who might know a name.’
‘And how little a girl?’ asked Varra, even more guarded. He set down the lute,
ostensibly to take the cup in his left hand. ‘Sixteen, would she be?’
‘Four,’ said Samlor.
Cappen Varra spat out the wine as he stood. ‘It shouldn’t offend me, good sir,’
said the minstrel as he up-ended the lute, ‘there’s folk enough in this city who
traffic in such goods. But I do not, and I’ll leave your “copper” here in the
gutter with your suggestion!’
‘Friend,’ said Samlor. His hand shot out and caught the falling coin in the air
before the sun winked on the metal. ‘Not you, but the name of a name. For the
child’s sake. Please.’
Cappen Varra took a deep breath and seated himself again. ‘Your pardon,’ he said
simply. ‘One lives in Sanctuary, and one assumes that everyone takes one for a
thief and worse … because everyone else is a thief and worse, I sometimes
fear. So. You want the name of someone who might buy and sell young children?
Not a short list in this city, sir.’
‘That’s not quite what I want,’ the Cirdonian explained. ‘There is – reason to
think that she was taken by the Beysib.’
The minstrel blinked. ‘Then I really can’t help you, much as I’d like to, good
sir. My songs give me no entree to those folk.’
Samlor nodded. ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘But it might be that you knew who in the local
community – fenced goods for Beysib thieves. Somebody must, they can’t deal
among themselves, a closed group like theirs.’
‘Oh,’ said Cappen Varra. ‘Oh,’ and his right hand drummed a nervous riff on the