THE MINOTAUR, Chapter 1: Tremors
by J. P. Moore
An old sailor once told Elysa that the air is wet because of a river in the ocean. His hair smelled like the breeze on the cliffs. It was a heady mix of sea musk and smoke. She had lost all memory of his face, but could still see the purplish scar that ran down from his elbow, wrapped around his forearm and ended just above the top of his hand. He boasted that he had been cut by a thick line of tackle that went suddenly taut with the weight of a monstrous shark.
"Nearly took my arm off, he did."
They always tried to impress her, and she wondered why.
Warm water from Tearpoint carried tropical air northward, he explained, but the cold wind dropped from the mountains, from the mines. The resulting fog roiled like smoke or steam. It was the ever-present ceiling of the Dure. Its mists made a scrim that diffused all light, washed all detail and left a film of moisture over everything. Rain fell almost every day.
The gray and the heaviness struck Elysa. She found herself outside, near the western gate, having traced the northern wall of the city from the brothel district, wondering now where her mind had been on that long walk. She had no memory of taking the steps. Her heavy cloak was soaked through and clung to her legs and arms. Strands of black-wet hair fell from beneath her hood and seemed pasted along her thin face.
"You know the law."
An officer approached, wearing the heavy coat of the Talarian constabulary. His wide hood was drawn, revealing a handsome, fatherly face framed by an open helmet. One gloved hand sat atop the hilt of his sheathed broadsword. The other was flat out to her face, warding her away.
"I'm not working, now."
"Working or not. You know -- no whores on the docks."
"I'm shopping," she said, and offered her empty basket as proof. "I'm shopping. Here. I even have a list."
The ink had blossomed on the wet paper. The officer smiled.
"Nothing to buy here," he said. "And these men have nothing to do with you until the sun goes down."
She wanted to ask: what sun? He was a captain, an educated officer. He was from Talar. Durians did not speak of a sun so much as of a diffused glow that was daytime. Inside one found memories of milder climes. Oranges danced with the ever-stoked flames upon soft, cured wooden beams and studs. What fog there was rose gently from great pots of soup, fish and clams with potatoes. Life and comfort survived in shelter. But outside the world was without color.
"Regardless," he continued. "What whore does not hear the rumors? You must know to stay in your brothel. What fool wanders about now?"
Shamhat had disappeared only a week before. She was dark skinned, from the desert. Prized. She and others were missing from the brothels. Some said that she took a man to her room. He wore a hood and would not remove it. They were gone without any trace but his muddy footprints, which were said to have ended mysteriously just within her doorway.
"We are no safer in the brothels," she said.
But he had already lost his patience.
"Turn about, now. The market is behind you, though I advise you to return to your room."
Elysa turned, walked slowly back toward the market and, beyond, the brothels. The guards laughed quietly to themselves. Some joked and one called out. He had a break coming, soon. She might come back then. He took a swat from the Talarian captain. Correcting the local in a garrison town - what did Durians know of etiquette?
"A Talarian Legionnaire does not speak in such a way!" the captain said, loudly enough for her to hear. She wondered if, within that helmet, a guilty conscience seethed. Perhaps he had visited her, once. They all spoke respectfully in the end, as men who know that customers are not always right. Those who laughed and joked - they had never taken a whore.
Thunder rumbled across the sky, beginning far to the west over the sea and rolling in, splitting somewhere above the city. She turned to see activity breaking loose upon the ships. Giant stone causeways carried the road beyond the gate, connecting islands and sharp outcroppings into a gentle path that wound toward the sea, to a place just past the jutting stones. The ships moored there were cast in blue and gray at the close border between visible things and things lost to the mist. Not many ships - most of Dure's commerce traveled the inland River Cruen on wide, flat barges - metal from the smelters and forges, wood from the south.
A single ship of Eile hurriedly unloaded crates of wine for the Talarian elite, no doubt. Another vessel, a lone and curiously unmarked sloop, bobbed lazily on the growing swells just beyond the Eilean freighter. An emissary traveled aboard that sloop, perhaps, or a rich merchant. A war frigate sat in protection over several smaller vessels, all flying triangular Talarian pennants. Men climbed into the masts. Sails fell quickly and ropes were thrown. The sky began to darken even further and, within minutes, looked as it did at night.
* * *
Rourke stood in the harbormaster's office, flexing the muscles of his legs and arms after days of travel in the cramped sloop. His bunk had been comfortable enough, but weather had kept them all below deck. There was little room to move about. He was not prone to sea-sickness, but found himself suffering headaches and indigestion below the deck with no light or fresh air. The fare was little more than hardtack and water, despite the cost of the passage.
A large fire spat and popped at the bottom of a metal barrel in the center of the office. The winds fell into the seaward wall, which was entirely closed. The wall facing the city, however, had a long opening at waist level, and windows on the other walls looked out onto the docks. Men scurried to unload the last crates and tie down the ships before the storm began.
Rourke's cloak was as wet as if it had been dropped from the side of the sloop but it had been soaked only by mist. He stared straight into a drop on the rim of his hood, waiting for it to fall. His eyes appeared crossed to the harbormaster.
"Welcome to Dure, then, and all of that." The harbormaster was a short, fat man. His face bristled with thick gray hairs, like a brush. "Pull back that cowl, now, will you?"
Rourke withdrew his hood carefully. Another dark-haired Eilean. He was handsome, but not striking, with sharp features common to the coastal folk and some lines on the wiser, less frivolous parts of his face, as if he were reaching middle age with an uncommon knowledge of the workings of the world.
"I was told only to present this," he said.
He flicked the water from his hand and removed a leather document pouch from the folds of his cloak. The pouch fell onto the counter with a soft, wet sound. The harbormaster rubbed the tips of his fingers together and then reached for the pouch, carefully removing a folded, wet paper. He laid it flat onto the counter and brought a pair of glasses to his eyes. Rourke continued.
"The sloop carries no cargo. That is, to say, that I am the cargo."
The master paused, looked up from the pouch.
"Never been here ... to Dure, I mean. Have you?"
"No."
"I never forget a face, and yours is new to me. I'll be here fifteen years tomorrow, and that's a new face."
"It is just myself, my man and our equipment. The sloop has orders to return to Talar as soon as I am ashore."
"Hack's my name. Welcome to the City of Mist, Mister ... Artomey. Rourke Artomey. Eilean? I think you'll regret leaving yourself stranded. Eile is a much fairer place. It'll be some time before that sloop is able to leave, what with the storm. So maybe you might reconsider."
Hack smiled dumbly and the bristles all stood at attention. His teeth were brown and crooked. He turned back to paper. He breathed in heavily and then let out a loud whistle.
"You come under the Chancellor's Seal? I'll have to check on this."
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Submission copyright © 2000 by J. P. Moore; excerpted here by permission of the author | 