K Parker: The Belly of the Bow

‘Welcome to Scona,’ Gorgas said with a grin.

‘Thank you.’ Alexius took another sip. The aftertaste was ever so slightly stale. ‘You’re the second person to say that to me. Maybe you know why I’m here.’

‘Me? Sorry.’

‘Oh, well. I thought, since your sister had me brought here-’

Gorgas’ mouth set in a dry imitation of a smile. ‘I’m afraid I don’t know the half of what my sister does. All I can say is, if she fetched you here, it’ll be for a good reason. Good for her, of course, and for the Bank. But I’ll do my best to see to it that your stay here’s as pleasant as possible. Which reminds me, where are you staying? Has Niessa had you installed in one of the lodges at the Bank, or have you been slung out to make your own arrangements? Actually,’ he added, ‘if it’s the latter it’s a good sign, if you see what I mean. From your point of view, that is.’

Alexius’ mouth twitched. ‘I asked one of the clerks at the place I was taken to if he could recommend a good, cheap inn. To be fair to him, it’s cheap.’

Gorgas laughed. ‘If it’s the Wildcat in Cat Street, it’d be cheap at half the price. It is the Cat, isn’t it? Well, in that case, I’d like it if you’d stay with us here. No, really,’ he added, as Alexius made polite noises. ‘The Cat’s one of the Bank’s inns and really, you don’t want to stay there. I’ll send my boy round there in the morning for your luggage.’

Alexius decided not to protest. True, there was something he could not quite fathom about this house that made him feel uncomfortable. On the other hand, he had no difficulty whatsoever in isolating any number of things about the inn that made him feel very uncomfortable indeed, ranging from the fleas to the certain knowledge that he wouldn’t have enough money to pay the bill after the first week. Mental discomfort, he decided, may be a cruel thing, but sharing one’s bed with half the bugs on Scona was just as bad and rather more immediate. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘You’re being extremely kind.’

‘That’s all right,’ Gorgas replied, meticulously sprinkling cinnamon powder into his cup from a small pointed spoon. ‘Sadly I’m in no position to say that any friend of my brother’s is a friend of mine, though not from any lack of goodwill on my part. How’s the fire doing? Are you warm enough?’

‘I’m fine, honestly,’ Alexius answered. Just fine, he added to himself. And thank you for not pointing out that I keep shivering, because it’d be embarrassing to have to explain that these shivers have nothing at all to do with how cold it is. ‘Please excuse me if this is a rude question,’ he went on, ‘but haven’t you put on a little weight since I saw you last?’

Gorgas pulled a mock scowl. ‘You’re a horribly perceptive man, Patriarch,’ he sighed. ‘The truth is, I’m getting to the age when men start to slow down and thicken out. I’m told the condition is incurable. You, on the other hand, are obviously pickled in wisdom and likely to keep good almost indefinitely. They do say scholars only come in two sizes, short and round or long and thin, and the latter category’s like the strips of dried beef you take on long journeys.’

Alexius smiled from the neck up. ‘Your sister’s just taken me on a long journey,’ he said pleasantly. ‘I do hope she doesn’t mean to eat me.’

‘Not in the sense you mean,’ Gorgas replied, straight-faced. Then he leant forward, resting the points of his elbows on his knees, his hands cupped under his chin. This man has the biggest hands I’ve ever seen , Alexius noticed. ‘If you want to know why you’re here, my guess is that those two merchant friends of yours – Venart and something or other, I forget the girl’s name – have been dining out on stories of their friend the great wizard, and my sister’s heard about it. She’s very fond of collecting things she believes may come in useful at an unspecified future date, and I imagine you fall into that category.’

Alexius’ expression stayed fixed. ‘But I’m not a wizard,’ he said. ‘There’s no such thing as wizards. I’m sure a – a businesswoman like your sister must know-’

Gorgas shrugged. ‘Niessa knows all sorts of obscure things,’ he said. ‘Quite possibly – and no offence intended – she knows rather more about what you are and what you aren’t than you do. Or maybe she just wants someone who’s widely believed to be a wizard, which is probably every bit as useful as the real thing, looked at from the practical point of view. In any event,’ he added, rubbing his broad cheeks with his fingertips, ‘if I know Niessa the worst she’ll do to you is keep you hanging around and maybe be a few weeks late paying your expenses. After all, she’s a banker, not a wicked queen.’

Alexius nodded. ‘Thank you for the reassurance,’ he said. ‘I’ll admit I was worried. But tell me, I’m never ashamed to admit my ignorance: I really know next to nothing about Scona and this Bank of yours. Your sister said something about being at war. I didn’t realise that banks fought wars.’

Gorgas leant back and folded his hands behind his head. ‘That,’ he said, ‘is by way of being a very long story. I’ll be happy to tell it to you now, but it’ll keep till morning if you’d rather.’

‘Now will do fine,’ Alexius replied. ‘If it’s no trouble.’

‘A pleasure.’ Gorgas smiled. ‘But first, my guess is that you’d be very interested indeed to know if I’ve got any news of my brother, but you didn’t like to ask, in case – well. Am I right?’

Alexius dipped his head. ‘Understandably enough, I think. But yes, I’d dearly love to know what’s become of him. I only knew him for a short time, but-’ Alexius hesitated, then closed his mouth. Gorgas nodded.

‘Quite so,’ he said. ‘Well, you’ll be pleased to hear that my brother’s very much alive, disgustingly healthy and, as far as I can tell, as happy as a lamb in his new profession, which is making bows, of all things.’

‘Making bows?’ Alexius repeated.

‘Making bows. You know, as in bows and arrows. Apparently he’s very good at it and earning a comfortable living, up to his ankles in shavings and his wrists in glue, in the mountains here on Scona and ostentatiously having nothing to do with his sister or myself. I expect he’d like to see you, though, so I’ll see about having a message sent to him. Or better still, perhaps you’d best write him a letter. Otherwise he might assume a message from me is some kind of game and refuse to hear it.’

‘Thank you,’ Alexius said. ‘If you don’t mind doing that, I’d be very grateful.’

‘My pleasure. Now, I was about to start the history lesson. A drop more wine before class? Good idea, I think I’ll join you. Now then. I think the best place to start would be the beginning.’

In the beginning (according to Gorgas Loredan) there was a large triangular spit of land jutting into the sea. The distance across the base of the triangle, which was reasonably flat, is ten days’ ride; but that’s virtually the only flat land on the peninsular; the rest of it’s taken up with mountains of varying degrees of bleakness, and nobody in their right mind would want to live there if they didn’t have to. Unfortunately, however, the ancestors of the people who now occupy the Shastel peninsular didn’t have the choice. They were thrown out of their own country by some wild and woolly tribe or other – second cousins of your own plainsmen, so I believe – and settled in the mountains because horsemen couldn’t go there. By the time the horsemen had gone away, they’d been there over a century, and so they stayed.

Now, it’s in the way of things that some people do better in life than others, and after a few generations there were a few families who’d done well, and a great many more who hadn’t, and there’s nothing unusual in that. What made the settlers in Shastel different was the fact that over the years they’d become – what’s the word I’m looking for? Not superstitious. Religious, perhaps? No, that’s got the wrong associations. Pious, maybe, or at least they were all very moral people, terribly concerned about right and wrong and thinking deep thoughts about spiritual matters when they weren’t killing themselves trying to scratch a living. In any event, those families who’d become better off than their fellows came together and decided that it wasn’t right that they should have more than they needed while others didn’t have enough; not only was it rather terrible and wicked, it also offended against what their philosophy saw as the fundamental principle of balance and equilibrium – I don’t know why I’m telling you this, because of course you know all about it. Isn’t that where your own system of philosophy originated, and the study of the Principle? Anyway, that’s all rather above my head. The upshot as far as this story’s concerned was that they decided to pool all their surplus resources and endow a great and good Foundation, which was to last for all time and devote itself to the two things they held to be most worthwhile: helping the poor and working out a coherent code of morality and ethics.