Beneath an Opal Moon, page 16
part #4 of Sunset Warrior Cycle Series
we can count on the Palliate for all the funds for this?” His tone was disdainful.
‘ But all that stained glass is so frightfully expensive,” said Don Gode, the young cure. ”Surely, Don Hispete, we can devise a less expensive style in enlarging the iglesia. And the money saved could be used to help feed and clothe “
“My dear Don Gode.” the other interrupted, heaving a great sigh as if the cares of the world were couched upon his shoulders, “have you any conception of the areas of Corrufia our iglesia encompasses? These are monied parishioners, men and women of great prestige and honor. And our new iglesia must reflect this grandeur.”
“But we are taught “
“Yes, yes. I know all that,” Don Hispete said irritably. “I was once in the Palliate seminario myself. Although, Dihos knows, it seems faraway to me now. But when you have been with us here a sufficient amount of time, you will begin to understand the complexities of running an iglesia in the Palliate.” He reached into a serving dish, plucking out a tiny boiled potato dripping with cream. He popped it into his mouth, said around it as he chewed, “What you must remember, Don Gode, out here in the field, as it were, is to forget everything you learned at the seminario.” He laughed uproariously, swallowing.
He plucked up another potato. “Come, come, my boy, surely you know I speak figuratively. But the hard truth is that life out here is much different. Books, after all, are no substitute for life, eh?” He lifted one fat forefinger. A thick gold ring gleamed, embedded in the pink flesh near its base. “Do you understand? No?” He brought a sliver of meat to his mouth, chewed on it. “I agree. It would be very nice to use the money we have so laboriously raised to aid those neediest. But reality dictates otherwise.” Grease glinted along his half-open lips. A bit of meat sat on his rounded chin, atop the curling black hairs of his thick beard. “However much our hearts tell us to do otherwise, we have a duty to the Palliate that must override such personal preferences.” He took a quick gulp of wine and belched. “We get our money from our parishioners, Don Gode. Let me tell you, it’s quite a task making ends meet in these times. Oh, seasons ago it was much easier, but we have grown since then and times have changed, quite naturally. It is now a most complex business. Money makes the Palliate flourish, Don Gode, never forget that. Faith is all well and good. We BENEATH AN OPAL MOON 131
serve that up and it has its place, surely. But faith will not cause that Palliate to survive and prosper. Only money can accomplish that feat.”
“But, begging your pardon, Don Hispete, our first duty is to bring solace to those in need; to show them the way toward salvation in this life. That is the miracle of the Palliate.”
“Uhm, yes.” Don Hispete broke off a haunch of seared meat at its white-and-pink socket. “But, it too is a miracle, Don Gode, what money can do for the Palliate. And without that, well” he shrugged “the Palliate would be able to reach no one.” He tore into the flesh with his white teeth. “Be of calm spirit, my boy,” he said. “Our work is all for the glory of Dihos.”
Fugue
THE Plaza de la Pesquisa was deserted.
He stood deep within the shadows of the olive trees, having chosen a spot with excellent visibility to the east and west as well as to the north, where he could observe the Seguillas y Oriwara house undetected. He had been in this spot for some time now. No one had come in or out of the front door during that time. Four people had passed by without stopping.
He checked his other views, drew a blank and returned his attention to the big house. Doors were only one method of entrance.
With extraordinary quickness and silence, he flitted from shadow to shadow, out of the plaza. An old man went slowly past and, some time later, a young couple arm in arm, coming from the opposite direction. No one saw him.
At length, he gained the darkness of the small side street to the right of the house. The second tree in had the right configuration and he climbed it, moving out from the trunk onto a thick limb which arced inward toward the vine-covered side of the building.
He put the toe of one boot into a V notch where one vine became two and, ascertaining that it would indeed support his weight, launched himself upward. Hand over hand, his fingers grasping, tugging experimentally, he ascended.
High above the street, he became aware of the soft cries, as of thin wire whistling through the air, and, once, he felt the tentative brush of a leathery wing tip. He was not fond of bats and these seemed unusually large but, though they continued to dip near him, calling in their high-pitched peculiar speech, they posed little threat to his progress once he had acclimated himself to their swooping presence.
Along the wall he went, clinging like some nocturnal animal on a hunt, and soon he was at the corner of the house. There was some illumination here, mostly from the flickering lights around the plaza he looked skyward: banks of stratus cloud obscured the rising moon but he was reasonably certain he could navigate this last stretch of wall without being observed from below.
The immediate problem now, however, rose from another quarter. For the first hand-and foothold he was totally blind and would have to rely totally on touch.
Cautiously, he reached around the corner, extending his torso as far as he dared to give himself as wide a search area as possible. He felt his fingers close around a thick vine on the front of the house. He tugged. It held. He tightened his grip and let go with his feet.
Afterward, he would remember how absurdly lucky he was to have held on with his right hand, because the new vine ripped under his weight and he slammed against the side of the building, his face scraping against the ivy as he slid downward. He let go with his left hand and swung for a moment, supported by just one handhold. Gravity dragged at him, beckoning him down to the street below.
He used the toes of his boots to stop his swinging and, pressing his chest against the side of the house, searched for another vine along the front. Found it and used it. This time it held and, within breathless moments, he was swinging onto the right-hand balcony which framed the shuttered second-story window.
He crouched on the strips of wrought iron for a moment, feeling quite vulnerable in the light. In addition, he noted from this vantage point that the balcony was more decorative than functional. If it was not meant to hold this heavy a weight
He reached out a dirk and insinuated its point into the corner seam of the wooden shutter. Found the simple metal latch and flipped it upward.
Slipped into the room beyond, pulling the shutters to behind him.
He found himself in a smallish room with a high down bed and an ornately carved wooden dresser above which hung an outsized oval mirror framed in lacquered bamboo. A bamboo rocking chair stood immobile in one corner as if awaiting its master’s return. The room was scented faintly and a lamp was lit on a small table at bedside. This in itself was peculiar, for the room had a deserted air, despite the obvious attempts to make it seem otherwise.
In three strides he had crossed the room and put his ear against the door. Too thick to hear anything. Cautiously, he opened it a centimeter at a time. Hallway with a curving balustrade overlooking what he took to be the first-floor hallway.
He went out, standing quite still. He could hear the murmur of voices, echoing slightly, and he knelt, peering through the wooden bars. The Senhora Seguillas y Oriwara was standing at the front door, talking to Chimmoku. Apparently he was about to depart, for he was wrapped in a dark cloak.
” as quickly as possible.” He heard her voice drift up to him. “And for the sake of Dihos, make certain he does not follow you back.”
Chimmoku nodded silently and slipped out the door. Moichi now had to make an immediate decision: to stay here with the Senhora or to follow Chimmoku on his nocturnal errand. He chose the former not only because it had been his original plan but because circumstance had proved to be his ally, leaving him alone with the Senhora. To go against that now would be to court disaster.
The Senhora had bolted the door behind Chimmoku and was coming toward him. She began to ascend the stairs.
Moichi went quickly and silently back to the room from which he had gained entrance to the house and closed the door to a slit. Despite the lamp burning, he was quite certain this was not the Senhora’s bedroom. In a moment, he heard her passing him and ventured a look. He saw her go through a door at the far end of the hallway. Over it, attached to the wall
was a polished brass ship’s bell.
There was no help for it now, he thought. And any procrastination allowed that much more chance that he would still be here when Chimmoku returned. He wanted to avoid that.
Taking a deep breath, he opened the door, went out into the hallway and, without a sound, went into her room.
Chiisai had little difficulty in finding the mercado. It was an enormous one-story structure in the heart of Corruna divided into myriad stalls, each rented to a different merchant or trader. The proprietorship of these spaces could be permanent or quite fluid, changing hands many times within the space of several days as traders came and went with their seasonal wares.
At times, as now that is, at night or during inclement
weather the entire rnercado was covered. However, during the dazzling sun-drenched Daluzan days, the separate stall roofs were taken away, giving the vast place a brilliantly dappled, endless feel.
Even now, after the day’s selling had ceased, there continued to be much activity within the mercado, albeit of a different nature from that which went on during the daylight hours. The mercado of Corruna, it was said, never slept.
Here, during all the night, shifts of workers unloaded fresh produce, craftsmen toiled at their work in leather, silver, gold, precious and semiprecious stones, pearls, painting, tapestries and sculpture in stone and clay; far in back, the sweating metalsmiths worked their red-hot forges, creating their weaponry. For the day was for selling only and, at night, the artisans populated the mercado like a mythic flock of nocturnal tribesmen who disappeared with the coming of dawn, replaced by the hard-bargaining merchants.
This was the real mercado, one which few people in Corruna ever saw, for this was not an all-night city as was Sha’angh’sei.
Chiisai stood on the mercado’s threshold, entranced, as if she stood on the brink of the Promised Land. She was used to seeing artisans at work, for every Bujun was also an artisan of some sort What good is a Bujun, her father had told her often, with just the knowledge to kill? But never had she seen so many at once and the sight was dizzying.
Slowly, she strolled down the long aisles between the stalls, watching a man split an uncut diamond here, a woman spinning a cape of silver thread there and, further on, a man etching a delicate design onto a huge leather scabbard by dropping acid on it.
She paused, fascinated, to observe a woman carving what appeared to be an enormous ruby into the likeness of a human head. She waited until the woman put down her tools to rest to ask, “Will it be a man or a woman?”
The woman turned to look at her, wiping at her forehead with her arm. She was dark-haired and long-eyed with thick lips and an exquisite neck that Chiisai immediately envied. Her face had been melded by years of determination, or so it seemed to Chiisai.
“A woman,” she said. “Eventually.”
“Is it very difficult?”
“Darling,” the woman laughed, “it is very nearly impossible.”
“Then why do you do it?”
“Because it’s there, for a start, and no one else around here would dare to attempt it, man or woman. This is my second attempt; the first one I consider a failure.” She put a hand out, her fingers long and delicate, questing like the feelers of some complex insect, stroking the coolness of the ruby’s irregular side. “Here, come here, darling, and feel what I feel.” Chiisai put out her hand. “But I love the ruby for itself, you see,” the woman continued, “because it withholds from me its very essence.” She smiled. “Until the very end.”
“And that is important,” Chiisai said, not knowing whether she was asking a question.
“As important as drawing breath,” the woman said, “for me. For without mystery, life would be nothing and I should wish, when I put my head down on the pillow at night, never again to awake.”
Chiisai took her hand reluctantly from the ruby. “Do you have a finished piece of yours here? I’d like to see one.”
“I don’t think ” The woman searched below the counter of the stall. “Wait. I’ve found one.” She lifted up a warrior carved out of tiger’s-eye. “It is not so fine, I’m afraid. It’s a very early piece. Still ” She set the figure down on the counter top and Chiisai picked it up. Something about it struck her.
“This warrior’s face looks familiar to me.”
“It’s a Tudescan,” the woman said. “Have you been to Rhein Tudesca? That is where I am from.”
Chiisai looked up. “You are Tudescan?”
The woman nodded. “My name is Martyne.” She offered her hand. “And you?”
“My name is Chiisai. I am Bujun.” She took the hand, found it cool and firm. “I hope you’ll pardon my ignorance, Martyne, but I thought all Tudescans had light hair.”
“Most do, but only my mother was Tudescan, you see. I have her light eyes but my father’s hair, I imagine.”
Chiisai returned her gaze to the figurine. It was marvelously carved. She could clearly see the cruelty of the man’s visage. “We were attacked by Tudescans yesterday,” she said. “On the sea.” She waited a moment, then said, “You do not seem surprised.”
“Why should I be? They are evil people. That’s why I am in Dalucia now.”
“But you made this,” Chiisai pointed out, indicating the warrior.
“Yes. I made that as a reminder.”
“Of what?”
“My father came from the sea. He was a freebooter who sailed into Rhein Tudesca one day. And there he met my mother. And now they are both dead.”
“I am sorry.”
“So am I. They were exceptional people, my parents. But my mother disobeyed the law and they were both slain for that transgression. “
“What could she have done that was so terrible to have warranted execution?”
“She married my father,” Martyne said simply.
She whirled as he closed the door behind him. It made a sound not unlike a sigh of resignation.
Her eyes flashed and he saw the earth-brown motes swimming in their jade depths. She wore a loose creamcolored silk blouse with a drawstring front, below which was an oval opening displaying the swell of the tops of her breasts, and a long skirt of a green so deep it appeared to be black.
“You!” she hissed. “How did you get in here?”
Not: pleat do you want?
Her hands hung loosely at her sides.
”I came in through a second-story window.”
“Get out of here this instant!”
It was worrisome because there was no fear and even now her fingers were fully extended, not balled into fists of outrage.
“Not until I get some answers, senhora.”
Had to drag his eyes away from the sight of her heaving bosom. Not the way. He advanced. “Senhora “
She stood her ground. “Get out!”
Felt his muscles tensing of their own volition and he began to worry in earnest because there was information trying to get through.
“Senhora, please. YOU must listen to me. Your daughter’s life “
“I will not debate with you.” Her voice was like ice.
Image of Cascaras, dead in the alley.
“I will not leave.”
She moved then and, just before he was borne backward by the full weight of her lightning attack, he knew what it was.
As she leapt, he caught a glimpse of her fingers, together, fully extended. They tumbled to the floor, rolling over and owr, for he knew now that any cessation of movement on his part and he was finished. The one word reverberated through his brain as the back of his head slammed against the wooden boards and he saw a shadow looming over him.
Koppo.
“The folk of Rhein Tudesca live solely by laws,” Martyne said, as they sipped compana. “It is how they are born and brought up. A network of laws. And that is how the country runs. Efficiently, effortlessly. Bloodlessly.” Her face was drained of all color in the telling of this. “A Tudescan may marry another Tudescan and no one else.”
Chiisai said nothing, staring into the depths of the golden liquid.
“The Tudescans hate outlanders, ” Martyne continued. “Oh, they tolerate those with whom trade is vital, but visitors to Rhein Tudesca are strictly limited and the crews of the merchantmen bringing imports are never allowed shore leave. And any outlander in the country is escorted at all times.”
“You have not been back?”
“No,” Martyne said. “I would never return.”
“Do you know a Tudescan named Hellsturm?” Chiisai said abruptly.
“No. Should 1?”
Chiisai shook her head. “Not really. There’s no connection other than you’re both Tudescan.”
“I have no interest in others from Rhein Tudesca, Chiisai.”
“Perhaps, then, you know of a Dalazan merchant named Cascaras.”
“Oh, yes. Certainly.” Martyne poured them both more wine. “But it has been many seasons since I have seen him. He was about to leave the city. He used to have a stall over there” she waved a hand toward the vastness of the mercado “but that was some time ago. We became friendly because he specialized in archaeological artifacts.”
“You knew him well, then?”
She shook her head, her dark hair a nimbus like the night. “Not really. He would have liked to get to know me better. But I found out that a number of artifacts he had were stolen.”
“From collections?”
“Oh, no. He was a grave robber. He looted digs at night.
Mostly to the northwest. He knew that region so well I often told him he ought to give up the thieving and become a cartographer.” She gave Chiisai a small smile. “He wouldn’t hear of it, of course. He loved the excitement far too much as well as the enormous profits.”
