The Pharoah Contract

A port pierced the wall next to the doorway, and Ruiz looked inside while the larger of the guards fumbled in its pouch for the molecular seal that operated the door. The landscape within the paddock approximated a small Pharaohan oasis, without the fields and catchment system. A dusty compound huddled in the center of the paddock, surrounded by the feathery foliage of dinwelt trees.

The door hissed upward, revealing a security vestibule, lined with storage bins, closed at the far end with another door. “In you go,” said the guard, flipping the nerve net at Ruiz’s heels.

Ruiz moved with respectful speed. Once inside, the other guard opened a bin and hauled out a tunic of coarse brown fabric and tossed it to Ruiz. Ruiz put it on, and then the sandals the other guard handed him.

The guards inspected him. “Looks authentic to me. Didn’t the other ones want to shave their heads?”

The other guard laughed, a choked whistle-gurgle. “He doesn’t have to, so it appears. A natural pluckhead; can you believe it?”

Uneasiness touched Ruiz. He hoped no one else would notice that he did not have to perform that particular Pharaohan grooming ritual. His depilation was good for a few weeks yet, but his tattoos would fade before the depil wore off — another problem.

One guard touched a control panel. The first door dropped, and a moment later the inner door popped open. The guards shooed him cheerfully out of the lock. The door slid shut behind him with a clang.

Ruiz stood alone, the light of Sooksun beating on his naked head.

He looked about curiously. The paddock seemed to cover a roughly circular area of slightly more than a hectare. The walls were high and smooth, made of the same meltstone masonry as the rest of the compound. The tops of the walls were protected by snapfields that reached high above the compound, forming a faint lacy pattern in the air where they intersected with other fields. The glowing fields would be quite beautiful at night.

He set off down the path to the compound at the center of the paddock.

He resolved to pass himself off as an innocent Pharaohan bystander, to step lightly with his fellow slaves, to collect information but give out none, to fit in as seamlessly as possible, to wait for an opportunity to improve his circumstances. After all, this was his profession, which previously he had practiced with reasonable skill. He shook his head, feeling a bit pessimistic.

Taking care not to touch the corrosive fronds, Ruiz edged past the dinwelt hedge into the compound’s central square. It was deserted in the noontime heat, but after a moment a burly man with the tattoos of a guildmaster emerged from one dark doorway. “Man or demon?” he demanded of Ruiz, in a voice hoarse with suppressed terror.

Ruiz stood quietly for a moment, adopting an unthreatening posture, open hands held at his side.

“More than man, less than demon, or perhaps the other way about. Sometimes it’s difficult for me to tell,” he said cheerfully.

The man squinted at Ruiz, then relaxed. “It’s just a snake oil peddler, by his tattoos and speech.” At this reassurance, a half-dozen other Pharaohans emerged into the square.

“Oh yes,” Ruiz said, “I’m the dream merchant, but alas, I’m fresh out of dreams. Perhaps this is the dream, eh? Certainly it’s stranger than any realm I’ve visited on snake-back.”

“You spoke true, Guildmaster Dolmaero,” said a thin fellow with a blind eye and the tattoos of an animal handler. “I thought never to welcome such a one, but he’s an easier sight than those warty gray horrors.”

They studied Ruiz with tired red eyes. Finally Dolmaero spoke. “What is to be our fate? Have you word of this?”

Ruiz spread his arms in a gesture of puzzlement. “I’d hoped,” he said, “that you could tell me.”

Faces fell. After a bit the Pharaohans turned and shuffled within. Last to go was Dolmaero, who paused and said kindly, “There is the dwelling of the casteless.” Dolmaero pointed across the square to a building that showed signs of long disuse. “Twice a day the demons come to summon us to feed. You must wait your turn, but there will be plenty to eat.” A look of private sorrow touched Dolmaero’s broad face. “There is no snake oil here.” Then he disappeared, leaving Ruiz alone in the square. Ruiz had the uncomfortable sensation that many eyes watched him from the shadowed doorways that fronted the square. The remainder of the conjuring troupe was housed here, perhaps forty or fifty men and women who — working the traps and slides and pulls that made the illusions possible — had been beneath the stage when the catchboat had taken them.

Ruiz shrugged and walked to the door of the indicated building. The hanging wilifiber strands that once had protected the interior from noxious flying insects were tattered to uselessness. He pushed them aside and entered.