The Dragon Revenant - Katharine Kerr [23]
Down near the river in Valanth, on a narrow, dead-end alley, stood a house that was crumbling into decay. The stuccoed outer walls of its compound were peeling and cracking, the courtyard within so tangled with a garden gone riot that the ancestor statues were completely hidden. The longhouse itself had lost a good portion of the shakes on its roof, and the outer walls gaped and cracked in places. The citizens who lived nearby thought that it belonged to an old merchant who had lost both his fortune and his only son to pirates and who, thanks to the resulting madness, refused to go out or see anyone but his pair of slaves, as ancient as he. Baruma knew better. Late that night he left his inn and went to the compound, knocking on the splintery gate in a pattern of sound that few people knew.
In a few moments the gate opened a cautious crack. Lantern in hand, an aged slave peered at him.
“I wish to speak to your master. Tell him Baruma of Adelion is here, come from Deverry.”
The slave nodded.
“Is he in? Will he see me?”
The slave shrugged as if to say he didn’t know.
“Answer me, you insolent fool!”
The slave opened his mouth and revealed the scarred stump of a tongue long ago cut from his mouth.
“Huh. Well, I should have realized that. Are you allowed to show me in?”
The slave nodded a yes and ushered him into the weed-choked garden. They picked a careful way across on a path where the flagstones had cracked and tilted treacherously, then went into the house and down a musty corridor lined with cobwebbed statues—all stage-dressing for the neighbors and tradesmen who might come this far in. Near the back of the house were the master’s real quarters. The slave motioned Baruma into a high-ceilinged chamber, bright with lamplight, that was furnished with cushioned furniture and red-and-gold carpets laid over the tiled floor. On one wall was a fresco showing a pony and a barbarian woman engaged in a peculiar kind of sport; he was busy examining it when he suddenly realized that he was no longer alone. He whirled around to find the master towering over him. It took all his will to keep from yelping in fear. As it was, something must have shown on his face because the master laughed. A tall man, with bluish-black skin, he was wearing a plain white tunic, and over his face was a hood of the finest red silk. Tattooed around his right wrist was a striking hawk.
“If you were one of my pieces of work, you’d be dead, Baruma. Have you come to show me your wares? I’m most interested in seeing them.”
“I’m honored that you are. Perhaps we can strike a bargain, then. You see, one of the little rats who scurry at our bidding has disobeyed me. I can’t go back to Myleton to tend to the matter myself, but he needs to be punished. Not killed, mind—merely taught a painful lesson.”
“Nothing could be easier to arrange.” The master hesitated briefly. “This fool lives in Myleton, then.”
“Brindemo the slave trader.”
“Ah.”
In the flickering lamplight Baruma could see nothing but the coarsest silhouette of the hawkmaster’s face through the fine silk, but he received the impression that he was being studied. The hair on the back of his neck pricked in a perfectly reasonable fear at the thought.
“One of my men accompanied you to the barbarian kingdom,” the master said at last. “I believe he was calling himself Gwin.”
“Yes. I didn’t realize that he was attached to this particular guild.”
“It wasn’t his place to tell you.” There was a trace of humor in his voice. “He made, of course, a full report on what happened.”
Baruma’s fear deepened when he remembered the Hawk’s insolence. He was painfully aware that no one in the world knew where he was at the moment, that he could disappear forever if the Hawkmaster should choose.
“I’m very interested in this Rhodry of Aberwyn.” The master