The Steel of Raithskar Read online

  “Ransom,” said Thanasset shortly, then shrugged. “At least, that was Zaddorn’s theory. What other reason would there be? It’s the only practical way to make money from the theft.”

  “Was his theory?” I asked. “What changed his mind?”

  “A quarter-moon passed with no message from the thieves, and all of Zaddorn’s digging brought up exactly nothing,” Ferrathyn said. “Either it’s the most tightly-held secret in Raithskar’s long history, or the rogueworld really does know nothing about it.”

  “And so he blames Eddarta now,” I said, and refrained from mentioning the posse I had seen.

  “Yes,” Farrathyn agreed. “It was actually my idea that sparked the new theory. When he could learn nothing, Zaddorn came to us—” he gestured to include Thanasset “—in desperation for any clue. He seized on my suggestion of city rivalry and, with his usual sharp understanding, quickly determined that if the Ra’ira left Raithskar, it must have traveled with the caravan of Gharlas.”

  “Which is where you come in, son.”

  Here it was at last. I held out my glass for a refill, surprised that my hand wasn’t shaking.

  “That girl, Illia, delivered the note you left for me. When Gharlas was suspected, I confided in Ferrathyn that you had signed on with his caravan. Naturally, seeing you back home so soon, Ferrathyn and I wondered …”

  You wondered? I thought at him. You should be on this side of things!

  “Did you see or hear anything, Markasset,” Ferrathyn asked me, “that might suggest to you that our thieves rode with your caravan?”

  How the hell could I answer them? Yet answer them I must, and I had only seconds to decide what to say. The truth? “Sorry, folks, I’m a stranger here myself.” I had a strong hunch I’d get a lengthy tour of the local equivalent of the madhouse. Would they believe me if I told them I was Ricardo Emilio Carillo, and that, in some fashion I did not understand, I had been loaned the use of Markasset’s faultless body and faulty memories? I thought not.

  But I couldn’t lie, either. Not from any compunction over lying to “my” father—though I did feel a reluctance—but from the sheer impracticality of it. A good lie has to be based on a sound knowledge of the truth, or it won’t fit in, even for a moment.

  Even a censored version of the truth wouldn’t work. If I said, “I don’t remember,” I’d sound like a Capo Mafioso testifying to a Congressional committee.

  But I had to talk, and talk fast!

  “I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t help you there. I don’t recall any suspicious or peculiar behavior on the part of anyone in the caravan.”

  I waited for more questions, but Ferrathyn only nodded. “Good enough. But—” I had taken a mouthful of faen in my relief; it turned bitter and I had to struggle to swallow it. “—then why did you return early to Raithskar?”

  I looked at him directly and brought out my most sincere voices. “Sir, with all due respect, that is a personal matter. I assure you it had nothing whatever to do with the Ra’ira.”

  Was I lying? Or telling the truth? I didn’t know. No wave of guilt surged up from Markasset’s memory, but I couldn’t count on that to mean he wasn’t involved in some way.

  The Chief Supervisor gazed at me for a long two seconds. He looked kindly, puzzled, and just a little sad. “I see,” he said, and sighed. “Well, we’ll know for certain before too long. Yesterday Zaddorn sent out a special squad with only food and water. They can travel half again as fast as a heavyladen caravan—but even so, we cannot expect them back for more than a moon yet. We shall just have to be patient.”

  A moon, I thought to myself. It will be much longer than that. The caravan had a nine-day head start. That means Zaddorn’s squad won’t catch up with them for … um … eighteen days, and then it will take them at least that long again to get back …

  My chain of reasoning was cut off sharply by the realization that I didn’t know just how long a time period a “moon” was in Gandalara. On my Earth, it was twenty-nine and a half days, but if I were on some planet circling Deneb or Fomalhaut, its moon could have an entirely different period.

  “If it can be found,” Thanasset said, “we can trust Zaddorn to find it eventually. He’s tough and he’s smart.”

  Ferrathyn nodded. “He is that. And he hates to give up.” Suddenly he chuckled. “He may yet find the Ra’ira here in the city.” The chuckle became a laugh and the old face crinkled up with merriment. “Oh,” he gasped. “I can see it now. The squad reports back, exhausted, dejected, drained by the heat of the desert, and its leader reports sadly to Zaddorn: ‘Sir, we have found no trace of the Ra’ira.’ ”

  “And Zaddorn,” added Thanasset, laughing with his friend, “looks up from his desk with that absent expression he has when his mind’s on something else, and says: ‘Oh, that! We found that thirty days ago!’ He’d certainly have twelve very unhappy men on his hands!”

  “And it would be my fault,” Ferrathyn said, “since it was my idea that sent them after the caravan!” He chuckled again, shaking his head. “And I can’t say I’d be sorry for it, either. Zaddorn is a fine man, but his independent ways have given me headaches enough in the past.” He drained his glass and stood up. “Well, I must be going. I’ll see you in the morning, Thanasset?” It was only half a question.

  “Of course,” Thanasset replied, standing up and walking with Ferrathyn to the door of the room. “I’ll have to see to Tailor’s Street first thing; it hasn’t been resurfaced in eight moons, and the ruts are getting bad. I received a note on it yesterday. And then I’ll try to get to the threescore other matters waiting for me. This whole business has thoroughly disrupted my routine.”

  “I know,” Ferrathyn said feelingly. “You should see my desk.” He turned to me and smiled. “It’s been a pleasure to meet you at last, young Markasset.”

  I stood up and bowed as I had earlier. “You honor me, Chief Supervisor.”

  Both men left the room then, and I collapsed back into my chair. I could hear the soft whisper of their sandals as they crossed the polished wood floor toward the door which opened into the street. And I could hear their voices.

  “A well-spoken lad,” Ferrathyn said softly. “He is a credit to you, old friend.”

  “Thank you,” Thanasset said, and I heard the heavy door swish open. “Until tomorrow, then.”

  “Yes. Good fortune until then.”

  Thanasset came back into the room and silently refilled his glass, then mine. But he didn’t drink his. He just sat there, across from me, and stared moodily at the surface of the faen, tipping the glass slightly and watching the shifting liquid. The tip of his tongue worried his right tusk in about the same spirit as I might drum my fingers on the table. He was thinking. He was worried.

  And so was I—and for the first time since I had awakened on the desert, not just about myself. I liked this man. Whether that was a carryover from Markasset I couldn’t tell, but the fact remained that I felt a strong liking for him. I remembered what that cop on the trail had said: something about arresting “that fleabitten old man” and persuading him to tell them all about it. They had meant Thanasset, of course—the Ra’ira had been stolen from him. Did they think …

  “Father, are you in trouble?” I asked softly.

  He looked up at me with the same expression I had seen on his face when he introduced me to Ferrathyn. He seemed about to say something, then apparently decided against it. At last he said, “I don’t know, son. Maybe. I’m not suspected of the theft, of course, but—I may be open to a charge of criminal negligence.”

  “The door,” I said, and he nodded. “Did you leave that door unlocked?”

  “No!” He slammed the flat of his palm on the top of the table beside his chair. Ferrathyn’s glass, which had been left there, jumped clear off the table. Even with the thick green rug covering the parquet floor, it would have shattered when it landed. With a reflex speed I didn’t know I had, I leaned out of my chair and caught it in midair. Thanasse
t barely noticed. “I locked that door when Ferrathyn left!” he said. “My honor on it!”

  I took the glass and set it on the shelf where the pitcher stood. “I believe you, Father. The question is, how did the robbers get in? It definitely can’t be unlocked from the outside?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  I thought for a minute. If that room was always occupied by a Supervisor, it was unlikely that visitors, even the son of one of the Supervisors, would be admitted. It seemed like a safe bet that Markasset didn’t know any more about the room itself than Ricardo did, and I could ask questions freely.

  “What would happen if the Supervisor on duty suddenly became ill or dropped dead? How would the others get the door open?”

  Thanasset’s eyebrows tried to crawl up over his jutting supraorbital ridges. “That would never happen. A man that ill would never be allowed to take the duty!”

  “Not if anybody knew he was ill—of course not,” I agreed. “But if something happened unexpectedly? Suppose … his heart just stopped?” There was no way to say “coronary thrombosis” in Gandaresh.

  His face cleared of its puzzled look. “Oh, I see! You’re proposing a purely hypothetical case: that for some reason a man’s inner awareness failed to tell him of the possibility of an oncoming malfunction.”

  Inner awareness? I wondered.

  “I’ve never heard of such a case. But, assuming such a thing could happen, I suppose we’d just have to take an axe to the door.”

  I managed to keep my face straight, but inside I was gawping at him like an idiot. The Guardian shift was a third of a day—eight hours—and Thanasset had never heard of a case where a man hadn’t known of a fatal malfunction at least eight hours before his death.

  No doctors, I thought, stunned. No lab tests, no outside opinions. Just “inner awareness.” I must have it, too. Perhaps I would have the rare privilege of twice knowing beforehand that I’m about to die!

  But, I reminded myself, that only works for interior failings. My “inner awareness” is giving me no messages about whether or not I’ll be executed for the theft of the Ra’ira!

  “How does the lock work?” I asked, to cover my surprise and confusion.

  Thanasset shrugged. “It is not a thing generally known outside the Council, but I see no harm in telling you now that there is nothing to protect. The building is very old, and the lock on that door has never been changed. But it lacks nothing because of its antiquity—it’s the strongest door and most secure lock I’ve ever seen. The door is a pace wide and half a hand thick, solid wood, reinforced and nailed with rakor.”

  Rakor. Markasset’s memory came through. The word meant “most precious metal”—but the English equivalent was “steel.” Evidently iron mines were far from common in Gandalara.

  “There is a set of five steel brackets,” he continued, “two on the door itself, two on the wall on the opening side, on the left, and one on the wall on the hinge side, on the right. A heavy wooden bolt slides in the brackets. When the door is unlocked, the bolt is pushed clear of the door, to the left. To lock it, you slide it to the right until it rests in the bracket on the hinge side. There’s a hole in the bolt that matches a hole in the bracket, and there’s a steel pin as thick as your thumb that goes in there. The bolt won’t slide until that pin is removed.”

  “And you put the pin in?”

  “I did. I remember it distinctly.”

  I believed him. And not just because I liked him. It didn’t make sense to think he had left that door unlocked on purpose and expected to get away with it. He was not a stupid man, nor an irresponsible one. That the Ra’ira had been stolen from his care troubled him deeply, and his anxiety for the stone’s return was compounded by his bewilderment over this business about the lock.

  Somehow, that door had been unlocked by the robbers themselves. But how? I had no better answers than Thanasset did. I’d read plenty of locked-room mysteries, but this was the first unlocked-room mystery I’d come across.

  “I’d like to take a look at that room,” I said.

  “As I said before, there’s no harm now. Yes, we’ll go there tomorrow. I have this day off, and I need the rest.” He eyed me, and smiled wryly. “And you need a bath. You’re all over salt and dust.” We both stood up. “Bathe and change your clothes. Lunch will be ready by the time you’re through.”

  A bath and some food! Suddenly nothing was more important.

  9

  I remembered where “my” room was. I rushed up the stairs that led upward from the street entrance. They were made of wood, but the stepping surfaces had been covered with rough-surfaced tiles—for safety, I presumed, and to protect the precious wood. A hallway led off to my right when I reached the top of the stairs, and the second door on the left side was my room.

  Another of the tall, latticed windows in the far wall overlooked the neighboring garden. A cloth hanging was mounted above the window, and would cover it if it were allowed to drape naturally. But now its folds were gathered and drawn to the side of the window, held there by a long wooden peg mortared into the stone of the wall.

  Beneath the window was a man-sized woven pad much like the ones I had seen in the Refreshment House. This one seemed larger and thicker, and it lay upon the floor of the room. A light, soft blanket was neatly folded beside the pad. This was to be my bed, and it looked comfortable enough.

  I turned to one of the side walls, which was covered completely with narrow bronze-hinged wooden doors. When I pulled at the two handles in the middle of the wall, the doors folded apart, exposing room-length shelves spaced about two feet apart from floor to ceiling.

  Wow, I thought, looking at the contents. Markasset does know how to dress!

  Arranged on the shelves was an enormous wardrobe of brightly-colored tunics, trousers, and belts. And boots and headscarves. And sandals. And pins and rings and metal chains that were either belts or necklaces.

  I picked up a bright yellow tunic and shook it out. It had long sleeves and a high neck, and reached to mid-thigh on me. I looked back at the stack of clothes and found a bright green sleeveless jacket about the same length. It was heavier and elaborately embroidered and bordered with yellow—they made a beautiful match.

  But I put them back. For one thing, the fact that their colors were deliberately coordinated set them apart from the ordinary street wear I had seen so far. They must be Gandalaran formal dress. For another, though I admired them and longed to wear them, they were a little too … obtrusive for me yet. I was learning more and more about this world, but I was still a stranger here. Best, I thought, to attract as little notice as possible.

  So I selected a relatively plain blue tunic and set it out on the woven pad with some sandals. Then, with relief, I stripped off the clothes I had found myself in when I woke up in the desert. They had been carefully washed by the Fa’aldu at the Refreshment House of Yafnaar, but three days on the trail had thoroughly dusted them up again. The boots I shook off and placed on the floor of the closet with the other footwear. The clothes I dropped in a pile in the corner.

  On one of the shelves was a short robe of a soft, thick fabric. It was well-worn, and obviously designed as a bathrobe. I put it on and went downstairs, the rough tile pleasant against my bare feet.

  I went out the back door and along the path I had followed before, toward the back buildings. I looked in on Keeshah and smiled. He was sound asleep on the floor, lying on his side and twisted just enough so that one huge foreleg was suspended in midair. I had a strong impulse to go in and scratch the lighter fur of his chest, but I knew it would disturb him.

  Rest well, Keeshah, I thought at him. You deserve it.

  As though my thought had reached him dimly, he moved in his sleep, lowered the hovering paw, and curled around to rest his head on one extended hind leg. I left him then, and hunted for the bath-house.

  It was only two doors down in a long series of outbuildings that formed the rear wall of the estate. It wasn’t large, jus
t a squarish room with a rectangular sunken pool long enough for a man to lie down in, and about as deep as the tubs I was used to. The tub was lined and bordered with pale gray tiles, each one decorated with fine blue traceries in an intricate design.

  A ceramic pipe a couple of inches in diameter led down from the ceiling, evidently from a cistern on the roof. No problem pumping water up there, I thought. The lake at the foot of Skarkel Falls is higher up the slope than the city—there would be plenty of pressure. And the water standing in the cistern would be sun-warmed.

  There was a rope hanging beside the pipe. I pulled it tentatively and was rewarded by a flow of water into the tub. On a ledge in the corner was a stack of scratchy-looking towels and several bars of soap. I took one—its scent was odd but pleasant—and climbed down into the tub. The water was comfortably warm, and I slid down the smooth tile until only my head was above water. I simply soaked for a while, really relaxing for the first time since I had awakened in the desert. I let my mind wander.

  It was apparent that the firm of Thanasset & Son were in a jam. Thanasset was suspected, at least in some quarters, of aiding and abetting in the theft of the Ra’ira. At the very least he had, apparently, been negligent in his care of it, thereby contributing to the felony. And one person—one very important Chief of Police Zaddorn—suspected Markasset of complicity in the same crime. Markasset could even be said to have a motive: a certain rogueworld character named Worfit was very anxious to have a large loan repaid.

  Markasset was better off than his father in one way: all he had to do was get on his sha’um and ride off to another city. To my mind, that was exactly what he had been trying to do when he took up the job with the caravan—though he had obviously had sense enough to travel incognito, with Keeshah following downwind.

  Had Markasset been involved with the jewel theft? I just couldn’t make up my mind about that. All the evidence I had seen assured me that Markasset had been a pretty wild young man—but I didn’t want to believe that he’d pull off a robbery for which his own father would be blamed.