Part 18 (1/2)
”Hey!” he said. ”She's all right!”
I was about to correct him, because I ached all over. But then I realized that if I was all right I could sit up. I pointed this out, pus.h.i.+ng his ugly face out of my way after patting his cheek, and struggled to my feet.
The room was suddenly full of people who were glad to see me. If you've ever had the experience, you can fill in the blanks here-I'm not going to describe everything that was said and done.
Eventually I noticed Morlock leaning against the doorway with a broad smile on his bruised face, watching me in the bosom of my family.
I glared at him. He was supposed to be invulnerable, protecting me from the bad people. And there he was grinning at me because, through sheer luck, his recklessness and the golem hadn't killed all four of us in Charis's house.
”Thanks for saving my life,” he said, when the furor died down a bit.
”Yeah, well,” I said huffily. ”Watch your step. I might not be around to do it, next time.”
He shrugged and opened his hands in a well, you know kind of gesture. This seemed pretty flippant, under the circ.u.mstances, so I clouded up and thundered at him for a while. I was pretty clear about what I expected from him and how he had so far failed to deliver. At least I tried to be, but the fact that my face was buried against his chest part of the time may have m.u.f.fled some of my words, that and some of the weeping.
He patted my back awkwardly until I settled down, and then said, ”Eh, what are you complaining about? You didn't even have to walk home.”
Charis was standing nearby in the room beyond and he said, ”I must say the young lady has a point. We all owe her a great deal. I would estimate-”
”It's not a business relations.h.i.+p,” Morlock said. He wasn't smiling when he said it, but his tone wasn't really much different than when he'd been talking to me. Still, Charis crumpled like a moth who'd gotten too close to a candle flame.
I stood back and wiped my eyes. ”So you got what you need from Charis's house? Now we go north?”
Charis's twisted face took on a panicky look, which Morlock ignored, saying, ”Yes and no.”
”Ugh. What a stupid thing to say! Which is it?”
”Yes, we got the information from Charis's house. No, we are not going north, at least not right away.”
”Morlock thinks there's some threat to the city from outside,” said Roble, coming up beside me. ”He may be right.”
”So what?” I said. If all Sarkunden sank into the ground it wouldn't ruin my day.
”Eh,” Morlock said, ”it's not my favorite city either. But it's the keystone of the Empire's defenses in the north. If it broke, the Khroi or the Anhikh could sweep in at will-possibly both.”
”You're an imperial outlaw!” I said. ”What do you care?”
He shrugged his wry shoulders. ”I have friends in the Empire. If it collapses, they'll be in harm's way. I'm going to see about this.”
”All right,” I said grudgingly. ”What do we have to do?”
”You,” my mother said, with a calm that was just the thin icy coating on a deep dark lake of fury, ”will do precisely nothing.”
I didn't feel like arguing with her. First because she obviously was one thumb's length away from crazy and I didn't want to push her in the wrong direction; second because I ached all over, especially in my belly. I didn't want to go anywhere.
”It's someone else's turn on the field anyway,” Stador said, apparently thinking I was disappointed. ”Come look at the map!”
The map was unrolled on the floor in the next room: a huge map of the city. Looking closely at it, I saw three tiny pieces of gold quivering on the map.
One was not far from the Great Market, where we'd had our run-in with the Sandboys. Another was moving down the twists of an alley toward the South Wall. One was firmly fixed on the citadel, where the Imperial Guards had their headquarters.
I looked at Morlock for an explanation, then decided it would be too much trouble to drag it out of him and turned to Thend.
”You remember those gold pieces Morlock gave the bullyboy in the wh.o.r.ehouse?” Thend asked. ”They were ensorcelled. Those gold bits tell us where each one of those gold pieces are right now.”
Well, I'd worked in a cathouse. I thought I could follow the reasoning. The Sandboys probably had their little sand-paws into every business on that street. The bullyboy had probably pa.s.sed along what he knew, along with part of his loot. ”So who's who?” I asked.
”If I had to guess,” Roble said, ”I'd guess the coin heading south is in the pocket of your friend from the cathouse. The one still near the cathouse is in the strongbox of the house's pimp or the Sandboys.” He crouched down and tapped the gold fleck at the citadel. ”This is the interesting one.”
”I see,” I said. ”Someone in the Guards is slurping money from the Sandboys.”
”The commander is my guess,” Morlock said. ”That immunity was the perfect bait to bring me into the city where the Sandboys are strongest. They're connected, somehow.”
”But just because the commander's doing business with the water-gangs doesn't mean he's a traitor,” Naeli objected. ”The Sandboys wouldn't want a foreign conqueror in the city.”
”Hard to say,” Morlock replied. ”They might be hoping for a better deal with the new rulers. Or maybe the commander is the agent of a foreign power, corrupting the local gangs. We'll go and find out.”
”How?” I wondered.
Morlock shrugged, and I knew that was as much as he was going to say about it. He rolled up the map and stuck it under his arm. He and Roble spoke apart with Naeli for a few moments and then they were gone.
Then it was time to go back to bed, past time ... but no one did. Bann went off to stand watch, and Naeli paced around in the entryway on the first floor, and Stador and Thend were playing a knife-throwing game in the map room. I was sitting on my bedroll, rocking back and forth, wondering why my gut hurt so much. I was wondering about that, and also wondering why Charis was standing just outside my doorway (as I could tell from his shadow on the floor).
”If you're waiting for me to put the light out,” I called to him finally, ”I'm not going to.”
He appeared in the doorway then. ”I'm sorry if I alarmed you,” he said. ”I'm in a bit of a quandary.”
”And you think I can help?”
”I hope not. That is-you've done enough. Too much, I'd say. I owe you a very great debt and I don't see how I can repay it.”
”It's on the house.”
”Nothing is 'on the house,' if I understand what you mean. Everyone keeps track of these things, and debts have to be paid. Those are the principles by which I have lived my life.”
”I can see you've made a big thing of it.” This was a little icy, I admit, but my belly hurt and I didn't like the game he was playing (to the extent that I understood it).
His face twisted. ”I was doing well enough-until I did business with Morlock.”
”You shouldn't have tried to cheat him.”
Charis sighed. ”My troubles only really began when I stopped trying to cheat' him, as you put it.”
”How would you put it?”
”I would say that no bargain justifies putting a man in danger of his life. No one can be fairly asked to trade away his life, because there is nothing of equal value he can receive for it. A bargain that puts my existence at stake is void.” His voice was getting almost hysterical and he broke off, looking a little embarra.s.sed.
”Then you shouldn't have struck the bargain in the first place.”
Charis sighed. ”That's true, of course. But I wanted what Morlock had to offer me. Now I've lost that, and nearly everything else as well, and I've contracted a new debt to you. You see my problem.”