He meant nothing to Aaron.

  I saved your life, he wanted to shout. Don't I get anything in return? Apparently not.

  Aaron made him uncomfortable in a number of ways. Darvish had thought himself an expert at merely existing from day to day, but the outlander made him appear a rank amateur. And Aaron did it without the wine.

  One word and the thief would be there to bother him no more. Darvish knew he could never speak that word. If only to prove his father wrong.

  "His life is yours. When you tire of him, he dies. "

  "The healer's busy." Darvish squatted by the pallet and dipped two fingers into the pot.

  Aaron braced himself for the prince's touch. The salve smoothed over the jagged edges between the new skin and the old, but the easing was almost lost in the feel of the strong brown fingers that stroked it on. It seemed as though his heart began to beat to their rhythm. From under lowered lids he snatched a glimpse of the prince's face and the concern there surprised him-as much as it would have surprised the prince had he been able to see it.

  The surprise drove a crack into the stone surrounding him and a question wailed free.

  "What do you want from me, Darvish?"

  Startled blue eyes met equally startled gray eyes for an instant, the question hanging in the air between them. Then the gray eyes cooled back to ice and only the blue acknowledged the question had been asked.

  "What do I want from you?" Darvish repeated softly. He had seen, in that instant, a loneliness that matched his own, recognized it from a hundred thousand reflections in a hundred thousand mirrors. It stopped the glib answer and it stopped the leer.

  What do you want from me?

  Like ripples in a quiet pool, other questions spread out from the first.

  Why did you save my life ?

  Why do you care ?

  Something. . . .

  Darvish remembered the look on Aaron's face the first night on the balcony, the pain that had nothing to do with the injuries that had brought him down. Maybe because his head was clear, without the usual insulation of wine, Darvish suddenly remembered his thoughts from that moment. This is someone who knows. He'd understand how I feel.

  He looked at Aaron's face now and realized what he wanted.

  What do you want from me ?

  I want you to be my friend.

  But he wasn't going to say it. Even though he'd bought and paid for that friendship with Aaron's life. He couldn't take that risk. He asked for the one thing he knew he'd get.

  "Nothing." Darvish shoved the cork back into the flared neck of the pot, his voice a soft contrast to the almost violent action. "I want nothing from you."

  Aaron nodded, his fingers so tightly interlaced that the knuckles stood out bone white. "I can give you that," he whispered, relieved.

  One corner of his mouth twisted up and without really meaning to, he smiled. The wrong answer would have shattered him into little pieces. He could feel how close he'd come, but he was still whole.

  Darvish stared at Aaron's face. He's smiling? Slowly, his own mouth began to curve and, shared, the moment stretched.

  "Highness?"

  Oham's quiet voice drew Darvish around and Aaron's face became expressionless once again, but a link, tenuous and unacknowledged, remained.

  "Highness, His Most Imperial Majesty commands your presence in the small audience chamber. Immediately. He requires also that you bring the thief."

  "When you tire of him, he dies. "

  It wouldn't be the first time His Most Imperial Majesty had changed the rules.

  "Well now, Aaron," Darvish said with the false sincerity usually saved for social occasions and members of the court high in the king's favor. He tossed back his hair and stood, crossing the room and lifting the carafe with both hands. Hands that trembled, just a little. "It seems we had our talk just in time." The wine ran in crimson lines down from the corners of his mouth and over his chest. Breathing heavily, he tossed the now empty container onto the bed and grinned, his eyes too bright. "I guess I'd better get dressed."

  You gave me his life, Father. At Darvish's sides, his hands curled into fists. I'll fight you if you try to take him from me.

  Tension filled the small audience chamber, tension so palpable that Aaron almost raised a hand to brush it from his face. Like sheets of lightning before a summer storm, it radiated out from the four who waited for them and lifted the fine hair on the back of his neck.

  As they crossed the room, the only noise the light slap of their sandals against the tile, Aaron took stock of the doors, the windows, the guards, the habits of years reasserting themselves. It would be a difficult but not impossible job and probably worth it for the heavy gold lamp brackets alone. Lastly, he noted the people.

  The throne in the small audience chamber was rosewood, intricately carved and highly polished. The king, however, was still obsidian and between the gray of hair and beard his expression was black. To his right, the crown prince also showed anger, but it was equally mixed with speculation as he watched them approach. The shaven-headed priest was simply terrified and the lord chancellor-Aaron recognized the fat man immediately, Darvish's drunken ravings were quite accurate-had set his face in no readable expression at all.

  From his position a pace behind the prince, Aaron watched Darvish drop gracefully to one knee and mirrored the motion a heartbeat later. His half-healed chest allowed him little grace and his thighs trembled as he rose, but he set his jaw and pretended he hadn't spent the last three nine-days flat on his back. As he lifted his head, a glare from the lord chancellor drew his gaze.

  A man's ears don't stop hearing just because he no longer wishes to live, and while Aaron healed he'd listened. He'd listened to the words and to what was behind them. He knew who paid the third dresser.

  You're a fool, he thought at the broad sweep of Darvish's back, while returning the lord chancellor's glare with a cold stare of his own, if you think this man is not dangerous just because he is fat and old. But then, he already knew Darvish was a fool.

  From the expression on the lord chancellor's face, Aaron suspected that the obeisance made to the king by a thief was supposed to differ from that made by a prince. Tough.

  "You requested my presence, Most Exalted?"

  Darvish had thrown back two additional goblets of wine on the way through the palace and Aaron marveled at how little the amount of alcohol he'd consumed had affected him. His voice sounded clear and his hands hung steady by his sides. Nor did he appear affected by the tensions in the room. The muscles of his back were knotted, Aaron could see that clearly through the thin white silk of his shirt, but he'd brought that tension in with him.

  The silence the followed Darvish's ritual words stretched and lengthened and the air became heavier still. It seemed that the colored tiles in the mosaic behind the throne grew both muted and more distinct. Aaron's eyes narrowed. He'd assumed, like Darvish, this meeting had been commanded to tell the prince his thief must die, but now he wasn't so sure. He ignored the faint taste of relief. He wanted to die. He waited to die.

  And then the king spoke, thunder to herald the storm.

  "The Stone has been taken."

  "Nine Above ..." Darvish breathed and Aaron silently echoed it. The Stone held the volcano. Without it, Ischia would die. "Who?"

  Slowly, all eyes turned to Aaron.

  "It wasn't me," Aaron said dryly, wondering how they expected him to have stolen anything when he could barely walk. "I was with him." He jerked a thumb at the prince and felt strangely pleased when, after an astounded moment, Darvish grinned and stepped back so that they stood side by side.

  "That does not necessarily excuse you," the lord chancellor snapped.

  "Are you accusing my Most Royal brother of taking The Stone?" Shahin's question was silk, but it was the silk of the garrote. Over the last few weeks, the heir had been discovering more and more how much he disliked his father's omnipresent councillor. That the man was devoted to the throne, he did not doubt, but some of the ways that devotion had been expressed he did not care for at all. In the opinion of the crown prince, the lord chancellor needed to be reminded of his place.

  The lord chancellor recognized the tone and hurriedly bowed. "Oh, no, not at all, my prince. But he does share quarters with a known thief. ..."

  "And we all know that if said thief had stirred at any time during the night you'd have known of it a heartbeat later. So let's stop this foolishness," the word was directed equally at the lord chancellor, Darvish, and Aaron, "and get to the point." The hooded eyes pinned Aaron to the spot. He felt not unlike a rabbit must, caught in the gaze of a great hawk. "You could not have taken The Stone, but you will know who did. Tell us."

  Aaron considered the other thieves of Ischia. He owed them nothing, after all.

  "If The Stone is missing, what holds the Lady?" Darvish asked suddenly, a hint of fear appearing in his voice.

  The priest spoke for the first time, her voice a clear, light soprano growing shrill with the strain of remaining calm. "Not even a living volcano constantly erupts. The wizards of both the temple and the palace focus power to block the smoke and smell, hiding the theft from the people. They stand ready should the worst occur."

  Darvish nodded. "So the wizards know," he murmured, relieved. "Who else?"

  "Only we six and a senior priest at the temple." Her fingers worked against the red and yellow tassels that hung from her belt of office, but her face remained impassive. "If the people find out ..."

  "If the people find out," Darvish repeated, "then the panic will destroy Ischia before the volcano has a chance."

  "I'm glad to see the wine has not completely rotted your brain, little brother."

  Under the sarcasm, Aaron was sure he heard approval in Shahin's voice, but before he had a chance to ponder it the king spoke again.

  "Who has The Stone, thief?"

  Aaron had weighed all the thieves of the city and found them wanting. "The thief came from outside Ischia."

  The king's teeth flashed in the gray of his beard. Not for an instant did Aaron believe the expression was a smile. "You are very sure."

  "I am." He uses his power like a sword, much as my father used his like a club. With the thought came memories-a huge red-bearded man, a dark-haired girl crouched

  at his feet, her blue eyes wide with terror-and with the memories came a storm of emotion-guilt, anger, terror, pain-too thick to breath through. NO! He slammed both memory and emotion back down behind the walls where they belonged. I am through with all that! He added denial to the walls until nothing remained but the void.

  "Aaron?"

  The void and Darvish. But Darvish he could deal with. He should never have left the prince's rooms. He should have stayed there, waiting to die.

  Aaron avoided the prince's gaze-concern could break the walls again-and spoke directly to the king. "I could not have done it and I was the best."

  "The best?"

  The lord chancellor's words were a verbal sneer of disbelief.

  Aaron merely replied, "Yes." They could believe him or not, he didn't care.

  Plump hands spread and the lord chancellor smiled. "And just look where you are."

  "That is hardly his fault," Darvish snarled.

  "And this is hardly to the point," the priest broke in. "Squabbling like children will not help us to recover The Stone." She suddenly recalled whom she chastised and flushed. "Begging your pardon, Most Exalted."

  Aaron barely heard the argument. Hardly his fault? "What do you mean, that was hardly my fault?" He'd failed. Who else could bear the blame?

  Keeping a wary eye on his father, Darvish turned and glanced down at the younger man. "Didn't I tell you? Bugger the Nine," he ignored the gasp from the priest, "I thought I had. Your grappling iron had been deliberately flawed. It couldn't have happened by accident and it couldn't have borne your weight."

  Deliberately flawed. Deliberately flawed. Cold fury rushed in to fill the void-fill it and overflow it. Aaron didn't see Darvish step back.

  He didn't see king, prince, priest, and lord chancellor watching him, faces wearing nearly identical apprehension. He saw a fat face, smoke-stick bobbing on one full and greasy lip.

  When he spoke his voice came out like shards of ice.

  "There's only one place in Ischia The Stone can be."

  * * *

  Not even the strong breeze off the harbor could sweep away the mixed smells of rot and dirt and too many people in too little space.

  Darvish fought against the urge to breathe through the fabric of his sleeve, as many young nobles did when one thing or another brought them down to this part of town. He scowled at a whining beggar, stepped over a pile of garbage-the bloated flies nearly covering it were so well fed they ignored him-and wondered if the volcano might not be preferable.

  Behind him, he could hear the three guards muttering obscenities, they liked this place even less than he did. He, at least, knew they were here for a reason. They thought only that their prince had sold something he shouldn't have, the the prince's pet thief knew where it was, and they were the muscle in case he had trouble getting it back. Not exactly a shining purpose to ease a walk through the worst slum in Ischia.

  "Will three be enough?" Darvish had asked.

  "Do you ever travel with more than three ?"

  "No."

  "Then more will cause suspicion. Questions will be asked and the more questions the greater the chance the people will find out and panic." The priest shook her head, dark stubble a shadow against her scalp. "Above all else, the people must not find out that The Stone is missing. "

  "How fortunate for us all, Darvish^ that your reputation allows you access to such people without raising the type of comments that would lead to questions. You'll have your sword," Shahin added. "Perhaps you'II have a chance to prove you can use it as well as a bottle.

  Aaron's eyes were too cold to be human. "Herrak has no guards about him-he would have to share his treasures, then. He has the best wards his money can buy. But I have been through Herrak's wards before, they know me. And Herrak thinks I'm dead. "

  His most exalted father wouldn't have been depending on him, Darvish knew, if he had any other choice. But he didn't, for the priest was right. Above all else, the people must not know. It was Shahin Darvish didn't understand; his words had been almost more a challenge than a dismissal.

  Aaron stopped in front of a townhouse that looked as though it were about to collapse under its own weight. Each of the three stories was sinking at different angles and the stone, which might have been white once, now barely held its shape in infinite shades of gray. Only one piece of the obsidian inlay that had long ago made this building the showpiece of the neighborhood remained, tucked up under the perch of a crumbling gargoyle.

  The recessed door opened directly onto the filthy street. In its shelter, Aaron spoke practically his first words since leaving the palace;

  "They stay out here."

  As one, the three guards turned to the prince.

  "You might as well," Darvish agreed. "If he wanted to kill me, he could have done it easier last night." One of the guards turned a snigger into a sneeze. Darvish ignored him. He knew what they thought. "You're not needed inside and I'd prefer not to exit into any surprises."

  Body blocking the exact motions, Aaron worked his fingers against the latch, twisting them with an agility that suggested the manacle scars had not destroyed his skills. The door opened just enough to allow him to slip inside. Darvish, larger and heavier, squeezed through behind with more difficulty. The guards philosophically settled down to wait. This wasn't the first time His Royal Highness had gone into a strange house leaving them to secure the door.

  "Course, they're usually not quite so . . ." The first guard let the comment trail off, moving his foot away from a small unidentifiable mound of gray.

  "Yeah? Well, you weren't along when his nibs tucked inta Black Sal's." The second smiled with satisfaction as she added, "They tossed him out just before dawn. We hadta carry him home. Yep, he's bin in places worser than this and come out again. Got the Nine's own luck up his ass does our royal master." She hacked and spit, scoring a direct hit on a roach.

  The third guard only watched the now closed door and hoped that her prince wouldn't need her.

  "Stand still." Aaron's voice cut the small anteroom into smaller pieces still. "Don't touch anything."

  "When will Herrak know we're here?"

  "We crossed the first ward at the mouth of the alley. He's known for some time."

  "Oh." The outside door slid silently shut and Darvish discovered that the termite ridden boards facing the street were only a thin veneer over solid oak planks. "Aaron, you can't open this door from the inside." Nor, given the lack of maneuvering room, did he think he could break it down. The trapped air was hot and heavy and Darvish had the sudden uncomfortable thought that they stood in an inescapable oven.