From a far corner of the room, a small ratlike ferrin woman came out of the shadows, bearing one of her pups in hand. The pup squealed in its small way, but the Days did not hear it, didn’t have Gaborn’s keen ears. All six of the ferrin woman’s nipples were red and swollen, and she wore a yellow rag tied round her shoulders. She stood only a foot tall, and her pudgy face was accented by thick jowls. She waddled up behind the Days, nearly blinded by daylight, and stuffed the pup in the Days’ coat pocket.

The ferrin were not an intelligent people. They had a language of sorts, used some crude tools. Most folk considered them vermin, since the ferrin constantly tunneled into houses to steal food.

Gaborn had heard it was common for a ferrin woman to wean her pups this way, by finding an inn, then sending the pup off in the pocket of a stranger. But he’d never seen it happen.

Many a man would have tossed a dagger into the ferrin. Gaborn smiled blandly, averted his eyes.

Good, he thought, let the pup eat the lining of the damned historian’s coat.

He waited until the ferrin finished.

“And what of me?” Gaborn asked the drunken Days. “Am I a good man?”

“You, Your Lordship, are the soul of virtue!”

Gaborn smiled. He could expect no other answer. In the back of the common room, an Inkarran singer struck up the mandolin, began to practice for the crowd that would gather later. Gaborn had seldom seen an Inkarran play, since his own father would not let them cross the borders, and he enjoyed the diversion now.

The Inkarran had skin as light as cream and hair that fell like liquid silver; his eyes were as green as ice. His body was tattooed in the manner of his tribe—blue symbols of vines twining up his legs, with images that brought to mind the names of his ancestors and his home village. On his knees and arms were images’ of knots and other magic symbols.

The man sang with a throaty crooning, a very powerful voice. It was beautiful in its own way, and hinted that this singer wore the “hidden runes of talent.” The art of creating hidden runes was mastered only by a few Inkarrans. Yet, despite these runes, the singer’s voice could not duplicate the ethereal tones sung by the virtuoso outside the songhouse an hour ago. His voice was more generous, Gaborn decided. The woman at the songhouse had sung for wealth and prestige, but this man sung now merely to entertain. A generous, gesture.