“I welcome you and your ship to Aus, Captain,” said the beachwear model with another shimmering smile, “on behalf of the elders and the wizard.”
“Wizard?”
“Ah! Your first visit to these parts? Yes, the wizard is the ominous Lord Yzarazzo, sorcerer of the Seventh. Aus has long been free of swordsman barbarism.”
“What about water rats?”
Again the teeth shone. “They will not be molested if they stay on board. We have two local laws I must explain, Captain. The first is simply that any swordsman setting foot ashore will be delisted. Permanently.”
Tomiyano reddened. “My mother is a swordsman. She normally handles our trading.”
“That is unfortunate. She may trade from the deck. If she steps off the plank, she will violate the law.” Ixiphino shrugged and then chuckled. “But she will find that Aus is a good place to trade. Trading on deck is not uncommon, and the profits will probably be higher than you are used to.”
“Why?”
“Because some ships have a prejudice against sorcerer towns, so fewer call than before. But the traders are honest—relatively speaking, of course—and the people are peaceable.”
“Then the sorcerers keep order?”
The port officer laughed. “They do, and very well, too.”
The man had not once looked at the deckhouse, although the crew members were carefully leaving that side of him clear, for the benefit of the watchers. Curious!
“What does a sorcerer do if, say, the apprentices riot?” Tomiyano asked.
Another laugh. “We keep our apprentices under better control than that, Captain. But we have had violent persons—visiting swordsmen have attempted violence on occasion. I can tell you that the sorcerers’ methods are just as effective as the swordsmen’s. More so, I should say. A spell can be cast from a distance.”
Tomiyano was a skeptic. “Turning them into frogs?”
“Turning them into corpses, Captain. Sometimes charred corpses.” Pause. Within the dim deckhouse, glances were exchanged.
The officer was still being amiable. “But apart from that one restriction, Captain, Aus is like any other city and more pleasant than most. The trading fee is two golds.”
The captain raised his eyebrows into the fringe of his hair. “That seems very reasonable.”
“In most cities that is the fee. The difference is graft, and my masters do not permit that.”
Tomiyano silently handed over two coins and shook hands. The young man bowed his handsome head slightly and turned as if to go.
“You said two laws?”
“Oh, yes. Stupid of me.” The port officer flashed his smile again. “There is an absolute restriction against swordsmen of high rank—Sixths or Sevenths. They are not even allowed in port. But such are rare. You have no free swords aboard, do you?”
“Of course not,” said Tomiyano.
The officer turned to look at the deckhouse, then back to Tomiyano with quiet amusement. “And you swear that by your ship, sailor?”
Sweat broke out on Wallie’s brow. His hand tightened on the hilt of the seventh sword.
“I do.”
Nnanji drew breath with a hiss.
The port officer gave the captain a long cynical smile, shaking his head as one might disapprove of a naughty child. Then he spun on his heel and departed, his sandals slapping on the gangplank. Tomiyano absentmindedly wiped his forehead with the back of his hand and began shouting orders.
“My lord brother!”
Here it came. Ever since the first time they had met, Wallie had known of Nnanji’s impossible idealism. He had known that some day it must lead to trouble. And here Nnanji had an open-and-shut case.
“I have told you that you cannot make a denunciation to me, Nnanji. Will you denounce the captain to his mother?”
Nnanji flushed scarlet and glared around the group. Even in the gloom of the shuttered deckhouse, Thana, Lina, and Matarro were visibly hostile. Brota’s eyes were chips of steel.
“I think my son’s remark was made for your benefit, adept!”
“I do not hide behind perjury, mistress! Then my own honor would be sullied.”
This was insanity! Suicide! Wallie had two cities full of sorcerers to worry about now, and Nnanji was provoking the sailors as if he actually wanted to be thrown ashore. He would certainly not live to the next port, nor would Wallie. Then Wallie saw away out.
“It was not perjury, Nnanji. It was simple, honest-to-Goddess truth. We are not free swords.”
Nnanji turned to stare at him blankly.
“You told me there were three types of swordsmen. You missed one—mercenaries.”
“Well, that’s not really a type, lord brother. I mean the chance doesn’t come up very often.” Nnanji was ambivalent about mercenaries. Taking money to wage war was barely honorable. On the other hand, mercenaries could wallow in blood and feats of honor.
“Nevertheless, we are on a specific mission for the Goddess. Therefore we are mercenaries, not free swords! So the captain spoke the truth. Now shut up!”
“Yes, mentor.”
Brota gave Wallie a long, hard look and then almost smiled. “You swear that, my lord?”
“By my sword.”
She nodded, apparently satisfied.
Tomiyano marched in and pulled the door closed behind. He leaned against it and glared at Wallie. Old Lina threw open a shutter on the River side, admitting gratifying light and fresh air.
“Thank you, Captain,” Wallie said.
“He knew you were here!”
“Apparently.”
“I think we should leave,” Brota muttered. “I don’t like this.”
“Can’t!” her son snapped. “No wind now. Calm as milk.”
Wallie was not surprised. “I should prefer that you stay awhile, anyway.”
Brota scowled. “You mean that? Why?”
“Because,” Wallie said, “I have to learn more about sorcerers. The Goddess would not have given me an impossible task, so there must be some way to fight them. They must have a weakness. I can’t guess what it is, and the only way to find out is to ask questions in places like this. How many more cities have been captured? When? How? Where is the nearest swordsman city? Those sorts of questions. You can find out for me, mistress; you and your crew. It will be a service to the Most High.”
It might be a penance, also, but Wallie was not about to inquire about
Sapphire
’s cryptic past.
Tomiyano looked at his mother and she nodded. “I’ll lay out some samples, then,” he said grudgingly.
“Two questions, “ Wallie said. “You shook the port officer’s hand. Was it smooth or calloused?”
“Smooth. Why?”
“Not a sailor’s hand?”
The captain’s eyes narrowed. “I expect his father is an elder, or something. He’s just a playboy sailor. Never mind that—”
“Second question: have you ever in your life queried a tax for being too low?”
Tbmiyano’s face reddened. “What the demons does that matter? You saw and heard, didn’t you? He knew about you. The sorcerers have told him.”
“He was a sorcerer,” Wallie said.
Facemarks were so basic to their culture that the idea took a while to sink in. Brota seemed to accept it first, and her shrewd eyes shrank to slits within their wrinkles. “Why do you say that?”
“Because he refused the extra money,” Wallie said. “If that really is the custom, as he said?” She nodded. “So? He did that to persuade us that his masters were all-seeing, all-powerful. But he didn’t act like a flunky being watched by his masters—he was amused, relaxed. And you can’t buy that sort of higher loyalty, because he could take the extra salary and demand the graft, too. His hand is smooth. He is a sorcerer.”
The others exchanged frightened glances.
“Well, we’re here,” Wallie said. “Go and do your trading. But remember that anyone may be a sorcerer, regardless of facemarks. I suggest you don’t allow more than one stranger on board at a time.”
“My lord brother?”
“Yes?”
“Sorcerers can make themselves invisible. The ship may be full of them already.”
Wallie groaned. “Thanks, Nnanji. Good thinking.”
†††††
A display of lumber and a few brass pots had been set up on the quay. Brota settled into a chair on deck and waited for customers. Sailors slipped down into the crowd and wandered off in search of information, river lore as well as military intelligence. Honakura went also, at his tortoise pace, and he was sure to be a shrewd investigator. Hawkers came by with carts, calling wares. Old Lina tottered down to haggle over pink plucked fowls and baskets of strawberries. From time to time sorcerers went by in pairs, paying no especial attention to
Sapphire
. The afternoon wore on, hot and airless.
Nnanji had gone back to sit by Matarro’s bag of swords. He had scowled over each one in turn, finding them much shorter than he expected, and had finally pulled out his whetstone and started to sharpen them.
Vixini had gone to sleep. Jja and Cowie sat like sculptures, with slaves’ unlimited patience. Wallie watched through the shutters.
“Mentor,” Katanji said. “May I go out on deck?”
“No. Why aren’t you wearing your sword?”
“My kilt is downst—below decks, in Mat’o’s cabin.”
Nnanji grunted and went back to whetting. Wallie did not interfere, although he saw no reason why Katanji should be imprisoned as he and Nnanji were. Katanji had no ponytail and his facemark was a festering red sore, almost unreadable even at close quarters.
Time passed. Nothing much happened. A trader sniffed disparagingly at Brota’s lumber and walked on. The first two sorcerers went by again. Nnanji’s whetstone scraped nastily and untiringly. Honakura wandered back past the ship to explore in the other direction. Katanji fretted, mooning from window to window. Wallie grew tired of standing, rolling his problems around in his mind until he was giddy. Always the answer was the same—he must have more information.
It was not fair! How could he wage a war unless he knew his enemies’ powers? Military intelligence was what he needed. Mata Hari . . . George Smiley . . . In Thondi’s house he had been a whodunnit detective. Now he found himself in a spy thriller, and the damnable facemarks of the People made it impossible. He needed to become, for a while, James Bond, or even Travis McGee. A few days as a longshoreman or a porter in Aus would let him uncover the data he needed, but he had seven swords indelibly engraved on his forehead.
Nnanji’s whetstone made a tooth-jarring screech.
That did it.
Several times, Wallie had been forced to remember that emotions were not a mental process. In acquiring Shonsu’s body, he had also acquired his glands. He had learned to look out for danger signals when he had his sword in his hand and adrenaline could be expected, but sometimes those glands could sneak up on him.
As now.
Frustration, impotence, the ignominy of hiding, even perhaps some residual jet lag, all suddenly boiled over. Wallie Smith lost Shonsu’s temper.
“
Hell
!” he snapped. “I’m going ashore!”
Nnanji looked up approvingly. “Right!” he said, and put away his whetstone.
“You’re staying here,” Wallie told him. “You’ll guard my sword and my hairclip. Katanji, go to Brota and ask her for some black cloth. Shut up, Nnanji.”
Ten minutes later, he had stripped down to a piece of black burlap around his loins and a rag around his brow. He had never felt more naked, and his conscience was whimpering cautions at him, but it was too late to back down. He started for the door.
“My lord brother!” Clutching Wallie’s harness and sword, Nnanji was glaring mutinously. “This is wrong! A swordsman without his sword is without his honor. You asked me to tell you—”
“Your objection is noted.” Wallie stepped around him and marched out on deck.
Brota stood with fists on hips and looked him over without expression. “You’re all beef and no brains. What are you trying to prove? It’s stupid!”
Insolence! But he was not a lord of the Seventh when his head was bound. He walked by her without a word.
Jja stood at the top of the plank, pale and troubled. He smiled cheerfully and tried to get by her, also, but she stepped in his path and put her arms around him.
“Master, please? I know a slave should not say such things, but please do not do this! It is very dangerous.”
“Danger is my business, Jja.”
He kissed her forehead and eased her out of his way.
She clung to him. “Please . . . Wallie?”
She never called him that except when they were making love.
He shook his head. “We must trust in the Goddess, darling.”
He looked both ways for sorcerers. Not seeing any, he trotted down the plank and mingled into the pedestrians, settling to their pace. He had a good view over people’s heads, and no one seemed to pay much attention to him, although he intercepted a few scowls that he found more puzzling than threatening. He strolled past display tables loaded with wares and guarded by traders; past hawkers’ carts bearing piles of bright fruits, golden loaves, and heaps of bloody meat encrusted with flies; past stationary wagons with horses tossing their nose bags in a jingle of harness. He stepped out of the way of other wagons rumbling along; he jostled in and out of the crowd and was careful not to get his bare toes stepped on, or stub them on the cobbles. He scanned the litter of trade goods being loaded and unloaded. He began to enjoy himself.
The air was still; hot and sticky. The docks of Aus stank, but he was having fun.
Then he saw a couple of cowls approaching. Turning his back on them, he squeezed into a group around a hawker’s cart where lumps of something were being roasted on a brazier and offered on sticks. The old man tending it gave him one of the scowls he had noticed and then muttered, “Here, then,” and handed him a stick.
Now Wallie recalled that beggars also wore black and bound their heads. So the mighty Shonsu was a beggar, a big, husky beggar who should go and find an honest job? He suppressed a grin, thinking of his pocketful of jewels back at the ship. He bit into the offering and found it rubbery but delicious, hot and spicy. On a second mouthful he decided that it was octopus, or squid. Fresh-water octopus?
In return he mumbled a benediction: “May She strengthen your arm and sharpen your eye.”