"The Snakes of Slaamsheel," she called to the players, and a roar of delight went up, for this was an old ballad, and the flame-like Flaith dancing with skirt to mid-thighs across the tabletops, set the blood bubbling in a man's veins.
The McCanahan caught the fire of her throaty singing just as Ars Maasen whipped the cloak off his shoulders and flung it about his chest.
"A full belly, is it?" the dark little man asked. "Wine or Puban ale or maybe both?"
"I'm sober as the snakes Flaith sings of, and as mean!"
Ars Maasen caught the madness in his voice, and grunted, "Come quickly, then. This way, across the sill and through the alley to her doorway!"
When they were moving into the shadows of the alley, Kael told him of his father's death, and of the orders of the High Mor that made him lower than a Tuuran-peddler. And as the words came through his teeth, the raw fury that twisted him showed in his eyes. "They blasted him without a chance for a fight—the way they tried to blast me! Now they're hunting me for a reason only the Shee fairies could know!"
"Easy, boy. Easy! Talk as you want—it helps ease the pain under your navel. But don't let the hate shake you so. It blinds a man."
The little trader turned the key in the lock and the stout wooden door opened inward to a tiny room where an oil lamp cast a dim yellow glare on a dressing table and stool. Costumes hung from a peg-rack on the wall above a tycat-skin couch.
"Flaith's room," he muttered. "Only she comes here."
The McCanahan sat on the couch, and with elbows on knees he looked at the floor and began to swear. He cursed in low Martian, and in fluent English, in high Centauran and sibilant Antaranese. "May the foul fiends of Mars' ten hells gnaw his belly! May the imps of Iseen claw his eyes from now 'til Doomsday! If only Hobgob himself were alive, and here to fly away over Cureeng with his mean little soul!"