Penric's Demon (13 page)

“You
can’t
imagine we were so stupid as not to work that out in advance,” chided Clee, also grabbing a pike and getting between Pen and the door. Together, both men strove to back him up, jabbing and feinting and allowing him no escape. They seemed ruffled, but not enraged. It felt very strange to be murdered so indifferently. Rusillin, Pen thought, would be just this cold and level-headed in battle, perhaps
had
been.

Surely any Bastard’s demon must prefer so potent a soldier.

“What,” jeered Desdemona aloud, “and have to look at
your
ugly face in every mirror till we found a way to throw you off? The Bastard my Master spare us that!”

“Des, don’t
bait
them!” yelped Pen, horrified.

Clee blinked in confusion, but held his block. Rusillin’s brawny arms drew back his heavy pike, preparing for a lethal lunge.

Pen set their hair on fire.

Clee dropped his pike and yelled. Rusillin, made of sterner stuff, tried to complete his lunge first, his pike’s hooked blade banging and scraping into the stone wall where Pen had been an instant before.

Every trouser tie, buckle, and toggle on both men’s clothing worked loose at once. Rusillin’s next lunge was much impeded by his trousers falling down around his thighs, catching him up; Pen swore Desdemona
giggled
. As both men staggered around beating out the flames on their heads and tripping over their clothing, she cried,
Make for the water gate!

Pen ran down the ramp, tried to push off the skiff, which didn’t budge, saw Rusillin out of the corner of his eye hopping furiously toward him, and shot through the low archway. The water splashed cold around his ankles, calves, thighs,
crotch
,
aaah
!
 
He wailed, “But Des,
I can’t swim
!” as his next step landed on nothing, and he plunged over into a drop-off as steep and sudden as the castle wall’s rise above him.

That’s all right
, said Desdemona smugly.
Umelan can. Let her guide you
.

Umelan made it known in a violent surge of revulsion that she was not used to waters this cold, nor a body so lean and unbuoyant, but somehow Pen floundered to the surface and began a dog’s paddle out into the growing darkness. He blinked water out of his eyes and swiveled his head, looking for the direction to shore.

Make for the opposite bank
, Desdemona advised.
Rusillin will be sure to have men out searching the nearer one for you before long
.

“I can’t swim that far!” Pen gasped.

If you relax and slow down, you will find that you can
.

Pen kept paddling. Gradually, his strokes lengthened, and his trailing legs found a rhythm like a frog’s which, if they did not propel him much, at least did not impede him. His frantic gasping steadied.

Until he heard Clee’s voice, too close behind him: “There he is! I can see his hair in the water.”

Pen turned to find the shadowy silhouette of the skiff putting out from the water gate. Two men, it seemed, could shift its weight where one man could not. The oars creaked and screeched in their locks as Rusillin pulled mightily. Could Rusillin beat Pen down with an oar and drown him? Hook him with a pike, and drag him back to the castle like some long, unwieldy fish?

Now, that wasn’t bright
, murmured Desdemona happily. Pen’s body warmed in pulsing waves, in the cold water.

Clee, standing to peer toward Pen, a pike gripped in his hands like a harpoon, swore in surprise as his foot went through the bottom of the boat. He lost his hold on the weapon, which sank, weighted by its big steel blade. The oarlocks worked loose, and the oars skittered along the thwarts; Rusillin cursed. The skiff settled sluggishly.

Over the high castle walls, a voice floated up in a frightened bellow: “Fire! FIRE!” Other voices took up the chorus.

Rusillin looked out into the darkness after his retreating prize, back over his shoulder at his other threatened treasure, and, using one oar as a paddle, began to turn his water-weighted craft around.

“Rusi,” said Clee in an alarmed voice, “I can’t swim either!”

“Then you’d better grab that oar and get to work,” Rusillin snarled. “The other fool will drown in this cold soon enough.”

At that point, it was really
redundant
for Rusillin’s oar blade to snap off as he dug it into the water.

Very quietly, Pen turned on his back and began paddling in the opposite direction.

*
   
*
   
*

The moon was rising over the eastern hills by the time Pen pulled himself up over the rocks, crawled a few paces, and flopped down in some lovely soft mud. He was chilled through and wheezing. He never wanted to move again.

At length, curiosity overcame his torpor, and he made the effort to roll onto his side and peer back across the lake. The sparks and orange glow that had been soaring from the castle like a chimney fire had finally stopped, ah.
That was a nice castle
, he thought sadly
. Too bad
.

Rough justice
, murmured Desdemona, sounding nearly as exhausted as Pen.
If you want the other kind, you shouldn’t draw the attention of the white god
.

“Did Ruchia do things like this?”

Not often. She was too astute to let herself be cornered
. Desdemona seemed to consider.
After the first few lessons
.

She added after a little,
If you lie here longer, you will perish of the cold, and all my night’s work will be wasted. Also, I do not wish to be stuck in a cow
.

Pen pulled himself to a sitting position. “You could have had Clee.”

I’d rather the cow
.

“Or Lord Rusillin.” Why had she not chosen Rusillin?

Get up, Pen. Walking us out of here is your work
.

Pen climbed to his knees, then to his feet. Then, skirting around a few incurious cattle, to what passed for a road on this steeper eastern shore, more of a rutted farm track. He stared north up the length of the lake, south down it. He bore no risk of getting lost, exactly.

We could go north
, Desdemona observed.
We could go anywhere
. A pause.
Except Idau
.

“I can’t say that I’ve ever longed to see Idau.” Or even thought about its name on the map, where it appeared as a dot no bigger than Greenwell, some fifty miles west of Martensbridge and just over the border to the lands of the earl palatine. “But all my things are back in Martensbridge. And I never finished the book. And Tigney must be wondering where I am by now. Do you think he really gave Clee leave to take me to the castle?” Could Tigney even have been a conspirator? Uncomfortable thought.

Hah
.
Tigney might have given you leave to go beyond the town walls—never us
.

“You suspected something? Even then?”

Mm
. A very noncommittal . . . non-noise.
We were sure something interesting must be afoot. We didn’t know what. We could not speak aloud in front of Clee, nor yet silently to you.

“Are all demons this curious? Or did you get that from Ruchia?”

Ruchia and we . . . were a very good match. Unsurprising, since we chose her
. Desdemona feigned a yawn.
You walk. We’ll nap. Wake us when we arrive.

Pen sighed and started south, boots squelching as he stumbled over the ruts. This night was going to be interminable.

*
   
*
   
*

The sky had turned steely, though the sun had not yet chased the moon over the eastern hills, when Pen came again to the Martensbridge town gates. Early market traffic already made them lively. The gate guard scowled at Pen, and began to recite the restrictive town rules about vagabonds.

“I bear a message for Learned Tigney at the Bastard’s Order,” Pen said, picking the not-quite-lie most likely to explain both his appearance and his urgency. “The boat had a mishap. I have traveled all through the night.”

The name of Tigney and the Order seemed to be the master key. Pen found himself trudging again up the steep street as the sky melted to bronze, then muted gold.

The surprisingly awake-looking porter answered his pounding at the door, and gaped at him in amazement. “Lord Penric!”

“Good morning, Cosso. I need to see Learned Tigney. At once.” He’d had plenty of time to think, while he’d stumbled through the dark, of how to explain the night’s doings, and why a powerful local lord had tried to murder him. Indignation had given way a while back to unease. Now that he was here, all his fine furious speeches seemed to run through his numb fingers like water.

“I believe,” said the porter, “that he wishes to see you. Though I can’t say you are expected. Come up.”

Cosso ushered him straight to Tigney’s work chamber, where candles burned low and guttering in their sockets.

“Learned, Lord Penric is here.” Cosso gave way, pushing Pen before him, then took up a guardsman’s stance by the door, his face quite wooden.

Tigney sat at his desk, his quill molting in his fingers as he fiddled with it. Pen was alarmed to see Ruchia’s book laid out on the writing table, but much more alarmed to find Clee there before him. Both Temple men looked up at him in shock.

Tigney was dressed for the day—no, for yesterday. Clee wore a close cap over his remaining hair; howsoever he had put himself to rights after a night of attempted murder and, presumably, firefighting, he was rumpled up again by a ten-mile ride in the dawn. Still, he had to look better than Pen.
At least I’ve stopped dripping
. Pen would be enraged at the sight of him, but he was just too tired to muster the emotion.

“Well, well,” said Tigney, putting down the quill and steepling his fingers. “Has the committee for the defense arrived?”

Verbal sparring was beyond Pen by this point. He said simply, “Good morning, Learned. Yesterday afternoon, Clee told me you had approved an invitation by his brother for me to dine at Castle Martenden. They gave me a drugged cordial, and took me down to the storeroom and tried to murder me. They wanted to steal Desdemona. I broke away, and swam the lake, and now I’m back.” He squinted. That seemed to cover most of it. “Oh, and I’m afraid we may have set the castle on fire, but they shouldn’t have tried to spit me on those pikes.” He squeezed his eyes shut, and open. “And I’m sorry about the boat. But not very.”

Tigney, canny and cautious, raised his chin and regarded Pen. “Whereas the tale Clee has just told me was that your demon ascended and beguiled him to take you to the castle, where you went on an arsonous rampage, stole a boat, and either escaped or drowned. You are supposed to be halfway to the border of Adria by now.”

Pen considered this. “Much too far to walk.”

“It is two men’s word again one’s,” said Clee, who had overcome his first horrified paralysis. “And him a stranger in this place.”

Stranger than you can imagine
. Pen raised a finger. “Two against two. Me and Desdemona. Unless you count her as twelve, in which case I can make up a jury right here.”

Tigney rubbed his forehead, doubtless aching, and glowered at them both. “That one of you is lying is self-evident. Fortunately, I have another witness. In a sense.” He motioned to the porter. “Cosso, please fetch our other guest. Apologize, but make him understand it is urgent. Ah—tell him Lord Penric has come back.”

The porter nodded and went out.

Clee, heated, said, “Learned, you cannot be thinking of taking testimony from the demon! It is utterly unreliable!”

Tigney stared dryly at him. “I do know demons, Clee.”

Clee either had the sense to shut up, or was temporarily out of arguments. Pen was pretty sure this was not the scene Clee had been picturing when he’d hurried to lay his tale before Tigney. If he had really thought Pen drowned, a not-unlikely outcome, why had he come to make these accusations, rather than holing up with his brother? Maybe Rusillin had thrown him out? Clee certainly had been the one to pass along the gossip about Pen’s arrival in town. Which of the brothers
had
been the first to broach the demon-stealing scheme?

Minutes passed. Pen sat down on the floor. Tigney started to say something, then made a never-mind gesture, and left him there.

Finally, a bustle sounded from the hall; the porter’s voice soothing, a new one querulous. A short, stout old man wearing a stained white dressing gown and stumping along with a stick entered the room. Tigney, who had left Clee and Pen standing, hurried to set him out a cushioned chair. His hair was white and receding and combed back to a thin queue; his face was as round and wrinkled as a winter-stored apple, but not nearly as sweet. He might have been a retired baker with bad digestion. He thumped down in the proffered seat with a grunt, and stacked his hands on his cane.

Inside Pen, Desdemona
screamed
. And wailed a heartbroken,
Ah! Ah! We are undone! It is the Saint of Idau!
Pen felt a desperate flush of heat through his body, and then she curled into so tight and despairing a ball within him as to nearly implode.

“Blessed Broylin.” Tigney bowed before him. Then, after a moment, he thumped Clee on the back of the head and shoved it down as well. Coming up wincing, Clee crouched and backed away, signing himself and mumbling, “Blessed One . . .” Clee seemed nearly as surprised as Desdemona, if more frozen. No one could be as frantic.