Maybe
the past did hold the keys to the present. I hadn’t found my lost self in my memories—though the quivering efik addict who’d just killed a king had all too much in common with the drunk wearing that same skin today. But I did know exactly where to look for Devin now, and for that I could thank the efik. It was funny, really, that when I’d been a Blade, it had never occurred to me to think of efik as anything other than a tool of my trade. A dangerous one, to be certain, but just another tool I used.
Even when I’d given up efik after I came back to Tien, I hadn’t seen it as more than that. I’d quit because the old Aral, Aral the Kingslayer, drank efik when he could get it and chewed the beans when he couldn’t, just like all the other Blades. And every damned bean provided another reminder of the life the Son of Heaven had stolen from me. At the same time, Aral the Kingslayer had never touched alcohol.
So, when it came time to let the Kingslayer go, to really become Aral the jack, I drank myself unconscious every day for a week. It was the best method I could see for making a break between the two lives. It had honestly never occurred to me that I was just swapping one drug for another. Looking back now with the eyes of a drunk, I could see that back then I wasn’t all that different from the sleepwalkers with their razors and efik-crusted scabs. Still wasn’t in some ways, no matter that Triss had approved of my efik habit and hated my drinking.
I hadn’t touched efik since then, but I remembered exactly how it tasted and how it made me feel, and I knew exactly where to find it. I knew how much it sold for by the mug and the ounce, and when the shipments came in from Varya, and which smugglers made the deliveries. Because efik was moderately illegal in Tien, there were only three alley-knockers where you could find a proper cup or pick up a bag of roasted beans.
All three of the illegal taverns were in Little Varya. If Devin wanted efik, that’s where he’d have to go to find it, and that’s where I’d find him. It’s a good thing that most of the world had known so little about the habits and workings of the Blades back in the day, or people like the Elite would have known right where to look to find us. But the Blades had always been rare—a few hundred in a continental population that ran into many tens of millions—and more a matter of legend and speculation than anything real for most people. Beyond that, the power of Namara had blurred the memories of those few who did encounter one of us.
Figuring I’d have better luck traveling light and fast, I left my larger pack behind in the chimney of the Ismere Club. It’d be safe enough there, and none of the stuff in it would matter to me this side of setting up a new snug. As I stepped out onto the library’s little balcony, I turned and looked over the river flowing by on my left. A thought occurred to me.
“Triss, could you follow a shadow across running water?”
“I don’t think so. Not for long, anyway. Water
will
hold the—” He hissed something in his own language. “When we used to play tag on the lake’s surface on a very still night, Zass and I and the other Shades could follow each other easily enough across the surface. But in a wind or on a river, the movement of the water would break up the”—hissing—“too quickly.”
“I was hoping you’d say that.”
The Zien River bisected Tien, entering between two of the hills that held the wealthier neighborhoods and exiting by way of the harbor. In the lower parts of the city, several long canals extended the reach of boat traffic outward from the hub where river met bay. By stealing a dinghy, I was able to slip from the river into the Channary Canal, which took me right to Little Varya’s doorstep. A slower route than the chimney road, but not by much, and the advantages of leaving no trail more than made up for the lost time.
“
It
feels strange to be looking for efik again after all these years,” Triss said in a very quiet voice. “It’s almost like the old days.”
“We’re not looking for efik. We’re looking for Devin. Now hush. We don’t want anyone noticing me talking to myself and answering back in another voice.”
I stretched then and rolled my shoulders before reluctantly reaching for the oars again. It was unusual exercise for me, and every pull reminded me forcefully of the cut Weasel had made across the back of my ribs. None of my other injuries liked it much either, but it was the ribs that made me sweat.
Even at this hour, the river and canals carried a lot of traffic. Farmers bringing in early vegetables and greens from the southwest—bok choy, pea pods, baby daikon . . . Fishermen hauling the late catch upriver to restaurants and great houses. Shippers moving loads they didn’t trust to the crush of the day traffic. And, of course, the smugglers pretending to be one or another of the other sorts of traffic. The rain had stopped, but it was still cloudy and dark as the inside of a miser’s wallet—perfect smuggling weather.
Twice as I made my way toward Little Varya, customs cutters slid in close and played their big magelanterns over my boat. But there was nothing to see except for me, my shadow, and a tiny pack tucked under the thwart. That last might possibly have gotten me stopped and briefly searched on a slow night, but not now. Not with so much bigger game on the prowl. Still, it was a relief to slip into the quiet waters at the foot of the Channary Canal.
The canal ended at the base of the Channary Hill, in an artificial bay where the nobles living at the top of the slope kept a small but fancy marina. A narrow brick lane ran along the western shore, marking the edge of Little Varya, and it was there that the first alley-knocker lay. From the water’s surface, the whole area looked almost empty in the small hours of the morning, almost bleak, much quieter than the open waters behind me.
I rowed us in to shore on the west side of the canal a few yards short of the marina gates, where things looked considerably less fancy. I didn’t bother to tie up because the last thing I did before hopping onto the dock was to rake a shadow-edged sword blade along the bottom of my little boat, scuttling it. I didn’t want to leave any ideas for Devin to pick up on if he hadn’t already figured out the running-water trick.
Behind me, sewage-laced canal water fountained up through the great rent I’d made in the planks, raising a truly delightful smell. You could get a pretty serious fine for dumping shit in the water, but that didn’t stop some people, and unlike the main river, the canals didn’t have a steady flow to keep it all moving out to sea. Before I’d made it the length of the dock, my little rowboat had already sunk to the gunnels. I’d have felt worse about that if I hadn’t made sure to steal my dinghy from an ostentatiously rich yacht anchored in the river between the Ismere and the Palace Hill. The owners could afford the loss.
I paused at the foot of the dock and took a second look around, borrowing Triss’s senses for a moment so that I could see beyond the end of my nose. I didn’t spot anyone other than the dozing guard at the marina gate and a couple of day-working drunks staggering their way home from the taverns to catch a too-short sleep. It was just past four bells now, and the casual drinkers had gone home hours ago, while the night workers, both shadowsiders and sunsiders, had only just settled in to drink. That left the streets mostly empty. It was a marked change from the tens of thousands of people who would pour into the streets with the rising of the sun.
Normally, the relative emptiness would have made keeping an eye open for threats easier, but if Devin was around and enshrouded, I’d never know it until I stumbled into him or he struck. If he got it right, I’d never know another thing at all. With that in mind, I flipped my sword to an underhand grip and tucked it back against my shoulder rather than resheathing it. The darkened steel of the blade would blend well enough with the gray of my overshirt in this light. Both derived their shading from the juice of the oris.
As long as no one got very close or produced a too-bright magelight to shine on me, I could keep the sword in hand without alarming any potential passersby. Somehow that didn’t make it any easier for me to climb up to the lane. I’d never had to worry about being stalked by a Blade before, and I didn’t much like the idea. I did have the grace to wonder whether my own targets had felt that same little lead ball sitting in the bottom of their stomachs at the thought of an invisible assassin stalking them that I did now.
Probably. With a roll of my shoulders, I started forward, soft-footing my way up the half dozen stone steps that led from dock to lane. At the top, I turned right and headed for a narrow unmarked door wedged into an improbably short wall between a tailor’s and a cobbler’s. The door headed a steep stair that led down to the Cat’s Gratitude. The illicit tavern occupied a low cellar filled with dim light, tiny tables, and people who’d rather not be recognized.
I didn’t bother going inside, just walked past about six inches from the door while Triss had a bit of a sniff around. When he didn’t signal me, I knew that we’d missed the mark, so I continued along my way till I hit a slim gap between two of the buildings fronting the lane.
When I turned in, the scuttling flight of a startled rat allowed me a moment’s relaxation, signaling as it did an otherwise empty darkness. Not even a Shade could hide you from a rat’s nose. A pass down the clogged and stinking snicket behind the alley-knocker yielded another miss. As I headed for the next alley-knocker—two blocks in from the canal and a couple farther north—the tension slowly returned to my back and shoulders. The only other soul I saw was the driver of a cart making the run from the Coast Road to the canal end with a dim oil lantern bobbing along just above his head to light the way.
The Manticore’s Smile topped an old tannery. The bar and tables were hidden from curious eyes on the hill above by a bunch of tattered old sails dipped in oris and strung up awning fashion over the whole area. Because it was open to the air on all sides, I actually had to climb up and circle around the whole perimeter to let Triss check for Zass’s spoor.
When I ordered a tucker bottle of Kyle’s and a clean glass to give me an excuse to mingle with the other patrons, Triss gave me sharp pinch on the heel. I stumbled at that and had to bite back a snarl. What did he want me to do? Wander around empty-handed? Because that’d go down great with the management of an illegal club. Ask for a pot of tea?
The Manticore didn’t sell anything but alcohol and things that made alcohol seem as tame as candy. I didn’t really have a lot of options if I wanted something with an intact seal from a reputable distiller. So I silently promised Triss that I’d just have the one glass, and myself that I’d tell him about that promise as soon as I got to someplace we could speak again. Then I walked to the edge of the roof and pretended to look out over the city as I drifted along.
Twenty minutes later, I’d made the full circuit and drunk a glass and a half—I had a brief talk with Ashelia, an old smuggling acquaintance who thought she might have some business for me. Again, I didn’t have much choice but to play friendly. Getting loose of her cost another half glass and a promise to look her up as soon as I finished my present job.
“Well?” I asked Triss as soon as I’d gotten clear of the rickety stairs that led back to the ground.
“Nothing,” Triss said, his tone falling somewhere between depressed and angry. “No Zass. No Devin. Nothing to make it worth the . . . effort involved.”
I winced at the obvious message. “Look, Triss, I’m sorry about the Kyle’s. I needed to be drinking something for cover purposes.”
“So you bought a whole bottle?”
“In a place like the Manticore, you want to see the seal. Besides, it’s a small bottle. And I was only going to have one drink.”
“I counted two.”
“That was because of Ashelia. If I hadn’t kept drinking, she might have gotten suspicious.”
“That
would
be out of character, now wouldn’t it?”
I yanked the bottle out of the pocket I’d tucked it into and threw it over my shoulder to shatter on the cobbles.
“Happy?” I growled.
“Delighted,” he snapped back.
“Good.”
Without another word, I turned up the street and headed for the western edge of Little Varya where it butted up against the Downunders as the Coast Road entered Tien. The Downunders had started out as a shantytown catering to the drovers and traders who dealt in goods and animals that were too cheap or otherwise unsuited for ship travel, and it had never really recovered from its squalid beginnings. The streets got narrower and dirtier as I got closer and closer to the Dead Man’s Pouch, offering a thousand hiding places for a Blade waiting to strike. Once again, I slipped my left-hand sword free of its sheath to carry against my shoulder.
The Dead Man stood between a more reputable sort of tavern on its right and a flophouse on its left. A signpost without a sign hung over the front door in a subtle nod to the alley-knocker’s name. In Tien, a dead man’s pouch was usually gone before the body hit the ground.
The building leaned to the left, as though it wanted to have a lie down at the flophouse, or perhaps feared catching an incurable case of legitimacy from its other neighbor. The windows were boarded over, and several big planks appeared to have been nailed across the door as well, though the latter were just for show. You
couldn’t
open the door from this side, but that was because of a huge iron latch that opened easily enough from the inside. Quite a few patrons left by the “front” door, though most entered by knocking on the alley-side door. Which was the origin of the term alley-knockers, also occasionally called three-knocks.