ON THE AFTERNOON following the conflagration, Jame went to the Lower Town in response to a message from Patches. She found the area in a state of chaos. Having no intact river gates, it had suffered badly from the flash flood two days back, and so far had made little progress in sorting itself out. All the rickety houses along the Tone had been swept away, while others, seriously undermined, continued to fall with little or no warning. The homeless thronged the streets, terrified at the prospect of another night in the open, but unable to seek shelter elsewhere because of the barricades erected by the remaining four of the Five, who feared riots and looting. Meanwhile, each dawn saw more children ill or dead. The thing that stalked in the dark fed well.
Marc had been in the area since early that morning, alternately helping to keep order and searching through the rubble for the dead. When Jame found him, he put down his crowbar and, with his captain's permission, went with her.
They found Patches' house still standing but befouled inside and out with river silt. Patches herself was there, assisting her mother and siblings to clean away the muck. Though all had been drenched, none were the worse for it except Taniscent, who had developed an inflammation of the lungs. It was for her sake that they had come. At last, the dancer was returning to the Res aB'tyrr.
Marc carried her home wrapped in a blanket while Jame limped along beside him. There, they put her in her old room. She didn't remember anything that had happened to her since the night of the near-riot almost a year before and was very confused. The sight of her own hands, knob-knuckled and blue-veined, upset her badly. She kept asking, in a thin, querulous voice, for a mirror, which no one was so foolish as to give her.
Jame stayed nearby all that long day and well into the night, taking turns with Kithra and Cleppetty at nursing the invalid. Sometime well after midnight, she excused herself from the sickroom and, with a plate of scraps, crossed the square to the fire-gutted Skyrrman in search of Fang.
Someone was huddled on the doorstep. Moonlight shone on Niggen's tear-swollen face as he jerked it up. Misery gave way to terror. He scrambled to his feet, lashing out wildly at the hand that she held out to him. Only after he had lurched past her into the night, fleeing as if for his life, did she realize that he had thought she was about to strike him.
She did not follow him, nor did any ragged feline form slink out of the ruins in answer to her call as it had the previous night. The city had swallowed Marplet's cat as it had his son.
Jame put the plate of scraps on the ground for whomever might claim it and walked back to the Res aB'tyrr. As she reached the front door, someone called her name. Turning, she saw a shadowy figure approaching her across the square. It was Dally.
"Well, it's all over," he said. "We lost."
Almost with a start, she remembered the Guild Election. "I'm sorry. What happens now?"
"I hardly know," he said. "Even now, I can scarcely believe it happened. Mend's secret backer failed him at the last minute. If it weren't such an odd idea, I'd almost have thought that he blamed you for that. Now . . . I just don't know. My brother is used to getting what he wants, usually when he wants it. He might try again in seven years or when Theocandi dies, I suppose, if the Sirdan's assassins don't get him first. Canden was right," he said with a bitter laugh. "It isn't easy to stay alive once you've lost. He almost died tonight after the Conclave, coming down the Guild Hall steps."
"The Sirdan is working fast."
"Oh, I don't think he ordered this particular attack. It was just some little 'prentice trying to curry favor. I killed him." An odd look crossed Dally's face. "I've never killed anyone before," he said. "I didn't like it. Anyway, word has gone out that Theocandi has something else in mind, something far surer. There's talk of the Shadow Thief again."
"Oh?" said Jame. "The last time that name came up, you weren't even sure that such a thing existed."
"Nor am I now, but a good many other people are, and some of them—Canden, for instance—are no fools. They say Theocandi's such a traditionalist that he would never have threatened Mendy before the election (candidates being sacred), but now. . . . Of course, there's still a chance that he could touch off a guild war; but if he were to get Mendy first, my brother's remaining supporters would disband immediately to save themselves, and there'd be no one left to bring charges."
"Not even you?"
"Who would listen to me?" said Dally bitterly. "Without Mendy, I'm nothing in this town, not even a practicing thief. I can't help my brother, myself—or you."
"Me!" said Jame in surprise. "Why? Do you think I need it?"
"Yes . . . if what I've heard is true. It's rumored that the Shadow Thief will have a double assignment this time. You're the second half of it."
"I'm honored."
"Jame, please! Be serious. This is no ordinary assassin. We're talking about a . . . a 'temporarily detached soul of special malignancy and power, or so the Guild archivist tells me, 'a psychic vampire that steals the soul and kills simultaneously with the touch of a hand.' No one knows who it was seven years ago, but your friend Bane's name has been mentioned, and you've told me yourself that he consigned his soul to Ishtier at about that time. Perhaps the priest loaned it to Theocandi. I've heard rumors too about how cozy he and the Sirdan were during the last Council session. If that was the case then and again now, don't count on Bane's friendship—such as it is—to protect you. The Shadow Thief has no will but his master's, and in this case, that's Theocandi."
"I'm still honored. Look, Dally, when Canden left, I told him that I would take full responsibility for any consequences. If they only involve a game of 'tag-you're-dead,' I'll consider that I've gotten off lightly. But what about you? What are your plans?"
"They hardly matter now, do they?" he said, startling her with his sudden note of hopelessness. "I'll wait, and see what role Mendy wants me to play."
"Just the same, it can't be very healthy to be his brother just now. Stay here awhile. The inn is safe enough. Stay with me."
He gave her a quick glance of surprised gratitude, then looked away again, the light fading from his face. "I wish I could," he said dully, "but I can't desert him, now least of all, when everyone else is. I should be getting back to the party's headquarters in case he needs me for anything tonight."
"Well, at least take some precautions," she said, touching the sleeve of his royal blue d'hen. "You shouldn't go around wearing his color, tonight of all nights. Change jackets with me. This one should fit you; after all, it used to be yours."
"N-no. . . . somehow that would be almost as bad as staying here. I'll be all right. Good-bye, Jame. My father's blessings on you."
He took her hands and stood looking at her for a moment, then turned and walked away. She watched him go, wondering at her sudden impulse to follow him. Then Kithra called, and she went in to help.
DALLY CROSSED the square, thinking about the boy he had killed. The thin form darting forward, the sudden scuffle on the steps, the boy's astonished face as steel slid home between his ribs . . . then Men-dalis looking at him over the still-twitching body, cold, remote. Do you think this changes anything?
What had gone wrong?
He turned westward onto a narrow side street, a nameless despair gnawing at his heart, eating it away. The corner light sphere shone down on him, startling a flash of blue from his d'hen as he passed.
Two men muffled in their cloaks watched from the shadow of a doorway. "Yes, that's him," said the larger one heavily when the boy had gone by, "consorting with the chief agent of my enemy, just as you said. I believe it all now." He stepped out into the street, closely followed by his wizened companion.
Some instinct made Dally turn. He saw the two standing there and recognized both his brother and the Creeper despite their disguises. A sense of unreality and hopelessness deeper than words swept over him. When the others emerged from the shadows all about and closed in on him, he didn't even struggle.
TANISCENT LIVED for two more days. At first, deep in some dream of the past, she called out from time to time for her dancing costume, wine, or Bortis, but then the long silence fell, broken only by the gurgling sound of one who drowns slowly within herself, beyond the help of man.
Patches came to the inn several times during this period, bringing news from the outside world. The Thieves' Guild was not settling down properly after the excitement of the Election. Usually by this time the loser had either fled or fallen to some assassin's wiles, but Men-dalis refused to do either. He had withdrawn into the fortress like headquarters of his party and from there held together his followers apparently by the sheer fact of his continued existence. It was almost as if he had not yet given up hope of obtaining the sirdanate, although by what means no one could guess. The entire Guild was on edge, sensing the potential violence that lurked beneath this strange state of affairs.
"One wrong move now and bang!" said Patches at the end of her last visit. "Guild war. That sort of thing, no one wins."
"Sounds like a good time to go hide under a haystack. What about Dally? How's he managing?"
"Wouldn't know. No one's seen him since the Election. I expect he's holed up in the fortress with his brother. Oh, before I forget, this is from your master." She handed Jame a folded square of paper, begrimed by the dozen or so hands through which it had passed. Naturally, its seal had long since been broken.
"Time I was scooting," the Townie said, standing up. "If you do go out tonight, Talisman, walk wary, won't you? You've a lot of enemies out there, the Sirdan not least, just waiting for you to break cover."
She left. Jame read the note, smiling slightly both at its contents—which, in part, rather surprised her—and at the thought that Patches, illiterate as she was, had still found a way to familiarize herself with the message.
Early that night, Taniscent died. They laid her out in her own room with fire and iron at both door and window and the usual effigy, hastily carved from a bar of soap, in the next room. The Keepers of the Dead would come for her in the morning. Kithra unearthed the dancer's little rosewood box of cosmetics and tried to make her more presentable, but nothing could disguise the network of wrinkles, those sunken eyes with their blue-veined lids or the shriveled lips. It was very hard to remember just then that Taniscent had only been twenty-five years old.
Jame found that she couldn't face the prospect of an all-night wake.
"If you can spare me," she said to Cleppetty, "I'm going out. Penari sent me a note this afternoon. It seems that despite everything, I've been promoted to journeyman, and he wants to celebrate." ? "Do you think that's wise?"
"No, but it's the only chance I may get to say a proper farewell to the city. This is Marc's last night on guard duty. In a day or so, as soon as I can find out what's happened to Dally, we'll be off down the Tone, bound for the Eastern Sea."
"I keep forgetting you two are leaving us so soon. It will seem strange here without you. I've almost forgotten what peace and quiet are like."
Jame laughed and went.
She found Penari up a spiral stair in the Maze, chucking rare manuscripts over his shoulders onto the floor far below in an irate search for some ancient tract probably devoured by mice a quarter century before. He would never acknowledge the ravages of time, here anymore than out in his beloved Tai-tastigon, which made housekeeping rather a problem. In fact, as he came rattling down from the heights, Jame suddenly remembered that the stairway he was on, an infrequently used one, had several broken treads near the top. Before she would shout a warning, however, he was at the spot and past it without missing a step. It must have been the wrong staircase after all, she thought, helping the old man to find his cloak, which Monster had tried to convert into a nest. Then they set off.
Penari had not been out of the Maze since the night he had taken her to be enrolled at the Guild Hall. For the most part, he lived quite comfortably with his memories and the supplies left weekly by arrangement inside one of the Maze entrances, only emerging himself on special occasions, such as the time Monster had chosen the previous Feast of Dead Gods to come down with a sore throat, which required physic. Paddling through the streets with him now, Jame wondered if the unspecified tavern of his youth, for which they were bound, was still in existence. It would be just like him to burst into some private home built on its ruins and demand service. Soon, however, she saw that she needn't have worried. Ahead of them loomed the Cross'd Stars, an inn that had stood for better than two hundred years and was good for as many more.
Penari's sudden appearance there caused a considerable stir. He was quickly absorbed at one of the main tables in a babble of greetings, some from friends whom he had apparently not seen in decades.
Jame quietly took a seat a little back from the others. Just as the Moon catered to apprentices, the Stars had masters and high officials of the Guild as its primary clientele. There wasn't another journeyman in the room, and most of the men at the table were arch-partisans of Theocandi, who had probably done everything in his power to prevent her own promotion. Some celebration this was going to be.
She was trying to think of an excuse to slip away when the trouble started.
Someone had congratulated Penari on Theocandi's success, and he was responding in a typically sharp-tongued way when one of the Sirdan's lieutenants's slammed down his tankard.
"Thai's balls, man!" he exclaimed thickly. "What sort of a brother are you not to have helped the Old Man when he needed it? What are a few secrets compared to the sirdanate? 'Greatest thief in Tai-tastigon'—ha! If you really had anything worth knowing, it would have come out long before this."
"Are you trying to say," said Penari in a dangerous voice, "that I don't deserve my reputation?"
"D-damn right. Name one thing you've stolen lately, 'greatest thief.'"
The old man scowled. "Name one thing—anything— and I will steal it. Now. Tonight."
"Sir, no!" hissed Jame at his back under cover of the commotion that had broken out at the table.
"All right: the other Eye of Abarraden. Steal that, if you dare."
"Done!" cried Penari with glee.
"Oh, God," Jame said, putting a hand over her face.
THE ARGUMENT continued all the way to the Temple District, waxing steadily.
"Look," said Jame at last, catching the old man's arm and making him stop in the shadow of the gate. "Even if that man back at the Stars was as drunk as he seemed (which I doubt), look at the situation you've let him maneuver you into: no time to scout the land, even less to lay out escape routes, and enough publicity to make an escort of trumpeters superfluous. You think the guards are deaf? One word in the wrong ear and your venerable hide is up for grabs."
"I tell you, I know what I'm doing," said Penari petulantly. "Remember, this isn't the first time I've been on this particular errand. Besides, no one will betray me. Such things simply aren't done."
"Someone did it to me when I took the Peacock Gloves to the Moon. All right, at the very least, I'm going with you."
"Huh! You just want to nose out my secrets."
"If I hear that word one more time, I'm going to take a flying leap at the nearest brick wall. Has it ever occurred to you that I simply don't want that scrawny neck of yours to get broken? Loyalty is the only virtue I happen to possess; kindly stop throwing it back in my face."
"You mean it, don't you, boy?" he said, peering at her. "Well, come along, then. I suppose you've earned the right."
The temple of Abarraden was one of the largest in that part of the District still held by the Old Pantheon. Its front loomed over a small, sun-starved square from which eight minor avenues radiated, two of them sweeping back at an angle along its outer walls to form the boundaries between the old gods and the new. The temple immediately behind it had been burned down the previous year, as the last blow in a temple war dating from the overthrow of Heliot by Dalis-sar nearly two and a half millennia before; many of the huge, decaying temples beyond that were still engaged, however feebly, in similar struggles.
At the height of her power, Abarraden's house had expanded seven times in as many decades, on each occasion gaining a newer, larger, and more shoddily ornate shell. The temple was now like a series of boxes sitting one inside the other with a warren of rooms between each major set of walls.
Once, the whole place must have hummed day and night with activity; now dust muffled Jame's footsteps as she followed Penari through the passageways. Over the weeks since Gorgo's accidental demise, she had become increasingly aware of the gods of Tai-tastigon as a community in their own right, dependent on faith for their creation and specific characteristics, yet often capable of independent thought. And she sensed that they were increasingly aware of her, the god-stalker and theocide, in their midst. It was partly for this reason that she had insisted on accompanying her master, hoping to frighten off Abarraden or at least to divert her divine wrath. It was clear now that that would not be necessary. The goddess slept, her deep breath flowing through the empty halls. Like Taniscent, she would never wake again.
They reached the sanctuary without incident, having seen only a handful of caretaker monks, all easily evaded. This innermost chamber completely occupied the original shell of the temple. It was high, dimly lit with light spheres, and one-third filled by the giant image of Abarraden, once the all-seeing, now the single-eyed. Like most of the Old Pantheon deities, she was a composite of human and animal features—the latter, in this case, predominantly bovine. At her cloven feet lay a broad ring of dark water, the usual barrier against demons. Only bolt holes were left of the spell-shielded bridge that should have spanned it. A constellation of luminous disks floated just under the water's surface. Jame leaned forward for a closer look, but Penari hastily pulled her back. He took a dusty piece of sausage out of a pocket and tossed it out over the water. A dozen ribbon-thin tentacles whipped up, snatching it out of the air. The eyes blinked once, simultaneously, and waited. Human warders came and went, but the Guardians of the Pool remained.
"This is so ungodly simple," the old man said in a whisper, "that I'm almost ashamed to do it. Still, a challenge is a challenge. Go keep watch at the door."
Jame went. When she looked back, Penari was above the pool with the tentacles snapping futilely up at him, halfway across a bridge that no longer existed.
She was still staring at him, mouth agape, when the sound reached her. Men, a considerable number of them, had entered the temple. She listened a moment longer, hearing the muffled tramp of boots, the low voices arguing which was fastest, then hissed across the room; "Sir, guards!"
"Damnation," said Penari irritably. He was standing on one of Abarraden's full breasts with the white eye-gem from her bowed head already in his hands. He pointed to a doorway in the far corner.
"Up the stairs to the roof, quick, but first douse these lights."
Jame did as she was ordered, extinguishing sphere after sphere with a breathless, "Blessed-Ardwyn-day-has-come," all the time hearing the voices draw closer, grow louder. She paused at the last light, waiting until the old man had gained the stairs, then threw the room into darkness just as the first of the guards burst into it. The others piled up behind him, from the sound of it, then came spilling into the room helter-skelter, cursing loudly. At least one fell into the pool.
Good night vision notwithstanding, Jame could see as little in this blackness as any of them, but had the advantage of knowing the room's layout. She had almost reached the stairway when, to her amazement and horror, a strong pair of arms suddenly locked about her. With all her breath, she gave tongue to the rathorn war cry—a shocking thing to do to anyone at close range. The arms released her instantly. Sprinting for the door, she ran head-on into one of its posts, recovered, and scrambled upward. A spirited free-for-all seemed to be going on below. Then the guards were on the stairs. She half fell out onto the roof, heaved the trap door shut, shot home the bolt, and collapsed on it.
"What kept you?" demanded Penari.
The rooftops of the Temple District stretched out in all directions, a jagged landscape slashed with fissures through which the streetlights far below shone. Penari held up the stolen gem to the moon, turning it over in hands so sensitive that they more than made up for his failing eyesight.
"What a great deal of trouble," he said with a dry chuckle, "for a piece of glass."
"What?"
"That's what it was fifty years ago, and it hasn't changed since. I examined both eyes then and took the genuine one. Mind you, that was no such plush job as tonight, but I never have understood why people made such a fuss over it. Fools, the lot of 'em. Why, anyone could have walked out with this bauble anytime since then"—provided they could cross a spell-bridge that was no longer there, Jame thought—"but the imbeciles managed to convince themselves that it was impossible. This is a city for odd beliefs. Maybe you've noticed."
"Yes, sir. But how did Abarraden get a glass eye in the first place?"
"Who knows?" he said impatiently. "Probably some rogue priest made off with the other real one centuries ago. It doesn't look as if the sect survived losing them both."
The boards of the trap door groaned, one of them beginning to bend under the pressure of a crowbar applied from beneath. Jame shifted her seat hastily. "Uh, sir, glass or not, these gentlemen are still after our hides. What do you suggest we do about it?"
"Why, leave, of course," he said, standing up. "A good thief never overstays his welcome."
"By what route?" she asked, with a premonition of disaster.
"How many choices d'you think we have up here?" Penari said irritably. "Across the rooftops, of course."
He was pointing toward the back of the temple, across the gaping void left by the building that had burned down.
The bridge had been real to him, perhaps those missing steps in the Maze as well, and now—this was hardly the time to shake his self-confidence, but oh lord . . .
"Are you—uh—sure it's all right?"
"Of course I'm sure," he said petulantly, and stepped off into space. He slithered down several feet, regaining his balance with difficulty. "Reasonably sure, anyway. But what are a few rotten shingles? Come along, boy, and mind the holes."
She watched him carefully pick his way across the abyss, probing ahead into emptiness with his staff. That solved his problem, at least, provided he didn't slip. But as for her own! She made a rapid circuit of the rooftop, noting the smooth, sheer walls; the opposite buildings, well beyond reach; the distant ground, which a grapnel line would have reached, if she had thought to secure one in her dress d'hen. On the whole, it was not a particularly favorable situation.
"Well, come on," Penari shouted impatiently from the opposite roof. "D'you think they'll take all night with that door?"
Patently, they would not. Wood splintered. A hand came through the jagged hole, groping for the bolt. Theoretically, there was no reason why she should run from them at all. Having never touched the stolen object, she was innocent of its theft according to the laws of the city, but something told her that tonight such fine distinctions would do no one any good.
"Well?" shouted Penari, beginning to grow hoarse with exasperation. "If I can do it, by all the gods, so can you!"
Perhaps he was right. There was no question that he believed what he said; and with this old man, belief was obviously a very potent thing. Jame stood there a moment, ignoring the sounds at the door, Penari capering with impatience on the far roof, forgetting everything except what she had learned over the past year about faith and reality in Tai-tastigon. Then, with eyes tightly shut and infinite caution, she took a step forward, over the edge.
There had to be something there, because her foot slipped on it. Like Penari minutes before, she found herself sliding sideways down what felt like a slick, sharply pitched surface. Eyes still squeezed shut, she checked her descent and began to creep forward along the incline. The surface over which she blindly groped her way had no particular texture at first, and an unnerving tendency to melt away whenever the growing commotion to the rear caused her concentration to waver. She recalled vividly how Penari had so often had her describe a route through or over a house she had never seen—often because it no longer existed—and the kind of imaginative reconstruction necessary for such work. This wasn't all that different, really, discounting the possibility of a hundred-foot plunge. Ah, there were shingles. She traced the outline of one, then jerked back her hand with a hiss.
"What's the matter now?" demanded Penari's voice, very near.
"Of all the. . . a splinter, I think. What did you say about. . ."
"Talisman!"
The bellow came from behind, incredulous protesting, and unmistakably from the powerful lungs of Sart Nine-toes. Startled, Jame opened her eyes. There was nothing beneath her, nothing, and she was falling. Her hands flew out wildly as though with a life of their own, and clamped on the edge of the opposite roof.
"I told you to watch out for those holes," said Penari, hauling her up by the scruff of the neck.
After that, Jame insisted on escorting her master out of the district and home, through back alleys, at as fast a pace as the old man could maintain. Although his trophy was only glass, so worthless that by rights the period of jeopardy should have elapsed by the time its length could even be determined, she suspected that there were those who would refuse to treat it as anything less than the genuine article. Someone was out to get Penari, and perhaps herself as well. If it was the Sirdan, he would not hesitate to bend the law as he had already bent the thieves' moral code in betraying them to the guards. Under the circumstances, the best place for Penari was the Maze, and for her, the hills to the north west of the city, waiting either until things settled down or she and Jorin could rejoin Marc for the trip south. Consequently, she said good-bye to her old master at his front entrance and then set off hurriedly for home by the rooftops, meaning to collect her possessions and get out of town as quickly as possible.
REACHING THE RES AB'TYRR, Jame climbed hastily up to the loft and froze, one leg thrown over its parapet. Inside, the floor was strewn with shreds of clothing. The two pallets had also been gutted, and the bricks of the fireplace were scattered everywhere. In the far corner, stones had been pried out of the wall, revealing the dark, secret cavity behind them. The knapsack lay sprawled on the shambles of her bed. The sword shards lay beside it, and the little package that contained the ring was just visible in the folds of the blanket, where it had apparently been overlooked. The Book Bound in Pale Leather, however, was gone.
Jame sat quite still for a moment, taking this all in. Then she swung her other leg over the parapet and went quickly down the inside stairs. Just as she entered the kitchen, Sart Nine-toes appeared at the street door.
"Now wait a minute, Talisman," he said hastily, seeing that she was about to bolt. "Believe it or not, it's Marc I'm looking for, not you."
"Marc?" Sudden alarm sharpened her voice. "Has something happened to him?"
"That's what I'm trying to find out."
Cleppetty had come up from the cellar as he spoke and now advanced on them purposefully. Before she could say anything, however, Sart swept her off the ground and clamped his hand over her mouth.
"We're on patrol just outside the Temple District," he continued, ignoring his squirming captive, "when the captain comes trotting up with a dozen or so of our lads behind him and says, 'Someone is robbing Abarraden. Fall in.' So in we fall, and off we go to that puzzle-box of a temple; but someone (in a minute, m'dear) douses the lights just as we come into the idol room. I grab hold of Marc's sleeve, knowing that you Kennies have a way with the dark, and get hauled right across the room. Then someone lets off a god-awful yell just about in my ear (wait, love, wait), and the next thing I know, Marc has swung about and is wading into our lads like the last typhoon of summer. I bash a few heads too, just to be companionable, then go pounding up the stairs with the rest and out onto the roof."
He paused, eyeing her doubtfully.
"You really were standing on air, weren't you? It wasn't just too much ale? Anyway, so I turn to point you out to Marc, and he isn't there. I haven't seen him . . . ouch!"
Cleppetty, at last losing her patience, had bitten his hand. He dropped her.
"You may not have seen him since, but I have," she said grimly, smoothing her apron. "He stopped by about an hour ago. Whatever's going on, I'm afraid it's serious. Jame, he asked me to tell you that 'An honorable death wipes away all stains.'"
"Oh, God. It's serious, all right. I've got to go after him. Sart, would you mind staying here until I—we get back? I've an odd idea that the inn shouldn't be left short-handed tonight."
"Glad to," he said, grinning at Cleppetty. The widow, unaccountably, blushed.
IT WAS OBVIOUS what had happened: those had been Marc's arms around her in the dark. By releasing her, a supposed thief, as soon as he had realized who she was, the big Kendar believed that he had broken faith as a guard. For him, that constituted a massive loss of honor, more than any Kencyr would expect him to survive. Consequently, he had gone to restore his good name in the surest way possible, by seeking a death in accordance with the ancient rites at the hands of a Kencyr Highborn. In Tai-tastigon, that could only mean the priest, Ishtier. She must stop Marc before he reached the temple or, somehow, cut short the rites, which could destroy an innocent man as readily as a guilty one.
Once again, the rooftops provided the fastest, safest means of travel. Jame sped over them, following the route that Marc was most likely to have taken, anxiously scanning the streets below. Dally might be somewhere down there too. She would not leave the city until she had seen him, Jame decided, even if it meant invading his brother's fortress; but that must wait until Marc was safe. Nothing else mattered now.
Nothing? Not even the Book? Sweet Trinity, she'd completely forgotten about that. Some guardian you are, she thought, negotiating a treacherous stretch of thatching far too fast.
Her feet shot out from under her. She went cannoning down the slick straw into space, caught someone's laundry line, circled it once, let go and bounced off a shop canopy, somersaulted twice onto the opposite balcony and swarmed up again to the rooftops.
"Next time, bring down a pigeon!" someone shouted from the street below.
It was a night for essentials and establishing priorities. Darkness damn the Book, and her too, if she failed Marc now.
Then she saw him, a tall, unmistakable figure striding along far down the street. He was almost to the circle of decay that surrounded the temple. She swung down to the ground and ran after him, calling. He didn't seem to hear. In another minute, she would be close enough to touch him.
Then, in complete silence, a figure glided out of the shadows to stand between them, one hand raised.
Jame skidded to a stop, staring at it. The night was dark, but even so she should have been able to make out some detail of the stranger's face, or at least of his garments. All were featureless, black, a mere silhouette . . . no, a shadow —upright, solid, reaching.
So she had not been the second half of Theocandi's assignment at all but the first; and here was his assassin, nameless, faceless, come to execute its commission.
She retreated, shouting again after Marc. His step did not falter. This time he must have heard, but as far as he knew she could say nothing that would redeem his honor or save his life. She must explain the truth to him, she must, but death stood in her way. Too dangerous to try ducking past. . . she sprang sideways into an alley and ran for both of their lives.
Fleet as her own shadow, it followed. The byways twisted and turned, choked with rubble, treacherous underfoot. It would not let her double back. What obstacle would stop it? Ah, between two sagging walls, the moon-glint of the Lower Town's western fosse. Jame raced for it. One leap and she was across, dashing northward toward the temple. The other kept pace on the far side. They were coming to a bridge, just short of the temple's ring of dust. If it could cross . . . Jame sprinted. It had crossed. She saw its outstretched hand from the corner of her eye and dove forward, out from under it, to roll over and over in the crumbling debris, sending up billows of dust. Coughing, on her knees, she saw that it had stopped, just as that other nightmare had done so long ago, at the edge of the poisoned circle. She rose and ran toward the temple, noting with a little spasm of panic that its door was wide open. Marc had already entered.
She finally caught up with him in the central chamber. He was kneeling before the altar, his big, gnarled hands frozen in a gesture of resignation. To her alarm, he responded neither to voice nor touch.
"You're too late," said a thin, dry voice. Ishtier stood beside the statue, looking like a pale excrescence on its granite form. "He is already deep in the death-trance and will sink farther still before the end. Never before have I encountered a man so eager to greet oblivion."
"But he mustn't! It's a mistake, all of it: he's done nothing to make this necessary."
"So you say. Nonetheless, I abide by his wish in this matter, not by yours. All your cunning can't save him from himself, anymore than it helped you to retain possession of the Book Bound in Pale Leather. Ah yes, I guessed that you had it," he said, coming down a step, his face alive with triumph. 'BE STILL, TONGUE THAT SPEAKS . . . TO THE CHOSEN LEAVE THE HIDDEN WAYS.' You remember that, do you? The first half is indeed from Anthrobar's scroll, which you contrived to destroy, but the second is not. Only someone familiar with the contents of the original would have been able to add that quote. There are a handful of priests and scrollsmen who possess such knowledge—little good it does them without the runes themselves—but none of them have ever been near East Kenshold, your home; and it was to East Kenshold that the Master himself came, looking for something so valuable that he entered the corrupt air of this world in an attempt to reclaim it. A guess, you see, but I was right, wasn't I? Well, it's out of your hands now, and soon to fall into more appropriate ones."
"Yours, I suppose," said Jame, trying to conceal her dismay. "Might I inquire how?"
"You have a friend to thank for that," he said with malicious relish. "As soon as Penari's message to you was intercepted, Theocandi laid his plans and I, mine. Bane is responsible for your loss."
"And perhaps for yours as well," said Jame, sudden alarm in her voice. "When I saw him last, he spoke very bitterly of you and said that the next time you gave him an order, the results might surprise you. How long overdue is he?"
"He would never betray me," Ishtier said, more to himself than to her. "He couldn't, even if he has been less obedient of late than usual. I have you to thank for that too," he added, shooting her a venomous glance. "But this . . . this would be a betrayal of the whole of our people. No, no, it's unthinkable."
"To him, you are the Kencyrath, and when he spoke of vengeance, it was because he thought that he himself might have been betrayed. You know better than I if you have any reason to fear him now."
"I deny any reason," said the priest furiously, "but I acknowledge my foolishness in trusting someone so unstable. That boy is capable of imagining anything. Assume the worst, then, as he undoubtedly has: what will he do next?"
"In his place," said Jame slowly, "I would do the most injurious thing possible. I would give the Book to Theocandi."
Ishtier drew his breath in with a hiss. "The man's a savant of sorts, as I have cause to know. And he is ambitious enough to devour the world. If the Book is there, we must get it back. You must."
"I, m'lord? And what of my friend here? If I do this errand for you, do you swear to bring him out of this trance so he can hear the truth and change his mind?"
The priest struggled with this for a moment, then made an ill-tempered gesture of assent.
Jame got as far as the chamber door when a thought struck her. "Uh, m'lord . . . a slight problem. The Shadow Thief is waiting out there to kill me. How does one dispose of a demon?"
"Nothing to it," said Ishtier irritably. "All you need is its true name and then a great deal of fire or water. That should be easy for you, theocide."
Water she could provide, Jame thought as she stood just within the temple door, waiting for her chance. As for a name . . . ah, there the thing went, passing her narrow line of vision through the door's crack as it began another patient circuit of the circle's rim. Wait, wait. . . now. She threw open the door and dashed out, racing for the fosse.
It was marginally faster then she, but with a head start, Jame managed to get to the other side of the little waterway before it closed with her. Almost all the way to the Tone, this slight lead allowed her to shift banks just ahead of her pursuer whenever a bridge gave it access to her side. Then, within sight of the Tone, she stumbled. The assassin cut in front of her. She sprang sideways into a ribbon-bedecked street of the Silken Dark, deserting it as soon as she could for the rooftops of the courtesans' district.
The chase ended on the crest of a house whose upper stories overhung the swift-flowing Tone. Jame, at bay, turned to see death slipping toward her along the roof's spine. She had one chance now.
"Bane?" she said tentatively.
It rushed at her. She barely had time to block the reaching hand, forearm to forearm, and to get a grip on something that felt like a collar before it was on her. She went over backward, one foot in its stomach, and threw it over her head. Something hard, swinging down from the shadowy form, hit her in the face. Tears of pain blinded her momentarily. When she could see again, there was only the rooftop, the Tone, and something dark on its surface, being borne swiftly away.
Jame sat on the roof, getting her breath back. On the basis of Dally's description, she had gambled that only the creature's hand was deadly, but as for the name. . . . Even now, she could hardly believe that she had guessed that correctly, too. As Dally had pointed out, Bane had entrusted his shadow to Ishtier seven years ago, during the priest's "exchange of information" with Theocandi and just before the Sirdan's erstwhile rival, Master Tane, had fallen prey to the Shadow Thief. If Ishtier (who was supposed to be keeping Bane's soul safe) had lent it then and again tonight for such a foul purpose, he had betrayed his trust indeed. Well, she had put an end to that; but Sweet Trinity, what an end.
The sound of angry voices below broke in on her thoughts. A group of men clad in Men-dalis's royal blue were forcibly restraining one of their number, while Theocandi's supporters jeered at them.
"Quiet, man," a friend hissed at the angry man. "D'you want to start a war?"
Jame suddenly realized that the street below was full of thieves—far too many of them. Instead of lying low like their master, the partisans of Men-dalis were out in force, much to the delight of their enemies, who lost no chance to taunt them. If they responded violently, so much the better: an undeclared guild war would bankrupt the side that struck the first blow. But why was the New Faction abroad tonight at all? Its members had the air of waiting for something without knowing exactly. . .
What was that?
The sound grew, a low, hoarse roar, almost a groan, rising nearby to the north. The thieves below exchanged looks. They began to move, slowly at first then faster and faster, toward the firelight outlining the houses that looked down on Judgment Square.
Puzzled, Jame swung down to the cobbles and joined the flow. Crossing a bridge to the north bank, she saw a familiar figure in a cream velvet d'hen walking blindly toward her.
"Darinby!" she called, fighting her way through the crowd to his side. "What's happened?"
"Talisman?" He hardly seemed to see her. "Don't ask. Don't go to look. Just get off the streets. There's nothing anyone can do . . . nothing."
She stared after him, shocked, then turned and ran toward the Square.
It was full of men, swarming about the Mercy Seat.
Torch flames leaped over their heads, casting a demonic light on the upturned faces, on the back of the Seat where something blue was draped. Jame paused on the edge of the crowd, some touch of prescience sickening her. Then she began to force her way through the press of bodies, pushing and kicking at first, then using her nails with an abandon which would ordinarily have appalled her. Then she was through the front line and saw.
"Oh God. . .Dally."
The world narrowed to the two of them, one sprawling negligently on the marble throne, the other on her knees before him, vomiting again and again. The emptiness of her mind ached with the buzz of carrion flies. Slowly, their insectile hum became words, repeated over and over, each time drawing a louder response.
"This is Bane's work!" a man in a blue d'hen was shouting. 'This is war!"
Could the dead do this to the living, she wondered, still half-dazed. But even if she had just destroyed his soul in the Shadow Thief, it couldn't change what had happened here —it might not even change him at once. A slow, withering death, Darinby had once said.
Around her, Theocandi's supporters had drawn back, surprised, frightened by the mob's response. Jame guessed before Men-dalis's rabble-rousers could name it, how this growing sense of outrage and violence would be channeled. The intensity of it almost brought her to her feet, shouting with the rest, but a sudden doubt stopped her. She looked again at what sprawled on the Mercy Seat, taking leave of it, then rose and slipped out through the crowd. At its edge, she began to run, then to climb.
"Why, Talisman!" exclaimed the dark figure that had suddenly appeared at the roof's edge. Its hand, raised to strike, swooped down to help her up. "What's going on?"
"Sparrow, I haven't time to explain. Any second now, that mob is going to march on the Thieves' Guild Palace, and I've got to get there first. Can you and your people delay them?"
"The Palace? Fleshshambles Street to the river is the best route, with the north bank tangle mazes on either side. Yes, we can do something about that, if you don't mind us maybe dropping four tons of stone bull on a few heads."
"Smash every one of them, for all I care. Just give me five minutes."
"You've got them," said Sparrow, and darted off.
Jame remained a moment, looking down. Below, they were already on the move, torches streaming toward the mouth of the street the Cloudie had indicated. The sound that rose was hoarse, grating, scarcely human. This was what Dally's death had unleashed on the city. Jame stripped off her gloves and let them flutter down into darkness. So be it: nothing hidden, nothing held back.
The roofs of Fleshshambles Street were ornamented with an array of stone animal heads, meant to propitiate the spirits of the beasts sold piecemeal below. One of these, a particularly massive bull on the corner of River Street, already had a dozen Cloudies active at its base, chipping away the few patches of good mortar that held it in place. Jame waited until the mob had nearly reached the Tone, then raced for the corner. The Cloudies shouted a warning as she sprang to the bull's broad head, feeling it bow under her weight, then off again, barely in time, over to the opposite roof. She did not look back either at the sound of that great weight crashing to earth or at the screams that followed it.
Ship Island rode at peace behind its vengeful figurehead.
Jame came into the Guild Hall shouting for Bane and was promptly collared by one of his followers. This man took her back into the Palace and up to the richly furnished apartment from which, so long ago, she had seen the corpse of a boy flung.
Bane turned away from the fireplace into whose flames he had been staring. "So you've come to me at last," he said with a smile.
"Never mind that. Did you do it?"
"Let's just say I had it done. Forget the Book, m'lady. It's a filthy thing. You're better off without it."
"Damn the Book! Dally is out there on the Mercy Seat, half flayed in your own favorite pattern, and his brother's men are on their way here now to make you pay for it."
Bane's henchman swore out loud and hastily left the room to check. His master's smile, however, hardly flickered.
"You have more casual cruelty in you than anyone I've ever met," said Jame to him fiercely, trying to break through his composure, "but God's claws, man, you aren't stupid!
Whoever did this must have known what would happen. It's the first blow in an undeclared guild war, and right now you look like the instigator. Tell me you haven't been such a fool, especially not for my sake. Tell me!"
Bane's man reappeared at the door. "The minx told the truth," he said breathlessly. 'They're coming! What shall we do?"
"Whatever you like. I'm a fool, certainly," Bane said to Jame, stepping between her and the door, "but not in this, m'lady."
"Damn it, then do something! I don't want to lose you both in one night. . . oh God," she said, suddenly paling. "I'm going to anyway. Bane, I-I think I've just killed you."
"What on earth do you mean?" he said, looking amused. She explained. To her amazement, he burst out laughing. "Indeed, you've out-guessed yourself this time. No, look farther away and yet near at hand for your thief of souls, m'lady."
"What do you mean . . . and why do you keep calling me that?"
"You'll have to get used to it, you know. After all, it's probably the least of your titles."
"What?"
"Do you mean to say that you didn't know?" he said, surprised at last. "No one ever told you? How very odd."
"Wait a minute," Jame protested. "How do you know all this? Have I got a sign on my back that says, 'Kick me, I'm Highborn?'"
"Go around offering to carry other peoples' souls, and you might as well have. All Shanirs must possess at least a touch of the Highborn strain, but soul-carriers like you and Ishtier need blood as pure as it comes. Besides, how many Kencyrs are there, even among the Highborn, with your talents or training? For such a clever person, you really are remarkably ignorant. What a pity I shall never have the chance to educate you."
Below, the Guild Hall door crashed down. Someone screamed. Now many feet were thundering through the passageways, many voices howling on the trail of blood.
"You know," said Bane, turning back to her with a smile, "this may not be quite how I envisioned our last meeting, but you must admit that for us, it is at least in character. Farewell, my lady. Remember me."
His hand slid up to the back of her neck and he kissed her, fiercely. Through sudden pain, she heard a sharp click behind her, then staggered backward as he pushed her away. The wall beside the fireplace was not where it had been. As she came up hard against some further surface, the panel swung shut again, sealing her in.
From the chamber beyond came the screech of wood as its outer door gave way.
Jame tore at the panel with her nails, raking up splinters, knowing all the time that it was hopeless. A spot of light touched her hand. Hurriedly she knelt and peered through the spy hole.
They were in the room, a semi-circle of them almost facing her, with more pressing in behind, all held at bay. Even now, with their overwhelming numbers, their prey terrified them. In that brief, petrified silence, Jame heard him quite clearly no more than inches away on the other side of the wall, laughing quietly as though at some private joke. Then they closed in on him.
He fought with the knife and the Senethar, with consummate skill and savage joy. Within a minute, the dead lay thick at his feet and the living drew back, appalled at the carnage. Jame heard his quiet laugh again.
"Dogs," he said softly, advancing on them, drawing their eyes from the secret panel. "Is death sweet? Jackals, come and lick the blood."
There was a movement on the floor behind him. Jame saw the hand of a fallen thief stealthily close on a dead neighbor's knife. She cried out, but too late. The man sprang up. He caught Bane around the throat with an arm and plunged the knife up under his ribs. Bane shook himself free. With a movement too fast even for Jame to follow, he broke his assailant's neck. Then, almost contemptuously, he jerked out the knife. Blood poured down. Something like a sigh went through the room. They were waiting for him to fall. Instead, he advanced on them again, one step, two, and then he went down on one knee, a hand pressed to his side. He looked up at the spy hole and smiled. Then they descended on him.
Not a man there struck less than once, and some many, many times, but Jame could hear Bane's ragged breath as clearly as her own long after it should have ceased. He was still breathing when they took him away. A man who has lost his soul dies very, very hard; and a Kencyr hardest of all.
Jame found herself sitting on the floor, leaning against the panel. Pain had roused her. In a half-dazed fashion, she raised a hand to her face, then held it up to the arrow of light from the peephole. The fingertips glistened darkly. Bane had bitten nearly through her lower lip.
She was still staring at her raised hand when something came between it and her face. Jame threw herself sideways with a cry of horror. The other's fingers almost brushed her cheek. No amount of river water would suffice if the name was wrong, she thought wildly, springing to her feet. It had tracked her down again; she was alone with the Shadow Thief in the dark.
She ran. The secret passageways formed a maze within a maze, twisting past all the Palace's major rooms. Shafts of light from many spy holes pierced them. Jame raced on, seeing little ahead and nothing behind but the swift, silent darkness that broke each beam of light as it passed. This was not the Tower of Demons nor was the thing that pursued stupid Thulig-sa, whom this obscurity would have baffled. Despite its name, it meant to touch her, not her shadow, and was perilously close to doing so. Desperately, she put on a fresh burst of speed, rounded a corner, and ran head on into a wall.
Half-stunned, she saw the dark form bending over her, haloed by the furtive light of the peepholes.
Then, far away, someone screamed.
The Shadow Thief froze, its hand inches from Jame's face, then, incredibly, it whirled and was gone. She marked its rapid progress down the corridor. Some instinct brought her unsteadily to her feet, sent her after it, stumbling at first, then moving more swiftly and surely. The hunter became the hunted, both now racing in the direction of that terrible, unfaltering cry. God, how could anyone sustain such a ghastly sound so long without once pausing for breath?
Ahead, the end of the corridor was rimmed with light, momentarily obscured as the other passed through it. The scream, very close now, sank to a hideous gurgle. Jame, skidding to avoid another collision, came up against a soft, yielding surface, the back of a wall tapestry. She swept it aside, and stepped into Theocandi's private study.
The Sirdan himself sat at his desk, his gnarled hands gripping its edge. His head was thrown back, his eyes wide, wide, open. Eyes? He had none, just dark holes punched out under the bristling brows, opening into greater darkness. A thin, hissing noise still escaped between his clenched teeth. Under its heavy chain of office, the frail chest continued to contract until the ribs themselves collapsed with a flesh-muffled crunch. And all this time, the Sirdan's returning shadow grew darker on the pages of the Book Bound in Pale Leather, spread out open on the table before him.
"A savant of sorts," Ishtier had called this man. Clearly, he had been enough of one to summon the Shadow Thief and to unlock the runes, but the latter had proved beyond his control. Anthrobar must have looked much like this when the Book had finished with him.
"It is a filthy thing, isn't it?" Jame said to the motionless figure. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry that this happened."
She closed the Book and gingerly rewrapped it in its old linen cloth, shuddering at its obscene warmth. Then she slipped out into the main corridor with it in her arms.
The hallways of the Palace seethed with people, each one intent on saving himself from the coming holocaust. No one paid any attention to the slight figure clutching a flat white parcel, who joined the general flight out into the cool night air. Frantic as they were now, how much greater the rout would be when word of the Sirdan's death spread among them.
At the prow of the island, the figurehead brandished its grisly trophies over the swift water, the sky turning red with flames behind it.