Ship of Magic

He found himself nodding woodenly to the garrulous old man. Brashen was beginning to suspect that the mate who had sent him here had been having a bit of fun with him. Still, here he was, and it was quiet and clean and quite likely a better place to entertain Althea than a crowded, noisy tavern. “I'll be heading out back to take a bath, then,” he announced when the landlord paused for breath. “Oh, and a shipmate of mine may be coming here to meet me. He'll be asking for Brashen. That's me. The lad is named Athel. Would you bid him wait for me?”

“Aye, I'll let him know you're here.” The landlord paused. “Not a carouser, is he? Not the type to come in here drunk and spew on my floor and knock over my benches, is he?”

“Athel? No indeed, not him. No indeed.” Brashen beat a hasty retreat out the back door. In a small shed set in a cobbled yard, he found the water pump, a bath trough and a fireplace as the landlord had promised. Like the rooming house, the pump-house was almost excessively tidy. And the several rough towels that hung on pegs looked clean, if well used, and the trough did not show a ring of some other man's grease. Just as well, Brashen told himself, to stay at a clean place. He pumped several buckets of water and put them to heat. His shore clothes were in the bottom of his duffel. They were clean, though smelling a bit musty. He hung out his striped shirt and stockings and good woolen trousers to air near the fireplace. There was a pot of soft-soap and he helped himself to it. He took off several layers of grease and salt and possibly a layer of skin as well before he was finished. For the first time in weeks he took his hair out of its braid, washed it well and then bound it back again. He would have liked to lie and soak in the tub, but he didn't want to keep Althea waiting. So he rose and dried himself and trimmed his beard back to its former shape and donned his clean shore clothes. Such a treat to put on clean, warm, dry clothes over clean, warm, dry skin. The bath had left him almost lethargic, but that was nothing that a good meal and a cold mug of beer wouldn't cure. He stuffed his dirty clothes back in his sea-bag and did a quick tidy of the room. Tomorrow, he'd find a laundry to have all his clothes washed out, save for those so tarry as to be hopeless. Feeling a new man, he went back to the main house to have a meal and wait for Althea.

She had never been in a foreign port alone before. Always before, she had had shipmates and a ship to return to when the night grew dark. It was not late afternoon yet, but the day suddenly seemed both more chill and more gray. She looked around herself yet again. The world was suddenly an edgeless, formless place. No ship, no duties, no family ties. Only the coin in her pocket and the duffel on her back to concern her. A strange mixture of feelings suddenly assailed her; she felt at once forlorn and alone, devastated at their refusal to give her a ticket, and yet oddly powerful and independent. Reckless. That was the word. It seemed there was nothing she could do that would make things worse than they already were. She could do anything she wanted just now, and answer to no one, for no one else would care. She could get shamelessly drunk or spend every coin she had on a sybaritic night of food, wine, music and exotic surroundings. Of course there was tomorrow to worry about, but one always had to reckon with tomorrow. And if she chose to slam into one head first, there was no one to forbid it, or to say shame to her the next day.

It wasn't as if careful planning had paid off well for her lately.

She gave a final heist to her bag and then deliberately set her cap at a jauntier angle. She strode down the street, taking in every detail of the town. This close to the waterfront, it was ship's brokers and chandlers and cheap seaman's boarding houses, interspersed with taverns, whorehouses, gaming rooms and druggeries. It was a rough section of town for a rough pack of folk. And she was part of them now.

She chose a tavern at random and went inside. It looked no different from the taverns in Bingtown. The floor was strewn with reeds, not very fresh. Trestle tables bore ancient ring stains from many mugs. The benches looked much-mended. The ceilings and walls were dark with oily smoke from cooking and lamps. There was a large fireplace at one end, and there the sailors had gathered thickest, close to the warmth and the smell of stew. There was a tavern-keeper, a lean, mournful-looking man, and a gaggle of serving maids, some sullen, some giggly. A staircase at the back led up to rooms above. The conversational roar pushed at her as solidly as a wind.