I made my way through the mess of stalls, which showed no semblance of organization. A stall offering barber services and one selling meat faced each other. I next walked past a food stall selling dried fish, extending off another offering shoe repair. These two were at least partially related, with some of the dried fish resembling the leather strips of the stall next door. As I walked on, the smell of incense assaulted my nose, and I turned to look into a purple tent with a beaded entrance. Through the beads I saw an older woman tossing corn to a rooster. The sign above the entrance read, “Alectryomancer,” though I had no idea if that was her name, or whatever she did to chickens. Groups of children were playing wherever space allowed. One boy was on his own, creating his own entertainment. I watched as he hid on the inside of a tent, his face to the ground. As he saw a lady walk past, he stuck his foot out, tripping her, then ran away.
It took a long time to find the items I needed within the maze of canvas. I bought a small cleaver, a burner fueled by lamp oil, and some bottles of various sizes. I also bought thin fishing line and some small weights, and I stopped by a tailor’s and arranged for him to come by the inn when he was next available. We’d left Castralavi with nothing but the clothes on our backs and had only managed to acquire an additional set each on our way to Sagemont.
Still searching for a few items, I saw Neysa storming down an alley in the direction of the lake. What was it about the girl that fascinated me so? She had a foul temper and the mouth of a sailor. Yet there was something about her. My eyes followed her until she disappeared down an alley. That’s when I noticed a large man trailing close behind her. Before I knew what I was doing, I followed the two in and saw the man exit the other side. I made my way to the end and leaned around the corner to watch. My gut told me the man was up to no good. Something about the way he walked spoke of his intentions. I was still deciding what to do when a hand grabbed me by the shoulder and pushed me hard up against the wall.
The slaver in the white robe had me pinned. Most of his face was hidden in the shadow of his hood, but I could see his mouth. With his free hand, the man reached up and lightly traced his finger on my forehead. Round and round his finger went, following the faint scar left where I removed the brand. A toothy smile appeared on the man’s face. “You’re not the first slave to cut his face. But you are a slave, aren’t you? My slave now,” the man said, leaning in. I could smell his flowery perfume, and garlic on his breath. I showed him my teeth, which confused him for a moment. “What a pretty smile,” he said. He ran his tongue up my neck, then brought his face close to mine and gave me that perverted look that Angus used to give me.
My teeth still showed, but if you ever see the fangs of a lion, do not mistake it for a smile. His face fell as my dagger found his heart. I followed the man to the ground as he slumped, and gave the dagger a vicious twist. “I am no one’s slave,” I said, and stomped my heel down on his face, snapping his neck with a loud crack. I looked both ways down the alley, but it was hidden in shadow. No one had seen what happened.
His previously white robe was soaked with bright red blood, and the contrast made it look all the redder. I wiped my dagger on a clean patch, put it away, and then searched the man. He had a heavy coin purse in one pocket, and a key hung from a gold chain around his neck. I took both. “We were kings once,” I said to the corpse.
Stepping from the alley I looked in the direction Neysa had gone. There was no sign of her or the man. I turned and looked in the direction of the inn, knowing full well that I needed to get away from the body and off the streets. I hesitated for a moment longer before running after Neysa. She was still nowhere to be seen, and I soon arrived at the lake. The lakefront was empty, at least where I was at. Not knowing what else I could do, I turned to leave. Then I heard a muffled scream.
Looking again, I saw a small pier to my left, with two feet sticking out from beneath it, just short of the waterline. I rushed forward and peered underneath to see the man lying on top of Neysa. He did not hear me approach. Too bad for him. His hand was over her mouth, and he licked at her face. She struggled, but the man was large. It looked like I’d gotten there before anything truly unpleasant had happened. There was little room between where they lay, he on top of her, and the pier overhead. A handspan, two at most. I quietly opened my satchel and took the small cleaver in my right hand and the mushrooms Neysa had pelted me with in my left. Neysa noticed me and her eyes went wide. I waved, a smile tugging at the corner of my mouth.
I took a firm grip on the cleaver and struck down as hard as I could on the back of the man’s ankle, cutting clean through his tendon and well into the bone. I was pleased with my purchase. It had been a while since I’d last used such a sharp cleaver, as small as it was. The man screamed and smashed the back of his head on the low pier. His hand slipped from her mouth, a big mistake, as she sunk her teeth into his ear. I used the distraction to strike again on the other ankle. The man rolled out, thrashing and screaming. As he rolled out, I shoved the mushrooms into his open mouth and kicked him hard in the jaw, ensuring he bit down on them. Within moments, the man was unconscious.
I looked around to see if anyone came. No one did, so I cut his throat before wiping my cleaver on the man’s shirt and placing it back in my satchel. “Two for the one who waits,” I said to my god. An offering. I looked beneath the pier at the girl. She was spitting and gagging, a part of the man’s ear to her side, lying in a pool of blood. “You can come out now—it’s safe,” I said.
She crawled out and looked at the man, then at me. She didn’t say anything as she backed away. Not knowing what to say, I turned my back on her and walked into town. I was too angry to be cautious and went up the alley with the dead slave master. I stepped over him and walked to the market to buy the last few items I needed.
Behind me, I heard a scream. Neysa must have followed me to the corpse.
I walked back to the port and made myself comfortable on the corner of the intersection. From my position I had a good view of the imperial warehouse. I placed the cloth hat I’d bought in front of me and brought my new flute to my lips. With the ragged clothing I had on, I made a good imitation of a transient busker. As I played, I watched the legionnaire guards at their posts. I could not even remember the last time I’d played, years in any case, but while I made mistakes, coins dropped into the hat often enough for me to feel satisfied with my performance. The sound of the flute filled the street, and the sad melody had many peeking from their windows.
The slave kid still lay in the road some distance away. He wasn’t moving, and I suspected he was dead. It was probably better than being a slave. Probably. The sight of him tugged at my heart and my sadness filled the music flowing down the street.
Many of the giant crates were already in the warehouse, but a few still remained on the ship. There were now two guards on the door and one at each corner of the building, making six in total. Another ten legionnaires appeared to be on a more general patrol of the port. The centurion walked among these men.
An hour before dusk there was a changing of the guard. The number of guards on the warehouse remained the same, but now only four legionnaires patrolled the port. I put away my flute and picked up the heavy hat which I emptied into my satchel. My busking more than paid for the goods I’d bought in the market. I followed the centurion at a distance, but my skill at tailing was wasted on the man, as he never looked behind him. He was dragging his feet, and his shoulders sagged. He entered a house, and through the window, I saw him remove his breastplate and boots and flop down on a bed. I watched for a while, but saw no one else enter or move around the house and I left, satisfied it was the centurion’s house.
As I walked toward the inn, I noted that most of the roofs on both sides of the street were tiled. I smiled. Thatched roofs were the worst; tiles I could deal with. When I reached the Shady Oak, I walked past it and continued on instead to the market, which was quieter than before. Some stall owners were packing up their wares. I hunt
ed around until I found the mischievous boy I’d seen earlier that day.
I approached the boy and went down on one knee in front of him. “Do you want a reward?” I asked the kid. The boy looked suspicious but nodded. “I have an important job for you. The owner of those wagons over there has dropped his key,” I said, dangling the slaver’s key in front of the boy. His eyes followed it as it swung in front of him. “Now, your job is to look after this until the slave master returns. If you do this important job for me, I will give you this copper coin.” I held the coin in my open palm, and the little brat snatched it away before I could blink. “It’s very important that you not use the key on those wagons. Promise me that you won’t?” He promised.
A cheeky smile played on my face as an idea occurred to me. “Would you like to say a naughty word to those slaves? Something in their language?” The boy nodded, his eyes sparkling. “Can you say, Wah ‘ha Gabeera?” It took him a couple of tries, but he soon had it.
I rushed back to the port, knowing the lad would set the slaves free sooner rather than later. I arrived short of breath and leaned against the side of a building. My heart was still racing when the warden’s bell called the legion to arms. In the next few minutes, several legionnaires ran past me toward the bell, but the guards on the warehouse remained where they stood. “That answers that question,” I thought to myself.
When I returned to the Shady Oak, I was in a foul mood. Perhaps it was foolish to hope that my quest would turn out to be easy after all my years of planning in the dungeon. But the suffering I’d endured over those years did not cause the Gods to lighten my load. I’d killed two people, which while far fewer than my daily average still ruined my mood, and the warehouse was guarded well enough to make our entry a challenge. To top it all off, when I stormed into the inn, I saw Marcus and Neysa talking at a table. It looked like she had been crying, and knowing Marcus, he was comforting her and would be well on his way to getting between her sheets. I had no right to feel slighted by this, but when added to my already less-than-pleasant day, it stung. I sneered at them and stormed up to our room.
CHAPTER NINE
Once an Assassin
There was a loud thump on the door. “Gods,” I heard from the other side. I put aside the cleaver and unlocked the door. When I peered out, I saw Marcus rubbing at his nose. Had he walked into the door? “Oh, it’s you,” I said.
“Yes, don’t mind me—I just live here,” Marcus said as he walked in. He flopped onto his bed and sighed. “I hear you’ve been busy again.” I did not reply, but kept chopping fine red roots into smaller and smaller pieces. The table was cleared of the flowers it had previously held, and an oil burner and several bowls and jars were arranged in their place. “You killed two men. I hope no one tracks the bodies back to us,” Marcus said.
I scraped the fine pieces of root into a bowl, added water, and placed the bowl onto the burner. “So, you and the girl have been talking?” I felt jealous of my friend. Any relationship between them would not last long, which irked me too. Marcus had a way with ladies. Well, with people, really.
“She’s shit scared of you. She recognized that plant you’re chopping up. Told me it’s largely used by rapists. Apparently, a drop of that stuff in a girl’s drink enables certain types of men to knock a girl out and have their way with her. This true?”
“It is.”
“But that’s not what you’re intending, is it?”
“Nope,” was all I said.
“What happened with the slaver?” Marcus asked when the silence stretched on for too long.
My shoulders sagged. “Well, it turns out my face surgery was not as flawless as I’d hoped. He knew. I’ll need to be more careful in the future. But look, I didn’t just go on a killing spree—I also did some reconnaissance. They’re still unloading the imperial ship, but I think they will be done by tomorrow night. My guess is that they will start moving it the day after. We have practically no time, in other words.”
“Tomorrow night, then,” Marcus said.
“Tomorrow night. I watched the legionnaire guards for a while, too. They have the same number on the building at night as during the day. Two on the door, and one on each corner. They only have one guard patrolling the port, but the ship crews are still aboard.”
“Six guards might be a challenge to deal with. Maybe we can distract some away from their posts?” Marcus suggested.
“No, won’t work. I already tried that,” I said.
“Really? Did you show some leg? You might not be their type.”
“I showed them a lot of leg. Three wagons’ worth of slave legs. When I killed the slave master, I took his key, gave it to a bratty kid, and left him to work his magic. When the bell was rung, the legion came running. But not the guards on that warehouse.”
“Well, that’s unfortunate.”
“Quite.
“What happened to the slaves?”
“Not sure,” I said. “I hope some got away.”
“But where would they go?”
“I taught the little boy a new swear word in Ubraian. Or at least, he thinks I did. I would bet good money that he said it before he freed them.”
“Not a swear word, then?”
“No, he said Wah ‘ha Gabeera. It means Great Oasis. It’s in the north of Ubrain, and while they might have a hard time getting there, if they can, it should be a safe place for them.”
“Best of luck to them, then,” Marcus said. “By the way, you were right about the Shady Oak.”
“How so?”
“Elijah confessed that he has serious money problems,” Marcus said. It often surprised me how much people were willing to confide in Marcus. He had a tricky way with that smile of his, and it worked a sort of magic. “Apparently, he has borrowed money from some dodgy characters to keep up with his taxes. Now he’s behind on his payments to both. Not sure what he’s up to exactly, but Warden Adair’s suspicions about the man are probably well-founded. Elijah is a nice man, though,” Marcus said, yawning.
“Get some sleep,” I suggested. “We’ll think of a way to get into that warehouse in the morning.”
An hour past curfew, with Marcus snoring away, I snuck out through the window. The roof was cold on my bare feet, but at least it was dry. I looked down at the streets and found them empty but for a couple of legionnaire patrols. I wondered if the curfew was as strongly enforced here as in Castralavi, but it did not look like I had anything to worry about. The night was dark, which suited me. My night vision had been excellent when I was young, but since I’d been accepted into the assassin’s guild and my training completed, it had only gotten better. I often wondered if it had anything to do with the tattoo on my shoulder.
Staying low, I leapt from the inn to the next roof—quietly, as a roaring lion kills no game. In my experience, the easiest way to remain unseen was to be where no one expected to see you. Simple, of course, but these lessons had been learned the hard way. I’d found that rooftops gave me the best chance of remaining unseen, especially as closely spaced as they were in Sagemont. They posed their own risks, however. Once, Angus had sent me to assassinate a nobleman, and I’d fallen through a poorly thatched roof. As I’d lain winded on their dinner table, the occupants of the house had overpowered me and called for the legion. The legion, of course, had handed me back to Angus, and I’d received one of the worst beatings of my life.
It may sound odd, but my tasks as an assassin were by far the most enjoyable of those I’d had as a slave. They’d meant I could be away from the dungeon, and Angus. The Sons of Svyn treated all its members as equals. Even slaves. While slaves were stripped of their real names, that presented its own difficulties. We were given slave names, unimaginative, but demeaning names like: worm, maggot, shit, dung beetle and so on. I wondered how many maggots there were. Many, I would think. My guild gave me a new name: “Ghost in Shadows.”
They were brothers to me at the time I’d most needed them. Part of me wished I could involve
them in my quest, but the guild walked a fine line at the best of times. The empire often made use of their unique skills, and so tended to look the other way for other assassinations, too, but I doubted such courtesy would be extended where my goals were involved.
A cold wind blew across the lake, and the lapping surf roared in the otherwise quiet night. I always enjoyed being up on the roofs past curfew. It was quiet, dark, and clean somehow. Alas, it usually meant I was about to kill someone. Too bad for them. I crouched out of sight of a patrol and waited for them to pass. As had become my habit, I looked up at the Eye of Svyn. It was just a brighter patch of cloud that night. When the patrol was a ways down the road, I continued on.
A few minutes later, I arrived at the centurion’s house and slowed down. I leapt to the apex of the roof, which was the strongest part and made the least noise. Moving slowly, I shifted my weight from one foot to the other until I got to a spot I believed would be above his bed. I pried a roof tile free and placed it so as not to slide down. Kneeling beside the hole, I closed my eyes, let them adjust, then shoved my head through. When I opened them, I saw that I’d misjudged the position of the bed. But the hole was right above a thick rafter, which would do as well. I lifted another three tiles, creating a square hole just large enough to fit through, and lowered myself onto the rafter.
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