Jo Clayton - Blue Magic

“Eh, it’s not everyone who snaps his fingers and makes a tigerman fetch for him.”

“I see. Yaril, what’s your brother doing?”

“Still watching the Dreeps. They’re up in the attics turning out the servants’ rooms.”

“Tell him to leave them to it and get back here.”

“He’s coming.”

There weren’t that many sorcerors around, at least not those who’d reached the level of competence in their arts that matched Taa’s description of the man he’d robbed. And, from what she’d observed in her travels when she was still wandering about the world, they all knew each other. So it was more than likely this one could give her some useful information about Settsimaksimin and less than likely he’d tell her anything unless she had a hold on him.

Jaril oozed through the door. “The search is about finished, but the Head Dreep, he’s not happy about it, he wants to get the hounds in and start over on the rooms, Kheren is having fits about that. I got the feeling the Dreep was walking careful around our Host, that he knew if Kheren complained about him, he’d be up to his nose in hot shit.”

“Hmm. Tua, I’ve got a deal for you. Listen, I’ll send the children for that egg if you’ll bring your sorceror here.”

“Why? Don’t get snarky if I don’t jump at the deal, but it’s my body and my life you’re playing with.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll take care of you.”

“He’s a sorceror.”

“And I’m Drinker of Souls and I’ll have his in my hands.”

“I don’t have a choice, do I?” ‘

“No. You might save us some time if you told Yaril and Jaril where to find Jizo’s House. Doesn’t matter all that much, the place is probably lit up and swarming with guards, the children could fly over the quarter and go right to it.”

“I talk too much.”

“Oh, I don’t think so. You’re getting what you want without risking your hide.” She chuckled. “Tua Tua, you’ve been working hard to worm this out of me, clever clever young thief playing pittypat games with the poor old demidemon, making her singe her aged paws plucking your nuts from the fire.”

He opened his eyes wide, angelically innocent, then he gave it up and grinned at her. “Was clever, wasn’t it.’

“Shuh. Be more clever. Tell the kids where to find the egg.”

He was a tall man with a handsome ruined face and eyes bluer than the sea on a sunny day. His fine black hair and the beard neatly groomed into corkscrew curls and the bold blade of his nose proclaimed him a son of Phras. He came in slowly, the thick, textured wool of his black robe brushing against boots whose black leather was soft and glowing and unobtrusively expensive. He wore a large ruby on the fourth finger of his left hand, his right hand was bare; they were fine hands, never-used hands, soft, pale with a delicate tracery of blue veins. He stood without speaking while Tua shut and locked the door and joined Brann who was sitting on the bed, Jaril-Mastiff crouched by her knee.

The silence thickened. Tua fidgeted, scratching at his knee, feeling the knife up his sleeve, rubbing the back of his neck, the small scrapes and rustles he made the only sounds in the room. Brann continued to sit, relaxed, smiling. She intended to force the man to speak first, she had to have that edge to counter the power and discipline she felt in him, to wrest from him the knowledge she needed. He’d spread a glamour about himself, he’d dressed in his best for this meeting, wearing pride along with wool and leather and power like a cloak, but he was dying, his body was beginning to crumble. He saw that she knew this and his eyes went bitter and his hands shook. His mouth pressed to a thin line, he folded his arms across his chest; the shaking stopped, but there was a film of sweat on his face and a crease of pain across his brow. He knew the egg was nowhere in the room. (It was with Yaril who was being a dayhawk sitting on the ridgepole of the Inn, the egg in a pouch tied to her leg; Brann had no way of knowing how close a sorceror had to be to retrieve his souls and was taking no chances.) “You called me here,” he said; his voice was deep and rich, an actor’s voice trained in declamation and caress. “You have something for me.”

“I have.” She put stress on the I.

“Give it to me.”

“Not yet.”

Dark power throbbed in the room, lapping at her with a thousand tongues. Brann kept her smile (though it went a little stiff), kept her hands relaxed on her thighs (though the thumbs twitched a few times); tentatively she tapped into the field and began reeling its energies into herself, scooping out a hollow he couldn’t penetrate. The young thief scrambled away from her, went to sit in the window, legs dangling, ready to jump if Brann faltered. The Jaril-Mastiff came onto his feet, muscle sliding powerfully against muscle, and padded noiselessly around the periphery of the zone of force protecting the man. He oscillated there for several breaths, looking from the sorceror to Brann (who was sitting unmoved, draining the attack before it could touch her) then he grew denser and more taut and when he was ready, he catapulted against the man’s legs, bursting unharmed through the zone and knocking him into a painful sprawl.

Jaril-Mastiff untangled himself and trotted over to Brann. She laughed, scratched between his ears and watched the sorceror collect himself and get shakily to his feet. “Are you ready to talk?”

He brushed at his sleeves, unhurried, discipline intact. “What do you want?”

“Information.” She smiled at him. “Come. Relax, I’m not asking that much. Sit and let’s talk.”

He shook his robe back into its stately folds, straightened the chair he’d knocked awry in his sprawling fall and settled himself in it. “Who are you?”

“Drinker of Souls.” Another smile. “What name do you answer to?”

Another thoughtful pause. “Ahzurdan.” His blue gaze slid over her, returned to her face, touched the short delicate curls clustered over her head, again returned to her face. “Drinker of Souls,” he said. “Brann,” he said.

She frowned. “You know me?”

He glanced at the boy in the window, said nothing. “Turn him loose,” she said. “That’s what he’s here for.”

Abruptly genial, he nodded. “Isoatua, the contract is complete.’ He raised a brow. “Go and don’t let me see you again.”

Tua scowled, turned his shoulder to him. “Fenna meh?”

“A minute. Jaril?”

The mastiff came onto his feet, yawned, was a glitnmersphere of pale light. It drifted upward, whipped through Ahzurdan before he had time to react, then returned to Brann and shifted to Jaril the boy. “He means it,” he said.

“You heard, ‘Ilia. Next time be a bit more careful what you lift.”

Tua started to say something, but changed his mind. Ignoring Ahzurdan he bowed to Brann, strolled to the door. With a graceful flick of his wrist, he unlocked it. When he was out, Jaril turned the key again, put his head through the wall. A moment later he ambled over to Brann. “He’s off.”

“Thanks. Ahzurdan.”

“Yes?”

“How do you know me?”

“My grandfather was a shipmaster named Chandro bal Abbayd. I believe you knew him.”

“Shuh. You hear that, Jaril? Three. That’s not coincidence, that’s plot. Miserable gods are dabbling their fingers in my life again. All right. All right. Nothing I can do about it. Look, Ahzurdan, there was an attack on me a few days ago, a tigerman slid a knife between my ribs. No, I don’t think you sent him. I’m reasonably sure someone called Settsimaksimin wants me dead. He came close, not close enough. I have no doubt he knows that by now. What I want from you is this, anything you can tell me about him.”