Valdemar Books

by Lackey, Mercedes

  That did leave him some options. Sometimes he could find someone with errands to run; sometimes he could shovel snow or sweep crossings for a pennybit. There was refuse to haul off for the rag-and-bone men if they came up short a man. But none of that was to be counted on as a source of food or money to buy it, and Skif had finally hit on something that was.

  It took him far out of his own neighborhood, and into places where his ragged, coatless state was very conspicuous. That was the drawback; before he reached his goal, he might be turned back a dozen times by suspicious folk who didn't like the look of him in their clean and prosperous streets.

  Eventually he left the tenements and crooked, foul streets and penetrated into places where the streets were clean and kept clean by people whose only job was to sweep them. The transition was amazing to him, and even more amazing was that there were single families that lived in buildings that would serve to house a dozen or more families in his area. He didn't even try to venture onto those streets; there were all sorts of people there whose only job was to keep people like him out.

  Now he went to the alleys, slinking from bit of cover to bit of cover. There was plenty of cover here; permanent rubbish bins where ashes, broken crockery, bits of wood, scraps from food preparation too small or too spoiled for anyone from these houses to consider useful were left for the rubbish collectors. This was where the wood—and possibly some of the foodstuffs—bought by Uncle Londer came from. Skif knew better than to rummage in those bins; they "belonged" to the rubbish collectors who guarded their territories jealously, with curses, kicks, and blows. But the rubbish collectors didn't care who they saw in their alleys so long as he left the bins alone, and they ignored Skif as if he was invisible. Sometimes there were other things left back here as well, usually weeds, bags of dead plants and leaves, sticks and trimmings from gardens. It all made places for a small boy like Skif to hide. These alleys were faced by blank walls that rose well above Skif's head, but not all of those walls were as impervious as they seemed.

  He had skipped over three or four social strata now, he'd known better than to look for a mark among people like Dolly's parents or the small merchants. Such folk feared to lose what they'd built up and were as penurious in their way as his uncle; they didn't share what they had, and when they caught someone trying to get a bit for himself, punished him with fury. No, when Skif decided that he was going to help himself to the bounty of others, he knew he'd need to find someone who had so much that he couldn't keep track of it all, and so many servants that it wasn't possible even for them to do so.

  The drawback was that in such a rich household, there were privileges that were jealously guarded, and as he knew very well, even those things that the owner thought were refuse had value. The cook and her staff all had the rights to such things as fat skimmed from the cooking, the burned or otherwise "spoiled" bits, and "broken meats"—which last were cooked leftover items that had been cut into or served from without actually having been on someone's plate. Depending on the household, unless such items were designated to go to the poor, the cook and helpers could sell such items from the back door, or give them to relatives who were less well-provided-for, or a combination of all of these things. "Scrapings"—the leftovers scraped from plates into a slop bucket by the dishwashers—belonged to the dishwashers in some households, or were fed to household animals in others, and again could be sold or carried off, if not fed to animals. Stale bread and cake were the provenance of the pastry cook, sometimes a different entity from the head cook, who had the same options.

  All these leftover items were jealously guarded from the time they became leftovers. But from the time they left the hands of the cooks until the moment that they were brought back to the kitchen, no one was paying any great amount of attention to the quantities on platters in a so-called "great" household.

  And that was where Skif had found his little opportunity to exploit the situation.

  He noted the first breach in the defenses by the cloud of sweet-scented steam rising over the wall; this was a huge household that had its own laundry. Making sure that he wouldn't be spotted, he kicked off his boots and hid them inside the wall, squeezing them in through a place where he'd found a loose brick. It had occurred to him more than once that he was probably using someone else's hiding place—bricks in well-tended walls like this one didn't just "come loose" by accident. He wouldn't be the least surprised to learn that someone (or several someones) in this great house had once used the place to store small articles purloined in the course of duties, to be retrieved and carried off later.

  Now barefooted, he climbed nimbly over the top and into the open laundry yard, full of vats of hot water, bleaches, and soap in which household linens soaked before being pounded by a dozen laundresses, rinsed, and hung up to dry. Between the vats, sheets and towels were strung on lines crisscrossing the yard. The bleaches were so harsh that these vats were kept in the open, and away from the rest of the laundry where the clothing was cleaned, for a careless splash could ruin a colored tunic forever. The steam and the hanging linens gave him cover to get into the room where the livery for the pages was stored once it had been laundered, and on his way through, he grabbed a wet towel out of one of the vats to take with him.

  The pages—there were at least twenty of them—went through a dozen sets of livery apiece in a week, for the servant who had charge over them insisted on absolute cleanliness.

  This room—which they called a "closet" although it was as big as the Hollybush's common room—held only shelves that were stacked with tabbards, tunics, and trews for every possible size of boy. They didn't wear boots or shoes, perhaps because they were so young that they would probably outgrow boots or shoes too quickly; instead, they wore colored stockings with leather bottoms, which could fit a wide variety of feet. Hence, Skif's current barefoot status.

  The rest of the livery was designed to be oversized on practically any child, so Skif would have no difficulty in fitting into whatever was clean. Within moments, his own clothing was hidden under piles of discarded but clean tabards too worn to be used for anything but really dirty jobs, but too good to be relegated to duty as rags. A quick wipe all over himself with the damp towel—a dirty boy would stand out dreadfully among the clean pages—and a quick change of clothing, and Skif was now a page.

  Just in time for luncheon.

  Now properly outfitted, and hence invisible to the rest of the staff, he dropped the filthy towel in a pile of others waiting to be cleaned, trotted out of the laundry just as if he was on an errand. He crossed a paved court to the kitchens, slipped inside the door, and joined the line of pages bringing common food into the lord's Great Hall. He made certain to take a platter heavily laden with a pile of what looked like boiled baby cabbages no bigger than his thumb; by the time it got to the table, two of them were in his pockets.

  This Lord Orthallen must be a very important person. Every day he entertained a horde of people at his table, perhaps fifty or sixty of them, besides the dozen or so of his own immediate family. That was just guests; there was a small army of his own servants and retainers at still lower tables, but they had to serve themselves from great bowls and platters brought from the kitchen by one of their own number.

  Skif and the other pages served only the guests, who got foods that were designed to be eaten with one's own knife and hands. After the tiny cabbages, he purloined a dainty little coin-sized meat pie, a soft roll of white bread, a cube of cheese, more cheese wrapped in pastry, a small boiled turnip, and an apple. That was all his pockets would hold. He made certain that he was in the procession of pages that got the platters going to those who sat below the lord's salt—he didn't have the manners to serve at the head table and he knew that he'd be recognized for an interloper. Those who sat lower were too busy eating, gossiping, and watching their betters to pay attention to the pages.

  Once his pockets were full, Skif made certain to "accidentally" get some grease on the front of his tabard—a
n accident that occurred to at least three of the pages at every meal, since many of them were young and they were all rushing to and fro. As he expected, he was sent to the laundry to change.

  Once there, he swiftly changed back into his own clothing, left the soiled uniform with others like it, and went back up—but not over the walls and into the alleys.

  After all, why should he? He had nothing particular to do out there. His friends were all too busy working or on schemes of their own to get themselves fed to have any time for play—playing was what the fortunate children of the rich did. For the moment, he wanted a warm place to rest and eat, and there was one right here at hand.

  There was an attic over the laundry, a loft area that was barely tall enough to allow him to walk hunched over, where old tubs and some of the laundry stores were kept. It got more than enough heat from the laundry below to be comfortably cozy and more than enough steam to keep down the dust. Here, Skif curled up inside an overturned wooden tub for extra concealment and dug into his purloined food.

  He could, of course, have eaten three times what he'd stolen—but it was twice what he'd get at the tavern, and not only entirely edible, but tasty to boot.

  With his stomach relatively full, he curled up in the tub for a nap. Here, and not in his cubby at the Hollybush, was where he could sleep in comfort and security. And he did.

  2

  No matter how comfortable he was, Skif slept like a cat, with one eye open and one ear cocked, in case trouble stole upon him, thinking to catch him unaware. So even though he didn't know what woke him, when he woke, he came alert all at once, and instead of jumping to his feet, he stayed frozen in place, listening.

  Wood creaked slightly, somewhere in the loft. Was it a footstep? The sound came again, a trifle nearer, then fabric brushed against something harder. There was someone up here with him.

  Now, it wouldn't be one of the laundry servants on proper business; they came up the stair, clumping and talking loudly. It might be a servant or a page come up here to nap or escape work—if it was, although Skif would have a slight advantage in that the other wouldn't want to be caught, he had a profound disadvantage in that he didn't belong here himself, and the other could legitimately claim to have heard something overhead and gone to investigate. If that was the case, he'd be stuck under this tub until the other person left.

  It might also be something and someone entirely different—a thief, who wouldn't want to be found any more than Skif did, who might flee, or might fight, depending on the circumstances, if Skif came out of hiding.

  He didn't know enough yet; better to wait. It was highly unlikely that the other would choose Skif's particular tub to hide himself or anything else underneath. It was out of the way and smallish, and Skif had chosen it for precisely those reasons. Instead, he peered under the edge of it, as the surreptitious sounds moved closer, thanking his luck that it wasn't dusty up here. Now would be a bad time to sneeze.

  It sounded, given the direction the sounds were coming from, as if the unknown had gotten into the loft the same way that Skif had, through the gable window at the end. Skif narrowed his eyes, waiting for something to come into his area of vision among the slats of the wooden tubs. The light was surprisingly good up here, but the sun was all wrong for Skif to see a shadow that might give him some notion of who the other intruder was. The creaking gave Skif a good idea that the fellow moved toward the stairs, which meant he was at least thinking of using them to descend into the laundry itself. That wasn't an option Skif would have chosen—unless, of course, the fellow was a thief, and was planning on purloining something from the laundry itself. There was plenty of stuff to steal in there; silk handkerchiefs and scarves, the embroidered ribbons that the young ladies of the household liked to use for their necks and hair and the young men liked to give them, the gossamer veils they wore in public—all light, easy to carry, presumably easy to sell. The only reason Skif hadn't helped himself before this was that he didn't know where to dispose of such things and was not about to share his loot with Kalchan.

  A foot slid slowly into view; not a big foot, and most importantly of all, not a foot clad in the soled sock of a page or liveried indoor servant. This was a foot in a half-boot of very flexible black leather, laced tight to the ankle and calf, much worn and patched, not much larger than his own, attached to a leg in rusty black trews with worn places along the hem. This foot, and the person who wore those trews, did not belong here. No one in Lord Orthallen's service wore anything of the sort.

  Skif made a quick decision, and struck. Before the other knew he was there, Skif's hand darted from under the tub, and Skif had the fellow's ankle held fast in a hand that was a lot stronger than it looked.

  Skif had half expected a struggle, or at least an attempt to get free, but the owner of the ankle had more sense than that—or was more afraid of the attention that the sounds of a struggle would bring than anything Skif could do to him. So now, it was the other's turn to freeze.

  Skif mentally applauded his decision. He thought he had a good idea of what was going through the other fellow's mind. Now, the arm that Skif had snaked out from beneath the tub was clad in a sleeve that was more patch than whole cloth. So Skif obviously didn't belong here either, and the two of them were at an equal advantage and disadvantage. For either to make noise or fuss would mean that both would be caught—and no point in trying to claim that one had seen the other sneak over the wall and followed to catch him either. An honest boy would have pounded on the back entrance to report the intruder, not climbed up after him. No, no—if one betrayed the other, both of them would be thrown to the City Guard.

  So the other fellow did the prudent thing; he stayed in place once Skif let go of him so that Skif could slip out from under the tub. Like it or not, for the moment they were partners in crime. Skif, however, had a plan.

  There was a moment when the other could have tried to knock Skif out and make a run for it, but he didn't. Such an action would have been noisy, of course, and he still might have been caught, but with one unconscious or semiconscious boy on the floor to distract those who would come clambering up here, he might have been able to get away. Skif breathed a sigh of relief when he was all the way out from under the tub and was able to kneel next to it, looking up at the interloper.

  What he saw was a boy of about fifteen, but small for his age, so that he wasn't a great deal taller than Skif. His thin face, as closed and impassive as any statue's, gave away no hint of what he was thinking. His eyes narrowed when he got a good look at his captor, but there was no telling what emotion lay behind the eyes.

  His clothing was better than Skif's—but then again, whose wasn't? Skif wore every shirt he owned—three, all ragged, all inexpertly patched by his own hands, all faded into an indeterminate brown—with a knitted tunic that was more hole than knit over the top of it all. His linen trews, patched as well, were under his woolen trews, which for a change, had been darned except for the seat which sported a huge patch made from an old canvas tent. This boy's clothing was at least all the same color and the patches were of the same sort of material as the original. In fact, unless you were as close as Skif was, you wouldn't notice the patches much.

  He had long hair of a middling brown color, and a headband of dark braided string to keep it out of his eyes. His eyes matched his hair, and if he'd been fed as well as one of the page boys his face would have been round; as it was, the bones showed clearly, though not nearly as sharply defined as Skif's.

  There were other signs of relative prosperity; the other boy's wrists weren't as thin as Skif's, and he showed no signs of the many illnesses that the poor were prone to in the winter. If he was a thief—and there was little doubt in Skif's mind that he was—this boy was a good enough thief to be doing well.

  The two of them stared at each other for several moments. It was the older boy who finally broke the silence.

  "Wot ye want?" he asked, in a harsh whisper.

  Until that moment when
he'd seized the other's ankle, Skif hadn't known what he wanted, but the moment his hand had touched leather, his plan had sprung up in his mind.

  "Teach me," he whispered, and saw with satisfaction the boy's eyes widen with surprise, then his slow nod.

  He squatted down beside Skif, who beckoned to him to follow. On hands and knees, Skif led him into the maze of tubs and empty packing crates until they were hidden from view against the wall, next to the chimney.

  There they settled, screened by stacks of buckets needing repair. From below came the steady sounds of the laundry, which should cover any conversation of theirs.

  "Ye ain't no page, an' ye ain't got no reason t'be in the wash house. Wot ye doin' here?" the boy asked, more curious than annoyed.

  Skif shrugged. "Same as you, only not so good," he replied. He explained his ruse to get fed to the boy, whose lips twitched into a thin smile.

  "Not bad done, fer a little," he acknowledged. "Noboddie never pays mind t'littles. Ye cud do better, though. Real work, not this pilferin' bits uv grub. I kin get through places a mun can't, an ye kin get where I can't. We might cud work t'gether."

  "That's why I want ye t'teach me," Skif whispered back. "Can't keep runnin' this ferever. Won' look like no page much longer."

  The boy snorted. "Won't need to. Here, shake on't." He held out his hand, a thin, hard, and strong hand, and Skif took it, cementing their bargain with a shake. "M'name's Deek," the boy said, releasing his hand.

  Skif was happy to note that Deek hadn't tried to crush his hand in his grip or otherwise show signs of being a bully. "Call me Skif," he offered.

  Deek grinned. "Good. Now, you stay here—I come back in a tick, an' we'll scoot out by th' back t'gether." He cocked his head down at the floor, and it was pretty clear that there wasn't anyone working down in the laundry anymore. It was probably time for supper; the laundresses and some of the other servants ate long before their betters, and went to bed soon after sundown, for their work started before sunrise.