A Gathering Of Stones

13

Raining again.

Strong winds, sleet, heavy cold.

The next storm would probably bring snow.

Brann huddled in the entranceway of a kotha, a house built directly on the street without the size, the grounds or the enclosing wall of a doulahar. The kotha belonged to an ancient fence who’d survived purges, investigations and other worries thought up by the Isun, not only survived those but managed to hang onto the greater part of his profits. The door at the back of the short passage was small and massive and there was a trap in the ceiling in front of it; persistent and annoying visitors got a most uncivil welcome; more than once his guards had poured burning oil on a man who wouldn’t take go away for an answer. He was even nastier to street folk who tried to sleep there, but she was safe enough if she didn’t linger too long or make a fuss.

Jaril came trotting in; he was using the horny, water-

shedding form he’d dreamed up that night above Kukurul. He shifted and stood shivering before her. “She’s staying home tonight. I’m not surprised. With weather like this I’d rather be inside myself. Callam smiglar is in his room, the one on the third floor; he’s busy about something, I couldn’t see what, I was too far off to do anything but place him. Be better if he was downstairs, soon’s we make a noise he’ll be over with the Chuttar. Can’t help that, though. The relief is at the back of the house in another wing doing something with the other smiglar, the one who stays in the suite when the Chuttar’s not there. That’s all right, they’re nowhere near the terrace, you can go in there without worrying about them. The stair guard and the roof guard are in their usual places.”

“Anything I should worry about?” •

“Callam. He and the Chuttar are wide awake and up to something. Most nights they’re resting by now if the Chuttar doesn’t have a client. Dormant. Like Yaril and me, you know. Otherwise nothing different.”

“What do you think, should we call this off?”

“There’ll always be something.”

“You’re right. How’s your energy level?”

“The cold and the wet are pulling me down. I could use a shot.”

“And I’m more dangerous when I’m hungry. Take my hand, yell if it gets too strong.”

Brann fed him till he started to glow and she felt a hollow pulse inside her. A Need. When he pulled free, she touched his shoulder. “If you see anything I should know about, give me a tweak, hmm?”

“Bramble!”

“I know, I don’t need to say it. Go on, get!”

After he left she stripped to undershirt and loincloth, stuffed her clothing and sandals into a waterproof bag and plunged out of the passage into the rain. She ran along the street, settling to a long easy lope, her feet splatting steadily on the muddy cobbles; she was in her original body again, the old woman banished for the moment. The rain beat into her face, half-blinding her, but she wasn’t bothered by that, there wasn’t much to see. Most of the street lamps were out, either water or wind had got at them. Splat and splat. On and on, feeling good because the waiting was over, feeling good because her body was fire and iron, working like a fine timepiece, alive, alive, so alive.

She loped past the doulahar’s gatehouse, a glassed-in lamp putting out enough light to show her where she was. She slowed, moved closer to the wall and followed it until it turned and she could no longer see the lamp. She unwound the rope from her waist, swung the end with the climbing claw several times, then threw it up. The claw caught. She tugged. It held. She walked up the wall, switched the claw over and slid down, landing up to her ankles in the sloppy mud of a flowerbed. Leaving the rope dangling, she ran for the house, jumping low hedges, plowing through more flowerbeds, swerving to avoid ornamental trees she could barely see, laughing idiotically as she ran, riding the kind of high she hadn’t felt for a century or more.

She slapped her hands on the stone railing at the edge of the terrace, vaulted over and ran across the slick streaming tiles; her feet slapped down noisily, she was panting like a swayback mare at the end of a race, but she didn’t care, the wind was howling, the rain came swooshing down, the storm was loud enough to cover a stampede, let alone the small sounds she was making.

When she reached the array of glass doors, she looked up into the murk and waited for any comment Jaril wanted to make. Nothing. Good enough. She swung her pack down, reached into an outside pocket and took out a *love; the back was plated with iron and the tips were curving claws. With that on her left hand, she smashed a pane, reached through, and unlatched the door.

As soon as she was inside, she closed it again, threw the latch, and stuffed a wad of drape into the hole. It was black as a coal cellar in there, cold and silent, the sounds of the storm muffled by the thickness of the walls and the heavy draperies drawn across the doors. Working by touch, she took off the claw and dropped it on the rug, then stripped off her sopping clothes and dressed in dry things from the pack. She rubbed her feet, then her hands and head on the draperies, removing much of the wet, enough so she wouldn’t drip on the stairs and betray her position by the noise she was making. She hesitated a moment, then pushed the pack behind one of the drapes. Her hands were her best weapons, her empty hands. No point in cluttering them or weighing down her body with unnecessary paraphernalia. Move fast, move clean, she told herself, momentum’s the word.

There was a splotch of gray on the far wall, a night-light filtering through a tightly netted doorweb. She moved cau-

tiously across the room, stopped before the web and ran her fingers lightly over it. It was beaded, with beaded fringes, a misery to get past without enough clatter to break through the storm noise. She swore under her breath, gathered a handful of webbing and eased it aside enough so she could edge through. Keeping the fringe still, she spread the web out again until she could take her hand away without shaking the beads.

She listened. The storm sounds were a muted background; there were the usual night noises from a large old house. Nothing more. She ghosted away from the door and plunged into a nest of interconnecting rooms; there were small nightlights scattered haphazardly about, wicks floating on aromatic oil in glass bowls shaped like half-closed tulips. Annoyed and disoriented, she slowed. Jay, you’ve got it easy, luv. Sheeh! if I just had wings I could cut all this nonsense.

She emerged finally into an immense atrium three stories high with a graceful staircase curling around the rim like a climbing vine, its steps and rails made of white-painted wrought iron with more of the tulip bowls set on the outside edge of the steps, a shimmering loveliness in the tall dark. She listened again. Nothing. All right, she thought. Let’s get at it. She glided across the black and white tiles and started up the stairs.

She was wary at first, but by the time she reached the first turn she was running, her bare feet making no sound on the lacework iron steps. Up and around, up and around, first floor, second. She stopped, stared into the murk; she couldn’t see anything, but there was no point taking chances she didn’t have to. She swung over the rail, hung for a moment until she found footing on the end of the step. Hand over hand, feet feeling for holds, she moved up the outside of the stair, ignoring the abyss below her.

The guard was restless; she could hear him kicking at the floor mat. She hung where she was and peered through a lacy panel. The staircase ended in a dark hole, made all the darker by the faint light from one of the tiny lamps. She couldn’t see the guard, not even as a blotch in that blackness, but from what she could hear, he had to be a few steps down the hallway. She shifted her grip and went on.

When she reached the top, she rested a nioment, mind-shouted intent at Yaril, then gathered herself and pushed off, using the strength of her legs to counter the relative weakness of her arms and shoulders. She went flying over the rail, landed running. Before the guard had a chance to react, she was on him, her hands slapped against him, drawing the life from him.

At first he went limp, then he began to dissolve; it felt like she had her hands on a sack full of hot-tailed scorpions. She increased the drain until she was taking in at her limit. The dissolution went faster, he was losing his shape, parts of him struggling to escape. He wasn’t fast enough. She took everything he had and left him as dust on the mat.

Jaril met her at the door to the Chuttar’s suite. He was glowing and grinning, wild and strange, more alien than she’d ever seen him. He nodded at her, shaped his hands into a parabola and shot a stream of fire at the lock, melting it and a good portion of the door around it.

Brann kicked the door open and plunged inside, running at the women who sat near a bank of windows, her hands folded over a black velvet cushion on her lap. The Chuttar Palami Kumindri, smiling and unconcerned. The other smiglar in the room, a big man with black mustaches hanging from the ends of his mouth, stood beside her. Cammam Callam, the Housemaster. He smoothed his mustaches, stepped in front of the chair and raised his hands, palm out. Brann slammed into something as resilient as a sponge, strong as oiled silk. Jul’ changed and a blazing lightsphere hit the resilience beside her, rebounded, came at it again and yet again; each time he was flung back, each time he punched a deeper hollow in it. Brann flattened her hands against the shield and drew; somewhat to her surprise, she began pulling in a trickle of power. She laughed and pulled harder; she’d never managed to tap into a magic shield before; apparently this one was so much a part of that smiglar, was maintained so intimately out of his inner strength, she could attack it as if it were his flesh. Callam staggered, paled. He shrunk, grew denser, braced himself and shoved out the sags in the shield.

The Chuttar Palami Kumindri watched calmly for several minutes, then she began unfolding the black velvet. It wasn’t a cushion. The milky, flawed moonstone that was Yaril sat on the velvet, pulling in light from all around her. Palami Kumindri lifted an elegant pale hand and splayed it out an inch or so above the Yaril stone. “Be still,” she said. Her voice was low and lovely and full of the consciousness of her power. “Stop what you’re doing or watch me eat her.”

Jaril settled to the floor. He changed and stood radiating fear and rage, his eyes fixed on the Yaril stone.

Brann dropped her hands. “If that viper beside you attacks, I will defend myself,” she said, “I will not stand still and allow myself to be destroyed, even for her.”

“I have no intention of destroying you, Drinker of Souls. You are going to be much too useful.”

“Not if I can help it.”

“That’s the question, isn’t it.” PaIarni Kumindri cupped her hands about the gleaming stone, still not quite touching it. “There’s something I want. You can use that to ransom your friend.” She took her hands away, rested them on the chairarms. “I will see.that she is bathed in sunlight so she will keep as well as possible in this state. I will not harm her in any way, but I cannot prevent her from harming herself. I see you understand.”

“What do you want?”

“In the Temple of Amortis, in the holy city Havi Kudush, there sits one of the Great Talismans. Churrikyoo. A small glass frog rather battered and chipped and filled with thready cracks. Bring it to me and I will give you your friend.”

“There’s a problem. Amortis. She doesn’t love me and she knows me far too well. If I go near her, she’ll eat me alive.”

“You are a clever woman, Drinker of Souls, you will find a way.”

“There are other talismans, send me after one of those.”

“Churrikyoo is the only ransom I will accept, Drinker of Souls. Bring it here and claim your friend.”

“Why should I trust you to keep. your word?”

“I repeat, you are a clever woman, work that out. In any case, you have no choice.”

Brann clasped her hands behind her, let her shoulders go round. She took time for a leisurely examination of the Chuttar, then the Housemaster. *Jay.

*What?* His mindvoice was sullen, unfriendly.

*Can they hear this?*

*No.*

*You sound very positive.*

*I am.*

*You know any way out of this?*

*No.*

*Terse.*

*What’s to say?*

*We snapped up the bait, didn’t we.*

*Yeh. Trolled us right in.*

*Trust me?*

*You know it.*

*Stay quiet, then, I’m going to do some pushing.* She finished her look round the room, faced the Chuttar. “I have no choice if I let you dictate terms, if I value my friend’s life above everything else. Listen and weep, whore. I do value her, but not beyond a certain point. Beyond that I WILL NOT BE PUSHED! Believe it. I will go after Churrikyoo. I will trade it for my friend. But not here. The exchange will be on my terms, not yours. I won’t come back to this house. I won’t come near this city.”

“Where?”

“Let me consult with my friend.” She turned to face Jaril. *Any ideas, Jay?*

*Yeh. A Waystop in the Fringelands. Yaro and me, we’ve been past there more than once. It’s just north of the Locks. The place is called Waragapur.*

*Tell me more about it. Why there?*

*It’s a truceground, which should mean something, but probably won’t and there’s an old fossil of a sorceror there, one of the Primes. Tak WakKerrcarr. If that bitch smiglar starts playing games with us, she’ll have him on her neck. He’s the one laid down the guarantee and it’s one of the few things he gets stirred up about.*

*Good. Maybe we can use him to kick something loose.* *Anything’s better than here.*

*Agreed. She faced the Chuttar, straightened her shoulders and put her hands on her hips. “These are my terms, I will get Churrikyoo and bring it to Waragapur on the edge of the Fringelands. As soon as I get there, I’ll send a message north by one of the riverboats. Come there. Bring her with you and we will make the exchange.”

“Why should I?”

“You get nothing if you don’t. If you refuse, we fight. You can destroy our friend, but we’ll, get you. One way or another you die. If not now, later. I have friends I can call on and I will, if you force it, and if you think you can stop me getting out of here, dream on.”

“Calmly, calmly, Drinker of Souls. I too must consult. Step outside, please. I will call you when I am ready to answer you.”

Brann bowed her head, strolled out.

Jaril hesitated, then followed her. *Bramble…* *What could I do?*

*Nothing, I suppose. *

*Be patient, Jay. Our time is coming, has to.*

*Yaro’s in there.*

*1 know. Does she have any idea we’re here?*

*It’s that shield, Bramble. The same as the one in the cave. I can’t feel anything through it, so Yaro can’t feel me.*

*Damn, I was hoping we’d get at least that much out of this.*

*We could still try breaking through. I think I was close.*

*So do I. But we’d have to start over again and we couldn’t break it fast enough to save Yaro. Well, we might have to try it. I meant what I said, Jay. If she gets us back here, none of us will get out.*

*I know.*

*One thing, we’ll have the talisman.*

*You can’t use it.*

*No, but WakKercarr can and from what Maksi said, he might not be a friend, but he’s no enemy.*

I didn’t think of that. After all these years you can still surprise me, Bramble-all-Thorns.*

*Let’s hope I can surprise them.*

*Yeh.*

“Drinker of Souls.” It was a surly growl. Cammam Callam held the door open for them, then went back to stand beside Palami Kumindri, glowering like a chastised boy, obviously hammered into an agreement he wasn’t strong enough to refuse.

Brann went back into the room. She waited, saying nothing.

The Chuttar sat with her hands cupped about the Yaril stone as if she were warming them at the changer’s glow. “We have considered your terms, Drinker of Souls. We find them acceptable. We will meet you at Waragapur and make the exchange there.”

Brann nodded, swung round and stalked from the room. Jaril backed up after her, not taking his eyes off the pair.

They went down the stairs in silence and left the doulahar without breaking that silence.