Witches of Kregen by Alan Burt Akers Read Free Book Online Page A

oh no, by Zair!
    Once more, in this fashion, I was convinced the Star Lords had set a task to my hands.

Chapter five
    Two Paktuns
    A theory formed itself in my head.
    Now theories are tricky beasts and can land a fellow in all kinds of trouble if he’s not careful.
    Still, the probability of this particular theory being valid struck me as quite high. I wouldn’t pitch it any stronger than that.
    Among the flim-flammery of gaudy silks and sashes brought along from the flutsman’s kit I drew out a scarf of green and blue eye-watering silkiness, with silver edgings. None of this stuff was being worn, for obvious reasons. I wanted these people to take me for a simple paktun and not a reiving flutsman.
    The silver came away as the point of my dagger probed it free. I twisted up some of the strands into a special spiral arrangement, one I knew and loathed. Together with the snip of feather I’d taken from Salvation’s darker parts, the brown and silver insignia would have to serve.
    I pinned it to the reverse flap of the khiganer I’d selected to wear. This khiganer, shaped in the usual fashion with a wide flap caught up over the left side with a row of bronze buttons from belt to shoulder and from point of shoulder to collar, was tailored from a heavy brown material. The collar was not as stiff and high as usual. I valued comfort more than ostentation. Naturally I wore the old scarlet breechclout; but this was decently covered by bronze-studded pteruges. When I’d finished and pinned on the evil badge, I walked back to The Quork Nightly.
    My assumption proved correct, for two hard characters were seated at table wolfing the second breakfast. They were dressed as soldiers of fortune, their weapons were scabbarded to them, and while one bore a scar from forehead to ear, the other bore a scar from nose to lip.
    “Llahal, doms,” I said, cheerfully, as I went in.
    One spat a bit of gristle onto the floor and grunted something. The other slugged back a mouthful of weak ale, belched, and said: “And what’s so all-cheerful about it, then, rast?”
    These greetings, you will perceive, were not those conducive to friendly relations.
    I sat down.
    “You called me rast, dom,” I said, still in that overly cheerful voice.
    “Aye, cramph, yetch, rast you are.”
    I stared at them. Big, hard, muscled, hairy. Their iron helmets rested on the floor by their chairs. Their booted feet stuck out at arrogant angles. They made a mess when they ate. They wore thraxters, the cut and thrust sword of Havilfar. I wore a drexer, and if anyone questioned why I carried a Valkan sword, I’d simply say I’d won it in battle and taken it from a dead Vallian.
    Also, I wore my rapier and main gauche. They did not have scabbarded to their belts the rapier and left hand dagger, the Jiktar and the Hikdar.
    They did have axes, small and nimble, rather like tomahawks. Those, I’d have to watch.
    I said, “I wonder why I have not thrust your teeth down your throats. By Hanitcha the Harrower, I marvel at my reticence!”
    They jerked up at this and swiveled to stare more closely at me.
    “Hamalese?”
    “Are you? You speak and act like clums, like guls. Are you all that Hamal can find to dredge up out of the gutters and send forth as fighting men?”
    They reared up, their hands groping for the hilts of their thraxters.
    I waved them away as though I waved a fly away.
    “I’ve no time to waste on you, by Lem, no!”
    As I used that hateful word I watched them narrowly.
    Their whole appearance changed.
    They sat back, and their hands left their sword hilts and reached for the ale.
    “Well, dom,” one said, and belched. “You could have said.”
    “Aye, we but tried your mettle,” said the other.
    That was probably quite true. Fighting men like this became bored with frightening speed. Some excitement stirred up the blood. I could never stomach them or their like, for my idea of a fighting man is vastly different. Still, it takes all sorts to