Bolutu.'
'You found him!' they cried.
Dastu nodded. 'He's down in the liquor vault, and he's in a bad way. That change he was expecting? Well I think it's started, mates. And he says he's got to tell you something before it's done, Pazel. Somethin' about Rose — about 'how to get the better of Rose.' He won't say more than that to me.'
'Why didn't you bring him here?' said Neeps, looking at Dastu nervously.
'Bring him?' Lord Rin, mate, you'll see! Pazel, you've got to come down there! It's safe, for the time being. There's nobody in the Abandoned House. And I think we can manage without a lamp.'
'We'll all go,' said Neeps.
'Come on, Undrabust!' said Dastu, more high-strung than Pazel had ever seen him. 'This ain't the dead of night. What'll our story be if we're caught? What if that guard decides to tell somebody that we all charged out of here together?'
'I am going,' said Thasha. 'If Bolutu's really got something to do with Ramachni, I have to be there.'
Dastu squirmed with impatience. 'Whoever's going has to come with me now. You don't know what's going on in there!'
Pazel turned to Neeps and Marila. 'It'll be four bells in, what, twenty minutes? Come after us then, if we're not back. Just take the long way around, and for Rin's sake, don't let anyone see you on the scuttle! All right, Dastu, let's go.'
Before Neeps could think of another objection, Pazel, Thasha and Dastu stepped out of the room. Neeps watched them until they passed the guard, then shut the door and whirled around.
'Twenty minutes!' he said to Marila. 'I'll go plum mad, worrying about them! Damn and blast, I still don't trust that Bolutu, even if he does have the scar. And you were a big help! Couldn't you have said something?'
Marila walked up to him with a scowl, as though prepared to resume their fight. But instead she placed her pale cheek against his darker one, and stood there, blinking, until he put his arms around her shoulders. 'When are you going to tell me why you really stowed away?' he said.
'Soon,' said Marila.
Five or six minutes passed. One of their stomachs growled. Jorl and Suzyt padded in circles, whining for Thasha.
Suddenly Marila tensed, and raised her head.
'How could Bolutu get inside the vault?' she said. 'Pazel locked it after the council meeting, with the master key. He said so.'
Neeps stared at her. A terrible notion seemed to be blossoming within him, broader and fouler by the second. He let go of Marila. Then he charged for the door and threw it open and ran, not caring who saw him or where they thought he was going.
'I've got matches,' whispered Dastu, 'but let's go as far as we can without 'em. The light could give us away.'
'I don't need any light,' said Thasha. 'I could find that room in my sleep.'
They were at the bottom of the Silver Stair. Voices reached them from the mercy deck, but they were far forwards, barely to be heard. They passed the spot where Jervik had accosted Pazel, then the smoke cellar, the paint room, the stacks of anonymous freight. Dastu was right: the path to the scuttle was perfectly clear.
'I wasn't expecting anything like this,' Pazel murmured. 'Bolutu didn't sound worried about changing back into himself. In fact I thought he was looking forward to it.'
'He shouldn't have been,' said Dastu grimly. 'Quiet now, we're almost there.'
Silent as thieves, they crept down the scuttle and into the Abandoned House. The smells, the slop of bilge, the maze of narrow passages were unchanged from the night before — and after the first turn, so was the blackness. The three youths linked hands, and groped slowly forwards. At last they reached the door of the liquor vault.
Pazel heard a creak. 'It's open,' whispered Dastu. But not the least glimmer of light came from the vault. Dastu whispered urgently: 'Say there, Bolutu! I've brought them. Pathkendle, and Thasha both. Where are you?'
No reply but the splash of the bilge. 'He had a lamp,' whispered Dastu, moving forwards. Then he stopped abruptly, as if he had stubbed a toe. 'Oh Pitfire,' he said. 'Come in, quick. Tell me when the blary door's shut.'
Still holding the elder tarboy's hand, Pazel stopped, making Thasha pause as well. Something was different about the room now. Was it the smell, the temperature? He couldn't be sure. But he knew he did not want to go into the room. He started to let go of Dastu — but the older boy's hand tightened sharply.
'Didn't you hear?' he said, voice sharp with anger. 'I said tell me when the door is shut!'
Dastu gave a savage tug. As Pazel crashed forwards, a knee struck him so hard in the stomach that he could not even cry out. Another blow landed on the back of his head, and he fell. When he regained his senses a moment later someone was lighting a lamp, and a heavy boot was on his chest. He began to rise, but the boot stomped with terrible violence, and at the same time a cold blade touched his throat. It was a broadsword, old, weather-stained, sharp as a razor. At the other end of it was Captain Rose.
'The door is shut,' said a second voice.
Pazel moaned with rage and frustration. The voice was Sandor Ott's. He turned his head and saw the spymaster holding Thasha from behind, one hand pulling her hair, making her arch her back and thrust her chin at the ceiling; the other holding his long white knife against her side.
36
9 Umbrin 941
Diadrelu felt like weeping, though she could not have said if it was with grief or joy. How they commingle, those pure extremes, whenever one feels them fully.
Two yards from her, Felthrup sat with his head on his forepaws, his throat still puffy with Dr Chadfallow's water injection, the blood from whatever battles he had survived stiff and dry in his black fur. His eyes had opened very slowly a moment ago, and were open still. But Dri knew they did not see her.
'I thought he was gone,' she said. 'I feared Mugstur had killed him at last.'
Hercol reached through the bars. She turned and leaned into his palm with a sigh. 'We are all of us exiles,' she said. 'That is what binds us: our not-belonging, our homelessness. The way our natural kin have turned on us, or turned us out, or become so strange to us that we no longer fit. But none of us are so exiled as he. Back on the Nelu Peren he begged us, begged us to accept him as a friend. My brother responded by locking him in a pipe.'
'You responded differently,' said Hercol. 'If he dies now, he at least will have known what it is to be cared for.'
Dri raised her arms in his direction. Hercol lifted her through the bars and kissed her forehead, ever so gently. When he withdrew she bent double, placed her palms flat on his open hand, and there before his worshipful eyes pressed up into a handstand, perfectly balanced and still. She smiled, crossed her legs. Hercol breathed a sigh.
'Diadrelu Tammariken,' he said, 'you're the marriage of all the dreams of women my heart has entertained.'
She laughed, gazing down at his palm. 'You yourself are not quite as perfect as all that,' she said. 'Just perfect enough for me to believe that you're real, and that you might stay with me awhile.'
'Awhile?' he said. 'After I leave this cell, I hope never to know another morning when I wake and do not find you beside me.'
'And the incomprehension of your people? And mine?'
'You spoke the answer,' he said. 'We're exiles already. We're a new people. Mongrels now, later the creators of a race.'
'The warrior becomes a visionary.' Dri lowered her legs with the same perfect control, and reclined as before
