by Alexey Pehov
“We can say that I’ve been very lucky.” I had already recovered my wits a little after what had happened, and now I was impatient for an opportunity to slip out of there and get as far away as possible. “Am I free to go?”
There was nothing more for me to do there—I wouldn’t learn anything from Bolt’s dead body, and the other dead men would be as tight-lipped as . . . well, as dead men.
“Why, have you business to attend to at such a late hour?” The baron chuckled. “I hope it doesn’t involve entering some innocent rich man’s house?”
“Innocent rich men only exist in fairy tales, milord,” I harrumphed, and got up off the stool, firmly intending to be on my way.
The baron seemed about to order me to sit down and shut up, but then Djig appeared and distracted him.
“Milord, there’s one of our men over there.”
“What drivel is this?” Frago asked with a frown.
“If it please milord, there’s no doubt. It’s Yargi. He was on the night shift with the sixth patrol. The Port City.”
“From Justin’s unit?”
“They have another commander now. In that business beside Stark’s Stables Justin—”
“I know, I know. You don’t have to remind me,” Frago snapped.
“Well, what a night!” Frago exclaimed, and spat. “Harold, do you at least know that you bumped off one of my men?”
“Of course no, milord. He didn’t bother to introduce himself before trying to reduce me to prime cuts.”
“I see.” Frago sighed. “Well, there’s a mangy sheep in every herd.”
I could have told the baron that he had more than one mangy sheep in his herd, but I maintained a judicious silence. They say silence is golden, and just recently I’d begun to understand that they’re right.
“Come with me; you can identify him,” Frago said with an imperious gesture.
Uh-huh. Why, of course! I had nothing better to do than go running after the baron like a lapdog up on its hind legs.
“Pardon me, milord, but I have the king’s assignment.”
That earned me another dour glance from Lanten. But he decided it was better not to insist. You didn’t usually argue with the king’s orders, unless you were a goblin jester. It could have a most lamentable effect on your health.
“All right. Get out of here.”
I didn’t wait for the commander of the guard to change his mind, but disappeared into the corridor in a flash. And I didn’t forget to pick up the torch on the way, to make the return journey bright and cheerful. I was in an absolutely foul mood.
15
ANSWERS
Pardon me for the foolish pun, but the Street of the Sleepy Dog was sunk in a deep sleep. It differed strikingly from its sister street—the Street of the Sleepy Cat—in both the arrangement of the houses and their size. The Sleepy Dog was rather short and winding, with an assortment of low-class shops, little old houses, and a couple of inns with reputations that were not exactly the best.
I was standing right in front of one of them. One fine day that huge sign in the form of a knife and an ax promised to forget its public responsibilities and come tumbling down on the head of some unlucky passerby.
As I had expected, the Knife and Ax was empty. For had told me that Gozmo had closed up his little establishment for no apparent reason. Which was rather strange, if you knew how much money he lost by doing that. And not just from the sale of beer, but also from the fees that came his way when contracts for Commissions were concluded inside his inn.
The doors and the shutters were closed, but neither were any real barrier to me. I was in a determined mood and intended to visit Gozmo’s inn that night, come what may. A serious conversation between my old friend and myself was long overdue, and night is the most convenient time for catching an innkeeper off guard. Between three and four in the morning he ought to be sleeping like a log and it’s not very likely that he would be disposed to resist.
At first I felt like simply breaking in as bold as brass through the main door and walking right through the entire inn as if I owned the place, but I bridled my passion and decided to break into Gozmo’s bedroom window. It was a lot simpler, and there would be less fiddling about with locks and bolts.
The window of Gozmo’s bedroom was on the second floor. I had the cobweb rope with me, and it only took me a minute to reach my goal. I had to spend a little more time on the catch. Unfastening it without making a racket was no simple job, but I don’t earn my bread for nothing.
Gozmo was snoring away, trilling like a nightingale; nothing could have been farther from his mind than uninvited guests. There were several china pots with forget-me-nots in my way and I almost knocked them off the windowsill. I had to twist and turn like one of the circus acrobats on the Market Square in order to avoid breaking anything.
Gozmo carried on sleeping serenely. That’s what’s it like to have no conscience at all.
I tiptoed up to him, took the rope lying on his bedside table, and then carefully slipped my hand under the pillow. I was right. My fingers came across something cold. My old friend Gozmo wasn’t quite as stupid and placid as you might think.
After borrowing his throwing knife, I made my way across to an armchair, brushed a few cheap rags off it, and sat down. I wanted to make Harold’s entrance effective. The innkeeper had thoroughly deserved it, so it was worth my while thinking how to arrange everything for maximum effect, so that I could get at least some of my own back on the damned traitor.
When I’d visited Gozmo’s room five years earlier (on that occasion I happened to go in through the door), there had been a heavy hunting horn hanging on one of the walls. Quite a valuable item. Now I got up, walked over to the wall, and felt along it until I found the toy trumpet.
I took out my crossbow, sat down in the armchair again, set the weapon on my knees, and imagined Gozmo’s face. I felt like laughing, but I restrained myself.
I wasn’t afraid of waking anyone else. Gozmo didn’t rent out rooms, so there were no guests at the inn, and after their shift the bouncers went home. We were alone in the building, and as for the inhabitants of the houses round about, they had seen far stranger things in their time. Or rather, heard them.
I raised the horn to my lips, filled my lungs with air, and blew.
What a sound that was! Even I hadn’t expected such an effect! The sudden roar—which was like the rumble of a mountain avalanche mingled with the braying of an ass crazed with terror—went hurtling round the room, bouncing off the walls and setting my ears ringing.
Gozmo stopped snoring, flew a full yard up into the air, together with his blanket, and when he landed he started shaking his head violently, still too sleepy to understand a thing. I had got my satisfaction and I roared in merry laughter.
“Who’s there?” the villain barked. His eyes weren’t accustomed to the dark yet and all he could see was the window.
His hand slid under the pillow like a snake and discovered nothing there.
“Harold.”
“Harold?”
“Who else could it be, visiting you at this hour? Light a candle.”
The innkeeper’s hands were trembling and so it took a while for the light to appear, and when it did, it lit up the old swindler more than it did me. He was sitting on the edge of the bed with an absolutely idiotic expression on his face, batting his eyelids crazily. All he could see of me was a shadow in the armchair, a blurred form on the boundary between light and darkness. The light of the candle simply didn’t reach me; the darkness devoured it when it was barely halfway there. I had to lean forward to bring my face into the circle of light.
“Well, have you recovered?” I inquired derisively.
“Harold, you’re a real bastard!”
“I’m glad that you and I are in agreement on that point. Now let’s talk.”
“What about?” Gozmo looked angry and dumbfounded at the same time.
“There’s a little matter I need to disc
uss. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking—”
“That’ll do you good,” the innkeeper interrupted.
The bowstring twanged, and a bolt went humming across the room and struck the headboard of the bed, very close to Gozmo. He jumped in the air.
“In the name of Darkness! What’s wrong with you? Are you crazy?”
He seemed a little jittery.
“Be so kind as not to interrupt me. I’ve had a hard night and I’ve been feeling a bit on edge. So shut your trap and be so good as to hear me out.”
The innkeeper took my advice and shut up, although his thin lips turned noticeably paler. He couldn’t see the crossbow, but he could sense with every pore in his skin that the weapon was trained on him.
“Right then,” I went on, “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. About that conversation we had, and about a lot of other apparent coincidences. Why would a rogue like you suddenly decide to apologize? I was a bit too hasty at the time; I decided that it was all about the garrinch in the duke’s house, the one that you, you shameless villain, apparently forgot to warn me about. You grabbed at that line of explanation because you thought I didn’t know anything and so your precious life was in no danger. But it wasn’t really a matter of the garrinch. Isn’t that right, Gozmo?”
The innkeeper opened his mouth to say something, then changed his mind and merely licked his dry lips. In our little world the usual penalty for selling somebody short, especially in the way that Gozmo had allowed himself to do, was a slit throat. And, of course, the villain knew that perfectly well. That was why he said nothing and put his trust in luck, fate, Sagot, and Harold’s kind heart, now that I had so inconveniently found out about everything.
“All right, I can see that I’m not mistaken. And that’s encouraging. Let’s start from the fact that you knew who gave you the Commission for the figurine from the duke’s house and you didn’t say a word.”
“I didn’t know . . .”
“Well, you had a pretty good idea, which is practically the same thing,” I said with an indifferent shrug.
The point was that the person to blame for all this trouble I’d got into over the Horn was Gozmo. And so I had no reason to stand on ceremony with the former thief.
“As Sagot is my witness, Harold, I didn’t want to set you up!”
“But you didn’t hold back. When you saw Frago Lanten visit your dump and then take me away with him, you understood everything. And you evidently decided that I would be sent to the Gray Stones. You must have been very surprised to see Harold out in the street the next day. You thought I must know everything and you decided to cover your rear. I wouldn’t be surprised if Markun played quite an important part in all this.”
I threw in that last phrase for effect, to check the depth of the water, without really expecting it to produce any great effect. But Gozmo was so frightened he hiccupped so that I could hear him.
“Markun had nothing to do with it, that’s not—” He suddenly broke off.
“That’s not how it was?” I asked, grasping avidly at this new thread. “I believe you! I do! Especially since I think you weren’t really entirely to blame for slipping me that Commission.”
Gozmo sighed in relief, realizing that perhaps he wasn’t going to have his throat cut after all.
“But I’ll change my mind about that, if you don’t tell me all about that fat hog’s little deals.”
“May the Nameless One snatch you,” Gozmo whispered wearily. “All right, Harold, I did something stupid. The first time and the second time. But you have no right to complain about the first time—you got your gold pieces for the figurine, and I can see that your misunderstandings with Lanten have been sorted out. That evening, after you went away with the men in orange and black, Markun and his lads turned up. . . . And he let it drop, in passing as it were, that you had decided to join the guild after all and he needed to talk something over with you urgently. I told him that you were already bound for the Gray Stones and you wouldn’t be joining any guild, but Markun insisted. You know how he can be.”
I did know. Markun’s lads had always been well known for their polite way with reluctant talkers, and I doubted that Gozmo had resisted much, even for the sake of effect.
“You let him know where my lair was,” I stated rather than asked.
“Yes! But I didn’t think that you’d be there!”
“But the Doralissians that Markun set on me thought differently. Because that night they were waiting for me with a warm welcome. Thanks, Gozmo. You’re a real friend. You proved it twice.”
The innkeeper winced, ready for any kind of beastliness from me. If I had dispatched him into the light then and there, everyone would have supported me and said I’d done exactly the right thing. In our community of thieves nasty little tricks like that come with a stiff price attached, even if they are unintentional.
“My old friend Gozmo!” I began in a joyful voice, and the other man became even more miserable at this sudden and unreasonable amiability. “I am prepared to forget all our misunderstandings and even not to spread the word about the way you have behaved all round the city, but for a couple of favors in return.”
“Anything at all!” Gozmo replied hastily, realizing that one pan of the scales held a couple of favors and the other held his reputation and his life. “That’s not much to ask!”
“First of all, tell me about the killing of the magician from Filand and the disappearance of a certain item.”
Gozmo chewed on his lip thoughtfully, rubbed his chin, and then said, “Markun’s men. Shnyg and Nightingale, the word is. They did a perfect job; not even the magicians can figure it all out. They stole some Doralissian trinket or other. It must be something very valuable, if Markun decided to kill a magician.”
“And to confuse the trail even further, that scumbag who is unworthy of the name of thief set the Doralissians on to me! Why else would they have been looking for me all these days?”
“He did that, and then he withdrew into the shadows, to wait for a buyer or a client.”
“Wonderful! So now for the second favor. You know everyone who wants to buy anything that’s a little bit hot?”
“Well, I do a bit . . .”
“Don’t be so modest. Tomorrow morning you’ll meet the head of the Guild of Thieves and tell him that someone new has turned up who will buy this item from him for, let’s say . . . twenty thousand gold pieces.”
“But that would be a lie!”
That made me laugh.
“Gozmo, don’t try to tell me that you’re an honest man and you never lie. I won’t believe you.”
“But Markun and his lads will feed me to the fish under the piers!”
“Don’t worry about it. I swear on Sagot that soon Markun will forget all about you for years and years. Will you tell him?”
“I will,” Gozmo muttered.
“All right, say he has to be in the inn at ten minutes to midnight. Tomorrow. Or, rather, today. Yes! And you can take an advance from him to cover the damage to your inn, in case the deal doesn’t go down.”
“What damage?”
“Don’t get nervous. You’ll just have to wipe the blood off the floor and that’ll be it. Tell Markun and his lads to be here, and to bring the goods with them. Say this is the only time when the customer can meet them. Markun’s too greedy not to show up.”
“What about the damage?”
“Forget it. Nothing terrible will happen,” I declared in a perfectly honest tone of voice.
“I don’t know what you’ve thought up, Harold, but I don’t like it one bit.”
“But you have to agree that it’s better than losing your life.” I got to him there. “All right now, it’s time for me to go. It was nice to see you.”
“Hey, Harold, I’ll do what you ask, but you have to promise you’ll forget all the minor inconveniences that I caused you without intending any harm.”
“It’s a deal, my friend,” I lied.
I d
idn’t feel like leaving through the window; the usual way seemed more attractive, although it is true that I had to walk backward all the way to the door, since good old Gozmo was famous for his skill in throwing even the very heaviest of knives. I couldn’t be sure that he didn’t have some other nasty toys hidden away under the mattress. I didn’t trust the old swindler any more than a crayfish duke, and life is far too pleasant a thing to part with it as stupidly as that.
I had no doubt at all that Gozmo would do as I had asked. He really had no choice. Unless he wanted to get out of town or tell Markun all about our nocturnal conversation. But the first choice was impossible—he would have to abandon his beloved inn—and as for the second . . . Would you conclude an alliance with a bloodthirsty snake, knowing perfectly well that he would bite you on the heel just when you weren’t expecting it? There, you see. Neither would Gozmo. He would rather put his trust in Harold, and he would try to earn a little bit of money from the guild as well, in the hope that everything would turn out all right.
I pulled back the bolt on the main door and slipped out into the street. I couldn’t give a damn whether Gozmo closed the inn after me or left it wide open to the whim of gods and vagabonds.
16
HUNTERS OF THE HORSE
The day that followed turned out pretty topsy-turvy. I went round to a dozen different places in order to put a couple of ideas into action. If everything went well, the night ahead was going to be a pretty dramatic one, although the actors still had no idea of the roles they were destined to play. What I had to do now was put the final touches on the production and warn the last few participants about the imminent performance. And so I paid a visit to Archmagician Artsivus’s house.
The archmagician wasn’t in, and I asked Roderick to pass on his invitation to the friendly little party. The young lad looked rather astonished, but he promised to relay the message in detail.
And then, having done everything that had to be done, I set off with an easy heart to For’s place, to while away the long hours until night.