The Keys to Paradise, page 43
Giles called back to Petia. She shook her bridle and trotted up to ride on Giles’ other side.
‘Can anyone block you from sensing them?’ Giles asked.
‘I don’t know. Another Trans might. If you’re thinking about those who were following us the day before yesterday, Anji is certain that it wasn’t a Trans.’
‘Have you been listening?’ Giles asked. ‘Sensing?’
Petia nodded, her expression grim. ‘My mind seeks constantly now. If it is Segrinn back there, I’ll know it.’
‘Sing out the instant you know anything,’ Giles said.
In late afternoon they rode into Malor, which proved a larger village than Giles had expected, but certainly not a town. Winter had shut down any industry that might have flourished during warmer months, but Giles doubted Malor prospered even then. The entire village had a curious, dead feeling about it.
‘You, good sir,’ he called to a man standing in the road silently watching them. ‘Is there an inn nearby?’ The answer was nothing more than a vague wave of the hand. The man turned and walked off in sullen silence.
‘What wonderful hospitality,’ grumbled Keja, who had complained of the cold all day. ‘We’ll find this inn and discover it closed. Wait and see.’
He shivered and wrapped his arms around himself for the scant added warmth this provided. Giles shook his head. Anji ought to be the one suffering. The boy seemed to enjoy the novelty of the cold. But Keja? Giles pushed the small thief from his mind. If Keja wasn’t griping about something, then Giles would worry.
The sign hanging over the inn door needed repainting, but the quartet made out the name, The Bread and Water. A plain loaf of bread, no butter, and a tin cup only half full of water portrayed the words.
‘If this is someone’s idea of a joke,’ Keja said, ‘we might be better off in their gaol.’
No ostler ran out to help with the horses, and Anji and Keja were left to hold the reins while Giles and Petia went to see about rooms. They were aware of surly glances from heavily dressed men standing nearby, but amused themselves by whistling an old folk song in two-part harmony. ‘That ought to cheer the old place up,’ Keja said. ‘It certainly looks as if it needs it.’
The onlookers silently left, as if Keja and Anji’s tune offended them.
When Giles and Petia returned, Giles said, ‘The colour of our money seems good. We have rooms and a meal, but don’t expect much else. I’ve never seen anything like this.’ He took his horse’s reins from Anji’s hand. ‘The stable is around in back, and we take care of our own horses.’ Giles looked around the glum village, then added, ‘We set watches tonight.’ The others nodded, remembering all too well their problems at the last inn.
* * *
The meal had been edible, but not much more could be said for it except that it proved better than the mouldy bread and bitter cheese of the previous night. Giles and Keja ordered mulled wine after dinner. The wine was poor but tolerable because of the spice stick overpowering the taste.
Just as they settled down comfortably by the large fireplace, the inn door swung open and a guard officer entered. He ordered an ale from the inkeeper, then turned to survey the room. Keja watched his eyes light as he saw them. ‘Here it comes,’ he whispered to the others. He loosened his dagger in its sheath, waiting for the inevitable.
‘Let me tell our story,’ Giles whispered back.
The officer seemed content to leave them alone. But Giles had served in the military long enough to know the type. While Giles fought in the Trans War this overdressed upstart of an officer was probably hiding beneath a haystack, only coming out to boast of his noble exploits. The companions sat quietly, chatting, and ignored the officer.
When he swaggered over to their table, Keja finished telling the story he had begun and paid no attention to the man. Everyone chuckled at the end of the story, and Giles poured more wine into Keja’s cup. At last, settled again, he looked up as if he was noticing the man for the first time.
‘Good evening, sir. Would you care for a cup of our mulled wine?’
The officer leaned back against the neighbouring table, knowing full well that he had been purposely ignored. ‘Strangers here, aren’t you?’ Keja snorted in disgust at such an obvious question. Petia restrained him before he made a flip reply.
‘Just passing through,’ Giles answered mildly. ‘On our way north.’
‘North?’ The officer’s voice was tinged with sarcasm. ‘At this time of year? What would you be going north for?’
Keja leaned forward, but Giles spoke before a single sarcastic word left Keja’s mouth.
‘We’ve heard, on good authority, that a great deal of mineral wealth in the north country offers itself to the bold. We’re going exploring.’ He leaned back and took a sip of his wine. ‘Sure you won’t have some?’ he asked. The story was a poor one, but the officer might not care. He might be content with running them out of town in the morning, claiming to have done his duty. What worried Giles the most, the officer was entirely right when he mentioned that, with winter coming on, it was the worst time of the year for prospecting.
Keja spoke up now, but Giles thought that he would follow his lead.
‘Actually,’ Keja said, voice dropping low, ‘we’re looking for gold. A source we can’t name, a noted explorer from Bericlere, told us where we might find it in the northlands.’
Giles marvelled at Keja’s skill. He made the tall tale sound plausible. Giles had to admit that Keja performed his chosen profession well.
The officer turned his head enquiringly. ‘Where might that be?’
Keja leaned back and chuckled. ‘Now, you don’t really think we’d tell you, do you? We may look stupid, but we aren’t going to give away that kind of secret.’
The officer gestured at Petia and Anji. ‘Your wife and son?’
‘No,’ Keja said. ‘Although…’
Giles broke in. ‘Partners in our venture. ‘We’ve travelled a good bit together. This isn’t the first time that we’ve joined up.’
‘Trans, aren’t they?’ The man said it as if his mouth fulled with muck. ‘Why’d you pick up with Trans?’
Petia flushed. Her anger made the veins along her temple jump. She opened her mouth to answer, but Giles touched her knee under the table, signalling for her silence.
‘These two are good at prospecting. They have the knack of finding all that’s worth finding.’ He touched Petia with his knee again, pleading silently with her to hold her temper and let him and Keja do the talking. Giles decided to see if he could elicit some pity. ‘Petia’s husband was killed during the War.’
‘Your choice,’ the officer said, not bothering to hide his contempt. ‘We don’t like Trans much here. Don’t like strangers, either. I’m going to have to report your arrival to my superiors. Meanwhile, stay close to the inn. No telling what might happen if you get to wandering around the village.’
‘That’s no problem,’ Keja said. ‘We’re only staying the night. We’ll be on our way in the morning.’
‘You’ll need a pass to continue. Meanwhile,’ he said, ‘painfully drawing his seal on the bottom of a tattered sheet of paper, ‘here’s a temporary authorisation to be in Malor. Don’t go anywhere until you see me again – and don’t leave Malor.’ He laid the authorisation on the table. ‘See that you keep that with you and show it whenever you are asked by any of the uniformed soldiers.’
He swaggered to the door, made an obviously rude remark about the quartet to the men sitting nearby. He raised a loud of guffaw for his efforts. He winked at the innkeeper and left.
‘Nice people,’ Keja commented. ‘We haven’t even done anything and they hate us.’
‘Unusual, indeed,’ Giles murmured. ‘I wonder how they feel about each other. Are they ever happy? Well, drink up.’ He poured into Keja’s cup again. ‘Petia, would you like a small glass? It will make you sleep better.’
Giles frowned when he saw that she had turned sombre, melancholy written all over her face. Giles reached out and touched her hand. ‘Petia, what’s the matter? Don’t worry about that guardsman. They’re all alike, all wanting to make their power known.’
Petia raised her head. Twin tears ran down her face. ‘What you said to him was true. I did have a husband, and he was killed in the War. I never told you before. I thought I was over it. I… I’m not.’
‘I’m sorry. I would never have said that if I had the slightest notion it might be true. I was simply making up a story to satisfy that oaf. I truly am sorry.’
Petia dabbed at her eyes. ‘It’s all right, Giles. It seems like such a long time ago. Being indentured by my mother, escaping from Segrinn, being married, the war. Do things ever settle down? Is there ever any peace in life? When this is all over, I don’t think I want to see either of you ever again.’
Giles and Keja were stunned by Petia’s words. Unsure what to do or say, both turned back to their mulled wine. The silence between them became oppressive.
‘You can come up for air now,’ she said after staring into the dancing flames in the fireplace. ‘I apologise. I shouldn’t take out my feelings on you. It must be this place. I’m starting to be as inhospitable as the villagers.’
Keja stretched. ‘It’s not the friendliest place I’ve ever visited.’ He picked up the pass. ‘What a regimented country. I wonder if the locals are allowed to move around without a pass? Maybe they don’t want to. Can you imagine being stuck in one place all your life? Not me.’
‘The only reason,’ Giles said, ‘you’ve moved around so much is because someone is always after your thieving hide. You’d probably love to settle down in one place, but you won’t admit it.’
‘Not true, Giles. I could have stayed with l’Karm’s daughter. I thought about it.’
‘Except you thought about the gold key more,’ Giles said. ‘And ended up stealing it. Her father’s men are still after you for that. Face it, Keja, you’ll never settle down.’
Keja tried to work up a scowl, but his face broke into a crooked smile. ‘If I did, I wouldn’t pick Malor. Unfriendly people, tin soldiers, marching around, snide remarks about visitors, terrible ale, ugly women. I wonder what other problems we’ll have.’
‘Giles, I would like a small glass of your wine, after all.’
Giles gestured to the innkeeper. ‘A glass for the lady, please.’ He heard a snicker from the nearby table, but when he turned a cold eye in that direction, the men fell silent. They read danger – and death – in that unwavering look.
The innkeeper brought more wine and an extra glass. Giles gestured for him to sit and share a cup with them. The man nodded and fetched his own mug. When he had poured the wine, Petia continued. ‘Having to carry a pass is absurd.’
The innkeeper’s voice rang out deep and robust. ‘Everyone needs a pass here, even the people who live here.’ He pulled a brass sliver from his apron pocket and waved it.
‘What sort of place is this?’ Keja asked. ‘Not even the citizens are trusted.’
‘It’s getting so we don’t even trust each other, much less strangers. It wasn’t always like this.’ The man drained his mug and set it down with a loud, empty click.
Giles moved forward and refilled the innkeeper’s cup. ‘Tell us about it,’ he said.
‘We’re a good people, but lately there’s been a big change.’ Even this obvious statement caused the innkeeper to drain another mug. Giles obliged, refilling silently. ‘Simple folk, living here in the foothills of the mountains. We used to help each other out. Then the soldiers came. Said we couldn’t go anywhere without a damned pass. Threw people in gaol if they didn’t have one. Scared us good, they did.’
‘Aren’t they your own soldiers?’
The innkeeper paused and thought on this. ‘Guess we had soldiers of our own, once,’ he said. ‘But we never saw them, except once in a while when a troop would march through. We might have to billet them for a night. Never came back after the War, not a one of them. But now we’ve got a contingent of them here all the time, struttin’ around, askin’ to see our passes.’
‘Who’s your ruler?’ Keja asked.
‘Lord Onyx,’ the innkeeper said. ‘We’ve never seen him. He wasn’t the ruler before the Trans War, but now he is, it seems. Nobody knows how that happened, but we’ve got new laws. And the soldiers.’ He sighed. ‘Ain’t much we can do about it, but it grates on you after a while, the way people have to shut up and keep secretive all the time. People just ain’t the same as they used to be.’
‘We’re going north,’ Keja said. ‘Can we expect the same treatment all the way?’
‘I’d think it likely. We ain’t allowed to travel much, as you probably can tell. People is keepin’ things close to themselves. They’s bein’ especially careful around strangers. No, you ain’t got much welcome to look forward to. Not from the people or the land. You’re goin’ deep into the Adversaries and in the winter time, they ain’t very forgivin’.’
‘I thought we were already into the mountains,’ Giles said.
The innkeeper leaned forward and looked at Giles as if to see if he was making a joke. ‘You’re only in the foothills. If the weather would clear a little you could stand in the middle of the street and see the mountains up ahead of you. I wouldn’t care to be heading that way, not this time of year.’
‘The weather?’
‘Oh, that, too, I reckon. I was thinkin’ about the ice demons and the snow demons. We don’t see them much. They’ve only attacked a couple of times in the last five years. But that’s because Malor is so far away from their lairs. The closer you get to them mountains, the more likely you are to be attacked. The ice demons live in ice caves, so don’t go takin’ no shelter in them. The snow demons, well, I guess they build caves, too.’
‘You believe in spirits?’ Keja asked. He licked suddenly dry lips at the idea of meeting such things.
‘Oh, yes. You’d better, too. I could take you down to the end of the road near here and show you a log cabin with the sides ripped right out. You’d believe me then. Tell you what, son. You go on up to them mountains and keep them demons busy. Then they’ll leave us alone this winter.’ The innkeeper sighed and swallowed the last of his wine. ‘Don’t want to tell me what you’re going after, I suppose?’
Giles struck to the story he had told the guard officer. ‘Doing a little prospecting, looking for gold, mostly, but anything else we might find, silver, lead, iron.’
‘Bad time of year for doin’ that.’ The innkeeper gazed vaguely at a ceiling beam. ‘I don’t believe you for a minute, but you stick with your story.’ He winked at Petia, put his hand on Anji’s shoulder. ‘Back to work. Thank you for the wine and the talk.’ With that he wandered off to take care of the other guests.
The companions sat quietly, pondering what the innkeeper had said. Giles drew circles with the drops of wine which had spilled onto the table. Petia studied her fingers.
At last Keja broke the silence. ‘It doesn’t sound good, Giles. Ice and snow demons and the winter coming on.’
‘No.’ Giles’ statement was more of a long sigh than a response. ‘Maybe we ought to sleep on this.’ He rose and walked away, deep in thought over how far they had come, how close they were to success. The fifth and final key that opened the Gate of Paradise lay ahead. Could an old man with sparse years remaining pass up such a tasty morsel as Paradise?
The gods insisted that it wasn’t going to be an easy decision.
* * *
The innkeeper served them a big breakfast. Giles deciphered the man’s expression as a nostalgic remembrance of older times when people had been friendlier to strangers – and one another. A loaf of fresh brown bread, a platter of scrambled eggs and salted fish, and mugs of tea brewed from the leaves of a native bush were set before the four. Anji’s eyes sparkled as he dug in. The others ate stolidly, knowing that a decision must be reached whether to go on or to return to warmer climes. If they ventured deeper into the mountains, they’d be no turning back.
When they were finished, Keja moved the platters aside and folded his hands on the table. ‘Well, Giles?’
Before Giles could respond, the door opened and the guard officer of the evening before stalked into the room. Two soldiers accompanied him. Petia saw others outside. ‘Trouble,’ she whispered.
The officer strutted over to the table. ‘I see that you didn’t sneak off in the middle of the night,’ he said.
‘Why should we do that?’ Giles asked. ‘We’re simply travelling through.’
‘Your pass.’ He thrust out his hand for the scrap of paper. A frown came over his face as he stared at it. ‘This won’t do.’
‘I don’t understand. Are you revoking our pass through this country? What’s the reason?’
‘Place them under arrest!’ Those with the guardsman moved to obey. The officer smirked.
Giles and Keja sprang to their feet. ‘Why? What’s the reason?’
The two soldiers stopped, tugging at their swords. The officer held them back with a wave of his hand.
‘Be careful, you two. There are more soldiers in the street outside, if needed.’ He sneered openly.
‘We haven’t done anything!’ protested Keja.
‘This pass is invalid.’
‘But you gave it us!’ cried Petia, outraged.
‘I’m only following orders,’ he said, with obvious enthusiasm. ‘All with revoked or out-of-date passes are to be arrested.’
‘We don’t understand,’ Giles said patiently. ‘You’ve got to give us an explanation.’
‘I don’t have to give you anything,’ the officer snarled. ‘I have my orders and I carry them out. That is all you need to know. Now get your belongings.’
‘I’m sure there’s some mistake,’ Giles said. ‘I’d like to see your superior. Then we can straighten this out.’
The gleam in the man’s eyes told Giles that he’d get no more satisfaction from the higher ranks than he got from this lowly officer.
It took only a few minutes to gather their packs and reassemble downstairs. The innkeeper stood silently. He gave a minute shrug that told the four he was sorry for them. The officer gestured grandly and followed them into the bright sun.
