The Land Below the Sunset

Chapter Seven

The crowds at the Temple Plaza gate were always thickest in the morning. It was the best time to show devotion, before the heat got too much.

Kethar manoeuvred his cart through the gate only to be stopped by a burly figure who planted himself in his path. It was Taltivin. Nephithia stood beside him, dressed now in a lemon silk blouse with pleated sleeves and a long skirt of brushed black velvet slit to the thigh. The effect was more ladylike, but Kethar noticed she still wore her sword.

He put down the shafts of the cart. "Well?"

"Do you know where Propriano is?" said Nephithia.

"There are two silver candlesticks missing," said Taltivin, lifting the cover to look inside the cart.

"I haven't got him in there."

"You reckon you're a clever dick, eh? Jack the lad, that it?" Taltivin edged past the cart. Without his master to hand he wasn't making any effort to disguise his animosity. He wrapped his fingers around the collar of Kethar's jerkin. "You've got about ten seconds to tell me where Master Astralis is, and then I'm going to start knocking down that wall with your head."

Kethar pulled away, flipping the shaft of the cart up with one foot as he did. It swung across in front of Taltivin's knees and he had to release his grip to keep from stumbling.

"That's it!" thundered Taltivin across the cart. "You're going to be bloody pulp, boy, when I've finished with you!"

Overhearing this, a family who were filing under the gate shrank back. The father hurriedly steered his fascinated children back out of the Plaza. They craned their necks for a better look - to them the big angry man must have looked like an ogre. A narrow-eyed priest of Razen approached from the other direction, splendid in crimson robes with polished iron bosses across his chest. A ruby-studded greatsword hung vertically at his back. That sword was a sacred accoutrement that represented the war god's serpent tongue. In theory the priest could not pass a battle without drawing it and, once drawn, it must taste blood. On this occasion the sword stayed in its sheath and he gave Taltivin a wide berth.

The four reciter-priests who stood to one side of the gate did not deflect their gaze from the sky, but their chant grew louder and more insistent: "By your actions honour them..."

But it wasn't Taltivin who worried Kethar. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Nephithia move back behind him. She had her hand on the hilt of her sword, and Kethar knew enough not to push her any further. "All right, all right," he said.

The crowd of onlookers lingered a short time with obvious disappointment and then began to disperse. "Another few seconds and they'd have been placing bets," Kethar said cockily to Taltivin.

"You bought this stuff with the master's candlesticks," said Taltivin. For a moment it looked as though he might just pick the cart up and drop it on Kethar. Nephithia interposed herself.

"Tell us where Propriano is."

"If he isn't at home, I don't know," said Kethar. "I dozed in a chair until dawn and then let myself out."

"Propriano's missing."

"I guessed that much. Why don't you try the taverns? He probably decided to get a liquid breakfast."

Nephithia was trying her best to stay cool, but Kethar could see the strain in her eyes. "His bed wasn't slept in," she said. "It looks like he went out into the garden and just vanished."

"Like the two candlesticks," growled Taltivin.

"Yes, all right, I took the candlesticks. They're Propriano's candlesticks, aren't they, so when he turns up he can come and have it out with me in person. Until then, just go away, will you?"