Imager

38

The second week with Maitre Dyana was even more rigorous than the first, but I felt that I was learning a great deal, especially in how to focus imagery and to use the least amount necessary. But she still kept demanding more and more finesse.

“Dear boy, you are but one imager, and at times, you could face far more than a ruffian or two. Without precision and finesse, you will be lost.”

Precision and finesse! How often I heard those words, but I could take consolation in the results, even if my performance was seldom to the level she demanded. The same was true of my work with Clovyl. I could feel my skills improving, steadily, if not dramatically.

With Master Jhulian, I had no such consolation. As soon as I learned one aspect of the law, we pressed on to the next. The assignment that had concerned me the most had been on murder, as defined in the Juristic Code. Master Jhulian had examined me in great detail on that. When I had asked why, his response had been direct.

“Contrary to your unstated belief, I am not trying to make a nomologist out of you. I am trying to instill the knowledge you may need to survive. Because any unexplained death in these times tends to be laid at the feet of the imagers, it is important for every imager to understand what murder is, in both real and legal terms, and to make sure that he or she is never involved in something that could be termed murder, either by the newsheets or the civic patrollers.”

Because I felt every word meant something, I committed the phrase to memory and wrote it down as soon as I returned to my room that Vendrei. “Never involved in something that could be termed murder” was a phrase that could cover a myriad of meanings-and sins.

By the time I returned from the dining hall after lunch on Samedi, I was more than ready to leave Imagisle. I’d been looking forward to that afternoon and evening, particularly after the long evening the week before at my parents’ house. I had written them a short note thanking them for their thoughtfulness and kindness, and the wonderful food-which it had been. I doubted that would much appease my mother, who definitely wanted her eldest son married to someone from the “right” background, certainly not another Pharsi girl, and before all that long . . . and never mind the imager business.

Ready as I was to depart Imagisle right after lunch . . . I didn’t. Instead, I sat down and attempted to organize my thoughts on my final essay for Master Jhulian-an analysis of the applicability of the Juristic Code to imagers. Two glasses later I had three pages of notes and an outline-as well as a profound desire to leave Imagisle as soon as possible. Since I had the feeling that I might be meeting Seliora’s parents, I did wear my best uniform and make sure that my boots were well blacked and shining. I had also squeezed in another haircut on Jeudi.

Outside, the day was pleasant, if overcast, with a slight breeze out of the northwest. I did have to wait almost a quarter of a glass before a hacker stopped to pick me up.

“Nordroad and Hagahl Lane, on the east side.”

He nodded, and I stepped up into the cab. The inside was clean, but threadbare.

When I descended onto the pavement close to a half glass later, I found that the building that served Seliora and her family as factory, factorage, and dwelling was far larger and more impressive in the daylight than in the lamplit gloom of late evening. The walls rose three stories, and the yellow brick was trimmed with gray granite cornerstones. Even the wood of the loading docks at the south end was stained with a brown oil and well kept, and the loading yard itself was stone-paved. The entrance on the side street to the north was the private family entrance, and it had a square and pillared covered porch that shielded a stone archway.

The hacker looked at me, and my grays, then at the stone entryway, but he said nothing. I gave him two coppers extra, then made my way up the steps. In the middle of the wide eight-panel door was an ancient and ornate brass knocker. Both the knocker and the plate had seen much wear, but both were brightly polished. I gave the knocker one hefty blow, then prepared to wait, but the door opened immediately.

Odelia stood there in the modest foyer, dressed in a pale green dress and darker green shawl that set off her coloring well. “Do come in, Master Rhennthyl.” She grinned at me.

“Thank you, Odelia, but I won’t be a master for some time.”

The only exit to the foyer was the polished oak staircase behind Odelia, and she turned and gestured toward it. “Everyone’s waiting upstairs.”

“Then I’ll let you lead me.” I added, “Who’s everyone?”

“Besides Seliora? Uncle Shelim and Aunt Betara, of course, and there’s Hanahra and Hestya-they’re the twins, my sisters-and Methyr, Seliora’s younger brother. Bhenyt’s off somewhere. Then, there’s my mother. You’ll recognize her.”

“She’s Aegina?”

Odelia nodded, adding, “And there’s Shomyr. He’s Seliora’s older brother, and he very much wants to meet you.”

I found myself squaring my shoulders as I followed Odelia up the steps.

The staircase, ample as it was, with its carved balustrades and shimmering brass fixtures, opened at the top into a large foyer or entry hall, a space a good eight yards wide and ten deep. The walls were paneled in light golden oak, and the floor was an intricate parquet, mostly covered with a lush carpet of deep maroon, with a border of intertwined golden chains and brilliant green leafy vines. Set around the foyer were various chairs and settees of dark wood, upholstered in various fabric designs. At the far end was a pianoforte.

The group standing in a rough circle at the edge of the carpet, beside a long settee, all turned as Odelia announced, “Rhennthyl D’Imagisle.”

I had barely picked out Seliora, in a crimson dress with a black jacket, when a broad-shouldered, black-bearded young man a half head shorter than I was stepped forward. “I’m Shomyr. I’m Seliora’s brother, and she’s said so little about you that I wanted to meet you.”

Said so little?

“Now, now, Shomyr, you’ll have confused him totally.” A dark-haired and wiry woman in green silk trousers and a matching jacket, who could easily have been Seliora’s older sister, moved toward us. “The less my daughter says to us, generally the more she’s interested, and the less we know.” Her smile was identical to Seliora’s.

I inclined my head. “I’m very pleased to meet you, Madame D’Shelim.”

“Betara, please. Please. We’re not that formal here.”

They could have fooled me, given the furnishings in that grand upper entrance hall.

Seliora eased forward and around the others. She took my arm gently, as if to suggest a certain restrained possessiveness. “Rhenn is very talented. He’s an outstanding portraiturist as well as an imager, and his family owns Alusine Wool.”

“Ah . . . you’re Chenkyr’s boy, then?” asked Shelim.

“He’s my father. My brother Rousel runs the factorage in Kherseilles.” Even as I explained, I wondered how Seliora had known. I’d never said more than my father was a wool factor, and there were more than a few in L’Excelsis, and even more throughout Solidar.

“How did you get to be an imager?” The question came from the single boy in the group, standing beside the red-haired twins, who looked to be two or three years younger than Khethila.

“Methyr,” someone murmured.

“When I discovered I could image, I walked across the Bridge of Hopes and told the imagers. They tested me and decided I was an imager.”

“It couldn’t have been that simple,” suggested Shomyr.

I managed a short laugh. “It was just that simple. Everything that came after that wasn’t at all that easy. They didn’t let me leave Imagisle for over a month.”

“Are there are any girls?” asked one of the twins.

“Some. One of the maitres I’ve been studying with is a woman, and there are others.”

“Can imagers marry?” That was Odelia, and the question was delivered with a grin.

I could feel Seliora stiffen just slightly, and I had a definite sense that the question hadn’t pleased her. “They can. That’s if anyone wants to marry them.”

That brought smiles to several faces, including to the face of the older and taller redheaded woman who had to be Odelia’s mother.

“Generally, they usually live on Imagisle after they’re married,” I added.

“What exactly do imagers do?” pressed Shomyr.

“Whatever our duties are.” I paused for a moment. “I’ve worked at certain things, but right now I’m being trained for a position at the Council Chateau.”

“With the Council?” asked Shelim.

“I haven’t been given all the details, but young as I am, I suspect it’s far more like working for them.” I tried to keep my tone wry.

“Do imagers make lots of coins?” asked Methyr.

“More than journeymen, and a great deal less than your father makes.”

At that, Betara nodded slightly, and there was a quick set of glances between Seliora’s parents. Before anyone else could ask another question, Betara spoke up. “Rhenn came here to take Seliora to dinner, not to see all of us. I think we’d best let them go.”

Seliora gave her mother a quick glance that I wasn’t about to try to decipher, then turned. Since she was still holding my arm, we turned and moved toward the steps, and then down them.

More surprising, there was a hack waiting outside, and a youngster standing on the steps. He grinned at Seliora.

“Thank you, Bhenyt,” she said.

“My pleasure,” he replied, nodding to us both.

“Felters, sir?” asked the hacker.

“If you would,” I replied, looking at Seliora.

“Bhenyt is Odelia’s younger brother,” she replied, taking my hand as she stepped up into the coach. “I just thought it might be nice not to wait for a coach. You were very gallant,” she added.

“Thank you.” Had I had any real choice?

Once we were settled in the coach and moving south on Nordroad, I turned to her. I couldn’t help but notice that, despite the similarity in colors to what she had worn the night we had truly danced for the first time, the dress and the jacket looked fresh-and had probably just been tailored and delivered. “How did you know who my father was?”

She laughed. “I didn’t. Mama was the one who wanted to know about your family. She had you investigated as soon as Odelia admitted I’d spent all of last Samedi with you.”

“Is Odelia your guardian?”

“We’re close, but she likes you.”

“You know I’m not likely to ask for money or anything else from my parents. So why do they matter?”

“The money doesn’t matter, even to Mama. She was impressed that you made journeyman and then became an imager. She says that you come from solid stock.” Seliora squeezed my hand. “I could tell that.”

“How could you know that from a meeting a journeyman artist a few times?”

“You were always neat, clean, and with short hair and no beard, and after I saw the study you painted, I could tell you had talent to go with that ambition. I worried that you had too much ambition for a portraiturist.”

“Too much ambition?”

“I didn’t say that right.” She tilted her head slightly. “Too much honesty for a portraiturist with that much ambition.”

A faint scent of flowers emanated from her, not too much, a light scent.

Before that long, the coach stopped, we stepped out, and I paid and tipped the hacker.

Felters was ensconced in what had been a graystone row house on the south side of the lane that angled off East River Road. The oversized lamps that flanked the door were already lit, although the sun had not quite set.

The harried-looking server who greeted us looked at Seliora, then at me.

I did my best to mentally press friendliness upon her. “For two, please.”

“Ah . . . this way.”

We ended up at a small window table, crowded between two much larger tables, one occupied by three older men in suits of a cut I did not recognize, and one empty, but the smaller table was fine with me.

“What would you like to drink?” asked the server.

I inclined my head to Seliora.

“Do you have a white Sanellio?”

The server nodded.

“Cambrisio, white,” I added.

The server left a slate on which the three specialties of the evening had been written in small script-Chicken Asseroiles, Pork Samedi, and Flank Steak Especial.

“Are any of these favorites of yours?” I asked.

“I think I’d like the chicken. You?”

“The steak. I’m partial to both mushrooms and parsley.”

When the two goblets of wine came, right after two couples were settled in at the table behind me, I ordered for us, adding a crab bisque as an appetizer and choosing the walnut and shaved apple and cheese salad. They were probably winter-kept apples, but it was worth a try.

After the server left, Seliora looked at me. “You don’t have to impress me.”

“I just wanted to have a good meal with you and enjoy it. That’s not something I get to do often.”

“If you do it often, you won’t be able to afford anything else.” But her words were said warmly.

I lifted my wine goblet. “To you and to a delightful evening.”

She lifted hers. “I’ll return that. To you . . . and the evening.”

The Cambrisio was good, but looking at Seliora was better.

“Why did you ask me to dance, that first time?” I asked.

“I wanted to. Rogaris told Odelia that you were too serious for me.”

“He didn’t know you well, then.”

“Do you?” A hint of mischief colored her words.

“No, but I know that there’s more to you than meets the eye . . . and I’m interested in learning more about you.”

For just a moment, her eyes flickered past me, looking outside.

“What is it?”

“Nothing. Someone going past, but he was looking this way.”

“Do you know him?”

She shook her head. “From what I saw, he’s not someone I’d wish to know.”

The server arrived with the salads. I took a bite, gingerly. “The salad is good, especially the cheese.”

A faint smile crossed Seliora’s lips, but she nodded, before saying, “It is.”

“Why did you smile?”

“Not that many men would worry about the salad. They’d either eat it or ignore it.”

I shrugged. I wasn’t about to say I’d wanted it to be good for her. “I enjoy a good meal.”

“You couldn’t have eaten that well at Master Caliostrus’s house.”

I hadn’t. “Why do you say that?”

“Last summer, I was with Odelia, and Ostrius was talking to her escort-the one before Kolasyn-about how he skipped as many meals as he could.”

“He could afford to. I couldn’t. It wasn’t that bad.”

“I like that about you.”

“What?”

“You’re not the complaining type. You do what’s necessary until you can make things better. That’s why you’ll do well as an imager.”

“Complaining doesn’t do any good,” I pointed out. “If the person you complain to is the kind who would listen, they’ve already done what they can, and anyone else either won’t listen, doesn’t care, or can’t do anything.”

“Most people aren’t that practical.”

I’d never thought of myself as that practical. How practical was trying to be a portraiturist when you came from a family of wool factors?

The server reappeared, took the empty salad plates, and placed the entrees in front of us. I cut into the flank steak, and then ate several bites, enjoying the combination of mushrooms, buttered parsley, and seasoned tender beef. “How is your chicken?”

“Very tender, and tasty. It reminds me of Aunt Aegina’s.”

“Odelia’s mother?”

“Yes. She’s a good cook, better than Mother. That might be because she enjoys it.”

“Your mother eats because she has to.”

“You noticed.”

“She has a certain . . . determination, like someone else, I suspect.”

Seliora flushed, just a touch. Then she stiffened and looked up and out the window. “That man . . . out there, in the dark brown cloak and a square beard. He’s walked past twice, and he’s looked at you.”

“At you, I’m most certain. You’re the one worth looking at.”

“You’re kind, but he wasn’t looking at me.”

If Seliora said the man wasn’t, then he wasn’t, but why would anyone be looking at me? From what I’d seen so far since I’d become an imager, no one gave imagers more than a passing glance-and that more to avoid us than anything else. “There’s not much I can do about it now.”

“I suppose not.”

“Enjoy your chicken.” I almost added that she should enjoy my looking at her, but that would have been too forward.

“And what else? You were about to add something.”

“The company, if you can.”

“I’m enjoying that very much.”

“I’m glad.”

After several more bites and another swallow of wine, I asked, “Do you like designing the patterns for the upholstery?”

“The designing I like very much.” Seliora’s smile turned wry. “Working with some clients is sometimes less enjoyable.”

I kept asking her questions through the remainder of dinner and through dessert-an apple cream custard-and the tea that followed.

Finally, as much as I’d enjoyed the dinner, both the food and the company, there were people waiting outside, and the server kept looking at us.

“I suppose we had better go. I wouldn’t want to be accused of keeping you out too late.”

“You would have been anyway, even if we’d left a glass ago,” she replied.

All in all, the dinner cost four silvers, counting what I left for the server.

We stepped out of the bistro and were walking toward the pair of hacks waiting for fares, when Seliora stiffened again, glanced to my right, and then tugged my arm.

“Over there,” she whispered. “It’s the same man.”

I turned my head and saw the glint in the bearded man’s hand, and then what looked to be a spark or flash. I was too slow in trying to throw up shields, and something smashed into my shoulder. Despite the pain, I was furious. I concentrated on imaging caustic into his eyes and inside his chest, around his heart, or where I thought his heart was.

There was a single shriek, and he pitched forward onto the pavement of the sidewalk.

I stood there dumbly for a moment.

Seliora looked at me. “You’re bleeding.”

Before I could speak, she’d started to open my waistcoat and shirt and had jammed something into the wound.

“You!” Her voice penetrated the night as she pointed toward the lead hacker of those waiting outside Felters. “We’re headed to the Bridge of Hopes. Now.”

“But . . . that’s . . .”

“Someone’s shot an imager. Do you want the imagers after you?”

Getting into the coach wasn’t too hard. I didn’t even need Seliora’s help.

Once we sat down on the hard seat of the coach, she resumed pressing the handkerchief against and into the wound. “You’re still bleeding too much. I can’t stop it all.” She turned her head and yelled, “Faster!”

I tried to image something like a shield around the wound.

“Whatever you’re doing, Rhenn, keep doing it. The bleeding’s almost stopped.” She didn’t lessen the pressure on my shoulder, though. To keep the pressure on the wound, she had to be very close to me, and if it hadn’t have been for the pain-and the fear-I would have enjoyed that closeness a great deal more.

The ride toward the bridge seemed to take a long time, and no time at all, in a strange way, but before that long the hacker called down, “I’m not supposed to cross the bridge, Mistress!”

“Cross it!”

“But . . .”

A small pistol appeared in her gloved hand, and she leaned out the open coach window, pointing the pistol. “Cross it.”

The clatter of hoofs on stone was almost reassuring.

“Where should he go?” asked Seliora

I was having trouble thinking, and maintaining the shield over the wound, but it had to be the infirmary. Someone was always there. “The right . . . lane after we cross the bridge. The second building, and the first door, the one . . . staff and a green leaf on the door.”

Seliora shouted the directions to the driver, then turned back to me. “Hold on. Keep doing that.”

Then, the hacker brought the coach to a stop.

“Hold this in place, Rhenn.” She pressed my hand against the wadded handkerchief and the warm dampness, then pushed open the coach door and darted out, snapping something at the hacker.

I kept trying to stay awake and alert, trying to push back the encroaching darkness, as I heard doors opening and voices, but then . . . darkness was all there was.

. . . except a darkened twilight that I was carried through . . .

The room where I woke, if becoming vaguely aware of one’s surroundings meant awakening, was small and gray, and I lay on a hard and narrow bed or pallet. I had a vague recollection of being carried somewhere, and then someone standing over me, and pains shooting through my shoulder.

Seliora was standing there beside the bed. So was someone else, but she was closer.

“You’re here . . .” My voice was barely a whisper.

“I’m here. Where else would I be?” She reached out and squeezed my fingers-the ones on the hand of my uninjured side.

“Thank you.” I had to squint to see the figure behind her. “Master . . .?”

“Draffyd,” he supplied. “I took care of the wound, but you’ll have to lie still for a time. You won’t have a choice. You’re strapped to the bed, but that’s so that you don’t do anything to rip open the stitches and reopen the wound. Please don’t try to move against the restraints. Later, we’ll remove them, but for the next few glasses, you’ll need to be still.”

I didn’t like that at all, but there were both dull and sharp pains in my shoulder and chest, and both felt like I’d been run over by a draft horse with spiked shoes.

Master Draffyd turned to Seliora. “You cannot stay here for the evening.”

She just looked at him as if to ask why not.

“In Rhennthyl’s case, it wouldn’t be safe for either of you. There are imager reasons why this is so.”

She turned her head back to me.

I had to think for a moment before I realized why. Who knew what I’d do in my sleep? Or in a delirium. “He’s right . . . wish you could stay . . . but . . .”

“We’ll send you back home in a Collegium carriage. You’ll be quite safe,” added Master Draffyd. “We’re very thankful you were there, and both the Collegium and Rhenn owe you a great deal.”

“What about Rhenn?”

“He’ll recover. You got him here while he still had enough blood. If he were going to die, he’d already be dead. He’ll be very weak for a few days, but he’ll recover. You stay with him while I send for the carriage.” Master Draffyd nodded to Seliora, then slipped out of the room.

She moved closer. “That man outside Felters . . . I knew he was after you.”

“I . . . won’t dispute you . . . again.”

“You killed him, didn’t you?”

I started to nod, but even that hurt. “Yes. I think so . . . anyway . . . tried to disable him . . . Hurt too much . . .”

She bent over and brushed my forehead with her lips. She was so close I could see the redness in her eyes. She still looked lovely.

“ . . . be all right . . .”

“I expect it. Now . . . you be quiet. You don’t need to talk. Save your strength.” She squeezed my fingers again as she straightened, but she did not let go of them, not until Master Draffyd returned.

“The carriage will be outside in a few moments.”

“So soon?” she asked.

“There’s always one ready, at any glass.”

I hadn’t known that, not that it would have made any difference. The hacker had gotten us to Imagisle as fast as anyone could have. “The hacker . . .?”

“I had him paid,” said Master Draffyd. “The Collegium paid, actually. We also gave him a goodwill token. It’s worth a gold when he renews his medallion.” He paused. “I hear the carriage outside. It’s rather late, Mistress D’Shelim, and I’m certain your family has been worried.”

“They will understand.” Seliora bent over and kissed me, gently, but on the lips. “Take good care of yourself.” Then she stepped away.

After she left the room, Master Draffyd stepped closer. He held a small vial. “I’m going to give you something to deepen your sleep a little. You’ll have to open your mouth.”

I did, and he poured close to a cupful into me. Despite a mint-like scent that wasn’t unpleasant, the liquid itself tasted like acidic peppermint laced with cheap plonk, and I couldn’t help but grimace.

“It tastes terrible. I remember. You don’t forget.“ He stoppered the vial and slipped it into a pocket of his waistcoat, then looked back at me. “You wouldn’t be alive without the young woman, you know?”

“Nor . . . without you, either.”

“That’s true, but she had the presence of mind to get you here. How did she know?”

“I gave her directions.” I realized that I was a little stronger. Not much, but a trace.

He frowned. “You were awake?”

“Until after we crossed the bridge and got to the infirmary door. I was holding a shield tight against the wound . . . until the end when I got too light-headed to concentrate.”

“In that case, it did take both of you. She said so, but . . . it’s still amazing.”

That irritated me, weak as I was. “If Seliora said so . . . it’s true.”

“No. I’m certain she told the truth. I meant your holding a shield against a wound like that. Most wouldn’t think of that.”

I wouldn’t have thought of it without Seliora’s suggestion, but I wasn’t going to tell Master Draffyd that. “You imaged the bullet out, didn’t you, and then imaged some sort of dressing or patch in there.”

“It’s more complicated than that, but something like that.” He paused. “What about the man who shot you?”

“He’s dead, I think. I imaged caustic into his eyes and chest . . . inside his chest, near the heart. That was hard. He screamed and dropped over.” I could feel my eyes trying to close.

“You need to rest. Don’t worry. Someone will be watching.”

I was worried, but that didn’t stop my eyes from closing.