The Hidden City (34 page)

She shrugged again. Thinking of Arann and Lefty. “I don't know. Could I make that my life's work?”

“To know?”

She shook her head. “To save them.” She saw the stiffness in his shoulders, in the sudden straightening of his neck, and wondered what she said that was so wrong.

“It won't last,” he told her, voice cold.

“Neither will I. My father didn't. My mother didn't. My Oma didn't. Does it matter if it lasts?”

“Can you ask that, while you stand here, in this garden?”

She was silent.

“Can you understand that you can spend the whole of your life fighting—both literally and figuratively—to achieve something as fragile as peace? That, having given your life to it, you will lose it, either before your death, or for certain, after it? What will your life have meant, then?”

“Rath—”

“No. I will not speak more on this.” He was not speaking to her. She
knew
it. And wondered about whoever it was he
was
speaking to. Her Oma had told her that the past was like a whole other country, with different rules, and no way of changing anything. She saw that in him now. It was the first time she had ever seen it so clearly.

“It will mean,” she said distinctly, “that I'll have
tried
.”

“And failed,” he said bitterly.

She bent, now, before a perfect stone blossom. Gray, dusty, webbed; she touched it, and the webs clung to her fingers, becoming part of her. “These were never alive,” she told him.

“I'm aware of that,” was his cool reply.

“But if the person who made them had never
seen
life, they would never exist all. They don't grow. They don't change. They can't change,” she added, “anything.”

“Beauty can change much.”

“Depends,” she said, rising as well. “Depends what you find beautiful.” But even saying it, even defiant, she felt a pang as he led her away from the stone garden. Because it
was
beautiful, and in a way that life could never be: It was perfect.

“And maybe,” she continued, although he was no longer speaking, “if people saw people
try,
they'd try, too. Maybe then we'd have something like the garden, but alive.”

“You're young, Jay.”

“I won't always be young.”

“No. I was young once. And now? I'm Rath. Come. We've spent much time here, and we've a little ways to travel.”

He led her beyond the building; the light's radius was so small, it was gone as if it were dream. Someone else's dream. The width of the streets narrowed, and part of the road was blocked by fallen stone, the collapse of walls. Rath navigated these with deliberate care; he was slow, and heavier than she, and the stone teetered beneath his weight. He went first, always, testing these stones and their give, although it was clear he'd passed over them before.

When it was safe, he signaled and she followed, finding foot and handholds where she had to climb. Nothing was so tall or forbidding that he offered to use the rope he carried, and although she scraped skin off her knees and elbows, she didn't complain. The dust was like a second skin by the time they'd cleared the ruin, and nothing in it could tell her what the wall had once hidden from the view of passersby.

Beyond the ruin, there were tunnels. If they had once been narrow streets, they were now a mix of stone and earth; she thought the ground must have sloped toward the city above, although she couldn't be certain.

Rath motioned a halt, and she sat heavily upon the ground. It was difficult to imagine that the hard dirt beneath her legs led to the stone garden, and only in thinking this did she realize that they had not entered the building proper. She wondered if it still stood. Or if it, like the ruins, had folded from within, leaving great passages blocked by chunks of sharp stone that were larger in all ways than she.

Rath held his compass in the glow of the magelight, consulting it briefly. “Here,” he told her quietly.

She squinted. Ahead, darkness, and behind, darkness; Rath was her only light, and his feet were pale shadows. She wanted to speak to the magestone, to tell it to brighten. Had she been at home, she might have tried—but this was more Rath's than any room in the apartment they shared, and she acknowledged it by silence. Sometimes silence served best.

He turned a corner of sorts, a rounding of earth and stone that seemed worn by some sort of liquid. It was cold to the touch, and Jewel touched it only once.

“The ground is solid,” he told her. “But we'll ascend, soon. Be ready.”

By which he meant: be quiet. This hall was narrow and less well formed. “This is nearer the street,” she said, almost without thinking.

“Why do you say that?”

“The narrow tunnels are.”

He turned; the light caught his brief smile. “Good. Could you find your way back?”

“Back?”

“Home.”

She hesitated, right and left a memory, and at that, a jumbled one. “I—might be able to.”

Not the right answer, but from his expression, the one he expected. “We have two days,” he told her softly. “In two days, the answer must be yes.” And he led her down the hall.

It trailed into darkness before Rath stopped. “Here,” he told her, and pointed, his hand brushing the low ceiling. “Can you see?”

She couldn't, until he lifted the magelight and held it almost against the earth. Or what she had assumed was earth. There was a small crack in the uneven surface, and it looked as if it were made of wood.

“There's an entrance?” she asked him, surprised.

“It leads to a subbasement. Half height; when it's really raining, it's much less pleasant.” With care, and a bit of a grunt, he pressed against the wooden slats; they moved up. There was no hinge here. What had appeared to be a trapdoor was merely a set of boards, and from the look on Rath's face, a heavy one. He grunted once as he lifted it an inch or two and slid them to the side.

Then he knelt, and handed her the stone; the compass, he slid into his inner pouch. “Up you go,” he told her. “Don't stand quickly; you'll hit your head.”

She braced herself on his shoulder with her left hand, holding fast to the magestone with her right, rising as he rose. He was careful. But she was light, and she did graze ceiling in spite of his warning. It was four feet from the slats, if that. She wondered who had boarded this entrance up in the first place, because there wasn't a similar one anywhere above it that she could see.

Something skittered by her feet. She hoped it was a mouse. Or mice. Or a hundred mice. She
really
hated rats. Spiders, she could live with—mostly because she could step on them. Bugs with shells were a bit more of a problem because they were usually larger and rounder, and her weight wasn't a guarantee that they would go crunch.

She heard Rath whisper her name, and forgot about bugs. “Sorry,” she murmured, holding the light above the hole as she moved. The ceiling here was low enough that he needed no help to get up, which was good, because she wasn't in a position to give him any.

Arann, now, that would be different. If he were here.

Rath unfolded as much as he could, crouching on the balls of his heels, knees bent. He grimaced and began to crawl, stomach facing the ground. She motioned to the board, but he shook his head, and she left it; it was hard to navigate around the opening; there was barely enough space for Rath to climb through.

“Where does this come up?” she asked him, hunching as she walked. She could crawl, but she didn't particularly like the look of the ground, and walking wasn't as difficult at her height.

“You'll see,” he replied.

Her first impulse, when he pushed against the short, short ceiling, was to frown. Her second, better impulse, was to hold the magelight for him. Her third was to notice that he once again pushed boards up and out of the way. These were, on the other hand, like a trapdoor without a hinge; heavy, but obviously made for the purpose of covering a hole. “Rath—”

He held a finger to his lips, and she shut up.

She could hear noise, the sound of voices, in the distance.

“Give me the light,” he whispered, and she handed it to him without thinking; voices, even in the distance, were often a sign of danger.

He crawled out of the square opening, and after a moment, she saw both his face and the light. “Can you get up on your own?”

She nodded, and caught the lip of the entrance with her hands; she didn't weigh much, but her arms weren't strong, and she struggled to swing her leg up, to gain purchase. He watched her for a moment without comment, but he didn't try to help her.

Minutes passed; she managed at last to emerge, and when she did, she was surprised. She was in a storeroom. It wasn't used for anything important, that she could see; a broken chair, a chipped table, some trays that were literally dented. Make that four broken chairs. But the room itself was a normal room, and she could see a door between two of the chairs.

Rath pointed to that door. “This is the tricky part,” he told her, smiling. He paused to brush the dust and dirt from his clothing, which had the effect of smearing it. The tunnels were damp. She looked at her own clothing with some dismay, but she'd been dirtier than this before. Not, on the other hand, since she'd come to live with Rath.

“Beyond that door,” he said, voice still low, “is another storeroom. Which
is
in use. Supplies are there, and the owner of this place doesn't much care for thieves.”

“Is there another way out?”

He shook his head.

“Will anyone notice us?”

“Probably.”

“Is the door locked?”

“That's the funny thing. The owner is a damn cheap bastard, and the answer should be yes. Not that getting out would be a problem,” he added, “If you've been paying attention to anything I've taught you.”

She nodded.

“Getting
in
would be. And getting in is crucial. Do you understand?” All in a low, even tone, as if he were talking to a frightened animal. Or a small child. She tried not to bridle. Succeeded because she was, in fact, frightened.

“No one will comment on our presence here if we don't appear to be furtive. The tavern is busy enough, if we've paid attention to time.”

And if we haven't?
Jewel paid attention to time by sunlight, damn it. Of which there wasn't any.

Rath pushed the door open, and Jewel saw instantly that he was correct. Saw, as well, that
this
door swung in, which was a good thing; it was half blocked by canvas bags. Lumpy bags. Potatoes or apples, by her best guess. There were bags of heavier, finer cloth, and she thought those must be flour. The second storeroom smelled, to Jewel, like wealth; like life. She saw barrels by the far wall, and realized they were on one side of a door.

“It's late enough in the day,” Rath told her, maneuvering his way around the sacks that were laid out across the floor, “that they've gone to the Common and come back. Never try this in the morning,” he added softly.

It was Jewel's intent never to try this
at all
.

He pushed the door open, and the distant noises became almost overpowering. The subtle scent of food gave way in an instant to the smell of smoke, ale, cooking oil, burning wood. And sweat. Rath stepped into the back rooms of Taverson's, and smiled as Jewel joined him. Taking her hand, he led her into the main room, bypassing a set of swinging doors behind which a man was cursing loudly. And colorfully.

The bar took up the west wall, and tables and chairs—chairs similar to the broken ones they had first encountered—took up the rest of the place. Most of those were occupied by men and women who were eating, drinking, and arguing. Someone was playing a lute, and only half badly; no one was telling him to shut up, at any rate.

No one seemed to notice they were there.

She gaped.

“Taverson's,” he told her, smiling slightly. “Food to be had, of a sort, for a price. They won't serve you ale at your age,” he added, “but it's swill, so count yourself lucky. When you look older, you may have to actually buy some if you don't want to be tossed out.”

Rath entered the dining room, found a table, and took a seat. “We look a mess,” he said with a grimace, “but that usually means faster service.”

But not, at least to start, friendlier service. The man behind the bar came out with something that could be called a scowl—except ten times worse.

Rath, however, laid his purse upon the tabletop, and as it was not obviously empty—and more to the point, in much better state than his clothing—the man's snarl diminished into something approaching politeness. He took Rath's order; Jewel was too intimidated by his height, width, and general bulk, to say a word.

Only when a woman came by with a tray that had two mugs, one small and one large, did Jewel relax. Because the woman took one look at Rath, plopped the tray on the table, and tried to hug him.

Rath endured this, to Jewel's surprise.

“I didn't recognize you without your beard!” she said. “You've been avoiding us. Carl, you lout, you didn't say it was Old Rath!”

The lout was behind the bar, and he looked up at his name, but his glare didn't change in any significant way.

“And who is this?” the woman asked.

“A friend,” Rath replied, in a voice which discouraged further questions. Or should have. She asked anyway, and when Rath didn't answer, she turned that friendly ebullience on Jewel. Jewel didn't know what to say, and stared at the tabletop.