Tapp returned carrying a butchered goat carcass over his shoulder. “For testing the swords.”
“Me first!” Leddie yelled. She swung her new extra-long broadsword at the dead goat four times, but the weapon never produced more carnage than one would expect. She flung the sword down and damned the private parts of Effla and Weldt. “Give me another one!”
I handed her one of the other two swords. It performed no better than the broadsword. She grabbed the last sword and whirled a prodigious cut, struck a bone, and broke the blade. Leddie ran to the hammer, a rusty, unwieldy thing with a broad head and a four-foot long handle. She lifted it with both hands, tried to find the balance, and finally threw it toward the house where it rolled across the grass.
Leddie sat straight down on the ground and pouted.
I nodded at the hammer. “You try it, Halla. I’d rupture myself.”
Halla lifted the hammer, tried three different grips, and swung at the air twice.
“Don’t be shy!” I said. “Smash that goat to bits, and Mama will boil it tonight.”
“I will not hold back.” Halla aimed at the goat carcass but then spun the other direction, bringing an overhand blow down on the life-size stone lion monument. The front half of the lion was pulverized. Each of us bled from stone chips and flakes hurled into our faces.
“That’s probably the Bloom thing, huh?” Tapp smirked, wiping his face with a faded blue handkerchief.
“Unless I can walk over and kick down that house with these boots, I’d say yes. Halla, that monstrosity may not prove decisive, but it’s a damn good thing to have with us, don’t you think?”
Halla was rubbing at the rusty head of the hammer with her thumb, and she didn’t answer me.
“This isn’t fair at all!” Leddie smacked the ground with her fist before she stood. “You must promise me that I will get Memweck’s sword. Me! Promise!”
“Sure, I promise.” I nodded.
Leddie threw up her hands and walked away from me. “You’re such a liar! I hate you!” She pointed around. “Everybody! All of you swear that you’ll make Bib give me Memweck’s sword. Swear, or we’re going to stay here and eat goat until we die!”
Whistler and Halla promised.
Tapp cleared his throat and held up the city ring we had recovered. “Thanks for this, and I really do mean thanks. Thanks from Lord Babardi too. I’m sure he’ll want to show his gratitude in person after all this. Follow me. I’ll report and then introduce you.”
The guardian’s nasty opinion of Babardi had been stomping through my head. Maybe it was nothing but bile. But when a murderous, otherworldly creature hates somebody that much, it shouldn’t be ignored. Also, I had long experience with how grateful people were once sorcerers had saved them. It ranged from a little bit grateful all the way to embarrassed loathing.
I slapped the captain on the shoulder. “You go ahead, and we’ll catch up. I know Bea wouldn’t want to miss meeting Lord Babardi.”
“That’s fine and good.” Tapp walked off toward the street, waving over his shoulder.
I sent Whistler to fetch Bea. The rest of us walked to the spacious, blue-painted upper-city stable where we’d left our horses. Halla and I agreed that although Babardi might put on a feast for us, it seemed unlikely. He might even find a reason to dislike us. Kings and lords got embarrassed and did that sometimes. We decided not to laze about once he finished lauding us.
We saddled our horses and rode back to Babardi’s home, the three-story stone house beside the crypt. I gave a boy two copper bits to hold our horses and promised him two more when we claimed the beasts. I also told him what a pleasure it was to find an honest man such as himself, since I had hated to kill those last two boys who tried to run off with my horses.
Tapp waved at us from the top of the broad stone steps. “His Lordship is waiting for you. Expecting you. He couldn’t be more excited if you were arriving in a golden coach and bringing him a diamond chamber pot.” Tapp didn’t sound excited about it, though.
We followed Tapp inside through an open double doorway set with thick, scarred wooden doors. Half a dozen soldiers saluted when we walked into the clean, chilly stone entryway. Two marble busts had been set into alcoves. Maybe those were some of Babardi’s forebears, or his patron gods, or the drunks who owed him money.
“Follow that servant girl,” Tapp said, walking beside me. The young girl smiled and waved us along as she skipped ahead, her pale, yellow skirt swirling.
The thick-timbered doors thumped shut behind us, dimming the hallway just as I entered it. I stopped, and Leddie almost ran into me.
Tapp lowered his voice. “I’m sorry for the doors, but don’t concern yourself over it. His Lordship almost always keeps them closed in case of assassins or invasions.” It seemed as if he might say more, but he shrugged instead and followed the girl. I glanced at Halla, who looked about as displeased as I felt.
Thousands of goats trotted, ate, slept, and fornicated in the fields around Caislin. That meant hundreds of dogs stood out there guarding them. As I walked beside Tapp, I pulled four yellow bands and sent one off in each direction.
Two hundred and fifty-four fuzzy dog ears went up.
The servant girl led us to a darkly waxed wooden door, guarded by two soldiers. A third solider opened the door, and I walked through just behind Tapp.
We trooped into a sparse audience room big enough for fifty people to spread out in. Oil lamps lit bright, rich tapestries covering the walls, and faded rugs lay thick on the floor, but I didn’t see a stick of furniture. The smell of burning oil hung flat in the room, as if
