Page 75

“You brought me here to experience all that Terrsaw has to offer, did you not?”

“There is nothing at the bottom of these mugs that will help you see clearly.” Baltisse stood abruptly. “Come. We’ll take our leave whilst your legs are still beneath you.”

But Yennes had begun to feel a pleasant buzzing in her mind. It ousted the echo of the voices. She looked about the tavern, at the lazy smiles and the free-flowing liquid that exchanged hands with a strange ease. “I wish to stay,” she told the mage.

Baltisse muttered something beneath her breath, and it sounded like a curse.

Within the hour, Yennes had consumed several servings of the ale – lager, the patrons called it. One man in particular seemed intent on delivering fresh mugs to her table whenever she ran low.

With the arrival of Yennes’ fourth drink, Baltisse stood. “I’m leaving. You should join me.” She was a beacon for attention with her obvious beauty. It seemed she could no longer suffer the advances of every male in the dank room. “Last chance,” she told Yennes, donning her shawl.

“Why not stay?” Yennes slurred. Words seemed harder to string together.

“Because this is not a place for women to linger beyond nightfall,” she said. “Come with me, Yennes. Heed the warning. No good awaits you in these dark corners.”

But Yennes had never felt more welcomed. “I won’t go back to that bay.”

“Then I’ll await you outside,” Baltisse said. “Until you’ve had your fill.”

Yennes laughed. How could she ever hope to have her fill? How could the bay ever bring her the lightness she felt now? She never wanted to see or hear the ocean again. And the Ledge… Soon it would feel like a nightmare, easy to disregard. “Do not await me,” she said, lifting her lager to salute Baltisse. “This is where we part ways.”

“Yen–”

“I do not wish to return with you, Baltisse,” Yennes said, her voice reminiscent of her former self – fierce and unyielding, albeit slurred. “I thank you for your help.”

Baltisse shook her head to the ceiling, but seemed to decide against arguing. “You will find yourself in need of me,” she warned, placing a silver ring on the table. It was thick-banded and marred by divots, holding a simple, unimpressive onyx stone. “This will help you trace your way back.”

Yennes felt a lick of resentment unfurl up her spine. It made her sit taller. “I survived a lifetime on the Ledge and a shorter one in Glacia,” she said icily, her knuckles straining against her hold on the mug. “I do not need your help to survive a kingdom that sits on its hands.”

Baltisse nodded. “Then good luck to you, Yennes. I truly hope it’s everything you wish it to be.” Then, she left.

Soon after, Yennes was accompanied by a group of three men who seemed intent on competing for her attention. The drink had replenished her confidence, removed the incessant anxieties that plagued her so. She felt renewed. The lager was becoming easier to swallow.

One of the men at her table was hollering his tales, though Yennes hadn’t kept track.

“And then I said to ’em, ‘Yeh’ve lost yer bleedin’ mind! I didn’t steal no horse! Tha’ one there’s mine!’ And – I swear to the Mother this be the truth – the guard looked me in the eye an’ said, ‘That’s a donkey yeh rode in on, and it belongs to Mrs Habberdish!’”

The men all roared with laughter and Yennes grinned like a fool.

“Did they lock you up in the keep?” one of the lads asked – a handsome one. His eyes kept skirting back to Yennes, slipping to the opened buttons of her blouse.

“Aye, just the night.” The storyteller slapped the table dramatically. “That’s when I heard all tha’ chatter, yeh know? ’Bout the Queen Consort. The guards kept blitherin’ on ’bout how she’s taken ill.”

“Queen Cressida?” another asked, joining the group. “I heard the very same just this morn’. The smithy’s wife says she’s got some kind of fever that won’t break. Infection maybe. Says the word is Queen Alvira sent for every healer in the kingdom!”

“Aye,” the donkey-thief nodded. “She’ll be dead by week’s end, I’d wager, the way them guards were talkin’.”

“Good riddance to her,” the handsome one said, his eyes locked with Yennes. “Perhaps we’d all be saved from having to bow our heads to that sneering face. I’d much rather kneel to a pretty one.” He took a sip of drink, watching Yennes over the tankard’s rim.

Yennes smiled back.

“I don’t disagree. That woman’s been lookin’ down ’er nose at the likes o’ workin’ folk fer too long.”

Yennes tilted her head to the side, her eyes seeing four hands instead of two. She chuffed, slightly hysterically. “Your hands don’t look like those of a working man’s.” She tapped the storyteller’s knuckles with her fingers. Indeed, his hands were unmarked by any measure of labour Yennes had ever seen. There was a ring around his second finger on his left hand. “Is it your wife who carries out the chores whilst you steal donkeys and tell your tales?”

The other men guffawed, surprise lifting their eyebrows.

But the lout with the smooth hands looked at her with an ugly smile. “Why?” he said. “Yeh lookin’ fer a husband?