Paul Kemp - The Hammer and the Blade

"How fare your master's sisters?" he asked. He wanted to see them again, to look them in the eyes, to see if they were the cause of his discomfiture. "I can help you bear this food-"

The eunuch, arms laden with a wheel of cheese and two loaves of flatbread, responded with only a vacant stare so otherworldly that Nix, for once, found himself at a loss for words. He stepped aside so the giant wouldn't walk over him.

"He's a mute," Baras called from around the crackling fire. "And he'll welcome no help."

Nix nodded, eyeing the eunuch as the man walked back toward the carriage. A scar made a pink line above the fold of skin on the back of the eunuch's neck, a scar too clean to have been caused by a weapon. Nix had heard of such scars before, though he could not quite remember where — something about magical chirurgy.

"There's something off in that eunuch," Nix said, when he returned to Egil's side.

"Everything about this is off," the priest answered, shoveling a chunk of cheese into his mouth. "The people and the place. Still need to eat, though."

"Aye," Nix said, and did just that, though he found his eyes returning frequently to the carriage.

After the meal, Baras posted guards and set the watch schedule for the night. The men not on duty lingered around the low flames of the fire, saying little, watching smoke rise into the air. Egil shook his dice and Nix endured nausea to work at the spellworm. He needed to get himself free, now more than ever.

Everyone sat with weapons near to hand but the night got on peacefully.

Above them, the cloud cover broke, revealing a wedge of sky between the cliff walls of the cut. They could not see the skeletal trees standing watch on the cliff tops above, but the branches rattled in the wind like dry bones. As the hours passed, the darkness grew predatory. The wind howled above them, whistling dark promises.

"Heard lots of stories about you two," one of the young guards said to Nix. "Are they true?"

"Lies, all," Nix said, stretching out his legs.

"Can't all be lies," pressed the guard. "Tell us about one of these adventures you been on."

"Very well," Nix said. "Once, Egil and I were forced to travel the Demon Wastes with some guards of a doltish cast. One of these, a young whoreson who couldn't grow a respectable beard, insisted on hearing stories from me. I strangled him while he slept."

Uncertain laughter from one guard, silence from the rest, a frown from Baras.

"Did I give away the ending?" Nix asked Egil.

"I believe you did, yes."

"He was just asking, is all," said another guard, perturbed. "To pass the time. No need to be a prick."

"No need?" Nix said. "Really?"

"Nix," Egil said, but Nix ignored him.

"We're not here for your entertainment, boy, and we're not friends. Egil and I are prisoners. You're our keepers. Do I not speak the plain truth?"

"It ain't like that," one of the young guards protested.

Nix scoffed. "Can we just get up and walk home, then? We're a long day out of Dur Follin. Can we return if we wish?"

Baras frowned in his beard, sipped his coffee. "It isn't personal."

"So you say," Egil said.

"The lumps on my head feel personal," Nix added.

Baras shrugged, scratched his beard. "Have it as you will." He topped his tin cup with more coffee from the pot. "I offer no apologies. Duty is duty, and done is done."

"Duty," Nix said, shaking his head, and Baras said nothing.

"I think you've ruined the mood," Egil said to Nix.

Nix waved a hand derisively. "Bah. What mood?"

For a time, silence, then Jyme spoke, his tone incongruously light.

"It was for me," he said.

"Was what?" Nix asked, leaning back, his hands behind his head, staring up at the clearing sky, the stars. Minnear would rise soon. He did not relish sitting in the dark of the Demon Wastes under the Mages' Moon.

"Personal," Jyme said. "It was personal for me."

Nix smiled darkly. "Of course it was. Egil personally knocked the sense from you. Wait…" He sat up and looked across the fire at Jyme. "Did you mean that as a jest?"

Jyme was smiling, and Nix's frustration went out of him in a rush.

"Egil, is it possible that Jyme, Jyme, has a sense of humor?"

"Come now, no need for insults…" Jyme began.

"I've seen demons and devils," Egil said. "More than a man should. Even bloodied a few, so I know much is possible in this world. But this notion of Jyme having a sense of humor strikes me as preposterous."

Chuckles around the fire, certain this time, and including Jyme.

"I was just pissed, see?" Jyme said, setting down his tin cup. "You beat me down in front of my men. I didn't know you was all right, then. I just wanted to get even."

Nix toasted him with his coffee. "And instead of getting even you got a trip into the Wastes. Well played, Jyme."

More chuckles, except from Jyme, who looked sheepish. He nudged a log with his boot. "Who's got the luck, right? I suppose I'm as much a prisoner here as you two. They made me come, too."

"True enough," Egil said philosophically, then, "Listen, you caught me in a foul mood right then, back in the Tunnel. I had other things on my mind. We'd just bought a shithole, after all. Apologies for the punch."

"None needed," Jyme said, waving it away. "I was owed it. I was rude to that girl and for no reason."

The current of the priest's more forgiving nature caught Nix up in its wake. To the young guard he'd embarrassed, he said, "And a foul mood infected me as well, just now. With that story, I mean. Apologies. I vow not to strangle you."

The young guard inclined his head and Jyme raised his cup. "Well, done is done, as Baras said."

Nix shook his head. "Gods, I was quite happy disliking all of you, you in particular, Jyme, and now you've gone and fouled that up. One day in the Wastes and I don't know who to despise. I almost wish I'd never taken your coinpurse."

Jyme's mouth fell open. "Back at the tavern? That was you what took my coinpurse? I wondered where that went."

Nix nodded absently, eyed his hands, which so often worked of their own accord. "When you bumped me outside of the Tunnel. I put it into the hands of an old man I saw on the street."

"Alms," Egil said.

"Pshaw," Nix answered. To Jyme he said, "I'll repay you when we return to Dur Follin."

"Well enough," Jyme said. "There were, uh, fifteen terns and two royals in there."

"Ha!" Nix said. "There were exactly nine terns and three commons and you haven't seen a gold royal since the Year of the Jackal."

More laughter around.

Despite the situation, Nix found himself warming to the men. The Wastes had birthed quick camaraderie from shared menace. Before long, he'd find himself liking Rakon and his sisters.

Or perhaps not.

"Well," Jyme said, looking up at sky. "You won't have to repay if we don't get back to Dur Follin. And right now, I don't see how that happens."

"There is that," Egil said. The priest stretched his long legs out before him and crossed his hands behind his head.

"There is that," Nix agreed.

"None of that now," Baras said, though the words sang a false note. "We'll be fine."

Egil tipped back the rest of his coffee, shook out the cup, and nodded at the supply wagon. "Here's what I say. Women and fine ale seem much more than only a day gone, the night is cold, the fire feeble, and we're all going to die out here in the Wastes. Before we do, I say we make the best of it. Since this coffee tastes like piss, I offer we look to the beer in that wagon."

"The priest speaks with wisdom," Jyme said. "How about some beer, Baras?"

Baras considered, nodded, and two of the younger guards quickly rose, smiling, and made for the supply wagon.

"Meanwhile," Egil said, "why not tell them of that time in the Well of Farrago, Nix, when that door defied your talents?"