Erin Evans - Lesser Evils

“What’s the punishment, Sulci,” Sairche said, “for disobedience to your fury leader?”

He could hear Sulci panting. “She questioned your authority. I was-”

“What,” Sairche said, a little louder, “is the punishment for disobedience?”

Silence. “Eighty lashes.”

“Then I think we all know what comes next. Be thorough, Zela.”

“Why are you here?” Zela demanded.

Sairche was silent for so long that Lorcan made himself open his eyes again and lift his head. She was glowering at him.

“Unchain him,” she spat.

He heard, not felt, the shackles come from his wrists, and without the chains’ support he crumpled to the floor. The blood rushed back into his arms and he fainted.

He woke seconds later, his pulse in his ears. Sairche stood over him, looking disgusted. She withdrew a small vial from under her cloak and dropped it beside his head, before turning and walking away, trailed by too many erinyes, into the fuzz of Lorcan’s failing vision.

WATERDEEP

1 FLAMERULE, THE YEAR OF THE DARK CIRCLE (1478 DR)

"Tannannath and Frynch,” Brin murmured to himself. “The Broken Marble safehold.” He took one last look at himself in the streaky glass beside the door. He’d freshened up his clothes as best he could, combed his ever-lightening hair and washed his face. He still looked like someone’s runaway apprentice.

He’d ignored the accounts Constancia had mentioned for days now, and he’d have liked to keep on ignoring them, but he was running short of his own coin. Tam’s acquaintance got him a bedroll on the floor of the rooms the priest kept, but Brin wasn’t about to ask Tam for board as well. All he had left to sell was his sword, his holy symbol of Torm, and his father’s flute.

“Tannannath and Frynch,” Brin murmured again, as he left the room. “The Broken Marble safehold.” He pulled the door shut behind him and glanced across the hallway. To the room the twins shared.

Coward, he thought.

It might easily be a curse or a blessing that he’d ended up in exactly the same place as the twins. He’d spotted Havilar the day before, arguing with the innkeeper about the futility of peace-binding her glaive, Devilslayer. He’d frozen, like a deer hearing a rustle in the underbrush, and been unable to do so much as say “well met,” as she turned and saw him. Her mouth had gone small, her back straight as the polearm, and she’d faltered against the innkeeper, agreeing that perhaps she should retire herself and her weapon to the room upstairs.

He could hear Havilar on the other side of the door, the thud and crack of her pretending to thrash someone with her glaive. On the road from Neverwinter, he’d watched her and even stepped in to spar with her a time or two. It left him with no doubt at all: this girl was lovely and funny, and she could kill him in the span of a few heartbeats.

And now she was angry at him.

Don’t flatter yourself, he thought. As surely, if he apologized to Havilar, she’d wrinkle her brow and ask what in the world he meant by that? Don’t even mention it, he told himself.

He hesitated another moment, listening to the rhythm of her feet striking the floor in a complex dance. Dancing, he could have handled, and bladework, well enough, even against Havilar. But no one had given him lessons in dealing with girls, and he felt rather sure it wasn’t supposed to be difficult. If you were fond of a girl, you simply told them so or made some grand gesture or gifted her with something-and then you were in love and everything went on as it was meant to. You never worried she was the wrong girl to head down that path with. You never worried she might laugh at you. You certainly never worried about her glaive.

Perhaps it was better to go on avoiding her.

Coward, he thought, and he made himself rap on the door.

Havilar opened it, glaive in hand. The tawny skin above her open collar was beaded with sweat and her breath came hard. Her eyes widened at the sight of him, and he could hear the faint tap of her tail starting to flick against the floor. The sound made Brin’s nerves rattle.

“Oh. Brin.” She took a step back. “Did you want something?”

He shook his head-just say it, he thought. I’m glad you didn’t go. I would have felt like an utter plinth-head, and … She stared, just stared, at him-angry, surely angry. “How are you?” he said.

“Fine,” she said. “All right, anyway.” She folded her arms across her stomach. “Farideh’s not here.”

“I didn’t think so,” he said, then added hurriedly, “It didn’t sound as if she were. I’m impressed you can do any practicing in these little rooms.”

“Oh.” Havilar blinked at him. “Do you want to come in?”

Yes, yes he did. Constancia wasn’t right, but she wasn’t entirely wrong either. Havilar wasn’t the sort of girl, the sort of woman he was supposed to look twice at. She wasn’t human, she wasn’t ladylike, and she stood over him by a noticeable amount, even if you didn’t count her horns. She was wild and a little silly, and entirely too attached to her polearm.

And yet, despite-or perhaps because of all that-a part of him would be very pleased to be alone with her in a room, with all their weapons set aside.

“No, I just wanted to see you,” he said. “To say … to see how you were.”

Havilar frowned at him, as if she couldn’t tell if he was being serious. “I told you already. And you?”

Ye gods, could this go any worse? he thought. Sune’s bright face, he knew how to talk. He could be a little charming-charming enough for court. Why did it all fall apart when it was Havilar looking down at him? It had been so much easier on the road, when they weren’t just standing there, looking for things to talk about, when they had things to do to distract them …

“I have to go to a counting house,” he said, “to see about some coin. Would you … you could come along.”

Havilar blinked at him. “I haven’t got coin to count.”

“Oh.” Brin looked away. “No. I didn’t mean-”

“When did you get coin?” she asked, leaning against the door jamb. “I thought you were sleeping on Tam’s floor.”

Brin flushed. “Did he tell you that?”

“Well … I mean, I asked.” She looked down at the point of her glaive, worrying it into a knot in the floor. “ You weren’t going to tell me.”

“You didn’t ask me,” he pointed out. Gods, what a mess. What a total mess. “I wasn’t asking if you needed to go as well. I was wondering … Look, I’m a little nervous about this and I’d just like some company. Would that be all right?”

“Oh.” She considered him a moment. “Do you think you might be robbed on the way back, is that it?”

He started to say that he didn’t think that, that he wasn’t planning to take much coin at all-if in fact he took any-and anyway, she didn’t need to worry about him. But he caught himself-that was worlds better than having her think he was asking her to see his accounts. “Yes,” he said. “Oh, that’s most definitely a worry.”

Her smile grew. “Let me change.”

If the previous shops Farideh had encountered had been shabby, Master Florren’s might better have been described as only recently crawling up from “midden heap” to “shop.” Light struggled through the torn curtains covering the windows, spearing the dusty air where it broke through. A lamp burned behind a cracked shade, casting the array of over-sharpened weapons laid out beside the counter in an oily light. She shut the door behind her gingerly, loath to close herself into the musty shop.

Her eyes adjusting to the shift of light, Farideh edged forward, toward the counting bench. She said a silent apology to Havilar, but Adolican Rhand had been right-no one was going to give her the price she needed. Two more days of furtive searching and she still had no ritual book. Lorcan was still trapped somewhere in the Hells, suffering gods knew what torments, and she still couldn’t do anything about it.