King Samlo returned from overseeing a job. Folk lifted hands in casual salute. When he cared to exercise it, his power was divine and total; but mostly he ruled by consensus.
He was a contrast to his people, large, blocky-boned, hooknosed. His mahogany features carried a fully developed beard and mustache. He limped. His garb was white, more clean than one would have thought possible here. Save for tooled-leather boots, crimson-plumed turban, and necklace of antique coins, it had little decoration.
His pale gaze fell on Ivar and remained as he lowered himself into an ornate armchair outside his wagon. “Heyah, stranger,” he said. “What’s your lay?”
Ivar bowed, not knowing what else to do. Mikkal took the word: “He tags himself Rolf Mariner, claims he’s a hunter and jack-o’-hands as well as a varsiteer, and wants to come along.”
The king didn’t smile. His gravity marked him off yet more than did his appearance. Nonetheless, Ivar felt unafraid. Whether dreamy runaways, failed adults, or fugitives from justice, occasionally nords asked to join a Train. If they made a plausible case for themselves, or if a whim blew in their favor, they were accepted. They remained aliens, and probably none had lasted as much as a year before being dismissed. The usual reason given was that they lacked the ability to pull their freight in a hard and tricky life.
Surely that was true. Ivar expected that a journey with these people would stretch him to his limits. He did not expect he would snap. Who could await that, in this blithe tumult?
There passed through him: In spite of everything they suffered, I’ve heard, I’ve read a little, about how those guests always hated to leave, always afterward mourned for lost high days—how those who’d lasted longest would try to get into different troop, or kill themselves— But let him not fret when all his blood sang.
“Um-m-m-hm,” Samlo said. “Why do you ask this?”
“I’ve tired of these parts, and have no readier way to leave them,” Ivar replied.