The Death of a Swordsman 14

14

Varad woke up to find a short man sitting on a chair by the doorway. The interloper was very lean, and had several braids of thick black hair tied back behind his neck. Even in the dawn they looked greasy. Like everyone else in the consequence, he wore a leather shirt that hadn't been sized well. It hung off him with bad stitching on the sides. His pants were a little better, but they were also belted tightly. They still hung in wrinkles.

"I am Farus. I've come to look at your legs," the stranger told Varad when the latter sat up.

"Why?"

"Because if they get infected, you'll die. Then we won't get paid for you."

Varad shrugged. He could not think of an argument for that.

The swordsman pulled the horsehair blanket off him and pulled his pants up around his knees. Farus walked over to crouch by the bed.

The wounds had all closed by now, and the skin was mostly a normal pink. Splotches of the extremes of white and red popped up here and there. The southerner looked carefully, and then placed his hands just above one ankle. He pressed firmly, but nothing wiggled.

"The bones have set," he observed.

"Yes, I know."

"Then why is it still splinted?"

"Because I crawl two dozen yards to shit three times a day," Varad said flatly. Without trying to be provocative, his words still came across condescending. "The splint keeps it immobilized."

"Then why when you sleep?"

"In case someone drags me off to see Lrok."

"Yes. That would hurt."

"It did."

"Oh, I know. I was one of the men who dragged you," Farus agreed.

Varad went silent. His expression hardened, but the other ignored it.

"Would you like to meet the other? Koquo is here as well. Koquo!" Farus called.

A head appeared around the corner of the door, and another braided figure stared in at Varad. He still looked exhausted.

Varad looked back and forth between them, and wanted to spit in their faces. He wanted to hurl people through walls. Farus watched him analytically, and then leaned back to sit against the sod wall across the small room. His feet still almost touched the bed. Koquo got bored, and pulled his head back outside to stare at the clouds.

"What is your name?" Farus asked.

The swordsman stared at him, and then sighed, momentarily as exhausted as his captors. He didn't see a point in refusing.

"Varad."

"Where are you from, Varad?"

"Dylath-Leen. I'm in the Red Guard."

"Ah, the Red Guard. The Swordsmen of the Asharai," Farus replied, knowing something of them. "Good fighters. Terrible horsemen, but good fighters. They ring southern cities, don't they? Tyr, Hysterat, a barracks at Asali Al. We know them."

"Yes," Varad agreed blankly. None of this was a secret. Except for the horsemen point, most of the rest was a matter of pride.

"Why are they the Swordsmen of Asharai?" Farus asked. "Are not all the Asharai swordsmen?" His questions were curious and non-hostile.

"The Red Guard are the greatest swordsmen of the lowlands," Varad replied simply.

"And they fight on foot, yes? They man the walls of your southern cities and pull guard detail?"

"Yes," Varad agreed again, still speaking blankly without inflection.

"What do you do?"

"I'm a Swordsman."

"Not anymore. You cannot stand, and your blade is broken. You are a prisoner," Farus pointed out.

"Fine. I'm a prisoner," Varad agreed, apathetic.

"So what did you do?"

"I was a sword fighter."

"And what was a sword fighter doing alone so far from the northlands?" Farus asked again.

"How far from the northlands am I?"

"Does it matter?"

"I want to know when to expect my ransom."

Farus shrugged. "You are a two hundred leagues from Hysterat. It will be weeks still. That is, if they ransom you at all."

"They will."

"You are sure of this?" Farus asked.

"They always ransom their own," Varad replied simply.

"You haven't told me what you were doing here," Farus told him.

"Yes, I haven't," Varad replied.

Koquo leaned around the corner to say something, but Farus waved him back in silence. The sentinel frowned but obeyed.

Varad suddenly wondered why this one was ordering the other one about, and why he was suddenly asking questions. He hadn't said anything important, but suddenly an uneasy feeling hit him. The curious expression on Farus's intent face was unaltered, but Varad suddenly lost the stomach for the conversation.

"Is my meal ready? Don't you want me nice and fat to command a high price?" Varad asked pointedly.

Farus stared at him. His expression was patient and curious. The prisoner hoped, suddenly, that this Farus would threaten him with withholding food, or perhaps a beating. Varad bet he would laugh in their faces when they did their best.

"I will see about your meal," Farus said, pulling himself up to his feet. "Lrok has ordered that one of us sit with you at all points. Koquo will do it now while I go."

The two plainsmen switched places, and the larger and quieter Koquo took a seat near where Farus had. Varad turned his head to the wall and tried to ignore him.

"His loyalty is weak. He is no redcloak or bears them little allegiance," Farus was telling Lrok a moment later.

"How do you know this?"

"He called the Red Guard 'they.' He never said 'we,'" Farus explained.

Lrok nodded. He was sitting on a boulder, looking down on the herds below. The riders were breaking the cattle into smaller groups with the dawn, and taking them out to the different dells between rolling hills for the day's grazing. The massive horned man was watching them go, and picking at a hand with his teeth. There was still some meat on the fingers.

"Then who is he?" Lrok asked.

"A sword fighter."

"The redcloaks are the Swordsmen of the north," Lrok pointed out. "You said he was not one."

"At least, he thinks himself one. He tries not to care, but he has pride about it. I tried to argue, and he avoided that like it would cause him pain."

"He doesn't seem one to fear pain," Lrok replied.

"I doubt you could break him with pain, sir, but threatening his swordcraft would be different."

Lrok noted the shift from 'master' to the less formal 'sir' but said nothing.

"Also, he is very certain they will ransom him," Farus added. A twinge of uncertainty hit him, and he was uncertain if his choice of address was a transgression against due respect. He avoided using any direct term in his next few statements.

"The redcloaks always ransom their own," Lrok replied. "I have heard of this before."

"He is not a redcloak Swordsman, but he was a swordsman. This one thinks the other Swordsmen value him highly," Farus expanded.

"Why is that?"

"I will learn," Farus promised.

Lrok nodded. "Go. Feed him. Unless I decide he must die, he must be well fed. I want him fat."

Farus nodded, then rose from his squat and loped down the rocky hillside. His horned master nodded slowly, and lumbered, squatting while using one hand, to the edge of the boulder he perched on to stare down at the sod hovel his prisoner was kept in. That the northerner was a swordsman just made his death more of a question. Lrok tried to decide if the higher likelihood of the paid ransom meant he should or shouldn't kill the prisoner anyway. He went back to gnawing the flesh off the fingers in thought.