Page 40

Tobi looks back at Lymok with a placid expression, thinking that he is demonstrating his acting skills in this very moment. But he suspects Lymok was implying his mother’s skills were something else.

Tobi holds Lymok’s eye. He smiles sweetly and says, “I suppose that is for my new Master to decide.”

Lymok reaches out and pokes Tobi in the belly. “Traditionally,” he says, “a kushir does not wander the halls of Urynwud. You ought to be in your chamber, bathing and oiling yourself and preparing to serve your Master when he has need of you.”

“I was given no such command,” Tobi says, matching Lymok’s cool tones.

Lymok tips his head to one side, looking Tobi up and down. “You’re quite a pretty thing, aren’t you? I do not have much interest in the tastes of the deep earth, but I could make an exception for you, you are as pretty as a female.”

“Thank you,” Tobi says, as if this was a sweet compliment not a bold assessment of how pleasurable he would be to fuck.

“Why don’t you come to the traders house and meet my friends?” Lymok says. “They are meant to be learning Artemian. I try to teach them and they could use the practice. And you are the talk of Urynwud. Perhaps you will inspire them to try your tongue.”

“I would love to,” Tobi says, still sweetly polite. “I am very keen to find out as much as I can about my new home.”

Lymok leads Tobi across the courtyard to a stone hut. The doorway is hung with a curtain of sacking.

The room inside is bigger than it looked from the outside. There is a large central space, taken up by four carts. Tobi glances them over with a sudden spark of hope, but they are none of them the cart that carried Tobi’s belongings from the campground by Ramriddle river.

These carts are much larger and partly loaded with goods ready to be taken to the markets.

“You are making ready to leave?” Tobi says.

“We leave on the morrow,” Lymok says. “Although the Exceli have been attacking our routes through the forest. I think we need an escort of warriors for protection, unless Harok wants all his traders full of arrows and all our goods taken by his enemies. But that is no matter for a kushir to mind. Come this way. Join us for a drink.”

Lymok leads Tobi through the large room and into a smaller one. This room has a low ceiling and the air is thick with moonleaf smoke, rich and woody. It’s a nice scent, a familiar one. Some things remain the same however far one travels, Tobi thinks, and men drinking and smoking moonleaf in dim poky rooms is one of them.

A small table is set in the room’s centre, with barrels around it for chairs. Four of the barrels are occupied with meaty looking Solwen who look up as Lymok walks in with Tobi. Clearly, this is where the traders spend their time.

“Meet our new kushir,” Lymok announces. “The rumours are true. Harok is allowing him to go wherever he pleases in Urynwud. He has come to visit us. Along with his guards.”

The Solwen all look at Tobi. Their eyes run up and down his body in the thin fabric of the alit. One of them says something in Ambolk that sounds quite crude.

“Artemian,” Lymok snaps. “He’s from Azuria. Be polite. He has visited us because we know his tongue.”

“His tongue,” says one of the traders in heavily accented Artemian. “You lose hand for knowing kush’s tongue.” He nods to the four guards who have lined up silently along the wall.

Tobi glances at them. He had assumed his guards were there to protect him. He hadn’t thought that protection would also mean his honour, his body. But now it’s been so boldly stated, Tobi wonders why he’d ever considered their purpose was for anything else.

“Don’t be coarse,” Lymok snaps. He gestures to the empty barrel. “Kushir, take a seat.” He looks to one of the other traders, “Amwel, give him a drink.”

Tobi does as he is bid and a cup of ale is slid in front of him. “I assure you that you are in no danger from my guards. I am just getting to know my new home. Tell me about what you do here?”

One of the Solwen frowns as if concentrating to understand.

Tobi says more slowly, “What do you do? Traders?”

The man nods, clearly he can follow this. “Take carts to Ceruleum. Not get arrow shot. Timber and gemstones .”

Tobi takes a sip of the ale. He still finds the taste rough but it is sharp and refreshing. “What things do you need? The forest seems to provide richly.”

The traders look back at Tobi blankly. It does not seem they know much Artemian at all.

“Not quite,” says Lymok, pulling over a barrel from a corner to sit himself beside Tobi. “There are extra things we don’t have in the forest. We trade timber and metal and gems for grain and wool and Juran spices.”

Another of the traders leans forward. “Where you from, kushir?” he says in a broadly challenging tone. His Artemian seems more accomplished than the first man’s.

“Northern Azuria,” says Tobi. “But I grew up in Fanost.”