The Yellow Silk - Don Bassingthwaite [96]
Come play me and Veseene a song. You know where. Bring the Yellow Silk of Kuang.
The note wasn't signed. The devastation in the room was signature enough. Tycho clenched his teeth and thrust it at Li. The Shou shook his head. "I can't read it."
"You probably don't want to." He read the note out loud and Li choked.
"Brin knows about the Yellow Silk!" Li's hand went to his arm. "How is that possible?"
"Yu Mao," Tycho pointed out. "He probably told Brin all kinds of stories about Shou Lung. When you started throwing bolts of light around last night, he must have recognized the Yellow Silk's power."
"But the Silk is our family's greatest treasure," protested Li. "Yu Mao wouldn't have… " His voice faded as Tycho gave him a long look and he closed his eyes for a moment. "I suppose Yu Mao could have done anything, couldn't he?"
"After hearing what Staso said, I don't think anything I heard about him would surprise me. The Silk might be why Brin was looking for you last night, too." Tycho's eyes narrowed sharply even as the words came out of his mouth. "No, that's not right. Brin was looking for you before you used the Yellow Silk."
"Maybe he knows more than we think-maybe he guessed that I would have the Silk." Li rubbed a hand across his face. "Maybe he just wants me because I'm Yu Mao's brother."
"Maybe." Tycho crumpled the note in his fist and hurled it into the cold ashes of the fireplace. An heirloom artifact of ancient magic in exchange for Veseene and Laera. He couldn't ask Li to give up his family's treasure, but if they didn't give Brin the Silk… Brin hadn't made any threats in his note but he didn't need to. He looked at Li only to find the Shou looking at him. Tycho drew a breath between his teeth. "What are we going to do, Li?"
"If Brin had the Yellow Silk, would he keep it or sell it?"
"Knowing Brin? Sell it."
"How much are the beljurils worth?"
"Probably not enough-and Brin likely isn't going to accept something he thinks belongs to him anyway." Tycho glared at Jacerryl's corpse and spat on it. "Damn you. Damn you and Mard and Laera!"
Laera.
Tycho ducked down and grabbed Brin's note out of the fireplace, smoothing it over his knee. Play me and Veseene a song, the halfling had written. He looked up sharply. "Li, Brin doesn't have Laera!" He jumped up, spinning around and sweeping the room with his gaze.
"Tycho, she could be anywhere!"
"Not if her father's still looking for her!" Tycho ran into the back room. Just as he had seen through the door, this room was a shambles, too. His chest had been dumped out and its contents spread across the floor. "Laera!" He ground his teeth. There was nowhere to hide in the two little rooms! His eye fell on the window. The rope that he had left knotted to the bedpost was gone. He leaned out the window and scanned the shadowed alley below. The rope was there, pooled on the ground. "Laera!" he shouted. He swung over the sill and let himself down until he was hanging by his hands and dropped the rest of the way.
A shadow in a narrow little niche gasped at the sound of his landing. "Laera?" Tycho called softly. He went over and crouched down, reaching for the shape huddled inside. "Laera, it's all right. It's Tycho."
She all but fell out of the niche into his arms, weeping desperately and gasping his name over and over so fast it was almost incomprehensible. He tried to help her stand up, but her arms and legs were knotted-when he tried to straighten them, she gasped again, this time in pain. How long had she been wedged into that tiny hole? He began to massage her joints gently as he murmured comforting words. "Shhh… it's all right. It's all right."
"Tycho?" The bard glanced up. Li was leaning out of his window.
"She's fine," he called back. "Just stiff. We'll go around and come up the stairs." He looked back to Laera. "Do you think you can walk?" She drew a shaky breath and nodded. Tycho helped her stand. As he took her hand to lead her out of the alley, though, she hissed. "What