It started to drizzle, then it started to rain. My thin coat soon soaked to my body, so the girl had to make do in her ragged dress. For some time we walked in silence-though the storm pounded her tiny frame, Celia didn’t weep.
The Aerie had been completed, its edifice jutting out into the ether, but the maze surrounding it was still being constructed. We had to struggle through a hundred yards of overturned mud, no easy task for the tiny legs of a small child, though she barely noticed. As soon as we had come within view, her eyes had locked on the tower in awe and excitement.
Five weeks prior the entire population of Low Town, swelled by crowds of outsiders and shepherded by a flock of guardsmen, had celebrated the installment of the Blue Crane in his new surroundings. I’d watched from the back as the High Chancellor honored a lofty figure in extravagant robes. No one from the area had since shown courage enough to introduce themselves. Now seemed as good a time as ever to welcome the wizard to our neighborhood.
The little one by my side, I strode up to the tower with what arrogance I could muster.
A dozen feet above the ground a monstrous statue sat on a small ridge, jutting out from the building proper and marring the smooth perfection of the exterior. Beneath it I could see the outline of a door. I banged on its center and yelled into the night.
“Open up! Open up now!”
The movement of the gargoyle was no small shock, and Celia let out a shriek. I bit my lip trying not to do the same. The thing above the door twisted its heavy features with an ease that was unnatural, and its voice was inhuman if not directly threatening.
“Who is this that disturbs the repose of the evening? The Master is sleeping, young friends.”
I hadn’t lost the savings of a childhood ill-spent to retreat at this gentle remonstration, and there seemed to be no reason to show this construction any more deference than I would his fleshly equivalent. “Then you’ll need to wake him.”
“Sadly, child, I do not arrest the Master’s slumber at the will of a pair of ragamuffins. Come back tomorrow and he might be willing to see you.”
A flash of lightning illuminated the landscape, the spire standing out uncannily against the barren ground surrounding it.
“Will the Blue Crane sleep warm in his bed and awake to the corpses of two children on his doorstep?”
Concrete eyebrows curled inward and the strange creature grew less friendly. “Do not speak such of the Master-my patience is not infinite.”
Things had gone too far to back away, and even then I understood that advance is often the only alternative to retreat. I shouted louder, my voice cracking with the strain. “Does the First Wizard care nothing for the people of his city? Will he rest in his castle while the children of Low Town drown in this storm? Call him down! Call him down, I say!”
The gargoyle’s face glowed in the moonlight, and I was conscious of the danger I was courting. The thing hadn’t shown itself capable of movement beyond its perch, but there was no knowing what forces it might martial in defense of the tower. “Your abuse grows tiring. Leave, else the consequences…” It quieted mid-sentence, its visage frozen, all signs of intelligence absent.
Just as unexpectedly sentience returned. “Wait here-the Master approaches.” It was not lost on me that this offered no guarantee of our safety. The wind screamed its hatred through the night. Celia squeezed my hand.
The stone shifted to reveal a tall, thin man with a long beard and eyes that glimmered even as they shook off the haze of slumber. I had only seen the Crane that once, from a distance, and he had looked more imposing in the midst of a vast crowd of people. I watched an inclination toward geniality combat the appropriate response to being woken late in the evening by a pair of vagrants. Somehow I wasn’t shocked to discover the first winning out.
“I am not used to company after midnight, particularly company I’ve yet to meet. Still, the Daevas bid us show kindness to all our visitors, and I shall do no less. What is it you wish of me?”
“You’re the Blue Crane?” I asked.
“I am.”
“The one they call the savior of Low Town?”
“If that’s what they call me.”
I pushed Celia toward him. “Then save her-she needs help, she’s got nowhere to go.”
The Crane looked down at her, then back at me. “And you? What do you need?”
Water ran down my sneer. “Not a damn thing.”
He nodded and dropped to one knee, lowering himself with an extraordinary lack of pretension for one of the most powerful men in the Empire. “Hello, child. People call me the Blue Crane. It’s a funny name, I know. Do you have a name you’d like to share with me?”
The girl cocked her head up at me, as if asking for permission. I patted her lightly on the back. “Celia,” she barked out finally.
The Crane’s eyes lit up in mock wonder. “That’s my favorite name in the world! My whole life I’ve been hoping to meet someone with that name, and now you show up on my doorstep in the dead of night!” Celia looked like she wanted to giggle but didn’t remember quite how. The Crane held out his hand. “Let’s get a cup of tea and you can tell me all about what it’s like being born a Celia. I’m sure it’s very exciting.”
This elicited a slight smile, the first I had seen from her all night. She took the Crane’s palm, and he stood carefully, leading her into the tower. He turned as he headed into the doorway, his eyes offering entry.
“I’ll be back to check on her soon,” I said.
Celia twisted herself around to face me, realizing now that I wasn’t coming. She didn’t speak but her eyes were trembling. My chest was full of fire and I felt a lightness untie itself from my bowels and rise up through my stomach. I sprinted off in the night, leaving the two of them standing there, together, illuminated by the soft light drifting out from the entrance.
I was thinking about the last time I had brought an orphan to the Crane’s while I tried to catch the guardian’s attention. It wasn’t working. I punctuated a string of epithets by tossing a pebble against the gargoyle, but it bounced off without garnering a reaction.
“Why are you doing that?” Wren asked, perched on the innermost wall of the maze.
“Normally he responds.”
“Who?”
“The magic talking monster perched above the doorway, of course.”
Wren had the good sense not to antagonize me further. I sat down beside him, then pulled my tobacco pouch out of my satchel and started rolling a smoke. “Fucking magic. We’d all be better off without it.”
“That’s bullshit,” Wren said, oddly passionate.
“Is it now? Name one good thing that ever came from the Art.”
“The Crane’s ward.”
I lit my cigarette beneath a shielded hand. “Now name another.”
“I’ve heard Frater Hallowell has the touch, and heals people at the church of Prachetas the Matriarch.”
“Frater Hallowell ever heal you?” I asked, breathing low-grade poison into my lungs.
“No.”
“He ever heal anyone you know?”
Wren shook his head.
“Doesn’t really count then, does it?”
“No,” he responded, as usual quick to grasp the point. “Not really.”
“Don’t twist it up in your mind-the two in the Aerie are anomalies, exceptions that prove the rule. Start thinking otherwise and you’ll get yourself into trouble.”