Mind the little things

I turned quickly, but Malak saw me and recognized me at once. A broad grin on his face, he headed in my direction.

"Why, Esmirrrrrrrrrelda," he called, loud enough to quiet some conversations and direct attention toward me. He had an annoying habit of drawing out rolling the 'r' in my name, making him sound like someone with a bad stutter calling for help while rolling down the side of a mountain. "Whatever are you doing in a place like this?"

"Correcting your mistakes, as usual," I replied.

Malak was all that most women would look for in a man. Tall and not overly slim, he was capped by a tousled shock of blond hair that occasionally obscured his bright blue eyes. His clothes fit so well they appeared tailored to him and they were always clean. Always. His jaw was well-defined, his teeth all present and relatively straight and his face was unblemished by scar or pox. A gold chain clung tightly to his neck and blue gems sparkled at his ears. A silver ring shaped like a serpent coiled around the middle finger of his right hand. His only other accessories were the black pouch slung over his shoulder, rectangular in shape and sturdy of material that held his assorted writing quills, inks and most likely an expensive spyglass and perhaps a compass or other tools. He wore a long knife on his left hip tucked into a scabbard of rich leather that looked fresh from its maker's hand.

"You wit is as quick as a snake, as always," he responded.

"Only to some." Another form filled the doorway, but the boy I had noticed earlier was still disappointed. I frowned, then turned back to Malak. "I should thank you. If it weren't for your traipsing about and misinterpreting basic history or your staggering inability to remember basic geography, I'd find little enough work."

"You can buy me an ale, then," he said with a broad smile.

I protested, but he already had his hand in the air. My night was going sour in a hurry.

Later, he waved off my complaint.

"What do you mean, who cares?" I felt warm and my head was buzzing slightly. The noise of the crowd had increased, too. Laughter drowned out even the sound of the minstrel—a blessing, because the man wasn't all that good to begin with. All seemed content to regale each other with stories of their day and spend whatever coin they had to forget their toils at the same time. All save the boy who stared intently at the door, his growing nervousness evident, and another man who I hadn't noticed before. He sat alone in the far corner, his back to the room. He was short, bald and thick and drank with a serious purpose. When had he come in? I hadn't noticed. But he was either a stranger to this town or not liked by anyone, for no one paid him any heed.

"I mean just what I said," Malak said. He shrugged his shoulders and gave me a look intended, I think, to disarm me. "A river here, hills there. It is all close enough."

"It's a map."

"It's still a map."

"People use maps to find their way."

"And they will! Think of the surprised they wouldn't otherwise find."

"It's irresponsible," I said. ""Doubly so if you don't even attempt to get things correct. This is why we're here; this is why we took the commission to begin with. Didn't you take the oath? Does it mean nothing to you?"

My questioning must have started to annoy him—either that or he sensed he would get no more drinks from my purse—because he sighed and looked around, trying to catch the attention of an unoccupied lass, or at least a willing one.

"It means something to me," I muttered. I thought of a scorched clearing that had once been a small village, the only remnants a child's toy I had pulled from the rubble. "These are important things."

He scoffed. "Important? That I got a few trees out of place on a map in the archives of a temple in a town nobody will even bother visit? How is that important?"

"Your name is on it, Malak. OUR order. If people cannot trust us on the little things, they won't trust us with the bigger things, their stories, their customs. If we can't be bothered to do the little things right, we might as well not do any of it right. It won't be true."

"Every story is true, depending on who writes it," he said.

I was about to say something else, but the door opened again and this time, the conversation did stop. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the boy stand slowly, his knees wobbling, as a man staggered into the tavern. He was a mess. His clothing was torn in several places and each rent in the fabric or split in the leather showed an angry red welt of blooming purple bruise. Blood was caked around his mouth and matted in his hair. He lurched forward, clutching the boy in a one-armed embrace—the other did not look like it worked properly.

"Papa?"

"I'm sorry lad, I'm sorry," he mumbled.

Several people broke away from their tables and approached the man concern and fear in their eyes. "Where are the others?" One of them asked. "What happened?"

"We were lost; misdirected," he managed. A mug was offered to him and he smiled, took his arm from the boy's shoulders and lifted it with a grimace. "Nothing was where it was supposed to be and then we were ambushed. The others...they are all dead, or soon will be."

The boy started to sob, then, and one of the tavern wenches pulled him close and patted his back. Connell Malak looked decidedly uncomfortable. I think he would have sprinted to the exit then, if the door was not blocked by the large crowd. I reached for my mug and eased myself closer to the group, so that I could overhear some more details.

My respite, as brief as it had been, was over. I smelled a story.

The things along the way

Later, I rested my back against the wall of The Bent Lance, my tired feet on the stool in front of me. I longed to pull them out of my boots, but decorum prevented me. It was comfort enough to take my weight off of them, to sit back and let the general merriment of the tavern wash over me like the sun breaking through the clouds. It had been a long time since I was among people.

My mood had improved considerably. A hot bath will always do that for me, and I had been fortunate enough in my negotiations with the temple clerk to earn a spare coin to pay for that luxury. I also had a room for two nights, at least, and clothes that were clean, but still a little damp. And a large glass of Verupian red wine, which was inexpensive and a bit bland, but strong enough. I was surprised to find that it was available at the relatively small tavern and delighted when it was served in a glass large enough to make a nice home for a pet fish.

I usually allowed myself one night to relax, free of any concerns after a successful trip and deposit into the grand history of the land. Only one. After that, I started to get antsy. Some members of my occupation were happy to live freely, taking their assignments when and if they came. Not me. I needed to know where my next coin would come from. I needed to chase a tale or learn about something as soon as I could. I didn't like to sit idly or watch my hard-earned coin disappear between my fingers.

I often took my respite at a local drinking establishment, for they were rich mines of local customs and personalities and they very occasionally led to larger things. I had learned of the survival of a cult of Koskians in the upper reaches of The Spine at one such place, for example, and my account of their existence there had not only earned me my largest sack of coins, but my most prized possession: a gift from the head priest himself. I could feel its cool weight in my hidden pocket right now: a Traveling Stone. I remember his moist, appreciative eyes as he pressed it into my hand and I felt the tingle of its old power.

"Use it sparingly," he advised. "It is only a Minor Leaving and its power grows shorter with each use."

Leavings are magical items or tomes left behind by the Elders. They rely on the touch and spirit of their possessors to work. Traveling Stones—or at least the one I have—are activated by a series of gentle rubs and concentration. I cradle the flat, smooth stone with the index and middle finger on my right hand, rub the back of it with my thumb and think of the place I wish to go and the creature to take me there. I had only used it on a few occasions during the long years it has been in my possession because I fear I will exhaust its properties and because if you take such short cuts all the time, you miss many things along the way. And the things along the way were important to me—as they should be to everyone.

Alas, those were the places where a stranger was always welcome at a table and they were disappearing as fast as dew under an early summer sun. I grieve, sometimes, for the future, when I think about what is fading from the world and the only thing to keep them alive is the babbling writings of a cranky old woman.

I pushed aside my empty glass and signaled for a mug of ale instead. Apparently Verupian wine made me as cranky as a wet dwarf and as gloomy as a minstrel among the deaf. I shook it off, forced a smile and took a closer look at the other patrons, instead.

It looked like a good natured bunch, nary a scowl among them. The tavern keeper was a lean man with a piercing gaze that shifted around the room constantly. He wore a colorless shirt that was fraying at the collar and cuffs. The gray apron tied around his waist might have been a darker color once. A short, thick cudgel was tucked into it, just above the string.

Near him, a fat man with loose trousers hoisted one of the tavern wenches on his ample lap and curled her hair around a finger as rounds as a cucumber. She giggled and smiled as she tried to subtly turn her nose away from breath so foul it nearly made the poor girl's eyes water.

A boy caught my attention. He was sitting quietly at a wobbly table near the doorway, a shapeless hat resting on the tabletop next to him. His straw-colored hair was pushed down straight, yet it curled up at the ends like the petals on a flower. His expression was solemn. He might have lived ten summers. He stared intently at the door, his hands clenched together with fingers in constant motion. He started and his eyes widened whenever the door opened, but each time he looked crestfallen at the man or woman who appeared there.

He was waiting for someone, and worried about his or her fate, that much was certain. There might be a tale there and I got to my feet, grasping my half-empty mug as I did.

But then the door burst open again, and the boy and I both looked up, startled at the man who stood framed in the archway. The boy let out a sad sigh because he did not know the man. I cursed softly because I recognized him at once.

It was Connell Malak.