Crier's Knife

by Neal Litherland

  “What can I get for that?” he asked.

  The younger woman took the jug, and walked it over to her elder. The old woman grunted, and hefted the jug. She examined it, tilting it this way and that to study the surface. She raised it to her face, and sniffed around the mouth.

  “Where you get this?” she asked, this time deliberately spacing the words out so her question was plain.

  “A man called Banys,” Dirk said. “A few days hence.”

  “He gave it to you with his own hand?” the dark-skinned man asked, leaning around the cloud of blue pipe smoke to get a better look at the jug. He had a strange, rolling accent Dirk couldn't place.

  “He did,” Dirk replied.

  The man nodded his head, and took his pipe out of his mouth. He blew a wide smoke ring, and then a smaller one, smiling as the one slid through the other. “Banys has not let a bottle of brew go in some time. You must have done something very special to earn it.”

  The old woman smiled, revealing the few nubs of brown teeth she had left. She gestured expansively around the inn space. She said something, but Dirk couldn't follow it.

  “Cry pardon?” he asked.

  “Name your price,” the younger woman said.

  “Ah,” Dirk said, nodding. “A meal for the night will do me. And one for myself and a friend when we come back through this way. We may need a bed that night, but tonight I will sleep in the yard.”

  The two women spoke softly, exchanging a rapid patois Dirk couldn't follow. The older one was frowning at the younger, and she shook her head several times when the younger made what looked like a suggestion. The dark man crossed his legs, and tapped the ashes from his pipe bowl onto the floor. Finally the older woman nodded, but she added a last word.

  “That is your price for the entire bottle?” the younger woman asked.

  “Aye,” Dirk said, nodding.

  “Done,” the old woman said, flashing her gap-toothed grin before speaking to her younger companion again. The washer woman nodded, and retreated into the kitchen. Dirk heard the clink of crockery, as well as the sound of a lid being drawn off a pot.

  “You could have gotten more for that,” the dark-skinned man said.

  Dirk shrugged. “I do not imbibe often. What I got was more than good value to me.”

  The man smiled, exposing rows of straight, white teeth. “Worth lies in the heart of the buyer, or so my father once told me.”

  “He sounds a wise man,” Dirk said.

  “No,” the other man said, his smile widening. “But he listened when wise men spoke, and made sure to store their words on his tongue.”

  The serving woman returned from the kitchen, a trio of cups balanced in one hand, and a bread bowl in the other. Dirk took the bowl, and found it was full of a thick, cool stew filled with chunks of carrots, onion, and what looked like rabbit. He sniffed it carefully, then tore a piece of bread from the rim. He dipped the bread into the slurry, and put it in his mouth. It was greasier than it looked, and overburdened with gravy, but he'd had worse in better places than this. It was heavily spiced, and while the seasonings burned, none of them made Dirk's tongue go numb, or his vision start to blur as the Crone Tongue had. The mistress, as Banys had said she would, was pouring draughts from the bottle. One for her, one for the man who'd yet to speak, and one for her serving woman. The spirit was strong, dark, and smelled of honey gone to seed.

  “This is good,” Dirk said, tipping the bowl to his lips, and drinking. The innkeep raised her cup in toast, then took a long sip of the thick nectar. The man with the crooked leg did the same, smacking his lips after his first taste.

  “It should be,” the younger woman said. “When Nieran Hoffeld cooks a meal, travelers come from miles around.”

  “Fortunate you arrived when you did,” the dark man said, tucking his pipe away in a belt pouch and smoothing his mustache with his thumbs. “Much longer, you would have need of a chisel rather than a spoon.”

  Nieran frowned at the man, but Dirk kept eating, tearing more shreds from the bowl to scoop out the stew.

  “Fortune favors me, at times,” he said. “My name is Dirk.”

  “Aban,” he said, holding out a hand. “Your words mark you a southerner, if my ears tell truth.”

  “South from where we sit,” Dirk said, clasping the offered hand before he returned to his dinner. “And far to the east, besides.”

  “Have you a notion how far?” Aban asked.

  Dirk shrugged. “I left my home a month and more ago. Some of the travel was straight, but some lengths I've had to walk twice or thrice before I continued.”

  “A most strange way to travel,” Aban said.

  “It would be easier, and simpler, if I knew where I was traveling to,” Dirk said around a mouthful of stew. “But I ride another's drag, and I can only go where the trail leads.”

  The mistress of the inn watched Dirk as he spoke. Her face was carefully neutral, but even though the way she spoke was nearly impossible for Dirk to follow, he had a feeling she understood every word that came out of his mouth. Aban nodded his head, and pursed his lips.

  “Whose trail would you be following?” Aban asked.

  “His name is Teller,” Dirk said. The mistress's lips twitched into a frown. Nieran glanced up from her cup. Even the big man shifted, leaning forward. Aban leaned back on his seat, making the wood creak. The fire crackled. Dirk took another bite of the bowl, chewing calmly. When the silence dragged on, he asked, “Did he come this way?”

  “Not a common name,” Aban said, tucking a thumb behind his belt. “Was he afoot?”

  “Ahorse,” Dirk said. “He rode a swaybacked gray with a cropped tail, and one moony eye.”

  Aban nodded again. “When was this?”

  “A season past, I reckon,” Dirk said.

  “He was headed north, this Teller?” Aban asked. The inn's mistress frowned, sucking quietly at her teeth as her eyes slid from Aban, to Dirk, and back again with each question.

  “He was,” Dirk said.

  “I saw him. On the first leg of my own journey. He was here when I arrived, washing and cooking for a room. I know not what he made, but it was delicious.” Aban ran his tongue over his teeth, pausing a moment. “He gave the name Raren, when asked.”

  “He was full of questions,” the big man said in the same, muddy accent as the old woman. He scratched the hound behind the ears, and the beast chuffed at him as it shifted. Then the man took his crooked leg in both hands, and shifted it with a grimace. “Wanted to know what lay beyond the heath. Asked about secret places, and old ghost tales. Lot of foolishness.”

  “Young minds have young thoughts, Kern,” Nieran said. She tossed back the rest of her drink, as if to punctuate her statement. “I found him sweet.”

  “You find any man who cleans your plates a treat,” Kern said.

  “Not truth,” the washer woman said. “It need not be a man.”

  The old woman cackled at that. Kern frowned, but it was the sort of frown parents wore when their child said something they knew better than to laugh at. Aban smiled, and Dirk popped the rest of the bowl into his mouth, chewing slowly before wiping at his chin with his kerchief.

  “I told him there was a town north of here called Barrow Fields a few days hence,” Aban said. “It is a safe enough journey, as long as one follows the road and does not wander into the bog.”

  “Did he say aught else?” Dirk asked.

  “He offered many thanks. I did not see why, but told him if he was in need that he should seek my wife beneath the Crescent Moon.” Aban grinned. “She has no great love of traveling, and after a season away from me, she forgets most of my failings.”

  “Not all?” Dirk asked.

  Aban's grin widened. “If I stayed away that long, she would think me dead!”

  They all laughed at that, and the inn's mistress offered small tastes of the spirit to her gathered company. Aban accepted. Dirk thanked her, but declined. As the spirits flowed, the others
shared the stories they'd told when Teller had stayed with them. Kern told of a man hung from a crossroads oak, who let himself down and followed his killers into the bog. Nieran spun a yarn about a pair of young lovers seeking a treasure, and how their hearts turned to treachery once they found it. How the man killed his lady love while she cooked their evening meal, and how he ate the poisoned stew she'd made after. Even the mistress of the hovel told a halting tale about a boy who wandered through standing stones beneath a full moon, and found himself in the court of a tiny queen and her strange, small people. When morning came, he found himself grown to manhood, and a stranger to everyone he'd ever known.

  There were many and more tales told. In time, Nieran set her glass down, and began climbing rickety stairs up to the loft. Her gait was unsteady, but she walked the steps as much with her memory as with her feet. Outside a wind blew, and even seated close to the fire, Dirk could tell there was no hint of summer left in that night breeze.

  “This may be the first night in several moons I am pleased to have a fire,” Aban said.

  “May it keep you,” Dirk said, standing. “I must see my horse.”

  “You ride on, come morning?” Aban asked.

  “Will,” Dirk said.

  “Would you share the road?” The dark-skinned man leaned forward his elbows on his knees. “I would be glad of the company.”

  “As you wish.”

  Aban smiled. “May the open sky bring you dreams of the stars.”

  Dirk nodded his thanks, lifted the door so it didn't scrape along the groove, and stepped back outside. The day had been warm enough, but cold was stealing in fast. The wind rose, and they duing leaves chattered among themselves. Dirk watched the trees, letting his eyes adjust to the night once more. Sunset nickered, and pawed at the gravel. Dirk approached, clucking his tongue lightly to calm the mare. Sunset nipped at him, catching his shirt between her teeth before he sidestepped the bite.

  “Easy, girl,” he said, stroking her neck with one hand, and taking a firm hold of her bridle with the other. He unhitched her, and tugged her along toward the corral. She came hesitantly. “No worry to be had, here. Just a pair of wagon draggers. They will not mind you for a night.”

  One of the bays was fast asleep, and the other had its head low so it could reach the long grass outside the fence. Neither of them showed any interest when Dirk opened the gate, and Sunset began to settle as he took her through the routine of removing the saddle and brushing her down. By the time he'd finished getting the burs and knots out of her coat, she was almost calm.

  “We have an early start tomorrow,” he told her, putting the blanket over her before tossing the saddle over the fence. He followed, closing the pen behind him. “If nothing else, you can rest your legs.”

  Sunset let out a whoosh of breath as she lay down, grunting at him. Dirk pillowed his head on the saddle, and pulled his rain cloak over him. He lay in the dark, breathing the night air as he folded his arms inside his shirt. Barrow Fields seemed Teller's destination, but Dirk was certain he wouldn't find his cousin waiting for him there. Danger, the knucklebones had said when his grandmother had asked them what lurked on the road ahead. Dirk touched the talons hung around his neck, and closed his eyes. In his mind, he heard his grandmother sing her soft charms to them. A ground fog rose, brushing his cheeks with damp, chill kisses. The moon slid from behind the trees, and something howled over the bog. The echo died away, sinking into the distance. Dirk's fingers slid around his dagger's hilt, and he slid into an unquiet sleep.

  Chapter Eight

  Aban was up at dawn, grunting as he shouldered open the inn's front door. Dirk was just cinching the saddle on Sunset when Aban came round the side of the corral. He smiled when he saw Dirk, his mustache lifting to reveal his strong grin.

  “Ah, you awaken,” Aban said, raising a steaming cup to his lips.

  “Such as it is,” Dirk said, stifling a yawn. He tugged on the saddle to be sure it was secure, and dug a carrot out of his pack for Sunset. She took it eagerly, and he patted her side.

  “The night is a jealous mistress, and she does not let go simply because the day calls you from her embrace,” Aban said. He offered his cup. “Drink this. It will loosen her hold on you.”

  Dirk took the cup, and sniffed the bitter brew. He drank, and it tasted even stronger than it smelled. He turned his mouth down at the corners, and handed the cup back. Aban laughed.

  “You have never tasted choaua before, I take it?” Aban said.

  “No,” Dirk said, coughing as he dug a waterskin out of his saddlebags.

  “It is an acquired taste,” Aban said, taking another drink. “Some prefer it with cream, or goat milk, but I find sweetening it only weakens its power.”

  Dirk swished water around his mouth, then swallowed the last of the harsh tang. He stowed his skin again, and started chewing on one of his last pieces of dried beef. “Need you aid?”

  “Do not be fooled. Yonder beasts may look like horses, but in truth they are more like dogs.” Aban opened the gate, and whistled loudly. Both the bays turned toward him, ears pricked and tails swishing. “I work them like dogs, and I reward them like dogs. If I am honest, it may be the only reason they stay on the road, instead of running me into a ditch.”

  Aban didn't exaggerate. The horses knew their job, and they followed their master to the wagon as Aban hitched them into place. Once he'd finished, and they were where they were supposed to be, Aban produced two apples from the back of his cart. He cut them into pieces with his belt knife, taking a few pieces himself. The bays snuffled, taking their treat, and pushing their heads against Aban. He smiled, and petted them, speaking a language Dirk had never heard before. Once the horses were settled, Aban retrieved his cup, and drank what was left. He rinsed the cup in the trough, stowing it in his cart along with the wheel chocks.

  “Are you ready, my friend?” Aban asked.

  Dirk led Sunset out of the corral, and swung into the saddle. Aban climbed up on the driver's seat, and took a moment to straighten the reins. He clucked his tongue, and gave the reins a dexterous flick. The bays pushed off in unison, and the wagon started rolling toward the road. Dirk followed, and when he saw the road was wide enough, rode up beside Aban. They rode in silence for a time, following as the road curved away from the trees, and crossed fields of thick, rolling green.

  “The Bracken Bog,” Aban said, swinging an arm in a wide arc. “Or part of it, at least. The thickest part is miles away, and this is the driest time of year for it. The rains will swell it soon, though, and it may be lapping at the ditches by the time winter sees fit to dip her frosty fingers. Then it will be a green lake, and only those in real need will walk this path. The wise ones will bring skis with them.”

  “And in summer dawn?” Dirk asked.

  “Early in the season it is the easiest time to travel,” Aban said. “The awkward dampness and mud of spring is mostly gone, and the boundaries with the damn is still clear to the eye. It is why I pick that time to travel this road every year.”

  “Where do you go when you leave?” Dirk asked.

  “East, to the lake country,” Aban said. “Summer hangs heavy there as well, but the breeze from the north cools my head. More importantly, it is a time of festivals. The crops are planted, and there are idle hands all about looking for something to do.”

  “And you provide?”

  “In my humble way,” Aban said, stroking his mustache to hide his wide smile. “I bring skins and shear, along with dark brew and fine bog wine. More than that, though, I bring news. I tell them who I have seen on the roads, and share the passing of the weeks. I tell of the birthing of children, and the dying of the sick and unfortunate. I give smiles and praise, along with counsel and wisdom where asked. I listen to secrets, and keep confidences.”

  Dirk nodded, but didn't say anything. Aban continued, sharing the stories of his last season. How he finally persuaded a man named Harden to buy something for his wife, since she was greatly ups
et with him, and he needed a way to win back her good graces. He told of a boy who wanted wine for a girl, and how he instead gave him a lesson on how to woo her without the aid of a spirit. Outside one village two masked men blocked the road, but made the mistake of reaching for the horses. One got kicked for his trouble, and the other was bulled back into a tree. They fled, but the next day they were foolish enough to try trading him for soothing ointment and the last of his beer. He took everything they could afford, and some that they couldn't, to teach them a lesson. Though he did give them the goods they'd paid for so dearly. The miles fell away behind them as they rode past hills, copses of trees, and the occasional boulder. The heath and bogs dried out, and the land grew firm again.

  “You aren't much like your blood,” Aban said, once several hours had passed.

  “My blood?” Dirk asked.

  “The boy you call Teller,” Aban said. “You are not brothers, but there is a look you share. You have frowns where he has smiles, mayhap, but you have the same face in many ways. Your tongues grew up near one another, speaking the same words in the same ways. Also, he came a long way to get to that broke-back inn. No one would follow him that far except an enemy, or family.”

  “Who says I cannot be both?” Dirk asked.

  Aban laughed at that, startling the horses as he threw his head back. He dabbed at his eyes, and smiled. “You could be, but I doubt it.”

  “Why?” Dirk asked.

  Aban's smile retreated, and he looked at Dirk. His dark eyes were both serious, and cautious. Aban drank deeply from a jug of water. He swished some around in his mouth, then leaned over the wagon seat and spat into the dirt. “You do not strike me as a man whose enemies are long for this world.”

  Dirk inclined his head to show he'd heard, but gave no other response.

  “You keep your own counsel,” Aban said,. “Teller could not. I see where he got the name.”