Dangerous Gifts (22 page)

“Yes. Mokraine. Why are you here? And
how?
”

“I am here because...” For a moment he looked nothing more than an old man, confused, and at a loss. “Something drew me. A portal, I think.”

“A portal? You mean Bealach?”

“No. Yes. I don’t know. As to how...” He shrugged. “The usual way. A ship. Some sort of vehicle. That style of thing.”

“But...” I didn’t finish. You don’t ask a warlock as powerful as Mokraine still possibly was, “Where the hells did you find the money?” At least, I didn’t feel like risking it.

“You know him?” Brodenay said.

“I’m never quite sure about that, actually,” I muttered. “Recognise him, yes. Well, he’s here. Seneschal, any chance you could find him a room? Or something?”

“I cannot accept a guest without consulting the Family,” the seneschal said. “It is late. I should not wish to disturb them.”

The fella even
talked
like a Gudain. I wondered how hard he’d had to work to rid himself of the usual lilting Ikinchli susurration. I took him by the elbow and drew him – perhaps slightly more firmly than necessary – to one side.

“Look, chum,” I said. “That gentleman may look as though he just wandered in off the street, but he is in fact an extremely powerful if somewhat
distracted
warlock and I really, really would advise you not to risk annoying him, do you follow me?”

“What is a warlock?”

“Oh, for...”

“Can I be of assistance?” a familiar and smooth-as-silk voice said behind me. “By the All, is that
Mokraine?
”

Even Fain sounded slightly startled; he gave us both a
What’s going on?
stare, at which I shrugged and which I doubt Mokraine even noticed. He was staring at the seneschal with a disturbing intensity.

“You know him, sir?” the seneschal said, flicking his gaze away from Mokraine’s stare.

“Why yes, a most respected magical practitioner. Who should
not
– may I make this very clear – should
not
be upset or annoyed. Or touched. At all.”

The seneschal blinked his third eyelids, the first time I’d seen him make that particularly Ikinchli gesture. “I see,” he said, backing away slightly. “Then please follow me, and I will find some accommodation for the gentleman.” He looked at the familiar as it lurched after Mokraine. “That... Is it likely to... Should I have some straw fetched?”

“Oh, it doesn’t excrete matter,” Mokraine said, striding into the hall.

“It doesn’t... What does it excrete?” I said.

“The sensation you feel when it brushes against you? I believe that may be its version of the eliminatory process.”

“So when it touches you it sh...
eliminates
on your soul?”

Mokraine actually laughed. “Possibly. But I’m sure your soul can shrug off any such thing, Babylon.”

I wasn’t at all sure about that.

O
NCE HE’D BEEN
sent off with the seneschal, Fain said, “Was this your doing?”

“
Me?
No!”

“I really hope not. Introducing Mokraine into an already unstable situation would be an act of extraordinary foolishness.”

“I didn’t bring him here! I had no idea he was planning to come here, and neither, from the sound of it, did he.”

“Do you have any idea of the current extent of his abilities?” Fain said.

“No. He’s been on Scalentine as long as I’ve known him.”

“That, of course, is part of the problem. He is no longer in Scalentine.”

“I know he’s no longer in Scalentine. If he was, we wouldn’t be
having
this conversation,” I said.

“Please endeavour to be serious. His power is no longer damped. This makes him, potentially, extremely dangerous.”

“I know! What, exactly, do you suggest I do about it?”

“I suggest that you keep a careful eye on him and inform me if you notice any changes.”

“Fain, I can’t watch him
and
Enthemmerlee,
and
spy for you,
and..
.” I managed, just, to stop myself mentioning the silk shipment. Which I had to do something about. Though what, I still had no idea.

“True. Then I will watch him myself.”

“And what will you do if you think he’s becoming a threat?” I said.

“I shall take whatever measures I deem necessary,” Fain said.

“Are any of them likely to work?” I said. “Because if you attempt to restrain him in some way, and fail, I don’t want to be you. Or anywhere near you, actually.”

“I am aware of the risks. Now, unless you are on duty, I think you should try and get some sleep.”

“Thank you, I’d never have thought of that,” I said.

“Madam Steel...”

“Goodnight, Mr Fain.”

I wasn’t the only one up late; Bergast’s light was burning. I heard him muttering behind his door. I couldn’t make it out, but it sounded like the same set of phrases, over and over again, with occasional pauses for much more audible swearing.

I
MANAGED TO
grab a couple of hours of uneasy sleep, darkness woven through with voices and a sense that things were moving around me that I couldn’t quite see. Then Rikkinnet was shaking my shoulder and telling me it was time to accompany the family to
privaiya
.

Bergast and I went into the little chapel to check it out; inside, it was low and dim, the eaves of the tiled roof hanging half over the windows. An elaborate brazier of some darkly gleaming ceramic stuff stood at the front, a stone table behind it. The priest was an elderly Gudain male, in multi-coloured robes whose internal ruff was square, making him look like a small, mobile building until you got close enough to see that inside the boxy outline he was so wispy and frail that a strong wind would send him drifting over the roof of his own chapel like a kite. “It’s not quite ready,” he said. He was setting out various bowls and implements on the table with slow care; shuffling back to a recess in the rear of the chapel to fetch more items, bringing them back and laying them out. He couldn’t carry much at a time, and everything had its own place. A copper bowl, a knife, worn thin and shiny with use. Flint and tinder.

I checked out the recess: nothing more than a shelf-lined cupboard, too small for anyone to lurk in. “Please don’t move anything!” the priest said.

I looked at him as he tottered up, hands held out in distress. He hadn’t reacted to my non-Gudain appearance, or Bergast’s for that matter, and as he turned yellowed eyes on me I realised he was nearly blind. He blinked slowly at me, looking vaguely puzzled. I had the right-shaped features, but was the wrong colour.

“I won’t move anything,” I said. “I’m a guest of the family. Just having a look about.”

That seemed to satisfy him.

He took something else out, a lump of dark green stuff like mud, about the size of my fist. It smelled oversweet, sickly. Incense, probably. No wonder the child didn’t like it; I wasn’t looking forward to breathing that for long. He made his slow, painful way back to the table. That seemed to be the last thing. Bergast wandered about the chapel, making notes, his quill scritching like a mouse in the walls.

“Bergast?”

He looked at the stuff on the table, broke off a bit of the incense, and crumbled it under his nose.

“Bergast. Anything?”

“Oh, yes,” he said. “It’s very interesting. You know, there are some fascinating similarities...”

“I meant, any threat?”

He looked slightly miffed at being reminded of his actual purpose in being here. “Oh. No, nothing I can detect.”

I nodded to the family waiting in the doorway. Enthemmerlee, Selinecree and Enboryay filed in, leaving Rikkinnet outside. Fain was nowhere to be seen, and I wondered, uneasily, what he was up to.

Empty benches, great old polished stone things too heavy to move easily, lined the chapel. The little family, huddled at the front, looked like flotsam washed up on some rocky, hostile shore.

The priest lit the brazier with agonising, arthritic slowness, and only after several tries and almost setting light to his own robe.

“Burn down the bloody chapel one of these days,” Enboryay muttered, quite clearly, but the priest didn’t seem to hear him. Selinecree made a faint distressed noise.

The priest hadn’t seemed to notice Enthemmerlee, sitting a few feet from his nose. He muttered almost inaudibly, with occasional, apparently random, outbursts.

Soon the smoke began to rise, wavering towards the low ceiling, spreading out. A smell of tomb spices and dying lilies thickened the air.

“
Mumble mumble mutter
GREAT ARTificer
mumble mumble
CONTROL
mumble mutter mumble
UNTO his beLOVed CHILDren...”

I felt the smoke creep inside my nose and throat, and tried not to cough. My hair was going to stink of the stuff.

“
Mumble mutter
SACRIFICE
mutter
INNOCENT...”

Oh, that charming old story about the sacrifice maiden again. I wondered if the priest knew, or cared, how many Ikinchli had been beaten up or slaughtered because of a stupid myth. Mind you, being a priest, he might actually believe it himself.

At least standing here gave me a chance to think. I worked out what to do about the guards, if I could find the right lever. I also decided that to find out more about the silk route, I must use Fain’s stance as a merchant to my advantage,
if
I could do it without letting him know my situation. Damned if I would give the man more advantage over me, he had plenty enough.

And he owed me.

Bergast surreptitiously scribbled in his notebook.

Eventually the priest became more consistently audible, as though his voice had needed time to warm up.

“Earthly PASSions burn and
mumble
. Great ARTificer stretches OUT his hand, and quenches the FLAME.
Mumble
so the smoke rises; all is calm, praise the name of the one who quiets the unRULy HEART.”

“Praise the name,” the family mumbled, as though they had caught inaudibility from the priest, apart from Selinecree, sitting very upright, whose voice rang out.

The priest raised his hands to shoulder height, palms down and fingers pointing towards his own chin, then dropped them, and came to a halt, blinking at his tiny congregation.

They all made the same gesture. Selinecree paused to speak to the priest, while the rest of us filed out.

Chitherlee, banned from
privaiya,
had curled up on one of the benches outside. Enthemmerlee stroked the girl’s long pale hair. “Chitherlee, wake up.”

Selinecree hissed, “Enthemmerlee!”

Chitherlee, blinking, righted herself. “Oh, I thought Enkanet was here.”

“No, darling,” Enthemmerlee said. “It was me.”

Chitherlee slid off the bench, frowning. “So now you’re different, will you hug me like Enkanet does?”

“Would you like me to hug you, Chitherlee?”

“Only servants
hug,
” the child said, the jab quick and ugly, and ran off.

Enthemmerlee closed her eyes for a moment.

I caught sight of Stikinisk and another Ikinchli walking near the wall. They seemed to be patrolling. Good. Stikinisk looked different, though; I watched them, trying to work out what had changed. The other guard said something and she threw back her head, hissing laughter, then took a mock punch at him. As they moved on I watched their tails briefly twine around each other, and wondered if that was friendship, or more.

The thought passed across my mind with no more ripple than a leaf drifting on a lake.

Lobik and Fain, deep in conversation, waited for us outside the house. Lobik smiled at Enthemmerlee, but his smile seemed strangely dimmed. Fain watched us with his usual expression of impenetrable courtesy; he had his own clothes back, which must have pleased him. Normally it would please me, too; but his neat figure and handsome features were just that. Neat. Handsome.

I realised the dimness wasn’t in them, it was in me. Not a flicker of lust, not a pinch of passion. What in the name of the All? I don’t walk around in a permanent fever of desire – I’d never get anything done – but here I was, looking straight at Darask Fain, and I felt about as lustful as a loaf of bread.

I turned to look at Stikinisk; those slender, powerful hindquarters, that lithe grace. Nothing. Not a spark.

I felt a chill down to the bottom of my soul. What had happened? Had I been bespelled, poisoned, what?

Chitherlee was waiting for us, peering around the base of one of the statues. She was chewing a lock of her hair, and watching Enthemmerlee.

“Come here, Chitherlee. I want to talk to you.” Enthemmerlee’s voice was gentle, but implacable.

Chitherlee shook her head, but didn’t move.

“Come here.”

Chitherlee let go of the statue and shuffled forward, still chewing her hair.

“Chitherlee, you see me now,” Enthemmerlee said, kneeling down, mud seeping into her gown. “What do you see?”

“You’re different.”

“Yes. I am the Itnunnacklish now. You know what that means?”

Chitherlee started to nod, then shook her head.

“It means I am part of your family, and I am also part of the people who have always served you, and dressed you, and hugged you. Everyone...” She sighed. “Everyone is just people, Chitherlee. Do you understand?”

“Are you part animal now?”

“No. I am part Ikinchli now. But I am still Enthemmerlee. Now,” she said. “Will you hug me?”

Chitherlee put her arms around Enthemmerlee’s shoulders and hugged her, quickly, as though afraid she would break. “There,” she said, stepping back. “Can I go now?”

“Yes, go on,” Enthemmerlee said, getting to her feet.

But Chitherlee didn’t move. “You don’t
feel
like an animal,” she said.

And suddenly, I remembered what she had said at that horrible meal, about becoming an animal. And I knew what had happened.

It was the All-cursed smoke. Intended to damp the flames, to keep the Gudain’s ‘animal’ natures under control.

I was furious. And more than a little frightened. What if it was permanent? I felt numb, crippled. The thought of feeling like this for the rest of my life... I tried to calm my racing heartbeat.