He took it without gripping, resting it on his spread fingers as he observed it thoughtfully. “Fingers,” he said slowly, as though savoring the word. “Now that’s an odd name for a princess.”
“I am no princess, sir,” she responded instantly. “That’s but something I told the priestesses when I came off Weasel, to be sure my warning would be listened to.”
The other girls stared at her as though betrayed, but the Gray Mouser only nodded ruminatively, hefting her hand as though appraising it. “That fits better with what I find here,” he said, “much as your speech says Ilthmar to my ear and not Tovilyis. Observe,” he continued, as if lecturing, “though narrow, this is a strong and efficient working hand, has done much gripping and squeezing, rubbing and slapping, twisting and prodding, tapping and stroking, finger dancing, et cetera.” He turned it over, so her palm lay upward, and rubbed that testingly with his thumb in a circle. “And yet despite the work it’s done, it’s moist and most pleasingly soft. That’s from the oil in the lambswool of the gloves. I doubt not that her uncommon yashmack equally benefits her cheeks, lips, and winsome chin, making them all luxuriously smooth.” He sighed thoughtfully. Then, “May, approach us! Hold out your hand.” The blond girl obeyed wonderingly. He dropped the hand he’d been supporting into it and turned toward Klute, who was grinning wickedly.
“How does my favorite niece?”
The other girls appeared to be hunting furiously for something to say. Fafhrd swung toward the Mouser, Fingers looked tranquil, when all of a sudden Afreyt called briskly from the top of the stairs, “That’s enough games in the cellar and skulking in the forecastle! On deck all of you and earn your dinners!”
Klute and the Mouser led the way, gossiping airily, he making much of her, Mara and Gale followed somewhat glumly. Fafhrd deftly caught up May and Fingers where the Mouser had left them standing bemusedly hand in hand and, holding them comfortably in either arm, brought up the rear.
“My co-captain has somewhat crabbed ways,” he explained to them lightly. “Would question the credentials of the Queen of Heaven, yet be jealous of a chipmunk that won attention. He treasures an insult above all else.”
.5.
Cif’s kitchen was wide and low-ceilinged, ventilated and somewhat cooled by an early evening breeze sweeping through opposite open doors, although the low rays of the setting sun still struck in.
Tall silver-blond Afreyt and lithe green-eyed Cif were still in their long white priestess tunics, though both had unyashmacked. After embracing the Mouser, the latter directed him and Fafhrd as to carrying the two tables and some benches outdoors on the room’s shadeside. The girls were gathered about Afreyt, May and Gale eagerly addressing her in low voices while gazing around from time to time over their shoulders.
When the two men returned from their task, they found the two Moon priestesses standing side by side and changed to gayer scoop-necked tunics of yellow-striped violet and green spotted with brown. The girls, apparently already given their directions, set to carrying tablecloths and trays of condiments and dining utensils outside.
Cif said, “I gather you’ve already been acquainted with our new guest?”
“And told of the signal service she did our nieces and all Rime Isle, for that matter?” Afreyt added.
“We have indeed,” Fafhrd affirmed. “And I assume you’ve already taken measures against the miscreants captaining and crewing Weasel?”
“That we have,” Afreyt affirmed. “The Council was convened in jig time and swiftly persuaded to deal with the matter Rime Isle fashion—they imposed a considerable fine (on other charges than intended kidnapping: that Weasel’s woodwork showed holes suspiciously like those of the boreworm that swiftly infests other craft) and sent the infamous trader packing posthaste.”
“We invited Harbormaster Groniger home to dinner with us,” Cif took up, “but he’s gone by way of the headland to check that that pestilent Weasel has dock-parted as sworn to and is on her way.”
“So what’s all this, most dear Gray Mouser,” Afreyt demanded quietly, “about your badgering the poor child and ignoring she’s a novice of the Goddess and even refusing to grip hands with her?”
Straightening himself and folding his arms across his chest and looking her in the eye, even doing the leaning-back bit, the Mouser retorted loudly, “Poor child, forsooth! She is no princess, as she swift confessed, nor any kidnapped moon novice from Tovilyis, I’ll be sworn. What her game is I do not know, though I could guess at it, but here’s the truth: She’s nothing but a cabin-girl from Ilthmar where the rat is worshipped, the lowest of the low, beneath recognition, a common child ship-whore hired on for the erotic solacing of all aboard, unfit to share your roof, Lady Afreyt, or company with your innocent nieces or with Cif’s except to corrupt them. All signs point to it! Her name alone is proof. As Fafhrd here would instantly confirm, were he not lost in romancing, fondly willing to play knight-and-princess games for a child audience whatever the risk. Which is his chief weakness, you may be sure!”
The others tried to hush or answer him, the girls all listened wide-eyed, slowing in their chores, but he doggedly maintained his tirade to its end, whereupon silver-blond Afreyt, her blue eyes flashing lightning, spoke arrow-swift, “One thing’s confirmed beyond question, mean-minded man, she is a true novice of the Goddess: she knows the cryptic words and secret signs.”
To which Cif swiftly added, “She knows the color. She wears the garment and the yashmack.”
“And gloves?” the Mouser inquired blandly. “I never knew you and Afreyt wear gloves of any hue in summertime. Even in winter it is mittens only. The girls the same, goes without saying.”
Cif shot back, “We at Rime Isle are but one twig of the sisterhood. Doubtless they have different local customs in Tovilyis.”
The Mouser smiled. “Dear lady, you are far too innocent, and limited in your knowledge by your island life. There’s more evil in gloves than you ever dreamed, more uses for a yashmack than a badge of purity or advertisement of a man’s possession, or for a mask. Amongst the more knowing Ilthmar cabin-girls (and this one is no novice I’ll he bound!) it is the practice to wear such things to keep their hands soft, also their lips and faces, while as for their privities, you may be sure they enjoy the close covering of oily wool, being tweaked shamelessly hairless besides. For, hark you, on Ilthmar ships the cabin-girl delights the crewmen by her hands alone, the short knowing dance of her most pliant fingers; there’d be too much risk of damage to her otherwise, and fresh cabin-girls do not grow on sea trees, as they say. That, by the by, is why her name is proof. The mates and lesser officers have the freedom of her face and teats, all above waist, while what’s below is reserved for his eminence the captain alone, besides all else he wants. But he, the wisest aboard, can be trusted to see she doesn’t conceive. The arrangement is swift, efficient, and practical—helps maintain discipline and status both.”
By this time the girls were all gathered close around, four of them goggle-eyed, Fingers respectfully attentive.
“But is this true he says?” Afreyt asked Fafhrd with some indignation. “Are there such cabin-girls and naughty practices?”
“I’d like to lie to spite him for his boorishness,” the Northerner averred, “but I must agree there are such practices and cabin-girls, and not alone on Ilthmar ships. Mostly their parents sell them to the trade. Some grow up to become hardy sailors themselves, or wed a passenger, though that is rare.”
“All men are beasts,” Cif said darkly. “New proofs keep coming in.”
“And women beastesses,” the Mouser added sotto voce, “Or animalesses?”
Afreyt shook her head, then looked at Fingers, who did, alas, appear to have been hearing all these enormities with remarkable coolness.
“What say you to all this, child?” she asked, straight out.
“All Captain Mouser said is mostly true,” Fingers replied simply, making a little grimace suiting her piquant mien, “about cabin-girls and such, I mean, although I only know what I learned serving aboard Weasel. Unwillingly. But on the first legs of our voyage there was a two-years-older cabin-girl, jumped ship at Ool Plerns, who taught me much. And my parent did not hire or sell me into the trade. I was stolen from her—that much is true of ‘kidnapped.’ But I did not tell you about these matters, Lady Afreyt and Lady Cif, when I escaped and brought you my warning, singling out you two because you wore the color and the yashmack, because I did not think that they were vital.”
The Mouser butted in complacently with, “So much for the story of Weasel being a slaver. Her tale is fishy.”
“She never told us Weasel was a slaver!” Afreyt snapped.