The Wolf's Call - Anthony Ryan Page 0,63

walkway lining the wall. His grin was cheerful as he approached, Vaelin noting how he bowed to Chien before she bowed in return. The official status of women in this land, it seemed, was not mirrored amongst its outlaw society.

“Esteemed brother,” she said. “Esteemed Father sends greetings, and a gift.” Her hand disappeared into her jacket and emerged with a small red lacquer box.

The stocky man said, taking the box and removing the lid to sniff the contents, “Ah, Firebloom Balm.” He patted the small of his back and inclined his head in gratitude. “My old bones thank you.” For all his apparent affability, Vaelin saw a keen and possibly dangerous calculation in his gaze as it slipped from Chien to the foreigners at her back. “And you bring interesting company. A gift in itself, I always say.”

“We require passage across the lake,” Chien told him. “Esteemed Father has given his word.”

The man’s eyes betrayed another moment’s calculation before sliding back to Chien. “And his word will be honoured,” he said, bowing once more. “I am called Crab,” he went on, raising his voice and speaking in slow deliberate tones to the foreigners, as if addressing lackwit children. “I need no other name and have killed men who asked for it. This is my boat.” He pointed at the narrow-hulled craft in the water. “We go across the water when it gets dark. Until then, you eat.” His blunt-fingered hands mimed the passage of invisible food to his mouth before he rubbed his stomach. “Mmmmm.”

“This one’s an idiot,” Nortah said in Realm Tongue, drawing a faint snicker from Ellese.

“Quiet,” Vaelin said, smiling and bowing at the man who called himself Crab. “I suspect it might be to our advantage if he thinks we’re the idiots.”

“Can’t risk a daylight run these days,” the boatman told Chien as they ate a short while later. The food, a pleasantly spiced pork and vegetable broth, was prepared by the old woman who had answered the door. From the energy with which she moved from one steaming pot to another, Vaelin was forced to wonder if she was as old as she appeared. Apart from her and Crab, no others had joined them, but the occasional creak from the shadowed rafters above made it clear they were still under close observation.

“Too many folk coming south,” Crab went on. “More folk on the water means more Dien-Ven keen to tax what they’ve brought with them. Been going on since the spring rains. Soldiers go north, people come south. More by the day, and not all peasants either. I’ve had to remind some newcomers that these lakes belong to the Crimson Band, but not all are likely to heed the lesson, no matter how many ears I cut off. Esteemed Father should know this.”

“Then send word,” Chien said. “There was news of a battle in the borderlands. What have you heard?”

“Mostly just rumours and nonsense from beggared peasants. Lots of tales of the Harbingers of Heaven, of course, but that’s always the way when trouble brews. As for the battle . . .” He shrugged. “Some horde or other come out of the Iron Steppe for a good old rampage. They’ll piss off home when their saddlebags are full of booty and they’ve garnered enough slaves. That or the Merchant King will find a general to beat them. It happens every few decades. Ask her.” He turned to the old woman, raising his voice to a shout. “Seen it all before, haven’t you, Old Snake? Rampaging barbarians and such.”

The old woman spooned broth into a bowl, barely glancing at him as she spoke in a dry, cracked voice, “You are a fool.”

Crab let out a hearty guffaw at this, slapping his knee. “She loves to berate me, and what man would begrudge his great-grandmother her pleasures?”

His merriment died when the old woman spoke on. Apparently, voicing more than a short insult was not her custom. “They called it the Year of the Tiger,” she said, the rasp of her voice soft but still easily discernible in the still air of the mill. “When the Steppe tribes rode all the way through the Venerable Kingdom to sack Hahn-Shi.”

“The Merchant King was weak then,” Chien said. “A drunken wastrel they say.”

“No.” The old woman shook her head. “He was just a man, as all kings are. Wise in some ways, foolish in others. And it is a fool who fails to heed the Harbingers of Heaven. Warning was given,