Ammonite

by Nicola Griffith

  “There’s lots of ships in,” the older one who had started the chant offered, “The wind brought them in all at once. But there’s some room. I think.”

  The children followed them, resuming their game as they went.

  The inn turned out to be a cluster of buildings: different shapes and ages, built of different materials and to different standards, growing as North Haven had grown–gradually, and in no particular order. The result was a pleasing mix of old stone and raw wood, mossy shingles and bright tiles, with windows winking higgledy‑piggledy into three separate courtyards, one of which had a fountain.

  A woman with reddish gold hair down her back was sweeping at the leaves in the fountain yard. She looked up when she heard the giggles of the children, and saw Marghe and Thenike.

  “Thenike, is it? About time. That boat of yours needs hauling out of the water and its bottom scraping before it rots down to its timbers. But what are you doing standing there gawping–never seen a woman sweep leaves? Get away!” Marghe jumped, but the woman was shouting at the children. “Away with you. Did they follow you all the way here?” This time she was talking to Thenike. Then she shouted again. “If you’ve nothing better to do than laugh at a poor working woman, then I’ll find you something. Now”–she turned back to her visitors–“what can I do for you Thenike, and your companion.”

  “Zabett, I’d like you to meet Marghe Amun.”

  “Marghe Amun, is it? That’s a big name. How do you like to be called by ordinary folk?”

  “I’m not sure yet. I’ve not had the name long.” Marghe had to struggle not to fall into Zabett’s speech patterns.

  “Well, now, a new name.” Zabett gave the leaves one more sweep. “There’s a story there, I’ll be bound, and no doubt the two of you will expect to stay here for free in exchange, and eat me out of house and home.”

  “Why else would we come here, to the finest inn in the north?” Thenike said with a smile.

  “Flatterer. But flattery won’t get you the best room in the house. In fact, there is only the one room left. Over in the west courtyard. I suppose you’ll be wanting to go there right this minute, so you can rest a bit, and wash that journey muck oft your feet.”

  The room in the west courtyard was no more than a lean‑to, an afterthought added to a wall. But there was room for a bed and a shelf, and there was a latch on the door. Zabett patted the bed. “It’s small for two, but no doubt you won’t be spending much time in here, except to sleep, and the bed’s newly made up.”

  Maighe liked it. “It’s very nice. Thank you.”

  “Well,” Zabett said grudgingly, “it’ll do. Now then, I can have you some food ready in a little while, but not instantly. I’ve more folk than you to look after, viajeras or no.” She left, still holding the broom.

  “She likes you,” Thenike said, unrolling her pack.

  “You’ve known her a long time.” Marghe prowled the room, looked out the tiny window. “She runs this place on her own?”

  “With her sister, Scathac.”

  “Is it fair for us to stay here without payment?”

  “Nobody stays here without payment. We’ll sing for our supper. She was right: we won’t be spending much time in here. We’ll be telling the news to a packed common room every night, and many will want us to take messages with us when we go.”

  Marghe had been looking forward to a few days of rest.“Both of us?”

  “There’ll be some things only you can tell: about your world, how you were caught by the Echraidhe and escaped, how Uaithne started the tribe feud.”

  “That’s a lot of talking.”

  Thenike sat down on the bed. “It’ll only be in the evenings. During the day, we’ll sit in the sun and eat Scathac’s fine food, gossip about nothing in particular, and wander the docks and along the coastline. I’ll show you the Nid‑Nod. No doubt Zabett’s right and she needs some work done on her.” She laid her clothes on the shelf, checked her drum. “There. The food should be ready by now. Are you done?”

  Marghe was astonished to find that her hands had automatically gone about their business, unpacking, smoothing out her clothes, laying her nightbag on the bed. “Yes.”

  They took a seat at the bleached white table in the kitchen. Zabett turned and nodded, busy at the fire. After a moment she brought them hot dap. “Eggs in a moment.”

  Marghe blinked. This was not Zabett: same hair, same build, but her face was not screwed up in that skeptical way, and she did not bustle and fill the room with noise. Not Zabett. Thenike smiled, enjoying Marghe’s surprise.

  “Scathac, allow me to introduce Marghe Amun. Marghe, this is Scathac, Zabett’s twin, a fine cook, a good listener, and a mind like a wirrel trap.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” Marghe said.

  Scathac nodded. “Viajering is hungry work. You’re welcome to come into the kitchens and eat at any time. With or without Thenike.”

  They ate, eggs and bread and fruit, and left for the docks.

  The day had warmed a little, though the wind was still from the north, slicing the tops off the waves, flecking the gray sea with white. Alien sea or not, it smelled to Marghe the way the sea should smell: big and wide and full of the promise of adventure.

  They stood at the edge of the wharf, looking out. Several small coracles were tied together and then secured to one of the huge olla rings embedded in the stone; they bobbed precariously on the swell. Marghe pointed. “Where do these come from?”

  “Two days along the west coast. From Luast. See how they’re all tied together? Those two, there and there, the ones with the thwarts, are rowed, one woman in each, and the other four are piled up with furs, and little sacks of blue beads dug near Beston‑in‑the‑Mountains. They paddle along the shallows, never out of sight of the shore.”

  Marghe was appalled at the thought of such tiny, fragile craft battling the northern seas. All for trade. “What do they take in exchange?”

  “All kinds of things: wine from the south, timber–they don’t have much where they come from, though normally they bring bigger coracles for that–sometimes fruit, or spices from Oboshi… whatever they need, assuming that they timed things right and there are people here who want furs or beads.”

  Marghe scanned the other ships. There were nine, all different makes: two‑masted, one‑masted; oars and not; double‑ended and having definite bows and sterns; larger and smaller. They looked like brightly colored children’s toys. She pointed out the ship Thenike had mentioned earlier, which looked to be just leaving. Tiny figures were hauling on sheets, and the sails were bellying. “The Nemora. You know someone aboard?”

  “Vine, and her kinswomen. Ah, it’s a shame we missed them.” Thenike rubbed the white scar on the back of her hand, smiling to herself.

  Sixty yards out, a boat pulled away from a lateen‑rigger. As it neared the wharf, Marghe heard the breath of women pulling oars and the creak of rowlocks, and the sounds of laughter drifting over the water. It was not long before the sailors’ boat was bumping up against the stone.

  They threw a rope, which landed at Marghe’s feet. She picked it up without thinking, then looked around for something to tie it to.

  “Like this.” Thenike showed her a knot that would hold. “It’s called a fishback.” It did look a little like a sinuous fish doubling back upon itself, Marghe supposed.

  A woman hauled herself up onto the wharf. A bracelet of small clay disks clicked as she held out her hand. “Roth,” she said, “Captain of the Telwise. My thanks for the knot.”

  “Thenike, viajera.”

  “Marghe Amun–” Marghe hesitated, “also a viajera. But new to it.”

  “So. We all start sometime.” Other women were clambering up onto the wharf, clay disks tinkling around waists and necks. “So, Marghe Amun, where do you call home?”

  Home. A long story or none at all. Marghe hesitated. “Have you heard of the women from other worlds?”

  Roth nodded. “The viajera Kuorra was i
n Southmeet. She had the story from Telis, who had it from T’orre Na. Supposed to be from beyond the stars, or somesuch she said. Set off burns, don’t know anything about anything, wear funny clothes. Call themselves mirrors.” She looked hard at Marghe. “But you’re a viajera… Kuorra says these mirror women can’t deepsearch or remember or even have children.” She looked from Marghe to Thenike, back again. “Yours must be a strange story.”

  Thenike said nothing to defend her. Marghe knew this was up to her. “You’re staying at the inn? Then come and hear it. It’s even stranger than you think.”

  “No doubt. No doubt. There’s room at the inn?”

  “You know Zabett,” Marghe said, “if you’ll pay double the price she’ll find you a floor to sleep on, and make you feel grateful.”

  Roth laughed. “No doubt.” She touched the disks at her wrist. There were more, Marghe saw, around her neck and under her tunic. “But we’ve done well this voyage, and the last two or three. It won’t be hard to part with a few of these in exchange for Scathac’s cooking.” She nodded. “We’ll see you at the inn.” She walked away, a strong‑looking woman with legs bare from the knee, a roll of clothes hanging crosswise across her chest and bumping at her hip.

  “By the time she gets to the inn, half of North Haven will know what you’ve just said.” Marghe just nodded. “Roth reminds me of Vine: with those eyes that look more easily into the distance, and those strong bare legs.” Thenike laughed. “Like all sailors.” She was rubbing at the scar on her hand again. “Come. Let me show you the Nid‑Nod.”

  The Nid‑Nodwas tied fore and aft to one of the double wharves at the south of the seafront. She was a small craft with a stepped mast of about thirteen feet, and one sail, rieatly furled. A silhouette of a long‑legged bird was painted in dark green on both bows. Marghe pointed to what looked like a tiny handprint next to the port symbol.

  “What’s that?”

  “Gerrel’s mark. The summer the boat was finished, Huellis and Leifin came to North Haven to see me off and to trade some of Leifin’s carvings. They brought Gerrel. She was about four. I was still painting on the name. Gerrel decided she wanted to help. I left the mark on.”

  When they got back to the inn they found Roth and her thirteen sailors standing in the northern courtyard, with Zabett pointing an accusing finger at a pile of clay dust in her outstretched hand, shouting.

  “See, it’s not there. No fish tooth. It’s a fake. One of you gave me a false credit, and until I find out who, none of you stay here. None.”

  Thenike leaned toward Marghe and spoke quietly. “They may ask us to judge this matter.”

  “Us?”

  “We’re viajeras.”

  Roth untied the string around her neck, unthreaded one of the clay tokens. “Here’s another. Genuine. I know it’s genuine because these are the ones I had from you two years ago when we brought in that cargo of keoshell.” She held it out.

  “Oh, no, it’s not as easy as all that, Roth. One of your number tried to pass me a false credit, and that’s robbery.” She folded her arms.

  Roth looked irritated. “Well, you tell me what I’m supposed to do.”

  “Find out who the dishonest one is among you. I’d think that that’s what you’d be after doing anyhow, for your own peace of mind. But I’m not having a thief stay in my house.”

  The injured parties glared angrily at each other. Then one of the sailors saw Thenike and Marghe. “Let the viajeras sort it out,” she said.

  Roth looked over at the two women, hesitating a moment over Marghe. “Well,” she said to Zabett, “that’s agreeable to me. You?”

  Zabett nodded shortly. “But you’ll pay the fee, as it’s your people who caused the trouble.”

  They spat on their hands, and shook.

  Marghe whispered to Thenike. “Wouldn’t it be a good idea if they agreed now, while they still don’t know who it is, what the punishment would be?” She had seen too many negotiations, on Earth and off, fall to nothing because not enough was agreed at the start.

  “Tell them,” Thenike said, and gestured.

  Marjhe took a deep breath. Pretend it’s just like negotiating something for SEC. “Shake, too, on the reparation price and the punishment you’ll mete,” she said, stepping forward. While Roth and Zabett prepared to haggle over that, she turned to Thenike. “Any ideas on how to settle this thing?”

  “One or two, but they’re not perfect.”

  Marghe thought fast. “These tokens. Zabett has to smash them to see if they contain a fish tooth, otherwise they’re not genuine. So… Zabett makes them? Yes. And someone’s given her a dud. But…” They were one‑time use only. “That’s the central difficulty of the matter, then: once the credit’s smashed, it’s invalid. So how do we check?”

  Roth and Zabett were still talking. Some of the sailors appeared resigned to a long discussion and had sat down in the dusty courtyard,

  Marghe thought hard. There was no perfect solution. “The only thing I can think of is that we ask each sailor to take off all her tokens, and empty her pockets, too, just in case, and put them on the ground in front of her. Then we choose one from each pile and smash it. We keep doing that until we smash a dud.”

  “Some may only have three or four. Losing even one will be a great hardship to the innocents.”

  “I know.”

  They were silent; Roth and Zabett had finished talking, and were waiting.

  “I can’t think of anything better,” Thenike said eventually, “and it may be that you won’t have to break many.”

  “Me?”

  “You.” Thenike deliberately stepped back. Marghe looked around her. She was Marghe Amun. A viajera. She straightened her shoulders and stepped forward.

  “Roth.” She motioned for the captain to join her thirteen sailors, then stood before them. “Take off your credits and put them on the ground before you. We’ll break them one at a time until we find out who did this.”

  Roth and two others looked resigned and unfastened anklets and necklaces, dropping them into the dust at their feet. The others glanced at each other.

  “Why should we?” one asked, a small fair woman with a chipped front tooth.

  Marghe’s heart was thumping. There was nothing to make these women do as she said. Nothing at all.

  “Juomo’s right,” said a tall woman the color of rich river mud. “We’ve done nothing wrong. I don’t have enough credits to let them get smashed to pieces for nothing. We could sleep aboard.”

  Several nodded in agreement, and folded their arms.

  Marghe looked at Zabett. “Perhaps Zabett would agree to replace any genuine tokens that get broken?” Zabett nodded. The innkeeper was on her side, at least. Maybe this would not be so bad after all.

  The sailors still looked stubborn. Roth looked at them one by one. “I agreed with Zabett that the journeywomen should sort this dispute, Juomo, Tillis. This is the way they’re doing it. If you don’t like it, elect another captain.”

  Marghe saw by Roth’s easy stance that the captain knew the sailors would not go that far; she began to enjoy herself. This might work.

  The women muttered, but began to strip themselves of their wealth. Marghe set aside the urge to grin and watched carefully.

  One woman placed a string with just two clay disks in the dust; Tillis, four. Juomo, with the chipped tooth, offered a necklace of five.

  Tillis looked at Juomo’s necklace and frowned. Juomo pretended not to notice. But Marghe did.

  She stepped up to Juomo, touched the necklace with one foot. “Perhaps you have more credits than this.” She watched Juomo’s carotid thump as her pulse increased. “We wish to see it all.”

  “You’re seeing it.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Juomo stepped back a little, tucked her thin hair behind her ears nervously.

  Marghe was no longer enjoying herself. She held out her hand. “Give me the rest.”

  Juomo bolted, but Tillis shot
out a leg and tumbled her into the dust. The big woman hauled Juomo upright by her belt and casually wrapped one arm around her neck. Tillis yanked up Juomo’s sleeve. A string of twenty or thirty credits was wrapped around Juomo’s biceps. “Knew she had more,” Tillis said with satisfaction. She snapped the leather thong and unthreaded one of the clay disks. She dropped it in Marghe’s outstretched hand. “Try this.”

  Zabett was there now, and Roth and Thenike. And the other sailors were picking up their dusty credits.

  “Leave them awhile,” Marghe said, “until we’ve tested these.”

  “You can’t smash my credits!” Juomo shouted.

  Tillis shook her. “Shut up. If it’s real, then you can have one of mine.” She grinned at Marghe. “Test it, journeywoman.”

  Marghe was not sure she would be able to tell a dud from the real thing. She held out the disk to Zabett. “I think we should give Zabett the privilege.”

  After the excitement in the courtyard, lunch was late. Marghe and Thenike ate outside. The clouds were thinning, letting afternoon sunshine heat the wood of the table, releasing a spicy, resinous scent. Their plates were almost empty; they were eating fruit.

  Thenike had been explaining to Marghe the credit system. Zabett and Scathac gave board and lodgings on a barter system; if an individual or crew had a large item that was worth more than the number of nights or meals needed, then the innkeepers gave them credit, in the form of clay disks. One disk equalled one night. Because of their fixed value, and because the sailors traveled from one place to another, mixing with other travelers, the clay disks had begun to assume the status of portable wealth in those places–ports and well‑frequented areas, especially around the coast. Protocurrency. Several years ago, Hamner, the innkeeper in South Meet, had arranged with the two northern innkeepers to honor their credits if Zabett and Scathac would honor hers. They agreed, and now the disks were becoming more popular as currency.

  Marghe paused, a goura half‑peeled. “But if the disks are being used as currency, then much of it stays in circulation.”