Part 18 (2/2)

”Give it up, sc.u.m. You're not a dwarf. You don't have a to-the-death focus to worry about. Stop being so stubborn and think straight for a change. If I'd wanted to kill you or hurt you or anyone else, I could have done it ten times over by now. I'm not your enemy. I'm not Quraite's enemy. I'm not anybody's enemy-except some templars back in Urik: the ones making Laq. We're on the same side, Ruari. While you were wrecking that stowaway, I was trying to convince Telhami and Akas.h.i.+a not to take any more zarneeka to Urik. They weren't listening to me, but you stopped them. You did the better job.”

Ruari scratched the itchy spots on each of his kivits before he met Pavek's stare. ”How do I know I can believe you? You lie real good, templar-man, like you lied about my poison.”

”You believe a man after you ask what he's got to gain by lying. I've got nothing to gain by lying to you, and and I haven't killed you yet. That should be enough.” I haven't killed you yet. That should be enough.”

”Kas.h.i.+.” Ruari looked down at the kivits as soon as he'd uttered the word.

”Mekillots will fly first. You may enjoy being a fool, but I don't. That woman's never going to be interested in an ugly, third-rank templar.”

”She is.”

”I'm not,” Pavek insisted with a force that surprised himself. ”I know better than to overreach.”

Ruari pushed the kivits down and rose unsteadily to his feet. ”I'd kill you.”

”She'd kill me first.”

”She wouldn't. Kas.h.i.+'s not like that. She doesn't see the evil in a person.”

He could think of a dozen things to say, all of which would have set them brawling again. Instead, he extended a finger toward a kivit and tickled the tip of the inquisitive creature's nose.

”All the more reason to keep her and zarneeka out of Urik. You did a good job with that stowaway.”

Ruari sat down again. ”Telhami's angry at me. I never saw her so angry. I thought she was going to invoke the guardian and suck my bones into the ground.”

”Maybe she wanted to, but none of the other druids at that meeting this morning, except Akas.h.i.+a and Telhami, wanted to send zarneeka to Urik, and I don't think the guardian did either.”

Ruari shredded a blade of gra.s.s. ”Can you really feel the guardian, or is that just more lies?”

”No lies. I'm a lousy liar.”

Ruari swore softly and shredded another blade of gra.s.s. ”I wish you'd never come to Quraite.”

”I wish I'd never seen a man poisoned by Laq, then I wouldn't have needed to come. You ready to go home?”

Ruari said he was, but he was weak and wheezing before they left the grove. So they sat talking by the pool, getting past being enemies without becoming friends. The sun was setting when they returned to the village. Pavek went looking for Yohan, but the dwarf was gone, and so were Akas.h.i.+a, two farmers and five kanks: Telhami'd evoked a whirlwind to separate the ripened zarneeka from the sand, then she'd sealed it up and sent it on its way to Urik.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

The air remained cool from the recent dawn when Akas.h.i.+a, Yohan, and two awestruck Quraite farmers set out afoot from the market village of Modekan, headed for the brilliant yellow walls of Urik. After four day's travel kank-back across the wastelands, the farmers were eager to see the Lion-King's city; Akas.h.i.+a wanted to finish their business quickly, uneventfully.

No one knew what Yohan was thinking-except that he didn't approve, and he hadn't said more than two words at a time since they left Quraite.

It wasn't Modekan's Day for the Urik markets; they had the road to themselves. Akas.h.i.+a had ample time to relax, think, and get anxious again. They took some chances bringing zarneeka to Urik on a day when it and they weren't expected. She could hope that the Modekan registrar had reported to his superiors in the templarate, and that the repulsive dwarf they traded with would be at his procurer's table in the customhouse.

And she could hope that the dwarf would shepherd the zarneeka powder to its proper destination: a thousand folded papers of Ral's Breath powder. But for that hope to become real, she had to hope, above all else, that Just-Plain Pavek was wrong about his former colleagues in the civil bureau.

Akas.h.i.+a believed with all her heart that the chronic aches and illnesses of Urik's common folk were important enough to justify the risks she was taking. She believed, too, that her mind-bending skills coupled with druidry would be sufficient to protect her, her companions, and the three amphorae nestled in the straw-filled cart Yohan pulled.

When she called her spells and her skills across her mind's eye, her confidence grew; then something would catch her attention at the side of the road or she'd see the shadow of Just-Plain Pavek lurking in the corner of her memory, and her calm would shatter.

In her heart she believed Pavek was wrong about Urik's need for zarneeka and Ral's Breath but, try as she might as she walked, she couldn't convince herself that he was lying about the city's danger or the procurer's duplicity. Grandmother had agreed that Pavek spoke what he fervently believed was the truth. He was transparent in so many ways to both mind-bending and druidry; he'd never make a master of either craft-yet he could evoke the guardian and, somehow, he'd managed to enter Ruari's grove after Ruari had hidden himself inside it.

She thought she she could have found her young friend's grove and forced herself inside, but by every reckoning she and Grandmother had made, the challenge should have been far beyond Just-Plain Pavek's abilities... Unless Ruari had welcomed him, in which case one of them might have slain the other, or-worse to consider-the two of them might have discovered that, where zarneeka and Urik were concerned, they were of like minds. could have found her young friend's grove and forced herself inside, but by every reckoning she and Grandmother had made, the challenge should have been far beyond Just-Plain Pavek's abilities... Unless Ruari had welcomed him, in which case one of them might have slain the other, or-worse to consider-the two of them might have discovered that, where zarneeka and Urik were concerned, they were of like minds.

And that would have been the end of the zarneeka trade: Yohan would have stood with them. And the remaining Quraiters, druid and farmer alike, were already more afraid of Urik and Urik's inhuman king than was necessary; they would have supported the recalcitrant trio. Quraite wasn't some idyllic community where everyone's opinion counted with equal weight and the heaviest position prevailed; such communities rarely survived a year, much less the generations that Quraite itself had endured. Grandmother's word naturally and rightfully outweighed everyone else's, but Grandmother would never be foolish enough to drag the community in a direction it absolutely did not want to go.

As she was dragging Yohan to Urik.

The old dwarf trod silently between the traces of the handcart. He'd resisted her attempts at conversation since they left Quraite. Yohan had spoken vehemently against Grandmother's decision to dispatch zarneeka to Urik while Pavek and Ruari were still hidden in Ruari's grove. But in the end, Yohan had swallowed his objections. He'd helped to separate the zarneeka powder from the sand in the ruins of the stowaway. When Grandmother invoked a diminutive whirlwind to whip up the gritty mixture, he'd held a winnowing against it until his feet were buried in grit. She'd stood behind the sieve with a tightly woven basket, collecting enough yellow powder to fill three amphorae. And then he'd harnessed the kanks-all the while looking over his shoulder at the path Ruari and Pavek would have taken if they had returned together.

But the path remained empty, and they'd left the village before sunset without knowing what had happened between the templar and the half-elf-exactly as Grandmother had wanted it.

Because Grandmother was was wiser than all the rest of them together. And Grandmother wiser than all the rest of them together. And Grandmother knew knew the right thing for Quraite to do where zarneeka or anything else was concerned. the right thing for Quraite to do where zarneeka or anything else was concerned.

”You'll see,” Akas.h.i.+a a.s.sured her plodding, sullen companion. ”Everything will fall into place. You'll be headed home before sundown, I promise. There's nothing to worry about. There won't be any trouble at the customhouse-”

”Not there, not the customhouse,” he interrupted, the longest single string of words he'd put together since they left Quraite. ”It's too risky. If your heart's still set on delivering zarneeka to Urik, I'd sooner take it to the elven market I'd sooner trust a cross-eyed elf than that hairy dwarf at the customhouse.”

”The elven market?” Her mind filled with the wonders she imagined among its tawdry tents and shanties. She'd heard about the market from the Moonracers since she was a little girl, but in all her fifteen trips to Urik-she'd kept careful count-she'd never done more than trek from the gate to the customhouse and back again. Except, of course, this past time when they'd encountered Pavek, and Yohan had led them to the dyers' plaza where lengths of brightly colored cloth had threatened more than once to distract her from the interrogation.

Any excuse to visit the elven market was an almost irresistible temptation-especially if cautious Yohan was suggesting it.

Then the imagined wonders faded: ”We gave our names to the Modekan registrar...”

”Three itinerant peddlers with trade for the customhouse,” Yohan recited in rhythm with his walking.

Yohan had been trekking the zarneeka to Urik since before she was born. He'd taught her what to do and say, and she never told the truth about their names or merchandise to the village registrar. ”They won't suspect? Won't come looking for us?” He shrugged; the amphorae s.h.i.+fted in the cart. ”Not in the elven market. Templars don't go into the market, not alone. We'll be on our way home, like you said, before they start looking for us. If If they start looking for us.” they start looking for us.”

She pondered temptation for a little while. The dazzling yellow walls-cleaned and replastered after the Tyr-storm-lifted up in front of them, the freshly repainted portraits of the Lion-King were blurred, but colorful at this distance. The great, dark opening of the gate was visible as well, and the road was still empty ahead of them. There wouldn't be a line. Elven market or customhouse, they'd be into the city and out again in record time.

But the inspectors would ask questions. She had to be ready to use a mind-bender's subtle art, and that meant she had to have her words and images memorized before they reached the gate.

”Are you certain?” she asked.

”Nothing's certain-except that Pavek knows the procurer we've traded with. Whatever truth Pavek's telling us, I don't want to come face-to-face with that procurer until we're sure what's already happened and what's likely to happen next. That hairy dwarf's got muck all over his hands; he's not to be misted. That much is is certain.” certain.”

Of all the races, dwarves were the most consciously proud, of their appearance. Yohan's distrust of the procurer had its roots in the disgust he undoubtedly felt each time they stood before that stained yellow robe. Under different circ.u.mstances, she would have discounted her companion's advice for that very reason. Today's circ.u.mstances were as different as they could be, but she made one more attempt to resist temptation.

”Grandmother wants us to learn about the purity and strength of Ral's Breath. We'll have to visit the customhouse anyway-”

Yohan spat into the dust at the side of the road. ”Wouldn't trust a customhouse templar's answer to that question, no matter who or what he was. We've got to visit an apothecary or two ourselves, Kas.h.i.+, if we want to take those answers back with us.”

<script>