The Dragon's Path

Many people know it.”
    Marcus laughed.
    “Are you trying to bribe me?” he asked. “You are, aren’t you? You’re asking whether I can be bought?”
    “Can you?” Qahuar Em asked without the slightest hint of shame in his voice.
    “There’s not enough gold in the world,” Marcus said.
    “I understand and respect that. But you understand that my duty to my clan required me to ask.”
    Marcus finished the last of his ale in a gulp and stood up.
    “We have any more business, sir?”
    Qahuar shook his head.
    “Truly, I am honored to have met you, Captain Wester. I respect you and I respect your employer.”
    “Good to know,” Marcus said, and then walked back out through the common room to wait for Cithrin on the street, and the heat be damned. When she came, hurrying down the street like a girl her own age, Marcus stepped out. Sweat beaded her skin and smudged the paints that she’d put to her eyes and lips.
    “It’s taken care of,” Cithrin said. “It’s good you came for me. That man’s a pretentious ass, but he’s going to be very useful.”
    “Your suitor in there tried to bribe me,” Marcus said.
    Cithrin paused, and he could see the chagrin in her eyes for less than a heartbeat, and then the mask fell back in place. She became neither the girl nor the woman-still-to-be but the false sophisticate that Master Kit had fashioned. It was the Cithrin that Marcus liked least.
    “Of course he did,” she said. “I wouldn’t have expected any less. Captain, I may not be returning to the house tonight. If I’m not there in the morning, don’t be alarmed. I’ll send word.”
    She might as well have thrown a brick at his head.
He’s your enemy
and
I forbid you to sleep with that man
and
Please don’t do this
crowded each other out. All he could manage was a nod. Cithrin must have seen something of itin his eyes, because she put her hand on his arm and squeezed gently before she went back inside.
    Marcus walked back down the street toward the house, then stopped, turned, and headed for the port instead. The sun, lazing down toward the horizon, pressed on his right cheek like a hand. Near the port, the traffic on the streets thickened. Someone had started putting up streamers of thread, the knots hung from windows and trees, the trailing ends blowing in the breeze like the tentacles of a jellyfish. The street puppeteers were staking out corners and public squares, sitting at them even when they weren’t performing. The ships from Narinisle might not arrive for weeks, but the celebration was already being prepared.
    The smell of the port itself was brine and fish guts. Marcus threaded his way past sailors and longshoremen, beggars and queensmen, to the wide square just past the final dock. Two taphouses and a public bath pressed for attention at the edges of the square, bright cloth banners and bored-looking women in too little cloth. At the farthest edge, a crowd stood enthralled around a theater cart. Master Kit wore a flowing robe of scarlet and gold and a wire-worked crown. He held Sandr’s unmoving body in his arms, a thin trickle of red-tinted water dripping down the boy’s flank.
    “How? How have I let this be? Oh Errison, Errison my son! My only son!” Master Kit called out, his voice breaking carefully so that all the words were still clear, and then slipped gracefully into verse. “I swear, dear boy, and heed this call! By dragon’s blood and bones of God, Alysor house shall
fall
!”
    Kit froze then, and a moment later, applause rang out. Marcus shifted forward through the crowd as Cary and Smit took the stage, Smit in a mockup of steel armor made from felt and tin and Cary in a tight black dress that hadclearly been cut for Opal. Marcus watched through the long final act as the ancient rivalry between noble houses slaughtered first the guilty and then the innocent, mothers killing their daughters, fathers falling to poisons meant for their sons, and the world in general crashing in until at last Master Kit stood alone, all the other players lying at his feet, and wept. By the time the company rose, grinning to take their bows and gather the coins thrown to them, Marcus’s mind was almost back in order.
    As the company broke down the stage, Marcus walked to the back. Master Kit had changed back to his more customary clothes and was leaning against the seawall and wiping his face with a soft cloth. He smiled when he saw Marcus.
    “Captain! Good to see you. What did you think