Children of Chaos

thirty-five

BENARD CELEBRE

had never owned a sundial. He ate when he was hungry and slept when he was tired—unless he happened to be working on something interesting, in which case he forgot to eat at all and slept when he fell over. He had no idea how many days had passed since he left Kosord with Ingeld. They had gone by like swallows in fly time. He had watched the land and sky change, the trees don copper and bronze raiment and then strip naked. He had seen the harvest gathered. He spent his days just being with her and his nights sharing her bedroll; he would be content for the world to stay like that forever. Alas, the gods insist on change.

The idyll was over. The world had soured to uniform gray and tasseled rain clouds brushed the hills. That drab-looking town on the bluff ahead was Tryfors. Captain Bro eased Ucr Blessed through the maze of narrow channels and banks of shingle that were all that was left of the mighty Wrogg. The crew was helping the boat along with poles, but Benard's offers to help had been refused with the polite explanation that this was skilled work and he might put them aground.

He liked the peculiar riverfolk, with their carefree ways, their incomprehensible jabber, and monosyllabic names—Bro, Ma, Thu, and so on. They had guessed right away who Ingeld was, for Daughters were distinctive and never normally had reason to desert their sacred hearths. Since she was obviously not a new initiate leaving to take up her lifetime duties somewhere else, and since her young male companion displayed affection more extravagantly than a son would, she could only be the dynast of Kosord herself eloping with a lover. Although riverfolk were notoriously avaricious, Bro and her crew had stayed true to their agreement with Guthlag, ignoring the opportunities for blackmail or betrayal.

"We've arrived," Ingeld said. "What are you going to do now, love?" The passengers were huddled together on a thwart, shivering in voluminous cowled cloaks of oiled wool. The rain had started again.

"What do you want me to do?"

"You decide."

He eyed her skeptically around the edge of his hood. "You've ruled a great city since before I was born. Stop pretending to be a humble little peasant wife."

She chuckled contentedly. "You obviously don't know peasant wives. I love it. I have shed all my cares except Oliva on to your shoulders. For the first time in my life I have a man I can love and trust and lean on. Fear the day I start giving orders again, Master Celebre! Besides, I gave you very clear orders last night."

Those had concerned certain procedures best not discussed in public.

"I've never been responsible for anyone except myself before."

"Good practice for you."

"Rent another boat above the rapids and sail on?" Benard suggested hopefully.

"No. Oliva has had quite enough of boats."

The first time Ingeld had admitted to nausea Benard had flown into a panic and talked wildly of finding a Healer. The riverfolk had leered knowingly. Now he kept his worries to himself.

"How long before Saltaja arrives?"

"I don't know," Ingeld said. "Soon, I think. And Horold close behind her."

She saw them in the campfire every night.

"I suppose you want to investigate that clue the seer gave me, whatever it was?"

"Sixty Ways. Doesn't that sound like a brothel, Pack-leader?"

"It does, my lady," Guthlag said.

"That would not have been my first choice for a refuge." Ingeld's eyes twinkled. "On the other hand, it may be an interesting experience. You remember the password, love?"

"No," Benard lied.

"You are to ask for Poppy Delight and say Mist sent you. And if it really is a brothel, you come straight back here, Benard Celebre!"

"That would attract suspicion. Maybe you should send the packleader instead."

A hint of Ingeld metal glinted through the meekness paint. "No," she said.

♦

Tryfors was ugly, petrified childhood nightmares. Walled cities were rare, relics of far-off days before Weru founded His cult of Heroes, or at least of days almost as ancient when savage hill tribes had not yet been brought to know the benefits of civilization. Tryfors retained only fragments of its ancient fortifications, but it still had a grim, fortresslike air. Its buildings were single-story slabs of somber gray stone, without cornices or pilasters or any other decoration, and that day all the windows were'shut-tered against the rain.

Werists were everywhere on the streets, but not all wore Satrap Therek's orange. Benard also saw Horold's purple, and although those men were not necessarily from Kosord itself, running into Cutrath or his friends would bring disaster. He must complete his mission quickly and leave.

He also saw many Florengians, because slaves had been cheap in Tryfors until the trade dried up. He expected them to be a ready source of information, but in practice this was not quite true. Checking that his hood hid his ears, he fell into step beside a white-haired man pushing a barrow. "Which way to Sixty Ways, brother?"

The carter rolled his eyes. "Man! That's not for the likes of us."

"Got lucky. Master pleased with me."

"Or mistress tired of you?"

"She never tires of me, man."

That won a scornful laugh. "Chickens'll all be roosting, man! Left at the grain exchange, bear right to the temple of Nula, go up the steps beside the—" And so on.

On his third attempt, Benard learned that the house he sought was near the palace and guessed that the palace was the building with the tower. That brought him close, and two more inquiries led him to a door under a crudely painted sign, not artistic but explicit. He reached for the equally explicit bronze knocker, and the door swung open.

"Enter, Master Artist Celebre," said the seer.

♦

She led him through silent corridors and several doors, down into a cellar and back up again, until he was certain they had moved into another building. Eventually they came to a small room lit only by a crackling fire and furnished with two stools, a couple of wicker hampers, and a sleeping platform much too narrow to suit the uses of Sixty Ways. The shutters were closed; several garments hung on nails. The place smelled of herbs and old lady, and now, no doubt, of wet Benard. Producing a towel from a hamper, his hostess bade him remove his cape and be seated. By the time she returned, he was steaming happily. She closed the door and handed him a beaker of a hot, spicy beverage.

"We have important business to discuss, master."

"I was told to ask for Poppy Delight."

"I am Poppy. The other is a code." She was small, slightly stooped, but alert in her movements, businesslike. She sat on the edge of a stool and folded spidery hands in her lap.

"Mist sent me," he told her featureless white veil.

"I guessed as much—sometimes even we have to rely on inference. But it is known that you are worried, probably hunted, that you are very deeply in love, that you are basically an honest man, and although you have no such ambition, you may make your mark on the tablets of history. I confess I knew your name only because you were pointed out to me once in Kosord. Why don't you trust Mist?"

He took a sip of wine while he considered this remarkable speech. "I'm not sure." Something about a woman without a face? He did not feel the same unease with Poppy. "Because I thought that she was not being honest with me."

"Tell me, please."

He told of the seer's warning in the Bull Concourse, back in Kosord.

"Mist must be careful!" Poppy said sharply. "The division in our cult is deep and bitter. I tell you, Hand, that there are five Witnesses in Tryfors just now and all of us are Mist supporters. That did not happen by chance. We and certain others seek the overthrow of the bloodlord and all his house—are you not on our side?"

Could seers be too honest?

"Sides do not attract me. The war does not interest me. I will do anything in the world to defend the woman I love and our unborn child." He smiled apologetically. "That done, I would also help my sister escape forced marriage to the worm Cutrath."

"Horoldson left town two days ago for the mustering at Nardalborg. The weather upcountry is very bad, and he is now beyond my sight anyway. Who is the woman you adore so greatly? She is beyond my range."

Herded by sharp questions, Benard told how he had fled with Ingeld, how Saltaja and Fabia would soon arrive at Tryfors, and how Ingeld believed her husband to be on his way, also. Something about Witness Poppy reminded him of his deportment teacher back in the palace of Kosord—polite, gracious, and inflexible as marble. She had never failed to cuff any juvenile ear in need of cuffing.

"Things may be coming to a head at last," this other old lady mused, "if both Saltaja Hragsdor and Horold Hragson are coming here, to Therek. Or may not be. Opportunities for good or evil are equally manifest. I fear Saltaja more than either of her brothers, and a gathering of all three of them is a baleful development. I shall be happy when Mist arrives and takes charge."

None of which meant anything, but Benard's suspicions had been softened by wine and warmth. A seer would be an invaluable ally. "I, too, have a brother in these parts, I am told."

"Who calls himself Orlad Orladson. It is known that he lives in Nardalborg, three menzils from here, and has just completed his Werist training."

In Benard's sketchy memories, Orlando was permanently a stocky, curly-haired little tyke who laughed a lot. "The curse of the Dark One on whoever did that to him. Would he betray me if I approached him?"

The seer sat very still in the firelight as if watching things far off. Eventually she sighed. "We do not prophesy. The satrap has summoned him here to kill him."

"What! Why?" Was wife-stealing a family trait? "Can you warn him?"

"No. We never advise. Therek is insane. His dementia oppresses me even at this distance. Go and fetch your pyromancer and her warrior, Hand. I will give them sanctuary until Mist arrives."

"You are kind, Witness, although hiding from Werists in a brothel does seem a little foolhardy."

If seers smiled, they did so unseen. "You are not in the brothel now. Since ancient days the Witnesses have maintained secret lodges all over Vigaelia. Extrinsics are very rarely admitted, for any reason whatsoever."

Cuff! That would teach Benard not to waste his humor on a Maynist.