by Kirby Crow
"You are looking better, too,” Liall commented. “There is color in your face again, and you have no bruised look beneath your eyes."
Scarlet knew he had lost some weight and looked thin and unwell compared to all these strong, hale men on board, especially Oleksei. He glanced up at Liall, feeling suddenly embarrassed. “Thank you,” he said awkwardly.
"Whatever for?"
"For taking care of me when I was ill."
Liall gave Scarlet one of his mocking looks. “My motives are entirely selfish. I enjoy your company."
Scarlet and spat again into the water. “Such as it is.” He smiled uncertainly at Liall, knowing that his clothes needed a good wash and that his hair was unkempt and his nails grimy. Liall, on the other hand, was as imposing as ever in a long black cloak with hood and gray woolen breeches and new boots. The cloak was embroidered with silver and blue at the edges and had a sturdy gold clasp at his throat in the shape of a crouching bear. He was sure that Liall would draw looks in any crowd, and he suddenly felt grubby and small beside him, like a plain-feathered robin gazing up at an eagle.
Scarlet realized he was staring. Liall's mouth curved and he reached out to stroke Scarlet's unruly hair into place.
"What are you thinking, redbird?"
"Nothing,” he replied quickly, and felt his face heating up.
Mautan the mate appeared and said something to Liall. Liall nodded to Mautan and spoke a few words in scratchy Sinha, a language that must be spoken in the back of the throat to get it right. The mate moved away with a rolling, sailor's stride that utterly nullified the swaying of the deck, looking as steady as a goat wandering along a flat path. Liall could do this, too, but so far the trick had eluded Scarlet.
"I must speak with the captain now,” Liall said. “Stay here in the sun for a bit; the fresh air will do you good."
Scarlet nodded. His strength was far from fully returned, and now his legs felt wobbly again and he was not ready to try breakfast again so soon after losing the first. Liall patted him on the shoulder and followed the mariner in the direction of the captain's cabin.
Scarlet watched him walk away and wished he knew more about Liall, about his family and why his presence was needed so urgently. He still did not really believe that Liall's country was the fairytale land of Rshan, and he was annoyed that every time he badgered Liall for details on his family, Liall would reply that it was too dangerous for him to know more than the barest information. The atya had offered to make up a charming lie, which irritated Scarlet so much that he refused to talk to him for the remainder of one evening. Too dangerous, indeed! Never mind that he had saved Liall's skin on arriving in Volkovoi, and that he had cleared the bravos so they could board the ship; it was too dangerous. Still, Liall seemed to believe what he was saying.
Tilting his face up into the wind, Scarlet closed his eyes and breathed the salt air, trying to be patient. Liall had been right about the fever and he had been right about being able to cure him of it, so perhaps he was right about Rshan. Yet, it bothered Scarlet's fierce sense of independence to be relying so much on someone else.
Scarlet's eyes flew open as a spate of Sinha near his ear startled him, and he turned to see a mariner he did not recognize standing quite close to his side. The blond mariner was grinning and Scarlet saw he had lost an eyetooth in some dockside battle or to scurvy.
"Sorry, I don't understand,” he said.
The mariner held up a silver bit and gestured, miming handing the coin to someone else.
No wiser, Scarlet looked over his shoulder, hoping to see Liall, but no luck there. He shrugged.
Still grinning, the man gripped the front of Scarlet's shirt and dropped the coin inside.
His jaw dropped. “What—” Scarlet began, but the mariner took hold of Scarlet's wrist and pressed the pedlar's hand firmly against his groin.
Shock held him immobile for a moment. He jerked his hand away, fumbled the coin out, and flung it at the mariner.
"Sheep-raping, dung-eating maggot!” he shouted and swung his fist. It connected solidly on target with the mariner's jaw, and the man staggered back. By the time Liall blessedly reappeared with the captain, Scarlet was shaking his numb hand and surrounded by angry, shouting mariners.
Scarlet was small and the mariner nearly twice his size, but the mariner was flat on the deck, holding his jaw. Neither the captain nor Liall seemed particularly impressed by this. Liall fixed Scarlet with a grim look.
"What happened?"
Scarlet told him the bare facts: “He tried to buy me into his bed."
"How?"
"He put a coin down my shirt and put my hand on him."
"So you punched him?"
"Yes!"
Liall was exasperated. “For Deva's sake, you can be such a child. Why not just return the coin?” Liall turned to the captain and began explaining.
Scarlet was coldly furious. He steadied himself against the rail while the offending mariner stood glaring. The man gave Scarlet a bleary look that held hatred, and Scarlet saw Oleksei smirking at him with satisfaction. He suddenly felt cold and alone.
Captain Qixa began speaking to his crew, his tone sharp. Liall spoke to Qixa and then to the mariner Scarlet had punched, his tone mild and humorous.
"What are you saying?” Scarlet demanded. “Don't apologize for me."
Liall turned on him. "Silence!" he hissed, his blue eyes so fierce that Scarlet was shocked into obeying. Liall said several words to the crew again, then took hold of Scarlet's shoulder and began to hurry him toward the cabin.
"Come with me,” Liall said icily. “I vouched for your conduct on board and I've just had to explain myself to that swine you hit."
Scarlet wrenched away from Liall's grasp. “I didn't do anything! I was just standing there and he came up and—"
"I understood you the first time.” Liall pushed him through the open door of the cabin. “What you do not appear to understand is that you travel on this ship purely on sufferance and I have made my word of honor your bond. You must be more mindful with it."
Scarlet just breathed, so angry that he did not trust himself to answer right away. “Your honor,” he said flatly. “Am I supposed to protect yours and forget mine?"
Liall's expression softened. “No, of course not. But with your looks, surely you have dealt with this sort of thing before."
"You have a short memory, Wolf."
Liall looked immediately regretful and reached out to put a hand on Scarlet's shoulder.
"Keep your hands off me,” Scarlet said deliberately.
Liall's hand halted in mid-air and his expression went blank and emotionless. He turned on his heel so suddenly that the hem of his black cloak snapped behind him, and he left the cabin, closing the door firmly.
In the sudden silence, Scarlet sat on the floor and began going through his pack. If he could not go out, he might at least find something useful to do inside, and some of his clothes needed mending. His mind remained unsettled as he tried to work, and he began to wonder what he had gotten himself into by choosing to follow Liall. What did he know of the man, anyway? Only what Liall had told him and what he had personally observed from Liall's actions, which was a knot of contradictions so tangled that he despaired of unraveling it.
An hour passed before Liall returned. He entered with an apologetic look on his face and sat down on the floor next to Scarlet, his long legs sticking out.
"We both have sharp tempers,” Liall said carefully. “So, let us begin again. You must be careful how you behave, Scarlet. I do not want you to see you hurt, yet I cannot protect you from every man on board. That does not mean I would not try, but even I cannot prevail against so many."
Scarlet nodded grudgingly, not looking at him. “All right."
Liall tilted his head, trying to catch Scarlet's eye. “Do you understand? I do not think you were wrong to strike him, but you would have been wiser not to, considering our situation."
"Yes,” he sighed.
Liall patted Scarlet's knee, and then withdrew his hand quickly. “I know it is not pleasant, but it is necessity. You must realize that we are, in effect, in my lands now, and you must listen to me and heed my advice."
"I know.” Then, because he knew that he would have died if Liall had not nursed him during his fever, Scarlet ducked his head in apology. “I don't mean to be ungrateful."
Liall made a rude noise. “I do not want your gratitude. It is a meager substitute for friendship.” Scarlet remained silent. Liall turned and cupped Scarlet's face in his hands.
"Look at me, pedlar. Your thrice-damned honesty is one of the things I admire most about you. Another is that you do not coldly calculate before you act, but follow your instincts, however foolish they may be. That is honesty, too, in a way. A man always knows where he stands with you, red-coat. I value that.” His thumb brushed Scarlet's cheek. “Now that you know how impressed I am with your nature, please ... would you try not to be yourself so much, at least for now? It is the only way either of us will reach Rshan."
Scarlet nodded in reluctant assent, mollified by Liall's words even as he detested what was being asked of him. It galled him that to be so out of his element. Liall knew these mariners and their language and their ways. Scarlet had no choice but to rely on him.
Liall released him. The timbers creaked and the silence of the sea closed back in, making Scarlet feel like a creature trapped in a cage.
* * * *
It would be a mistake to care too much for this boy, Liall chided himself. He had left Scarlet brooding in the cabin and joined Qixa's table for dinner, as the captain had requested. He drew wet rings on the scarred oak table with the moisture beading up and pooling down from his metal wine cup and gave each ring a name. The first was Foolish, the second Reckless. His index finger hovered over the table just before closing the ring, and he named the third one Wrong.
Scarlet was a fraction of his age. Not only that, but Scarlet had never had a lover before. That thought was both attractive and terrifying, for if he fell in love with the pedlar, it would be an attachment not easily broken for either of them. He recalled how unexpectedly difficult he had found it to leave Scarlet for the first time in Byzantur, and then again for the second. Now, the thought of losing Scarlet filled him with a cold dread that he feared had less to do with love than self-preservation. On the day he left Rshan so many years ago, he had vowed to himself that no one, man or woman, would ever find a place in his heart again. The events that led up to that vow had not only shattered his faith in himself and his will to live, but it had very nearly split the kingdom of Rshan asunder.
I do not deserve to love, he concluded, and then was disgusted with himself for entertaining such a mawkish opinion. Impatiently, Liall passed his hand over the table, erasing the marks, and forcibly turned his attention to his host.
Liall knew little of Captain Qixa, but already he was beginning to trust the man. Liall liked his bluff manner, bordering on rudeness, and he observed that Qixa's crew obeyed him swiftly but without fear. This was a captain well-liked by his crew.
The common galley was ripe with the smell of the bilge and the air too close and warm. Liall had not been seasick in decades, but that night was the first time he came close to it since he was a boy. Dining at the captain's table of a brigantine ship and dining among the crew was not too terribly different. The crew ate waybread and salted meat and fresh fish and onions. As far as Liall could see, that was identical to what the captain and his quartermaster and first mate dined on. The only difference was the wine: pale green anguisange wine for their table, ale and imbuo for the crew. It was decent vintage too. Liall told Qixa as much while seated at his right hand. Qixa had tried to give sway and vacate the captain's chair, the place of honor, to Liall, but Liall had been able, with a stern look and a small shake of his head, to dissuade Qixa. There were those on board who knew of his true identity, but he feared pushing his luck too far. The bounty-price to prevent him from ever reaching the shores of Rshan would naturally be very high, perhaps even high enough to tempt a captain of men to seek another career elsewhere. Nemerl was a very large world.
At the lower table, Oleksei, who had been shadowing Liall's steps since he came aboard, raised his wooden cup to Liall in a small toast and grinned, displaying white teeth and comely, curved lips. Liall returned the gesture if not the expression, and was discomfited at the flash of pleasure on Oleksei's face. He wondered what the young man thought of Scarlet. Though it was true that he had led the crew to think of Scarlet as his property, the crew also patently believed them to be lovers. He had not bothered to deny it, feeling that there might be some safety in the fiction for Scarlet. At least it would—or should—render him untouchable by the crew, who might not even see him as human: a pet, perhaps, or just a possession of his that they need not consider beyond that.
Mautan leaned across the table and refilled Liall's cup. “He is better, the lenilyn?” he asked without real interest.
Lenilyn. Outlander. Non-person. “Much better. I thank you,” Liall answered tartly. The healer had been next to useless and had not seemed to care if Scarlet lived or died.
The mate grinned and shrugged and scratched under his arm. “Only my job. I was sure the little thing would die. Hilurin, is he? Must be made of tougher stuff than he looks."
"He is,” he said, casting a look at Oleksei, whose eyes seemed to be stuck on him.
"I don't see why you bother, myself. I would have pitched the scrawny git overboard just to stop him puking on me."
Liall took a drink of the excellent wine. “That would not do at all."
Qixa chuckled into his mug of wine. “Is he good between the sheets, your outlander?"
Liall realized he had gotten himself into a trap. If he said no, the crew would be even more curious, which might cause more trouble later. As it was, the crew seemed to be settling into the notion that Scarlet was Liall's personal property, and must be tolerated to some extent. Discouraging that view might be disastrous. “He is ... inventive,” he improvised, which was not a lie.
Mautan made an obscene gesture with his hand that invoked catcalls from the lower table. “I'll bet he's a tight piece, too. Where'd you find him?"
Liall was reluctant to relate the tale of the red-hooded pedlar and the wolf. For some reason, he wanted to keep it to himself, like it was a private moment between them, when it had been nothing of the sort.
Qixa put his mug down with a grave air and placed a sympathetic hand on Liall's shoulder. “Tell me, were you his first? Did you break him in well? Poor lad, to go all your life looking at little Byzan twigs, then to tackle a Rshan oak!"
"We were suitably impressed with each other."
Qixa laughed uproariously and pounded the table until he and Mautan had tears running from their eyes. Mautan was a humorous fellow who often laughed. He and Qixa had a comfortable relationship that reminded Liall of Peysho and Kio, and Liall was suddenly and unexpectedly struck with a pang of longing for his adopted home. Of all the strange things he had known in life, to be suddenly homesick for the Southern Continent, a country he had been raised to think of as barbaric and dirty, peopled with backward savages, took him utterly by surprise. He took a drink to cover it, and his eyes wandered the hall. Below him, he saw that Oleksei was giving Qixa a sour look for having mentioned Scarlet at all.
Liall sighed and looked away before Oleksei could flash his handsome smile again. There were other matters that begged his attention. Liall turned to Qixa and began to ask him, in carefully respectful tones, what he knew of the current situation in Rshan.
Qixa had gossip but no real news of the court, and it was that which Liall needed to hear. The captain knew that the old king-consort was dead, and that the crown prince, whose name was Cestimir, was too young to inherit and could not hold the support of the barons. Scant enough information, and the rest was rumor and fish-wife gossip, useless and probably years old. The food was tasteless and Liall was tire
d and wanted to lie down, but he could not quit the table until the captain did. Some traditions are courtesy everywhere. The good wine kept him occupied and he refilled his cup again and again, drinking until his headache went away and the stench of the bilge did not bother him so much.
* * * *
As the night wore on, Scarlet dozed and woke fitfully. He got up several times to drink water and chew on the generous portions of hard waybread and smoked fish Liall had left for his dinner. Though he knew his acute hunger stemmed from his recent sickness and his body's attempt to recoup the weight he had lost, he found it difficult to work up an appetite for the taste of stale waybread and fish. Liall had also left the rose-scented che. He contemplated venturing out for hot water, and then thought better of it. If there was trouble, he would be blamed for it because he disobeyed Liall's orders. That unfairness nettled him, and he settled uncomfortably in the bunk and tried to give his mind some occupation by going over the pedlar's routes to Rusa from Nantua and Dorogi. They were much trickier than the straight routes down the Snakepath through the Nerit and the Bledlands. He had planned, once upon a time, to hire a map-maker to sit down with him and illustrate the circuitous pathways, with their names and hazards and what a pedlar could expect to find on the way, but he supposed that was idle thought now. He had little use for a map of Byzantur at present.