As she looked up, he smiled and asked, “Too early for lunch I suppose?”
“Too late for breakfast,” Nettles said, chuckling. She tucked a loose strand of her greying hair behind her ear, then looked down from her broth and fished around in a crucible on the ground for a pinch of herb which she sprinkled on the broth. “Bunch of night owls you two are. Saw your light on last night. Another week on the road with Dorry and you’ll be tuckering in before the sun’s even set.” She scooped a generous helping of the broth into a bowl and offered it to Gnochi. “Where’s the lad?”
“Still sleeping. I was working with him last night.”
“You ain’t messing with that boy, right?” Her light brow arched to finish the thought she was too reserved to vocalize.
“No, Nettles,” Gnochi said. “He is my apprentice, my scribe, and most importantly, my charge. He’s like a son to me. No more.”
“If you say so,” she said. “Just know that I see things. And I know what its like to love outside the norm, but some things ain’t right, regardless.” She held up her hands. “It’s none of my business if there’s anything more between you two, but the lad’s too young to be making decisions like that for himself. And if he’s hurt, we will remove you from here.”
Gnochi wanted to feel offended and hurt by Nettles’s brash assumption, but he smiled, knowing that she was only living up to her namesake. “I can assure you that I have no romantic interests in Boli. Now, could you tell me if you’ve seen Zara?”
Nettles’s gaze relaxed, her brows softening. She seemed content with his words. “She’s probably at her cabin. It’s the all-black wagon over by the central tent,” Nettles said, resuming her preparation.
“Thanks,” Gnochi said, taking a sip of the warm broth. It tasted of beef and salt, and had floating chunks of vegetables that brushed against his lips. He found the blackened wagon easily enough. Everything from the tin-plated roof to the worn wheels was stained black and faded from their daily baths of sun and dust. He mounted the steps and was making to knock when the door was thrown open and a strong hand pulled him into the wagon’s interior abyss.
Gnochi reached for his hip where his short sword normally hugged his thigh, then winced because he had left the weapon in his wagon. He was falling into a bad habit of not having his weapon on him when he needed it. After acclimating to the dim light, he spotted the gleam the gleam from dozens of weapons, enough to arm every man and woman in the menagerie, twice. Razor sharp swords seemed to hover off the walls, and axes too large for splitting logs hung loose through metal loops secured to the ceiling.
“Welcome, Gnochi.”
His eyes fell on the woman who yanked him into the wagon. Shrouded in a cloak equally black and faded as the wagon she lived in, Zara was both menacing and mysterious. She pulled the cowl back to reveal her shaven head and Gnochi saw what looked to be faded ink curling up from behind her ears. The woman’s hand slithered out from the overreaching folds of her cloak and filched the knife Gnochi had sheathed in his boot with no hesitation. “Thanks for returning my knife.” Her hand retreated into the folds of her cloak, and when it reappeared, the knife was gone. She seemed to notice Gnochi’s reserved glance, so she stood and held her hands, palms up, at her hips, showing that she was with good intentions. “Here, let me take this off so you can see me.” Zara stepped out of the cloak and Gnochi gasped a little too loudly for proper etiquette. The shapes curling from behind her ears were indeed tattoos. They snaked around her toned body in an endless form, dipping in and out of her black-stained leather armor. Healed scars tore through the snake’s body. A single silver chain hung taut around her neck and from that dangled a miniature butcher’s cleaver, though Gnochi doubted that it was any less lethal than the blades stored anywhere else in the wagon.
A cluster of leather sheaths crisscrossed her chest and in them sat daggers and dirks of every size. She must have followed Gnochi’s gaze once again and flinched. “I suppose this isn’t much better,” she said. “I’m Zara, sword-swallower. Quartermaster in this army. Please, don’t give me that look. It’s easy enough for me to tell that you see through our façade.” She paused, then added, “Plus I was in Dorothea’s tent when he met you.”
“So, you know?”
“That your apprentice is a girl? Yes, though I could have guessed, just looking at her. But, you needn’t worry. I try to interact with people as little as possible. These louts only come to me if they need anything sharpened,” she said, pointing to the grindstone sitting on a desk cluttered with dulled blades. “I do not gossip with them like children.”
“About yesterday,” Gnochi said.
“What would you like to know?”
“Well, could you train me in dagger throwing?”
Zara seemed to look askance, but it was hard for Gnochi to tell. Even the scant pre-dawn light seemed to shy away from the wagon.
“I won’t be with your army forever,” he said. “I’d like to be able to better protect myself and Boli. I’m decent enough with my sword to have stayed alive this long on my own. I’ve yet to be trained in throwing knives, and I need to be halfway decent before we embark on our own,” he said.
Zara pondered for a moment, then turned to Gnochi, her light blue eyes speaking the question he knew would come: “What do I get out of this?”
“I could teach you to juggle or whittle,” Gnochi suggested, to which Zara snorted in derision. “We could swap stories. I’m always looking for more to tell, and I’d say that you’ve got more than a few to your name.”
She thought for a minute, then said, “Come an hour earlier than you did today, every morning, and I’ll try to help. Mention this to no one - not Dorothea; neither Harvey, nor Roy; not even Boli, or whatever her name is.” She slipped back under her cloak and turned her back on Gnochi before adding, “You can leave.”
“Fair enough,” he said, turning for the door. As his hand reached for the handle, Zara stopped him.
“Tonight, after supper, I want to duel you,” she decreed. “Sword to sword. I am intrigued about how a bard handles himself.”
He paused at the door and gulped. “And if I refuse?”
“Then you can teach yourself to throw.”
Without waiting for another amendment, Gnochi pulled the door open and exited the wagon. The first wispy tendrils of light were slinking over the treetops and illuminating the menagerie. Everyone hustled around packing and preparing the animals for travel. He took no detours on his route back to his wagon.
◆◆◆
“I’ve got to get Typhus settled for the evening before dinner, so make it quick, Roy,” Harvey said, aggrieved at his friend’s interruption. Dorothea had pushed the menagerie harder in their travels because of their late start. The lead wagons had finally stopped as the sun dipped below the feathered treetops, the animals exhausted from the day’s tiresome march. Despite the chill of the evening, his short hair was plastered by a sheen of sweat to his forehead.
Roy fingered the smooth swirl that capped his taut leather sword hilt and relaxed. “She saw me naked,” Roy stammered, then glanced around and added, “Well, not naked entirely, but in my skivs.”
“Who?” Harvey asked, stopping his task to stare.
“Who else?” Roy asked, his voice sounding impatient. “The girl that’s with Gnochi.”
Harvey shook his head. He paced, inspecting the ground as if looking for something of interest.
“I had returned from bathing. Was toweling dry behind the curtain. Didn’t expect her to barge in without knocking,” Roy said in a rushed whisper. His cheeks reddened at the recollection of the tryst. “Do you think she told him?”
“Are you still breathing?”
“Huh?”
“He watches her with part parental love, part selfish suffocation.” Harvey unbuckled the saddle from Typhus’s back and pulled it to the ground. “No, I think he’d kill you if he thought you had done anything with Boli.”
“She is cute in a boyish
sort of way. Do you think they are together?”
Harvey slapped his palm to his sweat-stricken forehead. A breeze meandered past him, evoking a shudder. “I think you’d best stop talking like that before you get us both killed,” he warned.
“Why? He’s a bard. A simple entertainer.”
“Not this one,” Harvey said. “I know the fools we’re used to in Blue Haven can afford to be incompetent and frail because there are guards on every corner in the clean districts of the city proper. But one who travels, as Gnochi says he does, will need to be self-sufficient in every aspect of his life. You’ve seen the sword he wears on his hip. Their horse carries a capped quiver that rattles with arrows. And where there are arrows, there is a bow.”
“Oh, you’re exaggerating,” Roy said. “He’s got a gut for Providence’s sake. Doubt he could run a mile on it, and I saw how whipped he was from riding all day. He probably doesn’t even know how to use that sword on his hip. I bet he’s living the life of luxury paying his way through towns by his words alone.”
“You’re foolish if you believe that,” Harvey said. “And you’d be smart to avoid the girl he’s with. She’s bad news for you, me, or anyone.”
“I can take care of myself, you know. I’m not the helpless little boy you found in the slums. I can pick my own battles, and I didn’t come to you, of all people, for dating advice, Harvey!” Roy rushed off and tore into their shared wagon.
Harvey winced as the slammed door shook the wagon’s rickety wheels. He heard the sharp metal of the rungs being pulled separating their two sections. He found himself staring into the swirls of skin on Typhus’s leg for a long minute before he saw Gnochi’s apprentice meandering around the camp tents. “Boli, come here.”
She sheepishly approached and asked, “Yes, Harvey?” as though testing the name across her tongue.
Harvey felt his cheeks warm at the thought of their last encounter. He had not spoken to her since. Riding high above other mounted riders fails to facilitate passing small talk. “You busy?” Harvey asked after a moment of thought that stretched out a moment too long. He restrained an urge to groan at his verbal bumbling. Roy would know what to say in this situation. He always seemed to be more present when it came to women.
“Not really, but I was—”
“Help me with Typhus then,” he ordered, wincing at the bite he had not realized his voice had taken on. “I’m about to feed him.”
“Oh, okay,” her voice deflated.
Harvey ignored her silent protestations. He led her over towards where he had tethered the elephant to a tree. He handed her a pail and spade.
Cleo asked, “What’s up with Roy? He’s been avoiding me like I’ve got Typhus,” she said, snickering to herself. Harvey answered her joke with a blank stare. “Sorry, that’s probably only something Gnochi would get.”
Harvey narrowed his eyes, suppressing a fire that raged behind their auburn glow. “Roy has more pressing matters to attend to, so you’ll have to excuse him if he doesn’t have time to chat with the menagerie’s princess every time she sees him,” he spat. He noticed the slightest fear flicker across her face. Her eyes split and looked from side to side to see if anyone else had overheard their spat. Where had this anger come from?
“I didn’t know,” she said. “I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, well, scoop up the dried droppings and bring them over to Nettles,” Harvey said, his voice softening as he changed the topic for fear of the apology welling in his raw throat. A horrified grimace painted Cleo’s features, which she made no move to conceal. Harvey smiled. “Unless of course, Boli,” Harvey amended, “you’d prefer not to get your hands dirty. That’s completely understandable.” Without uttering the snide remark he imagined she was coining in her mind, he watched her shove the sharp spade into the mound of dung and scooped it into the basket. She gagged at the pungent odor.
◆◆◆
Once the pile had been shoveled, Cleo lumbered towards the central blaze, carrying the bucket heaping with dung. Nettles directed Cleo to feed the feces to the coals of the fire with the point of her blade as she minced through herbs and vegetables. She returned the spade and pail to Harvey who dismissed her with a wave of his hand. “I thought I was going to help you feed Typhus?”
“Well, you were so helpful with the droppings that I figured I’d save you the time by feeding him for you.” Harvey grinned a faux smile.
“Gee, thanks,” Cleo said, walking over towards the nearby stream to wash up before returning to her own wagon. She smiled when Perogie perked her ears upon her return. Cleo placed a hand on the mare’s muzzle and asked, “That mean old man, Gnochi, feed you yet?”
From their wagon Gnochi emerged. Apparently, he had heard Cleo’s comment because he mirrored her, saying, “That mean old man, Gnochi, was about to. He was busy working. You know, trying to ensure that we have a roof over our heads, wheels beneath our boots, and food in our stomachs.”
Cleo noticed that he was wearing his short sword, which she found odd, but what drew her eye was the bundle of paper in his stained hands. Ink etched its plain surface, though she did not recognize the paper as being from the journal. “So was I,” she argued. “I just scooped up elephant dung for the cook fire.” She beamed at the thought of having bested her master.
“Poor Perogie,” Gnochi said, chuckling. “And now she’s rubbing your nose.”
As if in response, Perogie’s nostrils flared out, and she licked her pink tongue over her nose.
“Quit being immature. I washed my hands,” Cleo said, punching Gnochi in the arm.
He let out a tired laugh and then said, “Hey, listen. I’ve got an assignment for you. I wrote up a script of sorts. I need you to make four more copies of it on the blank pages I left on the table in there,” he said, gesturing to the wagon. “And, I’d appreciate it if you could write a copy into the journal.” He smoothed the paper over his knee and offered it to Cleo.
She looked to the page but found the lettering short and nigh illegible. “God is a Dinosaur?” Cleo asked.
“Yes,” Gnochi affirmed.
“And you wrote this? I thought your eyes were shot.”
“They aren’t up to their game, but I’m not like Oslow,” he said. “I do hope you will bear with me for I fear my penmanship is lacking, to say the least.”
Cleo flipped through a few pages, her eyes scanning the text. “What did you write this with: your left foot?” she joked. “Good thing you’re the master and I’m the student. If my writing had this many ink-spills, I would’ve had to scrap the page a dozen times already.” She smiled at the discomfort reflected on Gnochi’s face.
“If it’s too messy,” he grumbled, “I can figure something out.”
“No, no. I like knowing that I am better at something than you.” She knew she was inviting punishment, but after shoveling dung, she wanted a little joy.
“Yes,” he conceded. “You, an adolescent in the spring of her life has better vision than an old man nigh on his winter.” Though he laughed, he bore no smile. In a serious tone, he added, “I’m afraid you’ve uncovered my master plan. I don’t want you for your companionship. I want you for your hands.” Gnochi’s face broke out in a bright smile and he slapped Perogie’s rump as though they had shared some joke. “Anyway, I need you to get these copies written before next we reach our stop, Brichton, which sits immediately south of River Middle Creek, if my history serves.”
“A city sits on a river? That must be beautiful.”
“It was actually positioned on the lake, though the river has been drying up since it was dammed hundreds of years ago. Shame, too. A lot of trade from the northern lands entered Lyrinth through Brichton. We would’ve gotten a big crowd at an inn if there were still routes running through the city proper.” Gnochi looked like he was going to say more, but his eyes trailed off. Cleo followed his gaze and saw Dorothea releasing a carrier pigeon to the west.
◆◆◆
Harvey and Roy were sippin
g their supper slurry when Gnochi and Boli approached Nettle’s cook fire.
“This is not a good idea at all. Why would you agree to that?” the apprentice asked, oblivious to how loud her concern had been voiced.
Both young men glared at the scribe. Harvey noticed that the bard wore his short sword on his hip, its aggressive tone clashing with the character he was trying to make himself out to be. Harvey watched them take their bowls and approach Zara’s blackened wagon, which sat on the edge of the camp. He glanced at Roy who had been observing them as well. Without a word, the two returned their bowls to the pile for children to clean, and then they snuck in between wagons until they were kneeling under the brush looking at the back of their quartermaster’s ominous abode. There, at dueling distance, stood Gnochi and Zara. The apprentice sat off to the side, gnawing on her nails in an obvious display of her frazzled nerves.
Roy gripped Harvey’s bicep and hissed, “Gnochi is going to get slaughtered.”
Harvey could not help but agree. In the Perm, there was no one more skilled in the art of swordplay than Zara, and despite the self-imposed exile in which she lived and worked, she had proven her merit in battle several times that Harvey had seen. Further rumors surrounding her prowess with a blade only elevated her existence as a fearsome warrior. The two hunkered down to watch as she inspected one of her many blades.
“Draw your blade.” The quartermaster’s voice was smooth, yet as sharp as the edge of her short sword.
“Wouldn’t it be better for us to duel with wooden blades? Practice swords?” Gnochi asked.
Without replying, Zara lunged at him, her sword level with the bard’s chest. Harvey felt his throat close in, threatening to shut off air to his lungs, but the bard appeared unfazed by the quick attack. With a surprising agility for his size, he jumped back, unsheathed his own blade, and jabbed toward her, all in one fluid motion.
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