Glasswrights' Apprentice (21 page)

“What's today?” Rani asked as she slunk up to the little domestic scene. Pride forbade her to admit that the crust of bread in the child's grimy hand looked appetizing. One thing about all this roaming the City streets - she felt as if she'd never eat her fill again.

“Turnin' Out Day.” Rabe answered, his features pulled into a grimace at her ignorance.

Rani felt a sick turn of horror in her belly. She had seen Turning Out from the safety of her parents' shop. Soldiers drove the Touched hordes from their parasitic sites, making the four quarters of the City clean and safe again for Jair's favored castes. Even as Rani tried to swallow her panic, Mair turned her attention to the anxious faces that looked up at her. “All right, troops. 'R' ye ready? Pell, where'll we meet on th' outside?”

A young boy, peering through matted hair that hung to his shoulders, flashed his gap-toothed grin at the leader. “We'll meet at th' stagin' area fer th' merchants, outside o' th' Merchants' Gate.”

“Aye,” Mair nodded, reaching out an authoritative hand to tousle the child's filthy hair. “'N' when'll we gather there? Trace?”

A coltish girl flashed a nervous smile about the group, ducking her head shyly. “We'll gather at th' third hour after noon, Mair.”

“Brice, Felt, where 're ye goin', as fast as ye can make yer way?” Mair picked out two of the smaller children, grimy twins who had made a formidable team during yesterday's scouring of the Noble's Quarter.

“We'll run t' th' Touched Core, 'n' let everyone know we're rousted but well.” Brice answered immediately, his freckled face serious as if he contemplated a mental map of the City's tangled streets.

Mair nodded. “'N' tonight? When we're back inside th' walls?”

Felt answered, his filthy brow puckered in deep thought. “We'll be findin' ye 'n' reportin' back any word fro' th' Core. We'll look fer ye i' th' marketplace one hour after th' Pilgrims' Bell starts ringin', and then ever' hour after that.”

“Right, then! Good luck, all. Keep yer eyes peeled 'n' yer ears clear.” Mair held out her filthy hand, setting it in the middle of the half-circle of children. Within seconds, each member of the troop had added a fist to the collection. Rani hesitated only a second before she, too, floated her hand among her fellows. Excitement trembled through their fingers, arcing across her taut skin like the crackle of static electricity. “T' th' Touched!” Mair cried.

“T' th' Touched!” the children echoed, and one or two added, in piping voices, “T' Mair!”

Before the leader could acknowledge the salute, the pound of soldiers' feet became a thunderstorm, and a phalanx of armed guards rounded the corner. The men walked four deep, the soldiers in the first row sporting heavy, boiled-leather shields. All the men wore fearsome masks, gruesome features carved out of hardened leather and wood. Rani recognized Sorn, the god of obedience, and Tarn, the god of death. There was Cot, the god of the soldiers themselves, and a warlike depiction of Pelt, the god of Order.

As the soldiers pounded forward, panic pulsed through Rani's body. As soon as the armed company saw the Touched, they broke ranks, each man working with two or three of his fellows to encircle a terrified child. The Touched were driven like a herd of disorganized sheep through the streets. Any attempts to break away were brutally suppressed.

As Rani watched her colleagues scramble, the full weight of Mair's warning swooped down on her. The soldiers were actually driving the Touched children from the City, punishing them for daring to beg, daring to live outside the caste system. It hardly mattered if the children did not survive their sojourn beyond the City walls. There were always more Touched brats.

Every day of Rani's civilized life, she had heard of the horrors beyond the City walls. Life outside was hard in countless ways. King Shanoranvilli's protection was less certain in the countryside. The Pilgrims' Bell, summoning travelers into the safety of the City, away from ravening wolves, was only one symbol of the safety that Shanoranvilli offered his people. Rani knew that highwaymen traveled the roads, and there were tales of strange illnesses that descended on unprotected villages and destroyed every man, woman, and child in a single night. She had heard of one group that branded children for entertainment, carving off their ears and noses and etching evil runes on innocents' foreheads.

As a merchant, as an apprentice, if Rani had ever bothered to think about Turning Out, she would have concluded that it was the only way to deal with casteless hordes. After all, it wasn't permanent banishment, merely a warning, a show of the power that the king
could
exercise, if he so chose.

Now, her blood pounding like the warning klaxon of the Pilgrims' Bell, Rani convulsed at the thought of being cast outside the City walls. How could these soldiers throw her to the wolves outside the City - the beasts both animal and human that would certainly plot her death? How could grown men condemn children to torture and maiming?

Rani stumbled and came down hard on her knee, crying out as tears sprang to her eyes. For just an instant, Mair turned around, snarling at the guards in an attempt to break through to her fallen companion. A flame-edged spear convinced the leader of her foolishness, though, and Mair threw up her arms in fury. “Remember, Rai! On th' outside!”

Before Mair could offer further encouragement, her shepherding soldier landed a heavy blow across her face. Rani's cheeks flushed hot with shame. Here she was, afraid of pain on the outside of the City, and her only friend in all the world was being beaten
inside
the supposed safety of the City walls. Beaten, the apprentice realized, because of Rani's own fear and weakness.

“Lan,” Rani prayed, “look upon me with your blessing. Keep me safe from harm outside the City walls.” Rani continued to extemporize her prayer as she swallowed hard, bracing herself to make a break for the City gates. She hesitated too long, though, and found herself hopelessly outdistanced by her companions. She glanced about, frantic to find a means of escape, but before she could make her desperate dash, she was cut off by a well-armed soldier.

The man was a full head taller than Rani's own father, and his arms bulged from his leather jerkin like joints of meat hanging in a butcher shop. He wore his hair in a warrior's clout, but his beard was not so tamed; ancient grease competed with that morning's bread crumbs to tangle the russet strands. As the man opened his mouth to bellow at the cowering child, Rani reeled beneath a wave of foul-smelling breath, and she saw that the soldier lacked more teeth than he boasted. Rani, stomach churning, planted her heels and faced down the man.

“Ach,” the guard bellowed, “What have we here?”

“Rai!” Mair called over the tumult, tossing out a lifeline into the maelstrom of Rani's panic. “Don't fight th' soldiers! We'll meet ye on th' outside!
Outside
!”

“Aye, gutter rat, go meet your pack on the outside.” The soldier leered as he spat the last word, and Rani felt slippery cobblestones beneath her leather soles. Contradicting his own speech, the man cut her off from escape.

“What are you going to do with me?” Rani's voice quavered as she tried to remember how to breathe.

“Do with you?” The man threw back his head and laughed humorlessly, chilling Rani to the bone. “Quite the fierce tiger cub, aren't you?” The man reached out a broken-nailed hand, clearly intending to grasp the meat of Rani's arm. Catching her breath at the indignity, Rani gave up a sound like an animal caught in a trap. Too late, she realized that the only person in the alley who heard her cry was the soldier; the rest of the king's men had completed their sweep of the streets, driving the herd of surprisingly calm children to the City gates. Rani was alone with an opponent who bettered her in weight, experience, and sheer gall. “Let's see if this little cub remembers how to suck milk.”

Closing his massive hand around Rani's throat, the man forced her against the wall. Even as he cut off her breath with cruel fingers, his free hand fumbled with the lacing of his trews. Rani's struggles only excited the man more, and his breath came in short, evil-smelling gasps. He leaned close to cover her mouth with his own, and she tossed her head with the desperation of a horse trying to throw off a bit. She was rewarded by a knee driven, sharp and hard, between her legs, and the soldier's heavy body pinned her firmly.

Rani began to cry, forgetting that she was no longer a merchant's daughter, that she was not even the lowest of apprentices in the glasswrights' guild. She was only a Touched child, separated from her troop in the City streets.

The soldier recognized helplessness when he saw it, and laughter rose from deep in his belly. “Aye, little tiger. Mewl for your mother to come and free you! I've news for you, tiger cub. Your mother is dead and skinned.”

The soldier had finally succeeded in loosening the tie on his breeches, and he leered at Rani as his beefy fingers closed around her neck, forcing her to kneel on the cobblestones. “No, little tiger, there's no one to help you now.” His breath panted between clenched teeth as he drove Rani's head back against the wall.

She twisted away, stiffening her fingers as if they truly were tiger claws. When she struck out at the man's gut, though, she was rewarded only with a surprised laugh. As the soldier towered over her, Rani raised her hands for one last defense.

The soldier's uniform was so filthy, Rani would not have known he wore Shanoranvilli's gold and crimson if she had not first seen him with his fellow guards. The fabric was stiff with dirt, and Rani's fingers scrabbled for a purchase as she tried to push away her leering attacker. His breath came hot and foul above her, and her desperate fingers tangled in the rigid laces on his breeches. To her horror, the rotten uniform fabric split open at the seams, and a torrent of curses rained down upon her.

“My uniform! There'll be no saving you now, girl!” The soldier's rage turned his face as crimson as his breeches should have been. “Your own mother couldn't help you now, tiger cub. Nor your father, nor all your sisters and brothers!”

Rani, though, knew better. She found herself staring at a nightmare pattern, an outline so familiar that she knew she had dreamed it all her life, and all the lifetimes she had lived before. Four snakes, eight eyes - she hardly had to count any longer. The tattoo writhed on the soldier's thigh, snaring the girl's attention more thoroughly than the man's now-meaningless nakedness.

Staring at the pattern, she raised suddenly fearless eyes to the fighting man. “And if my brother is Bardo Trader? What then, soldier? Who will save you then?”

 

 

Chapter 9

 

 

“I'm telling you, if I could take you to the Brotherhood tonight, I would! By Cot, you're a nuisance!” The soldier kept his voice low, but he pounded his fist on the mess hall table, nearly upsetting his tankard in his frustrated rage. Rani glanced about the room nervously, but none of the other soldiers even acknowledged Garadolo's outburst.

She suspected that they would pay the same attention if he suddenly pulled a knife and slit her throat, and that suspicion reined her voice to a hoarse whisper. “And I'm telling you, you'd best find a way to take me to Bardo. Don't you understand? There's a reward in it for you - more beer than even you could drink in a year.” Gluttony gleamed in Garadolo's eyes, and Rani pressed her advantage. “Besides, if you don't take me to him, I'll find someone who will. And when Bardo hears some of the stories I can tell him about the dangers of living in the City streets.…” Rani let her voice trail off, and Garadolo shifted uncomfortably on his wooden bench.

“No need to spread tales, girl. No need at all.” He waved over a serving lad, indicating that Rani's bowl should be filled again. Garadolo might be a drunkard and a lout, but he was generous with his soldier's rations.

Rani tucked into the fare greedily, enjoying watching the man squirm. When she had revealed her family ties, he had lost all semblance of lust. It had taken only a minute for him to rewrite his actions, to whine that he had only been jesting. He was a compassionate man, he vowed. He was not about to leave Rani on her own, with only the lice-ridden Touched for companions. He swore he would not let Rani out of his sight until he had restored her to her brother.

Rani was no fool. She heard the thoughts beneath his solemn words: there was no telling what trouble a Touched brat might bring on a soldier who had forsworn his loyalty oaths to his king and his birth-vow of conduct as a member of the soldiers' caste. There was no end to the danger of a snake tattoo.

Rani had been forced to twist her own tale around the truth. She could describe her brother readily enough, leaving no doubt in Garadolo's mind that she did, in fact, know Bardo. She clearly recognized the intertwined snakes, and she took every discreet opportunity to remind him of the tattoo's ominous connection with the Brotherhood. Nevertheless, she had been forced to admit that she did not presently know where Bardo was hiding. While she hinted at some secret family mode of communication to track him down, Garadolo had seen that she had no way to access her notorious brother directly. At least not promptly.

Rani was repulsed that she needed Garadolo's assistance. Independent by nature, she was loathe to trust a man who pawed young girls. Still, there was no one else that she could turn to. While it seemed that half the City bore the cryptic sign of the snakes, she knew the whereabouts of no other
living
person with the Brotherhood's tattoo. As disgusted as she was by the soldier, and as frightened as she would never admit to being, she knew that he was her most likely tool for finding Bardo. She forbade herself to imagine what she would do if he proved as prone to accident and death as all the others she had found who bore the Brotherhood's insignia.