Jo Clayton - Blue Magic

On the seventh evening when her prowling was done for a while and her new clothes had been delivered, she moved from the tavern to a better room in, a better Inn in a better neighborhood, close to the wall that circled the highmerchant’s quarter, a four-story structure with a bathhouse and a pocket garden for eating in when the days were sunny and the evenings clear.

Brann gave a handful of coppers to the youth who carried her gear and showed her to the room she’d hired for the next three nights; she watched him out, then crossed to the single window and opened the shutters. “Hunh, not much of a view.”

Jaril ambled over and leaned heavily against her. “Nice wall.”

Yaril squeezed past them and put her head out as far as she could; she looked up and around, wriggled free and went to sit on the bed. “Should be bars on the windows. Bramble, our Host down there obviously didn’t think much of you, putting you in this room. Should we leave the shutters open to catch a bit of air, anyone could get in here. The top of that wall is just about even with the top of the window and it’s only six feet off, if that.”

Brann smiled. “Pity the poor thief who breaks in here.” She left the window, prodded at the bed. “Better than the rack in that other place. My bones ache thinking about it. Uuuh, I’m tired. Too tired to eat. I think I’ll skip supper and spend an hour or so in the bathhouse. Yaro, Jay, I’d appreciate it if one of you gave the mattress a runthrough before you bank your fires, make sure we’ve got no vermin sharing the room with us. I can’t answer for my temper if I wake itching.”

Unlike Hina Baths, the House was divided, one side for women, the other for men and the division was rigidly maintained. The attendant on the women’s side (a female wrestler who looked more than capable of thumping anyone, male or female, who tried to make trouble) didn’t quite know what to make of Brann; she wasn’t accustomed to persons claiming to be females who wore what she considered male attire. Half annoyed, half amused, too tired to argue, Brann snorted with disgust, stripped off her shirt and trousers. Demonstrably female, she strolled inside.

The water was steamy, herb scented, filled with small bubbles as it splashed into a sunken pool made of worn stones, gray with touches of amber and russet and chalky blue. Nubbly white towels were piled on a wicker table near the door into the chamber, there were hooks set into the wall for the patron’s clothing, a shallow saucer of soap and a dish of scented oil sat beside the pool beneath a rail of smooth white porcelain, scrubbing cloths were draped over the rail. Brann hung up her shirt and trousers, dropped her underclothing beside the towels, tugged, off her boots and put them on a boot-stand beside the table. Stretching, yawning, the heat seeping into muscle and bone, she ambled to the pool and slid into water hot enough to make her bite on her lip and shudder with pleasure when she was immersed. She clung to the rail for a moment, then began swimming about, brushing through the uncurling leaves of the dried herbs the attendant had dropped into the water as she opened the taps that let it flow from the hot cistern. She ducked her head under, shook it, feeling the half-inch of new hair move against her skull. Surfacing, she pulled herself onto the edge of the pool and began soaping her legs, taking pleasure in her body for the first time in years; she’d lived a deliberately muffled life up on her mountain, centering her pleasures in her work and the landscape around her; a longtime lover could have learned too much about her, there was no one she trusted that much, no one she wanted enough to chance his revulsion when he learned what she was; even a short-timer would have made too many complications. Now, she was a skinful of energy, tingling with want, and she didn’t quite know what to do about it. Cultures change in a hundred years; the changes might not be large but they were enough to tangle her feet if she didn’t move with care. Laughing uncertainly as her nipples tautened and a dagger of pleasurable need stabbed up from her groin, she pulled a scrub cloth across her breasts, watched the scented lather slide over them, then flung the cloth away and plunged into the pool, submerging, sputtering up out of the water splashing herself vigorously to rinse away the remnants of the soap. Later, as she stood rubbing herself dry, she began running through her plans for the next day. It was time she began looking about for a ship to take her south. Better not try for Cheonea from here, better to change ships… she knew little about the powers of the limits of sorcery, she hadn’t a guess about how Setsimaksimin had found her… she was reasonably sure he was her enemy, she’d made enough others in her lifetime, though most of them had to be dead by now, besides there was the boy and the packet with its plea for her help… so she didn’t know if he could locate her again, but breaking one’s backtrail was an elementary tactic when pursued by man or some less deadly predator. Hmm. She’d always had a thing for ship captains… she grinned, toweled her head… maybe she could find herself another like Sammang or Chandro…

The night was warm and pleasant, the garden between the bathhouse and the Inn was full of drifting perfume and small paper lanterns dangling on long strings; they swayed in the soft airs and made shadows dance everywhere. On the far side of the vinetrellice that protected the privacy of bathers moving to and from the Inn she could hear unobtrusive cittern music and voices from the late diners eating out under the sky, enjoying the pleasant weather and the fine food Kheren Zanc’s cook was famous for. She thought of going round and ordering a meal (more to enjoy the ambiance than because she was hungry) but did nothing about the thought, too tired to dredge up the energy needed to change direction. She drifted into the Inn, climbed two flights of stairs and tapped at the door to her room.

Not a sound. She waited. Nothing happened. She tried the latch, made a soft annoyed sound when the door opened.

The children were both in bed, sunk in their peculiar lethargy. As Brann stepped inside, one pale head lifted, dropped again. She relaxed. Trust Jaril to leave a fraction of himself alert so he wouldn’t have to crawl out of bed and let her in. She stopped by the bed and ruffled his hair, but he didn’t react, having sunk completely into stupor; she smiled. looked about for the key. It was on the bed table, gleaming darkly in the light coming through the unshuttered window. She locked the door, stripped and crawled into bed. A yawn, a wriggle, and she plunged fathoms deep in sleep.

A noise outside woke her from a restless, nightmare-ridden sleep. She pulled a quilt off the bed, wrapped it around her and got to the window in time to see a dark head and shoulders thrust out from the top of the wall, close enough she could almost touch them. Beyond the wall she heard shouts and dogs baying. Without stopping to think, she leaned out, caught the fugitive’s at-tendon with a sharp hiss.

The head jerked up.

“In here,” she whispered. She saw him hesitate, but he had little choice. The hounds were breathing down his neck. She moved away from the window, jumped back another step as he came plunging through and whipped onto his feet, knife in hand, eyes glittering through the slits in his knitted mask. “Don’t be silly,”

she said, no longer whispering. “Close the shutters or get away from the window and let me do it.”

He sidled along the wall, keeping as far from her as he could. After a quick glance out the window, she eased the shutters to, careful to make as little noise as she could, pulled the bar over and tucked it gently into its hooks. That done, she set her back against the shutters and stood watching him.