Before the Scuffle

1587-10-20
Lower Quarter, Mulecrest

I spent another season walking taverns where no one listens. Three songs buy stew if the stew is thin. The dockmen clap for drinking rounds. The nobles tip for jokes that are not mine. The stories I carry slide off the room like rain off oiled canvas.

Coins hit the floor near my boots. I keep playing. When the talk swells I drop to a softer measure so the strings do not fight the room. It changes nothing. The barkeep nods at a wall I cannot see through. In the corner a carter mutters that the red towers along the river are being taught a new note by stone-church men. Another swears that war will stay cold if the towers sing straight. No one asks me to sing the news.

I know the names that circulate like smoke: Master Merryen of Maraisbourg, von Lychenar whose pages teach from far away. I have never stood in their halls. I keep their rhythms in my head the way a sailor keeps a compass he cannot afford.

Night settles. My case is light. The air smells of malt, damp rope, and sea wind that never quite reaches these rooms. I am not heard. I am not seen. I pack the lute and count what is left. In the morning I will walk the river road.