Roland Green - Knights of the Crown

Seeking that clear line for his throw, Pirvan had taken two steps away from the wall. That was one too many. In one moment, he sensed someone approaching him from his left; in the next, the person was behind him, between him and the passage.

He whirled, angling the dagger upward to hammer the pommel up under his attacker’s chin. That could kill, but he would pull his blow if he could-

The next moment, he felt as if a dragon had whipped its tail into his lower abdomen. He doubled up, all the breath going out of him in a whuff he was sure must be waking the house. The pain he felt was such that if he had let out the scream deserved, he would have awakened half of Istar.

But the breath for the scream would not come. He was still fighting for it when he felt the dagger plucked from his hand and a second attacker behind him. Trying to turn merely cost him what was left of his balance, and as he went down, a hard fist hammered against the side of his jaw.

Pirvan the Thief was as senseless as a log of firewood before he struck the floor.

Pirvan awoke with pains lingering in both head and belly. He concluded that he must have struck his head in falling. He also discovered that his bruised temple and scraped cheek had been cleaned, salved, and lightly dressed.

He was on a pallet stuffed with fresh-smelling hay, with a clean woolen blanket over him and a wooden frame lifting the pallet off the wooden floor. Beside the pallet, on a low table, were a jug of water, a cup, and a plate of light biscuits. The water was clean and smelled of herbs, the biscuits an appealing brown, and the jug, cup, and plate good gray pewter with the Encuintras mark on it.

If he was a prisoner of Lady Eskaia’s family, they were either fattening him for the slaughter or wished his goodwill.

Meanwhile, his throat tasted as if a regiment of ogres had camped in it. He washed some of the taste out with the water and cleaned the rest away with two biscuits. He was afraid that the biscuits would make him nauseated, but there was something in the water that settled his stomach enough for them to stay down.

The water also held something to make him sleep. After his second cup, he did. He awoke feeling free of pain, a bit muzzy-headed, and hungry enough to eat not only the remaining biscuits but half of a good-sized bakeshop as well.

When he’d done that, he began to study his quarters. They were well above the level of a cell, not quite a guest room. There was a private cubicle in one corner for the necessary pot, and a second pallet rolled up and leaning against one wall. The light was dim; it came from lamps set in horn-covered niches in the wall. It was enough to let him see a good deal more, once his eyes adjusted to it.

All the walls were smooth-scraped, whitewashed wood, and the other two were largely covered with racks and stands. On one wall were buckets, sponges, jugs, short robes, padded leggings, and what Pirvan recognized as exercise sticks and weights. The racks on the other wall mostly held bottles, stoppered jars, and glass vials that might have contained anything from poisons to spices. Some of them Pirvan recognized as Qualinesti work.

He stood up, realizing as he did so that someone had removed all of his garments and given him a thorough bath-which he admitted he must have needed, after his struggle up the passage into the cellar. This meant that he was neither clothed nor armed, but with the loaded racks in easy reach that hardly mattered.

He walked slowly to the rack with the exercise sticks and took down three, a pair of short ones and a long one. He tested their balance and his own, and discovered that both passed. Then he put on one of the robes, which ended the sensation of being naked and helpless.

It was odd that they would put him in a room so full of things that might be used as weapons, if in fact he was a prisoner. Perhaps they were setting a trap for him, tempting him into some bold escape attempt that would give them cause to punish him more severely.

And perhaps not. They presumably had the jewels, unless that servant had snatched them from Pirvan’s prostrate form before-Haimya was her name-had been able to search him. Not that a man in a loinguard and gloves would need much searching, either …

The plate was empty, the jug full. Pirvan drank some more water (a thief who had traveled among the desert barbarians said that the best place for spare water was in your stomach). It seemed that someone had changed the water since the first jug; this time there was no taste or scent of herbs.

The water did nothing to ease a hunger that by now was nibbling at his stomach like rats. Much longer, and it would be tearing at him like a catamount. He also became aware of scrapes and strained muscles that no one had done anything to heal. Sleep again or remain awake, so they would not take him unawares?

Instinct told him that sleep was folly, keeping from him even a hope of going down fighting. Reason told him that House Encuintras could simply wait until exhaustion put him at their mercy, and take him then. In any event, the better rested he was, the safer. The knowledge that he should not enter a battle of wits half asleep helped soothe him.

Presently he slept again. When he awoke, Pirvan was not alone.

* * * * *

The Crater Gulf was on the eastern shore of the fat peninsula that was one of the northernmost points of the continent of Ansalon. It was not far from Istar, if one could fly. But dragons slept, pegasi were rare, kyrie the next thing to legends, and griffons so untrustworthy that no one wishing to end their journey outside their mount instead of inside cared to use one.

That left land and sea. The mountains that ran down the spine of the peninsula had many names in many tongues, but none of them sang praise. They were not high, but their upper slopes were rugged, steep, and chill; their lower slopes, overgrown with a hideous tangle of vegetation. A man could spend a whole day hacking his way through a mile of it, fall into an exhausted sleep, and never wake again as the leeches drained his blood and the insects devoured what the leeches had left.

In two days he would be unrecognizable. In five he would be bones, and before seven days ended the bone-borers would have come, and nothing of the man would be left except his metal gear, which might last as much as one season before the endless rain dissolved it with rust and corrosion.

Wise men did not seek to reach Crater Gulf by land.

By sea, one had to run the gauntlet of mist and fog, squalls and more enduring storms, reefs close to shore and reaching far out into what rash captains thought was deep water, and enough floating logs each day to build a small ship. Seafarers with no business on Crater Gulf gave it a wide berth-and they were the majority, for it offered little except timber, fruit, and fresh water, and no civilized inhabitants of any race.

It could therefore hardly have been more suitable as a refuge for pirates. Of whatever race they might be (mostly human and minotaur, with an occasional ogre; goblins seldom went to sea of their own will) they wrecked little from dangers that drove most ships well offshore. Their light, fast-sailing vessels could ride over reefs that gutted larger ships, the forest offered refuge if an enemy did contrive to land, the reefs abounded in fish, and altogether a sailor could make a dishonest living on the Crater Gulf more easily than in most other places.

In the year Pirvan the Thief did night work at the Encuintras estate, most of the pirates in the gulf gave allegiance to one Synsaga. They did not give it as readily as they had done to his sister Margiela, and some had not given it at all. But most of those had left Crater Gulf for either honest livings or piracy elsewhere, and Synsaga had needed only one pitched battle five years before to make his rule at least tolerated.