Дэйв Дункан - Magic Casement

“Maybe. You want the princess returned with the word.”

“What word?”

He laughed coarsely and sauntered back to his chair. “It is common knowledge that the kings of Krasnegar still hold one of Inisso’s words. My luck at the tables might change if I had a word.”

She twirled her gold-knobbed cane, studying it. “Then the girl stays here. I have Inosolan, and without her nobody gets the word… if there is one, of course.”

“I agree, then,” he said. “You give me Krasnegar to hold in fief from your son, and I send back one word-knowing princess. You pay the expenses.”

“Outrageous!”

Yggingi chuckled. “Necessary! In your felicitous turn of phrase, I have already looted Pondague for all I can take. My men have not been paid for months and are close to mutiny. So a thousand as seed money, plus the princess, and I shall take her to Krasnegar. You shall have her back, with the word if she gets it.”

From the first, Ekka had known the weakness in her plan—she would have to trust this self-admitted scoundrel. But if he needed money so badly, she had a little power left. “Your wife, I think, stays here. The journey would be too hard for her.”

His eyes narrowed. “I believe the danger from the goblins might require more men than I first thought. Two thousand imperials for expenses.”

Skinflint! But Ekka had nothing to lose except two thousand imperials and a sister-in-law. Angilki could breed a son on the girl and the next duke of Kinvale would inherit two words. It was certainly worth the gamble.

“Agreed, then,” she said.

Tucking his helmet under his arm, Yggingi rose and saluted. “Agreed!”

“So now you must try to get the child to Krasnegar.”

He chuckled. “Ma’am, I shall get your princess to Krasnegar if I have to kill every goblin in Pandemia and drag her all the way through the forest, weeping.”

Wolverine Totem had once been the most southerly of the goblin villages, set high in forested foothills, near to Pondague. Long ago it had been raided by a troop of imps, the inhabitants slaughtered and the buildings burned. One house, originally the boys' cabin, had survived the devastation, and it was used now on occasion by travelers.

Rap had found it with his farsight in thickly blowing snow as a storm moved in. Little Chicken had been unperturbed by the weather, for he was capable of burrowing into a snowbank and staying there for days, not emerging for any purpose whatsoever. Rap, preferring freedom and fire, had been very glad to reach the dilapidated ruin. Now the two of them sat by a crackling blaze to wait out the weather. Shadows leaped and jiggled over the log walls, wind screamed overhead, and whiffs of snow blew in through chinks to pile up in corners. Yet the cold was much less now, farther south and closer to spring. Near the hearth, the temperature was almost comfortable. Rap had unlaced his buckskins, while the goblin had stripped to the waist and sat impassively, staring into the fire, poking it once in a while with a long stick, probably mourning his lack of grease for rubbing himself, his favorite occupation. Fleabag was stretched out on the dirt farther away, paws twitching as he chased memories through a forest of dreams.

Farsight failed to show anything moving outside. Even Little Chicken could not hunt in such a blizzard. Even Fleabag could not, or Rap could have sent him out to do so. They had enough food for two days, and the first day was almost gone.

Rap had slept. Perhaps the goblin had. Now Rap realized that this empty, echoing ruin had brought him his first real opportunity to talk with Little Chicken. Through all their weeks of travel together he had always been masked and running, or else too exhausted.

“I want to tell you my story,” he began. “Tell you why we’re going south.”

The burly young woodlander looked up, but with no interest showing in his slanted eyes. “Not important to trash.”

“But I’ll tell you anyway—don’t you like stories?”

Little Chicken shrugged.

“Very well,” Rap said doggedly. “That man who brought me—Wolf Tooth, he called himself. He was some sort of demon.”

That brought no reaction. None of it did. Rap told of Inos, and the dying King Holindarn. He told of Andor and his power to bewitch people into trusting him. He told of their trek together from Krasnegar, and the inexplicable appearance of Darad.

At the end of it all Little Chicken was still gazing at him impassively, without comment or apparent interest. Seeing that the recital had ended, however, he asked. “Then this chief will give you this woman?”

“Certainly not! She is the chief’s daughter. I am only a keeper of stores. She must marry another chief.”

“Why?”

That question proved surprisingly difficult to answer. So, also, did the next—why, then, was Rap going to all this trouble?

Loyalty did not translate into the goblin dialect. Friendship did, but Little Chicken could not comprehend that a man might be friendly with a woman. Women were enjoyable and useful. Friends were necessarily other males.

Friends… Rap was surprised to discover that he wanted to be friends with Little Chicken.

The young goblin’s monstrous cruelty was not his fault. It came from the culture of his people, and he had never been taught better. Apart from that, he was admirable in many ways—self-reliant, confident, effective, and a superb woodsman. His courage was unbreakable, his strange loyalty to Rap apparently absolute. In a word, he was trustworthy, and Rap recognized no higher accolade than that.

“You run good, town boy.” Those first words on their journey had been haunting Rap ever since. They had never been repeated, and all Rap’s efforts had failed to draw another syllable of praise. All his pains and efforts had gleaned nothing but amusement and contempt. He knew now that no matter how hard he might strive, he would never match Little Chicken in strength or endurance. That inferiority rankled deeply.

So he was the lesser man, but even so, surely effort deserved recognition? Rap had driven himself to his utmost limits and failed to receive acknowledgment for it. The harder he had tried, the more disdainful his companion’s reaction. He had revealed his supernatural powers and they had been dismissed as party tricks, beneath a man’s dignity. Only one thing about the town boy seemed to satisfy Little Chicken—that he had cheated in the testing. For some reason that knowledge pleased the goblin greatly. And of that, Rap was ashamed.

By the second day of the blizzard, Rap was growing frantic. If he thought about Inos or Andor—or anything—then his mind curdled with anxiety. Time was running out, and he should be running, also, not sitting still. The sinister Darad must have crossed the mountains long since.

Rather to his disgust, Rap had also discovered that he was in need of exercise. Weeks of running had so conditioned him that he felt stodgy without it, and incapable of relaxing.

Snow was still falling, but it was the heavy, wet, warm-weather snow of the south, not fine, dry arctic powder. When the storm passed, Rap knew, he and Little Chicken would be able to travel without their masks, but the drifts would make the terrain more difficult.

Travel where? They had left the last of the goblin settlements behind. There were imp homesteads in the area, perilous for goblins and to be shunned. Somewhere nearby lay Pondague, an impish outpost guarding the only pass through the ranges. Had Rap arrived at Pondague with Andor, it would have meant the start of friends and safety. They could have acquired more horses, bought food, and even hired companions, had they wanted them. South of the pass lay the Impire, with good roads and post inns and safety.