Secrets of the Swords, Book 1

Chapter 22: Secrets Among Smugglers

Ulsper had trained for situations like this. When Saer Lon's smuggler friends had discovered one of the wine bottles missing, it was only a matter of time before they began searching the building for an intruder.

There were two options: either he send Suthe out as the scapegoat, or take the blame himself. Either way was dangerous. The Imperial Guard was still searching for him, and there was a chance he would be recognized. But Suthe would raise more suspicion, as a Montese girl who couldn't understand a word of Shun Dwo, hanging around the premises of a woman who couldn't speak the girl's language either. Once that discovery was made, it would be easy to surmise that she was a druith in hiding. Suthe, who innocently marveled at the foreign food Nem Koel brought to them and grew impatient at things out of her control, was yet unprepared to face this troublesome product of her untamed curiosity.

"All righ', I s'pose ya caught me," Ulsper slurred as he staggered towards the smugglers, faking drunkenness. He forced his native Esper accent into the Shun Dwo he spoke, hoping the others would be put more at ease if they thought he had a poor understanding of their language.

Saer Lon looked ready to smash the bottle he held over his head.

"What is this?" one of the smugglers, a man with a mole on his wide nose, demanded.

"He's harmless," Saer Lon tried to amend. "Just a drunk who won't remember any of this in the morning."

"You weren't supposed to be accepting boarders during shipments!" the woman beside Saer Lon hissed. "Do you want us to get caught? He's gotten into the goods!"

Saer Lon stepped forward and snatched the bottle from Ulsper with a growl. "The cloaking mix won't evaporate for a few hours," she said, holding out the bottle so her companions could take a sniff. "I just put the powder in this evening, so this still has all the taste and smell of water. We can still pack it in the crates and send it through the checkpoint without suspicion. The worst thing is that we're down a bottle and this man will wake up too sick to move in the morning."

Ulsper caught the hesitant look of the first smuggler, and faked a sigh. Some more convincing theatrics were needed.

"Gi' it ba-a-ack," he complained, reaching towards Saer Lon with a pout and a hiccup. At her warning glare, he decided to tone down the antics, lest Suthe end up laughing at the ridiculous scene and give her hiding spot away. The girl had promised silence, but she had also drunk enough disguised alcohol to cloud her better judgement.

"He's a Sylterran, too," another smuggler said, and his accusatory tone made Ulsper wary. "A foreigner.  What if he attracts those Imperial Guards that've been roaming around lately?"

"They're looking for someone like him anyway, aren't they?" the woman said. "A spy, of some sort. Betrayed his country. Extremely dangerous."

All eyes in the room turned to Ulsper, and he tried his best to look as harmless as possible.

"D'you said I was a spy?" Ulsper said, leaning against the wall. "Nahhhh."  He waved his hand. "I trade. Jewelry. Lookin' for some nice ol' Pretian designs but can't find 'em. They gotta be rare y'know? Then I can sell 'em for more expensive."

The youngest of the group, a boy in his mid-teens, blinked in surprise. "Are you looking for Enji?" he asked, and was rewarded with a punishing slap on the back of his head.

"Don't mention him, boy," mole-man snapped. Ulsper exchanged a glance with Saer Lon, but she looked just as confused.

"Enji, y'said?" Ulsper ventured, careful to slur his words. "That a person?"

It was no use. The older man's warning had silenced the boy, and he now looked fearfully between Ulsper and the other smuggler, biting his lip.

Ulsper looked back to Saer Lon, and she flicked her gaze down for a second, a silent acknowledgment of his request. She'd ask the smugglers about the name later.