The Gambler's Fortune (Einarinn 3) (5 page)

“We’ve tried every trader down to that rancid dealer in half-cured coneyskins.” Keisyl stepped into Jeirran’s path and folded his arms. “No one’s buying, not from us.”

“We haven’t spoken to that man yonder.” An obstinate light burned in Jeirran’s eyes. “He’s sold most of his stock, so he’ll want more and have the silver to pay for it.”

Keisyl heaved an exasperated sigh but followed Jeirran toward a burly man in a beaver-trimmed jerkin of mustard broadcloth who was bending down to an urchin hopping urgently from foot to foot. The lad shot the two Mountain Men a startled glance and melted away while the fur trader rested his hands on his paunch. “What can I do for you?”

“We have furs to sell: fox, hare and otter, fine elk hide and some deerskins—” began Jeirran in an ingratiating tone.

“Guild-stamped, are they?” snapped the trader. “Paid your tenth at the audit hall, have you? No, I didn’t think so.” He raised his voice. “I wouldn’t disgrace the guild by trading behind their back, do you hear? Who do you think I am, offering me such insult? I’ve never seen you before neither.”

“Don’t,” Keisyl caught Jeirran’s arm as the shorter man took an angry step forward, beard bristling on his thrusting chin. As Jeirran stopped, indecisive, a reveler stumbled into him, unaccustomed ale sending the youth sprawling loose-limbed to the ground. Jeirran loosed frustrated rage in a savage kick that set the unfortunate lad spewing up. Passing fairgoers too slow to keep boots or skirts clear exclaimed in annoyance.

“Come on!” Keisyl dragged Jeirran over to an open space where stilt-walkers were entertaining the crowds. A pair painted like butterflies swooped and fluttered vast wings of sapphire silk, capering ungainly to amuse a wide-eyed child but deft enough to wrap their pinions around some giggling girl. A third in more conventional motley of scarlet and gold came after them, a hopeful bag-puppet on one hand, its maw greedy for small coin.

Jeirran shook free of Keisyl’s hand and stepped into the path of a passing dame. “Here madam, fine furs, smooth and supple leathers, fairer prices than anyone else will offer!” The woman shook him off, affronted and coloring beneath the frills of her cap.

“Sir, that’s a fine cloak you’re wearing,” Jeirran darted in front of a prosperous merchant. “Think how a fur trim would improve it, let me show you!”

The man’s florid face darkened, indignation warring with consternation in his deep-set eyes. “Be off with you, vagabond,“ he spluttered, drawing the lavender folds of his mantle around him.

“Here, you!” One of the stilt-walkers loomed over them, annoyance clear beneath his garish paints. “You’re queering our pitch, pal. Go and make a nuisance of yourselves somewhere else!”

“If you’ve got something to sell, go pay for a token like the rest of us!” called a nearby stallholder, safe behind cheap, speckled plates and green glazed pots under a brightly striped awning. Even Jeirran’s belligerent self-assurance wasn’t proof against hostile eyes on all sides.

“Let’s get something to eat.” Keisyl looked around and beckoned to a lad who was carrying a savory-smelling basket.

“Lamb pasty, mister, with a bit of this and that.” The boy looked from Keisyl to Jeirran, eyes wide and wondering at the oversewn seams on their embroidered shirts, at the stamped patterns on their short capes and the long leather trews gaitered into sturdy boots.

“Four, how much?” Keisyl held up his fingers.

“Two copper, mister,” stammered the boy.

Keisyl frowned as he rummaged in a pocket. “That’s the last of my coin, Jeirran. Teiriol has our purse.”

Jeirran was looking dubiously inside the pastry, picking at a stringy piece of grayish meat with a fingernail. “This is no more lamb than my boot soles.” He chewed slowly with an expression of distaste but the lad had already melted away into the crowd, leaving a faint smell of leeks fried soft in rancid fat.

Keisyl swallowed a stubborn mouthful. “I’ve eaten worse at the diggings. If you’ve got some coin, we can find a drink to take the taste away. Do you suppose they brew mead anywhere down here or will it still be that goat’s piss ale?”

“I’ve only got a few silver on me.” Jeirran reached inside his cape. “I didn’t want to risk having my purse cut, so I left most of the good coin in Eirys’ coffer.”

He spread his hand to count the paltry pennies, worn almost anonymous, edges bent and nicked. As he did so, a mailed gauntlet landed heavy on his shoulder and half the flimsy coins jumped from his hand to vanish into the crushed grass.

“You muck-footed fool! Can’t you people ever look where you’re going?” He turned furiously and found himself facing a bronzed breastplate, freshly polished with festival zeal. The gauntlet tightened its bruising grip on Jeirran’s shoulder.

“I’d keep a civil tongue in my head if I was only arse high to a short horse,” sneered the Watchman. He shook Jeirran by way of emphasis, demonstrating muscle beneath his flab. “Let’s have a look in that bag of yours, shall we?”

Jeirran ripped the gauntlet from his shoulder with an ease that clearly disconcerted the bigger man. Keisyl moved to pick up the fallen coin but another official planted a hobnailed boot on the pennies, an unfriendly smile creasing his unshaven face, fingerless leather gloves with studded knuckles gleaming on both hands. Jeirran turned but a third Watchman in a leather cuirass blocked his way with a metal-bound stave as thick as his bony wrists. The first Watchman tugged Jeirran’s satchel roughly from around his stiff neck and unbuckled it, grunting.

“Looks like them’s our pigeons, lads.” His chapped lips curved in a satisfied smirk. “Right, you pair come and explain yourself to the festival assize.”

The thin Watchman with the quarterstaff brought it level in both hands and gestured at Keisyl, whose fists were now clenched and raised. “I don’t think you want to make a fight of it, corn-poll. I’ll cut you down to the stubble if you do!”

Keisyl spat an incomprehensible Mountain oath that sent a rustle of apprehension through those fairgoers clustering behind the protection of the Watchman’s stave.

“You tell your friend, any trouble and I’ll put you both in irons,” warned the first Watchman, jingling the manacles at his belt in emphasis.

“What right have you to detain us?” Jeirran glared at the man, refusing to acknowledge the faces whispering and gawking on all sides.

The Watchman brandished a handful of fur and leather, white, russet and black. “We’ve had complaints. Some reckon you’re in the pay of the guilds, trying to tempt them to break the laws. Some tell us you’re trying to gull them into paying out for goods you ain’t got. I just think you’re uplanders with no more wit than your goat. Got a fair token to show us, have you?” he demanded sarcastically.

“I don’t know what you mean,” answered Jeirran warily.

“Then you haven’t paid your guild fee, have you, cully? Else you’d have bought the right to trade like an honest man and have the token to prove it. You’re coming along with us!” The Watchman nodded to his subordinate with the stave who brandished it in unmistakable threat.

“I’d check their purses, boss,” the one with his boot still resting on Jeirran’s fallen coin spoke up with an innocent air. “If they’ve not got the price of a meal and bed on them, they’re vagabonds, ain’t they? That’s the law, ain’t it?”

“You thief—” Jeirran took an ill-judged step toward the unshaven man.

The Watchman with the manacles moved swiftly to grab Jeirran’s arms, pulling them up behind his back with a painful twist of the elbows. “That’s enough from you. Rif, check his pockets.”

The man leaned forward awkwardly to stick intrusive hands into Jeirran’s cape and trews, glowering at an urchin eagerly hoping he would step away from the fallen silver. “No, nothing beyond what he’s got in his hand, boss,” he said with satisfaction.

“What about you?” The one with the quarterstaff thumped its butt on the ground and held out a hand to Keisyl.

“I have no coin,” Keisyl said, the foreign words halting on his tongue but the wrath in his face speaking clearly enough.

“Then it’s the lock-up until the assize calls for you.” The leader snapped black iron fetters on Jeirran’s wrists, the smaller man too startled to resist. Keisyl raised his fists in fury but a sweep of the quarterstaff behind his knee sent him sprawling to the ground. The Watchmen hauled him to his feet, deftly manacling him as they did so.

The one called Rif hastily scooped what coins he could from the tangled grass, the urchin scrabbling eagerly for any the Watchman missed. The boss sent Jeirran on his way with a shove past fairgoers exclaiming at the unexpected diversion. “Get moving!”

“So we had to pay some toll to trade?” Keisyl hissed furiously at Jeirran. “Something else Degran’s man didn’t tell you? Did he make any mention of this assize or whatever they call it?”

Jeirran twisted around to face the Watchman pushing him along. “What is the penalty for simply making an honest mistake?”

“Mistake or no, your goods will be forfeit, I reckon,” Rif replied with happy malice.

“Well done, Jeirran!” Keisyl’s indignation halted him until a blow from the quarterstaff sent him on his way again. “We’ll be going home with no goods, no deal, nothing to show for the trip at all. That’ll fulfill Mother’s every expectation of you!”

“That’s enough of your barking, cully.” The Watchman with the breastplate shoved Keisyl’s shoulder. “Talk like a civilized man or not at all, none of this yapping like dogfoxes.”

The humiliation choking Jeirran prevented him from answering Keisyl or the Watchman and fury stained his face scarlet as the pair of them were driven through the busy streets. People stopped to stare open-mouthed, to catch a neighbor’s arm and point, to whisper behind lifted hands. After what felt like an eternity, the Watchmen dragged them up steps of reddish stone to a solidly built hall.

“Knock ’em up, Neth,” ordered the leader. The one with the stave hammered on the stout door with its butt. A balding man little taller than Jeirran slid a metal squint aside and peered out.

“Fair festival to you, Vigo.” He stepped back to open the door. “What have you got here?”

The one called Neth gave both Jeirran and Keisyl a shove with his stave. “Mountain Men, still with the snow on their boots and trying to trade in the fair without a token.”

The little man nodded unsurprised as he turned to make a note on a lengthy parchment.

“And they’m vagabonds,” added Rif suddenly. “Not got coin on them for a bed and a meal, that’s the law, that’s two offenses.”

The clerk looked up, a smile lightening his somber face. “You and Westgate Ward got the usual wagers on, have you, Vigo?”

“That’s right,” grinned the burly Watchman. “You make sure it’s all recorded straight and there’ll be a drink for you if we come top of the tally.”

“I’ll hold you to that.” The clerk stuck his quill back in his inkpot. “Right, leave them with me.” He nodded to a well-muscled man lounging against a wall who stepped forward to glower at the two Mountain Men.

“Let’s see what other game we can spring, shall we?” Vigo led his men away, picking up more manacles from a basket with an optimistic air. The clerk closed the door carefully behind them.

Jeirran and Keisyl stared in all directions, wondering where they had been brought. Scuff marks and dents on the dusty floorboards showed the room had been cleared of substantial furniture for its temporary duty as a place of judgment. A stale smell of food and wine suggested some kind of dining hall. Black oak hammer beams soared above their heads, dusty pennants hanging motionless in the heights. Narrow lancets just below the roofline let in the last of the evening light but tallow candles were already burning in sconces set into the windowless walls lower down. A handful of Watchmen with staves and cudgels guarded a disconsolate group of men and women hunched on the bare floor.

“If you give me your word that you’ll behave, I’ll take those chains off and you can wait here until the assize calls you.” The clerk nodded to three prosperous townsmen seated behind a long table on a dais at the far end of the hall and looking unfavorably on a ragged beggar being dragged up the steps. “Give any trouble, you get chained in the undercroft with the barrels and the rats and like as not you earn a kicking from those nailers who’d rather be out looking for fun.” This nod indicated the two Watchmen either side of a menacing arch over dark descending steps. “What’s it to be?”

“We will abide quietly here,” Jeirran forced the words out.

“You swear it?” demanded the clerk.

“We swear,” said Keisyl in clipped tones. Jeirran echoed him.

“Good enough.” The clerk took a key from his belt and removed the manacles which his thick-set assistant tossed into the basket of identical restraints. “Right, there’s nothing I can do about the trading offense, but you don’t look exactly like vagabonds to me. If you can show means of supporting yourselves, we needn’t take up assize time with that nonsense. Have you got a lodging paid for? Is there anyone who can vouch for you?”

“We’d better send word to Teiriol, get him to bring a purse down here,” Keisyl said firmly.

Jeirran opened his mouth to object but finding it empty of any argument closed it again.

“What’s that you say?” The clerk looked suspiciously at them and the heavy-set man loomed over his shoulder.

“If we can send a message to our companions, they can bring money,” translated Jeirran in resigned tones.

“Good enough.” The clerk made another note on his parchment and used his fingers to whistle up a lad from a bench by the dais. “Tell the boy where to go.”

Jeirran gritted his teeth and gave the youth directions to their rooming house. “Tell Teiriol to bring the hazelwood box from Eirys’ coffer.”

“Get on with you,” the clerk gave the lad a copper penny from a bowl on his table and opened the door to let him out. “Right, you pair sit over there. Make any trouble and it’ll go harder when you come to be heard.”

Jeirran walked briskly to a space against the wall, glowering at any curious faces turned their way, but most of the petty offenders were content to sit and keep their own counsel. Jeirran flung his cape down and sat on it, arms around his knees, brooding blackly with his eyes fixed on the door.