Page 8 of Dishonor Among Thieves
ChapterThree
“Come, girl.” I turned around and nodded at the Coldblood Trotter following a short distance behind me.
It had been just over twenty-four hours since Lord Neoruzzi Oderisi told me to find him in a week if I still wanted a job. I’d spent the day wisely, which was how I ended up leading a small white mare, her mane and tail dark as the cones of an ironbark pine, into the small village in the shire of Omrora just a few hours after sunrise. I didn’t expect to see signs pointing me to the estate of Lord Oderisi; neither did I expect the name to be so provocative when I did inquire. I stopped first at a place I suspected a man such as him would be well-known: the farrier.
“Good day, miss.” The woman in the farrier’s shop peered at the condition of my mare with an obvious look of distaste. “This horse looks like she’s had a spot of trouble. How can I help?”
The front of the shop was little more than a workbench with a chair, but behind the entrance was a pristinely kept stable bustling with activity. Apprentices worked furiously in stalls, while a supervising farrier wandered between the humans and animals giving corrections and praise, critique and insults.
“Watch it…watch it!” A man with his hair tied back in a thin, straggly ponytail tapped the blunt end of a whip against the straw-covered ground as he leaned over the work of a sweating young boy.
I could hardly stem my curiosity at the activity behind that wall but had a goal in being here that would not be quickly accomplished by distraction.
“Trouble,” I repeated, bringing my attention back to the farrier. “Yes, you see, I’ve only just rescued her,” I explained. “She was in the employ of a man who didn’t have the patience the breed requires.”
The woman came around, her expression softening. “By the gods.” She stood a respectful distance away from the horse, but her eyes trailed over the many old, well-healed scars on the horse’s body, as well as a few newer injuries on her face. “Trotters are the gentlest of creatures—when handled right. Who in the Realm would lose patience with an angel like this?”
I nodded and took a step closer to the woman. She looked visibly relieved when the mare stepped with me, keeping a close distance between our bodies. “I was able to take her off his hands,” I said, shaking my head, “but I’ve just arrived in this shire. I’m on my way to a new job and wonder if you might look her over and put the charges on my employer’s account?”
The woman pinched her lips between two fingers and looked at me sideways. “Your employer?” she questioned. “And who might that be?”
I gave her the pretty man’s name but did not get the reaction I’d expected.
“Oh no.” She shook her head. “We don’t maintain an account for Lord Oderisi. I wouldn’t be able to do that for you.” She looked me over, as if trying to decide whether I was trouble or if I was unaware of the trouble I was in. “What kind of work were you hired to do?”
I shrugged. “To be honest, I’m not entirely clear. Household staff of some sort. I believe he has a butler and a crofter, but needs a household supervisor.”
Even as I said it, the story sounded off. The woman stepped a bit closer and lowered her voice.
“You have family, girl? Someone to look out for you?”
I didn’t hesitate to reassure the woman, even though my words were completely untrue. “I do,” I lied. “I met Lord Oderisi while he was traveling. My people know exactly where I am.”
She nodded but didn’t move her fingers from her lips. “You rescued this mare, you say?”
“Just yesterday,” I confirmed. At least that much of my story was true. I’d decided to start the journey to Omrora on foot but encountered a drunk merchant beating the trotter with a wooden club. The man was a savage. Had two other horses tied to a cart that looked completely broken and beaten down, but this girl was separate, unattached to the cart and the only immediate victim of the man’s temper. “Ran across a merchant whose daughter had died. This was her horse,” I said, stroking her mane with gentle fingers. “I’d like to believe he took his grief out on the horse, not that that’s any excuse.”
The farrier nodded and looked distraught. “Have you anything?” she asked. “Anything you can spend?”
I shook my head. “I spent my last coins getting her away from the merchant.”
That also wasn’t true, but this lie didn’t sadden me. I had in fact spent the last of my coins paying the merchant for a place to stay overnight. In his stable. With the abused horse. The fact that we fled together before sunrise didn’t mean that I had not truly spent the last of my money on the horse. Just not in the way the farrier might believe.
“But I have a job, ma’am,” I assured her. “If you’re able to care for the horse, I’d be happy to take a note to Lord Oderisi. I’ll ask him to pay you out of my earnings. I understand I’ll be given lodging and food, so any extra will come here to pay off my debt.”
The woman looked worried, and not only about the cost of cleaning up my horse. “Do you know anything about the Oderisi family?” she asked. She looked deep into my eyes, the maternal affection there making my heart catch in my chest. No one had looked at me that way in so, so long. I wasn’t sure I could remember a time when I’d seen such unrestrained concern directed at me. I remembered the treacherous innkeepers and wondered if this might too in some way be a scam, an attempt to part me from my money.
“I don’t mean to frighten you,” the farrier rushed on.
I shook my head in answer to her question. “I do not know anything about them,” I admitted. “I’m a young girl far from home in need of work. The gentleman was nothing but kind when he offered.”
The woman considered me a for a moment and then sighed. “Well, I cannot very well let this horse walk around in that state. And you, dear…” She shook her head. “You put your own safety at risk riding her. Come. We’ll find a way.”
A swell of gratitude bloomed in my heart. “You’ll help me? And her?”
The woman nodded, all business now. “Consider it done. We offer credit to many in this shop.” She sighed and shook her head. “We spend half the time giving credit to local men who drink up the money they should be putting toward their debts. I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t offer you aid.” Her smile was warm, and she reached out and clasped my arm with a hand. “You rescued her. I’ll pay that kindness back to you, girl.”
I stared at the woman in a state of near speechlessness. She would extend me credit simply because I had said I’d been kind to the horse? What a far cry from the innkeepers and the care and treatment I’d know thus far.
