The Pharoah Contract

He was watching the light strengthen over the town, conscious that he might never see such a thing again, when a peremptory rap brought him across the cage to the shadowed side. He looked out and saw nothing, and then thought to apply his eye to a lower chink. There he saw the smallest of the boys who had greeted him on his arrival into Stegatum.

“Hello,” he said.

The boy watched him earnestly for a moment. “We’re sorry you’ll die.”

“Me too.”

“It ain’t a good way to die… though they say you’ll bring a good rainstorm.”

“Do they?”

“Yeh. They say your Exp’ation been put off till tomorrow night, so the Lord’s foolkiller have time to come up with some fine new tricks. Not a drop did fall, for the coercer’s dying… old stuff. We seed it all before.”

“Old stuff, huh?”

“Yeh. It’s no easy job, being the Lord’s foolkiller, ‘cause we got so many fools here, so the Lord’s always having to do ‘em down. Hard to come up with new ‘lusions.”

“I suppose.” The conversation was disheartening on one level, but also a great relief. He might live another night, if the boy could be believed. Then again, the boy might only be reporting a rumor.

The boy showed no signs of departing. “Say,” he said tentatively. “Since you not be needing your tricks, maybe you could show me how you did that gem and bug trick you shown us. I never saw that one before.”

A notion occurred to Ruiz. “Perhaps I could. But I need my apparatus, and they took everything.”

“Oh,” said the boy regretfully, and started to turn away.

“Wait! I have an idea.”

“What’s that?”

“Well… listen. Did you see Relia anywhere about, this morning?”

“Denklar’s whore? Nope. Didn’t see him neither. Maybe they run off together.” The little boy snickered in a manner much too old for his years. “Why?”

“Hmmm. Let me think.”

He thought. Denklar gone? Relia gone? The only two people who were in a position to help him were missing. What did that suggest? Perhaps someone was actively working against him, someone he didn’t know anything about.

“What’s your name?” he asked the boy.

“Brumbet.”

“Brumbet, eh? A promising name. You want to be a conjuror, then?”

“Who don’t? But if I can’t be a conjuror, I won’t be an oil man. Who wants to hear voices all day, and spend the night having bad dreams? Then like as not I’d end trussed up on the stage, like you done.” The small boy delivered this speech in phlegmatic tones.

“Good thinking. I wish I’d been as smart as you when I was your age. Tell me, Brumbet. Seen any new faces around town?”

The boy guffawed. “Yeh. Town’s fall of ‘em, here for the killings.”

“Hmmm. Well, what about before… say, a couple of days ago?”

The boy rubbed his chin in a curiously adult manner. “You mean, like t’other oil man, the rich one?”

“Right! When did he come?”

“Night you left, and then he went away again, but he’s back now. Though I ain’t seen him.”

“How do you know he’s here, then?”

Brumbet looked scornful. “His striderbeast’s in the stable. You think I smell like this ‘cause I spend all day shoveling moonpoppies?”

“I hadn’t noticed. What’s he look like?”

“Tall man, but not ‘risto-faced like you. Though he’s got a striderbeast and you don’t. Still, he looks to be a lizardcutter, you ask me. Up to no good, but too mean to get caught. Not like you.”

“Mean man, eh? Where do you think he might be?”

“Don’t know, but could be Denklar put him in the back corner, same room you stayed in, away from the decent folk. Maybe he’s there, sleeping off a binge.”

“Maybe. Maybe so. Well, that’s a problem. I left my little bag of tricks hidden in that room, before I went up to the keep. If they’re still there… well, I could show you how to work a couple of them, if I’m still here tonight.”

The boy leaned close and his narrow face was alight with anticipation. “For real? I’ll fetch your tricks; you tell me where to find ‘em.”

Ruiz forced himself to sound reluctant. “Well, but what if the mean man is in there? I’ll show my tricks to you, but I’d rather they rusted away than go to a stranger.”

“No worry. I’ll wait till he goes to the shitter, or to supper, or I’ll yell ‘Fire!’ in the hallway.” The boy grinned. “I ain’t stupid, no matter what my brother says.”

“All right,” Ruiz said. “I’ll tell you where to find the tricks, and you bring them to me. You mustn’t play with them before I show you how to work them — they’re dangerous, some of them.”

Brumbet curled his lip, “I told you I ain’t stupid.”

Ruiz remembered that he was on Pharaoh, where illusions could be very grim indeed, and nodded. “I believe it. Be very careful of the tall lizard-cutter. He might well be even meaner than you think.”

* * *

The day passed slowly. The women came to pour water on the roof, but this time they were disinclined to gossip.

As they were reattaching their buckets to their yokes, Ruiz asked them if he was to make Expiation that night. They exchanged pitying glances.

“No,” said the woman who had spoken with him the day before. “The Lord’s executioner researches novelties.”

“Ahh…” Ruiz said glumly, concealing his elation.

The women left and Ruiz waited.

* * *