Dragonquest - Donita K. Paul [3]
“Can you find me?” asked Dar.
Not in this crowd.
“You can’t follow my thoughts?”
Dar! Kale bit down on her exasperation. I’m getting better at this mindspeaking, but there are hundreds of people. Every one of them is thinking up sufficient noise to rattle the windows. It’s hard to hear you. Vendela’s entire population is buzzing around your words with their scattered thoughts.
“Humph!” The doneel paused. “Are you still in the market square?”
Yes.
“I’ll come back and get you.”
Kale grumbled under her breath, “He wouldn’t have to come back and get me if he hadn’t run off in the first place.”
Thanks. She muttered the word in her mind.
“You’re welcome.”
Dar’s chortle echoed after his polite answer. Kale knew he’d heard the sarcasm underlying her thanks.
She glanced at the city guards going from one merchant’s stall to the next. The little culprit seemed to have given them the slip.
Roaming around the square, Kale examined the merchandise—finely woven material from the southern provinces, glazed pottery from the hills of Blandel, and intricately sculpted stone statues. She paused to run her fingers over a glossy purple fruit she didn’t recognize. A tart, lemony smell tickled her nose. A tug on her cape brought her eyes down to a small figure hiding under the wooden counter. Two big eyes stared mournfully up at her.
“Help me?” The whispered voice barely reached Kale’s ears, but the frightened look in the doneel child’s eyes reached her heart.
She glanced over her shoulder and saw the guards approaching. One surveyed the crowd as the other two systematically inspected each booth. Kale waited until the marione scanning the marketers turned his head away. Quickly, she opened her cloak and signaled the child to come. The little girl hopped out of her hole between baskets of fruit and attached herself to Kale’s leg like a monkey.
As a leecent, Kale had vowed ten days before to uphold justice in the name of Paladin. Instead, she walked across the square to a booth that had already passed the guards’ inspection. Pretending to examine trousers and blouses in the merchant’s display, Kale reached out with her mind to speak to the fugitive she harbored.
What did you take?
“You can mindspeak!”
What did you take?
“A pickle.”
Kale looked over her shoulder at the guards moving to a cart filled with bags of grain.
“I’m Toopka. What’s your name?”
Leecent Kale.
A rough hand slammed down on Kale’s arm and spun her around.
“This one ’ere!” With a stubby finger pointed up into Kale’s face, the shopkeeper spewed out his accusation. “She’s the one. She’s got that pickpocket under ’er cape. They’re in league together.”
“Master Tellowmatterden, she’s one of Paladin’s,” said the guard with a captain’s insignia on his collar.
“Ha!” the tumanhofer merchant growled. “She’s stolen one of their uniforms, more likely.”
“Here now!” Dar’s voice rose above the murmuring of the crowd. “That’s no way to treat a servant of Paladin.”
The shopkeeper thrust Kale against the captain’s broad chest. The guard seized her arms in a no-nonsense hold.
Tellowmatterden rounded on Dar. “A doneel! The child’s a doneel. Arrest ’im. He’s the one trained ’er to steal.”
Dar pulled himself into his most dignified stance. His glare should have made the peasant merchant tremble. “I beg your pardon.” He turned to the guard in charge. “This unfortunate incident can be easily unraveled. May I suggest you send for a representative of The Hall? Leecent Kale is, indeed, in Paladin’s service, as am I.”
“Stuffed with feathers, they both are!” screeched the merchant. “Who ever ’eard of a doneel in the service?”
Dar ignored the man and spoke with solemn politeness to the guard holding Kale. “Should we take our business out of the streets, Captain?”
“That’s right,” the shopkeeper’s voice boomed. “Take them down to city jail.”
“I think,” said Dar, still amiable and soft-spoken, and still talking only to the captain, “a nearby inn would be more appropriate while we wait. It would be less embarrassing for your superiors if you were to settle this without involving