Redwing

by Holly Bennett

  It was pandemonium—Jago bellowing, Merik crying and struggling, Samik and the maid both shouting at the warlord to stop. Samik’s mother came flying out the door, jumped in and began hauling on the big man’s shoulders, trying to pry him off her boy. Samik leaped in to help, but Jago was heavy and strong, his rage growing rather than spending itself, and they could not shift him. He had his hands around Merik’s neck now, shaking the boy up and down like a rag doll. Samik’s mother began shrieking at him and raining blows on his head, but she might as well have been a mosquito for all the notice he took. Merik was not crying anymore—he was blue and silent, eyes bulging in terror. Jago was killing him.

  Samik cast around desperately for some kind of weapon. He could pry up a cobblestone—no, it would take too long. Merik’s life was surely now measured in seconds, not minutes. There was all kinds of debris on the street, but none of it heavy enough to—

  The house idol. He sat in his tiny alcove cut into the wall beside the front door, eight thumbs of solid stone, supposedly protecting the home from thieves. Well, he could protect them now.

  Samik snatched the stone idol from its base and raced back to Jago. Merik was unconscious now. God of all gods, let him be unconscious, not dead, thought Samik. He raised the idol and brought it down with all his strength on the back of the warlord’s head. The crunch, Jago’s collapse onto the cobblestones, the blood staining around his head, all seemed to happen in a slow, silent dream.

  And then things happened very fast indeed. He vaguely heard his mother calling servants, sending for the bonesetter, ordering his brother and Jago to be carried inside. But Samik was inside before anyone else, yanked in the door and dragged into the cellar by his father, who muttered at him, “Lie low here until I come back for you.” He was in trouble, he knew that. If Jago died, he had committed murder, and though it would surely be found to be justified, Jago’s clansmen were not likely to leave his punishment to a judge. And if he lived…

  If Jago lives, I’m a dead man. Samik was scared now, really scared. The man was a warlord—for the first time, Samik really considered what that meant, and the inherent risk of doing business with such a man. A warlord with a murderous temper. There was no way for an ordinary person to protect himself against a warlord with a grudge—and Jago would hold a grudge all right. He would hold it for as long as it took to get satisfaction.

  Samik’s father had evidently come to the same conclusion, for he hurried down the stairs a short time later carrying a travel bag and Samik’s cloak.

  “They’re both alive,” he replied to Samik’s first question. “The bonesetter says Merik will live, but he can’t say if…” His voice faltered, and he gulped in a couple of fast breaths. His father was close to crying, Samik realized, and that scared him more than everything else.

  “He can’t say,” his father repeated, deliberately now, “if he will be all right, or if he might be damaged in the head.”

  Damaged in the head. The words were ominous, but Samik didn’t quite know what they meant. While he debated the wisdom of asking, his father stepped up to him and clutched him in a hard hug. “He is only alive because of you,” Ziv whispered. “You have our eternal thanks, your mother’s and mine. But you have put yourself in great danger.”

  “Jago—how is he?” Samik asked. His father shook his head.

  “Still unconscious. He looks likely to live but…same as Merik. You broke his skull with that statue. He might recover and be his same old evil self, or he might end up unable to speak, or weak in his legs…or crazy.” His father gave a strained bark of laughter. “Though as we just saw, he is already crazy.”

  “He’ll come after me if he can, won’t he?”

  Ziv nodded. “As sure as morning follows night. Samik, you’ll have to leave. The man can hire the best assassins in the country—and he will. The only way I can think to keep you alive is to make you disappear.”

  “Where will I go?”

  Ziv was counting out coins as he spoke. “Go to your mother’s land—Jago’s spy network will not extend so far. I’ve sent for a hire coach, so it won’t be identified as mine. It will take you to Guara harbor. From there you can get on a trade ship to—well, anywhere in Prosper will do. They mostly go to Shiphaven. Take the first one you can get.”

  Samik nodded mechanically, trying to make his mind think ahead when it wanted to be stunned and stupid. He slung the purse his father gave him around his neck and tucked it inside his tunic, then stood holding a second pouch, unsure of where to stash it.

  “Take K’waaf,” his father said. “He’ll protect you with his life.”

  “How long will I stay?”

  “I don’t know, Samik.” His father looked worried. “It will be longer than your money will last. You’ll need to find a way to earn more.”

  “I’ll take my viol,” said Samik. At least it would be a good place to hide the extra money. “Didn’t Mother always say the Backenders love music and pay a good penny to hear it?”

  Ziv nodded. “It’s a start. There isn’t time for a better plan—the magistrate’s men will be here before long, and you must be gone when they arrive.”

  When Ziv returned with the viol case and a leather dog lead, Samik shrugged into his coat and slung the bag over his shoulder. “What did you pack in there, anyway?”

  “Not much,” his father confessed. “Clothes, a map of Prosper that your mother keeps and—well, I tossed in a couple of small bottles.” He smiled weakly. “Thought they might be fortifying.”

  Samik hitched a deep breath, trying to grasp the fact that he was about to walk out the door, leave his family and head into an unknown land. “Is the coach here?”

  His father nodded. “In the back alley. Go out the scullery door and take the dog from the kennel on your way. Hopefully Jago and his men don’t know about K’waaf.”

  They stood awkwardly. “How will I know when…?” Samik began. His father lifted his hands helplessly.

  “If Jago recovers, this house will be watched. I don’t know…give it three moon cycles anyway. Then, if you have landed in a place where you can stay for a while, try to send a message. If it’s safe for you to return, I’ll send word—or come and get you myself.”

  That was the last Samik had seen of his family.

  SEVEN

  Rowan had been so absorbed in Aydin’s story that it took him a minute to realize that it was done. Incredible, that such violence and menace could just break into a family’s life. Imagine living in a country where “warlords” were an everyday reality…

  Aydin stretched out his long legs and propped them, crossed at the ankle, on the empty chair and yawned hugely. Ettie’s chair, thought Rowan, but Ettie wouldn’t have minded. Besides, he wasn’t done with Aydin’s story.

  “How long have you—?”

  “About a fortnight,” said Aydin cheerfully. “And already I am nearly out of money. My education in frugal living has been woefully inadequate, I’m afraid.” He sat up straighter and looked hopefully around the little scullery. “Kiar’s Great Ax, I’m hungry. Is there any…?”

  “Not a scrap,” Rowan said firmly. “Not for you or for Kiar, whoever that is.” He hadn’t been bothering with a midday meal lately, through indifference as much as thrift, but now his stomach growled its agreement with Aydin. Damn the man; he’d felt fine before Aydin mentioned food.

  “Look, I have an idea,” Rowan ventured. “We’re stuck here for today anyway, so why don’t we try to find some music we can play together and try our luck at the inn tonight?”

  “There are two,” Aydin offered. “If the first won’t feed us, we’ll try the other.”

  Two inns. Rowan groaned inwardly; he could have done perfectly well on his own in one inn and left the other to Aydin, with no need to feel guilty. Now he was stuck with a partner who played exquisite music completely unsuited to the little rural towns that dotted this part of the country. “Fine,” he said. “My point is we should practice together.”


  “Yes, yes.” Aydin flapped a hand up and down dismissively, and Rowan felt his face tighten with anger.

  “I can’t play on an empty stomach. Wait here and I’ll see what I can scramble up.” Aydin was shrugging into his heavy coat as he spoke. He turned the collar up against the rain and slipped out the door.

  “WHERE DID YOU GET THIS?”

  Aydin had returned with ends of sausage, heels of bread and a cold cooked turkey neck.

  “That girl, the one who let me sleep in the root cellar. Summer, her name is.” Aydin swallowed a mouthful of sausage and grinned. “She likes me. I promised we would play at her inn tonight though—you don’t mind?”

  Rowan shook his head, bemused. Who would have thought a rich merchant’s son would be such an accomplished moocher?

  At last Aydin was ready to get to work. “We’ll have to play your Backender music, I suppose.” He pulled his viol from the case and plucked at the strings to test their tuning.

  Rowan busied himself with his own instrument, slipping on the shoulder strap and resting the box on his left knee before unhooking the bellows. He warmed up with a snatch of a simple jig, deliberately picking one of the tunes Aydin had butchered in the market the day before.

  Check it out, smart-arse, he thought, as his fingertips skipped over the buttons. Just a couple of lines, before moving on to arpeggios to stretch out his fingers. He looked up to find Aydin staring at him.

  “That’s…What were you playing there?”

  “We call those arpeggios.” Rowan smiled wickedly. It was nice to have the tables turned, if only for a moment.

  “No, before—is that what I was playing?”

  Rowan shook his head. “No, it’s what you were trying to play. It’s called ‘The Cat and the Cream.’”

  Aydin seemed oblivious to the dig, all business now. “Play it again,” he commanded. Then, noticing Rowan’s raised eyebrows, he added, “Please.”

  It was a tune Rowan hadn’t played for years, except as a warm-up or when requested by an audience member. But his mother had taught him not to sneer at the old favorites. “It may be old and worn-out to you,” she said, “but people in the country towns don’t get to hear music every day. Why shouldn’t they want to hear a tune they know and love?”

  He played it with care, driving the rhythm along while flickering—light and precise—over the melody and trills. “Like a fairy dancing on the neck of a galloping horse,” his dad used to say. And he took it fast, holding back just enough to keep the melody clear, his right knee jigging in time.

  When Rowan was done, Aydin let out a long whistle of admiration. “I bought some music in Shiphaven,” he said. “And I played it right, but it still sounded like crap. All the tunes did.” He shrugged. “I thought you Backenders just had bad music.”

  It was an apology, of sorts. Now Rowan could afford to be gracious. “I’d probably murder your music, too, if I tried to play from a score without ever hearing it.” He grinned. “Why don’t you pull out whatever you bought, and we’ll work on those tunes first?”

  THE OWNER OF THE PIG’S EAR listened to Rowan’s proposal with open skepticism. When Rowan wound to a halt, he tipped his grizzled chin toward Aydin. “’Twas you playing in the square yesterday.” The chin moved skyward, revealing a pouched throat bristling with several days’ growth of heavy beard. (“I thought he had a hedgehog nesting under there!” Aydin joked later.) While the man gave his stubble a slow, thorough scratch, apparently as a polite alternative to saying what he had thought of Aydin’s playing, Rowan quickly pulled his box out of the case.

  “Could I give you a sample, sir?” he asked.

  The scratching stopped, and Rowan glimpsed the publican’s tired eyes widening in surprise. The button box was a fairly new invention, and there were few with the know-how to make and set the delicate metal reeds and rows of horn buttons. They wouldn’t see one often in the backcountry—and Rowan’s was one of the best. More to the point for this demonstration, it was a beautiful instrument, inlaid on the ends with enamel and mother-of-pearl, the bellows made of supple black kidskin. Without waiting for permission, Rowan began a breakneck version of a popular reel. He wasn’t a flashy-looking player—his father had told him more than once that he hunched over his box like a broody hen—but he didn’t have to be. The box had enough flash for both of them.

  “By the Blessed Brew! Now that’s music!”

  The old boy doesn’t look so tired now, thought Rowan. In fact he was grinning from ear to ear. “I didn’t expect that from a lad so young, and that’s a fact.” Young or old, it wouldn’t be often that this town saw musicians as accomplished as Rowan. But in this case, being underestimated worked in his favor.

  “There’ll be plenty more tonight, and my partner here does a very good job of backing me up,” Rowan assured him. He felt Aydin stiffen behind him at the slight, but it was clear that the publican’s first impression of Aydin had not been good. Better to downplay his role.

  “We’ll play for your best dinner and a silver dallion each,” Rowan offered.

  “Dinner and a half-dallion apiece,” countered the owner.

  “For a half-dallion each, we’ll play through the dinner rush,” said Rowan. “Then you feed us. If there is enough of a crowd left afterward and you want us to continue, another half-dallion between us.” He stuck out his hand. “Mister…?”

  “Oh, just call me Burl.” Burl sighed and brushed palms with Rowan. “If I’m going to be bleeding my life savings into your pockets, you’ll hardly be calling me Mister.” He pointed a stubby finger at the boys. “People will come early on account of the rain. Be here by five bells—and you’d better have more than that one tune.”

  They didn’t have all that many more, Rowan reflected as they pelted back to the caravan under a cold driving rain. Aydin was a fast learner but easily distracted. They had less than one hour to cram a few more tunes. He hoped his new partner could beat a drum in time to the pieces he didn’t know.

  I’m having fun, Rowan realized with a jolt, as they dove into the caravan. The bargaining, the practicing, even the challenge of putting together a decent act at such short notice. For the first time since—Rowan rarely finished that phrase in his thoughts. Since had come to stand for just one event. But for the first time since, he actually cared about his craft. He would work hard tonight to make it a good show.

  IN BED THAT NIGHT, Rowan for once felt truly relaxed—tired in a good way, from a long day’s work. “Well fed, well paid and well played,” his father used to say at the end of a day like this. The clenching knot in his belly that had become his constant companion had eased. The tension between himself and Aydin was also—for now—gone. They had done well together, Rowan even managing to drum up the crowd’s interest in a few of Aydin’s pieces by presenting his knowledge of “the exotic music of the Tarzine Lands” as a “rare treat” for their discerning ears.

  Now, in the quiet darkness of the caravan, Rowan finally felt able to voice the questions that had been worrying him.

  “Aydin.” He blurted it out before he had a chance to change his mind. “About my sister…”

  “Finally.” Aydin’s voice floated back to him from the back of the caravan. “I was beginning to think you would never speak of her.”

  “Do you still see her?”

  “Yes, she’s here. Not as clear as last night.”

  “Why is that—is she leaving?” Rowan didn’t know if he would be relieved or sorry if Ettie left.

  “I don’t think so. We were sitting beside the stove that night—spirits are stronger around fire.”

  “Why?”

  The covers rustled, and Rowan could picture Aydin’s elaborate rippling shrug. “Who knows? Maybe the heat gives them energy.”

  “Aydin…” Rowan paused, trying to marshal his thoughts. What did he actually want to ask? “Why is she here?”

  “How should I know? I don’t talk to them, I just see them.” The dismissive, almost contemptuous tone
was back (stupid Backender), but Rowan made himself ignore it. This was too important to get sidetracked into an argument.

  “Yes, but…how does she seem? I mean, does she look sad or in trouble, or what?” Something had kept her from moving on to the deadlands. Why hadn’t she gone with his parents?

  Aydin’s voice softened. “I don’t think so. They say the dead sometimes stay because they get lost and cannot find their way to the spirit world, and that others stay because of a great anger that holds them to the earth. I do not think either is true of your sister. She is not drifting about aimlessly—she stays very close to you. It’s hard to see ghosts in bright daylight, but she came up very clear on our first meeting, when I tried to chase you out of the square. And she doesn’t look angry. She looks—” There was a pause while Aydin considered. “She looks watchful.”

  She’s watching over me. The thought came to Rowan with a certainty that took his breath away. Hadn’t she been like that in life, mending the rip in his shirt before their mother was even aware of it, slipping him the last honey cake from a pocket in her apron? Rowan was stricken with remorse at how little notice he’d taken of these gestures and how often he’d brushed off the little girl trailing behind him.

  Oh, Ettie. The tears welled up and spilled down Rowan’s cheeks when he tried to blink them away. She was here because of him, so he wouldn’t be left alone. But she shouldn’t have stayed. He was holding her to the earth when she should be resting in the peace of the dead-lands before entering her next life.

  Snores broke the dark silence. Aydin or Wolf? He couldn’t tell. Either way, Rowan found it comforting rather than annoying. It was nice not to be completely alone. And it was nice—he surprised himself with this thought—yes, it was nice to think that Ettie was nearby. All the guilt he felt about keeping her earthbound could not change that fact: it felt good to fall asleep in his chilly caravan thinking that his sister was, in some way, still in the bunk across from his.