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were Stepsons and Sacred Banders: "Enough to make a difference. Send word
where I can meet him." He backed out of there and, when the tent flap fell,
breathed a sigh of relief. He'd collect Jihan and pry her from the boy, who'd
got his freedom, who'd be happy with some coin and an escort out of the free
zone.
Then he'd go back to the hostel and wait&
She wasn't there. No Jihan, no boy. He looked around cursorily, then more
thoroughly, searching first in anger (composing his scathy critique of her
behavior) and then in earnest. But he couldn't find them. No one remembered
seeing them and not even Rankan gold could jog their memories. Jihan was not
easy to miss her stature, her swagger, her expensive mail. He didn't like this
turn of events one bit.
As the waning moon crawled across the sky, and he couldn't find her, he began
to worry. The boy's gray eyes, wizard eyes, danced in his inner sight. Halfway
around the perimeter of the camp, turning sleeping bodies and corpses too new
to stink, a voice came out of the gloom behind him:
"Riddler!"
"Grillo!"
"By the god's seething eye...I'd thought it was a poor joke& " Grillo was tall,
well set-up, a
Rankan of the upper class. His hair was light brown, and his skin was pale,
the bones under it well-formed, and the mind in that handsome head quick and
cold; his kind always prided themselves on being able to blend into any
population and anticipate the strategy and tactics of their enemies. But here,
despite his ragged mantle and some artfully smeared dirt on his boots and soot
on his brow, he stood out like a torchlit statue of the god.
And he knew it: "I shouldn't be in here; all perdition's breaking loose in
town tonight. Come, let's get very drunk and ah, you don't drink& well, I'll
get drunk and you can watch and we'll talk things over& " A hand on Tempus's
arm, he guided him toward an ill-lit section of the perimeter wall. "I still
don't believe it's you& "
"It is, and it's not. I've fallen into disrepute. I'll drink my share. But
I've lost my traveling companion& " He described Jihan.
Grillo chuckled. "That's what I heard, the description I got, all right. I
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didn't believe the report."
He whistled piercingly through his teeth. A quartet of beggars who had been
fighting over a refuse pile got to their feet; a pair of male prostitutes left
potential customers with whom they'd been haggling and sauntered their way.
"Gentlemen," Grillo said when the prostitutes accosted them, "this is a friend
of mine, who's lost his girl." He described Jihan in more detail than Tempus
had to him.
"See what you can do. We'll be at my place."
The prostitutes swished their scarves and made kissing noises, and Grillo
shouted at them to stay out of his way or they'd lose the tools of their
trade.
As they headed toward the deepest of the wall's shadows, the four beggars
followed. "Yours?"
Tempus asked.
"Them? Sure, yes. And what of yours? Sacred Banders and such?"
"You know, then?"
"My business is hearing things. Believing them is another matter. We've
trouble with the mercenary hordes keeping them on our side and off the
townspeople's necks. If you're going to be here awhile, perhaps we could work
a trade service for service, like the old days."
"This is a nice little staging area you've got here," Tempus remarked as they
entered the blackest shadows, and out of them voices asked for passwords and,
receiving them, suggested that they
"step right this way, lords."
"Is that what I've got? Maybe I'll need it, with you here. What happened to
your face?"
"A little disagreement with a witch or two. That's why I'm here. My people are
coming upcountry a few at a time. We've a score to settle with Datan and his
crew, witch taunts aside. One of my men "
"I heard. This way." Grillo ducked through a postern gate, taking Tempus's
hand and pressing it to the lintel which was so low they had to bend nearly
double.
When they'd come through and out, they were beyond the free zone's curving
wall of rubble faced with stone. "So, you were saying that your cohort is
coming?& "
"A few at a time."
"Again, I could use them, and you. This way& "
Tempus paced the Rankan officer until they were out of the wall's shadows, and
two men came
up leading horses.
"Ride with me?"
Tempus mounted and Grillo pulled his horse up beside: "My house isn't safe for
this sort of thing;
no one's is. Damn wizards have spies everywhere. We'll just ride around until
we're thirsty. You didn't answer assist me, and I'll return the favor."
They rode until the specifics were ironed out: Tempus would help Grillo keep
order among the unruly mercenary contingent, lend his Sacred Banders for
special assignment; Grillo would help
Tempus find Jihan, put him in touch with various special agents, but: "As far
as the Successors go, I
think your own Nikodemos, if it's the same Niko ashy hair, good fighter,
western-trained is your best hope. He's fought with them. They don't like me,
I can't imagine why." Teeth gleamed in the dark. "Unless it's that I can't pay [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]