Come!
And so I ducked, Snorri ducked lower, and we went in.
It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the blue gloom within the tent. Dr. Taproot I judged to be the skinny figure seated behind a desk, and the more substantial form leaning over at him, hands planted firmly on the papers between them, must be the fellow objecting to bathing lions.
Ah! said the seated figure. Prince Jalan Kendeth and Snorri ver Snagason! Welcome to my abode. Welcome!
How the hell- I caught myself. It was good that he knew me. Id been wondering how to convince anyone that I was a prince.
Oh, Im Dr. Taproot, I know everything, my prince. Watch me!
Snorri passed me and snagged an empty chair. Word gets around. Especially about princes. He seemed less impressed than I was.
Watch me! Taproot nodded, birdlike, a sharp-featured head on a thin neck. Message-riders on the Lexicon Road carry gossip along with their sealed scrolls. And what a story! Did you truly jump an arctic bear, Mr. Snagason? Do you think you could jump one of ours? The pays good. Oh, but youve injured your hand. A hook-knife, I hear? Watch me! Taproots chatter came so rapid and moved so fast that without your full attention the flow of it would hypnotize you.
Yes, the hand. I latched onto that. Have you a chirurgeon? Were light on funds-Snorri scowled at that-but Im good for credit. The royal coffers underwrite my purse.
Dr. Taproot offered a knowing smile. Your debts are the stuff of legend, my prince. He raised his hands as if trying to frame the enormity of them. But fear not, I am a civilized man. We of the circus do not let a wounded traveller go untended! I shall have our sweet Varga see to the matter presently. A drink, perhaps? He reached for the desk drawer. You may go, Walldecker. He shooed away the scar-faced man who had stood in silent disapproval through our conversation. Stripes! Watch me! Good ones. Serra has black paint. See Serra. Returning his attention to me, he fished out a dark glass bottle, small enough for poison. I have a little rum. Ancient stuff from the wreck of the Hunter Moon, dredged up by scallop men off the Andoran coast. Try it. He magicked three tiny silver cups into being. Im always one to sit and chat. Its my burden. Watch me. Gossip runs through my veins and I must feed the habit. Tell me, my prince, is your grandmother well? How is her heart?
Dr. Taproot offered a knowing smile. Your debts are the stuff of legend, my prince. He raised his hands as if trying to frame the enormity of them. But fear not, I am a civilized man. We of the circus do not let a wounded traveller go untended! I shall have our sweet Varga see to the matter presently. A drink, perhaps? He reached for the desk drawer. You may go, Walldecker. He shooed away the scar-faced man who had stood in silent disapproval through our conversation. Stripes! Watch me! Good ones. Serra has black paint. See Serra. Returning his attention to me, he fished out a dark glass bottle, small enough for poison. I have a little rum. Ancient stuff from the wreck of the Hunter Moon, dredged up by scallop men off the Andoran coast. Try it. He magicked three tiny silver cups into being. Im always one to sit and chat. Its my burden. Watch me. Gossip runs through my veins and I must feed the habit. Tell me, my prince, is your grandmother well? How is her heart?
Well shes got one, I suppose. I didnt like the mans impertinence. And his rum smelled like the stuff the herbmen rub on chilblains. Now that I had a chair under my arse and a tent about me and my name and station recognized, I began to feel a little more my old self. I sipped his rum and damned him for it. Dont know anything about how its ticking, though. The idea of my grandmother suffering any frailties of the flesh seemed alien to me. Shed been carved from bedrock and would outlast us all. That was how Father had it.
And your elder brothers, Martus, isnt it, and Darin? Martus must be coming up to twenty-seven now? Yes, in two weeks?
Um. Damned if I knew their birthdays. Theyre well. Martus misses the cavalry, of course, but at least he got a damn chance at it.
Of course, of course. Taproots hands were never still, plucking at the air as if snatching scraps of information from it.
And your great-uncle? He was never a well man.
Garyus? Nobody knew about the old man. I didnt even know he was a relative for the first few years after I took to visiting him in the tower where they kept him. I climbed in through the window so nobody saw me come and go. It was Great-Uncle Garyus who gave me Mothers picture in a locket. I must have been about five or six. Yes, not long after the Silent Sister touched me. The blind-eye woman, I called her back then. Gave me a lepsy. Fits and shakes for a month. I found old Garyus by accident when I was small, clambered in before I noticed the room wasnt empty. He scared me, hunched on his sickbed, twisted in ways a man shouldnt twist. Not evil, but wrong. I feared catching it, thats the honest truth. And he knew it. Good at knowing a mans mind was Garyus, and a boys.
I was born this way, he had said. Not unkindly, though I had stared at him as if he were a sin. His skull bulged as if overfilled, misshapen, like a potato.
He lay propped up in his bed, a jug and goblet on the table close at hand, lit by dusty sunlight. No one came to him in this high tower, just a nurse to clean him, and sometimes a small boy clambering through the window.
Born broken. Each sentence gasped between breaths. I had a twin, and when we were birthed they had to break us apart. A boy and a girl, the first joined twins that werent both boys or both girls, they say. They broke us apart. But we didnt break even. And I got. . this. He lifted a twisted arm as if doing so were a labour of Hercules.
He had reached out from his sheets-a grave shroud, that was what those sheets made me think-he had reached out and given me that locket, a cheap enough thing but with my mothers picture inside, so fine and real youd swear she was looking right at you.
Garyus, Taproot agreed, breaking a silence Id not noticed.
I shook off the memory. Hes well enough. None of your damn business, I wanted to say, but when youre far from home and poorer than church mice it pays to curb your pride. Garyus was the only one of them I had time for, really. He couldnt leave his room. Not unless someone carried him. So I visited. Possibly it was the only duty Id ever kept. Well enough.
Good, good. Taproot wrung his hands, squeezing out his approval, a pale wrestling of too-long fingers. And Hauldr Snagason, how stands the North?
Cold, and too far away. Snorri set down his empty cup, licking his teeth.
And the Uuliskind? Still fair? Red goats for milk on the Scraa slopes, black for wool on the Nfflr ridges?
Snorri narrowed his eyes at the circus-master, perhaps wondering if the man was reading his mind. Have you. . been to the Uuliskind? The Undoreth would remember a circus, and yet Id never heard of an effelant before today. And that reminds me. I must see this beast.
Taproot smiled: narrow, even teeth behind thin lips. He uncorked the rum again, moving to replenish our cups. My apologies, but you can see how it is with me. I pry. I question. I devour travellers tales. I store each snippet of information. He tapped his forehead. Here. Watch me!
Snorri took the little cup before him in his good hand. Aye. Red goats on the Scraa, black on the Nfflr. Though none to tend them, most like. The black ships came. Dead things from the Drowned Isles. Sven Broke-Oar brought this doom upon us.
Ah. Taproot nodded, steepled his fingers, pursed his lips. He of the Hardassa. A hard man. Not a good one, I fear. Pale hands shaped his opinion. Perhaps the goats, the red and the black, have new herders now. Boys of the Hardassa.
Snorri drank off his rum. He set his poisoned hand upon the table, the knife wound a livid and weeping slot between the tendons. Mend me and youll have to change that tale, circus-master.
Of a certainty. A quick smile lit Taproots face. Kill or cure, thats our motto. Watch me. His hands moved around the Norsemans, never touching, but framing it, following the line of the incision.
Go to Vargas wagon. The smallest, with a red circle upon the side. In the grouping close to the gate. Varga can clean a wound, pack it, stitch it. Best poultices you ever saw. Watch me! Even a sour wound may yield to them.
Snorri stood, and I rose to go with him. It had become a habit.
You might stay, Prince Jalan? Taproot did not look up, but something in his tone kept me there.
Ill find you later, I told Snorri. Save you the shame of weeping before me when this Varga sets to his work. And watch out for that effelant. Theyre green and like the taste of Vikings.
Snorri answered with a snort and ducked out into the blinding brightness of the day.
A fierce man. Watch me! Taproot eyed the tent flap, swaying in Snorris wake. Tell me, prince. How is it that you travel together? I didnt imagine you as one for the hardships of the road. How is it that the Norseman hasnt killed you for the pits or that you havent fled for your home comforts?
Ill have you know I learned a sight more about hardship in the Scorron Heights than- Something in the slow regret with which Taproot shook his head took the bluster from my sails. I feared if I mentioned my heroism at the Aral Pass, he might laugh at me. Thats the trouble with men who know too much. A sigh escaped me. In truth? Were bound by some enchantment. A damned inconvenient one. You wouldnt happen to have a-
A mind-sworn wizard? A hidden hand that might separate you? Watch me! If I had such, this circus would be a gold mine and me the richest of all rich men.
A mind-sworn wizard? A hidden hand that might separate you? Watch me! If I had such, this circus would be a gold mine and me the richest of all rich men.
I had expected him to laugh at my claims of enchantment, so to be taken seriously was a relief, though hearing how hard it might prove to be to undo the magic was less pleasing.
Taproot finished his drink and put the little bottle back in the drawer. Speaking of rich men, you might care to know about one Maeres Allus.