He looked at me, a thousand questions on his lips, then at the coins in his hand, then said, "Ah, the horses—"
"Will not be harmed." He had a sense of responsibility. How about that? "I won't touch them, or even go near them."
He heard the ring of truth in my voice, or the ring of metal in his hand, or something. He nodded abruptly. "Yes, my lord."
I added a fourth coin. "And there's no need to mention this to anyone."
"Of course not, my lord. An hour, you said?"
"An hour."
He bowed clumsily, and I went into the stable and locked it after myself.
"Here?"
"Why not?"
"How can you defend your self here?"
"I'm hoping I won't need to."
"Um, going to let me in on this?" He was genuinely nervous; I could tell because Rocza seemed jumpy.
"Look, chum, what exactly are we worried about?"
"The Jhereg finding you."
"Right. Now, either they already know where I am, in which case it's pointless to worry about it, or they don't. If they don't, then, if they get lucky, they'll be able to trace me while I have the amulet off doing the witchcraft spell. If they trace me, what will they do?"
"Uh... kill you?"
"They'll have to come to Burz to do it."
"Well, yeah."
"Know any Dragaerans liable to have this little Eastern town memorized enough to teleport to it?"
"Probably not, Boss. Going to bet your life that some sorceress from the Left Hand can't work around that?"
"No, but I'll bet my life that if an assassin does show up, I'll be ready. I'm doing a spell, not falling asleep. I'm in the middle of an open space. There's no way he can come at me without you seeing him.”
"And if he's invisible?"
"Look around."
"What?"
"Horses, Loiosh. They'll smell him. Keep an eye on the horses during the spell. If the horses suddenly get jumpy, and start looking where there isn't anyone, I'll stop the spell and, ah, kill him." I made a mental note to make up more Nesiffa powder; I didn't mention to Loiosh that I was out of it.
"Boss, sometimes I wonder about you. Okay, and if they track you, but don't come immediately?"
"They'll be across town from where I am, with plenty of time for people to notice that there's an 'elf in town, and I'll no doubt hear about it."
"No doubt?"
"And they want it Morganti, Loiosh. Morganti. The Jhereg won't he happy with anything less. There is no chance, none that they can bring a Morganti weapon into a town full of witches without creating an uproar the likes of which this town has never seen."
"And then, sometimes, I don't even wonder."
"Heh.”
"Go ahead, then."
"Glad to have your permission."
I cleared an area of hay, because burning the place down would have attracted unnecessary attention to myself as well as disrupting the ritual; not to mention breaking my promise not to harm the horses.
I lit three candles—two white, and one black—then removed the amulet and carefully separated the two parts. The gold I replaced around my neck; the black I set into my pouch. Once I closed that pouch—I'd crafted it myself—the stone might as well have been a hundred miles away.
I laid out what few things I'd need: herbs, a tube of purified water. I didn't have a brazier with me, but I didn't need one for this.
As I combined the salve with purified water—just a drop— I considered the nasty blisters on my fingers, and thought about what my fingers would be like without them, imagined them healing with a chant that came from inside my body painful muscles unknotting working past the resistance because it cannot stand up to me I am Taltos Vladimir and the power is mine and the body is mine it will do as I will keep at as long as my heart continues to drive the blood mixing with the salve and the fingers inside worked them over and understanding the body is the key to opening the doorway of knowledge of all things within and without a pause in the constant drone in the ears full of my own voiceless calling to a place that is here and also not hearing it again and again becoming part of my own fingertips as they clench against the heel of my hand, unwinding and yielding now, flowing faster as they tap the heel and heal and hear and see and smell the damp moldy straw of the stable in the flickering light of the candles as I stopped.
I took a deep breath, and, my hands trembling, removed the piece of the amulet from my pouch, re-attached it, and replaced it around my neck.
"Anything, Loiosh?"
"I'm not sure, Boss. I thought I felt something for a minute, but I can't be sure. It was subtle. Someone good, if it was anything at all."
"You blocked it, then. I didn't feel anything."
"I blocked you from it, Boss, so it wouldn't mess up the ritual. I don't know if I blocked it from you. I don't know if there was anything to block.”
"All right. If the Jhereg could find a witch at all, I doubt it would be someone good."
As spells go, that one was pretty easy; there isn't much in witchcraft that comes easier than convincing your body to do what it wants to do anyway. By the time my equipment was put away in my pack, the blisters had already started to heal, and the general aches in my body were noticeably improved. I still didn't like the idea of fighting anyone, but I figured I could probably do it if I had to. Of course, I paid a price; I was pretty exhausted and my head was fuzzy, but it was a reasonable tradeoff.
Best of all, no assassins showed up to put a nice shine on my epidermis during the process; my remarks to Loiosh notwithstanding, interrupting a spell to fight are neither easy nor fun. I have, a couple of times, actually performed a spell in the middle of a fight, the way sorcerers do. I don't recommend it, and I really hope I'll never have to do it again.
I gave the boy another silver and a smile as I left, shaky but much improved.
"What now, Boss?"
"Hey, I'm up for anything, as long as it doesn't require moving or thinking."
"So, no moving then, but other than that, just as usual."
"After I've worked that out, I'll probably swat you for it."
The walk back across town to the inn seemed very long indeed. And odd. Things always look different when you've just exhausted yourself with a Working, even a minor one; sometimes, I've never figured out exactly when, the effect is amplified: edges are fuzzy, people seem to blur into the background of whatever they're near. Any reflective surface seems shinier and texturing moves and shifts. There are some witches who believe that in this state you can see profound truths that are normally concealed. Some of them devote themselves, not to the Workings, but to the aftereffects, and reveal hidden secrets of the ages.
I think it's just that your brain is tired and you aren't thinking right.
I made a life-enemy during that walk, too. I think he must have been about six years old, and he was throwing a wooden ball against a house—presumably his—making "thunk-splot" "thunk-splot" sounds as it struck the wall then the street. He missed it, and it rolled across the street right in front of me, and from there down into a gutter and away down the street. I was considerably past it when I realized that I could easily have stopped it, picked it up, and tossed it back to him, and around the time I was finally reaching the Hat it came to me that he had been glaring at me. I actually thought about going back and apologizing, but the explanation would have been beyond my powers so I didn't.