Robert Adams - Horseclans' Odyssey

But finally, with the arrogant Ehleen ensconced in a bath of the right temperature, Portuh brought in men and girls to rescrub the floor, scoop up the mess and replace the fouled carpets.

Once bathed, oiled and freshly scented, clad in clean garments from one of his chests and relieved of the chafing weight of the leathern money belt, Urbahnos had Nahseer bear the ham, the veal, a loaf of bread, some of the wine and a couple of the cordials to his bedchamber, and only after his stomach was filled did he allow the hired guards to go down to partake of the serai’s evening meal. They were sent two at a time, so that there were never less than four of them and the hulking Nahseer to guard him and his gold. The Zahrtohgahn was granted no access to the hot meal below, receiving only the leavings of his master. When the last pair of hired men had returned and when the belowstairs tumult had quieted somewhat, the Ehleen sent Nahseer to summon the master trader to the suite. With luck, only a single night would be spent in this filthy sty of a barbarian pesthole. No matter what he had to pay for the two boys, if the bribe one of them would constitute accomplished its purpose and allowed him to return and live out his remaining days in a clean, decent, civilized land, the expense would be trifling.

As for the other, the less comely boy… well, he would provide sport and release for Urbahnos himself this night and many a night thereafter until the Ehleen tired of and sold him.

An experienced trader, Urbahnos knew men and could quickly and accurately type most of them upon first meeting. The plains trader Custuh, he immediately realized, was, for all his stinking, barbarian antecedents, a man much like himself—avaricious, cold, cruel, cunning and completely amoral. Were enough gold and silver stacked on the table between them, Urbahnos knew that he would speedily have this Cusrun’s mark on the bills of sale that he had had drawn up before he left Pahdookahport.

But the other man, Hwahruhn, the Ehleen just as quickly surmised, could easily present problems, make the transaction overly long and force him to spin fanciful lies as to the eventual fates of the little slaves. He silently prayed that Custuh was in charge.

Ahzee, the elder of the two wagoners who had been assigned to supervise the captive boys and care for their needs until they were sold, had moved immediately the food was brought into the main room of the serai. He had chosen foods which he had known from his years of service with Shifty Stooahrt on the prairie and plains would have the appeal of familiarity to his charges—boiled mutton in its broth, hard cheese and soft, chewy chunks of dried fruits, a two-quart beer pitcher of frothy, fresh milk. Before sending a servant to fetch the milk, Portuh had loudly questioned why these slaves could not be content with his good beer or cider. But wise Ahzee knew that even the best grade of beers and wines had a decidedly unsettling effect upon the innards of Horseclansfolk, and he also knew that Mistuh Custuh would be a man to be avoided for some time if the two boys were suffering a bad case of the shits when put up for sale.

Before Ahzee and the other wagoner, klahrk, could reach the foot of the stairs with the trays and pitcher, Mistuh Hwahruhn had added choice joints from a roast chicken and chunks of honeycomb to their burdens. The stocky, black-bearded Klahrk groused under his breath about the short delay, but Ahzee gave him a single, hard stare; he liked and deeply respected Mistuh Hwahruhn and thought it a gol-darned shame that Custuh had been appointed head man. In the room, Ahzee set the trays and pitcher atop a locked goods chest and drew a couple of smaller bales from the stack in a corner to seat the boys at the improvised dining table. While the older man so labored, the younger stood idly by the door, scraping his feet and whining that if they delayed longer all die choicer portions would be gone at the long tables belowstairs. Ahzee just snorted, “All you evuh thinks ’bout is yore dang belly, Klahrk, an’ it a’ready stickin’ out like you’s three moons gone, mebbe five! Don’t be so dang useless, heanh?

These here younguns is ever bit as much yore ’spons’bility aa they is mine. You jest tek their gut bucket an’ empty it an’ mek sure it’s a good number of hay balls in’t’ box. Then you broach one them bales o’ b’arskins, or with no fire, Bahb ’n’ lil Djoh here’ll plumb freeze’t’death or at leas’ come down with th’ dang bloody croup’t’night with them thin pallets an’ motheaten blankets.” The wooden latrine bucket in hand, the tall but paunchy Klahrk paused at the door, his brows knitted, picking with cracked and filthy nails at a pustulating sore on his chin under the matted beard.

“Sleepin’ col’ ass one night ain’t gonna hurt them lil bastids none, an’ I don’ think Mistuh Custuh’d be too happy if I broke no bale opuned, an’…” Ahzee straightened up and whirled to stand, arms akimbo, his seamed face revealing more disgust than real anger.

“ ‘An… ? Dang yore lazy ass, Klahrk, you musta been gone to tek you a piss whin they’s handin’ out brains! Bestest thang fer you’s’t’ let a body’s got sumthin more’n rotten ches’nuts in they haids’t’ do th’ thinkin. Heah me? “You’s a wagoner helper, boy. I’s a full senior wagoner, with dang near twenny years awn’t’ plains, an’ I knows, boy! Mistuh Custuh, he won’ say pee-turkey bout one dang bale, oncet he comes to fin’ out why it ‘uz broached, cause these here younguns is money, big money. An’ evun was he’t’, he cain’t do a dang thang’t’ me, he wouldn’ dast.”

Ahzee grinned broadly. “See, boy, this here train is still the Stooahrt Comp’ny’s, fer all poor ole Shifty’s a-layin’ back in Twocityport with jes’ one arm an’ a legil be gimp fer the resta his life an’ his balls a-tore near off him. Mistuh Custuh’s only got charge till we gits back upriver to Looeezfilburkport Then, if Shifty cain’t tek the train out nex’ spring, mos’ likely his brother, Zeek Stooahrt, ‘ll do it. Don’t matter to me none, boy, ‘cause both Shifty and Zeek, they’s my son-in-laws, see. “Now you jes’ shake yore stumps an’ git ‘long bout whut-all I tol’ you f do.

Heah?”

Later, when he had allowed the helper to go back down the stairs to crowd his way onto a bench and begin stuffing his face, old Ahzee sat while the boys ate, chatting with them.

In a casual tone and manner, Bahb shrewdly elicited all that the wagoner knew of the towns, inhabitants and terrain of the duchy, but kept his face blank to hide his deep disappointment from both his little brother and their captor. Short of trying to swim the vast and deadly width of the river, Bahb Steevuhnz could comprehend no possible way to win back to the west bank and even a thin chance to regain freedom. Nonetheless, his resolve was firm to continue on with the plan—better to die in honor, fighting to the end, than to become a possession again.

When the boys seemed replete, Ahzee placed the leftover food in the covered dish. Leaving it, the two cups and the milk in the pitcher, he gathered up the rest of the crockery and the lamp and departed, carefully locking the stout door behind him.

The moment they heard the iron lock snap into place and the descending footsteps of the old wagoner, Bahb and Djoh drew forth the three pieces of scrap metal they had managed to pick up near the wagon shop and forge during their brief time in the yard. All during the afternoon, while Bahb had held himself suspended by one arm from the sill of the window and picked at the shallow seating of the two bars, Djoh had been absorbed in honing the other, larger pieces to keenness on a flattish stone he had found and secreted. While Djoh, mostly by feel in the dimming light from the small, high window, began to slice an edge of one of the heavy bearskins into thongs, Bahb took the longer, slenderer bit of steel he had used on the bars and commenced to patiently work it into the big iron lock securing the chest. Neither of the boys knew what was in this or any of the other wooden goods chests, but with luck they might find better weapons than three clumsy handleless slivers of metal. Bahb worked the pick deeper, then twisted and turned at it, recalling the movements of the men he had seen thrust similar bits of metal into this and other locks; one bit of metal was as another to him, and he had never heard the words “key” or “lock” prior to his captivity.