2

’Twas the fourth hour of the night, and things were heating up in the Mainbrace Saloon. Bithbal could hear the threat notes under the mind-wrenching roar of conversation. He could smell anger through the fog of oil fumes and yeast. Even the dim flicker of lamplight was enough to show the shiny red faces starting to change color, and some deep primitive sense of battle was crawling over his skin like ants, telling him the time was near for action. He fingered the sap in his belt. All those blond jotunn heads shining in the gloom—how many would he bloody tonight?

Bithbal was twenty-two, tow-haired and big, even for a jotunn. He’d skipped ship here in Noom when he’d discovered what a bouncer could earn. The chance to fight every bleeding night and even get paid for it had been irresistible, sheer jotunn rapture. After six months, he was a veteran. He’d swallowed his pride enough to take up using a blackjack when the odds got impossible otherwise, and he’d had the front of his pants armored. He’d been hurt and healed and been hurt again almost daily, but he’d never bounced less than eight in a single night’s work, even when his arm was broken, and his record was thirtyseven. He loved his work.

Now he thought he might just have time to sell one more round of beer. He headed for the cage and thrust in the money he’d collected for the last lot, watching to make certain it went in his tally pot so he’d get his share of the take. Then he hung a dozen horseshoes of sausage over his elbow, hefted a full tray of steins, and went weaving off into the roar and the dark and the crowd. With hard-earned skill he held the tray high on his sore left hand, whipping off the beer and taking money with his right. There was no wasted conversation in that din, and no one had smiled seriously for some time.

Checking faces as he went, he felt a tightness growing in him, a thrill of pure joy somewhere down around his bladder. Yes, it would be a bone grinder tonight. There was a good sprinkling of imps for tinder, and the jotnar were well up to standard. He’d learned to spot difficult ones, and tonight they were all over the room. He’d never seen so many obvious hard cases. Oddly, it usually wasn’t the real toughs that raised the anchor, but once they got going they soon became the survivors, so they were the ones he had to remove afterward, before they started on the furniture. The furniture was solid bronze, all bolted to the flagstones, but sailors enjoyed a challenge.

He emptied his tray and headed for the door. Krat and Birg were there already, for it was the safest place to watch the early stages, and the most strategic. You worked inward from the door, usually. God of Battle, but there were some big ones around tonight! And yet . . . and yet somehow the tingle in his gut was not throbbing like it used to, couple of months ago, even. Was it possible that a guy could get tired of fighting? Not scared, just bored? Or just need a night off once in a while? Missing the sea, maybe?

Leaning back against the wall, Bithbal folded his arms and thus managed to jostle his broken fingers. He winced. That had been done two nights ago, and the buzzing in his right ear. . . four nights ago, or was it five? It wasn’t showing any signs of quieting down.

There was a whaler in town looking for hands.

He smirked at Birg and Krat on the other side of the doorway, and they winked back to show they were ready and eager. The room was rocking like a lugger in a nor’wester—not long now. He wondered where it would start. The big part-djinn over in the far corner was sure to be irresistible to someone.

Then the doors flapped open, and closed. Three men. Holy Balance!

One of them was bigger than anything else on two feet, a middle-aged jotunn, big as a troll—weird tattoos all over a punchbag face. A jotunn wearing forester garb? In garish colors like a namby elf? God of Blood! Bithbal revised his opinion of where the action was going to start. His scalp prickled, and he wished he was a little farther from that very spot—for the newcomers were just standing there, in a patch of good light. The noise level was falling rapidly as they gained attention.

And the one on the far side, near Birg and Krat . . . another jotunn, with a sailor mustache, and dressed up in the same sort of frippery! What was this—mass suicide? That one had the twitchy-shoulder look they did when they first hit port and were ready to fight anything.

The shouting had almost stopped. Men at the far side of the room were reeling to their feet to get a better view, rubbing their eyes and looking again. Some who had been almost at each other’s throats were exchanging grins of incredulity and anticipation. Any moment now . . . Bithbal began planning his retreat. Tough was good, but being trampled to death could seriously hurt a man.

Then the third newcomer turned to him and smiled.

In six months’ hard service, Bithbal thought he’d seen everything possible in the Mainbrace, but an elf was new. A threeway suicide pact? He wondered if elf blood would dry in the same brown-black color as the rest of the floor.

“Excuse me,” trilled the elf. “There wouldn’t be any tailors’ shops open at this time of night, I suppose?”

So his many-colored finery was dirty and Little Precious wanted something prettier to wear? There was a strong smell of wet horse about him, detectable even over the odors of beer and sweat.

“Not a chance!” Curious . . . elves and their shiny curls usually made Bithbal’s knuckles itch like crazy, but this kid had a winning sort of wry grin.

“It’s just that my friends feel a little conspicuous.”

“Sonny, if you want my advice—”

“Yes, I do. I don’t suppose a tailor would have the big one’s size in stock anyway.” The elf frowned. “Should have thought of that! Well, what I really need is an elf saloon.”

“Elf saloon?” The ringing in Bithbal’s ears must be getting worse. ”You didn’t say `elf saloon’?”

“Don’t elves—I mean, aren’t there any drinking establishments for elves?”

“Not here,” Bithbal muttered, aware that the whole room was silent as a crypt now. Even to be seen talking to an elf hereabouts was plain stupid. You could hear blood pounding. You could hear fists clenching. “Never see elves near the docks.”

“Near where, then?”

“Dunno. Theaters, maybe?”

“Direct me . . . quickly!” The elf’s eyes twinkled in sea green and sky blue. Lamplight flashed where the metallic gold of his hair peeked out from under his cutesy cap.

“Dunno,” Bithbal repeated dumbly. He was streaming sweat. The Mainbrace was going to explode into full riot from a standing start. He could smell it coming. This poor elf kid would be stamped flat for starters, and Bithbal for associating with him. He wondered why he didn’t just turn the brat around and boot him straight out the door. Krat and Birg would handle the two jotnar. But he just said, “Sonny . . . for your own good, please go away. Quickly.”

“First tell me where I might find an elf saloon.”

Bithbal could not even imagine an elf saloon. “Go west to the square, then nor’west and veer starboard at the fork and up the companionway, then bear west again to the temple and tack northerly about three cables’ length, there’s theaters around there. Best I can do, sir.”

Since when had he ever called an elf sir? “Thank you. Come, guys.”

The elf turned on his heel.

His companions started to turn, also, very obediently. Someone whistled at the back of the room.

The two jotnar spun around to see who had whistled at the back of the room.

A chorus of whistles, then . . .

. . .but Bithbal did not really see what happened then. The door closed behind the strangers and the room erupted in deafening booms of mirth. Bithbal stared across at Krat, who was laughing, and Birg, who had turned as pale as pack ice.

So maybe Birg had suffered the same delusion he had. Sensing the customers’ change of mood, the waiters all hurried over to the cage to get more beer, and Bithbal never did ask Krat to tell him exactly what had really happened.

What he thought he’d seen was the two jotnar leap forward to start the rumble. And then . . . then it had seemed as if the weedy elf boy moved even faster and took both of them from behind, by the scruffs of their necks . . .

And stopped them in their tracks? . . . turned them around?

. . .and pushed them out the door ahead of him? God of Madness!

When he eased his bruises into bed around dawn, Bithbal discovered that he was strangely unable to sleep. He soon decided that his buzzing ear must be worse than he’d thought, and might even need a little peace and quiet to heal.

He pulled on his boots, slung his bindle on his shoulder, and departed—by way of the window, as he was slightly behind in the rent. He swaggered along the harborfront till he found the whaler that was hiring. The bosun offered a hand to shake and Bithbal won, so they took him on. He made his mark in the log and sailed with the tide.

Sailor Bithbal lived to a fair age, but he never again dropped anchor in Noom. And he never again had anything to do with elves.