The Summer of the Swordsman

Chapter XI

Anakreon came to me the next day with a flushed face and a blazing eye, carrying a large box of carved sandalwood. I was in my rooms at Master Joris' house, not having the inclination to face the Burgess that morning. Joris was probably amused by the whole fiasco at Esrik's palace, but I was not. I was, in fact, sitting by the window listening to my stomach growl, staring at the bundles of my belongings and trying to decide whether it would be politic to sneak out of the house and leave a message for the officers of the troop to meet me outside the town.

A breath of wind came through the streets. It smelled like the sewer. I wondered how the thatched houses looked in the morning light. I wondered if the townsfolk would want to kill us for ruining their beautiful, thatched roofs. And then I shook myself and said, "Hah! A good rain'll wash it off!" Hearing myself speak helped, but not much.

Anakreon rapped once on the door as I was eyeing my packs, entered, and strode to the bed, to hurl the box on it and whirl upon me, his mouth twisted with rage.

The only thing to do when Anakreon is that furious is keep your temper at all costs. I said, as calmly as I could, "Sit down. Do you want some wine?"

Anakreon's eye flashed, and he pushed past me to the window, to stand there breathing quickly, glaring out over Master Joris' beautiful rose‑gardens.

I took that for an affirmative answer, poured two glasses, and handed him one. "Sit down," I repeated, and pointed to a chair. "What happened?"

Anakreon gestured toward the box, which had burst open and spilled a swath of silver across the counterpane. "That's our wage for firefighting," he said. "Given me by Esrik himself! He wasn't very cordial. He told me to pack my herd of filthy swine and begone. Told me he could manage the forming of his fire brigade by himself, and we'd be better away from Eslu as soon as possible!"

I raised my eyebrows and my glass and drank silently. 'Herd of filthy swine'? Not the kindest term applied to us, but then not the worst, either. "Was there more?" I asked.

Anakreon drained his glass. "He dismissed me, then. Like a criminal slave! Turned his back on me and nodded to his guards, who escorted me to my rooms! Me! Anakreon of Thrason! That's coming the prince just a little too strongly, don't you think? And what for? because that drunken swine Kenui got a bee in his bonnet and decided to shake it out in the middle of a party‑‑!"

He stopped and glared at me because I was suddenly consumed with mirth. I couldn't help it. The staring ladies, Kenui's ponderous dignity‑‑it all came back to me too vividly to fight. Princess Sieglinde writhing on the floor in strong hysterics, shrieking and drumming her heels, and Kenui trying to revive her by pouring the contents of his flask over her face before he was yanked to his feet and hauled round to face Anakreon, who was quivering with rage. He had listened to a blistering denunciation by Esrik and Anakreon with a wide‑mouthed, delighted smile, broke into applause at the end of it, and was marched away under guard. And he hadn't even had a chance to fasten his trousers again.

"Esrik must've been hung‑over," I said. "What a cap to a feast!"

Anakreon's expression softened and he actually smiled. "Pour me some wine," he said, the smile widening to a grin. "Yes, Esrik was hung‑over. But still‑‑" his frown reappeared, and I spoke hastily.

"So he paid you and told you to get out. How much did he pay you?"

The frown deepened. "Ten silver sestrians for each day. Two hundred and eighty. He said he'd throw in twenty more and make it three hundred. Generous of him. So there are three hundred silver sestrians there. He said the rest of the money was being withheld to pay for cleaning up the city after the sewer incident last night." He drained his cup again, set it down with a crack, and said, "Ten silver sestrians to one gold one‑‑so he owes me another one thousand and ninety‑two gold sestrians!"

"Why don't you present him with a bill?" I suggested blandly. I couldn't resist the opportunity to needle him.

Anakreon didn't explode. He only eyed me with a mild speculation. "Not a bad idea," he said. "You deliver the bill for me."

I didn't like that thought much. "I suppose we're well out of this," I said. "We could just chalk it up to experience."

"I'll be damned if I do that!" Anakreon exclaimed. "We had a contract and that ape masquerading as a man is going to pay it if I have to wring it out of him with my bare hands! Depend on it, that Danskaggan skin‑flint's using this as an excuse to worm his way out of paying a few sestrians! And it isn't as though we didn't earn our pay! He said his wife was still sedated! Hah! He was probably bursting his gut laughing, and her too! When a Danskaggan takes hold of a penny, by God, it's a prisoner! He can't fool with me! I'll have the entire mercenary profession after him‑‑"

"Tufras the Boneless," I said.

Anakreon eyed me with dislike. "Shut up," he said.

"So what now?" I asked, knowing the answer already. Garius.

"We go to Hirstad, get on the ships waiting for us, and join Garius," Anakreon said. He looked across at me and suddenly was pleading. "Oristides, what else can I do? We're on the brink of starving! Kenui ruined any chance we had of finding peaceable employment anywhere in Danskagge short of a robber's den, and I'm not rich enough to let us stay idle! Hell, you know that if my lamented sire showed any signs of dying I'd hotfoot it to Thrason with the troop, but that isn't the case, and he's got a new favorite, and the favorite says she's pregnant! I doubt the child's his. Last I heard he was so riddled with disease he couldn't even get‑‑ Oh hell!"

I said nothing. I was trying to think.

"Oristides, we have to take this commission from Garius! Look," he said after a pause, "We go back a long way. If you don't want to go, I won't hold you to it. You can leave any time you want, and no angry feelings. But we have to get out of this dung hole of a city, and we have to have work, and I need you with me. Are you coming?"

The years suddenly seemed to fall away, and I saw the way Anakreon had aged as though for the first time. I saw, like a phantom, the man who had rescued me from that mob in Hellas. Laughing, confident. And then I saw him as he was now, older, more wary. I must have frowned, because Anakreon suddenly turned away and began sliding the coins onto his palm and then into the box.

"When will you leave?" he asked, his voice very calm. He was looking up at me through lowered brows, a spark of something I mistrusted in his eye.

"Whenever the troop leaves!" I snapped. "Do you think a contract means less to me than to you? I have my honor, too, you know!"

"Honor among thieves, eh?" Anakreon suggested.

"If you wish," I said. "And if I said I was going to leave, you'd let me go, then knock me silly with a club, truss me like a chicken, and send me under guard to Blogg."

Now Anakreon was really grinning. "You know me very well, Oristides," he said. "I think you're the only one who does."

"I should think so," I snorted, watching the money clatter into the box. "And what about the rest of our pay?"

"We have a contract," Anakreon said. "It was signed and witnessed by the foremost citizens of Eslu. We could make things hot for Esrik if we took it to Canulf and Inga in Hirstad."

"And we have two hundred and fifty trained troops," I added. "And a Master Swordsman, as well."

"I was forgetting the Swordsman," Anakreon said. "I'll ask him to go to Esrik with a message. That should do it. He won't want to anger the Guild of Swordsmen‑‑and have you ever caught the rough edge of Mourner's tongue? You can go with him."

"Not I," I said. "Quinquius should go. He's a patrician and he can outface them. Only a Roman's arrogance will do. I'd just muddle things. I'll get the troop together. Garius, hey? Isn't there somewhere else we can go?"

But I was only joking. The thing had been faced and decided, and complaining would accomplish nothing.