The White Order (The Saga of Recluce #8)(38)

Cerryl nodded, wondering what sort of household Tellis really had.

“You need directing, master scrivener, at anything but scrivening.” Beryal's cool eyes flicked back to Cerryl. “I ring the bell once for meals. Just once. Supper is true midday. Be noodles and quagroot today... and dark bread. You get brew with dinner, water any other time, unless you want to buy something and share it.” After a quick nod, she turned back to the stove and the heavy iron skillet in which something simmered.

Tellis gave a rueful smile and motioned for Cerryl to follow him through the kitchen, past Beryal, who did not look up. Cerryl could smell warming butter, a spice he couldn't identify, and something that smelled good but unfamiliar.

Beyond the spare common room, Tellis stepped through the rear door and into a small stone-paved courtyard, empty except for the hand pump and catch basin in the right-hand corner. “We don't use this much. It's too hot in the summer, and too cool in the winter.” He gestured. There was a wooden gate in the middle of the back wall, between what looked to be two small rooms. “The supply storeroom-that's the door on the left. The space on the right is yours. You can come and go as you please through the back gate. Works better that way.”

Cerryl glanced around the courtyard again. There was a third door on the right wall, and a narrow door near the common room door on the left.

Tellis followed his eyes. “Those are our rooms.”

The youth didn't ask who “ours” included, or what room was whose, but nodded.

“Put your things in your room. Arrange it how you like and then come back to the workroom.”

“Yes, ser.”

Tellis nodded and left Cerryl standing in the empty courtyard, his pack on his shoulders. Cerryl crossed the courtyard, perhaps ten cubits square, and gingerly lifted the latch and opened the door.

He let his breath out slowly. The space was perhaps four cubits by five and contained a pallet bed-wider than the one he had used at Dylert's-a washstand with pitcher and basin, and a narrow doorless wardrobe of plain and battered pine, plus a stool. The floor was stone, and the faintest film of white dust covered everything.

His nose itched, and he rubbed it, then set his pack on the foot of the pallet. He took another deep breath before opening the canvas flap and lifting out his jacket. He left his battered half-copy of Colors of White inside the pack-and his medallion from his father. He would need to find a hiding place for them, and soon.





White Order





XXVIII




As soon as Cerryl had arranged his things and returned to the workroom, Tellis stopped his work. “Might as well freshen the water. Empty the basins in the house first. Then fill the pitchers.”

Another figure appeared behind Cerryl. Beryal tapped Cerryl on the shoulder. “Be more than that. Use the polished bucket on the peg. The rough bucket's for scrubbing. Always pump a bucket first and empty it. No telling what be in the pump. Empty the basins into the sewer catch before you start pumping water, and don't be using the bucket for dirtied wash water. Sewer catch be outside the courtyard gate. If there's dirt in the basins, wash them under the pump. That's before you bring water into the house. Understand?”

Cerryl nodded and headed for the courtyard, carrying the empty basin. After emptying it and the one on the kitchen washstand, he rinsed them and replaced them. Then, heeding what Beryal had said, he began pumping, letting a bucket's worth of water spill over the polished wash stones before rinsing the bucket itself and filling it. He carted the water back to the workroom to refill the pitcher.

“When you finish with the water, Cerryl...” Tellis did not complete the sentence, preoccupied as he was with the nipping press in the corner.

“I'll come back.”

Tellis grunted without looking up.

Cerryl trudged back out to the kitchen, where Beryal was kneading read. The faint odor of yeast filled the room, and he took a deep breath.

“You can refill the pitchers on the corner table.”

“They're next,” Cerryl said, knowing that was what she wanted.

“Good.”

He slipped past her and carried the bucket through the common room and out into the courtyard, back to the long-handled pump. He lifted the pump handle. While it still amazed him that clean water flowed beneath the streets, he was happy enough not to be lifting buckets from a deep well. With the bucket three-quarters full, as much water as he dared carry, he turned and started back across the courtyard. A cool breeze, foreshadowing winter, ruffled his hair.

“Hello ...” A girl's face peered over the whitened wood of the rear gate. “Are you Tellis's new apprentice?” She giggled, then offered a shy grin before brushing a strand of brown hair back off her forehead. “You must be. Only apprentices carry water.”

Cerryl set down the bucket and walked toward the gate, stopping several cubits back and studying her, knowing he'd seen her. Then he nodded. “You're Pattera, the weaver. I'm Cerryl.”

Pattera's smile vanished. “How did you know my name?”

“I was walking by the shop, and your father told you to mind the loom.” Cerryl offered his own grin. “That was when I was looking for Tellis's place.”

“Oh... you were the boy in the window.”

Cerryl wasn't sure he liked being called a boy, but he nodded and kept smiling.