

“Hold him.” The magus raised the crop. When Pol grabbed me by the arm, I ducked away, but I was too late. I planted my feet and tried to overbalance him but ended up with my head locked under his arm. I grabbed him around the knee and tried to throw him, but we
both went down, and he landed on top. He shifted his weight until most of it lay on my head, and he held me pinned while the magus beat me across the back and shoulders with his horse crop.

I screamed curses—I am not sure what kind—into the grass and heaved with all my strength, but Pol would not be moved. He only ground my head harder into the dirt until I was exhausted and couldn’t get my breath to yell anymore. The magus went on with a few strokes after that and stopped. When Pol released me, I grabbed his shirt in order to pull myself to my feet. He helped. As soon as I was up, I chopped him under the breastbone and left him gasping while I headed toward the magus. I had never been so angry in my life. Not even in the king’s prison had I been this humiliated. If Pol had not grabbed me by the arm and jerked me backward, interposing himself, albeit hunched over and breathing painfully, between me and the magus, I am not sure what would have happened. The magus had taken one look at my face and was stepping back quickly.

I wasn’t aware of any sound but Pol’s labored breathing as the magus and I stared at each other. My mouth was so full of things I wanted to shout that I couldn’t get any of them out. Which was just as well. If one thing had come, they all would have. How dare he treat me this way? How dare he? Finally I spat in his face. He jumped back further to avoid the spittle, and I
turned away. I went to my blankets, where I threw myself down on my face and covered my head with my arms. I rubbed my face into the wool of the cloak rumpled underneath me, and except for that I didn’t move all the time that Pol made breakfast and the others ate and packed up camp.

Pol came over and touched me lightly on the elbow. “Get up,” he said very quietly. He didn’t offer to help me, and I noticed when I did get up that he stayed out of arm’s reach and watched me carefully, his weight forward on his toes.

Sophos was holding my horse. He’d moved it next to a stump that I could use as a mounting block, but I ignored the stump and pushed the horse away from it. Sophos came around the horse’s head to offer me a leg up, but I ignored him as well. I put one foot into the stirrup and jumped onto the horse’s back. I snapped the reins sharply to keep it from sidling, and the horse threw up its head in surprise.

I stopped to take a deep breath and let it out slowly. I could feel my eyebrows pressing together, and my teeth were so tightly clamped that the muscles in my jaw jumped. I took another breath and reminded myself that it wasn’t the horse I was angry at. Nothing but my own ambition was keeping me near the magus. I could walk away from this party of overeducated adventurers if I chose. Neither the king’s reward nor Pol could stop me, but I wanted to be a kingmaker myself. I wanted to
be the first one to steal Hamiathes’s Gift in hundreds and hundreds of years. I wanted to be famous. Only I couldn’t steal the damned thing if I didn’t know where it was, and only the magus could find it for me. I would stay with him until he led me to the stone, but I promised myself that someday I would stick a sharp knife into his arrogance and give it a good twist.

The magus and Pol had mounted their own horses.

“We’ll swing west then to the stream and hope to find some kind of village somewhere along it? You think that’s our best chance?” the magus asked Pol.

Pol nodded. The magus stuffed the map he carried in his hand into the bag behind his saddle. “This way then,” he said, and led us through the trees. My horse followed just behind him as usual.

As we rode, I looked back over my anger from a little distance. I’d been so mad that I’d frightened the magus, even with Pol between us. That was a new sort of event in my life, and I relished it a little as the morning passed. I was also pleased that I’d held my tongue. Saying things I shouldn’t has been the origin of most of the painful episodes in my past, and it would certainly be an improvement in my character if I had a little more control over my own tongue.

“Are you okay?” Sophos whispered from beside me.

I looked at him from under my eyebrows, which were still drawn down. “Oh, sure,” I said.

And I was okay. The horse crop hadn’t been heavy enough to do any serious damage. The clothes the magus had supplied me with were thick enough to keep the skin from breaking. I wasn’t disabled. My back hurt, but the fire would fade by nightfall, and whenever we got to wherever we were going, I would still be able to do my job. The magus would never do anything to impair my usefulness.

We came to a shallow river, bordered with scrub, and followed it upstream until we came to a break in the olive groves where other crops had been planted. The magus turned his horse and led us back into the trees.

“There will be a town somewhere close. Pol and I will ride in to get more food. Ambiades, I’m leaving you in charge. For gods’ sakes, don’t take your eyes off the thief.” He didn’t look at me as he spoke, but Ambiades cast a contemptuous glance in my direction.

I noticed that I had ceased to be “Gen” and returned to being a kind of unreliable animal, like a cow that’s prone to wandering away. The magus and Pol left their horses and packs with us and set off up a trail that followed the river into town. What food there was they left in the backpacks and told us to eat for lunch. Sophos opened the bags and took out the bread and some warm sweaty pieces of cheese and handed them around. He gave me a loaf of bread to divide, and I kept most of it before passing the rest on to Ambiades. He protested.

“I didn’t have any godsdamned breakfast!” I snarled, and he backed away. Evidently my anger was still effective. He wasn’t going to bring up the reason I’d missed the morning meal.

After we had eaten the bread and the slippery cheese and were chewing on the dried pieces of jerky, Sophos said mournfully, “I’m still hungry.”

I crossed my arms without saying anything. That was their tough luck.

“We could get some fish out of the river,” Ambiades pointed out. “Pol has fishing line and hooks in his pack.”

Sophos looked over at me.

“Don’t expect my help,” I said.

“We don’t ever expect you to be helpful, Gen, but I’ll bet you’ll want some of the fish if we catch it,” said Ambiades.

“I could fish and you could watch him,” suggested Sophos. I saw that Sophos had also placed me in the category of unreliable livestock.

“You’re terrible at fishing. You jerk the line and lose the bait.”

“I could watch him while you fished.”

Ambiades snorted. “If he got up and walked away, you wouldn’t stop him. No. What we’ll do is tie him up.”

“You will not,” I said.

“How?” Sophos ignored me.

“There’s rope in the magus’s pack. Go get it.”
Sophos went while I continued to protest.

“You’re not tying me up. The magus said to keep an eye on me. He didn’t say go fishing.”

“Shut up,” said Ambiades. “It’s your fault there’s nothing to eat.”

“No,” I said. “You’re not going to tie me up.”

I’d been sitting cross-legged on the ground. When Ambiades leaned over me with the rope, I rolled away. He dropped on top of me, across my sore shoulders, and I yelped. He slipped a loop of rope over one of my hands and back, pulling the loop tight over the new pink skin on my wrist where the sores had almost healed.

“Don’t.” I yelped again. I grabbed the rope to keep it from pulling any tighter and tried to slip the loop off, but the rough rope dug into the tender skin. Ambiades yanked on the rope, pulling it out of my hand and tightening the loop.

“Hold still, or I’ll pull it tighter,” he said, and I gave up. I sat still while they tied my wrists and my ankles together, complaining the entire time.

“Be sure and make it tight,” Ambiades told Sophos, who was working on my ankles.

“It’s too tight,” I said. “You’re tying my hands too tight.”

“Shut up,” said Ambiades.

“Are you sure it’s not too tight?” Sophos asked.

“Of course I’m sure. Have you got his feet done?”

“Ambiades”—I made one last effort to convince him—“you’ve tied my hands too tight. I can’t feel my fingers. You have to loosen them.”

“Maybe you should, Ambiades.”

“Don’t be stupid, Sophos, he’s just saying that. Look, his hands are fine.”

“They are not! Look.” I held them up to Sophos. The pink skin on either side of the ropes was already puffy, but he was looking at my fingers.

“They aren’t blue.”

“They will be soon.”

“They will not. Come on, Sophos.” Ambiades had collected the fishing gear out of the magus’s pack, and he pulled Sophos away.

I wanted to shout for them to come back, but I was afraid that that close to an Attolian town, someone else might hear me. One curious villager could get us locked in a cellar until a queen’s guardsman came to interrogate us. I didn’t want to be publicly beheaded, and the ropes were not so tight that I couldn’t stand them for a little while. I kept thinking that at any moment the magus or the Uselesses would be back. I sat and watched my hands turn blue.

Ambiades and Sophos didn’t return from the river until they had seen Pol making his way down the riverbank. They found me lying on my side, breathing quietly and trying by mental effort to force the blood past the constricting knots and out of my hands, which were
swollen and mottled.

“Oh, no,” said Sophos.

“Damn right,” I hissed, “get the ropes off.
Be careful!
” Ambiades had started tugging at the knots, and the pain was shocking. He jerked on the ropes and pulled the knots even tighter.

“Stop, stop,” I said. “Just leave them. You can cut them off.” But he wasn’t listening. He managed to loosen one loop of rope, and he squeezed it over my fist, scraping the skin off my knuckles.
“You’re killing me!”
I was reduced to yelling as Pol rushed into the clearing. He pulled Ambiades away and looked down at my hands and then at the fish lying in the dust, forgotten.

“Go get some more fish, both of you.”

After a couple of uncertain steps backward, both Sophos and Ambiades turned and hurried into the bushes by the river. When they were gone, Pol set about carefully removing the knotted ropes. I didn’t bother to whimper suggestively. I lay quietly while he cut the ropes away and only hissed when he pulled them away from the skin where they were stuck.

He started to straighten my curled fingers. “Don’t,” I said.

“They’ve got to be flexed. The blood has pooled.”

“I’ll do it,” I promised, “myself.”

After a moment he nodded.

“Where’s the magus?” I asked.

“He sent me ahead with some of the food. It’s a
good thing.” Pol looked over his shoulder to the river. “He doesn’t need to know about this.”

“Oh, yes, he does,” I said. By that time I wanted to see Ambiades flayed alive.

“No,” said Pol, “he doesn’t.” He crouched down a little more so that he could look into my eyes. “The magus has staked his reputation and his life to find this silly stone, wherever it is, and he’ll murder the person who prevents him from getting it. And that person is not”—he shook his finger in front of my face—“going to be Sophos.” I could see that there was no way to get Ambiades punished without dragging Sophos into trouble as well.

“His father sent me to make sure he’s safe and that he learns something on this trip, but he is not going to learn what happens when you ruin the plans of a man like the magus.” It was more words spoken altogether than I’d heard Pol use yet. He wrapped one hand in the fabric of my shirt and pulled my face closer to his. “My orders are to keep him safe and out of trouble. Whether we succeed in retrieving something from a fairy tale is not important to me. Do you understand?”

I nodded my head vigorously and then shook it back and forth. Yes, I understood, and no, the magus didn’t need to be told after all. After all, when I thought about it, I had no grievance against Sophos, and Ambiades’s hash I could settle on my own.

Pol went over to his pack to pull out the relief kit
and brought back some bandages and salve to rub on my sore hands and a little paper packet of dried berries.

“Chew two of these,” he said, “They’ll help with the pain. We’ll tell the magus that one of the sores reinfected.”

“How long have I got, Pol?”

“Till what?”

“Till we get to where we are going.”

“How would I know?”

“You know how much food the magus bought.”

He thought for a moment. “Two more days.”

The magus came back with the rest of the food and accepted Pol’s story about my wrists without question. He only seemed concerned that the hands would be functional, and Pol reassured him. Ambiades looked scornful, but Sophos was visibly relieved. When we rode back into the olive groves, he moved his horse alongside mine and apologized very prettily. I told him to shut up and watched him blush. I don’t know what had passed between him and Ambiades down at the river, but Ambiades seemed to have fallen quite off his pedestal. I thought he would probably climb back up again, but not soon. Meanwhile, Ambiades kept his horse near the magus, and Sophos fell back to ride beside Pol or sometimes beside me. I asked him why he had such a fancy cloak, and he blushed again. He was as regular as clockwork.

“My mother bought it for me when she heard I’d be traveling to the city to be with a new tutor.”