Imager's challenge

44

Not only were my buttocks and shoulder sore and painful when I staggered out of bed on Lundi morning, but my legs were sore, and I still had a trace of the headache I’d gone to bed with. I could see, however, and I could raise shields. I couldn’t help but frown at that. Did that mean that I’d handled the imaging part as I should have, but I was suffering the consequences of not physically protecting myself as well as I should have? Wonderful! My technique was better than I thought, but I still came close to killing myself . . . again. And then there was that vision of the Temple of Puryon exploding. I’d just have to see . . . and be very careful around the Temple.

Clovyl’s stretching exercises did help, but my running left so much to be desired that I was in the group bringing up the rear. Fortunately, no one seemed to care. The cold shower that followed my return to quarters numbed the aches, but also stiffened me up some, and I was slow in shaving and getting dressed. I still made it to the dining hall without being terribly late.

“You’re limping,” Ferlyn observed as I sat down at the masters’ table.

Chassendri slipped into the chair to my left before I replied. “That’s what comes of all those exercises and running on wet stone.”

I managed to look sheepish. “I do have a large bruise from falling.” That was true. I just didn’t say when or where.

“He’s sitting lopsided,” Chassendri affirmed.

“I wouldn’t be in security for anything.” Ferlyn poured some tea and handed me the pot. “Bad things happen to all of you, and there’s never any rest from problems.”

I filled Chassendri’s mug, and then mine. “Is there any rest from problems for any imager? Isn’t it just a choice of which problems we prefer and are suited to handle?”

Chassendri smiled, but only for a moment. “That may be true for us, but what about imagers whose talents don’t match what they prefer?”

“I don’t know that I have that much sympathy.” My words came out more sardonically than I’d intended.

“Oh?” asked Ferlyn.

“I could have been a master portaiturist,” I pointed out. “I didn’t exactly get that choice. We sometimes don’t. We only get to choose among some alternatives.”

Chassendri tilted her head. “That’s true . . . in a way.”

“In what way?” asked Ferlyn.

“Some choices no one gets. We don’t choose where and to whom we’re born. We don’t choose our physical characteristics. But that’s true of everyone. We do get to choose what we do with what we have. Didn’t you have to choose to work with Master Dichartyn, Rhenn?”

“Yes. I’ve already admitted that, but what does that have to do with sympathy?”

“Would you really prefer to work, say, imaging machine parts?”

“No.” That was an easy and obvious admission.

“You had the choice. What about someone like Shannyr, or Sannifyr? They don’t have your abilities and choices.”

I inclined my head. “Your point is well taken and gently made.” At least, she hadn’t out-and-out called me spoiled because I had the ability to be good in two fields and was complaining I hadn’t had much choice when others had none.

“Gently?” Ferlyn raised his eyebrows. “I’d hate to see what she’d do roughly, if that happened to be gentle.”

I laughed softly. “We’d best keep that in mind, then, hadn’t we?” I grinned at Chassendri.

She did smile back.

As I finished breakfast, I couldn’t help asking myself if I were becoming too much like Master Dichartyn, or at least in those characteristics I disliked. Yet . . . there was so much I could tell no one-except Seliora-and I probably wasn’t supposed to tell her. But she and her family could keep secrets. In my family, Khethila was the only one who could, and I didn’t want to burden her.

I had to hurry to the duty coach, but the streets were relatively clear, and I arrived outside the station as the bells were chiming seventh glass. When I stepped inside, both Lyonyt and a fresh-faced patroller who looked to be a good five years younger than I was walked toward me immediately. I didn’t see either Harraf or Warydt. I wasn’t about to go looking for them.

“Good morning, Master Rhennthyl,” offered Lyonyt. “This is Fuast.”

“I’m pleased to meet you, Fuast.” I inclined my head politely.

“I’m happy to meet you, sir.” His voice was young and enthusiastic. I found that bothered me, and at the same time, it disturbed me that it did.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” I offered. “We probably need to be headed out.”

“We should.” Lyonyt’s head bobbed up and down, even as his eyes flicked toward the doors and then back to me.

I ended up leading the way, at least until we were headed east on South Middle, when I dropped back and let Lyonyt explain.

“Best thing to do is circle the round before you start going up and down the cross streets . . . gives you a feel for what might be happening. If there’s trouble, you want to know about it before you get too deep in the taudis, goes for any round you do, but it’s worse here if you don’t know . . .”

When we neared the Temple, unchanged from when we had passed it last on Vendrei, I took a long and careful look. One of the priests was standing on the front steps, and he looked toward us and then away. Had I just imagined the explosion? Except . . . the last flash vision had been the fire at the factorage. We were nearly to the Avenue D’Artisans before Lyonyt stopped to take a breather from his nonstop briefing.

“They said that Third District’s one of the toughest.” Fuast looked sideways to Lyonyt.

“Has some of the tougher rounds, those going through the taudis, anyway. Every district’s got tough rounds, even Fifth District. Just doesn’t have so many.”

I didn’t know, but I suspected that Lyonyt had that correct.

“How many imagers accompany patrollers, Master Rhennthyl?” Fuast asked as we turned southwest on the avenue.

“Not many,” I replied. “At the moment, I’m the only one. I’m the imager liaison to the Civic Patrol, and this is part of my getting to know how the Patrol operates. I’ve spent time in headquarters and watching justice hearings.”

“Ah . . . sir . . .”

I had a good idea what he was thinking. “I’ve had duties like a patroller as an imager, and I’ve been trained in handling weapons and in taking them away from other people.”

Fuast looked to Lyonyt.

“He’s already taken down a taudischef and something like five toughs in less than a month, most of ’em with his bare hands.”

“Oh . . . I’m . . .”

“People think imagers just image. We don’t. There are imagers who are bookkeepers and sailors and machinists and advocates and justices . . . all sorts of jobs. We just do them on Imagisle. I also paint. I was a portraiturist before I was an imager.”

“I didn’t know that, sir,” said Lyonyt.

“I don’t believe I mentioned it.”

Before long, Lyonyt was back to explaining about the round, and where to watch carefully, and about sewer grates and refuse and a hundred odd details. I just listened. Some of it was new to me, probably because Alsoran hadn’t wanted to say much.

The rest of the day was uneventful, too quiet, really.

On the last section of the round as we headed back along South Middle, Lyonyt’s eyes kept surveying the wall on the left as we crossed Mando, then the Temple of Puryon up ahead. He frowned. “Something . . .”

I studied the Temple as well. Then it struck me. “All the shutters are closed. Every last one. They weren’t earlier.”

“I’ve never seen that before . . . except once. Wager that means the scripties are coming. Frig!” Lyonyt shook his head.

“Scripties?” asked Fuast.

“The Navy conscription teams,” I said. “They’re not popular in the taudis.”

“But they go everywhere,” Fuast said.

“There are exemptions for youngsters and young men who are apprentices, or journeymen, or in school,” I replied. “A far greater proportion of the young men in the taudis are day laborers or don’t qualify for exemptions.”

“Most of them don’t,” added Lyonyt. “They don’t like working hard, either. The scripties get pissed when they do a taudis because there’s always trouble. After they leave, there’s more trouble, and a year or two later, when things get settled down, the scripties do it all over again.”

“That’s . . . do they really do that?”

Lyonyt nodded. He didn’t say anything for a block, and that was the longest time he’d gone without speaking on any of the rounds I’d patrolled with him. After we’d passed the Temple, he glanced back, once, then twice. Finally, he shook his head. “Today’s been the quietest I’ve seen it.”

Captain Harraf was nowhere around when we returned to the station. Since he wasn’t, I stepped partway into the lieutenant’s small study. “Lieutenant? Have you heard anything about the conscription teams?”

He looked up from his desk, then smiled warmly. “I can’t say as I have.”

The smile and the pause told me that he knew.

“Well, sir, no one has told me, but we did notice one interesting thing today. The Temple of Puryon was shuttered up tight, and I’ve never seen it that way, and neither has Lyonyt. It could be that they know something we don’t. I just thought I’d pass that along, sir.”

“I do appreciate that, Master Rhennthyl. I will let the captain know. Thank you.”

I nodded and slipped out.

As I rode the hack back to the Collegium, I wondered how the Tiempran priests had discovered the conscription schedule-if they had. If they hadn’t, why was the Temple so closed up? Hostilities with Tiempre? Some operation Master Dichartyn had planned or undertaken?

As soon as I crossed the Bridge of Hopes and returned to the Collegium, I went looking for Master Dichartyn. For once, as he didn’t seem to have been much lately, he was in his study.

“What is it, Rhennthyl?”

“Just one thing, sir. When I was patrolling South Middle, the Tiempran Temple was totally shuttered. Lyonyt said the only time he’d seen it shuttered was the last time the conscription team came through.”

Master Dichartyn just nodded.

“I mentioned it to Lieutenant Warydt, and I could tell that he hadn’t heard about the Temple, but that he felt the conscription team was about to begin. I thought you should know.”

Dichartyn shook his head. “You could tell? That’s hardly proof of anything.”

“You’re absolutely right, sir . . . except if they begin in the next few days, it would indicate both the priests and the lieutenant had advance knowledge. That’s all I wanted to pass on, sir.”

“Thank you, Rhennthyl.”

“Have a good evening, sir.” I made my way to the dining hall, stopping outside where Reynol and Kahlasa were talking.

“Good evening. You two look to be up to no good. . . .”

They both turned.

“Is any imager?” asked Kahlasa with a smile. “What about you?”

“I’ve definitely been up to nothing that pleases anyone.”

“Except that lovely woman you’ve been seen with,” suggested Kahlasa. “Some of the seconds and primes were almost drooling when they talk about you two.”

Talk about us two? “Why would they do that?”

“Rhenn . . .” Kahlasa shook her head. “You’re the only imager that anyone knows has actually done anything recently. Everyone else has managed to keep their accomplishments quiet. The younger imagers want to aspire to something . . . and what better than a tall and powerful imager who attracts a beautiful woman?”

I did groan at that.

“Even some of the girls are gossiping.”

“Like Mayra?” She was one of the few I knew, besides the older imagers, such as Dyana, Chassendri, and Kahlasa.

“It doesn’t matter.” Kahlasa grinned at me. “You’ll just have to live with it. Besides, it keeps people’s attention on you and away from other matters, and that’s not all bad.”

The bells rang at that moment, and Reynol spoke. “I need to eat early because I’m meeting Meynard and a friend later.”

They headed for the table for seconds and thirds, and I found myself moving toward the masters’ table, empty except for Quaelyn and Ferlyn.

After greetings, I just ate and mainly listened to their conversation, partly because I was interested and partly because I was sore all over. At least, I was stiff and sore in so many places that it seemed like all over.

“. . . the yields on the eastern plains show a relation to the height of the rivers flowing through Cloisonyt and Montagne in Maris and Avryl . . .”

“. . .but there’s not enough water for irrigation . . .”

As I got up to leave the dining hall, I couldn’t help but think about Kahlasa’s comments. In effect, because the woman I loved was beautiful, I’d become almost an internal lure for the Collegium . . . and that was in addition to being an external lure. Just how had all that happened?

On my way out of the dining hall, I picked up copies of both Tableta and Veritum and brought them back to my quarters, where I read them, stretched out on the bed on my stomach, which was the most comfortable position. Neither newsheet had any stories that concerned either Caenen or Tiempre, but there was one about the battles west of the Jariolan coal mines. The sudden winter storm had been followed by a thaw and a rainstorm, and that had trapped another hundred Ferran landcruisers in mud, and cost them several thousand troops. Another story mentioned negotiations between a Council representative and a representative of the Oligarchy concerning a “supply base.” That sounded like the coaling station on the isle of Harvik Master Rholyn had mentioned several weeks ago.

After what had happened the night before, I wasn’t about to try anything else in the way of imaging-only to get a good night’s sleep . . . if I could, and if I could keep from thinking about Rousel.