Santaraksita began to balk again. “I won’t —”
Kendo silenced him again.
“You’ll translate and you’ll work hard at it, Sri. Or we won’t feed you. We aren’t the bhadrhalok. We quit talking about it a long time ago. We’re doing it. It’s just your misfortune to get caught up in it.”
Sahra arrived. She was soaked. “It’s raining again. I see you landed your fish.” She collapsed into a chair, considered Surendranath Santaraksita. “I’m exhausted. My nerves were on edge all day. The Protector returned from the swamp at noon. She was in a totally foul mood. She had a huge argument with the Radisha, right in front of us.”
“The Radisha stood up to her?”
“She did. She’s reached her limit. Another Bhodi disciple came this morning but the Greys stopped him from burning himself. Then the Protector announced that she was going to take the night away from us by letting the shadows run loose from now on. That’s when the Radisha started screaming.”
Santaraksita looked so completely appalled by the implications of Sahra’s revelations that I had to laugh. “No,” he insisted. “It’s not funny.” Then we discovered that he was not really concerned about the shadows. “The Protector is going to clip my ears. At the very least. These books weren’t supposed to be in the library at all. I was supposed to have destroyed them ages ago, but I couldn’t do that to any book. Then I forgot about them. I should’ve locked them up somewhere.”
“Why?” Sahra snapped. She did not get an answer.
I asked her, “Did you make any headway?”
“I didn’t get a chance to pick up any pages. I did get into the Radisha’s suite. I did eavesdrop on her and Soulcatcher. And I did pick up a little other information.”
“For example?”
“For example, the Purohita and all the sacerdotal members of the Privy Council will be leaving the Palace tomorrow to attend a convocation of senior priests in preparation for this year’s Druga Pavi.”
The Druga Pavi is the biggest Gunni holiday of the Taglian year. Taglios, with all its numerous cults and countless minorities, boasted some holiday almost every day, but the Druga Pavi beggared all the rest.
“But that doesn’t come up until after the end of the rainy season.” I had a funny feeling about this.
“I got a premonition from it myself,” Sahra admitted.
“River, take the Master and copyist and make sure they’re as comfortable as we can make them here. Have Goblin provide them with chokers and make sure they understand how they work.” I asked Sahra, “Did you happen to hear about this before or after Soulcatcher got back from terrorizing the swamp?”
“After, of course.”
“Of course. She suspects something. Kendo. As soon as it’s light out tomorrow, I want you to head for the Kernmi What. See what you can find out about this meeting without giving away how interested you are. If you see a lot of Greys or other Shadar around, don’t bother. Just get back here with that word.”
“Suppose this’s a genuine opportunity?” Sahra asked.
“It’ll stay genuine as long as they’re outside the Palace. Won’t it?”
“Maybe it would be best to just kill them. Put some flash buttons on the corpses. That would make Soulcatcher really mad.”
“Wait. I’m having a thought. It might just be straight from al-Shiel.” I waved a finger in the air as though counting musical beats. “Yes. That’s it. We need to hope the Protector is trying to bait a trap with the Purohita.” I explained my thinking.
“That’s good,” Sahra said. “But if we’re going to make it work, you and Tobo will have to go inside with me.”
“And I can’t. There’s no way I can miss work the day after Master Santaraksita disappears. Get Murgen. See if he was around the Palace today. Find out if there’s a trap and where it’s at. If Soulcateher is going to be away, maybe you and Tobo can do it on your own.”
“I don’t want to belittle your genius, Sleepy, but this is something I’ve thought about a lot. Off and on for years. The possibility is partly why I keep trying to worm my way closer to the center of things. The truth is, it can’t be managed by fewer than three people. I need Shiki and I need Sawa.”
“Let me think.” Sahra got Murgen’s attention while I thought. Murgen seemed to be more alert and more interested in the outside world now, particularly where his wife and son were concerned. He must have begun to understand. “I’ve got it, Sahra! We can have Goblin be Sawa.”
“Ain’t no fucking way,” Goblin said. He repeated himself four or five times in as many languages, just in case somebody missed his point. “What the fuck is the matter with you, woman?”
“You’re as small as I am. We rub a little betel-nut juice on your face and hands, dress you up in my Sawa outfit, have Sahra sew your mouth shut so you can’t shoot it off every time the urge hits you, nobody will know the difference. As long as you keep looking down, which is what Sawa mostly does.”
“That may be a solution,” Sahra said, ignoring Goblin’s continued protests. “In fact, the more I think about it the better I like it. No disrespect meant but in a major pinch, Goblin would be a lot more useful than you would.”
“I know. There you go. And I could go ahead and be Dorabee Dey besides. Isn’t it wonderful?”
“Women,” Goblin grumbled. “Can’t live with them but they won’t go away.”
Sahra said, “You’d better start learning Sawa’s quirks from Sleepy.” To me she said, “There’ll be plenty of work for Sawa. I made sure. And Narita is eager to get her back. Tobo, you need to get some sleep. Nobody’s connected you with Gokhale but you’ll still need to be alert.”
“I really don’t like going up there, Mom.”
“You think I do? We all have —”
“Yes. I think you do. I think you keep going up there because you want the danger. I think it might be hard for you when you do have to stop taking risks. I think when that happens, we’re all going to have to watch you close so you don’t do something that might get us all killed along with you.”
That was a kid who had been doing a lot of thinking. Maybe with a little help from one or more uncles. Sounded to me like he might be riding knee to knee with the truth, too.
34
I settled into a chair outside the cage where Narayan Singh was being kept. He was awake but he ignored me. I said, “The Daughter of Night still lives.”
“I know that.”
“You do? How?”
“I’d know if you’d harmed her.”
“Then you need to know this. She isn’t going to stay unharmed a whole lot longer. The only reason she’s healthy now is that we want your cooperation. If we can’t get it, then there’s not much reason to keep on feeding her. Or you, either. Though I do intend to keep my word about taking care of you. Because I’d want you to see everything you value destroyed before you’re allowed to die yourself. Which reminds me. Aridatha couldn’t be with us tonight. His captain was concerned that there might be some unrest. Another Bhodi disciple planned to burn himself. So we’ll have to wait until tomorrow night.”
Narayan made a sound like a whispered moan. He did not want to have to acknowledge my existence, for existence, and mine in particular, was making him very unhappy. Which made me happy, though I had no personal grudge. My enmity was all very sanitary, very institutional, very much on behalf of my brothers who had been injured. And on behalf of my brothers who were imprisoned beneath the earth.
I suggested, “Maybe you should go to Kina for guidance.”
Such a look he gave me. Narayan Singh had no sense of humor and did not recognize sarcasm when it struck from the grass and sank its fangs in his ankle.
I told him, “Just to recap: I don’t have much patience left. I don’t have much time left. We’ve leaped onto the tiger’s back. The big catfight is coming.”
Catfight. Universal male slang for a squabble amongst women.
Oh, really?
It had just occurr
ed to me. We were all women in this fight. Sahra and I. The Radisha and Soulcatcher. Kina and the Daughter of Night. Uncle Doj was as close to a principal as any man was right now. And Narayan, though he was mainly the Daughter of Night’s shadow.
Strange. Strange.
“Narayan, when the fur starts flying, I won’t be much interested in looking out for your friend. But I’m definitely going to take care of you.”
I started to leave.
“I can’t do this thing.” Singh’s voice was almost inaudible.
“Work on it, Narayan. If you love the girl. If you don’t want your goddess to have to start all over from scratch.” I thought I had that much power. By killing the right people, I could lay Kina down to sleep for another age. And I would if I could not get my own brothers out of the ground.
I found Banh Do Trang awaiting me in the little corner where I worked and slept. He did not look well, which was not surprising. He was not too many years younger than Goblin and did not have Goblin’s wondrous resources. “Can I be of any service, Uncle?”
“I understand Doj told you the story of our people.” The best he could manage was a hoarse whisper.
“He told me a story. There’re always doubts left behind when any Nyueng Bao shares a secret with me.”
“Hen. Heh-heh. You’re a bright young woman, Sleepy. Few illusions and no obvious obsessions. I think Doj was as honest with you as he could compel himself to be. Assuming he was honest with me when he consulted me afterward. He finally heard me when I told him that this’s a new age. That that was what Hong Tray wanted to show us when she chose the jengal to become Sahra’s husband. We’re all lost children. We must join hands. That, too, is what Hong Tray wanted us to understand.”
“She could’ve said so.”
“She was Hong Tray. A seeress. A Nyueng Bao seeress. Would you have her issue blunt rescripts like the Radisha and Protector?”
“Absolutely.”
Do Trang chuckled. Then he seemed to fall asleep.
Was that that? I wondered. “Uncle?”
“Uh? Oh? I’m sorry, young woman. Listen. I don’t think anyone else has mentioned it. Maybe no one else but Gota and I have seen it. But there’s a ghost in this place. We’ve seen it several times the past two nights.”
“A ghost?” Was Murgen getting so strong people were starting to see him?
“It’s a cold and evil thing, Sleepy. Like something that’s happiest skulking around the mouths of graves or slithering through a mountain of bones. Like that vampire child in the tiger cage. You should be very wary of her. And I think I should find my way to bed. Before I fall asleep here and your friends begin to talk.”
“If they’re going to gossip about me, I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have them connect me with.”
“Someday when I’m young again. Next time around the Wheel.”
“Good night, Uncle.”
I thought I might read for a while but I fell asleep almost instantly. Sometime during the night I discovered that Do Trang’s ghost did exist. I awakened, instantly alert, and saw a vaguely human shimmer standing nearby, evidently watching me. The old man had done a good job describing it, too. I wondered if it might not be Death Himself.
It went away as soon as it sensed my scrutiny.
I lay there trying to put it together. Murgen? Soulcatcher spying? An unknown? Or what it felt like, the girl in the tiger cage out for an ectoplasmic stroll?
I tried reason but was still too tired to stick with it long.
35
There was something wrong with the city. In addition to its extraordinarily clean smell. The rain had continued throughout most of the night. And in addition to the stunned looks on the faces of street-dwellers, who had survived their worst night yet. No. It was a sort of bated-breath feeling that got stronger as I approached the library. Maybe it was some sort of psychic phenomenon.
I stopped. The Captain used to say you had to trust your instincts. If it felt like something was wrong, then I should take time to figure out why I felt that way. I turned slowly.
No street poor here. But that was understandable. There were dead people around here. The survivors would be clinging to whatever shelter they could find, afraid the Greys would replace the shadows by day. But the Greys were absent, too. And traffic was lighter than it should be. And most of the tiny one-man stalls that sprawled out into the thoroughfare were not in evidence.
There was fear in the air. People expected something to happen. They had seen something that troubled them deeply. What that might be was not obvious, though. When I asked one of the merchants who was bold enough to be out, he ignored my question completely and tried to convince me that there was no way I could manage another day without a hammered-brass censer.
In a moment I decided he might be right. I paused to speak to another brass merchant whose space lay within eyeshot of the library. “Where is everyone this morning?” I asked, examining a long-spouted teapot sort of thing with no real utility.
A furtive shift of the merchant’s eyes toward the library suggested there was substance to my premonitions. And whatever had spooked him had taken place quite recently.
No Taglian neighborhood remains quiet and empty for long.
I seldom carry money but did have a few coins on me this morning. I bought the useless teapot. “A gift for my wife. For finally producing a son.”
“You’re not from around here, are you?” the brass smith asked.
“No. I’m from... Dejagore.”
The man nodded to himself, as if that explained everything. When I started to move on, he murmured, “You don’t want to go that way, Dejagoran.”
“Ah?”
“Be in no hurry. Find a long way around that place.”
I squinted at the library. I saw nothing unusual. The grounds appeared completely normal, though some men were working on the garden. “Ah.” I continued forward only till I could slide into the mouth of an alley.
Why were there gardeners there? Only the Master Librarian ever brought them in.
I caught glimpses of something wheeling above the library. It drifted down to settle on the ironwork of the gate, above Adoo’s head. I took it for a lone pigeon at first but when it folded its wings, I saw that it was a white crow. And a crow with a sharper eye than Adoo had. But Adoo was accustomed to posting himself in the gateway.
That constituted another warning sign.
The white crow looked right at me. And winked. Or maybe just blinked, but I preferred the implication of intelligence and conspiratorial camaraderie.
The crow dropped onto Adoo’s shoulder. The startled gateman nearly jumped out of his sandals. The bird evidently said something. Adoo jumped again and tried to catch it. After he failed, he ran into the library. Moments later Shadar disguised as librarians and copyists rushed out and began trying to bring the crow down with stones. The bird got the heck out of there.
I followed its example, heading in another direction. I was more alert than I had been in years. What was going on? Why were they there? Obviously they were lying in wait. For me? Who else? But why? What had I done to give myself away?
Maybe nothing. Though failing to show up to be questioned would count as damning evidence. But I was not lunatic enough to try to bluff my way through whatever it was the Greys were trying to do.
The milk was spilt. No going back. But I did want to mourn the one volume of ancient Annals I had not yet been able to locate and pilfer.
All the way home I tried to reason out what had brought out the Greys. Surendranath Santaraksita had not been missing long enough to cause any official interest. In fact, some mornings the Master Librarian did not arrive until much later than this. I gave it up before I threw my brain out of joint. Murgen could go poking around down there. He could find the answer by eavesdropping.
36
Murgen was busy eavesdropping even though it was daytime. He was worried about Sahra and Tobo. And maybe even a little about Goblin. I found O
ne-Eye, hung over but attentive, at the table where the mist engine resided. Mother Gota and Uncle Doj were there as well, tense and attentive themselves. Which told me that Sahra was determined to go ahead with our most daring stroke yet. To my amazement, One-Eye hustled over — in reality, a slow shuffle — and patted me on my back. “We heard you were coming in, Little Girl. We were scared shitless they were going to get you.”
“What?”
“Murgen warned us there was a trap. He heard some of the Grey bosses talking about it when he was scouting to see what Sahra was headed into. The old bitch Soulcatcher herself was out there waiting for you. Well, not exactly you personally, just somebody who goes around stealing books that aren’t supposed to be there in the first place.”
“You’ve lost me good, old man. Start someplace where I can see a couple of landmarks.”
“Somebody followed you and your boyfriend yesterday. Somebody more suspicious of him than of you. Evidently a part-time spy for the Protector.”
We knew there were informants out there getting paid piecework rates. We tried not to be vulnerable to them.
“Also evidently with a boner for your boyfriend.”
“One-Eye!”
“All right. For your boss. More or less literally. He went and told the Greys that this dirty old man was about to force perversions on one of the youths who worked for him. A few Greys went to the library and started poking around and asking questions and quickly discovered that some funds had gone missing, and Santaraksita as well, when they started dragging people out of bed and pulling them in. Then they discovered several books missing also, including some great rarities and even a couple that were supposed to have been removed from the library years ago but had not been. That got back to Catcher. She got her sweet little behind down there in about ten seconds and started threatening to eat people alive and hurting anybody whose looks she didn’t like.”