Juliet McKenna - The Swordsman's Oath

“I’ll see what I can find out from the wagoneers who came in this morning.” She sauntered off, hips swaying just enough to catch the eye.

I walked around to the rear of the inn, treading carefully around a suspicious hound chained to a post and grimacing as I caught the scent of the midden. Voices at the door came around the corner of the building and I stopped, hoping the dog didn’t decide to object as it watched me with pricked ears.

“I’ll work for broken meat and bread, just until I get a ride out of here.” There was no pleading in the cart girl’s voice, which I had to admire.

“We’re not hiring.” The glossy-haired wench who’d served us was sharp with disdain.

“I’m not looking for a permanent place, just something to eat in return for giving you an easier few days.” The girl’s instincts were good, I noted, making a reasonable offer rather than just begging. “The house looks pretty full to me.”

“Oh, all right. You can help out tonight, but you sleep in the stables.” I heard quick steps on the kitchen flagstones then the scrape of a heel as the maid turned back with an afterthought. “You do your business in the yard, I don’t want you bothering customers in the tap-room. Any thieving, I’ll send to Varis for the Watch and they can flog you in the market square.”

I leaned against a water butt until the dark girl came back around the corner.

“Are you heading north?” She looked me up and down and stayed out of arm’s length.

I shook my head. “South, and I’m looking for information about the road.” I tucked my thumbs into my belt and the coin in the purse hanging from it chinked softly as I nudged it.

“What sort of thing, exactly?” She looked cautious as well she might. Axle-greasers, harness brasses, call them what you will, these girls live a dangerous life; Dastennin only knows what the rewards are. She had the usual mongrel looks of the breed, thinner than she should have been, with a face older than her years should have given her.

“I’m Ryshad.” I held out a hand.

“Larrel.” She kept her arms folded defensively.

“I’m interested in finding a handful or so of men traveling together, black-liveried probably, all yellow-haired. We think they’re on the road south of here.”

“What’s it worth?” Her eyes told me she had seen them.

“That depends how much you can tell me.” I folded my own arms and smiled at her, not so pleasantly.

“There were six of them, all walking, one with a long cloak and no pack, the rest loaded like troopers who’ve lost their horses.” Her own smile told me she was no fool and more importantly, no liar, not about this at any rate.

I reached into my purse. “A Mark for the name of the nearest village and a Mark for how many days since you saw them.”

“Formalin Marks, not Caladhrian,” she countered. “Five pence to the Mark, not four, I’m not stupid, you know.”

“Fine.” I shrugged. The two extra coppers meant nothing to me but would buy someone like her a welcome hot meal.

“They were half a day’s walk south of Armhangar, the day before yesterday.”

She held out her hand and I passed her the coin. “My thanks.”

Surprise flared briefly in her eyes as she tucked the coin into a purse at her waist. I watched her go, found a bone in the midden to toss to the dog and went to see what I might find out from the kitchen staff in the lull between breakfast and the noon rush. It wasn’t much of a surprise to find none of them had seen so much as a polished stud off an Elietimm livery; the Ice Islanders didn’t strike me as the type of travelers to put up each evening at the nearest inn to share an idle ale and a joke. I frowned as I went in search of the others.

The stableyard was surprisingly quiet but a rising level of noise led me to a crowd gathering on the far side of the barns. I found the rails of an empty paddock lined with a mixture of locals and traveling men. Shiv saw me and waved, so I headed over to him.

“So, have you heard tell of any black-liveried travelers?” Shiv leaned on the fence rail and ran a hand through his hair.

I told him what I had learned and then looked around for the others. “Where’s Viltred?” I asked.

“Resting in his room.”

Shiv and I watched as two men climbed over the fence, one carrying two polished staffs over his shoulder, the other with a bundle of inflated bladders dangling from one hand.

“He’s not going to get much sleep with all this going on.” Fatigue betrayed me and I heard a slight sneer in my tone.

“He’s an old man, tired, stiff and sore,” said Shiv mildly. “Be fair, he’s only a handful of years off his third generation festival.”

I looked at Shiv in some surprise and tried to think if I’d ever known anyone that old before. We would have to make some allowance for Viltred if he was carrying seventy years or more in his purse. I supposed Messire D’Olbriot’s uncle, who had been Sieur before him, must be about that age and I had to allow he was hardly in any shape to go riding any distance, let alone day after day.

We watched as the men lashed together frames for hanging a bladder at each end of the field.

“This is spit-noggin, isn’t it? Is it as hard a game as I’ve heard?”

“It can be,” Shiv chuckled. “It depends if there’s anyone playing who has a score to settle with someone else on the field.”

Two teams were sorting themselves out by the paddock gate. After some toing and froing, the match resolved itself pretty much into local traders and a few farmers who’d been passing taking a line against the guards and wagoneers from the Duryea train; fourteen to each side was the figure finally agreed on.

“Is it only the man with the staff who can’t cross the throwing line, or does everyone have to stay clear of it?” I watched as the men setting the field scored a deep line in the uneven turf at either end of the playing area.

“Only the staff-holder. Don’t you play this in Formalin?” Shiv looked surprised.

“In the north, on the western borders, but don’t forget I’m from Zyoutessela. If you go any further south than that, you fall off the Cape of Winds,” I reminded him.

The first run of the game began. The wagon-train men were clearly used to playing together and soon had the staff passing smoothly between them as they ran through and around the local boys. A cheer went up as their man pitched the arm’s length of polished wood at the suspended bladder, but he missed by barely a finger’s breadth. Five men went down in the scramble for the staff but one of the grooms got it and the action came sweeping back down the field toward us.

“I’m going to see if I can find Livak.” Shiv stood up from the rail. “Are you coming?”

“I’ll hang on here.” I kept my eyes on the field. “This is quite something, isn’t it?”

Shiv laughed and slipped away through the crowd, and I concentrated on following the game. We don’t go in for these gang sports so much in Formalin; we tend to favor contests of individual skill instead. I started to wonder how my own spear-throwing talents would play in a game like this. The trick would be getting a chance to use them, I decided, wincing as a man poised to throw disappeared under a heap of dusty jerkins. One failed to get up as fast as the rest and limped off, clutching a hand to his chest. There was a short pause before another mule handler jumped the rails to take the injured man’s place.

“Do you fancy a turn in a team?”

I turned to find Nyle at my shoulder. What was it the man wanted with me?

“What about your friends?” he went on. “We could do with a decent runner.”

I shrugged. “You’ll have to ask them yourself.”