'Laeka, Swordlady.' The urchin bobbed her head. 'At your service. You're Shin'a'in?' Her eyes widened and became eager. 'You got a battlesteed?'
'Not yet, Laeka. If I can make it back to the Plains in one piece, though, I'll be getting one. Kessira is a saddle-mare; she fights, but she hasn't the weight or the training of a battlesteed.'
'Well, Da says what the Shin'a'in keep for thesselves is ten times the worth o' what they sells us.'
The innmaster cuffed the girl -- gently, Tarma noticed. 'Laeka! Manners!' Laeka rubbed her ear and grinned, not in the least discomfited.
Tarma laughed. 'No insult taken, Keeper, it's true. We sell you outClan folk our culls. Come with me, Laeka, and I'll introduce you to what we keep.'
With the child trotting at her side and the innkeeper following, Tarma strolled back to Kethry. 'This's a good place, she'enedra, and they aren't altogether outrageous in what they're charging. We'll be staying. This is Laeka, she's our Keeper's daughter, and his chief stableman.'
Laeka beamed at the elevation in her station Tarma granted her.
'Now, hold out your hand to Kessira, little lady; let her get your measure.' She placed her own hand on Kessira's neck and spoke a single command word under her breath. That told Kessira that the child was not to be harmed, and was to be obeyed -- though she would only obey some commands if they were given in Shin'a'in, and it wasn't likely the child knew that tongue. Just as well, they didn't truly need a new back door to their stabling.
The mare lowered her head with grave dignity and snuffled the child's hand once, for politeness' sake, while the girl's eyes widened in delight. Then when Tarma put the reins in Laeka's hands, Kessira followed her with gentle docility, taking careful, dainty steps on the unfamiliar surface. Kethry handed her the reins to the mule as well; Rodi, of course, would follow anyone to food and stabling.
Hadell showed them their room; on the first floor, it was barely big enough to contain the bed. But it did have a window, and the walls were freshly whitewashed. There were plenty of blankets -- again, well-worn but scrupulously clean -- and a feather comforter. Tarma had stayed in far worse places, and said as much.
'So have I,' Kethry replied, sitting on the edge of the bed and pulling off her riding boots with a grimace of pain. 'The place where I met you, for one. I think we've gotten a bargain, personally.'
'Makes me wonder, but I may get the answer when I see the rest of the guests. Well, what's next?' Tarma handed her a pair of soft leather half-boots meant for indoor wear.
'Dinner and bed. It's far too late to go to the Hiring Hall; that'll be for first thing in the morning? I wonder if we could manage a bath out of Hadell? I do not like smelling like a mule!'
As if to answer that question, there came a gentle rap on the door. 'Lady-guests?' a boy's soprano said carefully, 'Would ye wish th' use o' the steamhouse? If ye be quick, Da says ye'll have it t' yerselves fer a candlemark or so.'
Tarma opened the door to him; a sturdy, dark child, he looked very like his father. 'And the charge, lad?' she asked, 'Though if it's in line with the rest of the bill, I'm thinking we'll be taking you up on it.'
'Copper for steamhouse and bath, copper for soap and towels,' he said, holding out the last. 'It's at the end of the hallway.'
'Done and done, and point us the way.' Kethry took possession of what he carried so fast he was left gaping. 'Pay the lad, Tarma; if I don't get clean soon, I'm going to rot of my own stink.'
Tarma laughed, and tossed the boy four coppers.
'And here I was thinking you were more trailhardened than me,' she chuckled, following Kethry down the hall in the direction the boy pointed. 'Now you turn out to be another soft sybarite.'
'I didn't notice you saying no.'
'We have a saying -- '
'Not another one!'
' 'An enemy's nose is always keener than your own.' '
'When I want a proverb, I'll consult a cleric. Here we are,' Kethry opened the door to the bathhouse, which had been annexed to the very end of the inn. 'Oh, heaven!'
This was, beyond a doubt, a well managed place. There were actually three rooms to the bathing area; the first held buckets and shallow tubs, and hot water bubbled from a wooden pipe in the floor into a channel running
