"Better." The speaker grinned and waved one of the larger men forward. The fellow had to stoop to get in the door, and he rolled up his sleeves as he came, revealing arms as thick-muscled as an ox's leg and streaked with the identifying scars of a smith. Dunosh stepped back respectfully.
The big stranger went to the forge, mumbled something over it, took up the tongs, and studied the horseshoe between their jaws. He waved his other hand over the darkening iron, mumbled something that included the name of Deese several times, then pointed to Dunosh and said something straight and clear in Sabirn.
"Er, what'd he say?" Dunosh asked of the first speaker.
The man leaned closer and whispered in his ear: "He said: Temper with cold oil instead of water.'"
"Ey, I should do that . . . and that's all?"
"That's all. The rest's already been spoken."
"'Temper with cold oil' . . ."
Dunosh was still thinking that over when the strangers rolled out of his dooryard and back down the street towards the inn. Cold oil? Where could he get that hereabouts? Butter? Far too costly. Seed oil? The same. Meat fat? Now that was possible. Rendered sheep fat was cheap enough. Cold? The town boasted no icehouse, but the inn's cold cellar might do. Best go ask at once; he wanted to try that spell quickly, while the strangers were still in town.
Besides, if he followed them to the inn, who could tell what other secrets and charms he might learn?
Dunosh barked an order to his apprentices to bank the fire, and hurried off after the strangers.
By late afternoon, everyone who could leave work had gathered in or around the inn, trying to look casual while ogling the strangers. The innkeeper and his serving maids, of course, had the best excuse to chat with the odd visitors and entice information from them. The strangers proved amenable to enticement, quite glad to chat with the smiling innkeeper and his buxom serving maids, past platters of tough beef, fat pork, and underspiced mutton.
Oh yes, the strangers were devotees of Deese of the Forge—see the pretty amulet pendants: stylized iron hammers inlaid with brass flames—and yes, they were on a pilgrimage to the fabled River Gol and some ancient monuments on its banks. Yes, they knew smithcraft, and engineering, and many other bits of magic besides. Why yes, they'd be happy to talk about some of it. Headaches and joint pains? Invoke Kula three times, and drink a cup of willow bark tea. Cattle plagued with worms? Dry their feed in the first light of the morning sun, bless in the names of Deese and Kula, and feed the cattle lots of raw garlic. How to improve a lady's looks? Hmm . . . Invoke Kula thrice and wash with soap, every day. How to make that marvelous ointment? Invoke Deese's aid, boil fat in water soaked through wood ashes, skim off the result, and pat it into cakes.
And who were these accommodating, fascinating strangers? Ah, that was more fascinating still.
"We are the ancient Sukkti folk," explained one of them—quite young, to judge from the voice. "The lords of Sabis suppressed our worship everywhere, save in the Lost City of Itoma. There we hid, and practiced our craft, and waited. Now, with Sabis overthrown, we dare emerge again into the light of day and visit the ancient sites of our elder worship."
After that revelation, the landlord brought fresh jugs of beer without anyone's asking.
"Ey, but now the Ancar be come," said the nearer serving maid gloomily. "'Tis new masters now, and worse than the last, if any."
"Ah well, they know nothing of us," said another visitor, a tall skinny one with curly, wild hair. "And surely they know nothing of our magic. Let us just keep this as our little secret, shall we?"
Everyone in the inn hastily agreed. The gods knew, they had secrets enough to keep from the new crop of masters. In exchange they were happy to tell all they knew of the roads, towns, and lands to the north—though precious few of them had ever traveled far from town.
The strangers were in the midst of discussing the best place to set up shop for a day or two and sell some of their metalwares when another, less welcome, racket came from outside.
The townspeople froze, recognizing the sounds.
There were multiple hoofbeats, creakings and groanings of ill-made wagonwheels, shouts and curses in a totally unfamiliar tongue—and all coming toward the inn.
The serving maids hopped off their assorted perches and ran for the kitchen. Several of the smaller and frailer patrons followed them. The innkeeper whisked his better jugs out of sight and shoved his money box into a hideyhole in the floor.
The strangers looked at each other, pulled their cloaks and hoods closer about them, and began humming a quiet, oddly soothing, holy song.
The newcomers came tramping through the doorway, slamming the already open door all the way back to the wall, and tromped loudly up to the inn's serving counter. There were half a dozen of them, dressed in coarse homespun wool and roughly cured leather, hung with assorted bits of horn and plate for armor, and fairly dripping with weapons: daggers, short swords, long swords, bludgeons, horn-tipped longbows and quivers grain-sheaf thick with arrows. Their hair, beards, and even moustaches were braided, and the braids were strung with odd trinkets intended as jewelry. They wore identical scowls, as if they'd practiced the look, and they glared about the interior of the inn as if expecting an armed host and a pitched battle. Despite their carefully cultivated beards, they were surprisingly young; not one of them could have been over twenty.
The Deese priests made no move, only chanted softly and stared as if they'd never seen Ancar warriors before.
The apparent leader of the small invasion force, seeming a bit surprised to find his host so thoroughly outnumbered by civilians, looked around again, bristled and scowled even more fiercely, stamped up to the serving counter, and slammed his fist on it, making the jugs and cups rattle.
"Bur!" he announced. "Dimme bur!"
The innkeeper blinked, gaped, and asked, "Huh?" No one could have mistaken his meaning.
The rest of his troop crowded closer to him, either for better defense against the motionless customers or to better intimidate the innkeeper. The leader grabbed the front of the innkeeper's apron and tried to yank him forward, but succeeded only in pulling the apron off. He threw it to the floor, peevish at his failure.
"Bur!" he yelled again. "Von ol ugat!"
"Huh?" said the landlord again.
The squad leader stamped in frustration. He could slaughter everyone in sight if he chose, but he couldn't make himself understood; it was an embarrassing situation for a proper conqueror. He took a deep breath and tried again. "Bur," he said, miming a cup in the empty air and then drinking from it. "Hu noe, Bur."
"I think he means, he wants beer," one of the Deese priests said quietly.
"Ah!" said the landlord, and reached for a mug.
The young Ancar turned, automatically striking a fierce pose and look, to see who had spoken.
Almost as one, the Deese priests pressed their hands together and solemnly bowed. They went on with their quiet hypnotic chanting.
The Ancar youth looked them up and down, scratched his head, shrugged, and turned back to the counter. The landlord pushed a large mug of beer at him. He whooped in satisfaction, grabbed the mug, and emptied it in one long pull. His cohorts looked expectantly at him. He grinned and nodded. In a moment, they were all crowding the counter, yelling for mugs.
The landlord sighed and handed out the foamy cups, clearly not expecting to be paid for this.
In the corner, the Deese priests continued to chant quietly.
Halfway through his third cup, the young Ancar squad leader hit on another thought. He snagged the landlord, shouted unintelligibly in his face, and hand-mimed something bigger, then pointed at his mug. The landlord shook his head, bewildered. The youth went through the pantomime again, yelling louder.