Free The Malmillard Codex by K.G. McAbee Page A

see, boy?" Val grated, leaning
against the wall as a sudden dizziness threatened to drop him
again.
    "Only you, sire, indeed, a lying here all
alone, with the rats beginning to gather," said the boy, casting a
nervous glance at Val's sword.
    "Nothing else?"
    "No, sire, nothing else indeed. Well,
barring a strange sound, like as it might have been a very big rat
a scuttling away. There be some fearful big rats near the harbor,
sire," concluded the boy, as if satisfied in his own mind what the
odd sound must have been.
    But Val was not convinced that it had been a
rat, huge or otherwise. He jingled the coins in his belt pouch and
watched as the boy's face lit up.
    "Indeed, sire, it was my pleasure to save
you, but if you was a'wanting to offer me a reward, I won't say
no," he said, a grin plastered across his dirty face.
    Val dug out a small copper coin and tossed
it to the boy, then shook himself once and walked from the
alley.
    The boy bit down with two of his remaining
teeth on the coin. It was enough to buy bread for the whole family,
he thought in satisfaction. Or enough to buy meat and ale for
one.
    The boy scampered toward the ale shop at the
corner.

Chapter Six
    The sun was
casting out its last faint rays in a net of gold as Val approached
the cookshop where he was to meet Madryn. The crowds in the street
had lessened from earlier in the day. It was that time when
approaching nightfall had sent many of the weaker indoors, even as
the predators who thrived on darkness rose from sleep and began
their wanderings in the soon to be murky streets.
    The cookshop blazed with light. Succulent
smells drifted out the unglazed windows, to gather like clouds end
and entice the passers-by.
    Val paused outside the open doorway and
stooped to peer inside. Not seeing Madryn's lean, black-clad figure
inside, he looked up and down the street. He was still shaky from
his encounter with…whatever had been in the alley.
    What had happened while he had lain there,
unconscious, in that dank and smelly abode? Why had no one, in this
village that lived off thieving, stolen his weapons, his money, his
boots, while he lay there helpless? These and other questions ran
round and round his weary mind as he stood like some great bronze
statue before the cookshop.
    "You must be starving, Val," a voice
whispered in his ear.
    Val jumped, bumped into an inoffensive
burgher and sent him sprawling against a dirty stone wall.
    "Carefully," laughed Madryn as she helped
the man to his feet and brushed him off. "Your pardon, sir, but my
friend hasn't eaten all day and he has a mighty appetite."
    The man, quite small himself, looked with
careful consideration at the height of Madryn, the breadth of Val,
and the weapons of both, and decided that he had no complaint
whatsoever in the matter. He offered a weak smile and scurried
away, to disappear into the darkening street.
    "Come along and tell me about your day,"
Madryn said, taking Val's arm and leading him into the shop. "Was
Daemon well?"
    Val nodded as they stepped over the
threshold.
    Clamor and steamy smells rose like a wall
before them. A narrow, deep room cluttered with tables large and
small, the shop reached away into a dim distance towards a huge
fireplace that belched out a pale gray smoke through and around its
collection of pots and kettles and pans.
    A tall young man came toward them through
the crush, his dour face as white as uncooked dough. "You are
staying at the Raven and have ordered supper," he informed them in
tones that showed he would brook no argument on the subject. Then,
without waiting for a reply, he led them to a table set for two in
a relatively quiet corner near the door.
    Madryn unbuckled her swordbelt and hung it
on an unoccupied chair, then settled into another with a sigh of
relief. "Sit down, Val. You look like you could use a bottle or two
of wine." Her anger of earlier in the day had dissipated…or had
it?
    Val hung his sword beside hers and sat down.
Should he tell her