by Adrian Selby
“Four bits, that spot there you’re tethered to. Pouch of bacca might cover it.” He’s got one tooth and black gums, no taller than me with his back straight. He knows he isn’t comparing as well as he’s used to, for though he’s been at the gruet he’s a noke, and colour is colour.
“Spare us, sir,” I says. “We’re out of the Kelssens. There’s trouble, we escaped with our lives. We only want to ask a bit of food and some furs and we’re gone again.”
I’ve taken my fieldbelt off of course, I don’t want to use it up yet to bargain for something to eat, but we have a purse with us that Mell had stashed in the boat. The children are standing behind me. I need to see to Brek’s shoulder but showing some colour to these men is a bit more important in giving them pause. The guard sees Ydka then, who’s been kneeling with the duts to straighten out their tunics and whisper them some rules to follow. As she straightens up his eyes widen some, seeing her beauty, but before he can speak there’s another appears behind him. His beard hoop’s carved, Carlessen rings engraved on it, the five Families of the Carlessen clan linked together. He’s older, grey beard stained with bacca spit and a tunic stained worse than a beer cloth.
“Nothing for trade in the boat that I can see. These your slaves, soldier?”
He’s speaking King’s Common, likely then from the Carlessen port.
“Are you the quartermaster?” I ask.
“Not me. Name?”
Like he was having that. “I’m Seikkerson, these are Kelssens and they aren’t slaves. You got whiteboys, Samma Khiese, a day or so away. You have to tell your quarter. They killed everyone but these here.”
He frowns, like I’d gaffed.
“She’s talking about that bandit up in the Circle, Dakka,” says the guard. “You not listened to those coming in off the Ansi last few weeks?”
“Been laid up with my chest, in’t I. You must have a belt on you, Seikkerson, you paid colour, and you old wheezers always have to pack it, even after paying out.”
“You think I should just give you my plant?” It’s too confrontational, and I instantly regret it, but who the fuck thinks plant’s there for the taking off an old merc like me, surely not a man his age.
“You won’t help me then?” He’s given me a way back in, saving a bit of honour for us both.
“Might have something can be threaded into your bacca, but I’d need to see. I lost a lot when I was attacked.” The state of my face should be plain to see.
“Much appreciated, Seikkerson.” He looks over those with me, eyes also lingering a bit on Ydka.
“What happened?”
“Whiteboys, this bandit’s soldiers that he has covered in chalk and paint, they come in and burned the Kelssen theit to the ground. Boy there’s got an arrow wound. I just about managed to get away, the chief asking me to take the children to safety. They’ve killed everyone else.” I say this last bit quieter, enough noise about us to mask it with Ydka now talking to the duts, and they didn’t need to hear it said again.
“Nowt’s happened like this round here for many years. I can hardly believe it,” says Dakka.
Another man shouts over at us then—dressed well, a clean tunic and beard, and he’s fat with fine living, boots shining with wax and a rich green cloak with a bronze clasp that is finely worked.
“Hope you’re not bargaining on those children without me getting a chance to bid, Dakka,” he calls.
He comes over, leaving what must be a couple more guards behind him.
“What’s he offered? I have a drudha can cure a dozen ailments. You’ll get a better deal from me because I can sell them for more if they’re in better shape. Wait, they’re not chained?”
“They’re not slaves either,” I says.
There are a fair few questions queued up in the corners of his mouth but a few looks are exchanged between him and the other two and he straightens up to leave.
“My mistake. I’m Gressop, of the Bethessens, Clan Carlessen of course.”
“I’m a Seikkerson, my name’s … Well, I’m called Blackeye by these duts.”
“Yes, been looking at that, looks in a bad way,” says Dakka.
“Like the rest of her,” says the guard. Dakka finds this funny.
“You’re in trouble?” says Gressop.
“We all are. I need to see the quarter, but first I need to see if someone has enough kindness to spare these children some food and furs.”
He is about to ask about our trouble when Dakka interrupts. “I’ll tell you shortly, Gress. Look, Seikkerson, we get hundreds of beggars through here with their stories of bandits and other shit. Good luck getting a man here to give food away for nothing in return. Pay your bits to my man Eddler here and you’ll have this fine pier till tomorrow at dawn.”
He leads Gressop away. I get the pouch and pay the bits and so Eddler leaves as well.
“How much did Mell put in there?” says Ydka, of the pouch.
“Another ten bits and a silver, been clipped as well, though we might get away with it.”
“Let’s get the duts some stew and a bit of that fish and be going,” she says.
“How? That won’t get us far down the river and then we’re all out.”
“Your belt?”
“No. No, not yet.”
She gives me a dirty look. “Let me have the pouch. I’ll get them something and bring you and Brek back a bite. Might be I can get a bit more pity with this dut.” With that they walk off.
Brek’s struggling with the pain as I clean and cover the bark with cotton.
“It’s itching bad,” he says.
“It will while the bark knits in. Isn’t much of a wound, but bark’s the best for drawing out the poison. It’s thirsty is bark.”
“What are we going to do?” he asks.
“Get enough food to make the run to the Carlessens’ port.” I say no more because that’s as far as the plan goes, as far as I go. They need an almshouse and some work if they aren’t going to die.
I hear a scream then despite all the other noise of the market, a child, and there’s too few of them here for it not to be one of mine.
I start walking towards the smell of the food, the direction Ydka took them. Dottke runs up, tells me Jorno got into some sort of trouble and now Ydka’s in trouble. Sure enough, a few men are surrounding her, must be dock guards. One’s holding Jorno, who’s trying to kick out, while Aggie and Litten are holding on to Ydka’s dress. She sees me, she’s upset and desperate.
“A boy snatched the pouch as I was paying for some bowls of stew off this one. I can’t pay.”
“Where did he go?”
“Oi, you with her, can you pay for the stew she just give these duts?”
“Beggars get beaten,” says one of the other two. One of them’s paid colour, faded like me though, been off the brews a while longer by the looks of him. Him and his mate have clubs in hand, though the one who’s holding Jorno against him hasn’t used it on him.
“You saw what happened then, she had coin. Did you see who run off with it?” I look about us, but there’s a crowd here, we’re near a couple of pavilions that are set up for clearks and auctions and such. A boy could have ducked round any number of corners here.
“Well, it might be we can spare your slaves that bit of gone-off turnip and piss you call a stew, eh, Ces?”
A look that has some sort of meaning passes between them, and it don’t feel right.
“I’m going to let this little one go, you should tell him how much a club hurts.”
“Jorno, stand with your ma. We’re grateful for this,” I says.
“You got plant you can trade for more,” says Ydka to me.
“She has?” This was Ces, the old man who’s standing over his pot and a pile of dirty bowls. “You got a bit of white seed?”
I shake my head. “Is it for your throat or can’t you shit?”
That brings a laugh from the dock guards and a smirk from Ydka.
“Throat
of course.” Cow shit. He was saving face. He rubs the front of his throat under a short filthy beard to make better his lie.
“I can put a finger of mallow root in some hot water. Should help your throat.”
He looks grateful, and it seems only the two of us here know its main use is for his guts.
“Fetch it and there’s another bowl or two of this fine stew for these duts.”
He dips two of the dirty bowls back into the pot, gives one to Ydka and one to Litten.
I’m surprised a moment that he’d do this before getting his mallow, surprised at the two dock guards standing here with us as someone behind me hits the mud, and a roar goes up from five or six men drinking outside the tent of a brewer. The man fallen over is too soaked to get back to his feet easily and another, smaller man, quite young to look at, is in a rage, kicking him in the gut while being cheered on. The man on the ground is drunk enough to be laughing, and in a flash he grabs the other’s leg mid-swing and pushes him back off balance, knocking over a few plates and mugs. The brewer’s shouting out now for help, so why are the dock guards standing here?
When I look back from the scrap they’ve walked off towards the pens.
The old man selling his stew catches my eye, looking about him before whispering, “Boat.”
Fuckers was keeping an eye on me.
I splash through the muddy tracks, past the two men fighting and the growing ring of herders, sniffers and vanners looking for a moment’s circus.
At the pier I see Brek sat up and he’s crying.
“I was shouting for you!” he says. It’s clear before he says it that we’ve been robbed. There’s no sack under the stern sheet, my sword’s gone and my own sack, with Mosa’s shirt in it. I feel sick, my belly’s flipped upside down inside me. I can’t have lost it, not after this winter and all these months, all I’ve been through.
“Where did they go? Hey, Brek, it’s fine, come here.” There isn’t any gain in squeezing him now for whoever did this. There’s a connection here, given the old cook couldn’t have said anything while the guards was standing with us, keeping us there.
I sit next to Brek, who tries to adjust himself to better let me sit next to him without the boat rocking too much. I put my arm about him, gentle at his shoulder. He’s having a proper cry now, heaving and emptying all the last day out of him, I think. It’ll hit them all once the hunger’s eased back a bit.
His crying ends with the usual shudders and snotty sleeve. He leans behind him then fetches out my sack, which would have been lying beneath him when the robber come.
“Oh Brek,” I says. I kiss him.
“I was propping myself up with it to have a look about. When he come I just moved a bit so’s he couldn’t see it.”
I take the sack, small, grey leather, covered in my sweat and blood with no care or wax given to it since I found it forty yards from a dead man’s cart before midwinter in the high hills of Hardy. The worn leather drawstring is tied tight. The weight is right, barely more than the sack itself.
“What’s in it?” he asks.
“Something precious.” I loop it across my body.
“I’m sorry, Blackeye, I was scared and I didn’t want to be.”
“Don’t be. I’ll fetch Ydka and the duts back here and go looking for our things.”
He tells me what the man looked like, tells me who was stood near when it happened. His description isn’t going to be much use, a plaited blond beard and a brown hooded cloak, though this man did have a few teeth missing.
Ydka and the others I send back to the boat to see out the afternoon while I make up the mallow root decoction for the cook.
“Tell me about the quarter here,” I ask him.
He’s boiled up some water and I strip the guira and mallow and press them out into a bowl he’s prepared.
“Leb Carlessen, face like a bald ferret, can’t be much over twenty, dresses fine enough and I reckon has been put here to keep him out of the port’s taverns and to learn how to do something useful instead. About as straight as a horseshoe is the trouble. He quickly got used by a couple of brothers who cut their rope a few years back down southeast near Hope lands. I reckon Forontir would pay a bit to see their heads. Now he’s got them as his clearks.”
“Names?”
“Westal and Gressop. Westal’s paid colour. You know, I saw him playing with the woman Leb keeps around, out when I was foraging a week or so back. Kept my head down or he might have cut it off. Could be something you could wedge between them.”
“Leb’s got that longhouse just off the two big piers I saw coming in?” I ask.
“He has.”
He confirms there’s only one way in or out of the longhouse. He’s as grateful for the brew as I am for that bit about Westal.
I walk through the few other stalls that are set up and past some fires been made by those who are stopping over for the night. There’s a lot of eyes on me, woman who paid colour, and I’m sure my black eye don’t help. It’s rubbing bad and I need some oil on it. I’m desperately tired and hungry now, but I want to go walk around this longhouse of Leb Carlessen’s before I head back to the boat to get some rest. I don’t know how I’m going to feed the duts next.
I walk a route around the staging post and Leb’s longhouse, a habit from my soldiering, looking for runs in and out of the place. Sure as the old cook said, just the one door. As I return along the piers I can see Gressop at our boat, Leb’s man, the would-be slaver from earlier. He’s alone, standing with Ydka slightly apart from the children in the boat, and turns when he sees the children and Ydka look at me approaching.
“Aaah, Seikkerson.”
“What’s going on, Ydka?”
“He wants to help us.” There are tears in her eyes as she cradles the baby.
“I do. I heard of your misfortune from two of Carlessen’s guards.”
“I’m sure you did.”
I see a shade of tightness in his jaw, his lips. He doesn’t realise how much I can see, thinks perhaps my eye is worse than normal, or even blind, not far better.
“I can help Ydka and she can help all of you.”
“Ydka, what the fuck is going on?”
“Don’t, Amondsen.”
“Amondsen?” he says.
“Oh Teyr, sorry, I’m sorry.” I hold a hand up to shush her.
“I said my name was Seikkerson. It’s not, I’m Amondsen rope. I was being cautious.”
“Of course, I understand.” He swallows as he says it, as if the name caught him by surprise, as if it means something to him.
“So what do you mean by saying that Ydka can help all of us?”
“Ydka is beautiful, like Sillindar made a woman out of honey if I may say so, and, even better, she’s milking for that dut. I know a merchant with a number of main ten cargo interests—sorry, I’m saying that he’s very rich—and he will need a wet nurse come the summer.”
“A slave, then.”
“There are slaves and there are slaves, as you must know if you’ve paid the colour. You’ll have seen slaves broken in mines and you’ll have seen slaves living well. I have been plain about this with Ydka.”
“Who’s going to see Litten, Aggie, Dottke and Brek right then, with that food and coin?”
“Well, her older boy, Jorno, he’s not—”
“No.”
“Amondsen …” says Ydka, a tremor in her voice telling me she has talked about Jorno finding his own way—with me, she must think.
I look past her. Jorno is wrapped in a cloak and sat next to Brek. They’re all laughing at something Aggie must have said, as she’s cross and Litten has to hold her from rocking the boat too much. The sound of them at play rings a heavy and cold bell, and for a moment I’m hearing the harbour bell from the apple trees of my old garden. He’s hiding, I’m counting to ten.
“You’re abandoning your son as well as all these duts of your Family? You’d sever your rope?”
“Don’t talk to me abo
ut rope, Amondsen. You give your Family nothing. You said as much to Mell the other night and I heard you clear enough. This is about feeding my dut and keeping the Kelssen rope, all that’s left of it. You stopped to help the theit and you didn’t have to, so you made it your work to care for them now.”
“Like fuck I did,” I hiss.
“Five silver coins and food for the journey should see you south,” says Gressop over us. “If Jorno finds an almshouse to take him in the port then I’m sure some form of correspondence would be allowed. My friend will not open his doors to a family, and what then would Ydka and the rest of you do if you insisted on her refusing me? This sacrifice she makes now will help all these children until you can find something better for them. But, sorry, I forget that you have so many more important things to do, you would leave them.”
A moment where I see my fist hammer into his face passes.
“We’ll find some food, Ydka. I can hunt, I can sniff.”
She glances back to Jorno before looking again at me.
“Look at you, Amondsen. Look at us. Scrabbling around for hazelnuts and belets? No proper woollens or boots for the next few weeks? Is it better or worse for my boys, now my Murin’s gone and our theit’s gone? We’re not going hungry and right now we choose either nothing or five silver and food for all these.”
I turn to Gressop, whose concern is smeared thin across his face. “Gressop, if your family name was in need of even an ounce of honour you’d be supporting these Kelssens, you oily piece of shit. You’re all one clan. I’m going to speak to Leb.”
“That’s a good idea. We should do that.”
That wasn’t the answer I thought he’d give. Something smells bad about all of this.
“They your men, Gressop?” says Ydka.
Gressop and I turn to look behind us. I see a couple of men leading horses through the main run, but their backs are to us and they’re soon obscured by others loading and unloading barges.
“No idea,” says Gressop.
“They was looking our way, like they knew you.”
“Not seen them before, and dock guards wouldn’t be leading horses through the main run,” he says.