Duncan, Dave - A Man of His Word 3 - Perilous Seas

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Perilous SeasPerilous Seas
Book 3 of A Man Of His Word
By Dave Duncan
ISBN: 0-345-36630-1
ONE
Favor the deceit
1
In all the Impire, there was no more prosperous province than the island of
Kith. Ever since its conquest in the expansive days of the Xth Dynasty, it had
been the imps' main bastion in the Summer Seas.
It had rich mines, fertile farmland, and a substantial shipping industry. Once
in a while a typhoon would do some damage, or dragons might lay waste along the
northeast shore, but neither had troubled the western coast in centuries, and
there the city of Finrain was the largest and richest on the island, as well as
the greatest port.
Ports needed sailors. The best sailors were jotnar. Imps had good reason to be
jumpy when there were jotnar around, and they firmly encouraged the sailors who
manned Finrain's shipping to make their homes at Durthing, a couple of hours to
the south-close enough to be handy, but distant enough that their violent
impulses could do no damage to Finrain itself, nor its citizens.
Durthing was home also to a few trolls, most of them descendants of slaves
imported from the Mosweeps, because the aboriginal population had pretty much
died out after the Impire came. There were also some mixed bloods, and of course
gnomes to handle the sanitary arrangements. There were even a few imps, but any
imp who chose to live in a jotunnish settlement must have very good reasons, of
the sort that were better not discussed.
Lately, a young sailor of mixed faun-jotunn ancestry had taken up residence.
Although he had been a thrall purchased at enormous expense by Gathmor, the new
master of Stormdancer, he had subsequently been given his freedom. Within
limits. His shipmates did not exactly take turns at keeping an eye on him, but
... Well, he was a good kid and never lacked for company. He had shown no
interest in departing, anyway, but he was much too valuable to be allowed the
opportunity. Moreover, there was only one land road out of Durthing, and it ran
by a post of the Imperial army. Imps were notoriously nosy.
Its fondest resident could not have called Durthing a town, and barely even a
village, for its huts and hovels were scattered at random around the sides of a
shallow, bowl-shaped hollow. The only break in the bowl's symmetry was a notch
where the sea had broken through, back before the oldest Gods. With clear, calm
water and smooth sand for beaching, the near-circular bay was one of the finest
harbors in all of Pandemia. Three little streams watered the slopes, the sea
teemed with fish, and the climate was perfect. Usually a dozen ships lay
anchored there, or pulled up on the beach, and most often two or three more were
under construction.
There was no formal land law in Durthing, for there was no formal law at all.
The sea was a demanding mistress and whenever she stole a lover from his family,
his home was soon abandoned to weeds and swallowed up by scrubby woodland. '
A woman bereft must find herself another protector at once, and her children
likely died soon anyway. Even among jotnar, few men would actually kill a child
in cold blood, but even fewer would care overmuch for brats spawned by a
predecessor. The work was done by neglect and indifference, or in mindless
drunken rages. A widow who did not find another guardian was soon driven out by
the other women and vanished into the nightmare slums of Finrain.
But in every evil there was some good, as the priests said, and housing was thus
no problem for a newcomer. He might pick a pleasant spot not too far from one of
the streams and build the home of his dreams, or he could just move into one of
the empties. The selection was wide: impish wooden shacks, or low, dark sod
hovels of the Nordland type favored by jotnar, or the rambling piles of masonry
constructed by trolls. There were also some abandoned gnome burrows, but even
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the rats shunned those.
The faun had selected an ancient log cabin off by itself, and labored to make it
shipshape while he settled down to life as a sailor. After every voyage he added
more improvements. The months slipped by imperceptibly in that silken halcyon
climate, and spring had become summer already.
2
Far to the east, under a harsher sun, the caravan road from the great port of
Ullacarn ran eastward through the foothills of the Progistes before swinging
north to branch and divide and become a skein of paths into the Central Desert.
Squeezed between sand and mountains, the single way was known to the merchants
as the Gauntlet. Their guards called it the Slaughterhouse. In some places the
road was so constricted that drivers heading seaward could shout insults or
greetings to those bound for the interior, while the bells on their respective
camels rang in rondelet together. Many trader trains came through there, but not
as many as tried, for banditry was the main source of employment in the
district. The names of the passes told the tale: Bone Pass, Bodkin's Eye, One
Out, Bloody Spring, High Death, Low Death, Buzzard's Gizzard, and Eight Men
Dead.
Additional guards could be hired at either end of the Gauntlet, but they might
not be of authentic royal blood. The genuine lionslayers distrusted them
utterly, and with good reason.
After many weeks of trekking across the wastes of Zark, the caravan led by the
venerable Sheik Elkarath had come at last to the Gauntlet. A few dangerous days
ahead lay the fair city of Ullacam, representing rest, profit, and well-earned
comfort. The camels that had borne necessities to the humble folk of the
interior-shovels and mattocks of tough dwarvish steel, cunning elvish dyestuffs,
strong linen thread-were laden now with produce that the rest of Pandemia would
greet as luxuries: wool of mountain goats and bright rugs woven from it, uncut
emeralds, and durable garments of leather or camel hair, crafted by humble,
hungry folk, whose only resource was unlimited time.
Many times in a long life, the sheik had traversed the Gauntlet. He had met
violence there on occasion, yet he had never suffered loss of man or substance.
If pressed to explain his remarkable good fortune, he would merely smile
cryptically into his snowy beard and speak of vigilance and devotion to the
precepts of holy writ. This time, he was confident, his passage would be
similarly untroubled. This time his party was no larger nor richer than it had
been in the past.
Portly and dignified, Sheik Elkarath rode high on his camel, serenely surveying
the sun-blasted rocky landscape from under his snowbank brows as he led his long
train down to the Oasis of Tall Cranes. Here he was in the very center of the
Gauntlet, the most dangerous stretch of all. The barren crags around him
concealed a dozen dark ravines that only the locals knew, any one of which might
hold a band of armed brigands lying in wait. The jagged peaks of the Progistes
pressed close along the northwestern skyline.
The tiny settlement in the valley below comprised a few dozen adobe houses, a
welcome pond of clear water, and a hundred or so gangly palm trees. It owned no
mines and grew no crops of any substance. Yet the people of Tall Cranes were
well fed and prosperous. Their paddocks held many fine camels. Among other
peoples, all djinns had a reputation for perfidy, but within Zark itself, the
inhabitants of Tall Cranes were notorious.
From long experience, Sheik Elkarath anticipated a productive evening of
trading. Always he brought gold to Tall Cranes, because the elders would accept
nothing less for the jewels and crafts and livestock they offered. To inquire
into the source of their wealth would have been grossly discourteous and
insanely rash.
Behind the sheik, tall in the saddle, rode his chief guard. By the ancient
tradition of the camel roads, he was referred to always as First Lionslayer. In
his case the anonymity was especially valuable, because that spectacular young
man was Sultan Azak of Arakkaran, literally worth a king's ransom. Much farther
back in the caravan, the young woman professing to be his wife was Queen
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Inosolan of Krasnegar. She, however, would be worth nothing to the average
kidnapper, except brief carnal satisfaction. To the wardens, the four occult
guardians of the world, she was apparently worth considerably more.
But Sheik Elkarath would not be speaking of magic, or politics, during his visit
to the Oasis of Tall Cranes.
3
Ogi called out, "Shipmate ahoy!" as he drew near to the faun's cabin. The sun
had only just set and he was quite visible as he came through the low shrubs and
spindly trees, but life in a jotunn settlement like Durthing made caution second
nature to a man-startle a jotunn and he might kill first and apologize later.
Some would not apologize even then.
The hammering ceased, and a moment later Rap's face appeared in the window, a
homely face below a mop of brown hair like a tangle of dry ferns. He wiped his
forehead with a bare arm.
"Got some carp," Ogi yelled, holding them up. "And wine!"
"Wine? What's the occasion?"
"Just thought a working man might like a break. "
The faun smiled his usual diffident little smile. "Great!" he shouted, and
disappeared.
Ogi headed over to the fire pit and was pleased to discover a few live embers
remaining. He added some twigs and blew up a flame. Then he settled on a boulder
and made certain that the wine had survived the journey unharmed.
A gray bird flew in to perch on a twig and eye him with deep suspicion. There
were rocks enough to seat at least a dozen more people, so whoever had built it
must have had a large family ... no, the shack was small, so he'd just enjoyed
throwing big parties. It was a pleasant spot, though, set in a little dell and
sheltered from the tropic sun by a couple of half-decent treesin Durthing any
worthwhile timber soon vanished into cooking fires-but too far from a spring to
be a prime location; more private than most.
In a few minutes Rap came wandering out, pulling on a shirt. He was still
comically modest about clothing, considering the complete absence of privacy in
a sailor's working life, but a good lad, steady beyond his years. In appearance
he was pretty much straight faun, except for his hair and his size, and he had a
faun's disinclination to conform to social pressures. Like being cleanshaven,
for instance. He was the only man on Stormdancer not trying to grow a floorbrush
mustache like Gathmor's. He was also the only man in Durthing who wore long
pants all the time.
"One of them's likely Petrel. She's due. Don't know the other."
Ships arriving were always of interest, but the juvenile forest around Rap's
cabin blocked a clear view of the harbor. He, of course, could see through
anything, but either the ships were still out of his range or he just didn't
care much. He sat down again and stared at the flickering flames in silence.
The swift tropical dark was settling in all around, and the birdcalls were
fading away. Bright smoke and sparks and crackling fire ... oversexed crickets
racketing already ... It was a pleasant night.
As Ogi cut off the fish heads, he tossed them over his shoulder for dogs or
gnomes to find. Likewise, when he slit the bellies, he scraped out the guts on
the dirt behind him. Quite likely there would be a gnome child or two hovering
nearby already, drawn by the fire.
"Something wrong?" Ogi asked.
Rap had been staring fixedly at the flames. He smiled faintly and shrugged.
"Nothing you can help with."
"Please yourself. But if you want to talk it out to a friend, I'm available. And
despite what you may have been told ever since you were weaned, some imps can
keep secrets."
That brought the little smile again, briefly, and Ogi realized that the wide
faun mouth almost never smiled more than that. "It's just that I'm not finding
it easy settling down here." Yes, that was very odd.
"Durthing's not perfect," Ogi said loyally, "but there's nowhere much better.
You've gotten yourself a pretty fair house there for just the cost of a few
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days' work, and there's a very wide selection of girls. I know of lots who'd be
willing to help you fill it with babies."
Rap shuddered.
"You get used to the little pests," Ogi said complacently. Uala had two now and
another on the way already. Perhaps twins, the way she was bulging. "At times
they're quite lovable. Don't quote me."
Rap went back to staring at flames.
There was a mystery even about the way the kid had gotten to Faerie in the first
place, and it probably involved magic. Ogi was enough of a sailor to dislike
talking about that. Still, it was curious.
Ogi often wondered whether that was just another of his odd ideas about
propriety, or if he was touchy about his faun legs. There were a lot of things
about him that puzzled Ogi. Already the fire was crackling nicely. Ogi began
peeling onions. Rap settled on the next boulder, wiping his forehead again.
"Working too hard! Meant to go for a swim." He hefted the wine jar an tilted his
head for a long, hard swig-which was a pleasant surprise to the imp. Maybe
getting him drunk tonight wouldn't be the swine of a job they'd expected.
Rap lowered the flask with a gasp. "I'll go later."
"Hey, swimming in the dark . . . All right, smarty, you needn't smirk like that!
" Ogi did not usually cluck like a mother hen, but young Rap was a newcomer to
swimming. "So it's not dangerous for you-but don't go too soon after you've
eaten, okay?" In any case, certain parties had plans for this sailor's evening,
and swimming was not among them. He'd get to those later. "How's the builder
doing?"
"Come and see?" Rap asked shyly. He jumped up and led the way over to the little
hovel he now called home. It was a lot more homelike than it had been two months
before, and he proudly displayed his latest achievement, a shutter for the
window. It would keep rain out, if not wind. He had no furniture yet except a
hammock and a chair, although Ogi had often offered to lend him some money to
get settled in. At suitable interest rates, of course.
As always, Ogi wondered why a faun jotunn hybrid had chosen an impish shack. In
their homeland of Sysanasso, fauns lived in flimsy huts of wicker and thatch,
and yet Rap had selected an ancient log cabin, built by some long-lost imp in
this lonely dell. He had seemed surprised that his choice would surprise anyone,
muttering something about his hometown being impish even if he wasn't. To have
picked somewhere less isolated would have seemed more friendly.
He had fixed the roof and made the place quite astonishingly clean. Ogi viewed,
admired, and complimented. Then they headed back to the fire pit and the wine.
Ogi proposed a few toasts, and got some more of the wine into the kid that way.
Then he pulled out the day's catch and set to work cleaning them.
"Arrivals? " Rap muttered, peering over his head, apparently at the stringy
trees.
"A girl, was it?" he asked softly. "Or a dream?"
"A girl," Rap told the fire, "but not the way you mean."
"Son, I've tried every way there is," Ogi said nostalgically. Rap wrinkled his
wide faun nose. "A promise, then."
"What sort of promise?"
Rap shot him a brief, cryptic glance. "A crazy one." He took another swallow
from the wine jar and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "I don't really
want to be a sailor. There's the nub."
He wasn't going to be very popular if Gathmor heard him talking like that. Or
any jotunn, for that matter.
"Then you're fooling all of us, buddy. There was talk you might be made
coxswain's mate when Larg got promoted." Rap snorted disbelievingly and went
back to leaning elbows on knees. He'd rowed to Faerie and back three times now.
Men grew fast at his age, and he had a rower's shoulders already. He was going
to need those tonight-for a moment Ogi felt a gloating touch of avarice. Lovely
gold! Then he wet a finger and flipped a drop of spit at the griddle. It hissed
and danced satisfactorily. He threw on the onions and began buttering the fish
with his dagger.
"Gathmor said he paid forty-six imperials for me and the goblin," Rap murmured.
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"If I save all I can, how long would it take me to pay it off?"
"With interest, about thirty-nine hundred years."
"Oh-that soon, you think?"
"Be realistic, Rap! If you were Gathmor, would you let you go? Your farsight's
beyond any price to him. He loves his ship, he's responsible for his crew-he
isn't going to let you go. "
The faun sighed and fell silent.
His farsight talent made him unique, of course, and yet it was a freakish thing.
Stormdancer had not needed it since his first voyage. His subsequent trips had
been hard work, with too much rowing and not enough sailing, but completely
uneventful.
And the lad had more to him than just an occult knack. He had the makings of a
very fine sailor. He was competent and trustworthy. He never complained or
picked fights. He did whatever he was told to do as if he were grateful for the
opportunity. Even without his farsight, he was not a man Gathmor would readily
let slip away. Almost all the unattached girls in Durthing were giving serious
thought to the big faun, too.
"They say," Ogi remarked, "that happiness is pretending you always wanted what
you're getting. "
Rap chuckled, but he kept his gaze on the flames.
Ogi began to feel worried. If the kid was out of sorts, then tonight's operation
might turn into a disaster. Before he could explore that possibility, Rap spoke.
"You're an imp. Why d'you live among these maniacs?" Ogi twitched nervously. "I
suggest you don't say that word too loud, friend. And you shouldn't ask
questions like that here. "
"Oh! Sorry! Didn't think."
"It's all right with me. I'll just tell you to mind your own business-"
"But a jotunn would knock my head off," Rap finished. "That's what I meant."
"And you don't need to ask anyway. The only possible reason a nonjotunn would
live here is that it's pleasanter than the imperor's jails. Come on, lad-it's a
great life! Space and freedom! Women? You don't get women in jail unless you're
real rich. Enjoy it!"
None of which was true in Ogi's case. He had never fallen afoul of the law, and
he lived in Durthing simply because he loved the sea and loved being a sailor.
Trouble was, the only possible explanation for that was much harder to talk
about than a criminal past would have been. He knew his grandfather had died
when jotunn raiders razed Kolvane; his father had been a posthumous baby.
Although the family would never discuss the matter, and although Ogi himself was
impishly short and broad and swarthy, he was quite certain that he must be
one-quarter jotunn. To say so would greatly boost his standing in Durthing and
among Stormdancer's crew, but it would increase his risks, too, and the kidding
would never end. Ogi was not enough of a jotunn to find such matters funny.
"But they are maniacs," Rap muttered. "Kani's still after me to go pick a fight
with someone. Why, for the Good's sake? I've shown I'll defend myself!"
Ogi began flipping fish over with the point of his dagger. He hadn't meant to
raise the matter yet, and the kid wasn't close to drunk. "Well, there's a
difference, Rap."
"What sort of difference?"
He passed the wine. "Here-you're not drinking your share! Yes, you've had a
couple of fights. But they don't really count."
Rap put the jar down on the ground beside him and fixed a cold gaze on his
companion. "Don't count? Why not?"
The carp were done. Feeling his mouth watering already, Ogi began scooping them
onto the platters with his dagger. At least he need not look his friend in the
eye while doing so. He hoped they would still be friends tomorrow.
"You know the standings round here,. Rap. Lowest are the nonjotunn, like me.
Especially me, 'cause jotnar rank imps just barely above gnomes. Then the part
jotunn, like you. Fauns are quite well thought of, actually-probably because
they're so pigheaded that they never know when they're beaten-and you're almost
jotunn size, so you rate just below pure jotunn." He waited, but got no comment.
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