The Swordsman's Oath (Einarinn 2) by Juliet E. McKenna Read Free Book Online Page B

own foot to the floor, I’ll be back up to my neck in a flood of ripe gurry.”
    The old man rubbed a hand over his face; his eyes dimmed with momentary despair. “Better that than drowning in the deep of the ocean, surely? How many ships set sail with Nemith the Seafarer and never returned?”
    “Messire Den Fellaemion returned, Grandpa, and he has made the crossing a handful of times since. I trust him.” Temar tried to keep any rebuke out of his voice. He failed.
    “What is that supposed to mean?” The old fire flared in the Sieur’s eyes. “You trust him? You see a better future riding as his postilion, do you, rather than as master of your own team? You’re planning to abandon your own name and take his, perhaps?”
    Temar stood abruptly, shedding his efforts at unaccustomed humility. “My concerns are for the future of my name, Messire. I intend that my sons and grandsons will revere my ashes and bless the inheritance I bequeath them.” He clenched his fists unconsciously and felt the band of his father’s ring press into his flesh.
    “So what will you be doing with my funeral urn, then? Using it as a doorstop? Ungrateful hound!” The Sieur raised one twisted hand and very nearly struck out at Temar. “Am I to blame that first the Crusted Pox stole away the sons of my House and then a pox-rotted whoremonger has pissed away our lands through chasing his deluded ambitions?”
    Temar opened his mouth to reply in kind in the usual fashion of D’Alsennin family discourse, but something in his grandfather’s face halted him. Abiding grief underlay the wrath in the old man’s eyes and prolonging the fight seemed suddenly pointless.
    “I did not mean to insult you, Grandpa; I didn’t mean it, not the way it sounded. I know full well our House would be ashes blown on the wind many years since, if it were not for you.”
    Whatever the old man would have said was lost in a paroxysm of coughing and Temar looked around hastily for water or wine.
    “Leave it.” The Sieur produced a handbell from the folds of his mantle and its silvery jingle brought the chamberlain scurrying in.
    “I will consider your petition, Esquire.” The old man managed to control his coughing and looked up at Temar, high color masquerading as a brief pretense of good health. “I have other affairs to see to. You may attend me in my study before we dine.”
    He got to his feet with some difficulty but waved away the hovering chamberlain with irritability and stalked out of the salon, head unbowed.
    Temar watched him go and could not decide if he were more worried or annoyed by the old man’s behavior. What other business could he have to deal with? Most likely, he was just delaying a decision by going for a nap. Well, Temar wasn’t going to kick his heels in this cinder-shrine all afternoon, he decided with characteristic speed. He strode rapidly from the room and slammed the ponderous doors with an energy that drew a startled plume of smoke from the little fire.
    The nails in his boot heels snapped angrily on the stone treads as he made his way down the back stairs and into the kitchen.
    “Temar, my duckling, how lovely to see you.” A sparely framed woman in a clean if faded livery looked around a cupboard door, a half-full jar of spices in her hand.
    “Jetta! Well, I must say I’m glad to find you still here.” Temar tried for a light touch but his words fell flat. He slumped into a chair and stared moodily at the grain in the white-scrubbed tabletop, picking at it with a ragged nail. “I was starting to think everything and everyone had been sold off or sent packing.”
    “You reckon it’s all looking a bit bare above stairs, do you?” Jetta’s sardonic voice made Temar look up, startled.
    “If I didn’t know better, I’d say we’d had loan-broker’s men in!” he responded bitterly. “What’s the old fool been doing? Paying some alchemist for potions? Hoping to get him a doxy to bear him a better