Point of Hopes (10 page)

“
Well, she should have an heiress
by now,” Cijntien said, stubbornly. Neither man needed to say who
he meant: the Queen of Chenedolle’s childless state had been the
subject of speculation for years. “Or have named one. The Starsmith
is moving, it’ll enter the Charioteer within the year—”

“
Or next year, or the year after,”
Eslingen interrupted, his voice equally firm. Anyone in
Chenedolle—in the known world—knew what that meant: the Starsmith
was the brightest of the moving stars, the ruler of death,
monarchs, and magists, and its passage from one sign to the next
signaled upheavals at the highest levels. The current queen’s
grandmother had died during such a transit, and the transit before
that had been marked by civil war; it was not unreasonable to fear
this passage, when the current queen was no longer young, and
childless. But the tertiary zodiac, the one in which the Starsmith
moved, as opposed to the zodiacs of the sun and winter-sun, was
still poorly defined, its boundaries the subject of debate even
within Astreiant’s university. The Starsmith might well pass from
the Shell to the Charioteer this year, or not for another four or
five years; it all depended on who you asked.

“
At least you don’t say never,”
Cijntien muttered. “Like some godless Chadroni.”

“
Whatever else you may say about
me, you can’t call me that.”

“
Godless?”

“
Chadroni.”

Cijntien laughed. “I have missed you, Philip, and I
don’t deny it’d be good to have you along this trip, if only for
the company. But I mean it, this is not a good time to be a Leaguer
here.”

“
Because of missing children,”
Eslingen said. “Missing, you said, not dead?”

“
No one’s found bodies, at any
rate,” Cijntien answered.

“
So how many of them have just
decided to take to the roads?” Eslingen asked. “It’s Midsummer, or
nearly, fair season—hiring season. When did you leave home,
Dausset, or did you start out a soldier?”

“
As it happened, yes, and I left
home at the spring balance,” Cijntien said. “But that’s not what’s
happening, or so they say. It’s the wrong children, not the
southriver rats and rabble, but the merchants’ brats from north of
the river. Those children don’t run away, Philip. They’ve got too
much to stay for.”

Eslingen made a face, still skeptical, but unwilling
to argue further. In his experience, the merchant classes were as
likely to run as any other, depending on their stars and
circumstances—he’d served with enough of them in various companies,
even with a few who had taken to soldiering like ducks to water.
“Still, there’s no reason to blame us. It’s past the campaign
season—gods, if I couldn’t find a company hiring, how will some
half-trained butcher’s brat? If they’re looking to blame someone,
let them blame the ship captains.”

“
Oh, they’re doing that,” Cijntien
began, and a hand slammed down onto the table.

“
And what do you know about
butcher’s brats, Leaguer?” Eslingen swallowed a curse, more at his
own unruly tongue than at the stranger, looked up to see one of the
butchers staring down at them. He was a young man, probably only a
journeyman yet, but he held onto the table as though he needed its
support. Which he probably does, Eslingen added silently, wrinkling
his nose at the smell of neat spirit that hung about him. Drunk,
and probably contentious—there’s no point in being too polite with
him, but I don’t want a fight, either.

“
Little enough,” he said aloud and
gave the youth his best blank smile, the one he’d copied from the
Ile’norder lieutenants, sixteen quarterings and not a demming in
his pocket. “A—figure of speech, I think it’s called an example, a
part standing for the whole.”

“
There’s a butcher’s brat gone
missing,” the journeyman went on, as though he hadn’t heard a word
the other had said and Eslingen was suddenly very aware of the
quiet spreading out from them as people turned to look and listen.
“This morning—last night maybe. And I want to know what you know
about it, soldier.”

“
This morning,” Eslingen said
speaking not so much to the drunken boy in front of him but the
listeners beyond, the ones who were still sober and could cause
real trouble, “I was with my troop at the Horse Road camps, being
paid off by Her Majesty’s intendants—and I was there the night
before, too, for that matter, making ready for it. There’s a
hundred men who’ll witness for me.” He could feel the tension
relax—he wasn’t likely quarry anyway, was too new to the city to be
the real cause—and pushed himself easily to his feet. “But no harm
done, my son, let me buy you a drink.”

He came around the table as he spoke, caught the
journeyman by the arm and shoulder, a grip that looked a little
like linked arms but made the slighter man gasp sharply. He started
to pull away, and Eslingen tightened his hold. The journeyman
winced, subsiding, and Eslingen propelled him toward the door,
talking all the while.

“
No? Well, you’re probably right,
you’ve probably had all you want tonight. I hope you have a
pleasant sleep and not too hard a morning.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the other young
men from the table of butchers all on their feet, but hesitating,
not quite certain what to do, and he favored them with a broad,
slightly silly smile. “I think he was just going, don’t you? And
one of you should probably see him home, there’s a good chap, thank
you. Devynck would want it that way, I’m sure.”

The senior journeymen exchanged glances, and then
the older of the two nodded. “I’ll see him home, thanks.”

Eslingen nodded and smiled, but kept his grip on the
younger man until he was actually in the doorway. The senior
journeyman followed him, the rest of the butchers trailing after
him, pausing opposite Eslingen. The wind from the street was cool
and smelled of the middens outside the butchers’ halls, the sharp
green scent of vegetables.

“
You were paid off today? Sergeant,
is it?”

“
Lieutenant,” Eslingen answered. “I
was. I give you my word on it.”

The senior journeyman looked at him for a moment
longer, then, slowly, nodded. “Come on, Paas, let’s get you
home.”

Eslingen released the journeyman’s arm, and let the
rest of them file out past him into the street. They went quietly
enough, embarrassed more than anything, and he was careful not to
say or do anything more. Let them forget as quickly as possible
that Paas disgraced himself, he thought, and that’ll do more to
keep the peace than any threats or arguing. As the last of them
left, he turned back into the tavern, glancing around the room more
out of habit than because he expected more trouble. The
conversations were already returning to normal, nearly everyone
more concerned now with their drinks or a last order of food. He’d
pulled it off, then, and as neatly as he’d ever done. He allowed
himself a slow breath of relief, and Devynck said, “Not bad.”

Eslingen blinked, startled—he hadn’t seen her there
in the shadows, or the big waiter, Loret, who was tucking a cudgel
back under the strings of his apron—and Devynck went on, “I don’t
suppose you’d care to make a habit of it? Defusing the trouble, not
starting it, that is. I’d pay you or take it off your rent.”

Whatever else happened, Eslingen thought, he had not
been expecting an offer of employment, but he wasn’t stupid enough
to turn it down, not when he’d already decided to stay in Astreiant
for the summer. He nodded slowly. “I’d be interested, sergeant, but
I’d rather talk terms in the morning.”

“
Good enough,” Devynck said, and
turned away. “Your beer’s on the house tonight.”

“
Thanks,” Eslingen answered and
allowed himself a wry smile. It was a cheap enough gesture: he
wouldn’t be drinking that much now, not if he wanted to impress
her. And he did want to impress her, he realized suddenly. He
wanted this job, wanted to stay in the city, though he couldn’t
entirely have said why. He shook his head accepting his own
foolishness, and started back to his table and Cijntien.

The list of missing children reported to all the
points station arrived within three days—a measure in and of itself
of the seriousness with which all the Points were taking the
problem, Rathe thought—and was enough to silence even the most
skeptical of the pointsmen. There were eighty-four names on the
list, a little less than half of them from the five northriver
points—no, Rathe realized, more than half, if you counted Point of
Hearts as northriver. Which it was, technically; the district lay
on the north bank of the Sier between the North Chain Tower and the
Western Reach, but it was southriver in population and temperament.
Still, he thought, that was not what any of them had expected.
Logically, if children were going missing, either as runaways or
because they were taken, they should come from southriver, where
there were fewer people of influence to protest their vanishing. Or
else, he added silently, turning over the last closely written
sheet, I would have expected to hear of someone paying out money
for the return of an heiress. And there had been none of that; just
the opposite, in fact, merchant parents coming to the points
stations to report the loss of daughters and sons, and to demand
that the points find their missing offspring. There hadn’t been
much of that in Point of Hopes, yet; the majority of their
complainants had admitted, however grudgingly, that their children
might well have run away—except, of course, for Mailet and the
Quentiers.

Rathe sighed, set the list back in its place—Monteia
had ordered it pinned in a leather folder chained to the duty desk,
to keep the names and descriptions ready to hand—and reached for
his daybook, moving into the fall of light from the window to skim
through the pages of notes. There had been no sign of Gavaret
Cordiere in any of the northriver cells—he had even made a special
trip across the river to Fairs’ Point to ask Claes in person, but
the man had just shaken his head. Not only hadn’t they arrested any
boy matching Cordiere’s description, they hadn’t made point on any
pickpockets for nearly four days. And it wasn’t that the pointsmen
and women were taking fees, Claes added with a quick grin; it was
more that the pickpockets had stopped working. And that, both men
agreed had to be a bad sign—doubly bad, Claes had said, when you
matched it with the new band of astrologers who were working the
fairgrounds. The arbiters had declared they could stay, but no one
needed any more mysteries just now. Rathe had agreed and left
Cordiere’s description in the station, but he wasn’t relishing
telling Estel Quentier of his failure.

“
Rathe? Have you gotten the Robion
girl’s stars yet?”

Rathe looked up to see Monteia standing just outside
the wedge of light, a thin, dark-clad shadow against the dark
walls. “I was going this afternoon. I wanted to check everything
else first.”

“
No luck, then.”

Rathe shook his head barely stopped himself from
glancing again through the pages of notes as though he might find
something new there. He had been to the local markets, and to every
early-opening shop on the Knives Road as well as searching out the
rag-pickers and laundresses who served the street, all without
noticeable result. “A woman who does laundry for the Gorgon’s Head
says she thinks she saw a girl in green going down Knives toward
the Rivermarket, but she can’t remember if it was Demesday or
Tonsday that she saw it—or last year, for that matter. And a
journeyman sneaking in late thinks he might have seen a girl in
green going south, away from the river, but he says freely he was
too drunk to remember his mother’s name.”

“
That’s all?”

“
That’s all.”

“
Nothing at the Rivermarket?”
Monteia went on.

“
Not so far. I’ve been through once
myself, no one remembers her, but it was a busy morning. I’ve asked
Ganier to keep an ear out, though.” Ganier was the pointswoman who
had semiofficial responsibility for the complaints that came from
the district’s markets.

Monteia nodded. “On your way back from Mailet’s—or
to it, I don’t care—I’d like you to stop in the Old Brown Dog. I
hear Aagte Devynck has hired herself a new knife, and I’d like to
see what you think of him. And make sure he understands our
position on troublemakers.”

Rathe frowned and Monteia shrugged. “I’m sending
Andry to collect his bond, unless you want the fee.”

You know I don’t,
Rathe thought, but said only, “Thanks anyway. I’ll
talk to him.”

“
It’s not like Aagte to hire
outside help,” Monteia said, her voice almost musing. “I hope we’re
not in for trouble there. Not right now.”

“
So do I,” Rathe answered, and
slipped his book back into his pocket. He collected his jerkin and
truncheon from their place on the wall behind the duty desk, and
stepped out into the afternoon sunlight. The winter-sun hung over
the eastern housetops, a pale gold dot that dazzled the eye; the
true sun, declining into the west, cast darker shadows, so that the
street was crosshatched with lines of dark and lighter shade. He
threaded his way through the busy crowds, turned onto the Knives
Road without really deciding which job to do first. Mailet’s hall
was closest; better to get it over with, he told himself, and
crossed the street to Mailet’s door.