Daywatch found Ximo wandering aimless about the quayside, his belly full, but thoroughly bored.
He had stumbled from the Rat sometime after Dawnwatch into a cold, bright day, leaving his lord nursing yet another surly hangover. A cursory glance toward the jetties had told him the waterfront was empty in the early-morning chill, as he knew it would be, and he had made his way slowly towards the Pitchings, looking to break his fast and clear his head.
Folk were already about their business, walking with a brisk stride or huddled tight in whatever meagre clothing they had, or in the case of the occasional early bird merchant, wrapped comfortably in wool or rich furs, and he was surprised to find the pull of old habits, to follow a mark and see what chances arose had woken strong in him that morning. A wealthy looking Asqueri merchant caste had crossed his path, making the foolish mistake of travelling without a guard. Dressed in a fine-spun, grey woollen cloak and a pair of well-oiled black leather boots and with no obvious signs of weapons, the merchant was carefully stepping around the icy puddles and slicks of frozen mud, trying hard to keep the filth from his finery.
This fool is paying more attention to those fine boots than his purse, judged Ximo from where he stood, close to a warehouse wall. It’s almost too good a chance to turn down. He glanced around, suddenly wary that he had been careless, the thick mead-head he still carried perhaps dulling his usual caution. Too good is all bad, he cautioned himself, feeling a sudden chill on his neck.
He turned away, taking his own warning, leaving the merchant well alone and carried on, ignoring the half-frozen puddles of muddy water, but avoiding the occasional patch of oily, orange-brown mess melted through the snow. Though he was resigned to another day of freezing feet and ears so cold that they burned, it was still far too early in the day to carry the stench of another man’s soil on his only pair of boots. He flipped the hide collar of the old sea-coat up around his cheeks and neck and dug his hands into the coats false-backed pockets. The fingers of his left hand found the hilt of the long-handled dagger at his hip and gently curled around it. The other hand he always kept free.
Ice still clung to the sides of the quay, though it was a lot thinner looking than it had been a week ago, and all the boats were exactly where they had been ever since they first arrived, high and dry, away from the crushing grasp. He strolled to the end of the central jetty, wiped the crust of snow from the top of one of the large timber posts, sat, cross-legged, and took out his pipe. Filling the bowl with some of the honey-soaked Haga he had been saving for just such an occasion, taking care to pack it down tightly, lest the breeze take it, he looked out across the frozen lake.
Smoke this, watch the clouds go by and then back to the Rat. Néit might be up by then. See what he has to say.
It was a beautiful view and one he had grown quite fond of, when the sun was out at least. Daywards, across the far side were the hills of the Low Moors, the low winter sun making them seem somehow heavier than usual, dark clouds back-shadowing their snowy flanks. A shiver went right through him.
And bugger going back out there again, he thought, as he put the pipe to his lips, that’s just madness. He reached for a flame and realised there was no candle to hand. He didn’t have any of those classy tapers that burst into flame just by looking at them that Néit always carried either.
Yam’s Balls, he’s never around when I need him.
He knocked the Haga into his palm, stowed it and the pipe away, pulled the cat-skin mittens he had filched from a stall in the market out of his satchel, and slipped them on. They were a good fit. He curled a fur-clad hand around the hilt of his concealed dagger and pulled it out with a flourish.
“I could even fight in them,” he muttered appreciatively.
He sheathed the dagger, reached into his coat and pulled out the boot liners he had also lifted from the stall, turning them over in his gloved hands, inspecting the slight damage to the heel on one.
Not bad for nothing I suppose.
Slipping them unseen beneath his satchel and lifting them from the stall as he had been saying farewell had been easy. He put the liners in the satchel, turned his back on the lake, and faced the town.
I am bored with this shit though.
He gazed along the dilapidated waterfront. It was a hoar-frosted jumble of boats, old nets, shanty shacks, and crooked slums. The jetties were twisted and bent, like the withered hands of an old man, and the stone-built quayside as crumbled and broken as the walls of Gearlynn themselves. He shivered hard. He was Tongue-born, through and through. He missed the security of Ker-Caevàl, he missed that now more than anything else he suddenly realised
Néit is right about one thing though; we do need to leave this place. He felt the shiver again, deep between his shoulder blades. The boredom is likely to get us before those Dúmnon dogs ever will. And if they are looking, we’ll just be bloated corpses on the lake by the time they get here…killed by our own hand for the lack of something to do.
A faint call across the bay broke his jaded musing. Absently he turned and what he saw in the distance blackened his mood completely. High up on the headland, high above the far bank of the river, beyond the quayside shanty and the fallen wall, there was movement. Six large wagons, attended by escort had appeared at the bluff’s edge. Even from where he stood, Ximo could faintly make out the crack of the whips and the call of the drovers echoing over the ice. He sat rooted to the spot, unable to believe his continuing misfortune, as the unmistakable sound of a hunting-horn peeled from up on the headland and echoed over the estuary, the caravan turning slowly down the narrow track cut in the hillside, making for the river. The shiver returned, setting its cold grip into his spine and making his teeth hurt.
I don’t believe it. What mad bastard thought that would be a good idea?
But it was obvious — Ker-Baecodán, who else could it be? They must have decided to get an early start on the waning of the Crow Moon and the start of the Wandering Season; beat the competition to market, wherever that was. He looked again. Wherever it was, it would be a long way, judging by the size and number of folk, the wagons still making the turn and the massive Bull Muskies, taller than three men at the shoulder, leading each team. He jumped down off the post.
Néit will want to know about this, if he doesn’t already, he thought, and turned from the lake view.
He started to jog back toward the lanes of the crumbled old town, its scant comforts suddenly seeming so pleasantly snuggled in its sheltered little bay, worrying thoughts of frost-blackened fingers and the long, yellow teeth of snow-starved wolves crowding out the longing for his home. He quickened his pace; news would reach Néit just as it would the rest of the town, Ximo knew that for a certain fact, and he didn’t want his lord making any rash decisions without at least some sensible advice. Excitement had already spread as his boots hit solid ground, and the streets and lanes were alive with folk. Even as he reached the main square, stall-barkers in the market were calling out word of a happening, voiced loud and braying, though few agreed on what the happening might be.
“Zaindari hordes on the Bluff!” cried a voice.
“Ker-Baecodán falls!” called another.
“All the bees die, bees die!” hollered yet another.
All around the Pitchings word spread ear-to-mouth and on, quick as bird flight. Most folk dropped what they were doing and joined the stream of the merchant caste, tongues all-a gossip over fresh news or outlandish exaggeration. Twice Ximo heard sworn assurances that a great fish had been seen walking on the ice, calling out the doom of all, which was plainly stupid as any Adelantian gutter runner knows fish don’t walk. He joined the growing throng heading toward the Long Valley Gate, happy to lose himself in the babbling brook of rumour and hearsay: a city thief amongst backwater marks, a knowing smirk on his lips at the thought of the caravan gathering while all around folk prattled ill tidings and prayed for good fortune.
By the time he reached the gate, the stream had become a lake; a large crowd, gathering just outside the walls, growing all the time, and his lips went from smirk, to smile, to sly grin. He found himself standing on the edge of a pick-pocket’s paradise; more pockets to pick and purses to cut then he had seen almost anywhere else he had ever been, and every owner paying no mind whatsoever to a light finger or sharp edge. He rubbed his hands together, the old excitement bubbling through his belly.
But, you ain’t here for the lark he berated himself, so move on, before it’s you that’s nipped. Standing around like a loon, ‘ya tongue lolling like a lovesick dog.
Instead, he made his way through the crowd, using the old skills just a little: a sharp elbow here, a heel grind there, a little pinch on the arm of another, just to ease the way, slipping into a space, closing off a gap, until he was front and centre, his view of the unfolding spectacle unhindered.
The caravan had arrived.
The staging field beyond the gates was a flat, broad affair, with a gentle slope to the riverside on the left hand, the air still night-cold and thick with a late morning mist. A large fire had been lit on a patch of cleared ground close to the water’s edge and it served to brighten the scene just a little, though any warmth it shed was being soaked up by a squad of Bloodbeard soldiers clad in the black and yellow of Clann Baecodán, well-armed and well armoured. They were playing no part in the apparent chaos going on around them and stood aloof, watching the other castes working around them with bored and disinterested expressions, hands before the flames.
In the centre of the flat field stood six teams of wagons, the lead bull Musky in each team tethered through their great bronze nose rings to a thigh-thick stake driven in the ground, the heifers gathered close by. Milling through the mist, the wheels and the Muskies were the caravan’s crew, busy loading the large wagons from a nearby pile of stock: furs, bails of un-spun wool, baskets of hardware and dried rations, timber poles, hide covers, and metal bound barrels. From between the gates a chain of silent porters passed more goods, all the while replenishing the goods on the ground, and one of the wagons was already fully laden.
On the bench seat of the wagon at the centre of the tumult, clear of the mist, and bellowing orders at anyone not doing exactly what he wanted, stood an imposing figure. His skin bore the deep tone of a life travelled long under the bright gaze of Mi’Ra. He was Sabrosi caste, his beard a fresh-dyed red, though unlike those of the squad at the fire, untrimmed and abundant. Judging by the lines on his face, his baldpate, and the long scar running down his cheek and into his beard, the journey had been a long and eventful. He was clad in a fine black woollen kilt and a woollen body warmer of the same colour, Muskox wool by their look, the fine stuff from under the belly, and from his broad shoulders hung a long fur coat. He was strong-armed and thick-legged, definitely a soldier by birth, if not by trade. In one hand he held a clay tablet, in the other, a sharp stylus, marking off each item as it was loaded.
He looked up sharply from the tablet as a couple of the crew edging their way round the back of the furthest most wagon toward the fire caught his attention.
“Where the fuck do you think you two are too?” he growled, his voice clear above the murmur of both crowd and river.
The two men turned together. “It’s us fingers, Boss” complained a lanky bag of bones, “they’re frozen stiff. Thought we’d take the edge off, you know, stand by the fire for a spell, at least ‘till they — ”
“Back to it, ‘ya lazy buggers,” interrupted the boss, laying the tablet and stylus on the seat and reaching for the coiled leather whip at his side. His bare arms were huge, muscled thick, and heavily scarred.
“Yes, Boss, back to it,” put in the shorter thicker set Huwan, tugging deferentially on his black beard. “Sorry, Boss,” he added.
“You break when I say, not until. That’s the way of it, yes?”
“Yes, Boss,” they both chorused.
“Just as well,” warned the boss, fist still at his hip. “Now then, give…ah, Gorgasal, over there, a hand with the Kota poles; like with like, you get me?”
They looked miserably at a jumbled pile of long poles dumped in the mud near the gate and the lone figure wrestling with them and nodded.
“Good lads,” said the Boss, retrieving his tablet, “but I got an eye on you now,” he warned.
“Yes, Boss,” replied the tallest as the boss went back to his tally.
“Told ya he’d spot us,” said the other quietly as they trudged past Ximo.
“S’alright, we’ll just ‘av another go later.”
“Not bloody likely, he’s seen us now. Best get back on ‘is good side, if you ask me.”
“Don’t reckon he’s got a good side,” commented the tallest as he pulled a pole from the bottom of the pile and sent the whole spilling sideways across the mud and snow.
Gorgasal, a Zaindari: pale skinned and blue eyed, shot the tall Huwan a ferocious look from where he was crouched as a tumbling pole came to rest at his feet. He stood.
Ximo watched Gorgasal rise, his smile growing wider by the moment, as Gorgasal stood to stare down at the two shirkers. It was like watching a Redback Bear climb out of a rabbit hole; one moment no concerns, then before you know it…you’re running for your life.
“Now then,” ventured Lanky nervously, looking up into those cold eyes. “No harm meant, eh?”
“Err, no, none at all!” added Shorty, backing off. “We’ll just get that, then,” he said, bending for the pole at the giant Zaindari’s feet.
Gorgasal growled, sending both hurrying away.
Ximo laughed. He stood amongst all the ordered confusion, the hurried movement of the porters, the talking, the shouting, and the cursing of the crew, the gossip, and questions of the townsfolk and he drank it all in, his smile spreading wide across his face.
This really is a good place to be looking for distractions, he thought, seeing far more distractions than his heart could ever desire; purses hanging forgotten from belts exposed beneath open cloaks, baskets left untended and barrels just waiting to be rolled away into the mist and cracked open at leisure. It’s a grand place in fact.
Then, through it all, he heard a word, cutting through the commotion like the cry of some great bird on a windless night.
“Din…a…door.”
He looked around for the author of the word, but he saw no one of mark, just the people talking and pointing at something new, just as they always do.
He heard it again behind him in the crowd a short while later, and then moments after again, to his left. He knew for certain he had never heard the word before, but he knew with equal certainty that it was a name. He turned to the young woman standing next to him, a child at her hip.
“What did he say?” he asked, pretending to be part of the general gossip.
She looked sideways at him, not really taking her eyes of the spectacle in front of her. “Dinasdúr, he said,” pointing at the Sabrosi overseer up on the wagon, “they’re making for Dinasdúr.”
“Oh, where’s that then?”
She turned to face him, “Who knows, love.”
He met her gaze and saw confusion in her eyes, “You mean Cadan?”
“No, I heard him quite clearly. Past Cadan, up the Old Way…” she hesitated, “but there’s nothing passed Cadan but Old Man Dǽbh himself. Dinasdúr’s just a Way to tell your kids, there’s nothing out there but league after — ”
“Hey! You on the wagon!” Ximo called, much to his own surprise. “Hey!” he called again, stepping forward as the folk close by seemed to…shy away from him.
Some of the crew looked up from their labour, glad of the distraction.
“Looks like trouble, Dalan,” said one.
“Reckon you might be right,” said another. “Never likes to be disturbed when ‘is mind’s on the job.”
“Hey! Heads down,” warned a third quietly, “he’s eyes on us now!”
All three turned quickly back to the loading effort before the Sabrosi had the chance to lay at them, but in his haste, Dalan dropped a basket. The content of clean, waxed rope spilled into the mud.
“That’s torn it,” muttered his mate, stepping away, and trying to be subtle about it.
Up on top of the wagon the Boss saw the mistake. He tossed his tablet to another standing nearby in the mud, uncurled the whip that hung at his belt and flicked it with a crack over the heads of the unfortunate Dalan and his little gang.
“I want these wagons loaded by Duskwatch!” he hollered. “No one gets so much as a piss break until everything is packed and secure, and Yam take any that don’t like it!” He cracked the whip once more for emphasis, put a booted foot up on top of the wheel, placed a hand on his knee, and leaned over the edge of the wagon. “Now, friend,” he said scornfully, sneering down at Ximo, “what the fuck do you want?”
It might seem a manly thing to wear, but a kilt just doesn’t suit some situations, and this was one of them. Looking up this Bloodbeard’s kilt, in such cold conditions, was a shock and no mistake; it was also the funniest thing Ximo had seen in months, probably longer. He looked away, laughter bubbling up inside.
“Well?” demanded the boss.
Ximo bit his lip hard, looked back up to the same scene, and laughed aloud. Actually, it was more of a braying bark, which was funny in its own right. He laughed again, only louder this time, and longer.
All the crew, the porters and the soldiers stopped whatever it was they were doing and turned to look at the mad Asqueri caste idiot, laughing at the Sabrosi caste wagon master.
Ximo knew he was in trouble, but he couldn’t stop, the laughter just got louder. Perhaps the long months of frustration and inactivity, the constant brooding presence of Néit and his mead-fuelled temper, the Reckoning and the long flight from Adelanti had preyed on him more than he had been aware. Or perhaps it was simply that the clear, unobstructed sight of the big man’s shrivelled cock and cold-tightened balls, all sucked up tight beneath his kilt as he tried to intimidate was just too much to overlook.
Grating laughter peeled out across the trampled snow, echoing off the walls of the town, over the now silent crowd, the wagons, and the snorting Muskox, the tumbling river and, so it seemed to those that told the tale later, the very hills around them.
Ximo could hardly draw a breath. Tears ran down his cheeks. Snot dribbled from his nose. He was laughing like a lunatic, doubled over, hands on his thighs just trying to keep himself upright, glimpsing movement through his tears. He glanced up, just in time to see the Bloodbeard jump down from the wagon, his kilt flying up past his thighs.
Ximo’s laughter came ever louder, ever harder, the Bloodbeard striding forward, whipping out a dagger. Suddenly the point was into the soft flesh beneath Ximo’s chin.
“You’re in the honey-bucket now, boy!” spat the Sabrosi.
“Ah, steady now!” gasped Ximo, still laughing despite the sudden pain. “No offence meant, honest!” The point of the dagger pierced skin. “Whoa!” Ximo’s hands shot up, palms open.
The boss grabbed the back of Ximo’s hair, yanked his head back, and slid the dagger’s razor-sharp edge against his throat.
“Stop fucking laughing!” he bellowed.
“I …can’t,” cried Ximo, tears running into his ragged beard, eyes rolling wildly in his head as panic threatened to overwhelm him.
Enraged, the Bloodbeard punched Ximo full in the belly with the pommel of the dagger, knocking the last of his breath from him completely and Ximo collapsed to the floor, gasping for air.
“Hold him up!” commanded the boss.
Two of the nearest crew grabbed Ximo’s shuddering form and dragged him to his feet.
The Bloodbeard hit him again, harder this time. Ximo’s legs reflexively folded up, leaving him hanging just above the ground, carried by the crew as he retched violently, spilling his breakfast at their feet, and he was thrown hard at the wagon, the wheel-boss cracking into his back. He crumpled to the ground, spine arched, unable to breath, pain cutting off the laughter completely. Someone kicked him in the guts, and he doubled round, stars exploding across his blacked-out vision, his lungs screaming, his stomach muscled clamped hard as strong fingers made a fist in his tangled crown, and he was heaved from the snow, his hair snapping at the roots.
“Tie him to the wheel!” ordered the Bloodbeard. “Let’s see him laugh with the skin lashed off his back!”