“Want to make a bet, old man?”
“No, I don’t! I think you should stay away from Tomiyano. He’s dangerous.” But that, Honakura realized as soon as he said it, was not likely to be an effective argument in this case. “He’ll try to cripple you!”
Nnanji registered astonishment. “No! Yes, he will, won’t he? Well, then! There’s a real incentive for him!” He flashed a truly wicked smirk and went striding off toward the deckhouse door, emerging a few moments later without his sword and harness.
Tomiyano looked up warily as he heard boots approach. He sat back on his heels, scowling, reached for his knife, and then showed surprise at seeing a swordsman unarmed.
Honakura had spent a long lifetime analyzing people and knew be could read expressions better than most. He saw the dark flush of fury on the sailor’s face when Nnanji made his request. He saw it change to disbelief. He saw the attraction of the idea dawn. Nnanji pointed to the sanding job, looking hopeful and earnest and totally lacking in guile. Then he grinned broadly across at Honakura as the captain rose, heading for the fo’c’sle, obviously going to fetch the foils.
Still apprehensive, the old man perched himself on a nearby sand bucket and prepared to watch. The tension among the crew was far too high to risk such nonsense; the memories of the fight between Shonsu and the captain much too vivid. There would be too many opportunities for things to go wrong. It was a blatant challenge to the gods. He should have more faith, but he wished he knew what to expect, or how this could possibly help.
Tomiyano was gone some time. Quite likely his mother had hidden the equipment. Few people noticed the foils and masks in his hand when he returned, but the first clash of steel rang through the silent ship like an alarm bell, and the reaction was frenzied. Youngsters came swarming down the ropes, the knitting party on the poop disintegrated, people erupted from the companionway to stare in disbelief and then gaze at one another. Brota came out screaming, her nerves ragged from the days of uncertainty.
“
What in hell are you doing
!” she yelled, even as she burst through the crowd around die doorway like a surfacing whale.
The fencing stopped, and the captain pulled off his mask and looked around at the watchers, then at his mother.
“I’m teaching a swordsman to fence,” he said. “If all of you would get out of the way and give us some room.” Then he put the made on again and went to guard.
Brota ground out an incredulous oath. For a moment she seemed about to argue, then she fell back with the others and watched as the lesson proceeded, quietly wringing her fat hands.
Honakura knew nothing about fencing and cared less, but he could study the spectators. At the beginning, the women looked worried and the men mostly pleased, eager to see the captain return some of the medicine he had taken from Shonsu.
It seemed to be a very static match. The two men were standing their ground, left foot planted, left arm high. Nnanji’s right boot would stamp forward,
Clump
, and then retreat,
Tap
. The captain’s bare foot moved in silent counterpoint. Foils rang.
Clump . . . Tap . . . Clump . . . Tap
. . . Back and forth they disputed for that one spot on the deck. Evidently this was not orthodox—eyebrows began to rise. Glances were being exchanged. The smiles became frowns. But Thana, watching intently, was beginning to smirk.
Clump . . . Tap
. . .
Neither man was claiming any hits. The noise increased, the pace grew more ferocious. Then the captain stepped back instead of forward, and Nnanji followed.
Clump . . . Clump
. . . Spectators muttered in astonishment. Again the captain had to retreat, and this time he kept going, being driven by Nnanji as he had been driven by Shonsu. The watchers scrambled clear . . . faster yet . . . along one side of the aft hatch . . . past the fo’c’sle door.
Clump . . . Clump . . . Clump
. . . Forward again toward the main mast.
“One!” Nnanji yelled.
The match stopped. Tomiyano whipped off his mask and hurled it to the deck. He was red-faced, gasping for breath, and obviously furious; glaring murder at the swordsman.
Nnanji unmasked, also. He was equally breathless, but his grin said more than all the other faces put together. “Sorry!” He panted. “That was a little harder than I meant.”
Tomiyano was holding one hand to his incompletely healed, still-variegated ribs. He brought it away, and there was blood on his fingers. Thana stifled a noise like a giggle. The captain transferred his glare from the swordsman to his sister, then pushed past Nnanji and marched toward the fo’c’sle door, the crowd parting for him in silence. Nnanji looked around at the circle of scowling faces. “I didn’t mean to,” he said.
The sailors turned away.
He shrugged, laid the mask and foil tidily on the hatch cover, and walked toward the deckhouse. The spectators began to disperse in angry silence.
Honakura slid off the bucket and followed the swordsman.
Even with all the shutters open, the deckhouse was airless and hot. Shonsu lay in his usual corner, wasted and soaked in sweat, his breathing labored. Pus oozed from his tumescent thigh. Jja was asleep on the bare floor at his side, exhausted from her vigil.
Nnanji stood at the far end, by a window, wiping himself with a towel. He had removed his hairclip, and his hair was a red mop. He was panting still, and grinning still. Without pony-tail and harness he looked astonishingly young and innocent.
Honakura eyed him with concern. “You can beat him, then?”
He nodded and wiped his face. “He fooled me.”
“
He
fooled
you
?”
“Yes.” Puff. “He’s very fast . . . has some good routines . . . but now I know them . . . ” He wiped some more and panted some more. “He’s not a swordsman. A swordsman would have others . . . he doesn’t. I didn’t realize!”
“And he tried to hurt you?”
Nnanji laughed, unable to suppress his joy. “At first. But I truly didn’t mean . . . to hit like that. We were going very fast. It does happen.”
Shonsu had said that Nnanji’s memory worked in fencing, also. He never forgot anything. So now he had the captain’s measure. He knew his tricks.
“You have hardly calmed the crew’s worries, adept.”
Nnanji had draped the towel over one shoulder and was combing back his hair with his fingers, about to replace his hairclip. His juvenile grin faded. “No.” He frowned, lowering his arms. “And this does change things, doesn’t it? I could hardly give him a sword if he might lose, could I?”
He gazed at the speechless Honakura with that strange new stare of his. It was Shonsu’s stare. Then he waved at the oak chests.
“Pray sit, my lord.” That was Shonsu, too.
Honakura sat, waiting, hiding a rising excitement.
Nnanji threw away the towel and quietly closed the aft shutters for privacy. Then he stooped to retrieve his harness and the seventh sword from the floor. “Have you. Lord Honakura, in all your years on the temple court, ever heard of a valid excuse for civilians killing swordsmen?”
Aha
! So that was it?
“No, adept. I have been wondering the same. But, no. I have never heard of one.”
Nnanji rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “One isn’t enough—we need two, don’t we? I think I’ve found them, but I’m not sure of the words. I need your help, my lord.”
††††††
Long before sunset the wind failed utterly, and
Sapphire
dropped anchor, still in mid-River. The evening meal was brought out early, and the fare was sparser than usual. There were jokes about starving to death if the calm continued—black humor. Black was the prevailing mood on board these days.
Brota had found one very, very tiny ray in the darkness—for the first time, she thought Shonsu seemed a little better. Reluctant to raise false hopes, she said nothing.
Tomiyano’s stupidity in taking on a swordsman at fencing had cast a deeper pall than ever over
Sapphire
. He had tried to administer a beating and had thereby almost lost the first few passes. That had shaken his nerve, and then Nnanji had countered his every move and gone on to swamp him with innumerable complicated routines. She had recognized Shonsu’s techniques, of course, and probably Tomiyano had, also, but never in time to block them. In a real fight her son would probably be still the better man, for in a real fight repetition did not matter. But Nnanji had coached Thana and Matarro, Tomiyano’s pupils, and had also watched him fight against Shonsu. That experience had given him advantages Tomiyano had not foreseen. No matter how gifted, an amateur should not meddle with a professional.
But now the crew were more worried than ever, and there were dark whispers of caging Nnanji in a cabin. She had refused to listen, for she knew that the swordsman would fight if they tried it. For the first time since Tomminoliy had died, her leadership was being questioned, and the air smelled of mutiny.
Since the fencing, Nnanji had stayed out of sight in the deckhouse. Either he was being surprisingly tactful, or else the old priest had taken him in hand. He had appeared only once, when Tomiyano returned to collect his sanding blocks, coming out and offering to help with the work. That had been a peace offering, but the sailor had rejected it with obscenities. And the ship was too small to keep them apart for long.
So Brota abandoned her usual eating place. She sat herself on the aft end of the forward hatch cover, next to her still-resentful son. It was not a position she favored, for the flanking dinghies cut off her view of the River, but she had Tomiyano under control and could keep an eye on the deckhouse door. The rest of the family collected food and spread around the deck as usual, but there was little conversation and much angry brooding.
Jja appeared. She laid a few scraps on a plate, smiled faintly when spoken to, then hurried back to her master’s sickbed. Katanji, ever sensitive to mood, had put himself in a far corner and was being invisible. The old priest arrived. He took a slice of bread and a lump of soft cheese over to the forward end of the other hatch cover, facing Brota and Tomiyano. That was an odd choice, and Holiyi had to move to make a space for him. Was the old man keeping an eye on Tomiyano, also?
So everyone was eating except Nnanji, and normally he was first pig at the trough. Then the sound of boots . . .
Brota lost interest in the plate beside her. The red-haired young swordsman was not going toward the food. There was a strained, tense look about him.
He stopped by the mast, facing her. But it was not she that he wanted.
“Captain Tomiyano?”
The sailor’s hand slunk near to his dagger, and she prepared to grab his arm if he tried to draw it. “Well?”
Nnanji pulled in his chin and said gruffly, “I owe you an apology.”
Surprise! No, astonishment! Formal apologies from swordsmen were rarer than feathers on fish.
Tomiyano’s fingers moved up to touch the new scrape on his ribs. A half-healed scab had been knocked off; it was trivial. “I accept that this was an accident,” he said gruffly.
“Not that, sailor.” Whatever was coming, Nnanji was finding it difficult. He was taut. “I apologize for causing you worry. I made a mistake last week, when Novice Matarro asked me what would happen if Lord Shonsu were to die.”
Goddess be praised!
“I said that I should have to avenge him. I was wrong.”
Relief! The onlookers began to smile.
Nnanji took a very deep breath, all his ribs showing as they moved below his harness straps. “The oath we swore is very unusual, Captain. Of course he is not going to die, but even if he did, I misinterpreted that oath.” Another pause, an even deeper breath, as if he had to force the words out. “Because, if Lord Shonsu were to die, you would not be at fault.”
Tomiyano was suspicious, hunting for traps. ‘That’s very nice. Why?”
“He empowered you as a posse. He told you to drop the sword, but he did not use the correct words. You were entitled . . . you were required . . . to continue obeying his previous order. When a civilian has been deputized, then the swordsman who warranted him is responsible for whatever happens.”
“You’re saying that Shonsu ki—wounded himself?”
Nnanji tensed even more, clenching his fists. “Legally, yes.”
Tomiyano emitted a loud bellow of scornful laughter. “Well, that is very nice indeed! So I have nothing to fear? I can sleep sound, now? I don’t need to worry about you creeping up on me with a sword?”
“Tom’o!” Brota wanted to strangle him.
“It means that I bear no onus of vengeance for what happened to Shonsu.” Nnanji was glowering. “It does not mean that I may not take offense on my own account.”
Before the sailor could reply, Brota said, “That is good news, adept. We are very relieved. Now, perhaps, you will join us in our evening meal? Tom’o, how about some wine to celebrate?”
Thana ran forward, took Nnanji’s hand, and placed a quick kiss on his cheek. Color flooded into his paleness, but he did not look at her, or smile as he should have done. The old man was still watching carefully. There was more to come, then, although almost everyone else was grinning with relief and starting to chatter.
“It would be a strange case, Captain,” Nnanji said loudly. The listeners fell silent. “It would mean that a civilian had slain a swordsman and escaped punishment. That never happens.”
Thana backed away. Tomiyano went very still.
Nnanji looked at Brota and bit his lip. Then he said quickly, “Where is Yok, mistress?”
She took tight hold of Tomiyano’s wrist. “Ten days up from Hool. Why?”
“You have never been back to Yok?”
“Since when?”
“Since your son was killed.”
She looked at the old man. He had known this was coming. There must be more to it than an impetuous, arrogant young swordsman’s suicidal blundering. “No. We never went back.”
Again Nnanji seemed at a loss for words. Then he shouted, “Tell me!”
Tomiyano jerked his dagger hand free and threw his plate down. Sausage and carrots and pastry scattered at Nnanji’s feet. “You don’t want to know, sonny!”