“No no no,” I protested. “She’s the girl that sang along with me. My Aloine. I was just hoping to find her to pay my respects.”
Threpe looked as if he didn’t believe me, but wasn’t going to make an issue of it. “Fair enough, what’s her name?”
“Dianne.” Threpe seemed to be waiting for more. “That’s all I know.”
Threpe snorted. “What did she look like? Sing it if you have to.”
I felt the beginning of a flush on my cheeks. “She had dark hair to about here,” I gestured a little lower than my shoulder with one hand. “Young, fair skin.” Threpe watched me expectantly. “Pretty.”
“I see,” Threpe mused, rubbing his lips. “Did she have her talent pipes?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
“Does she live in the city?”
I shrugged my ignorance again, feeling more and more foolish.
Threpe laughed. “You’re going to have to give me more than that.” He looked over my shoulder. “Wait, there’s Deoch. If anyone could spot a girl for you, it’d be him.” He raised his hand. “Deoch!”
“It’s really not that important,” I said hurriedly. Threpe ignored me and waved the broad-shouldered man over to our table.
Deoch strolled over and leaned against a table. “What can I do for you?”
“Our young singer needs a little information about a lady that he met last night.”
“Can’t say I’m surprised, there were quite a crop of lovelies out. One or two asked about you.” He winked at me. “Who caught your eye?”
“It’s not like that,” I protested. “She was the one who sang my harmony last night. She had a lovely voice and I was hoping to find her so we could do a little singing.”
“I think I know the tune you’re talking about.” He gave me a broad, knowing smile.
I felt myself blushing furiously and began to protest again.
“Oh settle down, I’ll keep this one between my tongue and teeth. I’ll even keep from telling Stanchion, which is as good as telling the whole town. He gossips like a schoolgirl when he’s had a cup.” He looked at me expectantly.
“She was slender with deep, coffee-colored eyes,” I said before I thought about how it sounded. I hurried on before either Threpe or Deoch could make a joke. “Her name was Dianne.”
“Ahhh.” Deoch nodded slowly to himself, his smile going a little wry. “I guess I should have known.”
“Does she live here?” Threpe asked. “I don’t believe I know her.”
“You’d remember,” Deoch said. “But no, I don’t think she lives in town. I see her off and on. She travels, always here and gone again.” He rubbed the back of his head and gave me a worried smile. “I don’t know where you might be able to find her. Careful boy, that one will steal your heart. Men fall for her like wheat before a sickle blade.”
I shrugged as if such things couldn’t be further from my mind, and was glad when Threpe turned the topic to a piece of gossip about one of the local councilmen. I chuckled at their bickering until my drink was done, then made my farewells and took my leave of them.
Half an hour later I stood on the stairway outside Devi’s door, trying to ignore the rancid smell of the butcher’s shop below. I counted my money for the third time and thought about my options. I could pay off my entire debt and still afford my tuition, but it would leave me penniless. I had other debts to settle as well, and as much as I wanted to be out from under Devi’s thumb, I didn’t relish starting the semester without a bit of coin in my pocket.
The door opened suddenly, startling me. Devi’s face peered out suspiciously through a narrow crack, then brightened with a smile when she recognized me. “What are you lurking for?” she asked. “Gentlemen knock, as a rule.” She opened the door wide to let me in.
“Just weighing my options,” I said as she bolted the door behind me. Her room was much the same as before save that today it smelled of cinnamon, not lavender. “I hope I won’t be inconveniencing you if I only pay the interest this term?”
“Not at all,” she said graciously. “I like to think of it as an investment on my part.” She gestured me toward a chair. “Besides, it means I get to see you again. You’d be surprised how few visitors I get.”
“It’s probably your location more than your company,” I said.
She wrinkled her nose. “I know. I settled here at first because it was cheap. Now I feel obliged to stay because my customers know to find me here.”
I laid two talents on the desk and slid them toward her. “Do you mind a question?”
She gave me a look of impish excitement. “Is it inappropriate?”
“A bit,” I admitted. “Has anyone ever tried to report you?”
“Well now,” she sat forward in her chair. “That can be taken a number of different ways.” She raised an eyebrow over one icy blue eye. “Are you being threatening, or curious?”
“Curious,” I said quickly.
“I tell you what.” She nodded at my lute. “Play me a song and I’ll tell you the truth.”
I smiled and unlatched the case, drawing out my lute. “What would you like to hear?”
She thought for a minute. “Can you play ‘Leave the Town, Tinker’?”
I played it, quick and easy. She came in enthusiastically on the chorus, and at the end she smiled and clapped like a young girl.
Which, in hindsight, I guess she was. Back then she was an older woman, experienced and self-sure. I, on the other hand, was not quite sixteen.
“Once,” she answered as I put my lute away. “Two years ago a young gentleman E’lir decided it would be better to inform the constable than to settle his debt.”
I looked up at her. “And?”
“And that was it.” She shrugged carelessly. “They came, asked me questions, searched the place. Didn’t find anything incriminating, of course.”
“Of course.”
“The next day the young gentleman admitted the truth to the constable. He had made the whole story up because I had spurned his romantic advances.” She grinned. “The constable was not amused, and the gentleman was fined for slanderous action against a lady of the town.”
I couldn’t help but smile. “I can’t say as I’m terribly…” I trailed off, noticing something for the first time. I pointed at her bookshelf. “Is that Malcaf’s The Basis of All Matter?”
“Oh yes,” she said proudly. “It’s new. A partial repayment.” She gestured toward the shelf. “Feel free.”
I walked over and pulled it out. “If I’d had this to study from, I wouldn’t have missed one of the questions during admissions today.”
“I’d think you’d have your fill of books at the Archives,” she said, her voice thick with envy.
I shook my head. “I was banned,” I said. “I’ve spent about two hours total in the Archives, and half of that was getting thrown out on my ear.”
Devi nodded slowly. “I’d heard, but you never know which rumors are true. We’re in something of the same boat then.”
“I’d say you’re slightly better off,” I said looking over her shelves. “You’ve got Teccam here, and the Heroborica.” I scanned all the titles, looking for anything that might have information about the Amyr or the Chandrian, but nothing looked especially promising. “You’ve got The Mating Habits of the Common Draccus, too. I was partway through reading that when I was kicked out.”
“That’s the latest edition,” she said proudly. “There’s new engravings and a section on the Faen-Moite.”
I ran my fingers down the book’s spine, then stepped back. “It’s a nice collection.”
“Well,” she said teasingly. “If you promise to keep your hands clean, you could come over and do some reading now and again. If you bring your lute and play for me, I might even let you borrow a book or two, so long as you bring them back in a timely fashion.” She gave me a winsome smile. “We exiles should stick together.”
I spent the long walk back to the Universit
y wondering if Devi was being flirtatious or friendly. At the end of the three miles, I hadn’t reached anything resembling a decision. I mention this to make something clear. I was clever, a burgeoning hero with an Alar like a bar of Ramston steel. But, first and foremost, I was a fifteen-year-old boy. When it came to women, I was lost as a lamb in the woods.
I found Kilvin in his office, etching runes into a hemisphere of glass for another hanging lamp. I knocked softly on the open door.
He glanced up at me. “E’lir Kvothe, you are looking better.”
It took me a moment to remember that he was speaking of three span ago when he banned me from my work at the Fishery due to Wilem’s meddling. “Thank you sir. I feel better.”
He cocked his head minutely.
I lowered one hand to my purse. “I would like to resolve my debt to you.”
Kilvin grunted. “You owe me nothing.” He looked back down at the table and the project in his hands.
“My debt to the shop, then,” I pressed. “I’ve been taking advantage of your good nature for some time now. How much do I owe for the materials I’ve used during my studies with Manet?”
Kilvin continued to work. “One talent, seven jots, and three.”
The exactness of the number startled me, as he hadn’t checked the ledger in the storeroom. I boggled to think of everything the bearlike man was carrying around in his head. I took the appropriate amount from my purse and set the coins on a relatively clutter-free corner of the table.
Kilvin looked at them. “E’lir Kvothe, I trust you came to this money honorably.”
His tone was so serious I had to smile. “I earned it playing in Imre last night.”
“Music across the river pays this well?”
I held my smile and shrugged nonchalantly. “I don’t know if I’ll do this well every night. This was only my first time, after all.”
Kilvin made a sound somewhere between a snort and a huff and turned his eyes back to his work. “Elxa Dal’s pridefulness is rubbing off on you.” He drew a careful line on the glass. “Am I correct in assuming that you will no longer be spending evenings in my employ?”
Shocked, it took me a moment to catch my breath. “I–I wouldn’t—I came here to speak with you about—” about coming back to work in the shop. The thought of not working for Kilvin hadn’t crossed my mind.
“Apparently your music has more profit than working here.” Kilvin gave the coins on the table a significant look.
“But I want to work here!” I said wretchedly.
Kilvin’s face broke into a great white smile. “Good. I would not have wanted to lose you to the other side of the river. Music is a fine thing, but metal lasts.” He struck the table with two huge fingers to emphasize his point. Then he made a shooing motion with the hand that held his unfinished lamp. “Go. Do not be late for work or I will keep you polishing bottles and grinding ore for another term.”
As I left, I thought about what Kilvin had said. It was the first thing he had said to me that I did not agree with wholeheartedly. Metal rusts, I thought, music lasts forever.
Time will eventually prove one of us right.
After I left the Fishery I headed straight to the Horse and Four, arguably the best inn this side of the river. The innkeeper was a bald, portly fellow named Caverin. I showed him my talent pipes and bargained for a pleasant fifteen minutes.
The end result was that in exchange for playing three evenings a span I received free room and board. The Four’s kitchens were remarkable, and my room was actually a small suite: bedroom, dressing room, and sitting room. A huge step up from my narrow bunk in the Mews.
But best of all, I would earn two silver talents every month. An almost ridiculous sum of money to someone who had been poor for as long as I had. And that was in addition to whatever gifts or tips the wealthy customers might give me.
Playing here, working in the Fishery, and with a wealthy patron on the horizon, I’d no longer be forced to live like a pauper. I’d be able to buy things I desperately needed: another suit of clothes, some decent pens and paper, new shoes….
If you have never been desperately poor, I doubt you can understand the relief I felt. For months I’d been waiting for the other shoe to drop, knowing that any small catastrophe could ruin me. But now I no longer had to live every day worrying about my next term’s tuition or the interest on Devi’s loan. I was no longer in danger of being forced out of the University.
I had a lovely dinner of venison steak with a leaf salad and a bowl of delicately spiced tomato soup. There were fresh peaches and plums and white bread with sweet cream butter. Though I didn’t even ask for it, I was served several glasses of an excellent dark Vintish wine.
Then I retired to my rooms where I slept like a dead man, lost in the vastness of my new feather bed.
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
Jackass, Jackass
WITH ADMISSIONS BEHIND ME I had no responsibilities until fall term began. I spent the intervening days catching up on my sleep, working in Kilvin’s shop, and enjoying my new, luxurious accommodations at the Horse and Four.
I also spent a considerable amount of time on the road to Imre, usually under the excuse of visiting Threpe or enjoying the camaraderie of the other musicians at the Eolian. But the truth behind the stories was that I was hoping to find Denna.
But my diligence gained me nothing. She seemed to have vanished from the town completely. I asked a few people who I could trust not to make gossip of it, but none of them knew more than Deoch. I briefly entertained the thought of asking Sovoy about her, but discarded it as a bad idea.
After my sixth fruitless trip to Imre I decided to abandon my search. After my ninth I convinced myself it was a waste of valuable time. After my fourteenth trip, I came to the deep realization that I wouldn’t find her. She was well and truly gone. Again.
It was during one of my Denna-less trips to the Eolian that I received some troubling news from Count Threpe. Apparently, Ambrose, firstborn son of the wealthy and influential Baron Jakis, had been busy as a bee in the social circles of Imre. He had spread rumors, made threats, and generally turned the nobility against me. While he couldn’t keep me from gaining the respect of my fellow musicians, apparently he could keep me from gaining a wealthy patron. It was my first glimpse of the trouble Ambrose could make for a person like me.
Threpe was apologetic and morose, while I seethed with irritation. Together we proceeded to drink an unwise amount of wine and grouse about Ambrose Jakis. Eventually Threpe was called up onto the stage where he sang a scathing little ditty of his own design, satirizing one of Tarbean’s councilmen. It was met with great laughter and applause.
From there it was a short step for us to begin composing a song about Ambrose. Threpe was an inveterate gossipmonger with a knack for tasteless innuendo, and I have always had a gift for a catchy tune. It took us under an hour to compose our masterwork, which we lovingly titled “Jackass, Jackass.”
On the surface, it was a ribald little tune about a donkey who wanted to be an arcanist. Our extraordinarily clever pun on Ambrose’s surname was as close as we came to mentioning him. But anyone with half a wit could tell who the shoe was meant to fit.
It was late when Threpe and I took the stage, and we weren’t the only ones worse for drink. There was thunderous laughter and applause from the majority of the audience, who called for an encore. We gave it to them again, and everyone came in singing on the chorus.
The key to the song’s success was its simplicity. You could whistle or hum it. Anyone with three fingers could play it, and if you had one ear and a bucket you could carry the tune. It was catchy, and vulgar, and mean-spirited. It spread through the University like a fire in a field.
I tugged open the outer doors of the Archives and stepped into the entry hall, my eyes adjusting to the red tint of the sympathy lamps. The air was dry and cool, rich with the smell of dust, leather, and old ink. I took a breath the way a starving man might outside a bakery.
>
Wilem was tending the desk. I knew he’d be working. Ambrose wasn’t anywhere in the building. “I’m just here to talk with Master Lorren,” I said quickly.
Wil relaxed. “He’s with someone right now. It might be a while—”
A tall, lean Cealdish man opened the door behind the entry desk. Unlike most Cealdish men he was clean-shaven and wore his hair long, pulled back into a tail. He wore well-mended hunter’s leathers, a faded traveling cloak, and high boots, all dusty from the road. As he shut the door behind him, his hand went unconsciously to the hilt of his sword to keep it from striking the wall or the desk.
“Tetalia tu Kiaure edan A’siath,” he said in Siaru, clapping Wilem on the shoulder as he walked out from behind the desk. “Vorelan tua tetam.”
Wil gave a rare smile, shrugging. “Lhinsatva. Tua kverein.”
The man laughed, and as he stepped around the desk I saw he wore a long knife in addition to his sword. I’d never seen anyone armed at the University. Here in the Archives, he looked as out of place as a sheep in the king’s court. But his manner was relaxed, confident, as if he couldn’t feel more at home.
He stopped walking when he saw me standing there. He cocked his head to the side a little. “Cyae tsien?”
I didn’t recognize the language. “I beg your pardon?”
“Oh, sorry,” he said, speaking perfect Aturan. “You looked Yllish. The red hair fooled me.” He looked at me closer. “But you’re not, are you? You’re one of the Ruh.” He stepped forward and held out his hand to me. “One family.”
I shook it without thinking. His hand was solid as a rock, and his dark Cealdish complexion was tanned even darker than usual, highlighting a few pale scars that ran over his knuckles and up his arms. “One family,” I echoed, too surprised to say anything else.
“Folk from the family are a rare thing here,” he said easily, walking past me toward the outer door. “I’d stop and share news, but I’ve got to make it to Evesdown before sunset or I’ll miss my ship.” He opened the outer door and sunlight flooded the room. “I’ll catch you up when I’m back in these parts,” he said, and with a wave, he was gone.