Tales of Downfall and Rebirth Read online

  “It’s a scam the West Valley Railway Company runs, that it is, the black disgrace of the world,” Órlaith agreed; she had a Mackenzie lilt to her speech, though not as strong as some. “Fell and evil sorcery: they wave a potato over boiling water while chanting chickenchickenchicken and call it soup.”

  Órlaith made the Invoking pentagram over her own plate and recited the Mackenzie blessing:

  Harvest Lord who dies for the ripened grain—

  Corn Mother who births the fertile field—

  Blessed be those who share this bounty;

  And blessed be the mortals who toiled with You

  Their hands helping Earth to bring forth life.

  She dug in. The Willamette River swarmed with sturgeon ten feet long or better and weighing hundreds of pounds each, and the Hopping Toad’s cook—she owned the place and ran it with her children and grandchildren—did them a treat. The flesh under the thick crunchy brown batter was moistly firm and almost meaty, much less fragile and flaky than most fish. They ate in companionable silence for a few minutes, if you could call not contributing to the background roar that.

  “Good to have you back, Herry,” Órlaith said at last.

  “Nice to be back, Orrey. I know the last thing you needed while you were winning hearts in Corvallis playing student was an Associate knight hovering in the background.”

  “Truth. They make a great noise about how cosmopolitan and sophisticated they are here, but they can be as parochial as any dun in the dùthchas or manor up north, that they can. Or Mormon village or back-country ranch over the mountains, even.”

  They chatted for a while, Heuradys filling in the latest doings in the north and greetings from her mothers, father, siblings, numerous nieces and nephews, and all their connections. After a while Órlaith chased down the last of the Hopping Toad’s own proprietary spicy ketchup with a final fry, took the first forkful of pumpkin pie and held it before her lips in anticipation while she watched her friend thread her way back to the jakes.

  I wish there was someone I could bet with, she thought, as the young knight passed a table where they had a platter of thirst-inducing fish tacos and a whole tall gallon pitcher of Dean’s Downfall between them, a dark amber brew that was dangerously smooth and fatally easy to drink fast, especially when a jalapeno hit your tongue.

  She grinned while she waited, remembering the first time she’d come in here on a crowded night. Nobody with any sense whatsoever tried it with the staff—you did not want La Abuela Montoya coming out of the kitchen with a frying pan in hand—but with an anonymous out-of-towner there was always some arsehole with one too many in them who thought they could pat or pinch . . .

  A confused flurry of movement, a yelp . . .

  Yup, she dislocated his thumb when he grabbed, she thought, taking the bite of pie and suppressing a giggle—she was getting too old for those. Just precisely the same move that I used, so it is. Now is that a different arsehole, or the same one showing an inability to learn from experience? To be sure, Herry has an outstanding rump and the hose show it off.

  The similarity wasn’t an accident. Heuradys had spent a lot of time over the last eight or nine years at the High King’s court, as a page and then a squire; she and Órlaith had had the same unarmed combat instructors. She hadn’t even paused in her stride as her left hand did a quick grab-lock-twist-pull on the man’s right; the perpetrator yelled loud enough to carry over the background while two of his friends—possibly his friends, they were laughing—held him down and a third popped the thumb back into place, which would reduce the pain from agonizing to merely bad. Just putting a dislocation back didn’t make it all better, of course. The overstretched tendons still had to heal, which could take weeks if you were lucky.

  When Heuradys came out again the server who’d waited on their table stopped to talk to her for a moment, smiling and standing with a sort of three-quarter-on hipshot posture. Órlaith couldn’t hear what was said—that would have been impossible at five feet, much less thirty. The body language was fairly unmistakable, and more so when the server wound up and tried to deliver a roundhouse slap to the face. The Associate simply pivoted and pulled her head out of the way, then administered a gentle two-fingered nudge to a precisely calculated spot on the back that sent the other woman staggering while she slid past and returned to the table.

  “And what was that after being about?” Órlaith said innocently, looking at her friend’s exasperated expression.

  “That insolent churl grabbed my—”

  “No, I meant the slap that did not hit, but which was meant with all her heart, so.”

  “The Three Spinners and their pervy sense of humor. Mostly people get slapped for making propositions, not politely declining to meet someone after the tavern closes. Why, why, why do people always assume I’m interested in girls that way?”

  Órlaith snickered unsympathetically. Turnabout is fair play.

  “Because of your scandalous choice in clothing? Hose on a woman . . . why, it’s unnatural, so it is!”

  Heuradys groaned. “Oh, I expect that sort of bullshit up in the Protectorate . . .”

  Órlaith nodded. She’d run into the same assumption herself in the north-realm, though it didn’t bother her nearly as much.

  “But here?” Heuradys went on disconsolately. “The only skirts you see here are on Mackenzies and McClintocks of both sexes.”

  “Some Corvallan women wear them on formal occasions; forbye they know that people in the Protectorate don’t regard it that way. And don’t be calling the kilt a skirt, woman, if you want to get out of here alive,” Órlaith said. “And then there’s your parents, all three of them, the which is not much of a secret. I think the lass recognized your blazon and her mind sprang into bed, also to a conclusion, so.”

  “That’s not hereditary,” Heuradys grumbled. “Nor obligatory just because you’re entitled to wear the d’Ath arms. And my lady-mother and Auntie Tiph are the most absurdly monogamous people I know, anyway—all One True Love for them; I doubt there was ever any picking up barmaids.”

  “That we remember. But you can never tell about parents; they start out as folk younger than us, you know. And now we’ll have to worry about her spitting in the beer. You should have agreed to meet her.”

  “Hey! Some sacrifices I’m not going to make even to get my liege-lady guaranteed un-spat-in Guaranteed Tenure. Anyway, isn’t that a philosophical puzzle . . . you know, like the tree in the forest with nobody to hear? Is there spit in your beer if you don’t see it put there?”

  Órlaith waited until her friend was drinking before replying: “I didn’t say you actually had to show up. We could bolt before your virtue was threatened.”

  Heuradys choked, sprayed a little beer onto her empty plate, coughed and then wheezed: “No fair!”

  “Now you teasing me is funny, but me teasing you . . .”

  “Oh, all right,” Heuradys said, and laughed as well.

  They both stopped when a tall young man in student garb who looked as if he played the local head-butting game forced his way through the crowd to stand by their table, looming over them in a halo of curly dark hair and beard. The man with the injured thumb trailed him, and one or two others—it was difficult to tell in the dense-packed gloom who was with whom. The waitress who’d tried to slap Heuradys was hovering behind them, looking amused but a little frightened as well.

  “Yes, goodman?” Heuradys said politely, since his glare was directed at her, laying down her fork and glancing up at him.

  Or reasonably politely; that was how a noble who was being formal but not ultra-snooty addressed a commoner in the north-realm. The young man was already scowling and clenching his fists. Now he ground his bared teeth in a way that would have been audible in most places. Órlaith carefully laid her hands flat on the table, and brought her right foot forward with the ball pressed firmly
to the floor and her knee cocked. It just looked like an interested position, but you could come out of it like a released catapult spring if you had to.

  Out of the corner of her eye Órlaith saw two people dressed like Mackenzies who’d been sitting and very slowly sipping one mug of Sophomore each all evening and playing a desultory game of fidhcheall. Now they put the mugs down and packed up the board and pieces on the table between them. They actually were Mackenzies, named Dobharchú and Sionnach—Otter and Fox respectively—but they were also members of the High King’s Archers, the Crown’s premier guard regiment. The Archers provided plainclothes bodyguards for her; they were under orders to be as inconspicuous as possible and do what she told them, but they’d interpret that in light of their first priority, which was keeping her safe. Dobharchú fished in her sporran as Órlaith watched and then kept that hand in her lap, which meant she’d put on her weighted brass knucks.

  Their swords were peacebonded, as all bladed weapons over four inches long had to be inside the city wall of Corvallis, which meant a length of lead wire and a crimped seal wrapped around the guard and sheath. You could pull it apart with a quick jerk, but you’d better have a very good reason for doing that.

  Sionnach just clenched fists like small kegs and scowled; he was a mountain of a man with a burst-mattress brown beard tied in two plaits dangling down his plaid, and looked as if he could twist horseshoes straight with his bare hands anyway, which in fact she’d seen him do as a joke at a Lugnasadh festival. His nickname was Sionnach Tréan, Strong Fox.

  “This isn’t some goddamned fief full of serfs, northerner,” the young man said to Heuradys.

  Which was a little unfair, since serfdom had been abolished in the north-realm after the Protector’s War, before anyone involved here had been born. On the other hand, the man had probably never been to the Protectorate, and had a mental picture of it based on old stereotypes, which had been exaggerated even in her grandfather’s day. Most people didn’t travel much. Plus he was flushed and weaving a little. Dean’s Downfall could sneak up on you unawares. Alcohol removed inhibitions, which turned the passively imbecilic into the all-too-active moronic.

  “You can’t go around bullying and molesting anyone you please here. Stay away from Shelly . . . from my girlfriend!”

  Heuradys ate the forkful of pie, looked at the rest and sighed. When she spoke her tone was as reasonable as you could be when you had to half-bellow. It was difficult not to sound angry when you shouted.

  “Goodman, nothing would make me happier than staying away from her. She tried to hit me. After I declined to meet her when the Hopping Toad closes to . . . ah . . . become better acquainted, she said.”

  “You lie!” the man blurted.

  Then he looked a little apprehensive as well as very angry and slightly drunk. Giving a knight the lie direct was a killing matter in the Protectorate; for that matter, calling someone a liar was pretty serious in most places. You couldn’t live like a human being without your reputation, and letting it be put in doubt by unchallenged slander was intolerable. Corvallis was a little different, being a great city with upward of forty thousand people, where a bit less depended on face-to-face dealings and reputation and trust and rather more on formal contracts. But Corvallis was also an urban island in a rural world, and he knew he’d gone too far.

  The law of the city-state might forbid dueling, but even here a magistrate probably wouldn’t do anything beyond levying a modest fine if Heuradys simply beat the stuffing out of someone who called her a liar to her face. As long as no killing or crippling was involved, of course, since this was a painfully law-abiding and peaceable town on the whole.

  Heuradys rose to her feet. She was an inch taller than the young man, whose eyes widened as he realized it. He was probably thirty pounds heavier but she moved like a cougar and suddenly looked as dangerous as one, as the last trace of lazy good humor fled from her face. He had the height and heft and beef for a pikeman, certainly, and if he had any war-training it would be how to march in step while carrying a pike. Not the intensive study of generalized mayhem that a knightly family’s resources and tradition gave their children.

  “Excuse me, goodman, but what was that you said?” she enquired politely. “It’s very noisy in here. I probably misheard you?”

  Ah, most excellent, Herry—you’ve given him a path to retreat. My parents are not going to be happy if there’s a sordid drunken brawl over a barmaid . . . regardless of who’s in the right or was actually drunk.

  “I said I believe Sherry, not you!” the man said, not notably backing down.

  Which was gallant, or gallantly inebriated, but stupid. There were times when she suspected that men suffered a brain shutdown when their voices broke and didn’t start it up again until they passed thirty, like millwork with a crowbar shoved into the gears. Throw in booze or jealousy, and you had a bonfire on legs.

  “Then you’re thinking with your dick,” Heuradys said crisply.

  She reached out with deceptive casualness and gave his nose an emphatic tweak.

  “Which isn’t what it’s for,” she added. “Go away and sober up, you silly person, before you get blood on my good shirt.”

  The Corvallan howled and clapped his hands to his face in reflex as red leaked between his fingers; knight training with long sword and heavy shield made your hands strong. Heads were turning as he roared, wound up and swung a wild haymaker—few could have heard what went on, but that was body language loud enough to catch the eye and carry over the white waterfall blur of sound. Most of those who’d noticed just looked, mugs and forks and spoons suspended; others bolted out the door, surged backward or came forward depending on the degree of their curiosity, boldness, sobriety or taste in entertainment.

  Some people liked brawls. As her mother was fond of saying, whatever happened to the wheat or barley there was never a failure in the annual crop of fools.

  She saw two men who looked as if they were members of the northern Guild Merchant glance at each other and then pour the last of their bottles of wine into their glasses and gulp them down . . . before they grasped the bottles by the necks and held them down by their sides, inconspicuously ready to leap up and whack heads. They might or might not dislike the aristocracy at home, and might or might not consider a shindy in a pub fun, but they’d probably pitch in regardless to keep a fellow Portlander from being mobbed. Órlaith felt a stab of dismay, like a splash of cold water in the gut.

  Oh, Mom and Da will so not appreciate a sordid brawl that turns into a mass punch-up over who was born where, with me taking sides since I’m certainly not going to leave Herry in the lurch, that they assuredly will not. And someone might get really hurt if that happens. There are enough old quarrels in Montival as it is, sure.

  Heuradys swayed aside and ducked slightly, and the punch slid over her head. Órlaith wasn’t worried about Heuradys d’Ath losing a fight with a single half-drunken tavern bruiser. The duck continued as she sank into a twist and then uncoiled into a blow with doubled knuckles up under the young man’s short ribs, putting the strength of gut and legs as much as arm and shoulder behind the pile driver impact. The whole process took about a second and a half, and ended in an audible meaty thud.

  Nicely done, Órlaith thought; you had to be an expert yourself to see how elegantly it had been managed.

  “Urk!”

  He started to double over. That turned into a pitch backward as Heuradys heel-hooked him, combining it with a shoulder-thump that sent him turning and falling facedown into the arms of his friends.

  Thus neatly immobilizing them all, and making a brawl less likely, so. Very nice, Herry.

  Their shouts turned to cries of disgust as he began to vomit copiously. Órlaith started to smile in relief despite the sharp acidic stink; there was something inherently comic about a man throwing up . . . on someone else. His friends, or acquaintances, dropped him to
the sawdust-strewn brick floor with a limp thump. For a fraction of a second she thought the whole thing was about to teeter over into fits of laughter, as folk relaxed and grins spread.

  Then the server leapt screeching over the man, throwing herself at Heuradys with clawed hands outstretched like an illustration from a book dedicated to proving men had no monopoly on folly. While she was still in the air the light went out as someone threw a tankard of beer at the nearest gaslamp. In the same instant there was a c-thuk sound, exactly what you’d expect from a hard head-butt.

  Órlaith surged up, ready to vault over the table and come down beside Heuradys. It wasn’t completely dark, the fire still cast a red glow and the more distant lamps were still on, but that was mostly blocked by people who’d also leapt to their feet. There was a confused buffeting and thrashing, and things bumped into her. A bottle crashed somewhere, there was a clang of pewter plates hitting the floor, and the noise rose from its temporary lull to a crescendo. Arms closed around her like winch-drawn cables, and she nearly stamped a heel down to break bones in a foot before she realized it was Strong Fox.

  He swung her hundred and fifty pounds around as easily as if she were a moss-stuffed doll, putting his own broad back between her and any danger.

  “Let me go, you great ungainly bachlach!” she shouted.

  She heard Herry calling the war-cry of her House: “D’Ath! D’Ath!”

  Which sounded exactly like Death! when you yelled it, which was pretty much the point.

  She struggled frantically. It was futile, as long as she couldn’t do anything really harmful to him; Sionnach weighed more than twice what she did, every inch of it muscle when it wasn’t massive bones. And his oath was to her father, not her; where her wishes clashed with the High King’s orders, there was no contest at all. There was another sound, a panting grunt and a crunch, which was probably Dobharchú slugging someone with her knucks.