They found Lord Gullimer’s pavilion at the heart of the makeshift camp, its walls of common canvas rippling limply in the coastal wind. A banner had been posted outside bearing the apple orchard sigil of his house, and Saska could hear the strains of raised voices coming from within.
“Wait here a moment. I will announce you.” Sir Kester Droyn stepped inside. The voices died away abruptly, sinking to murmurs, and a few moments later some disgruntled men came bustling out, muttering among themselves. One was so lost to his grumblings that he almost stepped right into the Wall, and staggered away in fright when he saw him. “It is quite all right, Lord Tymson,” Sir Kester chuckled. “The Whaleheart is here under terms of parley.” He opened out a hand. “Please, come this way.”
The pavilion interior was as simple as its exterior. On a floor of hard dark sand and chunks of stone, a small pallet bed had been unrolled and there was a table as well, no more than a ragged slab of driftwood raised on legs of the same. A few camp stools had been brought in, and from the support poles hung a pair of oil lanterns, currently unlit.
“My lady.” Lord Wilson Gullimer stood beside the driftwood table, bearded, sunburned, and somewhat shabby, but still handsome for all that. When last she’d seen him, he’d been dressed in full plate armour, stained by blood and battle, with a sooty cloak at his back. Now he wore but linens and leathers of simple styling, and no cloak at all in the heat. “Pray forgive the inelegance of my dress,” he said. “My finer clothes are aboard the ship and I had not expected such company.” He looked at Sir Kester. “Serve the lady a cup of wine, if you would. Sir Ralston, will you partake?”
The Wall removed his greathelm, and shook his great head. “My thanks. No.”
“As you wish.”
Sir Kester went to the driftwood table and did the honours, pouring two cups, one for Lord Gullimer and one for Saska. She didn’t really want any, but knew it was polite to at least take a sip. She did so. She was no expert in wine, but this was sour stuff, most unpleasant.
Her face must have shown that, because Lord Gullimer gave a hoarse laugh. “Poor fare, I know, but it’s all we have left. Soon the rum will run dry and we’ll have real problems.” He had a drink of his own and set his cup aside on the table. “The men can do without water, but rum? Gods forbid they should die sober.”
“You’re not going to die,” Saska found herself saying. She was not sure what else to say, in truth. Or even why she was here. She had wanted to find out about Prince Robbert, and she had. What else was she hoping for? I can’t help them, she told herself. Not after waving away a hundred other pleas.
“I’m glad you think so, my lady. But some will, and soon. We have many sick men among us, and some wounded as well. And these waters are perilous to fish. Only this morning a man was taken by a shark, and another so badly bitten he is likely to follow come nightfall.”
Saska did not imagine being killed by a shark was a pleasant way to go. “Do you have medicine with you…for the sick?”
“Scant little. Harvest had some decent stocks in the hold, but retrieving it isn’t so easy. Not with those sharks prowling about the bay. I believe they call that a conundrum.” He gave a bitter hack, picked up his cup, took a sip, and set it down again. “So how is it you’ve come to be here? You’re a long way from Aram, Lady Saska.”
“That is not your concern,” the Whaleheart said.
“My concern?” Lord Gullimer repeated, studying the giant with a frown. “No, I suppose you’re right. I have enough here to be concerned about, Sir Ralston, than to worry over you. But I am interested.” He looked at Saska again. “You won a great victory in Aram, my lady. I would have thought it prudent to remain there, rather than venturing a thousand miles from home.”
Aram isn’t my home, she thought. Willow’s Rise was the only proper home she’d ever known, and who knew what had become of it? “I came to find out about Prince Robbert,” she only said. “Sir Kester says you lost him during the storms.”
“Weeks ago, yes. We’ve had a sighting or two of some other vessels, but for the most part the fleet is scattered and likely destroyed. How we managed to limp this far, only the gods will know. But far as we’ve come, I fear we will go no further. Alas my Orchard has grown withered, and I do not believe she’ll bear new fruit.”
“We saw the ship,” the Wall said. “You’re to say she can’t be repaired?”
“Well enough to be seaworthy? I would doubt it. Lest a strong mast should float ashore, and we find some bales of sailcloth among the flotsam, I fear she may be lost to us.”
“This land is not empty of trees,” the Wall told him. “One ought to serve for a mast.”
“One problem among many,” the apple lord said. “We lack for nails as well, and tar, and our defensive weapons have been ravaged. We have four hundred and fifty men among us, from Orchard and Harvest, too many to fit on a single vessel. I fear a strong wind will see us founder, much less a storm of the like we have seen. And already the men are talking of marching. Perhaps you heard the voices before you entered? Half the men want to rest here a while and hope the ship is repaired, while the rest would have us continue afoot to the northern coast. Eagle’s Perch,” he said. “That was our rendezvous point.” He pointed to a map on the table, an old crumpled thing curling at the corners, the ink all smudged and faded. “It’s not so far from here, only a hundred miles or so. Even with our wounded we might be able to make it in less than a week, and who knows, perhaps we’ll find help there? Another of our ships, or…”
“My lord,” came a voice.
Gullimer looked past them, to the flaps. Another of his ragged band was peering inside. “Yes? What is it, Jacob?”
“Pardons, my lord. A ship has been sighted. It is approaching from the north.”
Lord Wilson Gullimer gave an abbreviated nod. “How far?”
“Long leagues still. It is faint, some way out to sea. A large galleon, we think.”
“Tukoran?”
“Yes, my lord. It looks to be so.”
Saska frowned. She did not know why any Tukoran vessel would be coming south at this time, and galleons were typically warships.
“If you’ll excuse me for a moment.” Lord Gullimer stepped past them, moving for the exit. “Sir Kester, entertain our guests while I’m gone. Tell them that joke you know.”
Sir Ralston turned upon the young knight once the lord had left. “This joke, then. Let’s hear it.”
Sir Kester rather fumbled over the punchline - who wouldn’t, with the Wall staring down at you like that, colossal void of humour that he was - but Saska found herself chuckling anyway. It was a ribald joke, of the sort that Bawdy Bron Bowen used to tell her when she sailed on the Steel Sister, and only reminded her of her time with the crew. She still had Bawdy Bron’s parchment of jokes with her, as she did her shell necklace and quill-knife and the pitted coral that called to her, and sometimes she liked to read them through when she was feeling low. By now she knew most of them by heart. “I know some jokes too,” she said. “Would you like to hear one, sir?”
The man’s yellow eyes lit up like the sun. “Yes…of course, I’d love to.” He poured himself a cup of wine and waited, eager to hear it.
Saska made something of a pig’s ear of the ending herself, but kind as he was, Sir Kester repaid the compliment and unleashed a guffaw of laughter. “Very good, my lady, very good. I have another, in actual fact. Let me see if I can recall it…”
He did, and this time his delivery was on point. Saska laughed, long and true, and after that they went back and forth, exchanging jokes and never getting a punchline wrong. Rolly did not much enjoy it. Though once…maybe even twice…Saska was sure he cracked a smile.
By the time Lord Gullimer came back, Saska and Sir Kester were red-faced and breathless, and the entire jug of wine had been drunk down to the dregs. The lord walked in, took one look around, then smiled broadly. “Your joke went down well then, I see,” he said to Kester Droyn.
“And the rest,” the knight chuckled. “This young lady is full of mischief, my lord, let me tell you. The jokes she knows. Goodness.”
Gullimer smiled. “I should like to hear them.” He looked in fine spirits all of a sudden. “Perhaps you would care to share some with me, my lady, while we await him?”
“Him, my lord?” Saska wasn’t understanding.
“We won’t be waiting,” the Wall came in, with his great warhorn of a voice. His mouth twitched, as though he knew something Saska didn’t. Or feared something, more like. “We will be leaving at once.”
Saska glared at him, taking charge. “I’ll be the judge of that, Sir Ralston.” Her eyes returned to the handsome Lord of Watervale. “Who is coming here, my lord?”
