The Wordsmiths and the Warguild (23 page)

       
"Can I think about
it?" said Togura, seeing that argument was going to get him nowhere.

       
"Thinking's
free," said Draven. "But have a decision by tomorrow's daylight."

       
At that moment, two boys
arrived with buckets, and began to bail out the tavern. Shortly afterwards, a
butcher from D'Waith arrived to take away the dead bodies to be made into
sausage meat. Then some jubilant wreckers entered, bearing trophies - the heads
of five sea rovers - and pirate gold. As the tavern began to get lively,
despite the landlord's expectations, talk of sensitive matters ended.

       
From the tavern talk,
Tokura was able to complete his picture of what had happened while he had been
absent from civilization. On the day on which the Warguild had attacked the
wedding at the Suet's Grand Hall, Baron Chan Poulaan had gone missing. Rumour
had it that Togura Poulaan, also known as Barak the Battleman, had pitched his
father into a mining pit, thus murdering him.

       
Togura's half brother,
Cromarty, had assumed control of the family estate near Keep, and had offered a
reward for Togura's head. Rumour held that Togura, aka Barak, had been sighted
in fifty different places during the time he had been hunted - which was now
almost a year. He was credited with five rapes, two murders and several acts of
vandalism and arson; most recently, or so rumour had it, he had attacked a
homestead in the mountains, routing the seven men who tried to defend the place
against his depredations.

       
"Ay, I can credit
that," said a one-legged card sharp, and proceeded to give a vivid
eyewitness account of how he had confronted Barak half a year ago. "Chewed
off my leg, he did. Turned himself into a great black manul, leapt, fanged him,
bit, chewed, swallowed - kneecap, ankle, shin, he ate the lot."

       
"Give over,
Doss," said an onlooker. "You lost that leg ten years ago if it was a
day."

       
"No," insisted
the card sharp. "That's not true. Listen, it was up in the mountains. A
cold day. I challenged him. One moment he was standing there, as clear as I see
you - a great big unruly fellow with a spiked club in his hand - and the next
moment he'd turned himself into this gory great cat, as big as a horse if it
was larger than a mouse."

       
His eyes shone with
sincerity; his voice carried the tones of impeccable conviction; it was clear
that more than a few believed him.

       
These being the rumours
that Togura did hear - and in a single night, at that - he could only guess at
those he didn't hear. Offering a reward for a man's head was a foreign practice
previously almost unheard of in Keep; the reward made this manhunt a novelty,
and the recent increase in the amount of the reward had made it a topical
novelty at that.

       
With his dream of
retiring into this father's home now shattered, Togura had to think of his own
safety. There were no portraits or sketches of him in circulation, so few people
outside Keep would know what he looked like. Nevertheless, it would be safer to
get out of Sung until this trouble blew over.

       
By morning, Togura had
come to a decision. He asked Draven to take him to Larbster Bay; from there, he
would make his way along the Salt Road to Estar. Once he reached Estar, he
would be faced with another decision. There were two possibilities.

       
Either he could stay in
Estar and work at some honest trade, hoping for Cromarty to get himself killed
in a duel or a feud, thus opening the way for Togura to return home; or,
alternatively, he could approach Prince Comedo of Estar and ask for permission
to dare the terror of the monster which guarded the bottle which contained the
box which contained the index which spoke the Universal Language which would
give him control of the odex.

       
"Can you take me to
Larbster Bay?" said Togura.

       
"Nothing
easier," said Draven. "Once a ship calls for us. It's on the way to
Ork. Perhaps, of course, there'll be no ship. If so, I'll buy us passage with
the next Galish convoy travelling from D'Waith to Larbster Bay. We'll get you
on your journey, youngster. Trust Draven. Thousands do - and no man ever
regretted it."

       
Togura, judging Draven
to be sincere, ate well, drank well, slept well, helped the landlord tend the
bar, and waited until they could start their journey.

Chapter 19

       
The seas at the end of
summer were in full flood. The tall ship strode the ocean, riding over the
scalloping light, urged by a brisk wind which drove it through the dalloping
dolloping waves.

       
The name of the ship was
the Warwolf, but her figurehead was no wolf but a dragon. She had been built by
the best shipwrights of the Greater Teeth. Her timbers were of winter oak and
cedar, but for the masts, which were of kauri from Quilth, and the deck, which
had been made of a chance load of mahogany alleged to have originated in
Yestron. She had three masts, and sails of green canvas.

       
Togura Poulaan, taking
his ease on a sunny yet sheltered part of the deck, surveyed the work going on
at hand and thanked his stars - which were the two green ones known as the
Cat's Eyes - that he was not a pirate. From this vantage point, it looked too
much like hard work.

       
Taking advantage of the
fine weather, the weapons muqaddam was supervising the overhaul of armaments
and muniments. He was a broad-fisted man with shoulders like an ox and a shadow
like a menhir. He was bald but for a little floccus scabbing the centre of his
skull. His eyes, squinting out of a sun-weathered face, were as sharp as
caltrops. His tongue was as rough as pumice, and he used it industriously.

       
Glad to be a passenger,
Togura closed his eyes and leisured out at full length on the deck. Then cloud
quenched the sun; a crisp whippet of wind came cleaning around him, and,
chilled and annoyed, he sat up again.

       
"Come back
son," said Togura. "Go away wind."

       
The wind, obedient to
his commands, veered away to vanishing. But the sun remained hidden by a sulk
of cloud. In the sea, something hinted through the waters. Seal? Dolphin?
Whale? Rock? Togura narrowed his eyes, trying to see it more clearly. But it
had gone. Perhaps it had been nothing to start with, or a chance bit of
driftwood or float-stone now smothered by a wave.

       
Togura closed his eyes
again, but was abruptly jolted into full alertness when a fight began. Looking
round, he saw it was only two young pirates sparring with a lot of brag and
paraffle. The weapons muqaddam, seeing their footwork looked sloppy, screamed
abuse at them. They took heed, stopped fooling around and became more
businesslike. They were rather good.

       
Togura had always
imagined pirates as being lazy, leisurely beasts, loafing through the idle
seas, amusing themselves with wine and women until the opportunity for pillage
aroused them from their sport. Now, after only a brief acquaintance with the
breed, he knew the reality was altogether different.

       
There was wine aboard,
true, but it was rationed - a gill per man per day, which was next to nothing.
There were women somewhere below deck - not that Togura had seen them - but the
woman ration was stricter still. Most of the day was spent in work, maintenace,
exercise and training. The Warwolf was a taut, sober, workmanlike ship,
captained by the stern, ascetic Jon Arabin; there was no laybaout nonsense
here.

       
If Togura had ever had
the misfortune to sail on Draven's ship, the Tusk, then he would have found a
state of affairs rather closer to his imaginings - which was the main reason
why the Tusk had been smashed on the coast of Sung, the crew butchered by the
local populace, and the wreckage looted, while the Warwolf rode out the storm
with matchless aplomb.

       
As the sun came out
again, Togura dozed down to the deck and relaxed. For the moment, he had no
worries. This ship, its mission urgent, had no time to call at Larbster Bay on
this leg of its journey. Instead, it would take him all the way to the distant
island of Ork, then drop him at Larbster on the return voyage. For the time
being, all he had to do was eat, sleep, and enjoy the sun at the end of summer.

       
With all his
difficulties thus comfortably postponed, it was pleasing to toy with the idea
of being a questing hero. Once he finally got from Larbster Bay to Estar, he
would most certainly have a look at the monster in Prince Comedo's Castle
Vaunting. He would then be able to decide whether he should attempt to recover
the box which held the index.

       
He remembered back to
the days when he had lived in the stronghold of the Wordsmiths in Keep. Brother
Troop had talked about the box, which held the index which could control the
odex. Aasked what the index looked like, he had answered:

       
"When you open the
box, you'll know. Remember, it speaks the Universal Language."

       
Togura, daydreaming,
imagined himself performing desperate heroics and recovering the vital box. It
would open at a Word. And the Word was?

       
- Konanabarok?

       
- Yaradoshek?

       
- Slonshenamenel?

       
No, it was nothing like
that. It was something else, but, for the life of him, he could not remember
what. For a moment, he panicked. Then he relaxed. There was no need for him to
remember how to command the box. All he had to do was get it to Keep. The
Wordsmiths would do the rest.

       
It would be easy.

       
Or would it?

       
After all, there was not
just Castle Vaunting's monster to deal with. If he slew the monster, that in
itself would not be enough to give him the box which held the index, or the box
was at the bottom of the bottle. Togura tried to remember Brother Troop's
instructions for getting into the bottle, but could not. All he could remember
was Brother Troop saying:

       
"The box itself
lies as the very bottom of the bottle, and is Guarded ... which means there's
death waiting nearby."

       
Remembering this talk of
death made Togura once more doubt the wisdom of being a questing hero. He
decided to procrastinate his decision until he reached Estar, which would not
be for many days yet: there was no hurry.

       
A shadow blocked out the
sun. Togura opened his eyes and saw a fair-haired young pirate looking down at
him. The pirate, who was unarmed, was wearing a woolen shepherd's rig and
rope-soled shoes.

      
 
"What are you staring
at?" said Togura.

       
"Nothing that
catches my fancy," said the youth. "They told me you were a
manhunter, so I thought you'd be something special. But you're not."

       
Togura wondered whether
to take offence, then decided against it. The doughty little pirate was a
tough, nuggety piece of work. Togura might have trouble handling him if it came
to a scuffle.

       
"Tell me, for
you're the expert," said Togura, venturing a little flattery, "what's
that island over there?"

       
And he pointed at a
high-rising island some distance off. Its coast was "walled round with
bronze," as the pirate idiom had it - that is to say, it had a rugged, iron-bound
coast.

       
"That?" said
the youth. "We name him Drum. That's - "

  
     
He broke off as
the ship shuddered as if something had struck it. There was instant alarm on
board. Men rushed to the side and peered overboard. Shouts rang out as deck
queried crow's nest.

       
"What was it?"
said Togura.

       
"Sharbly we grounded
a whale," came the laconic answer. "No worry. It's gone, and us,
we're not drinking."

       
At that moment, the ship
lurched hideously. Togura was sent sliding. As he clung to the deck rail, he
saw something rising up out of the sea. Up, up it came, ascending in blue-green
coils.

       
"Snake!" said
the pirate.

       
Its jaws leered toward
them, as if it would strike, then it dipped down into the sea again. It was
indeed like a snake, except that it was three times the length of the ship and had
the girth of a bullock.

       
"There's
another!" cried Togura.

       
There were two - no,
three ... four! five! ... there were six sea serpents in the waters around
them. Togura heard Jon Arabin, the ship's captain, bellowing orders. Shortly he
heard wails and screams as the ship girls were brought up on deck. Fighting and
biting, they were dragged to the stern and thrown overboard. They thrashed
round in the water, screaming. Blood foamed on the waves as the sea serpents
ravaged them.