LXVII
The morning after the Seastag ported in Valmurl, and after muster, Kharl placed his few belongings into his pack, now mostly full, and, staff in hand, headed up to the main deck to see Hagen. There he waited in the chill air until after the regular deckhands and riggers had been paid. Then he stepped forward to the small table behind which the captain sat.
“You still intent on leaving us, carpenter?” Hagen’s voice was cheerful, but Kharl could catch a sense of worry behind it.
“I don’t know about intent, ser. It’s just that…well…I wouldn’t feel right if I didn’t try to be what I’ve spent my life learning and doing.”
Hagen nodded. “When you put it that way, it’s hard not to see it so.” The captain paused and looked down at the ledger before him, turning the pages until he was close to the end. “Your crew share, right now, is fifteen silvers, and I owe you five silvers and three for your wages.”
Two golds? Kharl certainly hadn’t expected that. He’d come aboard hoping to get off with what he’d had in his leather pouch. “Yes, ser. That’s more than fair.”
Hagen shook his head. “It’s fair. No more, no less.”
Kharl sensed the other’s honest feelings and nodded.
“You don’t have to go,” Hagen said. “I’d have you as carpenter second, and carpenter first when Tarkyn decides he’s had enough of the sea.”
“I only asked for passage to Austra, ser.”
“I know, but I’d still have you.” Hagen paused. “Where are you headed?”
“I’d thought Vizyn, but anywhere that I could be a cooper.”
“Coopers…there are more than enough here in Valmurl. You ought to stay on as a ship’s carpenter.” Hagen laughed. “Then, I’d be the last one to tell any man what he should be doing. That I would be.” He fingered his chin. “Three good coopers here in Valmurl. None as good as you, in truth. Oldest one is Dezant. He’s off the Traders’ Square. Then there’s Kundark, and he does mostly slack cooperage, and his place is on the south side of the city, by the Guard Barracks there. You might try Chalart. He’s on the north side, back of the refit yards. He supplies barrels for merchanters, mostly. You can tell any of them that I sent you. It might help, won’t hurt.
“You don’t like Valmurl…go and see Vizyn, but you’d better take a coaster. It’s a good nine hundred kays. Of the ones in port now, take the Norther or the Southshield…tell ’em I sent you. You don’t like it, then turn around and come back. Offer’s open until we leave Valmurl.”
“Thank you. How long will you be here? For refitting?” Kharl added quickly.
“Half a season, I’d guess. Takes longer to refit in winter, but there’s little enough trading to be done, and I’d like to have the engineers go over the engine after that problem off Worrak.”
“Is there anything special I should know about Valmurl?” Kharl asked. “Things that’d be obvious to you, but not to me? If you don’t mind, ser.”
“Valmurl is much like Brysta, save that it is the capital of all Austra, and there is but one lord. Lord Estloch has a good heart, and, unlike many rulers, he would be as fair as possible and still hold order within the streets. Still…dark streets are dangerous…especially harborside, and there are few patrollers past midnight. The wealthy are as they are in any city.”
If those words were not a warning, Kharl wasn’t a cooper. “Thank you.”
“You change your mind, and there’ll be a place for you, if not here, then on one of the other ships.”
“I appreciate that, ser, and I’ll just have to see.”
“That you will. Good fortune.”
After hoisting his pack onto his shoulders and securing his silvers and coppers in his concealed leather pouch, Kharl walked down the gangway of the Seastag, perhaps for the last time, and past the wagons already lined up to receive the cargo being off-loaded. While the pier was not so crowded as those at Swartheld, more than a score of loaders and others swirled around the area opposite the Seastag. Among them, he saw no patrollers, although more than a few men carried blades of various styles and lengths.
As Kharl reached the foot of the pier, he saw a wagon, with a platform. On the platform stood a blond girl, one certainly younger than Sanyle or Jeka. Despite the chill of the morning, the girl wore but the filmiest shift, and in the morning light, it was most clear that she wore absolutely nothing beneath, except for the bronze cuff on her left ankle, a cuff attached to a bronze chain. The chain was bolted to a bronze circlet affixed to the side of the wagon. The girl’s face was pale, and her green eyes carried sadness.
Four huge men with cudgels stood there-one at each corner of the wagon.
A man in a rich deep blue jacket stood on the stones of the street, his voice pitched to carry. “Beauties for indenture…young, beautiful girls…” His eyes took in Kharl’s staff, and there was the slightest hesitation before he continued. “Girls for every taste and pleasure…”
Kharl glanced down the pier toward the Hamorian merchanter tied up beyond the Seastag. A blonde beauty-and the girl was attractive-would be welcome in Swartheld. The girl’s eyes did not meet Kharl’s or any other’s.
“Blonde…redhead…any kind of beauty you’d like…”
Kharl turned abruptly, his lips tight together as he walked away from the slaver. Indenture or not, the process was slavery. He’d hoped for better in Valmurl. His eyes moved from side to side, taking in the handful of people out so early. Most seemed well-dressed, and he saw no one in rags or begging.
He thought over Hagen’s words. “Lord Estloch has a good heart…would be as fair as possible.” He understood the message beneath. Lord Estloch was either weak or having troubles in holding on to his land. Or perhaps those beneath him had too much power. Whatever Hagen had meant exactly, it was clear enough that matters were not as Hagen would have had them, and that troubled Kharl, for he knew Hagen to be a fair and more than decent captain and man.
Should he seek passage to Vizyn, and seek out Taleas, the scrivener whom Tyrbel had written? Or first check with the coopers that Hagen had mentioned? After a moment, he decided to visit the coopers in Valmurl. Why travel to a destination where the prospects were unknown until he exhausted the possibilities nearer at hand?
As he walked along the cobblestoned streets, avoiding the too-frequent potholes holding ice and mud, and the gutters that needed cleaning, he studied the shops and the narrow-faced brick dwellings squeezed tightly together. For the number of dwellings, he saw few enough men and women on the streets, although he still saw no beggars or peddlers or tinkers.
Trader’s Square was six long blocks west of the harbor, but it was still early when Kharl reached the square. Despite the winter chill, the air was still, and he had unfastened his jacket to keep from getting too warm. He stood at the edge of the square for several moments. The square was a good twenty rods in length and ten in width, with the center simply an open, paved space. A handful of carts had been pulled into place in the center of the square, but some of the shops and factor’s buildings were yet shuttered. The cooperage was on the far south side of the square, not exactly on it, but on the corner street leading into the square. The building was perhaps another ten cubits wider than Kharl’s had been, and featured double doors in front, with a front loading dock to one side. That suggested that there was not a usable alley behind the cooperage.
Kharl shrugged and stepped through the open doors and into a workroom nearly as deep as his own had been. He noted more shavings and sawdust than he would have preferred, but the cooperage was still relatively neat and clean, and the brick walls had been swept and cleaned recently. As he glanced around the shop, Kharl could see four figures working. One was slighter and smaller, probably an apprentice.
A young man, perhaps four or five years older than Arthal, stepped from the workbench at one side to meet Kharl. “Ser?” His eyes flicked across the staff and came back to Kharl.