Glasswrights' Apprentice Read online

  “Come on, Hal,” Bashi sighed. “Can’t you smell the sausages? Let’s go over there.”

  As Bashi tried to drag them across the marketplace, Hal’s hand shot out, grasping the metal weights before the merchant could keep them safe. As the crowd surged closer, Hal turned the weights upside down.

  At first glance, there was nothing wrong with the metal measures. Bashi stared at the smooth bronze weights and then rolled his eyes, sighing his disgust. “There! Are you satisfied, Hal?”

  The older prince, though, ignored his restless brother. Producing a short dagger from the top of his supple boots, Hal gouged at the bottom of the metal marker. It took a moment of levering, but a plug of wax fell onto the weighing table, glistening in the afternoon light. Glints of metal paint flecked the table.

  Prince Hal looked up to eye his brother steadily. “My name is Halaravilli,” he enunciated. “I am a prince of the House of Jair, and you’ll give me the respect I deserve.” Bashi flushed crimson, barely managing to swallow his rage and embarrassment. Hal did not wait for his brother’s response, though, before turning steely eyes on the merchant. “And you are a thief.”

  “Your Highness -” The man fell to his knees, his face paling to the color of thin whey. He worked his hands in supplication, glancing frantically about as the pitch of the crowd rose to a frenzied hum. “I beg of you, Your Highness.…”

  “What? You beg mercy? Did you have mercy for the poor folk who came to you to check their purchases for fair measure?”

  The merchants pressed closer, and Rani felt their outrage like a palpable flame. They had placed this man in a position of power; they had given him the ability to define right and wrong, to measure good and evil in the marketplace. Rani’s own blood pounded at the thought that her birth-caste would be so betrayed, and she literally swallowed the urge to spit on the criminal. The guilty man reached for the hem of Hal’s cloak. “Mercy, Your Highness.…”

  Hal’s gaze snapped back to the royal party, clumped in the marketplace in velvets and silk. “Prince Bashanorandi!” His use of his brother’s full name spoke volumes about proper respect and titles. Bashi stepped forward, pulling himself to his full height. “What is the penalty for a merchant caught short-weighting goods?”

  Bashi swallowed hard and looked back at his tutors; he clearly had not memorized the Table of Penalties. Before the prince could admit his ignorance, Rani caught herself mouthing the response. “A thumb for the first offense.”

  Bashi must have been standing close enough to catch her murmur, or else he heard it from the crowd. “A thumb for the first offense,” he parroted. “A thumb for the false weight he placed upon the scales.”

  “Very good,” Hal nodded, although he turned his grey eyes on Rani as he issued the tight praise. The crown prince nodded to his guard. “Carry out the sentence.”

  “Now?” yelped Bashi, as the weights-master cried out and the crowd surged closer.

  “Now.” Hal’s eyes narrowed as the soldiers manhandled the merchant, forcing him over to the weighing table, grappling with him to lay out his pale, pale hand against the weathered wood.

  “Please, Your Highness!” The man babbled, striking out with his arms, almost succeeding in breaking free. “I beg you to take me before the Merchants’ Council.” At a dangerous roar from the assembled tradesmen, the man changed his pleading. “Take me to the Court, then, let me hear the King’s Justice.”

  Hal leveled shrewd eyes on the marketplace, raising one hand in majestic reflection of the statue that stood on the far side of the marketplace, the Defender of the Faith. The gesture was regal, and even the most agitated folk in the marketplace fell silent. “I am the King’s Justice, man. There is no appeal from my decision.” Hal waited one long minute, while the crowd absorbed the power emanating from him, and then he nodded curtly at the captain of the guard. “Go ahead.”

  Rani could not keep her eyes from the shining steel blade, could not help but watch the sun reflect from that liquid tongue. For just an instant, she was catapulted back to the glasswrights’ hall that no longer stood in the Guildsmen’s Quarter; she remembered a similar knife falling on Larinda. She thought of the blood that had flowed from her fellow apprentice, and she almost cried out, almost begged Hal for mercy on behalf of a merchant, on behalf of a man who was born into her caste.

  Almost, but not quite. The scales-master had known the rules of the marketplace. He had defiled his entire caste when he broke the law. Hal’s sentence was fair, and mercifully swift.

  A cheer went up in the crowd as the guard raised up the merchant’s maimed and bleeding hand.

  Hal nodded at the approval, and gestured curtly to the guard to let the merchant go free. The man stumbled through the market, ducking his head against a sudden torrent of rotting vegetables and foul debris. Only when the criminal had disappeared beneath a filthy storm did Hal turn back to his small party. “Enough.” His voice was hoarse, and he panted as if he had run a mile through the City streets. The skin about his eyes was tight, strained, and Rani was surprised that his voice did not quaver. “Jair has spoken to me, spoken through me. I must pray to Jair, pray to the gods, pray to all the Thousand Gods. Let’s leave the market. Leave, leave, leave.”

  Rani followed the princes as the guards cleared a path. She was concerned about Hal, worried about the exhaustion she read in his features. His actions had drained him, as if he had only so much power to spend in a day, and all of it had been wagered in one show of strength.

  One show of strength, but what a show it was.… Rani had seen the flash in the prince’s eyes as he ordered the merchant punished. She had seen the thrill of power. Hal had thrived on flicking the whip of kingship. Deep in his addled mind, he lusted for the crown.

  Rani’s head reeled as she moved through the City streets. Unconsciously, her fingers crept to the metal band about her arm. She could feel the snakes’ ruby eyes through the cloth. Now she was grateful that she had not had the opportunity to seek out Bardo after Bashi’s silly show with the guards the night before. The younger prince certainly had not unveiled the sort of strength that his brother had just revealed.

  Now, Rani longed to find Bardo, yearned to tell him that she knew the answer to the puzzle he had set for her. She knew who had conspired against the king, who had wanted to eliminate Prince Tuvashanoran. She wanted to announce that Halaravilli - a prince who, with scarcely a blink, could command a subject’s thumb severed from his hand - Halaravilli was the one the Brotherhood sought.

  Rani was so intent on imagining her brother’s joy at her message, that she scarcely realized the princes were moving through the City streets toward the cathedral. Rani only looked up as they passed over the threshold into the nave, as she realized the soldiers were stepping back, making way for her because she was the First Pilgrim, and she was entitled to lead the way into this house of worship.

  When Rani hesitated for a second, Bashanorandi started to grouse. “What is your point, Hal? Why did you drag us here? Cook will be angry if we don’t get back home.”

  “Peace of Jair, guidance of Jair. Looking for the light of all the Thousand Gods.” Hal made his way down the cathedral’s aisle, ignoring the purported authority of the First Pilgrim. “Peace of Jair, guidance of Jair. The prince acts for justice, the prince acts for peace.”

  Lulled by Hal’s babbling and by the familiarity of the path they walked, Rani almost did not realize that the crown prince was leading her directly down the side aisle, picking his way unerringly to the small stone altar that Rani had come to know so well. “Justice of Roat,” Hal muttered. “Guidance of Roat.” She watched in astonishment as Hal knelt before the familiar altar, and when she dared to look around the cathedral, she half-fancied she would see Bardo sitting in the shadows.

  Of course, Bardo was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Rani’s attention was captured by Bashi. As always, the younger prince had declined to follow his brother. Even as Hal knelt before the small altar, muttering a prayer, Bashi strod
e down the cathedral’s main aisle, dragging with him the royal guardsmen, as if he were a lodestone attracting the heavy metal of their breast-plates.

  Rani’s attention darted back and forth between the princes. Hal lowered his head to the cold marble edge of Roat’s altar, swallowing his whispered chanting as he clasped his hands before his brow. At the same time, Bashi clambered up the steps of the main dais, taking them two at a time, looking back at his guards as if they were all playing at some military campaign.

  Rani could not keep her eyes from darting up to the fateful Defender’s Window, to the glasswork that had brought death to Prince Tuvashanoran and ignominy on Rani’s guild. The sun was almost at the same angle as it had been on that doomed day; Rani could see the streak of cobalt light that Instructor Morada had planned. She could see another prince ensnared in the glasswright’s web.

  She took a step forward, a cry rising in her throat, but before she could speak, Hal raised a hand to her arm. As if he knew she wore Bardo’s bracelet, his fingers settled unerringly on the band of snakes, pinching the metal as tight against her flesh as Larindolian had done the previous night. The movement was effective; Rani swallowed her words before she had a chance to warn Bashi of the danger.

  Of course, Bashi needed no warning. He stood for a moment in the cobalt light, tossing back his own cloak, letting the azure sunlight stain his hair, his face, his entire body. Then, he stepped out of the beam, all the time keeping his back to the main altar. Rani watched as Prince Bashanorandi joked with his guards, jested with his people. She was captivated as he stepped up to the main altar, and she stared in disbelief as he raised the golden chalice that was centered on a snowy white cloth.

  The golden chalice - the cup that symbolized the Defender’s gifts to his people. Prince Tuvashanoran had drunk from that cup. King Shanoranvilli was the only person living today who was worthy to drink from the Defender’s cup.

  And Bashi raised it to his lips.

  The soldiers did not seem to notice. They were lolling about the cathedral, glad to be inside its cool confines, grateful to be free of the pressing crowds that made their jobs so difficult. When one of them did take notice of his young lord playing with the holy goblet, he merely uttered an exclamation, and then the other soldiers fell to teasing the Prince, joking with him, turning the sacrilege into a game.

  Rani read volumes into that easy acceptance. The soldiers did not care how their leader acted; they were not going to question their chosen lord. Whatever Bashi did, he did in accordance with his royal entitlement, his birthright. Indeed, the men’s easy camaraderie bespoke their feudal bonds - they were not bound to the abstract concept of the house of Jair, after all. They were Bashanorandi’s men. They served him, and him alone.

  As Bashi set the chalice back on the altar, Rani swallowed a bitter sigh. She had been a fool to think Hal the suspect prince; she had been led astray by the flurry in the marketplace, by the sight of a mangled hand, a bloody stump. Rani knew in her heart of hearts that Bashi was the youth who aspired to power. She saw it with eyes that had served the priests, binding Tuvashanoran’s cold, dead body. She felt it with a heart that had lived in the Soldiers’ Quarter, had swelled with pride at watching the military loyalty of good soldiers. Only her merchant’s instincts had blinded her, temporarily, in the marketplace. Her longing to return to the quarter of her birth and the love of her family had deluded her, for one brief moment, into thinking that Hal was the scheming prince.

  Now, Rani turned to find Hal watching her strangely, as if the prince could read her careful calculation, could tell that she had suspected him, however briefly.

  “The light strikes the cup,” Hal observed. “The light strikes the cup, the cup strikes the chord. The chord calls the men, the men guard the prince.” Rani nodded, understanding the strange logic of Hal’s sing-song mysteries. “The men guard the prince, the prince calls the men.”

  Hal rose to his feet, and the guard snapped to attention. Even Bashi stopped his capering about the altar, following his brother down the aisle and back to the Palace. Rani fought the impulse to look over her shoulder as she left the cathedral yet again. She hoped against hope that Bardo had been secreted in the shadows, that he had seen Bashi’s brashness. If Bardo had been a witness, then she would not even need to name her suspicions. Bardo would know the traitor.

  The royal procession managed to return to the Palace without event, and the three charges settled in the nursery for an afternoon of reading, studying, and quiet time. Rani ignored her supposed guild of the bards, forsaking the opportunity to spin out tales for the princesses or read great stories in leather-bound tomes from the royal library. Instead, she scrounged up a slate and a piece of chalk, whiling away the darkling hours sketching the nursery’s residents.

  She drew each of the princes with a spray of strong lines, forcing the youths’ restless bodies into planes that would be easy to cut from sheets of glass, easy to read from a distance. At first, Rani thought that she was drawing portraits, but she realized she did not yet have the skill to capture the boys in simple glasswrights’ lines. The more she tried, the more frustrated she became, until she finally rubbed out all of her mistakes. Taking a deep breath and muttering an appeal to Lan for patience, Rani began again.

  This time, the lines drew themselves on the slate, flowing from the chalk as if some divine force controlled her hand. As she completed her “portrait” of Hal, she almost laughed aloud. A young lion stared out at her from the slate, its eyes wise beyond its years. She sketched in a mane with a few lines, finishing off the feline grace. Halaravilli might be young, but his heritage was clear; he was a prince of the House of Jair, and the royal lion was his symbol.

  Excited by her success at merging youth and animal, Rani turned her attentions to Bashi. The younger prince sat across the nursery, joking with the princesses and ignoring his studies. As Rani started to sketch the lines for his face, she again felt the supreme confidence, the easy flow of the chalk against the slate. This time, though, there was no royal lion that peered out from the drawing surface. As she sketched in the prince’s hair, captured his eyes, etched in his cheeks, the crafty gaze of a fox stared out from the slate.

  There was more behind the portrait, though. As Rani studied her strong lines, she realized that she had seen another cunning gaze; she had seen that vulpine hunger before. As if testing herself, she thought back to the previous night, when she had caused the commotion in the corridor. Then, she remembered her encounter in the shadowy hallways built into the city walls. Yes, she had been blind not to see it before.

  The entire court must be blind. Prince Bashanorandi’s features were a younger, softer version of Lord Larindolian’s.

  All of a sudden, a veil fell away from Rani’s eyes. It all made sense - she was a fool not to have seen the pattern earlier. She, who prided herself on seeing patterns.… Larindolian had emerged from the queen’s chambers. Prince Bashanorandi had the narrow, chiseled features of the cunning chamberlain. Larindolian had his fingers in every pie in the City - he had manipulated Instructor Morada, gaining access to the deadly scaffolding outside the cathedral. He had taken charge of Rani’s life behind the palace walls. He had sworn Rani to secrecy within the Brotherhood.

  Larindolian plotted to overthrow the king. How long before he took the final steps - murdering King Shanoranvilli, and the last true heir, Prince Halaravilli? How long before Bashanorandi became king of Morenia?

  Rani’s heart pounded. She needed to reach Bardo immediately. She needed to tell Bardo of the mistake they both had made, of their foolishness in trusting the chamberlain. She had been right all along - she had been wise to fear the man who had beaten Instructor Morada and turned the glasswright over to the Palace guard. She had been right to fear the man who had sliced open her veins, who had fed her blood to the snakes in the Brotherhood’s hidden chamber. Rani knew that she had no choice; she must get to the cathedral now, without her dangerous guard-dog Marcanado.

  Whil
e the princes still knelt at their prayers, Rani crossed the nursery floor. The family had become accustomed to her odd comings and goings, and she hoped that no one would notice that she was sneaking out early. Her heart thrummed when none of the nurses responded, and she slunk down the torchlit corridor, keeping to the shadows as if that would delay Marcanado from reporting for his nightly mission.

  She dared to breathe a sigh of relief as she entered the main courtyard; perhaps Lan himself was watching her, keeping her hidden from her watchdog’s stolid eyes. Darting across the cobblestones, Rani gained the gate, startling the kindly guard who kept watch for mischief in the night.

  “What ho!” he exclaimed, stepping from the shadows of a small hut beside the gate. He slapped back the sword that he had started to unsheathe. “You’re early tonight, young pilgrim!”

  “Aye,” Rani answered desperately, her words a little too sharp in the night air. “I need to reach the cathedral. The Thousand Gods are restless tonight, and I need to pray for peace.”

  “Where’s your soldier, little one? It’s still not safe in the City streets.” The man chided her.

  “He’s with the princes. The entire household is still up in arms over the marketplace today; even the princesses are out of sorts.”

  “I have strict orders…”

  “It’s more important that Marcanado stay with the princes tonight,” Rani wheedled, turning her most winning smile on the man. “Besides, I know the way now. I could walk it in my sleep.”

  “It would be my job, if I let you go.”

  “Nonsense,” Rani coaxed. “You can watch me from the gates - you can see halfway to the cathedral without taking a step.”

  “Well.…” The man had already decided to give in.

  “I’ll be back before they even know I’m gone.”

  “Be quick, then, little pilgrim.” The man grunted as he turned the heavy iron fitting on the gate. “I’ll watch you move down this street, and I’ll keep an eye out for your return.”