Glasswrights' Apprentice (9 page)

The girl shook her head scornfully, spitting out the single syllable. “Rai. Ye're stakin' claim to a Touched name, then, are ye?”

“Touched or a God,” Rani muttered, wondering if she would actually have to use the metal knife that warmed beneath her fingers. Her blasphemy drew an unexpected laugh from the girl.

“Ach, ye're no Touched girl, but ye've figured our way o' thinkin'. Touched, Gods, we draw no lines 'ere i' th' streets. What've ye got t' share wi' us, Rai?”

“To share? I don't have -” Rani remembered the carrots she had dug reflexively from
Cook's plot. “I've brought carrots from the garden.”

“Garden! We Touched don't 'ave
gardens
, girl. Don't make me call ye a liar.”

“Not
my
garden. The garden of the gl-” Rani's assumed scorn melted as she
realized she could not even speak the name of her former home. These Touched brats might just be
waiting for the opportunity to summon the guard. Everyone knew you couldn't trust the Touched,
especially not the bands of ragtag children who roamed the City unsupervised while their parents
worked as servants for the nobles and the priests. Rani swallowed a tight knot of fear and
reformulated her retort. “The garden at the stone heap Shanoranvilli's soldiers are destroying. I
ducked through the wall they're tearing down and helped myself. Those miserable guildsmen won't have
any need of
carrots
when the king is through with them.”

Either the swagger in Rani's voice was convincing, or the children were awed by her bravery in facing down Shanoranvilli's men. The crew stepped back, and even the leader paused before settling her possessive hand on the filthy roots. “Been chased by th' kings' men m'self, I've been. Can make a soul 'ungry.” Strong teeth crunched on carrots, and Rani dutifully produced roots for each of the other children. Rabe snatched two, and Rani was left with only one gnarled carrot for herself. Her loss was swiftly forgotten as the Touched's leader extended a grimy hand. “Name's Mair.”

Each of the other children took their cue from their leader, and Rani found herself shaking one dirty paw after another. She barely resisted the urge to rub her hand against her thigh after each filthy contact, especially when a challenge sparked from Rabe's eyes as he squeezed her fingers tightly.

“So, Rai,” Mair continued. “Ye dinna talk like ye're from th' City, at least not fro' th' Touched. Ye might watch that, y'know. If th' guard 'eard ye, they'd ask 'ard questions. They've been a little crazed, since 'Is Lordship took that arrow in 'is eye.”

“May the Prince's soul rest in peace,” Rani mumbled, lapsing into the etiquette her mother had pounded into her. The piety merely garnered a newly appraising look from the Touched children.

“P'r'aps ye're a Pilgrim's child, forgotten i' th' City streets?”

“No, I -”

“A
Pilgrim's
child might not know our ways, 'n' she might say th' wrong things at th' wrong time 'n' be o'erlooked. By th' Guard. Or by others i' th' Streets.”

Before Rani could respond, a clatter of boots on cobblestones echoed from the far end of the alley. “Soldiers!” hissed Mair, and the children scattered into doorways and scraps of shadow. Rani, taken by surprise, did not leap with the same agility and was left exposed in the middle of the street.

“Rai-” came Mair's strangled warning, bitten off as the guard turned down the narrow
lane. It was too late - Rani would only endanger the other children by following them into a doorway
now. The soldiers would not hesitate to round up the entire group, meting out whatever justice a
band of Touched urchins could expect on a misty morning when a prince had just been murdered.

Muttering a prayer to her new patron, Lan, Rani drew herself up to her full height as the soldiers emerged from the mist. “On your knees before your betters, brat. We heard your whispering, and the curfew not over for another hour yet. Who were you talking to? And why shouldn't we cut you down on the spot?”

Rani froze as even more soldiers loomed out of the fog. Their voices were harsh against the mist, and she surprised herself by bursting into explosive tears.

“Aye, you stand there! Keep your hands where we can see them!” The guard's harsh orders fed Rani's sobs, and she hiccuped for breath as she dropped her gnawed carrot to the cobblestones. Even as she wept, though, a plan formed in the most devious corner of her mind. She measured out a little more despair into her tears and peeked up at the troops' leader from beneath silvered lashes.

“P-please, your honor,” she stammered, then let her voice tremble away into another shuddering gasp. From the corner of her eye, she saw her words begin to have their desired effect; the soldier who had circled around to her right let his sword droop toward the cobble stones. She sniffled and tried again, “If you please, your honor, could you direct me toward the marketplace?”

“And what would a gutter rat like you want with the marketplace, an hour before dawn?”

Rani despaired at the man's harsh tone, and her voice quavered as she spun out her answer. “My da said I should meet him there if I ever got l-l-lost in the City!”

“And who's your da?”

“Thomas Pilgrim, your honor. We've walked all the way from Tyne-on-Shane.”

“Tyne-on-Shane? I've never heard of it.”

“There's no reason your honor should have,” Rani responded quickly, neglecting to mention that the village had not existed a few heartbeats earlier. “We are a humble little village, far to the north. Your honor could not know the home of every poor Pilgrim who walks in Jair's footsteps.” Rani hastily made a holy sign as she spoke the name of the First Pilgrim, remembering to sniffle a little as the guard furrowed his brow.

“If you're a pilgrim, where's your Star?”

Rani burst into new tears; she had been so hopeful she could carry off this sham. Of course she would be discovered - all pilgrims carried the Thousand-Pointed Star as a symbol of their mission. A Star would have been her ticket to inns along the road, through the City gates, into the holiest of chapels in the cathedral. With the Star, she was a sacred wanderer who commanded the religious dedication of the guard. Without it, she was only a street urchin.

“Th-that's why I'm here,” she choked on the lie. “I had my Star when I came into the City, and I lost it in the streets. The Touched attacked me in the alley there, and they ripped it from my clothes. If I don't find it, my da'll have my hide.”

Her conscience twinged as she accused Mair and her cohorts of crimes against her imagined Pilgrim self, but she rapidly translated her guilt into vulnerability, adding to the image by rubbing her thin arms in the chill fog. Her pitiful sobs proved too much for the kindly soldier on her right. “Don't cry, little pilgrim.” Burly arms pulled her to her feet, and Rani had to discipline herself not to shove away the raspy uniform. “We'll take you to the marketplace. Your da will come for you at dawn.”

“My da'll never speak to me again!” Rani managed to exclaim as the guard extracted a grimy kerchief from a pouch at his waist.

“Nonsense. He'll be so relieved to get you back he'll forget your wandering off. Blow.” Rani obediently cleared her runny nose, acting as if she were the infant this soldier apparently expected, rather than a self-possessed girl of thirteen. “You're just lucky it was the guard that found you. You can never be too wary of the Touched, and other miscreants roaming these streets.”

“Miscreants?” Rani's voice trembled over the unfamiliar word.

“Aye, little pilgrim. You must be new to the city, if you have not heard our woes. An evil girl has helped to murder Prince Tuvashanoran. Just tonight, she tried to break into a tinker's shop, stealing food and threatening to set fire to an infant's cradle.”

Rani let a little of her residual anger at Varna - at her
former
best friend - spill into her words. “No one could be so evil!”

“Aye, little pilgrim, so you might think. But not all girls are as obedient as you.” The soldier wiped away Rani's tears with an avuncular thumb. “Come along, little one. We'll take you to the marketplace. It's not safe to wander these streets alone. You've already found the Touched - you don't know what other evil you might encounter.”

Rani could see that the captain of the guard was not as tender-hearted as this man, but she let her adoptive savior settle his military cloak about her shoulders. The garment was long on her, fluttering about her knees. Before Rani could be grateful for the warmth, the soldier exclaimed, “What ho!” He poked his fingers through the ragged hole in her tunic, through the threads that had sported her glasswright's badge. “What's this?”

“That's where my Star was! That's where my ma stitched on my Pilgrim's badge, so I could pass through the City protected by all the Thousand Gods!” Real panic tinged Rani's voice, and she tried to wriggle free from the guard's grasp. The captain harrumphed, and she tried to translate the sound to either disbelief of a murderer's tale or disgust at a pilgrim's clumsiness. Her adoptive soldier flashed a look at his superior.

“Permission to accompany this child to the marketplace, Captain?”

“Who's to say she's not the brat we're looking for, man?”

“Look at her! Does she look like she was part of a plot to kill Prince Tuvashanoran? This little one could hardly blow her own nose!”

Rani swallowed her indignation at the man's patronizing tone, hunching her shoulders to make herself appear even smaller. The captain stared at her pitiful form and snarled to his man, “Go ahead, then. Take her to the market. If her father's not in sight, hand her over to the Council, and let's be about our watch.”

The soldier saluted, and Rani bobbed her head in wordless gratitude. She remained silent as they worked their way through the streets, not even crying out when shadows flickered in the fog and she just made out the shapes of the Touched children she had befriended - and betrayed. She did not know if Mair traveled to help or to seek vengeance against Rani's accusations.

Even with the threat of the Touched children, Rani looked for an opportunity to slip away from the soldier. As soon as the sun rose, he was likely to look at her tunic again, to realize that the missing Thousand-Pointed Star had not settled on her right sleeve, but rather on her left - typical location of a guild insignia. For that matter, the guard was likely to reflect on the wisdom of believing any grubby child alone in the streets - pilgrim or no.

The decision was soon taken from Rani. Arriving at the edge of the marketplace, she scanned the bustling folk who scrambled about to display their wares for the new day. Graceful stone pillars marched across the square, their intricate stonework supporting heavy tarpaulins that sagged with morning dew. The rising sun tinted the sky, rose light seeping into misty grey. Row after row of stalls stretched across the market.

The soldier led her deeper into the narrow streets, passing temptingly near the food stands. The pungent scent of cheeses wafted through the air, and a number of butchers had set up stalls beneath a fly-buzzing canopy. Pyramids of vegetables towered to her left. Already, buyers swarmed, pressed close against each other as late-arriving merchants choked the pathways with their trestle tables.

“So, child,” the soldier said, resting a proprietary hand on Rani's shoulder, “where were you to meet your family?”

“My father said he would wait by the scale-masters. He said men charged with maintaining the king's measures would protect a lost child.” Rani was improvising. She knew that the scale-masters were in the very heart of the marketplace, manning their brass balances so that customers could complain about merchants' short measures.

“There we go, then.” The soldier began to force his way through the congealing crowd. Rani waited until the man was turned sideways, edging between a donkey-cart and a permanent stand whose owner was setting out the last of her several dozen eggs.

“Papa!” Rani exclaimed in a shrill voice. Scores of men turned toward her cry, including a knot of pilgrims several yards away. The soldier looked up, startled, then let an easy smile paint his face.

“You, there!” he called to the black-robed worshipers. “You seem to have mislaid a treasure along the Pilgrim's Road!”

Rani waited just long enough for confusion to blossom on the pilgrims' faces, and then she shrugged from under the soldier's hand, ducking beneath the table that held the towering eggs.

The result was more spectacular than she could have imagined. The soldier, kind as he was, was still a trained man-at-arms, and he was not about to be stopped by a mere table. Lunging for his escaping charge, he crashed through dozens of eggs. The liquid clatter startled the donkey that had blocked his way, and the beast began to bray and buck, toppling its flimsy cart and striking out with sharp hooves against everything around him.

Rani exploited the chaos to duck down another aisle toward the crowded heart of the marketplace. Farmers cried out at her passage, and more than one well-laid board flew into the air. Pots of golden honey fell victim to her mad rush, and a pyramid of particularly fragrant melons rolled to the ground.

Despite the chaos - or perhaps because of it - Rani found it easy to melt into the crowd. The soldier's cloak she wore
was
darkest crimson, and the sun was not yet completely over the horizon. Wiping a mixture of egg yolk, honey, and pulpy bread from her face, Rani dived beneath a curtained stand, huddling beneath a pile of carrots and potatoes until the outcry faded around her.

As she squinted through a gap in the cloth of her sheltering trestle, Rani's heart
raced. Her lone guardsman was soon isolated in the middle of the market. Rani, a merchant-child at
heart, was fully aware of the conflicts between her caste and the soldier's. The merchant-farmers
were no different from her own family of trinket-sellers; they had certainly suffered beneath the
guards' tyrannical attention in the past. There were soldiers notorious for offering “protection”;
most merchants tithed to the guard, whether they cared to or not.