Shadows of Sanctuary Part 5

Fights broke out in the line at the tent, as people began to realize they would never get inside. Soon the mood grew so ugly that criers spread among the people, ringing bells and announcing that the carnival would present one more performance, several more performances, until all the citizens of Sanctuary had the opportunity to glimpse the carnival's wonders. And the secret. Of course, the secret. Still, no one even hinted at the secret's nature.

Wess pulled her cloak closer. She knew the nature of the secret; she only hoped the secret would see his friends and be ready for whatever they could do.

The sun touched the high wall around the palace grounds. Soon it would be dark.

Trumpets and cymbals: Wess looked towards the Processional gates, but a moment later realized that all the citizens around her were straining for a view of the palace entrance. The enormous doors swung open and a phalanx of guards marched out, followed by a group of n.o.bles wearing jewels and cloth of gold. They strode across the hard-packed ground. The young man at the head of the group, who wore a gold coronet, acknowledged his people's shouts and cries as if they all were accolades - which, Wess thought, they were not. But above the mutters and complaints, the loudest cry was, 'The prince! Long live the prince!'

The phalanx marched straight from the palace to the new-built platform. Anyone shortsighted enough to sit in that path had to s.n.a.t.c.h up their things and hurry out of the way. The route cleared as swiftly as water parting around a stone.

Wess stood impulsively, about to sprint across the parade route to try once more to speak to the prince.

'Sit down!'

'Out of the way!'

Someone threw an apple core at her. She knocked it away and crouched down again, though not because of the threats or the flying garbage. Aerie, too, with the same thought, started to her feet. Wess touched her elbow.

'Look,' she said.

Everyone within reach or hearing of the procession seemed to have the same idea.

The crowd surged in, every member clamouring for attention. The prince flung out a handful of coins, which drew the beggars scuffling away from him. Others, more intent on their claims, continued to press him. The guards fell back, surrounding him, nearly cutting off the sight of him, and pushed at the citizens with spears held broadside.

The tight cordon parted and the prince mounted the platform. Standing alone, he turned all the way around, raising his hands to the crowd.

'My friends,' he cried, 'I know you have claims upon me. The least wrong to one of my people is important to me.'

Wess snorted.

'But tonight we are all privileged to witness a wonder never seen in the Empire.

Forget your troubles tonight, my friends, and enjoy the spectacle with me.' He held out his hand, and brought a member of his party up beside him on the stage.

Bauchle Meyne.

'In a few days, Bauchle Meyne and his troupe will journey to Ranke, there to entertain the Emperor my brother.'

Wess and Quartz glanced at each other, startled. Chan muttered a curse. Aerie tensed, and Wess held her arm. They all drew up their hoods.

'Bauchle goes with my friendship, and my seal.' The prince held up a rolled parchment secured with scarlet ribbons and ebony wax.

The prince sat down, with Bauchle Meyne in the place of honour by his side. The rest of the royal party arrayed themselves around, and the parade began.

Wess and her friends moved closer together, in silence.

They would have no help from the prince.

The Processional gates swung open to the sound of flutes and drums. The music continued for some while before anything else happened. Bauchle Meyne began to look uncomfortable. Then abruptly a figure staggered out on to the path, as if he had been shoved. The skeletally thin, red-haired man regained his balance, straightened up, and gazed from side to side. The jeers confounded him. He pushed his long cape off his shoulders to reveal his star-patterned black robe, and took a few hesitant steps.

At the rope barrier's first wooden supporting post, he stopped again. He gestured towards it tentatively and spoke a guttural word.

The post sputtered into flame.

The people nearby drew back shouting, and the wizard lurched along the path, first to one side, then the other, waving his hands at each wooden post in turn.

The foggy white circles melded together to light the way. Wess saw that the posts were not, after all, burning. When the one in front of her began to shine, she brought her hand towards it, palm forward and fingers outspread. When she felt no heat she touched the post gingerly, then gripped it. It held no warmth, and it retained its ordinary texture, splintery rough-hewn wood.

She remembered what Lythande said, about her having a strong talent. She wondered if she could do the same thing. It would be a useful trick, though not very important. She had no piece of wood to try it on, nor any idea how to start to try in the first place. She shrugged and let go of the post. Her handprint -she blinked. No, it was her imagination, not a brighter spot that she had touched.

At the prince's platform, the wizard stood staring vacantly around. Bauchle Meyne leaned forward intently, glaring, his worry clear and his anger barely held in check. The wizard gazed at him. Wess could see Bauchle Meyne's fingers tense around a circle of ruby chain. He twisted it. Wess gasped. The wizard shrieked and flung up his hands. Bauchle Meyne slowly relaxed his hold on the talisman. The wizard spread his arms. He was trembling. Wess, too, was shaking.

She felt as if the chain had whipped around her body like a lash.

The wizard's trembling hands moved: the prince's platform, the wooden parts of the chairs, the poles supporting the fringed awning, all burst suddenly into a fierce white fire. The guards leaped forward in fury and confusion, but stopped at a word from their prince. He sat calm and smiling, his hands resting easily on the bright arms of his throne. Shadowy flames played across his fingers, and the light spun up between his feet. Bauchle Meyne leaned back in satisfaction, and nodded to the wizard. The other n.o.bles on the platform stood disconcerted, awash in the light from the boards between the patterned rugs. Nervously, but following the example of their ruler, they sat down again.

The wizard stumbled onward, lighting up the rest of the posts. He disappeared into the darkness of the tent. Its supports began to shine with the eerie luminescence. Gradually, the barrier-ropes and the carpets on the platform and the awning over the prince and the canvas of the tent became covered with a soft gentle glow.

The prince applauded, nodding and smiling towards Bauchle Meyne, and his people followed his lead.

With a sharp cry, a jester tumbled through the Processional gates and somersaulted along the path. After him came the flutists and drummers, and then three ponies with bedraggled feathers attached to their bridles. Three children in spangled shorts and halters rode them. The one in front jumped up and stood balanced on her pony's rump, while the two following did shoulder-stands, braced against the ponies' withers. Wess, who had never been on a horse in her life and found the idea quite terrifying, applauded. Others in the audience applauded too, here and there, and the prince himself idly clapped his hands. But nearby a large grizzled man laughed sarcastically and yelled, 'Show us more!' That was the way most of the audience reacted, with hoots of derision and laughter. The child standing up stared straight ahead. Wess clenched her teeth, angry for the child but impressed by her dignity. Quartz's oldest child was about the same age. Wess took her hand, and Quartz squeezed her fingers gratefully.

A cage, pulled by a yoke of oxen, pa.s.sed through the dark gate. Wess caught her breath. The oxen pulled the cage into the light. It carried an elderly troll, hunched in the corner on dirty straw. A boy poked the troll with a stick as the oxen drew abreast of the prince. The troll leaped up and cursed in a high pitched angry voice.

'You uncivilized barbarians! You, prince - prince of worms, I say, of maggots!

May your p.e.n.i.s grow till no one will have you! May your best friend's v.a.g.i.n.a knot itself with you inside! May you contract water on the brain and sand in the bladder!'

Wess felt herself blushing: she had never heard a troll speak so. Ordinarily they were the most cultured of forest people, and the only danger in them was that one might find oneself listening for a whole afternoon to a discourse on the shapes of clouds or the effects of certain shelf-fungi. Wess looked around, frightened that someone would take offence at what the troll was saying to their ruler. Then she remembered that he was speaking the Language, the real tongue of intelligent creatures, and in this place no one but she and her friends understood.

'Frejojan!' she cried on impulse. 'Tonight - be ready - if I can -!'

He hesitated in the midst of a caper, stumbled, but caught himself and gambolled around, making nonsense noises till he faced her. She pulled her hood back so he could recognize her later. She let it fall again as the cart pa.s.sed, so Bauchle Meyne would not see her from the other side of the path.

The grey-gold furry little being gripped the bars of his cage and looked out, making horrible faces at the crowd, horrible noises in reaction to their jeers.

But between the shrieks and the gibberish, he said, 'I wait -'

After he pa.s.sed them, he began to wail..

'Wess -' Chan said.

'How could I let him go by without speaking to him?'

'He isn't a friend, after all,' Aerie said.

'He's enslaved, just like Satan!' Wess looked from Aerie's face to Chan's, and saw that neither understood. 'Quartz -?'

Quartz nodded. 'Yes. You're right. A civilized person has no business being in this place.'

'How are you going to find him? How are you going to free him? We don't even know how we're going to free Satan! Suppose he needs help?' Aerie's voice rose in anger.

'Suppose we need help?'

Aerie turned her back on Wess and stared blankly out into the parade. She even shrugged off Quartz's comforting hug.

Then there was no more time for arguing. Six archers tramped through the gate. A cart followed. It was a flatbed, curtained all around, and pulled by two large skewbald horses, one with a wild blue eye. Six more archers followed. A mutter of confusion rippled over the crowd, and then cries of 'The secret! Show us the secret!'

The postillion jerked the draught horses to a standstill before the prince.

Bauchle Meyne climbed stiffly off the platform and on to the cart.

'My lord!' he cried. 'I present you - a myth of our world!' He yanked on a string and the curtains fell away.

On the platform, Satan stood rigid and withdrawn, staring forward, his head high. Aerie moaned and Wess tensed, wanting to leap over the glowing ropes and lay about with her knife, in full view of the crowd, whatever the consequences.

She cursed herself for being so weak and stupid this morning. If she had had the will to attack, she could have ripped out Bauchle Meyne's guts.

They had not broken Satan. They would kill him before they could strip him of his pride. But they had stripped him naked, and shackled him. And they had hurt him. Streaks of silver-grey cut across the red-gold fur on his shoulders. They had beaten him. Wess clenched her fingers around the handle other knife.

Bauchle Meyne picked up a long pole. He was not fool enough to get within reach of Satan's talons.

'Show yourself!' he cried.

Satan did not speak the trade-language, but Bauchle Meyne made himself well enough understood with the end of the pole. Satan stared at him without moving until the young man stopped poking at him, and, with some vague awareness of his captive's dignity, backed up a step. Satan looked around him, his large eyes reflecting the light like a cat's. He faced the prince. The heavy chains clanked and rattled as he moved.

He raised his arms. He opened his hands, and his fingers unfolded.

He spread his great red wings. Wizard-light glowed through the translucent webs.

It was as if he had burst into flame.

The prince gazed upon him with silent satisfaction as the crowd roared with surprise and astonishment.

'Inside,' Bauchle Meyne said, 'when I release him, he will fly.'

One of the horses, brushed by Satan's wingtip, snorted and reared. The cart lurched forward. The postillion yanked the horse's mouth to a b.l.o.o.d.y froth and Bauchle Meyne lost his balance and stumbled to the ground. His face showed pain and Wess was glad. Satan barely shifted. The muscles tensed and slid in his back as he balanced himself with his wings.

Aerie made a high, keening sound, almost beyond the limits of human hearing. But Satan heard. He did not flinch; unlike the troll, he did not turn. But he heard.

In the bright white wizard-light, the short fur on the back of his shoulders rose, He made an answering cry, a sighing: a call to a lover. He folded his wing-fingers back along his arms. The webbing trembled and gleamed.

The postillion kicked his horse and the cart lumbered forward. For the crowd outside, the show was over.

The prince stepped down from the platform, and, walking side by side with Bauchle Meyne and followed by his retinue, proceeded into the carnival tent.

The four friends stood close together as the crowd-moved past them. Wess was thinking. They're going to let him fly, inside. He'll be free ... She looked at Aerie. 'Can you land on top of the tent? And take off again?'

Aerie looked at the steep canvas slope. 'Easily,' she said.

The area behind the tent was lit by torches, not wizard-light. Wess stood leaning against the grounds' wall, watching the bustle and chaos of the troupe, listening to the applause and laughter of the crowd. The show had been going on a long time now; most of the people who had not got inside had left. A couple of carnival workers kept a bored watch on the perimeter of the barrier, but Wess knew she could slip past any time she pleased.

It was Aerie she worried about. Once the plan started, she would be very vulnerable. The night was clear and the waxing moon bright and high. When she landed on top of the tent she would be well within range of arrows. Satan would be in even more danger. It was up to Wess and Quartz and Chan to create enough chaos so the archers would be too distracted to shoot either of the flyers.

Wess was rather looking forward to it.

She slipped under the rope when no one was looking and strolled through the shadows as if she belonged with the troupe. Satan's cart stood at the performers' entrance, but Wess did not go near her friend now. Taking no notice of her, the children on their ponies trotted by. In the torchlight the children looked thin and tired and very young, the ponies thin and tired and old. Wess slid behind the rank of animal cages. The carnival did, after all, have a salamander, but a piteous, poor and hungry-looking one, barely the size of a large dog. Wess broke the lock on its cage. She had only her knife to pry with; she did the blade no good. She broke the locks on the cages of the other animals, the half-grown wolf, the pygmy elephant, but did not yet free them.

Finally she reached the troll.

'Frejojan,' she whispered. 'I'm behind you.'

'I hear you, frejojan.' The troll came to the back of his cage. He bowed to her.

'I regret my unkempt condition, frejojan; when they captured me I had nothing, not even a brush.' His golden grey-flecked hair was badly matted. He put his hand through the bars and Wess shook it.

'I'm Wess,' she said.

'Aristarchus,' he said. 'You speak with the same accent as Satan - you've come for him?'

She nodded. 'I'm going to break the lock on your cage,' she said. 'I have to be closer to the tent when they take him in to make him fly. It would be better if at first they didn't notice anything was going wrong ...'

Aristarchus nodded. 'I won't escape till you've begun. Can I be of help?'

Wess glanced along the row of cages. 'Could you - would it put you in danger to free the animals?' He was old; she did not know if he could move quickly enough.

He chuckled. 'All of us animals have become rather good friends,' he said.

'Though the salamander is rather snappish.'

Wess wedged her knife into the padlock and wrenched it open. Aristarchus s.n.a.t.c.hed it off the door and flung it into the straw. He smiled, abashed, at Wess.

'I find my own temper rather short in these poor days.'

Wess reached through the bars and gripped his hand again. Near the tent, the skewbald horses wheeled Satan's cart around. Bauchle Meyne yelled nervous orders. Aristarchus glanced towards Satan.

'It's good you've come,' he said. 'I persuaded him to cooperate, at least for a while, but he does not find it easy. Once he made them angry enough to forget his value.'

Wess nodded, remembering the whip scars.

The cart rolled forward; the archers followed.

'I have to hurry,' Wess said.

'Good fortune go with you.'

She moved as close to the tent as she could. But she could not see inside; she had to imagine what was happening, by the tone of the crowd. The postillion drove the horses around the ring. They stopped. Someone crawled under the cart and unfastened the shackles from below, out of reach of Satan's claws. And then -.

She heard the sigh, the involuntary gasp of wonder as Satan spread his wings, and flew.