The town of Baght was stinking, dark with looming half-timber houses, and full to the walls with every walk of humanity. Soldiers of the Sorthe Princes lingered about in thuggish groups on every street corner. Several times, soldiers grabbed some young man or woman off the street and ‘accepted’ their enlistment into the army. Once, a couple soldiers starting walking towards Caewen, but she shook her head slowly at them, and said, quite cooly, “I’m already in service to other powers.” They backed off.
The heraldry of Sorthe hung everywhere too: a white dragon skull on a sooty black field. The difference, prince-by-prince, was in the crown that was depicted above the dragon’s skull. The old story went that ages ago four brothers had slain a dragon in a cave in the Mount of Shaead. They had agreed to found a dominion, and share the rulership equally among their four bloodlines. They each had a crown of a different style, but that was all that marked them apart–none were above the others–supposedly anyway. The history was not exactly one of kinship and love. Rather, it was full of murders and plots, as the bloodlines moved against each other, aiming to steer themselves into a position of slight over-mastery, whilst maintaining the semblance of brotherhood.
Now, war had come to the Sorthelands again. No doubt, each prince was working hard to make sure the other three princes were the ones to lead armies into the more deadly sorts of battles. It would be so much easier to exercise control over another house if the new prince was only a child . Someone just come into inheritance after the untimely death of a father or uncle. Or at least, this is what the residents of Baght said when asked. None of them seemed very happy that their trading town was suddenly thronged with soldiers and knights, and frankly, very few of them seemed to think much of the princes at all. That Baght Town was within the demesne of Sorthe seemed to be an inconvenience that every good working soul had to put up with.
Meanwhile, the four companions were doing their best to remain unnoticed.
Fleat, with his owlish eyes, was far too strange-looking to pass for a human, even a human child. He had to stay covered up under a cloak, or better-yet, hidden behind a door, assuming they could find an inn. Dapplegrim was of course extraordinarily large for a horse and his skullish face and sharp ivory teeth were something of a give-away. But it turned out that he’d been right about weird creatures. With so many knights of the shadow-wrapped north filling the streets, there were at least several dozen strange horse-creatures about the place: some were deathly looking beasts with moon-glowing eyes; some covered in black scales rather than a horse’s pelt; some that looked like they were carved of alabaster, and not living, breathing creatures at all. This was a general relief to everyone. It became rapidly apparent they they hadn’t needed to worry about leaving Dapplegrim in the woods outside of town at all. Even the rough blankets they’d thrown over him by way of basic disguise probably weren’t needed. He simply vanished from notice among the other weird and monstrous mounts.
After they passed a knight in ornate angular armour riding a bright crimson horse with ebony-black eyes and six legs, Dapplegrim smiled his sharp smile and said: “Told you so.” He then asked for the heaps of blankets to be removed. “Bit itchy,” he said. “And really, really not necessary. Hurm.”
As for the others–Caewen of course was Caewen–she could pass for a northerner because she was a northerner, but magic and pride coursed a little too strongly in her blood now. She couldn’t calmly tolerate the sort of small, endless insults that anyone who was not a highborn Sorthe expected in Baght. And if Caewen got angry and drew a sword, she would draw attention too. An ancient sword made by the fane-folk, aglow with summery blue-green fire: well, that would not be something that a person ought to wave about in a place like this. And though her shadow-thing, Fetch, might be able to sneak about, Baght Town was still far enough south that it turned through a cycle of day and night. It was admittedly, a short, dim day, and a long, dark night: but the fetch still claimed that the sun would hurt him and refused to come out of his little leather satchel.
This left the boy.
He was small, and slight and barely noticeable. He was also quite clearly no good for fighting, so could slip past the pressgangs easily enough too. It was soon agreed that once they were off the streets, it would be the boy who needed to go back on the streets, and have a bit of a nosy around.
After asking at several establishments, they finally found an inn with rooms and stable. The town was nearly full to the brim, and it was apparently going to be hard to find space anywhere. The Crowning Glory only had rooms on account of its extraordinary cost. The price at least did seem to be fair: it was a very nice sort of inn. All the same, Caewen grumbled at the price as she clinked coins down onto the counter. Dapplegrim had waited outside, and once the sum was paid, he was immediately and respectfully ushered to the stables, whilst chattily asking about a bit of oats-and-blood to eat. The thin, grey-headed man at the counter cleared his throat and looked meaningfully at the receding shape of Dapplegrim as he slipped like a shade past the inn’s bottleglass windows.
“Fine. Yes, whatever he wants to eat.” Caewen slapped a couple more yellow coins on the counter.
“Very good. A young lass of means, like yourself, will find that The Crowning Glory sees to all needs.” He looked at her meaningfully. “Whatever they might be. Satisfaction can be arranged, for the correct price.”
“I don’t have any needs past the usual.”
“No? Pity. Unusual needs are not unusual here.” He did look around, subtly then. “Word of advice from a proprietor who wants no trouble among his guests: best be careful who you speak to. We’ve many lords and ladies here, and I detect that your accent is not of the most highborn notes. Others might remark. Me? I prefer discretion. It is my business and trade, after all.” A thin, stretched out smile. The man looked at the coins more closely. “Interesting purse you have. These are all very old coins. Some are ancient. A few are worth more to collectors of antiquities than they are as bits of mere silver and gold. I will take that into account in the fees payable, of course. Some of these have more than mere face value. I wonder where you came by them?”
“My business is my own.”
“As is everyone’s,” said the man. He gave out another fragile smile.