Authors: John Maddox Roberts
“It strikes me,” Nistur said, “that we need an operating base.”
The mismatched trio stood on a gracefully arched bridge that spanned what had once been a picturesque canal, part of a system that had connected all parts of the city with its harbor, allowing cargo to be off-loaded from the ships and transported easily to the shops, homes, markets, and warehouses of Tarsis. Now the canals were dry, slowly filling with dust, leaves, trash, and rubble that the occasional heavy rains failed to wash away. A few old houseboats rested on the bottoms, some of them still inhabited.
“With these”Ironwood tapped his seal “we can commandeer an office in the palace if we like, and lodging at any house or inn we want. I can’t say that I like the idea, though.”
“Exactly,” Nistur concurred. “Our prime suspects are the most important people of this city. Face it, my friends, we now have vaunting titles and supposed powers, but we have no protection save our own skill at arms. I think myself a match for most swordsmen with my blade, and I know that you, Ironwood, are a superb fighter, and Shellring here is adept at escape and evasion, but we must be realistic. We are no match for a lord who can send twenty armed men after us. The city is where we are in
the greatest danger, especially after dark. I doubt anyone will try to assault us in daylight, where witnesses may report.”
“We could take one of the towers in the city wall,” Ironwood suggested. “There we’d be secure.”
“Spoken like a soldier,” said Nistur. “But it would be uncomfortable, inconvenient, and all too public, with the walls thronged with mercenaries and drafted citizens. No, I would prefer a place where we can come and go unseen. Our duties may call for clandestine activity.”
“I know plenty of good hiding places in the Old City,” Shellring said, “but I wouldn’t call any of them comfortable.” After a pause, she said, “Why don’t we stay right where we’ve been? Stunbog’s hulk is secure, and the harbor dwellers think a lot of him. They have their own ways of passing signals. We’d get plenty of warning if outsiders came down to the harbor looking for us.”
“Not a bad idea,” Ironwood said. “And now we can pay him for his trouble.”
Nistur nodded. “He protests that he is not a wizard, but I don’t doubt that he can whip up a few protective spells, and I would estimate that Myrsa is a match for any three or four of the mercenaries and thugs who inhabit this city in such distressing numbers.”
“Stunbog’s it is, then,” Ironwood said, “if he’ll agree to it. Besides, I’m not so sure about our employer.”
“You think the lord himself might have done away with the ambassador?” Nistur inquired.
“Just now, nobody is above suspicion,” Ironwood said. “In the past I’ve usually been content to serve a paymaster, so long as it wasn’t some robber baron. But most small wars are pretty straightforward affairs. Two or more lords have a disagreement over who owns what land, or who deserves to inherit a particular title, and they agree to fight it out. In this wretched city it’s all
different: secret factions playing their own power games, people professing loyalty to one side while selling it out. I wouldn’t doubt that half the nobles in this city are dealing secretly with Kyaga, each trying to find some advantage for himself.”
“Alas, all too true,” said Nistur. “So we trust no one except one another.” He clapped Shellring on the shoulder. “My young companion, I have a special task for you.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What is it?” she asked suspiciously.
“Oh, don’t worry, you’ll find this agreeable. You are intimate with the underworld of this city. You know the rogues, the beggars, the thieves and fences. These are persons who must be quite reluctant to speak to official investigators. In fact, they will run at our approach. But they might well confide in one of their own. I want you to circulate among your lowly friends today. See if any of them saw anything untoward the night of the murder, or overheard some bit of conversation that might be pertinent. Be prepared to pay for information.” He took some coins from his purse and gave them to her. “Are you armed?”
She shook her head. “I had a knife, but the jail guards took it and didn’t give it back.”
“Then buy one and keep it handy. Report to us at Stunbog’s tonight.”
“I’ll be there,” she promised. Then she tucked her seal and its chain beneath her tunic. “Better keep this out of sight. The lord’s insignia kind of makes people nervous in my part of the city, and people will kill you for a lot less silver than this.”
“It probably isn’t silver anyway,” Ironwood groused, “just silver-gilt copper.”
“Believe me,” she assured them, “I know people who’d kill me for that much copper. See you tonight.” She left the bridge and faded from sight like a shadow.
“I thought I’d lived in some tough places,” Ironwood
mused. “I don’t know how that girl has managed to live as long as she has in this rat warren.”
“One does what one must to survive,” Nistur said. “Come along, my friend. We have a few hours of daylight left. I do not want to question anyone before I have a sound idea of our milieu. Let’s explore the city a bit and get a feel for the place.”
“Makes sense,” said Ironwood. “And I want to inspect the walls and get a look at the nomad camp. But just when did you take over this operation? You talk as if you were my superior officer. Let me remind you that it’s my geas stamped on your chin.”
“Of that I am all too aware,” Nistur said, absentmind-edly rubbing the spot, which still tingled a bit. “However, I think you will agree that my tongue is rather more glib than your own. It is the poet in me. And this sort of mental exercise appeals to me. What say you to this proposal: you back my lead in these matters of detection, and I will follow your leadership should we become involved in a war? I am quite ready to defer to your superior rnilitary expertise.”
“All right for now,” Ironwood said grudgingly.
They left the bridge and began to walk northward, past a high wall that surrounded the extensive palace grounds in the central city, on the side opposite the great plaza.
“And now, my friend,” Nistur said, “perhaps it is time you told me why a lord of this city has reason to purchase your life. At first I did not inquire because it was a professional matter and, truly, none of my business. But now we are involved with these disagreeable people, and I must be aware of all the facts pertinent to our security.”
“Believe me,” Ironwood said, “if I knew, I would tell you. I’ve no wish to place us in any greater danger than we are in already. The fact is, I have no idea why some local aristocrat wants me dead. I’ve been in the city less
than a month, spending the pay from my last war and looking for a new one. I’ve associated with nobody except my fellow mercenaries and such people as frequent the taverns on the old waterfront. Of course, I don’t always remember …” His voice trailed off in embarrassment.
“You mean, your recurring condition involves more than paralysis of the limbs? Are lapses of memory sometimes involved?”
“Sometimes. But not lately.” The mercenary shook his head as if to clear it. “No. I am certain that I’ve never had dealings with any lord of this city.”
“Ah, well. Aristocrats are a whimsical, unpredictable lot at the best of times. Perhaps he was slumming, in disguise, and you beat him at dice. Or possibly he was out strolling with his wife, and she cast a glance at you he thought perhaps too lingering.”
“It could be,” Ironwood allowed. “Or maybe he mistook me for somebody else. We’ll probably find out all too soon. Let’s just try our best to survive the experience.”
Near the northeast corner of the palace grounds they came to a broad boulevard that ran eastward to one of the city’s three largest gates, and they turned their steps gateward. As they walked, Nistur was struck by the sharp contrast between the two sides of the boulevard. To the south was a relatively prosperous district of imposing homes and expensive shops. To the north was the Old or UpperCity, which was, as Shellring had explained, considered abandoned by the authorities. Most of its taller structures had collapsed in the Cataclysm, and the few that still stood above three stories were shells only, with daylight showing through their gaping windows, all of the roofs having long since disintegrated. It was apparent that the Cataclysm had struck here much like an ordinary earthquake, which meant it had been followed by devastating fires. All the standing structures showed fire
damage, and there were no remaining wooden buildings at all.
“To judge by the height of the ruins,” Nistur observed, “that must have been by far the wealthiest part of the city. It is little wonder Tarsis never fully recovered.”
“They’ve just no spirit,” Ironwood said unsympathetically. “I’ve seen cities leveled to the ground by the Cataclysm, and they’ve rebuilt so you’d think they were never damaged. These people have no steel in their spines.”
“I cannot say I like them much, but we must be fair. The city was based on its harbor, and the Cataclysm destroyed it.”
“Why do we have to be fair?” Ironwood asked.
They came to the East Gate, a structure consisting of two massive wooden doors each ten feet wide and twenty feet high, backed by the heavy iron grid of a portcullis. Ordinarily the portcullis would be raised at this hour, only its fanglike lower portion showing overhead, but now it was in place for the duration of the emergency. To one side of the main gate was a small, heavily fortified door that allowed access by foot when the main gate was closed. This postern was now closed as well, and barred by several thick beams.
The gate was flanked by a pair of towers that rose fifteen feet above the wall proper, their tops crowned with crenellations and armed with heavy ballistae; crossbows three or four times the size of the man-carried weapon were mounted on swivels and capable of firing steel bolts or stones the size of melons. A number of newly hired mercenaries leaned on their spears, glaives, halberds, and other assorted polearms around the bases of the twin towers, studying the odd pair as they approached.
“Who’s captain of the gate?” Ironwood demanded. “Who’s asking?” said a soldier who leaned on a
longbow instead of a polearm. Nistur and Ironwood held up their seals, and the insignia worked its usual magic.
“Captain Karst, at your service,” said the gray-mustached individual who bustled from the base of one of the towers. Then he squinted at the mercenary in the dragon armor. “Ironwood? You were turned down by every recruiter in the city! How did you get a cushy position with the Lord of Tarsis?”
“Some of us were meant for higher things, Captain,” Nistur announced grandly. “We must inspect the walls and survey the nomad camp.”
The captain’s heavy shoulders shrugged, making his steel and leather harness creak. “Whatever you like. Come along.” He led them into one of the towers and they ascended the spiral, turnpike stairway. “We were told there’d be officials with those seals, and we were to let them pass through the gates. Are you really looking into the killing of that barbarian envoy?”
“That’s the job,” Ironwood affirmed.
Atop the tower, the mercenaries and city guards came to ragged attention when their captain appeared. The sergeant in charge saluted. “All quiet out in the nomad camp, sir,” he reported. “Looks like another band arrived about an hour ago. Maybe a hundred of them.”
Nistur and Ironwood went to the parapet and peered out through the crenels. “An imposing sight,” Nistur said.
The nomad camp sprawled in all directions. There were hundreds of tents, pens of animals, mounted men practicing archery or lance-play at impromptu ranges, roving patrols riding out or returning to camp, all of it lacking the order of a civilized army but having the unmistakable stamp of an encampment of warriors who knew their business.
“Nomads travel by whole tribes,” Ironwood said. “What proportion out there are warriors?”
“They’re all fighters,” Karst reported. “This new high chief made them leave their families out in their ancestral ranges. That camp is a third again as big as it was this time yesterday.” The captain’s teeth bared in a mirthless grin. “I’ll wager word has spread that Kyaga intends to sack Tarsis. They all want to be in on the looting, even the ones who haven’t yet sworn allegiance to him.”
“He’ll have their allegiance if he succeeds,” Ironwood said. “He’ll be leader of all the nomads and no question about it.”
“You mean,” Nistur said, “you think it is not in his best interest that we should find who killed the ambassador, thus robbing him of his excuse to attack?”
“He’d gain nothing by it at all,” Karst said. “Far from it. He’d disappoint all those warriors out there.”
“There is not much point to our commission then, is there?” Nistur said.
“That villain out there,” Karst said, pointing to the huge tent in the center of the camp, “is supposed to have come here for negotiations with the lord and the councilors. He said he’ll attack if the killers aren’t delivered up in five days. If he gets them, it’s back to negotiations. If the negotiations break down, he attacks anyway.” He shrugged again. “It’s all the same to me. I collect my pay whatever happens.”
“What shape are the defenses in?” Ironwood asked.
“Better than they were two days ago,” Karst answered. “We’ve had every carpenter and blacksmith in the city repairing the catapults and ballistae. They’re mostly in working order now. The stonemasons have been fixing the breaches in the city walls, which weren’t as bad as we feared at first.”
“Are there enough men to defend walls this long?” Ironwood asked.
“No, but then I haven’t seen those nomads building
any siege engines, either. I doubt they know how to make or use them. If not attacked by engines, even weakly defended walls can hold for a long, long time.”
“That’s true,” Ironwood said grimly. Nistur glanced at him, surprised at his tone, but he did not comment on it.
“Then they have little hope of storming the walls?” the former assassin asked.
“It’s something every soldier knows,” Karst told him. “You can’t take a heavily fortified position with missile weapons alone. They can be decisive in the open field, especially when coupled with mobility. But shoot up at walls like this, and the defenders just crouch behind the merlons until the storm .is past. You can even stand in the crenels to shoot back and be protected by the mantlets.” He indicated the big, rectangular wooden shields that had been hoisted into place between the merlons, slanting outward like the eaves of a roof.