Winterheim

11

Strongwind was on his way out of the salt block storage room when he felt a firm hand on his shoulder. He turned to see Black Mike, dark brow furrowed with concern, peering at him closely.

“One more thing. I’m going to be keeping my eye on you,” declared the swarthy rebel with no hint of apology. “I don’t like that you heard my name so soon-or the way you came looking for me.”

“I am a man of direct action,” the slave king replied. “Your secrets are safe with me-and as I told you, I think I’m in a position to help your movement.”

Mike snorted. “Movement? Bunch of skulking around, pretending something might happen? Not much movement going on, but we’re still alive, and we want to keep it that way.”

“I may have misjudged you,” Strongwind said, his tone intentionally harsh. “A lifetime of slavery is intolerable, but people make adjustments. Maybe you’ve adjusted more than you want to let on?”

“You watch your tongue!” The brawny hand on his shoulder tightened its grip, and the Highlander shrugged it away, quickly snatching Black Mike’s wrist in his own hand, squeezing until he felt the bones start to shift.

“I am used to watching my tongue,” replied Strongwind, conversationally. “I never say anything unless I mean it.”

The rebel stared into Strongwind’s eyes for a long beat, as if studying him. Finally he spoke again. “If you’re speaking the truth and you want to do something, see if you can learn how the king gets to the Lady Thraid. We know that he has a way to do so, but none of us has been able to track him. He is the monarch of this entire city, and it cannot be possible for him to hide-yet somehow, he does.”

The slave king nodded, his expression cold. “I will keep my eyes open,” he said.

He turned his back on the glowering slave and made his way through the salt alcove into the great room of the market. The line at the fish booth was long, but he stood patiently waiting until he was able to collect the two salmon requested by Thraid Dimmarkull. The two large fish were whole, though they had been gutted, and they were wrapped in a blanket of fresh kelp. Carrying the load awkwardly in both hands, he started toward the gateway leading back to the promenade.

“Hey, Big Guy-where have you been keeping yourself?”

“Tildy-hello!” He was delighted to see the short, sturdy slavewoman, who had come up beside him unnoticed. Her cheeks were bright and rosy, and her eyes sparkled as she smiled at him.

“Looks like they’ve got you loaded down, already.”

“I guess so,” he said. “What are you here for, fish, salt, or something else?”

She laughed, and brandished a piece of parchment. “All that, and more, but I don’t have to carry it. I just bring a list, and they send it up to the Posting House. They keep us pretty well supplied.” Her expression grew more serious, and she looked at him carefully. “How is it for you? Have they given you a decent station?”

Strongwind shrugged. “A nice enough house, and the duty is not too hard. I think I might go mad if I had to keep at it for more than a month or two, though.”

“A noble lady’s house, Lord Forlane said. Who is your mistress?”

Strongwind hesitated momentarily, yet he quickly remembered that Tildy was the one who had, indirectly, put him in contact with the rebels.

“Her name is Thraid Dimmarkull,” the king replied, smiling as Tildy’s eyes widened. “I take it you’ve heard of her?”

“Heard of her and seen her. Her house is better than lots of places you could have ended up, I’m thinking.”

The slave king started to look around as they emerged from the great market hall, afraid that his encounter with Black Mike had taken long enough that Thraid would be irritated or even suspicious

“You! Slave!”

He turned to see a strapping ogre in the uniform of the King’s Grenadiers bearing down on him. The brute’s mouth was set into a cruel smile, but it wasn’t until the ogre rubbed a hand across his nostrils that Strongwind recognized him as Bloodsnout, the guard he had punched in the first hour of his stay in Winterheim.

“Careful,” Tildy whispered, somewhat unnecessarily.

“Here-can you hold these for a moment,” replied Strongwind, handing the two salmon to the slave woman.

“I look for you,” snarled the ogre, stomping closer.

“Glad to see you got that nosebleed cleared up,” said the man breezily.

Bloodsnout roared loudly, tucked his head, and charged with his long arms outstretched. Remembering the lash across his back, Strongwind skipped out of the way as the ogre rushed past. The enraged brute stumbled and nearly fell, finally lurching to a halt in the doorway to the market. Dozens of slaves scattered out of the way, many of them looking open-mouthed at the infuriated ogre and his calmly taunting adversary. Shouts came from the ogre guards in the market, but the throng crowding in the doorway prevented them from rushing out to intervene.

Strongwind was preparing to dodge another assault when he saw that Bloodsnout was hesitating, looking past the slave at something on the promenade.

“Whalebone! It’s about time!”

He actually felt a rush of relief to see the noble ogress come trundling toward him. He pivoted and bowed deeply.

“Yes, my lady.” He quickly took the two salmon, which Tildy held out for him. “I am returning with the fish, as you requested.”

“You were dawdling!” she sniffed, with a contemptuous glance first at Bloodsnout, then at Tildy Trew. “I was waiting for you too long!”

“My apologies, mistress,” he said humbly. “There were a great many slaves in the queue, and I did not press forward as aggressively as I might have.”

“Humph!” Thraid snorted. She extended the chain and fastened the lock to Strongwind’s collar while he stood still, biting back the anger he felt at the humiliating bondage. He was ready for her to pull on the chain, and when she did he was already moving, so that she didn’t yank him off of his feet.

“Come along, then!” she snorted, stomping away, with another jerk on the chain.

He took the time for one glance backward, saw Bloodsnout glowering at him, and caught a wink and amused smile from Tildy Trew. Strongwind fell in beside Thraid, who set a brisk pace along the promenade.

“Did you speak to the wench who is your informant?” Stariz asked, glowering at Garnet Dane in the temple where they met. He cringed as he advanced, then dropped to press his face to the floor before answering. “I want to know what my husband has done with this Highlander slave!”

“Yes, your majesty. My contact had good information. She tells me that the Highlander prisoner has been assigned to none other than the Lady Thraid Dimmarkull as a house-slave.”

“What? What! My husband intends to hide his prize away in his lover’s house?”

At first, her reaction was pure outrage-how dare he? Anger surged at the thought of this further humiliation, certainly done to cater to some whim of the wench. However, as she stomped around and thought about it, a tight smile gradually creased her square face. There were ways this might be turned to her advantage. This might not be such a bad thing, not so bad at all.

“So it would seem, my queen,” replied Garnet Dane. “Do you wish to command any further action on my part or upon that of my agents?”

She looked at him, eyes narrowed shrewdly. “No. For now it is enough to know where he has been placed. I think that his spirit will still slake the vengeful thirst of our god at the ceremony of Autumnblight, though he may have other uses before then. Tell me, this informant of yours-do you trust her? Is she well placed to maintain contact with the slave?”

“I can say that she has been a trusted source of information for many years, your highness. She seems very well placed in the human slave circles, with access to many different people, and I get the impression that she is trusted by all of them.”

“Who is she? What is her station?” asked Stariz bluntly.

She was surprised when her spy straightened up, regarding her with a fearful but determined, gaze. “I cannot tell you that, my queen-this is one of those few matters where I must maintain my own counsel.”

“You are audacious besides impertinent,” she said coldly. “Have you forgotten so soon my punishment of your failure?”

“Nay, Lady Queen, nor shall I ever forget. Please know that I shall allow no failure to occur again, but there are some secrets I must maintain solely to ensure that my own value is … understood.”

The queen nodded slowly. Despite herself she admired this little show of self-protection. Besides, the identity of the spy’s agents did not seem to be a matter she needed to pursue immediately.

“Very well. See that you remember your pledge, and maintain your ties with this informant. Caution her that she must continue ultimate discretion, for now she is to watch and wait. When the time is right, we will take action.”

“It shall be as you command, My Queen,” replied the spy, his face still pressed to the floor. “Do you have more instructions for me now?”

“No. You have done well this time. Now, leave me-I have rites to peform, then I must return to the royal apartments.”

The spy hastily withdrew, and the priestess queen turned to don her ghastly mask. Quickly she entered the sanctuary with its looming black statue and knelt at the feet of the monstrous image.

“My willful master,” she began and immediately was pressed flat upon the floor as the immortal weight of Gonnas came to bear full upon her flesh. She gasped from the mixture of pleasure and pain and sobbed out her acquiescence to her lord’s every command.

“What is it you wish of me, O Gonnas?” she gasped, fighting to push the air from her throat.

The response was not verbal, but she immediately sensed images of danger and menace, images of fury and volence, storming through her mind. She quailed at a sense of barely contained rage. She pictured a bull ogre in chains, frantically raging against his bonds and coming very near to breaking free. This was her god, both thrilling and terrifying. She quivered at the thought of the unspeakable power, the massive destruction, that might be wrought by the Willful One, should his anger be fully unleashed upon the world.

A bear lurked amidst her vision this time, the bruin followed by a leaping deer, and she recognized these two sigils of the human gods. Kradok, the god of the Highlanders, was often viewed as a bear, while Chislev Wilder-deity of the Arktos-assumed the guise of a deer, bird, fish, or other wild animal at will. As she watched, the bear loomed up to embrace the deer, and the two creatures fell to the ground, rolling together and soon merging into the flesh of one animal.

“I understand, lord,” she murmured. “I know thy enemy, and she is mine as well.”

Now she was pressed with a savage weight, far more painful than before, and she groaned and screamed in agony. “How have I failed you, master?” she cried, begging for an answer.

The response came in the form of another vision, an image of a leafy tree sprouting from the barren tundra. Limbs spread wide, and verdant greenery expanded in utter defiance of the snow and ice that spread in all directions. The tree seemed to have a light of its own, an internal brilliance that drove back the wintery dusk that should properly have shrouded such a scene.

This was the sign of another god, Zivilyn Greentree, she realized, and she took the vision as a warning. A warning of what? This was a god not of humans nor of the Icereach. Rather, the green tree was a god of seafaring elves.…

She felt fear, then, as a cold, angry pain took root in the pit of her stomach.

“I will wait for the Lady Thraid here,” Grimwar Bane sourly told Thraid’s two slaves.

“Of course, Sire,” said Wandcourt, the male. He arranged a fur and several pillows on the large, sturdy divan, and the king made himself comfortable. “I would expect the Lady Thraid to return within the hour.”

“May I get Your Majesty a mug of ale or warqat?” asked the female, Brinda.

King Grimwar nodded distractedly, then gestured to the man as his wife went to fetch him a drink. “The lady’s new slave …?”

“Yes, Sire?”

“As regards the matter of discretion, I should like the slave to remain ignorant of my presence here. I want you to summon two of my grenadiers from the Terrace Level watch station and post them outside the door. They are to see that the slave remains outside when your mistress returns home.”

“It shall be done, Your Highness,” said the man, bowing then leaving the apartment.

“You were flirting with her, I saw,” Thraid remarked grumpily to Strongwind, as they made their way back down to the Terrace Level.

“With whom?” he asked, startled.

“That Trew woman. I know her. Brinda has warned me that she is an untrustworthy wench.”

“We were not ‘flirting,’ ” retorted the slave king stiffly. “She was kind to me when I was first brought to the Posting House. She merely asked how my life has progressed since then.”

“Oh? What did you tell her?”

Strongwind bowed deferentially. “I explained that I had been assigned to the house of a great noblewoman and that I was bringing fish from the market-and just then I was accosted.”

“That Grenadier? Why did he attack you?”

“Because I punched him, Lady, on the day I was brought off the ship. He was a bully, and he made me angry.”

She looked at him slyly, her lips pursed as she considered his words. “I was warned that you could be dangerous. Would you ever dare to strike me?”

“No, I wouldn’t. You are not a bully,” Strongwind replied, realizing to his surprise that he was speaking the truth.

She smiled, apparently pleased with his words, and let the chain hang slackly for the rest of their descent. Soon they reached the Terrace Level, and ten minutes later they turned down the street leading away from the Promenade. Whale oil lamps, as always, kept the avenue brightly lit, though it seemed to Strongwind that there were fewer pedestrians about than would usually be found here during the middle of the day.

Thraid’s apartment was at the far end of this street. He had noted before that the lady’s chambers abutted the mountainside at the periphery of Winterheim’s hollow core-she had mentioned once that this helped to ensure her privacy as well as eliminate the problem of noisy neighbors.

Bearing his fish-load into that courtyard, still trailing the ogress, Strongwind was thinking about nothing so much as a cold glass of water, about putting down the load and catching his breath. He was taken by surprise when two large ogres, both dressed in the scarlet livery of the King’s Grenadiers, accosted them before the apartment’s front door.

“Mistress Thraid, welcome,” said one, with a deep bow.

“I thank you, but why-?” Abruptly a flush came to the ogress’s round cheeks, and she pressed a hand to her lips. “Oh my!” she declared. Quickly she stepped between the two guards, pushed open the door, and vanished into the apartment. His leash left dangling, Strongwind made to follow.

“Where you goin’, slave?” demanded one of the grenadiers, placing a rough hand on Strongwind’s shoulder, stopping him in mid-step.

“This is the house of my mistress,” he replied levelly. “I am on an errand for the Lady Thraid.”

“Yeah? Well, she’s got a different errand now fer herself.”

“What should we do with ’im?” hissed the other guard.

“Oh, he can’t go far. You just find somethin’ else to do, and come back in …” The ogre looked at his companion, who winked and grinned.

“Better make it two hours,” said the first guard, with a deep chuckle of amusement.

“Very well,” Strongwind said, puzzled-until, in a flash, he understood the guard’s odd grin. “I will leave this fish here and return later.”

The guards nodded carelessly, moving back into the shadows where they couldn’t be seen by the few passersby who came back this far from the promenade. Strongwind Whalebone turned his back and sauntered away until soon he was around the corner and out of view. There he found a small alcove in the side of the street where he could remain hidden. Making himself as comfortable as possible, he settled down to wait.

And to watch.