Dangerous Gifts (19 page)

“Oh, yes, though it varies with the district, and of course, the meaning shifts. In the western valleys, you’ll still hear, for example,
kitesta
used to mean cooked meat.”

“Andretic for...” Bergast frowned. “For ‘feast,’ I believe.”

“Indeed.”

“And the Itnunnacklish? What does that mean?”

“
Itnun
is ‘woman.’”

“
Itni
is ‘girl,’ in Andretic,” Bergast said, nodding. He pulled out his notebook and reached for his quill, then remembered he was at the dinner table and that unless he dipped the thing in the gravy he had nothing to use for ink.

“Oddly, that word survives among the Gudain,” Lobik said, “though the spread of Lithan has almost wiped out their native speech. You’ll hear
itni
used as a term of affection, meaning ‘little girl.’
Ack
is ‘whole,’ or ‘complete.’And
li
is ‘to calm’ or ‘soothe,’ and
esh
is ‘the world.’”

“Interesting. So it means... what, ‘peacemaker’?”

“So we hope, Scholar Bergast, so we profoundly hope.”

Eventually the conversation turned to business. “Trade’s not so good,” Enboryay said. “You know, Mr Fain, we could do with some investment from outside. We have the marble, but the Ikinchli, well,
they
don’t seem to fancy the mine-work these days.” He seemed to have forgotten the two Ikinchli sitting at his table, not to mention those still serving him. “They’d rather farm, or fish, or just walk away; maybe to Scalentine, eh?”

“And Gudain workers tend to insist on being paid,” Enthemmerlee said quietly. “But they don’t like the mines, either. They’re dangerous. A family with only one child, as so many are now, is reluctant to risk them in such work. Only the desperate do it.”

“We have to keep the roads open for the Empire trade route,” Enboryay said, “but what good it does us, I don’t know. Caravans come through” – I pricked up my ears – “but it’s all from elsewhere. We used to export marble.”

“And what else?” Fain said. “I am ashamed to admit I know little about your major trade here.”

“Ah! Main course!” A positive stream of plates followed; the combined odours were strong enough to make my eyes water, although my stomach seemed to find them appealing enough.

“Fish,” Lobik said to Fain. “Fresh and dried. And lichens, for use in dyes. In these, the land is generous.”

Somehow all this chatter only seemed to emphasise an underlying silence. Cutlery clanged on the plates, and the whisper of rain against the windows haunted the room.

I
LEFT
R
IKKINNET
to watch Enthemmerlee, borrowed my jug back, and started towards the barracks. It wasn’t hard to find them; there’s something about the sound of a bunch of soldiers together.

It had some of the reek and roar of any barracks: cheap food, cheaper beer, weapon-oil, metal, sweat and ancient boots, intermixed with a wet-stone smell and the faint, unmistakable lemony aroma I associated with Ikinchli. Laughter and arguments, boasts and plain lies. But it was all in miniature. Empty tables were stacked at the back of the room, and the shouts bounced off the walls.

Two long tables. Gudain at one, Ikinchli at another. It was an Ikinchli guard who noticed me first; she tapped her companion on the arm and jerked her head in my direction.

The noise ebbed away. Before everyone in the room could stop eating and stare, I made my way to the hatch, where I saw people coming away with plates.

The smell of food was making my stomach growl like a chained dog. Behind the hatch was an Ikinchli woman, tunic splashed with what I really hoped was gravy. I almost leaned over and licked her to find out.

She looked at me, holding a ladle as though she were considering whether to hit me with it.

“Any leftovers?” I said.

She gestured to a series of tureens. “Those, on the right,” she said. “Those are Gudain. Left is for Ikinchli.”

Damned either way. I chose the solution that matched my appetite. “Then I’ll take a little of everything, please.”

Silently, she ladled me scoops from each one. The stuff from the Gudain end was a bright scarlet mush, purplish leaves, and some sort of meat in a thick sauce, all powerfully scented. The Ikinchli end was fish, and dark green mush.

Now came the problem of sitting to eat it. I leaned against the wall and looked around. There were seats enough, at either table. But if I chose one, I would be seen to be choosing more than a place to sit, and I didn’t want to do that.No one offered me a seat.

There was a chair about a foot to my left, back against the wall. I sat in it, only to discover it wobbled, which was probably why it had been pushed back. I managed to keep my balance – just – rested the plate on my knee, and, as subtly as possible, tested a little of everything with the jug. Nothing seemed poisonous, though the sauced meat made the tip of my finger tingle in a slightly worrying way.

The first mouthful of scarlet mush seemed to be made of crushed perfume. I gagged it down, and ate some of the green strands, which seemed not to taste of anything.

It only took me a couple of mouthfuls to realise that the Gudain liked more spice to their meat than I found palatable. In fact, the stuff was so powerfully flavoured that after eating some of the purplish leaves my mouth went numb for several seconds. The Ikinchli food was much more subtle; at the risk of offending the Gudain, but for the sake of my stomach (and my palate) I decided I’d stick with that.

I kept one careful eye on the guards.

A young Gudain with sticking-up hair was glowering at me as though I’d stepped on his toe. I could see the Gudain guards working up to something, with significant looks and whisperings, but they didn’t touch each other. There were no nudges, no hands on shoulders.

The captain was nowhere to be seen.

A young Gudain male, a snake curled around his arm, got up and came over to me. “So,” he said. “You been hired from outside.”

“S’right,” I said.

“You something special, then.”

I shrugged.

“You going to teach us to be special, too?”

“For all I know, you’re already special. What’s your name?”

“Brodenay.”

“Mine’s Steel. Nice snake.”

He glanced down at it. “Forest brown,” he said. “He’s a beauty, isn’t he? Fancy a stroke?”

I bit back several of the more obvious responses. At least, they were obvious to me, but here, maybe not. I reached out a hand and paused. “Depends,” I said. “He poisonous?”

“He’s a
forest brown.
’Course he’s poisonous. But he’s trained.”

“Thanks all the same, but no. He doesn’t know me. He might think I’m attacking you or something.”

“Yeah, maybe,” he said, grinning.

“So you all have poisonous snakes, then?”

“Do if you’re a
man,
” he said, with a contemptuous glance at the Ikinchli table. “Scalys don’t like ’em.”

I looked around at the other Gudain males. Yes, they all had a snake.

Spiky-hair boy had a particularly fine specimen, a glossy black creature with a row of scarlet scales running down its back.

“You looking at Dentor’s snake?”

“Yes, pretty thing.”

“Pretty!” He laughed. “Don’t get near it. That’s a scarlet angel, that is. Deadliest snake in Incandress, and one wicked temper on it too. Dentor’s the only one who can handle it.” His eyes shone with admiration.

I caught sight of Captain Tantris out of the corner of my eye, leaning in the doorway, watching.

“I’ll remember. You did well this morning,” I said. “Could have been nasty. You all acted sensible.”

“We weren’t worried. Just a bunch of scaly peasants, what were they going to do? Here,” the boy said, leaning forward, “is she really... you know. She some kind of... she’s like their god, right? What’s going on there, eh?”

He hadn’t lowered his voice more than a token. I could feel every eye focused on us; the Ikinchli table especially.

“She’s the person I was hired to guard,” I said. “That’s my job.”

I finished my food and stood up. Standing, I was a good head taller than the boy. “She’s of the family,” I said. “So I guess guarding her’s your job, too. Right?”

“If it’s really her,” someone said behind me. “And not some fucking scaly trick.”

The Ikinchli table was already silent. Now, the silence took on a decidedly thickened quality.

“That’s
enough,
” the captain said, finally deciding to make his presence felt. “I want you, Bentathlay, and you, Esranay, on the gate.
Move.
And keep your eyes open. The rest of you, I’m
watching
you. You, Sticky.”

“Sir.” The Ikinchli he’d addressed stood up.

“You’re on cleanup. Get to it.”

“Sir.” She was a rangy young female, tall for an Ikinchli, long-limbed and graceful. As she stepped past me heading for the kitchen, she gave me a quick but extremely thorough once-over, with eyes of an extraordinary shade of green, like sunlight through spring leaves.

“Ah, Captain Tantris,” I said, as though I’d only just noticed him. “Could you spare me a moment? If you’ve eaten, that is.”

“I’ve eaten. What did you want to talk to me about?”

Actually I could have told that from the fresh stains on his uniform, but it didn’t seem politic to point them out. The smell of old wine hung around him.

I started to walk towards the door. He didn’t move until the very last minute, when I was almost on top of him, and he was forced to back up, out of the barracks, into the soft, damp evening air.

“Ah, that’s better,” I said. “Bit of air after being cramped indoors. I don’t know if you heard, but I thought you and your crew handled things very well this morning.”

He grunted.

“I wanted to talk to you about how things were best dealt with. You know the layout, the family...”

“I do my job,” he said. “How about you do yours, and I’ll carry on doing mine?”

“Well now,” I said. “That’s going to be much easier if we work together, since my job is to guard the Lady Enthemmerlee, and so far as I know, so is yours.”

“Yes.”

“And just now, Lady Enthemmerlee is the most at risk.”

“I know she is.”

“So what can we do to help protect her?”

“
You’veseen the guard. Bunch of rag-ends and scrapings, and half of them scalys too useless even to bugger off to some other country, because no one would have ’em. But for now, they’re
my
rag-ends and scrapings, and I’ll thank you to leave us be.”

He’d kept walking, and we’d reached the cottage. It had once been a neat little building, in the same soft-coloured stone as the main house. It even had a garden, or the remains of one. Some grey, hairy creeper type thing had sprawled over most of it, leaving vague lumps and hollows where perhaps once there had been flowerbeds. He put his hand on the door.

“Captain Tantris? The grounds aren’t being patrolled. And even if that fella Kankish, the one on the road, really did keep walking, there will be others. And that wall couldn’t even keep
me
out with a running start.”

The door slammed.

CHAPTER

ELEVEN

I
WALKED BACK
towards the main building, leaned myself against a nice cool wall and let the rain patter my face with little soft hands. In the distance I could see a glow on the underside of the clouds, though it was long past sunset; a strange, low, unhealthy looking light.

“Heya, miss?”

It was the Ikinchli lass with the very green eyes.

“Hey,” I said. “All right?”

“Yes. What to call you, please miss?”

“Oh. The name’s Babylon Steel.”

“I am Stikinisk.”

“Stikinisk. Okay. How’s it going?”

“Okay, I think. Can I talk with you, please?”

“Sure, of course.”

“We walk a little, maybe?”

We moved out into the grounds. The rain still fell, that small sort of rain that doesn’t feel like much but gets right in every chink and crease. The great trees of the park loomed like veiled ghosts.

The rain did not trouble Stikinisk at all; Ikinchli are a water-loving lot.

I prefer my water hot, in a bath, with soap, though I’m no paper doll to crumple under a little rain; I’ve stood guard, and fought, in worse. But this constant drizzle was beginning to depress me.

Unseen creatures creaked and chirruped in the darkness, and something gave a sudden loud
poom
that made me jump.

Stikinisk hissed laughter, then glanced at me apprehensively. “Sorry, miss. Madam Steel.”

“Hey, don’t worry about it. It’s probably a frog or something, right?”

“Oh, no. It is Doronakaiken.”

“Which is?”

“Gudain call it ‘boom beetle.’”

“That’s a
beetle?
How big is it?” I hate beetles.

“Oh, not so big.” She held up a hand, the finger and thumb about an inch apart. “Dawn and dusk, they call out.”

“So,” I said. “What was it you wanted to talk to me about?”

“You here to look after the Itnunnacklish, yes? And Lobik Kraneel?”

“Well, mainly the Itnunnacklish. You think Lobik needs protecting, too?”

“He is a great man,” she said, with fervour. “If a man could be the Itnunnacklish, it would have been him, I think. And a Gudain woman took him to be her husband. Yes, I think there are plenty who would like him dead.”

“And Malleay?”

“Him I do not know so well.” She shrugged. “He talks a lot.”

“But you don’t think anyone wants him dead?”

“I think if he is in the way, then, yes.”

Poor old Malleay. Nothing but an obstacle to a would-be assassin.

“But us,” Stikinisk said. “The guard, it is our job, too, to protect the Entaire family, and now, that is the Itnunnacklish and both her husbands. Only we are not so trained like we could be.”

I wasn’t sure what to say that wouldn’t sound insulting, so I kept my mouth shut.

“Used to be more guard, better, ex-soldiers, some, but not now.”

“I thought the family guard didn’t
get
dismissed?” I said.

“Dismissed, no. But these last months; well, there was Hathlay, her daughter gets some trouble, she goes home to look to her. There was Bernak, he gets a chance to go to Scalentine, work with his brother. Prestallak, he has to take over the family farm when his parents die. And...” She broke off. “Some, one day, they just don’t turn up.”