Margaret Weis - Dragon Wing

The blow of the monk’s staff caught Hugh across his upper body. He staggered. The second blow knocked him to the floor. Blows rained down upon the boy’s body until the monk grew too tired to lift the weapon. Then he stalked out of the infirmary. The water bowl had been broken during the beating. Bruised and battered, Hugh groped about in the darkness until he found the rag—wet with water or his own blood, he didn’t know which. But it was cool and soothing and he placed it gently on the forehead of his friend.

Lifting the thin body in his arms, Hugh held the sick boy close, rocking him awkwardly, soothing him until the body in his arms ceased to twitch and shiver and grew still and cold. . . .

“At the age of sixteen,” Trian was continuing, “you ran away from the Kir. The monk to whom I spoke said that before you left, you broke into their record rooms and learned the identity of your father. Did you find him?”

“Yeah,” answered the Hand, inwardly thinking: So this Trian has gone to some trouble over me. The magus has actually been to the Kir. He has questioned them, extensively, it seemed. Which means . , . Yes, of course. Now, isn’t that interesting? Who will learn more about whom during this little walk?

“A nobleman?” Trian probed delicately.

“So he called himself. He was, in reality—how did you phrase it?—a clod in expensive clothes.”

“You speak in the past tense. Your father is dead?”

“I killed him.”

Halting, Trian stared at him. “You chill me to the bone! To speak of such a thing so carelessly—”

“Why the hell should I care?” Hugh kept walking and Trian had to hurry to catch up. “When the bastard found out who I was, he came at me with his sword. I fought him—bare-handed. The sword ended up in his belly. I swore it was an accident, and the sheriff believed me. After all, I was only a boy and my ‘noble’ father was well-known for his lecherous ways—girls, youths, it didn’t matter to him. I didn’t tell anyone who I was, but let them think I was someone my father had abducted. The Kir had seen to it that I was well-educated. I can sound high-bred when I want to. The sheriff assumed I was some nobleman’s son, stolen to feed my father’s lust. He was more than willing to hush up the old lech’s death, rather than start a blood feud.”

“But it wasn’t an accident, was it?”

A stone turned under Trian’s foot. He reached out instinctively to Hugh, who caught the wizard’s elbow and steadied him. They were descending, moving deeper and deeper into the monastery’s interior.

“No, it wasn’t an accident. I wrested the sword from him; it was easy, he was drunk. I spoke my mother’s name, told him where she was buried, and stuck the blade in his gut. He died too quick. I’ve learned, since then.” Trian was pale, silent. Lifting the glowlamp in its iron lantern, he flashed it into Hugh’s deeply lined, grim face. “The prince must not suffer,” the wizard said.

“So, back to business.” Hugh grinned at him. “And we were having such a pleasant chat. What did you hope to find out? That I’m not as bad as my reputation? Or the opposite? That I’m worse.”

Trian was apparently not to be drawn off onto any side paths. Keeping his hand on Hugh’s arm, he leaned close, speaking softly, though the only ones to hear them that the assassin could see were bats.

“It must be swift and clean. Unexpected. No fear. Perhaps, in his sleep. There are poisons—”

Hugh jerked his arm from the man’s touch. “I know my business. I’ll handle it that way, if that’s what you want. You’re the customer. Or rather, I take it you speak for the customer.”

“That is what we want.”

Reassured, sighing, Trian walked only a short distance further, then halted before another locked door. Instead of opening it, he placed the glowlamp on the floor and indicated with a motion of his hand that Hugh was to look inside. Stooping, placing his eye to the keyhole, the assassin peered into the room.

The Hand rarely felt emotion of any sort, never showed it. In this instance, however, his bored and disinterested glance through the keyhole at his intended victim sharpened to an intense, narrow-eyed stare. He was not looking at the plotting, scheming youth of eighteen who had sprung from Hugh’s reasoning. Curled up on a pallet, fast asleep, was a towheaded, wistful-faced child who could not be older than ten.

Slowly Hugh straightened. The wizard, lifting the glowlamp, scanned the assassin’s face. It was dark and frowning, and Trian sighed again, his delicate brows creased in worry. Placing a finger on his lips, he led Hugh to another room two doors down from the first. He unlocked it with the key, drew Hugh inside and softly shut the door.

“Ah,” the wizard said softly, “there’s a problem, isn’t there?” Hugh gave the room in which they stood a swift and comprehensive glance, then looked back at the anxious magus. “Yeah, I could use a smoke. They took my pipe away from me in prison. Got another?”

“But you frowned, you seemed angry. I assumed—”

“—that I was feeling squeamish about butchering a small child?” It is his privilege to die an innocent child, and escape the evil to which mankind is heir. The words came to him from the past. It was this dark and chill room, the cracked stone walls that brought the memory back to him. Hugh drove it down into the depths of his mind, sorry he’d recalled it. A warming blaze burned in the firepit. He lifted a coal with the tongs and held it to the bowl of a pipe the magus had produced from a pack lying on the floor. Stephen, it seemed, had thought of everything.

A few puffs and the sterego [4] Sterego is a fungus found on the isle of Tytan. Humans of that land have long used crushed sterego as a healing balm. Elven explorers during the First Expansion noticed that the slow-burning, pungent sterego was far superior to their own pipethorn plant, and was less expensive to grow. They transported it to their own plantations, but there is apparently something special about Tytan. No other variety can match the original in flavor and aroma. glowed and old memories faded. “The frown was for myself, because I’d made a mistake. I’d misjudged . . . something. That sort of mistake can be costly. I would be interested to know, however, what a kid that age could have done to earn an early death.”

“One might say ... he was born,” answered Trian, seemingly before he thought, because he cast Hugh a swift furtive glance to see if he’d heard. There was very little the assassin missed. Hugh paused, the hot coal held over the smoking bowl, and stared quizzically at the wizard.

Trian flushed. “You are being paid well enough not to ask questions,” he retorted. “In fact, here is your money.”

Fumbling in a purse that hung at his side, he produced a handful of coins and counted out fifty one-hundred-barl pieces.

“I trust the king’s marker will be sufficient?” Trian held it out. Hugh, raising an eyebrow, tossed the coal back into the fire. “Only if I can collect on it.”

Puffing on the pipe to keep it lit, the Hand accepted the money and inspected it carefully. The coins were genuine, all right. A water barrel was stamped on the front, a likeness (though not a good one) of Stephen’s head adorned the back. In a realm where most things were obtained by either barter or stealing (the king himself was a notorious pirate whose ravages committed among the elven shipping had helped him win his throne), the “double barl” coin as it was called was rarely seen, much less used. Its value was exchangeable in the precious commodity—water. [5] Water was scarce in the Mid Realm. Rain fell infrequently and, when it did fall, was immediately soaked up and retained by the porous coralite. No rivers or streams ran through the coralite isles. Various plant life growing there trapped water. The cultivation of crystaltrees and cupplants was an expensive, laborious means of obtaining the precious liquid, but it was the main source (other than stealing from the elves) of water for the humans of the Mid Realm.