The Alabaster Staff (4 page)

Kehrsyn sighed and stood up again, her slender hand reaching for the hidden fold in her sash and palming another stone from the score she carried there for just that purpose. It felt good to bring some small joy to a little soul in the midst of the cold, hungry winter. She didn’t want anyone to experience the same grim childhood she’d had.
Let the adults worry about the enemy that stalked the lands across the river; children needed to have their fun. So long as Kehrsyn could keep the war from stealing their innocence, she would.

She just wished it was a little easier to get their parents to show a little charity.

Despite her mother’s miserly demeanor, the little girl had attracted Kehrsyn some attention, just as she’d hoped. The beginnings of an audience were forming, most notable of whom were the soldiers, who walked up to her directly.

“Olaré!” said one in greeting. “So you’re a sorceress, huh?”

One of his mates, jealous that the other had spoken first, punched him roughly on the arm and said, “Of course not, half-wit. Where’s the aura? You ever seen a magician without a glow about her spells?”

“Actually, yes,” said a third, a seasoned veteran and clearly the senior of the rowdy group. “It’s rare, but it’s not unknown. Why, back in Chessenta, in, uh, fifty-four I think it was, I—”

“Come on, Sergeant,” said the first, “we hear your stories all night in the bunkhouse. I’d rather hear this maiden’s voice right now.” A murmur of general agreement settled the issue. “So, young one,” he continued, addressing Kehrsyn directly, “are you a sorceress?”

Kehrsyn chuckled and answered, “Of course not.”

“I think she is,” commented another soldier with a smile. “She’s already charmed me.”

Kehrsyn flushed with embarrassment.

“So if you’re not a sorceress,” asked the first, “how can you do all that stuff without magic?”

“It’s easier without magic,” she said, then she leaned forward toward the soldier. “It’s easy to make jewels appear,” she said in a stage whisper, “when guys like you don’t groom yourselves properly.”

With that, she tapped at his nose, striking it so that a
polished stone appeared to fly from his nostril, knocked loose by the flick of her finger.

The soldier stepped back, too startled to know whether or not to be affronted. His comrades laughed uproariously and showered him with a variety of new nicknames, from Gemfinger to Noseminer to Rocksnot.

The officer stepped forward, heedless that an audience had gathered.

“You’re a gambler, aren’t you?” he asked in a gravelly voice.

“No, I—I don’t have any coin,” said Kehrsyn. “Not even a wedge.”

“A likely story.”

“It’s true,” protested Kehrsyn. She turned to the sparse crowd around her. “But if one of you wants to loan me a coin,” she said loudly, “I’ll pay you back double.”

A half dozen coppers presented themselves, but she picked the lone silver egora offered by a merchant’s hand and favored the worthy with a wink and a bright, wide smile.

“All right,” she said to the sergeant. “You see this egora, right? This side is crowns, and this side is verses. Crowns, verses. I’ll bet you this egora against one of your own. Done?”

The sergeant nodded assent.

Kehrsyn suppressed a smile and said, “Are you ready? Watch closely.” She held out her right hand and placed the coin on it. “There, it’s showing crowns, right? Crown side up, got it? Now watch closely.”

She held her left hand out next to her right, palm down. With a flick as fast as an arrow, she flipped her right hand down on top of her left, concealing the coin against the back of her left hand.

“Now, Sergeant,” she said, “tell me which side is up: crowns or verses.”

The sergeant snorted, “Verses, of course.”

Kehrsyn faked a heavy sigh and lifted her hand.

“Sergeant,” she said, “you weren’t paying attention.”

The crowd gasped; the coin showed crowns. The sergeant blinked a few times and did nothing until the elbowing of his troops prompted him to give Kehrsyn a silver egora.

“All right, let’s try it again, shall we?” said Kehrsyn.

The sergeant nodded.

“Look,” she said, “we’ll try it a different way. I’ll put verses side up this time. Got it? Verses up. Remember that. Ready? Verses up.” Again she flipped her hand over with the speed of a falcon. “For a silver, Sergeant, which side is up?”

“It was verses up,” mumbled the sergeant to himself, ensuring he had been paying full attention and remembering the chain of events properly, “and you flipped your hand over, so now it has to be crowns. Crowns up,” he said.

“Sergeant, I’m trying to help. I gave you the answer, you know. I said, ‘Verses up.’ Three times I did.”

When she lifted her hand, the coin indeed showed verses. The crowd cheered, most especially the soldiers. The sergeant handed over another egora.

Urged by those around, the sergeant agreed to a third guess. Kehrsyn placed crowns up once more and flipped her hand, but before the sergeant could say anything, the soldier known as Noseminer stepped up.

“I’ll make the guess this time, wench,” he said, “and I’ll wager three egorae against all three of yours!”

Kehrsyn paused and glanced around, her face paling.

“Uh … but the sergeant …” she stammered.

“I’m onto your trick,” Noseminer proclaimed. He clamped his hands on hers, ensuring that she couldn’t manipulate the coin. “The guess is mine. Don’t back out!”

Kehrsyn recovered some of her composure and said, “You—you don’t have three silvers on you to wager, so I decline.”

Ordering one of his fellows to keep a tight hold on Kehrsyn’s hands, Noseminer emptied his purse and indeed
found he had only one egora’s worth of copper on him. So, while carefully watching to ensure she held her hands perfectly still, he quickly borrowed two others from his peers.

“There you are,” he proclaimed. “Three silvers, even if two are in copper. Now show the coin!”

“Your guess?” asked Kehrsyn.

“Crowns!” barked the soldier.

“You’re sure you won’t change your mind?”

“Quit trying to flummox me and show the coin!”

Kehrsyn lifted her hand. The egora very plainly showed verses. The audience erupted in laughter and applause. In the midst of the noise, the soldier stared at her in shock and anger.

“The trick,” she told him, “is knowing when to stop.”

But before she could scoop the coins from his hand, Noseminer clenched his fist and stormed off, followed by the jeers of the gathered crowd. The rest of the soldiers ambled off as well, chuckling to themselves.

Despite having been shortchanged, Kehrsyn still had a profit to show for her efforts. She paid the merchant back two silvers as she had promised, and received an ovation for her honesty. But, in the end, applause was all that the crowd was willing to part with.

She performed prestidigitation and sleight of hand through the early afternoon, to an ever-changing crowd that watched with enough interest to withstand the drizzle, if only for a short while. Finally, however, the ongoing drizzle chilled her thoroughly, and her hands began to shiver. She had to stop. She looked into her little box, open at her feet. Save a thin film of water, it was empty. She had nothing to show for her efforts but a single silver egora and the fading memories of a score or more of bright, young faces. One silver for a young woman with nothing to eat and no place to stay.…

She hoped the children’s happy memories of her would last longer than her pittance.

K
ehrsyn had stopped her performance, but the shopping in the plaza showed no sign of winding down, despite the cold rain. The initial crowds drawn by the arrival of a new shipment of food were thinner, but still persistent in the face of prices that had doubled, then doubled again. Chilled guards scowled over the newly arrived edibles, while the city watch occasionally roughed someone up.

Probably just trying to keep warm, thought Kehrsyn.

She gathered her gear and pulled her hood over her rain-dampened hair. Kneeling, she tipped the water out of her small box and closed the lid, put it back into her bag, and slung the bag’s strap across her shoulder. As she rose, she saw a scrawny youth standing nearby. Kehrsyn recognized him. He’d been hanging around the fringe of the crowd, trying to pretend he hadn’t been watching her. He met her eyes, then dropped his
gaze, then tried to look at her again but more or less failed and stared in the general vicinity of her neck.

“Yes?” she said.

“You’re real good, Miss,” he mumbled. He reached out one hand to her, hiding his face behind his shoulder. He held a large, ripe golden pear in his grip. “Um … here.”

She took the offering with both hands and smiled.

“Thank you,” she said. “Thank you very much. What’s your name?”

“Jaldi,” said the lad, with a self-conscious smile. He paused, then blurted, “You’re real pretty, too.” Then he turned and ran away.

Kehrsyn waved at his rapidly retreating back, but he didn’t look behind him before he left her sight. She took a big, contented bite of the pear, staring vacantly in the direction the boy had gone.

The delight engendered by his awkward compliment faded and was replaced by a cool dread. The boy’s admiration had put her in mind of the sole other member of the audience who’d watched her entire performance: a harsh-looking man with swarthy features and a dark green cloak. At first, she had taken him for one of the army, so military was his bearing. He had situated himself here and there around the plaza, never obvious, always where the view was best, leaning against a wall or wagon, arms folded across his chest, eyes narrowed, running his thumb back and forth over his lower lip.

She turned, chewing her lunch, and skimmed the courtyard. There, to her right. The same man was still watching her, over by the horse trough next to the blacksmith’s. While Kehrsyn liked admirers as much as anyone, there was something in the man’s stance that was far too businesslike for her tastes, as if he looked on her as an adversary and not a potential flirtation.

Kehrsyn casually walked out of the courtyard. She paused to inspect a blade offered by an arms merchant
(weapons were priced almost as exorbitantly as food) and, turning the polished bronze weapon in her hand to reflect the Jackal’s Courtyard behind her, caught a glimpse of the dark man moving parallel to her on the other side of the plaza. He was shadowing her, to her left and rear.

The merchant stooped under his table, and Kehrsyn’s hand strayed to her sash, but she remembered her vow and forced herself to return the blade with a “thank you” and a dazzling smile. She continued on her way to a street leading off the plaza. Once out of the man’s view, she increased her speed and turned into an angled street on her right, quickly enough that he—whoever he was—could not have seen her.

Just to be safe, she picked up her speed even more, then ducked into a narrow alley that opened to her left, keeping her free hand on her rapier to keep it from bouncing around. She wasn’t certain where the alley led, but, wherever it did, she was certain that she had evaded the stranger.

Though the alley protected her from the chill breeze, the rain and the cold remained, enhanced somewhat by the foul smells of rotting refuse. For once, Kehrsyn found a reason to thank the cold weather. In the summers, alleys stank something foul. Her breath steamed around her limp hair as she moved down the alleyway, looking for an outlet to another avenue. Navigating by instinct, she moved through the narrow, winding gap, passing a few branches before coming to a dead end. She paused and stared blankly at the wall in front of her, concealed as high as her waist by a pile of decomposing garbage. She pulled a lock of wet hair out of her face and retraced her steps, but just as she arrived at the first juncture, she saw her way blocked by an armed man.

She was relieved to see that it wasn’t the same man from the plaza … and, for just a moment, she also felt a slight pang of disappointment.

He was short, shorter than she. The steam curling from his sneering lip combined with his powerful build to give the impression of a bull or a fighting dog. A thick cloak covered his head and shoulders, and a black tabard with some sort of gold emblem draped off his wide chest, the hem shedding droplets that splashed in the dirty puddles at his feet. A shield hung across his back. He straightened as he saw Kehrsyn approach, and her ears picked up the grate of steel on steel. He’s wearing mail beneath his cloak, Kehrsyn thought, splint or scale.

“Olaré,” she said, for lack of anything better, and took another bite of her pear. “So, um, what kind of uniform is that? That’s no soldier’s outfit that I know. And you don’t have that medallion the Northern Wizards’ people wear. Are you a mercenary? Or some kind of deputized …”

Kehrsyn’s words trailed off as the burly man drew a long sword from a well-crafted scabbard. He swung it at his side in a lazy figure eight and stepped toward her.

Kehrsyn jumped to an unwanted conclusion.

“I’ll scream,” she said.

“Go ahead,” said the man in a surprisingly high-pitched voice with a noticeable northwestern accent. “If the local pikegrabbers get here, I don’t gotta trot you all the way over to the damn barracks to get my bounty.”