The Liar's Key (The Red Queen's War 2)

Another benefit of a return to sun and civilization was that the summer once more restored the gold to my hair, bleaching out the drab brown. Additionally the reappearance of people helped me remember at last that there were women other than Kara in the world. I purchased new clothes in the town of Amele and spruced myself up. I considered a horse but unless I bought at least four steeds then having a saddle under my arse wouldn’t get me home any quicker. I did consider just riding on ahead by myself, but even in Rhone travelling alone can be a risky business, and even if our enemies were focused on finding the key I didn’t like the idea of having to explain to them on some country lane isolated in the middle of a thousand acres of Rhonish cornfields that I didn’t have it. I toyed with the idea of getting a nag for Snorri, Tuttugu, and Kara, with Hennan up behind me, but Mother’s locket had started to look threadbare and I wasn’t sure I could stand all the moaning and falling off the Norse were likely to do.

I visited a barber and had my beard shaved off—a ritual shedding of the north if you like. The fellow with the razor and snips declared it an unholy tangle and charged me an extra crown for the job. With it gone I felt strangely naked, my chin tender, and when he showed me the result in his mirror it took me a moment to accept that the man looking back out was me. He looked a lot younger, and vaguely surprised.

Walking through Amele in my new outfit—nothing fancy, just outdoors clothes that a country squire might wear—and my chin still stinging at the slightest breeze, I will admit to turning a few heads. I smiled at a buxom peasant girl off about whatever business it is that occupies peasants, and she smiled back. The world was good. And getting better by the mile.

•   •   •

“Bonjour,” Hennan greeted me when I returned to the tavern where I left the others—the King’s Leg, sporting a wooden stump above the door.

“Bon-what?”

“Snorri’s been teaching me the language the locals speak.” He looked up at Snorri to see if he’d got it right. “It means good day.”

“The locals all speak the Empire tongue well enough.” I sat down beside Tuttugu and stole a chicken wing from his plate. “Sometimes you have to wave a coin at them before they’ll admit it. Don’t waste your time, boy. Awful language.” I stopped talking in order to chew. Whatever Rhone’s failings—and they are many—I’ll call any man a liar who says they can’t cook. The lowliest Rhoneman can make a better meal than all the north put together. “Mmmm. That’s worth the trip south on its own, hey, Tuttugu?” Tuttugu nodded, mouth stuffed, beard full of grease. “Where was I now? Yes, Rhonish. Don’t bother. You know what the literal translation of the Rhonish word for defence is? The-gap-before-running-away. It’s a hard language to lie in, I’ll give you that.”

Snorri made a warning face and Tuttugu became still more interested in the rest of his chicken. I noticed a few locals aiming hard stares in my direction.

“A wonderful brave people though,” I added, loudly enough for the eavesdroppers to choke on.

“You look different,” Snorri said.

“I think ‘even more handsome’ was the phrase you were looking for.” I filched another piece of Tuttugu’s chicken. He tried to stab my hand as I pulled it back.

“More like a girl.” Snorri picked up his flagon and drained it.

“Well, I’ll have to strain the bits out of my beer by hand now the moustache is gone . . . but otherwise it’s all good. You should try it.”

Tuttugu snorted at that. “My beard’s the only thing that keeps my chin from burning in this furnace you call home.” He sucked the meat off a leg bone. “I think the reason your chickens taste so good is that they’re all half-cooked before you slaughter them.”

Snorri rubbed his own beard but said nothing. He had trimmed it close, against the northern style: compared to most Vikings he merely looked as though he’d forgotten to shave that morning.

Kara watched me closely as if making a study. “You’re changing your skin, Jalan, casting off the north. By the time we reach the gates of your city you’ll be a southern prince once more. What will you keep from your journey, I wonder?”

And it was my turn to keep silent. Most of it I would gladly lose, though I’d learned a lesson about that. Throw away too much of your past and you abandon the person who walked those days. When you pare away at yourself you can reinvent, that’s true enough, but such whittling always seems to reveal a lesser man, and promises to leave you with nothing at the end.