Vaananen's own time had run out. He knew Takhi-sis was coming for him. It was only a matter of when and how.
As he sat on the red stone in the rena garden, Vaananen composed his last message. He picked gingerly at a black silken hair caught on the.inch-long needles of the large barrel cactus near his foot. The strand caught on a ripple of his breath and settled back upon the spines, this time well entan shy;gled. Vaananen stared abstractedly at it for a moment, and then caught a tiny, odd vibration from the life-current in the plant. He noticed the cactus had also swelled somewhat over the last few hours, as if there had been a sudden rain the afternoon before.
"Just like the new commander's power," he mut shy;tered. "Swelled full-blown overnight."
The priests of Istar had reveled as the new com shy;mander assumed the reins of the army. The scattered Twelfth and Ninth Legions recombined within a day and were renamed the Fifteenth, joining the First, Second, Fourth and Eighth in the defense of the city.
With the current size of the city's garrison, three legions could at any time march out the gates and still leave a sizeable guard at home. The town now knew that the fabled Sixth had arrived-the hexa shy;gons drawn in charcoal on the stone walls of alleys, scratched on doors and hung on tattered banners from the windows of abandoned houses, bore omi shy;nous witness that at last the legion was showing itself.
Soon they would all join together. Tamex would have his army, and the goddess within him would have her foothold in the world.
Vaananen shifted on the red stone. "But it isn't over yet," he said firmly, quietly.
Outside the window, almost in mockery, the dis shy;tant sounds of the shabby festival reached him from the Marketplace, and the druid stood, stepped away from the garden, and walked to the lectern, where he scrawled a hasty note on a scrap of parchment. He stepped into the corridor, handed the note to a passing linkboy, and ordered the child to the library.
"I want this book from the dark young man, the silent one," he whispered, and the linkboy hurried off.
Of course, it was no book Vaananen awaited.
Vincus arrived minutes later, his hands ink stained and sandy from Balandar's copying tasks. He found Vaananen somber and crouched above the rena gar shy;den as usual, but this time circled by lanterns as though he awaited a deeper darkness, as though all of that light was meant to ward him from something deadly and close.
Instantly, Vincus knew that this time was differ shy;ent. This time was special.
Vaananen beckoned him, and cautiously Vincus approached. He knew there was a magic in this gar shy;den, but it was quiet and meditative magic-far from the fire and thunder of the festival illusionists.
And yet, best be alert.
Solemnly, the druid showed him four symbols drawn in the sand. "You're a copyist, Vincus," he whispered, "and a good one, I hear. How is your memory?"
Vincus stared at the symbols in puzzlement. His memory was sharp and searching. Though he had seen them just once, he could have told of each booth in the Marketplace, the merchant's name and his wares, his home country and the color of the pennants on his tents.
No, there were no clouds in Vincus's recollection.
But the druid was asking for more than memory. And what he was asking for …
Well, Vincus was not sure.
So he shrugged, his right hand flickering with three tentative signs.
I remember as well as some, he told the druid.
Vaananen raised an eyebrow and smiled grimly. "You'll have to do better than that," he whispered. "You're the only one I can trust."
Vincus averted his eyes.
"No, look!" Vaananen urged, clutching the young servant's arm, pointing at the row of glyphs. "Could you remember these?"
Vincus looked. The lines were simple, bold. He already knew them. And yet..
Slowly, reluctantly, Vincus nodded.
Vaananen erased the glyphs. "Show me," he said.
Vincus drew again the four simple signs: Desert's Edge, Sixth Day of Lunitari, No Wind, the Leopard. And then the fifth symbol-the elaborate interlacing of two ancient letters.
"The last is the most important one," Vaananen said quietly. "The one that must reach Fordus Fire-soul-and he is far away, beyond the city walls, in the desert. Go."
Vincus looked up sharply in disbelief. The mythi shy;cal rebel commander!
"Yes, you must go to him," Vaananen said, smil shy;ing, trying to ease the young man's mind.
I will, Vincus signed. His gestures were confident, perhaps a little too bold. He would go. But he would never come back. Vincus did not believe in Fordus, nor in the world outside the city, for that matter.
Vincus stepped to the windowsill, searching the dark expanses of vallenwood below, the walls and the city beyond. Vaananen moved to him and touched his silver collar. A sharp blaze of blue crackled in the air at Vincus's ear, and he jerked away, dazed.
Vaananen looked him in the eye and said, "For years I have been striving to pay your debt-your father's debt-legitimately and legally. I have wrestled the Kingpriest, losing under his self-serving rules. But all the rules are broken now. Go in peace. Your collar will tell Fordus who you are."
The druid produced two books from beneath his cot. He handed them to Vincus, who turned the vol shy;umes over in his hands, then opened one.
On the frail, brittle pages was a story in the elusive Lucanesti script, of gods and goddesses, of Istar and inheritances and the rightful ruler. Vincus could read little of it. The other was a copy, but still written in Lucanesti.
"The one is too fragile to travel," the druid observed. "Here is a copy. Old words upon new parchment, as much as is legible. Take it with you. One will ask for it soon, and you will know it is right to give the book to that person."
Vaananen placed the book and some food, along with a dagger and some odd seeds, in a small hide bag, and pressed it into Vincus's hand.
"You have served well, Vincus," the druid con shy;cluded, as Vincus moved away, still puzzled. An odd note of finality crept into Vaananen's voice. "Well done."
Vincus descended through the spreading branches, climbing away from the words.
He stood at the edge of the Marketplace as the fes shy;tival closed for the night. One of the merchants-an enormous wine seller from Balifor-walked wearily from lantern to lantern, slowly darkening his brightly lit booth.
Vincus stepped into the shadows as the merchant passed. Uneasily, he fingered his silver collar. The druid's magic still stung.
It was too much, this task Vaananen had set before him. Until now, his work for the druid had been easy and intriguing-find this, listen to that, carry rumor and gossip and the whispers of officers back to Vaananen's quarters. And in return, Vaananen made sure Vincus received the best food and lightest duties.
What the druid did with the information could be anything, and it could be nothing. Whatever hap shy;pened had been none of Vincus's business or care, until now. This thing fretted at him.
He leaned against a marble wall that formed the southernmost edge of the Slave Market. On the day the Temple had bought him-a lone boy of eleven, he had stood in the square between two auctioned Que-Kiri warriors and been sold for the debts of a larcenous father-nobody had supposed him a spy in the making.
If they had only known! The strange, bright-eyed boy in their midst, inexplicably mute, had come to be trusted with the keys to a dozen chambers, to the library and the upper room of the Tower, where the Kingpriest spoke to his counsel. They had given him books and scrolls to carry and sort and store.
They never knew when he had learned to read.
Vincus's smile was veiled by the dark of the alley. They had always underestimated him-all except Vaananen, that is, whose bidding he had followed over the last year. He scooped up a fistful of sand from the base of the wall, scattered it into the shad shy;ows, covering his tracks. Out in the lamplit square, the vintner stored the last of the wine barrels in his rickety oxcart and, with a soft, guttural command to the huge animal, steered the vehicle into the dark.