Arcanum (111 page)

“I can’t ride in this, so I’ll walk. It’s not far.”

“I meant a carriage,” said Thaler, looking disappointed.

“A cup of wine before we go?” she said.

“Gods, yes.”

The wine was kosher, and the cups had been tovelled in the new mikveh. She poured them both out a decent measure, enough to stave off the cold and make all the standing that lay ahead of them bearable.

Thaler raised his cup to her. “A toast, my lady provost. Carinthia. Long may we be at peace.”

“I’ll drink to that,” she said, knowing that she had every incentive to work hard for that peace: not just in the palatinate, or between her neighbours, but further afield – Italy, Byzantium, the wild northlands. Because that was where Peter Büber would be for the next five years.

She drained her wine in a most unladylike fashion. “Shall we go?”

“I suppose we should.” He finished his own drink, and carefully placed the cup on the table. “I’ve a present for you. I want to give it to you now, rather than later, because this is for Sophia, not for the provost.”

“I’m intrigued, Frederik.”

He patted himself down in order to find it, and eventually discovered it in a pocket of his ceremonial robe. It was a padded bag, velvet with a drawstring. He handed it to her, and she was surprised by the weight of it.

She frowned, and, on his urging, started to pull the bag open.

“It’ll break if you drop it,” he warned, “but it’s meant to be used. I thought – we thought – that you might not spend so long in so many interminable meetings.”

It was like a flattened brass egg, circular in circumference and as thick as a thumb-width. The surface was plain, and gave no hint as to what it might be.

“We were going to have it engraved, but we ran out of time. Making it proved just a little bit more difficult than we thought.”

She turned it in her hands. There were two catches on the rim, and she pressed one of them.

The whole of one side popped up, with a hidden hinge allowing it to be pulled upright. Inside were fine brass cogs, a coiled ribbon of metal like a snail’s shell, and some tiny rods and shafts.

“Sorry, that’s the wrong side,” said Thaler. He reached forward and pushed the lid down until it clicked, and turned it over. “Now try it.”

Sophia pressed the other catch, and this time when the brass case popped up, it revealed a white horn disk with numbers written in a circle around its edge, and a tiny metal finger which pointed to them.

“It’s very fine,” she said. “What is it?”

“There’s a key that goes in that little hole in the face of the dial.” Thaler shook the bag, and a little brass key tied with a scrap of velvet fell into his palm. He supported her hand underneath while he inserted the key and gave it a few turns. Then he took the key out. “Listen to it,” he said.

She brushed the hair away from her ear and held the device next to her head. She could hear a distinct clicking sound coming from it.

“The finger moves to mark out the hours, as long as the spring is wound. Good for cutting insufferable windbags, like myself, off in their prime.”

“And you made this?”

“No one can claim sole credit. A dwarf called Thorvald Icehewer did a lot of the internal work, but the principles go all the way back to a water clock we found in a drawing.” Thaler put the key back in the bag. “It’s very much a working model. The next one we make will be more accurate.”

Sophia was captivated by its regular, mechanical heartbeat. “It’s perfect, Frederik. Thank you. Thank everyone.”

He beamed. “Well, that’s good. We do have to go now, though, or they’ll be sending someone else to find the pair of us.”

She closed the lid, and slid the disk back into its bag. “Yet again, I find myself without pockets.”

“You won’t need it today,” said Thaler, “and it’ll still be here in the morning.”

She placed the bag on the table next to the two empty cups before slipping her arm through his.

“We can’t put this off any longer. No matter how scared I am.” She took a deep breath, and was glad of the extra space she’d insisted they allow for her bodice. Still she hesitated.

“Sophia? What’s wrong?”

“I’m unworthy of this,” she said.

“Oh, we all are. If that’s the only thing that’s bothering you…”

It wasn’t. Peter could be on Vulfar’s barge already, slipping down the Salzach and away from her. She chewed her lip.

“I’m ready now. Why don’t we go and make the world a better place?”

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We had a bad shaman.

This is what Thorn would say whenever he was doing something bad himself. Object to whatever it was and he would pull up his long gray braids to show the mangled red nubbins surrounding his earholes. His shaman had stuck bone needles through the flesh of his boys’ ears and then ripped them out sideways, to help them remember things. Thorn when he wanted the same result would flick Loon hard on the ear and then point at the side of his own head, with a tilted look that said, You think you have it bad?

Now he had Loon gripped by the arm and was hauling him along the ridge trail to Pika’s Rock on the overlook between Upper and Lower Valleys. Late afternoon, low clouds rolling overhead, brushing the higher ridges and the moor, making a gray roof to the world. Under it a little line of men on a ridge trail, following Thorn on shaman’s business. It was time for Loon’s wander.

—Why tonight? Loon protested. —A storm is coming, you can see it.

—We had a bad shaman.

And so here they were. The men all gave Loon a hug, grinning ruefully at him and shaking their heads. He was going to have a miserable night, their looks said. Thorn waited for them to finish, then croaked the start of the good-bye song:

—If you ask nicely enough, he added, slapping Loon on the shoulder. Then a lot of laughing, the men’s eyes sardonic or encouraging as they divested him of his clothes and his belt and his shoes, everything passed over to Thorn, who glared at him as if on the verge of striking him. Indeed when Loon was entirely naked and without possessions Thorn did strike him, but it was just a quick backhand to the chest. —Go. Be off. See you at full moon.

If the sky were clear, there would have been the first sliver of a new moon hanging in the west. Thirteen days to wander, therefore, starting with nothing, just as a shaman’s first wander always started. This time with a storm coming. And in the fourth month, with snow still on the ground.

Loon kept his face blank and stared at the western horizon. To beg for a month’s delay would be undignified, and anyway useless. So Loon looked past Thorn with a stony gaze and began to consider his route down to the Lower Valley creekbed, where knots of trees lined the creek. Being barefoot made a difference, because the usual descent from Pika’s Rock was very rocky, possibly so rocky he needed to take another way. First decision of many he had to get right. —Friend Raven there behind the sky, he chanted aloud,—lead me now without any tricks!

—Good luck getting Raven to help, Thorn said. But Loon was from the raven clan and Thorn wasn’t, so Loon ignored that and stared down the slope, trying to see a way. Thorn slapped him again and led the other men back down the ridge. Loon stood alone, the wind cutting into him. Time to start his wander.

But it wasn’t clear which way to get down. For a time it seemed like he might freeze there, might never start his life’s journey.

So I came up in him and gave him a little lift from within.

I am the third wind.

He took off down the rocks. He looked back once to show his teeth to Thorn, but they were out of sight down the ridge. Off he plunged, flinging the thought of Thorn from him. Under his feet the broken gritstone was flecked with pock snow, which collected in dimples and against nobbles in a pattern that helped him see where to step. Go as agile as a cat, down rock to rock, hands ready to grab and help down little jumps. His toes chilled and he abandoned them to their cold fate, focused on keeping his hands warm. He would need his hands down in the trees. It began to snow, just a first little pricksnow. The slope had big snow patches that were easier on his feet than the rocks.

He tightened his ribs and pushed his heat out into his limbs and skin, grunting until he blazed a little, and the pricksnow melted when it touched him. Sometimes the only heat to be had is in hurry.

He clambered down and across the boulder-choked ravine seaming the floor of Lower Valley, across the little stream. On the other side he was able to run up the thin forest floor, which was all too squishy, as the ground was wet with rain and snowmelt. Here he avoided the patches of snow. First day of the fourth month: it was going to be trouble to make a fire. The night would be ever so much more comfortable if he could make a fire.

The upper end of Lower Valley was a steep womb canyon. A small cluster of spruce and alder surrounded the spring there, which started the valley’s creek. There he would find shelter from the wind, and branches for clothing, and under the trees there wouldn’t be much snow left. He hurried up to this grove, careful not to stub his senseless toes.

In the little copse around the spring he tore at live spruce branches and broke several off, cursing their wetness, but even damp their needles would hold some of his heat against him. He wove two spruce branches together and stuck his head through a middle gap in the weave, making it into a rough cloak.

Then he broke off a dead bit of brush pine root to serve as the base of his firestarter. Near the spring he found a good rock to use as a chopper, and with it cut a straight dead alder branch for his firestick. His fingers were just pliable enough to hold the rock. Otherwise he didn’t feel particularly cold, except in his feet, which were pretending not to be there. The black mats of spruce needles under the trees were mostly free of snow. He crouched under one of the biggest trees and forced his toes into the mat of needles and wiggled them as hard as he could. When they began to burn a little he pulled them out and went looking for duff. Even the best fire kit needs some duff to burn. He reached into the center of dead spruce logs, feeling for duff or punk. He found some punk that was only a little damp, then broke off handfuls of dead twigs tucked under the protection of larger branches. The twigs were damp on their outsides, but dry inside; they would burn. There were some larger dead branches he could break off too. The grove had enough dead wood to supply a fire once it got going. It was a question of duff or punk. Neither spruce nor alder rotted to a good punk, so he would have to be lucky, or maybe find some ant-eaten wood. He got on his knees and started grubbing around under the biggest downed trees, avoiding the snow, turning over bigger branches and shoving around in the dirt trying to find something. He got dirty to the elbows, but then again that would help keep him warm.

Which might matter, as he could not find any dry punk, or any duff at all. He squeezed water out of one very rotten mass of wood, but the brown goo that remained in his hand resembled dead moss or mullein, and was still damp. The firestick’s rough tip would never light such shit.

—Please, he said to the grove. He begged its forgiveness for cursing as he had approached it. —Give me some punk, please goddess.

Nothing. It became too cold for him to keep kneeling on the wet ground digging in downed logs. To make some heat in him he got up and danced. With this effort he could warm his hands, and it was important they not go numb like his feet had. Oh, a fire would make the night so much more comfortable! Surely something could be found here that would burn under the heat of his firestick’s tip! Nothing. His belt contained in its fold many little gooseskin bags in which there were spark flints, dry moss, firestick, and base. Dressed and carrying all his things, he could have survived this night and the fortnight to follow in style. Which was why he had been sent out naked: the point of the wander was to prove you could start with nothing but yourself, and not just survive but prosper. He needed to come back into camp on the night of the full moon in good style.

But first he had to get through this night. He began to work hard in his dance, throwing his arms around, spinning his hands in big circles. He sang a hot song and wiggled all over. After doing this for a while, everything but his feet began to burn. But he was also getting tired. He tried to find a balance between the cold and his efforts, walking in a tight circle while also inspecting the forest floor for likely punk and duff shelters. Nothing!

In every grove some wood will burn.

This was one of the sayings that Heather often repeated, though seldom when talking about fire. Loon said it aloud, emphatically, beseechingly: —In every grove some wood will burn! But on this night he wasn’t convinced. It only made him mad.