Warlock's Shadow (16 page)

‘Berren!’

‘Don’t! You’ll fall, Master Velgian. You will.’ Now that he’d led the poet thief-taker here to his little trap, escape was enough. Then home, Master Sy, the justicar, he could tell them all he was right …

Velgian started to run, still with his swords out, straight at the gap. It was a good jump and he almost made it. His foot caught the roof and he pitched forward just as Berren had done, only Velgian wasn’t ready for it. His hands were full. It was all over in an instant. His foot slipped off, he dropped both his swords, clawed at the roof and then he was gone, over the edge.

No, not quite. When Berren inched closer, he saw Velgian still hanging by his fingertips.

‘Master Velgian!’ The roof was steep, like all the roofs in this part of the city. ‘Whose purse, Master Velgian?’

‘You going to help me up, boy?’ Velgian’s fingers were slowly slipping. Berren offered him his hand and then withdrew it. The roof was too steep, his own footing too precarious. If Velgian wanted to be helped, Berren could help him, but what Velgian really wanted was to take Berren over the edge with him – he could see it in the thief-taker’s eyes. Nothing to lose any more.

‘Thought not. Got some sense there.’

‘Whose purse, Master Velgian? Whose gold bought you?’

Velgian’s arms were shaking. ‘Are you listening, boy? You tell Syannis one thing for me. You tell him that Saffran Kuy is not the friend he thinks. You tell him that, Berren. Do that for me. Tell him …’

The edge of the roof snapped under his fingers. It was only twenty feet down to the ground, but Velgian landed flat on his back. He bounced and lay still. By the time Berren got down, Velgian was dead. His neck was broken.

They were in sight of the thief-taker’s house. Berren dragged Velgian to the door and pulled him inside. Master Sy wasn’t there, presumably off watching the Two Cranes again or whatever it was he did, but Berren could hardly go to bed and leave a body in his parlour for the thief-taker to find when he came back. In the end he curled up in the thief-taker’s chair and fell asleep there, waiting for his master to come home.

It wasn’t Master Sy who nudged him awake barely moments after his eyes had closed, though, but the Justicar.

‘Wake up, boy.’ He was poking Berren with a finger. ‘Wake up. And then tell me, right now, what the bloody Khrozus Master Velgian is doing dead on the floor.’

For a moment Berren wondered if he should run, but he was too tired and what was the point? He didn’t understand why Velgian, of all of them, would have done something like this.

‘He fell,’ he said, and then slowly and carefully went through everything that had happened, trying to put it all together in his head as he did, as if that might bring some sense to it. When he was done, he was no better off than when he started.

‘Velgian?’ Kol rubbed his face, struggling with disbelief. Berren nodded. He could see quite clearly now how the poet thief-taker must have been the man in the scent garden. Everything about him was right, right size, not the best swordsman, moved the right way, everything. But why? Why would he do it? Even Kol seemed bemused.

‘For a purse filled with the Emperor’s head like he said, I suppose.’ Kol took a deep breath and frowned as though he still didn’t really believe it. He gave Berren a strange look. ‘There are ways to get to the truth, even now,’ he said. ‘Does he have any family to claim the body?’

They looked at each other. As far as Berren knew, Velgian had come to Deephaven from somewhere far to the east. He’d come alone, and if you believed his boasts in The Eight, he’d had a string of lovers as long as your arm. But in the end he always struck Berren as a lonely man. ‘I don’t think so. Don’t you know?’

Kol shrugged. ‘You thief-takers keep yourselves to yourselves. If he had anyone, he never spoke of them to me. Right then. You’re not going anywhere for the next few weeks are you, Berren? No, let me say it another way – you stay where I can see you. You and Syannis both. Now I’m going to have to go and haul some of my men out of their cups, which isn’t going to please any of us. So he’d better still be here when I come back.’

‘He was trying to say something when he fell. Something about the witch-doctor.’

A dark look crossed Kol’s face. ‘Was he now? Well like I said, there’s people in this city who can do something about that. If they can be persuaded.’

He went away and came back half an hour later with a pair of militia-men and a handcart. They lifted Velgian into it and wheeled him away. Kol watched them go.

‘Something I need to talk about with your master. Got some news for him about what’s keeping him at the Two Cranes. So I’ll be staying around for a bit.’ He gave Berren another odd look, sort of angry and sad at the same time. ‘None of your business what it is unless he says otherwise though. If I were you, I’d piss off to bed and get some sleep.’ He settled into Master Sy’s chair. ‘Yeh, that’s what I’d do if I were you, and I’d quietly forget that any of this ever happened. Velgian, eh? Poor bastard. Your master’s right. Meddle with the affairs of kings, look what happens.’

It was only as Berren huddled under his blanket on his mattress of straw that he realised Kol hadn’t been talking about Master Velgian at the end.

O
n the last Moon-Day of the month of Floods, Master Sy was waiting for him when he came home. Velgian was long gone, forgotten, it seemed, by everyone except Berren. Kol was back to his tight-lipped self and the thief-taker remained wrapped in his own plots and schemes. Today, as Berren came in from another week at the temple, Master Sy was sitting at his little table with two enormous dried spiced sausages sat on plates in front of him and a loaf of bread between them.

‘Monks working you hard as ever?’ He was smiling. Berren nodded. The aches and pains weren’t as bad as they’d been when he’d started but he was still exhausted when he came home.

‘It’s the same every day, though. Just the same things, over and over and over again. And still with a waster.’ When was someone going to let him hold a real sword, that’s what he wanted to know. When he was old and grey and shaky and could barely even pick it up any more? He sat down, picked up one of the sausages and sniffed at it. A Mirrormere Hot, stuffed with pork and a vicious mix of spices. His favourite. He grinned and cocked his head.

Master Sy smiled. ‘Tuck in.’

Cured pork didn’t come cheap in a city that lived largely off fish. Berren smiled back. ‘You want something.’

‘Monks teaching you anything useful yet?’

He shrugged. ‘I suppose.’ He didn’t dare say anything else, not to Master Sy. Tasahre might not be what he’d been hoping for, but he’d learned enough from the thief-taker over these last two years to know how lucky he was and when to keep his mouth shut.

‘Treating your teacher with respect, I hope.’

‘Of course, master.’ He didn’t have much choice in that, either. Tasahre could probably kick him right through the temple walls if she wanted to. Or worse, she could simply stop teaching him. Yeh, and she gave him shivers when she did that thing of standing right up against him to get the angles in his arms and legs right. But it was best not to think about that.

‘Seen anything odd?’

Berren shook his head. ‘At the temple? Not much. They’re a bit here and there. They go off into the city sometimes but I don’t know what they get up to.’ He bit off the end of his sausage and started to chew; then he raised an eyebrow. ‘They’re a bit like you, master.’ His mouth was starting to tingle with the heat of the spices. He tore off a lump of bread. ‘So has Kol found someone to conjure up Master Velgian’s spirit and ask him why he did it yet?’

‘Speak of the dead with respect, lad.’ The thief-taker watched Berren for a while, chewing on his sausage. The whole inside of Berren’s mouth was burning nicely now. ‘Good one is it?’

Berren nodded, reaching for the jug of goat’s milk.

‘I can tell. You’re bright red and sweating.’ The thief-taker sniffed and took a bite of his own. He stood up and walked to the door. ‘Abyss-Day tomorrow. No lessons. You said you wanted to be a part of what I’m doing, well tonight there’s more than watching and waiting to be done. You got enough strength to do some thief-taking?’

‘Yeh! ’Course!’

‘Right, come on then.’ The thief-taker got up. ‘Bring your sausage with you.’

Berren stuffed his cheeks with a last mouthful of bread and hurried into the yard outside. He chased after Master Sy along the dim twilight of alleys and passageways that wound down the hill into The Maze. ‘Master, how much would it cost to have a sword of my own?’

The thief-taker threw back his head and laughed. ‘Berren, you have no idea what you’re asking. I couldn’t afford steel for you even if I wanted to, not until your sword-monk friends have pissed off the city princes enough to get themselves thrown out and we’re back to having paid work. Even a bad sword costs more than most men will ever see.’ He looked up at the sky. Stars twinkled down between tufts of cloud. ‘Dry tonight, I reckon.’

Berren was looking at Master Sy’s short steel sword, trying not to feel envious. ‘Was just asking. I’ll start saving my crowns then.’

‘You need emperors for a good sword, lad, and several of them. Still, maybe you can do some sword-smith a favour, eh? Get yourself a bargain.’

‘Yeh.’ Berren nodded again. He thought about how long it would take to get that sort of money. Years, probably. He turned away so the thief-taker wouldn’t see his face and followed as they walked into the evening. Master Sy talked on about this and that, a bit about swords but mostly about what he’d been doing and about the Headsman. Berren nodded and grunted and pretended to listen but his mind was far away. He was thinking about Velgian and what he’d done, and he was thinking about swords. He was thinking about how to get one.
For the purse and the fistful of golden emperors inside it, that’s why
…

By the time they reached the Two Cranes, Berren had his mind back where it was supposed to be. Master Sy slipped into the twilight shadows of an alley a few dozen yards from the hostel’s entrance. There were guards watching the street, snuffers with swords looking out for any riff-raff who might cause trouble for their wealthy guests. When the doors opened, the air spilled out from inside. It smelled of perfume and spices and wine and carried the sounds of laughter.

There was a sword-monk too. Berren didn’t see at first, not until Master Sy pointed. And then Berren had to look again. He gasped.

‘Tasahre!’ He was certain it was her. Now and then he caught a glimpse of movement as she lurked in shadows of her own.

‘Yes. They’ve been watching me,’ murmured Master Sy. ‘Making a right nuisance of themselves actually.’ The thief-taker grunted. ‘You know how I spend my nights, lad? I hide out here watching people come and go. Quiet as a mouse, stealthy as a shadow, me. Then some idiot comes along dressed in bright yellow and props himself up against a wall where he thinks nobody can see him and now everyone in the Two Cranes thinks they’ve got a sword-monk after them. Fun to see how many have got the wind up them but it’s still a nuisance. Moon-Day nights I get her. Today she can make herself useful.’ Master Sy lowered his voice. ‘When the Headsman comes out, I need you to stay here, out of sight. I’ll tell you what to do. And do
not
let her see you!’

‘But–’

The thief-taker put a finger to Berren’s lips. He grinned and looked slightly sheepish. ‘That night you and Master Velgian had your coming together, Kol was coming to see me anyway. He was coming to tell me that the Headsman’s got something up with the harbour-masters in the House of Records up near Reeper Gate. I’ve been watching long enough to know the Headsman spends a lot of time up there and he’s keeping some curious company. The House of Records is about the safest place I can think of for him to keep something short of leaving it on his own ship. It costs money and it can’t be anything big he’s got there, but whatever it is, it’s well guarded. It has a very good lock on it too, judging by the keys he keeps on his belt.’

‘You want me to–’ Pick his pocket? Was that it?

‘What I want you to do right now, boy, is stay very quiet and still and use your eyes.’

For a long time they watched in silence. People came and went, mostly small clusters of men in rich clothes and always with one or two snuffers nearby. The sounds from inside the Two Cranes grew louder as the night drew on. The warm late-spring air finally began to cool and a dampness started to rise out of the streets from the afternoon rains.

‘There!’ Master Sy crouched beside Berren as six men came out of the Two Cranes. Two snuffers walked in front, lean and wiry with eyes that darted from side to side and fingers never far from the hilts of their swords. A few paces behind came two men in long dark cloaks and fancy hats. They were laughing together. One of them was short and so fat he was almost round, with an equally round fat face and an eyepatch. Here and there, curls of light hair escaped from under his hat. He looked old. Not
old
old, not grey and hobbling old, but older than Master Sy.

The second man was taller, younger. He walked with a cane and he had a loud voice with a heavy accent that cut the air. When he laughed at the fat one’s jokes, it was more a braying honk than proper laughter. Behind them both came another pair of snuffers, long and lanky this time. These ones carried short straight swords, like the one Master Sy had.