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 At the end. There s another one like him there.
I led Gairloch along the narrow way toward the back, and eased open the
stall door, holding it so that it didn t fall off the worn wooden hinge-pins,
then glancing at the bleached and cracked support timbers of the stable
itself, still wondering about the golden-finished white-oak coach.
Wheeee& eeee& The whinny of the other pony subsided as I let Gairloch take
his own time.
Both sniffed the air, while I wanted to sneeze.
In time, I got him in and unsaddled. I quickly stowed the staff in the
straw, along with my pack, and searched until I found an old brush. By then,
the stableboy, not the collector, was watching.
 Any grain?
He gave me a wary look, and I produced a copper penny. The boy produced a
battered bucket; and I split it between the two, although I gave Gairloch the
largest share.
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Finally, I felt Gairloch was settled enough for me to chance the inn.
Once inside, the odor of unwashed herders, rancid oils, stale perfumes, and
smoke left my eyes stinging. Squinting through the haze, I peered over the
crowded tables. Those in the back, toward the narrow but drafty door through
which I had entered, were long trestle tables with benches. Beyond them were
square tables, of a darker and polished wood. Between the two types of tables
ran a flimsy half-wall with three wide openings for the inn s servers.
Everyone on the road to or from Hewlett seemed stranded in the same inn. On
my side of the half-wall, men and women were shoulder to shoulder at the
trestle tables. A few of the tables for the local gentry, or whoever the
privileged ones might be, had vacant chairs around them, but none of the
tables were unclaimed.
The Snug Inn, despite its name, was not snugly built.
Uncle Sardit would have listed in detail all the faults in the
construction. While I scarcely had his experience, there were some poor design
features evident even to me. The outside eaves were not long enough to keep
the wind from blowing underneath and into the upstairs rooms. Likewise, the
stone facing of the front wall had been built for style and was beginning to
pull away from the heavy timbers that framed the side walls. The curves in the
rough beams that framed both side and front walls showed that they had not
been properly treated or cured.
Inside was worse. The hallway dividers separating the common and gentry
sections had been carelessly sawed and nailed together with small spikes,
needlessly splitting the wood. After my short tenure with Uncle Sardit, I
could have done better and probably done it quicker than whoever had built
them. The gentry s tables were square, sharp-edged, and probably gave the
inn s servants bruises. Again, a few minutes with a plane or even a shaping
saw would have produced a better and more serviceable table.
The common tables were green-oak trestles, sawed or split before the wood
had cured. With the amount of red oak, black oak, and even maple available in
Candar, I wondered why the tables were green oak.
I looked over the mass of people, wincing at the din. Though I had stood
there for what seemed a long time, no one even looked at me.
Finally, I made out a space on the bench next to a man in a rough brown
coat, halfway across the back of the commons area. I edged toward it.
 Watch it& 
 Young pup& 
 My apologies, I offered to the man whose elbow I had jostled, even as I
ducked past him. He glared over the edge of the chipped ceramic mug he held to
his beard-encircled mouth.
 Won t bring back the mead& worthless time for a storm& Lass! More mead!
From the smell, whatever mead was, I didn t have any desire to taste it.
Nor did I have much desire to stay in the Snug Inn, except that I was hungry.
Since I hadn t learned how to eat hay or oats, that meant entering the inn.
I looked at the space beside the man in brown, then shrugged and eased
myself into place, wishing somehow I had brought the staff, but knowing it was
safer in the straw of Gairloch s stall. I still didn t like leaving it.
 You? asked the brown man, bearded and hunched over his mug of steaming
cider. From his muscles and his belt, I would have guessed a carpenter.
Of course he didn t know me. I hadn t told him.  Lerris, used to be a
woodworker before I left home. All of which was true enough.
 Woodworker? Too damned fair for that. He glared at me.
I sighed.  All right, I was an apprentice woodcrafter-never got further
than benches and breadboards.
 Hah! Least you re honest, boy. No one would admit that, weren t it true.
Then he glared back at his cider, ignoring me.
Left to my own devices, I waved at the serving-girl. A black-haired and
skinny thing, she wore a sleeveless brown leather vest and wide skirts. She
ignored me as well. So I began to study the people while I waited for her to
get close enough for me to insist on something.
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At the table closest the hearth sat four people-a woman veiled below her
eyes, wearing a loose-fitting green tunic over a white blouse, and presumably
trousers. She was the only veiled woman I had ever seen. But if her lower face
were unknown, her clothes were tight enough to reveal that her figure, at
least, was desirable.
Her forehead was darkish, as were her heavy eyebrows and her hair, bound
with golden cord into a cone shape. Over the back of her chair was a heavy
coat-of a white fur I had never seen.
Two of the other men were clearly fighters, wearing surcoats I could not
identify and the bowl-cut of hair worn under a helmet. One fighter was older,
white-haired and grizzled, but his body seemed younger. His back was to me and
I could not see his face, though I would have guessed it was unlined, despite
the white hair. The other fighter was thin, youngish, with a face like a
weasel and dark black hair to match.
Between them, across from the woman, half-facing the fire, was a man in
spotless white. Even from that distance, more than ten cubits, I could see his
eyes were old, though he looked more like Koldar s age, perhaps a trace older,
perhaps even into his third decade. But the eyes had seen more, and I shivered
and dropped my glance as he turned in my direction.
The man in white smiled. His smile was friendly, reassuring, and everyone
in the dining area of the saloon relaxed. I could feel the wave of relaxation,
and I fought it off, just because no one was going to tell me what to feel.
Was he the one who rode in the golden coach?
 You in the back. I see you are cold. Would you like some warmth? I felt
he was looking at me, but his fingers pointed at three figures huddled against
the timbered wall behind me and to my left. The two men and the woman, all
clad in the shapeless gray padded jackets that marked them as herders of some
sort, ignored the question and looked down.
 Fine, said the man in white.  I can tell you have come in from the
blizzard s chill. The warmth is on me. He gestured, and in our corner of the
long room, I could feel the dampness and chill dissipate, though we were far
from the fire.
The woman looked away from the wizard, for that was clearly what he had to
be, and made a motion, as if to reject the heat. The two men looked down.
Me& for the first time since Gairloch and I had ridden out of Hrisbarg, I
felt comfortably warm, as if the long table where I sat were the one before
the hearth, rather than the farthest from the fire. Yet the heat thrown by the
wizard chilled me as well, inside, and it felt familiar, as if I too could
have called it forth, though I did not know how. Nor did I want to try.
At a small table in the corner nearest the hearth sat another man, the only [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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