The White Road - Lynn Flewelling [36]
"It's good!" Taegil whispered in surprise.
Turmay took a sip. "Yes. And I smell venison."
The food proved good, as well. The venison stew was thick and well seasoned, with chunks of carrot and onion among the meat, and the bread was sweet and hot from the oven.
As they were eating, one of the other patrons sauntered up, thumbs hooked in his sword belt, and looked them over. "Where are you from, brothers?" he asked Hazadrien in passable but strangely accented 'faie, though he certainly was not of that blood.
"My friend is mute," Rieser explained tersely. "We are from Aurenen."
"I don't know your accent. Which part of Aurenen?"
"The far south." Rieser went back to his food, hoping the fellow would go away.
"What clan?" the man persisted, appearing genuinely pleased to encounter so many of them at once. "You're the first I've ever seen not wearing any sen'gai."
"We're from a small clan in the south. How do you come to speak our language so well?" Rieser asked, hoping to steer him clear of where they were from, in case he'd been there himself.
"My wife," the man said proudly. "She's what you people call a ya'shel, from Skala. Pretty as the morning sky and as good a woman as ever trod the earth."
"Is that so?" Rieser suppressed an inward shudder at the thought of this malodorous Tir--or any Tir, for that matter--rutting with a 'faie woman, even if she was only a Tir-begat half-breed.
"Where you headed? Up to Wolde?"
"No, we're going south."
The man laughed. "South's a big place."
"We are going home," Rieser told him.
"By land or river?"
"River?"
Their inquisitor seemed surprised by his ignorance--not a good thing. "The Folcwine. Part of what we call the Gold Road up here, though a good stretch of it is the river. It's been a mild winter, and last I heard there was still open water all the way to Nanta. By the last reports, the Skalans were garrisoned there, keeping the peace." He gave Rieser another curious look. "The river's your fastest way south."
"We took a different way." This was something he didn't know before, though he'd seen a river marked on his map. A boat would mean close contact with these people, but he could probably stand it if it meant getting to their destination faster. River travel would save them weeks, if not months this time of year. It might be worth the risk and discomfort.
The man directed him to a town where they could find a boat south, then said, "If you came up from the south overland, you must have seen something of the armies, eh?"
Armies? Was there no end to this man's curiosity? "Only from a distance," Rieser replied.
"Which side? Skala's or Plenimar's?"
"I don't know. We were too far away." Rieser clenched his left fist under the table, resisting the urge to shout at the man. He was standing too close, making Rieser tilt his head back to look him in the eye.
"Well, it will be better if it's Skala, friend. You don't want to run afoul of any Plenimaran marines. They're a rough lot."
The man talked on, but Rieser's increasingly brief answers finally got the message across and he left them alone, as did the others, though there was much staring. Perhaps it was because of Turmay, who was dipping his stew up into his mouth with his fingers, or of Nowen and the other three women of his company. They were comely, he supposed, and Sona and Allia looked young enough to be of interest. He was glad of the weight of his sword against his thigh under the table, in case things turned ugly.
But the night passed without bloodshed and they pressed on for the river.
The river town turned out to be a fair-sized place, no doubt because of the trade that went through it. The waterfront was a warren of warehouses and long wooden platforms that extended out from the shore. He saw stacks of wool bales everywhere, and tufts of the stuff blew about on the ground.
There were also soldiers. There was an encampment just outside the walls, and there were many uniformed men--and women, too--in