The light spread, and Burrich seated him­self on a wooden chair by the table. He looked dif­fer­ent, dressed in fine thin cloth of brown and yel­low, with a bit of sil­ver chain across his jer­kin. He put his hand out, palm up, on his knee and Nosy went to him im­me­di­ately. Burrich scratched his hanging ears, and then thumped his ribs af­fec­tion­ately, grim­acing at the dust that rose from his coat. ‘You’re a fine pair, the two of you,’ he said, speak­ing more to the pup than to me. ‘Look at you. Filthy as beg­gars. I lied to my king today for you. First time ever in my life I’ve done that. Ap­pears as if Chiv­alry’s fall from grace will take me down as well. Told him you were washed up and sound asleep, ex­hausted from your jour­ney. He was not pleased he would have to wait to see you, but luck­ily for us, he had weight­ier things to handle. Chiv­alry’s ab­dic­a­tion has up­set a lot of lords. Some are see­ing it as a chance to push for an ad­vant­age, and oth­ers are dis­gruntled to be cheated of a king they ad­mired. Shrewd’s try­ing to calm them all. He’s let­ting it be noised about that Ver­ity was the one who ne­go­ti­ated with the Chy­urda this time. Those as will be­lieve that shouldn’t be al­lowed to walk about on their own. But they came, to look at Ver­ity anew, and won­der if and when he’d be their next king, and what kind of a king he would be. Chiv­alry’s throw­ing it over and leav­ing for Withy­wood has stirred all the Duch­ies as if he’d poked a stick in a hive.’

  Burrich lif­ted his eyes from Nosy’s eager face. ‘Well, fitz. Guess you got a taste of it today. Fair scared poor Cob to death, your run­ning off like that. Now, are you hurt? Did any­one rough you up? I should have known there would be those would blame all the stir on you. Come here, then. Come on.’

  When I hes­it­ated, he moved over to a pal­let of blankets made up near the fire and pat­ted it in­vit­ingly. ‘See. There’s a place here for you, all ready. And there’s bread and meat on the table for both of you.’

  His words made me aware of the covered plat­ter on the table. Flesh, Nosy’s senses con­firmed, and I was sud­denly full of the smell of the meat. Burrich laughed at our rush to the table, and si­lently ap­proved how I shared a por­tion out to Nosy be­fore filling my own jaws. We ate to re­ple­tion, for Burrich had not un­der-es­tim­ated how hungry a pup and a boy would be after the day’s mis­ad­ven­tures. And then, des­pite our long nap earlier, the blankets so close to the fire were sud­denly im­mensely in­vit­ing. Bel­lies full, we curled up with the flames bak­ing our backs and slept.

  When we awoke the next day, the sun was well risen and Burrich already gone. Nosy and I ate the heel of last night’s loaf and gnawed the leftover bones clean be­fore we des­cen­ded from Burrich’s quar­ters. No one chal­lenged us or ap­peared to take any no­tice of us.

  Out­side, an­other day of chaos and rev­elry had be­gun. The keep was, if any­thing, more swollen with people. Their pas­sage stirred the dust and their mix­ing voices were an over­lay to the shush­ing of the wind and the more dis­tant mut­ter­ing of the waves. Nosy drank it all in, every scent, every sight, every sound. The doubled sens­ory im­pact diz­zied me. As I walked, I gathered from snatches of con­ver­sa­tion that our ar­rival had co­in­cided with some spring rite of mer­ri­ment and gath­er­ing. Chiv­alry’s ab­dic­a­tion was still the main topic, but it did not pre­vent the pup­pet shows and jug­glers from mak­ing every corner a stage for their antics. At least one pup­pet show had already in­cor­por­ated Chiv­alry’s fall from grace into its bawdy com­edy, and I stood an­onym­ous in the crowd and puzzled over dia­logue about sow­ing the neigh­bour’s fields that had the adults roar­ing with laughter.

  But very soon the crowds and the noise be­came op­press­ive to both of us, and I let Nosy know I wished to es­cape it all. We left the keep, passing out of the thick-walled gate past guards in­tent upon flirt­ing with the mer­ry­makers as they came and went. One more boy and dog leav­ing on the heels of a fish-mon­ger­ing fam­ily were noth­ing to no­tice. And with no bet­ter dis­trac­tion in sight, we fol­lowed the fam­ily as they wound their way down the streets away from the keep and to­wards the town of Buck­keep. We dropped fur­ther and fur­ther be­hind them as new scents de­man­ded that Nosy in­vest­ig­ate and then ur­in­ate at every corner, un­til it was just him and me wan­der­ing in the city.

  Buck­keep then was a windy, raw place. The streets were steep and crooked, with pav­ing stones that rocked and shif­ted out of place un­der the weight of passing carts. The wind blas­ted my in­land nos­trils with the scent of beached kelp and fish guts while the keen­ing of the gulls and sea-birds were an eerie melody above the rhythmic shush­ing of the waves. The town clings to the rocky black cliffs much like limpets and barnacles cling to the pil­ings and quays that ven­ture out into the bay. The houses were of stone and wood, with the more elab­or­ate wooden ones built higher up the rocky face and cut more deeply into it.

  Buck­keep Town was re­l­at­ively quiet com­pared to the fest­iv­ity and crowds up in the keep. Neither of us had the sense or ex­per­i­ence to know the wa­ter­front town was not the best place for a six-year-old and a puppy to wander. Nosy and I ex­plored eagerly, sniff­ing our way down Baker’s Street and through a near-deser­ted mar­ket and then along the ware­houses and boat-sheds that were the low­est level of the town. Here the wa­ter was close, and we walked on wooden piers as of­ten as we did on sand and stone. Busi­ness here was go­ing on as usual with little al­low­ance for the car­ni­val at­mo­sphere up in the keep. Ships must dock and un­load as the rising and fall­ing of the tides al­low, and those who fish for a liv­ing must fol­low the sched­ules of the finned creatures, not those of men.

  We soon en­countered chil­dren, some busy at the lesser tasks of their par­ents’ crafts, but some idlers like ourselves. I fell in eas­ily with them, with little need for in­tro­duc­tions or any of the adult pleas­ant­ries. Most of them were older than I, but sev­eral were as young or younger. None of them seemed to think it odd I should be out and about on my own. I was in­tro­duced to all the im­port­ant sights of the city, in­clud­ing the swollen body of a cow that had washed up at the last tide. We vis­ited a new fish­ing boat un­der con­struc­tion at a dock littered with curl­ing shav­ings and strong-smelling pitch spills. A fish-smoking rack left care­lessly un­ten­ded fur­nished a mid-day re­past for a half-dozen of us. If the chil­dren I was with were more ragged and bois­ter­ous than those who passed at their chores, I did not no­tice. And had any­one told me I was passing the day with a pack of beg­gar brats denied en­trance to the keep be­cause of their light-fingered ways, I would have been shocked. At the time, I knew only that it was sud­denly a lively and pleas­ant day, full of places to go and things to do.

  There were a few young­sters, lar­ger and more ram­bunc­tious, who would have taken the op­por­tun­ity to set the new­comer on his ear had Nosy not been with me and show­ing his teeth at the first ag­gress­ive shove. But as I did not show any signs of want­ing to chal­lenge their lead­er­ship, I was al­lowed to fol­low. I was suit­ably im­pressed by all their secrets, and I would ven­ture that by the end of the long af­ter­noon, I knew the poorer quarter of town bet­ter than many who had grown up above it.

  I was not asked for a name, but simply was called New­boy. The oth­ers had names as simple as Dick or Kerry, or as de­script­ive as Net­picker and Nosebleed. The last might have been a pretty little thing in bet­ter cir­cum­stances. She was a year or two older than I, but very out­spoken and quick­wit­ted. She got into one dis­pute with a big boy of twelve, but she showed no fear of his fists, and her sharp-tongued taunts soon had every­one laugh­ing at him. She took her vic­tory calmly and left me awed by her tough­ness. But the bruises on her face and thin arms were layered in shades of purple, blue and yel­low, while a crust of dried blood be­low one ear be­lied her name. Even so, Nosebleed was a lively one, her voice shriller than the gulls that wheeled above us. Late af­ter­noon found Kerry, Nosebleed and me on a rocky shore bey­ond the net-mend­ers’ racks, with Nosebleed teach­ing me to scour the rocks for tight-cling­ing sheels. These she levered off ex­pertly with a sharpened stick. She was show­ing me how to use a nail to pry the chewy in­mates out of their shells when an­other girl hailed us with a shout.

  The neat blue cloak that blew around her and the leather shoes on her feet set her apart from my com­pan­ions. Nor did she come to join our har­vest­ing, but only came close enough to call, ‘Molly, Molly, he’s look­ing for you, high and low. He waked up near sober an hour ago, and took to call­ing you names as soon as he found you gone and the fire out.’

  A look mixed of de­fi­ance and fear passed over Nosebleed’s face. ‘Run away, Kittne, but take my thanks with you. I’ll re­mem­ber you next time the tides bare the kelp­crabs’ beds.’

  Kittne ducked her head in a brief ac­know­ledge­ment and im­me­di­ately turned and hastened back the way she had come.

  ‘Are you in trouble?’ I asked Nosebleed when she did not go back to turn­ing over stones for sheels.

  ‘Trouble?’ She gave a snort of dis­dain. ‘That de­pends. If my father can stay sober long enough to find me, I might be in for a bit of it. More than likely he’ll be drunk enough to­night that not a one of whatever he hurls at me will hit. More than likely!’ she re­peated firmly when Kerry opened his mouth to ob­ject to this. And with that she turned back to the rocky beach and our search for sheel.

  We were crouched over a many-legged grey creature that we found stran­ded in a tide pool when the crunch of a heavy boot on the barnacled rocks brought all our heads up. With a shout Kerry fled down the beach, never paus­ing to look back. Nosy and I sprang back, Nosy crowding against me, teeth bared bravely as his tail tickled his cow­ardly little belly. Molly Nosebleed was either not so fast to re­act, or resigned to what was to come. A gangly man caught her a smack on the side of the head. He was a skinny man, red­nosed and raw-boned, so that his fist was like a knot at the end of his bony arm, but the blow was still enough to send Molly sprawl­ing. Barnacles cut into her wind-reddened knees, and when she crabbed aside to avoid the clumsy kick he aimed at her, I winced at the salty sand that packed the new cuts.

  ‘Faith­less little musk-cat! Didn’t I tell you to stay and tend to the dip­ping! And here I find you muck­ing about on the beach, with the tal­low gone hard in the pot. They’ll be want­ing more tapers up at the keep this night, and what am I to sell them?’

  ‘The three dozen I set this morn­ing. That was all you left me wick­ing for, you drunken old sot!’ Molly got to her feet and stood bravely des­pite her brim­ming eyes. ‘What was I to do? Burn up all the fuel to keep the tal­low soft so that when you fi­nally gave me wick­ing we’d have no way to heat the kettle?’

  The wind gus­ted and the man swayed shal­lowly against it. It brought us a whiff of him. Sweat and beer, Nosy in­formed me sagely. For a mo­ment the man looked re­gret­ful, but then the pain of his sour belly and aching head hardened him. He stooped sud­denly and seized a whitened branch of drift­wood. ‘You won’t talk to me like that, you wild brat! Down here with the beg­gar boys, do­ing El knows what! Steal­ing from the smoke racks again, I’ll wager, and bring­ing more shame to me! Dare to run, and you’ll have it twice when I catch you.’

  She must have be­lieved him, for she only cowered as he ad­vanced on her, put­ting up her thin arms to shield her head and then seem­ing to think bet­ter of it, and hid­ing only her face with her hands. I stood trans­fixed in hor­ror while Nosy yelped with my ter­ror and wet him­self at my feet. I heard the swish of the drift­wood knob as the club des­cen­ded. My heart leaped side­ways in my chest and I pushed at the man, the force jerking out oddly from my belly.

  He fell, as had the keg-man the day be­fore. But this man fell clutch­ing at his chest, his drift­wood weapon spin­ning harm­lessly away. He dropped to the sand, gave a twitch that spasmed his whole body, and then was still.

  An in­stant later Molly un­screwed her eyes, shrink­ing from the blow she still ex­pec­ted. She saw her father col­lapsed on the rocky beach, and amazement emp­tied her face. She leaped to­ward him cry­ing, ‘Papa, Papa, are you all right? Please, don’t die, I’m sorry I’m such a wicked girl! Don’t die, I’ll be good, I prom­ise I’ll be good.’ Heed­less of her bleed­ing knees, she knelt be­side him, turn­ing his face so he wouldn’t breathe in sand, and then vainly try­ing to sit him up.

  ‘He was go­ing to kill you,’ I told her, try­ing to make sense of the whole situ­ation.

  ‘No. He hits me, a bit, when I am bad, but he’d never kill me. And when he is sober and not sick, he cries about it and begs me not to be bad and make him angry. I should take more care not to an­ger him. Oh, New­boy, I think he’s dead.’

  I wasn’t sure my­self, but in a mo­ment he gave an aw­ful groan and opened his eyes a bit. Whatever fit had felled him seemed to have passed. Dazedly he ac­cep­ted Molly’s self-ac­cus­a­tions and anxious help, and even my re­luct­ant aid. He leaned on the two of us as we wove our way down the rocky beach over the un­even foot­ing. Nosy fol­lowed us, by turns bark­ing and ra­cing in circles around us.

  The few folk who saw us pass paid no at­ten­tion to us. I guessed that the sight of Molly help­ing her papa home was not strange to any of them. I helped them as far as the door of a small chand­lery, Molly sniff­ling apo­lo­gies every step of the way. I left them there, and Nosy and I found our way back up the wind­ing streets and hilly road to the keep, won­der­ing every step at the ways of folk.

  Hav­ing found the town and the beg­gar chil­dren once, I was drawn like a mag­net to them every day af­ter­wards. Burrich’s days were taken up with his du­ties, and his even­ings with the drink and mer­ri­ment of the Spring­fest. He paid little mind to my com­ings and go­ings, as long as each even­ing found me on my pal­let be­fore his hearth. In truth, I think he had little idea of what to do with me, other than to see that I was fed well enough to grow heart­ily and that I slept safe within doors at night. It could not have been a good time for him. He had been Chiv­alry’s man, and now that Chiv­alry had cast him­self down, what was to be­come of him? That must have been much on his mind. And there was the mat­ter of his leg. Des­pite his know­ledge of poult­ices and bandaging, he could not seem to work the heal­ing on him­self that he so routinely served to his beasts. Once or twice I saw the in­jury un­wrapped and winced at the ragged tear that re­fused to heal smoothly but re­mained swollen and ooz­ing. Burrich cursed it roundly at first, and set his teeth grimly each night as he cleaned and re-dressed it, but as the days passed he re­garded it with more of a sick des­pair than any­thing else. Even­tu­ally he did get it to close, but the ropy scar twis­ted his leg and dis­figured his walk. Small won­der he had little mind to give to a young bas­tard de­pos­ited in his care.

  So I ran free in the way that only small chil­dren can, un­noticed for the most part. By the time Spring­fest was over, the guards at the keep’s gate had be­come ac­cus­tomed to my daily wan­der­ings. They prob­ably thought me an er­rand boy, for the keep had many of those, only slightly older than I. I learned to pil­fer early from the keep’s kit­chen enough for both Nosy and my­self to break­fast heart­ily. Scav­en­ging other food – burnt crusts from the baker’s, sheel and sea­weed from the beach, smoked fish from un­ten­ded racks – was a reg­u­lar part of my day’s activ­it­ies. Molly Nosebleed was my most fre­quent com­pan­ion. I sel­dom saw her father strike her after that day; for the most part he was too drunk to find her, or to make good his threats when he did. To what I had done that day, I gave little thought, other than to be grate­ful that Molly had not real­ized I was re­spons­ible.

  The town be­came the world to me, with the keep a place I went to sleep. It was sum­mer, a won­der­ful time in a port town. No mat­ter where I went, Buck­keep Town was alive with com­ings and go­ings. Goods came down the Buck River from the In­land Duch­ies, on flat river barges manned by sweat­ing barge­men. They spoke learn­edly about shoals and bars and land­marks and the rising and fall­ing of the river wa­ters. Their freight was hauled up into the town shops or ware­houses, and then down again to the docks and into the holds of the sea ships. Those were manned by swear­ing sail­ors who sneered at the river­men and their in­land ways. They spoke of tides and storms and nights when not even the stars would show their faces to guide them. And fish­er­men tied up to Buck­keep docks as well, and were the most gen­ial of the group. At least, so they were when the fish were run­ning well.

  Kerry taught me the docks and the tav­erns, and how a quick-footed boy might earn three or even five pence a day, run­ning mes­sages up the steep streets of the town. We thought ourselves sharp and dar­ing, to thus un­der­cut the big­ger boys who asked two pence or even more for just one er­rand. I don’t think I have ever been as brave since as I was then. If I close my eyes, I can smell those glor­i­ous days. Oakum and tar and fresh wood shav­ings from the dry-docks where the ship­wrights wiel­ded their drawknives and mal­lets. The sweet smell of very fresh fish, and the pois­on­ous odour of a catch held too long on a hot day. Bales of wool in the sun ad­ded their own note to the scent of oak kegs of mel­low Sandsedge brandy. Sheaves of fever­gone hay wait­ing to sweeten a fore­peak mingled scents with crates of hard mel­ons. And all of these smells were swirled by a wind off the bay, seasoned with salt and iod­ine. Nosy brought all he scen­ted to my at­ten­tion as his keener senses over­rode my duller ones.