Teckla

I said, "Okay." I wasn't too worried, because if they'd wanted to kill me I would never have seen them. When I reached the one in front of me he was blocking my path, and I recognized him as Bajinok, which meant Herth—the guy who ran South Adrilankha. My shoulders went limp and my hands twitched. I stopped a few paces away from him. Loiosh watched the one behind me. Bajinok looked down at me and said, "I've got a message."

I nodded, guessing at what it was.

He continued, "Stay away. Keep out of it."

I nodded again.

He said, "Do you agree?"

I said, "Can't do it, I'm afraid."

His hand went to his sword hilt, just as an idle, threatening gesture. He said, "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure."

"I could make the message more explicit," he said.

Since I didn't feel like having my leg broken just then I threw a knife at him, underhanded. This was something I'd spent a lot of time practicing, because it is so fast. I don't know of anyone who has ever been seriously injured by a knife thrown that way except by me, and even with me it takes a lot of luck. On the other hand, anyone will flinch.

While he was busy flinching, and the knife was hitting him hilt first in the stomach, Loiosh was flying into the face of the other one. I had my rapier out before Bajinok had recovered, and I used the time to step out into the street to make sure neither of them could get behind me.

Bajinok's sword was in his hand by then and he had a dagger in the other. He was just coming into a guard position when my point took him in the right leg, above the knee. He cursed and stepped back. I followed and put a cut across the left side of his face, and, with the same motion, a good, deep one on his right wrist. He took another step back and I skewered him in the left shoulder. He went over backward.

I looked at the other one, who was big and strong-looking. He showed signs of having been bit in the face by Loiosh. He was swinging his sword wildly over his head while my familiar stayed out of his reach and laughed at him. I spared a quick glance for Bajinok, then, with my left hand, found a knife, aimed, and carefully threw it into the middle of the other guy's stomach. He grunted and cried out and swung in my direction, coming close enough to my wrist to take some hair off my arm. But that was all he had in him. He dropped his sword and knelt on the street, bent over, holding his stomach.

I said, "Okay, get going." I did my best to sound as if I weren't breathing hard.

They looked at each other, then the one with my knife in his stomach teleported out. When he was completely gone, Bajinok stood up and began limping away, holding his injured shoulder. I changed my mind about going straight home. Loiosh continued watching Bajinok as I turned up the street.

"I'd just take it as a warning," said Kragar.

"I don't need you for the obvious stuff."

"I could argue that," he said. "But never mind. The Question is, how hard is he going to push it?"

"That," I said, "is the kind of stuff I need you for."

"I don't know," he said, "but I assume we're going to get ready for the worst."

I nodded.

"Hey, boss."

"Yeah?"

"Are you going to tell Cawti about this?"

"Huh? Of course I'm going to… oh. I see what you mean. When things start to get complicated, they don't go halfway, do they?"

Kragar seemed to have left the room by then, so I took out a dagger and threw it as hard as I could into the wall—the one without a target on it. The gash it left there wasn't the first, but it may have been the deepest.

When I went home a few hours later I still hadn't decided, but Cawti wasn't there. I sat down to wait for her. I was careful not to drink too much. I relaxed in my favorite chair, a big, overstuffed gray thing with a prickly surface that makes me avoid it when I'm unclothed. I spent quite a while relaxing before I began to wonder where Cawti was.

I closed my eyes and concentrated for a moment.

"Yes?"

"Hi. Where are you?"

She paused, and I was suddenly alert. "Why?" she said finally.

"Why? Because I want to know. What do you mean, why?"

"I'm in South Adrilankha."

"Are you in any danger?"

"No more than an Easterner is always in danger living in this society."

I bit back a response of spare me and said, "All right. When will you be home?"

"Why?" she asked and all sorts of prickly things started buzzing around inside of me. I almost said, "I was almost killed today," but it would have been neither true nor fair. So I said "Never mind" and severed the link.

I stood up and went into the kitchen, I drew a pot of water and set it on the stove, threw a couple of logs into the stove itself. I stacked up the dishes, which Loiosh and Rocza had already licked clean, and wiped off the table, throwing the crumbs into the stove. I got the broom out and swept the kitchen, threw the refuse from the floor after the crumbs from the table. Then I took the water off the stove and washed the dishes. I used sorcery to dry them because I've always hated drying. When I opened the cupboard to put them away I noticed that it was getting a bit dusty so I took everything out and went over all the shelves with a cloth. I felt the faint stirrings of psionic contact then, but it wasn't Cawti so I ignored it and presently it went away.

I cleaned up the floor below the sink, then mopped the whole floor. I went into the living room, decided I didn't feel like dusting and sat down on the couch. After a couple of minutes I got up, found the brush, and dusted off the shelves next to the door, under the polished wooden dog and the stand with the miniature portrait of Cawti on it, and the carved lyorn that looked like jade but wasn't, and the slightly larger stand with the portrait of my grandfather. I didn't stop and talk to Cawti's portrait.

Then I got a rag from the kitchen and wiped down the tea table that she'd given me last year. I sat down on the couch again.

I noticed that the lyorn's horn was pointing toward Cawti. When she's upset, she can pick the strangest things to think are deliberate, so I got up and turned it, then sat down again. Then I got up and dusted off the lant I'd given her last year that she hadn't even tuned in twelve weeks. I walked over to the bookshelf and picked out a book of poems by Wint. I looked at it for a while, then put it back because I didn't feel like fighting with obscurity. I picked up one of Bingia, then decided that she was too depressing. I didn't bother with Torturi or Lartol. I can be shallow and clever on my own; I don't need them for it. I consulted the Orb, then my internal clock, and both told me that I wouldn't be able to sleep yet.

"Hey, Loiosh."

"Yeah, boss?"

"Want to see a show?"

"What kind?"

"I don't care."

"Sure."

I walked over to Kieron Circle instead of teleporting because I didn't care to arrive with my stomach upset. It was a bit of a hike, but walking felt good. I picked a theater without looking at the title, as soon as I found a show that was starting right away. I think it was an historical, taking place during the reign of a decadent Phoenix so they could use all the costumes they had lying around from the last fifty years of productions. After about fifteen minutes I started hoping someone would try to cut my purse. I took a quick glance behind me, and saw an elderly Teckla couple, probably blowing a year's savings. I gave up on that idea.

I left at the end of the first act. Loiosh didn't mind. He didn't think the actor playing the Warlord should have been allowed out of North Hill. He's a real snob when it comes to theater. He said, "The Warlord is supposed to be a Dragon, boss. Dragons stomp, they don't skulk. And he almost tripped over his sword three times. And when he was supposed to be demanding that more troops be conscripted, it sounded as if he was asking for—"