The beggar shrugged, his face falling. 'No harm. A guide, you say…?'
Cheyne nodded. Og's smile slowly returned.
'Muni? You'd better come out here…'
Muni awoke thrashing again, his dreams full of the evil djinn, the voice in his ears unfamiliar. He sat up on the low cot, fumbling for a lamp before he swung his feet onto the floor, the precaution ingrained by years of habit. Before he could find the strikebox and the tamp, Kifran lifted the tent door, a torch in his hand. Muni instantly came awake when the light struck him and he focused on the guard's grim face.
'Muje Javin did not come this morning. I waited for him until first light, then came to find him. He lies ill in his bed, and he asks for you.'
Kifran let the tent flap drop and waited for Muni to pull on his robes and boots. In another moment, they were both running toward Javin's tent, Muni reaching it first.
'My old friend… what happened?' Muni rasped, his voice heavy and the words coming hard. His old friend opened his gray eyes and tried to smile. Javin's face burned with fever, his flushed, sun-darkened skin drawn tautly over his angular features.
'How do you fight vermin?… They were here,' he said softly, barely lifting his hand and pointing toward the corner of the tent. Muni followed the gesture to a single scorpion lying dead on the dirt floor.
'Scorpion? Javin, when? When?' Muni shook his friend back to consciousness.
'I don't know. All night, I could not move. I fought them in my dreams.' He shuddered and fell silent.
Muni calmed himself, pushing down the thoughts of the irate Fascini, of the dig closing before they had found the Collector, of Javin dying here and now, and of his own helplessness to heal his old friend.
'No, no, Javin, you cannot die. We have too much to do, and you owe me a game of chess,' he assured, trying to smile.
Then he turned to Kifran, who still held the torch at the door. 'Where is Cheyne? Find him and go with him to fetch the doctor in the city.'
Kifran bowed, lit a lamp for Muni with the torch, and disappeared.
That's not ordinary vermin, thought the linguist, who was something of an unwilling expert on the subject, as he moved to examine the creature. The dead scorpion, a large brown one, lay curled into a ring, its poisonous tail embedded in its own head.
Ah. The Ninnites. So they have found him again, Muni raged silently, understanding the symbol. The scorpion had been magically summoned, a creature from some other realm, not the kind that roamed the site, or hunched in the dark crevices of walls in the city. A creature out of its element. The Ninnites had tracked Javin from one end of Almaaz to the other, even to his home in Argive. No matter how often he moved along, no matter where he dug next, they always found him, but up until now, he had always seen them coming. Javin was a careful man, but this particular dig had been too much of a distraction.
Muni moved back across the tent to his friend, who was murmuring in his sleep. He brought an earthenware cup to the fevered man's mouth, forcing the tepid water past his swollen lips, javin coughed a bit, and his eyes opened.
'I thank you. May your house be washed away in a flood of blessings.' He grinned, choking again on the water.
'Be still, my friend.' Muni poured some of the water onto a cloth and dabbed it to Javin's burning head. 'Cheyne will soon bring the physician, and you will feel much better. Yes, you will live this time.'
He found Javin's right hand, checked his pulse, relieved that it was strong. As he leaned over to place the archaeologist's hand back upon his chest, Muni also discovered the sting site: Javin's other hand lay by his side, the fingers swelled to three times their normal size, a small whitened whelp around a prick of dark blood on his ring finger. The wound appeared to be several hours old and looked horribly painful. Muni had seen a similar case before, when he had worked among the Fallaji mages-the poison would come and go, the wound would heal and fester, weakening the person until, eventually, it would sap their strength to the point that there was no more healing. Gangrene followed rapidly.
'You can recover, my friend. But listen to me, Javin: we will have to remove the finger, else the poison will spread. I'll bring more water for the fever. Just rest,' he whispered.
'No, Muni, I will be all right. Already, I am feeling better. There is no need to take the finger. And I must tell you… what I saw in the dreams… The man with no face. The Raptor. I could not move; I was powerless. He meant to kill me this time. I am the last one, you see. But it's all clear now; someone has told him about Cheyne. Where is Cheyne?' He sat up in the cot.
'Save your strength, my friend. The one after your son is Saelin. Yes, he is the chiefest of the Ninnite assassins, but he has failed once already; he will fail again. He is not so good as he thinks he is,' Muni said, hushing him.
'No, you don't understand…' Javin protested.
'Muni-* Kifran opened the tent flap and held up his hand, a couple of pages from Cheyne's drawing tablet in it. 'Javin's son is missing. All I could find were these.'
5
'Hey-ho, Og-been bathing again out of season?' the swarthy barkeeper shouted as Og and Cheyne came into the raqa bar, its lewdly painted walls a record of anatomical wonder and its sawdust floors dangerous with giant, cracked zebramussel shells and fishbones.
It was too early yet for the midday crowd; only one other customer, a hooded man smoking an ancient pipe, sat in the corner, his hand rising as slowly as his smoke when Og nodded absently to him. They found a table near the door and sat down. Cheyne blew crumbs away from his side of the well-worn oilskin tablecover, the remains of last night's repast yet to be cleared from it. Og never noticed the puddle of sour raqa he dragged his sleeve through as he raised his hand for service.
'Pay no attention to the thrull behind the counter,' said Og, annoyed.
When the man came out, Og signaled for two glasses and a bottle, but Cheyne shook his head, amending the request for water and two loaves of bappir instead. The barkeep gave him a smile and boxed Og on the ears as he went to fetch the much more expensive order.
'What did he mean, 'bathing again'?' said Cheyne, smiling, his tone wary. 'You weren't by chance waiting down there in the well on purpose for me, thinking you'd get that drink after all?'
Og looked mightily wounded. 'By the three sisters and the Five Most Sacred Vows, I was not!' he declared, thumping the table. 'I drown for no man.'
'Then…'
'I'll tell you about it sometime. Later,' said Og, the water carafe arriving. Apparently it was not often used- the vessel looked to be the cleanest thing in the shop. Cheyne poured for himself, but Og declined, frowning.
'Never touch the stuff. Not safe,' he said, wringing his cloak out over the sawdust.
His throat now thoroughly parched, Cheyne ignored him and drank deeply, poured another glass, and drank all of it as well. He put one of the big round loaves of bread into his pack and tore into the other, offering half of it to Og, who took it eagerly, but did not eat. When Cheyne leaned forward on his low, cane stool, Og began his finest pitch.
'You seem a man of means and substance. Why is it you need to go across the western erg?' he quizzed.
'You have sobered up. How did you know that's the direction I'm going?' said Cheyne, amazed.
'You've been here in the city all morning, probably arrived before dawn. AH the hunting guides go out before six bells, and it's past ten bells now. The only reason they wouldn't have taken you wherever you desired-for an extremely inflated price, I might add- is because they refuse to go where you ask for any price. And if they would not go there, it must be someplace very dangerous and far away. That would have to be in the direction of the western erg. The guides will not go into Wyrvil territory since the massacre,' Og explained succinctly, sounding like one of Cheyne's better instructors at the Argivian institute.
The young man smiled, guessing where this was leading. 'And how long have you been a guide, Og?'
