The Fork-Tongue Charmers

by Paul Durham

  Rye felt something heavy on her foot. Shady pawed at her knee, his claws snagging the hem of her nightdress. His thick fur bristled at the new scent on her coat, but she didn’t stop to pet him. She spotted Folly and Quinn watching her expectantly from a table. Bramble sat with them, alternating bites of an overripe brown pear with Shortstraw. The circles under his eyes were dark, as if his night had been as long as Rye’s.

  “You’re back,” Folly said, and wrinkled her nose. “And you’re a mess.”

  “Quinn, what are you doing here?” Rye asked.

  “I brought tarts from the bakery,” he said with a broad smile. He took a wax-paper bundle from his pocket and unwrapped it excitedly.

  “Where’s my mother?” Rye said quickly.

  Quinn frowned and rewrapped the sweets.

  “She’s not with you?” Folly asked. “Lottie wanted to take Newtie out for a walk this morning. Your mother went with her to fetch some things from the port shop. You weren’t in bed when I woke up—I assumed you’d joined them.”

  “A walk?” Quinn said, shaking his head. “Lottie dotes over that lizard like it’s a lamb. She feeds it so much I think it’s doubled in size.”

  “They’re in the Shambles?” Rye asked in alarm. “Bramble, I need to talk to Harmless right away.”

  “I haven’t seen him since dawn,” Bramble said, picking a tooth. “It was a bit of a brannigan last night—and not the fun kind.”

  “The Constable’s coming,” Rye said. “With soldiers. He’s here . . . in the Shambles.”

  Shortstraw broke into a cough that splattered munched pear all over the table.

  “You’ll have to forgive him,” Bramble said, shaking monkey spittle from his hand. “The dry heat from the fireplace gives him coughing fits.” He looked at Rye with his pale blue eyes. “Soldiers here, you say? In the Shambles? That seems unlikely.”

  “It’s true. I saw them myself.”

  Bramble flashed a skeptical scowl. “You must be mistaken, niece. Maybe the Ale-Conner, he’s been known to sample the local fare. But no lawman would be brazen enough to come to the inn.”

  A flicker of light overhead caught everyone’s attention.

  The skeletal chandelier tottered as a black shape balanced among the bones. Rye saw that it was a rook, the first live one she’d spotted since returning to Drowning. It jabbered and called with its long gray beak.

  “That’s an unusual signal,” Bramble commented to himself. “Around here anyway.”

  “What is it?” Rye said.

  Bramble hesitated. “Soldiers,” he finally muttered.

  Rye clenched her jaw and stared hard at her uncle. Concern flashed across Bramble’s face, but he was calm when he said, “Fuzzy, tell your father.”

  Folly scowled but hurried off without correcting him.

  “I’ll see what I can find out,” Bramble said, and made for the doors.

  Rye pulled on her leggings, sheathed Fair Warning in her boot, and quickly gathered the rest of her belongings before joining Quinn and Folly in a guest room on the second floor. Folly’s parents had sent her upstairs, even though she would have preferred to stay below with her brothers. They thrust open the shutters, giving themselves a bird’s-eye view of Little Water Street.

  Just below them, Constable Valant’s procession had reached the inn. The crowd had swelled behind them, and the Shambles’ residents now clogged the dirt street, watching quietly with hard eyes. Valant stepped forward. Dwarfed by the inn’s iron doors, he removed a glove and rapped politely with his knuckles.

  There was a chuckle from the crowd. The doors did not open.

  He cleared his throat and rapped again. The doors still did not budge.

  “Maybe no one’s home!” someone yelled with a laugh.

  Valant raised his knuckles a third time, but before he could knock once more, a door creaked open. The twins Fitz and Flint met Valant at the doorway, their broad shoulders blocking his passage. They stared down at the Constable, who smiled in return. He craned his head to the left to look past Fitz, but Fitz leaned to block his view. He tilted his head to the right, and Flint did the same.

  Finally, the Constable said in his silky voice, “Gentlemen, I come in search of drink and good conversation. I understand you have both inside.”

  The twins said nothing.

  “Certainly my coins are as good as any other’s, are they not?”

  The twins didn’t move. Valant just stared back, his grin still fixed upon his face, the waxed points of his peculiar, golden beard bristling like spines from his jaw.

  “No dogs,” Fitz said finally.

  “Ah, of course,” Valant said, and handed the leash to Hyde. “My apologies.” He took a step forward.

  “We mean you,” Flint added, with a disdainful flick of his chin.

  The soldiers bristled and Rye heard the sound of swords being unsheathed, but Valant signaled them to stand down. Quinn glanced at Folly nervously.

  “Breathe easy, everyone,” a voice called.

  Folly’s father squeezed his lanky frame past the twins and stepped through the doorway. He wiped one hand on his apron and balanced two mugs in his other fist. Fletcher Flood’s short hair matched the color of the rest of his family’s and he wore the gap-toothed, ever-present grin of an expert barkeep.

  “You’ll have to excuse my boys’ sentiments, Constable,” he said. “You see, when they were born, word reached Longchance Keep that the twins were somewhat . . . different . . . from other babies. The Earl at the time seemed convinced that they were monsters, some sort of curse upon the village. He too sent a constable and a group of soldiers—much like yours here—to take them from their cradles. He intended to lock them away in the dungeons . . . or drown them in the river—some unpleasantness I’d rather not recall.”

  Valant nodded solemnly. “Sounds like an unfortunate misunderstanding.”

  “Indeed. There were a lot of misunderstandings that day. It was over twenty years ago and, while the twins have no memory of the actual events, they’ve certainly heard the story. In that respect their memories are quite long.”

  “Understandable,” Valant said.

  “My own memory is growing a little rusty,” Fletcher continued, and his barkeep’s grin fell away. “I can’t recall exactly what happened to those soldiers. Their bones hung for a time under the bridge after the ravens picked them clean, but after that, who can say?”

  Folly’s other six brothers appeared behind Fletcher and the twins. They ranged in age from thirteen to twenty, but even the youngest was built tall and formidably. They all crossed their arms and wore matching glowers. Rye swallowed hard and looked to Folly. She recognized her friend’s pinched expression. Folly wasn’t frightened for her brothers; she was angry she hadn’t been allowed to join them.

  “Since those dark days,” Fletcher continued, “we’ve had a rather hard and fast rule about soldiers—or constables—in the establishment.”

  The growing crowd on Little Water Street watched silently with menacing eyes. The soldiers shifted as the crowd stirred around them.

  Fletcher’s face lightened as he handed a mug to the Constable, who accepted it cautiously.

  “So, while I can offer you a drink,” Fletcher said, “you’ll understand that any conversation you seek, you’ll need to find outside.”

  Fletcher tipped the mug in a toast, and pressed it to his lips.

  “Rules are rules,” Valant said with a tight smile his eyes did not mirror. “I will respect them.”

  Valant took a swig from his mug. His brow furrowed for just a moment.

  “Do you like it?” Fletcher asked. “This is just the regular house ale,” he said with a nod to his own drink. “But what you have there is our Earl’s Special Reserve.”

  Valant raised an eyebrow. “Special Reserve?”

  “Yes. We hate to be wasteful around here. It’s a very special blend made at the end of each night by wringing out the mops. You’d be surprised by what gets sp
illed on the floor.”

  There were loud howls and guffaws from the crowd.

  “On the house,” Fletcher added, flashing his wide, gap-toothed grin.

  Rye cringed at the thought. She’d seen the floors of the Dead Fish at the end of a long night. Quinn held his breath nervously. Folly beamed.

  But the Constable’s stare was unflinching. He merely smiled, glared at Fletcher, and lifted his drink in a return toast. Valant pressed the mug to his lips and finished it in three long gulps, wiping his beard with the back of his hand when he was finished.

  “Would it surprise you, Fletcher Flood, to know I’ve drunk worse?”

  He thrust the mug into Fletcher’s palm.

  “Thank you for your hospitality,” Valant said with a slight bow, his voice as smooth as spider’s silk. “It shall be long remembered.”

  Valant turned on a heel and marched across the dirt road, bumping shoulders and pushing through the crowd without apprehension. The soldiers and Hyde followed, taking up positions on the main wharf.

  Valant threw up his hands and announced, in an almost-convincingly sincere voice, “My apologies for the inconvenience, Shamblers, but on the authority of Earl Longchance this port is hereby closed until we’ve searched the cargo of all boats. It’s come to my attention that bootleg goods and contraband may be flowing in and out of these docks.”

  “Of course bootleg goods flow through the Shambles,” Folly said in disbelief. “Everybody in Drowning knows that.”

  “I don’t think this is about black-market spices or smuggled grog,” Rye said. “The Constable’s sending a message.”

  “He’s about to get himself strung up by his toes in the process,” Folly observed.

  “I’m not so sure about that,” Quinn said, pointing out the window. “Look.”

  From the window, they could see the village walls at the far end of Little Water Street and the winding steps of Mutineer’s Alley. The large troop of soldiers Rye had seen earlier now sprang into motion and began descending into the Shambles. Distracted by the Constable’s display, the crowd had congregated in front of the Dead Fish Inn, and now no Shambler stood in their path.

  Rye’s cheeks flushed with alarm. “We need to warn my mother.”

  They hurried downstairs and out the doors in search of Abby and Lottie.

  By the time they’d made it outside, tensions had quickly escalated. The crowd had become so thick in the street that the friends needed to push their way through. Rye struggled to find any sign of her mother or sister. The angry masses slowly inched toward the dock, as if ready to drive the Constable and the soldiers into the river itself.

  At the end of the wharf, one of the soldiers sifted through the contents of some bags and containers waiting to be loaded. Valant eyed the findings before moving onto the next crate.

  Rye heard a soldier’s voice growl from somewhere amid the crowd near the wharf. She saw signs of a scuffle and heard a young voice protest in anger. The soldier stepped up onto the wharf’s wooden planks and carried something to Constable Valant. It was a metal cage. Rye, Folly, and Quinn all froze and looked at one another in alarm.

  “What in the Shale do we have here?” Valant said, and unclasped the door.

  He plucked out the contents by its tail. It was Newtie.

  Valant studied the lizard carefully. Newtie thrashed as he hung upside down, snapping at the Constable as ferociously as his small mouth could muster.

  “A perfect example!” the Constable called out, with a tsk-tsk cluck of his tongue. “It is illegal to import reptiles into Drowning. Who knows what havoc unknown species can wreak on our local fish stock?”

  Rye fumed. The Constable was grandstanding—it was obvious that her sister’s pet was no threat to anything larger than a kitchen roach.

  Valant’s dog growled excitedly and tugged at the chain leash Hyde had fastened to the end of a pylon.

  “We’ll dispose of this right now,” Valant said, cocking an eye at the dog with a chuckle. “Snack?”

  The dog wagged its tail and opened its mouth, canines gleaming. Valant dangled the lizard over its jaws.

  Rye gasped.

  Newtie flared his sailfin crest at the dog and Valant paused, raising an eyebrow. “That’s interesting . . .”

  “Newtie!” a small but booming voice cried.

  Suddenly, Lottie broke free from the masses, rushing down the dock. Valant squinted at the angry red-headed fireball heading his way. Losing interest in the lizard, he flicked it onto the planks of the wharf. Newtie darted away from the dog’s snapping jaws.

  “No!” Lottie yelled, and running straight forward without stopping, buried two little fists into the Constable’s gut. The unexpected attack actually caused Valant to buckle over and cough.

  Lottie rushed past, pursuing Newtie as he scurried down the wharf toward the water. But before she could catch him, she snagged her shoe on an uneven plank and fell hard on her hands and knees. She watched helplessly as Newtie reached the far end of the pier and tumbled over the side, disappearing beneath the black water of the river.

  Valant caught his breath and his hand went to the red whip on his belt. Unfurled now, Rye saw that it was a cat-o’-nine-tails.

  “You nearly cost my dog its treat, child,” Valant said. “Now you’ll meet my cat.”

  Valant raised his arm. Rye felt her heart pound in her chest. But before Rye or anyone else could move to stop him, Valant’s head jolted back violently and he stumbled several paces. Rye couldn’t comprehend what had happened until Valant regained his balance. His crimson hat sat askew on his head, impaled by the shaft of an arrow that now protruded from low on its crown.

  It was at that moment that all of the Constable’s composure seemed to fall away, and his eyes turned rabid. He reached up and clutched the arrow by its fletching, pulling it free from the scarred leather war helmet in which the arrowhead was buried. The arrow’s tip snagged fabric on the way out, and he examined his fine hat still impaled on the end.

  “Not . . . in . . . the . . . HEAD!” he bellowed, his face consumed by an almost inhuman rage.

  Rye looked for the archer. It was not one of the sailors or fearsome vagabonds who made the Shambles their home. Instead, Abby O’Chanter stepped forward from the crowd, the smooth curves of a crossbow at her shoulder and her eyes simmering with a rage even hotter than Valant’s.

  Abby had already nocked another arrow and would have surely buried this one home had Lottie not regained her feet and rushed for her arms. At the same time, the angry mob surged down the pier toward the Constable and his small party of soldiers. Rye heard a vicious bark, followed by screams as Valant’s dog was set loose upon the masses. Rye saw Hyde rush to the Constable and point in Abby and Lottie’s direction.

  A rhythmic thud of metallic drums sounded up and down Little Water Street. When the beat was joined by shouts, Rye realized that they weren’t drums at all. Rather, it was the Earl’s soldiers, pounding their swords against their shields in unison as they marched down the narrow dirt road from Mutineer’s Alley. The Shambles’ residents redirected their attention from the Constable to the advancing wall of armored bodies. They huddled together, forming their own tightly packed mob in front of the Dead Fish Inn. Rye, Folly, and Quinn found themselves pressed together so tightly that they couldn’t break away. The soldiers came to a halt just past Thorn Quill’s shop, leaving a short stretch of vacant dirt between the two factions. They ceased their pounding, and the Shambles fell eerily quiet.

  Longchance’s men stared out from under their helmets. Shamblers glared back, men and women alike, their faces hard and unrelenting. Blades appeared from inside boots and under dresses. Those who were otherwise unarmed picked up oars, broken bottles, and other makeshift weapons. Rye didn’t doubt the Shamblers’ ferocity but feared their fate against the more heavily armored troops.

  Only then did the first black figure appear, climbing like a serpent from the river itself. Its companions crawled out from under wha
rfs and shadowy alleys. Beneath hoods, their faces were masked with white ash, their lips and eyes streaked with soot like skeletal eye sockets.

  From the rooftops above them, the rest began to descend, dropping themselves like spiders right into the middle of Little Water Street. Rye saw cowls and leering, hook-nosed faces. Flashes of scrap-metal teeth.

  The Luck Uglies.

  Their leather boots padded silently as they filled the narrow gap between the soldiers and the Shamblers. The folds of the Luck Uglies’ cloaks shifted, revealing nimble blades and nail-studded gloves waiting to strike. Rye had never seen the masked outlaws by the light of day; she doubted anyone had. She couldn’t tell who they were regarding more cautiously—the soldiers, the Shamblers, or one another.

  Then, like a spark to tinder, the first bottle was hurled at Longchance’s men from the Shamblers and, as one, they cried out and streamed forward. Soldiers, Shamblers, and Luck Uglies collided in a sprawling, street-wide clash.

  Rye lost sight of Quinn but saw Folly get knocked to the ground. She felt herself being swept away, her frame crushed by larger bodies in what had become an uncontrollable riot.

  She called out desperately for her friends, but a hand clasped over her mouth. Someone grabbed her roughly by the shoulders and dragged her away.

  13

  A Losing Hand

  Rye found herself on a damp embankment. High overhead, a stone arch of the great bridge that spanned River Drowning blocked out the sun. Chaos roared in her ears. Behind her, the dirt walkway of Little Water Street was a battlefield.

  The strong hands on her shoulders went to her head. They were familiar and warm. Harmless seemed to read the concern in her eyes.

  “Bramble has your mother and Lottie on their way into the Flats,” he said, nodding to where the embankment stretched out from under the bridge and headed away from Little Water Street. That was where the Shambles came to an end, replaced by rolling mudflats where the river flowed into the sea. Villagers called them Slatternly Flats after the worms and mollusks that burrowed there.