The incident got Emmis thinking as they walked, though. If Hagai was a witch, he ought to be able to do a better job of not being noticed. Witches could usually sense what other people were going to do before they did it; the good ones could allegedly actually hear people's thoughts. If Hagai was a witch then he surely knew he had been spotted, but he was still pretending to be just another passerby.
So he probably wasn't a witch.
He might be some other sort of magician, though.
Emmis wondered whether he should say any of this to Lar. The ambassador had said witches were fairly common back where he came from, though, so he ought to be able to figure it out for himself.
Or perhaps not. Just because witches were common didn't mean Lar knew anything about them.
He had not reached a conclusion by the time they crossed Games Street five long blocks later.
"This is the Wizards' Quarter," he said. "The next cross-street is Wizard Street. Warlock Street is a little further on."
"I see," the Vondishman said, looking around with interest.
In most respects this stretch of Arena Street was much the same as the rest – a broad avenue of hard-packed dirt lined with three- and four-story buildings, most of them stone for one or two floors and half-timbered above, with tiled roofs and assorted gables and overhangs. Balconies were common but not universal. Large torches were mounted in brackets at every corner, providing light; Emmis knew the city guard replaced those daily, as they usually burned away to nothing somewhere between midnight and dawn. Many of the ground-floor doors had signboards or lanterns or both above them; many of the windows were big, many-paned things holding displays of one sort or another. Some were lit, while others were not – not every magician stayed open for business this late.
North of Games Street the window displays had generally been of fabrics, or furniture, or kitchenware, or other commonplace goods. Here, though, they were a little less ordinary. One window held strangely-shaped bottles of multi-colored liquids, while another displayed only a dusty stuffed dragon – a mere baby, perhaps seven feet from the tip of its nose to the tip of its tail, and a wingspan Emmis judged to be no more than ten feet, though it was hard to be sure, since the wings weren't extended. A third held nothing but a dinner plate that was inexplicably sending up an endless shower of sparks, a spray reaching perhaps a foot high, and that changed color every few seconds.
One did display kitchenware, in the form of a teapot and half a dozen cups, but the teapot was ambling about on stubby little china feet.
Several windows had no displays at all, just velvet curtains.
And some held cards listing spells offered for sale, often in runes so ornate they were hard to read. A few of these glowed without need of any visible light source. Lar stopped to read one of these cards, and Emmis stopped beside him.
It was a fairly modest list – Fendel's Rune of Privacy, the Spell of the Spinning Coin, the Greater and Lesser Spells of Invaded Dreams, Eknerwal's Preserving Spell, Fendel's Infatuous Love Spell – concluding with, "and Many Diverse Others."
"That's a wizard's shop?" Lar asked.
"Yes," Emmis replied, even before looking up at the signboard over the door that announced, "Edarth of Ethshar, Master Wizard."
"What about that?" The Vondishman pointed at a shop window illuminated by a glowing sphere about a foot in diameter. The globe was surrounded by a dozen gleaming constructions of crystal and metal ranging from a thumb-sized amulet to an open-work contraption the size of a large dog, none of them with any recognizable purpose.
"I think that's a sorcerer," Emmis said.
Lar stared for a moment, then turned away shaking his head. "We don't have anything like that in Vond!"
The two of them continued down the street, with Emmis occasionally looking over his shoulder to be sure Hagai was still there, and soon reached the corner of Warlock Street.
"There it is," Emmis said, gesturing.
Lar frowned. "It's dark," he said.
Emmis had to admit that he had a point; where about half the shops on Arena were lit, almost none on Warlock Street were. "I suppose they don't want to work as late," he said. "You know the proverb – working on Festival means good money but it's bad advertising."
"Bad what?"
"Advertising." Emmis sighed. "I don't know the word in any other languages. Signs, notices, things like that."
Lar looked confused. "I don't think that's a proverb back in the empire," he said. "At least, I can't place it."
"Maybe not."
"And it isn't Festival for months, so I don't…"
"Never mind," Emmis interrupted. "Just forget it. All I meant is, warlocks don't seem to work late. I suppose they don't need to; they don't need to pay for any ingredients, or buy herbs, or appease any demons."
"They still need to buy food and pay taxes, don't they?"
Emmis grimaced. "Honestly, I'm not sure. There's a rumor that warlocks can live on their magic, like someone with a wizard's bloodstone, and if I were a tax collector I don't think I'd press a reluctant warlock very hard."
Lar's expression changed. "And… well, they try not to use more magic than they must."
"Yes. The more magic they use, the sooner they're Called."
Lar walked along Warlock Street and looked over the unlit signboards and darkened windows, with Emmis tagging close behind, while Hagai hung back, apparently still unaware that he had been spotted.
There were no stuffed dragons or crystal structures here; most of the windows held nothing but shutters or black curtains, though Emmis supposed that might be different by daylight. The signboards mostly simply gave the proprietor's name. Some appended the word "warlock," but none claimed any further title; no one here called himself a master.
"Not very informative," Emmis remarked. "Perhaps we should come back tomorrow."
"Tomorrow I am to meet with the overlord, am I not?"
"I don't know," Emmis said. "Tomorrow I talk to my contact at the Palace, and find out whether he's arranged anything."
"Ah." Lar stopped in front of one of the handful of illuminated shops, where a card stood in the window. "ISHTA OF FRESHWATER," proclaimed the large runes at the top. Beneath, smaller, elaborately-curled runes added, "Healing a Specialty – man, woman, child, or beast. Antiquities Restored. Porcelain amp; Other Valuables Repaired."
"It would seem at least one warlock works late," he said.
Emmis made a noncommital noise.
Lar marched up and tried the door; it opened with a light push, and he stepped inside. Emmis reluctantly followed.
They found themselves in a good-sized, well-lit room where half a dozen people were clustered around a table at one end.
"…told you, there's a piece missing," a woman was saying. "See, right there?"
"No," another voice said, a male one.
"It's tiny," replied a third, one that sounded like a child.
"Yes, it is," the first agreed, "but it's definitely missing, and if I replace it out of thin air I can't guarantee it'll match perfectly."
"But we'll never find something that small!" a fourth voice said – another woman, Emmis thought. "Someone's probably stepped on it and crushed it, or the cat might have eaten it!"
"I can make a replacement," the first woman said. Emmis was fairly certain the voice was coming from a black-clad figure, presumably Ishta of Freshwater. "I just want you to understand that it may not be exactly as it was before. Without the original piece I can't just rebuild it, I need to make a new piece, and since I never saw the missing bit, it may not match exactly."
"You can't use your magic to make it match?" the man demanded.
"No. I'm a warlock, not a wizard. I can move and shape things, down to the very tiniest particles, and I can see and feel things you cannot, but I can't simply make the damage unhappen. A wizard probably could, with the right spell, but it would almost certainly cost you more than my fee." She glanced over her shoulder at Lar and Emmis, then turned back to her customers. "Why don't you discuss it, and I'll be right back?" Without waiting for an answer she turned and left the table, striding briskly toward the two men just inside her door.