Sworn in Steel

by Douglas Hulick

  “Where?”

  “Third urn in, just past the statue of the woman with her hand up her—”

  “I see it.” Pause. “Are you sure?”

  Of course I was sure. It was getting dark enough that my night vision was beginning to limn the edges of things with faint amber threads. Another five or ten minutes, and I wouldn’t need to study the shadows—I’d just be able to see the lookout. Out loud, though, I said, “Just wait. If your boys do their job, you’ll see that Crow twitch well enough.”

  A new voice had added itself to the noise from below. As planned, a third man had joined Nijjan’s first two and begun egging the others on, upping the tension and the uncertainty. Things were getting louder now.

  “Got him!” hissed Nijjan.

  I looked over and smiled. Nearly directly across from us, a man’s head had emerged from the shadows of the urn and was now looking over the edge of the roof.

  Like me, Nijjan wasn’t originally from Ildrecca. But where I’d come from the woods, she was a plains girl—raised to the horse and the herd and the bow. She’d first made a name for herself when she began poaching from the Imperial Game Reserve northwest of Ildrecca and hosting Kin-only feasts at a tavern just inside the city. She was long past that now, but still put on the occasional demonstration to remind people that, even from far away, you didn’t want to anger Nijjan.

  I heard a faint sound beside me and turned in time to see Nijjan lift her bow from the shadows of the roof, lay one of the handful of arrows she’d brought across it, draw, and let fly, all in a seamless, flowing motion.

  By the time I looked back across the gap, the head was gone. I didn’t insult her by asking if she’d gotten her man.

  “Let’s go,” she said. “My men won’t be able to keep those coves busy forever without someone getting bloodied. I’d prefer we have our hands on Rambles when the time comes.”

  I rose and padded along the roof, reaching behind me to adjust Degan’s sword as I went. I’d managed to find a baldric to replace the rope the boatman had given me, but hadn’t gotten around to finding a suitable scabbard yet. I’d wrapped the canvas into a rough covering, though, so while it might not have been stylish, Degan’s sword was at least riding more comfortably across my back.

  For her part, when Nijjan had first seen the bundle she’d merely looked at it, looked at me, and shaken her head. Ungainly or not, I wasn’t about to risk losing it, even if it made it harder to run the roofs.

  We followed the roofline around the piazza, hopping low walls, dancing leaded peaks, and jumping a narrow drainage alley, until we found ourselves on the Mort Ken’s roof.

  There had been a garden up here once. Raised beds meant for flowers and herbs had been shoved off to one side of the roof, their wood faded and rotting. A few potted fruit trees still struggled on, their roots crowding out of the soil around the top, or escaping through cracks in the ceramic that held them. A handful of weathered columns were scattered about, standing guard over a herd of forlorn chairs and dining couches. I could almost see how, at night, with the right lighting and enough fortified wine, the place could take on an air of neglected elegance—just the kind of surroundings to help set the mood and persuade a Lighter to be that much lighter in his purse come morning. Assuming, of course, they first got rid of the man sprawled on the roof with Nijjan’s arrow sticking out of his head.

  We could hear shouting from the street now—voices raised in challenge and argument. No hiss or ring of steel yet, which was good. We needed attention focused on the front door for as long as possible; a fight would be over too quickly, and not in our favor. So far, it sounded as if Nijjan’s people were doing just what we wanted.

  The sunset was little more than a smudge below the horizon now, making the shadows on the roof even thicker. As I looked around, amber-gold began to settle itself more easily across my vision.

  “How the hell do we get down?” growled Nijjan. “I can’t see the damn jigger for all the crap up here.”

  I scanned the space around us, looking for the trapdoor that would have been used not only by customers, but possibly by the whores themselves when they decided to sleep or eat under the stars.

  “There.” I led Nijjan over to a rectangle set in the roof behind a pair of pillars. I held back, letting her take the door, both because I was the Prince, and because I didn’t need any sudden light blinding my recently awakened sight. When it creaked open, a faint glow crept out. Even then, my eyes still burned.

  “Looks like it opens into a room,” said Nijjan, her voice low. She set aside her bow and drew a long, curved knife. She stepped into the opening and went down into the building.

  I blinked the last of the tears from my eyes and went over to the door. A set of steep, narrow stairs led down into the whorehouse. Nijjan was waiting at their base.

  I half stepped, half climbed down into a sitting room. A single, weak tallow candle burned on the sideboard, illuminating a pair of worn chairs and a vase filled with the remains of dead flowers. Petals littered the sideboard and floor.

  Nijjan moved over to the room’s only door and opened it a crack. The hinge, thank the Angels, barely groaned.

  “Hallway,” she said. She turned to face me. “Now what?”

  “Now we go down one floor.”

  “And then?”

  I shrugged. “We look and listen.”

  Nijjan’s hand caught mine as I moved to go past her. “Wait. Are you telling me you don’t even know where Rambles is?”

  “I know he’s on the third floor.”

  “That’s it? We just go down a flight and listen at whores’ doors until we think we’ve found the right one?”

  “More or less.” I’d operated on a hell of a lot less for years. “No one else is doing any trade right now, so it shouldn’t be that hard.”

  Nijjan stared at me. “And these kinds of plans work for you?”

  “You’d be surprised.”

  The Upright Woman snorted as I opened the door the rest of the way. “I don’t know whether to be disappointed or impressed.”

  I smiled. “Me either, some days.”

  We padded our way past a few doors, then down the main stairway at the center of the building. More noises from the ground floor drifted up to us, along with more voices. I peeked over the railing and saw any number of heads and shoulders straining out into the stairwell trying to catch a glimpse of the action below. Fortunately for us, the ladies of the house had migrated down to the second floor and below for a better view, leaving the third-floor landing deserted.

  This floor was better appointed, if a frayed wicker chair, wall mirror, and faded wool floor runner constituted “better.” Tapers burned in sconces along the wall, their light reflected back into the hallway by the polished brass plates mounted behind them.

  Nijjan looked at me and quirked an eyebrow in question. I pointed left, mainly to seem decisive.

  Just like the floor above, the doors here were close together. These were the narrows, where the whores made the majority of the Bawd’s money, moving men and women in and out with impressive speed. The bigger rooms, for well-lined guests and the occasional orgy, would be down below, closer to the street and the money.

  However, Betriz’s information put Rambles’s preferred room on this floor, which didn’t make much sense until we came to a wide door at the end of the hall. Crimson damask had been tacked to the surface, turning the door into a flowery, bloodred rectangle. A single brass handle, shaped like an erection and polished to a high shine, shimmered in the candle light.

  “A bit much, don’t you think?” muttered Nijjan.

  “For a Mort Ken?”

  “Good point.”

  I leaned toward the door. There were voices on the other side. And laughter.

  Nijjan fingered her knife. I drew my rapier. Surprise might be nice, but I’ve found that putting an extra three-plus feet of steel between you and the person you’re bursting in on never hurts.

  I wra
pped my left hand around the brass cock, twisted, and shoved.

  I’ll admit, I’d been hoping to walk in and find Rambles ass-in-the-air over a doxy. Not only would it have been convenient from an ambush standpoint, but the humiliation would have been a nice touch as well. As it was, though, I wasn’t overly surprised to find them both dressed and sitting at the table, their supper before them, wineglasses to hand. You learn not to count on breaks like that when it comes to raiding an enemy’s ken.

  What did surprise me, though, was to find another person sitting at the table with them. A person I knew from the trail to Barrab and beyond. A man I’d been hoping to find again, but never figured I would.

  Wolf.

  I’d been more right than I thought: Wolf was Rambles’s man. Somehow, in some way, the Upright Man had been behind this. Now I just had to figure out how.

  If hadn’t had my sword in my hand, I would have drawn it then. As it was, I filled my left hand with my fighting dagger and stepped aside to let Nijjan through the door. No one at the table moved.

  Wolf surprised me by speaking first. “Please,” he said, his eyes still on his plate. “Don’t insult me by waving your steel around as if you mean to use it.”

  I showed my teeth in an expression that could never have been mistaken for a smile. “If you think I’m not willing to use this, you’re sadly mistaken.”

  Wolf held up a piece of roasted lamb on his fork. He was much as he’d appeared on the trail, only cleaner. With the dust of the road washed away, his black hair and beard had taken on an almost bluish sheen. By contrast, his complexion, though still dark from nature and sun, had lightened to a deep tan with the dirt removed. Gone was the sun-faded tunic and burnoose of the hills; instead, he now wore an embroidered silver-gray robe and matching pair of ankle pants. He’d put a striped robe on over all of it, the pattern no doubt declaring his tribe and clan to more knowledgeable eyes than my own.

  Wolf put the lamb in his mouth and chewed. “I was not,” he said, “speaking to you, O Prince.”

  I blinked, momentarily confused, until the implication settled in. Then I spun to put Nijjan fully in my field of vision. She was scowling at the Azaari bandit. She was also putting her knife away.

  Hell. No wonder her people and Rambles’s had never come to blows in the courtyard; they were in on this together.

  I reevaluated the situation. Three on one, if you didn’t count the doxy. I could do this, couldn’t I? Of course I could. I was the one with steel in his hands, after all.

  I was also in a hell of a lot of trouble.

  I shifted my stance and extended my dagger slightly toward the table. They were maybe seven feet away, and still sitting. Nijjan had her blades away. If I could take her with one quick, clean lunge, that would leave the doorway free. Even if I couldn’t pull it shut behind me, her body should—

  “Don’t,” said Wolf, spearing another piece of lamb on his fork. “You won’t make it out.”

  “You don’t think so?” I said.

  “I know so.”

  Wolf put down his fork and stood.

  When I had first met Wolf, he was wearing a dagger. On the road to Barrab, in the town itself, even on the road back, it had been the short blade for him. Some people are just that way: They prefer a dagger, or a sword, or what have you. Wolf was a dagger man.

  Except now he was wearing a sword. A sword with a silver-chased guard, set upon a well-used steel foundation. A sword that, when it was drawn, I knew would be of the finest Black Isle steel, with a single, faint tear etched into the metal where the blade met the guard.

  I knew this because I had seen a sword like his countless times before, because I had watched its like cut down both Kin and Imperial White Sashes, and because I carried its sister strapped to my back. Wolf was a degan.

  Which meant I was screwed.

  I dropped my sword and dagger on the carpet without ceremony. If Wolf had wanted me dead, he could have done it countless times on the road. The threat here wasn’t from his steel or mine: It was simply from my having walked into the room. “Knives, too?” I said, holding up my left arm and indicating my boot with my right.

  “I don’t see the need,” said Wolf.

  Ouch.

  Neither of us mentioned the sword on my back.

  “So, which is it,” I said, “Wolf or Silver Degan?”

  Wolf shrugged. “As you please.”

  I leaned back against the wall and folded my arms, trying to appear the Gray Prince, all the while using the maneuver to surreptitiously wipe my sweating palms on my doublet. I looked at Nijjan.

  “How much?” I said sourly.

  Nijjan shook her head. “You think I’d do this for money?” She brushed her hands together and made a casting-away motion in my direction, signifying she was done with our alliance, with our Clasp. “You aren’t the Gray Prince you looked to be a couple of months ago, Drothe. Having your back is going to get too costly in very short order. I don’t need that—not with him sniffing at my borders.” She jerked a thumb at Rambles, who was still sitting quietly, the girl on his lap.

  My gut clenched at her comment. I’d always held her in higher regard than most of the other Upright Men. Like me, she’d started out without any connections among the Kin and had managed to work her way up by means of sheer talent and determination. Nijjan was smart when it came to the street and her opinion carried weight. If she believed my star was on the decline, I didn’t want to think about what that meant for me over the next several months.

  To her face, though, I showed a blank expression and said, “So in exchange for my neck you get a quiet border? I would have given you a lot more for a lot less.”

  “Oh, I offered more,” said Rambles. The slender Upright Man picked up his wine, the rings on his fingers clinking softly against the glass. “But Nijjan wouldn’t take it.” He sipped and gave a satisfied smile, although I suspected it didn’t have anything to do with the vintage. “I offered her over half a cordon two months ago for your head on a platter, but she told me to—”

  “No one here is interested in your failed attempts at corruption,” said Wolf mildly, cutting off another piece of lamb. “If you wish to bark, little dog, go outside; otherwise, shut your snout.”

  The easy smile that had been on Rambles’s face vanished, replaced by a dark scowl. As for the doxy, she discreetly slid to her feet and crossed the room to settle on the bed in the far corner.

  Smart girl.

  “This is my ken,” said Rambles, leaning forward in his seat, “and my organization. You’re in my house, Silver: Don’t think for a moment that that sword at your side means you can tell me what to do, let alone what I can and can’t say.” Rambles thrust a finger in my direction. “If it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t have been able to corner this shit so easily. I—”

  “Don’t tell a wolf how to hunt,” said the degan. “If I hadn’t used you, I would have found another hound equally as useful.”

  “I’m no one’s ‘hound,’ you self-important Azaari son of a—”

  Wolf’s sword was out of its scabbard and at Rambles’s throat in a blur. Across the room, the doxy squeaked. Rambles froze.

  “My people,” said Wolf coldly, “are very sensitive about our lineage. We don’t take well to those who question it, let alone besmirch it. Especially when they are so-called civilized Ildrecci who couldn’t find their way out of a box canyon with a week’s worth of water and a map.” Wolf shifted his hand, causing the blade’s tip to dig into the skin of Rambles’s neck. I couldn’t help noticing that Wolf’s sword was a curved horseman’s saber. “You understand me?”

  “I . . . understand,” said Rambles.

  “Then understand this as well: Until I release you from the last tatters of Iron’s Oath, you’re mine. The strings he left on you before his death are mine to pull now. I’ve laid claim to them, and I’ll use you however, and as often, as I see fit.” Another twist of the blade. “Is this understood?”

  I beca
me very still against the wall. This changed things.

  I’d walked in here thinking Rambles was the one pulling Wolf’s strings; that, while my old rival might not have been the one who came up with the plan, he’d been the one passing the orders along. I couldn’t see Rambles having the stones to dust Crook Eye and set me up, but I could easily see him being a step or two down on the ladder from whoever had.

  But now, with Wolf invoking his degan’s Oath and pulling the leash taut on Rambles, I had to adjust my assumptions. And what’s more, it wasn’t a matter of Wolf having made an agreement with the Upright Man—it was Wolf claiming the Oath Rambles had sworn to Iron Degan. The Oath was the ultimate contract as far as the degans were concerned. Swearing it not only got you one of the best mercenaries in the empire—no small thing, considering some degans spent years fulfilling their Oaths—it also meant you likewise owed the degan a debt as well. A debt that could be called in any time, for any one service. Ages back, people were said to have killed friends and family rather than break the Oath; now the biggest threat to breaking that promise was having an angry degan after you—which, given the degans I’d met, was bad enough.

  The truly daunting bit, though—and the one that had given me pause when I’d sworn my Oath with Degan—was the provision that said any degan could claim your Oath if the degan you’d sworn it to died. How Wolf had found out about the deal between Rambles and Iron I had no idea; all I knew was that if he’d dug up the deal on Rambles, then it was possible he could find out about the Oath between me and Degan—the one I’d never fulfilled.

  Whether Degan’s change in status meant he could claim it, I had no idea, but I wasn’t in a hurry to find out.

  “Of course,” continued Wolf, his blade still lingering about Rambles’s neck, “you could always sever the Oath.” He flicked his wrist, drawing the barest hint of his sword’s tip across Rambles’s throat, only to bring the blade back to its original position before the Upright Man had time to do more than gasp. A thin red line began seeping from Rambles’s skin. “Is this your desire, little dog?”

  I could practically hear Rambles’s teeth grinding from across the room. “No.”