Free Skeen's Return by Jo Clayton Page A

lift a folded cloth from the hot water, teases it open, holds it out so Angelsin can judge the temperature with a quick touch of her slimfinger. She nods, takes a hard grip on the chair arms and endures the pain when he spreads the cloth over her knee. After a minute he takes it away, replaces it with another. Angelsin’s eyes go feral at this new pain. She half enjoys conquering it, half curses fate for cursing her.
    Her deep voice gravelly, she says, “Has anyone managed a clear look yet at the one who never goes out?”
    Hopflea looks quickly up, a flicker of apprehension on his soft face, then prods with delicate precision at the soggy cloth; when he speaks, the words come slowly, without much feeling in them. He gives the impression of shrewd but wholly amoral judgment. “No. I set the maids at her, but she keeps the door locked and has ears like a woffit’s, so there’s no surprising her. She sits with hood up and her back to the door.” He goes silent while he changes cloths. “You want I should buy a couple of hardboys and have her stripped sometime the others are out?” They are speaking Funorish and he has dropped the mangled speech he uses to bolster his stupid act.
    Angelsin’s eyes are half closed, but she doesn’t miss that flash of fear. It pleases her. Hopflea is her most valued agent and he knows it, but he knows too that if he slacks off or cheats her in any way, he’s dead. And if he quits her, he’s dead. He has made too many enemies in the long years he has worked for her. Given that the fly on the stone is reasonably perceptive, he must have seen by now that the Funor Boy is no boy at all. Though his face has a dewy youth that neither his years nor the things he has done seem able to touch, the flickering light from the richly decorated oil lamps brings out a patina of age and hard usage that is more apparent to the mind than the eye. “Not yet,” Angelsin says finally. “I want to know more about that clutch of misfits before I show my hand. The Pass-Through seems to be as much leader as anyone. You found out anything more about what she’s up to?”
    â€œShe has not gone to the taverns in a while.” He changes the cloth again, sits back on his heels. “Something about the others—the Min and one of the Aggitj, they’ve been looking at boats. Noserat wiggled close enough to listen. He knows some Aggitchan. They were talking about how seaworthy several fishboats were.”
    â€œBuying?”
    â€œNot them.”
    â€œSettled on one?”
    â€œDidn’t show it if they did. They’re not so green as that.”
    â€œThat’s enough heat on that knee. Use the oil. The Pass-Through. If she’s stopped the drinking, she had a reason for starting it. What?”
    â€œAt first I think she a lush.” He bends over the knee, rubbing and rubbing, kneading the hot distorted flesh, his hands slippery with scented oil; he speaks in short grunted packets of sound with hissing gasps between them. “She drink she talk make jokes ’n stories. After while hits me. All them stories all them ’bout bad things happenin’ to slavers, money lenders, assassins, drug dealers, those types.” He sits back on his heels and looks away as she pushes her skirt down. “And what she got out of that was stories about folk here in Fennakin or sometimes just names, when someone says something like that should happen to Eller that filth.” He gets to his feet, frees the wheels and pushes the trolley to Angelsin’s other side while she slowly, painfully, trades feet on the stool.
    â€œWhat names?” she says.
    â€œEsmerkop Eller, the moneylender on the Ditta Skak,” he says, “the one who’s always late with his tithe.” He kneels and begins kneading and manipulating the second knee. “Plossung Mil who runs the baby shop on Jatter Way.” He stands and uses the