Seregil rose to protest and was very surprised to feel the floor lurch beneath his feet in a decidedly unpleasant manner.
"There now, you see?" Nysander chided, pressing him back down on the bench. "You go downstairs and sit by the fire. Alec can show me whatever it is I need to see."
"I can't just sit here," Seregil insisted again, though his head was still spinning. "We ran into one pair of gaterunners down there already tonight. There could be others, or worse."
Nysander raised a shaggy eyebrow at him. "Are you suggesting that Alec would not be safe in my company?"
Seregil sank his head in his hands as Thero reappeared with clean garments over his arm.
"I leave Seregil in your able care," Nysander told him. "I suggest a cup of hot wine and, by all or any means necessary, a bath." Clasping the scrap of woolen cloth Seregil had given him, he traced a series of designs on the air and disappeared into the wide black aperture that opened briefly beside him.
When Nysander opened his eyes again, he was in a small deserted square.
"There you are," whispered Alec, crawling out from behind a clump of leafless bushes. "Is Seregil all right?"
"Yes, just a bit dizzy. He says you have something to show me."
"Something we need fixed," the boy replied with a familiar grin. "Follow me."
This was the first time he'd actually seen Alec at work, and he was impressed with his quickness and efficiency.
"My, but Seregil has been busy with you!" Nysander remarked as Alec let him through the second gate.
"Ruint me for honest work, he 'as," Alec replied, making a passable stab at a dockman's accent. "It's not far now."
Reaching the damaged grate, Nysander climbed up to inspect the damaged stone and ironwork, then moved across to see the intact corner.
"I see," he murmured to himself, peering closely at the remaining pin. "Most ingenious. And ingenious of you to have discovered it. Yes, I am quite satisfied.
Well done."
"Can you fix it?"
"Can I fix it?" Nysander snorted, climbing down again. Grasping the bars with both hands, he closed his eyes and listened to the voice of the cold iron.
Letting his own energy pass into it through his hands, he visualized the metal, felt it stir under his hands.
Standing beside him, Alec felt a powerful ripple pass through the rank air. There were no flashes of light or magical signs, just the brief scrape and whine of metal. For a moment it seemed to Alec that the metal came alive, like a plant, growing and moving as it healed.
Looking up, he saw that the damaged corner now looked as it had before. "Illior's Light!" he gasped, hardly able to believe his eyes.
Nysander laughed. "I hope you did not expect me to come down here with a hammer and anvil." Opening his hand, he showed Alec a long iron pin. It was scored along its length where it had been driven through the flange and blackened from forging, except where the white metallic substance showed through near one end.
Without a word Alec scaled the left side of the grate to find a solid pin in its place.
"That's amazing," he exclaimed, tapping the iron with his knife blade.
Nysander shrugged. "It is only magic."
Seregil grudgingly accepted the willow bark infusion Thero prepared, then went down to the baths. As soon as he was clean and dressed, however, he returned to the workroom and refused to be moved, despite Thero's obvious desire that he wait elsewhere.
Anxious and impatient, Seregil prowled the crowded room, fiddling with bits of delicate apparatus.
"Give me that!" Thero snapped, snatching away a cluster of fluid-filled glass spheres. "Drop that and we'll be up to our eyes in swamp sprites. If you won't go downstairs then for Illior's sake, sit down."
"I know what it is." Scowling, Seregil climbed the stairway to the catwalk overhead and stared out through the thick glass panes of the dome, watching the movement of lights below.
By the time Nysander and Alec materialized neatly in the center of the room, it would have been difficult to say which of the two looked more relieved.
"There you are!" Seregil exclaimed, bounding down.
"Any trouble?"
"No, everything looks as good as new," Alec told him, grinning.
"Shall I fetch fresh clothing?" Thero inquired, wrinkling his nose again.
"Yes, in a moment," said Nysander. "First, however, I must congratulate our two able spies on a most valuable find." He shook the iron pin from his sleeve. "I will keep this for now. Seregil, Alec tells me you took a sample of this curious white material?"
Seregil held up the small container. "Right here. Want to see it work?"
"Yes, but not here, I think. Too many flammable items." Taking a crucible from a nearby shelf, he ushered them into the casting room.
Placing a few of the white shavings in the crucible, Nysander set it on the floor and touched a candle flame to its contents. A small fountain of white sparks flew up and scattered across the floor.
"Incredible!" murmured Thero, nudging the remaining shavings about with a small glass wand.
Seregil watched him surreptitiously, recognizing the sudden light of enthusiasm in those pale eyes. At such moments he could almost see what maintained Nysander's hopes for the young man—the keen and wondering mind that underlay Thero's cold facade.
"Have you ever seen anything like this before?" Thero asked, turning to Nysander.
The older wizard lit another fragment, then sniffed at the smoke left behind. "It's a sort of incendiary metal, I believe. It's called Sakor's Bite or Sakor's Fire for obvious reasons. Very, very rare but" — Nysander paused to raise one bushy eyebrow at Seregil—"found in greater quantities in certain regions of Plenimar."
Seregil exchanged knowing grins with Alec.
"Looks like we've got ourselves a decent bit of work at last."
18
Over the next few days Alec and Seregil shadowed their man closely, but learned little more than that Rythel was annoyingly regular in his habits. He rose early, gathered his crew, and worked the day through without leaving the site. At night he took supper at his lodgings and turned in early.
Lounging across the street from the Sail-maker Street tenement the fourth evening, they saw a broad, ruddy young man step out into the street.
"That's the landlady's grandson," Seregil whispered to Alec. "He's been down to that tavern on the corner every night so far."
True to form, the fellow set off for the corner tavern, stopping to chat with neighbors along the way.
Seregil stood up and stretched, still following the young man with his eyes. "He looks like a talker to me. I think I'll nip in for a pint and try to strike up a conversation."
It was a clear, windless night, but cold. Moving restlessly from one cold doorway to another, Alec watched the house, and the half moon sailing slowly over it. It had gained the chimney by the time Seregil reappeared, chuckling to himself and smelling warmly of beer.
"You look pleased with yourself," Alec muttered, shifting his frigid feet.
"I am." Seregil threw his cloak back and presented him with a wooden cup of the Dog and Bell's best lager. "Let's go home. Rythel's unlikely to stir out for another couple of nights yet."
Alec took a grateful swallow of the watery beer as they headed back to the court where they'd left their horses. "Then you did get something out of the grandson?"
"Our smith appears to be equally disliked by almost everyone who knows him, with the exception of his landlady, who judges her tenants solely by how punctual they are with their rent. Her grandson, young Parin, has had a few run-ins with him around the house. Apparently harsh words were exchanged when Parin entered the smith's rooms unexpectedly one day. "Mind you" "grinning, Seregil mimicked Parin's somewhat slurred complaints—""he was only messin" about with some drawerings. Not like he was tupping nobody or nothin'. Just drawerings, for the love a' hell! He's a queer one, and a miser, for all his high and mighty ways."