Page 13 of Paladin's Hope

Earstripe looked tired. He was wearing many fewer rags than he had been before, and though he was still well covered, he looked smaller and more frail. “A gnole is not a guard-gnole any longer,” he said, without preamble.

“I’m sorry,” said Piper. Oh damn, now what do I say? This is hard enough with a human. He found himself wishing that Galen was here, someone who understood the gnoles a little better. He didn’t want to say something so utterly wrong that he offended Earstripe or drove him away. He held the door open. “Would you like to come in?”

The gnole nodded. Piper ushered him in. “Do gnoles…ah…drink alcohol?”

“Only sweet.”

“Damn.” Piper had always preferred the smokier whiskeys himself. He tried to remember if there was something in the cupboard that might work, a mead or a fruit brandy or something. “I’m sorry, Earstripe, I don’t think I have anything.”

Earstripe waved a hand. “A gnole doesn’t mind. A gnole didn’t come for that, bone-doctor.”

Piper sat down opposite him. “Go on.”

Earstripe met Piper’s eyes squarely. “I need your help,” he said.

Piper blinked.

“Too many bodies. There are too many. I am going up the river to look. I know something is going on, no matter what Mallory-captain says.”

Every word was carefully chosen, but Piper could hear desperation underlying them. The change in Earstripe’s syntax startled him more than he cared to admit. Did I somehow think he was unintelligent because of the way he sounded before? Even though I know better?

Perhaps. But how worried is he now, that he dare not take any chances with a human misunderstanding him?

“Do you think you can find the killer?” he asked.

“A…I have to try.”

“Going upriver could be dangerous,” Piper said.

“Yes.” Earstripe lifted his hands as if to begin twisting his whiskers, then smoothed them down instead. “Tomato-man has offered to help,” he added. “Galen-Paladin. The Rat-priests, they will listen to a paladin. They listen to you too, yes? Bone-doctor?”

“Sometimes,” said Piper. He knew where this was going now. Yes, of course. He’s going to ask me to come with them. And he thinks he has one shot at this, so he is using the most formal human language he can, and staring me in the eye even though I can tell he doesn’t like doing it.

His first instinct was to refuse. He worked in a little stone room underground, not on far-flung trips into danger. I am not equipped for this. I cannot fight and my conversational skills are limited to things like, “Did you know that blowfly eggs only take a day to hatch into maggots?” I am no good for this sort of thing.

Galen was going. Galen with his easy smile and some kind of secret in his eyes. Piper had laid awake thinking of those eyes and the arm Galen had laid across his shoulders, the strength of muscle and sinew and safety.

Galen is going. And Earstripe needs your help.

He took a deep breath. Perhaps it was inevitable. Perhaps it had been since the first morning on the riverbank, looking at a body with a gaping wound in its chest. “You need me to come with you,” he said.

“You would help a gnole, bone-doctor. You would help the dead.”

“There’s no helping the dead,” said Piper wearily, “but I’ll come anyway. Just in case we can help a few more of the living.”

* * *

It was barely dawn when they left the city. Piper couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something clandestine about their trip. We’re not doing anything illegal. We get to leave the city. I arranged for a replacement for a bit, I’m not leaving my job. And Earstripe left the guard, that doesn’t make him a prisoner.

Earstripe walked beside him. There was a new swatch of fabric draped across one shoulder. It was bright turquoise. Piper wondered if it meant anything. Congratulations on leaving the guard? Shame on you for leaving the guard?

Maybe it just meant that the gnole had gone shopping. Piper didn’t pretend to understand the details of the dress code among the nobility, and those were other humans. Trying to comprehend gnole fashion was probably a lost cause. For all I know, their eyes are as different as their noses, and there’s markings that I can’t even see.

There was still a great deal of traffic at this hour of the day, but most of it was flowing into the city of Archon’s Glory, not out. Wagons passed them, probably full of eggs and milk to feed the city’s appetites. Piper picked out women carrying baskets of vegetables and cages of live chickens. A fisherman went by with a string of eels on a pole over his shoulder. Hardly anyone was going the other way.

They passed human guards stationed at the gate, who eyed the trio expressionlessly.

Do they recognize Earstripe? Do they know that he’s going to investigate something outside the city? Will they try to stop him?

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