The Magicians And Mrs. Quent Part 7

"It is not a debt I have with them, Sashie. You need not fear that. Rather, I wish to make an investment in their trading company, an investment that would serve to better our circ.u.mstances."

She laughed at this; it was a music he adored above all others. "But, sweet brother, you have improved our circ.u.mstances. How can we fare better than to dwell here at the Golden Loom?"

Eldyn could not help smiling at her enthusiasm, even as it perplexed him. The inn was well kept, but like Eldyn's coat it was growing shabby. And while the clientele were generally respectable folk, that was not entirely the case, as must be for an inn down in Waterside.

"I would do much to improve our lot, Sashie. I would get us a house to live in, with servants to keep it, and our own carriage to drive about the city. I would be a gentleman and go back to university. And I would buy you dresses and jewels, so you might attend a party in the grandest house in the New Quarter and command the attention of all eyes there." He leaned across the table and took her hands in his. "I would see us happy."

"But, dear brother, I am happy. Indeed, it is impossible that any of those things you speak of could make me any happier than I already am."

She cast a look over her shoulder, across the public room toward the bar. A man stood there, speaking while others gathered around, listening and laughing. The spectators were some of the inn's less savory denizens: their clothes thickly patched, their grins gap-toothed and yellow. A woman leaned over the bar toward the man, her face over-painted and her bosom nearly spilling out of her frock as she howled with laughter.

The speaker might have been taken for a young gentleman of worth hanging about a seamier section of the city for a thrill. He was tall, with a lion's mane of gold hair, and was by any measure very handsome. His coat of russet velvet was superior to anything Eldyn had ever owned. Rings glittered on both of his hands.

The man went by the name of Westen, though whether that was his given name, his family name, or simply an affectation, Eldyn did not know. What Eldyn did know was that, despite his fine looks and fine clothes, he was no gentleman, and none of the rich things he wore had been gotten by forthright or respectable means, for the fellow was known to be a notorious highwayman. This was not a matter of rumor or idle speculation, as Westen had brazenly admitted to it on more than one occasion, and some of his exploits had been so audacious as to be the subject of articles in The Fox.

Even now he was regaling his listeners with some tale of his shadowy deeds. Eldyn could not catch the details from across the room, but the gist was clear when Westen made a little play, his hands flying up and his mouth forming a circle of surprise as he mimicked some hapless traveler whom he had accosted on the road and whom, at the point of a pistol, he had bereaved of all valuables.

The onlookers laughed, the coa.r.s.e music of their mirth ringing out over the inn. Eldyn might have been tempted to call for a king's man, but he knew there was no point. Though Westen enjoyed telling tales of his criminal doings, he was ever scrupulous to avoid mention of any details that might link him to a particular incident, and it was said he did his work in disguise, his face covered by a mask, so that none of his victims might recognize him.

During their first weeks at the Golden Loom, Westen had come in only rarely. However, before long the highwayman had started to show up at the inn with increasing frequency, and now Eldyn thought he began to have an inkling why. As Sashie gazed at Westen across the room, her pretty face alight, the highwayman paused in his storytelling to smile and nod in her direction. At this, Sashie s.n.a.t.c.hed her hands back from Eldyn and drew a silk handkerchief from the sleeve of her dress; she let out a sigh as she clutched it in both hands.

"I do not recognize that handkerchief, Sashie. It looks very rich." She resisted turning her head toward the bar, but her smile was enough to tell him his suspicion was correct. "Did Westen give it to you?"

At once a stricken look came over her face. "Please, sweet brother, don't take it!" She pressed the handkerchief to her breast. "You mustn't take it away from me. He said it is a token and that I must hold on to it. He said that only if his...only if one who thinks well of him holds on to it and keeps it close will he be warded from harm when he is on the road. If I give it up, he will be placed in grave peril."

It is you who are placed in peril by holding it, Eldyn wished to tell her, but such was the anguish in her expression that he could not bring himself to utter such hard words. Instead, he said, "If he is in danger on the road, it is because he brings it on himself, Sashie. You must know that."

Only it was clear she did not. Sashie was but eighteen and a guileless thing; she could not understand how it was that Westen acquired all his clothes and rings. To her he was simply handsome and tall and marked by wealth-all things she naturally responded to.

No, Eldyn could not blame her. He was the one who had brought her to the Golden Loom, and it was his fault for not seeing what was happening sooner.

"You know you must give it to me," Eldyn said as gently as he could. "A young lady cannot accept a gift from a man with whom she has no proper a.s.sociation."

"But we live here," Sashie said, tears forming in her eyes. "And this is where I met him. What a.s.sociation can be more proper than that?"

"You know it is not proper," Eldyn scolded softly. "Else you should not have kept it a secret from me. A young lady deserves and requires the society of gentlemen, Sashie, not scoundrels."

"He is no scoundrel!" she said, but her weeping had all but stolen away her voice, and hardly a sound came out, a fact for which Eldyn was grateful. Slowly, and taking the greatest care so as not to cause her hurt, he opened her fingers and took the handkerchief from her. He tucked it into his coat pocket.

"I shall see that it is returned to him," he said, "so that he might give it to another who is better able to bear it for him."

Sashie said nothing. She only slumped in her chair and stared at her empty hands.

Eldyn hated this. But it had to be done now, before it went any further. A man like Westen, given his occupation, could have no compunction about ruining an innocent young woman. In one awful, selfish act, he could remove all hopes Eldyn had for finding Sashie a husband and giving her a happy life. He could steal away her future, just as he stole gold from his victims, and reduce her not only to poverty but to the life of a slattern. She might not understand now, but she would thank him for this later.

"You should return to our chambers," Eldyn said. "I will speak to Mr. Walpert and see that supper is sent up."

She rose without a word, her face cast down, and ascended the stairs from the public room. Eldyn finished his cup of ale, then looked toward the bar. However, Westen was gone. Eldyn would have to return his handkerchief to him later.

Happily, there were better things to antic.i.p.ate. His conversation with Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing had left him with new hope, if new urgency as well. That he had met the two outside a moneylender's office on Marble Street that first time was surely a stroke of providence.

Eldyn had been at the moneylender's to settle a dispute regarding a debt of his father's, though it had taken several distressing hours. Anxious to be away from the place, he had rushed out of the lending house-and collided directly with Mr. Sarvinge, knocking a bundle of papers from his hands.

With a profusion of apologies, Eldyn helped Mr. Sarvinge and his a.s.sociate, Mr. Grealing, gather the papers that had scattered on the street. As this was done, Eldyn could not help noticing a number of handbills advertising for investors in a trading company to the New Lands. Once the papers were retrieved, he invited the two men to a nearby tavern, buying them a drink as amends for his rudeness, and he listened as they described their business venture-how the trading company was to be formed, what goods it expected to carry back from the New Lands, and how it expected to bring its charter members a tenfold increase on their investment.

One drink turned to three, and it was not long before Eldyn became certain he had found the means to earn back some of the fortune his father had squandered. To their credit, Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing never so much as suggested that Eldyn should invest in their company. However, by the time they departed the tavern, after a fourth and a fifth drink, Eldyn broached the matter himself and announced he was determined to be an investor in their company. Such was the solicitous manner of the two men that, despite the way he had accosted them earlier, they a.s.sured him they would hold a set of shares for him as long as possible, and they parted on the most agreeable of terms.

Gaining the required hundred regals had so far proven more difficult than Eldyn had expected. However, Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing had brought good news with them today, at least from Eldyn's perspective. The approval of the trading company's charter had been delayed by the Ministry of Imports; due to the great number of New Lands charters being requested these days, the ministry was reviewing each application more scrupulously to be a.s.sured it met the highest standards.

There was no cause for concern, as Mr. Sarvinge had been a.s.sured that the charter for his and Mr. Grealing's company would receive the ministry's stamp shortly. While this delay was frustrating for the other investors, it now appeared that the expected returns would in fact be fifteen times the initial investment, and no one could complain about that.

Eldyn was fortunate that there yet remained a few shares in the trading company, due to the untimely death of one of the initial investors. While Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing promised to hold the available shares for Eldyn, he could not impose too long on their kindness; he had to purchase the shares, and soon. But where was he to gain the hundred regals?

As pressing as this question was, an even more immediate concern impinged upon him as he saw Miss Delina Walpert emerge from the inn's back salon. Her frock was even drabber than usual, and the pale green ribbon she wore about her throat lent her face a sickly cast; he supposed she had donned it in an effort to make herself pretty, though simply combing her hair would have done far more toward that end.

Eldyn rose from the table, retreated into the shadows beneath the stairs, and gathered the darkness around himself. There was a tense moment as she pa.s.sed near, her shoes clomping against the floorboards, but her gaze never turned his way, and after that she pa.s.sed out the inn's front door. Eldyn let out a relieved breath, then went to find Mr. Walpert and order his and Sashie's supper.

T WO HOURS LATER Eldyn brushed his only coat, put on his second-best shirt and trousers, and polished his boots with a rag he had obtained from one of the inn's maids with a few kind words. He had no hat so instead tied his hair behind his neck with a black ribbon.

He told Sashie he was leaving, received only the tersest of replies through the door to her room, and, knowing he would get nothing more, departed their chambers. On the street, Eldyn looked for a hack cab to hire, then thought better of it; it was not so far to the Sword and Leaf that he could not walk, and it was better to save what little coin he had for a drink or two in case Rafferdy's pockets were empty that night.

It was not very far to the tavern, but neither was it safe to walk there alone after nightfall. If times were difficult in the country-where, according to the broadsheets, the number of men without a sc.r.a.p of land to farm grew every day-then times were harder still in the city, for it was to the city that all those who could not make a livelihood in the country came. And saints help them if they could not find work here, which few enough of them did, for no one else would help them. The poorhouses were overflowing and the churches exhausted of charity, with only the gibbet at Barrowgate doing anything to reduce the population of the indigent-and at this task it worked tirelessly. However, despite its industry, its labors were not enough to reap the prolific crop of dest.i.tute that grew by the day.

Keeping to lighted ways when he could, and folding the shadows around himself when he couldn't, Eldyn made it to the Sword and Leaf unmolested. The carved sign above the door depicted a silver sword piercing a curling green leaf. It was said that, long ago, the Sword and Leaf had been a favored haunt of magicians. However, the only magick he had ever witnessed there were the usual spells of bliss and forgetfulness conjured by drink.

Inside, Eldyn found his friend seated in a paneled booth that provided privacy on three sides yet afforded a view of the rest of the tavern on the fourth. Rafferdy was smoking something from a hookah pipe and had already had at least one drink, given the empty gla.s.s on the table.

"I started without you," Rafferdy said, the words accompanied by a puff of spicy smoke.

"For which I can in no way blame you," Eldyn said, not minding in the least. If Rafferdy was already at it, then it meant he had money tonight. "But, I say, you have a more determined air about you than usual. Is it your purpose this evening to drive all senses from your skull with the greatest efficiency possible?"

"It was a long and trying day."

"How so?"

"I have no intention of speaking about it," Rafferdy said, by which Eldyn took him to mean he had no intention of speaking about it until he had imbibed a sufficient amount of drink and had inhaled a sufficient amount of smoke. Toward that end, Eldyn signaled the bartender.

"So why did your father recall you to Asterlane?" Eldyn said when a bottle of whiskey and two cups had been delivered. "You never told me before you left."

"That's because I didn't know before I left. The dear old man hadn't the courtesy to tell me in his letter."

"Perhaps that's because he thought if you did know, you wouldn't come at all."

"You're right in that," Rafferdy said, and quaffed half his whiskey in a swallow. "I am sure I would have refused him if I had been granted foresight of what was to be."

"No, you wouldn't have," Eldyn said.

Rafferdy sighed. He was in no way a homely man, but he was only really good-looking when he was smiling, which fortunately was much of the time. However, at the moment he wore a morose expression.

"No, I suppose I wouldn't have refused him. Though on occasion I like to think that I might."

Eldyn had sometimes thought the same thing. Even with Vandimeer dead, it was no easy thing to step out from under the shadow of his father. He finished his own whiskey and refilled both their cups. "So what was it your father summoned you home for?"

"I thought it was because I left university," Rafferdy said.

The bottle clattered against the table as Eldyn fumbled it. "What do you mean you've left university?"

"Didn't I mention it?" Rafferdy said, his glum expression replaced by a sly smile. Rafferdy always waited to deliver news when it would have the most dramatic effect.

"No, you didn't mention it, as you know perfectly well."

"But you must have noticed I haven't been hanging about the colleges or the coffeehouses."

"You hate the coffeehouses," Eldyn said. "What was it you told me? Beer might make a smart man dull, but coffee is worse because it can delude a dull man into thinking he's sharp. Besides, there's no way I might have noticed you weren't hanging about the university. You know I wasn't able to...that I didn't go back to university this term myself."

By the look on his face, this was a fact Rafferdy had forgotten. "I'm sorry, Garritt. It slipped my mind."

"As does everything not related to clothes or gambling or your own appearance in a mirror."

Rafferdy was not a selfish or unkind man; he was quite the opposite, really. But like many the son of a lord, a life of privilege had trained him to be generally preoccupied with himself before others, and he had a habit of a.s.suming everyone had the same choices he did.

"You liked university, didn't you?" Rafferdy said, topping off their gla.s.ses. "My father thought it important that I go, but I found it a load of rubbish. Half the professors were drunks, and the other half were mad. The only useful thing any of them taught me was that I had better clean my teeth if I don't want to have a frightening smile when I'm forty. But I should have known you would like it, Garritt. You have a perverse way of enjoying things that are dreadful and disdaining anything that is marvelous. I've seen you sit in a musty corner, happy as can be reading some dreary old book, and frown when a pretty young woman pa.s.sed by and waved her fan at you, as if it were the most unwelcome of distractions."

"I did like it," Eldyn said, and he left it there for a moment, for how could he explain to Rafferdy, to whom it had all meant so little, how to him it had meant so much? At university, he felt as if he was making something of himself-something better. At last he said, "Sometimes I still go to the coffeehouses. I was at Mrs. Haddon's the other day. I saw Talinger there, and Jaimsley and Warrett."

"Be wary of those troublemakers, Garritt. Especially Curren Talinger. The gap between discussing politics and proposing treason is not so great as you might think, not these days."

"But it's only talk," Eldyn said, even though the same concerns had occurred to him. "It can't harm anyone."

Rafferdy shook his head. "That's where you're wrong. Why do you think my own speech is always so silly and worthless? I've not your brains by half, but I'm not witless either. I speak this way because I know how perilous speech can be. Look there if you think I'm wrong." He nodded to the copy of the Rules of Citizenship posted on the tavern wall. "A word is all it takes to put a man in prison, or to seize his property, or to end his life. A saber might be stopped by a shield. A bullet might be dodged by a stroke of luck. But you can't dodge a word. If one is flung at you, it will hit its mark unerringly. No, Garritt, there's nothing in the world more dangerous than talk."

Eldyn frowned. These were unusually somber words from his usually cheerful companion. "By the saints, Rafferdy, what happened to you in Asterlane?"

"I suspect my father wishes me to marry."

"Really, Rafferdy, what's so unexpected about that? Your father has always urged you to take on more responsibility."

"It was different this time," Rafferdy said, fidgeting with his empty gla.s.s. "He's getting old. And he's not well. He can hardly bear the journey to the city anymore."

Eldyn lowered his voice. "But you always knew this must happen."

"Must it?" Rafferdy said, reaching for the bottle.

As so often, Rafferdy was an enigma to Eldyn. Sometimes he wondered why they were friends at all. They dwelled in different worlds-a fact that Rafferdy sometimes forgot but that Eldyn never did. If they had not known each other from boyhood, they would certainly never have formed an a.s.sociation now. However, their grandfathers-both scions of well-to-do houses-had been devoted friends, and while Rafferdy's father had risen as far as Eldyn's own had fallen, and the two men had held nothing but disdain for each other, their sons had been given the opportunity to form a close friendship while their grandfathers yet lived.

However, at the moment Eldyn's friend confounded him. "I don't understand, Rafferdy. I've often heard you complain about your father's decisions and practices. Well, one day you will be Lord Rafferdy. That will be your chance to do things as you see fit, to make yourself into something." He leaned over the table. "Don't you want to be something, Rafferdy?"

"Yes," Rafferdy said. "I want to be utterly harmless." And he raised his gla.s.s and drained it.

"What are you talking about? You're to be a magnate."

"And I have seen what magnates do, Garritt. Despite what you might have heard me say, I believe my father is a good man. Yet even he has..." Rafferdy looked away. "It is a terrible thing to be lord over another man, Garritt. To be the master of his fate. Only G.o.d should have that power."

"Better to be lord over another man than to be lorded over, to have your fate rest in another's hands," Eldyn said, unable to keep a bitter note from his voice. "But I said it once, and I say it again. What happened at Asterlane? What did your father say to you?"

"He told me he is enclosing his lands," Rafferdy said. And after that they drank their whiskey in silence.

At some point while they sat there, a rather large group spilled into the tavern and took over the booth opposite their own. They were mostly men, but a few women were with them-though which were dressed more lavishly or outlandishly was hard to say. As a whole, they offered such a profusion of velvet, lace, and brocade-in every variety of hue from crimson to cerulean to the deepest violet-as to make a flock of peac.o.c.ks appear drab. The men and women alike wore powdered wigs and powdered faces, pale contrast to their rouged lips and cheeks.

The newcomers called out for drink, and laughed, and sang in high voices. It was a beautiful music but forlorn as well, and for some reason it made Eldyn think of exotic birds locked in filigree cages. From time to time a flash of light issued from the booth across the tavern, catching the corner of Eldyn's eye. However, each time he turned he saw nothing save mouths open in laughter, and a tangle of white arms and long white necks.

"You must forgive me, Garritt," Rafferdy said, looking up from his cup, which was empty once again. "I'm dreadful company tonight. I should never have dragged you out. But you're here, and the damage is done, so tell me-what of you? How have you been occupying yourself since you're not in university this term?"

A burst of trilling laughter rang out across the tavern; Eldyn made an effort not to turn and look. "Would that I had something of great interest to report. I'm working on a few business ventures, that's all. I have a hope they will do me and my sister well."

Eldyn described in general terms how he intended to invest in a trading company to the New Lands. However, Rafferdy was not paying attention, and it was just as well. For some reason, describing his dealings with Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing left him uncomfortable; perhaps it was only that he did not want Rafferdy to know how great his need was. In truth, he feared Rafferdy would insist on helping him raise the necessary funds, and he did not wish to be indebted to a friend. Not that it was likely that Rafferdy had ten regals to spare, let alone a hundred. He was not Lord Rafferdy yet.

"I'll go get us more to drink," Eldyn said, picking up the empty whiskey bottle.

He went to the bar and handed off the empty bottle. As he waited for it to be refilled, he heard a sound behind him. It was soft amid the clamor of the tavern, like the voice of a dove.

Turning, Eldyn saw one of the women from the peculiar group. She sat in a chair apart from the others, dressed in a high-necked gown the color of apricots. Her face was a thing of perfect beauty, flawlessly white, framed by snowy ringlets of hair, her lips and cheeks painted on just so. Something was cradled in her cupped hands.

Eldyn approached. A warm scent rose from her. She smiled and opened her hands. On her palms rested a tiny bird. It was like no creature he had ever seen, for its feathers were pure silver, tinged with gold at the wingtips. Its beak was gold as well, and its eyes tiny sapphires. At first he thought it a clever facsimile wrought of metal, but then he saw its wings stir and its throat flutter as the soft music emanated from it.

The woman held the bird higher, and Eldyn reached out a finger to stroke it. However, even as he touched it, the bird vanished in a flash of white light. Eldyn let out a gasp, and mocking laughter fell from the woman's red lips. Resting on her hand where the bird had been was a silver disk, like some sort of coin. She held it out toward him. Eldyn hesitated, then took it.

"Your whiskey, sir," said a voice behind him, and Eldyn stumbled around. He took the bottle, shoved the silver coin into his pocket, and, without another look at the woman, hurried back to his table.

"Be careful, Garritt," Rafferdy said. His glum look was gone, and he wore an amused expression now. "They are not what they seem."

"What do you mean?" Eldyn said, too startled to say anything else.

Rafferdy arched an eyebrow. "You really don't know? Haven't you ever been to one of their plays?"

Eldyn made an effort to hold his hand steady as he poured whiskey. "Plays?"

"They are Siltheri, Garritt. Illusionists."

Eldyn looked up from his pouring. Of course-their outlandish clothes and wigs were costumes. They were players, come into the tavern after a performance at some theater.

Rafferdy took his whiskey. "Just because one looks to be a lady on the outside doesn't mean there's not something very unladylike hiding underneath that dress. As they say, if you see an angel on Durrow Street, it's sure to be a devil beneath. Or didn't you know that all Siltheri are men?"

Eldyn's cheeks glowed with shame, and he was grateful for the dim light. In recent years, the theaters of the illusionists had grown in popularity, if not so much in respectability. Not that Eldyn had ever attended any plays, for want of money. However, he knew that Rafferdy was right, that onstage all roles-both male and female-were played by men, as it was against the law for a woman to work in such a vocation. And if from time to time an illusionist was found floating in the River Anbyrn, it barely earned a mention in the broadsheets. For such things were only to be expected from time to time with men who did such things and who lived such lives.

"I'm sorry, Garritt, I shouldn't laugh," Rafferdy said, then proceeded to do just that. "But the look on your face is quite priceless. I've never seen you so addled."

Eldyn glowered. Rafferdy was having far too much fun with this. The bird had been an illusion, nothing more.