He gritted his teeth. He hadn't been with a woman for far too long, and it was distracting him. Perhaps it's time to pay a visit to The Arms of Heaven. Suzette knew his desires well enough, and he could spare a bit of coin.
That brought a smile to his face. With the exorbitant fees he charged for his services, he could afford anything he wanted. He'd actually purchased a Praamian patent of nobility to establish his Lord Anglion identity.
Pushing aside thoughts of beautiful women, he turned his attention back to Lord Damuria's mansion. The constant flow of Steel Company mercenaries confirmed his suspicions. Something had Lord Damuria skittish as a newborn foal.
The Praamian nobleman—Beritane, that's the name—had said Lord Damuria was difficult to contact. Whatever it was had Lord Damuria in fear for his life.
Odd, given that he's one of the wealthiest men in Voramis. I guess all the gold in the world and a private army isn't enough to make you truly feel safe.
He contemplated his plan of attack. He could approach this target any number of ways, but which would lead to the fewest unnecessary complications? After a few moments, he made up his mind.
Time to see how good these Steel Company mercenaries really are. Human error had simplified his job more times than he could count. One lazy patrol, sleeping guard, or moment of inattention could open a hole for him to slip through to reach his target.
He slipped down the sloped roof. The mansions of Upper Voramis were spread too far apart for him to travel their rooftops conveniently, forcing him to use the main avenue. Of course, he always came prepared.
He dropped to the ground behind the concealment of a thick hedge and reached the satchel he'd tucked beneath it earlier. The rough-spun clothing of a workman lay within, along with a pair of pruning shears and a small shovel. He still wore the alchemical mask concealing his true features. The clothing and tools completed the disguise of a grizzled, one-eyed gardener.
As he came around the hedge and emerged onto the side street, he adopted a stooped posture and dropped his eyes to the street. With the slow shuffle of a weary working man, he would draw little attention. If anything, the nobles would ignore him—they didn't need his sort muddying the pristine image of life in Upper Voramis. The Heresiarchs would say nothing as long as he didn't loiter.
The flow of people, carriages, and vendors thickened on the main avenue that ringed Upper Voramis. Myriad scents assaulted the Hunter's sensitive nostrils. If he wanted, he could identify the unique odors of each person and animal that passed him. But without a target to follow, he simply forced himself to take slow, deep breaths until his nose adjusted to the overwhelming array of smells.
As he passed the Maiden's Fields, he searched the avenue for the little wooden cart with its buckets of flowers. Disappointment twisted in his gut. He'd hoped to see Farida here—her favorite place to set up her bright blooms. At the same time, he found himself relieved not to see her. Perhaps her absence meant she was receiving lessons in reading, writing, arithmetic, music, and history from the Beggar Priests. He'd given more than enough coin to ensure her life in the House of Need was as comfortable as their austerity permitted.
He picked up his pace, wending through the busy streets and exiting the gates that led down the short, steep descent to Lower Voramis.
The buildings at the base of the hill were like nothing in either Upper or Lower Voramis. Though their architecture was the same mixture of brick, stone, and wood as the rest of the city, they were painted garishly bright colors—each color indicating a different manner of entertainment.
Painted women in scanty garments lounged outside the white buildings, calling out to passing pedestrians, offering teasing glimpses of their wares. The men who stumbled out of the orange and yellow buildings had glazed eyes, dull expressions, and the manic grins of narcotic-fueled euphoria. Thick clouds of opium and arguilah waterpipe smoke puffed from within the grey buildings, while the shouts and cheers of men enjoying dog fights and bare-handed brawls shook the walls of the red buildings. Heavy-set bouncers allowed only men to enter the blue buildings, while women were sent to the green "pleasure palaces". No one ever spoke of what went on behind the walls painted a funereal black.
This was the Blackfall District, home to the Bloody Hand, and the place where citizens of Praamis indulged in every sort of entertainment, vice, and depravity that could be desired or imagined. The Hunter had little reason to frequent this section of town, save for the infrequent visit to The Arms of Heaven—always in disguise, of course. The Bloody Hand ruled Voramis from the shadows, controlling the city through the threat of violence, blackmail, and crime. Thieves, assassins, pimps, thugs, smugglers, they had their hand in everything illicit. No one operated in Voramis without their permission.
Except for him, of course. Though he despised what they were doing to the city, he'd made a point of avoiding direct conflict with the Bloody Hand. Not out of fear, but because he didn't need the hassle. If he angered them, they could prove a powerful enemy. Only a fool pokes an unchained greatcat, someone had told him. As long as they stayed out of his way, he had no reason to interfere with their business.
His steps led through the Blackfall District, toward the monolithic sanctuaries of the Temple District. He avoided Divinity Square; at this time of day, the broad plaza around the Fountain of Piety would be crowded with the pious, poor, and pompous. He had no need for gods anyway.
Beyond the white-washed temples, the streets grew muddier, the houses dirtier and shabbier. The people also looked rougher. They wore work clothes, their hands gnarled and callused from heavy labor, faces stained with dust, sweat, and grime. The commoners of Lower Voramis minded their own business, preferring to live their lives without interference from the King, nobility, or the Bloody Hand.
A wall of foul odors hit him as he entered the Beggar's Quarter. Debris lay piled high along the streets, and people emptied buckets of refuse into the alleys without care for those huddled in makeshift huts below. The denizens of this section of Voramis were the forgotten, downtrodden, and abandoned.
That's what makes it the perfect hiding place.
He set his gardening tools against a nearby wall; someone would find them and sell, trade, or perhaps even use them. From within his leather satchel, he produced a shabby cloak, which he slung over his hunched shoulders. He moved at a quick shuffle, fast enough to avoid being accosted but not so hurried he drew questioning gazes.
Deeper into Beggar's Quarter he went, occasionally pausing in his journey to "rest" and scan the road behind him for any sign of pursuit. No one knew he was the Hunter—his alchemical masks concealed his true features—but decades as an assassin had taught him to be wary.
Confident he was unobserved, he ducked into an alley. His stomach churned at the concentrated odor of filth and refuse in the tight space, but he forced himself to move at a steady pace toward the door at the far end of the narrow lane.
The interior of the building appeared empty at first glance. The rotting wooden beams looked ready to collapse beneath the weight of the roof, and large cracks ran through the mortar of the stone walls. However, deeper in, thick pillars shored up the ceiling, and a layer of plaster kept the wind from whistling through the walls.
Makeshift huts and tents dotted the floor of what had once been a warehouse. People moved among the dwellings, and the smell of smoke and cooking food permeated the building. A child ran past, a dog yapping at his heels. Two men sat before a barrel, a deck of ragged playing cards spread out before them.
One looked up as he entered. "Is that you, my lord?"
The Hunter nodded. "Aye, 'tis." He spoke in the thick accent common among the Einari living on the continent of Fehl across the Frozen Sea. "What d'ye think of my new face, Karrl?"
The man, known by his friends as Twelve-Fingers Karrl, grinned. "Looks mighty fine, mighty fine indeed." He squinted up at the Hunter. "I hardly recognize you."
"That's the point, eh?" The Hunter gave him a dramatic wink. "If
ye don't recognize me, neither will them what's lookin' fer me."
"S'truth," said the other man, a fellow by the name of Jak the Thumb, on account of his disfigured thumbs. "They can't harm you if they can't find you." He tried to tap his nose, but he'd clearly had too much of whatever was in the clay jar on the barrel.
The Hunter grinned and tapped his own nose. "Right ye are."
He'd had one of his contacts in Lower Voramis put out the word that this building was a place beggars could squat without fear of hassle. Their presence made certain no one would think to find him living here. To explain his odd comings and goings and the odd disguises, he'd started a rumor that he was a nobleman from the land across the Frozen Sea, hiding from assassins sent to kill him. No one had questioned it—the people living here tended not to ask questions as long as they could find shelter from the wind.
He glanced at the empty chair before the barrel. "Where's Thrifty Pete?"
Karrl shrugged. "Dunno. Ain't seen much of him recently."
"Tisn't like him to stay gone this long," Jak muttered in a slurring voice. "Seems a lot of us has gone elsewhere."
The Hunter raised an eyebrow. "What's he talkin' about?"
Karrl gave a dismissive wave. "Oh, you know how Jak gets when he's had too much to drink."
"I ain't had too much!" Jak protested. "Pete, Rozyn, Tarth, a few others. They ain't come 'round these parts in weeks."
"Is that true?" the Hunter asked.
Karrl shrugged. "I ain't seen 'em either, but might be they've just found somewhere else to hole up a while."
The Hunter nodded. The men, women, and children that stayed in the building were a transient lot, always on the move to find better opportunities.
He thrust his chin at the clay jar sitting on the barrel. "Spare a nip of that fer me?"
Karrl shook his head. "Jak's had more than his fair share. The Mistress herself couldn't coax a drop out of that jar."
"Ach!" The Hunter threw up his hands. "And here's me achin' for somethin' to wet me whistle." He drew a silver drake from his purse. "Might be the two of ye's could pop out and fetch another fer me? The change's yers fer the trouble."
Jak stared at the coin through bleary eyes, but Karrl snatched it from the Hunter's hand. "Back in three shakes of a bull's dangle." He pulled Jak to his feet and dragged the man away.
The Hunter had no intention of drinking whatever foul swill Karrl brought back, but the men had their pride. Something about the plight of the people living here made him want to help. Perhaps it was due to the fact that they were outcasts, just like him. The only difference was that he could afford luxury, while they were condemned to a life of hardship and misery.
As he hurried toward the heart of the building, he glanced at Old Nan's tent. The old woman was nowhere in sight. She couldn't have gotten far, not with her limbs twisted by age and malnutrition. A short distance away, a young girl—Ellinor, I think—rocked a screaming child in her arms. Little Arlo would start walking any day.
A few more of the men and women nodded or offered a polite greeting, but most went about their business, ignoring him. He liked it that way. He had his own affairs to attend to.
His steps led toward the thick wooden door that guarded the entry to his private rooms. He quickly worked the complex locking mechanism, and the door swung open on silent, well-oiled hinges. Once inside, he pushed the lever that re-engaged the lock. Nothing short of a battering ram would get through that.
He strode toward the wardrobe that occupied the entire western wall of his room. Within lay an assortment of alchemical flesh masks, periwigs of every conceivable hair color, and outfits ranging from the formal wear of the nobility to the rough cloth of a dockhand. With care, he peeled off the mask he wore and set it gently in its place.
He stripped off his dirty workman's clothing, tossing them into a ball beside the bathing chamber, and splashed water over his body. As always, his fingers traced the scars on his back and chest. One for every life Soulhunger took. It was as if an invisible hand carved the marks in his flesh, a reminder of the death he brought.
Drying off with a soft cotton towel, he strode naked toward the wardrobe and perused the masks. He selected the face of a young man—well, younger than the disguises he usually wore. Though his memories stretched back forty or fifty years, he appeared in his mid-thirties, no older than forty. Perhaps whatever gave him his inhuman strength, stamina, and speed also kept him from aging. He was too tall, too broad in the shoulders to convincingly pull off the disguise of a much younger man. However, for the part he was to play, he needed to appear no older than twenty-five. The Steel Company would never buy his act otherwise.
Reaching into a drawer, he pulled out a jar of Graeme's special alchemical adhesive. The paste was water- and sweat-resistant, and affixed the mask to his face with such precision that it appeared perfectly lifelike. After years of practice, the Hunter could apply the disguise in a matter of minutes.
He turned to the mirror and stopped as he caught a glimpse of his true features. Strong jaw, a nose neither too long nor too thick for his face, and prominent cheekbones—a face most in Voramis would consider handsome. But from beneath his heavy eyebrows, black eyes peered back at him in the mirror.
That was what marked him as an outsider. Those eyes couldn't be human, but he had no idea what they were. The few people who had seen them had stared in horror, or attacked him, shrieking of demons.
His eyes, like the dagger on his belt and the scars on his chest, were another mystery he'd failed to solve. Though he rarely thought about them anymore, the question of his past still haunted him.
With effort, he shrugged the maudlin thoughts aside and set about applying the disguise. Lord Damuria's men handle patrols and watch duty well enough, but let's see how they respond to an actual intruder.
Chapter Twelve
The young man who swaggered up the streets of Upper Voramis looked nothing like the man beneath the façade. Bright red hair spilled down his shoulders, and featherglass lenses turned the Hunter's black eyes a blue as deep as the Endless Sea. Though he had the same tall, lean build, his stride had an exuberance and buoyancy only found in those not yet worn down and burdened by life. He flashed his crooked smile and waved a jaunty greeting to everyone he passed.
"Flower, sir?"
He turned to smile at the young girl standing beside the rickety wooden cart. "Why of course, dear girl!" Shifting the cloth-wrapped bundle under his left arm, he produced a coin from within his jacket. The girl, no more than eight, watched wide-eyed as he made the silver drake dance between his fingers. He flicked it into the air, caught it deftly, and made it disappear. The girl's puzzled frown was replaced by laughter a moment later when he produced the coin from behind her ear.
"How many flowers will this get me?" he asked.
"Two bundles of my finest roses," she replied. "Not a wilted petal among the lot of them."
"Tell you what." He crouched beside her and dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "I'll take just one of the roses with me now, but next time you see a pretty lady come along, you give her the rest and say 'A gift from Gladrin Silvertongue'."
The girl raised a curious eyebrow. "You call yourself Silvertongue? A silly name, that."
He stood, and his hearty laugher rang out across the Maiden's Fields. "Of course I don't call myself that." He gave her a wink. "But who am I to argue with the name given me by the good ladies of Lakeshore?"
She stared at him from under her long, dark lashes, the look in her piercing green eyes filled with childish curiosity.
The Hunter couldn't help noticing how much she'd grown in the last year; she almost reached his chest. The girl—Farida was her name—wore the rough, simple clothing of a Beggared child, though her slight frame had yet to fill out the over-large robes. He determined to have some better-fitting clothes made and delivered to her. In the eight years since he discovered her lying freezing on the streets of Voramis and deposited her on the s
teps of the House of Need, the Beggar Priests had received a number of mysterious packages containing coins, clothing, and other things a growing girl could need. He stopped by to see her whenever he could, always in disguise. She was safer not knowing who he truly was.
He made the coin dance across his knuckles once more. "Do we have a deal?"
"We do!" She held out a slim hand, which the Hunter shook with the gusto expected of the young man he was pretending to be.
"But make sure she's very pretty, eh?" With a sly grin, he deposited the coin in her hand. "I'm counting on you to have a discerning eye."
"Of course, sir." She gave a little curtsy and tucked the coin away.
The Hunter's face spread in a broad grin. That should cover her expenses for a few days. Whenever he managed to visit Farida, he always found ways to give her extra coins. The Beggar Priests provided for the orphans, but the children were expected to earn their keep as much as possible. The Heresiarchs turned a blind eye to the Beggared children unless a particularly onerous lord or lady raised a fuss.
"Then, my fair little lady, I wish you a glorious day." He swept an exaggerated bow, which elicited a giggle from Farida.
"To you as well, sir," she called after him as he strode away. The cart's rear wheel squeaked as she pulled it farther up the street.
The Hunter found himself enjoying his role as Gladrin, young buck from the village of Lakeshore, three days' walk to the south. Something about being able to step out of his own skin and into that of the witty, optimistic, adventurous, over-confident youth gave him a break from the grim reality that was life in Voramis. For a few hours, he could be a "someone else" diametrically opposite from his true nature.
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