r."
"We were the last to fall," the Tregean said a little too defiantly. "Borifort held out longer than anywhere else."
"But it fell," the Senzian said bluntly, sure of his advantage now. "I wouldn't be so quick to talk about other men's wives. Not after the stories we all heard about what the Barbadians did there. And I also heard that most of your women weren't that unwilling to be...”
"Shut your filthy mouth!" the Tregean snarled, leaping to his feet. "Shut it, or I'll close it for you permanently, you lying Senzian scum!"
A babble of noise erupted, louder than any before. Furiously clanging the bell over the bar, Ettocio fought to restore order.
"Enough!" he roared. "Enough of this, or you're all out of here right now!" A dire threat, and it quelled them.
Enough for the Khardhu warrior's sardonic laughter to be audible again. The man was on his feet. He dropped coins on the table to pay his account, and surveyed the room, still chuckling, from his great height.
"See what I mean?" he murmured. "All these stick-like little fingers jabbing and poking away at each other. You've always done that, haven't you? Guess you always will. Until there's nothing left here but Barbadior and Ygrath."
He swaggered to the bar to claim his sword.
"You," said the grey-eyed Tregean suddenly, as Ettocio handed over the curved, sheathed blade. The Khardhu turned slowly.
"You know how to use that thing as well as you use your mouth?" the Tregean asked.
The Khardhu's lips parted in a mirthless smile. "It's been reddened once or twice."
"Are you working for anyone right now?"
Insolently, appraisingly, the Khardhu looked down on the other man. "Where are you going?"
"I've just changed my plans," the other replied. "There's no money to be made up in Ferraut town. Not with double duties to be paid. I reckon I'll have to go farther afield. I'll give you going rates to guard me south to the Certandan highlands."
"Rough country there," the Khardhu murmured reflectively.
The Tregean's face twitched with amusement. "Why do you think I want you?" he asked.
After a moment the smile was returned. "When do we go?" the warrior said.\本\作\品\由\\網\友\整\理\上\傳\
"We're gone," the Tregean replied, rising and paying his own account. He claimed his own short sword and the two of them walked out together. When the door opened there was a brief, dazzling flash of sunlight.
Ettocio had hoped the talk would settle down after that. It didn't. The youngster at the bar mumbled something about uniting in a common front, a remark that would have been merely insane if it wasn't so dangerous. Unfortunately, from Ettocio's point of view, at any rate, the comment was overheard by the Ferraut wool-trader, and the mood of the room was so aroused by then that the subject wouldn't die.
It went on all afternoon, even after the boy left as well. And that night, with an entirely different crowd, Ettocio shocked himself by speaking up during an argument about ancestral primacy between an Astibarian wine-dealer and another Senzian. He made the same point the tall Khardhu had made, about nine spindly fingers that had been broken one by one because they never formed a fist. The argument made sense to him; it sounded intelligent in his own mouth. He noticed men nodding slowly even as he spoke. It was an unusual, flattering response, men had seldom paid any attention to Ettocio except when he called time in the tavern.
He rather liked the new sensation. In the days that followed he found himself raising the point whenever the opportunity arose. For the first time in his life Ettocio began to get a reputation as a thoughtful man.
Unfortunately, one evening in summer he was overheard by a Barbadian mercenary standing outside the open window. They didn't take away his license. There was a very high level of tension across the whole of the Palm by then. They arrested Ettocio and executed him on a wheel outside his own tavern, with his severed hands stuffed in his mouth.
A great many men had heard the