The Errantry of Bantam Flyn (The Autumn's Fall Saga)

by Jonathan French

  Deglan turned on his heel, but did not move from the stairs.

  “Clearly,” the speaker said with a self-effacing breath of laughter, “we have been well informed as to your skill. Many a report has reached our ears from the docks, attesting to your ability to cure various ailments. The local barbers and leeches have sat idle since you arrived here.”

  At last, the damn point of this summons.

  “Worry not,” Deglan told the judges. “I am leaving within the week. Your boys will have their trade back soon enough. They can go back to bleeding people and pulling teeth.”

  “No,” another of the guild masters piped up. This man appeared to be the youngest of the six and the only one whose heart was not likely to give out in the next five years. “You misunderstand, Master Loamtoes. Gipeswic must thrive. There is no place here for charlatans and hedge surgeons. Not when a Fae physician is a valued citizen.”

  Deglan fixed them all with his most shrewd glare, looking for the deception.

  Seeing his dubiousness, the original speaker jumped back in. “We are willing to construct a residence and infirmary to your exact instruction. We shall run all other claimants to medicine out of town if you so desire. We will provide you with any servants you require and if you wish to take apprentices, we will make certain you receive only the best and brightest of Gipeswic's sons as pupils. And. We will pay you a yearly sum of eight hundred sceattas.”

  This caused a stir in the gallery as men expelled their breath and began murmuring to their neighbors.

  “Money,” Deglan confirmed.

  He had witnessed mankind invent and forget the concept several times during his life. Minted coins were only the latest of man's attempt to attach value to a paltry thing for the sole purpose of hoarding it. In Deglan's youth, the Fae knew nothing of physical wealth. Immortality drove the pursuit of perfection, not comfort. The elves taught that each individual possessed an inherent love, what humans might call talent. Once this love was discovered it was to be honed for the benefit of all. Elven farmers nurtured their crops and fed their community, asking nothing in return. Surely, the harpist who delved daily into his art to provide music to ease his fellows deserved to eat from the bounty they provided, breaking bred at a table lovingly crafted by the carpenter who sat beside him.

  Not until the Usurpation did the Fae learn the inevitable imbalance of trade. Dispossessed and hunted, surviving hidden in the wilds while everywhere the Red Caps marched and slaughtered, the elves were forced to abandon their harmonious generosity. They took to the human ways of barter and payment. And where the elves trod, the rest of the Fae followed. Mankind was not to blame, they had not the gift of eternal life nor the aid of Magic. This was how they survived, knowing no other way.

  “Of course,” the guild master continued, “any money earned from the rest of the population would be yours to keep.”

  Deglan wrinkled his brow. “Rest of the population?”

  “Yes,” the fat merchant said, his smile broad. “The sum we would pay naturally covers the members of the Guild of Anglers and their families. We have no interest in what fees you charge the rest of the townspeople, provided our needs remain paramount, of course.”

  So, if one of these bloated bastards is passing a stone and one of the dockside whores is about to give birth, then luck be with the whore because Deglan surely would not be.

  “I see,” Deglan said. And he did. “Remember what I said about the cherries.”

  He turned and began making his way up the stairs.

  “Master Loamtoes!” one of the whale's pups called after him. “You have not given us an answer!”

  “Yes I have!” Deglan responded without slowing his climb.

  Ingelbert must have managed to keep his nose out of his book during the encounter, for he met Deglan near the door at the top of the stairs. Once outside the chamber, Deglan passed the mercenaries without a word, then thought of something and turned to face them.

  “Eight hundred sceattas a year?” he asked the sellswords. “What's that worth?”

  The lusty gleam in the eyes of the men was all the answer he needed.

  “Earth and Stone!” he swore, making his way quick as he could towards the blaze of light outside the whale's mouth. “I should take the damn offer just to poison those sacks of suet.”

  When at last they escaped the jaws of the guild hall, Deglan paced a moment, fuming. Ingelbert stood by, watching him with patient concern. The bustle of the street surged around them, people moving slump-shouldered about their daily business. Charcoal burners and dung collectors pushed handcarts, wearing the soil of their professions on their faces next to hard-set jaws. Swineherds and muleskinners led their charges through the congested lanes, the animals adding to the noise and reek that assaulted the senses. Rat catchers, scullery maids, oyster shuckers and fruit vendors, all of these and a myriad of other toiling vocations plied the streets, scraping a living out of the filth. And none belonged to the Guild of Anglers.

  These were the people the whales would see excluded from his care. Or at the least, pushed aside in favor of their own health. What did it matter? Even without the Anglers' selfish stipulations, Deglan could not handle the well-being of a town this size. Already, he awoke to a line outside the fishwife's hut, one that barely diminished come nightfall. The guild masters were not fools. Deglan would need the offered servants and apprentices if he were to stay in Gipeswic, but when would the time present to train them? They wanted their own brats taught at his knee, but if Deglan were to take an apprentice it would damn well be a fellow gnome. He had always intended to do it one day, pass on what Ruhle Nettle had taught him countless years ago. Maybe now was the time to send word to Toad Holm and inquire about a likely candidate.

  The direction of his thoughts halted his pacing.

  “Buggery and spit! Why am I considering this?”

  “Are you?” Ingelbert asked.

  Deglan shot a look up at the chronicler's long face. “No.”

  “So, um, then back to the Roost? Or Airlann?”

  “Yes.”

  “Which?”

  Deglan opened his mouth to answer and nothing came out. He did not know.

  Across the muck of the street stood one of Gipeswic's many wine sinks. These truculent establishments were hastily erected all over town whenever an influx of sailors made port and were in need of cheap, foul drink. This particular one was little more than a pavilion made of sailcloth, sheltering the drunken patrons from the worst of wind and rain, but doing nothing to keep their tuneless caterwauling or the sour stench of their cups from spilling into the street.

  The giant, Hafr, emerged from under the filthy tent, drinking horn in one hand and a tether in the other. Deglan was puzzled to see this tether attached to a goat, the very goat from inside the guild hall. The giant took a few guzzling swallows from his horn, then began leading the goat down the muddy lane.

  “What do you think?” Deglan pointed the odd sight out to Ingelbert. “That a pet or his evening meal?”

  And then Deglan saw it, his blood running cold. Slung across the giant's back was an imposing sword, no doubt collected from the mercenaries on his way out of the guild hall. Deglan knew that sword. Even sheathed and from a distance, he knew it. There could not be two like it in the world.

  “Ay!” Deglan called after the giant and then hurried after him. “Ay, you!”

  He left Ingelbert behind, but the chronicler's long legs quickly caught up to him.

  “Deglan?” the man inquired nervously. “What are you doing?”

  Deglan did not bother to answer. The street was crowded and the press of people made progress difficult. Everyone was taller than him and he pushed against a teeming barrier of legs and backsides. Hafr was taller still and was easily visible over the throng. The giant's limping gait slowed him, but the townsfolk did not impede his movement, readily parting to get out of his path. Deglan elbowed his way forward until he reached the small trail of abandoned street l
eft in the giant's wake.

  “Stop, you towering fuck!”

  Deglan felt Ingelbert place a hand on his shoulder, trying to pull him back and stop him from yelling at the same time.

  “Deglan,” the chronicler pleaded. “Enough. What is wrong?”

  Shaking roughly out of the man's grasp, Deglan approached the giant. Hafr had stopped and was now turning slowly, looking to see who had cast insults at his back. Deglan had to look up a long way to meet the giant's eyes. He was not afraid. Hafr was no taller than Coltrane, the Forge Born who was made of living iron. No taller than Faabar, who Deglan had stood beside and counted as a friend, as a brother for nearly two thousand years.

  Faabar, whose sword the giant now carried on his back. A sword Deglan had last seen resting on the fomori's scorched chest before placing the final stone on his cairn.

  “Where did you get that blade?” Deglan demanded.

  Hafr scowled down at him, then took a long pull from his horn. The immediate passersby had stopped, gathering around to gawk. Deglan ignored them.

  “Answer me, you daft bastard.”

  Hafr spit. A stream of warm, pungent wine spattered down on Deglan's face. He coughed and sputtered, hearing the booming laughter of the giant and the accompanying mirth of the crowd which followed. Deglan wiped the dark liquid out of his eyes with his sleeve, finding Ingelbert kneeling by his side and Hafr again walking away. He took a step after him, but Ingelbert grabbed his arm.

  “Master Loamtoes,” the man said, confusion spread across his face. “He, he could kill you! Whatever, this is about. Let it go.”

  “No,” Deglan growled, snatching his arm away.

  He caught up to Hafr again and darted around to get directly in his path. The giant stopped, looking down at him with renewed amusement.

  “You want to share another drink, maybe,” Hafr sneered, raising the horn to his lips.

  “I want to know how you came by that sword.”

  “You are too small for such a weapon, I am thinking,” the giant replied.

  “And I thought you too mighty to be a grave robber,” Deglan returned.

  Hafr's grin vanished. “Hafr Ring-Breaker despoils not the dead. I claim only what is won from those I slay.”

  “You did not slay the wielder of that sword,” Deglan said through clenched teeth.

  The giant shook his head impatiently. “Nay. It was a gift, not plunder. It was given to Hafr by—”

  Deglan cut him off. “I know damn well who gave it to you! Take me to him.”

  There was a moment's pause before the giant answered. “He is not here, maybe.”

  “He is here. You said a gift. Not paid for or bartered for. A gift. And a dwarf's gifts are not bestowed freely. You owe him something. He is here.”

  Hafr's face betrayed the truth. “Maybe he would like not to see you.”

  “Oh he won't,” Deglan affirmed. “But if I kill him, you will no longer owe him a debt.”

  The giant guffawed at this, then took a thoughtful swig from his horn before answering. “You? Slay he? This, Hafr would see. I go to him now. If you follow, you follow.”

  Without another word the giant started off again, tugging at the tether until his goat fell into step beside him. Deglan found Ingelbert a few paces removed.

  “Go back to the hut,” Deglan told him. “I will return directly.”

  The chronicler shook his head. “I, um, I think I will go along.”

  “You may regret that.”

  “Or you will if I, ah, if I do not.”

  Deglan had no argument for that.

  They followed Hafr into the craftsman’s district, passing stalls and shop-fronts occupied by cordwainers, wheelwrights, poleturners and billiers before reaching the hot, smoke-laden, clangorous alley that housed the smiths. Here, the buildings were made of stone and roofed in tile to reduce the risk of fire. A chorus of ringing hammers and roaring furnaces besieged Deglan's ears, the air in his nostrils dry and burnt. Within the forges, they passed sweating blacksmiths bent to task over their anvils with hammer and tongs while apprentice boys pumped the bellows, fetched water and shoveled coal.

  Hafr limped to the end of the alley where a courtyard containing a well was formed by several of the larger workshops. The grandest had a vaulted roof supported by stout beams and open to the yard along the entire face. Hafr eased himself down upon a low wall and gestured towards the place with a grin. Deglan looked up at Ingelbert and nodded, before the two of them entered the stifling heat of the great smithy.

  No fewer than three forges were housed within and could have been tended by a dozen soot-stained bodies, but the workshop was occupied by only a solitary figure. Deglan's rancor rose at the sight of the stocky, solid frame of the dwarf, his broad back turned as he smote the anvil.

  “Fafnir,” Deglan spat the name.

  The hammer fell again and then the dwarf turned to face them. He had changed since Deglan last laid eyes on him. The rust color of his hair had dulled somewhat and his beard had grown longer. His upper lip was still shaved, but the flesh of his face had lost its ruddy complexion, replaced with a sickly pallor. Still, he remained the same steel-peddling meddler he had always been. Fafnir's keen eyes took Deglan and Ingelbert in with a glance, squinting with interest.

  “The sour gnome herbalist,” he said, nodding at Deglan to mark his recognition. “Hog's Wallow. You are a long way from Airlann.”

  “As are you, dwarf,” Deglan snarled. “I see the distance from the Source Isle is already taking a toll.”

  Fafnir ignored this. “How can I be of service?”

  “Faabar.” It was all the answer Deglan could give, nearly choking with rage. He took a few steps further into the forge, picking up a smithing hammer lying on a nearby bench.

  The dwarf nodded slowly. “You think I dishonored him.”

  “YOU DEFILED HIS GRAVE!”

  Deglan could feel his entire body shaking as his voice reverberated against the rafters. “Faabar was my friend. I buried him with my own hands. And you? You dug him up to take back a damn sword. His sword!”

  “I retrieved the blade,” Fafnir admitted. “And covered the bones of the fomori once more.”

  Deglan had known it to be true, but upon hearing it from the dwarf's own lips, his fury boiled over. With a cry of anguish he threw the hammer at Fafnir, but he was clumsy with grief and tears blurred his vision. The flung tool spun past the dwarf, slamming into a rack of shields and sending them crashing to the ground. Deglan howled in frustration and made to charge Fafnir, but Ingelbert restrained him.

  “Does your avarice know no end?!” Deglan screamed as he struggled in the chronicler's grasp. “How dare you?!”

  Deglan wanted to kill him, even if it meant using his bare hands. The dwarf was taller and far brawnier, but it would not save him. This was the creature who had come to Hog's Wallow, tempting Faabar with promises of steel. When Fafnir returned a year later with the weapon, Faabar was injured and Deglan had ensured the dwarf came nowhere near his friend. But then death and fear had come to their village, forcing Faabar from the sickbed. He received the sword and, along with Deglan, the piskie Rosheen and a coal-haired mortal youth, set out to end the threat to Hog's Wallow. It was a decision that would end his life. Faabar had died standing against the goblin Flame Binder and his Red Cap zealots, sacrificing all to protect the community he loved. It was the beginning of a long and anguishing ordeal for Deglan, one which put Pocket in his path and continued to steer the course of his life.

  Fafnir had not even flinched when the hammer was thrown. He stared placidly, waiting.

  “How did you even know where he was buried?” Deglan demanded.

  “No weapon I have forged can hide from me,” the dwarf told him.

  Deglan surged forward again, but Ingelbert held him fast. “And you could not let it remain where it was?”

  “The price for the sword had not yet been paid.”

  “He traded dearly for it!”

&nbs
p; “No!” Fafnir's voice raised for the first time. “There was yet a debt outstanding.”

  “What?” Deglan scoffed. “To endure your presence on the road and guard your fucking goods?”

  “He agreed to travel with me, yes.”

  “Liar!”

  “Think on it, gnome!” the dwarf barked. “After a thousand years living amongst sheep and peasants, what did your friend possess of value? What could he have given me for so fine a sword? No, his desire was to leave Hog's Wallow, no longer to stand a useless guardian to a rabble of herdsmen. He yearned for greater purpose and I offered him a place. The sword was payment, herbalist. Payment for service the fomori did not render. Believe what you will, but a sword is not what your friend wanted. It was freedom from a life devoid of glory.”

  Deglan had ceased struggling. Could it be true? Had Faabar truly meant to abandon Hog's Wallow? If so, he had kept the fact hidden for over a year while he waited on the sword to be fashioned and delivered. Would he ever have told Deglan, or simply slunk away in the night, shameful and silent? They had fought together, bled together, saved each other many times during the Rebellion. At the siege of Bwyneth Tor, when the provisions ran out and they were forced to eat the gnomish mounts, it was Faabar who slaughtered Deglan's toad when he could not bring himself to do it. Why had he not told him? They were as kin. Deglan froze, paralyzed with realization. The answer was clear. Faabar, who knew him so well, was unwilling to suffer the censure he had witnessed Deglan dole out for centuries. Deglan would have judged him, harshly and freely, maybe even hated him. Even now, with his friend in the ground, he struggled with a rising bitterness.

  Deglan was too old not to know the truth when he saw it. His anger waned, replaced by a cold disgust for himself. He cocked an eye over his shoulder at Ingelbert.

  “Alright now, lad,” he said. “You can let me go.”

  Ingelbert removed his hands and Deglan took a deep breath, then looked up to meet Fafnir's implacable stare. Anger flared in Deglan once more, but he turned away from the despicable steel-monger before it could overtake him. Putting a guiding hand on Ingelbert's elbow, Deglan began to leave the forge. He stopped before he stepped outside, one question still remaining.