by J F Rivkin
Kneeling before the opening, Nyctasia saw that the wall was thick and solid except for the round hole piercing it behind this one barrel. The hidden chamber beyond was dimly lit by a small fire and a lamp hanging from a hook in the low ceiling. Once inside, she found that she could just stand upright, and she noted with approval that the little room had been swept and scrubbed clean. Fresh straw and mats of rushes covered the floor, to withstand the chill, and Lorr lay on a deep pile of pelts and coverlets by the hearth, wrapped in woolen blankets and fleecy sheepskin. His hands were hidden by warm, furred gloves.
But he looked to Nyctasia as if he were still huddled in the hay like a cornered animal. He struggled to sit upright when she approached, cringing away, until Jenisorn crawled into view behind her.
“Don’t worry, this is my cousin Nyc that I told you about-the Lady Nyctasia, I ought to say-from Rhostshyl, on the coast.” Jenisorn reached back through the hole and fitted both the front and back pieces of the cask into place again.
Even if someone opened the lid, there’d be nothing to see but an empty barrel.
He came and knelt beside Lorr, who clutched at his hand desperately. “She’s a healer, don’t you remember? She’ll soon have you fit again.”
“Why?” Lorr whispered, trembling. “It’s too late. I-I’m not afraid of death… only of d-death at the hands of the Saetarrin… Please…”
Nyctasia could imagine what sort of death would be dealt to a slave who’d killed his master. Jenisorn looked to her for help, and she too knelt by the pallet-bed and gently touched Lorr’s fever-flushed face. There was only one way to comfort him. “You are safe in this house,” she said firmly, “and when you’re strong enough to go, I’ll brew a deadly poison for you to take with you. Just a prick of it with a needle, or a drop on the tongue will kill in mere moments. If you’re taken, you’ll have a swift death at your command. Your enemies shan’t have you.”
For the first time, relief showed in the youth’s face. “You are merciful, lady,” he said weakly, bowing his head to her. In Nyctasia he recognized someone who had also known despair.
“But take heart,” urged Jenisorn. “They’ll not hunt for you forever. You may yet escape with your life. They’re sure to think you were lost in the storm and froze to death somewhere.”
“Yes, perhaps,” he said, as if to reassure Jenisorn.
He was clearly too exhausted for further talk, and Nyctasia bade him lie down again, while she looked over his wounded back. He gasped in pain as she uncovered the angry, swollen welts, but he made no complaint. Jenisorn turned away, and Nyctasia too was sickened at what she saw. Flogging was a common punishment in her homeland, for petty crimes of theft or brawling, but she had never seen at close hand how a really vicious beating tore the flesh. “Have you washed these wounds with vinegar?” she asked at last.
Jenisorn nodded. “Thrice in the day. And leeching-wort. We’ve tried ice for the swelling-”
“Don’t use ice. It may ease the pain, but it can hinder healing,” said Nyctasia.
She gathered up the stained bandages and threw them on the fire, then cut a wide piece from one of the blankets and laid it lightly over Lorr’s back. “Wool’s best for this,” she explained. “It may help draw out the poisons.”
“Nyc, I’ve been bathing his face with snow, against the fever,” Jenisorn said worriedly. “Was that wrong?”
“No, that can do no harm. But never keep ice on a wound for long, remember.” She helped Lorr roll onto his side and wrapped the woolen bandage around him, then draped the covers over him carefully, trying not to let them press on his back.
“Lie like that if you can.”
Lorr looked up at her and gripped Jenisorn’s hand more tightly. “If not ice, fire then?” he asked faintly, his voice shaking.
“It may come to that. But if I cauterize your wounds, I’ll give you a drug first that will keep you in a deep sleep till I’ve finished. You needn’t distress yourself over that.”
He closed his eyes and drew a long, shuddering breath. “Elixir of Painshade, no?
He was supposed to give me that when I was branded. I heard the smith say so
…”
Neither Nyctasia nor Jenisorn had to ask who it was he meant.
“Rest now,” said Nyctasia quietly, “and we’ll see what a bit of Vahnite wizardry can do.” With her knife she scraped a few coals from the hearth into the small brass bowl she’d brought with her. “This is only for burning a few leaves and herbs,” she explained, seeing that both boys were watching her apprehensively.
“You’re to breathe the smoke, Lorr, and that will help us to achieve a healing-trance together. Jheine, leave us now-someone has to stay awake. Light an hour-candle, and when it’s half-burned come back and waken me.”
Lorr reluctantly released his hand, and Jenisorn bent over to kiss him. “You’re safe with Nyc,” he promised. “I’ll soon be back. I’ll sleep here tonight. Nyc, pull the cask-lids fast after me.”
Nyctasia took his place beside Lorr and laid her hand on his brow, feeling the blood throbbing in his temple. His heartbeat was still strong-that was favorable. “Lean this way a little,” she instructed. “Breathe deeply.”
Dropping a small handful of crushed, powdery leaves over the coals, she held the bowl so that the wisps of bitter smoke drifted into his face. He choked and tried to turn away, but the fumes seemed to follow him, and he was suddenly too weak and dizzy to move. The floor was shifting dangerously beneath him, and unless he stayed perfectly still he would fall…
Nyctasia could feel the rope steady beneath her hand, leading her forward on an unswerving course through the dense, surging snowstorm. It was Lorr who struggled on ahead of her now, buffeted by the fierce wind, barely able to cling to the guide-rope. Fearing that without help he’d lose his hold and be lost, she called to him to wail for her, but the wind swallowed her words at once. A curtain of snow blew between them, and she lost sight of him completely.
When she reached the shelter of the porch, the door stood open, casting a bright beacon of light out into the starless, treacherous night. Had Lorr made his way to the house, or had he been swept away into the icy darkness? Nyctasia searched all through the building for him, hastening from room to room but finding them empty, and calling his name in vain.
11
“it’s not my fault!” Corson shouted. “How was I to know it was smugglers they were after? If they’d told us, I’d have warned her-that’s why they made rutting sure we didn’t know. There was nothing I could do! Do you want me to give the money back? That won’t help Destiver.”
She had tried to tell Destiver the same thing, on the way back to Chiastelm, but Destiver, wounded and in shackles, had only spat at her.
Annin looked as if she’d like to do the same. “Then what will help? You put her into prison-”
“I didn’t! She can blame herself. If she wasn’t a stinking smuggler-”
“If you weren’t a mercenary-!”
“They didn’t teach me any other trade in the army!”
“You didn’t have to take this job.”
“If I hadn’t, someone else would be fifty crescents the richer, and Destiver would still be in prison. I tell you, I didn’t sell her to the Guild. I’d have saved her if I could.”
“I don’t believe you. Everyone knows you hate her.”
Corson couldn’t deny that. “I can’t abide her. But you and Steifann like her, though only the Hlann knows why. I’d have done it for your sake, not hers, but I swear I’d have done it.”
“What’s to be done now, that’s the question,” Steifann reminded them. He had always disapproved of Corson’s profession, but, upon reflection, he couldn’t hold her responsible for Destiver’s arrest. “Destiver would be no better off if someone else had taken her,” he admitted, “but you might be better off, Corson, if someone else did the Guild’s dirty work for them.”
“You’d be better pleased, I daresay, if I’d taken the job Dest
iver offered me.
Then I’d be in prison with her now.”
“You needn’t have taken any sort of job-there’s plenty of work for you right here.” It was their old argument, never resolved between them. “But never mind that now. There must be something we can do about Destiver.”
“What about all those Rhaicimes and Jhaices you know, Corson? They should be able to obtain a pardon for her.”
“I know one Rhaicime, and I met one heir to a Jhaicery, and I left them both in the valleys of the Midlands. I wish to the Hlann that I’d stayed there myself.”
“Then they’re no use to us,” Steifann said reasonably. “But you do have friends on the city guard, Corson. Couldn’t you arrange for them to leave her cell unlocked one night and look the other way? We’d make it worth their while.”
Corson shook her head. “If she were just a thief or a common killer, it might be possible. But they wouldn’t dare let a smuggler get away from them. The Guild would have their heads for it.” The Maritime cities depended on trade for much of their revenues, and nothing could be permitted to interfere with their profits. The penalties for smuggling were as harsh as those for murder, and rather more likely to be enforced.
“But they might let you in to see her, on the sly,” Corson offered Annin.
“Well, you could bring her some food, I suppose,” said Walden.
“Or some ale,” Steifann suggested, “That’s what she’ll really be wanting.”
“Or a knife…” said Annin thoughtfully.
“That’s too dangerous. You’d be caught.”
“She’ll be hung if we don’t do something!”
“I have an idea,” said Trask.
The others looked at him with as much annoyance as surprise. “Corson, drop this brat down the well, would you?” Annin said sharply.
“With pleasure.”
“Don’t spoil the water, just throttle him and I’ll use him for stew-meat.”
Walden threatened to cook everyone, almost every day, but he always managed to sound as if he meant it.
“If you haven’t swept out the taproom, Trask, you’d better do it now,” Steifann ordered. “And if you have, go do it again.”
Trask sighed and picked up a broom, but only stood leaning against it lazily.
“If you’d listen to me for a change, I know of someone who might be of help,” he insisted. “Eslace av Ondra. She has influence on the Guild.”
“You don’t know Eslace av Ondra! An Ondra wouldn’t even use you for a footstool.”
“I didn’t say I knew her-there’s talk about her, that’s all. I’ve heard that she can be very generous, if one appeals to her in the right way.” He stroked the broom-handle suggestively.
“That’s the sort of thing you always hear,” Carson said scornfully. “Why haven’t you paid her a call yourself?”
“From all they say of Mistress Eslace, she has an eye for a man who’s big and brawny,” Trask explained, looking pointedly at Steifann. “There’s no accounting for taste.”
“Rot,” said Steifann.
Trask shrugged. “Please yourself. Destiver’s no friend of mine. But if half of what’s said is true, the daughter of Ondra would be well pleased to grant a hearing to a petition from the likes of you. Or you,” he added, turning to Walden. “If Mistress Omia could spare you for the night.”
The broad, barrel-chested cook was shorter than Steifann but no less muscular, and he could beat Steifann at arm-wrestling three tries out of five. But the only woman who interested Walden was Omia, his stout, good-humored wife and the mother of his numerous children. “I could do very well without Destiver myself.
I’m not her countryman and shipmate,” he said, grinning at Steifann. “I must yield to you the honor of pleading her cause with Madame Ondra.”
“It might be worth a try, at that,” said Annin.
Steifann considered the matter for a while, scratching at his bushy beard. “It couldn’t do any harm, I suppose. There’s no reason I shouldn’t address an Ondra.
I’m a respectable householder.”
Corson snorted. “You’re a common taverner!”
“The Ondra may give themselves airs, but they’re only traders, all in all.
They’re no better than the rest of us.”
“Well, the worst she can do is have you thrown out,” Annin reflected.
“We’ll see about that,” said Steifann decidedly. “More likely she’ll beg me to stay. But I’d better take a bath, all the same. Heat up some water. Trask, clean my good boots.”
Corson followed him into his room and watched moodily as he searched in a chest for his best shirt. “You never groom yourself for me,” she complained.
“I will,” Steifann promised, “when you’re someone of influence and consequence, instead of a worthless vagabond.”
“I always said you were a whore at heart.”
Steifann laughed. “I don’t blame you for being cross. You might have to make do without me tonight, poor creature. That must be hard to bear.”
“I’ll survive somehow,” Corson said darkly. “Maybe I won’t be here when you get back.”
Steifann pushed the hair back from his face and frowned. “Destiver and I came over from Azhes together, you know.”
“I know,” said Corson, burning with jealousy. She had never even been to the island nation of Azhes. That Steifann’s past did not include her was bad enough-that it did include Destiver was infuriating. “You Azhid always stand together.”
“We do, but it’s not just that.” He closed the door, then went to stand at the hearth, beckoning Corson to join him. “What you don’t know is that we can neither of us go back there, on pain of death. We’ve both been condemned for high treason.”
Corson started. “High… but isn’t that treason against the throne? How-?”
“Not so loud, Corson. Destiver and I were on the crew of the Golden Feather. You must have heard of it.”
“The royal ship-the one that mutinied?”
He nodded, his face grim. “Not all of Destiver’s stories are lies. We did live by piracy for a few years. There was no other way for us to live. Oh, it was nothing like the bold adventures she blathers about when she’s drunk. It’s a shabby trade. But we could hardly go back home after we’d set His Sovereign Highness Prince Breazhwen adrift, and made off with a royal galleon. And there were regal rewards for our capture in all the ports of the mainland.” His voice was bitter. “They should have given us a reward for rebelling against that pestilent whelp Breazhwen! They only gave him command of the vessel to keep him away from court-everyone knew that. All very well for them at the capital, but Their Excellencies didn’t concern themselves about the crew that would be trapped aboard ship with him for months, subject to his vicious whims.” He spat into the fire.
Corson had suffered under some brutal commanders in the army, but she hadn’t been penned up with them in the middle of the ocean, where she could not even hope to desert. “You should have killed him!”
“It wasn’t for his sake that we spared him, I promise you. We hadn’t much chance of mercy if we were caught, but no chance at all if we threw him overboard.
Mutiny’s risky enough without murder.” He laughed suddenly. “And then someone did kill him, not a year after he returned to the palace. I suppose there was nothing else to be done. Asye knows we’d endured him as long as we could. We all tried to stay out of his way, but he noticed me, worse luck. I’m big even for an Azhid, though we’re not all such a puny lot as you Mainlanders.”
Corson smiled. It was an old joke between them. A southerner, she was fully as tall as Steifann, but she was one of the few people he’d ever met who was.
“He took a liking to me,” Steifann continued, with a grimace, “which was more dangerous than his dislike, in some ways. That mutiny probably saved my life
…”
After a long silence, Corson asked, “Why did you never tell me all this before?”
Steifann put his arm around her shoulders. “I’ve never told anyone. The others only know that Destiver and I were shipmates in the Azhid navy. I hadn’t the right to tell, you see-it was her secret as well as mine. She was one of the ringleaders. But it can’t make much difference to her now, I fear. I want you to know that I trust you, Corson-and that I owe it to Destiver to try what I can to save her.”
“Oh, of course you do, I know that. I wouldn’t mind cutting her throat myself, but I don’t much want to see her hang. She did sneak me out of the city last year, even if she charged me a fortune for it.”
“She could have earned much more by betraying you, you know.”
“All right, I don’t deny it. Go pay court to the whole Guild, for all of me. I wish you success of it, because I don’t think we can afford to bribe the magistrates.”
“Well, as long as you understand that it’s necessary,” Steifann said seriously.
He dragged the wooden tub out of the corner and pushed it over to the hearth.
Trask came in without knocking, poured a kettle of hot water into it and went back to the kitchen for more.
Steifann pulled off his boots and began to unlace his shirt. “Of course, I have heard that Eslace av Ondra’s still quite a handsome woman,” he remarked, grinning. “A pity that comb of yours only works on men.”
Corson threw the boots and a basin and ewer at him before she stormed out of the room, nearly knocking over Trask and his steaming kettle.
12
the saetarrin lost no time in inquiring after their fugitive bondservant. But the Edonaris household was astonished, and not a little disturbed, when Lady Avareth and her son paid them the honor of a visit themselves, instead of sending a messenger.
When informed of the noble pair’s approach, Mesthelde had hurried to the barn to find ’Deisha and send her to wash and change her clothes. As heirs to the Jhaicery, the two of them would be expected to be on hand to greet their lordly guests, but ’Deisha, who was attending to an ailing sow, was in no state even to welcome a roadworn peddler. She cursed and clambered out of the pen, complaining loudly that she’d prefer to spend the morning in the company of a sick pig than with the best of the Saetarrin.