Low Town (4 page)

A dozen blocks east, the breath wore off and I put my arm against an alley wall and spewed until I could barely breathe, sinking into the muck and grime. I knelt there for a while, waiting for my heartbeat to return to normal. On the way up my leg gave out, and I had to buy a crutch off a fake cripple so I could hobble the rest of the way home.

I awoke with a headache that made my swollen ankle feel like a hand-job from a ten-ochre-an-hour hooker. I tried to stand, but my vision swirled and my stomach let me know it was up for a repeat of last night’s performance, so I sat back down. Prachetas’s cunt, if I never took another whiff of pixie’s breath it would be too damn soon.

The sun streaming through my window meant it was past noon. My feeling has always been that if you’ve missed the morning you might as well go ahead and skip the afternoon as well, but there was work to do. I steadied myself, then pulled on my clothes and walked downstairs.

I took a seat at the counter. Adolphus had forgotten to cover his eye, and the recess in his skull wagged disapproval at me. “It’s too late for eggs. Don’t even ask.” I had figured one o’clock was probably past the breakfast rush but wasn’t happy to have my suspicions confirmed. “The boy from last night has been waiting for you to wake up for the past three hours.”

“Is there any coffee at least? And where is my shadow exactly?”

“There is none, and he’s in the corner.” I turned to see the youth uncurl from a wall. He had an odd talent for remaining unnoticed, or maybe my hangover was worse than I’d thought.

We looked at each other in silence, some natural reserve keeping him from beginning. “I didn’t idle half the morning away in front of your door,” I said. “What do you want?”

“A job.”

He was direct, at least, and concise—that was something. My head was pounding and I was trying to figure out where my breakfast would come from. “And what possible use could you be to me?”

“I could do things for you. Like last night.”

“I don’t know how often you think I stumble over the corpses of missing children, but last night was kind of a rare occurrence. I don’t think I can justify a full-time employee waiting around for it to happen again.” This objection seemed to do little to sway him. “What is it you think I do exactly?”

He smiled slyly, like he’d done something wrong and was happy to let me know it. “You run Low Town.”

And what a lovely fiefdom it was. “The guards might dispute that.”

He snorted. It was worth snorting over.

“I had a long night. I’m not in the mood for this nonsense. Get lost.”

“I can run errands, deliver messages, whatever you need. I know the streets like the back of my hand. I can tussle, and nobody sees me that I don’t want to.”

“This is a one-man operation. And if I was to bring on an assistant, my first requirement would be that his balls had dropped.”

The abuse did little to faze him. No doubt he’d heard far worse. “I came through yesterday, didn’t I?”

“Yesterday you walked six blocks and didn’t fuck me. I could train a dog to do the same thing, and I wouldn’t need to pay him.”

“Give me something else, then.”

“I’ll give you a beating if you don’t scramble,” I said, raising my hand in something meant to resemble a menacing gesture.

To judge by his lack of reaction, he was unimpressed with the
threat. “By the Lost One, you’re a tiresome little bastard.” The walk downstairs had reawakened the fierce pain in my ankle, and all this conversation was upsetting my stomach. I fished into my pocket and brought out an argent. “Run over to the marketplace and get me two blood oranges, a dish of apricots, a ball of twine, a coin purse, and a pruning knife. And if I don’t get half of it back in change, I’ll know you’re either a cheat or too stupid to haggle a fair price.”

He hurried off with a speed that made me wonder if he would remember everything. Something about the boy made me unlikely to bet against him. I turned back around and waited for breakfast to arrive, but found myself distracted by the scowl atop Adolphus’s girth.

“You have something to say?”

“I didn’t know you were so desperate for a partner.”

“What did you want me to do, clip him?” I rubbed slow circles into my temple with my middle and forefingers. “Any news?”

“They’re having a funeral for Tara outside the Church of Prachetas in a few hours. Don’t suppose you’ll attend?”

“You don’t suppose correctly. Anything else making the rounds?”

“Word has spread of your encounter with Harelip, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“It was.”

“Well, it has.”

It was about then that my brain decided the time had come to free itself from its long years of imprisonment, and began a furious if unproductive effort to batter through its casing. From the back Adeline noticed my agony and set a pot of coffee boiling.

I was nursing the second cup, dark and sweet, when the boy returned. He set the bag of goods on the counter and put the change next to it.

“There are seven coppers left,” I said. “What did you forget?”

“It’s all there.” He wasn’t quite smiling, but there was a distinct upturn to the thread of his lips. “I swiped the pruning knife.”

“Congratulations, you’re a pickpocket. It’s a real exclusive club.” I took an orange from the bag and started to peel it. “Who’d you get the fruit from, Sarah or Yephet the Islander?”

“The Islander. Sarah’s are half rotten.”

I ate a wedge. “Did the Islander have his son or daughter helping him today?”

“His daughter. His son hasn’t been around for a few weeks.”

“What color shirt was she wearing?”

There was a pause. “She was wearing a gray smock.” His quarter grin returned. “But you wouldn’t know if I was right, ’cause you haven’t left the bar yet.”

“I’d know if you tried to lie to me.” I finished off the orange and tossed the peel onto the bar, then set two fingers against his chest. “I’ll always know.”

He nodded without taking his eyes off mine.

I scooped the remaining coins into the purse he had bought and held it in front of me enticingly. “You got a name?”

“The kids call me Wren.”

“Consider this the rest of the week’s pay.” I tossed him the bag. “Spend some of it on getting a new shirt—you look like a bum. Then stop by later in the evening. I might have something for you to do.” He accepted this development without response or expression, as if it were of little importance one way or the other. “And quit thieving,” I continued. “If you work for me, you don’t siphon funds from the neighborhood.”

“What does ‘siphon’ mean?”

“In this context, ‘steal.’ ” I jerked my head toward the exit. “Off with you.” He headed out the front door, though not with any great hurry. I pulled the second orange from the bag. Adolphus’s frown had returned. “You have something to say?”

He shook his head and began cleaning glasses left over from the night before.

“You’re as subtle as a stone. Spit out whatever you’re choking on or quit shooting me daggers.”

“You are not a carpenter,” he said.

“Then what the hell am I doing with this pruning knife?” I asked, flourishing the tool. Adolphus’s brutish lips kept their curl. “All right, I’m not a carpenter.”

“And you are not a blacksmith.”

“Nor was there confusion on that account.”

Adolphus set the tankard down with a start, and in his flash of anger I remembered a day at Apres when those massive arms had cracked a Dren skull as easily as you would an egg, blood and brain bubbling out from white bone. “If you ain’t a carpenter and you ain’t a blacksmith, then what the hell are you doing taking on an apprentice?” He spat this last sentence at me, along with a fair bit of, well, spit.

The void where his left eye once sat gave him an unfair advantage, and I broke contact first. “I don’t judge you for your trade. But it isn’t one a child ought learn.”

“What’s the harm in getting me breakfast?”

Adolphus shrugged, unconvinced. I finished my second orange and started on the apricots in relative silence.

It’s always unsettling when Adolphus is in an ill humor. Partly because it reminds me that if he ever lost his temper it would take half the hoax in the city to bring him down, but mostly because there’s something unpleasant about watching a fat man mope. “You’re in a hell of a mood today,” I began.

The flesh on his face dragged downward, menaced more than usual by age. “The child,” he said.

It was clear he wasn’t talking about the one who had just left. “It’s a sick world, but this isn’t the first we’ve had evidence of it.”

“Who will do right for the child?”

“The guard will look into it.” I could well appreciate what dubious comfort that was.

“The guard couldn’t catch pus in a whorehouse.”

“They called in the Crown. Two agents in their prettiest bits of finery. Even sent for scryers. They’ll find something.”

“If that child has to rely on the Crown for justice, her soul will never know peace.” He let his one eye linger on mine.

This time I didn’t flinch. “That’s not my problem.”

“You will allow her violator to walk free?” The traces of Adolphus’s Skythan accent hardened during his frequent moments of melodrama. “To breathe our air, foul our wells?”

“Is he around here somewhere? Send him over, I’ll find something heavy and brain him with it.”

“You could look for him.”

I spat an apricot pit onto the floor. “Who was it pointing out that I operate on the other side of the law these days?”

“Shrug it off, make jokes, play the fool.” He banged his fist against the counter, setting the heavy wood shaking. “But I know why you went out last night, and I remember dragging you off the field at Giscan, when everyone had fled and the dead choked the sky.” The planks of the bar settled to equilibrium. “Don’t pretend it doesn’t bother you.”

The trouble with old friends is they remember history you’d prefer forgotten. Of course, I didn’t have to stick around and reminisce. The last of the apricots disappeared. “I’ve got things to look in on. Throw the rest of this junk out, and give the boy supper if he returns.”

The abrupt end of our conflict left Adolphus deflated, his fury spent, his one eye drawn and his face haggard. As I left the tavern he was wiping at the countertop aimlessly, trying not to weep.

I started out from the Earl in a sullen mood. I rely on Adolphus for a dose of morning levity and felt ill equipped without it. Between that and the foul weather, I was starting to wish I’d kept to my original inclination and spent the rest of the afternoon wrapped in bed and burning dreamvine. Thus far, the best that could be said for the day was that it was half over.

Last evening’s unexpected encounter had interfered with my intention of visiting the Rhymer—a circumstance I needed to rectify. He’d forgive my absence, likely he’d already heard the reason, but we still needed to speak. This time of day he’d either be working the docks or up at his mother’s house. His mom had a tendency to try and set me up with women in her neighborhood, so I decided he was at the wharf and hobbled off in that direction, the pain in my ankle proving as reluctant to dissipate as the one in my skull.

Yancey was likely the most talented musician in Low Town, and a damn good contact besides. I had met him during my time as an agent—he was part of a clique of Islanders that performed at balls for court officials and aristocrats. I helped him out of a bust once and in return he started to pass me information—little shit, background chatter. He never rolled on anyone. Since then, our career trajectories
had trended in opposite directions, and these days his skills were in request at some of the most exclusive gatherings in the capital. He still kept his ears open for me, though the uses to which I put his intelligence had changed.

The irony of the situation was not lost on either of us.

I found him a few feet off the west quay, surrounded by a handful of indifferent bystanders, playing a set of Kpanlogo and spouting the rhythmic poetry for which he was named. For all his skill, Yancey was about the worst street performer I’d ever seen. He didn’t take requests, he set up in spots unused to traffic, and he was surly to onlookers. Most days he was lucky to make a few coppers, a modest reward indeed for a man of his abilities. Still, he was always cheery when I saw him, and I think he got a kick out of displaying his dizzying abilities to an ungrateful public. He made enough coin playing to the upper crust to make whatever he got busking meaningless anyway.