Colors of Chaos

XXVIII

AFTER NEARLY AN eight-day of walking the southeast quarter of Fairhaven, Cerryl was gaining an appreciation of just how much he hadn’t known about the city-as well as very sore feet. So he was pleased to be able to ride the big chestnut out beyond the southernmost part of Fairhaven to where the sewers ended-at the southeastern side of Fairhaven, beyond and to the east of the southern gates.

A single white granite building stood on the edge of the plateau that marked the end of Fairhaven and overlooked the ponds and fountains. Cerryl tied his mount to one of the stone hitching blocks on the shaded east side of the stone building that was mostly warehouse.

Duarrl and Cerryl walked another fifty cubits south, to where they could survey what lay below. The four patrollers had dismounted but remained in the shade beside their tethered mounts.

“The other problem we get is the sewer outfalls. Have to check those regular-like. Isork thought you ought to be along. Otherwise he’d have to come, seeing as there’s always the possibility of smugglers or some such.”

“I found that out. I ran into smugglers-or brigands-when I was on sewer duty.” Cerryl nodded. “Isork mentioned that, I think.”

Duarrl laughed. “For a little mage, you been a lot of duty places-mines, sawmills, sewers battles.”

“I did spend a little time with a scrivener,” Cerryl admitted. “That’s where the Guild found me.”

“Doesn’t that beat all…” Duarrl shook his head.

For a moment Cerryl looked down across the tiered ponds and the fountains that sprayed foul water into the air to be cleansed by the chaos of the sun. A hint of ancient chaos seeped from beneath the granite that walled the slope-a hint that suggested the hillside was far from completely natural.

The sewage flowed directly from the two main tunnels into four settling ponds. The pond on the west end was empty of water, and a dozen prisoners shoveled the settled mix of offal, sludge, and other solids into handcarts, which were pulled by ropes to the side where the contents were loaded into a larger wagon. The solids were carted off to a dry gorge to the northeast of the city on the eastern side of the hills where runoff would only seep into the higher grasslands southwest of Lydiar.

Cerryl studied the group but didn’t see any sign of Lyasa. Perhaps she was not on duty yet or somewhere else in the vast sewer collection system. His eyes drifted downhill.

From the settling ponds the water flowed into channels that spread the sewer water into thin sheets that flowed down the flattened sloping granite inclines, exposed to the chaos of the sun, to be collected into another set of ponds that fed the lower fountains. Those fountains, in turn, flung the water into the air in fine sprays where the pure chaos of the sun would destroy much of the remaining unnatural chaos in the water.

The lowest tier of ponds remained covered mostly with water lilies, and the cleansed water flowed over the granite lips on the south side of the ponds and into another granite channel that led to the Haven River. Although Cerryl would not have wished to drink the cleansed water, Myral had often assured him that it was far cleaner than the water used for drinking in any other city in Candar. That reminded Cerryl to chaos-clean water from anywhere else in Candar or drink ale or wine.

“Glad we don’t have to supervise that.” Duarrl gestured toward the sewage workers. “Just provide the prisoners and a few guards.”

“Disciplinary duty?” asked Cerryl.

The lead patroller nodded. “Little things-not showing up for duty, the first time, or being late a couple of times.” He grinned at Cerryl. “The mages who supervise-they tell me that’s disciplinary duty, too.”

“So I’ve heard. I’ve not had to do refuse duty.”

“Well…let’s go.” Duarrl turned and motioned to the four patrollers.

Cerryl and Duarrl walked down the granite steps to the landing that held the grated bronze door covering the entrance to the sewer walkway. A second bronze grate covered the sewer tunnel itself, a grate that angled from the tunnel top out over the stone lip where the sewage dropped into the twin channels that split and carried the sewage to the two settling ponds. Two hundred cubits to the west was another tunnel and door.

Cerryl frowned as he studied the grated bronze door, then glanced at the stones of the extended walkway. He extended his senses to the gate, then turned to Duarrl. “Do you have a key? I turned mine in when I left sewer duty.”

Duarrl fumbled through the ring on his belt. “Here…I think that’s it.” He looked at the gate and then at Cerryl. “You think…?”

Cerryl smiled apologetically. “Someone’s opened the gate, and not too long ago. There’s blood on the stones and no chaos in the lock.”

“Fellows,” Duarrl turned, “we might have a problem here.”

Cerryl turned the key and levered back the oversized grate door. He stood for a moment looking into the gloom. Behind him, four blades slid from their sheaths. After relocking the gate open, Cerryl squinted momentarily, then extended his order senses. Someone had been in the sewer tunnel recently-very recently.

At the end of the tunnel by the grate door, the walkway was wider than in the tunnels under the White City itself-nearly three cubits, almost wide enough for a cart, if a small one. At that thought, Cerryl looked down. Was there a trace of wheels in the slime?

“Ser? Ah…we can’t see in the dark.” Duarrl sounded apologetic. “If you’d wait a moment until I get a striker out…”

“I didn’t know the patrollers carried lamps.”

“Have to be two lamps with every patrol.”

“Just hold out the lamps, then.” Cerryl turned and waited for Reyll and Churk to extend their lamps. Hyjul and Saft stood back, as did Duarrl.

Whst! The tiny firebolt lit the first lamp wick. A second firebolt flared Churk’s lamp into light.

“That do?” asked Cerryl.

“Ah…yes, ser.”

Cerryl could sense something, rubbish, a bundle, something, on the walkway perhaps thirty cubits ahead. As he walked, he began to gather chaos around him-not to him, as Jeslek might have done, but around him.

A scraping sound echoed down the wide tunnel, but not loud enough for a man. Cerryl could sense something on the walkway, and the sickening rotting odor was far worse than just sewage. The scraping had probably been rats.

“Let’s have a lamp. There’s nothing alive here.”

Churk’s small lamp was enough to reveal what Cerryl had feared.

Cerryl wanted to gag but swallowed silently. The corpse had been a man-he thought, although the stench was worse than that of the sewage that gurgled in the tunnel beside the walkway. The figure wore rags, but anything else-boots, belt, purse-had been stripped. His face and chest had been burned, so much that the features were an unrecognizable blackened mass.

“They forced him to open the lock,” opined Duarrl.

“There are traces of chaos,” Cerryl said. “Not a lot of blood. He probably died when the chaos exploded out of the lock.”

Duarrl bent down but did not touch the body. “There’s nothing on him. Not a thing.” He straightened, then looked at Cerryl. “Might as well get rid of it. Can’t see who it was. No sense in burying it.”

Cerryl swallowed, then let the chaos swell, before releasing it.

WHssst!

When the flare of light subsided, all that remained was drifting ash, and a single copper lying on fire-scoured stone.

“They missed a copper.” Duarrl snorted. “Churk…your turn, if you want it.”

The flaxen-haired Churk bent down gingerly.

“Careful…” Cerryl cautioned, “It will be hot.”

“Thank you, ser.” Churk set his blade aside and took out a leather glove and picked up the coin, then straightened. “Hot enough that there be no flux clinging to it.”

“No,” said Duarrl. “Let’s see if we find anything else ahead. Doubt that we will, but you never know.”

Churk walked ahead, lamp in one hand, shortsword in the other.

After nearly four hundred cubits, past one set of stairs to a locked overhead grate, Duarrl stopped. “Not going to find anything now. Let’s head back.”

As they turned and started back in single file, Cerryl glanced through the gloom at Duarrl. “What do you think they were smuggling? They used a cart-a small one-but it was heavy enough.”

“You could tell it was a cart?”

“There were traces…The wheels crushed some of the slime. That makes another form of chaos.”

Someone swallowed in the darkness.

“See why you don’t underestimate mages, fellows?” Duarrl laughed before looking toward Cerryl. “If they had a cart, had to be something heavy. Couldn’t be finished goods, like woven wool or the like. Take too long to get the smell of sewer out. Arms of some sort, I’d guess. Maybe oils or perfumes. Had to be something worth killing over. Though folks like that’d kill for a few silvers.”

Their steps echoed hollowly down the tunnel over the gurgle of the sewage as it pulsed toward the treatment ponds.

Once everyone was out, Cerryl took Duarrl’s key. “I’ll need one of these.”

“You’ll have it tomorrow, ser.”

“Good.” Cerryl locked the grated door closed, returned the key, then forced himself to gather an enormous bolt of chaos, forcing it into the heavy lock.

“This time…there won’t be just one body.” He kept his voice low enough so that only Duarrl could hear his words.

The lead patroller nodded.

To the west, the prisoners continued to fill the wagon with the sludge from the empty settling pond.

“We’ll need to watch this more often,” Duarrl said to Cerryl as they walked back to the sewer building-and the waiting horses.

Cerryl nodded. He had his own ideas. He doubted that the old entrance to the sewers off the Avenue-the one where he’d been attacked by brigands-had ever been sealed and he had to wonder why.