The Gambler's Fortune (Einarinn 3) (29 page)

No. I set my jaw. So far, I’d discovered jalquezan in songs the women used for lulling fractious babies to sleep, timing the boil of their cooking and when sitting their children down for a session with a fine-tooth comb. Unfortunately, given my lack of experience in any of these occupations, I was hard put to decide if the jalquezan was having a significant effect. These women might just be practiced nurses, experienced cooks and diligent in their pursuit of lice. None of these songs were ones in my book and, as with the Raven song, I’d found two or three versions of each.

I looked over toward Orial’s sura. Zenela had been sitting outside, taking the sun yesterday. That lass was recovering faster and more fully than simples and herbs could account for; she’d have been ashes in an urn by now, back in Ensaimin. Convincing Usara of that was going to be a different roll of the runes, though. What was I missing? There had to be something.

My thinking about him must have set the mage’s ears itching. Hearing a noise within, I looked into the sura to see him rummaging for clean linen and his razor a little selfconsciously.

“You were back very late last night, again,” I observed neutrally.

Usara smiled suddenly at me. “One of a mage’s most important skills is discretion, Livak, and besides, my father always said an honorable man never boasts.”

“All I have to do is look for that necklace,” I reminded him.

“You do that,” he advised with a chuckle as he departed for the stream and his ablutions.

I wondered what the joke was and then asked myself what to do for the best. The prospect of another day making myself agreeable to the women of the settlement didn’t thrill me. What would today hold? Another tedious walk in the forest trying to disguise my utter lack of interest in leaves or plants I might gather to eat? The only firm fact I’d learned so far on this sojourn is that Forest donkeys are considerably smaller and darker than those used by the rest of the world and that they can be loaded with so much firewood they look like a stack of faggots with legs.

Frue emerged from a nearby sura. “Good morning!” For all his cheery greeting, he was looking considerably less lively than the other Folk. Life in Ensaimin had accustomed him to more comfortable beds and routines.

“Good morning.” I hastily gathered my scattered wits.

“We’re going after boar.” He was carrying two spears and waved the thick-shafted weapons with their sturdy cross-pieces. “If Sorgrad or ’Gren come, they can claim a share of the kill and then you can repay your dinner debts.” This was the second time in as many days he’d mentioned this obligation.

“I’ll come.” After the last few days, no one was going to keep me away from excitement.

Frue rested his spears in the ground. “I didn’t think— you’re hardly a country girl, are you?” He fell silent at the irritation in my face.

“They’re going along, aren’t they?” I returned a wave from Gevalla and her sisters, all dressed for the worst the woods could do, hair braided close. Each had ropes slung crossways over both shoulders and they carried a roll of stout net. “Trust me, I can run, climb and hit a moving target as well as any.”

“Yes, but—” Frue shrugged off his uncertainty. “Just don’t get in anyone’s way.”

A reedy whistle sounded above the trills of the morning birdsong. “Ravin’s leading the hunt,” Frue said sternly. “If you foul the chase and he tells you to fall back, do it at once.”

I nodded shortly. It was Usara’s bad luck that he chose that moment to come up, eyes bright with curiosity as he saw the hunting party assembling with bows, spears and long knives. “Hunting? Can I come?”

“No,” I said repressively. “You’re not dressed for it.”

Usara looked at the skirts of his brown robe, unbelted over shirt and broadcloth breeches. “Someone could lend me a tunic, couldn’t they?”

“There’s no time.” I waved a hand at Ravin, who was moving off into the trees. “Anyway, I’m not sure your kind of help would be appreciated.”

“The right spell at the right time can drop an animal in its tracks, rope of air, for instance—”

“And what if these Folk consider that a capital offense against Talagrin?” I demanded. “Use the time to talk to some more of the elders. Remember what we’re here for.”

“Frue?” Usara appealed to the minstrel.

“You’d best keep to the camp,” Frue replied apologetically.

I nodded my agreement. City bred I might be but at least I knew my own limitations and had the wit to keep out of trouble. Even though Usara was one of the best of the mages I had met, he still had as much common sense as a frog has feathers. The wizard claiming the quarry with some pit of magic would leave these men as useless as eunuchs in a brothel and as pleased as if they’d caught a dose of the itch.

“Oh, very well,” Usara sniffed with audible annoyance. He stalked off toward Orial’s hut and I followed Frue. Hunters were gathering, fired with the eager anticipation that townsmen slake with bloody pursuits like baiting. Some were singing extravagant invocations to the Master of the Hunt and I itched to get closer, wondering if this was some new jalquezan.

I went to stand with Rusia and her sisters. Other women had rough bags and sacking strapped close to their bodies, skinning knives at their belts. Several honed blades with casual whetstones, chatting in low tones.

“So how will this play out?” I asked.

Yefri pointed at a man with a mane of unkempt graying hair and pale, intense eyes. “That’s Iamris. He’ll be finding boars for us.”

Ravin sounded a trill like a woodlark on a reed pipe and we moved into the woods.

“He’s a tracker?” I whispered to Yefri.

“He’s a finder of game,” she shrugged.

Parul joined us, bringing several sturdy spears. “Do you want to share in the killing?” Yefri shook her head and I did the same. When the nobility in Vanam go pig-sticking in the streets to clear the feral porkers to feed the indigent at Ostrin’s shrine, they do it from horseback. I reckon out-dwellers have the right of it.

“I’ll join you,” said Gevalla abruptly. She took a spear and stepped close to Parul.

“Geva!” Rusia looked daggers at her sister, who lifted her chin defiantly.

“She can come if she wants.” Parul put an arm around Gevalla’s shoulders.

“Watch yourself!” hissed Yefri before a shrill blast on Ravin’s whistle silenced us all. Iamris led us into the trees. I tried to take note of landmarks and to get a sight of the sun whenever I could, but after what felt like half a season moving slowly through the forest, I realized I’d need some notable favor from Trimon to get back to the settlement unaided.

I eased my way through early undergrowth and branches felled by buffets of winter storms. Skills I’d learned for moving noiselessly through someone’s house uninvited were easily as good as the woodcraft of Salkin and his fellows. We became more scattered, but all attention remained on Iamris. He wasn’t checking the ground or looking for spoor but then my notion of hunting for meat is limited to finding a butcher who keeps blowflies off his carcasses. Perhaps Iamris had been out scouting earlier. What he wasn’t doing was singing, not that I could hear, anyway.

A loud crack betrayed someone stepping on a dead stick. As I looked from side to side with everyone else, I caught Frue’s eye and he nodded approval at me. We crossed a little stream burbling its way between mossy banks and I lost the minstrel among the burgeoning woodland. Parul and Gevalla were no longer visible, so I made doubly sure I kept either Yefri or Rusia always in sight.

Ravin’s whistle mimicked an apple thrush up ahead, catching me unawares in a long narrow clearing. I moved hastily into the cover of a youthful beech. A motherly woman with a plain, kindly face lifted a wooden pipe and returned the signal. More piping replies suggested everyone had taken prearranged places and I wondered what my group was to do. We were notably short on spears, which had to be a good thing, didn’t it?

Rusia and the girls strung their long net across a gap in the trees. Others secured similar snares to branches and stumps. I put the net between me and the sounds of other hunters moving stealthily away from us. Whatever came down the track would hit the net before it got a sniff of me. I mentally recited a general supplication to Talagrin, hoping the Lord of the Wilds might turn an eye if something unexpected leaped out of a bush.

Yefri handed me the end of a rope. I joined her in stringing branches and greenery to fake a barrier to turn the quarry to the supposedly open space where the net lurked unseen. Sudden commotion erupted to the north of us; shouts, whistles, spears hammering on trees, driving the prey onward. Tumult headed for us, piercing squeals and menacing grunts, what sounded like a whole rampaging herd of boars. I checked a good sturdy tree was at hand for climbing and realized my hand was opening the belt-pouch that held my poisoned darts. I tucked it firmly through my belt. Never mind Usara; no one was going to be best pleased with dinner inedible because of an apothecary’s best venom.

A massive boar came plunging out of the undergrowth, black and hairy, snout low to the ground, heavy head swinging from side to side. A handful of arrows deep in either flank left a trail of red behind it. In the center of the clearing, it rounded on its pursuers with a bubbling snort of agony. Leaves and muck were stuck to brindled legs and belly, massive shoulders heaved as it gouged at the moss with vicious tusks. Bloody foam sprayed from vicious yellow teeth as it vainly tried to bite at the shafts dragging it down.

I moved closer to my chosen tree. Ravin appeared, moving slowly, planting the butt of his spear firmly against his foot and angling it lest the maddened beast run at him. At Ravin’s command, two men darted forward to plunge their spears deep into its ribs. The force of the blows sent the pig sprawling forward, bright blood gushing from its slack maw. It screamed, writhing and thrashing, but the men stood firm, sweat dripping down their faces as they wrestled with its death throes. Finally it lay limp and Nenad ran in to set a hefty hook under the jaw of the carcass, dragging the beast away with a rope. Some of the women stepped forward but sudden shouts from up the path halted them. Nenad’s mouth hung open as two youths came racing into the clearing, one white and wild-eyed, the other limping, blood all over torn leggings but running just as fast.

A younger boar was in hot pursuit, a clotted gash in the coarse hair of its flank showing where an arrow had failed to stick. The animal’s back was arched with anger, the wound only provoking it further as it snarled with outrage. For a clumsy-looking beast, it was still a solid mass of muscle and fury.

“Nenad, leave it!” Ravin shouted at the boy frozen with fear and indecision. The newly arrived boar turned malevolent black eyes on him and saliva dripped from its scarlet mouth. Nenad took a pace backward, but the rope caught his foot and he fell to one knee. The boar charged the boy as he scrambled backward on hands and rump. The bristling black fury ripped into his legs with ivory tusks, blood and spittle spattering the turf.

Men and women raced forward, spears and skinning knives flashing bright in the sunlight, rising dripping red. Someone else’s cries joined Nenad’s screams as the boar died hard, taking every chance at vengeance offered it.

“Get clear, get clear!” More commotion was heading our way.

The Forest Folk scattered, two men dragging Nenad between them. Another backed toward me clutching a badly bitten arm. Iamris, leading a solid phalanx of Folk, drove an enormous sow out of the trees. Spears jabbed and harried her, Gevalla wielding one with grim-faced determination. Stripy piglets squealed and fussed around their mother’s feet, her heavy teats swinging low. She snapped at the spears, huffing and snorting, the bite of the spears sending her back in baffled pain. In some instant of understanding between the hunters, two of the leaf-shaped blades plunged down either side of the sow’s neck, slicing through tough hide to sever the great vessels. Crimson blood gushed all over her forelegs, sending frantic piglets dashing hither and yon. Some snared in the nets were dispatched with spear butts, others caught in swathes of sacking were held up by hind legs, wriggling until a cut throat silenced their squeals.

I hadn’t realized I was holding my breath until the thudding of my heart and faint buzzing in my ears told me to release it. Thinking I’d better do something useful if we were to claim some of this meat, I joined Rusia untangling suckling pigs from the netting. She was struggling with a particularly stubborn knot.

“Here, let me help.” I worked the point of the dagger in and twisted it to loosen the tangle. “Is Nenad all right?”

“Better than he deserves.” Irritation didn’t obscure her relief. “Freezing like a rabbit in front of a weasel, honestly!” The lad was sobbing as his wounds were treated on the far side of the clearing. I looked over to see the man with the bitten arm grimacing, tears running down his face as his wounds were roughly cleansed with spirit from a flask. I winced; the deep gashes were torn and filthy, dark red muscle bared beneath ripped, tanned skin, as likely to fester as any wound I’d ever seen.

“Has someone sent for Orial?” Gevalla appeared, blood on her leggings and a piglet dangling from her spear.

“Yes, Ravin sent Lisset.” Rusia pulled the net free. “Get that suckler bled; you know better than to waste time gossiping.”

The ringing sound of axe on timber echoed across the clearing. One cruck frame had already been lashed together and Ravin was directing Frue and some others in hauling the bigger boar up by its hind legs. Almiar pierced the neck vessels with a careful knife while two men caught the rich blood in waterskins. The sow was pierced through the hocks with a sharp stake and soon hung on a second frame, one woman making a slow incision down her belly while Ravin held the guts of the beast from spilling out too soon.

Rusia turned to ensuring all the other piglets were bled dry, briskly enlisting me for the smelly and unpleasant task. “Almiar says you’ve some knack for starting fires?”

I nodded and Rusia shouted to the lad passing by with his hands full of offal. “Etal! Give that to Dria and start finding lampthorn. Livak, light a fire and we can start singeing the hair off these sucklers.”