"What was it?"
"Well, an illusion, of course, but the privateers turned about and ran. What made it work wasn't just Acrimegus's light effects, but the details, the way he acted, the way we were acting."
"Were you frightened?"
"I pissed in my kilt. But what a story! I'd travel again with Acrimegus any day. Now you tell me something."
"I've seen a Lord."
"So have 1. Where was your Lord?"
"At home, in Lordshills. He had a fountain. And a room inside where they can cook. A room to piss in, with running water. And a room where kinless wrote things on paper and put them in jars, but I couldn't go in there." Whandall decided not to speak Samorty's name. He would hold that in reserve.
"Can you read?"
"No. I don't know anyone who can read." Except the Lords could read. And Shanda.
"You do now. What did your Lord do?"
Whandall was still trying to understand what he'd seen on two visits. "He had other Lords to dinner, and a magician. People who weren't Lords brought the food and took it away, and all the Lords did was talk and ask each other questions. At the end they acted like they'd fixed something broken, only... only it was the next Burning. They think if they can make people talk to each other, they can miss the next Burning. And at the end he put on armor and went out with some other armed men."
"Did they ... do you think they put off the next Burning?"
No grown man or woman could answer that question. Whandall didn't think even Lord Samorty knew that. Whandall said, "No."
"Then when will it happen?"
"Nobody knows," Whandall said. "There was another Lord who made cups move in a circle. Like this-"
"Yes, that's called juggling."
"How do you do it?"
"Years of practice. It isn't magic, Whandall."
"It isn't?"
"No."
"There was a ..." Whandall couldn't remember the word. "People pretending to be other people. Telling each other a story like they don't know they're being watched. Jispomnos, they called it."
"I've seen Jispomnos. It's too long for after dinner. It runs on forever! You saw just pieces, I bet. Was there a part where the wife's parents want blood money?"
They talked through the morning and deep into afternoon. Whandall practiced his scanty Condigeano from time to time, but usually they were each speaking their own language.
Tras spoke of his own affairs without hesitation. Still, it was hard for even a teller to tell how he lived ... to see it from inside ... to see what a stranger must miss. They had to walk circles around their lives, to sneak up on the truth.
"Do you know who your father was?" Whandall said, "Yes. Do you?"
"Yes, of course," Tras said.
"What you did with your face. It looked like you wanted to fight."
Tras shrugged uncomfortably. "Maybe for just a moment. Sorry. Whandall, it's an insult to ask if anyone but my father is my father." Tras changed to local speech. "This not Condigeo. You feel I still respect you?"
"Yes, but we don't say father. Resalet-" Tras lofted one eyebrow. Whandall explained, "Resalet is father to my brothers Wanshig and Shastern and two of my sisters. He tells us, 'I know who my father is. So do you. But maybe I'm talking to one who isn't so lucky. I don't throw it in his teeth. You don't either. You say Pothefit. You and I and he know who I mean. Even if we're wrong.' "
"Pothefit. Your father. Have other name?"
"Not to tell."
"Live with you?"
"Pothefit was killed by a wizard."
Tras's face twisted. The man's face was so alien, it was hard to tell just what he was showing. He said, "When was that?"
"My second Burning. I was seven. Five years ago." Almost five, Whandall thought.
"I missed it. My ship left late. Now nobody seems to know when the next Burning will start," Tras said.
"Nobody knows," Whandall agreed. , Tras Preetror sighed. "But someone has to know. Someone has to set a fire."
An odd viewpoint, Whandall thought. "Yangin-Atep sets fire."
"They used to know, here in Tep's Town. In late spring, every spring, you'd burn the city. Now it's been... three years? What do you remember of the Burning?"
Whandall tried to tell him. Tras listened for a bit, then asked in Condigeano, "A wizard killed this Pothefit?"
"It was said."
"Odd. I'd know if there was a powerful wizard in Tep's Town."
"He's here. I've seen him. Someday I'll see him again. I don't know enough about magic yet. I don't even have my knife."
Tras said, "I've seen those knives. Half a pace long, plain handles, maybe a little crude?"
"Crude?"
"A Condigeano merchant would spend more effort. Inca smiths get very fancy. Here, someone would just take it away from him."
Whandall frowned, remembering something. "Why did you laugh?"
Tras looked guilty. "You caught that? I'm sorry."
"Yes, but why?"
"Magic wears out. It wears out faster in cities because there are more people. Everybody knows a little magic. You ever try to work a spell near a courthouse? It's bad enough in Condigeo.
"But here! There's something about Tep's Town that eats the magic right out of spells and potions and prayers. Here, it's hard to imagine what a wizard could do that would hurt a careful man. He must have taken your f-taken Pothefit by surprise."
How? A man so old that he might die before Whandall had his knife! A gatherer must be wary, ready to run or fight. What could Morth of Atlantis have done to surprise Pothefit?
But Whandall only asked, "Have you been where magic is strong?"
"They're dangerous places. Deserts, the ocean, mountain peaks. Anywhere magicians have a hard time getting to, that's where magic can still leap out and bite you. But I like to go look," Tras said. "I'm a teller. I have to go to where I can find stories to tell."
"What will happen when all the magic is gone?"
Tras looked grave. "I don't know. I don't think anyone knows, but some magicians say they have visions of a time when there is no magic, and everyone lives like animals. Others say that after a long time there'll be a new age that doesn't need magic."
Whandall's mind's eye showed him Tep's Town spreading to cover the world ... just for a moment, before he blinked the image away.
What Whandall remembered best of that afternoon was how little he understood of what he'd seen of his world. But he'd learned just by talking, and the teller didn't seem disappointed.
Chapter 10
Of course Whandall asked Tras Preetror about Lords. Strangely, Tras wanted him to find out more. "Tras, we saw you with them on the wagon. You spoke to them," Whandall said.
"We see them when they want to be seen," Tras said. "A show for tellers. But you've seen Lords when they didn't know. Whandall, everyone is curious about your Lords. Who are they? Where do they come from? How do they get their power?"
"Don't other people have Lords?"
"Lords, Kings, and a hundred other ways to keep chaos imprisoned," Tras said. "But Tep's Town is different. You burn down your city, the kin-less rebuild, and everyone thinks it won't happen without the Lords. Maybe everyone's right. I want to know. Whandall, don't you want to go back?"