the Leathermines

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There were strange noises in the night to wake her randomly.  The darkness in the leaf and stick filled bed made her stop breathing and listen to the night creatures as they passed by.  She even heard the sounds of many, many hoofbeats in the distance late into the night, but they did not pass directly by the shelter she was in.  The starred night showed through the very tops of the sapling sized branches around her and she fell back asleep watching the blinking lights.

She had snatches of dreams.  Some were comforting.  Some were terrifying.  Some...she was not sure how the two were mixing.  She was active in the dreams, but she could not change what was going on around her.

She was dancing for Lady Hellon with other nobles around her Lady on the hill outside the keep that her Lady liked to entertain on in the Summer.  The other dancers were around her, swirling in the colors the Dance Master had put them in.  Laun was twirling, seeing the smiles on the faces of the nobles as she turned and then she turned and there was as if another set of people were sitting where the nobles were.  They were not replaced, but the shadows of the nobles took form and substance and were moving counter to the light figures.  She saw the dancers, too, had shadow selves that were moving and touching and interacting even as their bodies were moving to entertain the nobles.

Laun felt herself stop moving and she was at the feet of her Lady Hellon.  She had been there before often as she grew up.  She was watching Lady Hellon talking and moving and touching a Lord next to her.  She was always so kind and subtle when Laun saw her.  A shadow hand came from Lady Hellon, a third hand with the form of a knife in it.  It reached out and touched the Lord next to her and he started to fade, paling so that the stone trees behind him showed through before disappearing.  Lady Hellon turned to Laun, smiling and making forms with her hands and talking.  Laun could hear the tone of the words, but not what they were as her Lady started to fade, the wall of the kitchen showing through her.

Orgia was pushing her along out of the kitchen, away from her mother, a veil covering everything that was before, fading everything she was before.  The Dance Master was there and then they were in the Dance Master’s quarters.  He was looking at her.  She remembered being scared and not knowing what the new member of the household was going to do with her, knowing that new men meant changes around her.  She was only a slave, but she had just been pulling feathers off of chickens for that night’s meal and now she was being inspected by this big man.

Laun saw the other dancers, young like she was and older like they were.  They were made beautiful by the Dance Master for the pleasure of their Lord and Lady and the nobles they entertained.  They moved around Laun and the Dance Master as he handed her the skirt she would be wearing, the color a bright pinky thing against her pale skin.  She felt a coldness go through her as she started to wake from the dream, the Dance Master’s words clinging to her as he said, “She is right.  I just hope you are ready for the rest of the training...”

Laun woke up at first light soaked by dew.  She had sticks poking her and bug bites in places she didn’t realize she had places.  The thin layer of leaves that she had buried herself in shifted and let in all the cold morning air, shaking the dew onto the bare skin underneath.  Shivering, she sat up in her sylvan bed, having a flash from one of the stories she had read to her Lady, but feeling far less like a seductive wood nymph than just a cranky, tired slave.

She did not feel her best by any means.  She was hungry, thirsty, cold and cramped.  She wished for a fire to magically appear, but none did.  She missed sleeping with the other dancers, the warmth and companionship making her sad for it’s loss.  The last of the volcanic silt was clinging to her, but the itching as it pulled on her skin was barely noticeable as she started to move around.  She took part of a rag she had grabbed with some of her meagre items and put it between her bare breasts and the leather to help the chaffing, though the rag slipped down when she stretched.  Her face felt warm and slightly painful to the touch as she found some standing water to splash on herself.  Laun had never been in the sun long enough to know that she was getting sunburnt from being out on the road.  The hunger was more painful than her face and she dug around in her potato sack.  She ate the few crumbs she had left and set out again for the unknown castle and refuge.

The road was surrounded by thick woods and it was dark, but wonderfully cool, under the trees as the curving dirt road she was following heated up in the summer sun, the heat coming through her sandals in every step when she moved from the cool grass to the hard packed road.  Laun shifted the potato sack from shoulder to shoulder as she became more and more tired.  Sometimes a leaf left in her unbound hair would crunch and fall, a reminder that she had slept in the open for the first time in her life.  She did not let her mind dwell on the death behind her but the help that was promised by her Master before her.

The fear that had pushed her out of the keep was dulled by the lack of sleep and food, though the need to get to Lord Helmics’ castle kept her feet moving.  She thought of the people who had met death in the Salam-Dir keep.  Almost all of them she had known as she grew in the household.  Some had come in as wards, mostly wardsmen, and some had been babies she remembered having been born at the keep.  The dancers she had trained with and had entertained alongside...

Most of the dancers had gone to the Festival.  Laun thought about her best friend, Jesi.  She was the best dancer, the most beautiful of them and she had been the one to comfort Laun when her Mother had died.   Laun could not remember if Jesi had gone to the Festival or not at that point.  She tried to remember through the fatigue that was starting to dull her thinking, but then she saw the bodies she had passed in the gloom and she didn’t want to think of that any more.  She could smell the blood and shit even in the daylight along the open road.  Knowing that more of the household had been safe at the Festival helped to balance the death she had seen.

When she came to the stream that had been marked on the map, she found that it was larger than the Grey Waters, though it was marked by a smaller set of ripples and was unnamed on the map.  There was a road that went along the shore of the river on her side.  Laun stopped at the ridge before the road from Salam-Dir ended below in that river road, watching a man with a boat at a shallow beach below the river road.  Laun could see a tower above the treeline on the other side of the the water she hoped was the castle she was heading to.  She sat and rested at the edge of the road and rubbed the sore muscles she could reach.  There were also places that were blistering from being rubbed by the sweaty leather and tender spots that were red from the sun, but she did not know what she could do about those.

To cross the river, Laun knew that she would have to ask the man at the shore for passage.  Laun didn’t know how to swim, never needing to before, and she didn’t want to learn right then.  Laun wasn’t sure how the man there would take her being in the warrior’s harness, the fact that she was bare breasted not concerning to her as she had always been so.  She brought out an extra dancing skirt from her sack and put that over the leather and brass harness.  It was a long, flowing dancing skirt that tied around her waist and covered her legs and many of the pouches on the leather straps.  She had the short sword in the burlap sack with the little she had with her, though the pommel stuck out no matter what she did.

Laun approached the man who was resting next to the flat bottomed boat dragged onto the river bank.  The water lapped at the boat, making it move slightly in the pulling current. The Lady Salam-Dir felt her slave upbringing taking over and wanted to just turn and run, to escape from being out in the open and from having to avenge her Master’s death.  And to talk to a stranger.  Laun could feel the cane of the Dance Master across her calves as if she had misstepped in one of his routines at the thought of running away.  Laun came closer to the boatman and tried to talk calmly.

“Sir, could you take me across to Lord Helmic’s lands?”

The man dozing in the late afternoon sun lifted his patchwork hat to look at Laun.  “Do you have money?”

Laun did not know about money.  She wasn’t even sure what might be involved.  The few stories she had learned to read mentioned money, but not what it was.  Being a slave sequestered in the life of the castle and keep of Salam-Dir, she had never had to deal with money, but she did know how to barter.   “All I have is what you see, sir.”

The man looked Laun over slowly, lingering in places.  Seeing her sun pinked breasts through the leather straps, he started to say, “You have what I need-”  He saw the sword poking out from the sack she had over her shoulder.  “I could take that fancy pig-sticker you have there.”

Laun held the sack and sword to her chest.  “My Master gave this to me before he died.  I shall keep it until his death is revenged.”

The man’s interest was piqued.  Sitting up, he asked, “Who was your Master?”

Laun felt tears welling up in her.  “My Master was Lord Salam-Dir.  I am his heir.”

The laughter that blasted Laun made her start crying.  “If you are his heir, why are you going to Lord Helmic without an escort?”

Laun softly bubbled out, “They-Everyone is … dead.”

The man stopped laughing.  He saw the tears streaking her face through the road dust and heard the terror in the girl’s voice as she shivered in the afternoon’s hot breeze.  The talon crest in brass on her bare chest caught his eye as she moved her burlap sack to the ground, convincing him of what she said.  “I’m sorry, girl.  I’ll take you across.”  The dirt and fear on her face made her a sorrowful creature and realizing why she was alone made to break the ferryman’s heart.

The man pushed the boat a little into the flow of the river before helping Laun into the rocking craft.  There was a heavy, waterlogged rope going through two metal loops at either end of the boat.  The man pulled on the rope and made the boat cross the river, a small song coming from him to help him pace his pulls.  When the boat was across, the man said, “I have advice for you.  You need to address the gate person by the name of Jerald. Tell him your business and he will take care of you.  And, Lady... here-” the man took off his tunic and gave it to Laun.

“Thank you, sir!”  The work-sweat smell of the ferryman on the rough weave of the tunic was comforting as she pulled it over her head.  It was heavy on her sunburnt skin and weighted the leather straps on her roughened skin, but it was the first time she had covered herself as a Lady, and it felt appropriate in many ways.  A slave clothed by a workman and recognized as a noble.  She nodded her thanks as the tears she was holding back caught her throat as she tried to thank him again.  Laun turned and started back on her journey to Lord Helmic’s castle.

It was not as close to the treeline as Laun thought it had been when she saw it from the other side of the river.  After having sat in the swaying flat bottomed boat for a while to rest and the boost in her confidence from the boatman, Laun went ahead along the sand and grass beach to another trail that followed the river, though not as large as the other bank’s one was.  Laun went in the direction that she remembered the castle had been and found a packed-earth trail up into the trees.

The trek up the shallow slope didn’t take long, though Laun slowed to a creep as she thought about how she might be greeted.  The trees had shaded her walk from the river, cooling her.  She reached behind her under the tunic and found the boiled leather case that held the lone parchment.  She could just offer herself as a dancer to the household as she did not have a slave brand on her skin.  She could be a free woman for the first time in her life.  There were people at the Festival who would know her, but she was certain that no one would remember her as anything but a dancer and slave and not a free woman. If they met again.  If they remembered her at all.  Laun pulled at the case and the straps slid so that it was in a more comfortable place to touch.  The thought of abandoning her mission and letting people believe she was a free woman was not as comfortable.

A large open space between the cool treeline and the Keeps’ gate was bright yet foreboding in the late afternoon blood sun.  The trailhead went from a slightly sandy path to hard-packed dirt pointed at the gatehouse of the Keep.  The building was huge and easily twice the size of her Master’s castle.  Even the outer wall was taller and made from a dark stone that had small arrow slits that could have kept the place safe for quite some time...  Though they probably did not have any of the wardsmen either.  The Festival would have taken them away just like her household’s people.

Laun tried to not hunch under the weight of the burlap sack as she went the 30 paces or so to the large, plain wooden gate of the dark stone outer wall.  The heat from the dry dirt near the gate was more than uncomfortable, making her already tired feet feel every stone and misstep from when she had left her Master’s lands, adding to her inner angst.  She was about to turn from the gatehouse door when it opened.

“ ‘Lo.  ‘Oo are hou?”  The thick accent came from a friendly looking man with the flying hawk crest on his chest Laun had sometimes seen on some of the visiting men to the Salam-Dir lands.

Laun wanted to run, but fear stayed her feet.  “I n-need to see Lord Helmic.  Are you- ur - Jerald?”

“ ‘Im in de flesh.  ‘Oo want to knoo?”

Laun cleared her throat but could not bring more than a soft voice to say, “I am Laun, heir to Lord Vami Salam-Dir.”

A raised eyebrow was the only comment made by Jerald before he ushered Laun in.  He escorted her through a maze of corridors, past a few curious people to a room like the one Lord Salam-Dir used as a study.  It was bright with candles and lamps but bare of any comfort as Laun glanced around.  Lord Helmic only had two books on a rough-hewn shelf, she noticed with a slight rush of pleasure.  Laun put her potato sack on the floor behind her and tried to stand still as she took in what she could of the back of the man that took up most of the room in presence if not form.

There was a bushiness in the black hair that showed under the arming cap that seemed barely placed on the top of his head.  He had dusty, plain clothes on his broad shoulders, the garb of someone who had just come off the road himself.  Laun could see his hands around a piece of paper and those hands dwarfed everything they touched.  He had an angry way of breathing and Laun tried not to breathe at all.

“Lord, de Lady Salam-Dir ‘ishes to see hou.”

The hulk of a man rose from a rickety stool, holding the paper with an unadorned message on it.  “I thought she was dead.”  There was little emotion in the man’s voice as he turned to face Laun.  Not quite hatred radiated out of the dark-grey eyes under the jet-black eyebrows of the imposing man.

Laun did not know quite what to do.  Being introduced as the Lady Salam-Dir unbalanced any calm she had mustered.  Looking into those eyes that seemed to accuse her of something also made a flash of being safe go through her, but only a flash.  “I-”  She felt as though she was a doe and a hunter had just brought an arrow in line with her heart.  She could not talk, though the words she needed were just under her tongue.  She felt the nausea of fear start to threaten to bring up the crumbs she had eaten earlier.

“You aren’t Hellon.  What kind of impostor are you?  I should kill you for-”

“Lord, ‘e is de ‘air to de lands of Salam-Dir.”

Laun looked gratefully at Jerald.  “‘E, I mean, he is right.  I have this to show you.”  Laun had moved the scroll case around so she could touch it under the tunic while she was walking to the castle, the unconscious action making it easier at that moment.  Laun shakily reached under the tunic to take out the scroll from the case and handed it to Helmic.

Helmic harrumphed as he took the fragile link to the new noble title Laun had.  He read the letter quickly and handed it back to Laun.  “How did he know he was going to be killed - IF he is dead?”

The girl shrugged, the motion twinging the raw places on her shoulders.  “He said something about his wiseman predicting it.”

Helmic’s eyebrow went up.  “Why did he pick you?”

Confidence started to creep into Laun’s voice as she said, “My Lord said it was part of the prophesy.  I really don’t know why.  But I will revenge my Master’s death to the best of my ability.”

Helmic shook his head before almost yelling full force at Laun.  “Get out of my home and off my lands!  You do not have any claim on his lands and you have no claim to friends here.  Out!”  Helmic backhanded Laun so hard that she fainted from the pain in her jaw.  Jerald caught her as she fell.

“Loord!  I moost ‘rotest!.”

“Out!  I said out, I mean out!”  Lord Helmic caught at the gifted rough tunic to lift the girl and ripped it from shoulder to hem.  Both men caught their breaths at the sight of the warrior’s harness Laun wore.  The crest of Salam-Dir was the clasp of the chest piece of the warrior’s harness and heavily pulled across the limp girls’ bare skin.

“Loord...?”

Helmic shook his head.  “I cannot go back on what I said.  Take her out, but give her food and such.”  Helmic sat heavily on the rickety stool and picked up his missive again.  “And send Fredis in.”

“‘Es, Loord.”

Laun woke with a splitting headache about twenty minutes later.  She was outside of the gatehouse door and couldn’t remember anything about how she got outside.  She struggled with a cape fastened around her neck that she did not have before.   It was a hinderance and the heat that had built up in the short amount of time Laun had lain there was oppressive.  Wobbilly, she got up and held her head.  Boots poking out of a backpack, a wineskin and other things were beside where she had been lying.

“If this is how a freshly made enemy is treated, a friend must be really something to be,” Laun mumbled to herself.  The dazed girl picked up all of the stuff around her and randomly walked until she was under a tree a little into the nearby woods.  Her head had started swimming and she had to sit down again.  She put her hand to her head.  A slight greasy spot on her jaw was tender to the touch, and smelled like old pine trees and mint.  She let her head drop between her knees for a few minutes until the throbbing stopped and the nausea lessened.

Laun got as comfortable as she could under the tree with her new cape around her and started to sort through things when she could focus.  She found food, soap wrapped in a soft cloth, oil and rags(Laun could not figure out what those were for), a leather box with foul smelling salve in it and other small things that had been given to her.  She started to eat some of the journey cake she found, but her stomach reminded her that she really shouldn’t have anything in it right then.

There was also a new pouch that had been tied to one of the front pouches of the arming harness.  The needle and threads stashed away in the pouch, mixed with some metal disks, would work well enough on the torn tunic, if she got around to it, Laun figured.  The Lady Hellon had taught her to do some sewing and embroidery several years before, though Laun could never understand why the Lady would want to spend time with a slave.  She had seemingly found herself at the side of Lady Hellon several times through the year for odd reasons, like the sewing.  She had even asked to dine with Laun the evening she had taken ill.  Laun blinked and tried to focus on the things in front of her again, not the past.

The backpack had a pair of knee high boots at the top.  Laun took off the sandals she had been wearing since before the raid and pulled on the thicker boots.  The boots were a little big, but Laun, who had never worn anything but the barest of sandals or thick wool slippers before, figured they were supposed to be worn that way.  She was admiring the softness of the leather when she heard the sound of splashing from the river.  Laun soon heard many hoofbeats coming towards the castle.  She didn’t feel like being seen as fear and panic gripped her, so she wrapped the dust grey-brown cape tight around her.  The shadows of the woods hid Laun against any prying eyes.

Not being seen was good.  The bandits that had raided Lord Salam-Dir’s castle were about to attack Lord Helmic the Black’s castle.  Most of the soldiers and lower class people were off at the Festival several days travel away.  Lord Helmic had gone back to his castle because he had received a message that he was needed urgently, a message that had not been sent from his household.  He had been trying to figure out the message when Laun had been presented to him.  Lord Helmic the Black was not to know who had deceptively taken him away from the Festival.

Laun watched as the bandits forced their way into the castle.  Screams that sounded like the ones she had heard too soon in the past echoed through the silent woods.  The clank of steel against steel and war cries reminded her of the last she heard her Master.  It vibrated through her bones, making her want to join in with the defending of the castle and keep against the bandits.  The fear of death, the fear of not fighting well and the fear of not completing the geas given to her by her Master made her stay still in her cloak.

Laun sat under that tree, safe from harm as the people in the castle before her were slaughtered.  It took almost three hours until the last screams were silenced. Darkness from the advancing night made it almost black in the trees that Laun was sitting under.  She could not help pulling the cloak even tighter around her as the bandits assembled outside the gate.  The bandits rode out of the castle with bags and carpets filled with loot from the unfortunate place.  A few of the horses and mules had bound women tied to them amongst the loot.

The ill-gotten items clattered by as the bandits left in the dimness of evening.  Laun moved and a pain shot through her neck and jaw.  She smiled to herself as she rubbed her jaw where Lord Helmic had decked her.  She stopped and looked down at the cloak in shame for her pleasure at Lord Helmic’s death.

The weary girl picked herself up and followed the bandits.  She was glad that one of the things that the people of the castle had given her had been a real backpack.  All the stuff together was heavy and would have been really troublesome if she had to have carried it all in her burlap sack.

Laun came out of the wooded trail and realized that the sun was gone from the sky, but the dark of the trees was not as thick along the open river.  Clouds were tinged with red on their undersides along the Western sky over the trees and Lord Helmic’s castle.  The clouds were thick and black in the rest of the sky.  With the moon just waxing from it’s balsamic phase, no true light was promised from the heavens.  It was going to get very dark, very soon.

The bandits were ahead of her enough that she was certain that she would not catch up to them.  They were not trying to keep their trail secret.  At the river, Laun saw the body of the ferryman on the ground near his boat.  Good fortune had been with her, if not the boatman, for they had left it unharmed and on the beach.  There were signs that other flat bottomed boats had landed next to the ferry and she could just see a boat on the other side of the river several leagues past the beach Laun had met the ferryman.  The bandits had lit lanterns and the lights bobbed along as they disembarked on the other shore.

The one ally that her Master had sent her to was now dead.  Laun could not go back to her home and she could not stay in the recent death of Lord Helmic’s mains.  She had hoped that the ferryman would be there to take her in, to help her, but with his blood seeping into the sandy shore, that was not to be.  The scrap of map she had did not show anything useful.  Laun stuffed it into the backpack and decided to try to follow the bandits.

Laun pulled herself to the other side of the river with great effort.  She had a great appreciation for the ferryman and his trade.  Blisters started to form from pulling on the wet, heavy rope and a few burst even before she was halfway across the river.   Laun could not see in the twilight that there was blood on the rope as she stumbled out onto the beach.  The pain in her shoulders and back made putting the backpack on too painful immediately, but she had to push on.  After a rest on the shore, she followed the bandits past the abandoned boats as best she could along the river road.

The tired and hungry girl finally stopped when she realized she could not see the road anymore.  Night was thickly around her and the fog of weariness made any more travel impossible.  Laun collapsed into a pile of leaves just off the side of the road and slept heavily.

In the morning, Laun ate some of the few travel cakes she had and drank the dryness from her mouth away with river water.  Travel cakes are known for their dryness, but Laun figured that the dryness was normal for all foods not from her own home castle.  She missed being a slave-girl.  She had heard stories of other Masters who beat their slaves to a bloody pulp for no reason.  Lord Salam-Dir had hit her several times that she could remember, but she had been out of turn in something she said or had spilt on him when she served drinks.  The one person who had beaten her severely at the castle had been the Dance Master.  But other than that, Laun had always had food and a place to sleep.  That was a security that she had never chaffed against.

Her mother had been a slave at that castle when Laun was born and had died a scullery slave only a few years before.  They had worked together in the kitchens of the Salam-Dir castle until the Dance Master had come to the castle and started to train her.  It was hard, but it was what she knew, what she was brought up to be, nothing before that mattered or remembered clearly.  She was scared now that she was freed and had to revenge her Master.  Laun did not believe that the training she had prepared her for what was before her.

The muscles along Laun’s back were sore and her arms were stiff in the morning chill.  She walked about and tried to do her dancer’s stretches to limber up.  The leather warriors harness had rubbed a few places on her shoulders and hips raw, but she still could not figure out how to take it completely off.  With her aching hands, she could reach a few of the buckles and it did relieve some pressure to undo them, but then the section would flop around.  Laun re-buckled the harness at a more comfortable tightness in some places.  The sunburn that she had was not relieved so easily.  Parts of her shoulders and her nose itched where it was starting to peel.  Laun tried to move and think about something other than her tired, sore body.

The short sword from her Master was on top of Laun’s things.  She picked it up with both hands and tentatively swung it around.  Her muscles were still sore, but moving them helped to make the pain go down.  The sword felt odd in her hands, made more so with the few blisters that were still on her palms.  She had been taught several cane dances and those movements worked with the short sword.  Laun slowly went through one full dance with the sword acting as cane, the music going through her head to keep her feet going.  Her arms felt like wet linen when she was done and she ignored the blisters that had grown and torn open as she had ‘danced’.  She rested for a few minutes while chewing on another of the travel cakes.  She still hurt, but she could move, which was what she needed.

Laun set out again to track the bandits when she felt like she could move without dropping anything.  She didn’t know where she was or where she was going.  The scrap of map she had stopped with a ragged edge through Lord Helmic’s lands, cutting across the river and road.  She had to keep going, to avenge her Master.  The day was long, but Laun was able to keep track of signs of the bandits.

Laun did not realize that she was walking slowly, just that it was painful going.  There were a few farmer’s huts along the road as it bent away from the river.  Laun walked past trying to not bring attention to herself.  She did not know how to talk with people or even approach to ask for any sort of help.  There were a few people on horses that rode past in the direction that Laun was traveling, but none of them paused or even nodded recognition to the girl.  When there were no others around, Laun tried to keep the cape as open as possible, pulling up the hem and draping it over her backpack to try to catch any of the cool breezes that seldom went past her on the road.

A few hours past nightfall, Laun found a small inn to stay at.  When the innkeeper asked for money, Laun again didn’t know what to do.  She had her pouch of little things. The pretty copper and silver disks in with the needle and thread had no apparent use.  She figured that those might be what was called money.  She gave to the innkeeper a shiny copper piece and he sneered.

“You can sleep by the fire in the common room.”  Laun was happy that she was going to actually be sleeping in a warm place that night.  She spent another copper piece on a hot bowl of gruel and was satisfied as she curled up in a corner with her cape as a blanket.  Her back was against the wall, the pack between her and the wall as a lumpy pillow.  She had little concept of security, but it did keep her from being a target of the few moderate thieves that passed through the common room of the Inn while she slept.  It was not a rowdy group that night as most people were at the Festival, but Laun slept through what little commotion there was.  And dreamed.

She dreamed that she was in a place of sheer curtains, light and wind.  No need to walk, no sore body, just a place to exist.  Her simple dream was interrupted when she woke many hours later to a boot toe in her ribs.  The Innkeeper had a Lord that was passing through the area at the tavern for a rest and he didn’t want the noble to see any commoners lying around.  It was several hours past dawn and Laun needed to get out on the trail again.  A gentle housemaid brought Laun a bowl of soup without Laun asking.  The maid just gave it to Laun with a knowing nod and left without asking for payment.

Laun ate the luke warm, bitter soup while sitting across the room from the Lord the Innkeeper had been worrying about impressing.  He was familiar to Laun, but she could not remember if he had been a guest of Lord Salam-Dir or not.  He was about the age Lord Vami had been, and his short, helmet length hair was a greying brown that pushed something in the back of Launs mind, but not far enough forward for her to see.  The people the noble had with him were talking in low tones.  The Innkeeper fussed around the noble until a few soft words made the man back away and into the kitchen.

A few words here and there drifted from the low tones of the Noble, but all Laun could make out was that he was worried and needed to get back to his lands.  The training from the castle let her pick that out of the murmur without looking like she was listening at all.  It was interesting to her that yet another noble was traveling away from the Festival, but it did not occur to her why it was significant.  Laun was done with her meal, gathered her things against her chest under her cape and tried to leave the room.  One of the men with the noble reached out and waylaid her when she passed close.

“What’s a pretty thing like you traveling alone?”

“Please sir, leave me be.”  Laun struggled not so gracefully to get out of the man’s clutches.  Laun could feel the cold sword’s pommel against her chest under the cape and tried to hold the cape tight.  The man’s hand was strong through the fabric of the cape and Laun could feel the bruise on her arm already.   “Sir, I must be on my way.”  She tried to pull away from the man.

The man laughed.  “This one has some fight to her.”

The noble spoke in a low but clear voice.  “Let her go.”  The young man let Laun go almost reflexively at his Lord’s command.

“Thank you, sir.”  A bare curtsey and Laun just about ran out of the inn.  She slowed when she had rounded a curve and could not see the inn any longer.  She sat on the grass alongside the road for a few minutes to regain what composure she could before putting her backpack on over her cape and started to walk again.

The land was different here than what she had been traveling through in the past days.  The woods were parting more and more to show fields of flowers and tall grasses.  The dirt had a different color, too.  It was grayer- bluer might have been a better description.  About a half hour away from the inn, Laun found a small break in the trees off the main road that she followed for a few yards to a small clearing.  She had to relieve herself and decided to try doing the dance with the sword again to help get a few of the aches out of her muscles.  Her palms were covered with the crusting blisters which made holding the sword difficult, but she did it.  The pommel was dripping blood and the clear fluid from the blisters at the end of the dance.  Laun took some of the water in her waterskin and rinsed off the sword and her hands before wrapping the sword in the loose fabric and putting it in the backpack.  Laun finished off the water in a few gulps and looked for another journey cake, but she did not have any more food with her.

Laun looked around as she came out of the woods and back onto the main road.  It had been heavily traveled over the last few days and, with how dusty dry it was, she was not sure which tracks were the raiders.  She set off in the same direction she had been traveling before and tried to just focus on moving under the weight of the backpack.  The cape held in the heat from her journey, but with the sunburn and the torn tunic, Laun felt it was best to deal with the heat than to be exposed on the road, in many ways.

There were few other travelers on the road.  The one who finally talked to her was a merchant who was cursing to himself about not hearing about the Festival until a day before as he pulled up to Laun.  His old mule was laden down with various items, most of which Laun had no concept what they were for.  He was still muttering to himself as he fell into step with Laun, but there was a smile on his face as he nodded to her.

The merchant had a set of clothes on that had been bright and luxurious when they had first been made.  That must have been several years, and several sizes, ago.  The merchant had seen more profitable days before and the clothing was loose to the point that his belt could barely be seen under the folds of fabric from his tunic.

“My girl, are you going to the Festival?”

Laun tried not to flinch when she realized he was trying to talk to her.  “I have business elsewhere, sir.”

“I did, too, but I heard of the Festival and had to go.  Business has to be better there...”  He realized that he was talking to himself.  “I am Geralk, merchant of medicines, trinkets and gossip.  Who am I addressing?”

Laun was not sure what he meant, but said, “I am Laun.  Um - Lady Laun of Salam-Dir.”

“Ah!  Lord Vemi’s Lady?  You are much younger than I had thought-”

“I am sorry to say that I am his heir, not his wife, sir.”

The merchant was quiet as they walked side by side.  The mule clomped behind them, the lead slack and almost dragging on the ground.  “Heir?”

Laun nodded.  “My Master sent me away to...find someone.  Unfortunately, both are now dead.”

The merchant smacked his lips at the news.  As an information gatherer, this jewel just given to him was quite a tradeable item.  It had been quite some time since anything had been presented to him so openly as the information trade was, by it’s nature, shady.  The young Lady did not hide her feelings well to Geralk as he began to read her in earnest.  Her stride in the loose boots was obviously unaccustomed to them and hardly stretched the hem of the flowing, sheer skirt.  The cape was of a good quality, though the tunic he saw in glimpses under it was rough and seemed to be torn.  She had a red, sunburnt nose and dirt on her face and hands.  Those hands were delicate and did not look as though they knew hard labor, though he could see small streaks of blood on one palm from broken blisters.  Her eyes were a clear, hazel-brown that seemed to have a dark shadow over them.  The nose... reminded him of someone, but he could not put a finger on it.  The hair that was not under the cape’s collar was loose and a dark brown with hardly a wave or curl in it.  The pack she had on her back was not full, but there was a sword pommel loosely wrapped with a fine, light fabric that stuck out of the top.  The girl walking next to him was odd in the contradictions she showed, but the Merchant knew how to find out more.

“Ah.  I am sorry to hear that, Lady Salam-Dir.  May I offer my condolences?”

Laun again did not know what he was trying to say, but tried to come up with something that sounded like she knew what she was doing.  “If you think it is proper, please do.”

Geralk paused in his stride, his mule stopping a few paces behind him.  Laun stopped and turned to face the man.  Geralk took the threadbare cap from his head and bowed to her.  “I regret meeting you under such circumstances and wish to let you know that your Father will be greatly missed.”

Laun felt her face flush.  She made a curtsey, as much as she could in the loose boots and tight leathers, and replied, “Thank you, sir, but I said I was his heir, not his Daughter.”  Laun turned and started up the road again.

The merchant was not as embarrassed as Laun at his erred condolences.  He had not remembered there being any offspring from the marriage and Laun had just confirmed that.  It was odd to Geralk that a woman had been named heir, but nobles did things that sometimes just did not make sense at the time.

He popped the cap back on his head and hurried to catch up with the Lady.  “Please accept my apologies, Lady.  I did not mean to assume...”  He tried to be inoffensive but leading in his tone.

Laun, having an artless knowledge of the world outside her dancing, did not realize what the man was trying to do.  “No need to apologize, sir.   Until a few days ago, I was just a...servant to my Master and my Lady Salam-Dir.  The need to have an heir and his geas upon me were...sudden.”

“Ah!  A geas?  And what type of mission did your Lord send you on?”  Geralk reached into a pouch and brought out some dried meat, handing a chunk to Laun.

Laun’s stomach betrayed her hunger as the bowl of bitter soup was several hours behind her and even though she had been a slave, had never missed a meal in her 17 years at the castle of Salam-Dir.  She took the chunk of meat and sucked on it for a moment.  The look of food ecstasy was gratifying to the merchant as he chewed on his own piece.

Around the meat, Laun said, “I was to go to Lord Helmic the Black for help, but I was refused by Lord Helmic and sent away...  Right before his mains were raided and he and his were killed.”

The merchant almost choked on the dried meat, and not because of the salty dryness.  He coughed a few times and exclaimed, “Raided?  We haven’t had such things happen in the Midlands for at least a generation.”  He stopped, putting his hand on Laun’s shoulder to stop her.  “My Lady.  Do you mean to say that NestWood has no master?”

Laun shrugged, the motion shifting the pack on her back and opening her cape to briefly show the metal crest on her chest.  “If that was what Lord Helmic’s lands were called, then yes.  I have learned more of the world outside my Master’s castle in the last few days than I had known ever while in those walls.”

“Lady, may I escort you to... to...  Where may I ask are you going, now?”

Laun saw a fallen log alongside the road and went to sit on it.  If they were going to be stopped, she was not going to have her feet suffer for it.  She slid the pack to the ground and warily sat.  The cape was pushed back and the Merchant could see the warriors harness under the torn tunic fully.  Laun chewed on the dried meat and did not answer the merchant.

“Lady?”  He pulled the mule off the road and dropped the lead over the end of the log.  The want of information from this miserable looking girl collided with the need to comfort and protect her.  The merchant watched as his pack animal started to chomp on some scraggily grasses alongside the dirt road.  He turned to the young lady sitting on the log still chewing on the dried meat and made a decision.  Geralk went to one knee and hesitantly held out his hand.  “Lady Laun, what do you need?”

Laun swallowed and looked at the presented hand.  She looked up from his hand and said, “I don’t know.  I am not used to being called lady and I don’t know what it means.  My Master’s Lady died suddenly so he could not go to the Festival and then our lands and people were raided and he died defending me.  But he knew something was going to happen somehow and he made me his heir and made me promise to go to Lord Helmic to help get revenge.  But now that I have seen the deaths and Lord Helmic is gone, all I can do is follow the bandits that did it to try to revenge for them myself...”  Tears, the first full tears Laun had let herself have that day, welled and fell down her face, turning the road dust into dark streaks on her cheeks.  Her shoulders shook under the cloak and her hands went to hide her face.

The glee of having a tidbit of information handed to him was quelled as the enormity of what the girl in front of him had said sunk into his mind.  Having two major Lord’s lands raided-no, invaded-and their masters killed tasted of more than mere outlaws looking for money and goods.  Geralk had not heard of any of the grayworld’s people recruiting for such a raid, but he had been trying to sell wares to house mothers who did not need the things he had and people very rarely slipped good saleable information into conversation with him anymore.  To be able to use this information, not just sell it, he needed to be careful.

“May I escort you to the Festival, Lady?”

She let her hands fall back down as Laun thought and shook her head.  “I need to find the bandits.  I doubt that with the number of men that they would be going to and from the Festival.  It would cause suspicion when they would suddenly leave and then come back with goods and slaves from other people’s lands.”

The merchant was impressed with how the young Lady thought.  Inexperienced she may be, but she had common sense to make up for it.  “Then, may I travel with you as far as the crossroads?   There is an Inn there and it would be my pleasure to buy you a meal before we part.”

Laun smiled.  “Yes, thank you, sir.”

They walked for a few more hours, just a couple of other travelers passing them and one harvest wain being pulled down the road by several workhorses.  Small huts here and there near cereal fields that were just starting to turn from spring pale green to summer deep green had women with children running around their skirts.  A few gatherings of men on either sides of stone walls were passed, Geralk always stopping to greet the men and on occasion sell a trinket or salve before briskly going on again.  Laun understood that this was his livelihood, but the way he asked the men about large groups of men going to the Festival was subtle and she found that she picked out information about the bandits.  Geralk was able to discern more information by what they did not say.

There was one crossroads that Laun thought they were stopping at for food, having been invited for a meal by her companion at a ‘crossroads inn’.  A few buildings larger than farmer’s huts were along the intersection, but Geralk just stopped to talk and sell things to the men and women cooling themselves in the shadow of the buildings.  Laun found out that the road that they were crossing went to the Lord Jeral’s lands at one turn and the other would eventually lead back to her own Master’s lands, though one of the farmers said that the bridge over the river had been damaged recently to Jeral’s lands.  Laun turned away from the land she knew and went to the merchant’s side.  Geralk finished his sales and packed a few things back onto the mule.

She wanted to say something, but the thought of her dead master and household made her shrink from what she really wanted to talk about.  “This land is larger than I thought it would be.”  Laun said to her companion as they started on their journey again.

The merchant looked sideways at the girl and said, “Have you never been away from the Salam-Dir lands before?”

Laun shook her head and said, “A horse-cart away to tend my Lady as she entertained others.  I have part of a map that helped me get to...here.  But, it was - I’m not sure how to say it.  It showed things wrong and did not have all the roads on it that it should.”

Geralk nodded himself and pursed his lips together.  “That has always been a problem.  Each Lord wishes to have their land celebrated and seem more important and one of the ways to do that is to have the cartographers enhance the Noble’s maps and diminish the lands around theirs.  I try to have maps made at each Lord’s land in my chest so that I have some idea of what may be there.”  He leaned over conspiratorially and said, “And I always make my own notes so it is easier for me to sell things.”

Laun smiled briefly.  “If I hadn’t been able to figure out which way to go, I would have been hopelessly lost following the piece of map I have.  Though, without my Master, I am lost-”

Geralk did not wish to hear any more pitiful comments from the girl, so he interrupted with, “Ah!  But you cannot be lost!  For I am with you!”

Laun smiled and rubbed at the purpling place on her jaw.  She walked next to the Merchant and politely nodded and shyly smiled as he went on about the land and people they were passing.  Laun’s feet and legs hurt more than they ever had before.  It was hard to concentrate on her traveling companion and she did not realize that he was slowing down to match her pace.

 

Chapter 3 - The MErchant Geralk shows kindness, and more of the world, to Laun