A Gathering of Fools

by James Evans

  “Do you know who he was?”

  “No miss, can’t say as I do. Not from Riverbridge, I reckon; maybe from up north aways, by the sound of his voice. Rum lot up north but first time I’ve heard them accusing strangers of murder.”

  He pottered around as the overturned table was righted and new drinks were brought by the maids.

  “Let me know if there’s anything else you need, miss.”

  He tugged his forelock and took his leave, heading out to the back room, whispering instructions to one of the men who had ejected the bandit as he guided him by the elbow across the common room.

  Adrava sat there for another hour or so, picking at the new plate of food that the barmaid brought and sipping at her wine. The bandit didn’t return and by late afternoon things seemed to be back to normal. In one corner a man produced a small violin and began to play a lively jig. The people seated at the nearby tables nodded along to the tune, knocking their knuckles on tables in time to the music and even dancing at times.

  As the afternoon passed into evening, Adrava relaxed until, as dusk fell, she finally felt safe to leave the common room. She was, frankly, sick of the room having been there all day. There had been no further sign of the bandits and nobody else had caused her any trouble or even spoken to her - it seemed she was to be avoided - so she picked up her things and slipped quietly through the back door and up the stairs to her room.

  Krant and Gavelis made it to Stagford just before noon. They stopped briefly outside the town’s eastern entrance to rest and water the horses and buy bread and cheese for themselves. Half an hour later, refreshed and with no sign of pursuit, they walked their horses through the small town and began the final stretch of their ride to Riverbridge, where Gavelis was hopeful of commandeering a vessel to take them to Vensille.

  “Stagford to Riverbridge isn’t far, if memory serves.” said Gavelis when they had cleared the last of Stagford’s western residences and were again trotting along a road that ran through row upon row of neat orchards.

  “I thought you travelled regularly along this road?” said Krant.

  “Not this far. My relatives all live within the Empire and I have seldom had need to travel this way. From this point on we’re navigating by memory, mostly, and by asking directions.”

  “And it looks like the roads are deteriorating as we head west,” said Krant, pointing to a poorly maintained ford in a small river where the stream had washed away chunks of the stone road on either side.

  “If we’re lucky that’ll be as bad as it gets on the way to Riverbridge. After that we should be on the river, nice and easy.”

  “About that, Gavelis. Will we be able to hire a vessel large enough to carry our horses? We’re a long way inland, after all.”

  “Probably,” said Gavelis, nodding, “although we may have to wait a few days.”

  Krant looked horrified that they might have to spend longer away from Esterengel.

  “Surely not, Gavelis, surely not!”

  “We could always ride, sir,” said Gavelis, slipping back into his servant persona now that the immediate danger of the watch had receded, “but I suspect you might enjoy that rather less and it’s still a long way to travel. The river is safer and faster, sir.”

  They rode on in silence for another hour before Krant spoke up again.

  “This business of killing people with a fire charm, Gavelis. You speak as if you have specialist knowledge, and, yes,” he said, holding up his hand as Gavelis turned to speak, “I know you said I shouldn’t ask, and I won’t, but is there anything you might teach me so that I can act. Should the need arise, of course.” he added, hurriedly.

  “Most of the bandits, or in fact watchmen, we might meet will not be talented, sir, so any display of power might be enough to bluff them into submission, particularly if it was timed to cause maximum surprise. That might be enough under most circumstances. If they persist, or if the opportunity for a show doesn’t arise, or if they look like they’ll press their attack, then a long strike before they reach you would be favourite.”

  “A long strike? How long, would you say?”

  “Beyond the reach of whatever weapon they happen to be holding, sir, so about four feet for a sword, seven for a staff, fifteen for a halberd or pikestaff and maybe two hundred yards for a bow, although if they’re shooting at you and they know how to use a bow then it’s probably already too late to fight back.”

  Krant looked around to check that the road was clear then shrugged his arm to flick the fire charm into his hand. It took a few tries but eventually he caught it. He pointed it away from Gavelis and pushed as much power as he could into the charm, releasing it toward the distant hills. A hot bright flame shot out about four feet before collapsing back.

  “Very good sir. That would certainly be sufficient for many situations. If I may suggest, though, you may achieve greater reach by narrowing the flame front and concentrating it into as thin a jet as possible.”

  Krant nodded and shifted his shoulders then tried again. This time the charm produced a much narrower flame that reached maybe eight feet from the tip of the charm. Krant was delighted, laughing out loud and smiling like a child who’d been given a new toy.

  “Ha! That’ll show ‘em, eh Gavelis?”

  Gavelis nodded.

  “Yes sir, it would certainly severely inconvenience anyone who happened to get in the way. My advice would be to practice a little more and then keep it secret until you absolutely have to use it. And don’t hold back, sir. If you need to strike, strike to kill. It’s the best way to keep yourself from harm.”

  “Really? Well, if you insist,” said Krant, “but how will I know when the moment has come?”

  Gavelis laughed mirthlessly.

  “You’ll know, sir, you’ll know. If I’m dead or incapacitated or engaged then you strike, sir, as hard as you can. Surprise is our ally, sir, and it is often said that ‘he who strikes first strikes last’.”

  Krant pondered this as they rode on, practicing repeatedly with the charm for the next quarter of an hour until he was repeatedly and quickly producing long pencil-thin gouts of flame.

  “Very good, sir,” said Gavelis encouragingly, “just be careful not to push too much power into the charm too quickly. These domestic charms don’t have reservoirs, they’re not really designed for combat, and too much power might produce a backlash or transfer burn.”

  Krant looked at Gavelis, suddenly alarmed. Gavelis sighed, inwardly appalled at Krant’s lack of knowledge.

  “Just something to bear in mind, sir,” he said, although it wasn’t obvious that Krant was reassured.

  Krant sent a few more bursts of flame across the road before pocketing the charm as a horse and cart came into view. By the time they had passed the carter on the crest of the next hill, the walls of Riverbridge were in view. Krant heaved a huge sigh of relief as they trotted down the hill toward the relative safety of the town.

  “I think, sir, that it might be a good idea to use different names until we reach Vensille.”

  Krant frowned, perturbed by this news.

  “Why, Gavelis?”

  “If the watch are following, sir, it will allow us a breathing space. We can use our own names again upon reaching Vensille and then, if they ask around, they won’t receive helpful answers. It will make it more difficult for them to find us.”

  Krant thought about it and he had to admit that the suggestion was sound.

  “Do you have names to suggest?”

  Gavelis nodded.

  “I think you should become Smark, sir, and I would be Dundaserre.”

  “Very well. Smark and Dundaserre it is.”

  At the dockside Gavelis left Krant holding the horses while he sought out the dock master and arranged passage downstream. Eventually he threaded his way back through the crowd to Krant and took back his horse.

  “Well? Is there a ship?”

  Gavelis nodded but he clearly wasn’t happy.

  “Ships
don’t come this far up the river, it seems, but there is a large barge, sir. We won’t be the only passengers and it doesn’t leave till tomorrow around noon. We’ll be sleeping on the deck and minding our own horses.”

  “A barge? Will that be big enough?”

  “The dock master seems to think it will, yes, sir, but we need to purchase blankets to replace those we lost and food for the trip. The dock master suggested that we lodge tonight at the Bargeman, over there, and then make our way over to the docks tomorrow morning. If we secure board now, sir, I can then acquire the supplies we might need.”

  “Very good, G- Dundaserre, lead the way.”

  Gavelis walked ahead of his horse, pulling it through the crowds to the entrance of the Bargeman’s yard, and Krant followed suit. With the horses stabled and their packs stowed in a small room in the attic, Krant went in search of food in the common room while Gavelis left to buy supplies for the rest of the journey. Sitting quietly as he was near the back wall, he had a first-hand view of an astonishing encounter between a woman sitting on her own at a nearby table - itself a mildly shocking thing, especially as she appeared to be dressed in the robes of an Imperial cleric - and a rough-looking drunkard who had been sitting near the door.

  The violent end of the encounter, with the man bludgeoned to the floor by the innkeeper before being thrown out onto the street, reminded Krant that he was far from home and getting further away with every day. He sat, feeling very small and lonely, desperately trying to avoid attention, until Gavelis arrived some time later and joined him for an early supper.

  “You’ve missed the excitement,” he said quietly, leaning forward as Gavelis delicately ate the meat stew that seemed to be the only dish on the menu, “but I’ll give you the details later.” Then in a more normal voice he said, “Everything sorted for tomorrow?”

  “Yes, sir, everything has been sorted. I’ve stowed several days’ worth of food in our packs and arranged with the stable boy to take a couple of sacks of grain for the horses. That should cover most of what we need and we can probably buy more later if we need it, although anything they might sell us on the barge itself will most likely cost a great deal more.”

  “Good, good,” said Krant, not really listening. The woman who had been on the receiving end of the objectionable man’s temper was leaving quietly, slipping away through the back door. Surprising that such a beautiful young woman could move through a room like this without anyone really noticing. He said as much to Gavelis, who grunted.

  “I knew a girl once, sir, who had a trick that could make people look straight past her, if she didn’t want to be seen. A bit of power, a rare charm and you wouldn’t know she was there. Was that woman talented?”

  “I don’t know,” said Krant, uncertain and slightly confused, “I didn’t sense anything but then I probably wouldn’t from this range. And anyway, I didn’t have any trouble seeing her.”

  “Fair point, maybe she just has a knack for avoiding attention. Either way, sir, she’s left.”

  And she had, leaving through the back door without raising even a ripple of interest.

  Adrava sat on her bed in her room, looking at the inside of the door. Then she got up and dragged the bed across the floor until the heavy frame blocked the door from opening. She sat down again and looked at the shuttered window; nothing more she could do there unless she wanted to harden the wood itself and force it to flow together into a single solid piece. She dismissed the idea with an annoyed grimace; wood-charming was a skill she had never mastered, much to the amusement of her husband. She took out her shock cannon and set it down on the mattress. It was going to be a long night.

  The next morning Adrava woke with a start and grabbed at her shock cannon. She hadn’t meant to sleep at all but sometime around midnight, when the common room had begun to quieten, she had dozed off. Now, with dawn already here and the inn bustling with activity, she rolled out of bed and pulled the heavy frame away from the door. She packed quickly, washed in the small basin and then dressed before heading downstairs in search of breakfast.

  As she ate she planned the supplies she would need food for herself and String for the voyage to Vensille. A simple enough problem to solve; she stopped a passing maid and asked her to pack bread, dried meat, hard cheese, biscuits and a skin of beer. She would talk to the stable boy about grain or hay for String but he should have fed well overnight and there would surely be places at the riverside where she could buy more.

  By mid-morning she was fully stocked and she led String out of the inn’s yard toward the docks. The dock master saw her and waved in a friendly fashion as she approached.

  “Good morning, miss. We were about to come looking for you but here you are. Ready to go?”

  She nodded, “Yes, packed and stocked and ready to go.”

  “Let me walk you to the berth and introduce you to the captain, miss. It’s this way.”

  The dock master led the way along the docks until they reached the largest boat, a broad barge with a wide, steady gangplank. Leaning on the rail was a woman that Adrava took to be the boat’s master, a tall thin woman, well-preserved like an ancient walnut. Her face was lined and tanned and she smiled not at all as the dock master approached.

  “Good morning Mistress Banks,” he said, “here is Miss Naseep, the first of the passengers booked for today. And her horse, whose name I do not know.”

  “String,” said Adrava, “her name is String.”

  “Banks,” said the ship’s mistress, “Marjorie Banks. Well, come aboard if you’re coming, and then we can get your beast hobbled and settled. We’ve got three boxes amidships for horses.”

  The dock master made his excuses and disappeared back toward his hut leaving the two women alone. Banks stood watching as Adrava gently encouraged String across the short gangplank and along the deck to the first of the three horse boxes. With String settled and secure, Adrava walked back to Banks and held out her hand.

  “Naseep. Thank you for giving me passage. I hope the wind is fair and the voyage smooth.”

  Banks raised her eyebrow at this but took Adrava's hand and shook it while looking hard at her face and eyes.

  “I see in your eyes the signs of wisdom and long experience; truly, you are welcome aboard the Golden Rose.”

  It was an unusual style of greeting used only by people of very great talent and age when they wished to indicate discretely that they had recognised a fellow practitioner. Adrava bowed her head to acknowledge that she was, as Banks’ had suggested, a person of talent and said fumbled her way through what she hoped would be a suitable reply, “I am truly glad to be so welcomed and honoured that you see signs of wisdom, Mistress Banks.”

  Banks nodded, clearly satisfied with Adrava's response.

  “Later we must talk of many things but for now let me show you where you will be sleeping.” Banks turned and led Adrava across the deck and down a short flight of steep stairs to a small cabin in the stern of the boat.

  Adrava squeezed past the Mistress as she held open the door.

  “Oh, that’s very nice indeed, thank you,” she said, glancing quickly around the tiny space, “the dock master said I would have to sleep on the deck; is the cabin not sold?”

  Banks twitched her face into something that might have been a smile.

  “Yes, but it won’t hurt old Blucher to take the deck for once, and he can always walk if he doesn’t like it.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Don’t mention it,” said Banks, “especially as Blucher will probably whine and complain and make snide comments all the way to Vensille, if he ever bloody turns up. We sail at noon.” She nodded again then closed the door leaving Adrava alone in the tiny cabin.

  Krant and Gavelis arrived at the Golden Rose shortly before noon to find a one-sided argument blazing on the deck. A fat middle-aged merchant was remonstrating violently with the ship’s mistress, a tall tough-looking woman with short dark grey hair whose interest in the discussion appeared to be
non-existent.

  “That’s just how it is, Blucher. I’ve given the cabin to someone else, there isn’t another. You can take the deck like the other passengers or we can unload your cargo and you can walk. Which will it be?”

  The man stared at her and for a moment Krant thought he might begin shouting again but then he seemed to deflate.

  “Fine, I’ll take the deck, but I don’t like this high-handed attitude, Banks. We had a deal, after all.”

  “We did, it’s true, but you know the rule; the deal isn’t sealed until money has changed hands. No coin, no cabin, and now it’s too late.”

  He sighed, now truly defeated, and stamped off down the deck to stake out a spot near the stern under the canvas awning.

  “Hello,” shouted Gavelis once the merchant had left, “is this the Golden Rose?”

  “It is. Are you Smark?”

  “I am Dundaserre, Mistress Banks, valet to my master, Mr Smark.” Krant bowed as Banks scrutinised them both, eyes flicking quickly over their clothes, hair, horses and luggage.

  “Get aboard, then, and stow your horses in the boxes. The end one’s taken, mind.”

  “Thank you, Mistress,” said Gavelis as Krant led his horse over the gangplank. By the time they had loaded both horses - Gavelis’ was awkward and had to be coaxed gently across the gangplank which took the combined talents of half the crew and half an hour of concerted effort - and stowed their gear in a space under the awning noon had passed and Banks was clearly impatient to depart.

  As the crew cast-off and guided the ship out into the main stream of the river Krant nudged Gavelis and said quietly, “Those men over there, on the dock. Do they look like the watchmen from Rayvale?”

  Gavelis looked up from his pack and stared out over the river at a small group of men talking to various people on the dockside.

  “Yes. I would say that they do.” He turned back to his pack, sorting through his clothes and rearranging his modest possessions.