Free Karavans by Jennifer Roberson Page B

The guide said helpfully,
    “He means they are whores.”
    Audrun’s mind went blank. She felt the emptying of sense, of comprehension. She wondered vaguely if she were supposed to be angry, to feel insulted; and if she felt neither, was she then abnormal?
    She heard the big man move, a slight shifting of the massive body. She became aware that his eyes were genuinely sorry, but also wholly relieved. Apparently this was a better excuse than oxen being too slow.
    “This is acceptable,” she heard herself say.
    Jorda’s mouth parted the thick beard. “What?”
    “They are acceptable. Your terms. We will go behind the Sisters.” She kept her tone very even. “Of the Road.”
    He blinked at her, brow furrowing. The karavan-master, she realized, did not believe her.
    “The war,” Audrun said, summoning dignity, “has changed everything. One makes shift where one must. Where we lived, it was very bad. My husband—” She paused a moment, to recover her composure. “My husbandlost every member of his kinfolk. Father. Mother. Three brothers. Two sisters. Their children. There is no one now of his blood. Only my kin survive, and they are overmountain.” Briefly her hand cupped the slight curve of her belly beneath voluminous skirts and long, unbelted tunic. “We sought the advice of fourteen different diviners. All of them said the same. This child must be born in Atalanda, if it is to survive at all.” She raised her chin, the better to meet the suddenly sharp green eyes. “Sancorra is defeated. We can do nothing here. But we can do
everything
there.”
    BRODHI HEARD THEM even before he entered the couriers’ common tent. Timmon, Bethid, and Alorn. Laughing, as usual, telling impossible tales of impossible adventures and equally impossible sexual encounters, insulting one another with impunity, insulting those who would never hear the comments to know they were the butt of jokes. Nowhere were couriers different. He didn’t know if they were hired for it, or gained the vulgar camaraderie upon the road.
    It was dusk, and the interior of the tent was accordingly dim. Brodhi slid silently into the tent before they realized he was there. Bethid lay sprawled on her narrow pallet, one leather-gaitered leg cocked up as she grinned up at the glyph-carved ridgepole overhead. Her short-cropped fair hair was mussed into upstanding tufts and spikes, her duncolored woven tunic stained. She had tossed her blue courier’s mantle across the foot of her pallet, though Timmon and Alorn had resorted to crude iron hooks depending from the ridgepole. Timmon and Alorn themselves sat upon a spread blanket in the center of the tent, throwing bone dice.
    The two young men were intent upon their gambling. It was Bethid who saw him first. “Brodhi!” She sat upright. “We weren’t expecting you back so soon.”
    He availed himself of the nearest empty hook and hung up his mantle after shaking it out briefly and making certainthe heavy silver badge stayed pinned. The jesting had died. So too had the insults.
    Timmon and Alorn exchanged glances. The dice were scooped up and tucked away into a hidden pocket. As one the male couriers rose and went to the entry flap. Timmon stepped through, murmuring something Brodhi didn’t catch; Alorn hesitated and briefly turned back. “Bethid? Want to come? We’ll go down to Mikal’s.”
    “In a moment.” She jerked her head to suggest he go on, then tugged at a loose gaitered boot, tightening leather straps. “You could
try
, Brodhi. Learn the dice games. Play a few throws. Let them think you’re human.”
    He sat down upon the nearest open pallet and began to undo knots in the leather thongs cross-gartered over his own gaiters. “Why should I pretend to be something I am not?”
    Bethid waved a dismissive hand. “You know what I mean. Let them think you don’t hold them in contempt.”
    Brodhi glanced at her in mild irony. “But I do.”
    “
So much
contempt,” she amended, scowling at