charged him one elemental for the platter and the beer, looked relieved when he paid up without a fuss, and then went outside. Egar heard her murmuring to the boy.
When she came back in, he said, breezily: Guess you don t see that many like me in here?
What? Voice faint.
Steppe dwellers. Don t get a lot of them? I was wondering because
Not so early, she said and fled back into the kitchen.
Egar raised his eyebrows and went back to his pint. More lowered voices in the kitchen. The chopper chunked once, definitively, into wood. The publican came out through the curtain, glowering.
What s your fucking problem, then? I said she was my whore, I didn t say she was up for grabs.
Egar set his drink aside with care, and looked at the man.
Just making conversation, he said softly.
Where I m from, reasonable men can talk to a woman without it meaning anything. You seemed like a reasonable man when I came in, but maybe I was wrong about that.
The publican hesitated. Sunlight filtered into the low-beamed space and the quiet. Somewhere, a beer tap dripped into its tray. The moment stretched.
Went away.
Yeah, all right then. An ungracious shrug.
Let it go. Got a brother served up at the Dhashara pass, he always did say you lot let your women run riot. Mouthing off like they were men, riding horses, carrying weapons, shit like that.
Been known to happen, Egar agreed.
Yeah, well, that shit won t wash down here. This is Yhelteth, this is the Empire. We re civilized. Women know their place. And truth is, I m about fucking sick of the trouble we get from your kind coming in here. Grudging, bitten off. No offense.
Oh none taken. What kind of trouble would that be, then?
Only a big fucking fight a couple of weeks back. They put out two windows, and one of my serving girls lost a finger. Had to call the City Guard. Like I said, I m sick of it. You going to live in a civilized city, you ve got to act civilized, too. You know?
Egar pulled a face. Brawling at the Pony Stringer s Good Fortune hadn t ever been out of fashion as far as he could recall.
In fact, some of his best brawls
What was this fight about, then?
Fuck would I know? The publican swabbed irritably at his bar with a fetid-looking cloth. Some tribal shit? Not like I speak northern, is it? All I know is, one minute everybody s drinking and yelling back and forth like normal, next thing it s fists and blades. Half of them in Citadel threads, too I mean, that s just
He gestured helplessly, a man losing his grip on the changing world.
Citadel rig, huh? Egar, voice elaborately casual, sipping his beer. That s unusual.
Yeah, tell me about it. When I was a kid, they wouldn t have let an outlander set foot inside a temple, let alone fucking pay them wages to do it.
True enough. It was a time Egar caught the tail end of, arriving in Yhelteth a decade and a half ago. A time when a lot of taverns were still calling themselves the Majak s Head, still sporting iron cages very like the one outside this place to prove the point. He remembered burning one to the ground in the Spice Quarter one riotous summer night. A mixed-bag company of other steppe nomads, out staggering drunk on furlough. Summer heat, booze-tightened tempers, just waiting for the right tinder. Some heavyset Ishlinak, ax in hand, bawling that that was his fucking uncle up there in the cage, rot-eyed and blackened
They burst in, boots and brutal-indignant rage. Broke faces and furniture, tore women s clothing, grabbed torches from brackets on the wall. Roaring encouragement to one another. Whirl and toss up behind the bar, in amongst the crowded tables. The straw across the floor went up, flames thigh-high in seconds.
And then it was all discordant screams and chaos, and a stampede for the doors.
He remembered making it outside, standing there grinning into the blaze as it built. Remembered the fire leaping out of windows, chewing at the low eaves. The head in its cage, flame-wrapped and roasting until the bracket charred too much to take the weight and the cage tumbled to the street, still on fire. The roof timbers took cheap wood, poorly seasoned burned rapidly through, and crashed in with a roar. The watching Majak roared with it.
Whirling, red-orange sparks on a cinnamon wind.
Akal the Great, always shrewd in his lawmaking, brought in an ordinance the following year. War against the League had brought the Majak south in their mercenary thousands you could no longer afford to offend them. The tavern names changed.
No one recalled what happened to the various heads. Most, in truth, had probably never belonged to genuine Majak in the first place. and he should fucking know better. That s all I m saying.
Egar blinked back to the present. Scent of stale beer and the sifting, low-angle sunlight. He d evidently missed a chunk of the publican s rant.
Yeah?
Yeah. Look, don t get me wrong. I got nothing against you people, right. Really. And I still serve Harath in here just the same as anyone else, same as I always did before. I just think you got to know who you are, is all. Can t make a decision like that just because you re cunt-struck. He really wants to convert, hey, fine with me. Revelation says it s for all men to make that choice even outlanders. But you can t turn around later and say you want out just cuz your little whore fucks off and dumps you. That s apostasy, it s serious shit up at the temples. He can t blame the ones who still carry steel for the Citadel when they give him the cold shoulder.
So. Egar made a quick estimate on the shape of what he d missed. You re saying this Harath started the fight?
I m saying he was here, is all. And I ve seen the way he gets when the others are around. Starts yelling about the old gods, how the Citadel is full of shit. You can t expect to talk like that and not get a kicking.
True enough. Egar turned his tankard back and forth a little on the bar, frowning. You know where he flops these days?
It got him a funny look. Yeah, and what s it to you?
Shrug it off. Sounds like this guy I m looking for, is all. Mother s cousin s son, it s the same name. Bit of a fuckup by all accounts, but I m supposed to check on him. No big deal. Family. You know how it is.
Tell me about it.
Does he still come in here? Since the fight, I mean.
The publican glowered into the middle distance for a moment or two. Maybe he was remembering the broken fixtures.
Try up on the An-Monal road, other side of the Span, he said. Someplace above a pawnshop, I heard.
CHAPTER 11
They reached the river without event, followed the sounds it made and the flash glimpses through sun- metaled foliage that the path afforded them. They tracked along the eastern bank for a while until finally, a hundred yards downstream from the last set of rapids and craggy falls, the trail broke cover and went to the water s edge. It was the same fording point they d used coming in, and they already knew the water never went worse than waist-deep. Still, Ringil dismounted there into the long grass and stood for a while, watching. He wanted, he told himself, to check the far bank for any sign of an ambush before they crossed.
Getting a bit jumpy in our advancing years, aren t we, Gil? What s the matter, you planning to die old and in bed all of a sudden?
Not planning to die at all just yet.
It was a beautiful day, drowsy with heat and insect hum. Late-morning sunlight lay on the water in splashes too bright to look at directly. Ringil shaded his face and screwed up his eyes, peered across to the trees on the other side. It was about thirty yards, an easy crossing for the horses, no swimming required.
