Magic in Ithkar 3 Page 3

  No apprentice could stay and work on such a day, and Jorn was no different from the rest. The three knives were snugly tied to his belly, so that it was painful to bend forward, but it didn’t matter. They felt fine in the hand, and he had confidence. Even the fair-wards—and there were so many of them about!—could not make him feel afraid. He tipped his cap to those he knew and sauntered down the ways with the rest of the fair folk.

  Salisa’s hair glowed from endless brushing. Her dress was snug and flattering, as if her luxurious figure needed flattery, but it amused her to be as disconcerting as possible. Her father rested in his bed, able to sleep at last. Poor Jorn, she thought. It would be so much easier if I could be in love with him. But I’m not. Oh, if only my captain will be here!

  Jorn skipped about, thrilled with nervous energy. Once he noticed himself clenching and unclenching his fists, wet fists, and stopped it by an act of will. He calmed himself with a word, then danced again as though he weighed nothing, so happy he felt, as though the prize were already his. “Salisa!” he shouted to no one in particular, and wended his way through the throng, waiting for the evening dark, and the game.

  Gamesters’ row was beginning to fill, with tosspots and revelers and fair-wards, with the rich and their private guards, the less rich in disguise, the poor with their begging bowls, and the rogues with their schemes and quick eyes for misfortunate opportunities. Salisa pulled the ropes that stayed the flaps of her booth and made ready to put the three knives into action. In seconds, the regulars began to drift toward her, and she began all the usual automatic banter. The targets had been freshly painted with the vegetable dyes she could afford, and the little “knives” were likewise spruced up for this special festival night. All but one—and then she remembered where it had gone, and she felt an instant of guilt for the boy who knew nothing of love except in his imagination.

  A cocky bravo stepped forward and tossed a large silver coin on the counter. “I’ll try for it,” he said.

  Salisa picked up the piece. “Good sir, I haven’t the funds to cover this, yet. Perhaps a little later—”

  “Why, if I win, take it in trade!” he shouted, and the

  crowd loved it. Salisa smiled and tried to blush, and pocketed the coin. He was charming. She gave him one of the slightly heavier wooden knives. He held the blade in his fingers and prepared to throw it.

  “Hey there!” came the huge voice of a fair-ward, and a yellow gleam flashed down. The bravo gave a yelp as the brass-shod truncheon smashed into the wooden knife and scattered the Hinders to the ground. “I’ll have you before the magistrate for threatening with weapons here!”

  “Now, see here, my good man—” the bravo began, but he was drowned out by the spectators, who came to his defense. Somehow the fair-ward had missed this booth before, but he was no different from the others when Salisa cast the oldest spell known upon him.

  “They’re all wood, you say?”

  She smiled and spread her arms apart, then bent forward ever so slightly. “You couldn’t cut butter with them. Here, try me.” She reached a bare arm forward and leaned a little closer.

  “It’s plain to see you’re not hiding any others,” said the fair-ward, and the crowd roared its approval. The bravo pushed up to the counter. “Good maiden, my turn now, if you please?”

  Salisa blew him a kiss and stationed herself for his best vantage. One landed flat and fell. Two hit point on but bounced off. Three sank in a bit, then drooped and fell. “Rather like you with that little fluff last night, eh, Anders?” The bravo laughed and, arm in arm with his buddies, waltzed off to new amusements.

  New revelers shoved in, trying for a close-up look at the beauty behind the counter and a chance for their money with their skill at playing the game. They laughed, and the coins flew across the boards into the gamester’s coffers.

  Jorn was in among them now, pushing forward with the rest. Some would try once or twice, rarely more, and then move on. Even the fair-ward tried his hand, a free play for a kiss, and didn’t win. He stepped back, and Jorn twisted his way to the counter, a wicked grin frozen on his face.

  Salisa met his eyes and felt a coldness down her spine. But she kept up the cheery patter and, as she had promised, slipped him a copper to place on the betting space.

  “Jorn, my old friend, come to try it again? Two to one for you, you’re my best customer. Hey, friend, don’t hesitate now. . . .”

  “For coin, Salisa? For mere coin?” He raised his voice, and some of the folk turned to hear him. “It’s easy for you, no?” And he threw the wooden things as hard as he could, one, two, three; they clattered to the ground. “You told me it can’t be done. Can’t be done, Salisa? Surely it can! It’s too easy!”

  “Jorn, what’s the matter? Is it too much drink?”

  “I’ve never been more sober. Put the knives down, Salisa. I’m ready to play the wager you promised. For you. Are you ready?”

  Those who were near silenced to hear this tale long abrewing come to its end, with the throbbing noises of Ithkar Fair surrounding them, isolating them. Salisa nodded, sad that the boy had so pathetically snapped. If he must insist on being publicly spurned, so be it. She handed him the knives.

  He stepped back to prepare his throw, but the moist ground made him slip, and he fell on his face. Such awkwardness was no new thing for him, and they all knew it. But on the ground, he had his brief second to grab the metal blades from their hiding place and push the wooden pieces under the drape that hung from the front of the counter. The crowd had closed over him, smothering him, but they parted as he rose, ready to play, the knives held steady in his hand. The blades’ fresh paint gleamed luridly in the lantern light.

  One. The blade sank into the target up to the hilt. Two. It wobbled as it sailed across the booth to strike home at an odd angle, but it did not fall. Three. With reddened eyes, the target blurring with every condescending, patronizing sneer he had ever endured, he threw as hard as he could. The blade whistled through the air and plunged straight in. The rotted hay of the target bale teetered on its spindly legs of reed and fell over, coming apart in a fetid mush. The crowd went berserk and tried to lift the boy to their shoulders, but he wriggled free. “Salisa!” he shouted. “Salisa!”

  The woman paled. He had won. In a daze, she bent to the ruined target, felt for her knives, and instantly discovered the secret. She stood with the massive things in her hands, all painted with her colors.

  She was not afraid of him. “These are not mine,” she said. “Take them.”

  “I’m not interested in the knives, Salisa. To the Ith with them, and this whole booth, too. I beat you, and you’re mine, you hear me?”

  But the fair-ward was interested in the knives. He picked one up and saw that it was steel. A genuine weapon. He spun around to face the woman.

  “So you do have real knives with you!” He lifted the huge staff and held it above his head. “Not to move, understand, or I’ll smash your head in!”

  “They aren’t mine! This lovesick puppy brought them—am I to blame for that?”

  The fair-ward turned to Jorn, trapped by the dense crowd and unable to flee.

  “Who would carry a knife like that, let alone three—all painted up like a gamester’s cheating tools and made to the same design?”

  The fair-ward frowned. “Cheating tools?”

  “Have you ever heard of anyone winning?”

  The brass-hat turned back to Salisa. “Woman, is this so?”

  Salisa smiled and relaxed. “Of course it is so. How else could we earn enough to return next year? And who has come here and not been entertained to the value of the coin he put down, and got less than his money’s worth? Jorn could not have won unless he brought his own knives, which of course I do not allow. And as you pointed out, I have no place to hide three knives at all.”

  The fair-ward whirled upon the boy and grabbed him by the back of the neck. “At the temple we’ll see if you have other weapons hidden! Come on!”
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  Jorn shouted, “But the challenge! It says only to throw three knives!”

  Salisa laughed, a hard and weary sound. “So it does, Jorn. All right. You’ve won.”

  Jorn was completely powerless, dragged like offal before the fair-ward. Success and failure were so mixed that he had no idea what was happening. Eventually he was stood before a temple magistrate and made to tell his story, which was not believed. And then they took him to the scaffold, where his offenses were proclaimed: each of the knives was a separate offense, so this was the third time for all. He was right-handed, that was plain, so with the tongs they grabbed his right hand and laid it on the block. As the hooded one stepped up, Jorn finally realized what they were going to do to him, and he began the pleading and whining he had mastered; but there was no mercy in them, only cold, mechanical efficiency. The hooded one stroked the stone over the crescent blade, one side and then the other. Jorn wept and begged, and as the hooded one stood and stretched, Jorn screamed and thrashed and pulled against the iron until the skin ripped. The hooded one lifted the great axe, and then it came down with a splintery thump into the wooden block; white-hot needles piercing to the spine, screaming, his chest a rack of pain and tremors in his bowels; then the hot iron to stop the bleeding, and the tar, unimaginable pain; then rough hands to throw him down the scaffold stairway to the mud, and still more echoes of pain and solitude.

  The hand of an assassin was nailed still quivering to a rough wooden beam of the gallows, next to the others, and there it remained.

  He must have slept, for it was dark when he was again aware. The pain had lessened a little, but not much. He was aware of hunger, vaguely, and his filthiness. He pulled himself to his feet and looked down at his arms.

  It was true.

  Jorn knew how short was the way to the stables, but it seemed to take forever to drag himself there. The stableboy was frightened of his appearance and did as he was told, dousing Jorn again and again until the stink was gone. One must prepare to go calling, he thought to himself. And when his toilet was finished, he set off for gamesters’ row.

  Salisa had not fared well in the rumors that flew through Ithkar Fair. Her game had had at least a semblance of honesty, even if a moment’s reflection was all that was required to see through it. And the lovesick boy, mutilated by the magistrate’s decree when everyone knew how timid and harm-less he was . . .

  Jorn staggered down the ways and lanes, his feet directed by hidden memories. Folk occasionally noticed him, and thought on the tale, and stood aside for him. Jorn never saw it.

  It was the middle of the evening on gamesters’ row: over-heard conversation revealed that two days, not one, had passed since the evil thing was done to him. Everywhere was gaiety, except for one space that everyone shunned. Jorn moved there and saw, alone in a booth and ignored, Salisa, his beauty, and a challenge to throw three knives that no one would accept.

  She stared at Jorn and at the horror where his right hand had been. In only two days, his face had gone gaunt and pinched and pale.

  “The herb-master—” she said.

  “Who?” His voice was a dry rasp. His eyes remained fixed on her face. There was nothing to say.

  She took him by his hand and led him into the tent.

  “No one will come here anymore,” Salisa said. “You beat me at my own game.” She helped him to sit on her pallet and helped him pull his wretched clothes off. “The herb-master sent word here. He told me to tell you that a bright mind and one hand were all that’s needed to master herb lore.”

  Jorn shivered, naked and cold, as Salisa brought a thin blanket for him. It seemed to take hours to get just one thought together.

  “What do I need,” he finally asked, “to master you?”

  Salisa watched him. The blanket would never be enough to warm him. She stood and peeled off her tunic and then the thin gown underneath. Under the blanket he felt like ice, but she pressed as much of him into her warmth as she could. A frozen hand touched hers and gripped it, and she felt tears against her breast. It pleased her.

  “Not three knives, that’s for sure.”

  Were-Sisters

  Ann R. Brown

  Dereva tossed back her graying hair and lifted another tray of venison pastries out of the way of the chopping block. There was an untamed lightness in her agile body as she balanced the tin sheets on top of the other trays at the end of the wooden counter. Before the opening of Ithkar Fair the following morning, there was much for her to do: mince and spice the meat from the deer she’d pulled down in the forest a few leagues from the town; roll out circles of dough; fold and seal each pie; and fry the pastries in a caldron of lard. Dereva had hoped that her younger sister would be of help to her, but Lila only paced the confines of the booth and growled.

  Lila’s yellow eyes gleamed. “I hate this—how can you bear to be around all these humans? They stink of perfume and soap and soft living.” She snatched a hunk of deer meat and gnawed it with her white teeth.

  “Don’t let the customers see you eating it raw,” warned Dereva calmly, rolling the dough with a deft hand. She was only a few years older than her fiery, red-haired sister and had once been just as wild, but responsibilities had steadied her.

  Lila paced restlessly from one side of the booth to the other.

  With the tip of a copper knife, Dereva sealed the edges of the dough semicircles. Nothing in the booth was made of iron. Even the trays and kettles were either copper, brass, or tin.

  “Here, help me fill these pastries,” suggested Dereva. “There was no point in your coming with me if you’re only going to sulk. Let’s get ready for the opening, and then we can take the rest of the night off.”

  Lila uttered a short laugh that sounded like a bark and shoved aside a rolled-up canvas awning.

  “You only want to see if Gervys the hunter has come this year,” Lila mocked. Her good humor returned, and she began to spoon meat into the center of each dough circle. “How can you like a human man who trapped you?”

  A smile lit Dereva’s sun-browned face. She was a young woman still, despite the streaks of gray in her glossy chestnut hair. “He released me as soon as I turned into a woman. It’s just a tiny scar on my ankle.”

  The work went much faster with Lila’s slapdash assistance; and before too many hours had passed, they were ready for the first day of the fair.

  With a sigh of relief, Dereva ripped off her apron and stretched her arms upward in a gesture of freedom. “You’re free until tomorrow morning, Lila, but don’t think of going on all fours or I’ll crate you and ship you back to Wolvendale on a pack mule.”

  The wild young girl laughed and embraced her sister briefly. “You weren’t always the motherly type, Dereva. I remember when the elders were always calling you before the Circle Of the Law for howling all night and running with strange packs.”

  “Unlicked cub!” taunted Dereva as the girl darted through the curtain and was gone into the night.

  Stepping out into the cool evening, Dereva allowed the breeze to fan dry her sweating face and hair. It felt good to be free of the confines of the cramped stall, and also free of the responsibility of watching over Lila, at least for a few hours. Sometimes her watchful care was galling to them both. Next year perhaps she would leave the reckless girl back home in the forested peaks of Wolvendale. Lila didn’t belong in a populated district like Ithkar. Dereva didn’t like the town, either—the crowding, the smells, or the press of noisy humanity. But she had disciplined herself to bear these gatherings during the past ten years; and the silver she carried back to the dale would last her kin the whole year.

  She set out with a free-swinging stride through the rows of silent pavilions and stalls that displayed such tasty delights as marchpane, gingerbread, suckets, florentines, fritters, and star-gazey pies. Dereva hummed a tuneless song as she strode down the twisting alley.

  “Bitch!”

  The cry of hatred made her whirl, her green eyes glinting. The same coarse vo
ice roared, “Why don’t you stay in Dogdale with the other dogs?”

  Dereva’s keen eyes recognized the fat oaf leaning over the counter of his cookshack, and she choked down a red wave of fury. She wanted no trouble with the fair-wards, priests, or townspeople of Ithkar.

  She retorted, “Are you making your pies with cat meat again this year, Otrok?”

  The corpulent baker spat into the dust. “Sorceress. Witch. Why don’t the priests arrest you?”

  “You were drunk, Otrok. What you believe you saw was only your sodden imagination,” stated Dereva through her teeth.

  “I saw you!” he screamed, and hurled an iron ladle. Dereva dodged, and the metal didn’t touch her. “I saw you! Five years ago I saw you change!”

  Dereva lengthened her stride and soon left her competitor’s screams behind. Out the northern gate in the palisade she hurried, Otrok forgotten. Before her loomed the massive domes of the temple, which shut out half the night sky with its vast ramparts and towers. But it was to the huddle of tents beyond the stables that she ran, her heart slamming erratically. Her eyes, which saw so well in the dark, scanned the rope corral of horses but saw no sign of the big gray stallion of Gervys. Many seasonal workers for the temple and the fair pitched their tents on the green hill behind the stable. Toward the light of a flickering campfire she raced. Standing guard over the rough encampment was a retired fair-ward. Dereva recognized him by his battered helmet.