He edged out of the throng and followed the captain's directions. They brought him into an unsavory part of town, where moldering blank-walled houses crowded a winding labyrinth of narrow, unlighted streets and stinking alleys. Men of dubious aspect moved furtively through the shadowy maze, or brawled drunkenly before the tawdry inns and bawdy houses. Strange place for a city guardsman to direct him to—
But no priests or soldiers were in sight, which was recommendation enough. Alfric rode on until he saw the sign of the Falkh and Firedrake creaking in the chill gusty wind above a gloomy doorway.
He dismounted and knocked, one hand on his dagger. The door groaned open a crack and a thin scar-faced man looked out, his own hand on a knife.
"I want lodging for myself and my hengist," said Alfric.
The landlord's hooded eyes slid up and down the barbarian's tall form. An indrawn breath hissed through his lips. "Are you from the northlands?" he asked.
"Aye." Alfric flung open the door and stepped into the taproom.
It was dim and dirty and low-ceiled, a few smoky torches throwing a guttering light on the hard-faced men who sat at the tables drinking the sour yellow wine of the south. They were all armed, all wary—the place was plainly a hangout of thieves and murderers.
Alfric shrugged broad shoulders. He'd stayed in such places often enough. "How much do you want?" he asked.
"Ah—" The landlord licked his lips, nervously. "Two chrysterces for supper now and breakfast tomorrow, one soldar room and girl."
The rate was so low that Alfric's eyes narrowed and his ears cocked forward in an instinctive gesture of suspicion. These southerners all named several times the price they expected to get, but he had never haggled one down as far as this fellow's asking price.