Robin Hobb - The Complete Liveship Traders Trilogy - Ship of Magic, The Mad Ship, Ship of Destiny

‘Let him go, Sunshine. Let him go!’ the tamer commanded, and the bear dropped Comfrey and waddled away. He sat down obediently in the corner of the square and nodded his muzzled head all about as if accepting the cheers of the crowd.

Save that no one was cheering. ‘I had my every coin on that!’ one sailor shouted. He added a muttered comment about Comfrey’s virility that seemed to have little relation to bear wrestling. ‘It wasn’t fair!’ another added. That seemed to be the general consensus of those who had bet, but Wintrow noticed that not one of them followed it up with a reason why it was not fair. He himself had his own suspicions, but saw no reason to voice them. Instead he moved forward to offer Comfrey some help in getting to his feet. Mild and the others were too busy commiserating on what they had lost. ‘Comfrey, you moron!’ Torg called across the ring. ‘Can’t even get past a hobbled bear.’ A few other sour remarks confirmed that general opinion. The crew of Vivacia were not the only sailors to have lost their bets.

Comfrey got to his feet, coughing, then bent over to spit out a mouthful of blood. For the first time, he recognized Wintrow. ‘I nearly had him,’ he panted. ‘Damn near had him. Lost everything I’d won earlier. Well, I’m broke now. Damn. If I had just been a bit faster.’ He coughed again, then belched beerily. ‘I nearly won.’

‘I don’t think so,’ Wintrow said quietly, more to himself than to Comfrey. But the man heard him.

‘No, really, I almost had him, lad. If I’d a been a bit smaller, a bit quicker, we’d all have gone back to the ship with fat pockets.’ He wiped blood from his face with the back of his hand.

‘I don’t think so,’ Wintrow rejoined. To comfort him, he added, ‘I think it was rigged. I think the man that won was in league with the bear-man. They show you something that seems to make the bear give up, only it’s something he’s been taught to do. And then when you try it, the bear has been taught to expect you to try it. So you get stopped. Don’t feel bad, Comfrey, it wasn’t your fault. It was a trick. Let’s get you back to the ship now.’ He put a helping arm around the man.

But Comfrey abruptly wheeled away from him. ‘Hey! Hey, you. Bearman! You cheated. You cheated me and my friends.’ In the shocked silence that followed, Comfrey proclaimed, ‘I want my money back!’

The beast-tamer had been in the act of gathering his winnings preparatory to leaving. He made no reply but took up his animal’s chain. Despite Comfrey’s shout, he would have just walked off, if several sailors from another ship hadn’t stepped in front of him. ‘That true?’ one demanded. ‘Did you cheat? Is this rigged?’

The beast-tamer glanced about at the angry onlookers. ‘Of course not!’ he scoffed. ‘How could it be rigged? You saw the man, you saw the bear! They were the only two in the square. He paid for a chance to wrestle the bear and he lost. It doesn’t get any simpler than that!’

In a sense, what the man said was true, and Wintrow expected the sailors grudgingly to agree with it. He had not taken into account how much they had drunk, nor how much money they had lost. Once the accusation of cheating had been raised, a simple denial was not going to calm them. One, more quick-witted than the others, suddenly said, ‘Hey. Where did that fellow go, the one who won earlier? Is he your friend? Does the bear know him?’

‘How should I know?’ the bear owner demanded. ‘He’s probably off spending the money he won from me.’ A brief shadow of unease had flickered across the beast-tamer’s face, and he glanced about the crowd as if looking for someone.

‘Well, I think the bear’s been trained for this,’ someone declared angrily. It seemed to Wintrow the most obvious and, in this context, the stupidest statement that he’d heard yet.

‘It wasn’t a fair contest. I want my money back,’ another declared, and almost immediately this statement was taken up by the rest of the crowd. The bear’s owner again seemed to seek someone in the crowd, but found no allies there.

‘Hey. We said we want our money back!’ Torg pointed out to him. He swaggered up to put his face close to the beast-tamer’s. ‘Comfrey’s my shipmate. You think we’re going to stand by and see him beaten up and us cheated out of our hard-earned money? You made our man look bad, and by Sa’s balls, we don’t stand still for that!’ Like many a bully, he knew how to best rally men to their own self-interest. He glanced around at the men watching him and then turned back to the beast-tamer. He nodded significantly. ‘Think we can’t just take it if you choose not to give it?’ There was a rumbling of agreement from the others.

The beast-tamer was outnumbered and knew it. Wintrow could almost see him cast about for compromises. ‘Tell you what,’ he declared abruptly. ‘I didn’t cheat and my bear didn’t cheat, and I think most of you know that. But I can be fair and more than fair. Any one of you wants, I’ll let him wrestle the bear for free. If he wins, I pay off all the bets same as if that man had won. He loses, I keep the money. Fair enough? I’m giving you a chance to win back your money for free.’ After a brief pause, a muttering of agreement ran through the crowd. Wintrow wondered what fool would be the next to feel the bear’s strength.

‘Here, Win, you go against him,’ Comfrey suggested. He gave the boy a shove forward. ‘You’re little and quick. All you got to do is get past him and onto his back.’

‘No. No, thank you.’ As quickly as Comfrey had pushed him forward, Wintrow stepped back. But the sailor’s words had been overheard, and another man from another ship took it up.

‘Yeah. Let their ship’s boy give it a try. He’s little and quick. I bet he can get past the bear and get our money back for us.’

‘No!’ Wintrow repeated louder, but his voice was lost in the general chorus of assent. It was not just his own shipmates urging him on, but the crowd in general.

Torg swaggered up to him and looked him up and down. He smelled of beer. ‘So,’ he sneered. ‘You think you can win our money back for us? Somehow I doubt it. But give it a try, boy.’ He gripped Wintrow’s arm and dragged him toward the bear’s square. ‘Our ship’s boy wants to give it a try.’

‘No,’ Wintrow hissed at him. ‘I don’t.’

Torg frowned at him. ‘Just get past him and onto his back,’ he explained in an elaborately patient voice. ‘That should be easy for a skinny little weasel like you.’

‘No. I won’t do it!’ Wintrow declared loudly. A chorus of guffaws greeted this, and Torg’s face darkened with embarrassed fury.

‘Yes, you will,’ he declared.

‘Boy doesn’t want to do it. Got no guts,’ Wintrow clearly heard a man say.

The beast-tamer had his animal back in the square. ‘So. Your boy going to try or not?’

‘Not!’ Wintrow declared loudly, as Torg as firmly announced, ‘He will. He just needs a minute.’ He rounded on Wintrow. ‘Look here,’ he hissed at him. ‘You’re shaming us all. You’re shaming your ship! Get in there and get our money back for us.’

Wintrow shook his head. ‘You want it done, you do it. I’m not stupid enough to take on a bear. Even if I got past him and got on his back, there’s no guarantee he’ll give in. Just because he did it before…’

‘I’ll do it!’ Mild volunteered. His eyes were bright with the challenge.

‘No,’ Wintrow objected. ‘Don’t do it, Mild. It’s stupid. If you weren’t humming on cindin, you’d know that. If Torg wants it done, let Torg do it.’

‘I’m too drunk,’ Torg admitted freely. ‘You do it, Wintrow. Show us you got some guts. Prove you’re a man.’