He sighed, and looked so depressed that Robin reached out to pat his hand comfortingly. He looked startled, but smiled wanly.
"Well," he continued, "advantage is I started out with rules here. Don' care who ye be, nor what ye do_in here we got peace. Got th' whole buildin'. Rented out th' upstairs t' the head'a th' Whore's Guild; her girls work as m' wenches when they ain't on duty. An' 'f they decide t' go on duty wi' a customer, 'tis all right w' me, eh?"
"Padrik_the High Bishop," Robin said, after a moment. "With all the thieves and professional beggars in the Warren, you have to know those miracles of his are faked!"
"'Course we know!" Donnar said in disgust. "Trouble is, we can't figger out how he does half of 'em, so what's the good of tryin' t' expose 'im, eh? It ain't no good fer us t'do anythin' unless we c'n show ever'thin' is faked! Otherwise, nobody's gonna believe us."
Robin sighed, and agreed that he was right. She was going to have to wrestle with her conscience over this one, and she wished desperately for a way to contact the Chief of her Clan. There was no way that she could expose Padrik as a fake without revealing how his "miracles" were performed, which was in direct violation of her oath.
"Does anyone know who's helping him?" she asked, hoping someone did. If she could discover who the Gypsy was that had given away the secrets, she might be able to force him to confess publicly that he had helped Padrik perform his "miracles." That would take care of the problem without revealing any Gypsy secrets.
But Donnar disappointed her, shaking his head. "Not a clue," he replied. "Wish we did. We figger it's got to be somebody in the Priests. Mebbe they found summat in some book somewheres that tells 'em how t' do all that stuff."
That was a possibility she had not even considered! And if anything, that made her quandary worse. If there was no one to blame for revealing secrets, if the Gypsy "secrets" turned out to be something that had already been put in print somewhere, did that make her oath invalid?
She shook her head. This situation was confusing enough without making it more complicated than it already was.
"Well, the last thing we need is something you can do for us better than anyone else," she said. "We need more information than we have, particularly on the Priests, and the best way to get that _"
She paused significantly, and Donnar grinned. "Is t' go workin' inna House, a'course!" he finished the sentence for her. "I 'spect ye mean as musicians; I tell ye what, I'll get ye an audition at th' place I reckon'll suit ye best. Rest is up t' you." He thought for a moment. "Ye come by in two days, same time as t'day, less I send ye a message at th' Bird. I'll have it set up fer ye. A good House; I'd say here, 'cept I already gotta feller who ain't bad, an' he's old. Th' girls spoil 'im rotten."
Robin returned his grin. "So now what do we owe you?" she asked.
He named a price she considered quite reasonable; she slid the coins over to him, and he pocketed them neatly. "That includes safe-passage through th' Warren," he said, as an afterthought. "It'll be 'rranged 'fore ye reach th' door. That means most won't mess with ye. Some will, but th' rest'll leave ye be, 'cause if they mess w' ye, an' I find out 'bout it, well, I got friends in here now." He looked about his establishment, and sighed pensively. "Got so used to it, when time comes I can go back t' runnin' a real tavern again_well, I might not."
And on that odd note, they left him, and made their way back through the Warren's noisome streets completely unmolested. As promised.
There was one truism that Kestrel had always found held up, no matter what happened. Crisis might come and go, war, tempest, disaster_but people still needed to eat and sleep, and somehow, business continued as usual
And if they were to go on with their ruse, no matter how they felt about the situation, they had to act as if they were exactly what they appeared to be; simple traders. The next day was a repetition of the first; getting up with the dawn in time to be in the square before Prime, selling God-Stars, listening to another of Padrik's sermons, and trailing into the Cathedral to watch more of Padrik's fake miracles.
This time, with Robin's demonstrations firmly in mind, Jonny was able to catch some of the trickery. He also noticed that many of the same people showed up to be "healed" today as had yesterday_only today they were suffering from entirely new ailments! He had quite some time to study them as they lined up for their "miracles." There was definitely a similarity of features among them, as if they were all related.
Or are members of the same Gypsy Clan?
There were no demon-possessions today; evidently Padrik saved his more spectacular tricks to ensure that they didn't lose their impact, and didn't perform them every day. He did produce alms, and heal three cripples, two blind men, a deaf woman, five cases of gout, a woman with palsy, a man with "a withered arm," and a man with running sores on his leg. Today evidently was the big day for "miraculous messages" from angels; he "struck" three different Priests with rays of light, one red, one gold, and one white. They took turns relating messages from departed relatives to the grieving survivors. The one thing these people all had in common were tales of misfortune and woe, and they came seeking answers from those who presumably now had access to all of the wisdom of God.
Kestrel should not have been surprised at the answers, but he was. A great many of these spurious messages claimed that the misfortune that had brought the relatives here to consult with Padrik was due to inheriting "tainted money" and urged the survivors to take what they had inherited and donate it to the Church. Padrik took the occasion to preach an extemporaneous sermon on the subject of the evil magic practiced by nonhumans, and how it tainted even the lives and the goods of those who dealt with them.
"Only by giving selflessly can the taint be washed away," he told the hushed congregation. "Only the Church has the power to cleanse and heal."
And although a scant handful of those who had come to Padrik seeking an answer frowned or looked bewildered and walked away, several dozen more began to weep with hysteria and rushed forward to the waiting Priests. Presumably the Priests were quite prepared to help them with the arrangements for transferring their inheritance into the hands of the Church....