The Honorable Barbarian Read Online Free PDF

is. You are coming now."

    Seated on a cushion on the floor of the captain's cabin, Kerin strove to cross his legs as did Captain Huvraka and Navigator Janji. Used to chairs, he found this posture difficult but hid his discomfort as best he could.
    A brown, barefoot man in a skirt came in with pitcher and bowl, and towels beneath his arm. He poured water over his diners' hands, caught it in the bowl, and handed round the towels. Then he glided out, to return with three metal cups and a bottle, whence he poured a drink for each. Gathering up the towels, he slithered out again. Huvraka raised his cup.
    "To success of quest, Master Kerin, whatever it be."
    "Thanks," said Kerin. The liquor was smooth but stronger than any wine. "Captain, from what my brother told me, I thought Mulvanians drank nought alcoholic. At the palace in Trimandilam, they gave him only fruit juice."
    Huvraka wagged a finger. "Ah, you are hearing tales of the strict Mulvani sects. We sailors are not so—so—what is your word? Straitlaced. Since we are belonging to one of lowest castes, what have we to lose by a little fun, like drinking tari ? Drink up!"
    Three drinks later, Navigator Janji asked: "Master Kerin, you are telling us what this quest of yours is."
    His tongue loosened by liquor, Kerin talked: "I'm on my way to Kuromon to learn the secret of their clock escapement."
    "What is?" said both Mulvanians at once. Huvraka added: "Some device for opening locks, so you are escaping from prison?"
    "Nay, nay. An escapement regulates the speed of a clock, so it shall show noon at the same time as the sun every day. My brothers and I make and sell clocks as Evor's Sons. My brother Jorian has made inventions in clocks, but he has not attained a perfect escapement. . . ."
    Kerin rattled on until dinner arrived. Then, as eating halted his spate of speech, he heard a tinkly little voice in his ear: "Master Kerin, you have let your tongue run away with you! Be more careful!"
    Suddenly conscious of his imprudence, Kerin sat silently eating until Janji asked: "Are you doing aught with methods of navigation?"
    "Why, no. I've never been on a ship before, and your spell is the first time I've seen such a thing. I've heard the Shvenites have a kind of crystal. . . . Why dost ask?"
    "Oh, I am curious, being in that trade. How are you liking our food?''
    "Excellent!" he said. Although he was not enthusiastic about this vegetarian repast, he remembered Jorian's drilling him in seizing every opportunity to flatter his hosts.

    As the days drifted past, Kerin settled into his shipboard routine. He rose, ate, exercised, watched the sailors at their tasks, learned something of how the Dragonet worked, practiced his Mulvani, learned a little Salimorese from Janji, and went to bed again. On the second day out, Belinka told him:
    "He-he, Master Kerin, that brown woman is more to Captain Huvraka than just his navigator!"
    "You mean . . ."
    "Indeed I do. She enters his cabin of nights. Her bir regards it as a joke, since the captain hath two wives at home in Akkander. He says—"
    "Who says?"
    "The bir, the familiar. He says they be frightfully jealous, though not of each other. But if they find out about Janji, they will make the captain's life not worth living. But my instincts tell me to beware of Janji! All Salimorese navigators are witches, saith the bir."
    Kerin shrugged. "Huvraka's domestic arrangements concern me not."
    Belinka tinkled on: "The bir considers it strange that in most of Novaria, none may marry more than one mate. That, he saith, means that where the numbers of men and women differ, some are left mateless."
    "He may have the right of it," said Kerin.

    Kerin enjoyed a day ashore at Janareth, amid the motley, polyglot crowds. As he returned to the Dragonet , he saw that a stranger of about his own size and shape was speaking with Captain Huvraka on the afterdeck. As Kerin approached, the new man turned. The newcomer was of nearly Kerin's age, clad in a