Kitabı oku: «Honour Among Thieves», sayfa 3

CHAPTER FIVE

Inside the common room of the inn, food and wine was brought to them before they’d even asked for it. Malden was sure they’d be charged for it whether they wanted it or not, so he ate greedily of the cold meat and fresh bread he was served, and drank his first cup of wine down before it touched the table. Riding had left him with a deep thirst.

Croy lifted Balint up onto a chair and let her sit upright, though he left her hands bound. The innkeeper stared but said nothing as Cythera drew the gag away and held a pewter cup toward the dwarf’s mouth.

Balint stared at the cup as if it held poison. “Aren’t you all going to take turns spitting in it first, before I drink? Not that I could tell the difference, not with human wine. I’ll bet it tastes like something you drained from a boil off one of those lepers’ arses.”

There was a reason they had kept her gagged.

Cythera started to take the cup away, but Balint’s head snaked forward and she grabbed at its rim with her lips. She sucked deeply at the drink, then leaned back and belched. “I’ll take some of that food, now.”

Malden frowned at her but he broke off a crust of bread and held it so she could take bites from it. “If you bite my fingers,” he told the dwarf, “I’ll pick you up by your feet and shake you until we get the wine back.”

Something like grudging respect lit up Balint’s eye as she chewed. Curses and oaths were all the dwarves knew of poetry. They competed with each other for who could be more vulgar or rude, and counted a good obscenity as a fine jest. Clearly Malden had scored a point with her.

Cythera didn’t seem to see it that way. “Be more kind,” she said, “please. Balint may be guilty of much, but she still deserves some respect.”

“Ask the elves how much,” Malden said.

“The elves,” Croy said, shaking his head. “That makes me think—when we meet the magistrate, what do we tell him of the elves?”

“If he’s to know of her crimes,” Malden pointed out, “we’ll need to say something. After all, it was their city Balint toppled—nearly killing all of them in the process, not to mention us.”

“Once the king knows the elves are at large in his kingdom, though, I shudder to think what he’ll do. Send his knights to round them up, surely, and then—no. No, I won’t even think of that.” Cythera put her head in her hands. “Can we not just tell him that the elves all perished when Cloudblade fell?”

“And get me cooked for mass murder?” Balint said, her eyes wide. “You know that’s a lie. The elves survived. Most of them, anyway.”

“A blessing you had no hand in achieving,” Croy said. “You did not seem to care if they did all die, when you toppled Cloudblade.”

Malden shook his head. “It matters little. Our king has no authority to have you hanged. The worst he can do is send you north,” he pointed out, “which he’s bound to do anyway, no matter how many of them you killed. So it doesn’t matter what crimes we heap upon you, since the punishment will be the same.”

“I’ll take my lumps for what I did. I acted in the interest of my king, that’s all,” Balint insisted. When the humans didn’t relent and free her on the spot, she shrank within her ropes. “It’s been a long ride and I need to make water,” she said, then, looking away from their faces. “Which of you brave young men wants to pull down my breeches for me?”

Croy recoiled in disgust. That was what Balint had wanted, of course. She smiled broadly and tried to catch Malden’s eye.

It was Cythera who responded, however. “I’ll take her to the privy,” she said, rising from her seat. Once standing, however, she let out a gasp.

Malden spun around in his chair and saw a pair of men coming toward them, pushing their way through the common room. They were not dressed in the cloaks-of-eyes the city watch of Ness wore, but he knew immediately they were men of the law. Each wore a jerkin of leather jack with steel plates sewn to the elbows and shoulders, and each of them had a weapon in his hand. They had gold crowns painted on their cloaks as insignia of office.

Even without their uniforms he would have recognized them as lawmen, just from the smug looks on their faces. They were bigger than anyone else in the room and that look said they knew it. Their rough features and tiny eyes marked them as men who wouldn’t back down from a fight, as well. Malden had spent his whole life learning how to recognize such signs—and learning how to avoid the men who showed them.

“Good sirs,” Croy said, rising and spreading his arms wide in welcome. “I thank you for coming. We’d planned on bringing her to the keep directly, but perhaps you can save us the journey.”

One of the kingsmen—the one who still had most of his teeth—stared down at the dwarf and frowned. “What’s this?”

“Nobody said nothin’ ’bout a dwarf girl,” the other one said, looking at his comrade. A bad scar crossed his neck, just one side of his windpipe.

“This,” Croy said, “is Balint, late of the service of the dwarven envoy at Redweir. She’s broken her oath, and—”

“We didn’t come for a dwarf,” the first one, the toothy one, told Croy.

Malden slowly pushed his chair back from the table. He tried not to make a sound as its legs dragged across the floorboards. So occupied, he failed to notice that he was backing up into a wall. When the back of his head struck the plaster, he looked to either side, searching for windows he might jump out of. He found none.

The scarred one spoke next, saying exactly what Malden expected—and dreaded—to hear. “We’re here,” he announced, “for yer thief.”

Malden jumped up onto his chair. He looked up toward the rafters and saw they were too high to reach, at least ten feet above his head. The two kingsmen had by reflex moved to flank the table on either side, blocking off his escape that way, as well.

“Hold,” Croy said, rising to his feet. “What’s the meaning of this?”

“He was spotted comin’ in through the gate today under false identity. Somebody knew his face, and passed along the particulars. Now we’re to take him in.”

Malden had thought he would be safe here. Though he was well known in Ness he was a stranger in Helstrow. He’d assumed no one here had so much as heard of him. That foolishness had made him lax, made him forget his usual caution.

Cursing himself, he tried to decide which way to run. Normally when he entered a public building like this he would take a moment to memorize all the exits. This time he’d been so tired from the day’s riding he hadn’t bothered.

“But what’s the charge?” Cythera demanded.

Toothy looked at Scar, who looked back at him, as if they couldn’t decide between the two of them which one should answer. “Suspicion of bein’ a thief,” Toothy said, finally. “Now, which one of ye is called Malden?”

Balint began to laugh. Croy started to turn to look at Malden, giving him away.

Malden dropped his hand to his belt, where his bodkin used to be. It hadn’t been a good knife, really, but it had been his. Now it was gone—and in its place was a sword. A sword that should never have been his, a sword Croy had given him under false trust. A sword, more to the point, that he’d never learned how to use.

“Look out, Halbert—he’s got a cutter,” Scar said.

“Hand it over, boy,” Toothy—Halbert—said.

“What, this thing?” Malden asked. Then he drew the sword from its scabbard and let it taste the air. “It’s harmless.”

The sword had a name. It was called Acidtongue. The name came from the fact that while the blade looked like an old piece of iron, pitted and scored by age, it was in fact quite magical—on contact with the air, it secreted a powerful foaming acid that could burn through just about anything.

In olden times when demons walked the land, the sword had been made to fight against them. It was one of the seven Ancient Blades, brother to the one Croy wore at his own belt, and it had magic woven into its very metal. It could sear through demonic flesh that would resist normal iron weapons and cut through even the thickest armored shell or matted, brimstone-stinking fur. Malden knew from personal experience it worked just fine on more worldly substances as well.

With both hands on the hilt, Malden brought the blade around in a tight arc. The blade passed through the middle of a pewter tankard as if it were made of smoke. The top half of the tankard fell to the table with a clink—even as the wine it had contained splashed out across the table in a hissing wave.

Halbert and Scar both jumped back as if he’d thrown a snake at them. They also jumped a little to the side—Halbert to the left, Scar to the right.

Malden split the difference and dashed between the two of them, headed straight for the door.

CHAPTER SIX

Bursting out into the sunlight, Malden turned his head wildly from side to side, looking for any avenue of escape. His foot slipped on a pile of horse droppings and he slid wildly for a long second before he got his feet under him again. Scar and Halbert were already emerging from the inn’s door when he finally spotted his next move.

A low wall ran along one side of the innyard, a pile of unmortared stone attached to the side of the stables. It sloped gently upward toward the thatched roof of the stables and to one as fleet as Malden it was as good as a staircase. He danced up the rocks, hearing them tumble and crash as Scar tried to follow him. It was hard to be light-footed when you were covered in armor.

Malden grabbed a double handful of thatch and hauled himself up onto the roof. From there he looked out on a sea of rooftops belonging to the half-timbered houses he’d seen on the way to the inn. Most had slate shingles—which were hard to run on, as they tended to crack and shift under one’s feet. Far to his left, though he could see the lead-lined roof of a church.

If he could reach the church he could make some real speed. He jumped across a narrow alley to the top of the house nearest the inn and landed on his feet on the sloping roof. He’d come down hard on his left ankle but Malden merely switched his weight to his right foot and kept running. He heard the watchmen shouting for him to halt, but paid no mind. He’d yet to meet a watchman anywhere who could run along roof ridges as nimbly as he.

He was wise enough, however, to know he wasn’t free yet. As he jumped to the next roof he passed over an alley choked with workmen and beggars—and two more kingsmen, who gestured upward with their weapons as he passed. Up ahead he could see a public square where women were gathered around a well, washing clothes. More kingsmen were stationed there.

By Sadu’s eight index fingers, Malden swore, how many men had they sent for him? But then he saw other figures mixed in with the kingsmen. Smaller men, wearing no armor—their hands tied together before them. They had bruised faces and some were limping. They looked broken, and Malden understood.

The local watch wasn’t just after one thief who had entered the gate under false pretenses. They were sweeping up every criminal they could find. He had seen it happen before, in Ness, when the Burgrave of that city wanted to convince the populace of the grip he held on the streets. There was no better way to show one’s passion for law and order than rounding up a dozen thieves and hanging them all together in the market square.

He’d stumbled right into a mess, coming to Helstrow when he did. What an ignominious way to end his career. He hated to think he’d be brought down by something so crass.

Malden had no intention of being taken by the law, especially by the law of a town where he’d never actually committed a crime. He knew exactly what he would have to do, and having a plan put him a little more at his ease. For a while he would have to abandon his friends. He would have to find a cheap hostelry where he could lie low for a few days, then meet up again with Croy and Cythera once their business was done. He could join up with them after they’d dropped Balint off in front of a magistrate, when they were ready to leave again. Croy would probably urge him to turn himself in, but Cythera would smooth things over and the three of them could make a discrete exit from Helstrow fortress. If things got too hot in the meantime he could always climb over the wall and hide among the peasants outside.

But first he had to actually get away. Looking back, toward the inn, he saw that Scar and Halbert had procured a ladder and were even at that moment preparing to come up and catch him.

Had this been Ness, Malden would have known instantly which way to turn. He would have known some blind alley where he could lose his pursuers, or where the nearest bridge might be found so he could leap into the river, or he would remember the location of a root cellar where no one would ever think to look for him. But this was Helstrow, which he knew not at all.

The church he’d been running toward was out of the question. It fronted on the square where the kingsmen were gathering their catch. So he turned instead and headed north, toward the wall that separated the outer and inner baileys. It was the highest point he could see, and he always felt safest up in the air.

Leaping to a thatched roof he tucked and rolled, knowing the tight-packed straw would offer only spongy, uncertain footing. Spitting dry husks from his mouth he started running toward the rough stones of the wall—and then stopped in his tracks.

Up on the wall, between the crenellations, he saw royal guards in white cloaks looking down at him. One of them had a crossbow and was busy cranking at its windlass. In a moment the weapon would be ready to fire.

Crossbow bolts were designed to penetrate steel armor and pierce the vitals beneath. At this range, the shot would probably skewer Malden—who wore no armor at all—like a roasting chicken.

Backpedaling in horror, Malden dashed to the far side of the roof and grabbed its edge. He swung down toward the street and let go to drop the last few feet. He landed in the stall of a costermonger, amidst barrels of apples and pears.

The merchant shrieked and pointed at him.

“Good sir, I beg you, be still!” Malden said, leaning out of the entrance to the stall and looking up and down the street. “The kingsmen are after me, and—”

“Thief! Thief!” the coster howled. He plucked up a handful of plums and threw them at Malden with great force. Sticky juice splattered Malden’s cloak and the side of his face.

Holding up one arm to protect his eyes, Malden ran out of the shop and into a street full of marketers. They turned as one at the sound of the costermonger’s shout and stared at Malden with terrified eyes.

“Murder!” the fruit merchant shouted. “Fire!” The man would say anything, it seemed, to get the blood of the crowd up.

Malden had made a bad miscalculation. Had he dropped into a similar stall in Ness, he would have received a far warmer welcome. The coster would have shoved him under a blanket where he could hide until the coast was clear. But Ness was a Free City, where it was a point of civic pride that no one trusted their rulers. Here, in Helstrow, every man was a vassal of the king—his property, in all but name. And Malden knew from bitter experience that slaves often feared their masters more than they loved freedom.

“Thief! Fire! Guards!” the cry went up, from every lip in the street. A dozen fingers pointed accusingly at Malden, while shopkeepers rang bells and clanged pots together to add to the hue and cry.

“Damn you all for traitors,” Malden spat, and hurried down the street as women pelted him with eggs and rotten vegetables and children grabbed at his cloak to try to trip him. He thrust his arm across his eyes to save himself from being blinded by the shower of filth and ran as fast as he dared on the trash-slick cobblestones.

But just as suddenly as it started, the cry ceased. Malden was left in silence, unmolested. Had he escaped the throng? He’d taken no more than a dozen steps away from them, yet—

He lowered his arm, and saw a knight in armor come striding toward him, sword in hand.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The marketers all fled or pressed into the doors of shops where they could watch from something like safety. Malden was alone with his enemy in a wide open street, alone and very short on options.

The knight clanked as he walked. He wore a full coat of plate that covered him from head to toe. Even his joints were protected by chain mail. The visor of his helmet was down and Malden could see nothing of his face.

Such armor, Malden knew, had an effect on the mind of the man who wore it. It made him believe himself to be invulnerable. Which was true, for all practical purposes—no iron sword could slash through that steel. Spear blades and bill hooks would simply clash off the armor, at worst denting its shiny plates. Protected thus, men tended to think that their safety meant they were blessed by the gods, and that whatever they chose to do was also blessed.

Such armor was a license for cruelty and rapine.

Yet there were weapons that could pierce that protective shell. The bodkin Malden had once carried was designed to pierce even steel, if driven with enough force and good aim. Battle axes were designed to smash through armor by sheer momentum. An arrow from a longbow, as Malden had seen, could cut through it like paper.

And then there was Acidtongue, the sword at Malden’s belt. If he could strike one solid blow with it, the sword could cut the knight in half.

Yet that might be the stupidest thing Malden ever did. Atop the plate, the knight wore a long white tabard that hung down to his knees. Painted on the cloth was a golden crown. This wasn’t a knight errant like Croy, but a knight in full estate, a champion of the king of Skrae. Most likely he was the captain of the watch, superior in rank to all the Scars and Halberts in Helstrow.

If Malden got lucky and cut the man down, he would be pursued unto the ends of the world. You did not kill a nobleman and get away with it, not ever.

He could, of course, run away. The knight seemed agile enough even weighed down with so much steel, but Malden would undoubtedly be fleeter and the chase would not go far. He turned around, intending to do this very thing, only to find he had hesitated a moment too long.

Coming down the street from the other direction, a pack of kingsmen were advancing on him steadily. Their weapons were all pointed straight at his belly. They held their ground, not advancing with any kind of speed—clearly they intended to let the knight handle him. Yet there was no chance of getting past that wall of blades. Malden’s only possible escape was to get past the knight.

Malden wasn’t the type to pray, even in extremity, but he called on Sadu then. Sadu the bloodgod, the leveler, who brought justice to all men in the end, even knights and nobility. Then he drew his magic sword, and wished he’d bothered to learn how to swing it correctly. Or at least to hold it properly. Acid dripped from the eroded blade and spat where it struck the dusty cobbles.

The knight swore, his voice echoing inside his helmet. “By the Lady! Where’d you get that treasure, son? Did you steal it from Sir Bikker?”

Malden’s eyes narrowed. How could the knight know who had first owned Acidtongue? “Bikker is dead,” he said.

“But yours wasn’t the hand that slew him, I warrant. You’re no Ancient Blade.”

For the first time Malden looked on the knight’s own sword. No jewels decorated the pommel, and the quillions were of plain iron, though well polished. The blade was not even particularly long. Yet vapor lifted from its flat to spin in the air, and patterns of frost crackled in its fuller.

“Do you recognize my sword?” the knight asked.

“Judging by the fact I’m still in one piece, I think it’s fair to say I haven’t made its acquaintance.”

The knight laughed. “This is Chillbrand,” he said. “You’d know that, if Acidtongue was rightfully yours. No Ancient Blade is handed down to a new wielder until he’s been trained by the man who wielded it before him. He’s taught its proper use, and about the history and powers of all seven. None of us would ever let one of the swords fall into the hands of one who didn’t appreciate their traditions.”

“I’m still being trained,” Malden said, which was true enough.

The knight shook his head, though. “If you don’t know Chillbrand, you have no right to bear Acidtongue. I must assume you stole it from Bikker—or looted it from his dead body. Put the sword back in its sheath, now, and lay it gently on the ground. That’s a good boy.”

Malden’s lips pulled back from his teeth and he roared as he ran at the knight. He brought Acidtongue up high over his shoulder—vitriol pattered and burned holes through his cloak—and then swung it down hard.

The knight laughed, and easily batted Acidtongue away with Chillbrand.

“It’s not a quarterstaff, son,” the knight said, taking two steps to Malden’s right, forcing Malden to whirl around to face him again. “Don’t swing it around like a stick. That’s a waste of its strength. Cut with it. Like you’d chop the head off a fish.”

“You’d teach me to fight, even as I’m trying to kill you?” Malden asked.

“Judging by your skill it’ll take you quite a while to do that,” the knight responded. “I have to find some way to pass the time.”

Malden seethed with rage. He tried a stroke he’d seen Croy make a dozen times—feint quickly to the left, then shift all your weight to your right side and on the follow-through, bring the blade around to—

Iron clanged on iron. Chillbrand slid down Acidtongue’s blade and its point was suddenly at Malden’s throat, while Acidtongue was thrust harmlessly to one side.

“A swordsman,” the knight told Malden, “trains every day of his life. He sustains himself on wholesome food, to build up his strength. You’re puny, boy. You’ve gone to bed hungry one too many times. You’re quick on your feet, I’ll give you that, but the muscles in your arm are soft as cheese. I can feel it.”

“Will you insult me to death? Stop toying with me!”

“When two knights meet, swords in hand, they call it a conversation, because of the way the steel sounds its joy, back and forth. But you’d know that, too, if—”

Without warning, Malden brought Acidtongue around with his weight behind it, intending to run it straight through the knight’s body. Acidtongue flickered in the air it moved so quickly. Yet the knight was as ready for the blow as if he’d read Malden’s mind. Chillbrand came down from overhead and turned Acidtongue to the side like earth off the blade of a plow.

“Cut me down or let me pass!” Malden shrieked.

“If you insist,” the knight said.

Yet he would not even grant Malden the mercy of a quick death. Instead he just lunged forward and slapped Malden across the forehead with the flat of his blade.

Ice crystals grew and burst inside Malden’s brain, exploding his thoughts and freezing his senses. He felt every shred of warmth sucked from his body, drawn into the freezing sword. He started to shake and his teeth clacked together like the wooden clappers of the lepers he’d seen. His body convulsed with the cold and suddenly he could not control his fingers, and Acidtongue fell from his hand to bounce off the cobblestones.

Desperately Malden tried to wrap his arms around himself, to stamp his feet—anything to get warm. His body had rebelled against him, and he could not stop shaking.

It was the work of a moment for the kingsmen behind him to grab him up, and bind him, and haul him away. He could offer no resistance at all.