Bewchard laughed. "It was you, Veroneeg, if I'm not mistaken, who first began to complain about the pirates, said you could not stand the high levies they demanded, supported us when we formed the league to fight Valjon. Well, Veroneeg, we are fighting him, and it is hard, but we shall win, never fear!"
The crowd cheered again, but this time the cheer was a little more ragged and the people were beginning to disperse.
"Valjon will take his vengeance, Bewchard," Veroneeg repeated. "Your days are numbered. There are rumours that the Pirate Lords are gathering their strength, that they have only been playing with us up to now. They could raze Narleen if they wished!"
"Destroy the source of their livelihood! That would be foolish of them!" Bewchard shrugged as if to dismiss the middle-aged merchant.
"Foolish, perhaps-as foolish as your actions," wheezed Veroneeg. "But make them hate us enough and their hatred might cause them to forget that it is we who feed them!"
Bewchard smiled and shook his head. "You should retire, Veroneeg. The rigours of merchant life are too much for you."
The crowd had almost completely vanished now and there were looks of anxiety on many of the faces which only lately had been cheering the heroes.
Bewchard jumped down from the box and put his arms around his companions' shoulders. "Come, my friends, let's listen no longer to poor old Veroneeg. He would make any triumph sour with his gloomy prattling. Let's to my mansion and see if we can find you raiment more befitting gentlemen-then, tomorrow, we can go about the city and buy new outfits for you both!"
He led them through the teeming streets of Narleen, streets that wound an apparently logic-less course, that were narrow and smelling of a million mingled odors, that were crowded with sailors and swordsmen and merchants and quay workers, old women, pretty girls, stallkeepers selling their wares and riders picking their way among those on foot. He led them over the cobbles, up a steep hill and out into a square with one side clear of houses. And there was the sea.
Bewchard paused for a moment to stare at the sea;
It sparkled in the sunlight.
D'Averc gestured toward it. "You trade beyond that ocean?"
Bewchard unpinned his heavy cloak and threw it over his arm. He opened the collar of his shirt and shook his head, smiling. "Nobody knows what lies beyond the sea-probably nothing. No, we trade along the coast for about two or three hundred miles in each direction. This area is thick with rich cities that did not suffer too badly the effects of the Tragic Millenium."
"I see. And what do you call this continent? Is it, as we suspect, Asiacommunista?"
Bewchard frowned. "I have not heard it called that, though I'm no scholar. I have heard it called variously 'Yarshai', 'Amarehk' and 'Nishtay'." He shrugged. "I am not even sure where it lies in relation to the legendary continents said to exist elsewhere in the world…"
"Amarehk!" Hawkmoon exclaimed. "But I had always thought it the legendary home of superhuman creatures…"
"And I had thought the Runestaff in Asiacommunista!" D'Averc laughed. "It does not do, friend Hawkmoon, to place too much faith in legends! Perhaps, after all, the Runestaff does not exist!"
Hawkmoon nodded. "Perhaps."
Bewchard was frowning. "The Runestaff-legends -what do you speak of, gentlemen?"
"A point this scholar we mentioned made," D'Averc said hastily. "It would be boring to explain."
Bewchard shrugged. "I hate to be bored, my friends," he said diplomatically, and led them on through the streets.
They were now beyond the trading part of the city and on a hill in which the houses were much richer and less crowded together. High walls surrounded gardens that could be seen to contain flowering trees and fountains.
It was outside the gates of one such walled house that Bewchard at last stopped.
"Welcome to my mansion, my good friends." He rapped on the gate.
A covered grille was opened and eyes peered at them. Then the gate was pulled wide and a servant bowed to Bewchard. "Welcome home, master. Was the voyage successful? Your sister awaits you."
"Very successful, Per! Aha-so Jeleana is here to greet us. You will like Jeleana, my friends!"
Chapter Severn
THE BLAZE
JELEANA WAS BEAUTIFUL, a young, raven-haired girl with a vivacious manner that instantly captivated D'Averc. At dinner that night he fluted with her and was delighted when she cheerfully responded.
Bewchard smiled to see them play so wittily, but Hawkmoon found it hard to watch them, for he was reminded painfully of his own Yisselda, his wife who waited for him thousands of miles across the sea and perhaps hundreds of years across tune (for he had no way of knowing if the crystal rings had brought him only through space).
Bewchard seemed to detect a melancholy look in Hawkmoon's eye and sought to cheer him up with jokes and anecdotes concerning some of his lighter and more amusing encounters while fighting the pirates of Starvel.
Hawkmoon responded bravely, but he still could not rid his mind of thoughts of his beloved girl, Count Brass's daughter, and how she fared.
Had Taragorm perfected his machines for travelling through time? Had Meliadus found another means of reaching Castle Brass?
The more the evening wore on, the less able Hawkmoon was to continue a light conversation. At length he rose and bowed politely. "I do apologise, Captain Bewchard," he murmured, "but I am very weary. The time spent in the galley-the fighting today…"
Jeleana Bewchard and Huillam D'Averc did not notice him rise, for they were engrossed with one another.
Bewchard stood up quickly, a look of concern on his handsome face. "Of course. I apologise, Master Hawkmoon, for my thoughtlessness…"
Hawkmoon smiled wanly. "You have not been thoughtless, captain. Your hospitality is magnificent.
However…"
Bewchard's hand made a movement toward the bell pull, but before he could summon a servant there came a sudden banging on the door. "Enter!" Bewchard commanded.
The servant who had admitted them to the garden earlier that day stood panting in the doorway. "Captain Bewchard! There is a fire at the quayside-a ship is burning."
"A ship? Which ship?"
"Your ship, captain-the one you came home in today!"
Instantly Bewchard was making for the door, Hawkmoon and D'Averc following rapidly behind him, Jeleana behind them.
"A carriage, Per," he ordered. "Hurry, man!"
Within moments an enclosed carriage drawn by four horses was brought round to the front of the house and Bewchard climbed in, waiting impatiently for Hawkmoon and D'Averc to join Mm. Jeleana tried to enter, but he shook his head. "No, Jeleana. We do not know what is happening on the quays. Wait here!"
Then they were off, bumping over the cobbles at an alarming rate, making for the dockside.
The narrow streets were lit with torches stuck in brackets attached to the sides of houses and the carriage flung a black shadow on the walls as it passed, bumping and crashing through the streets.
At last the quayside was reached, illuminated by more than torches, for in the harbour a schooner blazed. Everywhere was confusion as masters of vessels arrived to bully their men aboard their own craft and move them away from Bewchard's schooner, for fear that they, too, would be set afire.
Bewchard leapt from the carriage, closely followed by Hawkmoon and D'Averc. He ran for the quayside, elbowing his way through the crowd, but once by the water he paused and hung his head.