‘Joust!’ one called out. Another stepped forward to shove Froi back. Another thumped at his own chest twice.
‘Our younger men have felt a need to relieve the tension.’ Ariston laughed.
‘Our lad isn’t one for fighting,’ Gargarin said in a dismissive tone.
‘Who are you trying to fool, Gargarin of Abroi? Your lad came up this mountain with a fight in his spirit and an eye out for danger.’
There was a shrewd, questioning look on Ariston’s face. They may have been mountain goats, but they were no fools.
‘We might want to keep him for ourselves.’
They weren’t quite savage, Froi thought the next day. Just untamed. As though up in these mountains they had become one with the wild. They were coarse, and quick with a bow, and he managed to please them by taking part in the hunt and contributing at least one arrow to the boar they caught. But for all their fierceness and skill, they were vain. Froi had seen peacocks once and the men of Turla resembled them in the way they strutted. Sometimes, back in Lumatere, Finnikin would imitate the way the Mont lads walked. He’d take off his shirt and pound at his chest and he’d walk in the same way they had seen birds walk in Yutlind. The Queen and Froi would laugh at the sight of his lanky milk-white body. But the Monts had nothing on these men.
Display followed display of their might, yet they never tired of competing or showing off. A joust. Sword challenges. Target practice. Races of speed. Races of endurance. Every sentence spoken between them was a challenge.
That night there was a feast, but still no women. The ale was plentiful and that made Arjuro happy, at least.
After dinner was wrestling, just in case the men of Turla had not had enough of an opportunity to show their skills and attributes. They had an annoying habit of finding any opportunity to walk around Quintana and Lirah with bare chests and their trousers worn low. Rings pierced their bodies in places that made Froi wince at the thought of the pain inflicted. Lirah did nothing more than roll her eyes with irritation, but Quintana seemed strangely relaxed with the Turlans in a way Froi hadn’t seen before. Then one of the younger men decided to carry over a litter of pups to her and Froi thought Quintana the Indignant was back when she allowed the dogs to lick her face. He’d prefer Quintana the Indignant to appear right about now. She was an innocent when it came to men. This Quintana understood desire. She had proven it that night they were together. And now in the way she allowed the Turlan lads to stand so close.
‘It’s a primitive bond,’ Arjuro explained. ‘They’re mad. She’s mad. Don’t try to compete.’
‘Why would I possibly want to do that?’ Froi snapped, eyeing the way her face lit up each time a Turlan spoke to her, young or old. He could see from gestures that one was explaining the rules of wrestling to her, which was ridiculous because there were no rules at all. The young Turlan even dared to place an arm around her shoulders as he pointed at what was taking place in the match. Froi wanted nothing more than to pull the ring on the man’s chest through the flesh and cause as much pain as was humanly possible.
After what seemed like an hour of men in bare chests rolling around in dirt, a stocky lad with an abundance of hair came to stand before Froi. He waved two hands towards himself in an invitation to fight.
‘A friendly wrestle, perhaps?’ Ariston called out from where he sat beside Gargarin.
Gargarin waved the offer away on Froi’s behalf.
‘Our lad is bashful,’ he said.
The Turlan who sat beside Quintana heard the words and whispered something in her ear. Froi saw her lip curl in amusement.
He leapt to his feet and removed his shirt.
‘The thing is,’ Arjuro said, rubbing the ointment on Froi’s bruised body later that night in the cooper’s cottage the five of them shared. ‘I probably would have stayed down the tenth time the human bear had your head between his thighs.’
‘Did you not hear me call out to stay down that last time?’ Lirah said.
‘He’s never been one to listen,’ Gargarin muttered, sitting opposite Lirah at the table, scribbling in his journal. ‘Deserves all the pain.’
Froi closed his eyes, wincing. ‘I would so appreciate it if everyone refrained from expressing an opinion.’
When he opened his eyes again he felt the force of Quintana’s stare.
‘There’s no shame in losing against the Turlans,’ she said.
‘I didn’t lose,’ he said, just as Arjuro finished. Froi got to his feet, really wanting desperately to stay calm. ‘And you would have known that if you had watched instead of playing with those yappy dogs at the exact moment I snatched victory!’
Quintana’s stare continued, but she refrained from speaking.
‘And I’ll have you know that not once have I lost a fight this year against anyone from the Lumateran Queen’s Guard!’ he added, sitting next to Lirah, who was trying to remove blood from the trousers he had worn in the wrestle.
‘You said they were forty years in age, Froi,’ Quintana said, irritated. ‘Can you honestly compare the Turlan lads to the old?’
Arjuro made a rude sound. Even Gargarin looked up from his writing, slightly wounded by her words.
‘The younger men would like us both to join them for tale-telling time,’ she said.
‘Wonderful idea,’ Arjuro said. ‘Perhaps you can join them and they can pierce both your bodies with blunt instruments and leave us old and decrepit alone to get some rest.’
Quintana turned her stare to Arjuro. After a moment she smiled. ‘You’re very funny, Priestling. The funniest man we know.’
Arjuro was wary of her mood. ‘What?’ he asked. ‘Funnier than Bestiano? Because I hear he is hilarious.’
This time she laughed and then Lirah joined in and Froi couldn’t help laughing himself, although it caused him pain. He caught Gargarin’s stare.
Quintana reached out and touched Lirah’s mouth and then Froi’s.
‘When you laugh, you look like your boy, Lirah.’
Princess Indignant was back the next morning as they prepared to leave. She spent her time skipping after the hound pups, looking up at Gargarin longingly.
‘Are they not the most beautiful pups you’ve ever seen, Gargarin? It’s as if the gods are begging us to take –’
‘No,’ Gargarin said firmly.
Ariston joined them on horseback and Froi had a feeling it was more about keeping an eye on them, than the need to help.
‘We missed your women last night, Ariston,’ Gargarin said smoothly. ‘Is the goddess of winter keeping them from you?’
‘The cleansing takes time,’ Ariston replied.
Gargarin and Ariston spoke amongst themselves most of the way up the mountain. From what Froi could hear it was mostly about produce and irrigation and it wasn’t hard to see that both men were impressed with each other, despite their lack of trust and the very little they had in common.
Froi and the others were quiet for the rest of the way and he could see that Arjuro was curious about this strange visit to the dying man. No matter how much Arjuro had tried for the last two nights he had not uncovered the reason for Ariston’s warning against the godshouse Priests. Froi wondered what had taken place forty-five years ago on an isolated mountain peak to warrant such an accusation.
As Ariston had promised, it was half a day’s ride and Quintana slept against Froi’s back most of the way.
‘Why is she always tired?’ he asked Lirah.
‘Because she’s making a baby,’ Lirah said quietly to prevent Ariston from hearing. ‘In the first few months when I was carrying mine I was weary to the bone.’
Froi noticed that she said ‘carrying mine’, not ‘carrying you’. Lirah and Gargarin still had not acknowledged him as theirs and he realised that he wanted more from them than they were willing to give. But they seemed broken people who were not good with words, so he kept his silence.
