Shallows of Night, page 9
“You can plainly see,” said T’ien expansively, “that we refuse to rely solely on the inconsistencies of the weather. Canvas is fine when the wind is up, otherwise—” He shrugged.
They walked slowly down a narrow central aisle between the oarsmen.
“They are continually manned,” T’ien continued. “The men work in shifts.”
“They do not mind this work?” asked Ronin.
“Mind?” said Tuolin incredulously. “They are soldiers, bound to Rikkagin T’ien. It is their duty. Just as it is their duty to fight and die if need be for the rikkagin’s safety.” He snorted. “Where is this man from that he does not understand this? He cannot be civilized, surely.”
Rikkagin T’ien smiled somewhat absently as if he were enjoying some private jest. “He comes from a long way off, Tuolin. Do not judge him so harshly.” Tuolin’s eyes blazed and for just an instant Ronin believed that he was going to turn on his rikkagin. “Teach him if he does not understand our ways,” said T’ien placidly.
“Yes,” said Tuolin, the cold light receding from his eyes, “patience is its own reward, is it not so?”
T’ien walked on and they followed, a pace or so behind.
“You see,” said Tuolin, “we carry with us many moral obligations which we are taught to honor virtually from birth.” A dark blur at the corner of Ronin’s vision. “To be bound to a rikkagin has many benefits.” Oblique approach, ballooning. “One eats well, one is clothed, one has money, one is trained—” And Tuolin had seen it too because even now he was moving, the long dirk no longer in his waist sash. There was a scream, disturbing the heavy air like a sudden breeze parting a velvet curtain, and the figure was upon them. Tuolin leapt forward, his dirk flashing in a savage thrust. The body, long and thin, sweat-coated, wielded a curving single-edged sword. The face was pinched, the mouth screaming, lips pulled back from rotted stumps of teeth in a rictus, the eyes glassy and bulging fanatically. Then the figure was spitted on the blond man’s blurred weapon. The legs kicked violently and then the eyes rolled as the blade ripped through the naked chest, spewing forth blood and bone fragments. The man’s sword clattered uselessly to the wooden boards. Rikkagin T’ien watched impassively as Tuolin withdrew the dirk and with a deft economy of motion slit the man’s throat. Ronin noted that T’ien had not even drawn his sword.
Now the rikkagin sighed and without looking at either of them said, “It is best if we return abovedecks.” And stepped nimbly over the crumpled corpse.
Sha’angh’sei loomed over them as they maneuvered the sea lanes clogged with vessels large and small and eased into the port. The ship plowed slowly through the thick sea, yellow-brown and clinging, past square-rigged fishing craft and high-sterned cargo vessels. Off to starboard, Ronin thought he could just discern the broad mouth of a river spilling into the sea.
He stood on a high poop drinking in the city while all about him was movement as men raced through the catwalk rigging, reefing the last of the unfurled sail, securing yards and lines, the forest of oars high in the air, dripping and shining, as the rowers prepared to ship them. It lay before him in the inky twilight like a vast fat jewel, dusky and dim with age, smoldering with fitful movement, heaving itself from the spume and effluvia of the land.
The low buildings closest to him appeared to be built on a delta and he looked again for the river’s mouth for confirmation but it was lost behind the thick clumps of buildings. Beyond the flat of the delta the city rose like the arched spine of a frightened animal and many of the dwellings in this area seemed to need the aid of wooden columns sunk into the hillside, which supported their jutting balconies, fluted and columnated, dark hardwoods gleaming in the smeary glow as lamps and torches were abruptly lit throughout the city as if by some prearranged signal. The deepening haze, sapphire and mauve, softened the flicker of the flames so that the individual sources blended and blurred and the city seemed to glow with an ethereal incandescence.
Ronin’s pulse quickened. By chance he had come to Sha’angh’sei, and it was obviously a major port on the continent of man. Here, he felt confident, he would find someone who could unlock the riddle of the scroll of dor-Sefrith. The wash of light reached out for him as the ship maneuvered toward the waiting wharf. Perhaps, he mused, Rikkagin T’ien will know of someone.
Men swarmed along the long arm of the wharf in anticipation of their arrival and Ronin, observing the frenzy of activity, felt the muscles of his stomach contract momentarily as his spirits soared. The continent of man: Borros had been correct all along. So many people here, such a teeming world; even now, though it was before his eyes, it was a shock; so long talked of, it was a dream world that had been an integral ingredient of the fantasy that had kept them alive with a goal as they flew across the featureless platinum ice for endless days and nights with nothing but the cutting wind and cold as their reality. This dream had kept Borros alive until the end, Ronin was sure; his body had been beaten and, save for this land beckoning him on, Borros’ mind would have let go in the midst of Freidal’s torture within the confines of the Freehold. And now: now I step upon the cluttered foreshore of the continent of man. A dream no more.
There came a brief command and the ship touched the creaking timbers of the long wharf.
There was an electric hum, the live-wire abrasive intensity of rushing bodies, the cacophonous atonality of voices raised in argument, laughter, command, the chunky slap of cargo continually being loaded onto ships ready to sail to other ports, unloaded from just-docked vessels, the brief slam of working doorways, the beckoning cries of vendors, the lilt of hoarse monotonous work songs, the crisp cadence of soldiers’ booted feet, the clangor of arms, the tolling of far-off bells, a whiff of mysterious chanting, and beneath it all, the heavy wash of the yellow sea lapping at the belly of the city, caressing it, washing its soil, eating its bedrock.
He stood on the wharf, an alien island in an ocean of moving bodies. The debarking soldiers passed him in formation, elbowing aside the scurrying workers, bare-chested and barefooted, tattered pants rolled up their legs, sweat streaming down their laden backs, some bent double under their immense loads, others in pairs trotting with crates of food-stuffs suspended from bamboo poles supported on their shoulders. Overseers screaming their instructions, orders being barked, sellers frantically hawking their wares, bodies coming against him like breakers, sounds like waves beating upon the shores of his ears, engulfing him. He breathed deeply and his nostrils flared to the steamy air laden with the fragrances of man, the pungency of fresh spices and syrupy oils, the mingling of exotic perfumes and thick sweat, the briny scent of the sea, rich with the myriad animal flavors of life and death.
Tuolin found him eventually.
“The rikkagin will see you tomorrow in the morning.” Caftans of silk and cotton, tight blouses over firm breasts, long earrings clashing softly. “He is most anxious to speak with you at length.” Gold rings glinting, a wooden leg with a worn shoe stuck on the end, colored skirts swirling, armbands dully shining, flash of yellow feathers. “Now he has many preparations to make and we could both use food and drink.” Carts bumping, green eyes flashing, strange two-wheeled carriages pulled by toiling runners, dark hair floating in the soft scented breeze, music skirling. “Especially drink, eh?” Faces hidden by veils, faces covered with long beards, greased and curling, the savory mouth-watering perfume of roasting meat, a black and terribly empty eyeless socket, laughter, mouths gaping wide, black teeth, eyes crinkling, flash of dirk. “And afterward, a very special place, Ronin. Oh yes.”
Along the sweep of the wharf the crowd thinned momentarily and Ronin was transfixed by a constellation of bobbing lights along the waterfront. Low, wide boats, some with makeshift shelters, most without, rocked gently on the evening tide. Lanterns were hung, illuminating the occupants. Families crowded the vessels, men, women, scrambling children and screaming infants, old ones still as statues, all assembled now for the meal at day’s end; sitting with cracked shallow bowls of rice close to their faces, eating with long sticks, throats working as if they were famished.
“Home for many people,” said Tuolin. “Generations have worked on land and have lived on the tasstans.” Bodies closed over the view in an unwashed tide, blotting out all but the sea lanterns’ mobile glow reflecting off the restless water. They began walking again. “There is no room for them in Sha’angh’sei.” Shouts and the sounds of running feet. “There never was.”
“Yet they work here, do they not?”
“Oh yes.” A scuffle beside them; coarse curses, receding, drowned in the sea of bodies. “There is always work from dawn until dusk: for a copper coin which the merchants take at the end of the day, for the mildewed rice that they must eat. There is always work in Sha’angh’sei for a strong back, day or night. But nowhere to live.” Tuolin laughed abruptly and clapped Ronin on the back. “But no more talk now. I have been too long from this city.” He guided them skillfully through the jostling throng, moving at an increasing pace.
“Come,” he called as he moved ahead. “We go to Iron Street.”
Night lights flared along every street they took; black iron lanterns, wrought in openwork grills, the flames within licking smokily at the darkness. The packed streets were cobbled, lined with buildings variously assigned as apartments or shops without any discernible pattern. Men, thin and fat, lolled in open doorways, picking at their teeth or smoking pipes with long curving stems and tiny bowls, squatting against grimy wooden and chipped brick walls, talking or dozing. Off these thoroughfares were ubiquitous narrow twisting alleys, blacker than the night, down which people would sometimes wander, disappearing within instants, leaving behind only a dissipating breath of sweet smoke.
They passed many soldiers, of differing types and obviously bound to various rikkagin. They seemed to be the only people in these noisome streets not in a hurry. Ronin was pleased to be able to walk; it gave him a chance to test his body. His back had ceased to pain him days ago and the wound in his shoulder was almost healed but he knew his ribs needed more time to mend. His chest was stiff and sore but most of the sharp pain had left him and this exercise was invigorating, not tiring.
On Iron Street, two men threw a set of five dice against the side of a wall, talking softly to each other, intent on the faces of the cubes. A woman in filthy clothes sat in the dust of the street, a bawling baby in the crook of one arm. She held a grimy hand, nails torn and black with dirt, palm upward.
“Please,” she called in a pitifully weak voice. “Please.”
Her sad eyes caught Ronin’s and they were filled with pain.
“Ignore her,” Tuolin said, noting the direction of Ronin’s gaze.
“But surely you can spare something for her.”
Tuolin shook his head.
“Please,” the woman called.
“The baby is crying,” said Ronin. “It is hungry.”
Swiftly Tuolin crossed the crowded street and, thrusting aside the folds of the woman’s robe, grasped the hidden wrist and Ronin saw that she held a dirk which she had been digging into the baby to make it cry. Her almond eyes flashed angrily and she wrenched her wrist from his grip, lunging at him with the blade’s point. Tuolin stepped back out of harm’s way and they resumed their walk along Iron Street.
“A lesson of Sha’angh’sei,” he said.
Ronin glanced back through the crowds of people. The woman sat, palm outstretched, the other hand hidden. Her lips moved; her eyes searched the passing faces. The baby cried.
“War is the reason Sha’angh’sei was built and it was built in a day.”
“Surely you are not serious.”
“Perhaps I exaggerate just a bit.”
“How long?”
“To build the city?”
“No. How long has the war been on?”
“It is endless. I do not remember. No one can.”
“Who is fighting whom?”
“Everyone against everybody.”
“That is not an answer.”
“Yet it is the truth.”
They were sitting in a low-ceilinged tavern, at a plank table located along the back wall which ran almost the entire width of the establishment. A wide wooden stairway to the second story took up the remainder of the wall.
The air was thick with smoke and grease and burning tallow. Before them lay platters of broiled meat and steamed fish, raw vegetables and the inevitable rice. Cups of a clear rice wine, hot and potent, were constantly refilled as they ate using the long sticks. The men aboard ship had taught Ronin how to use these peculiar eating utensils.
“All the races of man are here, I think,” said Tuolin between mouthfuls, “in differing strengths. And they have never gotten along.”
“Borros, the man I traveled with over the ice sea, believed that the sorcerous wars had ended all conflict.”
Tuolin smiled as he swallowed but his eyes showed that he was not amused; they were as coldly blue as ice. “Man will never learn, Ronin. He is eternally at war with himself.” He shrugged. “There is no help for it, I am afraid.”
Six soldiers in dusty uniforms came into the tavern, pulling up chairs around a table near the door. They ordered wine and began to drink, laughing loudly and pounding on the table. Their long swords scraped against the floor boards.
“This city is composed of factions,” said Tuolin, “all of them mistrusting the others because the war allows you to make much money if you are shrewd.”
In the far corner two cloaked men, tall and light-haired, sat with arms around a pair of sloe-eyed women, slight with high-cheekboned, flat-nosed faces, long black hair falling sleekly to the middle of their backs.
“The city is filled with many, many hongs—merchants—who are rich and fat from the war.”
“They live here?”
One of the couples was kissing now, a long and passionate embrace.
“Hardly,” Tuolin snorted. He gulped at his wine. “They live on the upper reaches.” He refilled his cup. “In the walled city.”
“Another city?”
“Yes and no.” He took more meat with his sticks. “It is still Sha’angh’sei.”
Along the opposite wall a woman with long eyes and a curiously simian face whispered to three men in dark cloaks. She wore her shiny hair piled upon her narrow head and long earrings of a green stone spun as she moved her head.
“What about the war?”
“It is everywhere. It is why we returned to Sha’angh’sei. An army of bandits have massed to the north and west.” Three children ran in from the street, thin and filthy and hollow-eyed. The tavernmaster called to them as they clattered up the stairs. He shouted and the tallest one returned and laid a number of dull coins in the man’s hand. The tavernmaster slapped the boy so hard that his frame shook. The boy dug a dirty hand into a pocket and extracted several more coins, then he ran up the stairs after the others. “The hongs are paying us to protect their interests before the bandits become a nuisance by descending on the city itself.”
Even to Ronin, so short a time with these people, it seemed an implausible story; however, he could not guess why Tuolin should lie to him.
“Then you will be leaving Sha’angh’sei?” he asked.
The simian-faced woman was gesturing now with narrow bony hands. Her long nails were lacquered green and, Ronin saw with some surprise, her teeth were black.
“Yes. The day after tomorrow. It is a three-day march to Kamado, the fortress in the north.”
One of the men got up and walked out. The remaining two resumed talking to the simian-faced woman with increased animation. Her teeth gleamed darkly.
Ronin was about to say something but Tuolin’s hand on his arm stopped him. He followed the blond man’s gaze.
Two men stood in the doorway. They wore dark baggy pants and black cloaks over silk shirts. They were almond-eyed with flat wide faces. Their long hair was waxed and bound in queues. An errant gust of wind plucked at their cloaks and Ronin caught a glimpse of short-hafted axes thrust into their sashes.
“Keep still,” whispered Tuolin, his eyes drifting slowly away from the tall figures. His voice carried a peculiar note, of fear perhaps? He looked at Ronin and said in a more normal tone, “The rikkagin will require you at a specific hour tomorrow. Until that time, he requested me to be your guide around the city.” Ronin stared at him. “Sha’angh’sei is a most complex and at times bewildering city. The rikkagin does not wish for you to get lost.”
The men were still in the doorway, their black eyes sweeping the room. The tavernmaster glanced up from serving a table and, wiping his hands on his apron, hurried across the room. He drew from some inner pocket a small leather sack which he handed to one of the men. The other said something to him and laughed. The tavernmaster bowed. Then the two were gone without a sound.
“Who were they?” said Ronin.
“The Greens,” said Tuolin as if that were all the answer needed. He drained the last of his wine. “I have had my fill of this place. What say you, Ronin, shall we move on?”
Tuolin paid for their meal. The green stone earrings of the simian-faced woman danced as she spoke.
Outside in the fragrant air, there seemed less people about than earlier in the evening. Tuolin looked both ways along the street, then he seemed to relax, stretching.
“Now,” he said, “the evening begins.”
The gold plaque said “Tenchō.” It was fixed with golden spikes to the brown brickwork to the left of the high yellow double doors at the head of a curving iron stairway on Okan Street.
