The Popinjay is one of the bigger inns on the edge of this square, dominating the corner to the north and east. The ninth chime of the day was sounding from a variety of bell towers as I forced my way past the exuberant youths heedlessly blocking the doors. That earned me some hard looks but no one was bold or drunk enough to try taking me on. A glance at my armring was enough to make most clear my path.
“Banch!” I yelled over the clamour of people trying to catch a potman’s eye or a maidservant’s apron. “Banch!”
The burly tapster surveying the tumult with the calm eye of long experience turned his head. He waved a hand the size of a shovel at me and I pushed my way through to the counter. “Ryshad.” He handed over a tall flagon of ale, tucking the silver in a pocketed apron belted below his barrel of a gut.
“Have you seen Yane? Sworn to Den Cotise? I was here with him yesterday.” I leaned over the scored and puddled wood, lowering my voice to a muted bellow. Yane would be on duty again tonight, as soon as the first chime of night sounded, but he’d said he’d be meeting his sweetheart here and her mistress was usually done with her by the last chime of the day. She was the dresser to Tor Sylarre, who’d found the whole tale of Temar’s quest so romantic.
“Out the back with Ezinna.” Anger darkened Banch’s pocked moon of a face and he slammed up the counter top to come out and grab a couple of lads by the scruffs of their expensive coats. I don’t know where people found the room but everyone stepped aside as he threw the two offenders out into the gutter. One started to argue so I left Banch to explain the error of his ways and ducked through a far door.
Even with pot lids clanging, knives and cleavers hitting boards and the dog turning the roasting spit yelping in its treadmill, the kitchen was still quieter than the taproom. A handful of girls were busy on all sides, a pause for more than a breath earning them new instructions from the stout woman ruling her domain with a gesturing iron spoon.
“Cut more bread and then baste that beef before it dries out!” Ezinna cuffed a pinch-faced lass lightly round the ear to emphasise her orders. I stepped hastily aside as the gawky girl yelped, burning her fingers on the ladle resting in the dripping tray beneath the meat, splashing hot fat as she dropped it.
“Where’s Yane?” I asked Ezinna.
She tucked a wisp of hair dyed raven black behind one ear, the rest drawn back with a spotted kerchief that might once have been yellow to match her faded dress. Grey showed at the roots. “Out in the scullery.” Ezinna’s habitual smile vanished.
“What’s happened?” I frowned.
“It’s Credilla.” Ezinna shook her head in resignation. “Go on with you, you’re in the way. Have you eaten?” Ezinna grabbed a crumbling slice of bread from one girl’s passing basket and wrapped it round a thick slice of beef. She sent me on my way with a shove before turning to give the hapless bread girl a lesson in how many a loaf was supposed to serve if the inn wasn’t to be ruined by the baker’s bills.
Soiled crockery was stacked high in the scullery, waiting for two little girls standing on rough boxes by deep stone sinks. Neither was working very fast, round eyes in round faces gawping at Credilla sobbing into Yane’s shoulder.
“Credie, flower, Credie.” He looked over her head at me with a mixture of relief and stifled rage.
“What’s happened?”
Credilla’s sobs shuddered into a whimper and she turned around, chestnut hair tangled over her pretty face. It didn’t hide the ugly bruise disfiguring her, a great welt of purple and black high on one cheekbone, swelling half closing her eye and blood crusted around a cut that must have come from a ring.
“What happened?” I repeated, handing the bread and meat to a scullery girl who was eyeing it hopefully.
“Demoiselle Lida Tor Sylarre.” Yane managed to get a rein on himself, but he still looked like a man desperate for someone to hit and plainly fancying me as a target. “The Maitresse came in just after noon, all fired up, ordering all the daughters to turn out their coffers, checking every casket against every inventory and deed of bequest.” He shook his head, baffled. “The Maitresse starts taking pieces, telling Lida to hold her noise when she says she’ll need some necklace or other for her dress tonight.”
“She was in quite a rage,” Credilla managed to quaver. “I didn’t say anything, not really.”
“But you recognised the pieces the Maitresse was taking?” I guessed.
“Demoiselle Lida saw I was surprised.” Credilla clutched the tear-sodden front of Yane’s jerkin. “She wanted to know why. All I said was I’d met a D’Olbriot man who’s interested in old jewellery but Lida said there must be more to it for her mother to be so fussed. When I couldn’t tell her anything, she hit me.”
Yane folded protective arms around her as the recollection prompted fresh weeping. “You keep your head down when there’s a storm brewing, Credie, you knows that.”
I nodded. Volunteering knowledge is never wise for a servant; it only leads to questions and then more questions about where you got the answers you give.
“I’m sorry I mixed you up in this, petal. Can you go back?” If she’d been turned out by Tor Sylarre, I’d have to find another place for her. Not with D’Olbriot though; that would just confirm whatever suspicions Tor Sylarre might be nursing.
Credilla nodded, dabbing her battered cheek with a scrap of damp muslin. “Maitresse would lock Lida in her bedchamber till the end of Festival if she knew what she’d done. She gave me three gold Marks to keep my mouth shut and said I’ve got to work with the seamstresses until my face’s better.”
“That’s something at least.” I bit down on curses the little girls shouldn’t be hearing.
“What’s it all about, Rysh?” Yane looked up from brushing hair away from Credilla’s tear-stained face.
“Just keep your head down, both of you,” I advised. “There’s a storm brewing, but I don’t know where it’s going to break.” I hesitated as I turned to go. “Artifice, the healing magic from Kellarin could do something for that bruise.” Demoiselle Avila could surely repeat whatever she’d done for Temar.
Yane shook his head. “Best you can do is leave us well alone.” He didn’t mean it unkindly and worse; he was probably right.
The sun was sinking with its accustomed rapidity as I left the Popinjay, the fading gold of the skies darkening to rich blue dusk over the rise of the land ahead. The Graceway was bright with lighted windows, tradesmen returning to the homes above their shops for their own entertainments now while private parties celebrated Festival in the upper rooms of inns and tisane houses. Linkboys had their candle lanterns already lit and bobbing on poles to show people their footing for a few coppers.
Once out of the Spring Gate I waved down a hireling gig and pondered Credilla’s unexpected suffering. So Tor Sylarre had somehow got wind of Temar’s search for those ancient jewels and treasures that might restore his people, and the Maitresse was none too pleased. Did that mean the Name was somehow involved in these connivances against D’Olbriot? It was certainly an ancient House, dating well back into the Old Empire. I frowned. Hadn’t Demoiselle Avila been betrothed to some long-dead scion of the Name, some lad who’d died in the Crusted Pox? Had Tor Sylarre had anything to do with Kellarin’s first colony?