Storm Season- - Thieves World 04 (19 page)

She stood up and went behind a curtain. He heard her lie down; he left quietly. Thrusherwas helping Dubro with a wheelrim, but both men stopped when they saw him.

"She wishes to be left alone the rest of the day," he said.

"Then you best begone from here."

Walegrin headed out from the awning without argument. Thrusher joined him.

"Well, what did you leam?"

"She told me that we will not go north and that a great fleet is headed for Sanctuary."

Thrusher stopped short. "She's mad," he exclaimed.

"I don't think so, but I don't understand either. In the meantime we'll follow our original plans. We'll come back to the city tonight and speak to the men you've found. There should be twenty-five swords finished by now-if there aren't, we'll cut our losses and leave with what we've got. I want to be out of here by sunrise."

6

The light in the tiny, upper room was provided by two foul-smelling candles. A man stood uncomfortably in the center of the room, the only place where he could stand without striking his head on the rough-hewn beams. Walegrin, deep within the comer shadows, fired questions at him.

"You say you can use a sword-do you fight in skirmish or battle?"

"Both. Before I came to Sanctuary, two years back, I lived a time at Valtostin. We fought the citizens by night and the Tostin tribes by day. I've killed twenty men in a single day, and I've got the scars to prove it." Walegrin didn't doubt him. The man had the look of a seasoned fighter, not a brawler. Thrusher had seen him single-handedly subdue a pair of rowdies without undue injury or commotion. "But you left Valtostin?" The man shifted his weight nervously. "Women-a woman."

"And you came to Sanctuary to forget?" Walegrin suggested.

"There's always work for such as me; especially in a city like this."

"So you found work here, but not with the garrison. What did you do?"

"I guarded the property of a merchant..."

Walegrin did not need to hear the rest of the explanation; he'd heard it often enough. It was as if the surviving hawkmasks had settled on a single excuse for their past involvement with Jubal. In a way there was truth in it; Jubal's trade wasn't fundamentally different from the activities of a legitimate merchant especially here in Sanctuary.

"You know what I'm offering?" Walegrin asked flatly when the man had fallen silent. "Why come to me when Tempus needs Stepsons?" __

"I'd die before I served hint."

That too was the expected response. Walegrin emerged from the shadows to embrace his new man. "Well, die you might, Cubert. We quarter in a villa to the north of town. A sign says 'Sighing Trees,' if you read Wriggle. Otherwise you'll know it by the smell. We're with Balustrus, metal-master, for one more night." Cubert knew the name and did not flinch at the sound of it. Perhaps he did not have the abhor-ence of magic and near-magic that most mercenaries had. Or he was simply a good soldier and accepted his lot with resignation. Thrusher emerged to open the door.

"Was that the last?" Walegrin asked when they were alone again.

"The best, anyway. There's one more, another hawkmask, and-" Thrusher paused, " a woman."

Walegrin's sigh made the candles flicker. "Very well-send her in." It was not the custom of the army, even here in the hinterlands, to consider a woman fit for anything but cooking and fornicating. Jubal's rejection of this time-honored attitude was, to Walegrin, far more outrageous than any of his other activities. Unfortunately, with the Stepsons changing the face of the Downwind side of town, Walegrin was forced to consider these distaff aberations if he was to leave town with a dozen men-soldiers-swords, whatever, in his command.

The last candidate entered the room. Thrusher slid back under the eaves as soon as he had shut the door.

There were two types to these women Jubal had hired. The first was small-built, all teeth and eyes and utterly devoid of the traditional virtues almost every soldier brought into battle. The second type was a man save for accident of birth-big and broad, strong as any man of equal size, but as lacking in military honor as her scrawny sister.

This one was of the first type; her head barely reached Walegrin's chest. In a way she reminded him of Illyra and the resemblence was almost enough for him to order her out on the spot.

She was shaking out her short kilt; repairing a knot at the shoulder of her tunic which tried to conceal a small breast as grimy as the rest of her. Walegrin judged she hadn't eaten for two or three days. A half-healed slash stiffened her face; another wound ran down her hard, bare arm. Someone had tried to kill this woman and failed. She tugged wide-spread fingers through her matted, dark hair, doing nothing to improve it.

"Name," he demanded when she stood still again.

"Cythen." Her voice was remarkably pleasant for one so callused.

"You use a sword?"

"Well enough."

"A lad's sword, not a man's, I suppose."

Cythen's eyes flashed from the insult. "I learned the sword from my father and my brothers, my uncles and cousins. They gave me theirs when the time came."

"And Jubal?"

"And you," she stated defiantly.

Walegrin was impressed by her spirit-and wished he could hire her relatives instead. "How have you survived since Jubal's death-or don't you think he's dead?"

"There's not enough of us left for it to make a difference. We always had more enemies than friends. The hawkmask days are over. Jubal was our leader and no one could take his place, even for a few weeks. Myself, I went to the Street of Red Lanterns-but it's not to my taste. I was not always like this.

"I saw your man face down a Stepson-so I've come to see you and what you're worth."

A man shouldn't look at his prospective officer that way-not that she was flirting. Walegrin felt she was trying to reverse their roles.

"Jubal was smart and strong-maybe not as smart and strong as he thought he was; Temp us got him in the end. I put a high price on my loyalty and who I give it to. What are your plans? It's rumored you have hard steel. Who do you use it for?"

Walegrin did not reveal his surprise; he just stared back at her. He had far less experience than the slaver, fewer men and far less gold. Ranke, in the form of Tempus, had brought Jubal down-what chance, truly, did he have? "I have the steel of Enlibar forged into swords. The Nisibisi do not fight in neat ranks and files; they ambush and we will ambush them in turn until we've made our names. Then with more swords-"

She sighed loudly. For one raging moment Walegrin thought she would turn on her heels and leave. Had she honestly expected him to scrabble for Jubal's lost domain? Or did she sense the hollowness of his confidence?

"I doubt it-but at least I'll be out of Sanctuary," she offered him her hand as she spoke.

A mercenary captain welcomed his men with a hand-shake and a comrade's embrace. Wale-grin did not embrace women as comrades. When he needed to he found some ordinary slut, laid her on her back and, with her skirts up to hide her face, took what he needed. He had seen women, ladies, that he would not treat in such a manner-but they had never seen him.

Cythen was no slut, and she'd hurt him if he treated her that way. She was no lady, either-not with her clothes half-gone and covered with dirt. Still, he wasn't about to set her back on the streets-at least not until she had a good meal. After quickly wiping his hand on his hip, Wale-grin took hers. She had a firm grip, not man-strong but strong enough to wield a sword. Trying to make it seem natural, Walegrin raised his other arm for the embrace and was saved from the deed itself by a thumping, shouting commotion on the stairs outside.

Thrusher was flat against the wall. Walegrin had a knife out of its forearm sheath and just enough time to see Cythen remove a nasty assassin's blade from somewhere in her skirt before the door burst open.

"They've taken her!"

The light from the torch on the landing blinded Walegrin to the details of the scene before him. There was a central figure, huge and yelling; writhing attachments to it, also yelling and presumably his guards, and finally Thrusher, leaping out of the darkness to wrap lethal arms around the neck of the unsubdued invader. The dark hulk groaned. It fell back, squeezing Thrusher against the wall. It twisted, freeing its right arm, then calmly peeled someone off its left side and threw him into the eaves.

"Walegrin!" it bellowed. "They've taken her!" Cythen was crouched on the balls of her feet, beneath the giant's notice but not Walegrin's. She was ready to strike when he laid a hand on her shoulder. She relaxed.

"Dubro?" Walegrin asked cautiously.

"They've taken her!" The smith's pain was not physical, but it was real nonetheless. Walegrin did not need to ask who had been taken, though he could not imagine how they had gotten past the smith in the first place.

"Tell me slowly: Who took her? How long ago? Why?" The smith drew a shuddering breath and mastered himself. "It was just past sundown, a beggar-lad came up. He said there'd been an accident on the wharf.

'Lyra bid me help if I could, so I followed the lad. I lost him almost at once^

there was nothing on the wharf-" he paused, taking Walegrin's wrist in a bone crushing grip.

"It was a trap?" Walegrin suggested, grateful for the gauntlet that protected his wrists from the full power of Dubro's despair.

The smith nodded slowly. "She was gone!"

"She hadn't simply followed you and gotten lost-or gone to visit the other S'danzo?"

A deep-pitched groan forced its way out of Dubro's throat. "No-no. T'was all torn about. She fought, but she was gone-without her shawl. Walegrin, she goes nowhere without her shawl."

"She might have escaped to hide somewhere?"

"I've searched-else I'd have been here sooner," the smith explained, shifting his grip from Walegrin's wrist to his less-protected shoulder. "I roused all the S'danzo-and they searched with me. We found her shoe behind the farmer's stall by the river, but nothing else. I went home to look for signs." Dubro shook Walegrin for emphasis. "I found this!"

He withdrew an object from his pouch and held it so close that Walegrin couldn't see it. A measure of calm returned to the smith, he released Walegrin and let him study the object. It was a metal gauntlet boss, engraved and distinctive enough to identify its wearer, should he be found. But Walegrin did not recognize it. He handed it to Thrusher.

"Do you recognize it?" he asked.

"No-"

Cythen took the boss from Thrusher's hands. "Stepson-" she said with both fear and anger. "See here, the lightning emerging from the clouds? Only they wear such designs."

"You have a plan?" Dubro demanded.

It wasn't only Dubro waiting for a plan. With the mention of the Stepsons, Cubert had re-entered the room, and Cythen was warm for blood; the hawkmasks all had reasons for vengeance. Even Thrusher, still rubbing his sore head, acted as if this were a challenge that must be answered. Walegrin tucked the boss in his belt-pouch.

"We know it was a Stepson, but we don't know who," Walegrin said, though he suspected the one who had overturned Illyra's table earlier. "We don't have time to run them all to ground, and I don't think Tempus would let us. Still, if we had a Stepson hostage or two ourselves, it would be easier-"

"I'll go with Thrusher. I know where they're at at this hour," Cubert asserted. Cythen nodded agreement.

"Remember, a dead Stepson won't do us any good. So if you must kill one, hide the body well-dammit."

"It'll be a pleasure," Cubert grinned.

"See that they get their swords," Walegrin said as Thrusher led the ex-hawkmasks from the room. He was alone with Dubro. "Now, you and I will search the back streets-and hope we find nothing."

Dubro agreed. For one generally reckoned no smarter than the hammer he used, Dubro moved well through the darkness, leading Walegrin rather than being led. The latter had expected him to be a massive hinderence and had kept him apart from the rest, but Dubro knew blind alleys and exposed basements that no-one else suspected.

At length they emerged from the Maze to the stinking structures of the chamel houses. Butchers worked there, gravediggers and undertakers as well. Slippery mounds of rotting flesh and bones stretched, undisturbed, down to the river. The gulls and the dogs avoided this place, though the shadows of huge rats could be seen scurrying over the filth. They had found Rezzel here that morning-and left her here. For a moment Walegrin thought he saw Illyra lying out there-but no, it was just another jumble of bones, glowing with decay.

"She'd come here every so often," Dubro said softly. "You'd know why, wouldn't you?"

"Dubro-you don't think I-"

"No, she trusted you and she's not wrong in such things. It's just, if she were frightened, if she thought she had no place else to go-she might come here."

"Let's go back to the bazaar. Maybe her people have found something. If not, well-I'll gather my men and whatever they've found in the morning. We'll deal with Tempus from there." Dubro nodded and led the way, carefully, around the eerily glowing things lying on the mud.

Moonflower, who was as large among women as Dubro was among men, sat awkwardly at Illy-ra's table when they entered the little rooms behind the awning. "She is alive," the immense woman said, rearranging Illyra's cards.

"Walegrin has a plan to get her back from the Stepsons," Dubro said. Between them they almost filled the room. Moonflower got off the creaking stool and approached Walegrin, a predatory curiosity in her eyes. "Walegrin-you've grown up!" She wasn't tall; no taller than Cythen, but she was built like a mountain. She wore layers of colorful clothes, more layers and colors than the eye cared to record. Yet she could move quickly to trap Walegrin before he reached the door.