“Scribe. I work for the curia of the archdivine of Orbas, in Vilnoc.” True in a sense. “I’ll be crying ransom to the curia. Also for my nieces.” He let his hands rest on the shoulders of the two girls, who, speaking no Adriac, had hunched closer to him in worry. He hoped this gave his new claim an authentic air. “Keep us together. My ransom will cover all.”
“Not up to me. Though I’d think the curia of Orbas could buy a new clerk for a lot less than that.”
“I’m very good at my job.”
“Howsoever. And those two?” The clerk eyed the girls, who didn’t look much like Pen, in jaded suspicion.
“Lencia and Seuka Corva.” They both looked up at the sounds of their names. “Daughters of my late half-sister.” Yes, as he and the dead prostitute were both children of the white god, perhaps siblings in faith. “She’d been lost to the family for a long time, then word of her fate turned up in Jokona. I’ve only just found her girls. They don’t speak any Adriac.”
“Jokonan, are they?” The clerk raised his brows. “You speak Roknari?”
“A little.”
The clerk made a pleased note. “Anything else?”
“Well, Wealdean, of course. My mother tongue.” Pen realized he might be inadvertently running up his price, but after giving his real birthplace he had to admit to that. Literate translators were much sought-after, slave or free, so the rest of his learning had best stay unmentioned.
“Really? Was the tongue silver? I’d have guessed you were a fancy Lodi lad. Or a Lodi fancy lad. But you must speak and write Cedonian, to work in Orbas.”
“Well, yes, that too.”
Another note. “Huh. You may be able to save your own tail.”
“I plan to.” Pen bit back tarter remarks. True or not.
Thankfully, the clerk waved him away before he could tangle himself further, and called up the next prisoners. Pen towed the girls to the freed bench and settled them close.
“Call me Uncle Penric from here on out,” he whispered to them in Roknari. “I’ve claimed your mother was my half-sister, and that I’ve just found you. It may or may not help keep us together, but it seems the best gamble.”
“Would slavers care about that?” said Lencia doubtfully.
Young apparently did not mean ignorant. “No, but they care about ransoms.”
“Oh.” She pressed her lips together, looking reassured. Seuka stared at him as if he had just performed some amazing magical trick. …Which he could, but Bastard’s tears, not here.
I like these girls, Des remarked cheerily. Let’s keep them.
At least as far as Vilnoc. Yes, any search for their elusive papa was best performed from the safety of home, at leisure. Preferably by letter—Pen had friends and colleagues in Lodi he might draw upon—because once he stepped ashore he was determined not to leave his and Nikys’s neat little house again even if dragged by ox-team. He had ways of dropping an ox-team…
But not an archdivine, Des observed. Or a duke.
Or a god. Pen sighed concession. Although if the merchant Getaf was found, he might be persuaded to reimburse the curia for the expenditure on his children’s behalf, soothing the comptroller.
The aged family disposed of, the stout Adriac merchant came up next to speak for his friend and beg clean water and medical care, only to be told he had to wait for their next destination, and the less trouble he gave, the sooner they would be taken there. Pen had to wonder what quality of physicians might be found in this backwater. Pirates and fishermen both were prone to dire injuries, though, so perhaps the local devotees of the Mother’s Order had practice.
The skinny fellow then proceeded to argue for considerations due to his claimed status as a divine of the Father’s Order, which Pen doubted and the clerk did not care about. It only ended when the captain rolled back in, soot-smudged and irritated. Regrettably, it seemed he and his crew had managed to put out the galley fire. That was all right. Pen could wait.
The prisoners were all collected again by the pirates and the armed port-shed guards, to be led on a march up into town. The captain was briefly interrupted by a trio of tough-looking, tattooed townswomen demanding to know where their husbands were, evidently among his crew detailed to bring in the prize ships, to whom he gave temporizing excuses that plainly did not please them. Escaping this hazard, he managed to escort his… catch, a revealing term Pen thought, to another large building, this in the more usual whitewashed stucco of the islands. Thick-walled, it was cool and shadowed when they stepped within.
Pen hadn’t been sure whether to expect a prison or an auction block, but this seemed neither. The front room was spacious and paved with a smooth cement, a set of stairs at one end leading to the upper story. Dormitories, I wager, murmured Des. Other passages led off it to who knew what, though presumably including a kitchen, because some trestle tables were folded against a wall, and a few benches were scattered about. Holding place, then. It seemed underfilled with only Pen’s party. Did it not hold people for long? Although two more ships’ worth of unhappy sailors were yet expected.
Maybe there was some more secure prison for violent captives. How big was this island? Might there be wild areas where a runaway could conceal himself, or other towns or villages with boats? The sea discouraged Pen, but a trained sailor might view it as more road than moat.
It appeared the ransom candidates were to be cared-for, after a rudimentary fashion. First, the guards herded them all out to a small closed courtyard, where they were permitted a wash and drink at a wall-spigot that emptied into a trough, draining from there away to a channel under the wall. Their several days crowded in a hold no larger than what Pen had shared with the Corva sisters had broken down any bodily reticence among them, so the men stripped to wash well, sharing around the chunk of coarse soap provided, and the rinse bucket. Pen resignedly bore the covert stares from all alike that he won during this. The chance to scour off the ship-stink was worth it.
The old woman washed by halves, everyone politely ignoring the inadequacy of her old husband’s attempt to shield her modesty by interposing his filthy shirt held out as a screen. Pen in turn prevailed upon her to help him with the girls’ much-needed ablutions. Pen grimaced to don his dirty clothes again, but he supposed everyone else’s changes were on their prior ship as well. Would such personal effects be returned when the ship came in, or just be stolen? He didn’t hold out much hope for his own.
While this was going on, an islander midwife with a green sash around her tunic, cursory salute to the Mother’s Order, appeared with a kit to attend to the cut-up Adriac merchant, whose name was Aloro, and the old couple’s son with the broken forearm. The arm needed to be rebroken and reset, in Pen’s view, but instead received some horsing around that left it scarcely improved and the son fainting. The midwife at least provided him with a sling. She cleaned and bandaged Aloro’s sword cuts, several on his arms and a longer gash across his torso. The little ordeal left the man supine and gasping, clutching his fearful friend Arditi’s sweating hand till the plump pink flesh bunched white. The wounds were red and ugly with infection, healing barely holding its own.
Don’t mix in, muttered Des, uneasy at Pen’s restive, reflexive evaluations. At least till we’re sure we can afford it. Nevertheless, under the guise of assisting the midwife, Pen did manage to slip the injuries a general boost of uphill magic, his reserve from the chaos planted on the ship not yet leaked away.