Vlad Taltos - Phoenix Part 8

After an interval of tossing s.h.i.+p and breaking waves I said, "Sounds Eastern."

"It's mine."

I looked at her. She didn't move. I said, "I didn't know you wrote poetry."

"There's a great deal that-no. Sorry. It came to me a few nights ago, as I was sitting there, worried about you.

Or maybe wondering if I should be more worried about you; I don't know which."

"A bitter tale," I agreed. "What does it mean?"

She shrugged. "How should I know?"

"You wrote it."

"Yes. Well, if there was something buried in it that I was trying to say, I don't know what it is."

"Let me know if you get any ideas."

The corner of her mouth twitched.

I watched the ocean do its ocean stuff some more. Up and down, and across, going nowhere. That kind of thing.

"I'm trying," said Cawti, "to think of something deep and philosophical to say about waves, but I'm not having any luck."

"You'll find something."

She shook her head. "No, but I ought to. About how they start somewhere, and keep coming closer, then they move you around and keep going, but we don't know what causes them, or where they come from, or, well, something like that."

"Mmmm."

"You made a lot of waves, didn't you, Vlad?"

"Are you speaking in general or in specific?"

"Both, I guess. No, in specific."

"Do you mean the whole business of the last few months, with the Organization, and the Empire, and your friend Kelly?"

"Yes."

"Yeah, I guess I made a lot of waves. I didn't have much choice."

"I suppose not."

"I wonder what Herth is up to."

"Word is, he's happily retired on what you gave him for South Adrilankha."

"South Adrilankha," I repeated. "The Easterners' ghetto."

"Yes."

"And now I'm the one who runs it."

"Not all of it."

"No. Just the illegal parts."

"Going to clean it up?"

"Do I detect a note of irony in your voice?"

"A note? No. A symphony, perhaps."

"You don't think I can, or you don't think I will?"

"I don't think you can."

"Who's to stop me?"

After perhaps a minute she said, "What do you mean, clean it up? Just what illegal activities do you intend to continue?"

"The ones they want. I'll make sure the gambling is fair, that the wh.o.r.ehouses are clean and the tags are treated well, that the loans are at reasonable rates, that-"

"How can gambling be fair for people who can't afford to gamble at all? How much does it help to give fair treatment to people who are selling their bodies? What is a reasonable loan rate to someone who has gone into debt because he lost everything at one of your tables, and how will you collect from those who can't pay?"

I shrugged. "It's going to go on, anyway. I'll be better than anyone else."

"I think I've made my point."

"I can't solve all the problems of the whole world. And neither can your friend Kelly, however much he thinks he can."

"Have you been paying attention lately? Haven't you seen it?"

"Seen what? Parades of Teckla through the streets? People in parks shouting at each other about things they already agree with? Posters that say-"

"And now there are Phoenix Guards watching them, Vlad. And I mean Phoenix Guards-not Teckla put into cloaks and given spears. That means they're scared, Vlad, and it means they don't dare use conscripts. Do you think maybe they know something you don't?

Three weeks ago, even two weeks ago, none of that was going on except in South Adrilankha. Now you even see some of it on Lower Kieron. At this rate, what's going to happen in another two weeks?

Another two months?"

"In my opinion, not much."

"I'm aware that you think so. But perhaps-"

"No, I don't want to argue about your d.a.m.ned revolution."

She shrugged "You brought it up."

"Can we talk about us?"

"Yes," she said, but I found I didn't have anything clever to say after that.

The s.h.i.+p plunged, the waves broke around it, to re-form in our wake as if we'd never been. I wanted to say something deep and philosophical about that, but nothing came to mind.

"I'm going to get some sleep," I said. "If Aibynn starts drumming, throw him overboard." I s.h.i.+fted with the waves until I found the tiny ladder that led to the area below the deck. I found a place to stretch out, located a blanket, and let the s.h.i.+p rock me to sleep.

It must have been about ten hours later that the same rocking woke me up. I stumbled up the ladder, banged my shoulder against something metal that some idiot had fastened to the wall (I think it was a hinge), sc.r.a.ped my s.h.i.+n when my feet slipped on the ladder, and made it onto the deck. Morrolan was still where I'd left him. The orange-red sky was hidden by low grey clouds, and the wind was vicious indeed. Morrolan's cloak whipped about him in a frenzy of romantic appeal. I was still wearing the shapeless robe I'd been given while imprisoned, or I'd have been romantic, too. Sure. I made my way along the railing until I was next to him.

"Rough sea," I said, almost shouting above the roar of water and wind and creaking wood. He nodded. I looked around, suddenly thinking how flimsy the s.h.i.+p was. I said, "Anything unnatural about the weather?" He gave me a funny look. "Why do you ask?"

"Tell you the truth, I don't know. Is there?" He shook his head.

Loiosh landed on my shoulder. "Think we 're in for a storm?" I asked him.

"How should I know ?"

"I thought animals had instincts about that kind of thing."

"Heh."

"What do you make of friend Aibynn?"

"I don't know, boss. He's funny.

"Yeah."

I checked the time through my link to the Orb, found out it was well before noon, but long past when I usually break my fast, and realized I was hungry. I started to ask Morrolan about food when it hit me. "I have my link to the Orb again."

He nodded. Talkative son of a b.i.t.c.h.

"When did it happen?"

"During the night sometime."

"Well, that's a relief."

"Yes."

"What about food?"

"There's bread and cheese and whitefruit and dried kethna below."

"That'll do. Couldn't we just teleport home from here?"

"Go ahead. I'm in no hurry."

"If we run into a storm-"

"I've decided that we won't."

"Ah. Never mind, then."

I went below again, found the food, and did appropriate things with it.

As the next day's dawn spilled an orangish tint on the sea to our right, the city of Adrilankha peered down from the Whitecrest Hills and spread her port and docks like a lap to receive us. The sailors gave us, and Morrolan in particular, ugly looks, because they knew he'd managed the winds that had brought us home so quickly, and Orca, I've learned, believe that if one conjures fair winds, nature will respond with a storm as soon as she can manage it. Perhaps they're right. But Adrilankha, staring down at us like a great white bird, the cliffs her wings and her head the great manor of the Lyorn Daro, Countess of Whitecrest, didn't seem to care. Neither did I, for that matter.

As we pa.s.sed Beacon Rock, the crew raised a bucket of water from the sea and spilled it on the deck, a ritual I've always wondered about, since I'm told that Adrilankha is the only port at which it is performed. They went through it mechanically, then prepared ropes and did other sailor things that I understood no better than I had the last time I saw them.

But I wasn't really watching then. Aliera was next to me, Morrolan next to her, with Aibynn on my other side, and Cawti a little further away. Loiosh was on my right shoulder. I wondered what was pa.s.sing through their minds as the city grew before us, one building at a time: the Old Castle, where the Three Barons had practiced their strange magics during an Athyra reign a few cycles ago; Michaa-gu's, perhaps the best restaurant in the Empire except for Valabar's; the Wine Exchange, fat and brown, built of stone that plunged deep into the hill.

And behind them, the city. Or, rather, the cities, for we had each our own: Aliera and Morrolan, who didn't live there, knew the Imperial Palace and her surrounding Great Houses; a perpetually trimmed garden below the slopes of the Saddle Hills. Aibynn, perhaps, saw a place as strange and wild and unknown as his island was to me. Cawti would see South Adrilankha, the Easterners' ghetto, with her slums and her stench and her open-air markets and Easterners who walked always lightly, ready to run from the Phoenix Guards, or the occasional young Dzur adventurer, or d.a.m.n near anyone else. I saw the city that held my special place along Lower Kieron Road, where the! bitter of violence mixed with the sweet of luxury, and you walked with your eyes open, either to grab at a pa.s.sing opportunity or to prevent yourself from becoming one.

These cities loomed before us, one and many, growing larger and more present as we watched; they took my eyes and held them as the dock lieutenant signaled to our s.h.i.+p with the black and yellow flags of safe harbor, and guided us in.

I was home, and I was afraid, and I didn't know why.

TWO.

Business Considerations.

Lesson Six.

DEALING WITH MIDDLE MANAGEMENT I.

"PEOPLE ARE STARTING to ask about you, Vlad," said Kragar, two minutes before the door blew down in front of us.

I was three days back from Greenaere. Cawti was off seeing her old friend Kelly and his merry band of nut cases and I had returned to running my business and trying to clean up South Adrilankha without filing Surrender of Debts to the Empire. (This is a joke; the Empire would not accept Jhereg debts. Just thought I should clarify that.) Progress on all fronts was nil. That is, Cawti and I kept trying to talk and it kept going around in circles. I still didn't have an office in South Adrilankha, and I had no reliable reports coming in. I had not heard from Verra. I didn't know what Aibynn thought of Adrilankha because he didn't talk much; in fact, he wasn't around much. I still wondered if he was a spy. I had explained the situation to Kragar, who had suggested getting Daymar to probe his mind. The idea made me uncomfortable, and I wasn't sure if it would even work. We were discussing various alter-natives when Kragar suddenly said, "Never mind that. There are more pressing problems, anyway."

"Like what?" I said, which is when he said, "People are starting to ask about you, Vlad."

"What people?" I said.

"I don't know, but someone above you in the Organization."

"What's he asking about?"