5.Death of Chaos
V
WITH THE SOUND of horses, I set down the chisel and stepped out into the yard. The sky was clear blue-green, and a chill breeze blew out of the north.
The open-topped carriage, drawn by matched chestnuts, stopped precisely opposite the door. On the driver's seat sat a driver and a guard with both a blade and a cocked crossbow. Both wore gray leathers and gray shirts, but the driver wore brown boots and the guard wore black.
The single occupant opened the half door herself and vaulted onto the packed clay of the yard.
“Master Lerris?” She might have reached to my shoulder. Her eyes were a gray even stonier than her hair, and, under the green silk shirt, the brushed gray leather trousers and vest, she seemed whipcord-thin. Her high boots-gray leather-did match her outfit. For all the trappings of wealth, I did not recognize her. The faintest hint of roses flowed from around her.
“The same.” I bowed. “How might I help you?”
“By inviting me into your shop.”
I bowed again and gestured toward the open door. “My pleasure.”
“From what I've heard of your lady, your pleasure is bound to be only visual.” Her laugh was easy and practiced as she stepped into the workroom.
“Nice design.” She pointed at the first of Hensil's chairs. “How far along is that?”
“It's not quite rough-finished.”
She studied the tools, the partly completed desk in the corner, and the spoked shafts I had been working on. “Do you have any finished work I might see?”
“An inlaid table in the house,” I offered.
“Then let us go view this masterpiece.”
I led the way, conscious that the guard with the crossbow followed us both with his eyes as we walked back out and into the house. The crossbow wasn't exactly trained on me, but I knew it would have taken but an instant.
I could have had a door between the kitchen and the shop, but that idea hadn't felt right, and I really wanted some separation. Besides, it kept the sawdust from drifting into the house.
When she saw the table, she looked--just looked. Finally, she nodded. “You are as good as they say. Why is this here?”
“The man who commissioned it fell out of a tree just before it was finished. He broke his neck and died. My consort insisted I keep it.”
“Wise woman. You should keep listening to her.”
“I try.”
She looked up from the table. “I would like to commission a desk.”
I had to spread my hands. “I need to know more. What style? A table desk, or a pedestal desk? Do you want drawers?” I paused. “I can show you some sketches of general types of desks.”
“I know what I want.”
I waited.
“Something like your table, except even less elaborate. The lines should be almost straight, very clean. Only an inlaid border on a top with beveled edges, but with drawers in the pedestals on both sides-and false backs to the top drawers on each side.”
“No special carvings or designs?”
“Would you suggest any?”
“I could put just a single initial-inlaid-somewhere not terribly obvious.”
“Why would you go to the trouble of inlaying an initial and not making it obvious?” Her smile was amused, as if she knew the answer.
“To show, tastefully, that it was a special piece.”
She nodded again. “How much would such a piece cost? Done to the same standards as the table?”
“Do you want a matching desk chair?”
“Yes.”
“Fifty golds. Forty for the desk and ten for the chair.”
“How much of a deposit?” she asked.
“Nothing.”
“You are so rich that you need no deposit?”
“No, madame.” I bowed again. “If I take your deposit, then I must accept your advice, because you already own the work, or part of it. I would prefer to do the best I can. If it does not suit you, you are under no obligation.”
“So idealistic, Master Lerris. And so young.” She laughed, but it was not an unkind laugh.
“Practical, madame. If you did not like the work, with your wealth, you could easily reclaim your deposit. And,” I added, “I have found I can sell whatever I can make.”
“I like you, young fellow. But please do not call me ma-dame. My name is Antona.” She waited.
“I beg your indulgence, Lady Antona, but I am relatively new to Kyphrien and have not had the pleasure of knowing of you.”
“I'm sure you will hear sooner or later. Don't believe everything you hear. Only half of it is true. I will not tell you which half.” She turned toward the door, then paused. “When could I expect this piece to be completed?”
I frowned. “Normally, for something like that, about a season.” I held up a hand. “It doesn't take that long in workmanship, but if you want it to weather well and not have the wood split later, I need to let parts of the joints and any curving set for a while. Also, I have already been obligated to... spend some time I had not planned on, so this might take a bit longer. If that bothers you...”
“No. As you pointed out, I have not paid you yet. It's a fair bargain.” Antona stepped back from the table after taking another look at the inlay work. “The grain angles are very delicate.” She paused. “Would you mind if I paid you a visit to see how things are going in some several eight-days from now?”
“Not at all.” I held the door for her and waited in the yard while she climbed into the carriage.
Then I went back to the shop and drew up a rough plan for the desk, sketching out what I had in mind, while those details we had discussed were still fresh. I also wrote down the price- higher than I thought necessary, but I had learned that everything seemed to take longer and cost more. I wasn't in the business just for artistry. I was learning that I did have to buy, not only wood, but such things as food, feed for Gairloch and the old mare, and more than I would have liked for the mounts of Krystal's guards, although Krystal paid for most of their feed and some of the food. She would have paid more, but I didn't feel right about asking her.
After completing my quick rough plan, I put both the sketch and the estimates in the folder for commissions-thin, but growing-and went back to working on Hensil's chairs.
I'd gotten the one rough-finished, and had the backs of the next two done. That left five more. The grooved spokes were still the hardest. After I finished bending the backs of the next two with my too-few clamps and they were setting, I could go back to the time-consuming work of the spokes and the diamond backplates with the inlaid initial H.
As usual, I didn't get as far along as I would have liked, since I was working on the fourth chair back when I looked up at a faint sound.
“So? What did you want?” Tamra stood in the doorway to the shop. “It couldn't have been that important, or you would have tracked me down. I was only out in the market.”
“How was I to know?” I set aside the clamps, wiping my forehead on my upper arm, only half-annoyed that she'd shielded her approach to catch me unawares. I was more worried about the chairs. Doing the backs was, like everything, going to take longer than I had planned.
“You could have looked-with your order senses.”
“Would you like something to drink?” I unfastened the leather apron and hung it on the peg, then wiped off the clamp with a cloth to make sure it was perfectly dry. Glue on the clamp surface would set rough and ruin the wood. Good and clean tools are a woodworker's livelihood.
“Of course.”
We walked past the rail where her roan was tied and into the house. She sat at the table while I got out the redberry. Rissa had taken the cart and the black mare to Kyphrien to market.
“Do you know where Justen is?” I poured two mugs and set one in front of Tamra, then sat down across the table from her.
“No. I already told Krystal that. You wanted to see me for that?” Tamra flipped the end of the green scarf back over her shoulder.
“Partly. I was wondering where he had gone, and how long before he'd be back.”
She shrugged, then swallowed about half the redberry in her mug.
“Why would he go off without telling anyone?” I got up and retrieved the pitcher of redberry, refilling Tamra's mug and setting the pitcher on the table where she could reach it.
“Lerris, you are still so... obtuse!” snapped Tamra.
I wasn't the one who had been dense enough to get enslaved by a white wizard, but I was obtuse? “So where is he?”
“He didn't tell me, but just because he's been around for a while doesn't mean he's not a man. You, with all your leering at Krystal, should certainly understand that.”
“Justen?” Somehow, the thought of my uncle Justen with a woman was disconcerting. “Justen?”
“You're impossible! Haven't you ever looked at Justen, really looked at him? With your order senses?”
“No. That's not something that exactly crossed my mind.”
Tamra sighed. “How you ever bested Antonin-”
“Lucky for you I did.”
“Lucky is right. Lucky.” She took a deep breath. “If you look at him with your order senses, if it ever crosses what passes for your mind, you can see an order tie-it looks like it stretches forever.”
“He's linked somehow to someone?”
“That's what I'm trying to tell you.”
I frowned. “The secrecy would make sense. He's probably got enemies...”
“Of course it would.” Tamra looked toward the pantry. “Do you have anything to eat?”
“There's some cheese in the cooler.”
“I'll get it.” She rummaged through the cooler-running water from the stream runs around the sides of the thing, a design that dates back to Dorrin, but I'd never seen one in Candar, so I had to have Ginstal, one of the local smiths, make it up specially for me. “You've only got the yellow stuff?”
“We finished the white the other night, and I haven't broken the wheel in the cellar yet.”
Despite the complaints, Tamra hacked off two healthy wedges and broke off a large chunk from the bread in the breadbox. I sipped the rest of my redberry while she sat down and ate.
“You going to eat, Lerris?”
“I had some cheese before you came.”
“Late breakfast?”
“Lunch.”
She winced. “... barely past mid-morning...” she mumbled with her mouth full. “When did you get up?”
“Early. I always do when Krystal's not here. Then I can stop whatever I'm doing when she comes in.”
“What happens when she's off somewhere?” Tamra refilled her mug.
“I get a lot of work done. I've gotten a lot of work done lately.”
“That's woodwork. What about real work?”
I frowned.
“You've gotten slow and sloppy.” Tamra flipped a strand of short red hair off her shoulder and looked at my chest.
“I have not. Not sloppy, anyway.”
She prodded my stomach. “Not sloppy... but slow, I'd still bet.”
“You just want an excuse to show your prowess.”
“Naturally.” She grinned. “You've been insufferable in your humbleness. Just the humble woodworker whose consort is the important one. Your humbleness is almost arrogance. Bah!”
I could use the exercise, and a break from planing the damned chair spokes. “All right. A short sparring session, but not for blood.”
“So get out that old staff.” Tamra drained the last of her mug and wiped her mouth.
“It's new. The old one got broken, remember?”
“I don't remember, thank the darkness. Let's get on with it. I'm supposed to work with the trainees later.”
“You like getting pummeled?”
“They have to hit me first. Or don't you remember?”
“That was a while ago, and it only happened once.” Once had been enough. Back in Recluce, the first time I'd sparred with Tamra she'd beaten me black and blue, and knocked me out-with a padded staff yet. I'd gotten a lot better since then, but I wasn't that enthused about sparring with her.
After rinsing the mugs and setting them in the rack, I led her out, stopping by the shop to reclaim my new staff.
We squared off in the center of the yard. A light breeze blew out of the west, bringing the acrid scent of graying leaves and a hint of chill all the way from the Westhorns.
“I hope you're better with it than with the old one.”
“We'll see.”
“So we will.” Tamra circled left.
I turned with her, but kept my feet balanced, knowing she was quicker.
Flickkk .. Her staff flashed, but I slid it off to the right.
Thwack! No finesse there, as that slight form shifted her weight to focus it all on the staff. My fingers were numb from the blow to my staff, and I backed up, trying to flex them while not letting go of the staff itself.
Thwackkk! Thwack!
Sweat was already popping out on my forehead, and Tamra looked cold, almost dispassionate, like some ancient Westwind guard must have.
I feinted, then dropped, and came up under her guard. She parried but not before I cracked her on the thigh, not hard. I couldn't do that, not in sparring.
“Think you're good?” She grunted, and her staff turned into a blur.
At that point, I had to surrender to my own sense of order and let my body respond.
The whole thing became a blur. I got in some blows, and she got in some. I got in more, but hers were harder. She didn't have the restraints I did, which is why she got in trouble with Antonin, but why it took more work for me to hold her off with the staff.
“All right!” I finally puffed, backing up, and sweating like a roasted hog. “You're doing this every day. I only do it occasionally.”
She put down her staff, looking only a bit warmer than before we started. Her red hair was slightly disarrayed. “When do you leave?”
“Leave?”
“About half the Finest know you're headed somewhere, and Ferrel hasn't come back, and Krystal's taken over the Finest. And you're asking about Justen.” Tamra snorted. “It doesn't take much in the way of brains.”
“Soon.” I bowed to the inevitable. “Since you know so much, what else can you tell me?”
Tamra brushed her hair back off her forehead. “I can't tell you that much. I can tell you that if Justen were here, he'd be telling you to take your book-The Basis of Order. Read it. You won't survive forever on dumb luck and your staff work, even if it is getting better.”
“Thank you.” I bowed, and my ribs ached, reminding me that I wouldn't survive long at all on staff work by itself. “You're also improving.”
“I've been practicing against the Finest. You have to get faster when you're working against blades. Krystal's a good instructor. Has she been working with you?”
“Only a little.”
“It shows. You ought to do it more often.”
“When?”
Tamra gave me a quick smile. “I know how you two spend your free time.”
“There hasn't been that much.”
Her smile got wider, and I wanted to crack her, but I walked across the yard and set the staff in the rack inside the shop door.
In the end, after Tamra rode off, pleased with herself, I did have to go back to the chairs. With the break, the work seemed easier, and I even got the fifth chair back bent and clamped in place, and went back to the demon-damned grooved spokes that I had begun to wish I'd never designed. Elaboration, even of a good design, can be a definite pain, and I just didn't have the experience of Uncle Sardit or Perlot. That hurt, because I spent more time on some things than was definitely wise.
The clinking of the harness and the faint creaking of the cart wheels told me when Rissa returned.
She looked in on me. “How many for dinner?”
“I'd guess on six or seven. Three of us, and three or four guards.” I shrugged.
“You... Never do I know who is coming for dinner.”
“Neither do I, and it's at least partly my house.”
“Fantesa, she says she could never cook in such a place. Are there three or fifteen?” Rissa put both her hands on her narrow hips. “Or in the morning, I think I will feed three, and ten hungry people sit down in the evening. Or it is the other way around.” She lifted her shoulders. “In the market, they all look at me and laugh. And Brene, she cackles like her chickens. We should have chickens.”
“What can I say?” I shrugged again, ignoring the reference to the chickens I didn't want. “My consort is an important woman.”
“This house...” But she said it with a smile before she retreated to the kitchen-or to the small room behind it that was hers. I went back to the spoke-shafts, and got two more rough-finished before it started to get dark.
Right after sunset, I pulled out my striker and went into the yard. Three tries convinced me that the big lantern wasn't going to light. I took it down and checked the wick. It needed trimming, but it was also dry, and that meant lugging it out to the shed where I kept the oils, a good fifty cubits behind the shed and off to the side of the stable. If lightning or something happened, like loose chaos, I didn't want the shop or the house burning with the shed. Rissa grumbled about that, and so did I when it was cold or raining or snowing-though that was comparatively infrequent in Kyphros-and I had to get finish oil or varnishes. Luckily, it wasn't that cold or rainy around Kyphrien, but I suppose I would have done the same thing if I had a place in Spidlar or Sligo.
I had just replaced and lit the big lantern when I heard, and sensed, horses. So I waited out in the yard for Krystal and the Finest. Even in the saddle of the big black she looked tired, but she smiled. I offered her a hand down. She took it, which told me how tired she was.
I glanced at the four guards, but none were more than noddingly familiar, then back to Krystal. “I told Rissa dinner for seven.”
“Good. None of us have eaten.”
“I thought it might be like that.” I squeezed her hand as we walked her mount to the stable. The others followed. Krystal just let me unsaddle her horse and rub him down, while she racked the saddle and poured the feed into the trough.
Then we walked back through the twilight-a few stars had begun to twinkle in the evening sky. As we neared the house, Krystal handed me a heavy leather purse. It clanked. “Put that away.”
“What's that for?”
“Your traveling expenses from Kasee. Please try to make the coins last. Our treasury isn't exactly the deepest, although Kasee would never say so.”
“I will try to return some, Commander.” I took the purse and bowed.
Krystal hit me on the arm, hard enough for me to wince. “Sometimes. Sometimes, you are so... so...”
“Insufferable?”
“Yes!”
“Have you washed up?” I asked.
“No.”
“Neither have I.” I did give her a hug, but it didn't last long.
“You're right. You didn't. And you're still insufferable.”
I turned to Rissa. “Dinner will have to wait a little longer. At least until we're more presentable.”
“Too much washing is not good for the health.”
“Neither is too little,” I answered.
After I carried the purse into the bedroom and set it in the wardrobe I had made far too quickly-and wished I had taken more time and care every time I looked at it-we went to the rear washroom together.
As I pulled off my shirt, Krystal turned to me. “What happened to your ribs?”
“Tamra. She showed up this morning, and we sparred. She thought I ought to sharpen up.”
“Being beaten black and blue is going to improve your skills?” Krystal laughed softly as she stripped off her vest and shirt.
At that point I forgot about washing and opened my arms, trying not to wince. She obliged, but only for a bit.
“You and I do need to wash up, and we have hungry troops waiting.”
“Where's Yelena?”
“Getting ready for tomorrow. Have you forgotten so quickly?”
“No. I wish I could.”
After washing quickly, I shaved, and we dried and hurried to the kitchen where, as soon as we entered, all the troopers stood and Rissa began carrying the big casseroles to the table for me to serve.
Dinner was something called burkha, hotter even than the normal chilied foods that the Kyphrans enjoyed so much, and although I gave every trooper a huge helping, they ate it all, and didn't even break a sweat.
I was sweating after three bites, and so was Krystal, and we kept grinning at each other.
“Perron?” Krystal said softly. “We'll have to leave not much after dawn.”
“Yes, Commander.” He glanced at the two of us, grinning.
“The order-master is my consort, but, more important from your point of view, he has already saved more of the Finest than anyone in Kyphros.”
Perron flinched at the gentle words, spoken quietly, and without edge.
“I never did thank you,” said a woman trooper at one corner.
I looked at her, but I couldn't say I knew her.
“I was the one with the lieutenant, ser. In the vale of Krecia. I'm Haithen.”
“I'm glad I could help, but I was very lucky,” I told her.
“Luck didn't have much to do with it,” she added, directing her words at the squad leader. “He's the one who took out the white wizard with a staff... on a pony.”
Perron seemed to acknowledge that I might have some benefit.
“How did your sparring go with Tamra?” asked Krystal innocently, although I could see the glint in her eyes.
“Pretty much a draw,” I mumbled with a mouthful of burkha. “I can hit her more often, but she hits harder.” I had to reach for the bread. Redberry alone wouldn't cool the burning in my mouth and nostrils.
“You sparred with the red-the redheaded wizard?” asked Perron.
“About midday. We have on and off for several years.”
“Brave man...” About sparring with Tamra he was certainly right.
After dinner, and more superficial remarks about the heredity and dubious claim of Berfir to the Duchy of Hydlen, Krystal and I took our leave.
After we closed the door and slid the small bar in place, I kissed her.
“We do have some time, Lerris. And I prefer to be close to you without my boots on.” She sat on the edge of the bed.
That was a good idea, and I followed her example, shedding a few other accessories as well.
She stopped and gave me a long deep look, the kind where I almost fell into her eyes. “You don't have to do this, tomorrow, you know?”
I looked at the floor. What could I say? “I owe you... and Kasee...”
She pursed her lips and laid a hand on my leg for an instant. “What else happened to you today?” she asked as she eased out of her leathers.
“You know. What happened to you?” I asked, pointing to an ugly bruise.
“Tamra.”
“Darkness, she gets around.”
We both laughed.
Krystal stretched out and lay there in the light of the one lamp. Outside I could hear the faint whisper of the low evening wind. “You never did answer my question about the day.”
“Not much. I worked on the damned chairs for Hensil. I finally got more of the backs done. It's taking forever, because I don't have enough clamps. Oh... do you know a woman by the name of Antona? She was familiar with you.”
“Antona?” Krystal laughed for an instant. “She is the proprietor of the Green Isles. She supplies most of the... courtesans... for the more established and wealthy young men-and some of the handsome... escorts for widows or bored consorts.” Her voice sharpened. “How did you meet her?”
“She came here this morning and commissioned a desk.”
“A desk?”
“A very tasteful desk. Also very expensive, with a matching chair. I told her it would be fifty golds.”
“She can afford it, but... still...” Krystal whistled.
“You told me to charge what things are worth.” I looked at her sheepishly. “Now I know why she told me not to call her madame.”
“Lerris, you didn't?”
“I did. How was I to know? She was very ladylike about it, just told me to call her Antona. So I called her Lady Antona.”
“You must have made her day.”
“She wanted a desk. I make them.”
“What kind?” mused Krystal. “Something ornate and elaborate?”
“She had definite ideas and-”
“I'll bet.”
“-she wants black oak, and she wants it simple and perfect.”
“I wonder why. I'm told that's not the style of the Green Isles.”
I grinned at her. “Because things that are simple and perfect are worth a lot more.”
“I don't know that I like that implication.”
“You are perfect.”
“Oh, Lerris.” But she did open her arms, and I turned down the lamp first, marveling at how long it had taken me to see what she offered, not only each night, but season after season, and how fragile each moment was. And how soon tomorrow would come.