by Lynn Kurland
“Who are you?” she croaked.
“Losh,” he said. “Who’re you?”
She hesitated, then supposed it didn’t matter whom she told her name to in this terrible place. She wasn’t planning on being there very long anyway.
One way or another.
“Aisling,” she said. She stepped back and put her hand on the wall to steady herself. She frowned when she realized he wasn’t moving. “What do you want?”
“I’ve been sent to watch you.”
She felt a thrill of fear go through her. Or perhaps it was the last vestiges of whatever she’d had the night before.
“Have you?” she said uneasily.
“Aye,” he said, sounding slightly awed. “Weger commanded it.”
“Did he say why?”
“Of course not,” he said promptly, “and I weren’t fool enough to ask him. He told me to watch you, feed you, then bring you to the upper hall when the work was done for the day—if you wasn’t still puking.”
“The upper hall?” she asked, her ears perking up. That boded well. “Where’s that?”
He swallowed, though it looked as though it were rather painfully done. “Never been there meself, but I can find it.” He nodded toward the door. “Perhaps a bit of fresh air’d do you good. It’s a bit close in here, aye?”
She agreed that it was indeed rather close in the chamber, settled her cloak around her shoulders, and did her best not to stagger as she followed after him. She would have locked the door behind her, but there was no lock, so she counted herself fortunate that the only thing of value she possessed was still tucked under her tunic. She hoped Rùnach had been as thorough with his own gear.
They went all the way to the upper courtyard, which took her longer than she thought it might, but there was nothing to be done about that. Losh didn’t seem to require any responses from her, so she let him continue on with his endless stream of babble and concentrated on making sure she stayed on her feet. When they reached the top of the steps, she was more than happy to simply lean against the wall. She was cold in spite of her cloak and far weaker than she cared to be.
Perhaps the night before was simply the curse announcing its presence. For all she knew, she would spend the day growing weaker and weaker until that night brought certain death. All the more reason to find Weger as quickly as possible and have her errand accomplished.
She realized after a few minutes that Losh had stopped speaking and was looking at her closely. She was too weary to try to hide her face, so she simply returned his look.
“What?” she asked.
“Just wondering about you.”
“Best not to,” she advised. “Let’s talk about you instead. How long have you been here?”
“Three fortnights,” he said. “On trial.”
She looked at him in surprise. “On trial?”
Losh shifted uncomfortably. “Well, you see, my uncle shoved me inside the gates and pulled them shut behind me, and I’ve yet to have the chance to prove my skill.” He looked at her and seemed to shrink into himself. “In truth, ’tis only because my uncle is who he is that they haven’t tossed me over the walls.”
“But surely he gives everyone who enters a sporting chance.”
“Well,” Losh said slowly, “I don’t know as that’s the case. He was full prepared to give me a heave right away, but someone told him my uncle was Harding.” He swallowed again, looking as if he were in great need of something strong to drink. “I think it bought me time. Until, you see, I acquire the necessary sword skill.”
“Harding?” she asked. “Who is that?”
Losh looked at her as if he couldn’t quite believe she could be so uninformed. “He is a very important man hereabouts. Perhaps Lord Weger trades with him, or thinks I’ll one day gain my mark, then go vex him.” He nodded, as if he were trying to convince himself as well as her. “I’ve considered that, once I’ve done what’s necessary. That will be soon, I’m sure of it. So until that time I’m anxious to do as Lord Weger says. When he told me to watch you, I said aye immediately and with great vigor.” He looked at her closely. “Are you hungry, or are you going to puke again?”
Just the thought of trying to ingest anything was enough to leave her feeling ill, but she was trembling with weakness. “I’m not sure.”
“I says you’d best eat,” he offered. “I always find that helpful.”
“Perhaps in a minute or two,” she said. “I think I would rather just stand here for a bit, if you don’t mind. The breeze is bracing.”
“It is that,” he said, though he looked as if he might have preferred a spot a bit less bracing. “I don’t suppose I can argue. Lord Weger told me to watch you, not order you about.”
That was something, she supposed. And if Weger had told Losh to watch her, she wasn’t going to gainsay him. She was happy to simply stand on even the side of the upper courtyard and shiver. The wind was bitter and ferocious, but it did a fine job of making her feel as if it were blowing not only her soul but her illness straight from her poor form.
She leaned back against the wall, using Losh as a windbreak, and watched the men fighting in front of her.
“Best of ’em,” Losh said reverently. “Aye?”
She couldn’t help but agree. They weren’t pretty men, but they were extremely fierce. There were perhaps a dozen of them there, fighting in pairs, parrying with a ruthlessness that was truly a sight to behold. She supposed any of them would have done for her errand, but what did she know of them, in truth? Obviously, Weger would need to help her choose the appropriate man for her quest—
She almost went sprawling suddenly thanks to a jostle she hadn’t seen coming. A hand, scarred and briefly clutching something that dropped at her feet, grasped her forearm and steadied her. She looked up and realized Rùnach was there, breathing raggedly.
“Sorry,” he said, then leaned over with his fists on his thighs. “Didn’t see you.”
Aisling would have said something to him, but she lost her ability to speak abruptly at the sight of Weger suddenly standing in front of them both. He picked up a black ball, apparently what had fallen out of Rùnach’s hand, and tossed it at her.
“Hold that,” he said to her. “Do the stairs again,” he said to Rùnach. And then he walked away.
“Och, and how many times is that, my lord?” Losh breathed.
Rùnach straightened with a groan. “Don’t ask, and I am no lord.”
Aisling had to admit he certainly carried himself like one, though she perhaps wasn’t the best one to judge. She watched as he nodded to her, then turned and trotted back down the steps she had come up earlier.
And that wasn’t the only thing that was threatening to come up. She put her hand over her belly.
“I don’t feel well,” she said, then clapped her hand over her mouth.
“Wine,” Losh said quickly, taking her by the arm. “Och, but you’ve an arm like a girl.”
She supposed she would argue with him later. At the moment, she thought perhaps a bit of wine might help settle her stomach. Memories of her last evening’s activities were very fresh in her mind, and she didn’t think she would particularly want to be washing it off the stone of the passageway.
By the time evening shadows had fallen, she had ventured a bit of soup in the buttery and was happily, if not carefully, following Losh to the upper hall. She was very dizzy, but she hadn’t been about to argue with him as to their destination. She had to speak to Weger and she had to do it soon.
She wished she could say she’d spent the afternoon counting and recounting the past three se’nnights of her life like precious pearls in the hands of a rich man on the verge of certain death, but the truth was she’d spent the afternoon asleep. It seemed a poor way to enjoy what could quite possibly be the last day of her life, but she had simply sat down on the bed in her chamber, then woken unable to feel her hand that she had apparently chosen to use as a pillow. She’d had no memory of any of it.
>
She now followed behind Losh, not bothering to spare the effort to nod at him every five paces as he looked over his shoulder to make certain she was still behind him. She didn’t have the strength. It was all she could do to put one foot in front of the other and continue on.
Losh paused in front of a sturdy door, then knocked. The door was opened, Losh tiptoed in, and she followed him. She ignored the jeers and slurs that greeted their entrance. Perhaps it was fortunate most of it sounded unintelligible. She spared a brief thought for Rùnach’s perfect elocution—the man who claimed he was not a lord but spoke like a lord’s son—then hazarded a look at her surroundings.
The garrison hall was surprisingly large. There were windows all along the far side save where they were broken up by more books than she had ever seen in the entirety of her life. She didn’t suppose she would manage to familiarize herself with them, which saddened her, but business was business. She followed Losh across the floor, ignoring the groups of men she passed who were talking of bloodshed and sieges, then sat with her guide on a long bench pushed up against a rather rustic bookcase. It was conveniently close to the hearth at the far end of the hall, though, which put her within leaping distance of Weger himself.
He was sitting in front of the fire, looking like nothing more than a man who had spent a hard day in the fields and was now enjoying a very welcome cup of ale. She was slightly surprised to find Rùnach there, sitting across from him, but perhaps Weger too enjoyed Rùnach’s crisp consonants and posh vowels.
“I think he’s an elf.”
She looked at Losh in surprise. “What?”
Losh nodded toward Rùnach. “Him. He’s an elf.”
“Don’t be daft,” she said without hesitation. “Of course he’s not. A lord, perhaps, but not an elf.”
“Why not?”
She would have snorted derisively if she’d had the energy, but she didn’t, so she merely shot Losh a look. “He doesn’t have pointed ears, of course.”
Losh rolled his eyes. “Have your lived all your life in a barn? There’s a difference between them all.”
“The only difference is the tales they find themselves in,” she said dismissively, “which is the only place they exist.” She paused, then looked at him seriously. “I’m sorry to disillusion you, Losh, but that’s the truth of it.”
And it was. She was very well-read, having devoured all Mistress Muinear’s well-loved books over the course of her incarceration at the Guild, everything from science to philosophy. The only reason she’d ever heard of elves had been that Mistress Muinear had occasionally unbent far enough to loan her a glorious, tatty tome full of myths and legends of the Nine Kingdoms. She’d gotten to the point where she’d been too old to enjoy it, but it had provided her with a goodly amount of entertainment in her youth.
Losh was looking at her as if she’d lost her wits. “You ain’t serious.”
“The Heroes of legend are real, of course,” she conceded, “but those other mythical creatures?” She shook her head. “Fanciful imaginings.”
“’Tis the fever, isn’t it?”
“I don’t have a fever.”
“Then someone has led you astray,” he said seriously. He paused, looked around him as if he stood to impart very secret and important knowledge and wanted no one else to overhear him, then leaned closer to her. “There are elves, and then there are elves. Most mere mortals don’t get close enough to tell the difference.”
“Then how would mere mortals possibly know what they look like?”
“Because there have been those who’ve gotten close and they’ve done the rest of us a goodly service by reporting what they’ve seen.”
“How convenient.”
He pursed his lips, then continued on. “Most elves have pointy ears. Well, the elves of Ainneamh have pointy ears. The ones from An Céin don’t, neither do the ones from Tòrr Dòrainn.” He paused again and frowned. “At least I think the ones from Ainneamh do. I wouldn’t know, never having seen one myself, but I’ve heard they look like something that has stepped out of a dream, all glittering and terrifying.” He looked at her seriously. “They look right through you as if you wasn’t there. That’s odd, isn’t it?”
“Weger does that,” Aisling said, “and I’m fairly sure he’s not an elf.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure.” He looked at Weger, then shook his head. “Since I came here, I’m not sure about anything. Not even elves.”
She could safely say she wasn’t sure about anything either. She had been convinced she was going to die the night before, yet she’d woken that morning, still breathing. Though perhaps that wasn’t going to last as long as she had hoped. Her stomach made a terrible noise that had not only Losh but half a dozen others looking her way. She put her hand over her mouth, but that didn’t stop the feeling of her supper beginning to crawl up the back of her throat.
Only this time the feeling was more violent than it had been the night before. Perhaps she’d been granted one more day, as a grace and a warning. She pushed herself to her feet and managed to remain there, however unsteadily.
“Where’re you off to?” Losh asked in astonishment.
“Must talk to Weger,” she said thickly.
He tried to stop her; she would give him credit for that. She shoved him away from her, a little surprised she was able to manage it, then stumbled across the floor to the hearth. Rùnach looked up as she came, then jumped to his feet. Perhaps she looked determined. Perhaps he feared she would puke down the back of his tunic. She didn’t care. She clutched the arm he held out toward her and vowed to weave him something made of any color but grey at her earliest opportunity, then put herself in front of Weger. She cleared her throat.
He ignored her.
She took a deep breath and spewed out words whilst she still could.
“I must speak to you, my lord.”
He looked up at her. “Must you, indeed?”
She nodded.
Weger considered her for several heartbeats in silence—though she had no silence inside her head. She could hear her heart beating as if it were a great river rushing in her ears.
He finally looked at the handful of men gathered there and nodded sharply toward the door. “Privacy.”
The men grumbled as they rose. Several of them shot Aisling looks that said they were heartily unhappy she had ruined their pleasant evening.
Weger waited until they’d gone, then looked at her. “Talk.”
Aisling looked nervously at Rùnach, then back at Weger. “In private, my lord.”
“Your master there won’t care what your wee concerns are, little lad, so spew them out, but be quick. I have a hot fire and a bit of dessert waiting for me in my chamber. You’re standing between me and it, and that place is perilous.”
“I need a soldier,” she blurted out. She supposed that could have been done better, but perhaps simply stating her needs was the best way to go about it all.
Weger yawned. “For what?”
She glanced at Rùnach, but he was only watching her without expression on his half-ruined face. She took a careful breath, then looked back to Weger.
“For business that I have been foresworn not to reveal.”
“Important doings, eh?”
“Very, my lord.”
“And just what sort of gold do you have for the hiring of a soldier?”
She felt a little faint. “I had a goodly amount, but it was stolen from me in Istaur. The rest of my goods were taken in Sgioba.”
“Not all that handy in protecting yourself, are you?”
“I never had the need,” she said. Her voice sounded tinny to her own ears. Not only that, an annoying buzzing had started in her ears. That and the flutterings in her midsection were starting to become quite alarming.
“Lad, you had best realize that the need has arisen.” He folded his arms over his chest. “What do you have to trade?”
She wished she’d had the peddler’s gold. She wished sh
e’d had a bright sword with a gem-encrusted hilt. She wished she had had anything to trade but perhaps something Weger wouldn’t even be interested in. But since it was all she had, it would have to do.
She turned her back to Weger and pulled the book from under her tunic. She looked down at it in her hands, though she would be the first to admit she was having a hard time seeing it. There was a very large O carved into the cover, and that cover was splattered with a few stains she had always hoped hadn’t been blood. It was obviously something Ochadius had treasured, so perhaps Weger would find some value in it as well.
She took a deep breath, turned, and then handed it to him.
He took it with a frown, opened the cover, then froze. The book dropped from his fingers suddenly, but he made no move to retrieve it. It was Rùnach who reached over, picked it up, and handed it back to him.
“Where,” Weger asked in a garbled tone, “did you get that?”
“I bought it,” she said.
“And what is it you’re thinking of doing with it?” he asked, looking at her sharply. “Selling it back to me at a premium?”
“That hadn’t occurred to me,” Aisling said, wondering why it hadn’t. She looked at him hesitantly. “Would you—”
“What, buy back my own damned words stolen from me by some…some…some—” He spluttered for a moment or two, then slammed the book down on the table by his elbow. He rose and glared at Rùnach. “Get this creature out of my sight before I kill it.”
Aisling blinked. “But I need your help—”
He snarled a curse at her, then turned and shoved a chair out of his way before he strode furiously across the hall and slammed out the door.
“And now off we go to bed,” Rùnach said, rising and retrieving the book. He tucked it under his arm, then took her by the elbow and pulled her along with him. “I think a sturdy door between you and the lord of Gobhann would be a very sensible thing to have at the moment.”