“You still serve a decent octopus casserole here, don't you?” Kenezki asked the barmaid, after the woman pushed herself off the bawdily laughing Radulf.
When the young woman raised her hand to strike the man's face, though, he gripped her wrist and gave it a slight pull, “tsk-tsking” her as he yanked her to him for a kiss full on the lips. She yanked away again and moved quickly out of the man's reach, standing next to Kenezki with flushed face as the pirate continued to order as if nothing had occurred.
“We'll take three of those, some
lakerda
,
and a few capons.” He leaned conspiratorially toward Clarinda, whispering with wine-laden breath, “We'll avoid the vegetable stew, eh, Young One? Not quite sure what they'll toss in it in a place like this, nor how old it is?”
“My parents own this place,” the barmaid protested, hearing the pirate's words. “And, it's not vegetable stew, but clam chowder. The freshest this side of the Golden Horn.”
Clarinda took the hint. “I'll take a bowl of that, please.”
The barmaid nodded with a brief, appreciative smile. “You won't be disappointed,” she said, and then rolled her eyes at the Thuringian who spoke with Paolo across the table.
Clarinda thanked her again after Alex and Pasquale ordered the same clam chowder, willing to take any bet that more than octopi tentacles were going to be mixed into Radulf's casserole.
“So, Hoplitarch,” the Thuringian's voice boomed, “do we pass parchments and proofs around the table, or do we get to business?”
Alex shrugged in response. “I'm here for Mistress Clarinda and Master Pasquale. If they need to deal with you,” his steady gaze swept across all the men gathered at the table, “they'll at least have some assurance that the Byzantine authorities back their endeavors. My presence can serve in lieu of papers.”
He looked directly into the bearish man's face, switching from Greek to German, with a harsh change in tone that frightened even Clarinda in the severity of its delivery. “I fought in the Caspian campaigns two years ago, Herr Radulf. If you're one of those who ran when the Five Brigades finally arrived, you can also be assured that there's no statute of limitations on murder here.”
Radulf said nothing in response to his words, nor did he avert his eyes from Alex's glare.
Pasquale broke the tension by slapping Alex's back lightly. “Well, I'm glad that we've settled all that!”
Alex rose from the table and looked at Clarinda while resting a hand upon Pasquale's shoulder. “Very well. I'll be back shortly. I need to tend to something.”
“I'd guess that he's going to order some soldiers to block the front and rear doors.” Paolo murmured as he glanced at Kenezki and Radulf, before focusing on Pasquale. “If we're still going to talk under these wonderful conditions, we ought to get to it.”
“It's very simple,” Pasquale replied, “of our five, we have two fully laden ships that need goods off-loaded and transported to Kiev before the winter season. Kenezki's told you about the merchandise?”
“
Si
,
” Paolo nodded, “amber and glass spindle whorls from Murano, and glasswares that are hard to come by in the northern countries?”
“And Egyptian fritware,” Pasquale added. “Angelo's plan had been to deliver them to Chersonosos while he went to the Levant, but I need to now go to Caesarea myself and so need the liaison work.”
“There were spices, also, weren't there?” Radulf clarified, looking hard at Kenezki before returning attention to Pasquale. “If I'm going to commission and protect these things for the overland journey â and especially waiting out a winter in Russia â there will be additional costs, you understand.”
“Those are separate transactions,” Clarinda said, “and while there's a portion of the first and second one that will be sold outright, for the rest we need to make sure that we respect the consignments ordered by the Hanse houses in Lund.”
“Well, by that reckoning there won't be much left for me,” Radulf grumbled. “
Und ich dachte, ich wäre Umgang mit Menschen heute, nicht kleine Mädchen,”
he said, jerking a thick thumb at Clarinda.
“You
are
dealing with men here tonight,” Clarinda said coldly, her German as angrily and rapidly spoken as Radulf's had been, “and you're dealing with me, as well. I'd prefer that you didn't call me a âlittle girl' again, but if such language makes you feel better, so be it. I won't be taking any rides on your lap, I can assure you.”
The force of her words surprised Radulf because she spoke his own language with better grammar than he did. He frowned at the young woman, but said nothing.
“Clarinda
is
first mate on the
Maritina
,
” Pasquale asserted into the silence, striving for a reasonable tone. It worked. Everyone at the table turned attention to him again. “I run the rest of Angelo's ships, but she
does
have final say on all billing issues and financial arrangements. The consignment agreements we have on the North Sea are substantial, and the Hanse cuts are nonnegotiable.”
“The Hanse are reaching into all the trade networks, Radulf” Paolo offered, taking a commiserating tone. “Sooner than later they'll have the entire Scandinavian and Baltic trades under their control. Better learn to deal with them now and get the rates you prefer, than later when you're at their mercy.”
Radulf glared at Kenezki. “This is why you bring me in from the cold?” he muttered, switching to a harsh and swiftly spoken Hungarian dialect. “I prefer the old times, my friend. We should be done with business and wenching by now. Whatever the time, though, that Greek
bunkÅ
of a guardsman
across the table gets a sliced throat the moment his back is turned. Did you hear him threaten me? and this,” he nodded toward Clarinda, “this slip of a girl, speaking to me like my mother with that tone! Pah!
Termeketien
gÅrÅgÅk
!”
“What was that?” Paolo asked, surprised by the shift into another language, and looking at his partners.
“Oh,” Clarinda replied, “
Unser âFreund' Radulf hier
just wondered aloud in Hungarian why he and âFriend Kenezki' came to this meeting at all. Then he reminisced about old times before whining about Alexander, threatening to slice his throat when he wasn't looking, and then adding that he was an âeffeminate Greek.'”
She initially looked at Paolo as she spoke, ignoring the astonished look on the German's face, but then shifted her gaze to someone behind Radulf. “Is that about right, Alex?”
“You missed one insult, Clarinda,” Alexander said as he made his way around the table, “but you're essentially correct. There was also something about him wishing you were his mother, I think. We probably shouldn't go into that too much, eh?”
The hoplitarch sat down in his chair and leaned back, regarding the furious Radulf. “Really, Gentlemen” Alex said expansively, “is business so good these days, that you can afford to pass up this size of a transaction? Are you going to protest every step of the way, or can we all just be done with this?”
“Where is Angelo Trevisan?” Kenezki asked. “We were talking about his absence before I left to find our friends here.” The man got a confirming look from Radulf before adding, “Many of these arrangements were made with him in Venice before you even set sail.”
Clarinda noted the formality of his expressions; the Greek language fell dully from his lips, as if learned by rote from waxen tablets in an ancient schoolroom. Why did she find this man so strangely at odds with his surroundings? It was as if Kenezki wore an invisible cloak that somehow distorted all of Clarinda's perceptions, akin to what she might feel if she were undersea watching him speak. Everyone else seemed to understand him quite perfectly, while she could barely follow him, his words reaching her almost as gurgles bubbling upward through water.
“Angelo's on a side trip,” Pasquale explained dismissively, “and Clarinda and I are long used to making these kinds of deals.” He paused and focused on Radulf. “If you're done complaining, her point stands: there are three, maybe four deals on the table that need sorting out.”
Paolo broke in, with irritation in his voice. “Are you always so abrasive with people you need to do business with?”
“Don't flip this keel onto us,” Clarinda said, turning to Alex. “I imagine there are others we can deal with? Find them. I've had enough.”
“Hold on,” Radulf interrupted, seeing the entire deal melting away from the fire in Clarinda's eyes. “A moment,
Fräulein
Trevisan. You obviously haven't dealt with many overland routes north of the Black Sea.” The man took a deep breath, visibly restraining his unruly side. “As the saying goes, my men and I will be âtesting Heimdall's patience' as it is in starting so late in the season. If I don't make Kiev by late November, none of your cargoes are going to make even the midsummer fairs at Calais and Lund. That extra speed costs hundreds of
denarii
.
”
Clarinda looked directly into the burly man's eyes. “We've done our research on you as well, Signore Radulf,” she said pleasantly, as if conversing about the weather. “Your ship got laden two days ago with enough illegal dyed silk-stuffs to sell up to ten tents' worth of goods for a summer's worth of fairs, and you
still
haven't visited the chancellor's office to make restitution for three years' worth of port taxes.” She chuckled. “The emperor's bureaucracy doesn't take kindly to merchants dodging taxes, and they're even more merciless with silk smugglers.”
“I have all the papers!” Radulf whispered fiercely. He turned his head nervously to look over each shoulder, dreading that either robed tax collectors or polearm-wielding Swedes might emerge from the crowd.
“I'm sure you've got
some
papers,” Clarinda said, “but keep them stowed. We don't care, and my point is that, as a hoplitarch, Alex is concerned about larger issues than enforcing overdue tax bills.”
Clarinda leaned forward slightly, her voice taking some urgency and laced with a common sensical tone. “Think about it, Radulf. Even though you couldn't sell enough of your own furs to make up for the shortfall you incurred last year, the silks in your possession will more than pay for all transportation costs this season; our commissions have nothing to do with that, of course. You'd make that profit if you walked away now and we never saw each other again. But, if we can come to terms tonight, Trevisan friendship might provide a better future in Constantinople
and
Venice.”
At this point Clarinda glanced at Paolo Santini, who nodded, regarding her with a curious and respectful expression.
She leaned back and crossed her arms over her chest. “But,
please
,
enough with the blustering talk about heading up to Kiev for our benefit alone. Or telling us with a bad poker face that you've got to take on extraordinary costs for getting our goods routed to Danzig and points westward once you've reached the Baltic next May.” She barked an incredulous laugh. “You're not even going âoverland' until the thaw in early spring!”
Radulf had been glaring at her initially, but now he, too, had leaned back and regarded her quietly. He fingered his goblet.
“Let's say that's true,
Fräulein
.
It's still Old Pecheneg territory between the Black Sea and Kiev. Many raiders wander there because its a No-Man's Land between imperial control and the Kievan army.”
“All those costs are factored into the deal,” Clarinda assured him, “and we're not going to pay for less than you need to hire the proper bodyguards and secure enough crafts. Signore Santini has hopefully testified to the worth of Trevisan promissory notes. You'll get your money, and some increased legitimacy in Venice.”
Paolo murmured his agreement and Clarinda finished with the burly German. “Do we deal, or do we find someone else?”
Radulf drained the last of the ale from his goblet, slammed the vessel onto the table.
“We deal,” he said.
Clarinda and Pasquale handled the rest of the negotiations with the same evenhandedness that she'd brought to every transaction for the last two years since involving herself in her father's business.
Afterwards, there'd been another long pause in the conversation when Radulf departed with Kenezki to find a public notary. The original documents that Pasquale had brought with him had to be redrafted and signed by all the parties. Alexander Stratioticus volunteered to âprotect' the men with a few members of the Varangian Guard, as well as to secure the notarial services of a man he knew in the imperial chancellery.
Kenezki and Radulf gratefully accepted the offer, their looks of surprise and ill-hidden excitement proving out Clarinda's predictions: these transactions with the Trevisans were perhaps the opening salvos into legitimacy and respectability.