over.
“The poison. A single spine struck past the edge of your armor.” Seg shook his head. “Well, you cannot armor every inch of your body and still prance about.”
“No.”
The orange flower in striking back at me, so Seg related, hit my shoulder where the armor stopped the poisoned spines dead. But a petal flapped up and that solitary damned spine ripped in past the rim of my corselet, past the mesh, and so nicked me in the neck.
“You’d have had your head fall off if I hadn’t kissed your neck as though you were a luscious sylvie.”
“I trust you enjoyed the experience.”
“I am not a fellow for sylvies, as you know.”
“You suggested it.”
“I was merely trying to be vivid in describing what could have been more awkward if that damned flower thing had upended you.”
“Oh? I see.”
The woman, this mistress Tlima, looked on in a bewildered fashion.
She addressed us as “pantor” which is the Pandahem way of saying lord. It equates with the notor of Hamal and the jen of Vallia. She called Seg Seg. She did not name me.
By this time Seg knew that I had a whole arsenal of names on which I could call. And for the Emperor of Vallia to be swanning about in a jungle on Pandahem could be awkward for said emperor if avaricious minds got to work.
The gourd emitting its party noises and the orange poison-spined flower formed a symbiosis of plants dedicated to catching and eating people. They grew in handy spots. The Kregish name can most easily be given as the Cabaret Plant.
Cabaret, I think, has the air to suit what they were up to.
Mistress Tlima bent and solicitously pulled and punched at my pillow in the way women have. A tinge of color glowed across her cheekbones.
“The Cabaret Plants are evil to us, for they delude poor drunken folk. Otherwise they live on small animals and their roots.”
“Evil?” said Seg, raising one ferocious eyebrow.
“Yes!”
“As to that,” I said, and rolled aside to avoid a sharpish straight left to the pillow and then rolled back to dodge the following right hook. “As to that, if a poor deluded folkim is drunk, perhaps he shouldn’t be?”
“I shall fetch a meal,” said mistress Tlima. The small room in which I lay was furnished as I have said, and was clearly one of her superior guest rooms. Seg had paid her in good gold deldys, which are Havilfarese coins. The local gold coin, the crox, was named after the local king. He, I was to learn, was busy causing the dickens of a stir and an uproar that was to embroil Seg and me willy-nilly. So, I lay back on the severely mauled pillow and smiled up at my blade comrade.
“So you brought me in on your back, hey?”
He looked shifty for a moment, did Seg, and then he hauled out his purse and dished out the ten gold pieces.
“I’ll hand it to you, Dray. You spotted that trap first.”
I took the gold and let a big smirk contort my features. That rubbed the salt in. Seg suddenly burst out laughing. He gazed down on me as the door opened and mistress Tlima came in with the tray that, quite clearly, had been already prepared. Still laughing, Seg burst out: “You can smirk all you like, Dray! I’m only thankful to have lost the ten deldys! By the Veiled Froyvil! I thought I was consigned to the Ice Floes of Sicce then.”
Mistress Tlima placed the linen-covered tray on the side table. She stared reproachfully at Seg.
“Pantor Seg! How could you?”
“Well,” said Seg, and that shifty look returned, “you can’t afford to give this comrade of mine a knuckle.”
“Pantor Dray? He saved you, and you tell him you brought him in all the way through the forest on your back!”
“Oh?” I said. I was enjoying this. “Oh ho?”
“You can oh ho, and oh ho ho, my old dom — I’lltell you — Mistress Tlima’s husband came across us and we brought you in flopped out over the back of his cart.”
So, I laughed.
By Zair! But it was good to be alive!
The food was good. It was roast rashers of
“The poison. A single spine struck past the edge of your armor.” Seg shook his head. “Well, you cannot armor every inch of your body and still prance about.”
“No.”
The orange flower in striking back at me, so Seg related, hit my shoulder where the armor stopped the poisoned spines dead. But a petal flapped up and that solitary damned spine ripped in past the rim of my corselet, past the mesh, and so nicked me in the neck.
“You’d have had your head fall off if I hadn’t kissed your neck as though you were a luscious sylvie.”
“I trust you enjoyed the experience.”
“I am not a fellow for sylvies, as you know.”
“You suggested it.”
“I was merely trying to be vivid in describing what could have been more awkward if that damned flower thing had upended you.”
“Oh? I see.”
The woman, this mistress Tlima, looked on in a bewildered fashion.
She addressed us as “pantor” which is the Pandahem way of saying lord. It equates with the notor of Hamal and the jen of Vallia. She called Seg Seg. She did not name me.
By this time Seg knew that I had a whole arsenal of names on which I could call. And for the Emperor of Vallia to be swanning about in a jungle on Pandahem could be awkward for said emperor if avaricious minds got to work.
The gourd emitting its party noises and the orange poison-spined flower formed a symbiosis of plants dedicated to catching and eating people. They grew in handy spots. The Kregish name can most easily be given as the Cabaret Plant.
Cabaret, I think, has the air to suit what they were up to.
Mistress Tlima bent and solicitously pulled and punched at my pillow in the way women have. A tinge of color glowed across her cheekbones.
“The Cabaret Plants are evil to us, for they delude poor drunken folk. Otherwise they live on small animals and their roots.”
“Evil?” said Seg, raising one ferocious eyebrow.
“Yes!”
“As to that,” I said, and rolled aside to avoid a sharpish straight left to the pillow and then rolled back to dodge the following right hook. “As to that, if a poor deluded folkim is drunk, perhaps he shouldn’t be?”
“I shall fetch a meal,” said mistress Tlima. The small room in which I lay was furnished as I have said, and was clearly one of her superior guest rooms. Seg had paid her in good gold deldys, which are Havilfarese coins. The local gold coin, the crox, was named after the local king. He, I was to learn, was busy causing the dickens of a stir and an uproar that was to embroil Seg and me willy-nilly. So, I lay back on the severely mauled pillow and smiled up at my blade comrade.
“So you brought me in on your back, hey?”
He looked shifty for a moment, did Seg, and then he hauled out his purse and dished out the ten gold pieces.
“I’ll hand it to you, Dray. You spotted that trap first.”
I took the gold and let a big smirk contort my features. That rubbed the salt in. Seg suddenly burst out laughing. He gazed down on me as the door opened and mistress Tlima came in with the tray that, quite clearly, had been already prepared. Still laughing, Seg burst out: “You can smirk all you like, Dray! I’m only thankful to have lost the ten deldys! By the Veiled Froyvil! I thought I was consigned to the Ice Floes of Sicce then.”
Mistress Tlima placed the linen-covered tray on the side table. She stared reproachfully at Seg.
“Pantor Seg! How could you?”
“Well,” said Seg, and that shifty look returned, “you can’t afford to give this comrade of mine a knuckle.”
“Pantor Dray? He saved you, and you tell him you brought him in all the way through the forest on your back!”
“Oh?” I said. I was enjoying this. “Oh ho?”
“You can oh ho, and oh ho ho, my old dom — I’lltell you — Mistress Tlima’s husband came across us and we brought you in flopped out over the back of his cart.”
So, I laughed.
By Zair! But it was good to be alive!
The food was good. It was roast rashers of
Similar Books
