Street Magic

  It was Briar’s turn to nod. “I had the two X’s on my hands, so they gave me the docks. Scraping barnacles until it killed me. But this Bag was there —”

  “Bag?” she asked, confused. In Chammuri the term had no special meaning.

  “Money-Bag. Takamer. Leastways, I thought he was a takamer, he dressed so nice. Niko, he was. He took me. The magistrate had orders to give him anybody he wanted. And Niko brought me to Winding Circle in Emelan.”

  “Where’s that?” Evvy wanted to know.

  Talking was thirsty work, so Briar got them each an apple. As Evvy bit into hers he could see she was missing teeth. He hoped Jebilu would help her keep from losing the rest. “It’s northwest of here, on the Pebbled Sea. That’s where I moved in with Rosethorn, and her friend Lark.” He went on to tell her of the three girls who had also come to live there. Together he and the girls had learned that their powers were so well hidden, so much a part of the natural world, that even Tris, whose magic was the showiest of all, had been passed over by other mages.

  Evvy was giggling over his tale of the last of Tris’s animal rescue efforts, trying to teach a young crow to fly without ever having flown herself, as they reached the house. Rosethorn was up on the roof, carefully urging the beans, corn, and clover plants into another growth cycle. Of all the gardeners in the lands around the Pebbled Sea, Rosethorn was the most successful with these new crops, discovered in the unknown lands on the far side of the Endless Ocean. Briar and Evvy climbed up to join her.

  “How were the farms today?” Briar asked, sitting on his heels beside Rosethorn. Evvy perched on the bench.

  “The same as the rest.” Rosethorn ran a hand through the sack of corn seed she had already coaxed out of the plants. “This land is so tired. They’ve farmed it for twelve centuries. The farmers do their best to reduce the acid that builds up with too much irrigation, but some have been poor for generations and can’t afford what’s needed to turn the land around.” A single tear oozed out of the corner of each eye. She rubbed it away impatiently. “It disheartens me, to handle dirt that’s so tired.”

  “But these will help,” Briar reminded her. “You said the beans and the clover will build up the soil.” Get in here, Briar urged some of the nearby plants. She needs you. To himself he added, And she’ll growl if I do anything obvious like move plants closer to her.

  The plants stretched until they could rest against her. Briar had seen her worse off, but he still liked to ensure that when she was empty of power and hope, her green strength was restored quickly. After her death and revival three years ago, just the thought that she might be weary, or failing, jabbed him into action.

  He glanced at Evvy: the girl stared at Rosethorn, mouth agape. Chances were that she’d never seen that much greenery on the move before, between the plants who comforted and the plants Rosethorn tended as they went from shoots to flowering growth under her hands. Of course, how many ever watched to see if plants moved? To most people they weren’t alive; they were things, without needs or instincts of their own. Even when humans knew that one plant, set in the wrong patch of earth, would die, or that another would take over, forcing every other plant out, they still refused to accept that plants were living creatures.

  After a while, just as Briar was starting to think of a nap, Rosethorn asked, “How did your talk with Stoneslicer go?”

  Briar sighed. “We had to change our plans.” He told Rosethorn about the day’s work, keeping the story short. She didn’t care how different people talked or behaved. Only the girls and Lark enjoyed that part of stories.

  When he finished, Rosethorn sat down on the roof carefully, ordering the plants back to their proper places. When they let go of her she turned so she could look at Evvy. “So you won’t visit the palace, eh?” she asked. She spoke more slowly than she did to Briar. Some people found her speech, with its hint of a slur, hard to follow. “I can’t say that I blame you. Palaces are cold and unfriendly, as a whole.” Evvy nodded vigorously. Rosethorn looked at Briar. “Well, you’d better ride up there and talk to him. If she’s already experimenting, we can’t get her a teacher quickly enough.” She looked at the western sky. “It’s too late now. That’s for tomorrow, then, first thing. And when are you supposed to sell trees in Golden House?”

  Briar grimaced. “Day after tomorrow. And I have work to do yet. That one fig tree keeps arguing with me.”

  “Well, go argue back,” Rosethorn ordered him with a smile. “You’re welcome to stay for supper,” she told Evvy.

  The girl shook her head. “I have cats,” she explained.

  Rosethorn smiled. “And they must be fed. But you’ll come here tomorrow — around noon, perhaps? We’ll know when you can meet with your teacher by then.”

  Evvy nodded rapidly, making Briar wonder if she would come back. He hoped that she would, after today, but he could tell she wasn’t resigned to an unknown teacher. If she didn’t come, he would simply have to collect her from her warren in Princes’ Heights.

  The girl started to climb over the wall, then she stopped, and turned back. “I better get my old things,” she told Briar, smoothing a wrinkle from her tunic. “If I go back to Lambing Tunnel like this, they’ll think I have money.”

  “Should have thought of that myself,” said Briar, leading the way into the house. Rosethorn had folded Evvy’s grayish tunic and trousers and placed them on a stool in the workroom, under a note on a slate: Shake out fleabane before wearing. Briar diplomatically lifted first the tunic and then the trousers, stirring the folds until the herbs dropped to the floor. He left Evvy there to change. When he returned she was gone, her new clothes folded almost neatly and left on the stool. Her sandals lay on top of the pile.

  Kid’s got pluck, Briar thought, remembering how he’d hated wearing any kind of shoe at first. Not one complaint out of her, and I bet they rubbed her feet.

  He went up to the roof. “She left,” Rosethorn said absently as she trimmed the lively jasmine back. “Over the roofs.” Eyeing the jasmine to make sure she’d cut all she needed to, the woman said, “I’d forgotten.”

  When she didn’t continue, Briar nudged, “Forgotten what?”

  “Hm?” Rosethorn asked, startled out of her reverie. “Oh, I’d forgotten what stone mages are like. Stubborn doesn’t begin to describe them. I should have warned you.”

  Briar smiled thinly. “That’s all right,” he told her. “I found out myself already.”

  Rosethorn snorted. “I suppose you did.”

  Evvy trotted along the rooftop roads, bound for home. From top to toe she was trembling from the strangeness of it all. It had been such a treat to sit in hot water at the hammam twice that day, scrubbing until she glowed a golden peach color, feeling her hair really clean. If she had just used common sense and gone home after that … But she’d had to see what the jade-eyed —

  Briar, whispered a part of herself. He has a name. A plant-name. Calling him something else is silly.

  Of course she knew people with names: Sulya, old Qinling, who spoke the language of home, blind Ladu, who warned the street people when the slaving gangs came through. But names seemed more important with — Briar, and Rosethorn. As if the words could change her life.

  I don’t want my life changed, Evvy thought rebelliously as she crossed a bridge over the Street of Wrens. For a moment she stopped to look down at the passageway that led to the Camelgut den. She would have liked to know how they did, if they had gone ahead and joined the Vipers. She had the feeling that Pahan Briar had disliked their choice, but she applauded their common sense. You didn’t survive in Chammur’s slums unless you learned to bend before you broke. Strange that a plant wizard wouldn’t know that. But that was plants, tricky, rock-cracking parasites that would break apart any stone they got their roots into. They never seemed to realize that sometimes quiet was better. As long as you were alive, fresh chances to fight would come.

  Seeing no signs of Camelguts or Vipers, Evvy moved on. She felt unsettle
d now, even with the city’s heights rising ahead, lit a flaming color by the late-afternoon sun. Always before the sight of those towering stone reefs calmed her, made her feel safe: it was why she had come here after running from her master. Let others complain of smells and crumbling walls and ceilings in warrens that had been inhabited for a thousand years. Inside those rock halls and corridors Evvy was safe.

  But now she knew why she’d always been safe, and the knowing shook her. She really had magic, and could learn how to make stone like her even more. That couldn’t be bad. Stone, unlike people, was constant. It was everywhere, in all its varieties. Who knew what she might be able to do with it, if she knew proper stone magic?

  The only problem was that to learn more about stone, she would have to deal with more people on a steady basis than she had in years. Pahan Briar seemed all right, for a plant person, but he wasn’t going to teach her. A stranger, one who lived in the palace, would teach her. Evvy wasn’t sure that she liked that. What if a real stone mage scorned her for what she didn’t know? Pahan Briar just told her what to do, and if she didn’t know how, he showed her. He assumed she would keep up. And hadn’t she done just that all day? Even when keeping up had meant such strange things, like heating stones, new clothes, and food. She wasn’t sure that she liked the sandals, which had blistered the tops of her feet, but the clean cloth had felt so good against her skin, and the food in her belly felt even better.

  She pulled her rolled-up headcloth from the front of her tunic, and checked its contents — an entire meat dumpling, and halves of others. She hadn’t been able to finish all the food he’d bought. With the salt fish and the leftovers from yesterday’s feast, she and the cats would eat well tonight.

  Would this stranger mage feed her as Pahan Briar did? Pahan Briar had been a thukdak. He understood about meals. How would a palace man know anything about going hungry and eating scraps until a whole dumpling was a feast?

  She clambered down and trotted through the Market of the Lost. Her thoughts absorbed her so much that she never realized a Viper was following her, keeping well back in case she chanced to turn and look around.

  7

  Briar gathered his horse’s reins. “You’ll be careful how you talk to her, if she comes before I get back?” he asked Rosethorn, worried. “You know you scare people.”

  “I won’t scare her,” Rosethorn told him. “I’ll be as kind as her own mother.”

  “Don’t do that,” Briar said. “Her mother sold her.” He clucked to the horse and set it forward, up the Street of Hares. Perhaps he shouldn’t worry if Evvy would arrive before he returned, but whether she would come at all. If she didn’t, he would have to root her out of those stone tunnels, a chore he didn’t even want to think about. He would just hope that she would come for the free food.

  His route took him through the Market of the Lost. Only a few stalls were open so early, but the signs of illegal business were everywhere. Lookouts whistled alarms when the Watch was in view; there were furtive glances and even more furtive pocketings of goods, and the few customers included the well-to-do in addition to the poor. He’d have loved to look around, but common sense stopped him. Dressed as he was, riding a good mount, he would only draw robbers and thieves. That they might get more than they realized would do Briar little good if the whole neighborhood decided to pluck him.

  Instead he followed Triumph Road south, watching the stony heights on his left. They were the real Chammur, its twelve-hundred-year-old heart. So much age should have impressed Briar. Instead it made his skin creep. The city breathed exhaustion from its pores. The stone was tired; Rosethorn had said the land was tired. How long did tired places endure? On the day they had toured the city, just after their arrival, Rosethorn had commented that one good earthquake would finish the place. The Earth Dedicate who was their guide had gone dead white, and begged her not to repeat it.

  Shaking his head, Briar nudged his horse into a trot. The sooner he returned to the Street of Hares, the better he would feel.

  His ride up Palace Road to the amir’s citadel was long and expensive. Each time he was stopped by a guard Briar surrendered a silver cham — a coin equal to five silver davs — as a bribe, so he’d be allowed to pass. His purse was much reduced by the time he reached his destination and a servant guided him to Jebilu Stoneslicer’s waiting room.

  Once the servant retreated, Briar looked his clothes over. He was the picture of a prosperous young man of the middle classes in a fresh cream-colored shirt and dark green baggy trousers. He’d worn his favorite overrobe again. He was glad he was dressed as well, if not better, than many nobles his age, because his surroundings breathed wealth and prestige. Stoneslicer’s marble walls were carved in lacy designs and inlaid with stone flowers; silk rugs in complex patterns warmed the cold marble floor. An assortment of braziers took the edge off the morning chill. Briar welcomed their warmth: autumn was settling around the city at last, and his silk overrobe wasn’t as warm as a coat.

  He did note with displeasure the scent of sandalwood that rose from the braziers. Why burn a tree just to impress those who knew how costly the stuff was?

  He knew the wealthy often burned sandalwood, to show their riches and power. He’d certainly encountered such customs often enough. It just seemed as if a mage ought to be more sensible and less wasteful.

  Another servant arrived with a heavy brasswork tray. He set its contents — teapot, cups, a plate of pastries, and a bowl of fruit — on the low table. He filled the cups, then bowed out, walking backward. Briar scowled. He didn’t like that kind of bowing and scraping, and wondered why the servant had used it on a mere pahan. He had his answer as a carved sandalwood door at the back of the room opened. Jebilu Stoneslicer came in, motioning for the servant to close the front door behind him.

  The stone mage was fat. He did not walk as much as he waddled in a billow of gold satin robes and musky scent. His skin was sallow, more yellow than brown. If he’d seen this man in an infirmary, Briar would have found medicines to treat ailments of the liver and kidneys.

  Jebilu’s head looked like an egg atop his body, an egg with straggly long black hair glued to its back half. A hump on his long nose testified to a break long ago; his chin was a round bulge jutting from the bottom of the egg. His brown eyes, tucked in folds of fat, were quick and clever, his smile serene. If he had eyebrows Briar couldn’t see them. Dark circles spread under his eyes, another mark of poor health.

  “Forgive me,” the older mage said in a high, boyish voice. “I was told a pahan was here to see me….”

  “I’m the pahan,” Briar said, bowing to Jebilu. “Briar Moss, from Winding Circle temple in Emelan.”

  Jebilu clasped his hands before him, regarding Briar silently for a moment. At last he said, “Moss is not a proper mage name, and you are but a boy.”

  Briar listed varieties of wort plants in his head until his temper cooled. Evvy needs this bouncing ball, he told himself, and replied evenly, “I am fourteen. I picked the name ‘Moss’ for myself and see no reason to change it, and the Initiate Council of Winding Circle has vouched for me.”

  He reached into his shirt and pulled a medallion over his neck. Keeping a grip on its silk cord, he held it out to Jebilu. The mage inspected it, touching it with a stubby finger to see the other side.

  Briar and the girls had gotten the medallions nearly eighteen months before. All four of their teachers — Daja’s master Frostpine, Tris’s teacher Niko, Sandry’s teacher Lark, and Rosethorn — had come to supper one night, as had Tris’s and Briar’s sometime-teacher Dedicate Crane. Afterward Frostpine had presented each of the young people with a silvery metal circle. The front of each was different: the name of the individual student and his or her main teacher was inscribed on the outer edges. At the center was an image of their magic — Briar’s was a tree. On the back was the spiral symbol for Winding Circle, to indicate where they had studied.

  The four were ordered never to show the pendants needlessly
or even to wear them outside their clothes unless it were vital. These were mage-credentials, proof that the Initiate Council at Winding Circle had approved them to practice as adult mages.

  For the most part they forgot they had them; the medallions seemed made not to be noticed by even the wearer. In the months since they had begun their journey east, Rosethorn had ordered Briar to show it to four mages, all of whom had argued about revealing how they worked to a student. The medallion had silenced them. Briar suspected they said more than just that the bearer was qualified as an adult mage, but Rosethorn refused to answer his questions.

  Whatever the message of the medallion was, it did not impress Jebilu. He wrinkled his nose, as if he’d smelled something bad. “The standards for credentials are lower than they were when I was a student,” he remarked. “What have you done to your hands?”

  Briar turned scarlet. “I tried to tattoo myself using vegetable dyes.” He put his medallion back on, tucked it into his shirt, and stuffed his vine-patterned hands into the pockets of his overrobe. “Actually, I didn’t come to talk about me.”

  “Indeed?” Jebilu lowered himself onto a couch by the low table, and motioned for Briar to take a chair. The man spread a napkin on his lap, then took a pastry and a cup of tea. “Surely a stone mage can do very little for a green mage.” He broke a tiny piece from his pastry and nibbled it carefully, allowing not a crumb to drop onto his gold satin tunic.

  “Lucky for me that I’m here about a stone mage, then, isn’t it?” Briar sipped his cup of tea, battling to get a grip on his dislike for this man. That wouldn’t help Evvy or him. “I found this girl polishing stones in Golden House. She has magic with them. I could see it lighting up in the stones she handled, and they kept the power even after she put the stone down. Since I told her, she’s been able to get rocks to hold light and heat.”

  Jebilu broke another fragment from his pastry and ate that busily. A crumb dropped onto his chest: he removed it carefully and inspected the cloth where it had fallen, turning it this way and that to see if the crumb had left a spot. Only when he was satisfied that his garments were still clean did he ask, “This concerns me how, Pahan Moss?”