Jabone's Sword (19 page)

"Yes, and a gorgeous Kartik silk gown is just what you want to be wearing in the trenches or on horseback while slaying the Amalite horde. I hear silk doesn't blood stain easily," Ufalla teased.

Jestia sighed then as if beaten, then seeming to ignore them all she started looking at yet another length of cloth and then another and then another. Until finally Tarius said, "Gods, Jestia, the rest of us would rather walk around town all day avoiding shit than stand around watching you make a fool out of yourself over one piece of cloth or another. Could we go now?"

"I'm still looking," Jestia said with a pout.

Kasiria was so bored she was thinking about just crawling into a bin of cloth and taking a nap.

"I could stay with her and we could meet you someplace later," Ufalla suggested with a shrug.

"Why should anyone have to suffer with the little princess," Tarius said, and it was obvious he used princess like a curse. Kasiria inwardly cringed. "Let her do what we want to do for a change."

Part of Kasiria thought it was a bad idea to leave the two women alone, but the part of her that had been screaming all her life that a woman didn't need a man to take care of her thought if any women could take care of themselves it was these two. Ufalla was better with a sword than anyone she'd ever fought except Jabone, and Jestia was both a swordswoman and a witch. If they weren't safe on the streets of this small village than no one was. And surely alone the two women wouldn't get into too much trouble.

"Meet us near the evening meal time at the Broken Tankard tavern on the east side of town and I'll buy dinner for us all, my treat." She looked at them hard. "Don't get into any trouble, please." They nodded and she was more than happy to leave them to it and go off with the two men. She smiled at Ufalla as she walked past her and said, "I'm sorry."

Ufalla smiled and said, "She doesn't know it yet, but she will pay for it one way or other."

Kasiria wasn't exactly sure what price Ufalla might ask for and she didn't want to know. She followed Jabone and Tarius out the door, shutting it behind her.

* * *

Ufalla stood at the door with it open a crack. At her shoulder Jestia asked impatiently, "Are they gone?"

"Yes, completely out of sight," she said, and opened the door. They walked out closing the door behind them no doubt ruining the shop keeper's day as he had no doubt been sure he as about to make a huge sale.

Jestia actually laughed, and it made Ufalla smile. It had been too long since Jestia had done anything but work on her spell and worry because she couldn't do it. "You were right. Your brother does make a perfect accomplice."

Ufalla laughed, too, and said, "Yes but only if you don't tell him what to do and he doesn't know he's doing it."

Jestia making sure no one on the street was watching her, reached down took a fist full of dirt in her hand blew on it then tossed it in the air and whispered, "Find witch." Ufalla saw nothing but Jestia laughed again grabbed Ufalla's hand and started leading her down the street, so
she
must see something.

"Is that it then? Just say what you want and it's that easy?"

"Usually," Jestia said, "I'm a thought caster. All I have to do is say what I want and it happens."

Ufalla hated to ask but curiosity got the best of her. "Can't you do that with this invisible shield thing?"

"I told you I tried I couldn't do it," Jestia snapped back. Then she took a deep breath and not turning to look at Ufalla no doubt because she was too busy following the trail that Ufalla couldn't see she said, "I'm sorry Ufalla."

"That's all right. I guess it was pretty ignorant of me to ask. I mean if it was that easy you wouldn't be working on it most every night."

A few minutes later Jestia was pulling her into an herb shop. An old woman inside was working with a mortar and pestle and she looked up at Jestia and smiled, "So, sister, what can I do for you?"

"I need to buy a spell," Jestia said.

Ufalla wondered if perhaps lack of sleep had made Jestia lose all sense but then the old woman just replied as if it weren't an odd request at all, "Which spell?"

"I need invisible shield."

The old woman frowned, reached under her table and pulled out a huge book from where Ufalla could only guess. "I don't think I have that one but let's see." She opened the book to the middle and said, "Book book, look look, find invisible shield if it is in your nooks."

Ufalla made a face.

The pages started to flip without her touching them. After this went on for several seconds the book just slammed shut and the old woman picked it up and put it away. Ufalla wasn't quite sure
where
she put it because it was just a table and it was like she had pulled it out and was now putting it back on a shelf that didn't exist and then the book just disappeared. Ufalla bent over 'til she was almost standing on her head to try and see where the book was. When she stood up again she looked at Jestia and it was obvious from the look on her face that she knew what the old woman was going to say before she said . . .

"I'm, sorry sister I don't have invisible shield. The only person I ever knew that had an invisible shield spell was the witch Jezel."

"Damn!" Jestia spat. "I can't believe she did this to me. I have to have that spell, but she only gave me half of it."

The old woman looked impressed. "You're Jazel's apprentice then?"

"I was," Jestia said. She looked at the old woman again, "Do you have some spell to summon Jazel or to get the spell?"

"Now wouldn't that be handy? A summons spell. You could just get any spell from any witch's spell book. No such spell exists, child. I suggest you go to the Kartik and get it from your old teacher, because I also know of no summons spell strong enough that it will move a person across an ocean," the old witch said.

Jestia looked ready to cry but then looked at the witch and asked curiously, "Were you casting in the woods west of here several weeks ago?"

"No," she said simply. "Is there anything you need while you're here?" She waved her hand in the air and a curtain behind her opened to reveal another room which was obviously an apothecary.

Ufalla knew Jestia and knew she was getting ready to stomp off without even looking because she was mad she couldn't get what she'd come for. If she couldn't get exactly what she wanted she wouldn't get anything. "Jestia, you'd better see if she has anything you need."

Jestia nodded. Shoulders slumped, she walked in and started looking around the room. Ufalla didn't realize she was keeping guard until she heard them. She went to the door and opened it a crack. "Damn, Jestia, Kasiria is headed this way."

Jestia nodded and paid the witch for what she had.

Ufalla closed the door and turned to look at the old witch. "Do you have a back door?"

"You should know I do. The Amalites hate witches even now and would gladly burn me if they got half a chance. The Jethriks barely tolerate witches and loathe the craft. I'd have to be a pretty stupid witch not to have a back door in the Jethrikain-held territory of the Amalite. It's at the back of the apothecary behind the curtain." She turned to Jestia and said, "Good luck little sister. Don't worry too much about the spell."

"But I have to stop the dream from coming true."

"Then you'll have to find some other way."

Jestia nodded and headed for the back door. As Ufalla walked past her the witch whispered in her ear, "Things aren't always as they seem, and things really do get darkest just before dawn." As the curtain closed at her back Ufalla heard the others come in the front door.

"Can I help you?" the old woman asked.

"I'd like some salt," Kasiria said.

They slipped out the back door, closing it quietly behind them.

"Was Kasiria following us?" Jestia asked.

"No, she was buying salt."

Jestia nodded. They walked a few feet down the alley and then Jestia sat down hard on a small wooden box sitting in a stack of trash and just started to cry. Ufalla fell to her knees in front of her and wrapped her arms around her.

"Jestia, it can't be as bad as all that. You're just tired and . . . "

"You're an idiot. Yes it is that bad, because I don't know what else to do." She put her arms around Ufalla and cried on her shoulder. "I should have stayed in the Kartik."

"Then go back now, Jestia." Ufalla pushed Jestia back then and dried the tears from her eyes with her thumb. "If that's what you think you need to do then you should just go home, Jestia. Do whatever you have to do to save yourself."

"Will you come with me?"

"No I can't."

"Then I can't go home because there isn't time to go and come back."

"You make no sense at all, Jestia."

"I have to find another way, that's what she said. I have to find another way that's all."

"That's right and you will." Ufalla smiled, stood up and helped Jestia to her feet. "I'm thinking 'Wall of Bats I don't Know Where They Came From' is looking better and better."

Jestia laughed.

"Come on, let's get out of here. If anything it's filthier here than it is on the street. Let's really go shopping," Ufalla offered

"But you hate shopping, Ufalla."

But I love watching you do it,
Ufalla thought and said, "Well then someday you'll go hunting with me." Jestia pulled a face at the horror of the thought of it. Ufalla laughed, "See there? Then we'll be just about even."

* * *

Kasiria bought her salt and then watched as the men bought bags of herbs, and knew they must really, really hate bland food. They had gone to the livery to buy some tack for Jabone's horse and then just walked around looking at things and talking 'til it was time to meet the girls at the tavern. When they walked in they found Ufalla and Jestia already waiting for them at a back table and when they sat down across from them it was obvious that they'd already had a couple of beers because their eyes were glassy.

A serving wench came over asked what they'd like and Kasiria ordered five more beers and the evening meal which as fate would have it turned out to be stew and bread. They had all laughed and Jabone said, "I would kill for a big chunk of meat or some fish about now." And the others even Jestia agreed.

"So," Tarius asked looking at Ufalla. "Did she like to kill you sister?"

"Aye," Ufalla said. "Looking at the most boring things in every shop front and cart we passed and I don't think she actually bought anything all day," Ufalla said.

Jestia sighed. "What would have been the point of it? There is nowhere to wear anything nice. I did buy an apple. Of course it had been in storage so long it was pithy."

"I know I ate it. I told you it was the wrong season here for apples to be fresh," Ufalla said.

They brought out the beer and stew and Kasiria watched with curiosity as Jabone pushed his mug over in front of Ufalla and started to eat his dinner.

Kasiria ate her stew and bread listening to the women who were obviously near drunk if not already there. They were sizing up everyone in the bar according to how they thought they might perform sexually. Jastia comparing the men while Ufalla compared the women of which there weren't many.

"That woman over there, she'd do you but you'd have to pay," Ufalla said, and Kasiria thought she was most likely right. It was a Jethirk bar and in the Jethrik "nice" women didn't hang out in taverns, rarely drank, and didn't wear so few clothes so in all probability she actually was a prostitute. Ufalla started digging in her pocket and said, "I wonder how much money I have."

"Not enough," Tarius said with a sigh, looking longingly at the woman.

Jestia pointed to a man standing at the bar. "And if you did him you'd have to make him pay, because otherwise it wouldn't be worth it," Jestia said, and laughed in that peculiar way that people did when they were drunk, loud and too much and for very little reason.

"Or you could just ask him to do it twice and slap you," Ufalla said and then they both started roaring with laughter.

"It's the punch line to an old joke," Jabone explained to Kasiria who was looking confused, but that didn't help her confusion.

Tarius looked at her then told the joke. "This woman says to her lover give me ten digits and make it hurt, so he made love to her twice and slapped her."

Kasiria just shrugged, and this made the women laugh even more than they had been before.

Kasiria was just starting to relax and enjoy herself when much to her disgust in wandered Thomas and his troop. She had seen men from the garrison all over the village all day long but she had purposely picked this tavern and not the one closer to the garrison because she had learned that it was owned by and mostly patronized by Jethriks and that the soldiers rarely patronized this one because it was so much further from the garrison and therefore it was harder to stumble home drunk. She was glad when Thomas sat on the other side of the tavern away from them.

"My brother must tell better stories than he tells jokes," Ufalla said.

"Your brother tells wonderful stories," Jestia said dreamily.

Kasiria noticed to her dismay that the women had downed the two beers she'd just bought them and Ufalla had drunk Jabone's and they had ordered two more.

By the time she'd finished her first beer and started on her second and was starting to feel it the two women and Tarius had both downed three more mugs and ordered another.

"Ah, maybe you'd all better slow down there, all right? We have to actually get back to the barracks and be up for roll call in the morning or they dock our pay."

"Let me get this straight. They pay us, let us go to town with our pockets full of coin, but then if we don't show up to roll they dock our pay?" Tarius slurred out.

"That's right," Kasiria said, taking another sip of her beer thinking that she'd better watch what she drank if she was going to be sure of getting them all back to the barracks tonight, and glad that at least Jabone seemed to be staying sober.

"Don't worry, Kasiria, we know how to handle our liquor," Jestia started, then just laughed out loud again. "Or at least Ufalla does," she said, slapping the other woman hard on the shoulder.