the Thayan pox!'
Tycho strutted out into the middle of the floor and spun around to the shouts of the crowd, playing fast and hard. 'Well, there's Thayan pox in every port, in sailor's shack and prince's court-'
'The pox, the pox, they've got the Thayan pox!'
'When'ere you see a wizard itch, you know what is that makes 'em twitch!'
'The pox, the pox, they've got the Thayan pox!'
In Tycho's head, the trickle of coins that Muire usually doled out at the end of the night was turning into a small flood. He laughed. 'Even temples aren't safe anymore,' he sang, 'you never know who walked through that door!' He swept out his arm and pointed his bow at the Ease's own rickety portal — which opened.
For one moment, the slightest fraction of a heartbeat, the crowd-and Tycho-paused. Framed in the tavern doorway was a tall man dressed in a long quilted coat of blue wool. Snow clung to his shoulders and to the fur- edged cap that he wore. If the snow bothered him, however, there was no trace of it in his travel-tanned, fine- boned face. He stood straight as a mast, stern and dignified.
For a moment.
'The pox!' howled the crowd in perfect time. 'The pox! He's got the Thayan pox!'
The stranger's mouth drew a thin line across his face.
It wasn't clear who in the crowd laughed first. It simply started and spread, sweeping through the tavern like a storm until everyone was hooting and guffawing. Tycho tried to fight it off but couldn't. Laughter rose from his belly and forced its way out of him. He barely managed to get his bow back to the shilling and scratch out the last bars of the song before doubling over in helpless mirth.
The only people in the place not laughing were the stranger and Muire. The stranger stepped into the tavern, slamming the door shut behind him, and stalked over to the bar. Muire gave Tycho a fierce look. The bard swallowed a laugh and reached out to the stranger as he passed. 'Olore, friend,' he choked. 'Welcome to the Wench's Ease.' He couldn't hold back a crooked smile. 'The merriest tavern in Spandeliyon.'
The stranger twitched away from his hand as though Tycho carried the Thayan pox himself. 'Leave me, singer,' he said in a thick accent and walked on.
At the nearest table, Rana's laughter turned into an ugly snort. 'Arrogant elf-blood,' she spat at the stranger's retreating back.
'He's not elf-blood, Rana,' Tycho told her, straightening up. 'He's a Shou.'
'Elf, Shou-you don't see much of neither in Spandeliyon.'
'No,' agreed Tycho, 'you don't.' He nodded distracted acknowledgment as others in the crowd shouted for another song, but didn't raise his strilling again. Instead, he turned and went after the stranger.
The Shou was just stepping up to the bar. Tycho gave him a surreptitious examination as he approached. The Shou was tall, lean, and stiff, a sturdy doorpost of a man. The pack he carried slung over one shoulder was large and heavy. The wool of his coat was dusty, dirt muting the fine blue of the quilted fabric. It was fraying slightly along the hem and at the cuffs and elbows. Unless he missed his guess, the man had come a long, long way. Clipping his bow to the strap of his strilling and shifting the instrument around to ride on his back once more, Tycho bellied up to the bar beside him. The Shou glanced at him out of the corner of his almond-shaped eyes.
'I said leave me, singer. I do not want a song.' The Shou man turned away as if Tycho were already gone from his mind and set a scabbard containing a heavy Shou saber on the bar. He looked to Muire. 'A clean cup with good wine or pale ale.' He set some coins on the bar.
Sembian copper pennies. A scant price for a mug of ale in another port, but just right for dockside Spandeliyon. The man, Tycho judged, was an experienced traveler.
Muire glanced down at the pennies, not even blinking at the saber beside them. 'A clean cup I can give you,' she said, 'but we only have dark ale here.' The Shou nodded and Muire turned away to the ale casks. Conversation in the tavern was returning to normal, laughter dying out to be replaced by the usual hum and murmur. Much of it, Tycho was fairly certain, would be about this unusual visitor.
The Ease's patrons were whetting their appetites for a good story and, bind him, he'd be the one to give it to them! He leaned in. The Shou fixed him with an angry glare, but Tycho didn't back away. Instead he smiled at him. 'You've come to a poor town on a cold night, honored lord,' he said in the musical Shou tongue.
He had the satisfaction of seeing the stranger's eyes widen ever so slightly in surprise. 'You speak Shou,' he replied in the same language.
'A little bit,' Tycho told him modestly. 'You aren't the only traveler here. I had the pleasure of spending some time in the Shou town of Telflamm in Thesk and learned your language there.'
The stranger nodded. 'Ah,' he said. He looked directly at Tycho. 'That would explain why you speak it like a lisping whore from Ch'ing Tung.'
Blood rushed to Tycho's face. He opened his mouth, a stinging insult rising to his lips, but Muire cut him off before he could deliver it. 'Your ale, sir,' she said, setting a tankard down before the Shou-and one before Tycho as well, foamy, thick, and hastily drawn. 'And yours.' The Shou man picked up his tankard and nodded to her. When Tycho reached for his own, though, Muire gave the tankard a shove that sent foam slopping onto his hand and sleeve.
'Let it go,' she hissed. 'I don't know what you're saying to him, but I can read faces as well as anyone.'
'Muire-'
'I've had enough trouble tonight. Apologize to him!'
Growling, Tycho took a deep swig of ale and glanced over at the Shou. The man seemed to have forgotten him already. He was scanning the crowd of the tavern, holding his ale but not actually drinking it. There was a look of deep intensity on his face. Though any number of the Ease's patrons were staring at him, he didn't appear to make eye contact with any of them. Lost in his own haughty world, Tycho thought balefully. He gulped some more ale-and swallowed his pride with it. He leaned over toward the Shou. The man's gaze snapped back to him immediately with the experience of a trained fighter. Tycho realized that he held his tankard in his left hand. One swift move would have his right around the grip of his saber. Tycho stayed still, as if absolutely nothing were wrong. 'I'm sorry if my feeble attempts at Shou have offended you, sir.' In spite of the stranger's insult, he stuck with the language. 'My name is Tychoben Arisaenn, but everyone calls me Tycho. May I know your name? '
The Shou's mouth twitched into a narrow frown. 'My surname is Kuang and my personal name is Li Chien and if you insist on addressing me again, you will go to the gates of the afterlife with that name upon your lips.'
This time, Tycho actually choked. Heckling, even dismissal-those were one thing. He could deal with them.
He had dealt with them, in taverns all around the Sea of Fallen Stars from Spandeliyon to Suzail, Procampur to Arrabar, and back again. Blunt intimidation, on the other hand, was something else. His jaw clenched. 'You might want to have a care, Master Kuang. Threats aren't taken lightly around here.'
'That's wise,' the Shou replied. 'A man should take seriously every threat made to him-as well as every threat that he makes himself.'
Both of his hands were still, right open to seize his blade, left steady and ready to toss his tankard. Tycho had been through enough tavern brawls to recognize the body language. Behind him, he heard Muire curse quietly. 'Tycho…' she said with low warning.
Her words seemed to echo. The Wench's Ease had suddenly grown quiet, Tycho realized, the hint of violence drawing every eye. Tycho ignored both Muire and the stares of the crowd. 'What do you want here, Master Kuang?' he asked, abandoning attempts at Shou. 'If you want trouble, you didn't have to travel so far.'
The change in language seemed to give the stranger pause. He blinked and his frown grew deeper as he noticed the attention of the crowd as well. He straightened up and looked out at all of the Ease's patrons.
'I am looking for a man,' he announced in his thick accent. 'A man who was a pirate.'
Tycho's lips curved up and he snickered-then laughed. So did the crowd. For the second time that night, laughter washed through the Ease. Unlike the first time, however, there wasn't anything good-natured about it. Tycho gave the Shou a thin smile. 'Master Kuang, have you heard of Aglarond? It's the country to the northeast of Altumbel. Its ruler is the Simbul. The Witch-Queen. She doesn't like pirates and she doesn't have much mercy for the ones that she catches off her coasts. There have been a lot of pirates recently who decided it would be better if they were to stay away from Aglarond and take up a more peaceful profession. Like fishing. In Spandeliyon.'
He nodded out to the crowd. A good number of the Ease's patrons-a very large number-opened their mouths in gap-toothed grins.
