"I'll be damned," Ronal said quietly. "I knew there was something strange about her."
Aaliyah and Spyder fell into each other's arms and wept together, and Spyder wondered how they could ever share love again through so much pain. He hadn't known the boy, Lisoh, but he knew what Lisoh meant to Aaliyah. And he had promised-he had promised. Through his tears, he looked up. The fog had melted away. In the sky, the moon was past full eclipse.
With an effort, Spyder got to his feet and, picking up his sword, went to Rime's body. Her mouth, though caked with mud, seemed turned up at the corners as if the bitch were still laughing at him. For a long moment he stood there letting the rage wash over him again, then the grief, then a terrible emptiness.
He raised the sword once and cut off her right hand. The untem-pered ring went into his pocket. It was evidence for Jamasharem. Unless he decided to keep it.
A second time he raised the sword and cut off her head. That was for spite. Then he cast hand, head, and her entire body into the flames to burn with Aaliyah's brother.
The rest of them could rot in the mud.
"She's a shapechanger," Spyder explained quietly. He didn't feel obligated to tell Ronal that he was the witch, or rather, the warlock, and that the weird weather tricks had been his. Perhaps in time. It wasn't that he didn't trust his friend, but some secrets were best kept. Especially in Sanctuary.
Ronal sat on the couch with his swollen left leg in a swath of herbal poultices and bandages. "I'm getting too old for this," he said after a pause. "That knife-toss should have found the witch's heart."
"You did well, Ronal." He turned and stared from the rooftop parapet out toward the bay. Half to himself, he added, "My knives are always where I need them."
His knives. His agents.
After another long pause, Ronal asked, "Are you going to keep the ring?"
Spyder pursed his lips. Though the ring was untempered and would never be as potent as it was intended to be, it was not entirely without power. He wasn't sure yet if he wanted to hand that unexplored power to Jamasharem. "For now, it's safe in my vault. I may destroy it." He had no idea how to accomplish that, but he was certain it would take more than his meager talent.
Aaliyah appeared at the top of the stair with a tray of food and a fresh jug of wine. She set them on the table by the couch within Ronal's reach and went to Spyder's side. He slipped his arm around her and drew her close. "Quanali muriel maha elberab canta," he whispered.
A sudden chill touched the air, but this time he wasn't the cause.
"It's beginning," he told her as he glanced toward the sky. Slowly the sun began to weaken and fade. He swept his gaze over the harbor below, then westward toward the Maze and the Bazaar, then toward the palace.
"Why do I have a feeling you don't mean the eclipse?" Ronal said as he bit into a roll.
"Witches, wizards, demons-even shapechangers." He forced a smile as he tilted Aaliyah's face toward his and kissed her forehead. "The Nisi covens are finished for good, but the things I've seen in two weeks' time. The things I've heard. We're all being drawn to Sanctuary again. It's as if we're being assembled for something. For what, I don't know."
The sky grew sullen and cool. Birds took to the air and flew in confused circles. Dogs barked. Everywhere Spyder looked people stood in the streets, on the docks, or on their own rooftops. They watched, too, with an uncharacteristic hush.
Slowly, the sky darkened, and the shadows of Sanctuary twisted into strange shapes as a black disk crawled across the sun. When it was finally in place all that remained where the sun had been was a flickering blood-red ring.
Spyder was not looking up, however. The placid, almost mirror-smooth surface of the bay held his attention. It reflected the spectacle in the sky with an uncanny precision. He wondered if anyone else saw it. He wondered if Aaliyah noticed.
On the bay was another ring of sea and fire.
Doing the Gods' Work
Jody Lynn Nye
"Thank you, healer," the gray-haired woman whispered as the potion took effect. Pel Garwood straightened his long back and stood up, taking the empty cup away from her lips.
"That should ease your back for a good week, until the full moon. You can chew this then," he held up a twist of green and gold herb strands, "to take away the pain for a day or two. I need the moon to make a potion that will last you a whole month. I can't cure what ails you, you know. I can only ease it."
"It's the penalty for living so long," Sharheya said. "I'm too old to expect miracles. I'm grateful for the relief."
"How much?" asked Carzen the sawyer, Sharheya's son-in-law, eyeing the apothecary warily. Pel's mass of black-and-silver hair and smooth face confused people as to his age, but his calm bedside manner gave him the air of a sage, too dignified to argue with.
Pel held up long fingers to count. "Nine padpols for today, another for the twist. A bright silver soldat for the month-long cure."
"A soldat! Too much!"
"Pay the man," Sharheya said, her eyes narrowing as if the pain had returned suddenly. Pel knew there was little love lost between his two visitors, but the widow Sharheya owned the wood and the lumberyard attached to it that was the family's fortune. If Carzen wished his wife to be disinherited and all passing to Sharheya's scholar brother, all Carzen had to do was infuriate Sharheya at the right moment. Accidents happened, especially in such a dangerous place as a sawmill. The woman was always changing her will. Pel had been in and out of it for a year. He had never cared whether a bequest was forthcoming; he would have provided care for those who genuinely needed his gift. If he liked them it would cost them less than it cost Carzen. He didn't like Carzen. The man had all the conscience of a scorpion.
"What's in it?" Carzen asked, peering at the taller man from under his shaggy brown eyebrows.
"Willowbark, dark-well water, cider, poppy, feverfew picked at the new moon, sgandi leaf…"
"Sgandi? You mean stinkweed? I could make your potion, for nothing!" Carzen snapped his fingers under the healer's nose. "I could throw those weeds in a jug and save myself the price, as well as the trouble of coming to you."
Pel just raised his salt-and-pepper eyebrow. "In what proportions would you mix them? Too much of one thing, not enough of another would be fatal. And do you know the propitious times to gather each plant? Where to get the most potent weeds?" It had been so long since he'd been here in his home city that the local Ilsigi-the Wrigglie-dialect felt strange and slippery in his mouth. What was the commonplace insulting term they used to one another? Yes, that was it. "Pay up, pud, or take your problems home with you. Fair for fair. If you won't pay, then I have no obligation to you. I don't care." But he did. He could feel the suffering of the people who came to him, and he wanted them whole. His hand sought out Sharheya's, and held it tightly. All their pain resonated in him. It was part of his punishment, and his salvation. The old woman gave her son-in-law a disgusted look.
"Pay him and let's go home! I don't trust the apprentices to make that rosewood table for Lord Kuklos without supervision."
Grumbling, Carzen dug in his scrip. Looking up at Pel after each coin hit the table, he tossed out padpols one at a time. When he got to nine he started to put his purse away. Sharheya cleared her throat with meaning, the meaning being that if he didn't move faster she would call for pen and parchment right there. He put the tenth down for the herb twist, then very slowly produced a soldat. It wasn't very shiny.
"If," Pel let his voice interrupt the woodman's movements, "if you'd rather pay me in kind instead of in cash, I need a roof joist for the rear of my shop."
"How long?" Carzen asked. Pel pointed up. The wood-smith ran a practiced eye across the ceiling. "Uhm. Nine yards. You need more than one, pud. All that's holding up your roof is prayer. You need at least sixteen."