change is just another way of accomplishing the familiar. Show them with little things first. It only seems to take longer.”
“Sir … it only seems…?”
“When you fight to change people’s minds, they resist. When people resist, it takes longer.” Quaeryt laughed. “Now I’m the one who must apologize for acting like a chorister of the Nameless. And I do apologize.”
“There is no need to apologize to me, sir … and I do thank you for bringing the missive to me. Will you be staying at the Ecoliae?”
“For a few days, a week, perhaps a little longer.” After a smile, the scholar added, “I should not keep you longer, and I do need to get my mount out of the sun.”
“Oh … yes, sir. Thank you again.” Lankyt nodded a last time, then hurried off clutching the missive in his hands.
Quaeryt walked down from the porch and untied the mare from the old iron hitching rail, thinking about the differences between the three sons.
As if he had been watching, Gaestnyr reappeared from the west end of the porch. “If you would follow me, sir?”
“I’d be happy to, thank you.”
As he led the mare behind young Gaestnyr around to the west end of the main building, presumably to the stable, and then to his quarters, his eyes ranged across the hillside below. Hot as the day was, he saw the signs of how far north Tilbor was. There were far fewer leafy trees, and those that he saw were mainly oaks and maples, while there were evergreens everywhere. Did the kind of trees affect people? Did those who lived around prickly evergreens tend to be more stiff and sharp?
He suspected he would find out before too long.
25
Once he had inspected his chamber, which was larger than the one he had occupied in Solis, as well as cleaner, although it had double shutters, which suggested that the winter would be cold indeed, and left his small amount of gear, Quaeryt reclaimed the mare from the small stable and started on his way down the lane.
To his right, farther west, were larger dwellings, the northern equivalent of villas, with thick walls and windows far smaller than those customary in Solis, or even in Nacliano. None was located on the actual crests of hills, but just slightly down from them, and most had a southern orientation. The lanes leading to them from the roads were angled to climb gently, and the roads themselves were not in the lowest part of the vales.
He could also easily see the Telaryn Palace-what had been the Khanar’s Palace until ten years before, when Lord Chayar had taken Tilbora from the west-since it was situated on the highest of the low hills to the north of the city, and its extensive nondescript gray walls and square towers stood out above the golden grasses on the hillsides below. The lower hills flanking the palace were covered with evergreens and held no dwellings or structures that Quaeryt could see, suggesting that they had been reserved for the use of the Khanar-and now probably for the governor.
Quaeryt wasn’t about to ride up to the palace-not yet. He wanted to ride through Tilbora and find out what he could before meeting Governor Rescalyn, and he turned the mare eastward onto the narrow but brick-paved road that appeared to lead into the center of Tilbora. For the first half mille or so, the way was bordered by modest dwellings with gardens, but there were no walled gardens or even walled courtyards the way there were in Solis. Even Nacliano had some walled courtyards. Quaeryt saw none. He also saw no grapes or figs, and every courtyard garden in Solis had some variety of one or the other.
He saw wooden rail fences, and occasional stone and brick walls that were between knee-high and chest- high. The dwellings were smaller and more modest the closer he got to town, but none were built wall-to-wall as they were in other cities he had visited.
After riding another half mille, he came to a brick-paved circle, a crossroads of sorts, in that two roads did cross, but various shops and other structures had been built all the way around the edge of the paved circle, leaving four equal arcs of buildings, each arc set between two roads. More than that, there was … something about the buildings. None quite looked like those he had passed earlier. All had narrower but longer windows, and every door had an iron grate that closed over it, although all were swung back at the moment. The types of shops seemed normal enough. He could pick out a small woolen shop, a tinsmith’s, a fuller, a cooper. One “quarter” held an inn, and the signboard suggested it had been named something different before, because the peeling paint revealed traces of another name, but not enough for Quaeryt to read it.
A woman emptied a bucket of water on the bricks before a shop and then used a worn broom to sweep away dirt and other less benign objects.
He couldn’t tell, and he wasn’t about to stop and ask. Not at the moment, anyway.
He kept riding, and before that long the narrow road ended at a stone-paved square that served the harbor area. At the east end was a knee-high seawall, also of the same gray stone. The mortar was cracking and missing in places in the wall, and the paving stones were uneven, as if they had not been reset in years. One pier jutted out from the south end of the square, a second from the north end, and a third and smaller pier was set farther to the north.
Quaeryt rode around the edge of the square, past a chandlery and a cafe of sorts, and all manner of small shops, a number of which bore signboards sporting painted fish. There were fewer women than men on the narrow streets and sidewalks, and most of the women he saw looked older. He kept riding, going up one street and down another, but avoiding the alleys, and eventually ended up back at the harbor square, where he reined up, trying to think over what he’d seen.
The harbor area was far smaller than that of Nacliano, stretching little more than six or seven blocks north and south and three or four to the west from the three piers, none of which approached the length of the smallest in Nacliano, or even the short coastal pier in Solis. In reality, the piers were not even that, but wooden wharves built on what looked to be rough-stripped tree trunks sunk into the harbor floor.
“You’d be looking for something, sir?” The inquiry came from another of the olive-green-clad city patrollers as he walked toward Quaeryt.
“I’m new here, and I was just riding to get my bearings.” Quaeryt paused just slightly. “You don’t have harbor patrollers here, do you?”
“No, sir. Why would we need them?” The patroller looked up at Quaeryt. His face was lined and ruddy, and his square-cut beard held streaks of gray.
“The last port I was in was Nacliano, and they had harbor patrollers. I’ve never been here before and didn’t know if it might be the same.”
The patroller smiled. “We’d not be needing them. Our folk don’t take to rowdiness or theft or any of that foolishness. We’re here for the times they need a mite of assistance.”
“That’s good to know.”
“You need a good stable … you might try Thayl’s place. It’s two blocks west of the small pier.”
Quaeryt smiled at the indirect suggestion that he needed to move on. “If I do, I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you.” He flicked the reins and guided the mare northward in the general direction of Thayl’s, not that he intended to stop there.
When he reached a point opposite the smallest wharf, he did turn the mare in the direction suggested by the patroller. After a single block, he began to grin. Just before Thayl’s stable was another building, one with open second-floor windows. Several of the windows were adorned-if that were the proper term-with women wearing the sheerest of cotton shifts or blouses, and some of those blouses were not fastened in the slightest.
The building had no signboard, but then it needed none, and he could see why Thayl might do a fair business stabling mounts for a short period of time. He rode by and took in the scenery. He’d seen better, and he’d seen worse, and in some places, like Nacliano, there wasn’t much difference between places like the Sailrigger
