Crusade - James Lowder [79]
It was this establishment that John sought as he wound his way through the narrow, dirty alleys of Telflamm's harbor. Homeless refugees and resident beggars lined the streets. Some offered black market goods or services in exchange for money, others merely pleaded for a few copper pieces to get them through the day. The pitiable pleas tugged at the fletcher's heart, but he didn't dip his hand into his purse for the ragged children or diseased old men. John had no money left. He'd given much of his wealth to the poor his first day ashore; the rest had been stolen by cut-purses soon after that.
Razor John thought longingly about the crowded marketplace in Cormyr.
How different it was from the squalor in Telflamm. He looked up at the sky, but could see little of it. The dilapidated buildings to either side of the narrow alley leaned together so that they almost blocked out the sunlight completely.
It's probably for the best, the fletcher decided bitterly. Too much direct sun and the garbage that filled the side streets would stink worse than it already did.
As quickly as he could, John walked the rest of the way to the Broken Lance. A thief was searching the pockets of an unconscious soldier resting facedown at the front door. As the fletcher got closer, the pickpocket looked up at him and ran off. John was glad the thief had fled, since he wasn't quite sure what he would have done otherwise. After checking to see that the soldier was alive, he entered the bar.
The Broken Lance was a small, dark place. Weak light filtered through sooty windows on one side of the room, and sour-smelling tallow candles burned at some of the tables. A large fire sputtered across from the door, sending oily peat smoke up toward the ceiling, where it swirled around before leaking out through various gaps in the poorly constructed roof. The sound of raucous laughter mixed with bawdy sea chants and bursts of swearing. Rats scurried freely across the floor, ignored by most of the patrons.
Razor John spotted Mal immediately. The big soldier was locked in an arm wrestling contest. A few men stood around Mal's table, cheering and cursing.
Most of the inn's patrons sat huddled over their tarnished tankards, swilling watery ale. Mal won the contest just as the fletcher reached his side. The soldier slammed the other man's hand to the table, sloshing wine from the large wineskin that rested there. Coins exchanged hands, and most of the men drifted back to their own tables. Mal rubbed his arm and only nodded to John as a greeting.
"We're supposed to be ready to march by highsun," the fletcher said softly.
He took off his black felt hat and held it before him, twisting it nervously.
"Is that what you're here for?" Mal asked incredulously. He leered and added, "Shouldn't you and your lady love be off somewhere? I hear Kiri's-"
"That's enough!" John said forcefully. His feelings for Kiri Trollslayer had grown steadily over the trip to Telflamm, and he wasn't about to let a drunken soldier-especially one who was supposed to be her friend-start ugly rumors about her.
Mal looked in turn at each of the other two men who sat at the table. One of them, a dalesman by the roughspun tan tunic and breeches he wore, grinned broadly. The other was a dark-eyed, well-armed mercenary, with a sizable and rather ugly scar running along his cheek. He simply snorted and took a long draw from the large tankard set before him. It amazed John to see Mal, who claimed to hate Sembians and dalesmen, drinking with these two soldiers. But then, the fletcher knew that Mal would drink with almost anyone.
John frowned. "The king's back from the north with the Zhentish troops. It's time to go."
"Zhentish troops!" The dalesman spat. "I hear they're orcs, the whole bunch of them. Fine lot of good they'll do us in a battle." He swilled some wine into his tankard. "More'n likely they'll slit our throats when we're sleeping."
"Maybe they're