Zarrin snatched up a stool and slammed a dog's head. The stool splintered, but the dog was hammered flat. Snatching out her sword, Zarrin took reckless aim and skewered the gnasher mangling Tamlin's leg. Blood fountained as its throat was pierced. Tamlin kicked the dying dog loose. The other dodged Zarrin's blade, snapping and snarling.
Temporarily free, Tamlin saw they were armpit-deep in rabid killers.
Flat on his back, Vox staved off one beast by the throat while pushing another back with his axe haft. Unable to free his weapon, he kicked a third brute. Escevar danced above him, swiping and slashing at jumping animals with smatchet and sword. A frustrated animal circled Escevar to dive for Vox's face. The swordmaster tried to roll when Escevar was tumbled by a dog ramming his belly.
Escevar flopped over Vox with a pair of snarling dogs atop him. Human and gnasher legs kicked around Vox's head. Escevar's blades swirled like a wind-whipped windmill. The animals gripped by Vox tugged free to escape the circle of steel. The swordsman flipped over on all fours. Escevar was dumped on his side. Dogs pounced on Vox's bearskin back. Swearing like a fury, Escevar stabbed wildly to protect himself and punctured his own thigh with his smatchet. Bleeding, Escevar stabbed, then lunged to gain his feet. Vox bumped his hip, and the two thumped back to back. Where in the name of Seven Sinners was Tamlin?
The Heir of Uskevren lurked behind a table that Zarrin had dumped and dragged against the wall. It formed a solid barricade, but the ends gaped open. A darting dog clamped Zarrin's boot heel. Zarrin shucked the boot but blundered into Tamlin and whacked her nose against the wall. The thought of a bloody swollen nose stoked her fiery temper, and Zarrin screamed as she slashed steel at anything that moved.
Tamlin armed himself with steel in each hand, but wrongly, so the smatchet jutted down and the sword tipped up. He whipped both, but steel clashed uselessly on steel. Still, he struggled to see what went on elsewhere, knowing they had to quit the room.
Shadows swooped and swung as someone banged his head on a lantern. In the crazy light, Zarrin shrieked a battle cry and whacked at milling, growling, jumping gnashers until blood speckled the walls and ceiling. Zarrin's four servants crouched in a corner behind stools and benches, and through cracks and over the tops poked dogs to hold them at bay. Escevar and Vox, bloody and sandy and fighting mad, stood back to back slicing and stabbing. As Tamlin watched, Vox feinted high, then drove his huge axe so hard a dog's head split and the blade chonked deep into pine floorboards.
Swiping where he could, Tamlin tried to count, but dogs had overrun the room, a dozen or more. To his left, six monsters breached the makeshift barricade and savaged Zarrin's servants. Two, no, four more dogs skittered into the room, panting for blood.
Howling, Zarrin jumped the table to protect her servants. Tamlin was left alone as seven dogs scuffled to attack him.
"Can't stay here!" the heir muttered. Flicking his blades wide, gritting his teeth, he vaulted the table and almost landed on a dog. Instantly the monsters champed at his boots and clothes. One winged creature hop-skipped to tear off his head. As Tamlin dodged frantically, the dog sailed by and crashed into its companions. Punching heads with his pommel and snapping his smatchet, Tamlin raced toward Escevar and Vox. His only plan was to die with his comrades like a hero in a folktale, yet to be eaten by ugly dogs seemed a foolish and frivolous death.
"Vox!" Panting, Tamlin kicked a dog headlong. He yelled so the warrior wouldn't whack him with a back-swing. "Escevar! We must get out-"
Vox whipped his axe down but missed a dog. The blade bit the wooden floor, and Vox let go the jutting haft. Whirling, Vox's craggy hands grabbed Tamlin and hoisted him bodily off the floor. "Vox! What are you-"
Toted like a baby overhead, Tamlin glimpsed the night lights of the stockyard and a starry sky out the open window. Then he squawled as his boots passed the window frame. "Vox! No-"
Pitched feet-first out the window, Tamlin wailed as he sailed through the air, but not for long. A howl ended with a grunt as his back slammed a forgiving pile, then a cry as he bit his tongue. Winded and agonized, Tamlin sucked air and a gushing aroma of cows. Vox had chucked him in a towering manure pile heaped beside the big doors.
Groaning, limping, shedding filth, Tamlin tottered to his feet. Head spinning, he sheathed his weapons and looked up at the window. A head flickered and disappeared. Tamlin heard yells and shouts and a vicious unending snarling and barking. He needed to rejoin the fray. He was no great talent as a fighter, but his friends and Zarrin needed every hand to fend off the monsters. Gnashers, Zarrin called them. Curious name.
Groggily Tamlin stumbled to the big barn doors, which stood open a shoulder's width. Faint lights glowed inside, or maybe sparkled in his head, since he felt dizzy. A sound arrested him. A whistle.
The whistle came from outside the barn, so the hillman, the dog trainer, was out here with Tamlin. The heir panted, "Not good news," and made to duck through the door.
An answering whistle piped inside the judging hall.
Surrounded, Tamlin froze in the doorway -and was almost stampeded by a charging bull.
A big brindled brown-and-white bull bawled and shoved its massive horned head outdoors. Tamlin barely dodged as a horn like a dagger hooked near his breastbone. Bellowing like a war trumpet, the terrified animal banged the doors wide and rumbled past like a war elephant. Cows and sheep gamboled after, bleating and lowing as if fleeing a forest fire.
Unable to get inside, not safe outside, Tamlin spotted an outside staircase and galloped up that. He hoped no animals pursued, but with his luck, he thought glumly, giant apes or mountain goats would climb for high refuge and butt him off the stairs.
A rough door at the top proved locked. Tamlin was debating where to try next when the door was flung open, almost clopping him in the jaw. Escevar and Vox, bloody and disheveled and armed with bare steel, skidded to a halt just before Tamlin was bowled down the stairs.
"Hold hard!"
"Watch it yourself! Are you all right?"
"What's happening in there? "
"Yes! Where's Zarrin?"
"Dunno!"
Tamlin and Escevar gabbled while Vox signaled madly. Below, the livestock still stampeded from the judging hall. Then the full pack of panting gnashers, winged and otherwise, erupted out the door in a brown river. Sharp whistles, three or more, shrilled through the stock market. The pack split and split again and vanished into the shadows.
In the sudden quiet, the men caught their breath. Tamlin asked, "Vox, why'd you pitch me out the window?"
"Oog!" Escevar sniffed. "Deuce, you stink!"
"Thank you, dear friend, for so kindly enumerating my faults regarding personal hygiene. Vox?"
The mute veteran's hands sketched in the air. Tamlin interpreted, "The dog-things, gnashers, were only after me and Zarrin? How do you know that? They broke off the attack once I was gone and Zarrin bolted out the door? Ah. That explains… nothing. I don't get it."
"None of us get much," sighed Escevar. He propped one leg on a riser because his punctured thigh throbbed. "The whistling hillmen must have sent the gnashers into the building after you and Zarrin. Remember she was attacked earlier, just as we were? This was a golden opportunity with both you valuable nobles in one cozy room. Why they want to catch or kill either of you…"
Tamlin flexed his right hand. Mashed earlier by a table, it swelled so his glove constricted like a tourniquet. "My, my, what a night. We should have gone boozing instead. Oh, well, let's get home and change clothes-again. At least Father will be pleased that I negotiated the gate tariffs before Zarrin disappeared."
*****
"… mutton-headed, crack-brained, slack-jawed, crosseyed, granite-skulled acts of depraved lunacy and sheer eye-popping idiocy it has ever been my misfortune to witness, let alone partake in!"
Thamalon Uskevren the First was only warming up. Agitated beyond belief, he paced before the fire in his counting room. Tamlin squirmed in a high-backed wooden chair while Vox and
Escevar stood equally mute behind.
"Why give away only the gate tariffs?" the elder raged. "Why not give away all our contracts? Why not rip the key to the family coffers from my aged, palsied hand, and throw open the gates of our miserable shack of a homestead, and use both hands to strew our gold and silver in the streets for every beggar to scoop up? What have I ever done in this lifetime that the gods punish me with a son who carries cobwebs in his empty skull? Why did not the fates send me a drooling, gibbering moron that I might have, in some tiny way by dint of long hours of excruciating labor, trained to do useful work such as fetching wood or slopping hogs? Instead, I suffer the sharpest torments by seeing this melon-headed twit tear down all my work and hurl my fortunes to the winds from the highest towers of Stormweather, our ancestral homestead for the moment, because I have no doubt that come tax time we will be impoverished and huddling in the gutters because of my son's blatant, ham-handed blundering-"
There was much more, but finally the elder ran out of breath. He collapsed in a chair and slugged Usk Fine Old gone cold. Thamalon Uskevren, "The Old Owl," looked like his son. He'd grown gray and seamed but never stooped, and his dark green eyes and still-black brows could summon a scowl to cower a prince, let alone someone who'd squandered his money. The room reflected the man: tidy, aesthetic, intellectual, buttoned-down. A table neatly was laid with a late-night snack, a chess game waited, a stack of books lay open. A hushed ease with luxury and old money and secrets emanated from the walls.
When the echoes of the tirade died, Tamlin cleared his throat softly. "If I don't guess amiss, you seem upset, Father. Is it possible that, though we shouldn't dwell on an unpleasant subject, you could see fit to say why?"
"Why?" The patriarch glared until Tamlin felt like a chipmunk facing a timber wolf. Thamalon bit off every word. "Because you failed to negotiate a contract to the family's advantage, son. That's why."
"Ah." Tamlin digested the news, but concentrating was an unaccustomed activity. "Uh, might you explain how? I did secure the taxation rights to the, uh, West Gate where the farmers come in. That promises to bring a pretty penny."
Thamalon made a strangling noise and chugged wine as if quaffing poison. Heaving a tremendous sigh, he conceded, "Yes, the gate will bring a penny or two. That's what farmers deal in: pennies. They don't have many to spare, you see, after the Hulorn's tax collectors circulate among the farms and extract the taxes first. All our family can collect at the western gate is a poll tax on livestock: a penny a head. In a good day, we might collect a hundred pennies or more."
"Ah." Tamlin pretended to ponder. "A hundred pennies. That'll buy… uh…"
"See my son, the Minister of Finance, who doesn't know what anything costs, calculate," snapped the father. "A hundred pennies might buy you a new pair of gloves, Tamlin. Not a lot, considering you've lost twelve pairs so far this winter. Your clothing budget, by the way, is treble what the younger children spend, but we'll scream about that later. For now, let me explain why I wish Zarrin Foxmantle were my son and you, Tamlin Uskevren the Second, were a fish cutter lost in a storm in a leaky boat on the Lake of Dragons!"
The lord rose, as did his voice. "Of course Zarrin would want the North Gate's tariffs! And not because their family manor stands in the neighborhood: What kind of jabber-jawed excuse is that? All the traffic from Ordulin and Surd and Tulbegh comes through the North Gate, and unlike the Mulhessens, who use the West Gate and send their tariffs ahead, the northern traffic is completely untaxed, which means the duties are collected at the gates! Further, the northern gate overlooks the Elzimmer Bridge, which charges for foot traffic and collects duties on all incoming ships' cargoes! So, while you're standing at the West Gate collecting cow chips and getting dust in your eyes, my lamentably eldest and empty-headed son, the Foxmantles will sprain their backs lugging away all that tax money! I can't believe how badly you botched this mission! How did poor Zarrin Foxmantle keep from bursting a blood vessel holding in her laughter? When word of this gets out, I'll be the laughingstock of Selgaunt!"
In a brittle silence, Tamlin said, "Perhaps, dear father, if you'd explained all this beforehand, I might've-"
Tamlin froze as the Old Owl thrust his face inches from his nose. With eyes smoldering below black brows, the patriarch hissed in an icy frightening whisper. "I-did- explain. You-didn't-listen."
"Oh," Tamlin squeaked. "Quite right. But it was so-complicated. All those variations. 'If this, then that, unless this, in which case that' stuff. I apologize. If there's anyway to make it up-"
"There is." Looming upright, looking very tall despite his middling height, the lord pointed a bony finger at the door. "Take your dishonor guards and go. Find Zarrin and undo this miserable deal."
"Uh, now?" Tamlin faked a yawn. "We've been dragged through the mill, Father, what with being attacked twice now by devil dogs and slung across ice and pitched out windows-"
"Go!"
The three listeners rose as if levitated and scurried out the door. Trotting down the wide circular stairs, they heard the liege lord scuffing hard behind in soft slippers. By the time they reached the door, courteously held open by a sleepy footman, Thamalon had final orders.
"Go," he told his son. "Get out there, find Zarrin, and fix what you've botched. Or I'll cut off your allowance, burn your clothes, sell your goods, cashier your servants, strike your name out of the city registry, and boil you in red pepper oil!"
The three delinquents stepped into the cold night, but Tamlin peeked through the crack of the door. "Uh, father, I know I haven't performed to your satisfaction but, just curious, you see, you don't really mean that last bit, do you? About the red pepper oil and such?"
Slowly the door creaked shut. Tamlin watched his father's narrow face grow narrower. Through a slash of a mouth, he growled, "Son, I'm afraid I do."
The door slammed.
Locked outside on high stone steps on a windy wintry black night, Tamlin looked at the door awhile, then at his friends. Grinning, he assured them, "He doesn't really mean it."
Biting their tongues, Vox and Escevar trudged down the stairs.
*****
"Funny, I thought Father would be pleased." The three companions trudged down the middle of Sarn Street, temporarily homeless if one didn't count Tamlin's two tall-houses and three guest apartments scattered throughout the city. The heir rambled, "He should be glad I settled the contract so quickly. When I'm forced to attend his business meetings, they drag for hours. All that talk about money-ick!"
"If it weren't for those business meetings," grumped Escevar, huddled against the cold and hating it, "you'd never get any sleep."
"That's true," Tamlin admitted. "Still, Zarrin rolled over so easily, agreeing to everything I said, I thought she'd been melted by my charm."
Vox walked behind, watching the street to both sides, signing nothing. Escevar stumped beside his charge, muttering, "I don't have any great head for business, Deuce, but even haggling in the marketplace you never pay the first price asked. You agreed to Zarrin's proposal in an eye-blink, then moved on to celebrating!"
"True, true. Still, I'm new at this 'work' stuff. So far it's dreadfully dull. What shall we do?"
"Find Zarrin, according to your father." Escevar's voice dripped acid. "It's hard to believe you are his son sometimes. Or most of the time."
"Find Zarrin… hmm…" Tamlin's cape whipped around his shoulders while frozen snow pinged his cheeks. Vox's bearskin had begun to frost over. Escevar cursed the gods of snow, winter, storm, and a few others. "Where do you think she might be?"
Escevar counted to twenty rather than thump his friend's head. The trio had already tried the Foxmantle homestead. The gatekeeper wouldn't admit them, it being enemy territory, but a maid admitted Zarrin had gone to the stockyards earlier and not yet returned.
"If Zarrin's not home," Escevar chided, "she's probably carousing in a pub, feet propped up by the fire and a hot caudle in her hand, toasting her success in selling you down the river!"
"Right." Tamlin nodded, then turned so abruptly he banged into Escevar. "Sorry, old chap. Let's try some pubs. I'm dry anyway. All this negotiating makes one thirstier than sword practice."
Escevar blinked snow off his eyelids as Tamlin drove for a lighted doorway. "Hey, I was joking!"
From behind, Vox voiced a single grunt that said, The last time you two had sword practice, candles drooped in their sockets from the heat.
Sarn Street was more commonly called "Souse Street." Sixteen pubs lined the north side of the avenue alone, and over the hours the determined adventurers hit every one. In each tavern, Tamlin greeted friends and strangers, bought rounds of drinks, told droll stories, hooked his arms around laughing women and, at Escevar's prompting, asked if anyone had seen Zarrin. As the night progressed and the pub count climbed, Tamlin made more friends, groped more women, and told longer stories, and even Escevar had forgotten Zarrin. Vox went along dutifully to each pub, drank little, watched everywhere, and tapped his foot in disgust.
Eventually Tamlin and Escevar stumbled into The Black Stag, the last pub on the street, and collapsed onto benches. Unlike most pubs, where the furniture was too heavy to throw and the room stood wide open so barkeepers could see what went on, the Stag had high-walled booths and shadowed nooks and dim lights, which made it a favorite meeting place for flesh-pushers, pawners and fences, poisonous apothecaries, slavers, smugglers, second-story thieves, and other "servants of the underclass." Still, frequenting such a dangerous place made visitors feel dangerous, so noble youngsters in the form of toffs, simps, bawds, and fops congregated. Naturally, many were Tamlin's friends, or at least friendly. Barely had the Uskevren heir plunked down than he called for a round of Stag Stout for his best friends, some of whom he could even name.
"This is a great place to ask for-whatever it is we look for," Tamlin babbled. "The Stag's famous for-trouble and-strangers. Best place for the worst things, what? Barkeep, where's that stout?"
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