Bitter Gold Hearts

"What're you doing here?"

"Shaggoth came upon this child on the road, in hyster­ics. He brought her to me. I wheedled some of her story out of her and guessed some more and thought you might be in trouble. We've been on the hill behind you for the past hour."

"Ran into Amber just by chance, eh?"

She smiled. "We like to keep track." She glanced around. "Your associate has asked twice what you want to do now."

"It isn't a matter of what I want to do. It's what 1 have to do to stay healthy. I was planning to dump them down the well and fill it. By the time anyone digs them up they won't be identifiable."

"You tend to think as grimly as those you oppose today, Garrett. You're the knight in the knighted land, remember? A rage for justice? That's what you brought with you when you visited me. Not kill or be killed."

"Show me the way. My head's locked in. It's gotten too bloody and too brutal."

"Amber. Come here."

Amber left Willa Dount, who had begun to show some color. "Yes?"

"Explain to Garrett what we discussed while we waited on the hillside."

"Discussed? You told me... Garrett, all we have to do now is get some people from the High Council to come and see what's happened. Nobody else has to get killed. We can just sit tight and keep things the way they are. Answer questions honestly. My mother has over­stepped her rights. They'll take appropriate steps. Includ­ing making certain Mother never hurts anybody again. You and your friends included."

I thought about it. I thought about it some more. Maybe they were too damned idealistic. But if the right bunch came out, some of the Stormwarden's enemies, we might come up smelling like roses. They could tie it in a knot and make a good show, get what they wanted, and come out looking like champions of justice themselves. "It's worth a think. Let's take a walk." I grabbed her hand and went outside.

"What is it?" she asked.

"The gold?"

"It's gone. Isn't it? Anyway, if it turns out the way the witch said, it won't matter. I'll get everything that be­longed to my mother and father and she won't be there to—"

"The gold isn't gone. Not most of it. Willa Dount hid it somewhere. Skredli's bunch weren't after two hundred thousand. They asked for twenty thousand. Domina forged an extra cipher into all those letters."

"Oh. I see. You want your half."

"Not really. I never counted on getting it. I just want you to keep it in mind if you bring in a tribunal. They get a sniff of that, they could get itchy to grab."

"It's all right with you? To do it this way?"

"It's fine with me. It's you I'm asking about."

"She said it would be."

"The witch?"

"Yes. She knows you better than I do, I guess."

"Let's go inside." We went. I told Crask and Sadler, "You guys got any reason to hang around?"

Crask was leaning against a wall, watching the witch. He said, "Yeah." He pointed. "Her." He meant Donni Pell. "Chodo wants her. When you're done with her. If she's still breathing."

"What for?"

"An ornament. Like the broads that hang around the pool. He thinks she'd be interesting, all he's heard."

"I see." I liked an aspect of the idea. I examined my conscience. Better than killing her. Maybe. "It's all right with me. Take her now."

The witch gave me an unreadable look. Then she stepped over and did something to Donni Pell. The girl began breathing easier. Saucerhead came strolling in. He saw the witch and looked sheepish immediately. I got the distinct impres­sion the world would be plagued by an ogre breed named Skredli no more. Morley said nothing. In fact, he did one of the fanciest fades ever. I paid no attention while Crask and Sadler started out with Donni Pell on a crude stretcher. And when I looked, Morley was nowhere in sight.

_____ LVI ______

The investigators came in a body of eight. They were painfully thorough, yet there was never any doubt of their ruling. The final decision found Lord Gameleon, Baronet daPena, and the Stormwarden Raver Styx all guilty of murder. Amiranda's death they ascribed to person or persons unknown. On the Hill they don't hang each other. Raver Styx was sentenced to be stripped of her property and sorcerous powers and ejected from the Hill, to make her way alone in the world. Except she didn't exactly go alone. Willa Dount vanished, and the last I heard Raver Styx was trying to hunt her down. One hundred eighty thou­sand marks gold!

I wonder if Raver Styx will have any luck. I never managed to locate Willa Dount or the gold, despite months of searching whenever I had free time. I did figure out that she had kept it with her all the time. She hadn't been late to the payoff meet because she'd stopped on the way, but, as Skredli had thought, she'd miscalculated the speed a heavily loaded wagon could make. The cut she'd forged for herself had been concealed under a false bottom. I found the very wagon and the man who had modified it for her. Whatever she did with the gold, she did it after the payoff.