by Tim Stead
“A few questions, nothing more.” Taranath waved at a seat and the other took it. A cup of wine was brought at once, even though the man had not asked for it. Taranath turned to his lawkeepers. “This is Mayor Finn Candros,” he told them, “elected leader of the city of Pek.”
“Ask your questions,” Candros said. “I will do my best to answer them.”
“Very well. Three Darnese sailors came through Pek a few days ago – probably a full week by now, even eight days. They would have been in a hurry, heading for Samara. It’s possible that they left their ship here – the Laughing Gull?”
“There’s been no ship of that name in port this past month, though I’ve seen her before,” Candros said. “But we did note the sailors. They arrived on foot from the east, bought three horses and left the same day. In a hurry, as you say.”
“And a day later, perhaps two, there was a horse stolen,” Taranath ventured.
Candros smiled. “Well, it seems that you know more than I do,” he said. “There was indeed a theft – two days after your three Darnese left Pek, from a smallholding on the western boundary. Will you tell me what’s going on?”
“If I knew…” Taranath shrugged. “There was a killing in Samara. The three Darnese are dead. They were followed, we believe, by their murderer.”
“A vendetta of some kind?” the mayor asked.
“We think the killings may have been to prevent the men from telling what they knew, but that is speculation. The captain tried to see a city official the day before he died – a matter of importance to Samara, he said.”
“So you are following in their footsteps, hoping to discover more. I see.”
“That is exactly right,” Taranath said.
“I may be of some assistance, then,” Candros said. “We had word of a ship salvaged between here and Darna. The word was that the crew were all dead, as unlikely as that might seem. I was going to send someone to examine the matter as Pek has some authority along the coast. Perhaps we could combine our interests?”
“I have no objection,” Taranath said. “Your man can travel with us, though we intend to go as far as Darna to complete our quest.”
“To Darna?”
“Aye. We want to know if the ship sailed from there and what her charter was.”
“I will tell my agent to help you in any way,” Candros said. “It may be that the Darnese will be more forthcoming to a Pekkan. They have no love for Samarans.”
“I am grateful, Mayor Candros.”
“It’s nothing. And I give you licence to poke around Pek as much as you like if you will help us determine the validity of the salvage. There are mutterings in the town that the farmers drew the ship on land somehow and slew her crew.”
“We will do what we can,” Taranath agreed. “But it seems unlikely if this was The Laughing Gull.”
They talked for a while longer, but the deal was done, much to Taranath’s satisfaction. Finn Candros was a man he trusted, a man who had dealt fairly with all during his tenure as mayor.
When the mayor left, Ansel, who had remained uncharacteristically quiet throughout the discussion, drained her wine. “More?” she asked, pointing to Taranath’s empty ale. “It seems our work here has been done for us.”
Taranath shook his head. “We’ll check everything,” he said. “I trust Candros like a brother, but he’s no lawkeeper and I’ll not take another man’s word in lieu of doing my job.” He smiled. “But I will have another ale. We’ll work tomorrow.”
*
In the morning they broke their fast at the inn. It had a good reputation and lived up to it, and Taranath encouraged them, even the king’s soldiers, to eat heartily. He was waiting again.
Even so, they had all but finished before Candros’s man arrived. Taranath was surprised to see that Candros’s man was, in fact, a woman. She stepped into the bar room and scanned the sated breakfasters, meeting his eye almost at once. She strode over and presented her hand.
“Dorcas Sloepicker,” she said. “Mayor Candros sends his regards.”
It was an unusual name, even comical, but Radiant Taranath wasn’t one to pick bones on that score, and she looked unlikely to find such comments amusing. She was tall, fair, and with the coldest blue eyes. He took her hand and found it firm.
“We’re glad of your assistance, Dorcas,” he said. “We thought we’d start with the docks and then move on to the place where the men bought their horses, and finally to the place where the horse was stolen.”
She looked mildly surprised, but after a moment nodded.
“You want to see it all for yourself,” she said.
“Of course.”
She eyed the crowded room. “Will all of you be coming?” she asked.
“Just the three of us.”
“Well,” she said. “You seem to have finished eating…”
So they collected their mounts from the stables and set out on a rather limited tour of Pek.
Everything was just as Candros had described it. They talked to sailors at the docks who remembered The Laughing Gull, but hadn’t seen her in Pek for a while. There were two ships fresh into port, however, and Taranath questioned the captains keenly. Did they know the Gull? When was the last time they’d laid eyes on her? On the second ship his curiosity was rewarded.
“Three weeks ago,” the captain of The Dancing Wind told him. “She was moored in Darna and Silman was looking for a cargo. I was loaded and gone before he found one.”
“Was there any hint that anyone was looking to hire him, or any ship for that matter?”
The captain pursed his lips and shook his head. “No,” he said. “I guess he found an ill wind, though. There are tales abroad that he lost his ship.”
“So it seems,” Taranath said. “Do you know what ships were moored close to her when you sailed?”
“Aye, she was paired with the Fortunate Son on pier eight as I recall. That’s Mandaroy’s ship and out of Blaye. I expect he’s been back there and away again by now.”
“The Fortunate Son, you say?” Taranath knew the ship. He’d been drinking with her mate, a man called Barker, in more than one port.
“Aye, that’s the one.”
“Is Barker still mate?”
“You know her then?” the captain said.
“I sailed awhile,” Taranath said. “I know a few ships up and down the coast.” And so the conversation drifted into shore leave gossip, but Taranath didn’t mind. It got him in thicker with the captain and every name the sailor mentioned was another man he could tap with the captain’s name. They parted on good terms, which Taranath considered valuable if he ever wanted to give up lawkeeping and return to the sea.
At the stables where Silman had bought his horses, and paid with Darnese gold, everything was as expected. The ostler seemed genuine, and pleased with the sale. His description of Silman was accurate. The captain had apparently been unconcerned by the price, but he wanted good mounts which the ostler provided.
“I could ha’ cheated un,” the man said. “He weren’t a man what knew horse flesh, but I gave un three good mares.”
It didn’t quite strike Taranath as the protestation of a truly honest man, but in this case he was willing to believe the tale. He knew that Silman had made it to Samara in pretty good time. He got no new information from the man.
The third stop on their tour was the least rewarding. Taranath had expected that it would be so. A thief had come in the night and spirited the horse away. There had been no untoward noises, no stamping of hooves, and no sign of discomfort from the other horses, of which there were many. The assassin moved with almost impossible stealth. Even now all Taranath had was a vague sighting by a village boy, a hand print on a river bank and a missing horse. It was enough, though.
“Tomorrow we leave Pek and ride east once more,” he told his lawkeepers as they ate in the bar of the inn. At last they would get close to the start of Silman’s tale. They would see the Laughing Gull and some small portion
of truth might be found.
15 The Settlement
“I can’t represent her,” Ella said. “I am a city councillor.”
“But surely you can advise?” Sam asked. “You know the law as well as anyone.”
“It is a plain conflict of interest,” Ella protested. “The officers of the Old Town Courts work for the council, for me. If I take sides they can hardly be impartial.”
“Do you think you are wrong?”
“No, of course not.” Ella closed the book in front of her with a slap. She stared at Sam with her calm, brown eyes. “But if the court disagrees I cannot overrule them.”
“All I’m looking for is justice,” Sam said. “It’s why we do the job.”
Ella stood and walked out onto the balcony. Sam followed. From here you could see all of Samara sweeping away below the Saine house down to the river and beyond to the grey, flat expanse of Gulltown.
“If it helps, I agree with you,” Ella said. “The woman has been robbed. The trading house should be hers under Samaran law, and by any natural law. What her husband did to her was wicked, but Samaran law cannot change it.”
“She does not seek to challenge that – merely to squeeze some portion of that wealth from the man before he flees back to Sarata.”
“As you explained… But you should have faith, Sam. The courts are wiser than you suggest, or perhaps you fear the woman will turn them against her? She seems spectacularly arrogant.”
Ella was right, of course. That was exactly what Sam feared. Ishara seemed to possess the subtlety of a street brawl. His only consolation was that her former husband was equally gifted. The court would probably want to hang them both, and that over a mere property dispute.
So why was he here pleading her case with Ella? He had asked himself that a dozen times, and the only answers he could find were either uncomfortable or made no sense.
He liked her. It was contrary that he liked a woman with nothing to recommend her but her self esteem, but he did. She was facing total ruin. Even if she won her case and dragged fifty gold out of the man it was hardly compensation for what she’d lost. By the way she dressed he guessed that fifty Samaran gold would last her a month. It would last Sam the better part of a year, and that was in his new, expensive rooms. Despite that she was unbowed. Perhaps fear was kept in abeyance by anger, but Sam didn’t think so.
The hearing was tomorrow.
He had seen Arla, Corin and Corin’s lawkeepers off that morning on a small vessel they’d managed to persuade to undertake the risky voyage to Cabarissa. Having a Shan on board had helped win the crew over. Even so, with Arla gone and Taranath somewhere in the east Sam was beginning to feel idle. There was almost nothing he could do to advance the investigation. Maybe that was why he was taking an interest in Ishara Fandakari. Maybe not.
*
Whatever the reason, he was nervous on the morning of her hearing. He hadn’t spoken to her since that day at the law house. He had delegated the case to one of Gilan’s officers, but had read the reports with interest. Now he found that he could not resist attending the hearing itself – just to see.
The Old Town Court met in what had once been a warehouse just off Market Street. Considerable work had been done to give the place a little more gravitas – there were new walls, hangings that looked like velvet in the royal colours, and furniture that seemed a lot kinder to the officials than the public. Even so, the floor was still beaten earth and a faint scent of grain still permeated the space.
Sam waited until the court was in session before he slipped in through the planked double doors at the back and stood with the spectators behind a painted wooden rail.
What he saw was not at all what he had expected. Ishara was there, standing in the plaintiff’s booth. She was listening, apparently with the deepest respect, to the lawgiver laying out the opposing claims in the case. The lawgiver, Sam knew, was a butcher from Cane Street, a red faced, portly man with a deep sense of civic pride. It was Ishara herself that surprised him most. She had discarded her impossibly expensive clothing and now wore a simple grey dress with a black cloak. Her olive skin and black hair completed a stark contrast with everyone else in the room. It was as though they stood in the sun and she beneath the moon, drained of colour and quite alone, even in this crowded room.
Sam smiled to himself. He had underestimated her – badly. She would hold this court in the palm of her hand and her errant husband would be lucky to escape Samara with his ship. He slipped along the back of the courtroom until he came to one of the ushers who kept the crowd in check. The man saw him coming and opened the gate in the rail to let him pass, but Sam shook his head.
“I won’t go in,” he told the usher. “But can you pass a message to the plaintiff?”
“Of course, Lawkeeper Hekman,” the usher said.
“Tell her that I’d like to speak to her when this is over, up at the law house, and if you could arrange to have a copy of the judgement sent to me as soon as it is handed down…?”
The usher nodded his head vigorously. “Of course,” he said.
Sam backed out of the courtroom, easing his way through the mass of people to where he could slip through the doors with as little fuss as possible. As he did, he looked back into the court and found her looking at him, her eyes seemed faintly amused to see him there.
She winked.
It was the slightest flutter of the eye, but he did not doubt that he had seen it for what it was. For a moment he felt like a boy caught peeping through a forbidden hole. His face felt warm.
He turned and walked from the court.
*
Ishara turned up at the lawhouse two hours later. She had not changed, and still wore her modest grey and black clothing. She was so prompt, in fact, that Sam had only just finished reading the written judgement of the Old Town Court.
Ulric’s head poked around his door jamb.
“She’s here,” he said. “She wants to see you again.” Sam hadn’t warned Ulric that she was coming, mainly because he hadn’t been sure that she would come. Nevertheless, he was in no doubt who the fat man was talking about.
“Show her in,” he said.
Sam prided himself on being calm. He’d seen a lot in his life – lost one living and gained another, lost a family, lost a home. He’d been chained and beaten. In the end he’d risen above it all. But now he found his cold blood warming a little. He took a deep breath and looked out of the window and that is how Ishara Fandakari found him, staring across the river towards Gulltown.
“You summoned me?” she said. There was amusement here, too, in her voice.
“I asked you to stop by,” he corrected her without turning around. “I’m sorry if the usher made it sound more compelling.”
“You are the chief lawkeeper of all Samara,” she said.
He turned from the window. “Sometimes it feels like I am the council’s errand boy,” he said. “But it happens less frequently these days.”
“So I can go?” she asked.
Sam looked down at the paper on his desk. One hundred Samaran gold, it said. It was a fortune, but for a woman like Ishara it was…
He was underestimating her again.
“I take it you’re not going back to Sarata,” he said. “What do you plan to do with the money?”
“Is that any of your affair?” she asked.
“Tell me.”
She sighed, as though this interview with the lawkeeper was becoming tedious. “I need to start again,” she said. “I’m a trader and I need to trade. A ship would be best…”
“But you don’t have enough.”
“True.”
“And you have living expenses.”
“True again. Where are you leading me with this?”
“I suspect that you’re a skilled trader,” Sam said. “As good as any in Samara.”
“So?” Her eyes flashed, and Sam realised that she’d misunderstood. He’d overplayed his hand. She thought he was trying to s
top her.
“How much does a ship cost?” he asked. “A good one?”
“How big is a stone?” she replied. “As much as you want to spend on it, but I suppose two hundred gold will get me a serviceable vessel.”
Sam wasn’t a trader. He was unfamiliar with the language they used, but he knew this one.
“I want to invest,” he said.
Ishara raised a perfect eyebrow. “A partnership?”
He’d thought about that, but the chief lawkeeper of Samara could hardly he an active partner in a trading house. He had a job already.
“No,” he said. “I will loan you a hundred and fifty, and for two years you will pay a third of the sum back to me, and at the end of the second year you’ll repay the full amount.”
Ishara raised her eyebrow again. “You have that kind of money?”
She was asking if he was corrupt, if he took bribes for favours.
“I’m well paid,” he said. “I live a simple life.”
“Well, then, I have a counter offer. I’ll accept your investment, but it’ll buy a one tenth share of the business. You’ll get a tenth of the profits from my trading forever.”
“That could be nothing,” Sam said.
“You don’t believe that.” Ishara pulled out the chair opposite Sam’s desk and sat down. “You know I’m a good bet. You can be rich.”
Sam stared at her face. Her eyes were perfectly clear, like a blue sky or a starry night, crisp and clean. He tore his gaze away and looked at the paper on the table. One hundred gold, and he was offering a hundred and fifty.
“Two tenths,” he said.
“And I have full control,” she countered. Sam had never wanted it any other way. He was no trader, but he had to push back. She’d want him to push back.
“Full control and a quarter,” he said. “And I have the right to inspect the accounts at any time, and to have another look them over.”
“I won’t try to cheat you, lawkeeper,” she said.
“You’d be a fool to try,” he replied.
“Your money will save me two, maybe three years work,” she said. “And having the chief lawkeeper of Samara as…”