south. Were I to approach, I'd be skinned alive. Funny, considering how I've learned to use magic.'
'I thought shamanism wasn't magic, but-I don't know-a gift from the gods?'
'From the Earthmother, and the land itself. A little magic is acceptable, such as healing and blessing weapons and homes and crops, but were I to conjure a storm, say, many would take it amiss. I could be stoned to death, or buried alive, or staked out and sacrificed. Still, my father could call the spirits of the dead, even elementals. My grandfather could shapeshift to mimic Brother Seal and Grandfather Walrus… but I ramble.'
'It's interesting,' Knucklebones insisted. 'It's just- it's been so long since you talked at all.'
Sunbright nodded absently, plucked grass and sucked the stem, and said, 'You bring out the best in me, Knuckle', though I've been poor company lately. It's just that I need my people. Without them I can't get on with my life. I'm as dead as an uprooted tree. Not much comfort for you.'
Knucklebones refrained from chiding, just tried to keep them talking. Yet she had no plans of her own, and his were frustrated, so there seemed little to discuss.
Then the man blasted the mood by adding, 'Greenwillow was good for me too. She kept me levelheaded and busy, applying and testing myself.'
'I don't want-' Knucklebones's temper flared, but she bit her words back. She was tired of his singing the praises of a dead lover. Still, better he talked, and she suffered in silence. 'Tell me about her.'
'Well… she was a lot like you.'
'What?' This was news. 'How can she, a high-caste elven warrior from the forest be anything like me, an orphaned sewer rat with one eye?'
Sunbright shook his head. 'It's not outward appearances, it's inner. Greenwillow had courage, not only to face terrible odds, but to face herself too. To force herself into battle, or the dark, or the unknown. As you do. I so admire your spirit. I can face polar bears and ice storms and ice worms and starvation and cold, yet I was raised by my tribe and taught these things slowly, and coddled when I made a mistake. How you managed to survive, abandoned and alone in the underworld of Karsus, I can't imagine. You must have a core of steel, and an undying heart to boot. Greenwillow was the same way.'
Knucklebones glowed under the compliments, wondered. Maybe Sunbright loved her not as a pale imitation of the elf maiden, but because she had mastered a dangerous environment. For the first time, the thief felt sympathy and interest in this elven warrior she'd never met, but she'd still prefer he concentrate on a live lover. But so did people pine for things they couldn't have.
Like a tribe. And a home. Or any clue where to go 'Behold. The geese and the enclaves fly south for the winter.'
'Hunh?' Knucklebones craned her head around, scanned the sky where Sunbright pointed. High overhead drifted an inverted mountain studded with buildings, a floating city. Enclaves drifted north in summer and south in winter. 'Oh. That's Ioulaum,' she said. 'It's easy to recognize.' In three hundred years it hadn't changed much.
'And in three hundred and fifty-five years,' Sunbright added, 'it'll fall and shatter, scattering buildings and people like an anthill kicked apart.'
Thief and shaman watched the city drift. It went slower than the wind, for the massive mythallar, the dweomer engine, could drive it in any direction decreed by the archwizards and city council.
The pair watched the city-mountain float, and Sunbright mused, 'Too bad we can't get up there. Perhaps we could see the whole world, look down and see my people waving. Or at least shooting arrows at it.' He joked because memories of floating a mile high in the air in Castle Delia, and then Karsus Enclave, set his stomach churning. He'd never been comfortable in the air.
Knucklebones gazed wistfully on the city, for sometimes she found Sunbright's 'groundling' world too wide. She often longed for the cozy confines of the city, its varied buildings and parks and houses, the tangled caves and tunnels and warrens that honeycombed the former mountain.
As Sunbright's jest penetrated, the woman mused, 'That's not such a foolish notion…'
'What?' Sunbright frowned. 'Looking down from the city to see my tribe is impossible. And the guards would never let us board an airboat.'
'But you can see the world from up there,' Knucklebones insisted. 'Not directly, but some ways, and getting up is no problem. Every door has a key. Trust a sewer rat.'
'No! No, I say!'
But it was too late, Sunbright saw the floating enclave reflected in Knucklebones's one eye. He wished he'd kept his mouth shut.
Chapter 5
'I can't get my head out!'
'Let me help.'
With small, strong hands, Knucklebones grabbed Sunbright's chin and forelock, and jerked. The barbarian yelped as his ears scraped between stacks of grain bags.
'Aggh! Lady of Silver, I could have done that!'
Gingerly he felt his ears, testing for blood.
'Cheap bribe, bad ride,' she told him flatly. 'Now hush up.'
'I can't hear you. My ears are shredded. How do we get out of here?'
Knucklebones pointed to a tiny sunlit window high up in the deserted warehouse. 'Scale the wall,' she said, 'slip through, and hope there's something soft to jump on outside.'
'Pandem's Pain, what fun. Go ahead.'
Sniffing, Knucklebones led the way. She felt cocky and happy now that they'd made it onto a floating enclave. Home, for her. Asking in Quagmire, she'd found a tavern, then a boatmaster with a shipment of grain bound for Ioulaum. There were many shipments as the city stocked up for winter before drifting south. The tipsy boatmaster had agreed, after haggling over the 'fare,' to pack them in a hollow behind sacks of rye. Sunbright had clamped down on his stomach as the air-boat lifted into the night sky, drifted, tacked, dropped and lurched in capricious air pockets, and finally docked, a mile in the air, at the spidery airdocks of Ioulaum. After his boat was towed into a warehouse, the boatmaster wandered off-after finishing the requisite paperwork-leaving the boat temporarily 'deserted.'
The thief scaled the wooden wall with fingers and toes, chuckling at how easy and familiar it felt, slid out the window, and circled to open a door so Sunbright could walk through. 'Sissy!' she teased.
'Sewer rat!'
'Hush up! I smell guards.'
Then she was flitting down damp, dark alleys like a moth while Sunbright splashed and stamped and huffed to keep up. As she listened at a corner, he asked, 'You've never been here before, correct? So how do you know your way around?'
'There are maps of all the enclaves in the libraries. When things got hot we studied them, trying to decide if moving was practical.'
'But where are we bound?'
'Thieves' Quarter.'
'How do you know there is one?'
She laughed, low and melodious. For all the aggravation, Sunbright was glad to hear her happy. It had been a long time since she'd laughed. Regrettably, that was his fault. He'd have to make up for the grief he'd caused her. For now, he plodded along without complaining.
It was dodgy, though, to stay calm. He was a creature of the earth, a groundling, and being a mile in the air unnerved him. Too, he couldn't banish the picture of Ioulaum shattering to fist-sized chunks from his mind's eye. True, the island wouldn't be destroyed for over three centuries, but still he felt it hung by a thread.
Through the warehouse district they tripped, avoiding city guards and night crews and dogs, sometimes skirting so close to the city's edge that Sunbright felt the yawning gap kiss his quaking knees. But finally they turned inward where lights and roistering marked taverns and food shops where workers wended after hours. Knucklebones told Sunbright to sit tight while she scouted. The barbarian propped his rump in a niche, folded his
