Star of the Morning

  She followed the men into a tavern, only slightly surprised when Adhémar held the door open for her. “Are you still here?”

  “Morgan!” Glines gasped.

  Morgan pushed past Adhémar and took Glines by the arm. “Why are you so friendly with him?” she whispered fiercely. “I know he is fair to look upon, but I warn you, Glines, that his bad manners more than make up for it. Do not encourage him.”

  “Ah, uh, I thought I recognized him,” Glines said, looking unaccountably nervous.

  “And I thought he was a mark you intended to fleece at cards,” she said. “I will admit that he would make a good one.”

  “Well,” Glines said thoughtfully, “that would pass the afternoon quite nicely, wouldn’t it?” He looked over her head. “Cards, my—”

  “Certainly,” Adhémar interrupted. “Of course, the wench here will have to give me back the rest of my gold before I can wager anything.”

  Morgan looked up at him, placidly. “Why would I have any of your gold?”

  “You’re wearing my socks.”

  “I keep telling you, lad,” Paien said with a laugh, “to be grateful the damage was limited to that. Camid, I think we’ve finally found a lad to turn her head. Can you believe she left him alive?”

  “But robbed,” Adhémar said distinctly.

  Paien only smiled over his shoulder. “It could have been worse.”

  Morgan agreed, but she didn’t bother to say as much. She allowed Glines to pull out her chair. After two years of trying to convince him she did not need such courtesies, she had given up. She did scowl at him, though.

  “You will never make a true mercenary,” she said.

  “So you say,” he said, sitting down next to her, “and yet I manage to brandish my sword and do damage with it.”

  “You do more damage with your gaming.”

  “I game, you fight.” He smiled at her. “I think we should wed and live our lives happily on our strengths.”

  Morgan was grateful there was no cup of ale in her hand, for then she would have already drunk and she would have wasted a mouthful by spewing it out. To her surprise, Adhémar was making the same sound of disbelief.

  “Wed with her?” Adhémar said. “A man wouldn’t dare!”

  Camid’s look would have felled a lesser man. “Careful, lad,” he said quietly. “An insult would need to be repaid.”

  “By me,” Morgan put in pointedly.

  Adhémar ignored her. “You are very protective of a wench who obviously needs no protection.”

  “Don’t mind him,” Paien said, waving expansively. “Camid would be just as protective of Glines.”

  Paien looked at Adhémar with a friendly smile, but Morgan saw the steel beneath it. No doubt Adhémar didn’t.

  “You’re a close group,” Adhémar remarked.

  “Loyal to the end,” Paien agreed.

  “Where did you meet?”

  “Ah, now that’s a tale,” Paien said, rubbing his hands together with relish. “I’ll tell it as we eat.” He looked at the food that had been set down before Morgan, then at her. “Eat, gel.”

  She thought not. “I ate this morning.”

  “Very well, I’ll eat yours. Now, Adhémar, our meeting was on this wise ...”

  Morgan listened with only half an ear as Paien described a rainy, miserable evening two years earlier when he had stumbled upon a young lass who’d reminded him of one of his daughters. Feeling protective of her, he’d made certain that she was not accosted in the tavern. When she left to go to the stables, he had followed her, just to make certain she would be safe, but he found there was no need. A group of men surrounded her with evil intent, but they had been dispatched, all four of them, with minimal effort on the girl’s part. Paien had bought her a refreshing cup of ale afterward and their friendship had been born.

  Camid had been added to that soon after, and Glines as well, once he had bested them all in a game or two of chance. Now they noised themselves about as a group, worked when it suited them, and returned to their homes when it didn’t.

  Morgan didn’t mention that she generally took on other, less palatable assignments when the others had gone to their various homes and were putting their feet up in front of their own fires. Of course, now she could say nothing, for the luxuries of the university far exceeded anything any of the others could boast of, including Glines, and she had certainly partaken of them fully in the past se’nnight.

  She noticed, as the others ate and recounted tales of glory, that they were being spied upon. There was a young man, likely not a score, sitting on the far side of the chamber, watching them nervously. Morgan looked at him openly and he turned away. She lifted her eyebrow, then shrugged to herself. He looked vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t place him. Perhaps it was one of Nicholas’s lads, come to make certain she was safe. She sighed. Judging by the number of escorts he’d sent her in the form of her usual companions, she shouldn’t have been surprised to find that was the case.

  The platters were taken away and they settled down to an afternoon with mugs of ale and conversation. There came a time, of course, when Glines pulled out his cards and smiled pleasantly. Adhémar grumbled as he investigated the depths of his plundered purse.

  Paien leaned over. “He’s tolerable,” he murmured behind his cup.

  “Are you thinking for yourself, or for one of your girls?” she whispered back.

  He looked at her with wide eyes, then laughed. “Hard-hearted wench,” he said, reaching out to ruffle her hair affectionately. “Someday you will fall.”

  “Pray you are alive to see it,” she grumbled.

  “I do, lovey, every night.” He chuckled a bit more and turned his attentions to Glines’s sleight of hand.

  Morgan did the same, marking Glines’s quite passable-looking face and his breathtaking cheating, Adhémar’s breathtaking face and his less-than-passable gaming—and the lad in the corner who was having a very difficult time blending in with rough company. It was taxing and required her full attention. That was just as well, for it took her mind off what was to come.

  Would she be able to get on that ship?

  She was beginning to wonder.

  Camid finished his ale eventually and set his cup down firmly. “Morgan, where are we off to?”

  “Istaur,” she said shortly.

  “And then where?”

  She chewed on her words, considered, then chewed a bit more. “North,” she said finally.

  “North?” Camid said, his ears perking up. “What mischief are we about?”

  “Mischief of mine,” she offered, giving them all a very pointed opportunity to thank her for a pleasant afternoon and be on their way, Nicholas’s message aside.

  “Mischief of yours is trouble of ours,” Camid said without hesitation. He stroked his long beard thoughtfully. “North, eh? I can think of many things to do on the way north.”

  “Aye, well, don’t give it so much thought it sours your pleasant humor,” Paien said in a friendly fashion. “There will be time enough to discover what Morgan’s about and plan your own adventures as well. I daresay Morgan isn’t going to tell us until she’s ready.”

  “North?” Adhémar said with a frown. “There is quite a bit of north available after you land in Istaur.”

  Morgan shrugged. “I’ll find my way to it, I’m sure. Don’t feel obligated to travel with us.”

  Adhémar shrugged. “There is safety in traveling with other souls.”

  “It is more difficult to find yourself robbed thusly,” she agreed.

  Or perhaps not.

  Morgan looked at Glines, who was leaning back in his chair, holding his cards in plain sight, and looking at Adhémar from under half-closed eyelids. Glines, at his most dangerous. Adhémar would not emerge from this encounter unscathed.

  “I’ll come along as well,” Adhémar said, hefting his further-lightened purse. “You might need me.”

  Morgan couldn’t imagine it, but instinct reared
its ugly head again and she found she couldn’t discourage him. She hadn’t left him for dead and now she wasn’t stopping him from joining her crew.

  Unbelievable.

  Eventually, the afternoon waned and Morgan knew she could put off the inevitable no longer. She pushed her cup away and put her hands on the table—because she looked more in charge that way, not because she needed something to steady herself.

  Not entirely.

  “I must take the ship,” she announced.

  Camid, Paien, and Glines pushed their cups away immediately and rose. Adhémar drained his, then rose as well.

  “Lead on, shieldmaiden.”

  Morgan did, though she would have given much to have plunked down Adhémar’s gold for a comfortable chamber and taken her ease for a fortnight or two and avoided setting foot on that boat.

  Unfortunately, she was no coward, no matter what she faced. She nodded briskly, then turned and led her little company from the tavern.

  A man near the door leered at her. Adhémar immediately stepped in front of her, but Morgan pushed him aside. She looked at the man and smiled pleasantly. Ah, something to take her mind off her coming journey.

  “Did you say something?” she asked.

  “Aye,” he said, “I asked if you were occupied tonight, but I can see you have a collection of lads here to keep you busy—”

  Adhémar apparently couldn’t control his chivalry. He took the man by the front of the shirt and threw him out the door. The man crawled to his feet and started bellowing. Adhémar planted his fist into the man’s face.

  The stranger slumped to the ground, senseless. Morgan glared at Adhémar.

  “You owe me a brawl,” she said.

  “What?” he asked incredulously.

  “A brawl,” Morgan said. “And it had best be a good one.”

  “With me?” he asked, blinking in surprise.

  “I’d prefer someone with more skill, that I might not sleep through it, but you’ll do.”

  Paien laughed out loud and pulled him away.

  “Adhémar, my friend, you cannot win this one. Next time, allow Morgan her little pleasures. She cannot help the attention her face attracts, and thus she has opportunities to teach men manners. In truth, it is a service she offers, bettering our kind wherever she goes.”

  Morgan would have corrected him on quite a few points, but Glines stopped her with a hand on her arm. He looked at her earnestly.

  “Morgan, any man with eyes could not help but offer his life for yours.”

  “Daft, the lot of you,” she said darkly. “I have no beauty but what lies in my skill.”

  “Hmmm,” Glines said, unconvinced. “If you say so, then I must agree. Now, lest you skewer me for heaping more praise upon your lovely head, let us move on to another subject. Did you notice our young shadow inside?”

  “I did.”

  “That’s Fletcher of Harding, you know.”

  “Is it?” she asked in surprise. “I wonder why he’s here.”

  “Who knows? We’ll find out if he follows us aboard.”

  She nodded. “I’m surprised you noticed, though. I assumed you were fixed on your game.”

  “Your skill lies with the sword, mine with the cards.” He yawned. “I had to keep myself from falling into my cups somehow.”

  She smiled in spite of herself. “You are really a terrible man, Glines.”

  “Stop,” he begged, “I may blush soon.”

  “Then I will stop, lest the praise be too much for you. Oh, look,” she said uneasily, “here we are.”

  And there they were. She had come to the point where to walk any farther would have meant she was walking into the water. Bad enough that she should have to get onto something that would be on the water.

  “I’ll book us passage,” Paien said. He held out his hand and everyone filled his palm.

  Morgan watched him go, concentrating on swallowing and breathing. She thought of the knife in the bottom of her pack, the knife that Nicholas had kept for years and entrusted to her. The knife that might have magic that the king was lacking.

  It might mean the difference between victory and defeat, he had said.

  Morgan continued to take deep breaths. She put her hand on her sword. It didn’t help.

  Paien returned, all smiles. “He’ll even feed us.”

  “How long a journey?” Morgan croaked.

  Adhémar frowned. “Haven’t you made the journey before?”

  “A very long time ago.” She had, when she’d been ten. It had been with her mercenary guardians and she’d vowed if she survived it that she would never again set foot on another boat.

  She took a deep breath to still her churning stomach.

  It did no good.

  “Time to board,” Camid said, his long nose quivering in excitement. “I love boats,” he said enthusiastically. “Not many where I come from, of course, but I’ve never not enjoyed a journey on one. I say we take a boat north while we’re about our business—”

  Morgan continued to breathe. In fact, there came a point where she almost felt better. The sea air was bracing and her stomach was settling quite nicely. She breathed a time or two more and thought that perhaps her fear of boats, or rather what would happen once she set foot on one, was perhaps ungrounded and unreasonable. Had she spent years avoiding something she should have enjoyed?

  “Let us be off,” she said cheerfully. She nodded to her companions, glared just on principle at Adhémar, then shouldered her pack more securely and followed her companions onto the ship.

  She was well.

  All was well.

  She stood on the deck of the ship. It began to rock. Her belly began to rock with it.

  She knew, with a sense of finality that wasn’t at all unexpected, that she was in deep trouble.

  Five

  Adhémar almost went sprawling from the force of the shove. He turned, his hand on his sword, only to see a blur as Morgan bolted past him. He would have tried to stop her, but he couldn’t catch her. Was she about to fling herself overboard?

  Ah . . . apparently not.

  Adhémar was bumped again as Paien of Allerdale hurried to aid his puking comrade. Unfortunately, he seemed to have an abundance of sympathy because he hardly had time to put his pack on the deck next to him before he was leaning over the railing as well, joining Morgan in her, er, business.

  Adhémar found himself standing next to the dwarf. He looked down. “You too?”

  Camid shook his head slowly. “Never.” He patted his stomach. “Sturdy. Reliable. Unfailing.”

  Adhémar had to admit that he didn’t have much to do with dwarves, as a rule, though Neroche did border their country of Durial on the east—and there was a dwarf on the Council of Kings. He thought he might perhaps have judged them as a group too hastily. Compared with the rather unsettling noises coming from the railing, the solid dependability of the dwarf next to him was rather comforting.

  “I’ll see to their gear,” Camid said, then moved off to do just that.

  “Your Majesty,” whispered a voice at his ear.

  “Glines, cease,” Adhémar growled. “I’m traveling in disguise.”

  Glines made him the slightest of bows. “As you wish.”

  “What I wish is to have the gold back you pocketed from me not two hours ago.”

  “My cards are always at your service, Your—” He broke off, then smiled. “Perhaps you might suggest what I should call you.”

  “Adhémar will do. Dolt will not.”

  Glines smiled briefly. “Don’t mind Morgan. She doesn’t suffer fools gladly.”

  Adhémar glared at him.

  “I mean,” Glines stammered, “she doesn’t suffer anyone gladly. Anyone who isn’t her. Actually, she doesn’t have much respect for anyone who can’t best her in a swordfight and since there isn’t anyone I know who can . . . well, you understand.”

  Adhémar pursed his lips. “I doubt that’s the case, but we’ll leave that be
for the moment.” He looked over his shoulder at the young lad who slipped onto the ship and went hastily below. Well, that one bore watching, but later, when he had seen how bad this situation here in front of him was going to get. He crossed the deck and stood next to Camid as the dwarf watched the indisposed pair.

  “This does not bode well,” Camid said mildly. “We haven’t even left the dock.”

  Adhémar gritted his teeth. The entire venture had been doomed from the start. Traveling without magic had been bad enough; trying to travel without his identity had been worse. He’d been insulted countless times, listened to numerous tavern stories of the king of Neroche who sat upon his fat arse upon his even more comfortable throne and did nothing for the common man, and been cheated in cards and dice more times than he cared to admit.

  Add to that being bested by a slip of a girl, and it had been more or less a perfect autumn. He supposed he would have been well within his rights to have heaved Morgan overboard for the slight and spared them all the misery of listening to any more of her . . . well, heaving.

  He dropped his pack next to the collection that Camid was guarding. He looked at Glines. “Keep watch over that and over them.”

  “High and mighty, isn’t he,” Camid said to Glines with a snort.

  Adhémar ignored the slur and walked over to the captain, where he inquired as to comfortable accommodations and the true length of the journey. The answer was, unsurprisingly, none available and longer than he would enjoy since he was the companion of the two fools hanging their heads over the railing. After promising to consider the captain’s suggestion to check their pockets for valuables and heave them overboard—and declining to mention that he’d already thought of that—Adhémar returned to see if things had improved.

  All sound indicated that they had not.