This time all of the other smiled, and two or three laughed. “Wherever you want,” the woman said. “Right here on the grass, if you like, or in one of the houses.”
“We don’t think we need to worry much about shelter,” the young man told him. “The sun hasn’t moved, the temperature hasn’t changed, and we haven’t seen a cloud since we got here. The breeze does rise and fall a little, but not enough to matter.”
“Oh,” Hanner said. He started to say something else, but then a familiar voice knocked the words out of his head.
“Hanner!” Rudhira called. She was trotting up the slope from the village.
“Rudhira!” Hanner called back, smiling broadly. “I didn’t know you had come here.”
“I thought it was the best way to stay out of Vond’s path,” Rudhira said. “I had put Pirra in the room across the hall, and I didn’t see any reason not to come here and get warm. It’s lovely here, isn’t it?”
Hanner looked around again, and admitted, “Yes, it is.”
He had designed it to be, of course, when he commissioned the tapestry. He had expected to spend the rest of his life here, and had tried to ensure that it would be as pleasant as possible – though Arvagan had warned him that wizardry had no guarantees.
“We’ve been working on fishing nets,” Rudhira said. “And we’ve been planting seeds from the fruit you sent, and those trees over there – I don’t know what kind of nuts those are, but they taste good and haven’t made anyone sick yet.”
“The water is good?”
“Oh, the water is lovely! Cool and clean. We could use more pitchers, though, if you’re planning to send more supplies.”
Hanner remembered why he was there. He shook his head. “There won’t be any more supplies,” he said. “Vond wants us all out of here.”
That triggered a storm of protests. “What business is it of his?”
“Why does he care?”
“Why should we care what he wants?”
Hanner raised his hands. “Please, please!” he said. “I’ll explain it all. But…but I need to rest a little, first. I was up all night. Let me take a little nap, and then I’ll tell you all about it.”
Rudhira and the basket-makers exchanged glances, and then Rudhira and two of the others hurried to escort Hanner.
“This way,” Rudhira said. “There’s a bed waiting.”
She led him to the village, and into one of the houses, where a pile of old clothes had been made up into a crude bed. Hanner sank down onto it gratefully. He lay back and closed his eyes.
“Are we really going to wait until he wakes up to find out what’s happening?” someone whispered; Hanner barely heard it. The speaker probably thought he was already asleep, Hanner told himself.
“We don’t have to,” someone else replied. “We can go look for ourselves.”
“Hush!” Rudhira said. “Let him sleep!”
Then they left him alone, and Hanner was finally able to drift into deep, peaceful slumber.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Edara of Silk Street crept down the attic stairs as stealthily as she could, but she knew she was no spy or thief, no expert at moving silently. She expected at any moment to find herself facing a guard of some sort, or even worse, Vond himself. She opened the door at the foot of the steps and crept out into the fourth-floor corridor.
No one was there. Sunlight spilled in from the window above the stairs at the southern end of the hall; she was slightly surprised to realize that it was early morning here. She hesitated, then hurried across and peeked in the door of a bedroom on the other side of the hall.
The tapestry was still there, hanging undisturbed and unguarded. She was tempted to go touch it, and pop back into what the inhabitants were calling Hanner’s Refuge, but she steeled her nerve and closed the door again. She took a deep breath, told herself that no one had any reason to hurt her, and started cautiously down the stairs.
The third floor was as deserted as the fourth, and that didn’t seem right. Where Hanner had kept the fourth floor vacant, there had been people staying in the rooms on this floor. Had they all gone out for the day? If so, where? The whole reason they were here in the first place was that they didn’t have anywhere to go!
Maybe they had all gathered downstairs for some reason. She frowned, and started down the next flight.
On the second floor she once again saw nobody, but now she could hear voices from below, so she knew the house was not entirely abandoned. She leaned over the rail to listen.
“…need some trustworthy men,” a man’s voice was saying. “I can’t be everywhere.”
“If you let us use your magic, we could do it,” someone replied.
“You have not yet convinced me you are that trustworthy, Zallin. If I let you use the remaining source, you will instantly be as powerful as you were before the Aldagmor source departed, and that might make you strong enough to defy me.”
“Your Majesty, I was never Called! I would be well below your own astonishing level.”
“A little practice would take care of that, wouldn’t it? Your turn will come, Zallin, I promise you that, but only when I know I can trust you. It’s been less than a sixnight; give me a month or two to get to know you.”
“A month or two?”
“Is that so very long? You have your whole life ahead of you! You served at least three years as an apprentice, didn’t you?”
“But I was given my magic on the third day!”
“Have I known you for three days?”
“Well…almost.”
“At any rate, I’m not looking for more warlocks. I want some men who can fight without magic.”
“Why?” This was a new voice, one Edara did not recognize at all.
“Because there may be times and places I can’t use my magic! You know the wizards are trying to stop us from resuming our rightful place in the World; what if they find a way to block my source of magic? What if they destroy it outright?”
“If they destroy it, then we’re all done,” a fourth voice said. “That’s the end of it, and we can all go back to being nobody.”
“I won’t!” Zallin protested. “I don’t care what the wizards want – I’m a warlock!”
“You don’t have any magic,” the third voice said.
“Nonetheless, I am a warlock!”
“You’re a fool,” someone muttered – Edara could just barely make out the mumbled words, and could not be sure whether this was a new voice, or one she had already heard.
“Your Majesty,” the fourth voice said, “if the wizards cut off your magic, then the palace falls out of the sky. They won’t allow that. You’re worrying needlessly.”
Edara wondered what that meant, about a palace falling out of the sky.
“Wizards can be ruthless when they think it necessary,” the first voice – Emperor Vond, Edara assumed – said. “Oh, I don’t think they’ll do it, I don’t even know whether they actually can, but I want to be prepared. If I’m going to run things the way I want here in Ethshar, I’m going to need a staff, and I’m going to need guards. The overlord has his soldiers, Ithinia has her gargoyles, and I need some trustworthy men. Now, I know most of you were thrown into the future just the way I was, but you, Zallin, you were never in Aldagmor. You know people. You know how the city works. I want you to go out and hire those men for me.”
“You want them to be loyal,” Zallin said. “How can I guarantee that?”
“Well, for one thing, we’re going to pay them very, very well,” Vond said. “Money won’t be a problem for us.”
“How do I convince them of that?”
Vond gave a bark of laughter. “You’re joking! Just show them what’s hanging in the air over Lower Street.”
Edara was puzzled; what was hanging there? She would have to go take a look, if she could figure out how to get out of the house undetected.