by Cari Z
“No, but Mama has family there. It’s as good a place to start as any.”
“I don’t want you to go,” she said with an air of confession, and a moment later, her stern façade fell away, the tears overwhelming her. She muffled her sounds against his chest, but he felt every wretched quiver that racked her body.
“I’m sorry,” Colm said miserably, over and over, stroking his sister’s long dark hair. “I’m sorry. I have to go.” He let himself cry as well for a few moments, but his tears were nearly exhausted. He stayed quiet until her chest stopped heaving and her eyes slowly dried, then said, “Lee, I have to go. I want to go.” It wasn’t even really a lie anymore. “You’ll be all right.”
“I want to hear from you,” she demanded, recognizing his implacability. “I want letters, every week.”
“Lee…” Writing had never come easily to Colm. Every word was a struggle to set down, and he was never sure any of them were spelled correctly, not even his own name.
“Every week,” she said, punctuating each word with a poke to his chest. “I don’t care how hard it is, you owe me letters if you’re going to abandon me here.”
Colm scoffed. “You aren’t being abandoned. You’ve a whole family here.”
“Not a whole one,” Baylee corrected him. “No father, and soon no you. It sounds like a broken family to me.”
It sounded broken to him too, but Colm didn’t say anything. After a long moment, his sister sighed. “Come on, then. You’d better let me help you pack, or you’ll be out of socks and unders before you hit Isealea.”
“Your faith in me is heartening.”
“Ha! I know you,” his sister said, arching one eyebrow perfectly. It was a gesture she’d picked up from their father, and one Colm had never been able to duplicate. “Put you on a boat and you know where every last thread lies, but beyond that, you’re a bit hopeless.”
“I admit nothing,” Colm said loftily and was heartened by Baylee’s snort. “But I’ll let you help me, just this once.”
“I suppose this once is all we have.” Baylee turned and headed back to his room. Colm took a moment to bank the fire in the grate, then followed her.
They packed by candlelight, and Colm was astonished at how many of his things his sister was able to fit into his pack. He certainly wouldn’t want for socks, at least. She also pointedly stuck a rolled-up sheaf of parchment and a tightly bound flask of ink into a side pocket. “Don’t ‘accidentally’ lose them, now, or I’ll come after you,” Baylee warned him. Colm rolled his eyes but took the admonishment. “And take your gutting knife. You never know when you’ll need a knife.”
“Tellan will need a knife tomorrow to get the boat untied,” Colm murmured, and a second later, Baylee started to laugh.
“It couldn’t happen to a better man! Let him prove his superiority with that.”
The last thing they added to the pack was Ger’s ashes. “I miss him terribly already,” Baylee said pensively as she tied the whole thing closed. “But I will miss you more.”
“I’ll miss you also,” Colm said, and for a moment, the thought of leaving was almost more daunting than he could stand. He needed a distraction. “Come on, then. Give me one more tune on your flute before I have to go without.”
“I say again: it’s your choice,” Baylee replied, but she went to get her flute regardless.
One tune turned into ten, and even once her repertoire was exhausted, Baylee didn’t leave him. Neither of them slept that night. She and Desandre saw Colm off at the road leading out of Anneslea at dawn the next day. Desandre pressed a small pouch of coins into his hand along with the letter to her aunt, and then kissed him on both cheeks. “Be smart, and be careful. Find good company and let them guide you to Caithmor. And don’t walk the whole way. You’ll ruin your feet.”
“And write,” Baylee said again as she embraced him.
“Yes, mothers.” That got a smile from both of them. He left them like that, smiling silhouettes against the rays of light that crept over the edge of the mountains sheltering Anneslea’s little valley. He turned around once, before the road vanished into the trees, and they were still there. He waved, then continued on.
Colm never glanced back after that.
Chapter Two
It took less than a week for Colm to reach Isealea, the trading town at the foot of the mountain road, and it was by and large a pleasant journey. He had traveled this way before with his father, and Ger Weathercliff was known to many of the people along the way. Colm was easily identifiable thanks to his height, and as such he never spent a night on the ground, welcomed into little homes in familiar villages to share food and warmth, and light to hold back the night.
The last of these benefactors, an old farmer who just went by Raener, walked with Colm into Isealea, promising him an introduction to a caravaneer he knew who was headed for Caithmor. “Fergus is a bit of an odd one,” he confided as they walked along. “Spent too much time in the East, he did. Picked up some of their strange ways, but he’s a good-enough man for all that. Prays to the Four and fears the Two, and that’s what’s really important.”
“I do appreciate your help,” Colm said for probably the fifth time, and the farmer chuckled and slapped him on the shoulder. It felt like being smacked with a shovel.
“No need to get bent out of shape o’er it,” Raener said. “Your dad was a good man, always ready to help another out. He gave me half an hour of his time once and four slipperscales to show for it, enough to feed us for two days. Least I can do is pay his lad the same courtesy.”
Isealea was much larger than Anneslea, with multiple roads heading in and out of it instead of just the one. The town center was filled with a slow, steady train of wagons, horses, carts and mules and the people who drove them, with vendors lining the edges.
“Market day today,” Raener remarked. “A good day to find a group heading to Caithmor. Look for the man whose wagons are pulled by camels, lad.”
“What is a camel?”
The farmer laughed. “Oh Lord of Flame, you don’t know camels? They’re like a bumpy beige horse with a bad attitude, lad…there! Look yonder.”
Colm looked, and at first all he saw were two shaggy humps rising above the crowd. Then the creature raised its long neck, and Colm started with surprise. It had huge, heavy-lidded eyes and a mobile mouth full of teeth that were, frankly, terrifying. “That’s a camel?”
“Aye, lad.”
“Are they meat eaters?”
The farmer scratched at his beard. “Not that I know of. Right big, though, aren’t they?”
“Very,” Colm agreed, letting his companion pull him forward through the crowd a little reluctantly. The closer they got to the camel, the more of them he could see. There was a true caravan of wagons pulled by pairs of the beasts stretched along the east side of the square, each of the wagons somewhere in the process of loading or unloading. Heavy bolts of cloth were being dispersed, making room for local pottery and valuable water-mocker pelts. Much of the space inside was already taken up with furs, and the little room that remained was filling quickly, despite the lamentations of a tremendously round man wearing a set of brown desert robes. A turban wound around his head, and beneath it, bright tufts of copper-red hair protruded like weeds in an otherwise uniform garden.
“For the love of the gods, Marley, can’t you stack those tighter?” he bellowed, arguing with the porter who was loading his closest wagon. “I’ve got five more cases to go in, and at this rate, I’ll have to carry the damn things on my lap! I’ve hardly got enough room for a wench on my lap these days. What will I do with five cases of stoneware?”
“I’ll get ’em in, Fergus, ne’er fear,” the porter said patiently.
“You’d better, my man, or the curses of my wife and the dirges of my poor starving children will be on your head,” Fergus grumbled. He turned and caught sig
ht of the farmer, and his face broke out in a grin. “Ah, I see I’m being hunted! You old scoundrel, what are you doing this far into civilization?” The two men shook hands, with Fergus blatantly staring at Colm. “And who’s this lofty young fellow you have with you, then?”
“Just came in to see you, o’course,” Raener drawled. “This is Colm Weathercliff, the son of a man I knew for many years. He’s lookin’ to get to Caithmor, and I thought you might be the man to take him there.”
“Mother of the Four, what does this look like to you?” Fergus demanded, shaking his heavy hands toward the wagons. “I’ve barely enough room for my own cargo. How can I possibly make room for such a skyscraping interloper?” Colm’s heart sank, but for being a man giving a refusal, Fergus was still surprisingly cheery. “Look at the lad. Probably doesn’t even have a coin to his name to cover the cost of his passage.”
“Actually,” Colm began, but his companion grabbed his arm warningly.
“There’s never enough useful hands when on caravan, are there?” Raener mused. “Much less young, strong ones like this lad’s.”
“The younger they are, the more likely to eat me out of house and home,” Fergus retorted. “I’ve plenty of doughty farm lads lining up for a spot in my caravan. I hardly need any more heavy lifters.”
“This’un’s dad was the best fisherman in all the White Spires,” Raener said, “and from what I hear, Colm can beat ’im at ’is own game. The road keeps close to the river the whole way to Caithmor. Might be nice to break the monotony of dry beef and watery stew with some fresh fish every now and then.”
Fergus’s eyes seemed to brighten, but his expression stayed doubtful. Only now did Colm realize that the two men were bartering, and that Fergus’s refusal had been nothing but an opening gambit in the game. Colm flushed with embarrassment that he hadn’t recognized it sooner, but bartering was a rarity in Anneslea, where you knew every vendor and exactly what each item they had for sale should cost.
“Several of my lads try for fish at the end of each day,” Fergus said. “They fail more often than not. The Slew’s a terrible river for fishing from the shore, too wide and too deep. How do I know he’ll bring in more than just his own supper?”
“How ’bout the first catch of every evening goes to you, and only after that does the young man feed his own self?” Raener suggested.
“A fine thought, in theory, but what if the first catch is a wee minnow, eh? What’s to keep him from handing that off to me to make do with while he goes on to catch a foot-long rock trout on his second try?”
“Well, specify a length, then, ye vast ravener. Four inches.”
“Eight.”
“Five.”
“Six.”
“Done.” The men gripped each other’s forearms, then both looked over at Colm, who knew he was gaping but couldn’t help it. Fergus burst out laughing, his tremendous gut jiggling like a sand-colored pudding. “How do you feel about the price that this cow-loving pile of dung has wrought for you, eh lad?”
“Better a pile of dung than a great blubbery ball of lard and guts,” the farmer said jovially. “And he’s fine with it, aren’t ye, lad?”
“Quite,” Colm said at last when it appeared that they were actually expecting him to speak this time. “Thank you both.”
“Oh, I’ll see you earn your keep on this trip,” Fergus promised him. “Fish and a bit of hauling here and there, and you walk at least half the time, Weathercliff. I won’t have you and your great lanky body tuckering out my camels half a month in, y’hear? Be here tomorrow, five in the morning sharp. Ye’ll beat the cock’s crow or I’ll leave you to run after us on those stork legs of yours. Marley!” he bellowed suddenly. “Great Four, are you lashing those boxes in place? On top of the furs? Do you want them to wreck all my pelts? Idiot!” He bustled past the two of them to harangue his long-suffering porter, and Raener looked on with the air of a man well satisfied.
“So, now you’ve your passage and I’ve done good by your dad,” he said. “I hope your luck is better than your sire’s, lad.”
“As do I.” His companion looked like he was getting ready to leave, and Colm had a sudden thought. “May I buy you dinner, and perhaps trouble you for another favor as well?”
“I wouldn’t say no to dinner,” Raener mused, rubbing a hand over his whiskery white chin thoughtfully. “Though my missus will have my head if I come home smellin’ of ale, so no more than a single tankard, mind. What’s this favor, then?”
“Could you get a letter for my family back to Anneslea for me?”
“Aye, if you write it up quick, lad.”
They found a table in a nearby tavern where Raener seemed to know everyone, and ate cold ham and seed rolls while Raener drank and Colm struggled through his letter to Baylee. In the end, it was disappointingly short, but the best he could manage in a hurry.
Deerest sister
I am in Isealee and vahe fownd a cavar a way to Caithmor. I will be prhaps a month on the rode, but will do my best to rite you. Isealee is small but lowd, and I can olny imagine how Caithmor must eclip sit. I hope all is wel at home.
Your brother,
Colm
He scratched out the last letter of his name with the quill and sighed with relief. It wasn’t perfect, he knew that, but it was as good as he could manage right now. Raener eyed him knowingly. “Never learned my letters, meself,” he confided. “Devilish little things, aren’t they?”
“They don’t come easy to me, true,” Colm said, folding the parchment and then dripping wax from the candle on the table to seal it. He wrote, very carefully, Weathercliff across the front of it, then handed it over to Raener. “Thank you for all your help.”
“Thank you for the meal, lad.” The farmer stood and clapped Colm on the shoulder. “And I think if you wait around a bit, there might be a spot by the fireplace in the back for ye.”
Colm smiled and bid the old man farewell. The cook did let him sleep in the kitchen, and woke him well before dawn. He made his way back to Fergus’s caravan, where he was met by Marley.
“Hisself is still sleepin’,” Marley said quietly. The air around them was misted and still, broken here and there by the vague shadows of people moving through the dark as the drivers roused their camels and sleepy passengers made their way to the wagons. “You’re to be with our own wagon up front, though. Drop your pack in the back, and best tie it down tight if you don’t want it walkin’ away. You’ll start on foot today.”
“Very well.” Colm followed the instructions and then stood off to the side, chafing his chilled arms and wondering when they would begin. The drivers did their work smoothly, a few wagons back a mother shushed a fussy babe, and here and there, young men—probably the “doughty farm boys” that Fergus had referenced—collected into groups, whispering excitedly amongst themselves. Colm considered trying to join some of them, but then thought better of it—he was quiet and awkward at the best of times, and it would be better to learn names and faces when there was actually some sun to see their owners by.
The sky was lightening in the east when a tremendous snort erupted from beneath the first wagon. There followed a raucous coughing, and then Fergus the Caravaneer rolled out from under his wagon, dragging a blanket with him and looking disgruntled. “What?” he asked crossly when he saw Colm staring at him. “Have you never seen a grown man sleep beneath his very own wagon before, then?”
“No,” Colm said honestly. Fergus snorted and heaved himself to his feet as Marley came to him.
“All’s ready,” he said.
“Good. You made room for the missus with the little lady?”
“Shifted a few boxes onto the shoulders of some of the lads from her village. They’ll manage till midday, at least.”
“Good, good. Well.” Fergus clapped his hands together. “I need a piss and a drink, in that order. The momen
t I’m back, we’re off.” He strode off into the darkness, and Marley watched him go with a smile.
“Crazy old bastard,” he said. “He would’ve been sleeping with his wife if he hadn’t gotten drunk. Called her the wrong name.”
“He has a mistress on the side?”
Marley laughed. “Mistress? No, lad, he’s got other wives! Wives in towns that stretch the length of this land, seven that I’ve met.”
Colm was both horrified and intrigued. The thought of just one wife was enough to send him running to Caithmor, he couldn’t imagine more than that. “And he keeps them all secret from each other?”
“He tries, lad, he tries. Didn’t manage so well this time, though.” Marley shook his head, then walked down the line of wagons, checking in with each of the drivers and the rest of the company. Soon after, Fergus was back, hoisting himself onto his wagon with much grunting and evident effort. A few minutes later, he prodded his camels into motion. The wagon creaked forward, and the procession headed out of Isealea, and Colm stepped beyond the boundaries of his experience with no little trepidation.
Breakfast was a cup of cold, congealed porridge that had clearly been made the night before, the pot passed along from hand to hand until it came back to Fergus, who shoved it at Colm.
“All right, Weathercliff, time to start paying for your place in my company. Go and wash this out.”
“Wash it where?”
“The river, of course! The Wending Slew, the river that makes all these pitiful little towns possible. The river where you’ll be catching our dinner tonight.” Fergus made a show of rubbing his belly. “I favor rock trout, but fortunately for you, I’ll make do with sand sliders or grass eels if that’s all you can find.” He waved a fat hand imperiously. “Go on, then. Clean it and catch up.”
Colm had it on good authority—it came from Desandre, it had to be good—that cold, muddy river water couldn’t compare to hot water and ash, but he wasn’t going to start complaining his first day out. He took the pot, heavy even though it was empty now, and walked as fast as his long legs could manage off the road, through the tall grass beneath the scattered pine trees and to the river.
