The Book of Fire Page 43

  “Is that what I think it is?”

  Köthen lays the bundle crosswise on the pile and slowly peels back the wrappings. The inside face of the cloth is unstained, and a deep maroon. Within its rich folds nestles a sword.

  Köthen’s hands hover over it as if it might disappear if he touches it. Then he flattens the fabric away from the hilt, exposing its intricate design: a winged dragon wound around the trunk of a tree. “Um Gottes Willen!”

  “Oh, nice,” approves N’Doch. “Appropriate, too. Kinda seen better days, though.”

  “Yes,” says Köthen strangely. “It has.”

  Slowly, as if reluctant, the baron slides his right hand under the hilt and fits his palm to the grip. He stares at it some more. “Surely I am dreaming.”

  “A perfect fit, eh?”

  “Fetch milady.”

  It’s such a strangled kind of murmur that N’Doch finally picks up on there being something more going on here than the dude finally finding a weapon he knows how to use. “Why? What’s up?”

  Köthen lifts the sword free of its velvet shroud. In the dim light, the long blade glints dully through layers of corrosion and patina. “Fetch her!”

  “Okay, okay.” N’Doch goes. When he gets back, Köthen has the sword lowered, concealed at his side. There’s an odd light in his eyes, but he watches the girl’s approach like she might be bringing him news of his own death sentence.

  “What is it, my lord?”

  Köthen frames a reply, stumbles, falls silent. N’Doch stares at him, amazed. The man’s a wreck. Köthen starts again, hoarse and halting. “Milady, I beg you. Tell me if I have entirely taken leave of my senses . . .”

  She looks up at him calmly. “Never, my lord.”

  Köthen takes the sword in both hands just below the crossguard, and holds the hilt up in front of her.

  Her response is the same sudden gasp. “Oh! God’s Holy Angels! But how . . .? Where . . .?”

  Köthen nods once, as if the sentence has been delivered as expected, then enfolds the sword in both arms as if it was a child, and bows his head over it. “What does it mean?”

  “I know not, my lord baron.”

  “Is it all preordained, then? Have we no choice in the matter?”

  “Perhaps some do, my lord. I know I do not.”

  N’Doch shifts impatiently. “Is one of you gonna tell me what the hell’s going on?”

  “A kind of miracle,” the girl sighs.

  “It’s a sword, not a miracle. C’mon, what’s the deal?”

  “Not just any sword. Sir Hal’s sword.”

  N’Doch grins at her. “Hey, right. You think I was born yesterday?”

  “It’s true, N’Doch,” she insists earnestly. “You must believe me.”

  He looks from one to the other, and sees they don’t care if he believes it or not. They already know it for a fact. He wonders if the town’s undercurrent of hysteria has gotten to them. “C’mon, you guys, be real. There’s probably a hundred old swords like that.”

  Köthen lifts his head. “No, though I, too, would prefer that explanation. But I know this weapon, like I know my own hands, every scar, every detail. Ten years I fetched and cleaned and honed this blade, and buckled it on the knight who was my master.”

  The girl says, “That sword was laid at Lord Earth’s feet when Sir Hal first pledged fealty to him.”

  And then to Sedou, that night in Deep Moor. Damn! The dragon hilt. N’Doch remembers it now, all too well.

  He wants to go there with the two of them, really he does, but sometimes the moment gets so heavy, it kicks him smack into rebound. Drowning in momentousness, he swims for the opposite shore.

  He laughs. “Well then, I guess we just gotta buy it for you, Dolph, so you can take care of it some more.”

  Erde knew then what she needed to do. “My lord baron, if you would wait here a moment until we return . . . come, N’Doch, we must speak with Stoksie.”

  OH, DRAGON, TELL ME . . . IS THIS WHAT IS MEANT TO BE?

  THIS IS A GREAT AND MEANINGFUL SIGN. IT MUST NOT BE IGNORED.

  DO YOU KNOW WHAT IT MEANS?

  PERHAPS THE VERY WEAPON THAT BARON KÖUTHEN HAS BETRAYED IS PUT INTO HIS HANDS SO HE MIGHT REDEEM HIMSELF BY THE PROPER USE OF IT.

  THEN THERE WILL BE FIGHTING.

  INEVITABLY.

  Erde unpinned the dragon brooch, pressing the carved red stone into the curve of her palm. It was as cold as ice.

  AH! THE STONE KNOWS ITS OWN PATH. IT NO LONGER WELCOMES YOU.

  YET I AM SAD TO LET IT GO.

  She felt as if the brooch had been with her all her life, though it was barely two months since her beloved nurse Alla had provided her with it and the means for her deliverance from Tor Alte, thus sending her off toward her meeting with Destiny.

  N’Doch leaned in to cover up the big jewel glowing in her palm. He was no longer laughing. “You sure about this, girl?”

  “Never more sure.”

  He smiled, but not truly in jest. “I shoulda stole the damn thing when I had the chance.”

  “You tried. Your own destiny would not allow it.”

  “Yeah, well . . .”

  Stoksie sensed the suppressed urgency waiting behind him and broke off his conversation with the weapons dealer. “Whatsit nah? Sumpin’ on yer minds?”

  N’Doch dropped one long arm around the small man’s shoulder and drew him away from the counter. “Stoksie, my man . . . you think any of these high rollers might be interested in a piece of real jewelry?”

  She felt naked without it, but by the end of the afternoon, the dragon brooch had given opportunity for the most inspired bargaining of Stoksie’s life. Or so he claimed. With it, he managed, without calling too much attention to his intricate manipulations, to provision Blind Rachel’s two wagons and one of Scroon’s to capacity with food, lamp oil, and trade items, including a small trinket for each of the children. He acquired several new weapons and the ammunition to fit them. For N’Doch, he bought a knife, the leather vest and a coveted T-shirt, for himself a new leather satchel. For Luther, spare wheels for the caravan and several sacks of grain for the mules. For Erde, a woven sun hat and change of comfortable clothing. Boy’s clothing, of course. Plus a small kit of items that he swore were of high trade value, to be stowed away in her pack for later use.

  Most important, to her if not to the Tinkers, Baron Köthen now walked beside her with Sir Hal’s dragon-hilted sword slung across his back. The long leather sheath was made for a heavier, wider weapon, but Köthen declared in still-stunned tones that it was perfectly suitable for the way he’d be wearing it.

  “Yu Blin’ Rachel Crew nah, fer shur!” Stoksie looked equally stunned by all this sudden good fortune, now that he saw it all actually being loaded into his wagons. “Mebbe we all jus’ go home nah, not hafta trade wit’ nobuddy we doan like!”

  “Dear Stoksie,” Erde assured him, “It’s only right that we return to you the generosity you’ve so freely offered us.”

  “We gib yu a cupla daze. Yu gib us a hafa yeer, mebbe moah.”

  She noticed how careful the Tinkers were to disguise their astonishing windfall as the results of a normal day’s trade, even from Scroon and Oolyoot, who were happily packing away the overflow.

  “We godda stik tagedda,” said Luther as he opened one of the grain sacks to give a portion to Blind Rachel’s mules. “But dere’s one t’ing we ain’t tole ’em yet.”

  “About Sedou?”

  He nodded. When the other Crews’ mules caught scent of it, he sent Charlie over with a canful to keep them quiet. Though he complained bitterly about the lack of room inside his tight-packed caravan, Erde noticed that he made sure to leave a good-sized space in the back corner free of cargo. She asked him why.

  He gave her an embarrassed grin. “Well, da day not ovah yet. Yu nevah know whad else I wanna pick up.”

  But it was close onto dusk. Surely the Tinkers were finished trading for the day. Tall torches were being lit
around the edge of the square, and Scroon Crew’s wagons had already packed up and headed out, though they were having trouble breaking a path through the milling throng. From the top of Luther’s wagon, Erde could see that the booths across the square were still busy with customers. As she helped him fasten the grain sacks to the caravan’s roof, she pointed out a scuffle that broke out around one of the stalls.

  Luther nodded. “Get summa dat nah. S’hot, pebble iz tired. Dey wan’ whad dey wan’. Won’ take no fer an ansa.”

  “Oh, dear . . . look!” Scroon Crew’s wagons had made it to the end of the square, then been turned back at the intersection by a cluster of robed men and women who were officiously barring all passage down the main street. Customers were leaving the stalls, hurrying toward the hubbub.

  “Huh.” Luther squinted out over the slate rooftops. A dust cloud trailed from the direction of the town gates. Somewhere down the main street, a cry went up. One of the robed men snatched up a lighted torch, ran through the crowd to the huge golden bowl in the middle of the square, and touched the torch to its glimmering surface. A bright flame shot up from the center, taller than the man was. “Mus’ be her, den. Lookit dem all run aroun’. Da priestess got heah early.”

  N’Doch’s on his way back from helping Scroon Crew fight their way through the crowd when Köthen grabs his arm.

  “Wait.”

  He sees the wagons halted at the mouth of the square, a flurry of red-and-purple robes, and torches. He and Köthen back against a wall and sit tight to see if Scroon protests the roadblock, and if they’ll need any help.

  “Must be the princess, knocking at the gate.”

  “She is a priestess, I believe,” Köthen says. “Another heathen witch.”

  “You got a real problem with that, doncha.” N’Doch grins. “Whatever. Helluva fuss to make over some old crone.”

  The driver of the lead Scroon wagon argues a little with the Chapter House priests and their townie muscle, but meanwhile the other Tinkers hop down to lead the mules aside. Puzzled, N’Doch watches as the wagons willingly split left and right to park right next to the tall torches the priests have lit on either side of the intersection. “Maybe they just want to hang around for a good view of the parade. You hear music or anything?”

  Köthen shakes his head. If there is any, it can’t be heard over the roar and rumble in the square.

  N’Doch is disappointed. He’s really been missing his music lately. “A real ceremony oughta have drums at least. Let’s head back.”

  “Let’s stay a bit. See what we’re up against.”

  “You’re the boss, yer lordship.”

  They work their way closer to the edge of the crowd. N’Doch’s height gives him a useful advantage, for once. He can see clear over the heads of these puny townies, or so he’s come to think of them already, in Tinker fashion, after rubbing elbows with too many of them all day in too little space. A few blocks down the dusty main drag, a line of marchers wavers into view through the rising heat and dusk. “Here they come. Soldiers, looks like, with big flashy helmets and . . . hey, get this! Spears!”

  “A suitable weapon for infantry.”

  “Maybe in your day. Won’t do much against the firepower we’ve seen around here. Okay, now there’s this big boxy gold thing coming, with four guys lugging it.”

  The crowd is starting to moan and sway a little, as if a wind has come up. Köthen cranes his neck a little to see. The big sword stiffens his back like a second, crosswise spine. “A sedan chair, Dochmann. I am relieved to discover a few things that I know about the future which you do not.”

  “Up yours, yer lordship. What’s a sedan chair?”

  “Most likely, the priestess rides in that chair.”

  “And those poor suckers gotta carry her? Probably too fat and old to walk on her own. Hey, there’s a second one coming up behind it. That one’s even bigger.”

  The soldiers pass by. They’re taller, better fed than the townies he’s seen, or than any of the Tinkers, and they march in pretty good order, despite their antique weaponry. Köthen studies them with professional interest.

  “Some of these men are . . . women!” he exclaims softly.

  They are indeed. Tall, strapping women with steely eyes. N’Doch chuckles. “Welcome to that future you know so much about.”

  When the first sedan chair draws level with him, N’Doch sees that the side curtains have been artfully draped and tied open, so that the occupant is regally framed by graceful folds of rich, gold fabric, made even more picturesque by the lavender dusk and the flickering torchlight. The townies cry out prayers. He’s surrounded by a forest of scrawny, reaching arms. Someone here really knows how to stage an entrance. Now he can see inside the chair.

  “Hey, that’s a guy in there! Big, good-looking dude with too much hair and too much jewelry. Looks like he owns the place.”

  Köthen tosses him a wolfish glance. “Perhaps he does. Such things are not unheard of, you know.”

  “Right. Sorry. Forgot who I was talking to.”

  A bunch of younger guys all dressed alike follow, then another squad of helmeted soldiers, then a pair of women in the same red robes as the women at the Chapter House, only these two are veiled. After them comes the second chair. This one looks like it’s really made of solid gold, though N’Doch knows that’s impossible, and it has a big red dragon right there on the side, just like the one carved on the brooch. N’Doch wonders where that stone will spend its next millennium.

  Up at the entrance to the square, one of Scroon Crew’s mules suddenly objects to a particular flare of torchlight, and starts up a loud braying and shying about on his sharp, heavy hooves. The first chair gets hustled past into the square but the second soldier squad ducks sideways in confusion like they’ve never seen a spooked mule before. Scroon Crew races about trying to calm the mule, though it looks to N’Doch like they’re doing just the opposite, and the whole procession staggers to a halt. The bearers of the second chair stop and set it down right in front of Köthen and N’Doch. All around them, the townies fall to their knees, moaning and murmuring.

  The gauzy, shimmering curtains are closed. Nothing is visible in the shadowed interior until a tawny, slim hand parts the drapery and the High Priestess herself peers out to see why they’ve stopped.

  The two men share the same reflexive grunt of approval.

  The priestess is young and she is beautiful. Really beautiful. More beautiful than any vid star N’Doch can think of, off the top of his head. He wants to whistle aloud, but he’s pretty sure it’d be considered inappropriate. She’s such a mix, he couldn’t begin to guess what her background is, but it looks like she got the very best of all of them. Her eyes are dark, her features delicate but lively, her skin that flawless espresso-and-cream that makes N’Doch wants to put his hands all over her. He nudges Köthen. The baron is transfixed.

  N’Doch bends to hiss into his ear. “Hey. Dolph, didn’t your mama teach you not to stare?”

  As if she feels their gaze, like some kind of magic heat ray, the priestess turns toward them, a slow haughty move like you make when you’re showing someone how little you notice them. N’Doch has the word “bitch” all ready on his tongue when the woman’s glance slides past him, past Köthen, then flickers back as if surprised, and settles on the baron in what appears to be shock. N’Doch thinks this could be getting dangerous. Everybody within ten klicks is looking at her, while she and the baron stare at each other long past what’s polite between strangers. Like, he’d have a big hole lasered through his chest if he stood between them.

  He nudges Köthen again. “Whatcha trying to do, get us in trouble?”

  Then the logjam clears up ahead, and the four bearers bend, grip, and hoist their golden burden to their shoulders. The procession moves forward again, carrying the High Priestess with it. But her gaze drifts back toward Köthen again, and she gives him a kind of stunned smile that transforms her face from that of a proud, self-contained aristocrat
to that of an astonished girl. Then she withdraws behind her curtains, and the chair disappears behind the next infantry squad and a long train of hand-hauled supply wagons.

  N’Doch is irritated. Haven’t these guys ever heard of mule power? He jogs Köthen’s shoulder brusquely. He’s pissed at him for attracting all the attention. “C’mon. We’re outa here.”

  Köthen follows willingly this time, as if he’s too busy thinking to resist.

  N’Doch hugs the facades of the houses fronting the square, where the going’s a little easier. The crowd is surging inward toward the center of the square, but coming up against some force or barrier he can’t see. “Hey! Watch where you’re going, man!” He hauls Köthen out of the path of a loaded hand cart. “So the ice prince has blood in his veins after all.”

  “Dochmann! I have never seen a more beautiful woman. Have you?”

  “Well, she wasn’t looking at me, so what does it matter?” N’Doch thinks about how the girl back at the wagon would feel if she’d seen what he’s just seen. “And you could wipe that silly grin off your face, y’know.”

  Köthen laughs, a charged-up, throaty laugh. A townie shoves past him rudely and he doesn’t even notice. “You are jealous, friend N’Doch.”

  He’s trying to imagine a way he can reasonably deny this. Through the shifting crowd, a face catches his eye. He stops short.

  Köthen is instantly alert. “What?”

  “That girl again. The one I was following.”

  “Alone?”

  “Couldn’t tell.” N’Doch shrugs uneasily and moves on. By the time they’re back at the wagons, he’s slick with the crowd’s close heat and the effort of plowing through it. He sees that during the pack up, the four remaining wagons have been reshuffled into an open square, with the mules all hitched and facing clockwise. Blind Rachel and Oolyoot are clustered inside, in conference. Brenda and Charlie are already perched on the roof of Luther’s van, weapons in hand. No one likes the feel of this crowd. N’Doch climbs over the traces of an Oolyoot wagon, and hears Luther sending the girl up into the driver’s seat, telling her to stay put with uncharacteristic brusqueness.