Free Apprentice by Eric Guindon Page A

and his guard.
    The foreigner said something incomprehensible, in Westren, Benen presumed.
    “Stay out of this, you cow-lover!” Ward said, the other kids laughed along. There was a nervous quality to their bravado now. The foreigners didn’t understand the insult, neither did Benen really, and the guard drew his long curved blade from its sheath.
    At this, Ward and the others held out their hands in a pose unmistakable even to a foreigner.
    “Don’t you hurt us, my father and his brothers will make you eat that sword,” said Ward, although he kept his tone such that without knowing what the words meant, you might think he was begging for his life.
    The guard motioned to the pouch with his sword and pointed at Benen’s fallen form.
    “Come on,” Ward said. “This isn’t your business.”
    The guard repeated the motion, impatiently.
    “You’ll regret this in the morning, when my father hears of it,” Ward threw the pouch to Benen; it thunked against his arm and fell near him on the ground.
    Using the sword again, the guard indicated the thugs should leave and this was exactly what they did, with all haste. The guard said soothing things to Benen in his language as he helped him back to his feet, handing him the pouch he retrieved from the ground as well.
    “Swoldon do speak you not tongue,” said the other foreigner, the presumed peddler.
    “Oh, I didn’t think either of you spoke Estren,” Benen said.
    “Tongue no good speak but okay do understand.” Benen couldn’t argue with that. The man’s speech was hard to follow, but he had little accent and seemed to understand fine.
    “Thank you for rescuing me,” said Benen and after a pause, “and my purse.”
    “Brother Brother always help.” Benen wasn’t sure what to make of that and must have looked puzzled because the foreigner tried again.
    “Brothers help Brothers always?”
    “But I don’t know you,” Benen said.
    “Both Benders,” the man said. “Brother Benders.”
    Benen looked at him uncomprehending. Orafin, in his satchel bag came out and said, “He means you’re both magicians.”
    Both foreigners jumped on seeing Orafin, speaking in their own tongue what Benen assumed to be hexes against evil. Orafin said some words to them in Westren and they calmed down and came closer. Orafin served as interpreter thereafter.
    “The older man, his name is Blon, he’s a magician, what he calls a Bender of the World. The big guy is his brother Swoldon. They’re travelling, seeking a constellation that only rises in the south from here.”
    “Why did they need to come east to go south?” Benen asked Orafin.
    “Political reasons. I guess the direct southern route is not friendly to wizards or perhaps to anyone. Not sure. Blon recognized you as having talent. Figured you were an apprentice. He says that he would have lost much standing if he had let someone’s apprentice be so mistreated. He hopes you and your master would do the same for his own apprentice should he ever take one.”
    “Tell him I thank him deeply and will endeavour to help my own ‘brothers’ as he has helped me,” Benen told Orafin.
    The rat looked at him for a moment, “No mention of your master doing the same?”
    “I don’t make promises I can’t keep,” Benen said simply. “You know Oster isn’t likely to help anyone. He’s as likely to watch and clap afterwards.”
    The rat shrugged and translated.
    “They offer to escort us back to our master,” Orafin said.
    “Tell them we’ll be fine on our own from here. Tell them it isn’t far,” Benen said. Orafin did.
    “They would like to meet our master,” the rat translated their response.
    “Um, tell them he’s busy,” Benen supplied. The rat spoke with the foreigners and they nodded understanding then and smiled. They bowed to both the rat and the boy and took their leaves. Benen wished his own master was half as genial as these foreigners seemed to be.
    “I tried to warn you, about the boys. You