L. Modesitt - Natural Ordermage

“Don’t try your thievery on me,” Rahl said quietly, the truncheon in his hand.

The boy turned and sprinted away, ducking behind a heavyset older woman.

“See…not all Atlans are easy marks.”

“…he’s a big one, he is…”

“…just a clerk for someone…”

Feeling another chaos-mist, Rahl half turned and slashed with the truncheon. He was not gentle, and an older youth reeled back, grasping his wrist. Like the first cutpurse, he dashed away.

In turn, Rahl hurried across the street, angling between two wagons. Inside, he was more than a little angry. Where were the patrollers and the mage-guards who were supposed to deal with thieves? He could feel his fingers tightening around the truncheon, and once he stepped up to the door of the Merchant Association, he forced himself to relax. He didn’t replace the truncheon in its half sheath until he was inside.

Daelyt looked up from the consignment forms he was studying. “You don’t look happy.”

“Cutpurses. They didn’t get anything…” Rahl paused and checked his belt wallet, concealed as it had been. “No…not this time, anyway.”

“I try not to carry anything I don’t have to,” Daelyt said, shaking his head. “Little bastards will take the belt off your trousers. How did you even feel them?”

“I don’t know. I just did. I hit one of them on the wrist.”

“They’ll either be looking for you or leave you alone.” The other clerk paused. “Mean-looking truncheon you carry.”

“I was told I’d need it.”

“It’s not iron, is it? The mage-guards frown on that.”

“It’s wood.” Rahl decided against mentioning what kind of wood.

“That’s probably all right.”

“Where are the mage-guards? I’ve only seen them on the piers.”

“They’re everywhere. You don’t always see them, but they see you.”

“They didn’t see the cutpurses,” Rahl pointed out.

“With what you did, they probably didn’t need to show up.”

There wasn’t much point in saying more, except that Rahl could sense order and chaos, and he hadn’t sensed either. But he could see that there was a certain value in having people think the mage-guards could be everywhere.

“Could you make another copy of this consignment order?” asked Daelyt. “It’s from Rystinyr for three hundred stones on the Montgren. ”

“I can do that.”

“While you’re writing it up, I’ll hurry over to Eneld’s. The director just left, and he won’t be back for a bit. You know what to do on consignments, and you have the schedule for the ships. I won’t be long. Do you have any questions?” Daelyt slipped off his stool.

Thinking about the state of his wallet, Rahl glanced to Daelyt. “Ah…when do we get paid?”

“Good question. At the end of the day every other sixday. The last payday was last sixday. So we get paid an eightday from tomorrow.”

Rahl nodded. His coins might last that long, but he’d probably be reduced to the cheapest loaves that Gostof hawked.

Sixday came and went, and so did sevenday, although Rahl and Daelyt had to work till almost dinner on sevenday, because the Legacy of Westwind ported, and the ship’s master didn’t have any intention of waiting until oneday to off-load and receive his cargo declarations. From Rahl’s point of view, that had been a mixed blessing because it had meant that Shyret-or the Association-had paid for both his midday meal and the evening meal, which didn’t happen on sevendays. On the other hand, he didn’t get paid extra for the half day’s work.

When he woke on eightday morning, later than usual, he realized, again, that the day was his and that he could do as he wished. Except for one thing-he hadn’t been paid and wouldn’t be for another six days, and all he had left was a little more than one silver, and that would have to go for the bread that comprised his morning meals.

After eating half of the loaf he’d bought the day before on the way back from his midday meal, when he’d realized that Gostof probably wouldn’t be hawking bread on end-day, he washed up and got dressed. At least, he could walk around, and look and study Swartheld. In fact, he told himself, the more he learned the better off he would be, because in less than a season, he’d be on his own. He hadn’t learned anything more about how to control his order-skills, but then, he’d had little enough time, and he hadn’t read much more in The Basis of Order either. He thought for a moment, then tucked the small black-covered book inside his summer tunic. He might find a quiet place to read.

He’d thought about writing his parents, but there was no point in it. It would be seasons before he had enough coins to pay for sending a letter to them, and anything he wrote now would have changed.

With a shrug, he slipped the truncheon into its belt straps, left his cubby, and walked to the front entrance, where he removed the bar, and unlocked the door. After stepping outside the Merchant Association building, he relocked the front door, then turned, glancing around. Heavy shutters covered the windows of the arms shop and Eneld’s cantina across the street. Farther westward, the coppersmith’s was closed, as was the lacemaker’s.

Where should he go?

In the end, he turned eastward. Daelyt had mentioned that it was cooler to the east, with nicer dwellings. Even as early as it was, the day was hot and muggy, and a faint silvery haze covered the green-blue sky, washing it out. Unlike the previous mornings, he passed but a few handfuls of people as he walked two long blocks eastward, and the streets were largely deserted, without a single hawker or peddler. He glanced to his left, in the direction of the harbor, where there were a few wagons, but not that many more people.

Abruptly, he laughed, if softly. Had he been in Nylan or Land’s End and seen the number of people he had passed, he would have thought it moderately busy. In Swartheld, he had already come to accept Daelyt’s definition of what was crowded.

He was sweating when he reached an avenue that angled off to the northeast, but it was broad enough that the riders, wagons, and carriages headed away from the harbor took the south side, and those headed in to the harbor, the north, while the two lanes were divided by a narrow parklike strip. On each side of the parklike divider was a line of trees that resembled giant acacias, except the leaves were broader, and in the middle was a stone-paved sidewalk, shaded by the overhanging trees.

Rahl gratefully crossed the street and took the shaded sidewalk.

Less than two hundred cubits farther along, he saw an empty stone bench to the right, and he decided to sit down there and cool off. After wiping his forehead, he watched the part of the avenue before him, the half for the wagons heading to the harbor. Only two empty wagons passed, and then the avenue was untraveled for a time before a covered carriage passed, holding two couples. They were having an animated conversation, but Rahl couldn’t make out the words as they rode by him.

Finally, he stood and resumed his walk, taking his time and appreciating the shade provided by the leafy canopy of the overhanging limbs.

He passed another bench where two older men sat, side by side, not talking. Neither looked up, nor did they move. Coming down the sidewalk toward him was a large-framed young woman, pushing a small wheeled carriage with a seat. In the small seat was a child, bound loosely in place by a cloth band. Rahl had never seen such a child carriage, but then, why would he have? To make it would cost coins, perhaps a gold or more, and what purpose would it have in Recluce? Then again, perhaps the wealthier merchants and factors in Nylan or Land’s End had such for their children.