Bradley, Marion Zimmer - SSC 03 (25 page)

 
          
The
four travelers left the mountains at the end of the day, tired, cold, and
hungry, and they entered Sanctuary.

 
          
The
inhabitants of the city observed them and laughed, but they laughed behind
their sleeves or after the small group passed. All its members walked armed.
Yet there was no belligerence in them. They looked around amazed, nudged each
other, and poined at things, for
all the
world as if
none had ever seen a city before. As, indeed, they had not.

 
          
Unaware
of the amusement of the townspeople, they passed through the marketplace toward
the city proper. It was growing dark and the farmers had nearly finished
packing their awnings and culling their produce for anything worth saving. Limp
cabbage leaves and rotten fruit littered the roughly cobbled street, and bits
of unrecognizable stuff floated down the open central sewer.

 
          
Beside
Wess, Chan shifted his heavy pack.

 
          
"Let's
stop and buy something to eat," he said, "before everybody goes
home."

 
          
Wess
hitched her own pack higher on her shoulders and did not stop. "Not
here," she said. "I'm tired of stale flatbread and raw vegetables. I
want a hot meal tonight."

 
          
She
tramped on. She knew how Chan felt. She glanced back at Aerie, who walked
wrapped in her long dark cloak. Her pack weighed her down. She was taller than
Wess, as tall as Chan, but very thin. Worry and their journey had deepened her
eyes. Wess was not used to seeing her like this. She was used to seeing her
freer.

 
          
"Our
tireless Wess," Chan said.

 
          
"I'm
tired too!" Wess said. "Do you want to try camping in the street
again?"

 
          
"No,"
he said. Behind him, Quartz chuckled.

 
          
In
the first village they had ever seen
—
it
seemed years ago now, but was only two months
—
they
tried to set up camp in what they thought was a vacant field. It was the
village common. Had the village possessed a prison, they would have been thrown
into it. As it was they were escorted to the edge of town and invited never to
return. Another traveler explained inns to them
—
and
prisons
—
and now they all could
laugh, with some embarrassment, at the episode.

 
          
But
the smaller towns they had passed through did not even approach Sanctuary in
size and noise and crowds. Wess had never imagined so many people or such high
buildings or any odor so awful. She hoped it would be better beyond the
marketplace. Passing a fish stall, she held her breath and hurried. It was the
end of the day, true, but the end of a cool late fall day. Wess tried not to
wonder what it would smell like at the end of a long summer day.

 
          
"We
should stop at the first inn we find," Quartz said.

 
          
"All
right," Wess said.

 
          
By
the time they reached the street's end, darkness was complete and the market
was deserted. Wess thought it odd that everyone should disappear so quickly,
but ho doubt they were tired too and wanted to get home to a hot fire and
dinner. She felt a sudden stab of homesickness and hopelessness: their search
had gone on so long, with so little chance of success.

 
          
The
buildings closed in around them as the street narrowed suddenly. Wess stopped:
three paths facec them, and another branched off only twenty paces farther on.

 
          
"Where now, my friends?"

 
          
"We
must ask someone," Aerie said, her voice soft with fatigue.

 
          
"If
we can find anyone," Chan said doubtfully.

 
          
Aerie
stepped toward a shadow-filled corner. "Citizen," she said,
"would you direct us to the nearest inn?"

 
          
The
others peered more closely at the dim niche. Indeed, a muffled figure crouched
there. It stood up. Wess could see the manic glitter of its eyes, but nothing
more.

 
          
"An inn?"

 
          
"The
closest, if you please. We've traveled a long way."

 
          
The
figure chuckled. "You'll find no inns in this part of town, foreigner. But
the tavern around the corner
—
it has rooms upstairs.
Perhaps it will suit you."

 
          
"Thank
you." Aerie turned back, a faint breeze ruffling her short black hair.
She pulled her cloak closer.

 
          
They
went the way the figure gestured, and did not see it convulse with silent
laughter behind them;

 
          
In
front of the tavern,
,Wess
puzzled out the unfamiliar
script: The Vulgar Unicorn.
An odd combination, even in the
south where odd combinations were the style of naming taverns.
She
pushed open the door. It was nearly as dark inside as out, and smoky. The noise
died as Wess and Chan entered
—
then rose again in a
surprised buzz when Aerie and Quartz followed.

 
          
Wess
and Chan were not startlingly different from the general run of southern
mountain folk: he fairer, she darker. Wess could pass as an ordinary citizen
anywhere; Chan's beauty often attracted attention. But Aerie's tall
white-skinned black-haired elegance everywhere aroused comment. Wess smiled,
imagining what would happen if Aerie flung away her cloak and showed
herself
as she really was.

 
          
And
Quartz: she had to stoop to come inside. She straightened up. She was taller
than anyone else in the room. The smoke near the ceiling swirled a wreath
around her hair. She had cut it short for the
journey,
and it curled around her face, red, gold, and sand-pale. Her gray eyes
reflected the firelight like mirrors. Ignoring the stares, she pushed her blue
wool cloak from her broad shoulders and shrugged her pack to the floor.

 
          
The
strong heavy scent of beer and sizzling meat made Wess' mouth water. She sought
out the man behind the bar.

 
          
"Citizen,"
she said, carefully pronouncing the Sanctuary language, the trade-tongue of
all the
continent, "are you the proprietor? My friends
and I, we need a room for the night, and dinner."

 
          
Her
request seemed ordinary enough to her, but the innkeeper looked sidelong at one
of his patrons. Both laughed.

 
          
"A room, young gentleman?"
He came out from behind
the bar. Instead of replying to Wess, he spoke to Chan. Wess smiled to herself.
Like all Chan's friends, she was used to seeing people fall in love with him on
sight. She would have done so herself, she thought
,
had she first met him when they were grown. But they had known each other all
their lives and their friendship was far closer and deeper than instant lust.

 
          
"A
room?" the innkeeper said again.
"A meal for you
and your ladies?
Is that all we can do for you here in our humble
establishment? Do you require dancing?
A juggler?
Harpists and hautbois?
Ask and it shall be given!" Far
from being seductive, or even friendly, the innkeeper's tone was derisive.

 
          
Chan
glanced at Wess, frowning slightly, as everyone within earshot burst into
laughter. Wess was glad her complexion was dark enough to hide her blush of
anger.

           
Chan was bright pink from the collar
of his homespun shirt to the roots of his blond hair. Wess knew they had been
insulted but she did not understand how or why, so she replied with courtesy.

 
          
"No,
citizen, thank you for your hospitality. We need a room, if you have one, and
food."

 
          
"We
would not refuse a bath," Quartz said.

 
          
The
innkeeper glanced at them, an irritated expression on his face, and spoke once
more to Chan.

 
          
"The
young gentleman lets his ladies speak for him? Is this some foreign
custom, that
you are too high-bred to speak to a mere
tavern-keeper?"

 
          
"I
don't understand you," Chan said. "Wess spoke for us all. Must we
speak in chorus?"

 
          
Taken
aback, the man hid his reaction by showing them, with an exaggerated bow, to a
table.

 
          
Wess
dumped her pack on the floor next to the wall behind her and sat down with a
sigh of relief. The others followed. Aerie looked as if she could not have kept
on her feet a moment longer.

 
          
"This
is a simple place," the tavern-keeper said.
"Beer
or ale, wine.
Meat and bread.
Can you pay?"

 
          
He
was speaking to Chan again. He took no direct note of Wess or Aerie or Quartz.

 
          
"What
is the price?"

 
          
"Four
dinners, bed
—
you break your fast
somewhere else, I don't open early.
A piece of silver.
In advance."

 
          
"The
bath included?" Quartz said.

 
          
"Yes,
yes, all right."

 
          
"We
can pay," said Quartz, whose turn it was to keep track of what they spent.
She offered him a piece of silver.

 
          
He
continued to look at Chan but, after an awkward pause, he shrugged, snatched
the coin from Quartz, and turned away. Quartz drew back her hand, then, under
the table, surreptitiously wiped it on the leg of her heavy cotton trousers.

           
Chan glanced over at Wess. "Do
you understand anything that has happened since we entered the city's
gates?"

 
          
"It
is odd," she said. "They have strange customs."

 
          
"We
can puzzle them out tomorrow," Aerie said.

 
          
A
young woman carrying a tray stopped at their table. She wore odd clothes,
summer clothes by the look of them, for they uncovered her arms and shoulders
and almost completely bared her breasts. It is hot in here, Wess thought.
That's quite intelligent of her. Then she need only put on a cloak to go home,
and she will not get chilled or overheated.

 
          
"Ale
for you, sir?" the young woman said to Chan. "Or wine? And wine for
your wives?"

 
          
"Beer,
please," Chan said. "What are 'wives'? I have studied your language,
but this is not a word I know."

 
          
"The
ladies are not your wives?"

 
          
Wess
took a tankard of ale off the tray, too tired and thirsty to try to figure out
what the woman was talking about. She took a deep swallow of the cool bitter
brew. Quartz reached for a flask of wine and two cups, and poured for herself
and Aerie.

 
          
"My
companions are
Westerly
, Aerie, and Quartz,"
Chan said, nodding to each in turn. "I am
Chandler
. And you are
—
?"

 
          
"I'm
just the serving girl," she said, sounding frightened. "You could
not wish to be troubled with my name." She grabbed a mug of beer and put
it on the table, spilling some, and fled.