Nightside the Long Sun

Silk felt an uncontrollable flood of relief. “I’ll do as you suggest, provided that the Juzgado’s still open.”

“They wouldn’t be, Patera. They close there about the same time as the market.”

It was hard for him to force himself to speak. “Then I must proceed. I must act tonight.” He hesitated while some frightened portion of his mind battered the ivory walls that confined it. “Of course this may not be the Blood you know, Auk. There must be a great many people of that name. Could Blood—the Blood you know—buy our manteion? It must be worth twenty thousand cards or more.”

“Ten,” Auk muttered. “Twelve, maybe, only he probably got it for the taxes. What’s he look like, Patera?”

“A tall, heavy man. Angry looking, I’d say, although it may only have been that his face was flushed. There are wide bones under his plump cheeks, or so I’d guess.”

“Lots of rings?”

Silk struggled to recall the prosperous-looking man’s fat, smooth hands. “Yes,” he said. “Several, at least.”

“Could you smell him?”

“Are you asking whether he smelled bad? No, certainly not. In fact—”

Auk grunted. “What was it?”

“I have no idea, but it reminded me of the scented oil—no doubt you’ve noticed it—in the lamp before Scylla, in our manteion. A sweet, heavy odor, not quite so pungent as incense.”

“He calls it musk rose,” Auk said dryly. “Musk’s a buck that works for him.”

“It is the Blood you know, then.”

“Yeah, it is. Now be quiet a minute, Patera. I got to remember the words.” Auk rocked back and forth. There was a faint noise like the grating of sand on a shiprock floor as he rubbed his massive jaw. “As a penance for the evil that you’re getting ready to do, Patera, you got to perform two or three meritorious acts I’ll tell you about tonight.”

“That is too light a penance,” Silk protested.

“Don’t weigh feathers with me, Patera, ’cause you don’t know what they are yet. You’re going to do ’em, ain’t you?”

“Yes, Auk,” Silk said humbly.

“That’s good. Don’t forget. All right, then I bring to you, Patera, the pardons of all the gods. In the name of Great Pas, you’re forgiven. In the name of Echidna, you’re forgiven. In the name of Scylla, of Molpe, of Tartaros, of Hierax, of Thelxiepeia, of Phaea, of Sphigx, and of all the lesser gods, you’re forgiven, Patera, by the powers trusted to me.”

Silk traced the sign of addition, hoping that the big man was doing the same over his head.

The big man cleared his throat. “Was that all right?”

“Yes,” Silk said, rising. “It was very good indeed, for a layman.”

“Thanks. Now about Blood. You say you’re going to solve his place, but you don’t even know where it is.”

“I can ask directions when I reach the Palatine.” Silk was dusting his knees. “Blood isn’t a particular friend of yours, I hope.”

Auk shook his head. “It ain’t there. I been there a time or two, and that gets us to one of those meritorious acts that you just now promised me about. You got to let me take you there.”

“If it isn’t inconvenient—”

“It’s shaggy—excuse me, Patera. Yeah, it’s going to put me out by a dog’s right, only you got to let me do it anyhow, if you really go to Blood’s. If you don’t, you’ll get lost sure trying to find it. Or somebody’ll know you, and that’ll be worse. But first you’re going to give Blood a whistle on my glass over there, see? Maybe he’ll talk to you, or if he wants to see you he might even send somebody.”

Auk strode across the room and clapped his hands; the monitor’s colorless face rose from the depths of the glass.

“I want Blood,” Auk told it. “That’s the buck that’s got the big place off the old Palustria Road.” He turned to Silk. “Come over here, Patera. You stand in front of it. I don’t want ’em to see me.”

Silk did as he was told. He had talked through glasses before (there had been one in the Prelate’s chambers at the schola), though not often. Now he discovered that his mouth was dry. He licked his lips.

“Blood is not available, sir,” the monitor told him imperturbably. “Would someone else do?”

“Musk, perhaps,” Silk said, recalling the name Auk had mentioned.

“It will be a few minutes, I fear, sir.”

“I’ll wait for him,” Silk said. The glass faded to an opalescent gray.

“You want to sit, Patera?” Auk was pushing a chair against the backs of his calves.

Silk sat down, murmuring his thanks.

“I don’t think that was too smart, asking for Musk. Maybe you know what you’re doing.”

Still watching the glass, Silk shook his head. “You had said he worked for Blood, that’s all.”

“Don’t tell him you’re with me. All right?”

“I won’t.”

Auk did not speak again, and the silence wrapped itself about them. Like the silence of the Windows, Silk thought, the silence of the gods: pendant, waiting. This glass of Auk’s was rather like a Window; all glasses were, although they were so much smaller. Like the Windows, glasses were miraculous creations of the Short-Sun days, after all. What was it Maytera Marble had said about them?