“Finn?” the Asian asked, frowning, but the Merovencian said quickly, “Aye, a Finn he is, and a sorcerer, like all his race! Keep his mouth bound or he’ll sing up a storm to sink you!”
“Why then should I buy him?” the captain challenged.
“Because he is strong—look at the broadness of his back, the thickness of his arms! Only see to it his mouth stays shut, and you will have much work from him!”
“Well, I’ve a wizard of my own on this ship: that should be protection enough,” the captain allowed. “I will give you fifty doubloons for him.”
Matt was surprised to hear the Spanish coin mentioned, then realized that it was probably a standard medium of exchange throughout the Eastern Mediterranean. They were still close to Ibile, after all.
“Fifty!” the Asian protested. “He is worth two hundred.”
“Perhaps seventy-five …”
Matt listened to them bargaining over him, with the Asian pointing out his finer features to boost the price, and the captain pointing to old scars and new sunburn to beat the Asian down. In the end Matt went for ninety-four doubloons and a flask of brandy, and felt thoroughly mortified.
The Asian and the Merovencian went their way, but Matt noticed a small brown shape slipping between the legs of the crowd to follow them. He wondered if Balkis would come back, and if she did, what tales she would have to tell.
Then the captain kicked his legs out from under him and said, “Now, Rosandry! Bind his tongue so we may dispense with that gag!”
Matt looked up into a face of wrinkles that cleverly disguised a mouth and eyes. The blade of nose was easy to make out, and so were the lips, after they opened to reveal a grin featuring a few yellow teeth. Matt could have sworn the man had discovered tobacco.
“What have we here, then?” Rosandry leaned over to peer at Matt, who realized the Berber’s magic didn’t include a cure for nearsightedness. “This is one who has seen little work with his hands.”
“He will learn it, never fear. Now lock his tongue!”
“Easily done,” Rosandry sniffed, and tossed some powder into a brazier that sat in front of his crossed legs. He chanted in his own language, and thanks to his French translation spell, Matt caught the sense of it, if not the poetry. It came down to the fact that his lips would be able to open, but would be stiff and numb, as would his tongue—able to move enough to swallow, but not enough to form syllables. Even as he chanted, Matt felt the heaviness stealing over his mouth. It felt as though he’d had a complete treatment with novocaine.
Rosandry finished the verse with a triumphant flourish and said, “Remove his gag.”
The captain summoned a sailor, who held his scimitar above Matt’s head, then cut the strip of cloth with his dagger. Matt opened and closed his mouth, waggled his jaw, and decided that even filled with the stench of rotting fish, the waterfront air tasted marvelous.
“What is your name?” the captain demanded.
Matt turned wary and tried an alias—but somehow “William Shakespeare” didn’t sound the same without consonants. Matt stared, thunderstruck-Rosandry’s spell had worked, and all too well!
The sorcerer cackled with glee.
“He might be faking,” the captain said, scowling, and stamped on Matt’s foot.
Matt howled and turned on the man, swinging his bound hands up and shouting, “You blasted runt, get back to Tripoli or I’ll send the Marines after you!”
Unfortunately, all that came out was a sort of modulated bellowing. Matt froze in shock.
The captain laughed. “Well done, Rosandry, well done! Take him below, Hakim, and chain him to his oar. Be quick about it—I wish to catch the evening tide for Said!”
All Matt could think, as the mate hustled him below, was that he was still going in the right direction, so he might as well play along. Hard work didn’t bother him—he needed to get back into shape, anyway. He could always jump ship in Egypt.
The mate manacled him to five feet of oar and said, “Row as the others do and when they do, or the oar itself will break your neck!” With those words of tender consideration, he stamped away down the aisle between the benches, bending low because the whole space was only four feet high, and disappeared up through a hatch into the realm of sunlight and fresh air.
The boss could certainly learn a thing or two about ventilation, Matt decided, and wondered if he’d smell as badly as the others by the time they reached Port Said. He looked around, picking out human forms in the gloom, and wondered how men could be so muscular and still so emaciated.
Then his gaze took in the glowing yellow eyes and the furry brown body wedged into a cranny in the side of the ship.
“You certainly must be able to find a more comfortable way to travel to the east,” Balkis said, and at his look of alarm to the slaves in front and in back of him, she said, “Be not anxious, I have cast a sleep over them, not that they needed much aid.”
Matt decided his new apprentice had some ability after all.
“Can you not find a safer way to travel?” Balkis repeated.
Matt grinned, as much as he could with numb lips, and shook his head.
“Can you not talk?” the cat asked with anxiety.
Matt shook his head and made a cawing sound to prove it.
“That could be troublesome.” The cat fluffed herself, unnerved. “Well, would it interest you to learn where your captors went?”
Matt nodded, and his eyes gleamed in the gloom as he fantasized revenge.
CHAPTER 7
“The two went their separate ways,” Balkis reported. “When they came to a tavern, the foreigner gave the thug half the money they had from selling you, and that half has probably rolled down his throat in the form of ale already.”
Matt nodded agreement; she knew the type. Just what kind of a past had this cat had, anyhow? He raised his eyebrows in question.
“The foreigner wound his way through the alleyways till he found a cellar where he knocked, spoke some words in his senseless tongue, and was admitted,” Balkis said. “Before the door closed I heard men’s voices chanting, and somber and off-key they seemed. I squeezed through where a piece of board was missing and descended some stairs to a pagan temple, ill-lit by rushlights. At least, I would have thought it a temple, but it had no idol—only a cavity in the back wall where no light fell, dark as the deepest night. Nonetheless, the men there seemed to be praying to it. An odd lot they were, three in dark blue robes, one with a hat and two with headbands. Behind them knelt a dozen or so men of every kind, fat and prosperous, skinny and poor, tough and mild, and soft-handed and work-hardened. Most, I think, were sailors, or had been. Almost all were like your captain and the foreigner who sold you.”
Matt scowled. It sounded as though the high priest of the barbarians had managed to open a branch office in Merovence, and he didn’t like the sound of that at all.
The boat lurched, the slaves came awake, and Balkis disappeared. A man came walking down the aisle lashing everyone on the back. The sting of the lash was enough to shock, not to injure, but its pain still caught Matt by surprise.
Matt grasped his oar and sat up straight, smarting from the lash, trying to channel his anger into rowing, and privately swearing that he would one day decorate the back of the slavemaster with his own whip.
A drum began to beat and the slaves began to shout, counting as they swung their oars. Matt imitated them as best he could, but he was out of sync at first, and his oar must have clashed against someone else’s, for it jumped in his hands and rammed him in the stomach. Swearing without consonants, he took firmer hold and forced himself to bend forward, then lean back, in unison with the rest.