The Harvest Tide Project

by Oisin McGann

  ‘Mr Flivel,’ the judge snapped, slamming his fist on the podium. ‘I do not know from which barracks you come, but here in Hortenz, we insist that our soldiers exercise a proper use of grammar. And I find yours lacking, sir. Already you have, on a number of occasions, evinced the incorrect use of a verb and now you blatantly, blatantly, sir, employ a double negative. For which I am fining you the sum of fifty drokes. You will continue your narration in a manner befitting our beautiful language, or you will not continue at all. Carry on with your testimony.’

  Hilspeth kept her silence through all of this, struggling to keep up with the lawyer, and patiently waiting for the soldier to finish his story. Now she wondered if she would ever get to tell her side of it. At this rate, it was going to take all day. Flivel gave the impression that he had not understood the bulk of what the judge had said to him. He had understood the bit about being fined, however. Fifty drokes was a lot of money by any standards, but especially if you were on a foot soldier’s pay. His face scrunched up as he tried to recall his early schooling. His money was at stake now.

  ‘We had … no instructions about … carts. It were … was a woman with bottles and … objects. On the cart. She were … was alone. The cart jingled and therefore, we did … pay it our full attention. Left-Speartrooper Grulk did stand firm … before it. Wherefore the cart’s owner did stop.’

  A glance at Judge Pliskett did nothing for Flivel’s confidence. He continued, ‘Grulk did proceed to question the owner, whereupon the owner did give Left-Speartrooper lip about her smell. Grulk did then proceed to thump her head in.’

  ‘I have been more than patient with you, Right-Speartrooper Flivel. But I will not stand by while you end a sentence with a preposition. I am hereby imposing a further fifty-droke fine, payable at the end of session. Have you more to say, Right-Speartrooper Flivel?’

  Flivel stood in shock at the unfairness of this. Good grammar was not of great use to a soldier. Good grammar did not keep you alive in the chaos of a battlefield. He had not asked to come to this courtroom; he had been ordered to, and now he was losing half a moon’s pay over it. Giving testimony was proving expensive. When it came right down to it, he had never really liked Grulk anyway. And besides, she was dead.

  ‘That was all I saw,’ he concluded. The Accuser’s face clouded over.

  ‘Thank the gods for that,’ Judge Pliskett muttered. ‘Mr Accuser, call your next witness.’

  ‘Yes, your Judgeship, I call Forward-Batterer Wulms.’

  ‘Didn’t see nothin’,’ Wulms grunted from the group at the back of the courtroom. He had seen what had happened to Flivel, and had no intention of putting his money on the line. The Accuser twisted around to glare at this betrayal.

  ‘Did I hear another double negative, Forward-Batterer?’ Pliskett asked.

  ‘No, your Judgeship.’ Wulms’ answer was quite final.

  ‘I see. Next witness, Mr Accuser.’

  ‘I call Crossbow Carrier Rects.’

  ‘Wasn’t there,’ came the reply. The Accuser hissed through his teeth. He called four more soldiers as witnesses, only to meet with refusals each time. He had no one else to call.

  ‘Finished, Mr Accuser?’ the judge asked.

  ‘It would seem so, your Judgeship.’ The Accuser sat down, his face purple with rage.

  ‘Miss Naratemus, you may begin your argument,’ Pliskett told Hilspeth.

  ‘Your Judgeship,’ Hilspeth stood up to speak. ‘As the Accuser has not even managed to present a complete accusation, other than describing how a heavily armed woman, twice my size, thumped me on the side of the head, I put it to you that there is no charge to answer. I have been imprisoned for two days and nights, and have lost my cart and all my stock. Punishment enough, I think, for standing up to a bully, if that can be called a crime. I think I should go home, your Judgeship.’

  There was a silence in the court as the white wooden mask aimed its expressionless gaze at her.

  ‘Agreed,’ said Pliskett. ‘Case dismissed. Miss Naratemus, you are free to go.’

  The Accuser sourly gathered up his papers and prepared for his next case. The soldiers filed out of the room, and Hilspeth stood uncertainly in the pit, surprised and slightly wary that there might be more to come.

  ‘You may go, Miss Naratemus,’ the judge urged her gently.

  Without further hesitation, Hilspeth left.

  A soldier escorted her as far as the gate, where she stood for a moment, looking back into the barracks and thinking of Panch. Where had he gone? Was he alive? Had he escaped or had Grulk got him? She knew she would have to find out before she could take up her normal life again. She spun on her heel and strode out of the gateway, walking right into a tall, thin figure in a navy, hooded cloak. A grunt sounded from somewhere near the figure’s waist, and it toppled over. Hilspeth gasped an apology, and bent over to help the person up. As she recognised the face of the girl under the hood, she also realised that the girl’s elongated body had broken at the waist – broken completely in half. The girl gave her a pleading look. Hilspeth thought for a second, and then nodded. Gathering as much as she could of the top half’s weight in her arms, with the girl holding her shoulders, she lifted it up, keeping the robes of the cloak draped over the bottom half. The legs and hips got up by themselves, a fact that was hidden by the cloak.

  ‘You come with me now, or I rip off the cloak,’ said Hilspeth.

  ‘Okay,’ replied Taya.

  7 GETTING ANSWERS IN THE STORYHOUSE

  Hilspeth had heard of Myunans, but she had never met any before. As she led them away from the town square, she attempted to find out more about these two. The girl’s name was Taya Archisan. She was the face Hilspeth could see inside the hood of the cloak. A muffled voice at waist-level introduced itself as Taya’s brother, Lorkrin. Hilspeth could not help but admire the two shape-changers for their ingenuity. There was no way the guards would allow children into the barracks, but adults could walk in unchallenged if they appeared to know where they were going.

  Standing one child on top of another does not make the shape of an adult, however, and the two Myunans knew this. Taya had increased the size of her head and even coloured her skin as if she were wearing make-up. She had lengthened her arms, at the same time making her legs much smaller and thinner, leaving them just strong enough to allow her to keep her balance on Lorkrin’s shoulders. Lorkrin had flattened his head to conceal it under the cloak, shortened his body and lengthened his legs so that he could stride like someone twice his height. His shorter arms helped Taya keep her balance. The effect was very convincing, and would probably have worked if Hilspeth had not bumped into them.

  ‘We were trying to help your friend, Shessil,’ Taya explained once they reached a small alleyway where the children could regain their shapes. Watching Taya’s head shrink was something Hilspeth would remember for the rest of her life.

  ‘You mean Panch?’

  ‘We heard him called Shessil,’ Lorkrin grunted as his body expanded back down into his legs. ‘We … eh, met him here, well, under here, in the sewers. A couple of days ago.’

  ‘Then he is the one they’re all looking for,’ Hilspeth mused. ‘They had him and they didn’t even know it. But where is he now?’

  ‘Isn’t he in the barracks?’ Taya asked.

  ‘He was, but not any more. He seems to have disappeared, along with this guard who was out to get him.’

  ‘We know her. She was found dead last night,’ said Lorkrin. ‘She’d fallen from one of the towers. Wow, you mean Shessil did that? He’s tougher than I thought.’

  ‘Why were you trying to help him?’ Hilspeth asked. ‘What has all this got to do with you?’

  ‘Well,’ Taya said, making a very close study of her feet. ‘He has something of ours, something we need to get back. And we sort of owe him. We made him fall into the sewer. And then we gave him a bit of a fright …’

  ‘A lot of a fright, actually …’ Lorkrin put in with a hint of pride.<
br />
  ‘… And he jumped into the river in the sewer and got washed down the drain. The army seem to have been looking for him ever since,’ Taya finished.

  ‘I see,’ said Hilspeth, in a cold voice. ‘And would it be too much to hope for that there is a grown-up that I can deliver you to nearby? Parents? Relatives? Anybody with a sense of responsibility?’

  The two Myunans exchanged looks, and Taya answered, ‘We’re not going anywhere until we find Shessil and make sure he’s all right. And we get our quill back.’

  ‘Is that so?’ Hilspeth raised her eyebrows at them.

  ‘And you can’t make us and you know it,’ Taya finished, in a resolute tone.

  ‘Now why would I want you to miss out on all this trouble?’ Hilspeth replied. ‘It would be a shame if you didn’t get your fair share of it. Now, we might have a better chance of finding him if we knew where he came from. He said he had been staying somewhere here in Hortenz. We can bet wherever it was, it will be guarded by soldiers. Whatever he was doing, he was doing it for the government.’

  ‘We met him near here,’ Lorkrin offered. ‘It was close to the square.’

  ‘That sounds like a good start,’ Hilspeth nodded.

  It was a short walk, and when they got there, the children showed her the freshly repaired section of wall where Groach had fallen through the ground into the sewer. She went to the end of the wall to see what there was to see. There was the barracks, but she had been in there and was sure that whatever Shessil did, he did not do it there. The damaged wall itself was very high, too high to see over, and ran the length of the square to the side of a large building, surrounding wide, spacious grounds. The building was a manor house of some sort, with three floors and dozens of windows, most with window boxes full of plants. This was a wall made to keep people out … or perhaps to hold people in. She moved out into the square, followed by the Myunans, to get a better view, and saw soldiers standing to attention by the heavy double doors under the verandah.

  ‘I want to know what they are doing in that house,’ she told the two children.

  Brock Moffet was having a short nap before bedtime. His two-barrelled pipe lay on the hearth, ashes spilled on the slate in front of the fire-grate. Mrs Moffet finished oiling her frying pan and washed her hands with water heated in the kettle. She turned and looked at her man, his head tilted back, mouth open in mid-snore, and shoeless feet propped up on a short stool. On his lap lay a sheaf of vellum pages that Mrs Moffet recognised as having belonged to Shessil, their visitor from up-river. She picked some of them up, straightened them out, and slapped her husband across the head with them.

  ‘Huh! Wha—? Who’s there? What?’ Moffet struggled his way free of slumber and scowled at his wife. ‘What was that for? Can’t a man take a nap in his own home in peace, without some biddy taking a shot at him with some gardening documents?’

  ‘These are Shessil’s. They are no business of yours, we agreed to keep his things in case he came back. That does not mean we nose through them as if he left them to us.’

  ‘I’m not hurting the man. I was trying to find out who he is.’

  ‘You know who he is. Now put these away and show some respect. What are they about anyway?’

  ‘I told you. Gardening,’ he replied huffily.

  ‘Oh aye?’ She raised her eyebrows in sudden interest, casting her eyes over the pages. ‘What kind then?’

  ‘Gardening under the esh.’

  ‘Now you’re being ridiculous as well!’ She slapped him with the pages again.

  ‘I’m only telling you what I’ve read, woman!’ he protested. ‘And what little I understood. It’s madness, some of the things he says. The man is some kind of magician with plants I tell you.’

  ‘Well, all the same. You shouldn’t be reading his writings. They might be private. Give the rest here.’

  Moffet handed the remainder of the notes to his wife, and she put them back in the leather folder that lay on the floor. Shuffling them into place, the rotund woman noticed that one of the quills in the folder was of a different style, and had no cut down the center to channel ink. It was a different shape too, quite the strangest pen she had ever seen. She shrugged and replaced the folder in Shessil’s satchel, which they kept now in a drawer in the kitchen dresser. Shessil would return for it, and they would keep it until he did.

  Hilspeth watched the guards on the door to the manor house for a while. They would know something about what went on within, but she decided they would get suspicious if she simply walked up and started asking questions. She was wondering what to do next, when another bunch of soldiers came along and relieved them. The first team of guards, now apparently off-duty, made their way across the street to a storyhouse. Hilspeth nodded to herself. Now they would be a bit more relaxed. The storyhouse was a two-storey, brick-and-plaster building with round, latticed windows and a rickety veranda. Vines hung off it, and attracted flies and other insects, as did the man sleeping in its shadows, his head concealed by a large floppy hat, the brim of which fluttered when he snored. The front wall was adorned in animal parts, trophies from a dozen hunts, skins, heads, paws and hooves hung from cords dangling from the veranda posts. Hilspeth wrinkled her nose in disgust at the place as she walked closer. She was about to go in when Lorkrin stopped her.

  ‘You can’t, he said. ‘Look.’

  On a sign by the door were the words ‘Men Only’. And then, in case that was not clear enough, beneath it was: ‘No Women. No Children.’

  ‘Well, isn’t that just typical.’ Hilspeth rolled her eyes back. She thought for a moment, and then turned to the others. ‘Give me that cloak.’

  Lorkrin, who had it rolled up under his arm, handed it to her. She took it and put it on. It had holes in it, a badly worn hem, and it was damp with something – she wasn’t sure what.

  ‘Where did you find this?’ she asked.

  ‘In a pile of rubbish behind a shop,’ Lorkrin replied. ‘I don’t think anyone in a place like this will notice how bad it looks.’

  ‘Well, let’s hope not.’ Hilspeth shrugged the cloak into a more comfortable position on her shoulders. Its loose shape hid her figure and her skirt. This way she might pass for a young man.

  ‘Wait, the rest of you looks too clean,’ Taya said. She took some dust from the road and rubbed it on Hilspeth’s hands and face, and into her hair. The scentonomist growled at having her hair mussed up but she said nothing. The two Myunans studied her for a minute or two.

  ‘Hair still looks too girlie.’ Lorkrin said.

  ‘I can’t hide it with the hood,’ Hilspeth gasped in frustration. Taya took in their surroundings before settling her gaze on the man sitting on the ground against the wall.

  ‘Oh, you must be kidding …’ Hilspeth began, but Taya gently lifted the man’s wide-brimmed hat from his head and handed it to her. ‘We’ll give it back,’ she reassured Hilspeth.

  Hilspeth exhaled sharply as she bundled her hair up into the hat and pulled it down on her head.

  ‘Forget talking to them, I’ll be lucky to get close to them smelling like this.’

  ‘You’ll fit right in,’ Lorkrin assured her.

  ‘Yeah. Well, whatever. I’m not coming out of there without some answers.’

  Hilspeth shifted the hat again slightly and walked through the door and into a large, dark, smoky room filled with rough, mean-looking men sitting on stools around round wooden tables. Not seeing the guards she wanted to talk to, she decided to go up to the bar and order a drink while she took a look around. Excusing herself politely did not get her anywhere, so she kept her arms folded and shouldered her way past, noting that everyone had bigger harder shoulders than her. She got to the bar, and reminded herself that she had to act manly. Sticking out her chin, she called to the landlord in her deepest, gruffest voice:

  ‘By the gods, I’ve a mouth like a Reisenick’s armpit! A flagon of ale, there, sir. Your strongest stuff!’

  ‘Eh?’ The man squinted as if it wo
uld help him hear better, genuinely puzzled by the request.

  ‘A flagon of ale, please?’ Hilspeth’s voice faltered. She wasn’t sure what men drank in storyhouses. This wasn’t her type of place.

  ‘We don’t have any flagons, sir. Would a mug do?’

  The proprietor was a medium-sized, wiry man, obviously from Traxea, where they had a green tinge to their skin, and six fingers to each hand. He had a very large head with blue-black hair that formed a near-perfect circle round his face, from brow to chin.

  ‘A mug’d be just damned fine.’ she replied, only just remembering to keep her tone as gruff as possible.

  Afraid that she wasn’t expressing enough masculinity, she spat on the floor for good measure. The landlord frowned at the feeble attempt.

  ‘Mind if I ask what age you are, sir?’

  Thinking quickly, Hilspeth leaned over and sniffed his breath.

  ‘Older than that whiskey you keep for yourself,’ she retorted. ‘That’s not the cheap, watered-down rubbish I’m smelling off your customers.’

  ‘All right, all right, keep your voice down,’ the Traxean muttered.

  ‘A mug of ale, please.’

  ‘Right you are.’ With a charming smile, he took a clay mug from line of similar cups hanging from hooks above the bar, and poured some ale into it from a jug beneath the counter.

  She thanked him and paid for the drink. She tasted it tentatively and was surprised to find it quite palatable.

  A storyhouse was a place where travellers could come and earn a meal, and sometimes even a bed for the night by telling a story. Locals would buy them drinks and tobacco in return for being entertained. The more entertaining the story, the more hospitality the traveller would enjoy. At the tables in the room, men from all over the land were telling tales of adventure, and pranks, and war, and exotic places. Those who kept the customers happy would be offered a place to stay for a few nights by the owners of the house. The room was noisy, and everyone had to talk at the top of their voice to be heard.