The Destiny of the Sword by Dave Duncan Page A

with a senior in front, usually a green,kilted Sixth, rarely a red Fifth, and very rarely a blue Seventh. Browns were most common, of course, but there were absurd numbers of fresh,faced Firsts and Seconds, who would be more or less useless, mere errand boys and extra mouths to feed.
    Even from the ship Wallie could detect tension in Casr. Gangs of small children ran along behind the troops sometimes, shouting rudenesses, and they would be taking that attitude from their elders. Swordsmen expected cheering, not jeering. He thought he saw some unobtrusive fist,waving from adults and certainly he saw petty pilfering, girls being accosted, men being roughly shouldered aside or insulted. If such things were going on in public, what was happening behind the shutters?
    Free swords lived on charity, a primitive form of taxation. Such extortion was bearable for a night or two when a troop arrived hi a town or village to clean up any crime that the garrison could not handle, to confirm that the resident swordsmen were themselves honest, to tumble the best,looking girls, and
     
    then to move on. A large city would hardly notice them, but even one as large as Casr would be reeling from this invasion. All these men must expect to eat regularly and sleep somewhere. And certainly not sleep alone, not swordsmen! Hundreds of active young men with nothing much to keep them occupied—who was in charge of this zoo? Who had been so brash as to call a tryst?
    Wallie had kept his sword on his back, prepared to run down and intervene if he noticed any serious disturbances, but that had not been necessary. Yet obviously the tryst was chaos in spades. He wanted nothing to do with it.
    Then came the message from Honakura, brought by a sour,faced priestess, and that was good news. To learn that Shonsu had no parents or other family in Casr gave Wallie a huge sense of relief. Lunch was almost due. He decided to celebrate with a tankard of beer and asked Jja to fetch it for him. Before he could drink, Nnanji’s boots thumped on the deck, and he strode in, dusty and hot. His normal carefree cheerfulness had been replaced by an ominous angry scowl.
    Wallie held out the beer “My goods are your goods,” he said.
    Nnanji shook his bead. “No thank you, brother. I’ve been having that stuff thrust at me all morning.”
    A Fourth would be a good catch, a very tall and unusually young Fourth. The recruiting was blatant and ferocious. As soon as Sapphire had docked and the port officer had gone ashore again, no less than eight swordsmen had tried to come aboard, hunting for newcomers. Brota had donned her sword and stood at the top of the plank and glared, huge and red and ugly, a swordsman’s nightmare. She had kept them away, but obviously Nnanji would have run into the problem in the town.
    “How many times were you propositioned?” Wallie asked.
    His prot£g£ scowled and counted on his fingers. “Thirteen!” He shook his head, changed his mind, took the tankard, and drained it. Yet obviously it was not the recruiting that had been worrying him. There was something else.
    “What did you say?” inquired Wallie, amused.
    “Just that I had a mentor already. Then they wanted to know who and what rank; I quoted one seventy,five at them! Acch!”
     
    Then Thana came in. Nnanji grabbed her to administer a long and doubtless beery kiss.
    Jja tactfully shepherded the children out. Wallie seated himself on die chest by the window, where he had spent the morning. Nnanji and Thana settled on the other, arms around each other, and Wallie told them of Honakura’s message.
    Then Katanji strolled in, looking cheerful. He, also, had been scouting. His injured arm relieved him of the obligation to wear a sword, and probably that had been a big advantage for nun, Wallie thought.
    ‘Take a seat, novice,” he said jovially, waving at the floor. “I don’t suppose the press,gangs bothered you much?”
    Katanji sank down cross,legged and grinned. “They did,