Dragon Stones (36 page)

The door opened.  She turned and saw Wert, standing in the hallway, looking at her.  "So?" he said.  "Did she reach you?"

"You knew."  Diasa waggled her finger at him.  "You knew she was going to find us all."

The old man grinned broadly.

"You've hardly ever been right about
anything before
," Diasa said.  "Why do you know so much now?"

Wert tapped the side of his head.  "Overdose," he said.

"I know you overdosed," Diasa said.  "Everyone knows that.  What's it got to do with anything?"

"Not me, her.  The princes overdosed Tolaria.  I can see inside her head now.  I can help her."

"You can see inside her head."

He nodded.

"Because they fed her too much vapors."

He nodded again.

"And can she see inside yours?"

He appeared to consider this.  "I suppose so.  Don't know why she'd want to."

"Well, that makes two of us."  Diasa sat down on the bed.  "Tolaria's coming here.  She's on that boat you told me about."

"Yes."

"When will she arrive?"

Wert closed his eyes.  Then he opened them again, and looked at Diasa without seeing her at all.  "The river is widens," he intoned, his voice flat as the wastelands they had left behind.  "Coming into the lake.  Open water ahead.  The wind is with us and we're making good time.  Talbrett says we'll be in Achengate around sundown.  I wonder if he's all right.  I'm worried about him.  He's started to drag his left foot when he walks.  The growths go deeper than he knows."

Diasa stared at him, shocked at the ease with which he had slipped into Tolaria's mind—if he was really doing it, of course, and not merely indulging some fantasy.  "Wert," she said.

"I will tell the headmistress that Dunshandrin destroyed the Crosswaters.  She will find a way to punish him for—"

"Wert!"

He blinked several times, then his eyes refocused and he looked at Diasa.  "What?"

"Get out of her head," she said.  "I don't want you doing that unless you have a reason."

"Why do I need a reason?"

"Because you're violating her."

"Every oracle is violated in one way or another."

"Well, there's no need for you to add to it."

"You don't understand what it's like."  He seemed to be pouting.  "The voices.  The visions."

"You're right.  I didn't inherit any of my mother's talent, and I'm not sorry about it."

"Perhaps you inherited a bit of your father's," Wert said.

She looked sharply at him then.  "What are you talking about, Wert?"

The little man said nothing.

"Do you know who my father was?"

Still he said nothing.

"If you know, you had better tell me," she said, beginning to stand.  Then a thought struck her and she sank back onto the bed again.  "Oh, no.  It's you, isn't it?  
You're
my father."

"No," Wert said.

"I should have known," she said.  "No wonder you were always following my mother around, saying
Damona
this and
Damona
that and looking at her like—
"

"I am not your father," he said.

After a moment, Diasa said:  "Oh."

"But I know who your father is."

Her heart began to beat faster, the way it did just before a fight or a training exercise.  "Who?  Who is it?"

He shook his head.  "I can't tell you."

"
What?
"

"It's a secret."

"I know it's a secret, damn you!  My mother spent twenty-five years keeping it from me!  And now you say you know who it is but
you can't tell me
?"  She stood up and grabbed him by the shirt.  "You had better change your mind, little man."

Suddenly Ilfiss appeared in the hallway, with the little girl, Prehn, in tow.  He cocked his head at the sight of Diasa half-lifting Wert off the ground.  "Am I interrupting something?"

"Yes," Diasa said severely.

"Let him go, Diasa."

"He knows who my father is and he won't tell me."

"Diasa.  You know you aren't going to beat it out of him.  He'll tell you when he's ready, assuming he even really knows."

She held Wert's shirt a moment more, then sighed and half-tossed him away.  He maintained his balance surprisingly well, and gave her a sad look.  "You'll understand soon," he said.

She took a menacing step toward him; he turned and fled up the corridor, disappearing down the stairs.  Ilfiss watched him go, then entered the room.  "Here she is, fed and sleepy," he said, presenting Prehn to Diasa as if she were a debutante.  "How are you feeling?  Did you rest well?"

"Not particularly."

"I'm sorry.  Dreams?"

She nodded.

"Anything you would care to talk about?"

"No."

"As you wish."  Looking at the floor, he said:  "I'll be leaving soon.  One of the students wants me to go back to his father's estate and continue his instruction there."

"And you agreed, of course."

"Of course.  I'm not much of an oracle, really, but I'm an excellent teacher."

"Which student?"

"Radovar."

"Oh."  Diasa nodded.  "The vintner's boy."

"Yes."

"Radovar's father has no idea what he's getting into."

"Indeed he does not.  I will make sure my contract includes a generous allowance of wine and spirits."  Ilfiss smiled.  "You could come with me, you know.  Radovar's father might have a position for you."

"I doubt a vintner has much need for the likes of me," she said.  "Besides, Yttribia is no place for a woman with a profession.  I'd be married off inside of a month, and Radovar's father would collect the dowry."

He laughed and said, "As if you would let that happen."  Then, looking uncomfortable:  "Radovar has used his father's good name and credit to hire a skiff.  We'll be leaving as soon as it's ready.  A few hours, I'm told."

"So soon?"

"The boy doesn't want to stay in Achengate a moment longer than he must.  I can't say that I blame him."  He put his hand on her shoulder.  "You will be all right on your own?"

"Of course.  I can take care of myself.  I was the captain of the guard in Flaurent, as you recall."

"Is
that
why you were always carrying weapons around?  And here I thought you were just unusually violent."  Ilfiss grinned, but it faded quickly.  He began looking around the room, as if searching for something more to say.

"You needn't feel guilty about taking this position, Ilfiss.  You must eat and put clothes on your back."

He nodded, turned, and went to the door; but he stopped there, taking up most of the frame.  "I know what you're planning to do," he said, not looking at her.  "I don't need to be a very good oracle to see that.  You must be careful.  Setting yourself against a king is a deadly proposition."

"Dunshandrin is not a king."

"Close enough.  I'll return for Prehn before I leave."

Diasa looked at the little girl, curled up on her bed, apparently asleep.  If her dream were to be believed, the child's father was waiting for her somewhere in Astilan, and they were fated to meet.  "I'll keep her," she said.

Ilfiss did look at her then, surprise on his face.  "That isn't what you said earlier.  You told me that a child had no place in your future."

"I know what I said."  Diasa tugged at one of her curls, twisting the dark hair around her finger.  "I have rethought my position."

"And if you are killed?  What will happen to her then?  Would you see her in an orphanage?"

"I saw her father in a dream, while I slept," Diasa said.  "I promised to look after her."

"This is the dream you did not want to discuss?"

"Yes.  A dream, a vision.  I don't know what you would call it.  Do you remember a student named Tolaria?"

"Of course.  She was brilliant, and so your mother sent her to the Crosswaters.  What about her?"

"She orchestrated the vision.  Or maybe Wert did it; he knew the vision would come if I fell asleep.  There were five of us there, and one was Prehn's father."

Ilfiss stroked his chin.  "Still … would it not be better to send the girl with me, and tell her father—if indeed you ever meet him—where she can be found?"

"I don't know."  She looked at Prehn again.  "I think I must keep my promise, and watch over her."

"But—"

From the room below, a voice called out:  "Professor Ilfiss!  The wagon has come to take us to the harbor!"

"His master's voice," Ilfiss murmured.  He looked at the stairway, then at Diasa, then at the child.  "You
will
keep her out of harm's way, I hope."

"As well as I keep myself."

"That," Ilfiss said, "is perhaps not as reassuring as you might think."

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Tolaria stood at the prow of the
Pride
as it approached the docks of Achengate.  A strong wind had kicked up out of the east, speeding their passage across the grey lake; they had arrived at the harbor considerably earlier than Talbrett had estimated.  From her vantage point it didn't look like the city had changed much since the last time she'd passed through.  Still dirty, still ramshackle.  The dilapidated buildings along the harbor stood on rime-encrusted poles rising from the salty waters.  She supposed some might find the town quaint and charming, but to her eyes it was merely dreary.

Far beyond Achengate she could see clouds of sand and dust towering over the Salt Flats.  The same wind that had sped Talbrett's ship toward the city would be making life hellish out in the wastes, where she was going.  Flaurent's high walls helped keep the salt out, but on a day like this grit would fall from the sky like hail.

She went to her tiny cabin below deck to gather what little she had—Talbrett had somehow scrounged a change of clothes for her—and also to get out of the way while the crew moored the ship.  She tied the unworn clothes into a little wad of fabric, tucked it under her arm, and waited for the motion of the ship to stop before going back above.  When she did, the boat had drawn adjacent to one of the piers, secured by long, drooping ropes and complicated knots.  She found Talbrett at the railing, idly fingering the knuckle-like growths at the base of his skull.  He didn't hear her approach; he was intent on staring into the city, as if trying to imprint it on his mind and take its memory with him from this world to the next.  He glanced at her as she came to the railing next to him.  "Here we are.  Achengate."

She said nothing.

"Last time I'll see this place," he said, sounding wistful, though she knew the emotion was not directed at run-down Achengate but at the world in general.  "I'll miss it."

"Thank you for helping me," she said.  "I can't begin to repay you."

He shrugged.  "I didn't do that much."

"You did more than many other men would have, and you didn't even claim the service that I promised you."

He smiled wanly.  "Well, what does it really matter, in the end, who fathered the boy?  I raised him, and that makes him mine."  He pointed at the gangplank, which his crew had just finished securing.  "Shall we disembark?"

"Certainly," she said.

He linked arms with her and escorted her down the walkway.  After spending so much time on the water, the dock felt odd under her feet, solidly immobile.  They walked up it, stopping at one of the flat-bottomed boats that navigated the network of shallow rivers out in the Salt Flats.  "This one's mine," Talbrett said.  "We'll transfer the cargo to it and head out into the wasteland.  You're welcome to come if you want.  We're not going to Flaurent, but we can take you part of the way."

"Thank you," she said.  "Perhaps I will, if you think—"

Suddenly something flashed in the air, catching the oblique rays of the sun.  Talbrett shouted and jumped in front of her,  pushing her to the side, causing her to cry out in surprise.  He grunted and reeled backwards, his pudgy hands clutching the wobbling black hilt of a dagger that had caught him neatly in his left eye.  The little merchant crumpled to the dock, twitched a few times, fell still.  She knelt beside him, her body trembling all over.  Blood oozed from around the blade.  She touched his fleshy throat, looking for the heartbeat.  Nothing.  It seemed the knuckles would not squeeze his life away after all.

Someone came out of the cabin of Talbrett's flatboat, a big, dangerous-looking man.  He swaggered up the gangplank to the dock, and drew a long, gleaming sword as he approached.

Tolaria stood and faced him.  "You killed Talbrett," she said.

The man shrugged.  "I was
trying
to kill you.  The fat fool spoiled a perfectly aimed throw."