The Towers of the Sunset - L. E. Modesitt [63]
Creslin agrees with the sentiment.
“. . . hush. Just listen.”
The silver-haired man leans forward and takes a sip of the cider, heavily spiced and warm. The taste is of apples and spices, with the faintest of bitter undertastes, though not enough to mar the overall effect. He glances toward the stage, then continues to watch.
He can see the order behind the notes played by the guitarist—almost as if the notes are pasted on the heavy, smoke-filled air. He sips from the weighty brown mug, no longer really tasting the mulled cider. The faint memory of another time drifts behind his eyes, the memory of a guitarist with silver hair, of grasping at a note floating in the air.
With a smile, Creslin shrugs, concentrates, and reaches forth with both hand and mind.
Thrummm.
The guitarist’s fingers falter as the single tone lingers on past the instant he played it, and his eyes widen as he looks toward the corners where it resonates, where the dimmest of silver glows issues from the fingertips of the silver-haired man sitting alone in the shadows of the table for two.
Creslin releases his capture, ignoring both the faltering of the guitarist and the raggedness of the rest of the ballad.
“What—” whispers the heavy serving girl, watching the glow vanish from his fingertips.
“Just a memory,” he says, as if the words explained anything at all.
The girl swallows, turns, and makes the sign of the one-god believers as she picks up another set of empty mugs from a table of dicers. “Another round, girl. Same as the last.”
Smoke from the burning oak swirls from the hearth, mixing with cold air rushing in from the open doorway.
Creslin sips again from the dark-brown mug, tasting for the first time the edge of autumn buried in the cider, drawing forth that sense of ripening fruit and that hint of something else that he noted with his first sip.
Plop . . .
Wobbling on the table is a red apple, streaked with green. On one side are both a large dark spot and the dark antennae of a fruit beetle. Creslin’s mug is now less than half full, though he has taken but three sips.
“I think I would have preferred not to know.” He takes another sip of the cider, discovers the taste is unchanged and nods at the understanding that the infested apples become cider.
“Where’d you get an apple this time of year?” asks the clean-shaven young man who has seated himself at the adjoining table. Hard-faced, he wears the white leathers of the wizards’ guards.
So does the woman pulling out the other chair; there is a black circle on the lapel of her white-leather vest. Her eyes glance at Creslin, catch the silver hair, then rest upon his face. Finally she looks away and gestures.
A small point of fire appears before the face of the serving girl, who turns quickly, sees the white leathers and scurries toward the two guards. “Yes, your honors?”
Creslin takes a deep breath. To leave at this point would call even more attention to himself. He takes a small sip, as much to bring the mug before his face as to drink.
“Cider and cheese, with the good brown bread,” states the woman.
“Same here,” says the man, returning his attention to Creslin. “About the apple.”
Creslin shrugs, bemused, and picks up the apple, extending it to the guard. “It’s a little spoiled.”
The man takes it, then employs his narrow-bladed and white-hilted bronze belt knife to cut away the brown spot, expertly carving the remainder of the fruit into identical crescents. He offers a crescent to the other guard.
Her eyes still scanning the half-dozen occupied tables, she begins chewing, then stops. “Harlaan, where did you get this?”
“From him. What’s wrong?”
“It’s fresh. That’s what’s wrong.” She turns toward the corner where Creslin sits.
“Fresh? That’s a problem?” mutters the young guard.
“You! What school are you from?” Her flinty gray eyes bore in on Creslin.
“School? I beg your indulgence, lady blade, but I am a stranger here, not a student, though I would learn what I could if I knew how to.”
Her lips tighten. “A pretty statement, especially for a western