Текст книги "Cascet of Souls"

Автор книги: Lynn Flewelling

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 22 (всего у книги 31 страниц)

The morning was nearly gone when they passed an open-fronted lean-to. Inside, an old woman was wailing over a little boy lying on a pallet of rags.

“What ails him, old mother?” Seregil asked, approaching slowly so as not to alarm her.

“Dead of the sleeping sickness,” she wept. “The last of all my kin! No drysian would come.”

“Have you lost any others to the sickness?”

“His sister died yesterday. What am I to do?”

Seregil knelt beside her and looked down at the child. He had hair the color of Alec’s, and a lock of it had been cut to the left of his face. “Did he and his sister trade with the raven folk, old mother?”

“With the what?” The old woman stared up at him with red-rimmed eyes.

“Beggars making odd trades? Did your grandchildren trade with them?”

“I don’t know what yer talking about! Just leave me alone.”

“Here now, don’t be badgering her about such things!” a fat man called from his own hovel across the path. Heaving himself up from the crate he’d been sitting on, he stumped over to join them. “Can’t you see she’s mourning? Leave her be with your foolish questions!” the man growled, aiming a kick at Seregil.

Seregil grunted in pain and sprang to his feet. “Apologies to you both. Maker’s Mercy, old mother, and the Old Sailor’s peace.”

* * *

Frustrated and hungry, they sat on the end of a broken-down wagon with the bread and sausage they’d brought, not wanting to chance eating anything they’d find here.

“It’s like looking for one particular frog in Blackwater Marsh,” Alec muttered. “We’ve got trades with no deaths and deaths with no trades, and no sign of any raven people. It’s almost three days now, for Myrhichia.”

“We still have plenty of daylight left.”

A handful of ragged, hungry little children sidled up to them and Seregil threw the remains of his food to them. With a sigh, Alec did the same and after a brief squabble the children scampered away, the losers pursuing the ones with the spoils.

One little girl in a ragged grey shift lingered behind. After a moment, she cautiously approached them and looked Seregil boldly in the eye as she held up her short brown braid. The end of it looked newly trimmed. “Trade?”

“Hello, little bird. Did someone trade you for your hair?” asked Seregil.

“Ain’t you raven folk?” she asked, taking a step back.

“No, but we’re looking for them,” said Alec. “You’ve traded with them?”

The child stood on one bare foot with a finger in her mouth as she eyed them. “I’ll tell you for a penny.”

Grinning, Alec snatched a penny out of thin air and held it out to her.

“Toss it,” she said, unimpressed with his sleight of hand.

Cagey even at this age, he thought as he flipped it to her.

She snatched it and hid it away in a pocket of her dingy dress. “I seen the old lady yesterday. She traded me this.” Digging in her pocket, she showed them a tiny cat cunningly carved from bone.

“Did you give her some of your hair?” asked Alec.

She sucked her finger again and nodded.

“When, little bird?” asked Seregil.

The girl shrugged.

“Do you know where we could find her today?” Alec prompted.

“I’ll show you, for ’nother penny.”

Alec produced another one and tossed it to her. “You drive a hard bargain, miss.”

Satisfied, she motioned for them to follow her and led them farther into the makeshift village.

“We need that carving,” Alec whispered.

“I know,” Seregil murmured back. “We’ll buy it from her once she’s shown us where to find the old woman.”

Smoke curled low over the rooftops, defeated by the mist, and the smell of horse-dung fires and poverty hung heavy on the air. The paths had been trodden to mire, and they sank to their ankles in places.

They were nearly to the outer wall, passing between two rude shacks, when a pair of swordsmen stepped around a corner and blocked their way. Four more moved in behind them, trapping them. The girl scampered over to one of them in front of Seregil and hid behind his leg, lisping, “I brung some, Papa.”

“Good girl. Run home,” the man said, never taking his eyes off his supposed victims. “Now then, boys, you’re strangers here. We don’t much like strangers, ’less they have the money for our toll.”

“How much would that be?” Seregil asked.

That made the others laugh.

“Whatever you got, stranger,” one of them in back said, stepping toward Alec. Perhaps he took him for the weaker of the prey, because of his bandaged eye.

Alec soon disabused him of that notion. He threw back his cloak and drew his sword. “Come see for yourself.”

Seregil drew his sword and stood back-to-back with Alec, facing the men in front of them. “I don’t much care for the hospitality here.”

“Me neither,” said Alec. “And here I was hoping we’d get through the day without killing anyone.”

The leader smirked at that. “Can’t ya count, you raggedy bastard? You’re outmanned.”

“I don’t see us walking away, even if we do pay yer toll, you ugly son of a whore,” Seregil replied. “So I’d just as soon keep my purse, if it’s all the same to you.”

The leader’s smirk widened. “Suit yourself, then.

With that, he lunged at Seregil while two other men at Alec’s end closed on him.

Clearly the ambushers had chosen this spot on purpose; there was enough room to swing a sword, but no way for their victims to get past them. Seregil heard the clash of blades behind him as he met the man’s attack and blocked his swing. Springing back, he had just time enough to pull his poniard from the back of his belt before the man and another came at him. They worked like wolves, one trying to distract him so the other could get under his guard. Seregil managed to block them both, but realized that it wasn’t common brigands they were dealing with. These men fought like soldiers, fearlessly pressing their attack. Seregil beat them back and glanced back at Alec, who was holding his own against a big man while the others stood back and cheered their fellow on.

“What was your regiment?” Seregil asked his attackers, poised to strike.

That won him a look of surprise. “What’s that to you?” the leader growled.

“I don’t fancy killing fellow veterans, is all,” Seregil told him. Alec was still fighting behind him, and Seregil heard someone go down.

“Eagle. You?”

“Queen’s Horse,” Seregil lied, since he knew Beka Cavish’s regiment the best.

“You don’t have a rider’s stance,” the man scoffed.

“That’s what they said when they cashiered me, but that don’t make it not so.”

Thinking Seregil off his guard, the leader’s second came after him, slashing at his belly. Seregil narrowly sidestepped disembowelment, caught the man’s blade on his quillon, and drove the poniard’s thin three-sided blade deep between his ribs and up into his heart. He jumped back again as the dying man collapsed with a surprised look on his face.

“You bastard!” the leader snarled, coming at Seregil in earnest this time, having the measure of his foe now. He was skilled, and drove Seregil back with brute force until he nearly collided with Alec. Seregil stepped awkwardly, lost

his footing in the mud and went down, still clutching his sword. Before he could raise it, the man came at him with a killing blow, only to be struck in the side of the head by Alec, who quickly wrenched his blade free of the skull and whirled back in time to run a man through.

The dying man collapsed without a sound on top of Seregil, knocking the breath out of him and impaling himself awkwardly on Seregil’s upraised blade in the process. Heaving the man off, Seregil rolled to his knees in time to miss being skewered by the third man on his side. The fellow overreached and Seregil got past his guard and stabbed him through the heart, getting a face full of blood for his trouble.

Scrambling to his feet, he wiped it from his eyes, pulled his sword from the body at his feet, and turned to help Alec.

Two others already lay in the mud in front of the younger man. Years of practice against the likes of Seregil and Micum Cavish had made a good swordsman of him, very nearly Seregil’s equal these days. But he was still fighting two at once and being driven back. Beyond them, more men were coming, attracted by the sound of the fight.

“Shit!” Seregil hissed between clenched teeth. “Run!”

And they ran, as fast as the mud allowed. They were both good at this, too. Dodging nimbly between shacks at random, they quickly left their pursuers behind.

“Bilairy’s Balls!” Alec gasped as they took cover in a deserted shanty and collapsed side by side against a wall, panting. Looking Seregil over, he let out a short laugh. “You’re a mess.”

Indeed he was, covered in mud and blood, and Alec wasn’t much better. Seregil wiped his hands on his muddy jerkin in a futile effort to clean off the worst of it. Alec had managed to avoid the mud, but his left shoulder was covered in blood. Blood that was running down to stain the arm of his filthy tunic. Too much of it.

Seregil pulled the oilskin cloak away from Alec’s shoulder and found the sleeve of his tunic cut open just below the seam, along with the flesh underneath. It was a shallow cut, fortunately, but it was still bleeding.

“It’s just a scratch, Seregil.”

“A bleeding scratch. Come on.”

The cleanest thing they had for a bandage was the scarf holding down Seregil’s hat. Somehow that had stayed free of mud. Seregil wrapped it tightly around Alec’s arm and tied it. “That takes care of that, but you’re still a bloody mess.”

“I’m fine,” Alec insisted, standing up. “As long as I keep my cloak on, no one will see. You, on the other hand-”

“Look like I live here now.” Seregil ripped a piece from the tail of his shirt to try to wipe away the worst of it.

They hunted a few hours more, but had no luck. As shadows began to lengthen across the slum they made their way back to the gate and headed for the Stag and Otter.

Ema and Tomin were in the steamy kitchen, helping the girls get the evening meal ready.

“I just scrubbed that floor!” Ema complained as they came in, dripping rain and mud.

“Sorry.” Seregil untied his cloak and tossed it onto the woodpile by the door.

“What happened to-” Tomin broke off, knowing better than to ask any questions. “Do you want the tub filled?”

“The sooner, the better!” Seregil exclaimed wearily, pulling off his sodden, cracked old shoes. “Alec, you stay here and have Tomin look at your arm. I’ll go fetch some clothes.”

Alec’s wound didn’t need stitching, so Tomin cleaned and dressed it with stinging horse salve and wrapped it in clean linen.

Leaving their filthy clothing for Ema to deal with, they washed and went up to their rooms. It was early dark and raining hard again, but the air was still too muggy for a fire. Everything in the room felt damp.

“I’d say it’s pretty clear that the raven people have something to do with the sickness,” said Alec, sitting down in his accustomed chair by the empty hearth to comb the knots from his wet hair.

“Yes, I think we can assume that.” Seregil stretched out on the sofa, staring up at the ceiling. Ruetha appeared from under the sofa and curled up between his bare feet, purring as she began to wash. “How they’re causing it is the next

question, and why? It’s not like they’re gaining anything of value for their trades, except to hurt someone else.”

“But the hair? Whoever these raven folk are, they could be using some sort of necromancy on whatever they’ve traded.”

Seregil raised an eyebrow as he considered this. “Or something like it. It’s interesting, this trading. What does that suggest to you?”

“That something stolen won’t work? That it has to be freely given?”

“Exactly. And the fact that the old woman could get close enough to those slum children to trade with them when we couldn’t means that she and whatever other folk of her tribe there are around aren’t seen as threats or outsiders by those they trade with. Our little friend who led us into the ambush pegged us as outsiders, and knew better than to get within arm’s reach of two strange men.”

“But an old woman would seem safe enough. We have to go back! Myrhichia-”

“I know, tali, but there’s nothing more we can do tonight. We’ll start again early tomorrow. And this time as something more harmless in appearance. We need to get our hands on some of those traded items.”

“We can’t just-just relax!” Alec exclaimed. “There must be something we can do tonight. A week at the most. That’s what that drysian woman down below said.”

Seregil sighed and sat up. “Hand me my boots.”

It was not late when they arrived at the Oreska, but they found Thero in his dressing gown.

The wizard frowned as he let them in. “How is it you always know when I’m about to finally get some sleep?”

“The sleeping death has struck in the Ring, and the Street of Lights,” Seregil told him, brushing past. “It’s Myrhichia.”

The wizard sank down on a stool by one of the workbenches. “I’m so sorry!”

“We think we may have found something about the sleeping death. There are strange beggar folk trading with people in the Ring and Lower City,” Alec told him. “People there call them the raven folk.”

“Given their taste in trades,” Seregil explained. “They barter for bits of hair, broken toys, and the like.

Thero raised an eyebrow. “Trades?”

Alec tried to rein in his impatience. “Yes. We’ve seen and heard of several children and some adults stricken with the disease, or magic, or whatever you want to call it. Many of them were known to have made a trade of some sort with the ravens.”

“I understand that. But-”

“We mostly see Reltheus and Malthus during the evening,” Alec rushed on. “And we haven’t heard from Elani in days. We may have fallen out of favor already.”

“I doubt that. But why are you here? Shouldn’t you be talking to Valerius?”

“He knows. He sent us into the Ring.”

“You’re workingfor him? Seregil-”

“We’ll keep up with our social life and any spying you need done by night, and look for the raven folk by day.”

“Prince Korathan wants this,” Alec added. “It’s a matter of-of-”

“Civic security,” Seregil finished for him. “If there’s a panic and this is a disease of some sort, then people will flee in droves, carrying it out to spread across the countryside. We have Kepi watching Reltheus for now.”

Thero rubbed a hand wearily across his eyes. “I don’t like this, especially now that they appear to be killing each other off.”

“There’s been another death?”

“Yes. Countess Alarhichia.”

“Her name hasn’t come up,” said Alec.

“No, but she’s a known friend of Duke Reltheus, and another member of the court. Considering the suddenness of her death, I think we should at least consider it another act of retribution. In the meantime, various nobles are retreating to their country estates.”

“Any of our conspirators?” asked Seregil.

“Marquise Lania and Earl Stenmir.”

“Do you think Korathan will send Elani away?” asked Alec.

“Not yet. I’m sure he knows that would start a full-blown panic. You musthurry.”

“I know, Thero, but we can’t abandon Eirual and Myrhichia, either, and we won’t,” said Seregil. “We’ll manage. Neither side seems to be doing anything very dangerous at the moment, anyway. I wonder if Korathan sending General Sarien away has had a chilling effect?”

“Possibly.” Thero seemed to be about to say something as they rose to go, but instead just shook his head. “Get hold of one of those traded items and bring it to me. I’ll see if I can make out anything from it.”

“Thank you,” said Seregil. “We mean to do just that.”

“What now?” Alec asked as they made their way down through the atrium.

“We’d better go see Eirual. Then we’ve got to catch a raven and see if we can make it talk.”

It was eerie to see the pink lanterns over the door of Eirual’s brothel dark, and no warm light spilling from the windows. She’d given out word that they had summer fever in the house, and Valerius had convinced Korathan not to raise the alarm yet, on the condition that the house remained closed to trade.

“How is she, Manius?” Seregil asked as the man led them through the empty salon to the stairs.

“Myrhichia is just the same, and the other girls are frightened,” the servant replied, lighting a candle for them. “We’re all frightened for Lady Eirual, too. She hasn’t left Myrhichia’s side for a moment, sleeps in the same bed with her, and hardly eats a thing.”

“Send up a tray of cold food. I’ll see what I can do.”

It had only been a few days since they’d seen Eirual, but the change in her was startling. Dressed in a plain dark gown, she sat curled in a chair by the bedside with a book open but ignored on her lap. Her dark curls were loose around her shoulders and her violet eyes had a sunken, bruised look. It had been years since Seregil had seen her without her face made up, and it saddened him to see the little telltale signs of

age around her eyes and mouth. The look of hope in her eyes as they entered broke his heart.

“Anything?” she asked.

“No cure yet, I’m sorry. We just came to see how you both are.”

She gave a listless shrug. “As you see. I’m going to lose her, aren’t I?”

“Don’t say that!” Alec urged, kneeling beside her chair. “We think we may know what’s causing this sickness.”

She stroked his cheek. “Then where is the healer?”

“We hope to have proof for him by tomorrow,” Seregil said, bending over Myrhichia. She looked in better health than her mistress. There was still some color in her cheeks, her carefully braided hair shone, and her expression was peaceful.

“She takes a little broth,” Eirual told him.

Seregil took the bowl and spoon from the night table and trickled a few drops of cold broth between Myrhichia’s lips. After a moment she swallowed reflexively, but there was no other sign of life beyond the slight rise and fall of her chest.

Impotent rage rose in Seregil’s heart but he was careful not to show it.

“Can you stay until morning?” Eirual whispered.

“Of course. Come, lie down and try to sleep, love.”

Seregil settled Eirual in bed beside Myrhichia, then stretched out beside her, nodding for Alec to lie beside Myrhichia on the other side, as if surrounding the girl with their shared warmth and hope would be enough to save her. They lay like that all night, Alec and Eirual holding Myrhichia, and Seregil holding Eirual. Alec drifted off, but Seregil remained awake, watching the waxing moon sail past the window and the stars follow. The fifth day would soon dawn.

Brader waited until the others had gone up to bed, then cornered Atre in the front room.

“Have you gone completely mad?” he whispered, furious. “A noble here and there, the old ones, drew no attention, but for the love of Soru, threein less than a month?”

“What makes you think it was me?” Atre protested.

“Of course it was you. You think I don’t know the signs by now? Important people dropping dead for no reason, and you looking like you do? Even Merina is taking notice. She may not know what it all means, but it’s not like she hasn’t seen it before.”

“First of all, I didn’t kill Alarhichia. That was probably someone from Kyrin’s group, or natural. As for the others? I’m sure the two cabals are convinced they’re killing each other out of revenge.”

Brader took a steadying breath, resisting the urge to pummel his cousin. “Each side knows whether they’vekilled anyone or not.”

“Relax, Brader. No one suspects us. This city is too huge to notice what we’re up to. That’s the beauty of it! The vicegerent will quarantine another area of the sleeping death, and the cabals will kill each other off faster than I can. There’s nothing to worry about.”

“I’ve heard that before.”

Atre smiled. “Trust me.”

CHAPTER 32. Stealth and Stones

IT was drizzling when Seregil and Alec entered the Ring again that morning, dressed this time as dirty beggar women. Swords weren’t part of the disguise, but they had knives hidden under their ragged cloaks. Both wore large faded kerchiefs that covered their hair and partially obscured their faces.

It wasn’t Alec’s favorite form of disguise; he felt uneasy with his legs hampered by long skirts, and although Seregil had gone to great pains to teach him how to make his voice lighter and more feminine, Alec always felt a bit silly speaking that way. For this job, however, even he had to admit it was a good choice. They attracted much less attention than they had yesterday.

“Let’s see if we can avoid any more fights,” Seregil murmured, keeping a sharp eye out for danger as they wended their way into a section of the slum they hadn’t been in before.

They did manage to stay out of trouble, but had little luck until it was nearly dark. They were on their way back to the gate, not wanting to get caught here after dark, when Seregil glanced down a side path and saw a stoop-shouldered, bowlegged old man speaking with a young boy and holding something out to him. The man must have been tall in his day, and had a head of wild grey hair that hung to his shoulders, a bulbous nose, and a patch over one eye. His unruly grey beard was stained with something dark at the corners of his mouth.

Seregil caught Alec by the arm and nodded in their direction, whispering, “The one-eyed old man.”

As they watched, the boy took whatever it was and handed the old fellow something back. The man patted him on the head, then stumped away deeper into the shantytown.

“There’s a bit of luck!” Seregil exclaimed softly.

“He doesn’t have anything hanging from his belt.”

“But he made a trade, all the same. You take the boy. I’ll see where the old fellow is headed. If you don’t catch up, I’ll meet you by the fountain in the Sea Market in an hour’s time.”

Leaving Alec to his work, Seregil set off after the old man.

The boy was walking away, looking at something in his hand.

Alec sidled up behind him. “What you got there?” he asked, doing his best to speak with a woman’s voice.

The child whirled around and drew a short dagger. He had a thin, ugly face and a wen on his cheek the size of a sparrow’s egg. “What’s that to you?”

Alec held up his hands, showing that he meant no harm. “Nothin’, except I been looking for one of those raven people and I thought that might have been one you was talkin’ to.”

The boy regarded him shrewdly for a moment, still wary, then said, “What do you want with ’em?”

“I hear they make trades. I was lookin’ to make one myself, maybe. So, was that old man one of ’em?”

The boy’s mouth slanted in a taunting grin. “What’s it worth to you to know?”

Alec pretended to hesitate, then turned away and fished a couple of copper pennies from the small pouch around his neck under his tattered gown. “Will that do?”

“Yeah, he was raven folk,” the boy said as he reached to snatch the coins from Alec’s outstretched hand.

But Alec held them back. “For this, I ’spect more of an answer than that. What’d you two trade?”

The boy opened his left hand and showed Alec a yellow rock crystal. “I give him my hog tooth necklace. Easy enough to come by another. Ain’t seen nothing like this, though.”

“That is fine,” Alec replied. It was a pretty thing, and a far cry from anything the boy was likely to find here. But it was a far cry from a sweetmeat, too.

“Sell it to you.” The boy jutted his chin at the coins Alec still held.

Alec pretended to consider it, then nodded and took out two more coins. The boy tossed him the stone, and Alec handed over the price.

“We finished?” asked the boy, still gripping his knife. “I got nothin’ more to trade or sell.”

“That’s fine.” Tucking the stone away, Alec turned to take his leave, but alert to any sound of the boy coming to knife him. Glancing back, though, he was already gone.

Seregil kept his distance, blending in with the crowd of destitute and cutthroats coming out like bats as the light failed. He dogged the one-eyed man, hoping to see him do another trade, but the old codger seemed to have somewhere to go, for he went on without pausing anywhere, head down and limping a bit. Dressed no better or worse than those around him, he attracted no one else’s attention, and no one greeted him.

It took him a moment to notice the tall, dark-haired man trailing the old one. At first he thought it might be coincidence, but when the old man turned, so did the big man. Seregil frowned; the last thing he needed was for the old man to get murdered in front of him before he could talk to him.

Drifting along behind them, Seregil caught glimpses of the old man’s face when he turned down a byway, and then another. Though the bowed legs could have made him a horseman, a cripple, or just undernourished, he had the rolling gait of a sailor. Perhaps the raven folk did come from somewhere else, by ship, or from a seafaring people.

The taller man’s face was hidden by his cloak hood but Seregil guessed from his stride and those broad shoulders that he was more than a match for the old fellow, and could easily have overtaken him by now, if he’d wanted to. Perhaps Tall Fellow expected Old Fellow to lead him

somewhere? If so, Seregil suspected it might be of interest to him, as well.

Having to keep out of Tall Fellow’s way made Seregil hang back more than he liked, and he nearly lost them both when the old man turned aside and headed deeper into the shack town through a wide place in the path. There were more people here, bargaining with the sellers of bruised vegetables and questionable meat. Seregil had to look over heads and past shoulders to keep them in sight.

And then Old Fellow was gone, along with his tall shadow.

“Bilairy’s Balls,” Seregil muttered as he hurried up to where he’d last seen him and looked around. It was an intersection of sorts where two paths crossed amid a cluster of tumbledown shacks. Seregil checked both ways, but there was simply no sign of him, and no hope of tracking his footprints in the churned mud. The mist was turning to a downpour again and the damp was coming through his clothes.

“Lookin’ for someone, sweetness?” a scar-faced tough called to him from the open door of one of the sturdier-looking buildings. He was dressed in the remnants of worn cavalry leathers, with a long sword at his hip and a decidedly predatory look in his eye. A fat louse crawled out from under his stringy black hair onto his left cheek. He absently pinched it between thumbnail and finger and flicked it away.

“My father,” Seregil replied brusquely, pretending not to anticipate the man’s clear intention. “Old fellow with a patch and a limp?”

“Ain’t seen him,” the man drawled, leaving the doorway and coming a little closer. “You’re soaked through. Come on in and I’ll get you wetter.” He grabbed Seregil by the arm, trying to drag him into the hovel.

Seregil didn’t have time for this. Drawing his knife, he kneed the man in the balls, then took him by the hair as he fell to his knees and bent the man’s head sharply back as the would-be rapist groaned in pain. Pressing the edge of the blade to his throat just hard enough to break the skin, Seregil whispered, “I don’t need no wetting from you, you whoreson bastard.”

“Filthy bitch!” the man hissed. A trickle of blood crept

down his neck to stain the already dirty collar of the shirt he wore under his leather vest.

“Didn’t your ma teach you any manners?” Seregil asked, giving him a shake. “Come after me and I’ll cut your pox-ridden balls off and feed ’em to you. You hear me?”

“Yes!”

Knowing better than to take the man’s word for it, Seregil drew back his knife hand and punched him in the head hard enough to stun him. He fell face-first into the mud with a muffled grunt.

“You should cut the bastard’s throat while you have the chance,” a wretched-looking young woman whispered from inside the man’s shack. Her dress was little more than a rag, and she had a freshly blackened eye and a swollen lip.

Seregil pulled the man’s knife from his belt and tossed it at her feet. “I’d hurry, if I was you, dearie,” he told her, then turned back to his search, leaving the man to the woman’s doubtful mercy.

The old man was long gone by now. Angry at losing his mark, he cast around a little while longer, hoping to find him trading with someone else, but there was no sign of him.

“Bilairy’s hairy codpiece!” he muttered.

Then suddenly he spotted him again, standing talking to someone on the muddy path between two shanties, just visible through the rain.

There you are, old grandfather! Time we had a little chat.

Holding the mud-caked hem of his patched skirt up with one hand, Seregil slogged along clutching his shawl over his head with the other, as if looking for shelter. He was almost to the old man when suddenly Tall Fellow stepped out from behind a shack, sword drawn. His sodden hood hung around his face, but Seregil could make out the black kerchief masking his nose and mouth.

“Well now, who do we have here?” the tall man asked in an amused, raspy voice.

Seregil pulled the shawl closer around him, hoping his large kerchief hid his face well enough. “No one, sir. I was just-” Now and then the truth was the best tack to take. “I was hopin’ to talk with the old raven man.”

“And what raven man would that be?”

Seregil looked past Tall Fellow’s shoulder but the old man was gone.

“Now you’ve made me lose him!” Seregil whined. “Are you one of ’em, too? Can I make a trade with you?”

The masked man chuckled. “And if I am? What does a scrawny little thing like you have to trade?”

Seregil tightened his hands in the folds of his shawl. “Well, nothin’ really, except maybe a tumble…”

“Like you gave that man back there?” The man laughed darkly. “I can do without that kind of fun.”

Damnation, the bastard had seen him take down his would-be rapist. No wonder he wasn’t falling for the helpless beggar act.

“To the crows with you, then,” Seregil muttered. “I’ll find someone proper to trade with.”

“Now, don’t be hasty, dearie.” The man took a step closer, and Seregil could hear the unseen smile in his voice. “How’s about a lock of hair?” He drew a sword that had seen years of use. “I can cut it for you myself.”

“N-no,” Seregil said, taking a cautious step backward. As he’d feared, Tall Fellow advanced.

“Are you sure, my lovely? Just a few silken strands and I’ll give you something for luck.” But that sword said otherwise.

Seregil brought a hand up to his covered head. “I’m afraid you might cut off too much with that big blade of yours.”