Of Names and Bad Aim by Kitty Ryan (ID 28858)

For Laura (AmazonDreamer, ID 488465) who requested non-romantic Numair/Onua interaction, set before either of them had anything to do with the palace, and those of importance within it.

~*~*~*~

Small children wailed. Big ones cursed, spit flying. The juggler retrieved his ball.

"I'm sure there won't be too much bruising."

More wails, more spit. The juggler put a hand to his cheek, stepping away from the crowd. He was a tall man in a short coat, wearing boots with soles thin enough to feel the cobblestones beneath them. A disgustingly self-satisfied looking street vendor was cooking something make with onions that he could smell constantly but never afford, and one of the rapidly decreasing circle of urchins around him seemed to be pissing in the street. The air was hot and humid. It was not his day.

"Hey, mister!"  A particularly malevolent looking youth with a gap in his teeth, terrible ears and straw-yellow hair glowered up at him. "You gonna pay so my brother can see t'healer, then? You broke his face, you did!"

"Yeah, you broke it!"

"Broke it bad--"

"--Smashed it--"

"--Stupid man!"

"Eejit--"

"--Bloody…um…wha'sat ugly bird? One wif…them long leg things--?"

"--A stork, twit."

"Oh, right. Well, Mister. Ye're a bloody storkI

"--Me gran juggles them balls better'n yez!"

The juggler backed away, hands raised. The children were encircling him, glaring. "I…he's barely hurt at all!" he said, finding himself in a corner.

"You hurt, Titch?" The gap-toothed ringleader put a skinny arm around his brother, squeezing him far too tight.

Titch whimpered. His brother pinched him. "You hurt, Titch?"

"…'es."

Another pinch, harder. "And you was hurt by the man, right, Titch?"

"…'ES!"

"See?"  A small, hard finger made its presence felt in the juggler's midsection. It managed to stain his shirt. "You gonna hafteh pay, now."

It was, in one way, a comical sight. The hugely tall, dark-eyed man--who, by his tools and the faded sign next to him, was obviously meant to be an entertainer--being mobbed by a group of people who collectively went as high as his waist. People stopped to watch, mothers of some of the children shouted either warnings or well-used tips from the sidelines. A Provost's Guard lingered around the corner, but he didn't do anything. It wasn't his beat. A skinny girl, all dark sinew and grey-green eyes but little else, chose this moment to slip into the back streets, ignored by everyone. A dog followed, only whining once as they past the vendor.

It was the juggler's move.

He glared. "Enough is enough."

"Ooh!" A stocky woman, wearing layers of something that you just had to assume was dress fabric, cackled at him. "Actin' like a lord-y, now, ain't-ee just?"

The juggler could barely understand the woman's thick exclamation, but he didn't care. Slowly, he knelt before the unfortunate Titch, and cupped his cheek in a large hand. "You're perfectly fine, aren't you, lad?" he asked gently, fixing the child with an intense gaze.

"Oi! Get them mitts off me brother."

The juggler didn't look at him. "Shut up."

No one told this boy to shut up. The crowd was impressed.

"Hey…you dun tell me--"

"--Shut up, you little fiend. Now, Titch, does your face even hurt any more?" Black and white sparkles gathered around the juggler's hand. Titch giggled.

"…'ickles!" 

 Looking at his hand, the juggler went dead white. The sparkles vanished. Eyes wide, he looked over the crowd, down street corners, past the girl with the dog, over chipped rooftops, as if he was waiting for someone to magically appear and jump him. People started to titter.

Blinking, the juggler took his hand away from the young boy's face. He smiled--it was ghastly. "You've no need to see a healer, Titch," he said, standing, then giving a flourished bow. "So, unless you all want to stay and see more magic and mystery, from the great--"

There were jeers, and the juggler dropped his showman voice.  With an air of tired desperation, he threw the pathetic balls into the air. He caught one, two, and three….

No, not three.

The third ball sailed past Titch, over the Guard's head, hit the dingy brick wall of a washerwoman's house, bounced off, and then landed.

Heavily. On the skinny girl's shoulder.

She cried out in surprise, and the crowd was scattered by several pounds of fast moving dog.

The juggler looked up into long, yellowish canines, and saw death. He smelled it, too.

The dog growled; the juggler whimpered.

"Oh, you…"

It was a harsh voice, and a tired one. It belonged to the girl, who, the juggler thought as he saw her scowling, haggard face, should really be called a woman.

"Everyone doesn't want to kill me, Tahoi," she said.  

"Oh, don't they?" muttered the juggler, shifting uncomfortably against the combination of cobbles and claws. "Wish I could say that."

Tahoi growled again, pressing down.

The woman looked at them, and grinned. The grin was just as harsh as her voice. The juggler could see, now, that there were fading bruises on her face and neck. "Talking," she said, "is not a good idea, right now."

"I'm a mage, I'll have you know. I could--"

"--You see this dog?"

"--Of…--"

"--Don't answer. Of course you do. Well, you heard his name. Tahoi. It means--"

"--Ox."

The woman blinked. "What did you say?"

"Ox. Tahoi means 'ox' in a southeastern K'miri dialect. Of course, it also means 'big feasting table' in some of the more northerly regions, but, usually, it means 'ox'. Well done. You chose the perfect name."

There was an uncertainty in the woman's bearing now. "If you're trying to be smart…"

"I'm not smart, I'm educated. Get your fine example of pure mammalian strength off of me, please."

Muttering curses, the woman clicked her fingers. Tahoi, with one last heavy lean on the juggler's chest, just because he could, walked off him, nose and tail high and disdainful in the air. 

The juggler, thus released, sat. "Protective of you, your ox," he wheezed, picking folornly at his shirt, which now had a rather large scratch on it. It would require darning. He hated darning. And it would be even more painfully ugly then it was already.

Brushing ragged hair out of her eyes, the woman kept her face impassive. "He saved my life."

"Aah. I see." The juggler stood. "Thank you for not ordering Tahoi to rip my throat out."

A smirk. "Might still do that. You're accent is terrible."

"You should have heard the rest of my class."

The woman backed away, suspicious. "What's any 'educated' person doing, pretending to juggle?"

Looking at the balls around his feet, the juggler shrugged. "What's a K'miri woman doing in a city?"

"Nothing she wants. Anyway, it's none of your business."

"I know, but you look so tired I just had to ask."

The woman sneered.

The juggler looked closely at her face, despite the expression on it. When he closed his eyes, faint glimmerings of copper threads danced across his vision.

The woman tensed. So did Tahoi. "Hey! What are you doing?" 

"You don't...happen to like horses, do you?"

"I might. Stop asking so many questions."

The juggler grinned. "I like questions. Do you have a place to stay?"

"I said, no more…eh?"

"You don't, I can see that."

The heat was a wet blanket over the city. All the children had vanished, to find some other form of entertainment. The heavy, lingering smell of urine hung in the air. It was not a good day, and the juggler was looking kindly at the woman, in a way she found most infuriating.

"I don't want your pity."

"You haven't got it."

"But you're offering me a roof."

"Yes."

"You're mad. I can't pay."

"I don't pay, myself. I live with a mad artist. I don't annoy him, he won't annoy me." 

"Why are you doing this?"

"Because…" the juggler paused for a moment. "Because I can. That's enough."

The woman reached into a pouch at her waist, drawing out a tiny pinch of something. "Say that again."

"Because I can. You know, I know you're eyebright-ing me."

"Hmph. Well, you're not lying, and, if you were a lecher, Tahoi would know. He will also know the second you become one, if you do. He really hates lechers."

The juggler raised his eyebrows. "Paranoid, my dear?"

He was flat on the ground in an instant, Tahoi back in his face again.

"My name's Onua. I'm no one's dear."

"Hmm…Onua. Another K'mir word, meaning: 'wide awake and full of life'."

Onua snorted. "Are all educated men so annoying?"

"Oh, they're far worse. I'm just Numair Salmalìn."

A laugh. "I can tell you what that means."

"You can? Mithros! It's got roots in five language families, plus Old Thak…."

Onua Chamtong looked down at the stained, thin, bedraggled man with the long nose and soft voice, lying sprawled in the street and so easily cowed by her dog. "Does 'delusions of grandeur' come close?"    

Fin