AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“The case of Mistress Orva Ashmiller, resident of Mulberry Way.” The herald had a fine, ringing voice that bounced from the worn, smooth wood of the floor and walls. “Charges – striking Provost’s Guardswoman Clara Goodwin while Guardswoman Goodwin acted to uphold the King’s law together with fellow Guard Matthias Tunstall and trainee Guard Rebakah Cooper.”
Sir Tullus scowled. “Struck a Guard? Report.”
Tunstall nudged me with his elbow. “Cooper.”
I must have stared up at him like a snared rabbit. “None of the other trainees had to.” I think I whined.
“Cooper, he hates Dogs that waste time,” Goodwin said. “Report. The Dog that was there for the whole thing does the report. That would be you.”
Ersken actually tried to push me to my feet. “You can do it, Beka!”
Some nightmares do not end. I peered at the Magistrate through my bangs and dug my feet in against Ersken’s push. To my scrambling brain Sir Tullus seemed very like the smoked boar face the butchers hang before their shops to advertise. His face was that beet-like red, his jowls dark with beard-shadow. I believe he had but one very long eyebrow.
His mouth gave the oddest of twitches. By then I was in a complete, blind panic. I couldn’t speak before all these people. I didn’t care if most were behind the onlookers’ bars!
“This day comes to all trainee Guards, Rebakah Cooper,” Sir Tullus said. “Your day has only come earlier than most. Speak up. The sooner you begin the telling, the sooner you may go.”
“We were walking the rounds when we heard the sound of violence,” Tunstall said quietly. It was one of the beginnings we committed to memory in training. Now Goodwin had a grip on my other arm, far more painful than Ersken’s.
“Stand up or I’ll poke your wound,” she muttered. “Do not embarrass Tunstall and me in front of the Magistrate.”
I stumbled to my feet with that, but my knees wobbled. “I – We were w-walking the – the rounds when we, um, we heard violence. Milord.”
“Look up, Guardswoman, and speak up.” For a man supposed to be peppery, he sounded almost kind. “Just tell it. What happened?”
How could I say I could not speak before this whole hooting chamber? I stumbled and stammered and got no more along than explaining the mess Orva’s man was when Sir Tullus took pity on me. “Enough. Tunstall, continue.”
I dropped onto the bench and put my face in my hands, feeling the heat of my shame against my palms. Why must I be unable to speak before strangers? It is my biggest fault as a Dog, and I must find a way to fix it, but how? They were all laughing at me. Who could blame them? From fish guts to drooling cracknob, I’d had a glorious week.
Nor was it done. I heard Tunstall say, “Orva escaped through the open window.” He stopped then and cleared his throat.
“She knew there were stairs without? Go on,” Sir Tullus urged Tunstall. “I assume you captured her outside.”
“No, Sir Knight,” Tunstall replied. He cleared his throat again. I saw where this was headed. My tripes clenched. For a moment I thought I might throw up.
“But you have said that Goodwin was unable to give chase,” Sir Tullus reminded Tunstall.
“I did, Sir Knight.” Tunstall started to rub his beard, as he often did when he wasn’t sure what to say.
“Ah.” To my sorrow, Sir Tullus was a quick-witted man. “Stand up and try again, Cooper.”
I actually heard a moan from the onlookers.
I stood.
I was dizzily trying to remember my own name when someone walked between my trembling legs.
Pounce.
He curled up on the toes of my boots. I could feel his purr rumble through the leather.
“Sir Knight, I went after her,” I told the floor.
“Louder,” Ersken whispered.
“Sir Knight, I went after her,” I repeated, as loud as I could manage. “She would not halt when I bade her to, so I gave chase. I caught her.”
“Where, Cooper?” The Magistrate sounded very patient.
I swallowed. “At the Sheepmire Tavern, Sir Knight.”
“He won’t know where that is!” Ersken whispered. So eager he was to help me that his voice was just a bit too loud. Folk heard and laughed.
Goodwin took out her baton, went back to the bars, and walked along, banging them hard. The ones hanging on to the bars had to jump away to keep from getting their fingers smacked. Of course they hit those crowding behind them. Some went down in a heap.
“Silence!” she cried in her crowd voice. “I don’t know what manner of Players’ jollity you thought you came here for, you scuts, but you were dead wrong! This is a court of the realm’s law. Shut your gobs or I’ll come back there and crack skulls!”
Goddess, how I want to be Clary Goodwin when I get to be a proper Dog, I thought with envy.
The court Dogs, them as were supposed to keep order, stirred. It had dawned on them that they ought to do some work. They moved out into the crowd, hands on their own batons. Goodwin thrust hers back into its straps and came to sit next to Tunstall and me.
“Thank you, Guardswoman Goodwin.” Sir Tullus’s voice was as dry as Crookshank’s heart. “It is a pleasure to watch you restore quiet in my court. Continue, Guardswoman Cooper. The Sheepmire Tavern…?”
For a moment I’d forgotten my own pain. I ground my teeth and tried to remember where the curst place was. “Spindle Lane, Sir Knight,” I said at last.
“I have no idea where that is,” the Magistrate said.
Tunstall stood. “It’s but a short walk from the North Gate, Sir Knight.” He sat down, giving me a pat on the shoulder as he did so.
I tried to forgive him for handing me to Sir Tullus. I knew nearly as well as he did that it was the Dog who stayed with the Rat who did the report. It was only because I was so curst tongue-tied before folk that he’d had to speak at all.
Sir Tullus’s eyebrow shot toward his forehead. “From Mulberry Way to the North Gate?”
My tongue felt too big for my mouth. Ersken kicked me to m
ake me speak. “I – I – Forgive me, milord, sorry, Sir Knight, but we went by back ways and through a few…” I clenched my fists and kept on going. “There was alleys and between houses and she went through a couple of drinking dens and I caught her by going around one, Sir Knight, then I hobbled her and we got a cart ride back to the kennel and I know I wasn’t s’posed to arrest her but I had her and so I told her she was arrested and then my Dogs – ‘scuze me, my Guards – they done it proper when I got her to the guardhouse.” My mouth kept going as I said, “I’m sorry for her children and her man, but they’re cracknobs for wanting someone who breaks crockery on their faces and tries to cut them with a dreadful big knife, with apologies, Sir Knight.” Then I clapped my hands over my traitor mouth. It was a heady thing, reporting like that, with my heart pounding and my cheeks burning like one of Crookshank’s houses. I think I went a little mad for just a moment.
Someone poked me from behind. It was Verene. She gave me a flask. I sniffed, but it was just warm raspberry twilsey, naught that would make me giddy. The tartness washed the dry coat from my mouth and made it tingle. I reminded myself to do something nice for Verene one day soon.
I looked at Sir Tullus through my bangs. His mouth was twitching, more this time than it had before. Then it steadied out. He scratched his head. “Better, Guardswoman?”
I nodded. This time it was Tunstall who kicked me. “Yes, sir, thank you, Sir Knight,” I said, thinking that between Tunstall and Ersken, my legs would look like eggplants in the morning.
“Perhaps you would be so good as to explain why you went to such trouble, if you please,” Sir Tullus said. “You show a degree of…enthusiasm that is unusual, even for a trainee Guard.”
“Sir?” I asked. Now that the worst of it was done, I could meet his eyes, as long as he didn’t want to be chattering until midnight.
“Why did you not let her go? You could have returned for her another day,” Sir Tullus explained.
Perhaps it was Sir Tullus who’d run mad, not me. Except he seemed to be the same as when the day had started. Still, it was a crackbrained question, though I could not say as much to him.
