The Gramary

Introduction
Part I: The Amulet
The Game
The Fortress
Declesa
The Valley
The Test
The Homecoming
Thieves
The Guild
The Trade
The Plan
The Raid
The Prelate
The Commission
The Betrayal
Part II: The Name
The Wildmen
The Storm
The Chase
The Prisoner
The Execution
The Revolt
The Abbot
Fever
The Book
The Reunion
The Siege
The Conference
The Reckoning
The Aftermath

The table was round and six feet across.  Gleaming ebony walled the four foot square sunk in the middle.  Three dice lay on the flat black felt, their spots deep pits against the bright white bone.  They showed 6-6-6.

"Teeth," announced the walleyed Sadman.  "Eighteen."  His nose was rotten with the pox, and he rubbed it absently with his one hand.  He was the referee.

"Bloody Braz, Wizard's Teeth!"  The bos'n slammed down his rope-scarred hand.  Coppers danced across the table like water on a white-hot stove.

I raked the coins into the pile in front of me.  After two hours of playing at three coppers a throw, I had enough for a soupbone and a shared, infested blanket.  I wanted fresh meat and clean sheets.

The bos'n's friends crowded round behind him, all talking at once.

"Not doing so good."

"Better double the stakes."

"Sure, your luck has to change."

The bos'n glared at them and then at me.  He slapped six coppers onto the table.  "Roll," he growled.

It was time to lose.  I let one die free and controlled the other two.  The random die turned up a six, the others a pair of fives.

"Ten," said the Sadman.  "The count is ten."

It was a bad roll.  The only worse were Stock Pens, Dead Man's, Tombstones, and --

"Teeth," said the Sadman.

"Too bad, buck," said one friend, patting the bos'n's shoulder with one hand while collecting money with the other.

"Your toss."  The Sadman pushed the dice at me.

"Seven up on Shorty," someone said: he was taking a count of seven or more, and I was Shorty.

"Cover," said the lucky friend.  The odds were with him, about two to one.

I definitely had to lose this time.  The bos'n's left hand was under the table, probably on his knife.  I worked all three dice, and with a last-second twitch I got my own Wizard's Teeth.

"Eighteen," said the Sadman.  "The count is eighteen."

Lucky scowled at me as he parted with a few coins.  "Double on Fatty," he said.  The bos'n was large rather than fat, but they'd been calling him that all night.  He hadn't objected any more than I had to being Shorty.

"What count?"

"Same."

"Seven?"

"Eighteen."

"You're nuts.  He's done it twice in a row already."

"Give me odds, then."

"Never happen.  You're out of your mind.  Six to one."

"On double?"

"Sure, double."

Lucky was going against the odds this time.  A six to one pay-off on a 215 to one long shot -- that was well past pressing his luck.  But if he won, it would be the biggest single pay-off I'd seen in my four years in Landro.

The bos'n snarled at his friend and threw the dice hard enough to crack bone.  They bounced off three walls and skittered to a stop.

"Eighteen.  Push."

Buzzing filled my ears.  Something was not right here.  I wasn't controlling the bos'n's dice, but somebody was.  Not the bos'n himself: he lacked the subtlety.  And not the lucky friend, either.  In his condition he'd have trouble controlling his bladder.

"Push," the Sadman repeated.

I looked up.  The bos'n's wager was now twelve, while mine was still six.  "Sorry," I said.  I slid six more coppers in front of the referee.  "Whose throw?"

"Yours, and be quick about it."  The bos'n drained his wine, belched loudly, and refilled the bowl from a jug at his elbow.  His hot red eyes followed my hand as I shook the dice.

If this was a crooked game, I wanted no more of it.  I'd be thirty coppers up if I won this push.  Less six for losing the next -- always lose the last roll -- so I'd say good-night with twenty-four.  Enough for a clean bed and a decent meal, but not for the mutton I could almost taste.  Clean sheets would do.  I tossed a 1-2-3.

"Perfect.  The count is two."

The pressure was on my unseen opponent.  The worst I could do was another push.  I'd win that for twenty-four; then I'd lose and leave.

The bos'n slapped away a hand reaching for his wine jug.  He squeezed the dice hard enough to change their spots, and threw them straight at me.  I flinched.  They cracked off the ebony a foot from my face, and when I looked again, the bos'n was laughing.

"Two and four," the Sadman said.  "Perfect.  Push."

I sighed and added twelve coins to the pot: six I'd won and six I'd brought.  I had three left in my pouch.  If I lost -- if I lost!  I hadn't walked away a loser in four years.  But if I lost, I'd still have enough to find a clean game.  Or sleep in an alley with my belly growling and start again tomorrow.

The bos'n counted out his twelve with care, mouthing the numbers and squinting.  His friends watched him, or made bets among themselves.  The Sadman stared down at the table, sighing as he scratched his nose.  My eyes slid past him to the door.

A young man, my age or a little older, stood apart from the other patrons.  He was tall and lightly muscled, dressed in a weather-stained cloak and muddy boots.  He looked like a minstrel, but the sword at his side showed mercenary.  He was near the door, as if he had paused on his way in or out to watch the game.  His eyes were dark and full; they caught mine, and one lid dropped in a lazy wink.  I tore my eyes away and returned to the game.

The bos'n had already rolled: 4-4-4, Stock Pens, twelve count.  Easy win, and then I'd leave.  Forget the fellow by the door.  Forget losing the last roll.  Get out quick and head for the best mutton-house in town.

I shook and rolled -- and the dice moved in my hand.  I tried to pull them back, but they squirmed free and bounded away across the black felt.  One slowed, and I pushed at it.  It zigged, then it zagged back and settled on six.  The second stopped on six as well.  The third spun on one corner in the middle of the table.  I nudged it to fall on five -- even Tombstones would win -- but it dodged away and came up another six.  Wizard's Teeth, eighteen, a loser.

The man by the door smiled.  His even white teeth glowed softly in the dim tavern.  He winked again.

My vision dimmed.  He had taken my own dice away from me.  My right hand crept unbidden to my dagger; I could almost see his blood steaming on the blade.  I swallowed hard and pulled my hand away.  He had challenged me with the dice; I couldn't answer with the blade.  I caught his eyes again and nodded.

"Three," I said, emptying my pouch on the table.

The bos'n shrugged.  He was ahead now, he didn't care.

The duel was on.  I had the easier task, for I could control all three parts of a dice toss: the hold, the throw, and the roll.  He had only the roll, free and clear -- the bos'n had the rest.  He went first.

"Teeth."

A glance told me this was no mistake.  He was conceding the first roll -- to keep me in the game, of course.  Or to tell me that the game between us had nothing to do with winning and losing coppers.  I nodded, and tossed 5-5-5, the Crossed Bones, the Dead Man's Roll.  The crowd gasped.  I took the pot.  The man by the door pursed his lips and slowly nodded.

The game went on.  When he went first, I matched his roll or barely won.  When I went first, he did the same.  I didn't interfere with his rolls, and he didn't with mine -- but I knew he would try.

I was ready when he did.  A four fell over to a five, but I won with a two count to his three.  He straightened and took a step forward.

The game took on a new flavor, a new intensity, as we each tried to control both sets of dice.  Sometimes his rolls came up, sometimes mine.  Mostly, the result was a curious combination of the two, throwing the game into random confusion.

At length I threw a Perfect to the bos'n's Teeth.  I looked up in time to see the trailing edge of a cloak slip through the door into the night.  The bos'n was grinning.  My final roll had pulled us even again, and made winners of all his friends.  I thanked them for the game and left.

He was waiting for me in the shadows.  I knew he was there before I heard or saw him, and my dagger was out and hidden when I turned.  His feet were firmly planted, his knees flexed; one hand rested on the hilt of his sword, the other draped casually over it.  I waited for him to speak.

"That was quite a show," he said pleasantly.  "Do you do that often?"

"Do you?"

He laughed.  "When I must, or when it amuses me."  He relaxed, but his hands did not leave his sword.

"So it amused you to steal my dinner and my bed?"

He opened his mouth, closed it, and his hands fell to his sides.  "I see," he said.  "I am sorry; you have reason to be angry."  Then he smiled and stepped forward.  "Come.  The least I can do is provide you the meal and bed I did you out of."

It was late and I was hungry, so I agreed.  I kept an eye on his back and a hand on my dagger all the same.

"What's your name?" he asked suddenly as we walked.

No one had ever asked me that before.  I didn't know how to answer.

"It's not Shorty, is it?"

"They call me that.  Don't like it much."

"But you let them anyway."

I shrugged.  "It's better than nothing."

"So what is your name?"

I considered that for a moment, and decided to tell the truth.  "Nothing."

He laughed.  "Well met, nothing.  I am called Lyneen."

I nodded.

"So, what shall I call you?"

"Whatever you want," I said.

He stopped and scratched his temple.  "Well, Shorty won't do.  I must call you something, so I'll call you nothing.  Yes, I'll call you 'Vran,' which means 'nothing' in an ancient language.  What do you think of that?"

I shrugged.  "Fine," I said, and followed him down the street.

Lyneen's landlord grumbled and cursed, saying it was too late for that sort of thing, but brought a sturdy table up to Lyneen's room and weighed it down with plate after plate of hot food.  I was so absorbed in a bite of mutton every bit as succulent as I imagined it must be that I missed Lyneen's question.

I swallowed hastily.  "What?"

He chuckled.  "Where you from?" he repeated.

"Kuhesos for a while," I said.  "Had to leave."

"Why?  Kill somebody's brother?"

I looked up sharply.  He was smiling, joking with me.  I laughed.  "Something like that."

He nodded and refilled my cup.  "I killed somebody's brother once.  She didn't want to kill me back, but a lot of other people did."

The change of subject was welcome.  "Oh?" I asked.  "Where was that?"

"Hmm.  The Valley.  I'm from there, you know.  The People of Sheep, you've heard of them?  Well, that's us.  Sheep everywhere you look, from newborn to bare bones.  Can't even go out to piss without tripping over a dozen of them.  At least we always had warm clothes."

"Sounds nice," I said, thinking of the cold nights I had known.

"Sure.  I had sweaters bigger than me.  They dropped in great folds around me, like puppy skin.  I'd lie out under the stars and listen to the flock cry itself to sleep, and pretty soon I'd go to sleep myself, and wake up with that sweater all around me so I couldn't breathe, but that only made the air taste sweeter when I fought through to it."

I nodded, as if I understood.  "So why'd you leave?  Because you killed that man?"

"Long before that."  He shrugged.  "I got a chance to travel.  Been back a few times since, for a day or two.  It's been a long time since I've seen the Valley.  I wonder if she ..."  He gazed at the ceiling and sighed.  "Ah, well."  I ate in silence, refilling my plate and cup without a glance from him.

Soon he joined me, and over the last bit of roast he told me the latest gossip.  I'd heard most of it before, some when I was quite small.  I hadn't understood most of the jokes then, but I'd laughed anyway.  Now I laughed even though I understood them, Lyneen told them so well.  It was as if he had heard them fresh that morning, and wanted to be the first to tell me.  He lied better than most people tell the truth, and had me believing I was hearing them for the first time as well.  The story of the mouse in the countess's pudding was older than both of us combined -- older than Landro itself, probably -- but he told it as if he put the mouse there himself.

I laughed at his lies, and he laughed at mine, and the evening passed convivially.  At last I nodded to sleep between two empty wine jugs.

I dreamed of Valita.

Thrumijum is a simple game, if you have a way with dice.  Simple and popular.  All sailors play it, and bet on the side when not playing.  Valita was a dancing girl, too old to dance, who cared for me at times and knew the waterfront taverns that always host a game.  She knew the taverns; I knew the dice: our fortune was secure.

I had the skill already, but the craft I learned at great cost.  A three-inch scar on my cheek taught me not to roll 1-2-3 every time.  From other scars, on my belly, arms, chest; from broken legs, broken fingers, broken ribs, I learned the other lessons of my trade.  I lost as often as I had to; I won only what I needed; I maintained the illusion of chance; I always lost the last roll.  I lived by these rules for eight years.  But I had one last lesson, and it cost me Valita.

The Thorn and Standard was crowded that night.  Drinkers stood elbow to elbow along the rough wooden walls and crouched beneath the heavy beams.  The air was mostly smoke: from damp torches sputtering at intervals along the wall, from clay lamps guttering on favored tables, from pipes of well-traveled sailors relaxing with the foreign smoke-weed.

Many people knew me, and nodded as Valita pushed me through the crowd.  Some frowned and looked at her askance -- I had not yet grown my beard, and looked too young to be in such a place at night.  Valita stiffened when she saw these glances.  She did not speak, barely nodding to shouted hellos.  We stopped abruptly and she hissed into my ear, "There he is!"

"Who?"

A dozen men sat or lounged within arm's reach, but her eyes were fixed on a table directly ahead.  There sat a man, alone, idly tossing a set of dice.  I glanced from her face to the table, and back to her face, for the look there was alien to me.  I had seen Valita in anger and in joy, in excitement and despair; I had seen her laugh and cry and curse and sing -- but I had never seen her like this.  This was more than hate; it was malevolence, vicious and single-minded and untiring.  It chilled me, made me want to run.  It wasn't directed at me, but still it made me long to be far far away.

"He's looking for a game," she said.  "We'll give him one."

"But he's a guard."  He still wore the uniform.  The helmet was missing, but the shortsword and dagger on his belt stood out like the stripes of a hunting arolan.

Valita swung me around and pulled my face close to hers, holding tight to my ears.  "Yes, he's a guard," she said, her breath hot on my eyes.  "He's a guard, and he has money, and you're going to win it.  Take him for everything.  All of it."

This went against all my rules, but her eyes were on me and her hatred flowed over me like a winter thunderstorm.  I knew I shouldn't take him, but I also knew I would.

His eyes narrowed as we approached.  "Ha!" he bellowed.  "Somebody here has the balls to play me after all.  The old whore and the bumboy.  Should have known."  He threw back his head and laughed, spraying us with droplets of bitter wine.  For a moment my eyes went red.  I had endured insults before, but the way he spoke to Valita, his insolence, his arrogance -- hatred like Valita's coursed through my brain and down my arms to tingle at my fingertips.  I longed to throttle him, to choke an apology from him, force him to beg her pardon.

Valita held me firmly.  "Get out your money, Torak.  How much do you want to lose?"

He choked on his wine.  "Lose?  To your trained monkey?  Might give you a tumble, though, for old times."

He called for another jug and stacked his coins on the table.  He piled coppers a hand high, then silver, then gold.  He pulled them from his purse with a flourish, and set them one atop another with a lover's hand.  He looked at my meager collection of coppers and chuckled.  "Short work, sweet."  He pushed the dice across the table.

Valita's hatred stood behind me as I played.  Torak seemed to sense it, for his eyes were not on me.  They laughed at Valita, sneered at what she had been and what she had become.  Not even when he drank did his eyes leave her.

I tried to follow my rules precisely, but my vision dimmed and my fingers tingled, and I could not control the dice.  I couldn't lose.  Valita's hands dug into my shoulders like fangs, sinking deeper with each win.  Torak parted grudgingly with each coin.  His fingers seemed to stick to them, calling them back to him with tender threats.

As his stacks dwindled, his contempt turned to anger.  The dice hissed and clattered from his hand like knives in a death-fight.  They stung me when I touched them, and burned my hand until I could return them with a winning toss.

The last coin crossed to me and the table stood bare before him.  His face twisted and darkened with anger, his eyes flooded with a hellish glow.

"You knocked-out whore!" he growled.  "I'll kill you for this."  His dagger flashed red in the firelight as he lunged across the table.  I sat stunned, and watched the light become blood as the blade pierced her breast.

Valita lay dying on the floor.  I leaped onto the guard's back, my own dagger flashing.  I jerked his head back by the hair and felt his neck pop.  Through tears of rage, I cut his throat; cut and cut until my blade jarred on bone; and then I watched Valita die, her killer's blood hot upon her face.

Such an act cannot be hidden, not even in the night world of the Warrens.  The Guard would not rest until my head adorned the spiked gate of Guild Hall.  I fled to the alleys and back streets of my childhood, to the anonymity of the poor, huddled together in mud and offal, and tried to live my life as they live theirs, in fear, and by rules not recognized beyond the Street of Miracles.

But even the Warrens have guilds: Thieves, Assassins, Beggars, Smugglers.  They keep a watchful truce with the Guild and the Guard, and my head became the price of peace.  My nameless state might stop the Guard, but never the Assassins.  They do not deal in names.  They deal in blood.

And so I left Kuhesos, the city of my birth, and found my way to Landro, and Lyneen.

I awoke refreshed, ready to forgive Lyneen his interference in my dice game, grateful for his hospitality.  I found myself in a deep, soft bed with sweet-smelling sheets, much nicer than anything I would have provided for myself.  I grinned and let my eyes drift shut.  Then I heard the sound, a light hissing beside me.

The table was gone.  Lyneen sat in a chair in the middle of the room, dressed for the road, running a whetstone carefully over his sword.  I reached for my knife, but couldn't move my arms.

"Good morning," he said.  "I trust you slept well.  Now I must kill you."  He had used the same tone to recount the adventures of the Captain of the Guard and the dancing girl from the Eye of the Sea.

I tried to leap from the bed, but my legs would move no more than my arms.  The bedclothes were wrapped tightly around me, tying me down.  He ignored my struggles.  I soon gave up and settled back, watching him.  My thoughts spun, burning energy my body couldn't use.  Stone rasped on steel, a clean sound, ringing and clear.  The room expanded, filled my brain, and soon there was nothing but the sword: long and slender and sharp, bright with oil, resting lightly in his hands.

"Why?"  My voice was faint, as from another room.

"Why not?"  The words sparked down the blade, and it twitched in anticipation.  The stone stopped; the rasping faded away; the world fell silent.

"No," he said.  "You should know why you must die."

The world grew again, and he was smiling.  From his shirt he pulled a small leather bag, hanging from a chain around his neck.  He opened the bag and took out a token on a second chain, and held it dangling in the space between us.  Redstone of the best wine-dark color, it was skillfully worked into the semblance of an ancient ceremonial lantern -- beautiful, certainly, but meaningless to me.

"Two kinds of people can do what you did with the dice last night," he said softly.  "One kind knows what this is; the other kind dies."

"Oh?"  I strained my feet against the binding sheets.

He chuckled.  "I am the kind that knows.  I will tell you, and then you will die."

I would have time, then.  There was some play in the covers, and with luck I could work my legs free.  Keeping my eyes on his and my movements small, I worked my feet as he spoke.

"You would call me a wizard," he began.  "Or a witch.  I practice what we call the Art." He returned the token to his shirt and resumed honing the blade.  "My master gave me this amulet when I left him, to show that I am skilled enough to use the Art, and wise enough to use it well."  He paused to oil the stone.  "Long years ago we came to the attention of some people whose goal it became to destroy the Art.  They killed many of us, the rest disappeared."  I could move my left foot several inches now.  He glanced down, and I froze.  He pulled the chair closer and continued.  The point of the sword was barely a foot from my face.  "The Art disappeared with us -- you cannot separate the Art from those who use it -- yet here you are, waving it about like a monster fish on market day.  You have no amulet, therefore no master, and so you must die."

The honing stopped.  The sword held firm, straining for my throat.  Not now, not yet.  My legs had less than a foot of play.

"I don't understand," I croaked.  "How do I fit in?"

He smiled gently.  "You don't.  That's just the point.  You know something of the Art; you used it to control the dice last night -- I tested you.  But you have no amulet, and you don't know what it means.  You are a danger.  If we kill you -- if I kill you -- that's the end of it.  But if they kill you -- as they surely will -- it won't stop there.  Your trail leads to me, and mine leads to ... others."  He kicked back the chair and stood up.  "I must kill you," he said.  "I have no choice."

The sword rose.  It filled my eyes, my brain.  I fought it back.  I wasn't ready; I had to try something, so I spoke.

"What about you, Lyneen?  You could be my master."

The blade lowered.  He relaxed a bit.  "I think not," he said thoughtfully.  "Our talents lie in different directions.  What you did last night, you did without training.  It took me seven years of hard work, and still you beat me.  Besides, I haven't the right to be a master."

A little more time -- just a little more -- and my legs would be free.

"I'm good, then."  I tried to sound as confident as he.  "You saw that.  Better than you, you admit.  What would your master say if he knew you killed someone with my talent?"

His eyes flashed, his knuckles whitened.  The sword rose again, and I prepared myself to die.  Then it stopped.  He was thinking, and for a moment paid me no attention.  I kicked hard.  Once more.  My legs were free.

His eyes returned, and I saw my death in them.  His mouth was firm and stern, his hand steady, the sword bright and eager.  "I'm sorry," he said, and the sword whistled down.

I rolled.  The blade hissed past my head into the pillow.  I hit the floor and tried to stand.  One foot caught in the blanket, and I fell.  Another roll; the sword chewed splinters from the floor behind me.  I hit the wall and stopped.

The sword hung above me; I could no longer see the face behind it.  It came for me, sharp and thirsty, and I knew I could not move away this time.  I blinked and looked at the sword again.  I knew it.  I had studied it in his hand, and I knew it like a part of me -- knew it was a part of me.

I felt it: cold, hard, slick with oil, a thread from the pillow and a splinter from the floor clinging to the long sharp edge.  I could no longer feel my body; the wall and floor were gone.  I hung in the air, suspended -- no, I was swinging downward, Lyneen's hand firm on my hilt --

I was the sword.  I was the sword, I had power -- and ... I ... STOPPED -- and darkness fell.

When the light returned to me I was breathing.  Lyneen knelt in the middle of the room, cradling his sword hand in his lap.  The sword itself quivered in a floorboard in the far corner of the room.  I felt weak, but I struggled to my feet and reached the door before he looked up.  "No, wait," he cried.  "Come back!"  But I was gone.

I ran into three men on the stairs.  They shoved me aside without a word.  I knew their kind.  They wore all brown, with wide studded belts holding knife, sword, and cudgel -- they were not city guards, but they had the same pedigree.  They were vicious men, petty and slow; I saw that in their eyes and the way they carried themselves, as if the air itself had better clear the way.  Good men to avoid.  They stopped at Lyneen's door.

Four more of them waited at the foot of the stairs, and another pair on the street outside.  I stared straight ahead and walked past them.  I turned the first corner and ran.

I ate in a new place that night.  I also felt it unsafe to play at dice.  But my youth had not been wasted on dice alone; I had another talent.  The pockets of several fat merchants yielded enough for old mutton and ale -- more filling than satisfying.

I listened to the talk around me as I ate.  In cities such as Landro -- in all cities, for that matter -- news flows fastest to the taverns.  The pundits and philosophers discuss it, and everybody else spreads it around the rest of the city, in various states of disrepair.  A band of toughs invading the second-best hotel in town was definitely news.

A one-eyed thief burst through the door and doubled over, gasping for breath.  The room fell silent, waiting for him to speak.  Someone handed him a bowl of wine; he drank it down and choked.  Several hands pounded him on the back, almost driving him into the floor, and at last he spoke.

"A wizard," he gasped.  "The Brothers caught a wizard!"

"Oh?" grumbled a foreign pirate.  "Which brothers are these?"

"Of God, you idiot.  They caught themselves a wizard, and now they're going to burn him."

"Brothers of God?" mused a third man.  "Haven't heard from them in years."

"Burn him?"  The pirate was appalled.  "Why?"

"They're still around?" asked a grizzled fisherman, cleaning one ear with the stump of a finger.

"That's what they do with wizards.  I just told you he's a wizard."

"Last I heard, they had a place just off the City road.  Big stone place, like a fortress or something.  Course, that was a long time ago."

"Burn wizards?  Never heard of such a thing."

"Thought they already caught the last of them.  That's what I heard."

"Scary place, that one.  You ever been there?  Don't hardly look like no House of God, you get my meaning."

"Guess you heard wrong, cause they got one now, sure enough."

"Great fun, a burning.  Better than Myralla Day."

"How d'you know?" sneered a domestic pirate.  "They haven't been public since your mother walked the docks."

"Tomorrow, I hear."

"So what?  Won't be public, I tell you."

"Free drink, I heard," chimed in another thief.

"Oh, shut your brapping yap, free drink," growled the domestic pirate, shoving the second thief.  That started the brawl, and I slipped out.

So they had him, and they were going to burn him.  It had to be Lyneen, of course -- or was it?  Did I care if it was?  He had tried to kill me.  You could be my master, I'd said.  To stay his hand -- perhaps.  I said that to him, and he tried to kill me, and now they were going to burn him.

I walked the streets deep into the night, the news going round in my head.  I walked the streets of Landro, and for the first time in many years, I saw Alessa's face.

A wine jug -- shattered on the floor ...

An old man, a drunk, in the slums of Kuhesos: rheumy eyes, rancid breath, face lined with broken veins -- the first face I remember.

Pain -- tears -- pain, and a wine jug, shattered on the floor ...

Boy, he called me, and I called him Father, or Uncle, or later, drunken old bum.  He taught me things, I remember that.  He taught me dice.

A scream: Only dice!  A raised hand -- pain -- tears ...

He told me things, now mostly forgotten.  Worlds changing, cities built and destroyed, women birthing, people dying ... and the Brothers of God.

Holding me, rocking me, to stop my crying ...

That name he said in a whisper, glancing over his shoulder, expecting to see them in his drunken fantasy.  Brothers of God -- and burning people.  Declesa, Maline, a dozen others; always looking over his shoulder lest they come for him, too.

They kill you or we do, Lyneen had said.  They -- the men on the stairs -- the Brothers of God -- they had Lyneen, and he would burn.  They saw me, and watched me go, didn't raise a hand to stop me -- but they had him, and he would burn.

Burned Declesa -- Only dice! -- burned Maline -- Dice!  Nothing but dice! -- burned ...

"Stop it!" I screamed at the face before me, at the half-forgotten face of Alessa -- and always in the background the flickering shadow of the pyre.

Had he been a master such as Lyneen's, I might wear a twin to the amulet around Lyneen's neck.  That, at least, he might have given me.  He took my name and gave me in return an uncertain knowledge of dice and stealth.  He opened avenues in my mind, unloosed the boundless seas within my head, but left me no chart through the murderous shoals.  I had one small corner of the tapestry, but the tapestry was tall and broad; my little piece told me nothing about the whole -- worse than nothing, for that piece could mean my death.  I had no assurance, no recognition -- no amulet.

The wine jug wasn't heavy.  Lifting it was as easy as controlling four dice.  It was four feet off the floor when the first blow struck ...

Yesterday I hadn't known about the amulet, and didn't miss it.  Everything changed when I stopped that sword.  The power -- for an instant I had complete control over something outside a dice game.  It felt good.  Lyneen knew the power; that's what the amulet meant.  He could call it when he wanted, could shape it to his will.  He had control -- and I wanted it, too.

The amulet was key, but alone it would do nothing.  Lyneen knew the secrets of the amulet; he had to tell me.  But first, he must not burn.

I promised Alessa.