The Tavern Without a Name

1589-03-01
Ruined Port City

In a ruined port city I sought shelter from wind and salt spray.
Among broken docks and charred warehouses stood a half collapsed tavern with no signboard.
Inside, a few wanderers warmed their hands at a guttering fire: a scarred mercenary with a torn coat, a Bonona student who still wore his sidesword though his eyes were empty, and a monk whose lute had only three strings. They shared cheap wine and the kind of grief that needs no words.

I tuned the monk’s battered instrument and played a quiet air.
Fingers tapped on tabletops. Shoulders eased.
When the song ended I drew my sword and traced a simple cut in the smoke.
Rhythm became motion. Motion became rhythm.
The mercenary’s brow climbed. The student barked a laugh he had not found in weeks.
A drunk in the corner squinted and said, “Is this a lute fight.”

“Then we will make it one,” I said.
We cleared broken benches and chalked a compass star across the floorboards.
We took turns with what each of us carried. German longsword strikes. Bononese flourishes. Lyndener sabre cuts. We looked for one timing between them. The monk kept time with three strings. I set the stremaçone to the downbeat and let the molinero turn like a waterwheel. The Bononese point found measure from the star. The mercenary showed how to keep the blade honest when fear tries to rush the hand.

By the time the wine ran out and the fire sank to coals we had agreed to meet again.
Out of mockery, music, and memory, something new took shape. A guild with no charter, no patron, no walls. We called it, half in jest, Lutefecht. The name sat on the tongue like a promise.

At dawn the gulls screamed over the ruined harbor.
On the tavern’s threshold I pressed my palm into chalk and left a print beside the star.
It felt like the first page of a book not yet written.