Chapter Fourteen
Ahearn was grinning at Druadaen. The aeosti was smirking. The dark man was expressionless but shrugged. “Well,” he said reasonably, “if you’re going to keep listening to us, you might as well sit at the table.”
“That’s very kind of you, but—”
Ahearn held up his hand. “No buts. And no kindness involved. This is business.”
Druadaen felt his wariness increasing. “Business?” he repeated uncertainly, stalling. Typically, eavesdroppers were sharply rebuked and sent packing, not invited to join the offended. No: something’s wrong here, but I’m where I need to be, so…“What kind of business?”
Ahearn indicated his nearly full table. “You want to listen and find out? Fine. But that’s not free. So you’re standing for the drinks as long as you sit here.” The aeosti edged away from the only empty chair. “Just stay quiet.”
Druadaen nodded, occupied the chair, and felt a strange calm. He couldn’t even afford the mental distraction of trying to puzzle out what Ahearn might be up to. That was a distraction from the only thing that mattered: remaining alert for signs of a sudden threat.
Ahearn turned back to the pekt woman. “So let’s suppose we have a passing knowledge of the Underblack and the Red.” He pointed at Kaakhag. “He still has almost all the knowledge you need. The moment he tweaks to any signs left by his tribe, he’ll be able to follow them. Our knowledge of the deeper tunnels might not even be needed. So what you’re really doing is hiring us as sell-swords. And since what you propose sounds very much like suicide, you’d better be able to pay appropriately.” He leaned back, crossed his large arms. “So, what are you offering?”
The woman sat very straight, seemed to be steeling herself to speak when Kaakhag put his green hand on her arm and shook his head slowly, but emphatically. She snatched her arm away, squared her shoulders, and said, “My axe in your service. For one year. Where you lead, I shall follow.”
Ahearn stared, stopped in mid-sip. He blinked and then stared again; the reaction might have been either theatrical or genuine surprise. “You’re serious?” He sipped again.
“I am. But heed this: you are my war chief. And that…is…all.”
Ahearn sputtered out his most recent sip of beer. “Oh, have no fears on that count,” he mumbled. He seemed both surprised and amused and was doing a poor job at concealing either. “I mean no offense to your axe or…or to the rest of you, but I’m interested in coin. I have no need of your service.”
“Haven’t you?” Her eyes were as sharp as her voice. “The tasks you are said to have undertaken within the past few moonphases could not be carried out by three. And she”—Umkhira tilted her head at the aeosti—“is new to your colors.” Ahearn almost managed to hide his surprise at her insight.
But she wasn’t done. “I am also not blind to your gear: sturdy but old. In want of improvement. Hardly what one would expect from a successful fortune-seeker.”
Ahearn’s gaze had settled on her and become shrewd. But he aimed his voice at Druadaen. “So, what do you think? Surety of service for the surety of suicide? Can you see any gain in those terms, lordling?”
Druadaen ignored the jibe that was also an exploratory jab. “If those were her terms, they would be pointless. But I do not see that as an accurate statement of what she is offering.”
Every pair of eyes at the table turned toward him—except those of the dog, which was licking noisily at some spot well beneath its belly. Druadaen took the time to look into each face and also to collect his thoughts and formulate a quick strategy.
“Firstly,” he began, “from the look on Kaakhag’s face, I think he fears that he alone will not be able to be your guide. After all, any hidden entrances he knows of are also known to those who held him and might be firmly held.”
The pek nodded vigorously, made tangled motions with his hands.
“So I suspect that there is value in having more than one person familiar with the tunnels, the habits, and the language of the pekt.”
They all started at the word “pekt.” Before Kaakhag’s and the woman’s immediate frowns could become snarls, Ahearn interceded. “Here, now! No reason for slurs! I thought Dunarrans were taught better manners than that.”
Druadaen pushed past the deflation of being so readily identified as a Dunarran. “I ask your pardons,” he said quickly to the two glowering beings to his right. “By what name would you be called? Urzhen?”
That term melted the frowns, brought relief to the human faces.
The woman’s chin came up sharply. “A proper, if imprecise, term, but it will serve. Now, back to my proposition. You reason correctly, newcomer. I need both a guide into the Under and swords that know what it means to fight—and hide—there.”
Druadaen resumed by nodding meaningfully at the pair of humans and then at the pair of urzhen. “So then, my second point: If the mission has four individuals familiar with the Under, and possibly a fifth”—he glanced at the aeosti—“it hardly seems like suicide. Particularly since you will only accomplish your end by focusing on stealth rather than combat. I suspect that if your numbers were much greater, it would lead to more frequent discoveries by your adversaries. Which would be your undoing.”
Even the aeosti nodded at that.
Ahearn leaned back and smiled at his dark companion. “Pay up.”
The man sighed and tossed a mark onto the table.
Druadaen frowned. “There was some wager?”
The companion nodded glumly. “Specifically,” the dark man muttered, “whether you really are a Dunarran.”
Ahearn chuckled. “Anyone could pick up the little odds and ends you’re still carrying from your homeland, and you wouldn’t be the first fellow who’d wandered into this kind of tavern looking like he was fresh out of a scriptorium. But when you opened your mouth just now—!” He hooted out a sharp laugh. “No one does that quite the way a city-schooled Dunarran does! ‘I conjecture!’ Every one of you comes out of the womb equipped with a scholar’s palaver!” Ahearn’s mouth remained smiling, but his eyes suddenly weren’t. “But what I still can’t figure out is why you were looking for me.”
Druadaen saw several things in the same instant. The two urzhen were even more surprised than he was at Ahearn’s revelation. The aeosti was as well; she/he was just better at hiding it. Ahearn and the dark man were both watching him like stooping hawks, but without any bodily shift which presaged anticipation of combat. Not immediately, at least.
Druadaen sighed; this was the crossroads, then. The tavern’s purportedly original name rose up like a suggestion: truth or consequences.
He inhaled slowly. “I will answer that by way of my third and final comment on this warrior-woman’s proposition: that there is yet another person willing to accompany you into the Under.”
Ahearn’s eyes widened, then narrowed. “You? Really?” He shook his head. “What’s this about, Dunarran? Why in the hells would you be eager to rub elbows with underkin? A death wish?”
“No. Curiosity.”
The smiles elicited by his reply were neither amiable nor kind. The dark man leaned sideways toward Ahearn. “That’s so perfectly Dunarran, I almost feel I owe you another mark.”
Ahearn nodded, his eyes still on Druadaen. “Make it a pence and we’ll call it even.” He shook his head again. “Still, why would you be curious about such things?”
“Because when I was with the bountiers out upon the Graveyard, they only understood how to hunt the urzhen. They knew nothing about them as a people. In particular, they had no way to explain how the urzhen could achieve a Horde every eight or nine years, no matter how terrible their casualties had been during the previous Horde.”
The response was stunned silence. “You went ‘exploring’ out on the Graveyard?” the aeosti asked eventually, her tone both doubtful and sardonic. “Alone?”
Druadaen simply nodded.
Ahearn’s companion glanced at him. “That’s how he knew to look for us. He must have met Fronbec.”
“I did, but you were also recommended by the leader of a troop of Teurond cavalry.”
Ahearn frowned. “And what was that worthy’s name?”
“Darauf, captain of the King’s Own Border Cavalry.”
Ahearn sputtered out more beer. The urzhen woman frowned. The big green male growled. The dark man became very still, and his eyes widened.
The aeosti was the only one smiling. “You have no idea who you actually met, do you?”
Before Druadaen could formulate an answer, Ahearn muttered, “That ‘captain of horse’ is a crown-lord! He’s the grandson of King Tandric V and eldest son of Prince Alaxöman of the line of Teurodn. Eight or nine years ago, he made a name for himself as the scourge of the last Horde.” He put both fists upon the table. “But it’s strange as spider teats that any Teurond crown-lord knows my name.”
Druadaen shrugged. “And yet he does. Maybe when we go back that way, you can ask how he came to be acquainted with it.”
The mute urzh slammed a large-knuckled fist on the table. He made a tortured sound deep in his throat.
The urzh woman nodded. “I believe Kaakhag means to say that he would rather kill the crown-lord than ask him questions.”
Druadaen shrugged; no surprise there. “And you?” he said, turning to face her directly. “Your opinion of the captain seems similar, if not so intense.”
She shrugged. “To most of you, we are all alike and, so, are all marked for death. In this regard, the spawn of the House of Teurodn are no better or worse than their subjects. But Darauf’s name is known above others because he killed so many of our people.”
Druadaen frowned, puzzled. “Your people?”
She frowned back, equally puzzled at his reaction. “Of course, my people. Despite the differences among those you call the urzhen, ours is one blood and one destiny.”
Druadaen shook his head. “But, you…are you not HalfBent?”
She started. “What? Why do you think such a thing?”
“Well…because you’re not green.”
She rolled her eyes. Kaakhag’s laugh was like broken wagon wheels bouncing over loose stone. The others leaned back, a modestly amused audience.
The woman’s stare was baleful. “We are not born green,” she said. Her tone added, you idiot.
Druadaen might have blinked. “But, all of you—”
“What you see is a dye, human. It has useful properties and identifies any underkin so colored as a warrior, a raider.”
“But you…aren’t you a warrior?” It took Druadaen a moment to realize that the male urzhen’s immediate reaction—a rumble of grunting snorts—was a long snicker.
The woman was rolling her eyes again. “Yes, I’m a warrior,” she explained through a long, exasperated sigh. “But…well, do I look like underkin?”
Feeling trapped, Druadaen tentatively replied, “Erm…no?”
She closed her eyes and shook her head.
“Umkhira is a Lightstrider,” the dark man explained. “Her kind of urzhen live on the surface—and only there. That’s why she knows so little of the Under. Much less than Ahearn and I do, in fact.”
Druadaen nodded. “And this is why I must go to the Under: to discover just such distinctions and details concerning the urzhen.”
A dangerous growl welled up from Kaakhag’s barrel chest. He made a slashing gesture with one hand.
“‘So you can come after us in our lairs?’” Umkhira translated.
Druadaen had been able to intimate that much; he was already shaking his head. “Although the knowledge I hope to gain might be used that way, it is not why I seek it. As I said, your existence holds mysteries that defy the laws of nature. Specifically, the numbers and growth of any species is limited by the resources it may access. But if that is true, then—according to all the facts I have been able to gather—it should be impossible for the urzhen of the Gur Grehar to ever grow into a new Horde.”
Kaakhag shrugged, waved dismissively and gestured downward.
Druadaen turned to Umkhira. “He attributes it to gods in the earth?”
Her gaze quickly went from imperious to curious. She nodded, then frowned. “You are very odd.” Her tone was not insulting, just frank.
Ahearn laughed. “Well, we have established that he’s a Dunarran, so no surprise there. It’s said that most of the young ones are half philosopher and half fool. For instance, did you really think it likely that any of the locals you asked about me—however indirectly—were going to keep it a secret? That once a stranger they’d never see again had crossed their palm with a little copper, or even billon, that they wouldn’t make another pence or two by coming to tell me?” He leaned back slightly. “You walked straight into this, lordling.”
Druadaen shrugged, hoping the motion would disguise how he shifted in his seat so that he could stand more quickly…and how his left hand cheated backward, closer to the hilt of his sword.
Ahearn shook his head, raised his empty hands. “Now, now. No reason to get nervous. If we meant to roll you, we’d have put you at your ease, and then—”
“And then attacked me in a nearby alley?”
“Attacked? Such an unpleasant word. Let’s just say that, at the end of our business together, we’d have had what’s in your purse and you’d have still had what’s in your veins.”
Druadaen shook his head slightly. “And that reassurance is exactly what you’d say if you wished me to lower my guard to make the same thievery that much easier when we leave.” He watched for the response: this moment, too, was a crossroads.
The dark fellow glanced at Ahearn. “He’s not gullible. Just inexperienced. We can work with that.”
Ahearn nodded. “Very well, then, consider yourself part of the company.”
Umkhira sat erect at the word “company.” “So, you accept my offer?”
Ahearn rubbed his chin. “I do. The damnedest group I’ve ever worked with, but there’s often opportunity in that.” Now it was the aeosti who rolled her eyes. “And what are you fussing over?”
She tilted her head toward Druadaen without deigning to look at him. “Really? This one? Who will be responsible for changing his”—she struggled to find a word, gave up—“jesa?”
Before anyone else could puzzle out the Iavan word, Druadaen calmly said, “The word you were looking for is ‘diapers,’ Sahn.”
The aeosti started at the last word.
The dark man frowned. “I don’t know that term.”
“It is a pronoun,” she explained, abashed. “For when one of my people are newly met and we are not yet fully…known.” She turned to face Druadaen directly. “Veth,” she apologized contritely. “I am called S’ythreni.”
He nodded, glanced at Ahearn. “So at what point did you decide not to rob me?”
Ahearn laughed. “Oh, pretty much the moment you came in the door. We wouldn’t have done so, anyway. Not unless you turned out to be a right bastard. Might’ve given you a sharp scare for your own good, though.”
“And why did you not do that?”
“Heh: the day’s not over, lordling,” Ahearn said with a wink. “Truth, though: You might be a bit of a swell, but you know to wear your weapons lower, a little further back, and on a lanyard with loose loops tucked where they won’t snag. Also, with your sword on your left hip and a long-quilloned dagger on your right, you’re rigged for a cross-draw or I’m a fish’s father. And that’s no costume you’re wearing, but your own gear: fits too easily and it’s weathered where your body’s creased it.” He stretched. “And besides, your timing could not be better.”
“You mean regarding Umkhira’s proposal?”
“Well, that too, but I’m speaking about more pressing matters.”
“Such as?”
The dark man’s eyes flicked at something over Druadaen’s left shoulder. “That,” he muttered.
A man of middle years was approaching the table. His profession was not evident from his attire, but there was no mistaking the way the three men with him made their coin. All were in leather armor, had their hands on the hilts of their weapons, and had the empty eyes of trained killers ready to ply their trade if necessary.
The man stopped a few yards away; his retainers continued a few feet further, arrayed themselves as a living wall between him and the table. From behind that screen, the man inclined his head slightly. “Elweyr.”
“Bannef,” Ahearn’s dark companion answered with a similar nod.
“You wanted to meet about a book.”
“Indeed I did. And still do.”
The man glanced disapprovingly at the other figures around the table. “You said you’d be coming alone.”
Elweyr shrugged. “So did you.”
“And who are these others?”
“Potential partners of his,” Ahearn explained with a table-sweeping gesture.
“Convenient how you managed to double your numbers by having this little meeting just before we do business. Did you mention anything about that to the three of them, I wonder?”
“And I wonder how it is that you knew Elweyr was part of a group, and how you had such detailed information on its numbers.” Ahearn had leaned forward and shifted sideways as he spoke.
Ready to stand and draw steel, thought Druadaen.
“Now,” finished Ahearn, “are you two gentlemen going to do business, or what?”
Bannef’s smile was cool. “I think the answer is ‘or what.’”
Ahearn raised a palm. “Ah, a shame, that.”
Druadaen mentally rehearsed the angle at which he’d need to make a grab for the hilts of his two weapons while sitting.
Elweyr put both hands flat on the table. “So you have no interest in selling that treatise you were dropping hints about?”
Bannef’s smile widened. “I can’t sell an object I don’t possess.”
Ahearn sighed. “And never did, I wager.”
“You’d win that bet.”
“And if we were to wager that the only reason you’re here is to take Elweyr’s own book from him—?”
“You’d win the bet and lose the book. Which is exactly what will happen now.” Bannef turned toward Elweyr. “Turn it over.” He waved two fingers in the air.
Six other men in the room stood. Everyone else started to leave. Quickly.
“Well,” murmured Ahearn, “this is interesting.”