A Skillful Warrior (SoulNecklace Stories Book 2) (20 page)

‘Life is for living,’ agreed Jed.

Ma Evans sat silent for a moment, and Will began to doze. Strange visions, filled with fire and shouting, passed through his mind. But when Ma spoke again, he jolted awake.

‘Rhys passed away near on five years ago when a plague swept along the coast. He packed me and the lads into a boat and set us off into the sea, told us not to come back until we saw the smoke arising. He knew what was coming, did Rhys.’ She stopped, then added. ‘Which reminds me — that ship? The one you saw? It was Rhys who first saw it. So it must have been coming and going for near on five years. Five years! Time goes fast, don’t it?’

‘You know why it was here?’

She yawned. ‘Tradin’. Came and went over the next few summers. My lads got right friendly with the men. The way they wandered on and off it, acted like it was their own ship. I told them this was wrong, that we never got friendly with a vessel — it don’t pay to, not in our line of business. We should just collect the payment, I said. But they laughed at me. Headstrong, they are.’ She sighed sadly. ‘Were, I mean. Look at me, forgetting they’ve gone.’

‘Ah well, lass,’ said Jed, ‘Cheer up. You’ve got me. Look. Here I am. Warm and willing. Come back to bed.’

‘Nay, not now, you great oaf,’ Will could hear the smile in her voice. ‘Time for sleeping. In the morning, though. Well, we’ll need to work out our actions in the morning. I’m not about to let my boys’ murders go unavenged. That ain’t the way Rhys and I lived our lives. People around here, they know not to cross us. That ship must pay.’

Will tiptoed to the window and saw Ma Evans sitting on the bench, her back straight, staring out at the dawn as if challenging it to battle. Will groaned softly. No point in trying to close that window. They’d only hear him, and then, knowing Jed, come and yell at him for spying. After traveling with the man for near on half a year, Will could pretty much predict what he would do. Instead, he sighed and went back to bed. Somewhat to his surprise, he quickly drifted off to sleep.

Ah, he thought the next day. Funny. You can travel halfway round the world with someone and not know them at all. For on the morrow, Ma Evans gave them a ship and a crew to sail it on one condition: that Jed remained behind. Will had expected Jed to bluster and protest, but instead he just stood in the bar room with a gimpy expression on his face, looking like the village idiot.

‘You can’t. You’ve got to come with us,’ said Will.

‘Now then, Will. You want to find your lass, don’t you?’

‘Lass?’ said Ma Evans. ‘That girl you described — she’s your girl, ain’t she?’

Will shrugged.
Lass
seemed too light a description. Dana was part of him, like a right arm or something. If she was hurt, he felt it.

‘Course she is,’ said Jed. ‘Boy of his age, with his looks? She’s his girl all right.’

‘So that’s why he’s so keen to go a-voyaging,’ said Ma.

‘You want to look for her, don’t you?’ said Jed to Will. ‘Now you can.’

‘I can’t go without you,’ Will felt his eyes prickle. He tried to pushed the tears away. What sort of a man would cry about leaving his traveling companion?

‘Will,’ Jed said gently, ‘I’ll still be here. Think of me as ... as a hostage. For a safe return of the boat.’

The barkeep, cleaning up last night’s revels, shook his head glumly.

‘What? What have I said?’ Jed asked.

N’tombe came into the bar room. ‘I would be careful of the language you use, Jed. Words such as hostage should not be said lightly.’

‘Aye, well, I think it’s a good word,’ Ma Evans slipped her hand into Jed’s elbow.

The barkeep shook his head again and Jed suddenly looked worried.

‘What about TeSin?’ asked Will. The Noyan, enjoying his soft mattress, had refused to move from the floor. When told his breakfast was ready, he’d waved Will away and closed his eyes. Before Will left the room, he was already returned to snoring. ‘He could stay instead.’

‘TeSin will be with us,’ said N’tombe calmly.

‘What! Jed not coming but we’ll take an enemy?’

Ma Evans wrinkled her nose. ‘Well, it’s like this, boy. If you want the boat, you’ll have to leave someone behind. For surety, like. And I’ve taken me a liking to your friend here,’ she winked at Jed, ‘but the little foreigner — well, he’s a bit small for the likes of me.’

‘Ah, Gwen,’ said Jed uncertainly, ‘when I said “hostage”, I didn’t quite mean it like that. I mean, what if something happens. Say they get lost or somesuch?’

‘Oh, they won’t get lost. No, they’ll return, sure enough,’ Ma Evans glared at N’tombe. ‘Won’t you?’

Jed swallowed.

‘I’m loaning you
The Guiding Star
,’ said Ma, as they broke their fast. The girls scurried in and out, bringing food and platters and such, but never stayed to talk. It was like watching servants around a queen. Ma Evans didn’t seem to notice. Or perhaps she expected it as her due. ‘Remember, it’s a loan, mind, not a gift. She’s a good boat. We waited out one winter in her, just me and my boys.’ Her eyes grew sad, and Will had a sudden image of a boat adrift on the ocean, a mother and her children muffled into shawls, gazing at the land, waiting for the plague to pass. ‘The crew’s good, too. Reliable.’ She looked out the window. ‘Here they are now.’

Three burly fishermen, caps in their hands, shuffled into the bar. They looked smaller than last night, when they’d all been singing loudly and waving tankards in the air. They seemed slower this morning and one pressed his hand to his forehead, as if the world gave him a pain.

Ma Evans spoke to them like a teacher addressing a rabble of children. ‘I’ve got a job for you, boys. Peter, you’re captain of
The Guiding Star
. I want you to take these folk where they want to go. You’re all provisioned?’

The three men gazed at her with startled eyes. They reminded Will of deer caught in a forest brush.

‘Aye, but ah, begging your pardon, Ma,’ said the headman, ‘Where is it that we’re planning on going?’

‘You know where you’re heading?’ Ma asked N’tombe.

‘The way is laid before us,’ said N’tombe, ‘but I cannot see its ending.’

‘As long as it ends in blood and death for them who killed my boys,’ said Ma, ‘I don’t care if you take her halfway round the world.’

Will was out in the stable. The animals didn’t really need grooming, but he felt he owed it to Dana to make sure they were well cared for. The mare blew softly into Will’s hair when he ducked under her shoulder.

‘There you are.’ Jed put his head around the stable door.

Will put down his brush. ‘What do you want?’

‘Same thing as you, no doubt. Chance to say goodbye.’

‘Where’s Ma Evans?’

‘Gwen?’ Jed jerked a thumb over his shoulder. ‘She’s in the house.’

‘Are you really staying?’

‘Aye. I think I am, lad.’ Running his hand through his hair, he looked embarrassed. ‘Guess it’s like. Well. I never thought to settle down. But not getting any younger, am I? But Gwen, she’s a damn fine woman.’

‘She’s a bloody pirate!’ Will felt the curry brush slip in his grip, like a projectile.

‘Aye. I know.’

‘I can’t believe you’ve fallen for a pirate.’

Jed shook his head. Not disagreeing, but more like agreeing with the strangeness of it all. He sat on a barrel and swung a foot in the air. ‘You know me, Will. As much as anyone does, I suppose. And I’ve been more than fifteen years on the road, lad. A man gets tired of that kind of life.’

‘But — with her?’

Jed shrugged. ‘She’s better than most.’

‘Oh! In the hay. I’m sure she’s, well, fantastic.’

‘Don’t knock it, lad. But that’s not it. Not all of it, anyway. The thing is, I’ve a mind to settle down. And while I feel sorry for your Princess,’ he held up his hand, as if to stop Will exploding, ‘I’m not about to let this chance slip away. Come lad, we’ve had some good times, you and I. Let’s say we shake on it.’

Will stared at Jed’s empty hand. ‘You know nothing of friendship,’ he shook his head, ‘if you think it means walking away when someone’s in need. You say you want to stop moving? Stopping moving means sticking with your friends, Jed. Sometimes standing still means running away. That’s what you’re doing. You’re running away. Just like you’ve always done.’ He threw the brush to Jed, who caught it automatically. ‘Take care of the horses, won’t you?’ He left the stable, left Jed standing there in the dark. ‘You’d best hope we do return. Or that your woman grows precious fond of you. Otherwise, I don’t know how secure you’ll be.’

Jed stood on the quayside, his arm around Ma Evans’ shoulders, and waved as the boat left the coast.

The ship had a bow cabin where the tiller man stood at the wheel. The top deck was piled with ropes, tied into rough coils; nets and buckets. Next to Will was a rough ladder that led below decks to the galley, the main storage lockers and the area where the crew slept, in hammocks strung from the rafters. Will looked at the ladder and sighed. Didn’t seem right to be setting out without Jed.

‘Why the long face?’ said N’tombe. ‘He will be happy with her, for a time.’

‘“For a time?”’ asked Will. ‘That don’t sound too good.’

‘It is all any of us have,’ she said. ‘Happiness, for a time.’

The boat rocked and swayed in the swell. Circling the mast, a bird called harshly.

‘You had better find somewhere to sit,’ she looked up at the dark-feathered bird and smiled.

‘So, you know where you’re going?’

‘I think so. Those magicians called the wind. And such calling leaves a trail. Not a stable path — it moves about, as does the air. But I can follow it, I think. And Will?’

‘Aye?’

‘Watch out for TeSin. I do not know what Dana was thinking in that forest. To save someone she had tried to kill? It makes no sense.’

‘You don’t trust him?’

‘I would as soon trust a leopard,’ said N’tombe. ‘They are feckless animals, leopards. Just when you think you have one tamed it turns on you. So keep a watch on him, and hold your knife handy.’

N’tombe beckoned to the captain as Will crossed the deck to sit beside the Noyan.

TeSin stared at the waves gloomily. ‘Travel by boat is not good.’

‘Easier than swimming,’ said Will.

‘Ah. Maybe. But horse is better. Ground under you. Not all this water.’

The sails cracked as they filled with wind. The sailors called to each other as they pulled at the ropes. The tiller man spun the wheel, turning the craft to the south. The sails caught the wind. Boards creaked, water sloshed against the decking and waves crashed as the boat rode through the swell. Behind them the sea was a-foam. The bird circling the masthead cried loudly then turned, heading back towards the land.

The wind was cool in Will’s face and smelt of salt. As the boat picked up speed, Will felt he was flying into the unknown, far away from all that was familiar. Except it wasn’t unknown, was it? He’d traveled before. But now he’d be without Jed.

‘It is wonderful, is it not?’ called N’tombe. She stared up at the sails and smiled. ‘It is like riding the wind.’

‘Ah,’ groaned TeSin, and threw up on the deck.

––––––––

N
ext morning, before the sun rose, the boy led me to the spring, then back through the rocks to the plateau where I’d first woken. The goats followed behind, bleating all the way.

We stooped at the plateau-edge. Below us the sea shone silver in the pre-dawn light. If I followed the shoreline I would eventually meet the roadway, and then I could find my way to a town. Hopefully, there I would be able to buy passage on a boat to Gusu.

I was better equipped now, for the boy’s family had given me a bladder, filled with water and some food for the journey, and I wore the shears tucked into my belt like a knife. But most importantly, I knew what I was seeking; a dagger, made of jade.

I waved farewell to the boy and his animals and walked towards the road. The hard-packed earth felt soft underfoot and as the sun rose it grew easier to find a path. I saw the occasional lizard or cricket, but otherwise there was little sign of life until, after an hour or so, I reached the hill of the roadway. I clambered up the low slope and stepped onto the neatly quarried stone of the road.

I walked as quickly as I could, for I wanted to reach the town before the sun grew too high. The distant rooftops glinted in the morning light. Walls, a dark line against the bright houses, seemed to encircle the town. There might be guards at the gates. Would they allow me to enter? How could I buy food or clothing with no money? And how would I make my needs known, if no one spoke my language?

The road was beautifully made; it was easy to walk on, even with bare feet and at first I made good time. But slowly the sun crept higher; sweat dripped down my back and the stonework was hot underfoot. Over the mountains, clouds began to grow. There was a sense of pressure in the air, as if a storm was brewing. I hoped it would. Rain would be welcome, but there was no shelter out here.

Behind me came a cloud of dust. Traffic on the road — three coaches, traveling fast. In front of the first coach trundled a cart, its shape silhouetted against the dust. The coach reached the cart, and tried to overtake the slower vehicle. It just made it; its wheels seemed to graze the stone curb. The cart’s driver, barely visible through the haze, shook his fist, then pulled his animals to a halt as the next two coaches passed.

The first two coaches reached me, and I stepped up onto the curb to give them space. Their wheels rumbled on the stone. I kept my eyes averted, to avoid the dust. Perhaps I should walk beside the road, but it would be harder on my bare feet.

The third coach slowed, and I risked glancing at it. It looked very similar to the one I’d traveled in, only two days ago. Two days! How much had happened since then. I caught a glimpse of a face staring out of a window. Its eyes seemed to burn.

I should be captured, twice captured, for being a fool. I had barely given a thought to other travelers. I never considered that this stone road, set into the plain at the base of the mountains, offered no shelter from prying eyes or refuge from pursuit.