The Dragon's Hide (The Shadow's Dragon Book 1) by Dustin Porta & D.K. Holmberg

Author:Dustin Porta & D.K. Holmberg [Porta, Dustin & Holmberg, D.K.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ASH Publishing
Published: 2023-04-24T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

THE BARDS

Thin smoke filled the tavern as Treylen descended—washed, perfumed, and dressed in the guise of Cren’pin—to find a crowded common room, and Marziel much too busy greeting customers and pouring drinks to tend the fire or trim the wicks of the lanterns. He’d dressed quickly, but it had taken some help from Rime to find an old cage in the attic, where he secured the pigeon before coming down.

The screech of a lyre set Treylen’s nerves on edge as he scanned the unfamiliar crowd. No sign of Aaron or Volanti. There was a mix of locals between the bar and the tables. Three tables held what looked like off-duty legionnaires. A third table looked like they might be officers. There were two more tables of elkbones who seemed deliberately uninterested in the soldiers. Treylen was a bit disappointed that the group he’d become accustomed to seemed to have moved on. But for once, Treylen’s arrival went unnoticed. A new warbard sat atop one of the mercenary tables, drawing most of the attention in the room.

She had one antler. The other had been broken off at the scalp, and her head was dressed with a bandage. She was bare from the waist up. A shawl of lace strung with silver coins hung over muscled shoulders. Her eyes were fixed upon a second bard, who was seated on a barrel between the two tables. Her companion belted out a rhythm of boastful syllables in the elkbone language and thumped on his naked chest as he acted out the motions of some great battle.

Treylen had been on the staircase, staring for a full minute, before a crash from the kitchen door pulled him out of it. The innkeeper and his friend, the elder bard, leaned at the end of the bar, glaring. Aaron—dressed in a new set of rags and a false beard—was bending over a mess of spilled soup and shattered crockery. He’d been looking at the bard when he’d walked straight into the counter with a tray in hand. Treylen shook off his stupor, coughed in the smoky air, and pushed past a couple of farmer-types and a flour-caked woman he took to be the town’s miller, to join them at the far end of the bar, nearest the door.

“Pardon the commotion. It seems the soldiers have come to roost.” Marziel moved frantically, taking mugs from a dirty pile, dunking them in a tub of gray water, then shoving them under the tap as fast as the beer would flow.

“No problem, Marcus. New help?”

“Aye, always hiring around here. Sop that up!” He grabbed a pile of rags and pitched them at Aaron’s head. Treylen was relieved to see that Marziel hadn’t made him take on any strange or complicated disguise on his first day. Aaron had always been a quick learner, but he was far too honest to be good at that sort of thing.

“Have you seen my uncle? I’m meeting him for dinner?” Treylen blinked to hide the

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