Glasswrights' Apprentice (10 page)

Now, as Rani crouched in hiding, an old woman discreetly swept up a sodden cabbage and lobbed it at the soldier. The man swore and started to round on the crone, but the hum of disapproval rose to an angry buzz.

“I warn you!” the guard growled, “That child might be a traitor! She might be the witchling who called Prince Tuvashanoran to his death! If the king finds you sheltering a conspirator, you'll all be gibbet-meat.”

“Aye, you can't keep your hands on a pickpocket, and so you threaten us!” The cry rang out from the fringe of watching farmers, and agreement echoed down the ranks.

“A traitor! Ha! If you'd been doing your job, the Prince would still be here to say how foolish you sound!”

“Incompetent guard!”

The cries disintegrated into a jumble, and the guard turned in a wary circle, measuring the sweep of his sword against the citizens' mounting outrage. Rani could read the thoughts creeping across his face, as clear as painted glass windows. He did not actually
know
that Rani was a murderer. She
could
have been a panicked child, springing after her father in a crowded marketplace. Pilgrims
were
accorded virtually unlimited courtesy under the law.

The soldier counted the angry merchants and recognized futility.

Jamming his sword into his sheath, he raised angry hands to shoulder level, showing his good intentions, even as his face raged against the crowd. The assembled marketers let the lone man escape, shouting only an occasional epithet. Rani's heart went out to the soldier - he did not deserve such shame when he had merely acted to help a lonely, frightened child.

Well, for that matter, she had not deserved the full scale manhunt that still threatened her. And the Touched had not deserved her accusations. And Cook had not deserved to be assaulted on the edge of her own garden. And Tuvashanoran had not deserved to die.

The Thousand Gods built mysterious cities.

Rani crouched beneath the trestle until her pulse returned to normal. By then, the market was in full swing. Touched women who served as cooks in nobles' houses jostled merchant wives set on finding the best bargains. Rani peered out at the spectacle, measuring the pace of the morning market in the well-worn leather shoes passing before her barricade. When the square appeared to sport enough people that she could melt into the crowd unnoticed, Rani pushed aside her sheltering fabric curtain.

Ducking from beneath the trestle, she immediately realized the magnitude of her mistake. Two men stood on either side of her hideaway, hammy fists on hips, severe frowns creasing their jowls. One wore the traditional leather apron of a baker, but the other - the one nearest her - wore a bloody linen apron that had once been white. Both boasted brooches on their left breasts, carefully fretted hemp tied into the familiar knot of the Merchants' Council.

The baker and the butcher took two ominous steps forward, and Rani's stomach turned as the sweet-rotten smell of animal gore assaulted her nostrils. The butcher closed his fingers around her upper arm, pinching the meat against her bones. “What have we here?”

“Looks like a rat has gotten into the market.” The baker spat through a huge gap in his front teeth.

“Let go of me! I'm the daughter of Thomas Pilgrim. I've come to the City on the holy pilgrimage of Jair!”

“Aye, and I am Quan, the harlots' god.” The butcher jerked her arm sharply, dragging her down a small byway toward the market's heart. “Come along, my little magpie. To the Council with you.”

The Council. The word quivered through Rani. Her father had longed to serve on the Merchants' Council his entire life. He sold outside the marketplace, though; he'd never been powerful enough or wealthy enough or popular enough to wear a Councilman's hempen knot.

Rani thought she might prefer another confrontation with Shanoranvilli's guard to a meeting with the Council. From everything her father had ever said about them, they were a mighty force, striking terror in the heart of any trader who dared disobey the caste's rules. Her father's words had been laced with jealousy and suspicion - there was a never-dying tension between the merchants who sold their goods in the marketplace and those who - like Rani's family - sold their wares in the streets of the Merchants' Quarter.

Since the merchant class had no desire to submit to constant visits from the king's soldiers, it had evolved the Council to serve as its own police force. The Council was not empowered to take military action, and it could not mete out any formal punishment for violations of the King's Peace. Theft, assault, and other crimes against the King's Peace were still handled by the guard. But marketplace disputes were reviewed by the Council; the merchants kept their own strictly in line.

Rani certainly was not put at ease by the brawny baker and butcher who forced their way through the crowd. The men bellowed when customers or merchants got in their way, and neither hesitated to apply a hammy fist to ease their passage. Rani, glancing over her shoulder in half-hearted contemplation of escape, saw the old egg-woman parading behind their little procession, holding her head high, even as gummy yolk solidified on her apron.

Sooner than Rani cared for, she was pushed toward a dark little hallway that led to the covered portico at the core of the marketplace. Ironically, the Council sat near the scale-masters where she had fantasized meeting Thomas Pilgrim. The intricate stone ceiling writhed with beasts and flowers, filtering out most of the morning's rosy light.

“Morning, Your Grace,” the butcher said, and Rani peered into the shadows, trying to discern a body in the gloom. As her eyes adjusted, she could make out a tall man sitting in a folding wooden chair, his bony hands relaxed on carved arm-rests. Shrewd eyes glinted beneath his bald pate, and shadows made a skull out of his sunken cheeks. The dim light picked out a fist-sized hempen knot secured to his left breast.

“It's too early for disturbances in the marketplace.” The man's voice was old, and Rani wondered who held the post of Chief Councilor this season. The job rotated among the most respected merchants; so far, it had remained far beyond her father's grasp.

“Not too early for the likes of this gutter rat.” The baker spoke this time, pushing Rani forward, so that she fell to her knees. “Broke all of Narda's eggs, she did.”

“Narda, do you seek the judgment of the Council?”

“Aye, Borin.” The woman managed to make her two words a pitiable plea for assistance, even as she gloated over being the center of attention.

“And you,” Borin directed his words to Rani. “What are you called?”

Rani ran through the possibilities. “Ranita” would likely do her more harm than good;
she could scarcely demand to be handed over to guildsman justice when she could not name her guild.
“Rai” would earn her a severe beating, if not worse - merchants considered the lawless Touched
children an unfortunate blight, like flooding, drought, and insect infestation. There was little
point in appending “Pilgrim” to her name - she certainly had no Star to mark her pilgrimage, and a
quick inquiry at the cathedral would clarify that no panicked Pilgrim Thomas sought his daughter.
Shrugging in resignation, she managed to voice the two syllables, “Rani.”

“Rani.” The old man's voice was as stony as the canopy above his head. “Do you have family to stand beside you as the Council decides its verdict?”

“No, Your Grace.” Rani longed to name her father, longed to throw herself on the mercy of the Council for help in finding her missing family. Such a request, though, would only raise nasty questions, impossible questions. Better to stand alone than to stand surrounded by the King's Guard.

As if acknowledging her decision, Borin nodded before turning to the butcher. “What happened to Rani in the marketplace?”

Rani listened as her exploits were recounted. Even though her knees itched where they were caught between two bricks, she did not shift position. She did not like the tone of the butcher's voice, but he was fair enough in his words, describing how she had fled Shanoranvilli's guards and upset various tables, including the one bearing all of Narda's eggs.

“And what other damage did she do?”

“Tarin lost two dozen melons - they were bruised enough that he'll likely not sell them. Rordi claims she trampled his squash, but two other merchants say he damaged his own goods, hoping for a Council verdict and a free afternoon. Others lost their displays, but their wares were not destroyed.”

Borin nodded slowly, weighing the personalities involved, measuring out his own knowledge of the merchants under his supervision. Rani remained enough of a merchant's daughter to take pride in the Council's smooth governance, even as she feared the penalty Borin would extract.

“Rani, do you have anything to say for yourself before the Council speaks?”

“No, Your Grace.”

“Do you have any money to pay for disturbing the Market's peace?”

“No, Your Grace.”

“Do you have any reason that the Council should not announce its verdict, binding you and the merchants you have wronged today?”

“No, Your Grace.”

“Very well. The Council gives this verdict. Rordi suffers punishment enough, in not having his own wares to sell. Rani will scrub down Tarin's stall every night for two weeks, and she will mind the stall for him during the noon hour for those same two weeks. A Councilor will watch from nearby and make sure that all the coins owed to Tarin get to him each day. As for Narda, Rani will be her servant for a fortnight, doing her command in all things at all times, except for those hours when the child meets her obligations to the other merchants. The Council will pay Narda from the Common Fund for today's loss of eggs.”

Narda crowed her delight, but both the butcher and the baker satisfied themselves with tight nods. Borin's sentence was a fair one. The old man looked Rani directly in the eye. “You hear the Council's verdict. By your name, you are already sworn to abide by the Council. Will you stand by that oath, or do you demand the King's Justice?”

Rani hung her head and forced a whisper. “I will abide by the Council.”

“Then rise up, Rani, and go to your appointed duties. In a fortnight, the Council will review your actions and determine if further sanctions are necessary. I release you into Narda's care. The egg-woman is responsible for feeding you during your service. Beware the Council and the King's Justice if you fail to do as you have sworn.”

Rani bowed her head in the gesture of submission she had used before her father for years. Authority was authority, whether in the guise of a parent or a judge in a crowded marketplace. Borin nodded, and the baker dug into a coffer, counting out coins to remunerate Narda for her losses.

As the woman hid away the coppers, she turned to her charge. “Come, girl. What do they call you? Rani? Well, Rani, we've a long day ahead of us, don't we?”

Rani followed the diminutive merchant back through the stalls. No one took notice of them now; the marketplace was flooded with townsfolk filling their larders with fine goods. Rani quickly ceased to have time to watch the shoppers. Narda handed her a rag and a small wire brush and ordered her to get to work, cleaning the toppled egg-stand. Narda, unexpectedly freed from a day's labor in the marketplace, took her settlement funds and made her way to a distant stall already setting out tankards of ale.

Rani quickly discovered that the eggs she had broken were not the first to paint the table. Glue-like yolk crusted the cracks between planks, and the trestle legs gleamed with an albumen glaze. The rag helped to wipe up the worst of the morning's misadventures, but Rani settled down to a long day's work with the wire brush.

The labor proved no more difficult, though, than many of the tasks she had mastered at the guildhall. The scrubbing created its own rhythm, and Rani hummed to herself as she wielded her tools. She vaguely remembered despising such jobs when she worked for her parents, but she had learned the true value of labor during her life as an apprentice. At least the sun was warm in the sky above her, and here in the marketplace, there were no embers to burn her, no lead fumes to inhale. She would not be cut by daggers of near-invisible glass. All things considered, her binding to Narda was no more difficult than her obligation to the glasswrights had been.

Most importantly, she had time to think as she sat cross-legged in the marketplace. She needed to formulate a plan. The guild was likely in ruins by now, all the glasswrights chained in Shanoranvilli's prison. Another apprentice was probably thumbless, maimed in the service of Rani's escape. Cook was almost definitely dead, Lan keep her. Rani's family was certainly arrested, if not worse, and her home was burned.

Tears stung at the corners of Rani's eyes, but she swallowed hard, berating herself that she was merely reacting to the pungent smell of egg yolk, freed from the wood trestle. If only she had not been ordered to bring Morada's lunch to the cathedral.…

Morada. There was the key.

Rani did not believe that Instructor Morada had murdered Tuvashanoran. In the first place, Rani could not imagine actually
knowing
a cold-blooded murderer. In the second place, although Morada had been angry on the scaffold, Rani had tormented her siblings enough to know that the Instructor's anger was rooted in fear, not in murderous rage. In the third place - and most importantly - Morada had a glasswright's body. Her fingers were nimble and deft; she could cut a plate of glass into the most intricate of designs. The woman's arms, though, were a craftsman's; she could not pull a bowstring taut; she did not have the skill to hit a target hundreds of ells away.

Fine. Morada was not the murderer. Nevertheless, she had welcomed the murderer to her scaffold. Certainly, that was the meaning of the Instructor's nervousness when Rani arrived with lunch; that was the reason for the cold hatred that Rani had read in Morada's grey eyes.