Part 24 (1/2)

”Short rest stops as required. Catch up on sleep later, aboard barge on the Arune.”

”Excellent. Then we'll hit Eynisse around dawn.” Provided his own strength held out, Girays reflected, but kept the misgiving to himself, for there was only so much humility he could swallow at one draft. ”I doubt that many of the others will do as well. In fact, I suspect the railroad strike will have knocked more than a few clean out of the race.”

”Perhaps, but many will persevere. Mesq'r Zavune, for example, may expect a.s.sistance from his own countrymen.”

”Then there's Porb Jil Liskjil, with his bottomless pockets, who can buy his way out of any difficulty. And Bav Tchornoi could bully his way through stone walls.”

”And Miss Devaire?” Stornzof inquired. ”She is resourceful, but now perhaps she must admit defeat?”

”Never,” Girays responded with absolute conviction. ”She will not give up. Not while she breathes.”

Stornzof cast a clear glance back over his shoulder. ”I see,” he said.

SHE HAD STOLEN HERSELF a lovely horse, Luzelle reflected. a lovely horse, Luzelle reflected.

Purchased.

Ballerina was fleet and sweet, well bred and well trained. She had carried her abductor-new owner-lightly through the night, her smooth stride devouring miles, until the flush of rose in the east had colored the white stucco walls of a roadside inn, and Luzelle had judged it safe to pause for a few hours of sleep. The city of Aeshno lay far behind her. Even had her escape route been noted, n.o.body would have pursued her over so great a distance; not for the sake of a stolen mare, not even for the sake of vandalized property. Or so she a.s.sured herself.

Relinquis.h.i.+ng Ballerina to the charge of a sleepy ostler, Luzelle walked into the inn to confront a night clerk whose surprise showed on his face. She could scarcely blame him. A young foreign woman, traveling alone by night, without a single piece of luggage to her name-naturally he was taken aback. His surprise sharpened to open curiosity when she asked in Vonahrish to be wakened with a knock on her door in exactly six hours. She could see the questions struggling to emerge, but he managed to contain them. And when she produced a roll of good Vonahrish New-rekkoes, he retained sufficient presence of mind to a.s.sume the air of respect that every solvent guest merited. She paid in advance without demur, he handed her a key, and she felt his speculative gaze press her back as she walked away.

Luzelle climbed two flights of stairs, remembering with regret the wondrous lift in the Kingshead Hotel in Toltz. Locating her a.s.signed room, she let herself in and locked the door. She hardly noted the character of her surroundings, which were plain, old-fas.h.i.+oned, and decent enough. She saw only the bed. She was tired, very tired. She had managed to ignore, evade, or resist fatigue for hours, but it had caught up with her now. She felt she could not stand upright another minute.

The southern springtime air was sultry. She stripped off her clothes and let them drop to the floor. Why not? They were already sweat stained and grimy from hours of riding. She herself was similarly grimy, but had not bothered to ask for a bath. What point, when she had no clean clothes, no change of underwear, no means at present of preserving personal decency, and above all, no energy? She did not want to wash her clothes, or even herself. She wanted nothing but sleep.

The sheets were clean, she was not, and she did not care. She tumbled into bed, her head hit the pillow, and she was immediately unconscious, or rather her consciousness changed. The dreams came, full of fire, smoke, noise; and those were the mild ones. Far more frightening were the visions of herself back in the neat, modestly appointed little bedroom she had occupied as a child in her father's house. She was looking at herself in the small mirror that hung above the washstand, and the face that gazed back from the gla.s.s was the wondering unmarked face of a child. But as she watched, the face altered and aged, s.h.i.+fting through the phases of adolescence, early and full maturity, middle age, and thence to sallow old age. And throughout all successive transformations, the chamber in which her mirrored image stood immured never changed at all.

A knock on the door banished such visions. Luzelle opened her eyes. She was still tired, but less so. Her eyes traveled about a plain, unfamiliar chamber. She remembered where she was, and how she had come. She did not want to get up yet, but the race was very much on. Yawning, she arose, noticed her own condition, and blinked. Her garments, visibly the worse for wear, lay scattered about the floor. Oh yes, she had dropped them there.

She ran her tongue across teeth that seemed slicked with rancid lard. Stumbling to the washstand, she rinsed her mouth out, then made the best possible use of water, soap, and towel before resuming yesterday's grubby garments. No comb, no hairbrush. Readjusting half a dozen pins, she anch.o.r.ed the riotous ma.s.s of red-gold curls as best she could, then hurried on down to the old-fas.h.i.+oned common room, where she breakfasted, or lunched, on skewered lamb and lentils, indifferent to the scrutiny of her fellow guests, some of them obviously hostile.

Too bad.

She looked up quickly from her plate to meet a pair of yellow eyes lancing out of a swarthy face, and felt her own color rise against the silent condemnation. She had seen it before, many times. She should be used to it by now, but somehow her nerves, blood, and stomach never inured themselves.

She chanced another look. Her silent critic flaunted saffron robes, black finger sheaths, looped linen streamers with black-edged cutwork. An orthodox Iyecktori, committed to the Gifted Iyecktor's vision of a stable, well-structured universe. Such a vision left no room for random peripatetic females, free to spread disorder throughout the world. The anger in the eyes of the watching Iyecktori confirmed her moral failing. She curbed the impulse to flash the Feyennese Four Fingers, for this was only the beginning. Heading east into the homeland of the Gifted Iyecktor, she was bound to encounter much more of the same, and she had better start learning to ignore insults.

Her eyes dropped to her plate. She ate quickly, without tasting, paid her bill, returned to the foyer, and asked the clerk on duty for her horse. Minutes later the ostler led Ballerina to the front. Luzelle tipped the ostler, mounted the stolen mare without a.s.sistance, and headed east.

For hours she rode hard under the strong Aennorvi sun, which was stooping westward by the time she came to a bone-white village, bleached and crumbling in the midst of the stony hills. She paused at the public trough in the middle of a plaza pale with ashen dust and black with intense southern shadow. She dismounted. While her horse drank, Luzelle studied the area. At first she thought the place dead, but presently discerned movement under the purple-diapered awning at the far end of the square, where the tradesmen were emerging from their midday coma. Pausing long enough to wrap Ballerina's reins around one of the public rails beside the trough, she hurried to the wakening shop, and entered a small-town general mart designed to meet modest needs.

The proprietor sported finger sheaths and linen streamers. His wife wore thumbless black gloves and a black cap with linen lappets. Orthodox Iyecktories beyond doubt, and the undisguised animosity hardening both bronzed faces momentarily gave her pause.

She rallied quickly. Advancing as if confident of her welcome, she asked in Vonahrish, ”Do you sell women's clothing? Linen?”

The shopkeeper answered in curt Aennorvi.

”Clothing.” Luzelle fingered the folds of her skirt ill.u.s.tratively. Luzelle fingered the folds of her skirt ill.u.s.tratively.

Her female listener chattered shrilly.

Several bolts of fabric lay on a table at the center of the room. Luzelle turned to investigate, and the chattering rose in volume. The shopkeeper lifted a hand, rigid outstretched finger pointing the way to the exit. Luzelle displayed a fistful of New-rekkoes, and the irritable Aennorvi voices fell silent.

The cloth awaited the scissors and needles of industrious local housewives. No ready-made garments were offered for sale, with the exception of big, geometrically patterned scarves that could double as shawls, and genderless hooded rainwear of olive-drab oilcloth. She chose a handsome scarf and an ugly poncho. She also picked up needles, thread, soap, nail file, toothbrush, comb, hairbrush, handkerchiefs, a basket of apples, raisins, crackers, a canteen, a carpetbag to hold it all, and a couple of buckled straps with which to fasten the carpetbag to Ballerina's saddle cantle.

No fresh clothing. No change of linen. Not today.

Selections complete, she returned to the counter to confront the proprietor, who thrust three upright fingers forward, almost into her face. For a moment she imagined a local variant of the Feyennese Four, then realized that he was specifying a price of three hundred New-rekkoes. A wholly outrageous price, of course. She supposed she was expected to bargain, but she hadn't the time, the inclination, or the knowledge of the language. Swallowing outrage, she laid the money out on the counter, swept her purchases into the carpetbag, and turned to go.

A high-pitched verbal fusillade halted her. She turned back to confront the shopkeeper's wife, who was yelling, gesticulating, pointing at the carpetbag with one hand, and shaking four stiffened fingers at the ceiling with the other. This time the line between financial negotiation and deliberate insult was unclear. Luzelle curled her lip and made for the door. A geyser of unintelligible abuse sprayed behind her. A volley of tiny missiles struck her back, and there was no pain, but the surprise momentarily froze her. Little pellets were hitting the plank floor all around her, and it took her a moment to realize that the shopkeeper or his consort had flung a handful of dried white beans.

Savages. Spinning on her heel, she flashed four fingers at her tormentors and flounced from the shop, leaving the door wide open to the flies.

Idiots. Ranting fanatics. Yes, and how many more of the same between herself and the border? And after the border, farther east, deep in the stronghold of the Gifted Iyecktor, how much the worse?

For a moment she was almost glad that she spoke no Aennorvi; otherwise she would have wanted to stay and argue.

Hurrying across the square to her horse, she filled the new canteen with water from the pump beside the trough, and slung the strap over her shoulder. She fastened the carpetbag to the cantle, then loosed the reins from the rail, mounted, and turned Ballerina east. She departed the village without regret, but not without incident. As she pa.s.sed the ripe garbage heap wreathed in creeping daggers that marked the end of what pa.s.sed for a main street, a gang of local yellow-eyed urchins leapt forth yelling and flinging clods. The soft dirt b.a.l.l.s broke against her skirts. Her horse snorted and s.h.i.+ed. A nauseous stench arose, a buzzing fog darkened the air, and Luzelle felt the sting of countless fiery darts. Her face and neck p.r.i.c.kled and burned. A cry escaped her, and she beat at the seething air with her hands. Dimly she noted the taunting yelps of the victorious youngsters. A brittle dirt ball shattered against her hair, the buzzing intensified, and the small darts stabbed her ears and the sensitive skin around her mouth. Even as her hands flew protectively to her eyes, the thought registered, clay nesters. clay nesters. The village children must have stockpiled scores of the delicate spheres, home to countless stinging winged arachnids, and now the intrusion of a lone female, odd and foreign, offered a welcome opportunity to launch the entire a.r.s.enal. The village children must have stockpiled scores of the delicate spheres, home to countless stinging winged arachnids, and now the intrusion of a lone female, odd and foreign, offered a welcome opportunity to launch the entire a.r.s.enal.

Ballerina plunged, and Luzelle barely kept her seat. The spectacle pleased the audience. A fairy chorus of excited juvenile laughter arose, and somebody threw a clay nest at the horse, then somebody else hurled a rock.

Little monsters. Their orthodox parents would probably be proud. She curbed the impulse to turn and yell at them; they would only take it as encouragement. Clapping her heels hard to the red mare's sides, she galloped east, and the laughing taunts and swarming clay nesters fell away behind her.

Once safely clear of the village, she let Ballerina slow to a walk. She was breathing hard and her heart was pounding. Her eyes burned and watered. Emotion? She thought not. Lifting a hand to her face, she found that the skin stung, as if with a sunburn. The hand itself was covered with a rash of tiny red pinp.r.i.c.ks.

The clay-nester venom was not strong enough to cause serious illness. Except in unusual cases. The rash on her face and hands would vanish within hours. Probably.

The southern sun beat down on her. Her skin stung and itched. Opening the canteen, she swallowed a little water, then splashed coolness on her face. It helped. She took the big new scarf, wrapped it around her head Aennorvi style, and that helped too, but not enough. Too bad. Too bad. Nothing more to be done about it at present. Nothing more to be done about it at present.

Luzelle scowled, and pushed east. She rode at a moderate pace, but her imagination raced, flas.h.i.+ng along the curve of the Grand Ellipse to overtake and surpa.s.s every rival. The Festinette twins. The Grewzians. Anyone else who might have pulled ahead while she had been delayed in Aeshno.

Glumly she wondered if a single one of them was a fraction as uncomfortable as she.

”THE ANGLE OF THE LIGHT annoys me. Change it,” Torvid Stornzof commanded. Settling himself back among fat cus.h.i.+ons, he added irritably, ”A well-trained attendant requires no reminder. Your masters are remiss. Well, they are Zuleeki.” annoys me. Change it,” Torvid Stornzof commanded. Settling himself back among fat cus.h.i.+ons, he added irritably, ”A well-trained attendant requires no reminder. Your masters are remiss. Well, they are Zuleeki.”

His listener, evincing neither guilt nor resentment-in fact, communicating nothing at all through the big ocher cloak and hood that contained his or her ident.i.ty-bowed deeply and tweaked the strings that angled the wooden slats admitting sunlight to the hired chasmistrio. A gloved hand was visible for a moment.

The light altered nicely. The objectionable heat and glare abated, and a cool shadow kissed the grandlandsman's brow. At least these idiots could do something right, when properly instructed.

He caught a glimpse of a hairy, broad-snouted, yellow-tusked countenance and then it was gone, swallowed in the shadow of the hood, and none too soon. He did not wish to trouble his vision with excessive ugliness. There were better things to do with his eyes.

Torvid gazed down through the wooden slats and gla.s.s walls upon a vista of sheer cliffs edging ax-stroke gorges, rising above a wrathful river and its tributaries. Typical scenery of half-tamed Zuleekistan, very stirring, very picturesque, and he could appreciate its charm while holding himself aloof from its dangers.

The paG.o.da-roofed gla.s.s-and-steel chasmistrio hung suspended like some piece of jewelry upon the great aerial cable bridging the clouds a thousand feet above the Wzykii Cleft, and connecting the formerly great trading center of Feezie with the string of villages littering the cliff top on the far side of the white-fanged Wzyk River.

Feezie. A deplorable backwater midden. The grandlandsman's lip curled at the recollection. No comforts, no amenities, no entertainment. A dreary, tannery-stinking blight upon the face of the world, a testimony to the inferiority of its inhabitants. If only the tale he had told his s.h.i.+ning star of a Promontory nephew had been true-if only he had traveled straight to civilized, amusing Jumo Towne, then life would have been far more pleasant. But duty called, his obligation to the imperior commanded, and thus he found himself reluctantly rusticated.

At least he had skipped over the dusty grime of Aennorve and the primitive rigors of Bizaqh. That was one consolation. And his sojourn in goat-and-bandit-infested Zuleekistan was likely to prove brief. That was another.

Torvid exhaled an impatient cloud of cigarette smoke, and saw his attendant turn away. No refuge, no pure mountain air to be found within the gla.s.s walls of the chasmistrio, and the other knew it but presumably wished to register his-her-its objection to the atmospheric pollution. Insolent freak of nature. A crease deepened between the grandlandsman's brows.