He shook out his limbs and strolled down the lane of stalls one more time, pretending to be a customer. He inspected a purple-green apple and set it back down. The vendor frowned at him and polished the apple. Ren shrugged and moved on, his gaze darting back to the work line. He walked past a vendor with two men standing guard, each with spears and short blades. They looked down at Ren and he played his role, bobbing his head, shuffling along to the next stalls.
There may have been a time when great Mornae worked the fields with their own hands, filling the world with the power of the goddess. These days the folk in this line did the work. Those houses lucky enough to have a fixed contract earned all the chits—not that contracts were ever completely safe. He knew houses forced to the edges of Mornae society, to the edges of Vaidolin. He’d helped get them there. Now they were no better than nomads, prey to brigands and scammers like himself. One poor crop might separate these fine folk from the fate those houses had endured.
He passed a stall with baskets of cherries, almonds, apricots, crushed herbs, and jars of honey. As always, the stall keeper watched him, eyes narrowed. Ren’s hand tapped along the edge of the stall, sorely tempted to snag something, to prove his worth to this man. This was child’s work though, palming fruit from a vendor, and he was no longer that child. His hand closed to a fist, and he moved along, half hoping the man would accuse him and demand to look in his hand. But he wasn’t here for that, he chided himself, shaking his head. His destiny held the promise of greater things than stealing cherries from farmers.
Still, a man was what he was…
Ren’s heart sank, and he nearly crushed the blood-red apricot in his hand.
“I am what I am,” he muttered. He’d not thought it out. He’d just done it. His hand had shadowed and the man, more focused on reading the guilt on Ren’s face, had not seen the shadow swallow the fruit. “I have no guilt,” he whispered.
He panicked as an overseer stood in front of the work line and plucked out three men. Ren sighed with relief as the man turned and confirmed it wasn’t his mark. He tossed the bruised fruit back on the pile. The vendor complained, but his house had no guards and he’d no metal on him to pick a fight.
Ren was itching for a fight. He hated waiting for his doom to come. Who asks for the impossible days before the winter gong? He’d have to explain his failure to his handler. Not my fault the dice favored me the night before. Not my fault the drink was stronger than usual. Not my fault I’d slept in.
He kicked at the pavers and found a new spot to wait. An hour passed and giant, black feathered vultures and eagles bickered overhead, squabbling with each other for the best perches. The tall gate’s monumental facade was so packed with them it shimmered and shifted. They were a flock of mercenaries waiting for their chance.
At the next bell, men appeared from all sides of the market, even women, rushing to the work line, cramming into the space appointed for it. Ren had to wait, though, and do things right. House guards pushed and shoved them away from their stalls. There was room for about a dozen, but they crammed in tight. Lucky for Ren, Xabrin, the steward of Lor’Hesvin, had returned to hire more workers. Ren sized up the front line of workers and determined the best spot to stand out against the rabble. He grinned, thrilled with the chance to do his best.
He slipped into the line by shoving one fellow and driving him to argue with his neighbor. When the man turned, he took no notice of another brown shape next to him in line. Ren was not a big fellow, but slim and wiry, and short like them. Short by Mornae standards at least. And that suited him fine. Made his work easier. He’d never do work amongst the lords. He could never pass as one of them. That type of work was for his betters.
Rather than try to impress this lordling, he’d worn clothes that made him look responsible and hardworking: heavily mended, but clean. He had broken-in, oiled leather gloves tucked in his belt, good boots for treading over rock or field. A cap to block the sun and a hood on his tunic if it got too bright, rounded out his costume. He’d thought of everything. Beneath notice, which is what his teacher had taught him. No one with gleaming silver hair notices a servant, a worker, brown as the dirt they sweep away.
Xabrin was a good-looking man, a proper Mornae. Silver hair, gray-blue eyes, pale gray skin, a haughty refined look about him. His broad shoulders tapered down to a slim waist and long legs. Ren measured him at about six and three. Not as great as Ren’s master, who was like a god to these low-born at seven feet. Still, Xabrin was a fine example of Mornae blood, and the man knew it. He looked down at them, his eyes like slits. The sun bothered him, but he seemed accustomed to being in the sunlight, and kept his eyes nearly closed, not a wrinkle of displeasure marring his serene face. He bore a dagger at his back and a short blade at his hip. Black and silver tournament ribbons hung from a wool belt about his waist. Two embroidered glyphs adorned his black felt vest, worn over a gray, sleeveless silk tunic. He was a serious man. Ren knew as much. But he also knew that Xabrin wore a mask. All show, his teacher used to say. The secret was figuring out just how false it was.
One thing comforted Ren. Xabrin didn’t have kithaun blades like Maunyn, but he was good enough to take out this lot of poor, hungry field-hands. Ren took in every detail about the man as if he meant to rob him, drug him, even kill him. His old teacher had taught him such things, and he’d never stopped the practice. A part of him wanted to push the edge, challenge this lordling like the Zauhune knight challenged Roturra in the goddess-court. Out of habit, he felt his belt for his knife, but found his gloves instead. Today, he just needed to get inside as a hired man. Step by step, his teacher would say.
The steward passed by, leaning in, and taking a whiff of each body, deciding if they’d try to mask the scent of illness or hide their weak frames under layers of clothes. It happened often enough. One man held his mouth open to reveal missing teeth, and others riddled with cavities. A young man suffering from hunger. He needed this job more than anyone in the line. The sad fact was that in Vaidolin, the strong got stronger.
Ren was happy to be above it all. He had the greatest of masters, the most powerful man in all Ilor’Hosmyr, and one of Vaidolin’s greats, consort to the high matron, master of Isilmyr, the academy for lords. If Ren was honest, he’d admit it irked him to always be in Maunyn’s shadow, as great as that was. He wanted to step out of it for once.
Xabrin lifted his chin, the disgust of the smells, the animals, the outside world, flaring his nostrils. “I’m hiring strong men to haul rock to rebuild an estate wall to the north, along the Hesvinan way. Lor’Hesvin. I’m sure you’ve all heard of it.”
He was right. There was whispering up and down the line. A respectable name meant a respectable wage.
“Two woods for every hour worked,” Xabrin said. “A bonus of five to the best worker.”
That would drive them into the dust for sure. Best worker usually meant the man that could last the longest. Not like hauling rocks took skill, but the line seemed pleased. Ren earned that much without lifting a finger, just from interest. Still, he bobbed and murmured like the rest of them to keep up the ruse.
Xabrin walked up and down the line one more time before selecting those he wanted. He didn’t pick a single woman, and they whispered insults at him. What could they do? They were the flesh of the goddess, and the goddess didn’t haul rocks. The selected fell in line behind Xabrin, Ren in the third slot. If they only knew who he really was, whom he served, they’d have put him first. Still, he’d passed the first test, now onto the second.
They walked in a train through the crowded streets to the mouth of the Hesvinan way, a narrow street leading away from the gate to the northeast. They shuffled through the crowds and a man bullied his way into the line in front of Ren. Ren grabbed hold of him and shoved him out. The man looked back wide-eyed and desperate. His clothes were dirty and frayed beneath a newer tunic. The other hires grunted their approval, and someone behind Ren patted him on the back. Ren’s hackles rose, and he shot a murderous glance over his shoulder, shadows gathering around his hands. Good for that man that he didn’t have his blades on him.
It was even better that Xabrin hadn’t noticed the swell of shadow about him. He turned back, muttering curses, and followed the steward. The shadows receded but tickled his fingertips. He’d almost blown it.
The Lor’Hesvin estate may have been grand for the east valley, but it was a pale shadow of those in the crater. In his mind’s eye the crater was a hive of white walled estates, villas like temple spires, marbled and lined with silver, soaring ceilings of stone arches and domes, shining white or deepest black if ancient. Sorcery shaped the world inside the crater. Outside it, at this estate, there were the ordinary matters of life: flowering vines for the beehives, a small vineyard, and a silk farm. The silk farm was the most valuable thing and ancient. Only an ancient farm could produce silk these days.
Yet, for all the greatness of the crater, Ren preferred the outside with its sunbathed warmth and inviting scents, full of life. As they approached the gate, he noted the glyphs adorning the frame, the doors, the iron bands stained black to make it look like kithaun. The trick, the danger, was to know how far the power extended. It all depended on the diviner that had put his intention in it. It could be trivial or lethal, and anywhere in between. No one in Lor’Hesvin would say, of course. There was a saying amongst the Mornae: a silver dagger works if the target thinks you’re carrying black. Everything, everything, was a ruse from low to high. For all he knew, the glyphs were nothing at all, artwork to keep away thieves like him. Or they could kill him instantly. He had ways of testing, of course. No need to take the hit if another will do it for you. That was the thrill of his work, the real challenge.
Xabrin, his lord for the day, had hired him to move rocks around the estate, but his real lord had other work for him. He’d trained all his life for this kind of job. As soon as he was past the lintel’s alarm glyph, granted permission by the steward, he would have access to the courtyard at least. That would be enough. Everything else he could manage.
The outside world, the sound of the farms, even the wind, seemed distant as they entered. The glyphs worked their magic to make the inside still, to recreate the crater. He assessed the power of the glyphs by how distant the sounds were. His teacher had taught him the degrees of power, as he knew them from experience. His teacher told of being stunned, burned, maimed, even cursed, by an underestimated glyph.
It was like child’s play, his old teacher would say, getting past these Mornae. His teacher was Mornae himself, but like Ren, with a muddy past. His teacher meant the rich Mornae, the ones that looked the part but were empty vessels—the word for a priestess who could not summon the Dark—but he used it for the men, too, the ones with badges and ribbons who could do nothing but look the part, cracking from the inside out. Men like us, he’d say, we are the sons of the goddess now. Like little mice with the power of giants.
The courtyard was expansive, with a cover of fine gravel, the center dominated by a miniature marble spire meant to emulate the temple. Four statues of the goddess, each in a different pose, hands poised to receive or grant the goddess’s blessing, stood at each corner of the spire’s base.
As they made their way through the courtyard and past an arched trellis of flowers over a ten-foot-tall marble statue of the Voice, the men groveled for a moment, worshiping each in his own way, begging her for the strength to endure to the last and win the bonus. They touched their fingers to their lips and then to her feet, well-worn from so much worship. Ren obliged and made a series of bows, keeping his hands to himself.
Xabrin didn’t bow but stood apart. The statue was for poor folk, not true Mornae. He wasn’t foolish enough to think the Voice was the goddess no matter how lovely the statue. Satisfied with their obeisance, Xabrin led them further into the estate.
They were walling up an orchard of prized fruit to protect it from the increasing crowds living in Lowkamas. The rabble was sprawling out into estates now, pressing up against their walls and lowering the standards. They were stealing, too. A pear or apple or fig from a prized orchard could bring ten silver bits. Alchemists made syrups, ointments, and tonics, claiming they could heal or grant a long life. It would take more than a pear to do that much for this lot.
Now he understood the reason the steward hired the entire line of men, even the scraggly ones. They needed to finish the wall or else the back gate was vulnerable, wide open all day, with an untold number of strangers moving in and out. Winter always brought more undesirables in. They sought refuge within the walls, or to steal.
The glyphs must be weak, just enough to let the steward know who came and went. Or the mesh was off. Who’d want to deal with all that buzzing in one’s head?
The estate was large, walled high and with an inner wall for the main house. Nothing to trouble a thief like Ren. The workers were sorting stones by size, hauling them in by cart through large double doors at the back of the estate from a quarry on the southern edge of the valley—the obvious entry point for a thief.
Xabrin pointed at a foreman and a dozen brown shapes already hauling rocks. Ren nodded and bobbed profusely, imitating the slavish workers. A sly grin worked its way across his lips as the lord held his chin up. That perfect chin, those long, perfect lines. The lord walked away and Ren stood counting the lord’s steps, the stride. His breath fell into line with the lord’s gait, the smooth rhythm of his body. The lord’s shadow beckoned him. Ren thought, he had always thought, that someday he might take form in that shadow. It would be a great power to have.
The foreman was staring at him.
Ren bobbed his head again and shuffled toward him, the hood covering his face. He squinted hard to keep the foreman from noticing his silver eyes. Here everyone was trying to look more Mornae, but he was trying to look less.
He brushed past the foreman, noting the glyph embroidered on his tunic. Later, at his place at the tavern, he’d write it all out, every detail of what he saw. He hated writing the reports, but it was part of the job, and he was not one to offend the goddess through laziness, no matter how laziness beckoned him. Writing what you saw was just as godly as wielding the Dark, his teacher always said.
The sun was going down, and then his actual work could begin. Valley houses followed the sun and its light, unlike the people within the crater that followed the night and lived by star and moonlight. He preferred working at night; easier to get around, easier to use his skills. That’s why he rarely got jobs in the crater.
