The Unicorn Trade Read online

  The Unicorn Trade

  Poul Anderson and Karen Anderson

  To

  John and Bjo Trimble

  THE UNICORN TRADE

  They graze at night, the unicorns, upon the fresh-dewed grasses,

  Molten starlight flying as they toss their sapphire horns,

  They step with light and dainty hoof below the stony passes,

  Shimmer under shadow where the nightingale mourns.

  The bright manes ripple over dapple flanks,

  Quarter-moon racing past cloudy banks—

  Now on the warning wind of dawn they flee night’s crimson death;

  They sleep in velvet forest shade; they spice it with their breath.

  The castle queens it on her hill, the crown of pride and power,

  Turreted and traceried and carven like a gem,

  With sunny court and golden hall, with wall and lordly tower

  Rich-tapestried with vine and grape, with rose on thorny stem;

  Rubies, damask, pomanders and swords—

  Wild loves, black hates, delights of wine and words—

  Let pipe and tabor play! and thus, hand resting light on hand,

  With quicker-beating heart we’ll foot the skipping allemande.

  There’s goodly trade in unicorns, in castles and their treasure,

  Dragons are much demanded, endless caverns, eagly crags,

  There’s trade in rings of elven work, in songs of striding measure,

  Star-smiting curses, aye, and quests, and splendid thumping brags.

  Come buy, come choose your heart’s desire of these,

  Fable and dream, wondrous commodities.

  Already yours, these unicorns, as aught you owned yestre’en,

  This castle, real as memory, that none but you have seen.

  —KAREN ANDERSON

  FAIRY GOLD

  Women, weather, and wizardry are alike in this, that their beneficences are apt to be as astonishing as their betrayals.

  —The Aphorisms of Rhoene

  It is an old tale, often told: a young man loved a young woman, and she him, but they quarreled, whereupon he went off in search of desperate adventure while she wept in solitude. However, this time it was not quite so. Arvel stormed down Hammerhead Street toward the Drum and Trumpet, where he intended to get drunk. Lona, after a few angry tears, uttered many curses and then returned to her pottery, where she punished the clay with her fists and pedaled the wheel until it shrieked.

  The hour being scarcely past noon, Arvel found none of his cronies in the tavern, only a half-dozen sailors. Trade had grown listless throughout Caronne, after much of the kingdom’s treasure bled away abroad during the Dynasts’ War. Ships that came to Seilles often lay docked for weeks before their masters had sold all cargo. The markets at Croy were a little better, but the Tauran League now held a monopoly of them.

  These men were off a vessel that had arrived on the morning’s tide. They sat together, drinking like walruses rescued from a desert, rumbling mirth and brags, pawing at the wench whenever she came to refill a goblet. Arvel recognized the language of Norren, though he did not speak it. A couple of them were not of that land, but dark-hued, while the manes and beards of the rest were sun-bleached nearly white and their skins turned to red leather. Evidently they had been in the tropics.

  Worldfarers! His longing took Arvel by the throat. He flung himself down at a table in a corner, hard enough to bruise his bottom. A sunbeam struck through a window leaded together out of stained glass scraps, to shatter in rainbows on the scarred wood. Smoke and kitchen smells lapped around him.

  The wench came through the gloom, her clogs loud on the floor. “Joy to you,” she greeted. Surprise caught her. “Why, Arvel, what a thundercloud in your face. Did a ghost dog bite you today?”

  “A pack of them, and the Huntsman himself to egg them on,” he snarled. “Wine—the cheapest, because I’ll want a plenty.”

  She fetched, took his coin, and settled on the bench opposite. Pity dwelt in her voice and countenance. “It’s about your girl, isn’t it?” she asked low.

  He gave her a startled blue glance. “How can you tell?”

  “Why, everyone knows you’re mad with your wish to go oversea, and never a hope. But that’s had you adrift by day, not at drink before evening. Something new must have gone awry to bring you in here so early, and what could it be save what touches your betrothal?”

  Arvel swallowed a draught. Sourness burned its way down his gullet. “You’re shrewd, Ynis,” he mumbled. “Yes, we’re done with each other, Lona Grancy and I.”

  The wench looked long at him. “I never thought her a fool,” she said.

  Despite his misery, Arvel preened a trifle. He was, after all, quite young, and various women had assured him he was handsome—tall, wide-shouldered, lithe, with straight features, slightly freckle-dusted, framed by fiery hair that curled past his earrings. As a scion of a noble family, albeit of the lowest rank, he was entitled to bear a sword and generally did, along with his knife; both were of the finest steel and their handles silver-chased. Otherwise, though, he perforce went shabby these days. The saffron of his shirt was faded and its lace frayed, his hose were darned, the leather of jerkin and shoes showed wear, the cloak he had folded beside him was of a cut no longer modish.

  “Well,” he said, after a more reasonable gulp of wine than his first, “she wanted to make a potter of me. A potter! Told me I must scuttle my dream, settle down, learn a—” he snorted—“an honest trade—”

  “And cease being a parasite,” Ynis finished sharply.

  Arvel jerked where he sat, flushed, and rapped in answer: “I’ve never taken more than is my right.”

  “Aye, your allowance. Which is meager, for the bastard son of a house that the war ruined. What use your courtliness any more, Arvel Tarabine, or your horsemanship, swordsmanship, woodsmanship?”

  “I guide—”

  “Indeed. You garner an argent here and there, taking out parties of fat merchants and rich foreigners who like to pretend they’re born to the chase. If they stand you drink afterward, you’ll brag of what you did in the war, and sing ’em a song or two. And always you babble about Sir Falcovan and that expedition he’s getting up. Is this how you’ll spend the rest of your years, till you’re too old and sodden for it and slump into beggary? No, your Lona is not a fool. You are, who wouldn’t listen to her.”

  He stiffened. “You get above yourself.”

  Ynis eased and smiled. “I get motherly, I do.” She was plump, not uncomely but beginning to fade, a widow who had three children to nurture and, maybe, a dream or two of her own. “You’re a good fellow, mauger your folly, and besides, I like your girl. Go back, make amends—”

  “Hej, pige!” bawled a Norrener from across the taproom, so loudly that a mouse fled along a rafter. “Mer vin!”

  Ynis sighed, rose, and went to serve him. She had been about to quench the rage that her words had refuelled in Arvel. Now it flamed up afresh. He could not endure to sit still. He tossed off his drink, surged from the bench, and went out the door, banging it shut behind him.

  To Lona came Jans Orliand, chronicler at the Scholarium of Seilles and friend of her late father. This was not as strange as it might seem, for Jans was of humble birth himself and had married a cousin of the potter. Afterward he prospered modestly through his talents, without turning aloof from old acquaintances, until the hard times struck him too.

  Lona had just put a fresh charge of charcoal under her kiln and pumped it akindle with the bellows. She was returning to her wheel when his gaunt form shadowed the entrance. She kept the shed open while she worked, even in winter, lest heat and fumes overcome her; and this was an amiable summer day. Nevertheless she
had a healthy smell about her, of the sweat that dampened her smock. A smudge went across her snub nose. A kerchief covered most of her gold-brown hair.

  “Joy to you,” Jans hailed. He paused, to squint nearsightedly at her small, sturdy frame and into her green-brown eyes, until he said: “Methinks you’ve need of the reality, not the mere ritual.”

  “Is it that plain to see?” she wondered. “Well—whoops!” In an expansive gesture, he had almost thrown a sleeve of his robe around one of the completed vessels that lined her shelves. She stopped him before he sent it acrash to the floor. “Here, sit down, do.” She offered him a stool. “How may I please you, good sir?”

  “Oh, let us not be formal,” he urged, while he folded his height downward. She perched on the workbench and swung her feet in unladylike wise; but then, she was an artisan, in what was considered a man’s occupation. “I require cups, dishes, pots of attractive style; and you, no doubt, will be glad of the sale.”

  Lona nodded, with less eagerness than she would ordinarily have felt. Feeling his gaze searching her yet, she forced herself to tease: “What, have you broken that much? And why have you not sent your maidservant or your son?”

  “I felt I had better choose the articles myself,” Jans explained. “See you, I have decided on renting out the new house, but its bareness has seemed to repel what few prospective tenants have appeared.”

  “The new house?”

  “Have you forgotten? Ah, well, it was years ago. My wife and I bought it, thinking we would move thither as soon as we could sell the old one. But the war came, and her death, and these lean days. I can no longer afford the staff so large a place would demand, only my single housekeeper. The taxes on it are a vampire drain, and no one who wants it can afford to buy it. I’ve posted my offer on every market board and had it cried aloud through every street—without result. So at last my hopes are reduced to becoming a landlord.”

  “Oh, yes, I do recall. Let’s pick you out something pretty, then.”

  Still Lona could not muster any sparkle. Jans stroked his bald pate. “What hurts you, my dear?” he asked in a most gentle tone.

  She snapped after air. “You … may as well hear … now. Soon it will be common knowledge. Arvel and I … have parted.”

  “What? But this is terrible. How? Why?”

  “He—he will not be sensible. He cannot confess … to himself … that Sir Falcovan Roncitar’s fleet is going to sail beyond the sunset without him—” Lona fought her wish to weep, or to smash something. She stared at her fingers, where they wrestled in her lap. “When that happens … I dread what may become of him. We could, could survive together … in this trade … and today I told him we must … b-because the father of my children shall not be a drunken idler—And he—O-o-oh!” She turned her wail into an oath and ended bleakly: “I wish him luck. He’ll need it.”

  In his awkward fashion, Jans went to her and patted her shoulder. “Poor lass, you’ve never fared on a smooth road, have you?” he murmured. “A child when you lost your mother; and your father perforce made you his helper; and when he too wended hence, there was no better inheritance for you than this.”

  Lona lifted her head. “It’s not a bad little shop. It keeps me alive. It could keep a family.”

  Jans winced. She saw, and welcomed the chance to escape from herself. “What pains you?” she demanded. “It’s your turn for telling.”

  He stood aside from her. His back sagged, while a sad little smile tugged his lips upward. “Oh, an irony,” he replied. “The single form of humor the gods know, I believe.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Quite simple, ’tis. Hark.” He confronted her. “When for a time it appeared that Arvel might indeed sail off to the New Lands, and you with him as his bride, were you not also ablaze? Be. honest; we speak in confidence.”

  “Well—” She swallowed. “Not in his way. I would have been sorry to forsake this my home for a wilderness. Nonetheless, I was ready to go for his sake, even if I must sell out at a great loss. And in truth, I would have welcomed such a chance to better ourselves and bequeath a good life to our children.” She spread her empty hands. “Of course, I knew from the first it was likeliest a will-o’-the-wisp. He would have had to borrow the sum required, and where, without security? His father’s estate entailed. Nobody who might desire this shop and cottage is able to pay a reasonable price, wherefore they are just as unmortgageable. After he tried, and failed, I besought him to settle down here and at least earn a steady living; but there it was I who failed.”

  Jans raised a finger to hush her. “No matter that,” he said. “My first point has been made. Id est, imprimis, you would have left these premises if you could.

  “Secundus, the dowries for my daughters exhausted my savings, and nature has not outfitted my son for my own sort of career. You know Denn Orliand for a good lad, and good with his hands, who at present toils as a day laborer, for miserable wages, whenever he can find work. I could buy him a shop of some kind, as it might be this very one, were my small capital not trapped by that incubus of a second house.”

  “We’re all trapped,” Lona whispered.

  “Tertius,” the dry voice marched on, “I looked forward to your wedding, for I am fond of you and Arvel is by no means a bad fellow. I had a book for a gift, a geography which migrants to the New Lands should find helpful or at least amusing, as the case may be, and which is in any event a sumptuous volume—”

  “Jans.” She took his nearer hand in both of hers.

  “Quartus,” he ended, “you might have had occasion to send me a wedding gift from oversea in your turn.”

  “What?” she exclaimed.

  He glanced away and cleared his throat. “Um-m … a lady in reduced circumstances, forced to work in a tavern—but a fine person. As a matter of fact, I met her when Arvel once took me to the, m-m, Drum and Trumpet.”

  “Ynis!” Lona trilled. “Why, I’ve met her myself a time or two, but I never suspected—”

  “Well, but of course I cannot think of assuming any fresh obligation before I have provided for the last child that my Iraine gave me, namely, Denn. The, m-hm, the lady in question agrees.”

  “Does Denn?” Scorn tinged her voice.

  “Oh, he has no idea of all this,” Jans answered hastily. “Pray do keep silence about it. And bear in mind, too, that … Ynis … would be most unwise to give up her present position, distasteful though it often is to her, and marry an aging widower, unless her stepson is able to provide for her and her children if necessary. Denn is loyal, he would do so, but he must have a foundation for his own life before he can, must he not? We are being sensible, even as you are.”

  Lona swallowed again. “Yes.” She jumped down from the bench. “Come,” she said, around an uncertain smile, “let’s choose your things.”

  Natan Sandana the jeweler was visiting Vardrai of Syr the courtesan. The occasion was not the usual one. The small gray man had always contented himself with his wife, rather than spend money on the favors of other women, especially when they were as expensive as Vardrai’s. His desire was for a different sort of joining.

  “I tell you, we cannot lose,” he urged, while he paced excitedly back and forth. The rug drank down every footfall. “My guild maintains a farflung web of communication—which stays healthy, sick though business has otherwise become. I had word of that Norrener ship soon after she had sailed from Owaio. Scarcely was she moored at the Longline this morning but I was aboard, to speak with her captain and look into his strongbox. The news was true. Besides his cargo of spices and rare woods, he has, for himself, such a store of pearls as I never saw aforetime. White, rosy, black, all huge, all perfect, oh, I have today let Beauty’s embodied being trickle through these fingers!”

  “How did he get them?” asked Vardrai from the couch whereon she had curled her magnificent body. She continued to stroke a comb through the mahogany sheen of her tresses.

  Natan shrugged. “He did not s
ay. But it’s known that while they were down among yon islands, the Norreners lent their aid—ship, cannon, pikes—in a war between two kinglets, for hire. I conjecture that the good Haako picked up some booty about which he did not inform his royal employer.”

  “And he’d fain sell the lot?”

  “What else? He can get a substantial price at home. However, he understands it will be but a fraction of the true value. If we, here, outbid it, we shall still have a fantastic bargain.”

  Vardrai set the comb down and touched the necklace that her throat graced. “Pearls are fine to wear,” she observed, “but who can eat them? If you can scarcely move what stock you have in your shop, Master Sandana, how can you realize a profit on such a hoard?”

  “Some can be sold quickly,” he maintained. “Not everyone suffers in this abominable climate of trade. Zulio Pandric, for example, waxes fat, and nowadays is my best customer.”

  She grimaced the least bit. “And mine, or one of them,” she murmured, half to herself. “I wish I could charge some less than others. A lusty young man would make up for a bloated old moneylender. But he and his kind seem to have all the gold, and I dare not risk word leaking out that Vardrai of Syr can be had cheaply.”

  “For the most part, the pearls will have to be held for several years, perhaps as much as a decade, until conditions improve,” Natan admitted. “But conditions will. They must. If nothing else, once Sir Falcovan Roncitar has established his colony overseas, the wealth of the New Lands will begin flowing back to Caronne, and we know with certainty how lavish the gods were when they fashioned that part of the world. Gems will not only command their present rightful price, they will have appreciated enormously. Think, my lady. How would you like a profit of two or three hundred per centum?”

  The woman sighed. Her glance strayed to an open window which, from this upper floor, overlooked King’s Newmarket. The breeze that blew in was soft and quiet, for little of the olden bustle stirred on the square; dwindled were the very odors of foodstalls and horse droppings. Cultivated musicality slipped from her voice as she said, in the provincial accent of her childhood, “The trick is to stay alive till then. How much do you need?”