A Shadow on the Glass Read online

  One morning Llian was woken by thumping on his door. It was still dark when he opened it. Outside was a grim-faced bailiff.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Llian.

  “Wistan, in his office, right now!” The bailiff seized him by the arm.

  Wistan’s office was cold and in the light of a single candle he looked positively malevolent. He looked up at Llian sharply, saggy jowls quivering with animosity. “Chanthed exists for the college,” he began, his voice like bristles on canvas. “My college! Let me but say the word and you have no room, no library privileges, and not even the meanest water carrier will let you push his cart.”

  Llian blinked. “Turlew has told me of your performance in the taverns last night, and other nights,” Wistan went on. “The office of the master will not be mocked.”

  Turlew sneered in the background.

  “Last night he laughed as loudly as any,” said Llian smiling. “Though he wouldn’t have if he’d stayed for the second act.”

  “Be silent! Do not use the voice on me! What is your intention? No, tell me no more lies—I know it already. You seek to have my office, to so ridicule me that the college will cast me down and declare you master by acclamation.”

  Llian gave a bitter laugh. “A Zain, master of the College of the Histories? Not in my time.” Llian cursed his ancestors for their folly, as he had often done. Though the Zain were no longer persecuted, they were still disliked and mistrusted And, arising out of their persecution, they had a great disdain for authority, though they were generally wise enough not to show it.

  “Indeed not! Offend again and I throw you naked out of Chanthed. Now get out!”

  I will not bow to your threats, thought Llian. I am not friendless. But he had no money, no references and nowhere to go. He set off down the street to a bar that opened at dawn, for it was almost dawn now. Halfway there he stopped.

  I can’t go on like this, he thought. I’ve been drinking every day this week.

  He sat down on the curb with his feet in the gutter. He was broke, lucky if he had two copper grints. No one would pay for a yarn at this time of day. If he went in he’d have to buy his own, and though drink was cheap, two coppers would melt like camphor on a hotplate.

  He went back up the hill to the library, but of course the doors were closed. He could wake up the porter, but the fellow would likely refuse. Llian’s influence had evaporated of late.

  He swore. Nowhere to go but back to bed. Then, down the street he caught sight of a pair of students weaving along, doubtless going home from an all-night session. He knew the girl but the fellow was a stranger. What the heck! If they could afford to drink all night they could buy him a few.

  Pasting on a harlot’s smile, Llian headed down to drown his miseries.

  3

  * * *

  HAUNTED BY

  THE PAST

  The magical telling was over. Karan, the red-haired woman who had so discomforted Llian, was swept out of the hall with the departing audience. She loved the Great Tales with a passion, and to hear them told at the College of the Histories was one of the high points of her life. The tale still seethed in her brain—being a sensitive, it was as though she had actually been there in the tower with Shuthdar and the crippled girl.

  Slowly the flames from the burning tower faded to a memory, and Karan found herself standing alone in the middle of a lawn surrounded by hedges of rosemary and lavender. For a moment she could not work out what she was doing there.

  She looked around. Llian and his party had gone and the last of the crowd were disappearing down the path. She should go too, before the guards realized that she had no right to be here. The Graduation Telling was closed to the public; she might end up in the watchhouse if she were caught. Now her head began to ache, the inevitable result of what she had done. She had been incredibly foolish, but she shied away from thinking about that. Karan pulled the hood down over her face and headed off toward her inn, the cheapest that Chanthed offered.

  Karan was small with a pale, round face, a warm open friendly face, framed by a tangled froth of hair as rich and red as sunset in a smoky sky. Her eyes were as green as malachite. She was twenty-three but looked much younger. In times of plenty her form was inclined to roundness, but after the long walk to Chanthed on short rations she was slender.

  At dawn she rose, dressed in baggy green trousers and an oversized shirt that were of good quality but much repaired, splashed her face with water and forced a bone comb through her hair, though after it was done it looked much as it had before. She sprinkled a few drops of lime-blossom perfume on her fingers, rubbed it through her hair and her toilet was complete.

  Breakfast was part of a loaf of hard bread and two apples, for money was so scarce that she begrudged even the copper grint they charged in the dining room. Still munching her apple Karan donned her pack and set off for home. She lived at Gothryme, an insignificant manor in the poor mountain province of Bannador. It was a week’s journey east across the mountains (if the weather was kind), but one that she had done many times—as pleasant a trip now, at the end of summer, as it was miserable and dangerous in winter. Traveling alone did not bother her though; in spite of her small size she was well able to keep out of danger.

  The wonderful tale came back as soon as she was through the town gates, and Karan began to tell it to herself from the beginning. It was a hard climb for the first few hours; the story helped to ease her into the journey. Mid-morning brought her to that point, just before the end of the telling, where Llian had paused and looked directly at her. Where stupidly she had made a link, her mind to his, putting him off balance for a second. Karan had avoided thinking about that quite uncharacteristic foolishness. She was normally so sensible.

  She sat down on an outcrop of sandstone that looked over the valley, the winding track and, far below, the slate roofs of Chanthed shining in the sun. Why had she risked revealing herself as a sensitive to a stranger who might use her, or thoughtlessly give away her secret? People with her talents were rare and kept them quiet for good reason: such skills were priceless to those who wanted to spy or to dominate. In times of war, sensitives were bought and sold for their abilities, though thankfully war was a thing of the past. The lands of this part of Meldorin had been at peace for all of Karan’s lifetime.

  Fortunately her talents were not easily detected, as long as she was careful. It took another sensitive, or someone highly skilled in the Secret Art.

  Where had her talents come from anyway? Karan was a blending, for while her mother had been old human, the original people of Santhenar, her father was half-Aachim.

  About four thousand years ago, three other human species had come to Santhenar in the hunt for the golden flute. The mostly tall and mostly dark Aachim, like her father, were native to the world of Aachan. The Charon, also big dark people, were few but incredibly powerful, masters of the Secret Art and of machines too. The third species were the Faellem, a small, rose-skinned and golden-eyed people from the other of the Three Worlds, Tallallame. They were not physically strong, but skilled at deception and illusion. The three off-world species were much longer-lived than humans, and they had turned Santhenar upside down, but that time was past. Now only old humans were numerous on Santhenar. The Charon were all gone, one way or another, while the surviving Aachim and Faellem had long hidden themselves and concealed their differences.

  Matings between the different species seldom resulted in children, and when they did, such blendings were often mad. But mad or not, they could have unusual talents.

  Karan had not found her talents to be much use though, for they were not at all reliable. She could often sense people before she could see them, even sense what they were going to do or say before they did it, especially if she was in danger. She could sometimes make a sending to another person, though just a mish-mash of feelings and images, and it hardly ever worked when she wanted it to. Rarely, Karan could make a link to someone else and actually speak to them,
mind to mind. She had only done that a few times in her lifetime. That was what was so shocking about the link to Llian; it had happened without her even thinking about it. Some expression of her innermost longings, she supposed.

  But her talents had disadvantages too—she felt things more strongly than other people; sometimes so strongly that her emotions overwhelmed and paralyzed her. And using her talents always resulted in aftersickness, as little as a vague feeling of nausea or as much as a devastating migraine that could last all day. So Karan was normally careful.

  Then why, at the end of Llian’s telling, had she cried into his mind, “Who killed her?” Karan knew the answer to that. Because she was completely captivated by the tale and the teller.

  She had heard Llian tell before; people came from all over Meldorin to hear the tales at the Festival of Chanthed. Llian had become well-known four years ago, after his very first public telling, and Karan had never forgotten it. That was part of the reason she had sneaked into the Graduation Telling, using the pass of a distant cousin who was a student at the college. Already she was planning her trip back for the autumn festival. It would be the highlight of her year, a whole fortnight of tales great and small.

  Well, time to be going. Put away your foolish dreams, she told herself. What use is a teller to you? There is nothing for him at Gothryme. Karan took a swig from her water bottle, pulled her broad-brimmed felt hat down over her face and jumped up. She was anxious to get home now, where she had worries aplenty. If she traveled hard enough she might cut the journey by a day. Luckily Santhenar’s huge moon was near full, its luminous yellow face lighting her way so that she could walk well into the evening.

  But as the days passed the other, darker face of the moon rotated further into view, the yellow pocked with seas and craters of red and purple and black. The moon turned to its own more sluggish cycle, and the time when the dark face was showing was generally accounted to be unlucky; a time when decisions should be postponed and journeys put off. Thankfully she would be home by the time the waning moon was all dark.

  On the fourth morning she passed through the tiny mountain hamlet of Tullin. It was just a straggle of houses and an inn, the only one between Chanthed and her home. She quenched her thirst at a well, then continued on—camping was free, and pleasant at this time of year. Behind the inn Karan saw an old man chopping wood vigorously. He raised one hand to her and she waved back. A group of children followed her up the track as far as the top of the hill. She smiled at them then disappeared over the crest.

  Nearly there! Karan sighed, brushed the red coils out of her eyes and headed down the track toward Gothryme, her ancient and shabby manor. The inner glow from the telling had carried her almost all the way home. She was in such a hurry to get there that she avoided Tolryme town, splashing across the shrunken river Ryme half a league upstream and setting off across the meadows. The green slate roofs of Gothryme appeared over the brow of the hill, then the walls of pink granite, blushing in the afternoon sun. Beyond that was the sheer face of the Gothryme escarpment, a high cliff of granite that from here cut off the white tips of the mountains beyond.

  Gothryme consisted of a squat oval keep, battered by time and by the periodic squabbles that had wracked Bannador, and two somewhat younger wings, two-storeyed with wide verandas, that ran out from the back. Beyond that was a sprawl of barns and out-houses, all in granite and slate. They were solid but very rustic.

  It was hot and dry, the gray grass crunching underfoot. It didn’t look as though there had been any rain since she left three weeks ago. All the problems of her rustic life came rushing back. The drought’s relentless grip was slowly breaking Gothryme and ruining her. Even this brief trip had been an indulgence. If it did not rain soon, she would never afford the autumn festival.

  Karan stopped for a moment and looked over her lands. Though she was heir to what at first glance seemed a sizeable estate—manor, land and forest—the land was barren, stony and drought-stricken, and the forest inaccessible by reason of the cliff. It provided a precarious livelihood for her and the people who worked it but there was nothing left over for luxuries. Yet it was hers, and after years of travel and turmoil she wanted nothing but to tend it and, when she could, to hear the tellers at the Festival of Chanthed.

  Climbing the steep hill she lost sight of the house. At that point Karan turned off the track and circled round the back of the manor. She was tired and just wanted to get in the door without people making a fuss of her. She skirted a reed-fringed pond on which a family of gray ducks paddled. Karan waggled her fingers at the ducks. Where was Kar, the old black swan?

  Just then there came a tremendous hissing and trumpeting from the far end of the pond. The swan’s black wings flashed; the water was churned to foam. A thin brown arm let go of the swan’s leg; a frightened boy scrambled up the bank and ran around the edge of the pond, skidding in the mud. It was the cook’s youngest son, a good-natured rascal.

  “What do you think you’re doing, Benie?” she cried, pretending sternness.

  The boy stopped dead. Even his hair was plastered with mud. “Fishin’,” he lied with downcast eyes.

  “Then do it in the river in future,” she said. “Off you go now, and wash the mud off before you go inside.”

  He scooted off, shouting at the top of his voice, “Karan’s back, mum. Karan’s back!”

  Karan watched him go, smiling. So much for a quiet homecoming.

  “Karan!” cried Rachis, her steward, as she entered. “Welcome home.” He embraced her.

  She had known Rachis all her life. He was tall and thin with scanty white hair surrounding a pink crown like a tonsure. As she hugged him Karan realized that all the flesh was gone from his bones—he was an old man now. Rachis had managed the estate faithfully for many years after her mother died and left it to her. But he was now quite frail—even leaving him in charge for mis brief trip made her feel guilty.

  After the greetings were done and the news of the estate and the outside world exchanged, Karan got a bowl of stew from the black kettle hanging over the fire, sawed off a crust of bread and sat out on the veranda to enjoy the evening. It was good to be home, to enjoy simple home food and have all die old familiar things about her. She leaned back against the granite wall and took off her boots. Tomorrow a hundred chores demanded her attention. Tonight she would just sit back and relax.

  She went to bed with the dark. Her bed was a vast box of black-stained timber that took up half the room. She curled up into a ball in the familiar hollow of the mattress, but later, as the scorpion nebula rose and shone in through her bedroom window, she was woken by a premonition so strong that it made her hair stand on end. Something had just changed in the world. She had no idea what, but after lying there for hours she realized that sleep would never come. Karan got up, caught sight of the dark, waning moon, and shivered. She made herself tea and was halfway through the miserable picture revealed by her book of accounts when dawn arrived.

  Looking out the window down the track that led to Tolryme, she felt her hackles suddenly rise again. Someone was coming up through the fog, riding a big black horse and leading another. Nothing unusual in that, but this stranger burned in her mind like a flame. She put down her pen and went to the door.

  It was Maigraith! Maigraith, who had rescued Karan from near-slavery after she had been robbed of everything in Almadin two years ago. They had not seen each other since, but Karan knew what Maigraith had come for. The obligation had to be repaid.

  Though she tried as hard as she could to suppress them, the horrible memories of her servitude came flooding back as vividly as only a sensitive could make them. For a moment she was actually there again, chained to the tanning vats day and night, and beaten whenever she slackened her work. Even in memory the stench made her gag…

  “Which way to Cadory, churl?”

  Karan heaved a hide out of the vat. The skins had to be soaked until every scrap of flesh had rotted away and the hair could be rubbe
d off. The stench, even after a month of slavery, was unbearable. And she could feel the fever coming back worse than before. She knew that she was going to die of it A shadow fell across her, giving blessed respite from the sun. She looked up dully.

  “Yes, I’m talking to you,” said a striking woman on a tall black horse. “My name is Maigraith. Which…”

  Her arrogance and her freedom were infuriating. “I am Karan, a free woman of Bannador,” Karan said angrily, hauling the hide onto the scrubbing rack. She rubbed her face with the back of her hand, smearing her cheek with green muck and knocking her hat off. Bright red hair sprang out in all directions.

  “A free woman!” Maigraith repeated without even the hint of a smile.

  “I was robbed of every grint I had. This was the only work I could get, but the stew and the water costs more than I earn. Each day I go further in debt.”

  She bent down for her hat. A rusty iron shackle circled her waist; a chain ran from it to the vat. Just then a stringy woman hobbled out of a shed and began beating Karan about the head with a bundle of switches. Karan fell down in the mud, protecting her face with her arms.

  “Work, you lazy red-haired cow!” the woman screeched, a whack for each word. One side of her face was half-eaten away by sores that would not heal.

  After a while the woman tired and limped away. Karan hauled herself up on the side of the vat. Blood dripped from her nose onto the hides.

  “I am on my way west, across the sea almost as far as Bannador,” said Maigraith. “Perhaps I could take a message to your family.”