The seated old man moved his hands, in dirty darned gloves, and out of the thin air between them bloomed a ball of colours. And birds flew out of it, white, like pigeons. They flew up, and I thought Oh God, what will happen to them here? Because I hadn’t seen a single bird or animal in the City that wasn’t stone. Not even a fly. And never trees, or any flowers – only those red things called Immortals.
However, the birds dissolved in light. They hadn’t been real.
And of course, then I thought of how Argul had taken the living sparrow out of Teil’s ear.
But I wasn’t going to cry any more.
The children were laughing and pointing. Little rabbits made of light were jumping round their ankles. (Had they ever seen rabbits?) And there were some smiles from the adults, too. Even – my God – one of the slaves was smiling. Hey!
The darker old man leaning on the pillar was giving me a funny look. The other one abruptly shouted three very strong words.
The crowd didn’t take much notice. They didn’t know these words weren’t polite, as I hadn’t when I used to hear them first.
‘Tronking okk grulps!’
Oddly, the second darker old man turned and thumped, with surprising force, the other old man on the chest.
And the other old man roared in a hurt voice: ‘Watch it, Mehm. She’s h—’
‘Then don’t make a scene, man.’
I wasn’t standing on the street any more. I was floating up and up. Like the magical chemical lights Argul’s scientist-magician mother must have taught him how to make.
He was getting to his feet now, the doddery seated old man. Of the three, he could have won a prize for the disgustingness of his beard. He took some time, too, so stiff and ungainly.
The children were clamouring for more tricks. Instead he was handing each of them an apple baked in toffee, from Peshamba, probably. And to each adult – and slave – a Peshamban chocolate sweet in coloured paper.
Then he came grunting and hobbling over, snuffling, leering, his ghastly mucky beard flapping, until he stood in front of me, and I had to look up to reach his eyes.
Behind him, Mehmed and Ro slapped each other (clouds of filth rose) and guffawed. The children were prancing and tearing chunks out of the toffee apples. The adults were wonderingly unwrapping their sweets. It broke your heart. You could see they too had never been given anything very nice, and never for free.
‘Hallo, Claidi-sheepy-baa,’ said Argul, through his brilliant disguise, the cakes of make-up and mud and horsehair stuck on his face. ‘Got yourself in a mess again, I gather.’
‘Yes, Argul.’
‘Don’t cry. I never saw you cry.’
‘It’s the rain.’
‘Oh yeah. Of course.’
In the porch of a building, out of the rain, we spoke so quickly to each other, as if there was no time. But as the Peshamban CLOCK said, There’s time enough for everything.
(Through the rain, I could see my slaves and guard, still unmoving at the edge of the square, waiting, presumably noticing me talking to this wild old man, and not knowing what went on.)
‘Why did you follow me? You were so angry—’
‘That changed. And I didn’t trust him. So. It took a while to get here. He’d talked a lot about his perfect City and glorious Wolf Tower. Can’t miss it, can you. What an eyesore. Wolves aren’t like that.’
‘No … What are they like?’
He laughed. ‘Still Claidi. They’re brave and loyal. They fight when they have to, or they don’t fight. They like each other and stick together. Hulta. That’s wolves.’
‘Argul—’
‘I saw you ditched your guard. If we just walk slowly, maybe—’
‘No, I’ve thought about all that. They won’t let me go. If I got away, they’d come after. It’s their rotten Law.’
‘We have to take the chance. I’ve brought Sirree. Yes, she’s well. She missed you.’
‘I missed her. Oh, Sirree—’
I stood gazing at this dirty wreck who was HIM.
In the holes and tatters of his shirt, I saw the glass charm winking.
‘I can’t, Argul. It’s too dangerous.’
‘Chicken.’
‘I am. And for you, too. I don’t want you to get hurt.’
He put his hand up over the charm. ‘See this,’ he said.
‘Yes, I remember.’
‘Remember I looked at it when you were in the Sheeper chariot?’
‘Yes.’
‘It tells me things. My mother – she said if ever I saw – if I saw a woman who meant something to me—’ He stopped.
He was embarrassed. Here, in the middle of all this. I looked down, to give him a chance. And he said, ‘The stuff in the bulb, that you think looks like glass, is a chemical. It reacts if I do. I mean, if the feeling is real. And it does react, Claidi.’ He slipped the charm-which-wasn’t off, and held it in his hand, and I saw the glass-which-wasn’t turn cloudy, and then a kind of movement happened inside. That was all. But it was love I was looking at.
I thought how Mehmed had whooped when he leaned over and saw it too, and threw a knife and caught it in his teeth.
‘Argul, I daren’t go with you. I mean, I do want to—’
‘You’ve said this before. Look what happened.’
‘Do you know,’ I asked him, ‘about the Law?’
‘Yes. We’re foreigners, they can have a moan to us. I know all of it and it’s—’ he said a word I hadn’t ever heard before.
‘Well,’ I faltered, ‘then you see—’
‘Claidi,’ said Argul. ‘Do you really believe two dice rolling about and some old books of rubbish can tell a whole city to live like this, in terror? You saw those kids over there. And the rest of them. Dice aren’t wicked. Books aren’t. People can be. People caused this.’
Something clicked in my mind. I can’t describe it any other way. I stood
