A courtsman wearing the six-striped tabard of the city’s urban militia was arguing with a sweating booker out front of the wagon. “I don’t care who’s inside it,” said the guard, “that thing isn’t going past this point. This road is for foot traffic and small wagons only, not for shit like this.” He gestured at the shabby monstrosity parked before the gate. “Anyway, you’ll have to back it up and go round to the Arena Gate. Or they could just get out and walk.”
“Walk? Walk!?” The booker, red-faced, was strutting and spitting like a bird in heat. “The Screaming Eagles don’t walk anywhere, son.”
“You could send for a carriage,” suggested the guard.
“I sent for one half an hour ago and it still ain’t here! Listen, if I don’t get these boys to the Riot House before dark it’s my ass.”
“Your ass’ll be in a dungeon if you don’t move this thing soon.”
“Well your ass better hope you-know-who doesn’t hear you kept her headlining band from entering the city.”
“First of all, I don’t know fucking who. And second, my ass’ll be just fine,” said the guard. He waved Clay and the others by without bothering to question them.
“Not if my ass goes, it won’t. If my ass goes, your ass is next.”
The two of them were still directing threats toward each other’s asses when a carriage ambled out of the crowd. Two white-feathered akra were yoked to its traces, mewling like sheep as they drew to a stop. The long-necked birds were a rare sight outside cities, but on cobblestone streets their dry, pellet-sized stool made them preferable to horses. The driver shook his head at the argosy wedged in the gate, and was about to whistle his arrival when Clay flagged him down.
“You’re late.”
The driver gave them a once-over, his gaze lingering on Moog’s sun-and-star pyjamas. “You’re the Screaming Eagles?” he asked dubiously.
“We are,” Clay answered without hesitation. He climbed aboard as if the carriage belonged to him. “We’re in a hurry.”
The driver looked toward the row going on at the gate. “Yeah, well, there’s a fight in the Maxithon tomorrow, so the city’s bursting like a brothel on two-for-one night, but I’ll go fast as I can without getting blood on the streets. Where to?”
Clay opened his mouth before realizing he had no idea where they were headed.
“Two stops,” said Gabriel. “Coinbarrow first, and then the Narmeeri Ward.”
“Narmeeri Ward’s a big place,” said the driver. “Anywhere specific?”
“Pearling Heights.”
The man looked over his shoulder, clearly surprised. “The gorgon’s place?”
Gabe nodded, and the carriage lurched into motion.
“The gorgon?” Clay muttered. He looked over at Gabriel, but his friend was gazing out over the sprawl of the city and would not meet his eyes.
Fivecourt was often called “the city at the centre of the world,” which was, as wine-addled cartographers had an annoying habit of pointing out, not even remotely true. It was, however, situated more or less in the middle of Grandual, governed by a council of representatives from all five kingdoms, and patrolled by a small army of dedicated courtsmen whose allegiance was to Fivecourt alone. The land for leagues in every direction was considered sovereign territory. Unlike the Free City of Conthas, however, which existed beyond the jurisdiction of any of Grandual’s monarchs, Fivecourt belonged to all of them. The city was, both geographically and metaphorically, the hub around which the wheel of Grandual turned.
The city itself was shaped like a shallow bowl. The homes of the wealthy ringed the circling heights, while the poorest lived in squalor at the bottom. It was divided like a pie into six wards, one for each of Grandual’s kingdoms, while the sixth doubled as an administrative district (at the top) and a seedy criminal underworld (at the bottom), though Clay had heard many joke that the two were interchangeable. The river cut a broad stroke through the city’s heart, spanned by half a dozen bridges and clotted with bustling boat traffic.
Floating improbably at the very centre was a colossal arena, bound against the river’s current by four massive iron chains anchored to towers on either shore.
As they rattled down the slope toward Coinbarrow, the arena looked even more daunting. Matrick, following Clay’s awestruck stare, cleared his throat. “The Maxithon, they call it. The largest man-made arena in all of Grandual,” he declared.
“There are others like this?” Clay asked, incredulous.
“Well, not quite like this. Brycliffe’s arena is a quarter the size, and the Ravine outside Ardburg is bigger, though it’s more or less just a conveniently shaped canyon. There’s one off the coast of Phantra called the Giant’s Cradle.”
“Good name,” Clay was forced to admit.
Matrick grinned. “I know, right? It’s shaped sort of long and narrow, like a boat, and it can actually cross the bay between Aldea and Eshere. It’s impressive, but not quite as big as the Maxithon.”
“If you say so,” said Clay warily. He wondered to himself why someone would build something as unnecessarily excessive as a sailing arena. Or a floating one, even.
As if reading his thoughts, Matrick went on speaking. “The world’s a changing place, Clay. Used to be there were monsters everywhere. Every cave, every forest, every swamp a lair for some awful thing or another. You couldn’t turn over a rock without finding a bloody murlog underneath it. The Courts couldn’t pay army regulars to fight monsters—not that they could handle that, anyway—and everyone figured the Heartwyld was someone else’s problem, so things just got worse and worse, until—”
“—until we came along.”
“Exactly,” said Matrick. “The bands changed everything. We cleared the goblins out of every sewer, killed every giant this side of the Wyld.”
“We turned over the rocks and killed all the murlogs,” said Clay.
“Damn right we did.” Matrick nudged him with an elbow. “So what was left? What glory remained for the bands of today?”
“They could still tour the Heartwyld,” Clay ventured.
“Sure, but there’s the rot to think of, and that’s a risk few are willing to take. Instead they build arenas like that—” Matrick pointed to the Maxithon looming dead ahead “—and bring the Heartwyld to them. Most bands today never go anywhere near the forest. They just tour from city to city and fight whatever the local wranglers have on hand.”
“And where do the wranglers get monsters from if not the Wyld?”
Moog poked his head up from the seat behind. “They breed them.”
Clay scowled to hide the fact that Moog had just startled the shit out of him. “They breed what, the monsters?” The wizard nodded, and Clay’s frown deepened. “Well, that’s just … stupid,” he said, peering up at the torch-lit Maxithon as the carriage reached the quay and turned sharply right.
He wondered what might be caged in the bowels of that place even now, stirring restlessly in the dark, waiting for its chance to kill or be killed as a crowd of thousands looked on.
And they call this civilization, he thought sourly.
Chapter Eighteen
All That Glitters
To most who lived in Fivecourt, Coinbarrow was considered the bad part of town. To those visiting from lands beyond, it was usually the first stop after they arrived.
While the north shore of the river was fronted by palatial manors with manicured lawns, elaborate hedge-mazes, and stone jetties where pleasure barges and white-sailed dhows bobbed on the drowsy current, the south side was more what Clay would have expected a harbourfront in Grandual’s largest city to look like.
Here were the gambling holes, the scratch dens, the smokehouses; here the seedy taverns, the wild brothels, the raucous inns. Here were the pawnshops and fence stalls, the moneylenders and the rowdy, run-down theatres where the actors were twice as drunk as the standing crowd and half as entertaining.
Block for block, Coinbarrow was home to more fighting pits than a
nywhere west of Phantra. Fortunes were won and lost on contests pitting desperate men against vile monsters, vile monsters against vicious dogs, vicious dogs against strutting cocks, and the ever-popular (and wildly unpredictable) desperate men and vicious dogs against vile monsters and strutting cocks.
“Gods, but I’ve missed this place,” said Matrick, hopping down from the carriage and stretching his arms.
“The prodigal son returns,” quipped Moog, whose wild white fringe and soiled pyjamas helped him blend right in with the colourful denizens of Fivecourt’s filthy dockside.
Even at night the streets were crowded. As he stepped clear of the carriage Clay recalled the very first time he’d ever set foot in Coinbarrow. He and Gabriel had come in search of cheap lodgings while Kallorek was trying to secure them gigs. It had been morning at the time, and the quay was simultaneously bustling with industry and teeming with those best described as orc-shit crazy. Gabriel, probably thinking he was doing a fine job of talking the place up, had assured Clay that come nightfall it was just as lively, except everyone was orc-shit crazy.
On the nearest corner, for instance, was a man in dirty green robes beseeching passersby to repent their sins at the shrine to the Spring Maiden, while on the opposite corner stood an immaculately dressed man proclaiming that two blocks over was a back-alley brothel in which Glif herself would spread her legs for a silver crown.
“Wait here,” Gabriel told the driver. “We won’t be gone very long.”
The man narrowed his eyes and frowned below a bushy moustache. “I’ll be needing some collateral from you, then,” he said.
Gabriel looked momentarily defeated, but then Matrick offered the man one of his jewelled knives—either Roxy or Grace. Clay had never known which dagger was which.
“If you leave without giving this back,” said Matrick, “I will hunt you to the curling edge of the fucking map and pull your tongue out through your ass. Are we clear?”
Good to see being king only softened his stomach, Clay thought amusedly.
A fight broke out on one of the merchant ships moored nearby, and the birds out front of the carriage baulked at the sound of shouts and ringing steel. Akra instinctively changed colour when they were startled or distressed, and the feathers of one were already flushed pink.
The driver looked appraisingly at the knife Matrick had given him. “Clear as glass,” he said. “But you pay double the fare from here to Pearling Heights. Unless you’d rather I go and see if the real Screaming Eagles need a lift,” he added, when it looked as though Matty meant to throttle him.
“Fine,” said Gabriel.
Clay hadn’t the slightest idea how Gabe planned on paying a double fare—or any fare at all, for that matter—but decided to keep his mouth shut.
“And a word to the would-be wise,” said the driver. “The next time you lot decide to masquerade as mercenaries, maybe don’t choose one of the most famous bands in all of Grandual. The Eagles are headlining the Maxithon tomorrow. There may be a few cheap seats left if you’ve a mind to see real mercs at work.”
Gabriel turned on his heel and set off toward the shadowed mouth of the nearest alley. Moog and Matrick hurried after, leaving Clay the choice between staying to ponder the staggering irony of the driver’s words or to follow along.
“Hey, wait up,” he said.
Gabriel led them up a set of rickety stairs set against the shabby tenement on their right. The boards creaked dangerously beneath Clay’s heavy tread, and somehow the reek of stale piss got stronger the higher he climbed. They’d surprised a pair of trash imps upon entering the alley below. The critters had squealed piteously and scampered into the darkness farther down the way, but now they returned to continue a spirited tug-of-war over what looked to Clay like a broken latrine seat.
Gabriel knocked on the warped wooden door at the top of the stairs, and when the hovel’s occupant failed to materialize he hammered it with his whole forearm, which set the sign above the door teetering on its rusting hook.
“Fender’s Cakes and Custards,” Moog read aloud.
“Seriously?” Matrick looked dubious. “We came to an alley in Coinbarrow for dessert?”
“Fender!” Gabe shouted, giving the trash imps below another scare. “Open up.”
“Who’s Fender?” Clay asked.
“A friend,” Gabe answered. “He collects things, sells things, stores things …”
“So he’s a fence?”
“He’s a kobold.”
Clay decided to stop asking questions, since Gabe’s enigmatic answers only spawned more. Fivecourt was one of the very few cities that granted a form of limited citizenship to nonhumans, so long as they behaved themselves. He supposed a kobold was as capable as any creature of living among humans, though Clay had never seen one outside a cave or a sewer—or without several hundred others of its kind yapping angrily alongside it.
Half a minute passed. The discordant music of half a dozen taverns wafted over the rooftops above. A pair of Carteans staggered by the alley mouth, trading poorly sung snatches of song back and forth. Something dripped into Clay’s hair, and when he looked up to discern whether or not it was raining (it wasn’t), another drop found his open mouth.
“Vail’s bloody fucking—”
The thunk of a bolt being thrown came from beyond the door, then another, and another. Clay heard the slink of several chains, followed by the scrape of a wooden plank being drawn from its brackets. At last a reedy voice called from within. “Is open!”
Pretty tight security for a custard joint, Clay might have joked, had he not been busy trying to figure out what the hell had trickled past his lips just now. His tongue tasted like he’d fished a copper coin out of a sewer drain and popped it in his mouth.
“Careful,” Gabe whispered, before easing open the door. When nothing barreled out at him he crept over the threshold, and the others cautiously followed.
Inside it was dark. The smell of urine retreated as its cohorts mould, dust, and rusting metal advanced in its place. Clay could hear something scuttling in the shadows, and detected the faint sound of rasping breath from somewhere nearby. The roof was so low it grazed Clay’s head if he didn’t stoop a little.
“Something tells me the cake was a lie,” grumbled Matrick.
Clay became aware of several pairs of lights floating like wisps in the darkness, faint as shuttered lamps.
“Whoosit?” came the shrill voice again. “Name you, now!”
“Fender—” Gabriel began.
“Fender is Fender.”
“Yeah, I know that. I’m Gabe.”
“Gabe? I know Gabe. Good Gabe Good.”
“Good Gabe Good, that’s me. Hey, can we maybe get some light in here?”
The speaker clapped its hand and barked, “Chittens! Lights!”
A series of scratches sounded all it once. The sour reek of sulfur barged in to rub shoulders with mould and rusted metal, and a trio of fish-oil lanterns sputtered to life. The band found themselves surrounded by scrawny kobold children—five of them, by Clay’s count—each of them wearing a pair of soot-smeared goggles, which dimmed the glow of their bright yellow eyes. Two of them were holding knives.
Fender—presumably their father—crouched opposite the door. He was no taller than Matrick’s waist, and looked like nothing so much as a scraggly rat standing on its hind legs. He was wearing goggles as well, and also, unbelievably, the exact same pyjamas as Moog, except he had a tasselled cap and pointed slippers to match. He was also hoisting a loaded crossbow with the safety sprung and three long bolts glinting in the dim light.
“Maiden’s Mercy, Fender.” Gabe raised his hands slowly. “Put that thing away.”
“Is nice, yes?” The kobold gave the crossbow a loving pat, which rattled the bolts and set the trigger wire trembling. Clay went rigid, Gabriel flinched, while Moog and Matrick each tried to place themselves in front of the other and ended up in an awkward embrace.
“Fender!” shouted
Gabriel.
“Sorry me, sorry me.” The kobold set the weapon aside without resetting the safety, which prompted Clay to wonder if he even knew it existed. He pushed the goggles up onto his forehead, his yellow eyes glowing bright in the gloom. “Why come you now? Is late night. Fender and chittens were sleep-dreaming.”
Clay squinted into the shadows, assessing the room. The place was a hovel, but not the cozy hovel of the sort inhabited by poets and scribes, crammed with bookshelves, candles, and antique curios. Nor was it the sparse kind of hovel, occupied by little more than a ragged blanket and a straw-stuffed mattress: It was a kobold’s hovel, and that meant shithole.
He caught sight of several small nests in the far corner of the room, presumably what Fender and his children (or chittens, as the kobold called them) employed as beds. The rest of the cramped space was given over to what could best be described as entirely useless junk. Among the many pointless treasures was an old bronze helmet with the skull staved in, the tarnished silver frame of a broken mirror, a box of assorted cutlery, and dozens of jars and cans filled to spilling with copper pennies, brass buttons, and just about anything else that might catch a kobold’s eye.
Gabe swiped a strand of dirty blond hair from his eyes. “I left some money with you a while back. A big bag of coins.”
The kobold cocked its head, wrinkling its pink nose and twitching its mangled whiskers. “Shiny?”
“Yes, shiny. Lots of shiny, for you to keep safe while I was gone, remember?”
“Yes, yes. Fender remembers. Fender hope Good Gabe Good fall in hole and die. That way shiny keep to Fender.” Despite the ugly sentiment, the kobold’s words carried no animosity at all, just plain old wishful thinking.
Clay flashed Gabriel a skeptical glance. “A friend of yours, huh?”
“I didn’t fall in a hole, Fender. Sorry.”
The kobold sniffed. “Too bad.”
“Yeah. Well, no, but—” Gabriel faltered. “Listen, I need the shiny, okay? All of it. Can you get it for me, please?”
“Yes, yes. You wait.” He scurried away, bounding over the crossbow and scaling the hovel’s crumbling plaster wall with alarming dexterity before disappearing through a hole in the ceiling.
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