The Dragon Revenant - Katharine Kerr [132]
“The Wondrous Witch Wizard of the Far Far North has a headache fit for the biggest demon in the deepest hell,” he announced. “Please, oh beauteous barbarian handmaiden, pour me some wine from that flagon, will you?”
Salamander flopped onto his back on a cot and groaned until she did just that, but he did manage to sit up to take the wine cup. Although both Gwin and Rhodry looked annoyed at the display, Jill could recognize Salamander’s symptoms.
“What’s wrong?” she snapped.
“Well, I’m not sure if anything is wrong, actually. It’s merely tedious beyond belief.” He paused to gulp half the wine straight off. “We do finally have an advocate, and Brother Merrano assures me that he’s the best there is.”
“A what?” Rhodry said.
“A legal advocate. Someone who knows the laws and can speak for you in the archon’s malover.”
“Why can’t I speak for myself? Or is it because I’m still a slave?”
“No one speaks for themselves in the malovers here, oh brother of mine.”
“Why not?”
“Because they don’t. It’s the custom. You hire this man who’s made a profession out of advocating, the way you’d take cloth to the dyers’ guild if you wanted to change its color. Advocates know all the tricks of the trade when it comes to arguing cases and convincing people to vote their way. If we can get Baruma arrested, he’ll have an advocate, too. You see, although the archon delivers the final judgment on a case, he doesn’t actually try it. They pick a hundred free citizens by lot, and they sit on something called a jury and decide the merits of the case by a vote after everyone’s finished talking.”
“What?” Rhodry was utterly outraged. “I’ve never heard of anything so stupid and dishonorable in my life! Why should I accept the judgment of a lot of common-born dolts as law?”
“Because you don’t have any choice, you lackwit!” Salamander finished the rest of the wine and held out his cup. “Please, beauteous handmaid, all the way to the brim. Somehow I knew this was going to be difficult.”
“Well, if I don’t have any choice, I don’t,” Rhodry went on. “But I don’t have to like it.”
“Just so. I only ask one thing: that you keep your noble-born outrage clasped light in your secret heart when you talk to the advocate. He’s coming here after dinner to hear our story, which means that you and I had best closet ourselves and rehearse a convincing one. Remember, never ever men-don one word about dark dweomer and Hawks and all the rest of it. Such unpleasant verities are most unwelcome visitors to the ears of our esteemed islanders.”
When the advocate arrived, Jill decided against sitting in on the conference, but rather than stay in the guesthouse and be alone with Gwin, she took a stroll round the temple grounds. She had just reached the flower garden by the front gates when her gray gnome appeared, waving its arms in excitement and jigging up and down.
“Has somewhat happened?”
It nodded a yes and pointed to the south and west.
“I don’t understand.”
Clutching its head it stamped in annoyance. When Jill knelt down on the cobbles, it trotted a few paces away, then slowly and deliberately walked toward her while it pointed to the west.
“Is someone coming here from downriver?” It nodded yes in evident relief, then twisted up its face as it tried to think.
“Are the bad men coming?”
Apparently not, and it went on thinking.
“Friends, then?”
This time she got another yes. Since Jill couldn’t imagine one person in all the islands who would qualify as a friend, she was as puzzled as it seemed to be.
“Here,” she said at last. “Can you act out this person’s name somehow?”
It shook