Troubled Waters

  He tied the scarf under her chin, making sure both ears were covered. "Now you do. Promise?"

  She nodded, then unexpectedly threw her arms around his neck and hugged and kissed him, messily. He hugged her back, and she squirmed out of his grasp to go crouch at Del's feet. He knew he was still blushing a little, but was feeling better than he had all day, kind of warm inside. She was a little sweetie—a lot nicer than the last one, who'd kicked him. He got gingerly to his knees, and edged carefully back from the pitching boat onto solid land, tucking his chilled hands under his arms as soon as he got there.

  Del cleared his throat, and Raj knew what was coming next.

  "Dammit, Del, I've said I won't take anything about a million times—and I damn sure won't take anything this time, either! You folks haven't any more to spare than I do, and I haven't done a damn thing this kid's Papa couldn't have done if he knew how!"

  "But 'e didn't, did 'e—"

  "So you tell him, and he will." Raj set his chin stubbornly. "And don't you go bleating "karma" at me, either. I don't believe in karma. I refuse to believe God goes around toting up marks against people's souls like some cosmic accountant."

  "That's as may be—" Del replied, just as stubbornly, "—but this baby's Papa does believe."

  "Oh, Hell—" Raj sighed, pulled the rope loose, and stood up, holding it in both hands, braced against the tug of the sluggish current and the icy wind on the skip. Karma. Hell. The very idea revolted him, and he damn sure didn't understand the way it was supposed to work. But he had to have some way to get Del off his back, some way to make these people figure everything was evened up. If he couldn't think of something, Del would stop bringing the kids to him—Lord, then he'd lie awake all night between worrying about Marina and worrying about the sick kids— Think, dammit.

  Finally— "All right, I tell you what. If you people are so all-fired worried about karma, here's what you do. When there's a pennybit to spare, have the people I've helped put it in some kind of common pot against the day when I can't help one of these kids, and they need a real doctor. I s'pose you might as well hold the pot, Del, since you're always the one bringing 'em here. If they do that, I figure we're clear. Suits?" That should solve two problems—theirs, and his.

  Del's face still looked stormy, but he must have reckoned that was the only concession he was going to get out of Raj. "Yey," he agreed, after a long moment of stubborn silence.

  He signaled to Raj to toss back the tie, and poled back out into the current.

  Raj headed back along the walkway, resuming his interrupted journey. His leather-soled socks made no sound on the damp wood as he kept to a warming trot; no bare feet in this weather, not for him or Denny; Mondragon had just about had a cat when he caught them without foot-coverings. Another undeserved kindness.

  Sounds were few above the wind; the occasional murmur of voices from above, slap of waves on boat and building, the ever-present creaking of wood, canalers calling out to each other down on the water. Cold, God it was cold. Weather for sickness, that's for certain; in the swamp, down on the canals, weather for dying, too.

  Funny, this business with Del Suleiman; it had started when he'd caught Tommy with a cut hand going septic, and forced him to let Raj clean it out. Then Tommy had brought him a kid with a bad case of the Crud. Then Del had gotten into the act. Always kids, though, never adults. Six, maybe eight of them so far.

  Raj couldn't resist a sick kid—not even when they kicked or bit him.

  Soft heart to match my soft head.

  No matter. Raj knew damned well he could no more see a kid in pain and walk on without doing something about it then he could stop breathing.

  Well, one thing, no matter how badly he'd messed things up with Tom, there were a half-dozen canaler babies he'd made a bit healthier.

  He made Kass in good time; he'd have at least an hour with Justice before he had to head back. He was glad to get there; the overcast had given birth to flurries, and his nose felt numb.

  If Justice was there—

  Hilda's tavern was the likeliest spot to find him; Raj poked his head into the door and got hit in the face with the light and the noise. It was almost as bad as a physical blow after the chill gray of canalside. It took him a moment to adjust to it.

  But when he finally did, he breathed a prayer of thanks to the Angel and St. Murfy—for at a table in the rear, book propped up in front of him and huge gold cat spread out like a rug on his lap, was a tall, thin, dark-haired young man wearing a College sash.

  "—so that's the whole mess," Raj concluded miserably.

  He slumped in his hard wooden chair, staring at his own clenched hands, surrounded by the clutter of artwork, books, and other paraphernalia of an art student's life that filled Justice Lee's tiny room. The lanky student across from him lounged on his unmade bed, chewing his lip thoughtfully. Raj had laid out the whole story—saving only Mondragon's identity, and what he was involved with. Justice already knew that Mondragon was a man with enemies—a lot of enemies. That was enough for him to add into his calculations, without him knowing enough for the information to be a danger to him.

  At least Justice hadn't laughed at him.

  "You've got yourself a problem, all right," Justice said, finally, putting his hands behind his head and staring at the ceiling. "A bad one. The Kamats are rising in influence; rising fast, from what I hear. They're moving into the Rimmon Isle circles. From the little I know, Marina Kamat would be a very bad enemy for your friend to have. And if you go through with this charade, she'll find out eventually; when she does, she'll want his hide as much as yours."

  "I figured," Raj replied dismally.

  "You weren't planning on trying to carry it off, were you?"

  "For about five minutes, maybe," Raj admitted. "After that—dammit, Justice, it isn't right, that's all I can say. It isn't fair, even if I could make it work."

  Justice smiled; a kindly smile. Like maybe he gave Raj a couple of marks for honesty. "How much of your hide are you willing to part with?"

  The lump rose in Raj's throat, nearly choking off his words. "All of it," he said at last. "She's gonna hate me forever, no matter what happens. If there's a way to keep T—my friend out of it, I'll take it, and take my lumps."

  "You got some place you could go to get out of sight for a couple of weeks? Long enough to let things cool down?"

  Raj thought, as best he could. Not Mondragon's place, where they'd been staying. Not the apartment on Fife that he and Denny shared; that would be the first place a searcher would look. Rat and Rif?

  They'd take him in—no doubt of it. But Rif was a Janist agent and a thief on top of that—Denny'd confirmed that, all of it. The two singers had been Denny's protectors and mentors in his early days on his own, Rat more than Rif, but he knew most of what there was to know about both of them. Rif had been "courting" Raj ever since she'd found out he wanted to be a doctor, dangling a secret Jane-run doctor school in front of him, like turbis-worms in front of a mud-pup. He was mightily afraid that his resolution not to get involved with any more fanatics would crumble under the slightest pressure at this point. It would be such a logical move; cut ties to Tom, get under the protection of somebody else, drop out of sight—and get his dream into the bargain. So easy—no, he wouldn't even think about it. "Easy" usually had strings attached that wouldn't show up until later. And what if the Janes used him to get at Tom or Denny—or Jones and her canalers? The swamp?

  He gave that one a second thought, and then a third. Maybe not such a bad notion. He could move his hidey into old Ralf's territory, it would be open with Ralf dead under Raj's knife. There was a fair amount of food-weeds there, and some good fishing spots. It was cold, sure; but he could take blankets and medicine out with him, he could tough it out for two weeks or so. Maybe getting back to the basics of surviving would clear his head out.

  "I think maybe I got a place," he answered Justice slowly. "Why?"

  "I think if I were you, this is what
I'd do—and first thing is, you aren't going to tell anybody anything; you're going to write to them—"

  It was almost dawn; Denny was so dead asleep he didn't even stir when Raj slipped out of bed. Raj hadn't slept more than a few minutes all night, lying there in the bed with every muscle so tight with nerves it was ready to cramp. He dressed quickly in the dark, putting on every bit of clothing he had here; not daring to light a lamp lest he wake Denny. His pack was back at Fife, already made up with the clothing he'd left there and the blankets from his bed. There were other things there, too; things he'd bought—a spare knife, a firestarter, fishhooks and line and lures. He'd been afraid to bring the pack here, or pack up any of the clothes he kept here, lest somebody catch him at it and try to stop him.

  The swamp had been a real good notion, except that he hadn't any money to buy the gear he needed to survive. In the end he'd had to get back to their apartment on Fife and retrieve his precious books and sell them. He'd spent all the money he had saved on trade-goods to swap with old May for the medicine to keep Tom alive, and the books were all he had left in the way of portable wealth. It had damn near broken his heart all over again to part with them. But this was his only choice; he couldn't live for weeks out there without supplies and cold-weather gear, not in winter, and not when he knew Raver and May would have stripped his hidey of everything useful once they were certain he wasn't likely to be coming back to the swamp.

  And maybe he'd have to stay out there for longer than a couple of weeks. The more he'd thought about it last night, the more logical that seemed. He'd just about talked himself into staying out there—unless his plan worked; the other plan he'd had, lying in the dark last night—

  Now he crept to the bathroom, one careful, hushed step at a time. He had to get into Mondragon's medicine-chest for the last of what he needed.

  He hated to steal, but there wasn't any blueangel left at any price down canalside, even if he'd had the money for it, and Mondragon had enough to cure a dozen fevers—or kill four men. Raj was glad there was a night-lamp left burning in here, else he'd probably have broken something and roused the whole house. The blueangel was right out in front, all the papers of it in a neat little row on the first shelf. Raj took about half of it; neither Mondragon nor Jones was likely to need it, and Raj might well before the winter was over. Blueangel was the only chance you had if you caught Hakim's fever. He stuffed the packets in his pocket, and stole out.

  Now he crept quietly into the kitchen; ran his hands along the shelf until he found old bread and a bit of cheese by feel, then found the round, hard bulk of the tea-canister the same way. First thing Mondragon did when he wandered downstairs in the morning was to make tea, so that was where Raj's letter to him would go.

  Dear Tom; I am a Bigger Fool than you ever thought I was. I've gone and got Both of us in Trouble, it began, and went on from there. It had been torture to write, and Raj wasn't entirely clear on what he'd put down. He'd fought down the ache in his gut and the swelling in his throat all through writing it, so it wasn't exactly a miracle of coherency. But it did lay out the whole sordid story, and finished by telling Tom not to go looking for him. He rather doubted Tom would want to waste time looking for such a fool as he was, but—better assure him that Raj was going to be hidden where nobody was likely to be able to find him.

  Jones' letter was a lot shorter by about three pages; that was going to her mail-drop at Moghi's.

  He wasn't going to leave a letter for Denny—Denny wouldn't have been able to read it. Although it caused him a physical pain as sharp as Ralf's knife to do so, he left a copy of Marina's letter folded up inside Tom's in the tea-canister, so Tom would be able to see for himself how Marina had woven a fantasy around him.

  His throat and stomach were hurting again, but he forced the bread and cheese down. He wouldn't be getting any more of that in the swamp. He didn't dare take any food with him—no swampy stored food on his raft. To do so was to invite a very unpleasant death— being nibbled to death by a feeding-frenzy of skits. Anything he ate—not that food was real attractive at the moment—he'd have to catch or find when he wanted to eat.

  He'd oiled the hinges of the door last night; now he eased down the hallway, and slipped all of the locks and bolts as carefully as he could. He froze half a dozen times, agonizing over the slightest sound, and finally inched the door open just enough so he could slip through. The sharp-edged cold hit him hard, waking him completely. He closed the door and relocked as much as was possible from outside, then went softly down the water-stairs and sneaked past old Min and Del and Jones' empty skip, all tied up at the bottom. The skips stayed silent, their occupants tucked up in all the blankets they owned, down in their hideys. Except for Jones, who was tucked up with Tom—

  His stomach lurched. Oh, Marina!

  Now came the hardest part of all—

  He knew Marina would never be up this early; hightowners kept hours like Tom's. He trotted down the wet walkways, watching carefully for patches of ice, as the sun began turning the edge of the sky a bloody red. No fog this morning, but it was as cold as Kalugin's heart, and there might well be more snow before the day was over. He could see ice-rims along all the canals, and thin sheets of ice over the still spots, shiny as a hightowner's mirror. There were a few hearty souls about, even this early; canalers, folks on their way to work or coming home from it. The cold kept the stink down; the sharp breeze smelled mostly of smoke and wool. Once he thought he saw Rif's raven head with her bold red scarf tied about her hair to confine it. He quickly chose another way, then. Rif was damnably persuasive when she wanted to be. And he didn't want to be talked out of the only honorable course he had left.

  Kamat's doorkeeper wasn't even awake—thank the Angel. Raj managed to slip his sealed letter to Marina through the mail-slot in the door. Five pages long, it was, and ended with a poem so she'd believe it was really him who had written the others.

  Now she'd hate him forever. It couldn't be helped. It wasn't in agreement with Takahashi Honor that he leave Tom entangled in a lie, nor that he let Marina continue to believe that same lie.

  So why didn't he feel better?

  Now Fife, for his pack, then Moghi's.

  Lying staring into the dark, he'd made some hard decisions last night. Given all the trouble he'd caused Tom, the best thing he could do for Mondragon was to cut his ties with the man. All of them, including the job with the Gallandrys, so not even they could hold that over his head.

  He sniffled in the cold, his eyes burning and watering—surely from the early-morning smoke and smog— and rubbed his eyes and nose across his sleeve.

  Smoke. Smog. Sure. Be honest with yourself, Rigel Takahashi, even if you've lied to everyone else.

  This was hurting more than he'd ever thought it would. For a little while he'd had a family. A weird family, but a family all the same. It hurt to cut loose.

  And he had to cut loose; and do it before he managed to do something that couldn't be gotten out of.

  Denny could still be useful to Tom, and if Mondragon ever needed anything Raj could supply, he could send it surreptitiously through Denny. Honor could still be satisfied that way.

  But he needed some way—if he ever was able to poke his nose back into town—to keep himself housed and fed. And maybe, maybe, save enough to sneak into the College on a changed name. If he could find something to make enough money. If Justice could find him a patron.

  Well, medicinal weeds weren't all that grew in the swamp. And the way Raj had it figured, if somebody was stupid enough to want to rot mind and body with recreational pharmaceuticals, he might as well get the benefit of the money being thrown away. He only knew of one person, though, who might know where he could safely dispose of dangerous things like get-you-high weed. Moghi. Who scared the hell out of him.

  Moghi's was just open; Raj went up to the front porch and through the door, open and above-board. He walked, barefoot (he'd stowed his socks in his pack), silent, and oh-so-carefully, across th
e wooden expanse of floor. He gave over Jones' sealed letter, then asked of the man behind the bar (Jep, that was—he remembered the name from a night in Moghi's shed that seemed like years ago), in a very soft and very respectful voice, if m'ser Moghi might be willing to talk with him on business. Jep left the bar in the care of one of the other helpers and vanished briefly. As it happened, m'ser Moghi evidently hadn't yet gone to bed—and was apparently willing to see the frequent bearer of so much of Mondragon's coin. Jep returned and directed Raj with a silent jerk of his thumb. The office.

  The door to the office was beside the bar. Facing Moghi scared the liver out of him; to sit quietly at Moghi's invitation all alone in that cluttered cubbyhole while the dim gray light smudged the dirty window-panes, and stammer out his offer took all the little courage he had left. Moghi sat behind his desk, tall, balding—and big, most of it not fat—and looked at him hard and appraisingly, melting away the last of his bravery.

  "You wanta sell drugs, huh?" he asked Raj bluntly. "Why?"

  Raj could hardly think under that cold, cold stare. He stammered something about needing a lot of money, and didn't elaborate.

  "What?"

  "T-t-trinsedge, m-m-mostly," Raj stuttered; it was a fairly innocuous weed, about the same strength as whiskey. "A l-l-little jemgrass. W-w-wiregrass. D-d-deathangel, if I c-c-can catch them." None of those were really bad drugs, except for the deathangel—and God knew anybody hankering for that knew what he was getting into.

  "That won't get you much in a hurry." Moghi continued to stare at him, jaw clamping shut on each word, eyes murky.

  "Don't n-n-need it in a hurry. Just n-n-need to put it t-t-together."

  "Huh." The way the big man kept staring at him, Raj imagined he could see all the way through him. He wondered what Moghi was thinking; the man's opaque eyes didn't reveal even a hint of his thoughts.