study one, and recognized that it appeared identical to the visage of a Great One. The people they encountered were all sociable, and greeted them in an amiable fashion, but they stared at Creme as if they had never seen a cat before. For her part, she studied their faces and discovered that, to some extent more or less, all the city's inhabitants resembled the crew of the ship on which they took passage.
Upon their arrival at the establishment, the family that owned and operated it were so overjoyed to have a cat in their midst that they gave the party the best available room and a substantial discount on the rent. Once they had settled in, she unpacked and put away her meager belongings, ordered refreshments and surrendered her peplos-style gown to be washed, and bathed, after which she sat with her companions on the bed and detailed her plan.
"I propose to spend time for now just watching and listening."
"To what purpose?" Creme said.
"We do not know where statue has been hidden. Unless, you do and you are withholding the information?" She smiled.
"Certainly not, Madam." His tone sounded annoyed as he gave her a half-lidded stare of feline displeasure.
"Then it is my hope we may learn something."
"That seems a forlorn hope, Lady," Conaed said.
She flashed a smirk. "People like to talk, especially when in their cups, or in the arms of a lover. In the common room of the inn we are likely to overhear many rumors and much gossip, some of which is bound to involve the statue. Something like that cannot be kept a secret for long."
"But Mistress, how can we distinguish truth from fiction?" Teehar said.
She nodded. "That will require careful analysis. Runt, I will rely on you to help me in that regard."
"Of course, Lady."
"So, I shall remain here at the inn, to talk with the other guests."
"Would not touring the city be more productive?" Creme said.
"I would be too conspicuous, but that is where you and Teehar come in. He will scout the city by day, listening to conversation in the streets, markets, and other public places. Creme, I want you to do the same, but at night, and I want you to pay particular attention to what people say in the 'privacy' of their homes--"
She cut herself off when she saw him crouch, bristle his fur, and lay back his ears. Yet his reaction did not strike her as angry but fearful. "What is wrong?"
"I...I cannot do as you ask, Madam."
She narrowed her eyes, but in puzzlement rather than displeasure. He had never refused an order before; in fact, he sometimes acted foolhardy where danger was concerned. "Why not? The city seems safe enough, and judging by their reactions, the people here seem genuinely fond of cats."
"Nonetheless, as long as we remain within the city, I will not leave your side."
"What could possibly be so great a threat that it would instill such terror in your heart?"
"Truthfully, Madam, I do not know, but it is a fear from of old, taught to all kittens while they suckle their mothers' milk."
She shook her head in frustration. "I understand caution, but refusing to take action simply because of some nameless dread we cannot even know is real smacks of superstition, and your people do not strike me as superstitious--"
"Madam, please!" His caterwaul contained a desperate pleading tone. "I cannot do what you ask! Do not force me to comply!"
She raised her hand and sighed in resignation. "As you wish. It will hamper our investigation, but I give you my word, I will not try to compel you to do anything that terrifies you."
He relaxed almost immediately and even began to purr, though it seemed to her more from relief than happiness.
"However."
His purring stopped.
"If you will not scout at night I will need to do so myself, and if you will not leave my side, you will have to come with me. Will that be a problem?"
His tail twitched in a nervous fashion, but he said, "No, Madam, I believe not."
They wasted no time, and began their quest immediately. As Teehar flew around the city to acquaint himself with its layout, Medb took Creme and Conaed down to the common room, where she spent the remainder of the day watching and listening. As she expected, however, her presence did not go unnoticed, and it wasn't long before other guests approached her to share her company. By the time the bird returned in the evening she had spoken with nearly everyone who came and went; played games of alquerque, dominoes, and tarock; and arm-wrestled three burly sailors from Ogrothan. After eating the supper the innkeeper family served, the other patrons sat around relaxing as they drank and smoked, and some of them began to sing their native fo'c's'le songs accompanied by fiddle and concertina. She danced with some of them to the more spritely tunes, but during a lull she retrieved her 30-string clairseach from her room. Modeled after the heroic harp of the Gaels of her native Erin, it had a perfect and complete diatonic scale. She started off accompanying the seamen, but soon they asked to hear songs from her own land. She played well into the night, alternating between plaintive laments, gay love tunes, forceful war-songs, lively jigs, and relaxing lullabies, and she held everyone mesmerized with her skill, even the innkeeper and his family.
The only event to occur all evening that seemed out of the ordinary was when, around sunset, a bell pealed high over the city. At the sound of it the people in the common room, residents and foreigners alike, including the innkeeper family, stopped whatever they were doing, knelt, and bowed towards the center of the town. She stopped singing for a moment and faintly heard the sound of chanting accompanied by musical instruments from far off. Yet when she tried to ask another patron about it, he silenced her, and only after the bell went quiet and the chanting had faded away did he explain that the priests who dwelt in the temple to the Elder Beings in the city's center performed a worship ceremony each night, and the entire community paid reverence out of devotion or respect. Though she was at first annoyed, the patrons continued their activities afterwards as if nothing had interrupted them, and she decided to ignore it.
When she retired at midnight, Teehar reported on his first day's explorations, but had little to offer beyond a description of the layout of the city. She and Conaed debated options, but concluded for that their best course of action was to repeat their tactics of that day. She then left them in the safety of her room as she went to spend the night with the three burly sailors from Ogrothan.
Their break came after seven weeks, on the afternoon when half a dozen Men of Leng entered the inn.
Before then, each day Teehar toured the city, discretely eavesdropping on any conversation that piqued his curiosity, and it wasn't long before he became a familiar sight flitting about on the balconies and through the garden plots of the dwellings. Each evening, upon his return he reported the rumors and gossip he overheard to Medb. Based on his intelligence, she determined which sections of the city needed closer investigation, and each morning she and Conaed and Creme went exploring to see what they could discover for themselves. They returned at noon to eat and spent the afternoon in the common room, listening to and engaging in conversation as she probed for any information on the idol. After supper she played and sang for a few hours, pausing only when the temple bell rang, announcing the daily evening service. She had grown used to it after the first few days, and even emulated the people in their obeisance so as not to incur their enmity. Sometime before midnight she and Creme then went back out into the city, to reinvestigate locations they had visited in the morning that had sparked her interest, but under the cloak of darkness for added security. They returned by midnight, and she and her companions retired to their room, where she and Conaed cataloged and analyzed the information they had gathered, to try to sift out nuggets of information. Afterwards, she spent the night with any of the other patrons willing to share their beds, but she always returned to her room before morning.
Unfortunately, after forty-eight days they had come no closer to finding the idol than when they first arrived, and Medb grew more frustrated, and desponden
t, with each new dawn.
At first she took little interest in the Leng Men. She had encountered them before, mostly in Dylath-Leen, the one port in the central Dreamlands that always welcomed the arrival of their black galleys without hesitation or restriction, and she had heard the many stories concerning their habits. She had even seen a group of them at one of the taverns in the northern part of the city that were frequented by onyx quarrymen. Even so, despite the close proximity of Inganok to the Plateau, she had learned that the Leng Men rarely came to the city, and those few who did traveled overland with their trains of yaks to trade their unusual silk and blood-red rubies for onyx. That day, however, a black galley had come into port in early afternoon; news of its arrival flew up the city faster than people could deliver it. The captain and his mates entered the inn soon after the news had reached the common room, and took a table along one wall. One of the mates removed a thin leather case from a canvas satchel he carried, along with a bottle that appeared to be carved from a large example of their trade rubies. He passed the bottle to the other mates and the case to the captain, who opened it and began setting up a backgammon board. Finally the captain placed a full purse the size of an apple on the table beside the board, and looked out over the common room with a toothy grin on his wide