Spirit Gate: Book One of Crossroads (75 page)

“This way.”

Behind her, he groped his way up the rungs of a ladder into the attic. Here she lit her tiny globe to reveal a long chamber with a steeply pitched roof on both sides. The low walls were lined with shelves on which rested various boxes and bags neatly filed away according to a system he could not quickly comprehend. She moved to a cabinet, opened it, and gestured. Ducking through after her, he was at once choked with a sense of closeness, weight pressing on him, dust a congestion in his lungs, walls falling at him on either side. But after all he fixed his gaze on her backside, very shapely, as she climbed stairs in what was little more than a narrow tunnel, the ceiling so low that he kept thinking he would slam his head against it and the walls so close that if he leaned any little bit left or right his shoulders brushed the paneling. It was quite dark, although the glow of her light outlined her figure most pleasingly. Hers was an easy target to aim for. He mounted the steps behind her, but she got farther away and he fell behind because the climb exhausted him and she was swift.

She opened a door and passed the threshold. At length, puffing and panting, he got to the top and stepped into a fine chamber ornamented with all manner of luxurious furnishings. Beside an open coin chest rested a reclining couch imported from the south. A set of paintings depicted a crane seen through the six seasons, edges embossed with gold foil to frame each hanging silk scroll. Two greenware ceramic ewers flanked a brass basin worked into the shape of a very rotund peacock with feathers spread high and small mirrors adorning each “eye,” so a person could catch a glimpse of himself as he washed his face.

It was the kind of chamber where a merchant entertained guests he wanted to impress with his wealth, or where he reclined on his couch in order to entertain himself by counting out his strings of money. It appeared that Zubaidit had arranged a different sort of entertainment for the other person in the room. This grand gentleman wore only an ankle-length night jacket cut from such a fine grade of southern silk that even Joss could appreciate its quality. The precise shade of blue was hard to distinguish because there were only two lamps burning, both set on tripods, one on each side of the chair to which the man was tied. Zubaidit finished untying the gag she had secured around the man’s mouth, and with a glance at Joss, she seated herself cross-legged on the couch next to her prisoner and folded her hands in her lap.

“I’ve met you!” said Joss, staring at the merchant. “I met you in the north.”

“He stinks!” croaked the man. “Don’t let him sit on my best pillows! Or on my Dayo’e carpet! Aui!”

“You have an overly sensitive nose. Best you be thinking of your life and livelihood and that of this city, rather than your pillows and expensive carpet. Oh, just sit down, Joss.”

He had to. His legs were about to give out. He tried to stay away from the doubled rank of eight pillows with their embroidered scenes depicting that day in ancient times when an orphaned, homeless girl knelt at the shore of the lake sacred to
the gods and prayed for peace to return to the land. This set of scenes portrayed the gods’answer: the calling of the Guardians, and the gifts given by each of the gods to those Guardians, to aid them in the burdensome task of restoring peace and establishing justice.

The merchant whimpered as Joss sat, but Zubaidit cut him off. “Master Feden, I thought perhaps you might be more likely to believe me if I let you speak to Reeve Joss, who hails from Clan Hall.”

“You’re lying,” said the man. “This is some story you’ve woven to confuse and befuddle me. You came here with Reeve Horas earlier today. You stood beside him as his ally, and swore to him that you would deal with this prisoner. Yet here this man sits, contaminating my good carpet! What have you done to my guards?”

“Nothing as lasting as the death that will greet them if you do not believe me when I tell you the truth. There is a strike force not a day’s march from these walls, and an army two or three days’ march behind that, many thousand strong, who mean to burn, rape, and plunder this town and set their own governor over what remains. You were a fool to ally with Argent Hall and whatever folk out of the north you have made alliance with. But it is not too late to act, and save yourself and this town.”

“An army?” said Joss. “On West Track? I saw none when I flew down . . . and yet—”

“Go on,” she said encouragingly. She had yet to move her hands, clasped so easily there between her thighs, as if she were waiting for a cup of tea to be brought so they could sip in cool collusion.

“On our way down here, we came across groups of men, armed bands. But I never thought . . . Could small groups be brought together that quickly, to form an army?”

“If they are well led, certainly. Who is your ally, Master Feden?”

“None of your business. None of the temple’s business.”

“Surely it is. If the temple is to be attacked, the temple must be prepared to withstand the assault.”

“Who would attack a temple?” cried Master Feden.

“You have not been listening to the stories that have walked south, have you? Those who serve the Merciless One have become targets, just as reeves have. In the north. Only in the south and in the east have the temples remained immune.”

“Impossible. No one would hurt those in service to the temples.”

“On the Ili Cutoff, you were talking to Lord Radas of Iliyat,” said Joss to Feden. “It just doesn’t make sense. Does Lord Radas know about this army? Who leads it? Where it comes from?”

Feden did not answer.

“I’ll tell you this,” said Zubaidit. “I have seen a thing I thought I would never see, a thing spoken of only in stories.”

She moved smoothly, uncoiling more than rising. Stepping away from the couch, she bent, picked up one of the pillows, and displayed the fine needlework in the spill of lamplight. Folk no doubt lost their eyesight stitching those tiny details. It made Joss’s eyes water to look, or perhaps that was the cloying scent steaming off
a heated bowl of perfumed water strewn with petals that had been placed on the low side table next to Master Feden’s chair. It had the sticky aroma of diluted sweet-smoke. Joss wondered if the man was an addict. Master Feden was twisting his hands, testing the bonds that trussed them, but he was caught fast.

“Look at me!” She shook the pillow. “You see? Here, the gods offer their gifts.”

Every child knew the Tale of the Guardians by heart, how the orphan had come to Indiyabu to plead with the gods to intervene, to save them.

Joss chanted.

Taru the Witherer wove nine cloaks out of the fabric of the land and the water and the sky, and out of all living things, which granted the wearer protection against the second death although not against weariness of soul;

Ilu the Opener of Ways built the altars, so that they might speak across the vast distances each to the other;

Atiratu the Lady of Beasts formed the winged horses out of the elements so that they could travel swiftly and across the rivers and mountains without obstacle;

Sapanasu the Lantern gave them light to banish the shadows;

Kotaru the Thunderer gave them the staff of judgment as their symbol of authority, with power over life and death;

Ushara the Merciless One gave them a third eye and a second heart with which to see into and understand the hearts of all;

Hasibal gave an offering bowl.

“I saw two of them,” said Zubaidit.

“Two Guardians?” said Joss, with a thrill of fear and excitement.

“Two orphans?” said Feden with a sneer.

“Two horses, winged.” She threw down the pillow. “Two horses. Winged. And an army of thousands, too many to count. Although based on the number and formation of their cohorts I would say there were four or five cohorts of about six hundred soldiers in each. Let us estimate three thousand men, three hundred and twelve in the strike force, and more ranging up and down the line as foragers and scouts. That, Master Feden, is the army that marches on Olossi. What did they promise you?”

“There is no such army,” he said, “and all agree the Guardians have long since vanished from the land, and were anyway only a tale told by our grandparents to school the young ones. You are insane.”

“I’m tempted to agree,” said Joss, but by the look she gave him in response, brows drawn down and mouth scowling, he saw he had truly angered her.

“So be it,” she said. “I wash my hands of both of you.” She crossed to the coin chest and helped herself to two fat strings of silver leya and one of humble copper vey.

“Thief!”

“Payment for services rendered. Yet the information is true enough. I’ll return to the temple to warn them, as is my duty. After that, you are all on your own.”

“You give no proof,” said Master Feden. “You have no proof. How did you release this reeve? Why didn’t you kill him, as you said you meant to do?”

“Marshal Yordenas commanded me to kill him—”

“You
were
trying to kill me!” Joss cried indignantly.

“No. The temple sold my labor to Marshal Alyon, when he requested protection. I stayed on after Marshal Alyon’s death because the Hieros ordered me to. She saw that things weren’t right at Argent Hall. She thought all the reeves had become corrupt. That’s why I was armed when I approached you.”

Joss could not help laughing. “Armed and naked. A deadly assault.”

“The reeve is wanted for murder,” said Master Feden. “Murderers deserve death.”

“Murder? Whom is he supposed to have murdered?” she asked scornfully.

“A border captain named Beron, a holy ordinand in the service of the Thunderer.”

“You and your council are fools five times over. I killed that man, on a commission given me from the temple.”

Master Feden, surprisingly, remained silent.

“Captain Beron undertook a commission to assassinate a member of the Lesser Houses,” she continued. “The Merciless One alone claims the privilege of such action. He crossed the boundaries, took a life in a way forbidden to the Thunderer’s ordinands. Therefore, he was marked for death at our hands.”

“The hells!” Joss glanced at Master Feden, but the merchant was now staring at his hands, all tied up tight, and not speaking. “How did you manage to kill Captain Beron? He was caged, concealed, and guarded by the Qin.”

“I arranged for an axle to break. In the fuss, I meant to make my move. But as it happens, just before the breakdown a window opened, and I took the opportunity.” She smiled, looking Joss up and down in a way that made him wipe his brow. She was laughing: at him, at herself. “I have many skills.”

“We needed his testimony! He was willing to talk, to tell us who he was working for, who was paying him off.”

“The Merciless One is a jealous mistress. He violated the boundaries. He had to die.”

“Then we’ll never know who hired Captain Beron to assassinate a man, and to hunt with ospreys.”

“Master Feden might know.”

“Me? Me!” Feden sucked in a lungful of smoke, and set to coughing. Belowstairs, heard either from down along that hidden stairway or through the closed door into the main part of the house, a clamor rose of many voices calling out the alarm.

“Master Feden! Master Feden!”

A high bell rang to wake the household.

“Heh! Heh! The guards come! You’ve been discovered! Now you can’t escape justice.”

She drew a knife from a sheath tucked up high on her thigh, hidden by the kilt. It was a thin, killing blade exactly like the one he had taken off her in Argent Hall. “It’s all the same to me whether you die now, Master Feden, or die later at the hands of the allies who betrayed you. What did the leaders of this army that is marching
on Olossi offer you? Gods! How gullible can a man be? Is it only greed that blinds you? Or are you just that stupid?” She waved the knife toward Joss. “Go on. Down in the warehouse, turn behind the ladder and find the fourth locker. Open it, and feel with your hands three bricks to the left. There is a stamp on the fourth brick. You can fit your fingers in and lift it, and find a hook beneath. Pull on that, and a door will open. Follow the tunnel out to the street, taking the third turn to the left and the second right. Go swiftly.”

“What tunnel? I know nothing of a tunnel under my warehouse.”

She ignored Feden’s spluttering, and instead repeated the directions.

“How will you escape?” Joss asked. Feet pounded on stairs. Soon they would be at the door.

She clenched her jaw. “Why must men be so stubborn? Just go. Save yourself. I am not clumsy enough to be caught by this manner of men.”

“Heya! Heya!” cried Master Feden. “Help me! Help me!”

Fists pounded on the far door. “Master Feden! Master Feden! We’ve news! Terrible news.”

“He’s busy!” she shouted. “Come back later, when I’m through devouring him.”

But they were desperate. Her reply did not raise a single answering retort, not even a lewd joke. “Terrible news. You must open up. Villages are being attacked and all the folk in them murdered. A lad escaped. Hurry, Master Feden! We brought him, to tell his tale.”

A new voice joined the chorus. “Master Feden! It’s Captain Waras! Master Feden, open up, by the gods. You must convene the council. What will we do? What will we do? We’ve been betrayed!”

The merchant had been frightened before, then flushed with rage and doomed triumph as he contemplated being murdered in cold blood by the Devouring woman. Now his complexion faded to a ghastly gray. “Villages massacred? Can it be true?”

She said nothing. Joss found he could not move his limbs, as if he had fallen into sucking mud and gotten trapped.

Then she moved, too quickly for him to stop her. She unlatched and slid the door open, and behind it unlatched and slid open a second, secured door. Captain Waras strode in, looking first at her, then at Master Feden, and finally at Joss. He was so flustered and shaken that he did not act as a guardsman should, to assess and react to the threat. He waited, hands loose at his sides, sword in its sheath. A pair of guardsmen walked in, supporting a lad of some fourteen years, a slender boy with the wiry legs and arms of an experienced rider. He had the stone-shocked look of a person who has seen something he dares not believe but cannot deny.