"No doubt you've a point, Milord," he admitted finally. "But even so, I can't say I don't begrudge every lost minute."
"No more can I," Bahzell said. He looked over Alfar's shoulder, and the human turned to see one of the inn maids walking towards him with a large, heavily laden tray of food. She looked as if there were nowhere in the world she would not have preferred to be, and Bahzell's lips tightened at her manifest unhappiness. But he only nodded to her, and gestured for her to set the tray on the table.
She obeyed quickly and silently, her anxious expression proclaiming her trepidation at finding herself in such close proximity to eight murdering hradani, whatever their leader claimed to be, and Alfar looked back at Bahzell as she turned and scurried away like a frightened rabbit. He felt his face heat, but Bahzell only flicked his ears in the equivalent of a human shrug and gave him a crooked smile.
Alfar wondered if he should say something, but nothing suggested itself to him. Then he wondered if he could get away with declining the substantial breakfast Bahzell had obviously ordered for him. One more glance at the hradani's expression told him there was no point trying, however, and his empty belly's sudden, sharp pangs as he smelled the food's aroma made him just as happy that there wasn't.
"Better," Bahzell said with a broader, less ironic smile as Alfar seated himself and reached for a spoon. "I'd half thought as how I'd find myself force-feeding you, Master Axeblade!"
"If I thought it might have gotten us on our way any sooner, you would have, Milord," he said around a mouthful of stinging hot porridge and honey.
"Ah, a man of wisdom, I see," Brandark put in. The Bloody Sword half-reclined along another bench directly under the window, plucking idly at his balalaika, and Alfar glanced across at him. "I wouldn't call Bahzell the very brightest fellow I've ever met, Master Axeblade, but he's certainly in the running for the most stubborn." Hurthang and the other members of the Order chuckled, and Brandark grinned. But then his expression sobered. "And in this case, he would have been right, too," he said. "You needed food, as well as rest, and you'd not have taken either if Bahzell hadn't made you. Riding with worry and grief can drive a man too hard and kill him as surely as any sword or arrow."
Alfar's spoon paused midway between bowl and lips, frozen there by the understanding in the Bloody Sword's voice. After a lifetime of mutual hatred, compassion was the very last thing he would have anticipated from any hradani. Which, he suddenly thought, might say more about his own prejudices than it did about Bahzell or Brandark.
"I-" He paused, wondering what might be the right thing to say. Then he cleared his throat. "I know what you mean," he said. "But to see something like that-to know an entire herd of coursers could be destroyed that way . . ." He shook his head. "I doubt anyone but another Sothōii could really understand what that feels like, Lord Brandark."
"Just 'Brandark' will do fine, Master Axeblade." The Bloody Sword chuckled. "None of us hradani stand much on ceremony, and even if I'd been inclined to do that, I'd've given up months ago. These Horse Stealer louts are too ignorant and uncivilized to remember proper titles, anyway."
"Just you go right on being civilized, my lad," Gharnal advised him, while another chuckle rumbled through the other Horse Stealers. "Don't you be wasting a moment worrying about what nasty things might happen to a man whose mouth is so smart he can't be keeping it shut."
"You see?" Brandark said plaintively. "All of them are like that, not just him." He pointed at Bahzell with his chin, and the Horse Stealer snorted.
"But as to understanding how this all feels for a Sothōii," Brandark continued more seriously, "no doubt you're right. I can probably come closer now that I've met coursers myself-Sir Kelthys' Walasfro and Baron Tellian's Dathgar-but that's not the same thing as growing up around them." He shook his head, his eyes dark. "All I can say is that I never dreamed I'd meet such magnificent creatures. I wouldn't have believed anything could ravage an entire herd of them the way you've described, but if there's something out there that can, then I want it stopped, Master Axeblade."
A dark, almost hungry sound of agreement murmured its way around the table. Agreement, Alfar thought, from hradani. And not just any hradani-from Horse Stealer hradani. He'd discovered that he was past feeling surprise, but wonder was another thing entirely.
He started to say something more, then shrugged with a half-apologetic smile and applied his full attention to the meal Bahzell had ordered for him. He ate quickly, but not so quickly he didn't savor every mouthful. It wasn't the best cooking he'd ever tasted-far from it!-but he discovered that the old saw about hunger being the best seasoning was absolutely correct. By the time he'd finished the porridge, drunk the hot tea, eaten the toasted sausages, and mopped up the last egg yolk with a piece of bread, he felt better than he had in days.
"Thank you, Milord Champion," he said simply, pushing the last plate aside. "I still begrudge the delay, but there's no doubt I needed the food, and you're right. Only a fool drives himself into the kind of blind daze I was pushing myself into."
"I'd not say you'd gone quite that far," Bahzell said with another slow smile. "Still and all, I'm thinking as how we can both agree you'd pushed a mite further and harder than you'd the need to. And now, it's no doubt best we be on our way."
"Of course." Alfar stood, reaching for the belt purse Lord Edinghas had sent with him, but Bahzell shook his head.
"No need for that. The Order's seen to our shot."
"But-"
"Leave off, Master Axeblade," Bahzell advised him. "I've no doubt Lord Edinghas would stand good for it, but it's Tomanâk's business we're on. It may be as how Lord Edinghas might choose to be making a donation to Himself's church when all's done, but that's neither here nor there just now."
Alfar started to argue, then stopped himself.
"Better," Bahzell said again, then gathered up his fellow hradani with his eyes. "I'm thinking we'd best be on our way, lads," he said. He drained his tankard and set it on the table, then climbed to his feet.
"Aye," Hurthang agreed. "And not just because we've need of haste on Himself's business." He grimaced. "It's not so very popular we are in these parts."
"What?" Alfar looked at him sharply, remembering his own impression when he first entered the common room. Had the hradani actually chosen their table out of defensive considerations?
Hurthang waved one hand unobtrusively, and Alfar's eyes narrowed as he followed the gesture. A balding, broad shouldered, deep-paunched man in a leather apron stood behind the bar at one end of the common room. Alfar hadn't seen him enter, and he certainly hadn't come near the hradani to see if they had any orders. Instead, he simply stood there, arms folded across his chest, and glowered at Bahzell and his companions. There was as much fear as anger in his expression, and his shoulders hunched sullenly.
"Milord Champion," Alfar demanded, "has anyone -?"
"Don't be worrying yourself, Master Axeblade," Bahzell advised him. "It might be as how there was after being an . . . intemperate word or two last night. But that's something as any hradani minded to travel amongst other folk had best be being thick-skinned enough to deal with. I'll not say as how that's after making it any more pleasant, but people are after being people, warts and all, whatever it might be we'd prefer, and we'll not convince your folk to be setting aside all the blood that's flowed betwixt us overnight. The innkeeper was none too happy to be seeing us, but we'd Sir Jahlahan's sealed warrant as how we're on Baron Tellian's business, and our kormaks spend as well as the next man's."