333 AR Autumn

Arlen breathed deeply, unused to feeling so afraid.

'Sure you need to do this?' Renna asked.

Arlen nodded. 'Ent got excuse to put things off any longer. Hollow's recovering, and they know what to expect now. Rojer's Jongleurs are spreading word wide through the duchy, and folk will come from all over when they hear we won. Defences'll be stronger by the next new moon than they were on the last. Equinox is just a fortnight away, new moon ten days after that. I'm gonna do this, need to do it now. Ent got time to ride all the way to Rizon. I'll be careful. Won't let myself be pulled into the Core.'

He turned to Renna before she could reply, seeing in her aura that he had misunderstood the question. 'You weren't asking about me skating so far. You ent sure I should go at all.'

Renna gave him a look that matched the annoyance in her aura perfectly. 'That Jongleur's mind-readin' act of yours is startin' to give folk the shivers.'

'It's not mind reading,' Arlen said.

'Heart reading, then,' Renna said. 'Makes you hard to talk to, way you glance at a body and know everything they're feeling, even better'n they do themselves.'

Arlen laughed. 'Creator, if only it were so.'

Renna looked away, staring up at the stars so he could not see her face as if that could hide anything from him now. 'Like you're in my head sometimes, way that demon was ...'

'Ent like that, Ren,' Arlen said, reaching out to put a hand on her shoulder. 'You see the same things I do with your wardsight. Reckon everyone with the sight does. Look close and it can tell you all sorts of things about a body. Just figuring it out myself, and I cheated a bit, stealing some of the language from the mind demon we met when I was in its head. Soon I'll be able to teach it to you, one way or another.'

'Not sure I like the sound of that,' Renna said. 'Love you, Arlen Bales, but my head's my own place. Ent lookin' to share it with anyone.'

Arlen nodded. 'Honest word.'

She looked at him, her aura amused. 'Don't think you've tricked me by changing the subject. You sure this trip is a good idea? This is what you want?'

Arlen shook his head. 'All I ever wanted was to kill demons. Didn't want to war with Krasia. Didn't want Miln making flamework weapons. Didn't want to be the corespawned Deliverer.'

He sighed, feeling so very, very tired. 'But it seems the world means to make me one, like it or not. All because Ahmann Jardir thinks the Creator speaks to him.'

Renna tilted her head, regarding him. She's trying to read my aura, he thought, surprised at how disconcerting it was. He felt a rush as she pulled a wisp of magic through him, Knowing.

'You still love him, even now,' Renna said. 'Like he's your brother.'

Arlen shrugged. 'Never had a friend like that in my life, and I've had a few. He was proud, and casually cruel in the way of Sharum. We argued plenty, but there was no one else in the world I wanted to guard my back when night fell.' He shuddered suddenly, feeling goose pimples rise on his skin though the night was not cold. 'At least, until he stabbed me there.'

'And you think throwin' him off a cliff is the answer,' Renna said.

Arlen shrugged again. 'Don't know, Ren, but I can't leave things the way they are. For everyone's sake, we've got to make a change. Got to do something the minds won't expect.'

'Worried about you skatin', too,' Renna admitted.

'Me, too,' Arlen said, taking another deep breath. Renna reached out, taking his chin in her hand and pulling him into a kiss. 'Love you, Arlen Bales.'

He felt some of his tension ease, and smiled. 'Love you, Renna Bales. You keep the Hollow safe while I'm gone.'

Renna nodded. 'And you come back quick.'

'Swear by the sun,' Arlen said, and dissipated.

Immediately Arlen felt the call of the Core, the source of all magic, begging to be explored. Faint fractions of its power drifted up all around him in paths, and he took the nearest of these, making sure to keep his sense of direction even as he passed through layers of soil and stone. He sensed a path heading southwest before breaking to the surface, and took it, skating along as quick as a beam of light.

He materialized a moment later on the surface and looked about to get his bearings. He knew the place, perhaps a dozen miles from the Hollow.

Not enough, he thought. Need to go deeper.

Again he slipped beneath the surface, this time dropping so far down that the call of the Core became more than just a seductive song. It filled his senses, bright and beautiful, pulling at him like flame drew a moth. A tendril of his being began to drift that way, wanting just a taste of its infinite power. It would be so simple to just ...

No! He had no head to shake, but he pulled his incorporeal form together and quickly sought another path to the surface, riding the current southwest.

He materialized a moment later under a cloudless sky, and quickly realized he had overshot his target. He did not know precisely where he was, but he knew well the cold clay flats of the Krasian desert at night.

He turned a circle, tasting the magic on the wind until he knew where he was. Less than a day's ride from the weapons cache he had left outside Anoch Sun. He made a note of the path. Visiting the lost city again before the minds could destroy it on the next new moon was important, but not his goal this night. Again he dropped down a path, this time skating northeast.

It took several more hops to finally get within sight of Rizon. Arlen might have kept at it, inching closer, but each time the Core dangled its lure, and like a cat confronted with a string, he could not resist it forever. He began to run instead, his bare feet eating up the miles. Once, a reap of field demons spotted him and gave chase, but even they could not match him now. The demons fell farther and farther behind, eventually breaking off in search of easier prey.

He bypassed most of the villages and guard stations until he came to an isolated sentry booth, warded to protect the Sharum runner within. He slowed, letting the man hear him coming.

The warrior stepped out of his booth, spear and shield at the ready. His aura and stance said he was ready to face a demon, but both relaxed when he spotted Arlen's human silhouette. At least until he saw that Arlen carried neither spear nor shield.

'Who goes-' he began, but then Arlen was on him, slipping around his guard with ease and getting behind him with his forearm across the man's throat in a sharusahk hold. He squeezed gently, careful not to crush, until the man fell limp in his hands.

Inside the booth, Arlen saw a mat for sleeping, food stores and cooking utensils, and other necessaries. Likely this warrior slept most of the days and kept watch at night, ready to carry word if one of the outlying villages needed reinforcements.

When the dal'Sharum woke a few minutes later, he was stripped to his bido with his arms and legs tied tightly behind him. The rope was looped around his neck so that too much struggling would cut off his air. He groaned through the gag in his teeth, and Arlen, dressed in the man's blacks with his night veil in place, looked down at him.

'Apologies, honoured warrior,' he said in flawless Krasian, bowing. 'It is not my intent to shame you, but I have need of your robes and equipment. I will return tomorrow night to free you and give them back. Inevera, no one will know of your defeat.'

The warrior growled and struggled, but there was nothing he could do. Arlen bowed once more and raced back into the night. There were still miles to go before he reached the capital.

The low wall of the outer city had been strengthened and fortified since Arlen's last visit to Rizon, and mounted Sharum patrolled its length, but it was too vast to guard completely. He found a clear section and bounded over the wall easily.

Dawn was not far off by the time he reached the wall of the inner city, but enough darkness remained for him to see the warding field that now protected the area as surely as one of the Hollow's greatwards. He studied the energy with fascination. What was the source?

'There's Warders, and then there's Krasian Warders,' his old master Cob had said. 'None better in all the Free Cities.'

Arlen shook his head, leaving the puzzle for another day. As the sky continued to lighten, he headed for the bazaar, slumping slightly like a Sharum worn from a night's patrols. His nose keener than a hunting hound's, it was simple to find an apothecary. He stole into the empty tent, stealing ladies' face paint and powder to hide his warded skin and pale complexion. He took the coin purse from his stolen robes and left a few draki on the counter before slipping back into the street. Other Sharum were filtering in from their patrols, and he kept his night veil loose around his chin, low enough not to draw attention or cause offence to the other warriors in the light, while still hiding his painted skin as much as possible. He needn't have bothered. The warriors saw only his blacks, nodded, and moved on their way.

For all that he was prepared, it shook him to hear the familiar sound of dama singing the end to curfew ringing out over the streets of Fort Rizon. Arlen looked up, seeing the newly built minarets rising above the wall of the inner city, surrounding what had been the great Holy House of Rizon. He wondered if the Krasians had already begun to decorate it with the bones of the fallen.

He watched as the city around him woke and came to greet the day. The Krasians came first, women and khaffit opening their kiosks and pavilions for a day's business. Soon after, when most of the returning Sharum had found their beds, the chin began to appear, opening their businesses as customers, Rizonan and Krasian alike, began to clog the narrow streets.

Soon, it began to feel achingly familiar, even as his sense of discomfort grew. The shouts of vendors, filled with exaggerations and outright lies, the noise and stink of livestock mixing with the smells of cooking food, meat and spices that made his mouth water as vendors displayed everything a buyer could want, and many they did not even know existed.

He had loved the Great Bazaar of Krasia, and it seemed a lifetime since he had wandered its maze of streets.

But you're not in Krasia, he reminded himself, seeing the differences, now that he had absorbed the familiar. Here, a group of dal'ting were followed by Rizonan men who carried their purchases like slaves. There, a pair of Rizonan women walked in the hot sun with their heads and faces wrapped in coloured veils. Everywhere, vendors called their wares in their native languages, but also in broken Thesan or Krasian, and buyers did the same. Already, a pidgin was forming, melding words from both languages with gestures, much like the trade language Northern Messengers used when visiting the Desert Spear. Arlen understood it instinctively.

A dama walked slowly by, watching the activity. An alagai tail hung from his belt in easy reach. Vendors and shoppers alike gave him nervous looks and a wide berth, but Arlen was in black, and simply gave a nod the dama returned casually before returning to his inspection. Arlen had no doubt that the whip would soon be put to use, if for nothing other than a warning to others.

This ent how it's supposed to be.

Abban did not need to look up when the dal'Sharum entered his office. Only one of his men wore black, and Abban did not need to raise his eyes past ankle level to know when his drillmaster darkened his door something that had never happened in the bazaar. Qeran despised the place.

'You were not invited, warrior,' he said, dipping his electrum pen into the inkwell and continuing to write in his ledger.

The Sharum said nothing, pulling the door closed behind him. Abban saw the feet of his two kha'Sharum Watchers appear at his back. They moved with utter silence on the soft carpet, one holding a short metal club, and the other the handles of a garrotte. As they moved to strike, Abban finally allowed his eyes to rise. He did so love to see his investments pay off.

The Watchers were from different tribes, one Nanji and the other Krevakh. Anywhere else in the world, the two men could not have been in the same room as each other without shedding blood.

But tribe meant nothing to Abban's hundred. He was their tribe. He wondered sometimes if, three thousand years after Ahmann's reign, the Haman tribe might endure. Had not Nanji and Krevakh been men once, serving at the side of Kaji?

He snorted. Haman? If Ahmann was truly the Deliverer, it should be the Abban tribe. That had a nice sound to it.

The men struck as one body, the first swinging his club at the meat of the newcomer's thigh, a blow meant for maximum pain and surprise, but minimum damage. While the Sharum recoiled, the other would move in, catching him from behind with the garrotte and allowing his partner open access to attack. Abban had seen them do the dance several times now, and never tired of it.

But the dal'Sharum surprised him, moving as if he had known the men were there all along. He was baiting them, Abban realized as the stranger slipped his leg away from the club and threw his head back just in time to avoid the garrotte. He came back up fast with a punch the Krevakh barely parried in time and a kick that the Nanji managed to turn aside with his wire, though he failed to catch the ankle as it retracted.

The dal'Sharum had a chance to slip the shield onto his arm, but he didn't bother, leaving it slung over his back. He twirled his spear like a dama's whip staff, parrying a club blow from the Krevakh, then spinning to strike the Nanji in the kidney. It came back and caught the Krevakh across the face before the Nanji finally caught it in his loop. He pulled, trying to yank the weapon from the man's grasp, but the Sharum thrust at the same time, breaking the Nanji's hold and slamming the butt of the spear hard into the centre of his chest.

As the Nanji dropped, the warrior turned to face the Krevakh fully. The kha'Sharum regarded him coolly, but pressed the hidden button on his club that extended a sharp, poisoned blade. The dal'Sharum attacked, but the Krevakh parried it smoothly and came in hard.

A moment later he was lying on the floor, gasping for air. It happened so fast that it took a moment for Abban's eyes to catch up to his mind. The warrior had sidestepped the blow and put an elbow in the Watcher's throat.

Abban hesitated. He had not thought it possible that any single man could defeat his Watchers, much less a common dal'Sharum. Thankfully, he was prepared to handle far more than a single man. He reached under his desk for the hidden bell rope that would bring a dozen kha'Sharum rushing into the room.

'Please don't do that,' the newcomer warned, pointing at Abban with his spear. His voice was a rasp, but it had a familiar ring to it. 'The more people you send running in, the more likely someone will get seriously hurt.' He gave Abban a look so intense the khaffit had to suppress a shudder. 'And I assure you, it won't be me.'

Abban swallowed deeply, but he nodded, slowly lifting his hands into the air. 'Who are you? What do you want?'

'Abban, my true friend,' the man said, dropping the rasp from his voice. 'Do you not recognize your favourite fool? This is not the first time you've seen me in a Sharum's blacks.'

Abban felt his blood turn to ice. 'Par'chin?'

The man gave a slight nod. One of the Watchers let out a slight groan, struggling to put a knee under himself. The other was climbing shakily to his feet.

'Out, both of you,' Abban snapped. 'Your salaries will be docked for incompetence. Wait outside and make sure my friend and I are not disturbed.'

As the men stumbled out the door, the Par'chin closed it behind them. He turned, removing his turban and veil. Beneath, his head was shaved clean, covered in hundreds of tattooed wards. Abban drew in a breath, covering his shock with a booming laugh and his customary greeting. 'By Everam, it is good to see you, son of Jeph!'

'You don't seem surprised.' The Par'chin looked disappointed.

Abban came around his desk as fast as his crutch would allow, slapping the Par'chin on the back. 'Mistress Leesha hinted that you were alive, son of Jeph,' Abban said. 'I knew then this "Painted Man" could be no other. Would you like some couzi?' He moved to the delicate porcelain couzi set on his desk. The drink was still illegal in Everam's Bounty, but Abban displayed it on his desk openly now. After what had happened to Hasik, who would dare say a word? He poured two cups, holding one out to the Par'chin.

'Not poisoned, is it?' the Par'chin asked, taking the cup.

It was a fair question. One of the delicate porcelain bottles in Abban's set was indeed poisoned, a drug Abban took the antidote to daily. Still, he put a hurt look on his face. 'You wound me, my friend! Why would I wish to harm you?'

The Par'chin shrugged. 'Been in the bazaar long enough to get caught up. Word is you and Jardir are suddenly pillow friends again. Makes me wonder if you always were, and your public bickering was just a Jongleur's show. Makes me wonder if you tricked me into retrieving the spear so your friend could steal it.'

'I warned you,' Abban said. 'You cannot claim I did not, Par'chin. Did I not say to you that I would deal in no Sunian artefacts? Warned you what my people would do if you so much as profaned the holy city with your footsteps, much less stole its treasures?'

'Yet you gave me the map,' Arlen said.

'You asked for it, Par'chin,' Abban pointed out. 'To be honest, I thought the holy city was a myth, and that you would never find it. But I owed you a debt, and I paid it.'

He paused. 'Now that I think of it, Par'chin, it is you who have not paid. "A mule load of Bahavan pottery" you promised. Is this why you have come? To pay your debt to me at last?'

The Par'chin laughed, and Abban was struck with how much he had missed the sound. They clicked cups and drank, Abban immediately refilling them for another round. They took their time about it, quietly enjoying each other's presence after so long. It was not until they tasted cinnamon that they moved to business.

'Why are you here, Par'chin?' Abban said. 'You must know Ahmann will kill you if he finds you, and his senses are sharp.'

The Par'chin waved dismissively. 'I will be long gone before he can catch my scent.' He met Abban's eyes. 'Will you tell him of this meeting?'

Abban shrugged. 'I do not see the profit in keeping silent, and I will not lie to my master.'

The Par'chin nodded. 'Nor would I ask you to. In truth, I want you to give him a message from me.' From inside his robes, he pulled a small, rolled paper, tied with a simple string. When Abban took the paper, he smiled. 'I saved you the trouble of breaking the seal and forging a new one. Jardir will know my script.'

Abban chuckled, untying the string. The Par'chin's handwriting was as florid and beautiful as ever, but the contents of the letter made his stomach sink. He looked at his true friend and shook his head.

'You do not understand what he has become, Par'chin,' he said. 'You are no match for him. This one time I beg you. Run far and never return. Run, and I swear by Everam's beard I will say nothing of this meeting to Ahmann.'

But the Par'chin only smiled. 'He couldn't kill me in the Maze, and then I was only a pale shadow of what I am now. You'd best start looking for a new master.'

'That pleases me no more than the thought of him killing you,' Abban said. 'Is there no other way?'

The son of Jeph shook his head. 'Ala is too small for us two.'

31.

Alive