Chapter 4
My good mood left me when the innkeeper at the Hog’s Head told us we all needed to bunk in threes if we all wanted a room. It was up to us how we shared the beds.
That last comment was for my benefit. He wasn’t being snide. He was actually concerned. I was a woman in a group of men after all, and I was known here.
“It’s okay, Mapkim,” I assured him. “I’ll take a stall and bed with the horses.”
No one liked that idea. Someone mentioned more than once that I was “prone to leaving.” In the end, two of the soldiers decided they’d sleep in the barn, and my new companion, Baxley, and I were to bunk together.
“Why him?” I asked the captain sullenly as we followed Mapkim to the upper level, where the rooms were.
“He volunteered.”
I glared at Baxley over my shoulder, and he winked in reply.
Prick.
They assigned me the room farthest from the stairs, and when I looked inside, there was no way I could escape through that window without alerting Baxley.
Still, the room was cramped, and although there were two beds, they were too small for anyone over six feet.
I grinned as I sat down, leaned back against the wall, and let my feet dangle off the floor.
“Ooh, roomy.”
The captain mentioned something about meeting downstairs for supper, but my attention was on the large male currently looking at his sleeping quarters with no more humor in his gaze.
I’d pushed my hood back and was unwrapping the face covering from my neck. There was a basin and a jug in the corner of the room, and I was eager to wash off the grime and dirt.
“How will you wash?” I asked as he dropped his pack on the bed.
“With my hands.”
I gave him a flat look. “While you carry out your morning and evening ablutions, I’ll step outside.”
“No need. I’ll take care of them elsewhere.”
I waited for more information or the offer of the same courtesy — that he would step out of the room so I could be alone during mine — but he said nothing and just pulled off his cloak.
The number of weapons on his body was honestly frightening.
He was solidly built, muscles rippled beneath his tunic, and I noticed dark tattoos on the backs of his hands as he removed his woolen gloves.
He pushed back the sleeves of his shirt, revealing more tattoos that wound around his arms in a pattern I couldn’t understand.
“Never seen tattoos before?” he asked gruffly.
“Not many,” I told him truthfully. “There aren’t many times bare skin is displayed in this country.”
He smiled but didn’t carry the conversation on or tell me what they meant.
“Do they have a purpose?” I was too curious to stay silent.
“Yup.”
I waited, but it was clear he wasn’t going to elaborate. I pushed myself off the bed and unhooked my cloak. It felt weirdly intimate to be taking off clothing in a room with a male, even if it was just my cloak.
He must have noticed my hesitation because he tapped me on the shoulder.
“You’ve nothing to fear from me, Amarya.”
I looked over my shoulder and saw the truth in his eyes. I nodded once, then turned back and carefully folded my cloak over the foot of the bed.
“Do you know where they want to go?” I asked him as I sat back down again. I pulled the leather from the bottom of my braid and started to loosen it as I waited for him to answer.
“North.”
My sigh of exasperation made his lips twitch, but he lay back on the bed, his knees pulled up to allow the bed to accommodate them, his feet just clear of the edge.
“Yes, they told me yesterday, north. North where?”
“You’re better hearing it from the captain.”
My fingers stilled. “Why?” I asked hesitantly. “Is it bad?”
He grunted. “All of Crystallese seems to be bad. It’s always fucking snowing.”
I laughed. “Not always,” I corrected. “There are three to four weeks after the Herag Solstice when the snow stops.” I resumed loosening my braid, shaking my dark hair free. “And closer to the southern border, it’s not as bad. Where Glassfyr is.”
Glassfyr. The city the old kings had built so high into the mountain that its towers caught the light and threw it back like broken glass, blazing cold in the dark.
The capital of Crystallese, a place I’d never been to and never wanted to go. One of the Institutes of the Verei Kahn was in Glassfyr.
Baxley watched me as I pulled a worn, cracked hairbrush from my pack and quickly brushed my hair. He said nothing as I rebraided it, tying it swiftly and tossing the long braid over my shoulder.
“Your hair’s very long for a trailfinder.”
I frowned. “Is it?”
He shook his head. “I assumed it’d be shorter.”
“When the cold is bitter, sometimes long hair can serve as a second neck warmer,” I told him honestly.
He nodded as if that made sense, then sat up. I fought back a giggle as he tried to get comfortable. He stood in disgust. “Does she have better beds?” He jerked his thumb as if Eilenora’s inn were right there.
“Mites,” I told him, picking at my nail. I held my hands out in front of me, the skin white, and the nails broken. I held them up to Baxley. “Well, they aren’t the hands of a lady, are they?” I said with a loud sigh.
He showed me his own. The tattoos covered most of it, but his skin was darker than mine, almost golden. He flipped his hands palm up and turned them over again. His hands were rough, with some calluses, but his nails were kept short and neat.
“Hands tell the truth of a person. Your hands say you work hard for your living.” He looked at the door. “The ale here is good. Coming?”
It was that or sit in the room and wallow in the fact I’d been caught.
“I’ll wash my face first,” I told him.
“I’ll be outside.”
Because while he wasn’t that bad, he was still my own personal guard, or mercenary, and I was still the person he was guarding for coin.
The water was at room temperature and warmer than what I’d been washing my face with for a few weeks, so it felt good.
I’d have given a silver coin, maybe two, if there’d been a bathing room available, but there wasn’t.
The Gilded Swan had one, but I’d rather walk around caked in mud, snow, and ice than pay that woman a single coin.
With a clean face and hair brushed and freshly braided, I checked my tunic for stains. After making sure I had my knives — one at my hip, one in my boot, and one on my thigh — I opened the door.
Baxley leaned against the wall, one foot braced behind him, head tipped back, eyes closed as he waited.
“I didn’t think I took that long,” I murmured, pulling the door closed behind me.
His lips twitched as his eyes opened. “In my line of work, you take your rest where you can.”
I knew that feeling well. He locked the door, checked that it was locked, and pocketed the key before walking ahead of me.
In silence, I followed him down the hall, down the narrow staircase, and into the wider serving area.
He took a seat in the far corner, away from the window, with his back against the wall, giving him an unobstructed view of the room.
“That’s usually my seat,” I murmured as I sat down on the chair beside him, turning my body so I too could see everything.
“Never understood those who sat with their back to the door,” Baxley spoke quietly.
“Fools.” I agreed. “Or ones who don’t need to look over their shoulder.”
His blue eyes met mine steadily, his nod of agreement all he needed to say.
Mapkim came over with two jugs of ale. He told us the captain had bought our first one. Baxley didn’t argue, and neither did I.
Ale was ale.
I took a sip — cool, slightly flat, and thicker than water, but still refreshing.
Baxley swallowed a mouthful. “Captain may have bought the first, but he bought the cheapest,” he said with a grunt.
I looked at my jug. “It’s not good?”
His lips twisted. “It’s cheap.”
When he didn’t elaborate, I didn’t pursue it. It tasted fine to me.
I already knew my companion wasn’t much of a talker, and honestly, neither was I.
We sat in silence as we watched the inn fill up.
Men finished their day’s work, and traders needed to rest after a long day at the market.
Soon, the soldiers who would be traveling with us came down from the rooms above, including Captain Marson.
The captain walked straight over to us. Or me. I got the impression that he was familiar with the man beside me.
With no words, he took the seat across from us. His back was to the room. I glanced at Baxley and saw his top lip curl, but he didn’t comment. Somehow, that made it funnier.
“Is your room good?” Captain Marson asked carefully.
“It’s warmer than outside, so yes,” I answered truthfully. I finished my mug. “Thanks for the drink.”
He waved it off, leaning back as the mean-eyed soldier from yesterday approached, two mugs in his hand.
He didn’t sit with his back to the room.
For a moment, it looked like he might ask me to move. I held his stare, noticing he didn’t so much as glance at Baxley. Instead, he walked around the captain and took the seat opposite.
“Your name is Amarya?” the captain asked after he’d taken a drink.
“You know my name,” I reminded him carefully, not liking this new dynamic. I preferred it when it was just me and the mercenary.
“I’m Loel Marson.” He extended his hand.
“Yesterday, I was shoved into the ground for not calling you captain, and today you want me to call you Loel?”
The captain flushed. “We have a long journey ahead, Amarya. I think we should start fresh.”
“If it’s a fresh start you want, I’ll happily leave.”
He smiled. He wasn’t handsome — quite plain in fact — but he seemed earnest. I didn’t trust earnestness, especially when it wore golden armor and went by the moniker of captain.
“This is Sergeant Gralen.”
Gralen’s look was as flat as his personality.
“Where are we going?” I asked, hoping “north” didn’t mean a long time in their company, and introductions could remain short.
“Northern edge of the kingdom.”
I turned to look at Baxley with wide eyes. “Iskaeld?”
Silence met my question.