Li put his hands flat on the table and looked Tycho straight in the eye. "It's a chance I'll take, Tycho. You know how far I've traveled. Am I supposed to stop now?" He sat forward as well. "I would value your help, but with you or without you, I will find Brin. I get the feeling that he won't be that hard to locate."
"Aw, bind me." Tycho set his mug down with a thump. By rights, he should let Li blunder off and get himself in trouble-certainly the Shou had brought him nothing but trouble. At the same time, he felt a certain grudging respect for him and his commitment. He sighed. I'm going to regret this, he thought to himself-and nodded. "I'll help you."
The Shou broke out in the first wide and genuine smile Tycho had seen from him. Tycho held a warning hand before he could get too happy, though. "But," he said firmly, "this is how we're going to do it." He jerked a thumb at himself. "I'm going to make inquiries. Something discrete. Throw out a line and see if I can arrange a meeting with Brin for you. It might make him feel more like talking civilly than having a big foreigner stalking him around Spandeliyon will."
Li's smile tightened slightly. "Don't mention Yu Mao." Tycho looked at him quizzically. "I want to ask Brin about Yu Mao myself," said Li stubbornly. "I don't want to give him time to prepare any stories or explanations." Tycho shrugged then nodded. Li's smile bloomed again, even wider this time. He bent himself in a little half-bow over the table. "Thank you, Tycho. I wish there were something more I could offer you-if Lander hadn't robbed me, the reward I mentioned last night would be yours."
Tycho snorted and picked up the last morsel of pie. "Well, that reward was as good as stolen as soon as you said the words last night at the Ease. That was stupid."
"What good is a reward if no one knows it's available? " Li folded his hands. "Besides, it was well hidden. If anyone has my coat, they're probably walking around with a small fortune and aren't even aware of it."
Tycho blinked. "What was this reward?" he asked around the pie.
"I had three fine rubies sewn into the lining of my coat," said Li. "I thought they would be safe. I underestimated the desperation of thieves in Spandeliyon."
Suddenly the pie was dry in Tycho's mouth. "Three rubies?"
"I would have given one as a reward last night. To you, Tycho, I would give all three."
Fingers shaking, Tycho reached for his pouch and pulled out one of the gold coins Mard had given him, hesitated for a moment, and pulled out the second as well. Hiding them with his palm, he slid them across the table to Li. "Lander," he said as casually as he could manage, "usually sells stolen goods to a fence named Giras." He pointed. "You'll find his shop three streets that way and two back toward dockside. Go see if he still has your coat."
Li's eyes narrowed. "Why didn't you tell me this before?"
"You didn't ask," said Tycho quickly, "and we were talking about other things. I would have suggested it anyway, though." Li's expression conveyed disbelief. "Really!" Tycho protested. "Remember, I said I'd help you before you said anything about a reward."
Li grunted. "That's true." He nodded. "All right." "Besides, the clothes you're wearing now stink." Tycho stood up and slapped payment for their food onto the table-top. "Look," he told Li. "You go get your coat back-and anything else you can, too." He dredged his pouch for any remaining coins and came up with a scant handful of copper and silver. He gave them all to Li. "Try to be discrete about it. Then go back to the Wench's Ease and wait for me. I'll meet you there later with news." Li stood up as well. "Thank you, Tycho." "Thank me when you've had your talk with Brin, Li." They left the pie shop and Tycho made sure Li got started in the right direction before turning and going the other way. Once the Shou was out of sight, though, he swiftly changed direction and headed down toward dock-side, whistling as he walked.
Three rubies for a conversation. That was a very good deal. He tapped the tin tube tucked into his coat. It was high time to deliver the beljurils to their waiting-and not especially patient-new owner.
He was even still whistling when he walked through the door of the Eel.
Lander choked as his spade broke through the icy crust and exposed another soft patch of slowly decaying pig dung. He gasped against the stench and levered the spadeful of manure up and into his wheelbarrow. The relief as the load slid off was like a small blessing; the spade seemed to rise up an extra foot on its own. Lander swung it back to the ground, letting the blade bang down into the filth, and leaned for a moment against the handle.
"Did I tell you to take a break, Lander?" Brin's rich voice was punctuated by the hiss of his switch through the air. Lander stifled a groan and scraped up another load of manure. As Brin's punishments went, mucking out his sty was one of the more pleasant. That didn't mean Lander liked it. His arms, shoulders, and back burned. He was sweating like… well, like a pig. In spite of the cold, his mantle and outer shirt were flung across Brin's table, draped over the damn Shou saber. He knew he should have sold it to Giras! What had keeping it gotten him? A frantic search through dockside in the middle of the night. Another search this morning, combing the streets all the way up into middle town. He'd even made contact with the usual bodysnatchers, unpleasant specimens who would be better off dead themselves. Even they hadn't seen anything of Li Chien's body though. And Brin had ordered him to not bring his men in on the search. Lander knew what that meant: the halfling wanted to keep his interest in the Shou quiet.
Since early afternoon, however, he'd been shoveling manure. Brin might appreciate hard work, but he still didn't like failure. Lander snuck a look over his shoulder. Brin was sitting on the table again, a tankard of the Eel's ale beside him and his switch in his hand. He was tickling Black Scratch under the chin. The boar ignored him and just sat like some weird beast-king, surveying the other pigs that trotted around the sty. Every so often, he would stretch out his neck and snuffle at Lander's mantle and shirt. "Put your filthy snout in those," grumbled Lander under his breath, "and you'll be Black Sausage by dinnertime." He bent and scooped up more manure. At least he was almost finished, though gods only knew if Brin was finished with him.
The back door of the Eel opened and Tycho Arisaenn stepped out, a repulsively smug look on his face. He saw Lander and smiled. "New job, Lander? It suits you."
The sound of Tycho's voice brought a chorus of happy squeals from Brin's pigs. The ones already in the sty ran across to greet him. Lander turned around just in time to see more come tumbling out of the covered shelter, woken from their afternoon nap. Suddenly they were pouring across the sty in a fat wave of swine-flesh. Lander yelped and scrambled out of their way.
His wheelbarrow wasn't so lucky. The hindquarters of one scrambling pig banged into it, setting it swaying. A second impact knocked it over and dung went spilling across the ground. Lander ground his teeth together, too angry even to curse. Tycho broke off his fond greeting of the pigs that swarmed around him to look up and smile again. "Sorry," he apologized. There wasn't a trace of sincerity in his voice. "You know how they are around me."
Tycho had sung to the pigs once. Once. It had been eerie to watch them all standing around and listening to the bard like some audience at a fancy concert. Now they acted as if he were their best friend whenever he came around. Fortunately, Lander wasn't the only one who found Tycho as annoying as an infestation of fleas. Black Scratch snorted and trumpeted loudly, trotting across the sty with his bristles up and his tail stiff. The other pigs scattered before their true king. Lander scowled at Tycho as he righted the wheelbarrow and grabbed the spade again. "I'd like to see you give that one a serenade some time," he snarled with a nod at the boar.