“She did that quickly,” Thom said softly around his pipe. “She could have set fire to the stable striking flint and steel in the dark like that.”
The woman came out with the end of a loaf of bread, which she gnawed as if it were hard and her hunger did not care.
“Is there any of that cheese left?” Mat whispered. Thom shook his head.
The woman began sniffing at the air, and Mat realized she probably smelled Thom's tabac smoke. He was about to stand and announce their presence when one of the stable doors opened again.
The woman crouched, ready to run, as four men walked in out of the rain, doffing their wet cloaks to reveal pale coats with wide sleeves and embroidery across the chest, and baggy breeches embroidered down the legs. Their clothes might be fancy, but they were all big men, and their faces were grim.
“So, Aludra,” a man in a yellow coat said, “you did not run so fast as you thought to, eh?” He had a strange accent, to Mat's ear.
“Tammuz,” the woman said as if it were a curse. “It is not enough that you cause me to be cast out of the Guild with your blundering, you great oxbrain you, but now you chase after me as well.” She had the same odd way of speaking as the man. “Do you think that I am glad to see you?”
The one called Tammuz laughed. “You are a very large fool, Aludra, which I always knew. Had you merely gone away, you could have lived a long life in some quiet place. But you could not forget the secrets in your head, eh? Did you believe we would not hear that you try to earn your way making what it is the right of the Guild alone to make?” Suddenly there was a knife in his hand. “It will be a great pleasure to cut your throat, Aludra.”Mat was not even aware that he had stood up until one of the doubled ropes dangling from the ceiling was in his hands and he had launched himself out of the loft. Burn me for a bloody fool!
He only had time for that one frantic thought, and then he was plowing through the cloaked men, sending them toppling like pins in a game of bowls. The ropes slipped through his hands, and he fell, tumbling across the strawcovered floor himself, coins spilling from his pockets, to end up against a stall. When he scrambled to his feet, the four men were already rising, too. And they all had knives in their hands, now. Lightblind fool! Burn me! Burn me!
“Mat!”
He looked up, and Thom tossed his quarterstaff down to him. He snagged it out of the air just in time to knock the blade out of Tammuz's fist and thump him a sharp crack on the side of the head. The man crumpled, but the other three were right behind, and for a hectic moment Mat had all he could do with a whirling staff to keep knife blades away from him, rapping knees and ankles and ribs until he could land a good blow on a head. When the last man fell, he stared at them a moment, then raised his glare to the woman. “Did you have to choose this stable to be murdered in?”
She slipped a slimbladed dagger back into a sheath at her belt. “I would have helped you, but I feared that you might mistake me for one of these great buffoons if I came near with steel in my hand. And I chose this stable because the rain is wet and so am I, and no one was watching this place.”
She was older than he had thought, at least ten or fifteen years older than he, but pretty still, with large, dark eyes and a small, full mouth that seemed on the point of a pout. Or getting ready for a kiss. He gave a small laugh and leaned on his staff. “Well, what is done is done. I suppose you were not trying to bring us trouble.”
Thom was climbing down from the loft, awkwardly because of his leg, and Aludra looked from him to Mat. The gleeman had put his cloak back on; he seldom let anyone see him without it, especially for the first time. “This is like a story,” she said. “I am rescued by a gleeman and a young hero” — she frowned at the men sprawled on the stable floor — “from these whose mothers were pigs!”
“Why did they want to kill you?” Mat asked. “He said something about secrets.”
“The secrets,” Thom said in very nearly his performing voice, “of making fireworks, unless I miss my guess. You are an Illuminator, are you not?” He made a courtly bow with an elaborate swirl of his cloak. “I am Thom Merrilin, a gleeman, as you have seen.” Almost as an afterthought, he added, “And this is Mat, a young man with a knack for finding trouble.”
“I was an Illuminator,” Aludra said stiffly, “but this great pig Tammuz, he ruined a performance for the King of Cairhien, and nearly he destroyed the chapter house, too. But me, I was Mistress of the Chapter House, so it was me that the Guild held responsible.” Her voice became defensive. “I do not tell the secrets of the Guild, no matter what that Tammuz says, but I will not let myself starve while I can make fireworks. I am no more in the Guild, so the laws of the Guild, they do not apply to me now.”
“Galldrian,” Thom said, sounding almost as wooden as she had. “Well, he is a dead king now, and he'll see no more fireworks.”
“The Guild,” she said, sounding tired, “they all but blame me for this war in Cairhien, as if that one night of disaster, it made Galldrian die.” Thom grimaced. “It seems I can no longer remain here,” she went on. “Tammuz and these other oxen, they will wake soon. Perhaps this time they will tell the soldiers that I stole what I have made.” She eyed Thom and then Mat, frowning in thought, and seemed to reach a decision. “I must reward you, but I have no money. However, I have something that is perhaps as good as gold. Maybe better. We shall see what you think.”
Mat exchanged glances with Thom as she went to root under the canvas covering her cart. I'll help anyone who can pay. He thought a speculative light had appeared in Thom's blue eyes.
Aludra separated one bundle from a number like it, a short roll of heavy, oiled cloth almost as fat as her arms would go around. Setting it down on the straw, she undid the binding cords and unrolled the cloth across the floor. Four rows of pockets ran along the length of it, the pockets in each row larger than those in the one before. Each pocket held a waxcoated cylinder of paper just large enough for its end, trailing a dark cord, to stick out.
“Fireworks,” Thom said. “I knew it. Aludra, you must not do this. You can sell those for enough to live ten days or more at a good inn, and eat well every day. Well, anywhere but here in Aringill.”
Kneeling beside the long strip of oiled cloth, she sniffed at him. “Be quiet, you old one you.” She made it sound not unkindly. “I am not allowed to show gratitude? You think I would give you this if I had no more for selling?