by Prior, D. P.
He tried the drawers, but they were locked. A quick scan came up with nothing he could use, but then he remembered: the keys to the cell were still in the door. He found a small one on the bunch that fit, and retrieved his things. Seemed the sheriff wasn’t all bad after all. The flintlock was there, with its bag of powder. So were the saber, his hat, and the stygian’s amulet. It pulsed with a blue glow, but even as he pocketed it, the light was dying. She was on the move, that was for certain. He only hoped she kept on going till she was the other side of the Farfalls.
Another fly landed on his cheek. He swatted it with his hat, but this time he missed. It buzzed an angry spiral around the room before settling on the floor.
Something caught Jeb’s eye there, and he moved closer to get a better look. It was a metal ring—the handle to a trapdoor. Half a dozen more flies had congregated there. Probably Tanner had off food in the cellar. Either that, or he had a dead body down there. He dismissed the thought with a low chuckle. Would’ve been one hell of a stench if that were the case.
He returned to the front door and unbolted it. On impulse, he pocketed the keys, then paused in the entrance, wondering whether he should have left them.
Unbidden, the sheriff’s naked corpse appeared in his mind’s eye, hands still covering his privates, and beside him, in no better state, was the man who’d brought Jeb’s food. Just an aftershock of his dream, he wanted to believe, but it sent such a cold thrill along his spine, it wouldn’t have surprised him if the next thing he ran into was a couple of stiffs.
He cast a long, lingering look back at the flies on the trapdoor, thought about taking a peek inside. Not part of the job, he told himself. Hunt or be hunted. It was as simple as that. Any more than that was someone else’s business.
He stepped out into the square and locked the door behind him.
24
IF THEY WERE surprised to see him back at the Sea Bed, the staff didn’t show it. Maybe one or two of the clientele did, but with that kind, a furtive look could mean any one of a hundred things. Jeb did his best to ignore them, and set about his breakfast of ham and eggs with gusto.
Maisie was almost certainly lying about Tanner. There was no way he’d have left her unattended with her son. Even if his precious law book allowed for such a thing, he was no fool. The sheriff was either dead or incapacitated, and of the two, dead was the most likely. Sooner or later, someone would notice, and it didn’t take a lot of brains to work out who that left in charge.
But there was a more pressing concern than Boss and his goons. Slythe had sent word to the Maresmen. Even allowing for the dispatch rider to reach Malfen, and the Maresmen to travel the other way, they could be in town any moment, if they weren’t there already.
Jeb crammed in the last of his ham and chugged it down with a gulp of coffee. He was half-out of his chair, draining the rest of his cup, when a commotion from reception had him turning.
“Told you he was here,” Davy Fana said, jabbing a finger Jeb’s way.
Jeb set his cup on the table and reached for the hilt of his saber. Before he could start to draw it, a hand clapped down on Davy’s shoulder.
“Thought I told you to sling your shogging hook.”
A stocky man slammed Davy against the doorjamb and leaned into him. He had thick brows and a swarthy face, more stubble than skin. His arms seemed too long for his body, and they were heavy with muscle. His black hair was wound back in a long braid that fell like a horse’s tail over his jerkin—also black. His britches were black, too, and so were his knee-length boots. He raised a fist, but before he could swing, a massive hand caught him by the wrist, and Terabin Sweet loomed over him, a strip of white cloth wound round his jaw and over the crown of his head.
“Leave the lad alone, Barlow,” Sweet said through swollen lips. Dried blood clung to the corners of his mouth, stained the front of his teeth.
Barlow yanked his arm free and spun on Sweet. “Don’t you shogging tell me—”
Sweet silenced him with a look, and Barlow backed off to the reception desk, muttering curses under his breath.
Jeb released his saber, left it hanging in its scabbard. To let Sweet see he’d almost drawn would be a sign of weakness. Instead, he shrugged his coat collar higher and cocked his head to one side. He couldn’t help it: he made a fist behind his back, but from the front, he hoped, he was a study in boredom.
Sweet limped into the bar, raised his eyes to meet Jeb’s, and looked away. A flush crept over his cheeks, but it did nothing to hide the bruises Jeb had given him. Likely, no one had ever handed him such a beating before. Man like that, whose name was built on his size and the misuse of it, would have a hard time coming to terms with losing a fight.
Jeb had seen enough of Sweet’s kind to know what was coming next. Surprise had been on the big man’s side that first time, and Jeb had been favored by it on the rematch. Third time round it was all even, and though Jeb knew he was faster by far, and had the power to knock Sweet out if he caught him right, he couldn’t stave off the nerves. In all other respects, he knew there was a very real chance he’d met his match. The size of Sweet’s fists; the strength in his arms; it would only take one blow and—
“Didn’t come here to fight, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Sweet said without looking up from his shoes. “Reckon I got my comeuppance, and I ain’t ashamed to admit it.” Now he fixed Jeb with a stare, this time steady as you like. “You got the better of me, Maresman, fair and square.”
There was an almost audible sigh of relief from the others in the bar. No sooner had the low hubbub of chatter resumed, than Jeb realized how deafening the silence had been. He pulled out a chair for Sweet, and sat on one himself. Davy made a beeline for the empty tables, picking at the scraps of food left over from breakfast.
Sweet waved a serving wench over and told her to fix the lad a meal. “Promised him a bite to eat in return for finding you,” he said as he lowered himself into the chair, keeping his injured knee extended. He clasped his hands together in front of him and didn’t seem to know where to put his eyes.
“So,” Jeb said, “what’s this about, if not best of three?”
A frown crossed Sweet’s face, but then he got what Jeb was talking about and chuckled. The effect softened his demeanor, and suddenly he didn’t seem so ornery, so jealous.
“Women,” Sweet said, shaking his head. “Bring out the worst in me.”
“Me too,” said Jeb, though he guessed it was a different kind of bad.
“My pa was the same,” Sweet said. He looked away as if remembering, chewed on his lip and then winced. “Got me good there,” he said, gingerly touching the swelling with his fingertips.
Jeb spread his hands. “Well?”
“Well,” Sweet said. “She being a husk and all—Maisie…” He spoke her name as if chewing on gristle. “Thought you might still be looking for her.”
“She’s gone,” Jeb said. “Left town.” At least he hoped so. Shog only knew what he was going to do if she’d decided to stick around.
“Still here,” Sweet said. “She passed by Tizzy Graybank’s. I was grabbing a coffee, you know, to start the day, when I felt my skin crawl. I looked round, and there she was hurrying on by.”
“She see you?”
Sweet shook his head. “Don’t think so. I downed my drink and followed her. Don’t know why I did it, given what she is, what happened…”
“Where’d she go?”
“The wagon square,” Sweet said. “Looked to me she was planning on leaving, only that friend of yours was waiting for her—the one that fixed me up.” He slipped a finger underneath his jaw bandage and scratched.
“Fixed you… You mean—”
“The Wayist.”
“Marlec,” Jeb said. “What the shog?” What was Marlec up to? Hadn’t he learned his lesson from the last time he’d tried speaking with her? What did he think…? And then he realized:
All that bullshit about me being the instrument of her s
alvation! Is that surrender to your god’s will, or are you just looking out for yourself like the rest of us?
He’d touched a nerve, exposed the monk for what he was.
“How long?” Jeb said, standing so fast his chair toppled over backwards.
Sweet shrugged. “Maybe an hour. Last I saw, they was sitting side by side on a bench, and he was reading a book to her. Big leather book, you know, like all them Wayists—”
“Stupid shogger,” Jeb said. “Davy!” The lad was his best means of finding this square quickly.
The wench chose that moment to return with a plate of eggs and sausages, and Davy may just as well have been deaf.
“Leave the boy to his grub,” Sweet said. “I can take you there.”
Jeb grunted that he’d heard. “Davy,” he said again, “anyone comes to town looking for me, you let me know right away and there’ll be coin for you.”
Davy looked up with egg spilling from his mouth and half a sausage in his hand.
“Enough coin for a dozen meals like that,” Jeb added.
Davy nodded and got back on with his eating.
Jeb sighed and turned back to Sweet. With his leg ruined after the fight, the big man would be too slow. “Just point me in the right direction, then go for help.”
“What help?” Sweet said. “The sheriff?”
“If you can find him.” Chances of that were slim to none. “Failing that, any help you can rustle up. Marlec’s in danger, and I don’t think I can stop her by myself.”
Sweet nodded and stood at the same time. “Come on, then.” He led the way outside, lunging with one leg, scraping the other behind him.
Barlow was on the porch smoking a weedstick, hands thrust deep in his pockets. “Brainless meatball,” he muttered, and somehow managed to spit around the stub of his weedstick.
“Least my pa weren’t a dwarf shagger,” Sweet said without stopping.
“That’s a shogging lie, and you know it,” Barlow said. “Weren’t no dwarves on the surface afore I was born.”
“Cockroach like your pa probably ran into one when he crawled down some dark crack in the shithouse. Just thank shog he didn’t stick his maggot some place worse, like a homunculus, or a bleeding boreworm. Rumor is, he weren’t exactly fussy.”
“Why you shogging piece of… I’ll have you, Sweet, you hear that. I’ll shogging kill you.”
Sweet chuckled as he gave Jeb directions, then limped off toward the sheriff’s office. Shog only knew what he’d find inside, but then Jeb remembered: it was locked, and he still had the keys.
25
WHEN JEB REACHED the wagon square, he was out of breath. He bent over and clutched his side, gasping. It didn’t sound right to him, how the air whistled going in and out of his lungs. When was the last time he’d run so fast? When had he needed to? He’d grown so dependent on Tubal, he’d gotten complacent. A man in his line of work needed to be able to run. It was a weakness he couldn’t afford, and one he planned to remedy once this was over.
The square was a paved mosaic depicting a boat hauling in a dragnet full of fish. It was flanked by two-story townhouses of the kind you saw in New Jerusalem, not in a dump like Portis. Likely, the owners were from the city. Just as likely, the mosaic was their contribution to the culture of Portis. New Jerusalem was rife with such pretensions from the most ancient times on Earth: the kilted militia in their crested galeas, the white togas of the senators, the fluted pillars, and the statues of muscle-bound nudity on virtually every street corner. Least that’s the way it had seemed on Jeb’s last visit.
Wagons were parked in a loose circle about a pond. Ripples of sunlight rolled across the surface, and in the center, streams of water arced from the upturned hands of a bronze mermaid.
Three of the wagons were going nowhere. One had no wheels, another’s front axle was snapped in the middle, and the third was having a new wheel fitted by a couple of swarthy men.
The fourth wagon, though, looked set to leave. The driver was leaning out from his seat, talking to a man in a white toga on the ground. Surely it wasn’t a senator, here of all places. Jeb took a few deep breaths and strode across the square, calling out to them.
The driver made a visor of his hands and squinted. The man in the toga turned and rolled his eyes.
“She’s leaving, Mr. Skayne, and there’s nothing you can do to change her mind,” Sendal Slythe said.
“Marlec,” Jeb said, not bothering to ask what Slythe was doing all dressed up like he was still in office. “Where’s Marlec?”
“Is that—?” a woman’s voice came from inside the wagon. The canopy was pulled back, and Dame Consilia poked her head out. “Oh, it is.”
Her platinum hair was a towering cone, bedizened with different colored beads that sparkled in the suns’ rays. From the neck down, her sumptuous figure was hugged by a blue satin dress that barely reached her knees. It rode up on one side, revealing a perfectly toned thigh. Her lower legs were crisscrossed with the black leather straps of her sandals.
Jeb gasped. Mostly because it wasn’t Maisie; partly because her dress was cunningly slit in several places, allowing him a glimpse of skin beneath; and partly because she looked like nothing so much as a high-class whore.
Her face was a study in feigned indifference, but he could tell by the rise and fall of her breasts she wasn’t unaffected by his closeness.
Slythe stepped up to Jeb like he was berating an underling. “Dame Consilia has graciously accepted a business proposition, isn’t that right, my dear?”
Jeb doubted she had much choice in the matter, given he’d lost all her money.
Now it was her turn to roll her eyes, and she let out a sharp sigh.
“Contacts in Brink, you see.” Slythe tapped the side of his nose. “Contacts everywhere, as a matter of fact.” He tugged down his toga, as if to remind Jeb he’d once been a senator.
Pointedly turning his back on Jeb, Slythe climbed up beside the driver. “Shall we?” he said, and the driver snapped the reins.
Dame Consilia stumbled as the wagon lurched into motion. Jeb wanted to say something, but his brain was befuddled. He caught her eye as the wagon pulled out from the island and headed toward the road.
“Wait,” Jeb called out. He thrust a hand in his coat pocket, fished out Tharn’s money purse. The least he could do was pay her back for her losses at the seven-card game.
The driver slowed but didn’t stop. Jeb had to run to keep up. He held out the purse to Dame Consilia, and she eyed it with disdain.
“For you,” Jeb said. He tried to explain, but he started to wheeze and cough.
Her eyes narrowed as she said, “You think me a whore?” Then they widened, and she snatched the purse from him. “How dare you!”
She ducked back inside, and Slythe urged the driver to keep going.
Jeb took a few more leaden steps then stood there with hands on hips, sucking in shallow snatches of air. For the first time he could remember, he felt regret, wished he’d treated her better. It was the dress, he told himself. The flash of thigh. She truly was exquisite. But deep down, he knew it was more than that. Something in him had changed—was changing. He’d first felt it upon seeing Maisie. Was it his mother, he wondered, confronting him with what he was, holding a mirror up to a life that fell far beneath the standards a man was supposed to live by? Showing him he was less than human?
He looked on as the wagon reached the road and disappeared from view. It was like watching his future drain away down the gutter. With an effort of will, he pulled his mind back to the task in hand. Marlec was in danger. Maybe he couldn’t put things right with Dame Consilia, but he could at least—
A boot scuffed the ground behind him. Jeb turned as a shadow fell over him—right into the path of a fist…
26
A FIERCE LIGHT scorched behind Jeb’s eyelids. He would have pulled his hat down, but he wasn’t wearing it. Shog knows what he’d do if he lost it. It was a gift from General Coltraine’s wife,
and he’d not found quality like that anywhere in Malkuth.
He groaned and tried to twist away from the glare, but heavy hands held his head in place. His instinct was to lash out, but rope cut into his wrists. When he opened his eyes a slit, white brilliance burned them, and he shut them tight again, for all the good it did.
He could feel the hard back of a chair digging into his shoulder blades. His arms were trussed behind him, and his ankles were bound to chair legs. His heart began to gallop, and he opened his mouth to cry out, but someone shoved a wad of cloth in it, then proceeded to gag him. He choked and moaned, threw his weight from side to side, trying to tip the chair. A heavy slap to the face set his head spinning, and then suddenly the light went out.
It grew deathly quiet. Besides the rush of blood in his ears, the thumping of his heart, all he could hear was the whining buzz of a mosquito. Just the thought of it latching on to him, drinking his blood, was enough to make him squirm. He hated mosquitoes. Always had. Malfen’s overflowing gutters were a breeding ground for them, and he’d lost count of the number of people he’d known who’d died from some gnat-carried disease. Made him think of his mother: what she was, what she did. Made him think of what he was, too, beneath his thin veneer of humanity.
Someone breathed beside his ear and then chuckled. It was as if they’d been holding their breath.
“Quiet,” a cold voice said—Bones the taxidermist. “You’ll wake the baby.”
“Too late.”—It was Clovis from behind. “He’s already awake.”
Jeb recoiled from the scrape and flare of a match being struck. Amid the stench of sulfur, a softer, warmer light blossomed into being.
From in front, he heard the rasp of metal on stone, over and over.
Jeb blinked his eyes into focus on Bones studiously sharpening a scalpel.
So, Boss had made his move. Had to owe it to him, it hadn’t taken him long to figure out Jeb had escaped; unless they’d just stumbled across him at the square by luck.
He craned his neck to look behind.