Queen of the North (Book 3) (Songs of the Scorpion) by James A. West Read Free Book Online Page A

extravagant as Nesaea preferred, but he had been a soldier too long to change. His heavy woolen coat was red, and the shirt beneath it brown linen and plenty warm. His leather trousers and stout boots, both lined with wool, were black. Simple garb, if better than what most of the folk of Iceford wore.
    “I made no mistakes,” Abyk said, scowling more fiercely than ever. “The problem isn’t with my workmanship, but with you. You’re built all wrong, and—” his forefinger circled around Loro’s prodigious belly “—and exceedingly bloated besides.”
    Loro frowned as he scratched his bald head. Generally, he did the insulting. Being on the other end seemed to have fouled his mood. “Listen here, you twiggy little fool, if you want payment, then you’d better make this right.”
    “How can I?” Abyk blurted, and promptly jabbed a finger into the bulge of Loro’s gut, making him retreat, eyes wide, mouth opened in shock. The tailor gave chase, every step of the way using his finger like a dagger to prod the portly warrior.
    “Your arse is smaller than your belly, which forces your trousers to fall.”
    Loro slapped at the man, trying to ward him off. “That’s why I have a belt, idiot!”
    Another jab. “Your teats sag worse than my grandmother’s!”
    “Teats!” Loro yowled, cupping his hands to his chest. “I’ve the strength of a bull!”
    Another poke. “Your legs are stumpy and broad as barrels.”
    “You ought to see what’s nested between them, you wilted bastard!”
    Another stab, driving Loro into a corner hung with samples of cloth. “Your neck is a flabby pillar of suet.”
    “It only looks bunchy because you made the collar too tight, you ham-fisted buffoon!”
    This time Abyk delivered a ringing slap to the side of Loro’s skull. “Your head is like a fat, brown egg.”
    “What difference does that make? I didn’t ask for a hat,” Loro growled, hauling out his sword and slashing it under the Abyk’s nose. “Now back away, or I’ll chop off that finger of yours, and stuff it up your bony arse!”
    Rathe suppressed a chuckle, but chose not to intervene. Presently, Loro didn’t have that particular crazed light in his eye that signaled he was ready to cut a man’s life short.
    Abyk danced back. Once he gained a safe distance, he pressed his fists to his hips, looked Loro up and down. With a sniff, he pointed a finger at Rathe. “Your companion is the picture of what you should seek to attain in yourself. He’s lean where he should be, tall and straight, and proportioned after a sculptor’s vision of an ideal hero.”
    “My thanks,” Rathe said, bowing to hide a grin from Loro.
    “He’s barely off his mother’s teat,” Loro countered. “Why, when I was that young, I looked the same—better, even.”
    Abyk eyed him doubtfully.
    “Be that as it may, heroes come in different shapes and sizes,” Loro said defensively. “Why, if it weren’t for me, Rathe wouldn’t be standing here soaking up all your sunny praise.”
    “That is true,” Rathe admitted. The short of it was, Loro had a knack for showing up when the fighting was at its worst, and he never hesitated to throw himself into the thick of things.
    Abyk snorted. “Even so, he’s still more of an ox than a man.”
    Loro gave Rathe a bemused look, but in this Rathe could not help him. Truth told, all the fat Loro had lost trekking through the Gyntor Mountains had returned during their time in Iceford. It was not all Loro’s fault, as Fira, the fire-haired Maiden of the Lyre he had reunited with at Ravenhold, took great pains to keep him well fed.
    Abyk looked to the ceiling, as if beseeching a helpful spirit stashed in the cobwebby rafters. “How does someone, even with my exceptional skill, change the unchangeable?” He dropped his gaze. “There’s nothing I can do for a … a man-ox , I say. Nothing at all.”
    “I don’t need to suffer this horseshit,” Loro snapped, flinging a pair of silver pieces at