The price of victory- - Thieves World 13 (90 page)

"Please, To—1 mean, Master Bakarat, calm yourself. My plan is as wise an investment as most. I am putting my entire life's savings into this venture, and I am opening up this proposal to let some of you in on it from the beginning. All I need is the capital to buy the land, the proper equipment, and hire the laborers. I supply the vines and the supervision of the vineyard. I offer the investors a forty percent share of the first five years' profits, after the wine becomes sellable. In the meantime, I offer the same percentage for all the existing wine we sell over the next three years. Gentlemen, you cannot lose."

"What makes you think you're qualified to run a vineyard?" Bakarat exclaimed.

"The fact that, with my husband, I operated the most successful vine yard in the Rankan Empire—the Aquinta!" Mariat countered the fat merchant. "Who do you think helped my husband all through the years with the operation of the winery? I even ran it alone when he was gone for long periods on business."

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It was obvious that the other merchants were rapidly becoming con vinced.

"This is madness, I tell you," Bakarat continued, oblivious of all rea son himself. "There is no place to plant a vineyard in Sanctuary!"

"No, not in the city proper," Mariat agreed. "But outside the walls there lies tillable land that has lain fallow for years. I have examined the land and the soil, and found plots in the hills and the upper swamps which will be suitable for grapes, given the proper drainage and irriga tion."

She pointed to the maps that Keldrick had drawn, and showed the men where she planned to set up the winery.

"That's government land," the Toad shouted. "You won't be able to buy that for the price of your entire stock of vintage!"

"As a matter of fact," Molin Torchholder interceded, "she will be able to purchase it for the price of its back taxes. As the minister in charge of land development, I see no reason why this land should be unused. I have heard Madame Mariat's proposal, and I am ready to enter into an agree ment with her on behalf of the prince. Who is with me?"

The merchants all stood and shouted their willingness to participate.
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Bakarat was absolutely livid.

"I warn you," he threatened his associates, "if you enter into a pact with this woman, you will regret it."

"Master Toad," Mariat said in disdain. The merchant whirled on her, not believing that she would dare to address him so.

480 STEALERS' SKY

"This brings me to a bit of unpleasant business which I had hoped to delay until after the meeting. However, your arrogance and threats leave me no choice."

She opened the door and called into the hallway.

"Commander Walegrin, would you be so kind as to step in here, please?"

Mariat played her final card as the officer in charge of the city garrison strode into the room. Walegrin was followed by two of his men, one of whom was supporting the weak-looking figure of Sinn the minstrel.

"Commander, please perform your office." Mariat stepped back as Walegrin approached the completely dumbfounded Bakarat.
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"I hereby place you, Bakarat the merchant, under arrest for conspiracy to commit kidnapping and extortion."

Fear struck the Toad for the first time.

"You can't do this to me," the fat man whined and objected. "You've got no evidence, no proof."

"Master Sinn," Walegrin asked, "would you be so kind as to affirm that you witnessed a conversation between Bakarat and three ruffians we now have in custody, in which the said Bakarat contracted their services to kidnap Mariat's grandchildren?"

"I do confirm it." Sinn managed to grate out the words between pain clenched teeth. Though his broken ribs had been set and taken care of, he was not supposed to be up and about for another few weeks. He had insisted on coming, however, to play his part in the Toad's arrest.

Bakarat finally realized he was beaten, for the moment. He bowed his head in silence as Walegrin's guards bound his wrists. But as he left the room, the Toad lifted his ugly head to give Mariat one final, withering look of hatred and malice.

His glare said better than any words that he would not rest until he
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had paid her back for this indignity.

"Don't worry about this dung heap, madame,'* Walegrin said as he shoved Bakarat out of the room. "He's going to be keeping the rats in the dungeon company for a very long time. I hope they won't be offended by his moving in on them."

Walegrin and his men left the room with their prisoner, and Dansea, the innkeeper's wife, came in and helped Sinn back to his room.

Mariat turned to the merchants.

"Well, friends, are we ready to drink a toast to the Aquinta Cartel?'*

They all agreed heartily. Darseeya and Timock came in on cue, bring ing a bottle of fine Aquinta vintage, and the pact was sealed with a drink.

Later, Lord Torchholder witnessed the more formal written agreement as the merchants signed their names to support Mariat's proposal. And so the Aquinta Cartel was formed and officialized.

It was a beautiful day in the spring of Sanctuary as Mariat and her three grandchildren overlooked the land recently purchased by the Aquinta Cartel.

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"There is so much work to be done," Mariat said to Keldrick, Dar seeya, and Timock. "And we must never shirk from hard work. For on this land, we will build the new Aquinta."

"Keldrick," she said, bringing the boy around to face her. "You are the man of this family now. You must learn to lead as you have learned to be a man. I know you can, for you are the true son of your father and grandfather."

She paused and looked down at the run-down farmhouse which would soon be refurbished to be their home on the winery, in addition to the uptown mansion Lord Torchholder had arranged for them.

"Children, this is home, where we will spend our vintage years. This is where we build anew, from the ground up."

It was an entirely new kind of day dawning in Sanctuary. A day of hope.

Diana L. Paxson

"Aglon! I thought they'd killed you!"

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He stands in her doorway, a pale figure in the moonlight that filters through the gauzy curtains, but no other man she knows has such fine shoulders or such a head of dark curly hai-r

"I'm surprised they let you come up to me at this hour—were you off on some mission? Why did they tell me you were dead?" Joia sits up in bed, throwing the covers aside in welcome. It must be late indeed, for the Aphrodisia House is silent.

He does not answer. Shadow veils him as he comes towards her. Then he's by the bed and once more the light/alls across him. She sees him pale as a marble statue of a god—all except for the black gash in his throat where the blade went in . . . She opens her lips to scream, but his touch freezes her.

Cold! He is so cold . . .

"Eshi's tits! Joia, you gone crazy?"

The sharp slap was muffled by bed-curtains. Still whimpering, the girl fell back against the silk cushions. A dark figure moved; light sparked from the flints and a wavering spark of lamplight firmed and grew.

"You're not Aglon!"

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"Aglon's dead! You little bitch, have you had so many men you can't even remember?"

"Ricio . . ." The name ended in a little catch of the breath. The girl pushed herself onto one elbow, brushing tumbled auburn curls away

from her eyes. "Thank the gods! I thought Aglon's ghost was . . . after me! I was so afraid."

She reached out to him, but he shrugged away her hand. He was very young, and the welts where she had scratched him were already rising red on his chest.

"Ricio, sweetest," whispered Joia. "You're not going to get mad just because I had a little nightmare? Look, I'm awake now. Don't want to waste the rest of the night, do you?"

"What's the use, if every time I touch you, you think I'm Aglon! I suppose all us garrison men are alike to you!" He sounded sullen, and she hid a smile.

"Oh, Ricio, it was a nightmare! He didn't mean anything to me once I met you!" This time he did not brush away her caress, but he was still
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frowning. "Look—this is the only thing he ever gave me—" Lamplight played like quicksilver on the glimmering surface of the ball the girl took from the night table. His belt pouch was hanging on the bedpost, and she dropped it in. "You take it, Ricio. I don't need it .anymore!"

Despite his pique his body was responding. Joia's hands grew bolder.

"You scratched me . . ." he said hoarsely, turning at last.

"I'll kiss it better, so?"

The guardsman groaned and eased back against the cushions as she bent over him.

"He came to me—last night. It was terrible . . ." Joia took a very small sip from the porcelain teacup that Valira pressed into her hand, then set it down again. Valira sighed. She was only twenty-two; even at the Aphrodisia House that was not yet old. The careful bleaching that lightened her Ilsigi-dark hair into something nearer gold hid no grey. Perhaps it was having a little daughter of her own that had made the other girls think of her as motherly.

"You were with Ricio?"

"He paid for the whole night," explained Joia. "In my nightmare I thought he was Aglon and I woke up fighting. And then he got jealous
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when I told him what was wrong."

"Puppy—" said Valira, resting her elbows on the inlaid wood of the table-It was new, like most of the furnishings, like most of the facade of Sanctuary—a glossy surface to hide the fact that underneath, not that much had changed. "You'd think he would sympathize. Aglon was his comrade."

Joia shook her head. "Ricio is very young." Her hennaed curls hung limp, and the violet shadows around her eyes owed nothing to the paint pot. "I told Ricio that I never loved Aglon, but it wasn't true. Oh, Valira,

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I fought him, but I wanted him. He was like ice inside me, and ne just kept on. And now I can't seem to get warm."

Joia was wrapped in a fluffy shawl of silk and wool which had probably been looted from some northern valley, and Valira felt the smooth skin of her own forearms pebble with chill despite the sultry heat of the day. One of the new girls came into the breakfast room, heavy-eyed and abstracted, nursing her own cup of tea.

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"I wanted him," said Joia, "and now I'm afraid."

"Did you have a nightmare?" asked the other girl. Flaine was new, and pretty in a kittenish sort of way, another escapee from the streets of Sanctuary.

"I hope that's all it was!" muttered Joia,

"I had bad dreams too—" said Flaine. "They must have been dreams

... he promised me—" Her pouting lips closed tightly.

"Something pinched me all night!" said another girl. "Couldn't sleep a wink, an' when I woke I felt all black-an'-blue!"

Valira raised one eyebrow. The child looked hagged, but she could see no marks on the dark skin.

"We seem to have an epidemic—"

"If Lythande were still in town I'd ask Myrtis to talk to him," Joia said suddenly. "Do you know anyone in the Mageguild who'd take out the price of his help in trade?"

Valira laughed. "When a wizard gets homy all he has to do is summon up a few succubi! Anyway, I've never seen any of that crowd here."

"But you grew up in Sanctuary!" said Joia. "You must know some
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one!"

Valira frowned, remembering a little man with ginger hair whose painting had shown her her soul. He had recommended her to Myrtis, had taught her that even a half-penny whore from Sanctuary's waterfront could have a future. And when his wife, Gilla, stayed here during the False Plague Riots a few seasons back, she had been kind.

"You do know a mage!" exclaimed Joia, watching her. "Please help me, Valira—I'm afraid!"

"Lalo is not exactly a wizard - . . and his wife is more than enough woman for him," Valira said slowly. "I don't know if he can help. But I'll take you to see."

"Go back to the Mageguild if you want formulae'" Lalo exclaimed.

"I've told you—I don't work that way!" He pushed the diagram back across the worktable to Darios. His easel was waiting beside the window with the finest imported paints beside it. Why was he wasting the mom ing light talking?

"All arts have rules. Can it hurt you to try and think systematically?" the young man asked patiently, "Why do you think the gateway you
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visualized to reach my spirit when my body was walled up in that vault worked so well?"

"Because I'd painted the thing in the first place—" Lalo began.

"You didn't make up the design!" Darios shook his head. "The details you remembered so clearly came from S'danzo tradition. Without those symbols the Otherworld would be impossible for the human mind to comprehend. The images let us focus our perception of reality, just as we control our emotions through words." The young mage paused for breath. "Look—here is the first plane—that's the world around us, the world you know—" He tapped the crudely drawn diagram.