The Bird of the River (17 page)

"We never had books." Eliss gazed into her teacup. It reflected branches and sky. "When Alder was a baby we lived for a while in a building with a lot of other people. There was an old man there, he'd been a scholar, and he still had some books. He taught me to read. So I can read signs and public notices and things. I started a novel once, but we had to move before I could finish it."

"What novel?"

"It was called
The Silvergilts of Delairia.
It was about this family who had been rich, but now they were poor, and they lived in this old falling-down house."

"Sounds like the Diamondcuts." Krelan chuckled.

"But they were
nice
. They were nice to each other and they figured out ways to get by, you know, the father built a little boat and caught fish for dinner, and dug clams, and the little girl of the family painted pictures on clamshells and sold them, and that brought in money. The mother would make big pots of soup out of whatever they had, and they'd all share." Eliss remembered vividly her longing to slip into the book and be part of that family.

"And you never finished it?"

Eliss pressed her lips together, shaking her head. She didn't want to remember that night, when Falena had pulled her out of bed and told her not to make a sound, and wrapped her in a blanket and carried her outside to the back of a cart. Eliss had waited, clutching Alder in her arms, as Falena and Uncle Paver ran back and forth in the dark loading bundles on the cart. She had finally fallen asleep on the long jolting ride through darkness that followed. She had long ago forgotten the reason they had had to run away, but her grief at losing
The Silvergilts
was still a vivid ache.

"Well, perhaps you'll find another copy, someday. Ah! Here's our order." Krelan moved the tea things to one side as the server brought their tray.

THE HOT BREAD WITH HONEY was so delicious Eliss had to restrain herself from eating it all. She managed to keep back a slice for Alder, wrapped in the greased paper that had lined the tray and slipped into her pocket. Krelan observed but did not comment.

"Now," said Krelan as they left, "what's next? Shall we look for an offering?"

"Yes, please."

He led her next door to a low-ceilinged shop whose sign reading SOUVENIRS AND OFFERINGS READY-MADE was half obscured by lichen. Inside were racks and racks of offerings, both in iron and tin, shaped like everything imaginable. Eliss lingered by the rack of family groupings, sorting through them. All had a father and mother figure, and every possible number and combination of children, but there were none featuring children alone.

"May I help you, miss?" An old woman appeared out of the shadows behind the counter.

"Don't you have a boy and a girl?"

"Over there." The woman pointed behind Eliss and went to pull out a pair of figures, slightly smaller than the father and mother figures.

"Oh." Eliss examined it. "I need one where the boy is smaller than the girl."

The proprietress glanced over at Krelan, who was lingering at a display of offerings shaped like weapons. She stepped closer and spoke in an undertone. "He's not
that
short, dear."

"No, it's for me and my little brother," said Eliss, feeling her face grow hot.

"Oh." The proprietress raised her eyebrows. "I can put one together. Just a moment."

She retreated behind the counter and Eliss heard subdued metallic noises. A moment later the proprietress returned with a pair of single figures hooked together with little metal rings, a girl and a smaller boy. "There you are, dear. Anything else today?"

"Just these," said Krelan, setting down a sheet-iron dagger on the counter. "We're together."

"Two silver bits, then, sir."

They took their offerings and walked out, but there was still a long line of people waiting to get to the Forge. Krelan glanced at them, and then at the clerk's office.

"Let's go ask, first."

The clerk's office was a long low building back under the copper trees, -- its doorposts were cast to look like trees too, reaching bas-relief branches up into the roofline. A young man was just emerging. He wore a leather apron and had a pair of steel pens thrust through the topknot in his hair.

"You would be the clerk," said Krelan, in the same confident and slightly bullying voice he'd used with the tavern server.

"The Assistant Clerk, sir, actually." The boy wrung his hands and bowed. "My master's at the Forge. If you'd like to wait--"

"No, no, -- you'll do. I require information." Krelan slapped his coin pouch. Eliss wondered how long it would be before the Assistant Clerk noticed Krelan was small and shabby and had a ridiculous mustache.

"What information, sir?" The Assistant Clerk was still bowing and averting his gaze.

"I'm resolving the affairs of Encilian Diamondcut. He journeyed upriver some half-year since. His lord father wishes to know what he spent on an offering, the precise date and amount, if you please."

"Oh! I remember him. Yes, sir." The Assistant Clerk hurried back inside the office. Krelan strode after him. Eliss followed, marveling at what a mere tone of voice could accomplish. The Assistant Clerk ran his finger along the spines of a shelf full of ledgers. He pulled one down and carried it to the desk.

"Here, sir. It was at Winter Solstice. Very crowded then, but of course you remember something like one of the Diamondcuts visiting. Here it is." He turned the ledger around for Krelan's inspection and ran his finger down one of the columns, stopping at an entry in red ink. "Just there."

"Hmmmm." Krelan frowned magisterially. "What's this? A miserable ten copper bits spent?" The Assistant Clerk seemed to shrink.

"I'm sorry, sir, one must record the truth. He bought one of the tin offerings from the shop. A male figure."

"His father will not be pleased."

"I wish I had better to report of the young gentleman, sir. I would have thought, with that pleasure-boat and all, he'd have offered something more fitting his illustrious name, but--"

"A pleasure-boat?"

"Well, sir, yes, sir, he had his little pleasure-craft, not one of the big party boats, you know, more of the sort the gentry race in. The
Fire-Swift
, it was called. Very fine."

"I see. And was he with a party of revelers?"

"No, sir, he was alone. But he had a manservant, of course."

"Lord Diamondcut expresses his gratitude," said Krelan, tossing a gold crown piece onto the ledger. "He would, however, prefer that this disgrace of parsimony went unrecorded. Can the entry be blotted out?"

The Assistant Clerk looked up beseechingly. "Oh, sir, we can't-- it has to be the absolute truth, the gods are so near here after all and--well--"

"That will grieve Lord Diamondcut. Consider it carefully, Assistant Clerk. Ask yourself whether a bit of spilled ink to obscure a line constitutes a falsehood." Krelan turned and stalked out, leaving the Assistant Clerk stammering apologies. He took Eliss's arm and hummed a jubilant little tune.

"Now,
that
was gold well spent," he muttered to Eliss.

"Was it?"

"I just found out a great deal. No one told me he'd taken the
Fire-Swift
. Or that he had a servant with him. And he got this far!"

"So ... do you think the servant killed him and took the boat?"

"Anything's possible," Krelan said, in a lowered voice as they walked down toward the Forge. "A damned stupid servant, if he did. It'll certainly make my job easier."

Eliss thought about what Krelan's job would entail, and shuddered. It didn't seem right to dwell on such things here. They took their place in line and waited. Most of the
Bird's
crew seemed to have made their offerings and gone back to the barge, -- Eliss saw no one she knew in line. At the doorway stood the priest's clerk, with a tablet and stylus. As each pilgrim stepped up to the door he took down their name and offering.

The woman with an iron loom went in and emerged shortly afterward. The man with an iron caravan-cart went next. After him went the family, a mother and father and three adolescent boys, the youngest carrying their cutout sheet iron representation. Waiting, Eliss watched the firelight from inside playing on the stone posts of the doorway. She clutched her offering self-consciously, wishing Alder had come with her.

The family emerged, talking quietly among themselves. "You can go next, if you like," said Krelan.

"Name, please?" inquired the clerk.

"Eliss Hammertin."

"And you have brought?"

Eliss held up her offering, not sure what to say. The clerk nodded and scored characters quickly into the tablet. He waved her inside. She walked in through the doorposts.

The Forge was a wide room, low-ceilinged and opening at the back under the very biggest tree. Leaning against its trunk was a boy wearing only a loincloth, his hair slicked up with oil so it looked like flames dancing on his head. His palms were gilded with paint. His face was as serene as though he dreamed. He was effortlessly juggling flaming coals, keeping a circle of them in the air.

To one side was the Forge itself. It looked like any blacksmith's forge in any city anywhere, but for the fact that it was much bigger. The priest, heating a bit of iron in the fire, seemed likewise twice as big as any man Eliss had ever seen. She felt like a child as she approached the anvil.

The priest turned to her. He was as dark with soot as the juggling boy was fair, but his light eyes burned in his face. Something about him reminded Eliss of Captain Glass. He looked at her searchingly.

"What have you made with your life, Child of the Sun?" His voice was hoarse.

"This, Father." Eliss laid the tin figures on the altar. "There's just me and my little brother now. Our mother died. I'm taking care of him as much as I can. It's all I have, so far."

He looked down at the two little figures. "That is what you're making of the end of your mother's life, child. What will you make of your own?"

Eliss thought about it. "I'm working on the
Bird of the River,"
she said. "I watch out for dangers. Snags and things. It's a good job. I'd like to stay."

The priest grunted. He took the pair of cutouts and, reaching up, hung them in the lowest branches of the great tree. Looking up, Eliss saw that it was festooned with offerings.

"Good. Work hard, Child of the Sun."

"I will, Father."

"Come and be kissed by True Fire."

Eliss stepped close to the Forge. The priest took her hand and passed it through the dancing flames. "Receive the blessing and go in peace."

SHE WAITED AFTERWARD while Krelan went in. They walked back down toward the quay together in silence, both thoughtful.

Several more boats had drawn up to the quay and souvenir vendors were now walking back and forth, hawking charms from trays of amulets and medallions, -- tiny copper trees, tiny anvils, even carefully packaged lumps of slag. Pilgrims were waiting to get off boats or get back aboard boats. Krelan suddenly unlinked his arm from Eliss's.

"That's the landing master's office, isn't it?" he said, nodding in the direction of a booth on the quay. "Would you mind very much waiting here? I'm going to see whether the
Fire-Swift
posted a destination."

"Go ahead." Eliss watched him stride away through the crowd. She turned and looked down on the
Bird of the River
. There were all the people she knew, returning to their places after receiving their blessings: Salpin lighting up a pipe on the afterdeck, concertina in his lap. Mr. Riveter carrying a keg of something on his shoulder, heading down the companionway. Mrs. Crucible hanging up wet laundry on the rail. Pentra Smith taking her seat under her sunshade, cutting a fresh point on a reed pen. Wolkin and Alder sitting together at the rail, talking earnestly.

Eliss had an eerie sense of disconnectedness from them, as though they were characters in a play she was watching.
This was the end of Mama's life,
she thought.
What
do
I want
to
do with my own?
Not that the poor ever had much of a choice, -- you took what you could get in life, and were grateful if you got anything. All the same--

"Saw you going in," said someone at her shoulder. Eliss turned and saw the oldest of the adolescent boys in the family who had gone into the Forge before her.

"That's right," she said, and turned her gaze back to the
Bird of the River
.

"So ... are you a widow or something?"

Startled, she looked back at him. "No. Why are you asking, anyway?"

"Because I saw you didn't have a husband on your offering. Just you and a little boy. So I wondered if you needed money."

"I have money, thank you." Eliss turned away from him, pulling her shawl close.

"I mean, I wondered if you ever did things for money." The boy sidled around into her field of vision.

"No." She was more startled than offended. He was trying to proposition a girl
here
, of all places? She started to walk away from him, but he followed and grabbed her arm.

"Sure? Because you could make two gold crowns. We could go over to the ruins, nobody'd see us. Look." He held out the coins in his palm.

"No. Really." Eliss tried to pull her arm loose. He wouldn't let go. "Take your hand off me. I mean it."

He looked scared but mastered himself enough to grin at her. "O-or what? What'll you do, beggar girl?"

"This." Eliss showed him what Uncle Ironbolt had taught her to do if she was ever grabbed. His face went a nasty color and he doubled up, clutching himself.

"How dare you insult my wife!" shouted Krelan, appearing suddenly beside her.

"What have you done to my son?" screamed the boy's mother, racing toward them with the rest of his family close behind.

"He propositioned me," said Eliss. "At the Forge!"

"She's lying, I didn't--" the boy said, gasping.

"He'd never do such a thing!" The mother leaned in threateningly. Eliss leaned away.