Garric and his companions might still be able to escape by sea. Even with Echeon’s art, the Protectors wouldn’t be able to patrol effectively in the middle of a winter storm. Though…with a homemade boat and a crew of landsmen, Garric thought he’d rather take his chances walking south through the hills.
“I haven’t heard of anything special on this coast,” Vascay said. “There’s the regular ships watching to keep people here from going out beyond fishing distance and anybody else from getting to Laut. Nothing in particular about this bay or Wikedun, though.”
He shrugged. “My gang stayed pretty much in the south and east, that being where we all of us came from,” he went on. “But I keep an ear out for what the Protectors’re doing, and I’d guess I’d have heard about extra ships the same as I did about the patrols on the land side.”
“What’s that?” said Thalemos, suddenly pointing seaward.
“That’s just a—” Garric said. He shut his mouth on “—shadow on the water,” because there weren’t any clouds in the sky.
It broke surface, or at least several hundred feet of its length did. Its lizardlike head was blunter than that of a seawolf, nor did a seawolf ever reach the size of this creature. The kinship was close, though. Gar’s soul, by now buried deep in Garric’s mind, begin to whimper.
The serpent looked at the three watching humans, then slid downward again with a sidewise shimmy of its whole long body. The green water covered all but memory of the creature.
“Did it happen to appear now, or were we being warned?” Thalemos asked. He sounded calm, but his clasped fingers writhed like the snake he’d just watched.
“Either way, we can save the effort of building a boat,” said Vascay.
He turned. “Come on, lads,” he continued. “Master Metron ought to be well enough to speak by now, and I’ve got some questions to ask the gentleman!”
“If we let you loose, Master Cashel…” said the fat, friendly fellow with ribbons dangling from his velvet cap. “Will you behave yourself?”
He’d come into the Hyacinth with four other townsmen: beefy, younger men who carried fishnets like the ones Cashel was already trussed with. No one of the men was Cashel’s size, but he was willing to agree that all together the four could handle him. The folk of Soong weren’t what he’d call harsh—back home, men preparing to release a maybe-madman would have cudgels to use if the fellow got out of hand—but they didn’t take silly chances either.
Leemay came out from the bar and stood beside the man in the fancy hat—the mayor or whatever they called the headman here. “Master Cashel,” she said, “I’m sorry about what happened here. There’s free food and lodging for you in the Hyacinth this night or however long you want to stay.”
She’d lit a lamp shortly before the mayor arrived, and two of the huskies had carried in lanterns of iron and horn. Daylight in this place was somber enough, but Cashel already knew how miserable and dank Soong became after the sun set….
“Let me go and give me what’s mine,” he said to the woman. “After that, Duzi grant that you never see me again!”
His voice came out in enough of a growl that the mayor flinched back, and his huskies stiffened as if they might have work to do. Leemay didn’t move, just gave a little nod.
“You may change your mind,” she said. “My offer remains.”
The inn had been open for business during the day. Indeed, the stranger tied to a pillar had probably brought in half the trade. Cashel hadn’t spoken to the locals, nor had anybody spoken to him, but all the folk who came through the front door had let their eyes linger on him. Several were still inside, an audience watching from the bar or the tables along the back wall.
Cashel met the innkeeper’s eyes, but he didn’t speak. He didn’t have anything to say beyond what he’d just said.
“Let him go,” Leemay said to the mayor.
He looked at her in concern. “Are you sure?” he said. “Maybe tomorrow would be—”
“Let him go,” she repeated with an edge in her voice. Cashel had the feeling that though Leemay got along well enough with her fellow townsfolk, nobody wanted to cross her. He could see why that might be.
“All right,” the mayor said sharply to the attendant on his right. “Cut him—”
“Sister take you, Jangme!” cried the fisherman who jumped up from a table. “Not unless the Corporation wants to pay me and Long for two new nets!”
He knelt beside Cashel and loosed the tie cords with strong, skilled fingers. Cashel didn’t move while the work was going on; if he bunched his muscles in anticipation, it’d just take the fellow longer to finish his job. Cashel knew how to wait.
The fisherman stood, lifting one of the nets with him. Cashel stood also, kicking his legs free of the other net now that the tension was off it. He stretched his arms, over him and out to the sides, arching his back at the same time. The mayor and his attendants watched nervously.
“If you’ll give me back my staff,” Cashel said, slurring the words because of the anger that he otherwise concealed, “then I’ll take myself out from under this roof.”
“Ah, Master Cashel,” said the mayor, “I think we’d best wait till you leave Soong—in the morning, I suppose?—before we give you that again. While I trust—”
“When I came out last night with the friend the woman there murdered…” Cashel said. He spoke slowly, taking a deep breath between each burst of words. “And you tied me up because you thought I’d gone crazy…. Then I didn’t want to hurt anybody but her”—he nodded to Leemay, who stood impassively—“because the rest of you hadn’t hurt me.”
Cashel looked around the room. Only one of the mayor’s companions would meet his eyes.
“But if you don’t give me my staff,” Cashel continued in a growl like thunder over the horizon, “then you’re all of you no better ’n a gang of robbers. And I’ll pull that—”
He pointed to the bar.
“—out of the wall and use it on you before you can stop me.”
“What?” said the mayor. He looked around at his attendants. “He couldn’t do that! It’s pegged top and bottom!”
Cashel stepped over to the heavy hardwood plank. Two of the attendants danced aside instead of trying to stop him.
“Give him his bloody stick!” said the fisherman. “You weren’t wrestling him this morning, Jangme.”
“All right, all right…” the mayor said, letting his voice trail off as he turned away. “I just think…”
“When did you ever think about anything but how important you are?” the fisherman said.
Leemay stood for a moment, then stepped behind the bar through the open gate. She reached down and brought up the quarterstaff; it must have been lying all day where Cashel dropped it when he carried Tilphosa out of the bedroom.
He took the hickory. Leemay stroked her fingertips over the back of his right hand. She smiled at him as he jerked away.
“Come back when you decide you want my hospitality, Master Cashel,” she said. She laughed from deep in her throat, a sound more like a cat purring than anything Cashel had heard from a human before. “I’ll make you very welcome.”
The mayor and his huskies were leaving the inn. Cashel had to wait for them to clear the doorway or else shove through; and it was only a lifetime of good manners that kept him from doing that second thing.
When Cashel was finally outside, he banged the double door shut after him. Leemay was still laughing, and he didn’t like the sound.
He breathed deeply. It seemed like he hadn’t been able to take in a real breath since Tilphosa’s cries woke him up this morning. The locals hadn’t tied him tight, and there wasn’t anything wrong with the air of the inn; but…