Thraxas - The Complete Series (143 page)

“I believe you mentioned it.”

“I have to walk out in front of everyone and declaim in public.”

“So you said.”

“It’s worse now. I have to stand up and talk to a class of people who all think I’m a thief! Is that fair?”

When Makri is in a bad mood her hand has a tendency to stray towards where her sword would be, if she was wearing one. She’s doing it now, but is clad only in her chainmail bikini, without weapons. In the sweltering heat sweat pours down her body. I’m given to believe that the lower-class elements in Twelve Seas like the effect.

“Have you proved me innocent yet? No? Why not?”

“I’ve been busy.”

“Will it take long?”

“I’m involved in a very important case, Makri. Vital for the city. With bodies everywhere.”

“How many bodies?”

“Nine.”

Makri purses her lips.

“I’ve bet on fourteen. Do you think I should up it?”

“Don’t talk to me about that.”

She shrugs.

“So don’t I matter as much as this other case?”

“No,” I say.

“Why not?”

“Because the other case involves a matter of national importance!” I explode. “And also I’m being paid.”

“Fine,” retorts Makri. “Of course when I was saving your neck last winter from that man with the magic sword I didn’t stop to ask if I was being paid or not. I just saved your life. I didn’t wait around to check on any possible remuneration, just weighed in there and risked my own life to save yours. But hey, I’m only a barbaric gladiator. When I was growing up I didn’t learn all the rules of civilised society. I just did what I thought was the right—”

“Makri, will you shut the hell up!”

When Makri arrived in Turai I swear she wasn’t capable of these sustained bursts of withering eloquence. I blame the rhetoric classes.

“I’ll sort it out for you. And meanwhile you can still take the examination.”

“In front of people who think I’m a thief.”

I ask Makri what she’s doing in my office when she should be working downstairs. She looks uncomfortable.

“Gurd and Tanrose are still arguing. The atmosphere’s bad.”

I’m still curious as to why she’s in my office instead of her own room.

“Dandelion’s there. I said she could stay a while.”

“Why do you put up with that woman? Sling her out.”

Makri shrugs, and when I press the point she becomes agitated. I drop it. Makri has to return to her work anyway so I accompany her downstairs. I should send another message to Lisutaris letting her know what happened at the Blind Horse. I’ll do it after a beer or two.

At the bar I’m accosted by Parax the shoemaker, who, in keeping with his normal practice, is not making shoes at this precise moment. He asks me how my day has been.

“Bad.”

“Any dead bodies lying around?”

“Since when would you care, Parax?”

“Can’t a man worry about his friends?”

It’s news to me that Parax is my friend. Telling him that he can look elsewhere for his inside information, I take a beer, a bowl of venison stew, a plate of yams and a large apple pie to a table, where I read the latest copy of
The Renowned and Truthful Chronicle of All the World’s Events
, one of Turai’s news sheets, and a fertile source of information on the city’s many scandalous occurrences.

There doesn’t seem to be much scandal today apart from a report that Prince Frisen-Akan, heir to the throne, has extended his holiday at his country retreat, which, as everybody knows, is a coded way of saying that the King has sent him out of town in an effort to get him sober. The Prince is degenerate even by royal standards. At one time it would have been a better-kept secret, but these days, with Senator Lodius’s opposition party grown so powerful, fewer people are feeling it necessary to revere the royal family. When I was a boy no one would have dared speak a word against the King, but these days you can hear talk in many quarters about how we might be better off as a democracy. Certain other members of the League of City States have already been riven by civil war as the power of their kings waned. If Senator Lodius and his Populares party get their way, it’ll happen in Turai sooner rather than later.

Gurd sits down heavily beside me.

“I can’t take any more of this,” he confides. “That fishmonger was here again today and Tanrose was all over him.”

“Gurd, you’re exaggerating.”

“Does it take two hours to order fish for next week’s menu? It’s not that popular an item.”

“I don’t know. A lot of dockers like it.”

“I’d say dockers usually go for stew,” says Makri, appearing next to our table with a tray of drinks in her hand.

“No, I think they still prefer fish.”

“How would you know?” demands Makri. “It’s me that takes the orders.”

“I’m an Investigator. I notice things.”

“Tanrose didn’t have to—” begins Gurd.

“There’s definitely more stew sold to dockers than fish,” states Makri emphatically.

“I beg to differ. Fish is still the staple diet of the dockers in Twelve Seas.”

“How can you say that, Thraxas? It’s just not true. No wonder you’re always having trouble solving your cases if you can’t observe a simple thing like who eats—”

“Enough of this!” yells Gurd, banging his fist on the table.

“Is Tanrose still upset at you?” asks Makri.

“Yes. No. Yes. I don’t want to discuss it.”

Seeing my old companion-in-arms looking as miserable as a Niojan whore, I wish there was something I could do to help.

“Maybe it’s time for some action,” I suggest. “Remember when we spent five days in that mountain fort waiting for the Simnians to attack? And eventually Commander Mursius said he’d be damned if he was going to wait any more than five days for a Simnian and he led us out and we drove the Simnians way back over the border?”

“I remember,” says Gurd. “What about it?”

“Well maybe it’s time you asked Tanrose to marry you.”

There’s a slight pause.

“Did I miss something?” says Makri.

“I don’t think so.”

“Well how did you get from attacking the Simnians to Gurd asking Tanrose to marry him?”

“It’s obvious. There comes a time when it’s no good sheltering behind the walls any longer. You have to attack. Or, in this case, get married.”

Makri considers this.

“What if the Simnians had brought up reinforcements?”

“We’d have beaten them as well.”

“What if they’d made an alliance with the Orcs and had some dragons lying in wait?”

“Very unlikely, Makri. The Simnians have never been friends with the Orcs.”

“So you’re saying I should ask Tanrose to get married?” says Gurd, looking quite troubled at the thought.

“Maybe. But you know I’ve always been useless with women.”

Makri nods her head.

“Tanrose tells me you treated your wife really badly.”

“Tanrose should keep her mouth shut.”

Gurd looks offended.

“About certain subjects only,” I add.

“That fishmonger has always been in pursuit of Tanrose. I’m banning him from the tavern from now on.”

“Most people prefer stew anyway,” says Makri. “And Thraxas eats enough of it to keep you in business.”

But by now Gurd has raised his brawny figure and departed, looking thoughtful. Makri takes his seat.

“Why have you always been so bad with women?” she asks.

I shrug.

“Don’t know. Just never learned what to do, I suppose.”

“I thought maybe it might be because you drink too much.”

“Yes, also I drink too much. But at least I don’t take dwa.”

Four dock workers, waiting for the drinks presently marooned on Makri’s tray, call loudly for their beer. Makri ignores them.

“I don’t take dwa. Well, not for a while. Don’t start criticising me. I’m not the one who’s useless at relationships.”

Makri is useless at relationships. She spent all last winter snivelling about some Elf she met on Avula because he didn’t keep in touch with her. I don’t bother to point this out. The dockers call for their beer. Makri curses them loudly and tells them to wait.

The front door opens and Lisutaris, Mistress of the Sky, strides majestically into the tavern. This time, she hasn’t bothered to disguise herself.

“We need to talk,” she says, and heads for the stairs.

“Thanks for the invitation,” says Makri, but Lisutaris doesn’t acknowledge her, obviously having more important things on her mind than social functions. I follow Lisutaris upstairs while Makri takes her tray of beer to the thirsty dockers. As I’m climbing the stairs I can hear them arguing. It’s a while since Makri punched a customer but she seems to be working up to it again.

In her full costume Lisutaris stands out strikingly in my shabby office. Her official Sorcerer’s rainbow cloak positively vibrates with colour. Unusually for her she doesn’t take a seat but paces up and down nervously, lighted thazis stick in hand.

“Things taken a turn for the worse?” I enquire.

“They have. Consul Kalius suspects that the pendant is missing. He sent his representative to my villa this morning specifically to ask if it was still secure in my hands.”

“How did the Consul learn of the affair?”

Lisutaris glares at me.

“How? I thought it might have something to do with you barging your way all over town leaving a trail of dead bodies in your wake. I appreciate you’re not famous for your subtlety, but when I hired you I wasn’t expecting you to start slaughtering the city’s inhabitants. It was bound to cause comment eventually.”

I’m astonished by the effrontery of the woman.

“I haven’t killed anyone. The way people have been after this pendant it’s no wonder the Consul’s got wind of it. I can’t believe you’d blame me.”

“You can’t? Why not? You’re supposed to be an Investigator. And yet on the simplest of cases you have notably failed to produce any results. Tell me, Thraxas, on most of your cases do you have exact information as to the whereabouts of the stolen item?”

“No.”

“Yet I have three times told you precisely where the pendant could be located and on each occasion you have failed to retrieve it. Instead, all I get is messages telling me that some brutal slaughter has occurred and the gem is missing again. Don’t you think it would be a good idea to arrive in time to locate the item I’m paying you to find?”

Lisutaris halts in the middle of the room and fixes me with a hostile stare. Coming from the head of the Sorcerers Guild, this is quite disconcerting. Lisutaris is one of the most powerful magic users in the world and if she decided it was time to use a little magic on an errant Investigator I wouldn’t want to be that Investigator. I’m wearing a fine spell protection necklace but no such item could hold out against the might of Lisutaris for long.

That being said, I don’t allow anyone to enter my room and abuse me. I meet her gaze and inform her coldly that if I’m not given enough time to do the job then the job won’t get done, and besides, it would be a help if she’d told me the full facts of the case.

“Are you implying I have withheld information?”

“Most clients do. You said that no one knew the power of this pendant. That’s obviously not true. From the way people have been killing each other to get hold of it, I’d say its importance was well known to someone. When you first arrived here the job looked simple and we were in a hurry so I didn’t get the full background to the case. Maybe I should have. Who else in your immediate circle knew you had the pendant, for instance?”

“No one but my secretary.”

“Then maybe we should have a few words with your secretary.”

“You will not investigate her,” says Lisutaris, quite emphatically.

“I think I should.”

“I am not interested in what you think. You will not speak to my secretary and that is final. If knowledge of the pendant’s true significance has somehow been learned, it is unfortunate but no longer relevant. I don’t care how it came to happen; the point is I must have the pendant back immediately. Do you realise that Consul Kalius will be at my house in two days’ time? He is suspicious already. He’s bound to ask to see the pendant.”

“Couldn’t you fob him off with an imitation?”

“If it were only the Consul, yes. But he will have with him Sorcerers from the government, all of whom I have invited to my masked ball. No imitation jewel I could fabricate would fool Old Hasius the Brilliant. Hasius is still seething with jealousy over my election as head of the Guild. He’d take one look at an imitation pendant and squawk so loud they’d hear him in Simnia.”

Lisutaris finishes her thazis stick and lights another.

“This is such a mess! Damn it, I never wanted to be head of the Sorcerers Guild in the first place. I never asked to be placed in charge of items vital for the defence of the city. The Consul’s going to be down on me like a bad spell when he learns I’ve lost the pendant. Only last month he was telling me that some Orcish prince or other had just conquered a neighbouring country and was looking to set himself up as war leader.”

“Prince Amrag?”

Lisutaris nods. Already in the west we’ve heard quite a few reports about this prince. The Orcs hate us as much as we hate them but they’re often more riven by internal warfare than we are, which prevents them from mounting a concentrated attack on us. But every now and then a leader comes along capable of unifying the Orc nations, and when that happens it’s but a short step to an invasion of the Human lands. Prince Amrag looks like he might be the Orc to do it, and it might not be too far in the future.

“Maybe it’s time to call in someone else.”

“What do you mean?” demands Lisutaris.

“If this is so important for Turai, maybe Palace Security should be involved. They could put their whole resources to searching the city.”

“Absolutely not,” says Lisutaris, shaking her head and lighting another thazis stick. Lisutaris’s substantial use of thazis often sends her into a happy dream world, and it’s a sign of how deep the crisis is that she shows no signs of relaxing, no matter how many sticks she smokes.

“I cannot own up to the loss of the pendant. I’d be ruined. The King would expel me from the city in disgrace and I’d be shunned in every nation. My family has been in the leading tier of Turanian society for as long as the city’s been here, and I refuse to end up a mad old hermit in the wastelands casting horoscopes for travellers.”