”Mr. Cranes?” Hellrien said to the pale face peeking behind a crack on the door.
”Who are you?” the face cheeped.
”Hellrien, of The Bloody Dawn. Undersergeant Blunoss sent me to discuss important matters concerning the town security.”
”Hold on…”
The door shut down, and the latch rattled. Hellrien turned away from the door and covered her smile. She looked around. The courtyard was littered with crates, sacks, lumber and broken-down carts, arrayed to form crude barricades against invaders. The house itself was like a dilapidated, unpainted wooden box in one corner of the cluttered courtyard. The window was so dirty one could barely see through it. But the shutters were in place and they had been installed with new, almost rust-free hinges. Hellrien grinned and shook her head. All that was missing was for Mr. Cranes to have the fountain dismantled for a clearer view and shot to the courtyard and the main street.
In spite of his ranting the first day ’Blue Nose’ had soon fallen into a habit of delegating Hellrien with tasks of running errands or delivering messages to important people in town. Perhaps he was more concerned about Hellrien’s assumed ’relations with the upper crust’ than he wanted to admit, or perhaps he had found that he was in a need of a second assistant after all. Whatever the reason, Hellrien didn’t complain. It provided her with some much needed variety to the monotonous, boring routines of guarding the Span and endless drills and physical exercises.
The latch rattled again. Another face appeared to the door.
”Can you prove your identity, miss?”
Hellrien showed him her sigil. A gray, dirty hand grasped the door. Finally the door opened, and a foul, stuffy stench penetrated her nostrils.
”You can never be too careful, not when your hometown is being besieged by abominable, hateful monsters, miss!” said Mr. Crane as he leered at Hellrien with his bloodshot, swollen eyes. ”Come in. Make haste.”
He showed Hellrien through the hallway and the squeaking floorboards in the kitchen into a small booth that presumably was supposed to pose as his office. Here Hellrien finally got a good look of him for the first time. He truly was a saddening sight. She was looking at a man who was being eaten alive by fear from the inside. Cranes was small and morbidly gaunt. His hair was thin, white and dirty. His skin tone was sickly gray and he had large bags under his eyes. His mouth was thin-lipped and trembling, there was some saliva on the corners. His hands, feverishly leafing through papers on his desk, were like bird’s legs, with long, hooked, sallow fingernails. Hellrien couldn’t help but feel repulsed at this wraith before her.
”To be quite honest, I expected a bigger force”, Cranes cheeped. ”At least twice as big as we have here now. I thought The Bloody Dawn was supposed to be a large mercenary company? Couldn’t you spare more men?”
Hellrien didn’t reply.
Cranes stared at her. Hellrien took note of the shrewd gleam deep in his colorless eyes.
”It’s about the money, isn’t it? It’s always about the money… but you are here now, and we have to make do with what we got.”
”Yes, we are here”, Hellrien admitted. ”As far as I know, the mayors of both Trestlebridge and Bree negotiated the contract. The orcs have been harassing trade on the road between Trestlebridge and Bree.”
”Yes, the orcs! It’s very wise for the mayor of Bree to be concerned about them. They are not just our problem, soon they will be yours too! Have you ever seen one, Hellrien? They have evil eyes, malicious, guileful, hateful eyes. And they lust after our women, did you know that? They lust after human women!”
”Is that so”, Hellrien said indifferently. She remarked a picture standing on the desk. It was a portrait of a pretty, dark-haired girl. It required some effort, but Hellrien could notice the resemblance between the girl and Cranes. ”Your daughter, Mr. Cranes?”
Cranes slammed the picture quickly face down on the desk. ”That is none of your concern, Hellrien!” Cranes panted heavily. ”You will not be seeing her in this house! My daughter is dead to me!”
”How unfortunate”, Hellrien frowned.
”And none of your business!” Cranes snarled. The bird’s-leg hands started to tremble. ”Leave my daughter out of this! She’s got nothing to do with anything! Instead I would like to know where you personally are going to stay in this town. I need a personal bodyguard.”
”Doesn’t Captain Trotter and his Watch take care of the order and security in town?”
”That small band of near-sighted wretches!” Cranes snorted sarcastically. ”And Trotter does nothing but sit in his office polishing his shiny shield! And all the time the encirclement around town grows tighter and tighter!”
”Mr. Cranes”, Hellrien said coolly, ”I came here to discuss about the state of trade and imports. Lack of lumber is beginning to be a major problem, and Undersergeant Blunoss would like to take a look at your documents about the state of financial affairs in Trestlebridge. If you could loan them to me, I would return them later today.”
”What for?” Cranes huffed quickly and fiercely.
”Undersergeant Blunoss feels there’s some room for improvement about how things are managed. He’s got a knack about numbers and thinks he could help out. The Dawn needs lumber too, so it’s relevant in organizing the defense.”
”I’m not going to give my documents to just anyone”, Cranes snarled. ”If your superior wants to see them, he can come here himself to meet me personally, like everyone else. But you still haven’t answered to my question, miss. Where are you staying?”
Hellrien stood up. ”At The Bloody Dawn Garrison, Mr. Cranes.”
”You can stay at my house.”
”That’s out of the question, I’m afraid. Undersergeant Blunoss insists that everyone spends their nights in the garrison. We have a strict curfew.”
”I can talk to Blunoss. I can pay if it’s about money. I have money.”
Hellrien felt a sudden bout of claustrophobia. The thought of having to stay in this stuffy, dreary, smelly house wrenched her stomach. ”No thank you. I have important duties that require my presence elsewhere.”
”I need protection, miss Hellrien! I thought I was making myself clear!”
”I’ll talk to the Captain.”
”The Captain! Don’t be ridiculous!”
Hellrien stepped towards the door. Cranes muttered irascibly behind her. The skinny scarecrow for a housekeeper followed her outside, and then the door closed behind her and the latch rattled.
She stopped at the bottom of the stairs. Give it another half a year and Cranes would be a raving lunatic. What was eating him? It couldn’t be just the recent trouble with orcs, he had clearly been this way for years. ’The richest man in town’, had Hemlock said. And yet he lived in a ramshackle hut like the poorest pauper. A lot of happiness had those riches bought him, Hellrien mused. Perhaps it was all those people he had trampled under his feet on his way to riches that had come back to haunt him. We all build our private hells. Hellrien lit her pipe. She had no doubt Mr. Cranes hadn’t deserved every minute of his nightmares.
On her way to the Mayor’s office she stopped by the Trestlebridge Barracks to mention that Mr. Cranes had demanded protection.
The Captain smiled. ”All right, I’ll hide a watchman into the fountain.”
”Can you direct me the way to the Mayor’s office?”
The Captain told her where it was, and Hellrien walked south to the shopping district. She saw the house soon after turning the corner from the market stalls. It was quite a stately building, built to lean on the side of a big rocky hill – three stories high, white and cool house on a root of a hill growing pine trees. Stony patios were in parts bounded by pink begonia bushes. Some crafters and vendors had set up their stalls to the front patio. The plinth of the house was man-high, and steep stairs rose to a sturdy oak door.
Hellrien knocked, and some sort of majordomo appeared to the door.
”My name is Hellrien. The Mayor is expecting me.”
The majordomo bowed. He was dressed in white.
”From The Bloody Dawn? That’s correct. The Mayor is unfortunately unavailable right now, but, Mrs. Maria Shelton will be happy to see you. You will find her from the north side of the house. She’s at the patio, miss.”
The majordomo bowed, and Hellrien descended the stairs slowly in the cool shadow of the trees. The north side patio was fenced, and begonias smelled dazingly. Birds sang in the branches of the tall, evergreen pine trees. Suddenly Hellrien remembered the brief visit she had had here in Trestlebridge almost two years ago. Nobody here seemed to remember her from that time, and that was probably for the best. She had gotten drunk and woken up under the bridge, with little recollections of the previous night’s events. Hellrien smiled self-ironically.
She arrived to the corner of the house and stepped into the patio, and perhaps her sarcastic thoughts reflected from her face when Maria Shelton saw her. In any case the woman remained standing and staring at her round, fair-skinned face, blue eyes and full-lipped mouth, and a feeling of distaste overwhelmed her. She stirred nervously.
Hellrien’s appearance was very unpleasant to Maria Shelton’s eyes. Her hauberk and ostentatious abundance of weaponry made it ridiculously obvious where she was coming from. Maria didn’t like the mercenaries stationed in her town, and Hellrien’s bulky, cumbersome frame and crudely sensuous features only emphasized her prejudices of what type of people swelled the ranks of such an organization – a common, vulgar woman, bawdy and irreverent, a swaggering, ale-swilling brute.
Hellrien, for her part, first noticed the other woman’s height. Maria was remarkably tall for a Breeish woman, and her white hair, cold blue eyes and deep furrows around her mouth made her appear cold and aversive. She was a lean, slender, middle-aged woman – between fifty and sixty – her mouth was tight-lipped and her eyes depreciative. Hellrien could sense the woman’s antipathy towards her. It didn’t bother her too much. She was used to evoking such feelings in some other women, though she could never completely understand why.
”Mrs. Shelton?” Hellrien said, bowing lightly.
The woman nodded, almost kindly. ”Please forgive me for staring, miss”, she said, and her faint smile couldn’t fade the tight expression of her mouth. ”I wasn’t expecting… I mean…”
She wasn’t expecting a woman, Hellrien thought.
Maria sensed Hellrien reading her thoughts and felt a slight tinge of red rising to her cheeks. To conceal her irritation for it she turned and nodded towards the table and a couple of light chairs. ”Please, have a seat, miss. Do you want something to drink?”
”Thank you.” Hellrien sat down and laid her hat on the table. The soft, grayish light of a cloudy day that cast on her face made it appear calm, impassive and almost stony. Maria looked her from the side, and Hellrien noticed how her eyes were darting between her swords and bow.
She said: ”Do my weapons bother you?”
”Not at all. What would you like to drink?”
”Ale, please.”
Maria called a vendor, who approached carrying a jug of ale and a mug. Maria showed no intentions to be serving Hellrien, so she filled her mug herself. She slurped quite a mouthful and noticed how loathing changed the expression of the other woman’s mouth.
The woman’s attitude irritated Hellrien. What the hell was her problem? She was used to the scorn and disdain of some women, particularly married women who were past their prime and perhaps worried that Hellrien might seduce their husbands into wayward and wanton acts and potentially give them a nasty little disease to further pass on to their wives. Was that it? Did Maria think Hellrien would beguile her precious husband the Mayor, who was undoubtedly old, fat and ugly as a mud fence, but rolling in gold? Hellrien swished the ale in her mouth, casting a sideways glance at Maria. She experienced the other woman’s contempt as downright challenging. Then she remembered that Taala had asked her to help foster better relations between the Dawn and the townsfolk of Trestlebridge, and swallowed her ale, feeling disappointed.
