Aethersmith (Book 2) (27 page)

“It did not belong in this world. If a ship comes, I want
them to find nothing but a lost traveler looking for passage to the mainland. I
want no mysteries to make them wary of me. So why does Gaktu want to challenge
me? If everyone saw what I can do with that sword, why would he want to fight
me?” Brannis wondered.

“To prove he is the best hunter. A panther’s claws will cut
a man’s neck with one swipe. A boar’s tusk will open his gut. A hunter lives by
avoiding the weapons of his prey. The more dangerous the prey, the more the
hunter proves himself. Gaktu is one among many who are saying you are a spirit
who escaped the spirit world when Kyrus left. To kill a spirit would have his
name told in stories long after he is dead,” Gahalu explained, putting a hand
on Brannis’s shoulder.

“The Denku revere the spirits,” Brannis protested. “Why
would he be honored for killing one? And besides, I am no spirit. I am a man,
like you, or like Kyrus. I am just a man far from home.”

“I believe you are a man, and no spirit. And, yes, we revere
the good spirits. They are not saying you are a good spirit.”

* * * * * * * *

Brannis stood across an empty expanse of the village center,
perhaps a dozen paces, and stared down his opponent. He had considered donning
his armor, and allowing the Denku hunter free rein to jab ineffectually at him
with a spear, but thought better of it. If he were to do that, he would never
be able to take off the armor while he was on the island, lest they wait to
catch him without it for a rematch. Avalanche was still sheathed at his side;
Brannis did not want to kill Gaktu if he could help it.

“You want kill me,” Brannis called out, feeling a tad more
comfortable with Kyrus’s knowledge of Denku than when he had arrived, sleepy and
disoriented. “I say you are killer of men, not hunter.”

“Words will not save you, spirit,” Gaktu shouted back, loud
enough to ensure everyone gathered to watch heard him.

“You kill strangers. I do not kill hunters.” Brannis sat
down on the ground. “Spirit Man Kyrus is my brother. I do not kill his
friends.”

“Coward.”

“Friend,” Brannis corrected.

“I have no spirits for friends. If you do not fight, I will
just kill you.” Gaktu advanced threateningly at Brannis, who could not be
certain whether the Denku hunter was bluffing.

“Fine, then.” Brannis scrambled to his feet and drew
Avalanche swiftly from its sheath.

“Your slow blade is no match for my spear!” Gaktu boasted
before all.

Oh
, Brannis realized,
he saw me swinging it slowly
so I did not send shards of rock everywhere
. Brannis grinned, holding his
sword out lazily in guard position, letting it drift back and forth at
approximately the speed he had used to break the marble wall.

Gaktu was cautious. Hunters lived longer lives when they
made sure of their prey’s limits before striking. The Denku hunter made short
jabs with his spear, testing Brannis’s reflexes. It was all Brannis could do to
avoid letting his instincts take over and take a real swing in his defense.

Not yet,
Brannis thought.
Not yet.

When Brannis judged that Gaktu had made just the right sort
of strike, a straight thrust that reached just inside Avalanche’s reach, he
sprang into action. The sluggish, drifting sword became a blur of motion faster
than Gaktu could react to. The first swipe chopped the tip off the spear. The
second halved its length. As Gaktu stumbled backward in surprise, Brannis
deftly cut between his wide-spaced grip and left his opponent with two short,
splintered sticks in his hand, each the size of a tent stake.

Brannis punched out with the cross guard of the sword,
pulling the blow just as it connected with Gaktu’s chest. It was still enough
to take the hunter from his feet and deposit him jarringly on his back.

“I win,” Brannis stated.

He sheathed Avalanche, making it clear that he had no
intention of fighting to the death. Then he offered a hand to help Gaktu rise,
but the hunter’s pride—and ribs—were too badly hurt to accept. That was
something Brannis could understand, until he saw the look Gaktu gave him. It
was filled with fear and hatred, and was more than Brannis could ignore.

Reaching down as Gaktu cowered and tried to defend himself,
Brannis grabbed the necklace Gaktu wore and snapped the leather thong. Letting
it hang by one end, the panther teeth slid off and fell to the dirt all around
the defeated hunter.

“You are not ready to be first hunter when Fannu becomes
elder,” Brannis told Gaktu, loudly enough for everyone to hear. “Fannu can tell
what is prey and what is friend.”

That should have been “who,” but I think they understood
me.

* * * * * * * *

Brannis dined by his hut that night, on a bowl of fish and
mango stew that Gahalu brought to him. It was tasty, with a sweet saltiness so
prevalent in Denku cooking, but a far ride from the feasting that had accompanied
Spirit Man Kyrus’s arrival.

“You made enemies today,” Gahalu told him, sitting by
Brannis’s side as the itinerant knight ate his supper.

“Gaktu is no more an enemy now than when he first tried to
kill me,” Brannis reasoned, talking around a mouthful of stew. If Brannis had
any thought of the rudeness of speaking with a full mouth, it was mitigated by
the fact that he was hungry and a new spoonful of stew replaced each that was
swallowed with little break between.

“You broke his necklace. You shamed him,” Gahalu explained.
“You had beaten him. You could have left it at that.”

“You should have seen the look in his eyes when I offered
him help standing. It made me angry. He made a fool’s mistake and I made one in
turn.” Brannis sighed. “I could have killed him, if that was my way, and I
thought giving him his life ought to have earned me his thanks. Would I have
made fewer enemies if I had killed him instead?” Brannis asked, genuinely
curious as to the Denku custom on ending challenges.

“Perhaps. You certainly would have made one fewer,” Gahalu
joked, trying to ease the mood. “But I think perhaps to simply have walked away
may have been best. He could not challenge you again without looking foolish,
and if he attacked you by surprise, he would mark himself as a coward.”

“Well, I have made enemies before. Hopefully I can mend that
garment over time. I like to have a clean conscience. I sleep well. I think any
man who lives his life right should and I would not want to lose that,” Brannis
said, staring vaguely off into the jungle rather than at his companion.

“Well enough,” Gahalu said, rising to his feet. “One other
thing. The fishermen pulled ashore with word of a ship on the horizon.”

Brannis perked up. “A ship? Is it headed this way?”

Oh, Kyrus, your timing could not have been worse. Another
day or two and you might have gotten off this island and back to Acardia,
instead of Kadrin.

“It fights the wind, but yes. The night will be too
treacherous to land without help. I doubt they will even get close enough tonight
to try. Get sleep and take your leave of us in the morning, if they will have
you. I think it would be best if they will take you. Spirit Man Kyrus never
caused this trouble you brought,” Gahalu said, seeming colder toward Brannis
than he ever had seemed to Kyrus.

“Well, do not let them leave without me,” Brannis joked,
informing Gahalu that he knew how Kyrus had come to be stranded on Denku Appa
in the first place.

“Have no worry. Toktu will be just as happy with you gone.
He liked Spirit Man Kyrus, but I do not think he would go to any effort to keep
you
here, spirit or not.”

* * * * * * * *

Brannis had thought to get one night of peaceful sleep all
to himself before departing on the morrow, but the thought was not destined to
last. Giggling outside his hut broke him free of that drifting place where the
mind waits idly for slumber to overtake it. His thoughts instantly went to
Tippu and Kahli, Kyrus’s seductive little admirers. He almost had to grudgingly
admire their persistence, but he quickly realized there were more than just two
awaiting him outside.

Brannis took their bait and rose to see what was transpiring
without. There were a dozen or so girls, clad in … Well, by any Kadrin standard
of decency, essentially they were
not
clad, except in the most
nitpicking sense. They wore loincloths, beads, and bracelets, but Brannis saw
it as a tawdry brothel turned inside out to deposit their wares in the sparse
jungle. The Denku all dressed vaguely such, from old crones to fishermen, but
intent made all the difference to Brannis’s way of thinking. The thoughts of
the giggling throng were plainly written in eager eyes and coy smiles.

Interestingly enough, Brannis saw no sign of either of
Kyrus’s nemeses among the group. Quite possibly, they were the only unwed girls
from the village not present. The nervous, conspiratorial whispers ceased when
they saw Brannis emerge from the hut, becoming a cacophony of shrill,
incomprehensible Denku language that Brannis only guessed at the meaning of by
context.

Brannis held up a hand in front of him and was grateful that
the gesture to stop was universal enough for Denku to have adopted it. The
girls’ propositions, questions, and promises slowed to a halt as they waited
for Brannis to say something in response.

“Wait here,” Brannis told them.

They looked confused, but none wanted to give offense and
upset him. There was a competition of sorts afoot and Brannis meant to settle
it cleanly. He took a rock with something resembling a point and drew a long
line in the dirt in front of the girls. By gestures, he got the point across
that they were to line up along it.

“I pick one girl. I pick, not you. Understand?” Brannis
asked. Heads nodded obediently and enthusiastically. One girl started babbling
a question, but Brannis cut her off with an imperious gesture. “Not you.” He
pointed back toward the village. “Go.”

The rest of the girls kept quiet as thieves as Brannis made
his way up and down the line, making a show of looking them over. “I will pick
one girl tonight. Any girl I do not pick, no argue. Understand?” Again, there
was nodding.

As Brannis inspected them, one by one he sent them back to
the village, never giving a particular reason, but leaving the impression that
they had failed some test, were lacking a certain something he craved. Most
bore the rejection with resignation. A few cried softly—their own doing, by
Brannis’s logic.

At last, he left himself with the shyest, least annoying of
the girls—possibly the youngest, though he would have been hard pressed to
divine her age. She stood rigidly at attention, not lifting her gaze to meet
Brannis’s.

Brannis lifted her chin, and looked her in the eyes when he
spoke to her. “At home, I have a girl I love. I choose her. Tonight, if you be
quiet, you can sleep in the hut. Tomorrow, I leave on a boat. You can tell
other girls anything. Make a good story.” Brannis smiled gently. He had no
further trouble falling asleep that night and made a young Denku girl the envy
of her friends.

Chapter 16 - Hide and Seek

“He was about yea high.” A soft and fluff-faced tavern
keeper held a stubby-fingered hand at chest height. “Hair a bit darker than
hay, mayhaps. Built like a stick, but then so many boys are at that age, eh?”
The man tried a bit of humor but it fell short in the face of the three very
serious men to whom he was speaking.

“What did he carry with him? What was he wearing?” Jinzan
Fehr asked in a low voice. He was dressed in the garb of the night guards to
attract less attention as he made his way about the city. Black lacquered mail
and doublet, dark grey hood and trousers. The truncheon and short sword at his
belt were as useful as horseshoes on a monohorn, but he carried them to
complete the disguise. He made no secret of his identity to those he
encountered, but as one of the Liberators, he drew greetings and well-wishes as
he walked down any street. For his purposes, that would have been
counterproductive.

“Little lad was all in his feast-day best—’cepting of course
he prob’ly dresses like that most days, being yours and all. He was scuffed and
dirty like he’d been out playin’ in the streets. Had himself a walking stick,
fancy as beat all. Carried it around like a parade banner, though, he did,
usin’ both hands and keepin’ it away from his body, like so,” the keeper
replied, mimicking the manner he described.

“Did you speak to him, or try to apprehend him?” Jinzan
persisted. He was not angry with the tavern keeper, but a hint of desperation
in his voice might have led one to think that he was.

“No, High Councilor. I heard the rumors of folk turnin’ up
dead and kept my mouth shut. Made like I didn’t see him at all. He looked right
at me—but not in the eye—and just kept on about whatever business he had. Never
said a word or nothin’.” The nervous keeper pulled a bar rag from his pocket
and wiped at his brow.

“Where did he go from here?” Jinzan asked, staring intently
at the keeper across his own bar. It was the first fresh sighting they had
found in days and he could ill afford to squander it. The animate dead they had
been finding in Anzik’s wake were less than helpful when it came to answering
questions.

“He rummaged a bit in the kitchen and left out the back way.
I went straight to find a guardsman after that,” the man half-pleaded.

Jinzan did not wait to make an apology for scaring the man,
who had done no wrong. He strode to the door and stormed through into the
kitchen. “For your help,” one of Jinzan’s similarly garbed companions said,
leaving a weighty purse of gold on the bar. They were there to aid High
Councilor Fehr in whatever way he required, including smoothing over the
feelings of distraught informants.

The kitchens were dark, save for the starlight that came
through the open window. Jinzan lit the room like daylight with a quick
gesture. A stack of bowls had been upset, and there was a puddle of thick,
brown broth on the floor near the stew pot. Jinzan looked into the pot and saw
that the ladle had been left in carelessly, covering it with cold stew, handle
and all.

At least he is remembering to eat, even if he is acting a
pig about it.

Jinzan walked out the back door and into the narrow back
alley behind the tavern. There was no sign of any boy. It was late night even
by Zorren’s cosmopolitan standards, with even the drunkards and whores abed.
The only sounds were the far-off rush of the Santar River and the caterwauling
of a cat in heat. When his two companions emerged from the tavern to join him,
Jinzan picked a direction and took off, trusting to luck in the absence of a
solid lead to follow.

They had come so close.

* * * * * * * *

Shadow to shadow, Tod made his way over to where Jodoul had
hidden himself. “What sort of cat was that supposed to be? You thinkin’ that’s
what a dead one would sound like?” Tod whispered sarcastically. The two were
dressed plainly in dark greys and browns. Both were from a school of skulking
that liked having answers to angry questions about why one might be nosing
about in the dark. None of the answers to those questions bore as much
credibility when the answerer was dressed in nothing but black. It was a
suspicious color, and not a lot better for hiding than the dark drabs they had
chosen instead.

“Worked, dinnit?” Jodoul snapped quietly. “They just went
off that way, but I think they were guessin’. They seemed all hot and eager
headin’ in, like they was owed money from some fella in there. They come out
slow, look around a bit, wander off. Think the kid bobbed ’em again.”

“Well, we can sneak after ’em rest o’ the night and hope
that sorcerer don’t get wind of us up his breeches, hopin’ he gets lucky, or we
can head back and tell Faolen ’n’ see if he’s got a better idea,” Tod
suggested, clearly favoring the latter option. Neither of them relished the
thought of tailing a sorcerer of the renown of Jinzan Fehr. They had never
heard of him back home, but everyone in Megrenn knew his name. The trouble with
sorcerers was that they could see out the back of their heads and even through
walls with their magic vision; one could never be certain when they would try
looking.

“Yeah, let Faolen run around chasin’ famous sorcerers if he
likes. I’ll run the docks and card-halls all night every night if’n he wants me
to, but I’m not fer sticking my neck under an axe on the chance we get lucky
the night they stumble on the kid,” Jodoul said.

The two kept to the alleyways and backstreets of Zorren as
they departed, safe from death at the hands of the Megrenn magic for one more
night.

* * * * * * * *

“Yeah, looks like they lost the scent of him,” Jodoul
explained. “Kid musta gone through, though, ’cause they had a sure hurry
headin’ there in the first place. If’n they’d have gotten nothin’, they’d have
come back out the way they gone in.”

Faolen looked down at the huge table around which the four
of them gathered. Upon its surface was Zorren, rendered in miniature by Faolen’s
magic. It had started days ago as a crude copy, based on a paper map they had
brought with them from Kadrin, but as they learned more of the city, it grew
more detailed and more accurate. Many of the houses were still just little
boxes with roofs, but the buildings they had studied bore more detail,
especially the ones that Faolen had seen personally. The ships in the harbor
bore tiny names scrawled upon their sides, keeping track of the comings and
goings of Megrenn’s merchant and naval fleets. The beautiful granite structures
near the center of the city were the headquarters of the Megrenn High Council,
the royal palace, the tournament grounds, and the Hall of Emissaries, where
foreign lands housed their diplomats on a semi-permanent basis within Megrenn.
Also rendered in greater detail were a number of seemingly random lesser
buildings, whose roofs Faolen had turned red, breaking with the otherwise
faithful—if incomplete—rendition of the city.

“High Councilor Fehr would not have stopped there in such
haste had a sighting not been reported. I will mark it anyway, just to be
safe.” Faolen waved a hand over that portion of the city, and the roof of the
Pickled Swine Tavern changed, along with a few details as Tod and Jodoul had
described the building to Faolen earlier. There were two glassed and shuttered
windows flanking the door, a back entrance to the alley, and a fanciful sign
depicting a pig poking its head up out of a barrel.

Aelon shrugged. “If there’s any melody to this song, I can’t
hear it. Lad seems to be running around the city on a lark. Could it be these
Megrenn are having it on with us?”

“No. If they knew of us, I suspect they would have just
killed us and been done with it. Chained in the dungeon at the very least. They
have nothing to gain from leading us on a merry chase in their capital, with
one of their High Councilors keeping out of the war atop it,” Faolen reasoned.

“Well, figure it like this,” Jodoul began, trying to make
himself sound erudite. “The little fella starts at home, see?” Jodoul pointed
to the Fehr estate in the northwest of the city, on a hillside with expansive
gardens and a view of the Aliani Sea. “Then they find dead horses and a stable
boy here.” He pointed again. “A dockworker here.” He pointed to a warehouse near
the harbor. “A butcher and his apprentice. A librarian and some old scholar. A
fisherman and half his crew. A greengrocer but not his wife or daughter. A pair
of city watchmen. A Safschan caravan master and eight of his guards,” Jodoul
summarized, giving everyone a knowing look to add to the suspense. “The lad’s
lookin’ for food and good places to hide. Think about it: warehouse, stables,
library, caravan … all great hidin’ spots. The rest he got somethin’ to eat.”

Aelon looked to Faolen and rolled his eyes, keeping Jodoul
at his back. “I must get up front,” Aelon said. “It’s dawn and who knows, we
might see a customer today.” They had rented a storefront to work from, and
ostensibly to sell the wares they had brought with them from Kadrin. While
names like “The Mysterious Shop of Wonders,” “Things from Kadrin,” and “Exotic
Goods” seemed like fine names for attracting business, Faolen had overruled
them all. They called their shop “Marod’s Goods” at Faolen’s insistence, as he
deemed it about the least likely name he could think of to attract neither
unwanted business nor suspicious attention from authorities. They had a crude
sign painted up on the short coin, just black paint on a plain wooden plank.
The humble and boring facade kept away most; it was Aelon’s job (in the role of
the eponymous “Marod”) to dissuade any stalwart shoppers who made it past those
safeguards. Aelon spoke pidgin Megrenn, drove hard bargains, and made no
attempt to win over any would-be customers.

Tod and Jodoul lingered as Faolen stared dreamily at the
city model. They had no real business to attend to and no good excuse save
fatigue for wanting to take their leave. It was not technically a military
hierarchy, but since leaving Kadris, Faolen had been very clear about who was
in charge. Faolen had not given them any further orders, nor permission to
leave.

“Hungry. Yes,” Faolen said, half to himself. After a long
pause, he continued. “But not hiding—at least that is not his first thought.
Stables, docks, caravans … He wants to escape the city but has failed each
time. And he cannot be hiding in these places for long, since the bodies have
been discovered quickly enough. He must have some other place he is taking
refuge.”

“Like where?” Tod asked. “Sounds like he got chased out of
some good spots already.”

“Has anyone considered the sewers?” Faolen asked, cocking
his head curiously.

“Yeah, a bit,” Jodoul replied. “It’d be the kinda place I’d
have hidden if I was ten summers and runnin’. But nobody said anything about
seein’ dead folks standin’ around down there.”

“Only three sorts of folk make a habit of walking the
sewers,” Faolen observed. “Crews who keep them in working order, thieves, and
guards who go down to protect work crews from thieves. I shall need you two
to—”

“No problem, already ahead of you. Me and Tod ain’t makin’
enough coin at the export racket; we want some easy gold. I’ll ask around and
see what turns up, if any of them are talkin’ about dead thieves in the
sewers.”

“Very well. I will make my rounds of the brothels,” Faolen
replied, straight faced and all business.

“Hey now! That don’t seem fair,” Tod replied.

“Jodoul noted that the boy left the grocer’s wife and
daughter alive. So far he has only killed men and boys. Brothels are also
places known for harboring the sort of women whose maternal instincts may not
be entirely fulfilled. They might take pity on a runaway. He might not take it
into his head to kill them,” Faolen said with a shrug.

Jodoul gave Faolen a hard, suspicious look but said nothing.
Gut them sorcerers. Can’t win, fightin’ ’em with words.

* * * * * * * *

Anzik blew a frustrated sigh that flipped a lock of his
filthy hair out of his eyes.
Why does everyone try to grab me? Podley seemed
so nice that time Mother brought us to see the Delamis.
The footman stood
smartly aside the door of the Delami family carriage, just the way Anzik had
remembered him. He seemed to belong that way, dead or not, so Anzik had put him
there after reanimating him.
Maybe they will not notice … for a while.

The carriage house had seemed large enough—and cluttered
enough—that he might have hidden there a night or two. If the carriage had been
readied to leave, he might have tried sneaking aboard to see where it got him.
Alas, it appeared the carriage would be going nowhere; the one who put people
in it was dead and Anzik did not intend to stay around to make him carry out
his job.

The back of the carriage house opened onto a narrow road.
Anzik poked his head out to make sure no one was around, even though he could
see in the aether that there was not. It seemed like the thing heroes in the
fairy stories did when hiding, so he thought he ought to as well. He darted
across the narrow road to an even smaller one—more a man-width gap than a
proper street. It was well that no one watched him go, as the sight of an
awkward, scrawny boy trying to “dart” while carrying a staff half again his
height might have given cause to laugh. Anzik hated being laughed at.

With barely a thought, a wrought-iron grating in the ground
rose up, revealing an iron-runged ladder. Tucking the Staff of Gehlen under one
arm, Anzik climbed down into the sewers.

The grate settled itself back down with a faint grating of
metal on stone.

* * * * * * * *

Jinzan sat in the foyer of his home, slouched across the
arms of a velvet-upholstered chair. He looked haggard and scruffy. Unshaved
stubble threatened to turn into a proper beard if left wild much longer. His
eyes were red-rimmed from lack of sleep. A stink of sweat and manure wafted off
him from days spent chasing reports of his son in stables, alleys, and
warehouses. He had slept little, interrupted by new reports every few hours
throughout the day, at his request.