Maia полностью

"Tharrin-oh, poor Tharrin-listen to me! You must listen to me, you must trust me! I'm going to help you; believe me, I'm going to get you out of here, Tharrin. But I can't do it unless you'll talk to me. There's things I've got to know. Come on, sit down here and talk to me."

As she pulled him gently by the arm he suddenly screamed, but so weak and puny a sound that it would scarcely have startled a bird. Drawing him down beside her on the bench, she could feel his ribs and backbone under his tattered robe. She recognized the robe. It was the one he had been wearing when they parted on the quay at Meerzat.

"Tharrin, dear, listen to me. I know just how you feel, because I've been through it, too. But I can help you: I've got money and influence: I'm a friend of powerful people; I'll save you. But to do that, I've got to know what's happened. Tell me what they say you've done."

"Sencho," he muttered after some moments. "Sencho was too clever for us, wasn't he?"

"Sencho's dead, dear: weeks and weeks ago." She wondered whether Pokada might be eavesdropping.

"Yes, of course," he said. He looked up at her piteously. "They're going to torture us, Maia: you can't know what it's like to wake and sleep day after day with the thought of that. People-people went mad coming up from Thettit. Made no difference: they're here just the same. Every day you wake up you remember-" He rocked himself backwards and forwards on the bench. She could see the lice crawling in his hair.

"Listen, Tharrin. Do you realize that I've become famous and rich? If I ask to talk to the Lord General, he'll see me; very likely the High Baron himself would see me. Do you know that?"

He nodded listlessly. "Oh, yes, I'd-I'd heard. 'Maia swam the river.' I knew it must be you." Then, with no change of tone, "The bread's all green and moldy, you know."

She realized that after many days of ill-treatment and

fear he had in all actuality become incapable of sustained thought-that his mind must spend all its waking time in virtually ceaseless flight from what it could not endure to apprehend. She wondered what his dreams could be like. Yet she would not allow herself to weep: this was no time for weeping.

"You were working secretly for the heldril in Tonilda, weren't you? Isn't that right?"

A nod. She took his hand in hers.

"That's where all that money used to come from? The money you used to give Morca? The money you spent on me?"

Another nod. "I never thought-" he whispered.

"You took messages to Thettit? And to Enka-Mordet and people like that? And you brought messages back, did you?"

"Money for us at home. More money than I could have got any other way." He paused. Then, "Can't you kill me, Maia? Haven't you got a knife or something?"

"No, dear, no such thing. I'm going to get you out of here safe, I promise you." She forced herself to kiss his cheek. "Ipromise! Now listen to me, Tharrin, because this is very important. I'm going to speak to some of my powerful friends, and p'raps they'll want to see you; I don't know. If we're going to save you-and we are-you've got to pull yourself together and get ready to put on a good appearance. Now I'm going to call in that head jailer or whatever he calls himself, and pay him to see you get everything you need. A bath and some clean clothes and proper food, and a comfortable bed. I'll bet he can fix all that if he wants to, and I'm going to see to it as he does want to. But you've got to trust me, Tharrin. You've got to be your own best friend. Come on, now, it's not too late to pull yourself together. This is Maia, your golden fish in the net; remember?"

"Yes, I remember. But I-I let you go. The slave-traders; I never even tried-"

"Never mind, dear. No need to talk about that now. You just stand up and try to look as manly and strong as you can, because I'm going to call him in and tell him what we need. You cheer up, now. Everything's going to be all right."

She had about three hundred meld with her. It was not a very great deal, but it would do for a start and she could

promise more. She went to the door, rapped firmly on it and called "U-Pokada!"

It was not easy, even for the Serrelinda, to get hold of the Lord General at so busy and troublous a time. He was not at his house the following morning, though she arrived there so early that the steward-as she could perceive- was embarrassed, his slaves being still at work in the reception rooms and the place not yet ready to receive callers and petitioners. Both the Lord General, he told her, and the young Lord Elvair-ka-Virrion were already gone to the Barons' Palace; he understood that later in the morning they meant to go down to the lower city to review the troops leaving for Thettit tomorrow. The lady Milvushina, however, was upstairs in Lord Elvair-ka-Virrion's rooms. Should he tell her the saiyett had come?