Dragonspell: The Southern Sea

‘What, honoured sir?’ Brindemo’s jowls were shaking in indignation. ‘A valuable barbarian, used as a muleteer?’

‘Only for a while. I’m quite sure I can resell him at a profit later on. Arriano told me that he needed to disappear, for your sake and his, and I can manage that.’

‘He told you what?’ The trader’s voice rose to a wail.

‘You can trust me. Eight zotars.’

‘You have larceny in your heart! You wish to drive me out of business!’

The haggling was on in earnest. For a good long time they insulted each other’s motives and ancestry at the top of their lungs until at last they settled upon sixteen zotars. Out came the original bill of sale, which Taliaesyn’s new master read over quickly with a bitter twist to his mouth, as if he were amazed at the clumsiness of the forgery.

‘I’ll make out a new bill, of course,’ Brindemo said.

‘Of course. My name is Zandar of Danmara.’

When Brindemo waddled off inside the house to write out the new bill, Zandar crossed his arms over his chest and considered Taliaesyn carefully and coolly.

‘You deal honestly with me, boy, and I’ll do the same with you. When your relatives catch up with us I’ll sell you back for little more than I paid – provided you work hard and cause me no trouble. Is it a bargain?’

‘Yes. I don’t suppose free men shake hands with slaves here, or I’d offer you mine.’

‘No one shakes hands the way you do in your country, so don’t take it as an insult. Unsanitary custom, it always seemed to me, rubbing palms with someone you barely know. You’ll have a quarterstaff like the other men. Will you swear to me you won’t turn it against me?’

‘On the gods of my people.’

‘All right, then. We won’t mention it again.’

In spite of himself Taliaesyn felt a grudging respect for the man. He would have liked him, he decided, if they’d met in other circumstances. Zandar went on with his slow scrutiny.

‘Silver dagger,’ he said abruptly. ‘That mean anything to you, boy?’

Taliaesyn felt his head jerk up like a startled stag’s.

‘I thought it might. You look the type. It would fit what little I’ve been told about your mysterious circumstances.’

‘So it does. Oh by every god!’ He spun around on his heel and began to pace back and forth in sheer excitement as memories crowded at the edge of his mind. He could feel the weight in his hand, the perfect balance of the dagger, see the pommel with the three silver knobs, the device graved on the blade, a striking falcon. All at once tears sprang to his eyes, as he saw another picture in his mind, the grim, scar-slashed face of a man with grey-shot blond hair and ice-blue eyes, a cold man, hard as steel, but one who loved him. ‘I think I remember my father, and by the hells, he was no merchant.’

‘We were all sure of that, boy. What’s his name? Think.’ He let his voice drop to a whisper. ‘Try to remember his name.’

Taliaesyn felt it rising, just out of reach, tried to remember, and lost the memory cold.

‘I can’t.’ Then he felt the stomach-wrenching cold of a loss of hope. ‘Well, if I was a silver dagger, you don’t need to worry about my kin coming to ransom me back. Doubtless they’ll be glad enough to be rid of me forever.’

‘Many a man’s worked his way out of slavery, you know. All it takes is a little shrewdness and a willingness to take on paying jobs after your duties are done.’

Taliaesyn nodded in agreement, but in truth he barely heard him. He was remembering the dagger again, and he knew now what Baruma had stolen from him, knew what he had to take back at the cost of Baruma’s life. Although he would never harm Zandar, he’d sworn no vow against escaping the first chance he got. Even though he would be torn to pieces as an escaped slave, he would take his revenge first, then die knowing he’d earned his manhood back again.

On the other side of the city from the harbour, Myleton sprawled along a shallow though broad river. Beside the water lay a tangle of alleys, tumbledown warehouses, and wooden jetties, where brightly-coloured punts bobbed in the flow. Beyond this disorderly district was a flat open pastureland where merchant caravans could camp with their pack-animals. Zandar’s caravan was waiting there, camped around two stone fire-circles and a pair of rope corrals. It was a big caravan, too: thirty pack mules and twelve riding horses, tended by nine freemen and now, of course, one slave.

Eking out his knowledge of the language with gesture and pantomime, the men introduced Taliaesyn to his new life. The extra horses were his responsibility, as well as all the odd pieces of work unworthy of freemen: cutting firewood, fetching water, stacking gear, and serving the food at meals, though one of the other men did double as the cook. Although everyone treated him decently, no one spoke to him unless it was to give him an order. As a slave he seemed to be almost invisible, like a tool or a cook-pot, hung up out of sight when not in use. When dinner time came, Taliaesyn was fed last and sat behind the others at a respectful distance. Afterwards, while they lounged talking around the fire he scrubbed out the cooking pots and washed the bowls. Even though he’d had some days at Brindemo’s to recover, he was still so weak from the long ordeal in the ship that by the end of the evening his head was swimming with exhaustion. As he fell asleep, he realized that it would be some time before he could seriously consider escape.

When the caravan broke camp the next morning, it headed out to the southeast, following the line of the river. After a few miles Taliaesyn realized why Zandar didn’t seem worried about his new slave escaping. The countryside ran perfectly flat, perfectly featureless, mile after mile of small farms with only a few shade-trees to break the monotony. Before noon they turned away from the river to head straight south and soon left the settled farms behind to follow a narrow caravan track through grassland. A runaway slave would have no place to hide, no food to forage, no true road to follow. Well, by the gods of my people, Taliaesyn thought, I’ll have to wait and see what the mountains bring me, then.

That time of year, when winter was already howling through Deverry, the Southern Sea was so rough that the small bark was forced to tack its way across to Bardek. Of a morning it might run miles out of the direct course before a strong west wind only to laboriously turn back in the afternoon when the wind changed. All around the ocean stretched wintry-blue and lonely, an endless swell off to a grey-mist horizon. Considering the time of year, it was doubtless the only ship out to sea. Its tattered crew of fifteen sailors grumbled at their captain’s decision to make the trip south, but then, they were usually grumbling about one thing or another. A rough lot, they went armed with swords and squabbled like the winds themselves, but they were quite respectful of the ship’s two passengers. Whenever Salamander the gerthddyn and his bodyguard, a young silver dagger with the supposed name of Gilyan, took the sea air or stood at the ship’s railing of a morning, the pirates bowed politely, left the deck to give them privacy, and made the sign of warding against witchcraft as they did so. If they had been able to see the small grey gnome that frisked along with the pair of them, they would have outright run away.

‘Ah, the call of the sea!’ Salamander remarked, one frosty morning. ‘The vast and wind-swept sea, at that, and then, far ahead of us, an exotic land and strange clime.’ He leaned against the rail and watched the white water foaming under the prow. ‘Bracing salt air, the creak of ropes and sails – ah, it’s splendid.’

‘I’m cursed glad you think so,’ Jill snarled. ‘I’d rather have a good horse under me any day.’

‘Spoken like a true silver dagger, Gillo my turtledove, but you’re overlooking a great advantage to shipboard life: spare time. Time to plan, to scheme, to brood revenge for the evils done our Rhodry, but best of all, time for you to learn Bardekian.’

‘Is it hard to learn?’

‘Oh, not at all. I picked it up in a couple of weeks the first time I was there.’

Salamander was forgetting, however, that he was not only half Elvish, with that race’s natural proclivity for language, but also a man with a highly-trained and disciplined mind. Jill found her studies maddening. Although she submitted to Salamander’s endless drills, after hours of sitting in the stuffy cabin her stubbornness began to wear on him. It only took a couple of days before his patience snapped.

‘Now here!’ he snarled one morning. ‘You’ve got to put the adjectives before the nouns, you little dolt! If you say “orno mannoto”, you’re saying “the dogs are ten”. Ten dogs is “mannoto orno”.’

‘Why can’t these idiots speak properly? If putting those ad-things after a name is good enough for the king, it should be good enough for them.’

Salamander heaved an unnecessarily loud sigh.

‘Mayhap we need a bit of a rest,’ he said. ‘I’ve been meaning to look over our coin, anyway. How much of Gwerbret Blaen’s bounty do we have left? These pirates are both bestial and of repellent aspect, but they do not come cheap.’

After Jill barred the door, they pooled their coin and counted it out. His long nose quivering, the gnome hunkered down to stare at the precious gold. When Salamander set aside the second instalment on their passage, the pile left looked inadequate indeed.

‘Even if we find Rhodry right away, we’re going to have to stay in Bardek all winter,’ Jill said. ‘Is it an expensive sort of place?’

‘It is, but men like a good tale no matter where they live. I shall ply my humble trade, but it’s going to look truly humble in the sophisticated islands. The rich folk won’t pay much for a storyteller, deemed fit only for farmers and slaves.’

‘Well, as long as we eat regularly, we don’t have to live in luxury.’

‘You may not have to live in luxury.’ With a decidedly mournful sigh, Salamander began making the coins disappear into hidden pockets in his clothing. ‘Besides, if I’m not rich, how can I buy an exotic barbarian slave?’

‘What? Who’s going to be buying any slaves?’

‘We are, my turtledove – Rhodry. What did you think we’d do? Demand him back by force or steal him with the sword? This is a civilized country. You can’t just take someone’s property.’

‘By every greasy hair on the Lord of Hell’s black ass, I want revenge, not haggling in a marketplace.’

‘Do you also want to be arrested for armed robbery? Jill, please, for the sake of every god of both our peoples, follow my orders when we get there. If we cause trouble, we could rot in prison for years, and that won’t do our Rhodry one jot of good.’

Once the coins were hidden, Salamander leaned back on his narrow bunk and idly stroked the blanket with his long, nervous fingers while he thought something through. All at once he laughed, his smoky-grey eyes snapping with delight.

‘I have it, my sweet, my eaglet! I shall be a wizard, not a gerthddyn.’ He waved one hand in a flourish, and blue fire danced and sparked from his fingertips. ‘Krysello, the Barbarian Wizard from the Far North!’ Another snap of his fingers sent a small shower of bright red sparks flying. ‘Come one, come all, and see the marvels of the northern lands! Bring the children, bring the aged grandmother, and see if you can discover if it’s done with powders and mirrors, or if the barbarian wizard is everything he claims to be.’ When he waved both hands, a sheet of purple flame stippled with gold drifted across the cabin to dissipate harmlessly against the wall. ‘By the hells, they’ll be throwing coin at us by the handful.’

‘No doubt, since they’ll be seeing real dweomer. But what would Nevyn say about this?’