He lay listening to the wind howl outside and the steady breathing of the man he shared the hearth with. Now and then he heard Neddio or the mules moving about in the parlor, the clop of iron shoe on wood floor. He turned his head. The fire was low, but he could leave it for a while yet. He closed his eyes and went back to listening to Maks. Maks… it was his name… it fit in his mouth with a familiar easiness… it wasn’t the whole name. He thinks I’d recognize the whole name. Maybe so maybe not. He wanted to touch Maks, but he didn’t dare, not now, not when he might wake and know he was being touched. Not yet. Simms drew his hands down his own chest. What was wrong with him? He was lively enough when he came out of that trance or whatever it was, unperturbed by his condition, but there was that… that something… The man’s spirit was so vital, so… absorbing, entrancing… Simms smiled into the fire-broken darkness… it obscured that other thing. Almost. Part of him wanted Korimenei here so she could work her magic on Maks. Part of him didn’t want to share Maks with anyone, anything. Even if their enforced cohabitation came to nothing, there would be at least three days alone with him, time out from the world.
Round and round in his head, was he sick with something? Will he love me will he hate me will he look through me like I’m nothing? Round and round until he had to move, do something. He slipped out of his blankets and added wood to the fire, chunks of tough hard fence post that’d burn all night. He bent over Maks before rolling into his blankets again, touched his fingertips light, light, feather-light to the man’s brow.
It took him almost an hour to get to sleep.
The house rumbled and rattled and shook under the blast of the wind as the blizzard settled around them.
Maks slept heavily while Simms fed the mules and Neddio, used an old cedar shake to scoop up their droppings and carry them into the straffill where he dumped them down the hole. He brewed tea, ate one of Maks’ trailbars and put a new pot of soup to simmering on the stove. He washed his shirt, trousers, socks and underclothing in the waste channel, looked over Maks’ clothing, brushed the mud and debris off the outercloak, washed the undercloak and the other things, hung them all to drip dry on a cord he’d stretched between two pegs in the straffill. It helped the morning pass. Now and then he went over to Maks, squatted beside him, worried about the long sleep, but there was no sign of fever or other distress, so he went away again and let him sleep on.
Maks woke an hour past noon. He stretched, yawned, looked relaxed and lazy as a cat in the sun. He turned to Simms, gave him a wide glowing smile that sent flutters running round Simms’ interior. “What’s the time?”
“You couldn’t tell it from out there,” he nodded at the shuttered window, “but it’s a little after noon.”
“Ahhhh. Perfect. I hate mornings. Best way to greet the sun is sound asleep.”
Simms chuckled. “So I see.”
“Don’t tell me you’re one of those pests who leaps out of bed at dawn caroling blithely. They should be swatted like flies.”
Another chuckle. “Ne’er uh blithe, but up, yeh. When I wan’t workin’.”
Maks raised his brows at that, but didn’t ask for explanations. He closed his eyes, turned his head from side to side. After a minute, he said. “Today, tomorrow, I think. Day after that we can move.” He pushed the blankets off and got to his feet. He was steadier, visibly stronger.
Simms finished sewing a button on his shirt, tied off the thread and cut it with one of his sleeve knives. “Tea on the stove. More soup, should be ready by now.” He rolled a knot in the end of the thread, turned the shirt inside out and started examining the seams.
Maks wandered out. Simms could hear him talking to the mules. He came back in the kitchen, looked through his packs, found a currycomb and a stone and went out again. A little later as Simms was putting a new edge on the frayed hems of his trousers, he heard splashing in the straffill, Maks whistling a cheerful tune. Maks came in, glanced at him, went to the stove and filled his mug. He looked at the tea. “You sure this isn’t going to crawl out and jump me?”
“Wake y’ up.”
“One way or another. You’ve had a busy morning.”
“Help the time pass, keeping y’ hands busy. ‘Sides, I been puttin’ off a lotta this, might’s well catch up while we stuck here.”
Maks nodded. “Not a bad idea.” He ladled out a pannikin of soup, glanced at Simms. “Want some?”
“After I
Maksim brought him the tea, fetched the pannikin and ate his soup while he squatted beside Simms and watched him set small neat stitches.
Simms was quietly happy; he said nothing because he felt no need to talk, and he was pleased that Maks seemed equally comfortable with the silence. He finished one cuff and began on the other. Maks set the pannikin down and sipped at the tea. The fire flickered and shadows swayed around them in a slow hypnotic dance, the wind howled and icemelt drafts whispered through the room. Maks set the mug down and gave Simms’ shoulder a squeeze, got to his feet and wandered out again.
He was back a moment later with the mules’ harness, some rags and a bottle of oil. After some maneuvering, he settled at the edge of the hearth, pulled a blanket round his shoulders and began working oil into the leather, cleaning it and working supple the places where the damp had stiffened it. Filled with the small peaceful sounds of their labor, the hiss and snap of the fire with the muted noised of the storm as background, the silence wrapped like a blanket about the two men as they went on with their work. Finally Maks spoke, his voice lazy and undemanding. “Arsuid’s a long way south of here.”
Simms chuckled, a small soft sound. “Y’ mean I got rocks in m’ head ridin’ into this kinda weather.” He glanced at Maks, met his eyes and looked away from the laughter in them, not because he didn’t like it, he liked it far too much. “C’d say the same, don’ y’ think?”
“So you could. Never visited Arsuid. What’s it like?”
“Yesta’day. Ev’ry yesta’day.”
Maks thought about that a minute. “I see what you mean. It can get boring if nothing changes.”
“‘Pends where y’ sit.”
“More so on whether you’re a sitter or sat on.”
“Y’ know ‘t.”
“Spite of that, Arsuiders seem to stay put.”
“T’s so. Arfon, he like to keep his folk hoverin’ round. Way I got loose, well, y’ might say I was flung out.”
“Feel like telling it, or is it none of my business?”
Simms tucked the needle into the cloth, dropped his hands and frowned at the fire. “Don’ know the whole, ‘s more confusin’ than entertainin’.” He snapped thumb against middle finger, shook his head. “Here tis. Arfon got a itch for a talisman of Is own. He a jeaaalous god, yehhh. An’ there was this sorceror came by, call hisseif Lazul. Turn out, wan’t so.”
“Sorceror, hmm. Did you ever find out what his name was?”
“After, yeh. Danny. Laz was for th’ duration, what he said.”
“Danny. Danny Blue?”
“Dunno. Might be. ‘Staffel trap him, me, a couple more, fill us fulla poison. Say go get Klukesharna, we wipe you clean when y’ give her to us.”
“Not nice.”
“Nah, that tisn’t.” Simms grinned at Maks, went back to watching the fire. “You know ‘im? Danny?”
“I know one Danny Blue. A student of mine once. In a way.”
“You a Sorceror?”
“For my sins. And you’re a Witch.”
“Nah.” Simms sighed, shook his head. “Ne’er got the training.”
“You have the Talent, you could still train.”
“I don’ think so.”
“Well, you have to want it. You got Klukeshama?”
“Yeh, we made one gwychcher team, in and out, slick’s a trick.”
“So Arfon has Klukesharna now.”
“Nah. We got her yeh, but after that, things got outta hand.”
“Danny?”
“Part. There was this putch the ‘Staffel land on us. Din’ need her, don’ know why they bring her in. Their mistake, for sure. Her ‘n Danny, they dump Felsa ‘n me, run for the Asatas. We wake up, go after ‘em. Had to. Poison. We catch up to ‘em this side the Asatas. Felsa nails Danny. He fall out facedown in the snow. I go for the Esmoon. Think I hit her. What happens next I don’ know till later. Felsa and me, we went out, whoosh, blowin’ a candle. We wake up next day half-froze with heads like y’ get after a three-day drunk. We still got no choice, so we take after Danny again. We catch him up. He with this woman, not the Esmoon, don’ know where she come from. No Klukesharna. Felsa gonna to skin him, she don’ believe nothing he says. He says the Esmoon went off with Klukesharna. He says the Esmoon’s no woman, she a demon.”
“Demon? Tell me what she looks like,” Maks’s voice was suddenly taut, compelling, for the first time he was putting the power on Simms.
Simms blinked. “Fahhn silver hair, way she wear it, it go to her waist in long waves, shiny. Blue eyes. Velvet skin. Beautiful and she know it. I ‘spect mos’ men go crazy for her. I ‘spect Danny right ‘bout her, I thought sure I put one shaft, maybe two in ‘er. You know ‘er?”
“Probably not her. But something like her. Go on. What happened next?”
‘It was in this Gsany village, in a bathhouse. We caught ‘em pants down, you’d think we had ‘em flat. Wan’t so. The woman drop a demon on Felsa an’ Danny drop me. Blessings be, old Tungjii stirring the waters, it turn out that the woman has this talisman, Frunzacoache, she use it to leach the poison outta us. Korimenei. Goin’ home and goin’ fast. Taktre Danny with her. Felsa taggin’ along, she don’ believe Danny don’ wanna see Klukesharna or the Esmoon ever again. I go along until I get tired a hurryin’. I leave and that’s how I end up here.”
“Korimenei.” Affection and amusement rumbled in the word. “How’d she look?”
“Like you damn well better not get in her way when she goin’ somewhere.” Simms rubbed his thumb along the seam of the trousers he’d been working on. “She a student too?”
“More like adopted daughter. Apprentice if I survive and she wants it.”
Simms blinked at him. “Cheonea,” he said. “Settsiulaksimin. Sorceror Prime.” He folded his arms across his chest and hugged himself as he watched hope and possibility wither and wash away; that was all he could see for the moment, then he realized what Maks had just said. “Survive?”
“It’s a web they’re weaving, Simms, the demons, the gods and the Great Ones. Arfon and the Ystaffel pumped you full of poison, my set of demons robbed me of my souls, temporarily I hope. They pointed me at Shaddalakh, either I get it or I die. I’m dying now. When the body’s empty, it begins to fall apart. No healer or herb doctor can stop the decay.” He shook his head. “They send me out and at the same time rob me of my best tools. Without my earthsoul I have no Shamruz body to journey for me, I can’t walk the realities or summon demons.”
Simms nodded, thinking he knew what Maks was saying. “Yeh. Y’ c’d fetch a demon an’ send it t’ get th’ talisman.”
Maks laughed, a happy shout that embraced Simms and invited him to share the joke. “N00000, no,” he said, “never let a demon near that much power, you could end up dancing to the demon’s tune rather than the other way about.”
“I s’pose. Yeh, thinkin”bout Esmoon, yeh.” Simms scowled at the fire, wrestling with himself; he hated the thought of messing with demons again, but his impulse toward spending himself for the man who attracted him so fiercely won out over his fears. He turned to Maks. “Take me with you. I c’n maybe help. Reason the ‘Staffel land on me an’ Felsa, we the best thieves in Arsuid. Tor y’ I c’d read walls, stones, dirt. I c’n see witchtraps, help y’
‘void ‘em. I c’n sing ghosts t’ sleep. Tickle locks. Lots more.”
“Simms…
“Y’ don’ want me, a’ right.”
“It’s not that. The Magus knows that someone is coming. He’s one of those who reads could-be nodes like other men read print. You could get swallowed up and spat out, it’s not worth it, my friend.”
“Y’ don’ know, Addryd Sorcecieur.” He gazed at his hand, stroked his fingertips up and down his thigh. “Goin’ in the Henanolee, that was dangerous too. It was the bes’ time in m’ whole life. I was workin’ on top of it, ne’er felt so full so strong so g0000d. I was scared t’ bone but e’en that felt good. An’ what’s it matter if I die? What am I? Jus’ a thief. No one give a shit.”
“No Addryd. Maks.” He leaned toward Simms, touched his face. “What’s this nonsense? Not just a thief, I have your word for it, best in Arsuid.” His hand was warm and smooth, Simms leaned into the curve of it, it was comforting and exciting. “You’d best keep out of this, little witch.”
Simms turned his head, kissed Maks’ palm. He smiled dreamily at the big man. “No,” he said. “No… command me… anythin’ but go ‘way.”
“And if I commanded you to climb to the roof here and jump into the wind?” The voice was darkness and light, caressing him, stirring him to the seat of his souls. It was fully there, the compelling, seducing Voice of the Prime.
Simms drew away a little, steadied his breathing before he spoke. “I w’d prob’ly do ‘t. But I sh’d wanna know why first.”
Maks threw back his head and laughed, the sound filling the room, overpowering the storm and everything else. “Good, good. Never jump without knowing why. And if I said, love me, would you want to know why you should do such a thing?”
“No. I don’ need t’ ask ‘bout what already is.”