“Oh, I know,” I answered lightly, and teased his chin with my blade.
“Wait,” Bellin said.
“You wait,” I suggested. “What in hoolies do you think you’re doing?”
Bellin’s tone was disingenuous. “Practicing,” he declared.
“Not any more.” A flick this way and that; axes spilled out of his hands. “No,” I said plainly, as he made a motion to scoop them up.
In the moonlight, his face was young. Almost too young, and too pretty. The grin bled away from his mouth. “I knew what I was doing.”
“I want to know: why?”
He stared back at me unflinchingly, ignoring stinging hands. “Because I could,” he told me. “And because you’re you.”
Del jerked the ax from the doorjamb and brought it over to me. “He might have sheared off your nose.”
Bellin the Cat smiled. “I just wanted your attention.”
I eyed him assessively, disliking his attitude. Then reached out my left hand and caught a wad of cloth at his throat, jamming him back against the wall. “You,” I said, “are a fool. A lying, conniving fool who’s lucky to be alive. I should give you a spanking—with three feet of Northern steel.”
With my fist tucked up beneath his chin, Bellin’s face was less than happy. But he didn’t sound repentant. “I hit you in the cantina because I had to.”
“Oh? Why is that?”
“If I hadn’t, they might have begun to suspect me.”
“Who is that?” I asked.
“The men I’m riding with.”
“The men you’re riding with would have required you to hit me? I find that hard to believe.”
“You don’t know them.” He swallowed awkwardly. “If you’d remove your hand from my throat, I might be able to breathe … and then I could explain.”
I let go all at once. “Explain,” I said harshly, as Bellin staggered his way to regained balance.
He rubbed gingerly at his throat, then set his green-striped robe into order. “The story would sound better over a jug of aqivi.”
I lifted my blade slightly. “Or over three feet of steel.”
Bellin looked past me to Del. Smiled weakly, eyeing the ax in her hand, then glanced back at me. “It was your idea.”
“My idea—” Abruptly I stepped close, forcing him to back up. The doorway behind him was open; Bellin fell in, then through. I followed silently with Del on my heels. “My idea, panjandrum?”
“Yes.” He stopped and stood his ground. “My axes,” he said plaintively.
Del and I didn’t move.
Bellin, seeing it, sighed. Rubbed vigorously at his head, which hurt his cut hand and mussed his hair, then glared back at me. “You said I could ride with you if I found Ajani for you.”
Now it was Del’s turn. “Have you?” she asked. “Or is this another trick?”
“No trick,” he assured us. “Do you know how many months it took me to find him?”
“Less than me,” she snapped. “What about Ajani?”
Bellin sighed. He was, I realized all over again, no older than nineteen, maybe twenty, and a stranger to the South. I didn’t know much about him except he was seeking fame, and he had a smooth way with his tongue. I was surprised he was still alive, that no one had killed him yet.
And then I remembered the axes.
“We’re waiting,” I said grimly.
Bellin nodded. “Not long after meeting you, I set out to find Ajani. It was the condition, you said; I decided to fulfill it.”
The ax in Del’s hand flashed. “Don’t waste time, panjandrum.”
He eyed her. Eyed the ax. Considered what it might be like to die by his own weapon; at least, I think he did. But it got him talking again.
“You can’t just walk into countless towns and settlements asking for Ajani,” he explained, even though Del, so straightforward, had. “It takes more than that. Cleverness, guile, a hint of ingenuity.” Briefly, he smiled. “What it takes is a man who knows how to fit a story to suit his needs.”
“The Sandtiger’s son,” I murmured.
Bellin nodded. “Who was I, but a stranger? A foreigner, to boot. No one would tell me the truth if I said what I really wanted. So I fed them a story. The best one I could think of.” He touched a shadow at his neck; strung claws rattled. “I said I was your son. People talked to me.”
“Why?” Del asked harshly. “Why go to so much trouble? You must know we want no part of you.”
It was blunt, but true. Bellin only shrugged. “But if I told you what you wanted to know, you’d think more kindly of me. Stories would make the rounds. My name might be mentioned in them.”