by M. C. Elam
***
Later, when he told Ellyanna, she clapped her hands, her face aglow with smiles he had not seen since they came to Lawrenzia.
“Don’t you understand, Christopher? My mother is alive. You must look where the old woman told you. Mother is alive. I know it.”
“You cannot be sure of that, Elly. The whole thing might be mere coincidence. Please do not set your heart upon it.”
“Christopher, my sweet champion,” she whispered. “You had a vision. I know that old woman.”
“You know her? How do you know her?”
“On my eighteenth birthday, I wanted a pair of bluebirds. My mother took me shopping, and among the vendors, we found a blind woman selling birds. My mother purchased my bluebirds from her. You must remember seeing the birds.”
He nodded.
“What else could it mean? Mother lives. The three of us will go home together one day.”
In those few words, Christopher knew that any plans to find a way out of the city ended. He never even mentioned the scheme. Ellyanna would not leave Brendemore without Lady Millicent, and Christopher would not go without Ellyanna. His course was clear. He must find Lady Millicent. He didn’t believe in visions. Whatever happened that day inside the bird shop was real, the old woman, the shop, all of it.
He found his way to the slave compound and roamed the area for some sign of Lady Millicent. The maze of cages and pathways led him in circles, and he returned downhearted.
“I know I promised to find her, but I don’t know where to begin. The compound is enormous. I need a guide just to learn the place, or I could wander there for weeks. Elly, I need coin to bribe the sentries. With it, I can find one among them willing to help me.”
“Sell my brooch,” Elly whispered.
“And my ring,” said Christopher.
The brooch and ring brought a considerable sum. Christopher gave the coin to Elly for safekeeping and carried only a small amount into the slave pens. He found a sentry willing enough to teach him about the layout of the compound for a few coppers.
“Come on along. I can show you. You’re that man from Glynmora. What the likes of you be wanting in the pens anyway?”
Christopher was afraid to tell him he was looking for Lady Millicent. He knew so little of the men here. One mistake could finish him.
“Yes, I’m from Glynmora. I am Christopher Tyndall.”
“Name’s Fishboy, they call me that because they took me away from the sea a long time ago.” He led Christopher to the top of a small rise and stopped. “See yonder, now? If you stand where I am, you can see all four areas. We got us three long barracks that hold about two hundred slaves each. Then there be the small one yonder.”
“The small one?”
“Aye, but you know I bet you ain’t seen nothing like a selection before. We got one first thing today. Selection is where slaves gets their barracks assignments. Should be getting started right about now. Follow me on down here.”
Fishboy led him toward the center of the compound. They stopped at the edge of a large fenced area that held a group of about one hundred people in what Christopher could only describe as a cattle pen. The men and women looked exhausted. A few children clung to their mother’s skirts crying and begging for food. The sentry leaned close to be sure Christopher heard him above the noisy din.
“Watch that old fella there. Name be Sterling Pincus. Hails from some village by the Sea of Shadall. Got caught up in the same raid took me ten seasons back now. Rose out a the pens and served awhile in the palace. They say he killed that Glynmora fella. Got too big for his britches they say and pissed off old Brenan. What is that saying about the higher they rise the lower they fall? Lucky bastid, though. He’s the one in charge, makes the selection.”
It was him. Christopher recognized the high cheekbones and slack jaw. The man's eyes looked bigger and seemed to protrude from his skull.
“Some says old Sterling’s got the smell of death. Putrid like, you know. Got a hold of a whore full of rot from too many times on her back. She passed it on to Sterling. Now he stinks of it.”
“Stinks of it?" Elly had told him that Brenan had a stink masked in lavender toilet water and roses. “Like rotten meat?”
“Aye, just like that. Smelt it have ye?”
“Not me. Someone I know.”
“Best tell them to steer clear.”
They watched while Sterling questioned each slave, recorded names and ages in his ledger, and then, with a wave of the hand, indicated an assignment.
“To the right,” Fishboy told Christopher, “they go to the common labor barracks, and them that goes left is meant for skilled workers,” said Fishboy. “That bunch yonder, there in the middle, they be marked incorrigible. They act out and fight back so King Peter wants them sold off fast. They don’t fit in with hired labor.”
“What do you mean by hired labor?” asked Christopher.
“Why they be hired out to the highest bidder of course. Common works the fields and goes for less than skilled. Sometimes if the gentry sees fit, they go for a permanent hire. Then they don’t come in unless something be wrong. King Peter’s got him a charge for everything. If one of them comes to harm he charges for the hurt. If one of them gets kilt off, they weigh him up and charge for the body. Ain’t no waste to none of it.”
“What about that group in the corner?” asked Christopher.
The sentry adopted a foolish grin. “Don’t know nothing unless another copper comes my way.”
Christopher produced the copper, his eyes still on the small group of about five young maidens clustered together.
“They be headed for the barracks where the whores bed. They most likely been broke already, sometimes not. Bet that little one in the middle be fresh. Fresh ones go for a lot. The gents pay gold to get hold to a virgin.”
Christopher stared at him.
“Don’t give me no snooty stare like you’re better than me. I ain’t never touched a one of them. It ain’t me that pays. Not me locked up as tight in here as they are. Only arse comes my way be offered up to ease a long night.”
“You are right. I apologize.”
A sentry claimed the girls and ushered them away toward the fourth barracks. That was when Christopher saw the bird woman. She trailed behind the girls, tapping her walking stick in front of her, measuring the ground.
“That old woman,” he said. “Who is she?”
“What old woman,” asked Fishboy?
“She’s right there, just behind the group of girls.”
The sentry scrunched up his face and made slits of his eyes. “I don’t see any old woman.”
“But you must; she’s right there. She has a walking stick, and she’s right behind them.”
“You’re not touched from the sun, are you? I don’t see no old woman. No one be there but the girls and Sergeant Willis, what comes to fetch them. Best you take yourself out of here for a bit. Set in the shade a spell. You’re seeing things not even there.”
With the bird woman so close, Christopher did not intend to leave. Another copper distracted Fishboy long enough for him to walk away from the selection area. He did not want anyone to see him follow the girls and kept to the outer edge of the compound, until he neared the whore’s barracks. The group disappeared from view between buildings, and he quickened the pace, afraid he might lose the old woman again, but when he neared the last barracks, he sighed, relieved. Still there, the bird woman hobbled along behind the girls. The group stopped in front of a gated exercise yard that surrounded the building, and before the old sentry unlocked the gate and hurried them inside, she turned toward him, beckoning.
She knows I’m here, he thought.
“Wait up, sergeant,” he called. “I’d have a word with you.”
The man continued toward the barracks door.
“Hail, sergeant, hold your place there. My name is Christopher Tyndall, and I wish to speak with you.”
Clay Willis turned. A crooked gr
in made his rugged old face less forbidding than usual. “Be with you in a minute, son. Got to leave off these little gals first.” He pounded on the barracks door and waited.
The door opened a crack and then fell wide. A huge woman with ruddy cheeks blocked the entrance. Two of the girls began to whimper at the sight of her.
“Now there, there. This here be Maudie. She ain’t out to hurt you none. She’s gonna act just like your mam, take care of you and see you get something to eat. Ain’t no one gonna touch you today.”
Willis turned back toward the gate where Christopher waited. “You be wanting to see Lady Millicent I spect. She said you’d be coming one day. He opened the gate and stepped back.
“She is here, then?”
“Course she be here. What’d you think? It’s why you come ain’t it?”
“Yes, but how could she know?”
“Don’t know. Asked her about that myself one time. Told me she knew was all. You coming inside or what?”
Christopher stepped inside and heard the gate close.
“Name’s Willis, Clay Willis. I take care of these here barracks. We’re gonna have to wait a bit till Maudie gets the new girls settled in. Won’t be long. Most times they just want to be left alone,” said Clay. He led Christopher to a long bench alongside the barracks door. “Don’t mind I sit a spell? This here bum leg I got aches powerful. Last few years, just walking makes her scream like a midnight horror. Reckon as long as I keep moving my job’s safe, though.”
Christopher had noticed the sergeants shuffling step.
“What happened to your leg?”
“Ah nothing much. They hired me out and I shot off my mouth when I was a young mite. Got knocked clean off my feet, and an ole mule stepped on me. The farmer what hired me didn’t want to pay no fee, so he kept me on ‘til I healed up. Didn’t want to pay for no healer neither. Hurt like bloody hell I can tell you, and healed up a little crooked. Rest your bones if you want, unless you object to sitting next to the likes a me.”
Christopher sat down.
“I spect that lady gonna be right happy. I done my best to keep her safe.”
“Keep her safe?”
“Yes sir, yes siree. First time I seen her, I knew I had to do right by her if I could. Then I found out she come from Ascalla, long time back. I do my best for Ascalla folks.
“Yes, Lady Millicent came from Ascalla. Not a titled woman until she wed Ambassador Merrill. Lady Millicent was an apothecary. In those days she tended the royals when they ailed.”
“Aye, told me the way of it, she did.”
“A bit of to-do from his brother about it.”
“Fools pride, you be askin’ me. Settin’ people apart in they classes, like one marks a hog,” he groaned. “Same as here, hard labor slaves, skilled and so on.”
“When can I see her?”
“Soon enough but first, I got to set you straight.”
Christopher turned toward Willis. “What do you mean, set me straight?” Irritation crept up his spine and he knew it sounded in his voice.
Willis shaded his eyes against the sun and looked across the compound watching the patrolling sentries. “See them men, yonder?”
Christopher nodded.
“Ain’t a one of them stupid. Only thing what’s got them here is they got took. Same as your lady. Same as me. No man in the pens be a free man ‘cept them that comes to rent a slave. They know who you be, lad. They paid up with their backs to get where they are. It ain’t freedom, but it’s better than the barracks. They be knowing just exactly who you be.”
“I don’t see what they have to do with me.”
“You want to help Lady Millicent, don’t you?”
Christopher nodded.
“Then listen up and ease yourself back. Ain’t no way you’re going inside till Maudie comes back, anyways.”
“But I…”
“You what? You ain’t got no power, and you ain’t no better than nary a man here. Just because you got you some fancy garb and live up to Brendemore Palace don’t make you different. We all be slaves here, Tyndall. That means you, too.”
“How do you know so much about me?” said Christopher.
“Lady Millicent, she done told me ‘bout you being betrothed to her girl. Now, I got me a story to tell and you got some listening to do.”
Christopher sighed and tried to hide his impatience.
“Been here nigh on forty years, myself,” Clay told him. “Snatched me out from Ascalla when I weren’t no more than ten, me and my mam. Poor mam, talked of nothing but going home. Sick at heart, she was. Died of it, I reckon. I near starved afore I learned how to get by. If you want to save that lady, best listen up and mind what I say. Lady Millicent be barely breathing when they flung her in the pens. I found her lying just where they left her next morning, up close to the main gate. I carried her down here to Maudie. Maudie looks a might rough, but she’s got healing in those hands same as your lady. Maudie took Lady Millicent right to her bosom, she did. Rocked her when the nightmares come, and soothed away the wounds and aches with her special healing salves. Seemed for a while her mind twisted. Maudie and me feared she be addled. Only spoke the girl’s name and called out in some funny words we didn’t know. Then she come around to herself and asked after you and her girl. Said you’d come if you could. When she was able, Maudie and me put her to caring for the young girls. She ain’t never been hired out.”
“Hired out?”
Willis shook his head. “You want me to say it out for you? She ain’t been used since she come in here. Now listen good. First off, you can’t just come barreling in here asking for her. Sentries’ll deny you every time, except for pay. Your face be known to them because you been marching your arse around here a couple days now. Ain’t stupid, no siree, they ain’t. You could only be looking for one person, Lady Millicent.”
“They know about her?”
“Sure as the birds flies. Laid bets up to Chandler’s on how long afore you figured it out. They think you be a dandy. Word travels, even here. They know how you stayed alive that night, bowing down to King Peter like you done.”
Christopher stood and began to pace. “What can they know of that night? Were they in the hall? I’m no coward, sergeant.”
“Sit yourself back down here. Them men yonder be marking every word you say. Lady Millicent spoke for you and her word be good with me. Wouldn’t matter none anyway. We all took a knee somewhere, or you’d find nary a soul left sucking air.”
Millicent’s name from the sergeant’s mouth jerked Christopher to attention, and he looked around noticing the heavy patrol around the barracks. He sat back down on the bench next to Willis.
“I always done what I could for the Ascalla folk shut up in here, but mostly kept to me job and steered clear of poking my nose into outsider business. Only leads to trouble the biggest part of the time. Kept my shift sentries moving and stuck to the rules. Gave up getting out of here a long time back. So I earned my pay best I could and spent it like the rest, on a swallow or two of ale down to Chandler’s Tavern. Worked out pretty well ‘til Lady Millicent come along. That lady’s eyes looks right down inside a man and finds them old homesick parts. And her words makes you think might be a way you’re gonna see that place again, even when you know you ain’t. She works on your dreams and takes you flying like you was on the back a some great bird, takes you straight off home. She’s got magic in her, and she give them sweet dreams to me.” He gave a half smile and revealed a mouth full of blackened teeth.
Christopher looked startled. “Like a bird?”
“Aye, like you could fly on out a here.”
“I saw an old woman following you after the selection. She waved to me to follow.”
“No old woman here, son. Must be you seen wrong.”
“But I saw her, a blind woman with a walking stick,” said Christopher.
“Well, now, sure would remember a blind woman. You must a mistook one of them little gals.” Sergeant
Willis grunted and stood up. Don’t know what’s keeping Maudie. Mayhap she forgot about us waiting out here. He banged on the barracks door and then turned back to Christopher. “Mind your ways boy, and do what I say about them sentries. You want them to go along with you, bring a bit of coin to sweeten them up. Works every time.”
The barracks door opened, and Maudie stuck her head out. Willis took a step inside, paused, and turned.
“Well, get your arse on in here. Wanting to see her, ain’t you?”
***
Thinking about all that had passed between them since that first encounter three months ago, Christopher knew he could trust Clay Willis, and trust in Lawrenzia was a rare commodity. Tonight the light from a lantern broke the night, and he saw the old sentry waiting for him by the whore’s barracks. Clay spotted him at the same time and hastened to unlock the outer gate. Christopher entered and the gate clinked shut.
“I’ve brought the fee, three gold pieces,” he whispered.
“Good for a year that be. How came you by so much?”
Christopher dropped his head. “I sold Elly’s earbobs,” he said.
“A good bargain. A year's rent be worth an earbob or two, and another six months if the recorder be partial to drink. Why’s your face hanging down to the ground? Earbobs be naught but goo gaws.”
Christopher retrieved the gold from his coin pouch and held it out to Willis. “Her father gave them to her.”
“I be laying a wager her mam’s worth more to her than a trinket no matter how dear, but tuck the coin away for now, lad. She wants to talk first.”
“The plan was to get her out of here and into rooms in the city.”
“Aye, I be privy to that. But she asked me to leave her be in the barracks for now.”
“Why do you risk so much for us, Clay?”
“Simple enough, I told you afore. Lady Millicent be born in Ascalla, same as me. Any from Ascalla I help when I can,” he shook his head. “But some be too dang stubborn. Only a few of them bend their backs to slavery. Proud, they be, and I be proud of them, no matter if they choose the fool’s way.” His eyes looked moist, but he avoided the intensity of the moment and handed Christopher a key with a number sixteen pressed into the metal.