Strong Heart - 2
***Jo thanked the servant that let her into the modest villa where Master Azrab was staying. It belonged to one of his merchant clan relatives; a third cousin, twice removed by marriage if she remembered correctly.
Turning a corner, she spotted a familiar dark-haired boy of about fifteen.
"Hey, Berab, can I talk to your uncle?" Jo gave him a friendly smile as he looked up at her.
"Hi, Jo. Let me ask," Berab said as he set down the clay tablets he'd been studying.
Well damn, that's the first time I've heard the kid talk without his voice going all squeaky, Jo thought with an indulgent smile as she followed the boy, all skinny angles from shooting up a knuckle's width in the last season, further down the hall. I wonder if Azrab will keep him on as an assistant after his apprenticeship is done.
"Honored Uncle Azrab?" the boy called as he slipped his head through a curtain of strings beaded with clay and semiprecious stones that separated the room from the inner hallway. "Guard Joana would like to tell you something, sir, at your convenience." After a pause, Berab pulled back into the hall and smiled up at Jo. "Honored Cousin Amrouk is with him, but my honored uncle waved for you to go in."
"Thanks, Berab." Jo passed him and ducked through the beaded strands. She found herself facing the caravan master and his cousin, the clan's local factor here in Besheb.
"Master Azrab," she said with a shallow bow to the short, wiry man seated a divan behind a low table. Jo knew hawks who had gazes less intense than the caravan master's. Turning slightly, she nodded to the blank-faced man sitting next to him. "Master Amrouk."
"Report," said Azrab.
"I've been offered a few days of freelance guard work while the caravan is in town, and I want to make sure it won't create problems for my honored employer before I accept."
"See, Amrouk?" Azrab leaned closer to his kinsman as he spoke, "Even one of the garrulous Fasaid nomads can give a polite and succint report. Hold that up as an example for the employee we were discussing earlier." He nodded back to Jo, "Continue."
"Yes, sir. One of the shopkeepers in town apparently needs to travel to Eret and wants a guard for his business while he's away," Jo said. She smiled wryly as she continued, "The bad news is his magician kinsman, who mentioned that the locals don't much like him when he was describing the job to me."
"Gods in the desert," Amrouk muttered. Jo and Azrab both looked at him sharply as his neutral expression gave way to annoyance. "Are you talking about Nerses and Tobias?"
"If Nerses is a thread merchant and Tobias the magician, then yes," Jo said warily, "What should I know?"
"Tobias and his cousin, Nerses' wife, are part of that Adorai cult, only after Tobias moved in with them two years ago it came out that they're apparently a different sect of Adorai than the rest of the cultists in town," Amrouk explained.
The scars across Jo's check thinned as her face tightened into a scowl. "Please tell me I did not just put my nose into a demon-fucking religious debate."
"Not quite. You see, Tobias has been helping his cousin make embroided charms for sale in addition to their regular thread trade. Mostly little good luck stuff," Amrouk added with a dismissive wave, "But apparently some of the spells draw heavily from Adorai symbolism. The other Adorai took offense at them, anyway, claiming that they were selling membership to their faith."
"Unhappy little gods in the desert." Jo looked over at Azrab. "Sir, if you want me to keep away from this, just say the word.”
“Amrouk, didn't you say they stopped selling those charms?” Azrab asked his cousin instead.
“Yes, two months ago Nerses told the local assembly he wouldn't sell them any more to keep the peace.”
Oh shit, he's got that scheming glint in his eye. Jo kept her face stone still this time. Damn you for bringing this job to me, Haik! I'm gonna make you get your finder's fee from Azrab yourself and good luck with that.
“But obviously there's still some tension.”
“Azrab, you can't be serious,” Amrouk said, dismayed. “Nerses' peace gesture shut up the public complaints but I'd be surprised if it did a thing for the private resentments. No one can figure out that damn magician's deal. It makes people nervous.”
“Joana, what did you think of Tobias?” Azrab asked.
“I don't know how to estimate a magician's power, sir,” Jo temporized.
“Then I expect you to learn, promptly. Aside from that?”
“Harmless, sir. I mean, there's intelligence there, but he seemed...” Jo closed a fist, rubbing her sword calluses together as she remembered Tobias' reactions during their conversation. “Young. Soft.”
Azrab nodded decisively. “Guard Joana, you will insist on getting paid at least partly in trade with some of those charms. If they absolutely refuse, then it's up to you whether you accept. But if they agree to the trade, then you will take that job.”
***
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