The Sarantine Mosaic (19 page)

‘We'll stay two nights,'
Linon said.

The bird was on the thong around his neck again. She hadn't spoken since morning. The blunt, sudden words startled Crispin.

‘Indeed? Why? Your little feet are tired?'

‘Mice and blood! You are too stupid to be allowed out of doors without a nursemaid. Remember the calendar and what Zoticus told you. You're in Sauradia, imbecile. And tomorrow is the Day of the Dead.'

Crispin had, in fact, forgotten, and cursed himself for it. It irritated him, however unreasonably, when the bird was right.

‘So what happens?'
he demanded sourly.
‘They boil me into soup if I'm found abroad? Bury my bones at a crossroad?'

Linon didn't bother to reply.

Feeling obscurely at a disadvantage, Crispin left Vargos to see to the mule and his goods while he strode past two barking dogs and a scatter of chickens in the sodden courtyard. He walked through the doorway into the front room of the inn to show his Permit and see if a hot bath could be had immediately for coinage of the Empire.

The entranceway was encouragingly clean, large, high-ceilinged. Beyond it, through a door to the left, the common room had two fires going. A cheerful buzz of speech in many accents drifted out to him. After the wet, cold road all day it was undeniably alluring. He wondered if someone in this kitchen knew how to cook. There had to be deer and boar, perhaps even the elusive Sauradian bison in these woods; a well-seasoned platter of game and a halfway adequate flask or two of wine would go some way to easing him.

It occurred to Crispin, looking around, noting the swept, dry tiling on the floor, that this inn might indeed be a perfectly decent place to rest his feet for two days and nights. Zoticus had been unambiguous in advising him to stay in one place and indoors on the Day of the Dead. For all his sardonic attitude to such things, it wouldn't do to be foolish merely to win a battle with an artificial bird. If nothing else, he thought suddenly, Linon was proof that the half-world was real.

Not an entirely comforting reflection.

He waited for the innkeeper, blessed Permit in hand, letting himself relax already into the sensation of being dry with the near prospect of warmth and wine. He heard a sound from the back of the inn, behind the stairs, and turned, a civil expression ready. He was aware that he was hardly distinguished-looking at the moment, nor did travelling on foot with one temporarily hired servant
commend him as affluent, but a Permit with his name elegantly written upon it—or Martinian's name—and the privy Seal and signature of no less a figure than the Imperial Chancellor could make him instantly formidable, he'd discovered.

It wasn't the innkeeper who came from backstairs. Only a thin serving girl in a stained, knee-length brown tunic, barefoot, yellow-haired, carrying a stoppered jug of wine too heavy for her. She stopped dead when she saw him, staring openly, wide-eyed.

Crispin smiled briefly, ignoring the presumption of her gaze. ‘What do they call you, girl?'

She swallowed, looked down, mumbled, ‘Kitten.'

He felt himself grinning crookedly. ‘Why that?'

She swallowed again, seemed to be having trouble speaking. ‘Don't know,' she managed finally. ‘Someone thought I looked like one.'

Her eyes never left the floor, after that first naked stare. He realized he hadn't spoken to anyone, other than some instructions to Vargos, all day. It was odd, he didn't know how he felt about that. He did know he wanted a bath, not to be making talk with a serving girl.

‘You don't. What's your proper name, then?'

She looked up at that, and then down again. ‘Kasia.'

‘Well, Kasia, run find the 'keeper for me. I'm wet outside and dry within. And never dream of telling me there are no rooms to be had.'

She didn't move. Continued to stare at the floor, clutching at the heavy wine jug with both hands beneath it. She was quite young, very thin, wide-set blue eyes. From a northern tribe, obviously. Inicii, or one of the others. He wondered if she'd understood him, his jest; they'd been speaking Rhodian. He was about to repeat his request in Sarantine, without the witticism, when he saw her draw a breath.

‘They are going to kill me tomorrow,' was what she said, quite clearly this time. She looked up at him. Her eyes were enormous, deep as a forest. ‘Will you take me away?'

Zagnes of Sarnica had not been willing, at all.

‘Are you simple?'
the man had cried the night before. In his agitation he had pushed Kasia right out of the bed to land sprawling on the floor. It was cold, even with the kitchen fires directly below. ‘What in Jad's holy name would I do with a bought girl from Sauradia?'

‘I would do anything you like,' she'd said, kneeling beside the bed, fighting back tears.

‘Of course you would. What
else
would you do? That is
not
the point.' Zagnes was quite exercised.

It wasn't the request to buy her and take her away. Imperial Couriers were used to such pleas. It must have been her reason. The very immediate, particular reason. But she'd
had
to tell him … otherwise there was no cause at all for him to even consider it, among all the usual requests. He was said to be a kindly man …

Not enough so, it seemed. Or not foolish enough. The courier was white-faced; she had given him a genuine fright. A balding, paunchy man, no longer young. Not cruel at all, merely refusing prudently to involve himself in the under-the-surface life of a Sauradian village, even if it involved the forbidden sacrifice of a girl to a pagan god. Perhaps especially so. What would happen if he reported this story to the clerics, or at the army camp east of them? An investigation, questions asked, probably painful questions—even fatal ones—for these were matters of holy faith. Stringent measures to follow against resurgent paganism? Fulminating clerics, soldiers quartered in the village,
punitive taxes imposed? Morax and others might be punished; the innkeeper could be relieved of his position, his nose slit, hands cut off.

And no more of the best treatment, the warmest rooms at this inn or any of the others in Sauradia for Zagnes of Sarnica. Word travelled swiftly along the main roads, and no one, anywhere, liked an informer. He was an Imperial Officer, but he spent most of his days—and nights—far from Sarantium.

And all this for a serving girl? How could she possibly have expected him to help?

She hadn't. But she didn't want to die, and her options were narrowing by the moment.

‘Get back in bed,' Zagnes had said brusquely. ‘You'll freeze on the floor and then you're no good to me at all. I'm
always
cold, these days,' he'd added, with a contrived laugh. ‘Too many years on the road. Rain and wind get right inside my bones. Time to retire. I would, if my wife wasn't at home.' Another false, unconvincing laugh. ‘Girl, I'm sure you are frightened by nothing. I've known Morax for years. You girls are
always
afraid of shadows when this silly … when this day comes round.'

Kasia climbed silently back into the bed and slipped under the sheet, naked, next to him. He withdrew from her a little. No surprise, she thought bitterly. Would any wise man bed a girl marked for Ludan of the Wood? Her sacred death might pass straight into him.

That wasn't it, though. It seemed Zagnes was a more prosaic sort. ‘Your feet are
cold
, girl. Rub them together or something. And your hands,' he said. ‘I'm always cold.'

Kasia heard herself make an odd sound; half a laugh, half a renewed struggle with panic. She rubbed her feet obediently against each other, trying to warm them so she could warm the man beside her. She heard the wind
outside, a branch tapping against the wall. The clouds had come, with rain. No moons.

SHE
'
D SPENT THE NIGHT
with him. He hadn't put a hand on her. Stayed close, curled up like a child. She'd lain awake listening to the wind and the branch and the fall of rain. Morning would come, and then night, and the next day she would die. It was amazing to her that she could shape this sequence, this thought. She wondered if it would be possible to kill Deana before they bound her or bludgeoned her unconscious. She wished she could pray, but she hadn't been raised believing in Jad of the Sun, and none of his invocations came easily to her. On the other hand, how did the sacrifice pray to the god to whom she was being offered? What could she ask of Ludan? That she be dead before they cut her in pieces? Or whatever they did here in the south. She didn't even know.

She was up well before the sleeping courier in the black, damp chill before dawn. She pulled on her underclothes and tunic, shivering, and went down to the kitchen. It was still raining. Kasia heard sounds from the yard: the stableboys readying the changes of mounts for the Imperial Couriers and the horses and mules of those who had brought their own or claimed them. She gathered an armful of firewood from the back room, returned for two more, and then knelt to build up the kitchen fire. Deana came down, yawning, and went to do the same for the front-room fires. She had a new bruise on one cheek, Kasia saw.

‘Sleep well, bitch?' Deana said as she walked by. ‘You'll never get that one again, trust me.'

‘He told me you were as sloppy below as you are above,' Kasia murmured, not bothering to turn. She wondered if Deana would hit her. She had firewood to hand.

But they didn't want her bruised, or marred in any way. It might almost have been amusing … she could say whatever she wanted today, without fear of a blow.

Deana stood still for a moment, then went past without touching her.

THEY WERE WATCHING HER
closely. Kasia had been made aware of it when she snatched a moment from emptying the chamber-pots to stand on the porch in back of the inn to breathe the cold, wet air. The mountains were wrapped in mist. It was still raining. Very little wind now. The chimney smoke went straight up and disappeared in the greyness. She could barely see the orchard and the sheep on the slopes. Sounds were muffled.

But Pharus the stablemaster was casually leaning against a pillar at the far end of the porch, whittling at a wet stick with his knife, and Rugash, the old shepherd, had left his flock to the boys and was standing in the open doorway of the hut beyond the orchard. When he saw her glance at him he turned away and spat through the gap in his teeth into the mud.

They actually thought she might run. Where could a slave girl run? Barefoot up the mountain slopes? Into the Aldwood? Would a death by exposure or animals be better? Or would daemons or the dead find her first and claim her soul forever? Kasia shivered. A wasted fear: she would never even make it to the forest or the hills, and they'd track her if she did. They had the dogs.

Khafa appeared in the open doorway behind her. Without turning, Kasia knew her step.

‘I tell mistress, you get whipping of idleness,' she said. She'd been ordered to speak nothing but Rhodian, to learn it adequately.

‘Fuck yourself,' Kasia said without force. But she turned and went in, walking straight past Khafa, who was probably the most decent of them all.

She put all the chamber-pots in their rooms, going up and down and up and down the stairs, and then went back into the kitchen to finish with the dishes of the morning. The fire was too low; you were beaten or locked in the wine cellar among the rats if your fire was too low—or too high, wasting wood. She built it up. The smoke stung tears into her eyes. She wiped her cheeks with the backs of her hands.

She had that blade hidden in the smith's shed by the stables. She decided she would go out for it later in the day. She could use it on herself tonight, if nothing else. Deny them what they wanted. A kind of triumph, that.

She never got the chance. Another group of merchants came in, stopping early because of the rain. They had no Permits, of course, but paid Morax, after the usual quiet exchange, for the right to stay illegally. They sat by one of the fires in the common room and drank a considerable amount of wine very quickly. Then three of them wanted girls to pass a wet afternoon. Kasia went up with one of them, a Karchite; Deana and Syrene took the others. The Karchite smelled of wine, wet fur, fish. He put her face down on the bed as soon as they entered the room and pushed up her tunic, not bothering to take it off or his own clothing. When he finished he fell immediately asleep, sprawled across her. Kasia squirmed out from beneath him. She looked out the window. The rain was easing; it would stop soon.

She went downstairs. The Karchite was snoring loudly enough to be heard in the hallway; she'd no excuse for lingering. Morax, crossing through the front room, looked closely at her as she came down—checking for
bruises, no doubt—and gestured to the kitchen wordlessly. It was time to begin readying dinner. Another cluster of men were already in the common room, drinking. The inn would be crowded tonight. Tomorrow had people nervous, excited, wanting a drink and company. Through the archway Kasia saw three of the villagers with a fourth glass at their table. Morax had been with them.