She turned back to the stranger and, emboldened by fear and anger, shouted, ‘Come out here, right now. I appreciate the lift out of the mud, but I am in no mood to deal with this nonsense.’
Shaking, Brexan forced her hands into her tunic belt, hoping to steady her fingers. ‘Come out, now!’
A low growl emanated from the bushes and Brexan felt her stomach turn. She thought for a moment of fleeing, trying for the Ravenian Sea: few pursuers would follow her there. Instead, she thought of Versen, felt for the warm strength of his hand in hers. She almost reached for him, before recalling that she was on her own these days. She took a determined step towards the bush, picking up a tree branch as she moved. It was too long and too bulky to be much use, but it might keep her anonymous assailant from tackling her to the ground.
‘Are you one of Malagon’s men?’ she called again.
A second growl preceded another rustling of leaves and Brexan watched in horror as a hideous man took shape before her, stooped at the waist and covered head to heels in a torn and stained cloak. The stranger didn’t make eye contact at first. Instead, brandishing Brexan’s knife, he looked all around, assessing both her and the surrounding forest. His face was contorted by pain or rage – Brexan couldn’t decide which – and his clothes, splattered with mud and blood, were apparently rotting off his body. Bits of food of some sort congealed at the corners of his mouth; his fingernails were blackened and broken.
His stoop appeared to be the result of a back injury or a damaged shoulder, for though he pulled himself upright for a few moments, towering over Brexan, he soon returned to his crouch with a grunt of relief.
Brexan leaned forward, too terrified to move any closer, but still determined to get a clear view of the foul-smelling stranger. ‘Do I know you?’ she asked, timidly, her voice cracking in fear.
He looked into her face, just for a passing moment – but it was enough.
‘Sallax?’ Brexan whispered. ‘Sallax Farro? Is that you?’
A look of genuine surprise passed across his face, then, slipping Brexan’s knife inside his cloak, he was gone.
‘Wait,’ Brexan shouted, ‘come back here! You have my knife! Sallax!’ Putting fear to one side, she chased after him, pulling up short when she passed by the bush where he had been hiding. She was immediately assailed by an amalgam of smells left in the former partisan leader’s wake: sweat and swamp mud, tangy rotten meat and spoiled milk hit Brexan’s empty stomach and sent her reeling. The former soldier almost fainted, overbalancing into a soft fern-covered depression.
When the nausea wore off, she decided clothing, boots and something substantial to eat were urgent, then she could track Sallax and find out what had happened. The sweet aroma of broken ferns washed away the lingering traces of Sallax and she took a moment to savour the fresh scent, wondering why he appeared to have been so horribly afflicted – and why he seemed to be carrying the contents of a compost heap around in his cloak. Questions for later: he must be in disguise, perhaps working his way into the city via some trash barge along the river.
Less than two avens later, Brexan was pulling on a pair of polished leather boots and tucking the flared ends of her new leggings in. She used a piece of sack-cloth to dry her hair, though not very successfully, so she decided to spend the remainder of the day eating and drinking, as close to a tavern fire as she could get without melting.
Outfitting herself had been easier than she had expected; lined with waterfront pubs and shops, the Orindale wharf was such a hive of activity that few people took notice as she made her way along the plank walkway into the city. She had straightened her clothes and cleaned off as much of the mud as possible. And while it would have taken no more than a cursory look to detect the miserable condition of her tunic and hose, no one was interested.
It hadn’t taken long to find a likely victim: the number of ships moving in and out of Orindale meant finding a seaman, roughly Brexan’s size, was an easy task. The youngster Brexan chose had made his way straight into the nearest tavern, dropped his sea-bag beneath the bar and ordered a bottle of beer, a pot of breakfast stew that had smelled so good Brexan wondered if she might steal that as well, and a loaf of freshly baked bread.
After he had finished his third bottle of the cheap Falkan brew, Brexan, watching from the corner where she’d slumped in an apparent doze, decided it was time to strike. She made her way confidently through the tavern’s front room, lifted an empty tray from the mantel and collected up a number of empty bottles and mugs. As she slid the full tray onto the bar, she quietly hefted the bag from its place on the floor and moved quickly through the kitchen as if she had every right to be there.
Without slowing her pace, she hurried out the back, through the alley and back into the forest, where she stripped off the clothes she had stolen in Estrad and ran down to the sea.
While she scrubbed the dirt from her face and hair, Brexan wept. Any memory of Versen, any lasting impression from his touch, or his lips against her skin, was gone now, scrubbed clean in the bitter salt water. Finally she climbed from the sea, pale and shivering, and donned her stolen clothes, clothes not stained with Seron blood, but also with no trace of Versen’s distinctive scent of woodsmoke and herbs.
Now Brexan said out loud, firmly, ‘He’s gone. Let him go. You have things to do.’ She slumped as choking sobs took her again. It would be a long time before she could follow her own advice. For now, though, safe in the coastal forest south of Orindale, Brexan let the sadness overwhelm her again.
*
Later, Brexan sat near the fire at a tavern several streets back from the waterfront. The front room began to fill as the dinner aven approached, but Brexan barely heard the rise in chatter; it was toneless background noise. Instead, she stared into the fire, the low embers casting a glow across her table that reminded her of Pellia and her family. What would they have thought of Versen? A Ronan, a freedom fighter, he might not have made a good first impression, but the big man’s curious sense of humour and stalwart commitment to his values would have won over her family as they had her.
Behind her, a musician began strumming a few chords on a bellamir and Brexan woke from her reverie. She gnawed at a gansel bone, more for something to do than hunger. A bowl of stew and bread had preceded a brace of roast gansel legs, washed down with a bottle of good Falkan wine and followed by cheese. It had been too long since she had eaten: feeling stuffed to bursting with hot food and good wine was a feeling she had almost forgotten.
Whenever the fire died down, she summoned the barman. She was tired of being cold too.
As she took a long draught from her wine goblet, Brexan felt the warm, dizzy sensation of incipient drunkenness wash over her. Her vision blurred and tunnelled pleasantly as she stretched her feet out towards the fire, warming the soles of the seaman’s boots, padded with handfuls of sack-cloth to fit her small feet. The sailor had been paid three silver pieces for his last voyage: he had made the fortuitous – for Brexan – mistake of tucking the coins into his sea bag. With that much silver, Brexan would be able to live comfortably in Orindale for the next Twinmoon, with coin enough for a room and a new pair of boots from a real cobbler, not just some street vendor with lengths of tanned hide and a sewing needle.
Slowly, a plan began to emerge through the comfortable stupor: she would find lodgings; she needed to do that tonight, but there would be plenty of choice. Tomorrow, boots, her first pair since enlisting in the Malakasian Army… and a skirt, a heavy wool skirt, loomed wool, not the ratty homespun she had been wearing for the past Twinmoon. She would linger over the process, trying whatever caught her fancy, and then buying real women’s clothes, from a high-class city shop. If it took all day, that would be fine. She would shop and she would think of Versen and she would end the day here again, here beside this same fire.