Read Online Servants and Followers (The Legends of Arria, Volume 2) by Courtney Bowen - Free Book Online Page A

been
to besides our own,” Basha said, smiling, and then sighed. “Sir
Nickleby … ”
    “ Don’t worry, it will
all be okay,” Oaka said, reaching over to pat Basha on the shoulder
from horseback. “We’ll get through this,” He muttered. Sir Nickleby
had warned that Coe Anji was rougher than Coe Baba, but the scene
upon entering the town still surprised Basha and Oaka.
    The core of this hamlet was
elbow-to-elbow vendors and stalls. Pedestrians had to get out of
the way of a herd of cattle, riders, and wagons.
    The buildings were all made of wood,
not just clapboard siding with a smooth finish, but rough-shod as
well with the bark still clinging upon and engrained into them. The
entire facades of buildings were painted to make the town seem
festive, but the paint was peeling off and fading underneath the
sunlight. The town seemed to be constructed haphazardly, with
random ramshackle huts stacked one on top of another to make the
buildings two to three stories tall. Three stories tall! But these
were narrow and precarious as well, with some buildings leaning
over so much that they had to have joints attached to them outside,
beams stuck into the ground and pitched against the walls.
    A rickety leaning city, Oaka thought to
himself; he had noticed the additions that had been made to The
Smiling Stallion inn and other buildings in his hometown over the
centuries, but those looked much smoother compared to the ones in
Coe Anji. In Coe Baba, people constructed with the intent to make
something permanent, and make it fit in with the rest of the town’s
facade, without making it look too new or too old. But the
buildings in Coe Anji looked to be temporary construction solutions
that had just turned permanent by accident, lashed and latched onto
each other through faith and hope with a bit of rope and nails. And
the buildings were so outnumbered by the expanse of tents pitched
in and around the town that Coe Anji looked to be a temporary
place, a market town made for merchants to exchange and barter
goods, services, and money.
    Oaka could not
imagine anybody living here. Basha, however, seemed to be taken in
by the facade, fascinated by the muddled, yet jovial atmosphere of
Coe Anji’s market streets. Down several alleyways, however, there
were venues of vicious sport and soiled pleasure , sometimes one and the
same, Oaka was half aware of as he turned his head and saw men, but
very few women, coming in and out of the mouth of these alleyways,
laughing, smiling, and joking about as they staggered.
    As they passed by a cart selling meats,
Fato, perched on the pommel of Basha’s saddle again, seemed to
smell something that attracted him, and he pushed himself off of
the pommel as he spread his wings wide to start flapping. Basha had
to let go of Talan’s reins for the moment, so that Fato would have
space to move, and the bird flapped his way up above the young
man’s head and soared off when he had wind underneath his wings.
Fato snagged a piece of veal from the cart, but was startled when a
strange little beast, covered in fur yet walking upright, snapped
at him and tried to reach out with tiny fingers to snatch at his
feathers.
    The peddler pulling
the cart yelled at the falcon, and the two young men it returned to
when it had dropped its piece of veal. Oaka had to go over and pay
for the veal. As Oaka walked back to the others, Fato complained,
“That monkey , I ought to … ”
    “ Fato, just be glad
you got off with nothing more than a scratch,” Basha
said.
    “ You humans are
related to monkeys!” Fato accused.
    “ I would be glad to
know that I was related to that wise fool of a beast, especially
when he had the good sense to shoo you away!” Oaka said, as he
mounted Joko. “I learn something new everyday. Now where do we
go?”
    “ We should look for
an inn,” Basha said, turning his head around. “I
smell … what is that smell in the air?”
    “ Salt?” Oaka asked,
smelling and tasting it too in