"What?" Now Estrada looked genuinely taken aback. "That's absurd."
"Is it really? I know you'll never care for me, Marina. I accepted that long ago. Still, I'd hope you could see the gift I've been preparing for you. A city run by and for its people. A Castoval led by Castovalians. A republic where once there was only oppression."
"Will you really stand there pretending you did this for me?"
"Think about what I've said," Mounteban told her. "Perhaps one day you'll understand. And if you change your mind, you'll know where to find me. In the meantime – leave my city now and I'll make sure you do so safely."
As though that were the matter settled, Mounteban began to back towards the gate. His bodyguard edged to block the space between him and Alvantes, and then they swung to follow, the cart clattering in their wake, leaving Estrada and Godares no choice but to move hurriedly aside.
"Damn you!" cried Alvantes, "don't you walk away from me."
"What about me?" wailed Lupa from his rooftop.
Mounteban ignored them both. He disappeared, as the half-opened gates hid him from view. A moment later and even the bulk of the cart had vanished.
Alvantes hurried after, his face a snarl of rage. Navare and the remaining guardsmen came close on his heels. Watching them rush by, fear caught in my throat and refused to budge. It might have been the fact that they were charging into a fight they were sure to lose. Yet my feet were moving – because along with that suffocating fear came almost irresistible curiosity. I had to know what came next. It was as though we'd arrived at a precipice, and there was nothing left to do but fall. I was practically sprinting by the time I cleared the gates.
There were Mounteban and his men, crowded into and around their cart.
There were Alvantes and his small troop, already almost caught up.
There, ahead of them all, was Mounteban's army.
It was just as he'd promised. The street was thronged with his men. The courtyard backed onto White Corn Road, which joined with the main street running from the north-west gate, and I'd no doubt that the approaching throng were the defenders who'd been gathered there. Now, realising the giant attack for the sham it had been, hearing that the guardsmen's assault on the west gate had ended almost before it had begun, they'd come hunting for a real threat.
Some were evidently lowlifes from the city gangs, some retainers from the families; a few were leftovers of Moaradrid's invasion. But those signs of old allegiances were fading now, and these men were no longer a rabble. In a mere few days, Mounteban had turned them into a real city guard. All wore armour be neath their matching crimson cloaks; all bore weapons appropriate to their function.
Moreover, they outnumbered our tiny band fifty to one – and Alvantes's men were already dead on their feet. If it came to a fight… but then, it wouldn't. Because many of them had bows, and we hadn't a shield between us. The best I could hope for was that Alvantes and Estrada hadn't completely blown our slim hopes of surrender – or failing that, for a quick and unexpected death.
All of which begged the question: why did this approaching army look so scared?
Only then did it occur to me that what I'd taken for the tumult of marching feet must be something more. Even so many men couldn't have made the noise I was hearing, the roar of storm-tossed waves pounding a granite shore. As it grew closer, the very stones beneath my feet began to quiver. In nearby buildings, shutters rattled in their frames.
The mob didn't slow as they drew near. They hardly seemed aware of us, or even of Mounteban. These men weren't attacking us. They weren't rushing to Mounteban's aid. They were fleeing for their lives.
They broke around us like white water round rocks, flew past as if we were invisible. I did my best to shield my face and plant my feet against the cobbles, terrified I'd be swept away and trampled. All I could hear besides the thrash of feet and clatter of armour was Mounteban screaming, "Stop, you fools! Stop! How many times did I tell you? They won't fight! They can't hurt you!"
On and on he bellowed, his voice somehow rising above the cacophony. I didn't see one man even pause to listen. Only when the giants tumbled into view did he finally quieten – and for all he'd said, the fear was clear in his eyes.
Saltlick, of course, stood at their head. His mock armour, sheets of cheap painted board strung together with frayed rope, was ragged and studded with arrows. The first drab rays of morning sun struck glints from the crown around his neck, lighting his broad face from below.
"This wasn't the plan," I told him.
Saltlick smiled toothily, picked a splinter of what could only have been the north-western gate from his shoulder. "New plan."
"That isn't how these things work!" I said. "You can't just…"
Can't just…?
Just spot a chance to turn a double bluff into an outright victory? I'd hoped the defenders would recognise the giant assault for the ruse it was; I'd gambled they'd assume the guardsmen's assault on the west gate was the real threat, when in truth it was every bit as much a diversion. What I hadn't considered was how that would leave the north-west gate undefended – or that, while the giants might not fight, nothing in their moral code forbade them to smash a defenceless barrier to smithereens.
I hadn't. Saltlick had.
"You couldn't have timed it better," I said.
Saltlick's grin threatened to split his head in two. But all he said was, "Help friends."
"You have. You really have."
If proof were needed, Mounteban provided it amply. He stood alone now. Even his entourage of bodyguards were gone. Even the cart had been carried away in the rush of fleeing bodies. However much loyalty he'd bought, bullied or cajoled, it didn't extend to facing down a hundred giants.
Alvantes's battered guardsmen had already moved to surround him. Now, Alvantes himself stepped forward. "Here's one last deal for you, Mounteban," he said. "Help repair the damage you've done, help weed out the vermin you've set up in unearned positions of power – and maybe, just maybe, you'll live out your life."
Mounteban's sword slipped from his fingers, to ring upon the cobbles. He looked inexpressibly weary. "I did what I thought was right."
"Is that your answer?"
"I'll do what you ask. Whatever you want." His eyes drifted to Estrada, almost hesitantly. "But I won't do it for you."
And he meant it. I couldn't say how, but I knew; perhaps it was just that I'd never seen anyone look so beaten. Whatever he'd been trying to achieve, whatever twisted motives he'd had, it had all burned to the ground today – and in his gaze was nothing except the ashes of that mad dream.
Estrada and Alvantes recognised it too. I caught a fraction of the glance they shared, saw the sure knowledge that somehow, against impossible odds, they'd pulled this city back from the precipice Moun teban had almost led it over. Soon Altapasaeda would be free again. Soon the Castoval could return to normal, putting Moaradrid's brief, terrible intrusion behind it once and for all.
But there were other things in that brief current of intimacy that made me look away as quickly as I could. It was the look of two people realising that now, perhaps, with duties done, responsibilities played out, the time might be close when they could embrace their own needs for a change.
They weren't the only ones. Now, finally, I could disentangle myself from their wars, their politics, their frantic life-and-death struggles for the fate of the Castoval. I could take the time to figure out a way of life that didn't involve routinely falling off cliffs and buildings, where no one chased me or tried to kill me, or made me break into anywhere I didn't want to break into.
Meanwhile, in the short term – and just like Estrada and Alvantes, like Saltlick and his fellow giants – I could indulge the wants I'd been neglecting for far too long. I could eat a proper meal; wash it down with decent wine. I could find a real bed and sleep a sound night's sleep… sleep for a week if I wanted! If I was appalled by how small my aspirations had become, I was nearly delirious to think how close within my grasp they were.
Moreover, if word spread as quickly as I hoped, it wouldn't be long before every man, child and, more to the point, every woman in Altapasaeda knew that the name Damasco was synonymous with their deliverance. Perhaps I'd find that heroes didn't need to pay for food and wine; perhaps saving the entire land would buy enough goodwill that the bed could be put to more use than mere sleeping.
The thought had barely had time to leave my mind when I saw him.
He was riding from the north-west, the same direction that so recently had produced Mounteban's routed forces and the giants. Though I recognised him, he was someone I'd never expected to see again – outside of the occasional nightmare, at any rate. All eyes widened at the sight of his uniform, matched for sheer blackness by his travel cloak and even the horse he rode. I heard Alvantes's breath catch, even as mine did. For the last time we'd seen this man, he'd been herding us into a prison cell.
Commander Ludovoco of the Crown Guard made no attempt to pick his way round the clustered giants. He seemed to assume they'd move aside of their own accord, and he was right; though he did nothing, said nothing, they shifted hurriedly to clear a path. It was as though he travelled in a bubble that nothing could touch, a bubble of his own indomitable will.
He ignored the guardsmen, Estrada and me. When his gaze settled on Alvantes, the corner of his mouth twitched, just slightly.
"Alvantes," Ludovoco said. He managed somehow to pronounce a silence where the words "Guard-Captain" should have been. "I hadn't expected to find you here."
"Nor I you."
That was apparently all the small talk we could expect. What Ludovoco said next was even more unexpected than his incomprehensible appearance. "I'm seeking Castilio Mounteban."
Unhindered by the guardsmen around him, who – recognising Ludovoco's uniform, if not the man himself – looked more bewildered than anyone by this latest turn of events, Mounteban stepped forward. "I'm he."
Ludovoco reached inside his travelling cloak, drew forth a tight scroll of parchment and handed it down. "Then this is for you."
Mounteban removed the silver ring that bound the material and unfurled it with a flick of the wrist. His eyes danced over its surface. His expression remained inscrutable.
When it was clear he'd finished, Ludovoco asked, "Will you confirm receipt?"
"Yes." Mounteban's tone was no more readable than his face. "I confirm receipt."
"You have seven days. Be ready." Ludovoco wheeled his horse, clipped his heels against its sides and rode back the way he'd come.
He was almost out of sight before anyone reacted. Then it was only Alvantes, reaching to pluck the scroll from Mounteban's hands. Mounteban made no attempt to stop him. In fact, in the instant the manuscript vanished from his view, I thought he actually looked relieved.
Alvantes too read over the document, and then again, more slowly. Even when it was obvious he'd finished, he continued to stare at the yellowed parchment.
In the end, it was Estrada who asked the question – the one, perhaps, that we all sensed might be better unasked. "What is it?"
Slowly, cautiously, as if the words were something dangerous he was letting loose, Alvantes replied, "The King is coming."
"He decided to send help after all?" She laughed, a little nervously. "Trust Panchessa to join the fight the minute it's all over."
"Help? No. Not help."
He looked up then – and as he turned the scroll to face us, I saw with utter disbelief that Alvantes was afraid.
"This…
this
is a declaration of war."
About the Author
David Tallerman was born and raised in the northeast of England. A long and confused period of education ended with a Masters dissertation on the literary history of seventeenth century witchcraft that somehow incorporated references to both Kate Bush and HP Lovecraft.
David currently roams the UK as an itinerant IT Technician-for-hire, applying theories of animism and sympathetic magic to computer repair and taking devoted care of his bonsai tree familiar.
Over the last few years, David has been steadily building a reputation for his genre short fiction and increasingly his writing has tended to push and merge genres, and to incorporate influences from his other great loves – comic books and cinema. He's currently hard at work on his third Easie Damasco adventure,
Prince Thief.
Acknowledgments
Extra special thanks to my mum, to Tom and to Anne, for reading
Crown Thief
more times and more carefully than anyone should ever have to read anything. I'm not sure this book could have happened without you, so it's only fair that you should take some of the blame.
Normal, run-of-the-mill (but still very grateful!) thanks to Jobeda, Rafe, Lavie, Rob, Grant, Rachel, Alison Littlewood, John B and John P, Adrian Tchaikovsky, Juliet McKenna, the guys at Angry Robot and my team at work, for your support, help and advice.
Lastly, thanks to everyone who bought and enjoyed
Giant Thief
, and especially to those bloggers and reviewers who helped spread the word. Here's hoping you like this one just as much, if not a little more.
ANGRY ROBOT
A member of the Osprey Group
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