Выбрать главу

“Bless you, Mags, I’m behind on the work and fair perishing.” Marc wiped his hands on a towel at his waist and accepted the napkin gladly. “Two of our men are out, as you might expect from trying to drink a barrel of beer dry, and I’m having to do the work of three.”

Mags shook his head sorrowfully, which gave him a chance to look around to see if there was anyone near that could overhear them. In an undertone, while Marc wolfed down the sausages—proving that his hunger was no ruse—Mags told him what he had heard and seen.

“Huh. Now that is a peculiar tale. Well, the Healer could be right. Seeing things is one of the signs of someone that’s a habitual drunk, and from what I’ve heard, these fellows have been setting records in the taverns since the holiday began.” He grinned. “Seems they can’t get drink strong enough at the Palace. For some reason, no one will serve it to them, or even admit that it exists in the cellars.”

Mags nodded, but something still didn’t seem right to him. “But wouldn’t they be seein’ creepy-crawlies all the time if it had to do with drink?” he objected. “They stopped actin’ peculiar when they got t’ the salle.”

“Hmm. You have a point.” Marc finished the last of the rolls and wiped his hands. “I’ll pass it on to the others. You see what else you can learn. I’m thinking we might want to put off our plan for a bit.”

“Won’ be much,” Mags warned. “Mostly rumor, I guess. Not like I c’n get inter the Palace.”

“Rumors often have a bit of truth at the core.” Marc’s head came up at the sound of a bell from the Collegium. “And that would be your reminder to get back to classes, I expect.”

“No classes yet. But aye, should be getting back, I got things as I need t’ tend m’self.”

He hurried back up the path to the Collegium, intent on his own thoughts, and trying to decide what, if anything, he should be doing about listening in at Bardic Collegium. At the moment, he had no real excuse to linger there and eavesdrop on the teachers and resident Bards. The best he could do was to position himself during meals where he could overhear as much as possible through the hum of conversation. He was already on his way to Healers’ with an eye to asking about things to prevent the miserable sneezing and coughing that some of the early arrivals had brought back with them. Not that he thought he was likely to get sick—but it gave him a good excuse to eavesdrop as Herald Nikolas wanted.

And that was when he ran right into Bear, or nearly. Bear was ploughing along the path with his head down, paying no attention to where he was going, and since Mags was doing the same, they bumped shoulders and started, becoming aware of what they were doing only at that moment.

Mags recognized Bear first. He stared at his friend as if at a ghost for a moment. Then he grinned, and grabbed both of Bear’s shoulders. “Bear! Yer back!”

Bear grinned, but it looked strained. Mags let go of his shoulders, his glee changing to concern. “Ye look worrit,” he stated flatly. “An’ it ain’t like ye t’ go bumblin’ along, payin’ no heed to anythin’ but yer feet. Summat wrong?”

Bear shrugged. His normally cheerful face took on a masklike blankness. “Nothing really. My holiday wasn’t much of one. But then, neither was Lena’s.”

“She’s back, too?” Mags asked, suddenly feeling very uncertain. This wasn’t like Bear at all. Bear never temporized. There was no doubt in Mags’ mind that Bear was hiding something, probably the cause of his unhappiness.

Bear nodded. “We came back together; we got in last night, but you weren’t about anywhere obvious, and you weren’t in your room, and we didn’t know where to find you.” Bear shrugged. “And anyway, we had unpacking to do and we were both pretty tired, so we went back to our rooms. I don’t know what Lena did, but I just got something to eat and then went straight to bed.”

“I was down th’ road with some people—” He hesitated; how much did he dare say? He had been down at Master Soren’s house, of course, all of Lydia’s group had gotten together to enjoy the last night of the holiday, the last night all of them would be free to get together as a group until the next holiday of the Spring Equinox. They had not yet made up their minds about when the girls were going to humiliate those mercenaries ... and in fact, Mags was getting the impression that they had begun to have second thoughts about that idea, and Marc’s words a few moments ago had confirmed that. But he couldn’t tell Bear about any of that. And he couldn’t quite figure out how he could readily explain how someone like him was friends with the circle around Master Soren’s niece.

“’S no matter anyway,” he continued.” ’Cause if l’d a knowed you were comin’ last night, I’d a been here, not there!”

Bear shook his head. “We weren’t in any mood to be around, Mags. Things didn’t go well at home for either of us. And we would rather not talk about it, if you don’t mind.”

He was rather taken aback by his friend’s words, in fact, he was rather hurt. Wasn’t he their friend? They had obviously confided in each other, so why not in him?

He wanted to blurt out all of this, but his mouth had other ideas, and said nothing more than, “Well, we gonna study t’gether tonight? Or at least hev supper t’gether?”

“No studying, that was mostly all I did at home,” Bear replied. “But supper, absolutely And you can probably find Lena up at Bardic if you want to go look for her.”

He ducked his head, and hurried on his way, leaving Mags staring at his retreating back in puzzlement.

Although Bear had not seemed particularly encouraging, Mags went up to Bardic, looking for Lena. He realized as he was halfway there that he had never been to her room, and he suddenly felt very diffident about trying to find it. There were implications to looking for a girl’s room that he wasn’t sure he wanted to deal with. His steps slowed, and finally, when he reached the door of Bardic Collegium, stopped altogether.

He stood uncertainly, looking up at the wooden facade of the building, noting that it was getting pretty shabby. What to do?

Finally, another girl, a little older than Lena but also in Trainee rust-red, came up from behind him and moved to go around him. “Hey—” he said awkwardly, and she stopped. “I don’ s’pose ye know Trainee Lena? Little bit of a thing, dark hair.”

The girl looked at him as if he was mad. “Everyone knows Trainee Lena,” she replied, with a lot of undertones to the words that he couldn’t quite read. Still this was his chance.

“Could ye tell ’er that Mags an’ Bear wants t’ meet her fer supper?” he asked. The girl rolled her eyes, as if to say Why don’t you tell her yourself? but refrained from making any such statement.

He had to reflect that just keeping your mouth shut on things you wanted to ask or say was a much more difficult thing than he had thought.

The girl hesitated a moment, probably weighing her options, inconvenience or a stern lecture from one of the instructors about proper manners.

Evidently the thought of a lecture decided her. Instead of brushing him off, she replied politely, “If she’s in her room, I’ll tell her, and if not, I’ll leave her a note.” She smiled at Mags, and Mags found himself feeling very warm of a sudden.

He stuck out a hand; she shook it. “Thankee!” Mags said, with gratitude, and turned to go back to the stables.

It felt a little odd not to be heading to Master Soren’s house at this time of day, but the holiday was officially over and, besides, he had a puzzle to unravel. He thought best when he was away from other people and he wanted to get Dallen’s ideas on it, too.