by Tom Lloyd
Even Investigators like Narin, who saw the harsher side of the city, were often as wary as little boys around her. Sheti knew it was only at the urging of his worldly friend, Enchei, that Narin had first invited her to eat with them, more than a year ago now. The invitation was now a regular one and she had found the pair enjoyable company in a way her stern and weary daughters-in-law were not. Spurred on by the occasional invitation to these convivial evenings, others in the compound had tentatively followed suit. Now a growing sense of family was developing ; Sheti playing matriarch to two score men mostly young enough to be her own sons.
Sheti straightened and shook her hair out. Pulling it deftly back she slipped a scarf – black, denoting peasant caste – over her head and tied it underneath her hair in the style of a married woman. She paused and blew a kiss towards a small painting of a young man that hung above the fire. It was a typical sailor’s portrait ; simple and quickly-made, but accurate enough to stir her memory.
The portraits were traditional wedding gifts for the brides of sailors, as so many men were lost to the sea-fogs and rocks of the Inner Sea. She had almost refused it when Oshene had presented the portrait to her, feeling immediately guilty at the idea, but for once he had been insistent. The pain of his loss was dimmed and distant nowadays, but forever present. It remained one of the reasons why she had chosen to work in the compound rather than live with one of her sons.
Only in the quiet moments did she remember him properly, felt him at her side as the bed creaked gently at night or a breeze brushed the sheets. For that ghostly memory she was glad to put up with long hours of work at the compound, cleaning and mending for careless young men, and the twinkling smiles from that aging fool, Enchei.
‘No, he’s no fool that one, my love,’ she said with a wag of one finger towards Oshene’s portrait as though her late husband had spoken through it. ‘However much he plays one, that old boy has us all well worked out.’
She closed the shutters and slipped the latch, gathering up her shawl as she headed towards the door though her journey was as short as could be.
‘No, far from a fool is our Enchei,’ she continued under her breath as she went out into the compound’s courtyard, ‘even if he does like teasing me to the point of getting a smack.’
And there’s the crack in his armour, she added privately. The man might like to argue about the sun and stars given half a chance ; but it’s always with a smile and never a raised voice. That smacks of a man who misses his wife, to my mind. Oshene and I squabbled the same way often enough.
Curtseying with a smile to one of her younger neighbours as he hurried out, tugging his Investigator’s robes straight as he went, Sheti crossed the packed-dirt courtyard and made for the stairway on the other side. She could hear Enchei long before she reached the door, clattering a pan on Narin’s stove while singing in his strange native tongue.
Despite the racket, somehow the tattooist still managed to know she was coming and as Sheti jerked open the door, Enchei stood there with his arms wide in greeting. In his hands were a large knife and a rusty-red crab with long dangling legs.
‘Mistress Sheti !’ Enchei declared with apparent delight, ‘your timing is impeccable as always.’
‘Indeed ? And for what this time ?’ she said with a raised eyebrow at what he held. ‘That crab doesn’t look cooked yet to me.’
She curtseyed briefly to both men despite their friendship, each being of a higher caste. The formality was a reminder to all of them, a polite boundary to their familiarity. Enchei offered a half-bow in return, one that had less to do with caste than theatre, and swept out of her way to deposit the crab on the table. The creature’s claws flopped over the edge, almost pleading for its life as Enchei prepared it for the pot.
‘That it isn’t, but Narin was just contemplating stripping his guest naked and naturally I thought of you.’
Sheti gave a start as Narin rose from the other side of the room. Still in his Investigator’s robes, Narin wore a strangely fearful expression, but any question at that dissipated when she noticed a bandaged man tied to a bed in the corner.
‘What is going on here, Master Narin ?’ Sheti demanded, bewildered by the sight.
‘Official Lawbringer business,’ the younger man said stiffly. ‘I’m not at liberty to tell you everything, Mistress Sheti, but this man will be staying here for a few days.’
‘Official business ?’ she echoed. Sheti blinked and looked from one man to the other. Narin was a handsome young man, well past the age he should be married, but a liar he was not. That, coupled with Enchei’s apparent delight, told her all she needed to know there. ‘Narin, we’re friends, are we not ?’
He hesitated, frozen like a rabbit for a moment before nodding. ‘I think so.’
‘Excellent, so do I,’ she said, advancing a step towards him and nudging the door closed with a flick of her heel. ‘Now please don’t insult your friend and give me an explanation I’m going to believe.’
He deflated almost instantly. ‘Very well, I’m sorry. I’m … I don’t rightly know what’s going on, though.’
‘Give me something,’ she advised.
‘I knocked him out last night, while out seeing a friend. He took me by surprise and I reacted without thinking. He’d fallen from a rooftop and was injured – I think he was being chased by Lord Shield at the time and he’s ordered me to find out who this man is and what he was up to.’
‘Lord Shield ?’ she gasped. ‘You spoke to a God last night ? This is your idea of a more plausible explanation ?’
‘I swear it’s the truth ! I wish I was making it up, but I think I’m in real trouble if I don’t find out what he was doing out on that rooftop.’
Sheti didn’t speak for a while. She approached the bed and looked down at the man. He was asleep or unconscious and half-naked already, a sheet only partially covering his broad chest. The man was older than Narin, but still in the prime of life given his build. The ghost of a black beard lay on his tanned cheeks, while a pile of weapons sat atop some stained black clothes on the other side of the bed.
‘Who is he ?’ she breathed, edging closer.
‘I’ve no idea. That’s what I have to find out.’
‘Is he dangerous ?’
Narin hesitated. ‘He’s a goshe – dressed and armed like an assassin. We have to assume he’s dangerous, but mostly I didn’t want him moving before he woke and I had to leave him alone for half the day.’
‘You honestly spoke to Lord Shield ?’ she said, confusion taking over again. ‘What game is he playing with you – how can you manage anything he cannot ?’
‘It seems Lord Shield doesn’t want to be too actively involved,’ Enchei supplied from behind her. Sheti glanced back to see the man reverse his knife and drive it down through the shell of the crab with a practised movement. ‘He must want Narin to stir up trouble first, see what rises to the top.’
‘And then ?’
Enchei shrugged and turned his attention back to the crab, neatly cracking it open.
‘What are you going to do, Narin ?’
The younger man scowled and gestured to the pile on the other side of the bed. ‘Firstly, go through his belongings. See if there’s anything that might help me.’
She shook her head. ‘First you fetch water and a cloth.’ Sheti sighed and knelt down beside the injured man. ‘I don’t know much about Gods, but I do know about injured men. He needs to be washed ; you don’t leave a man stinking in his own sweat and blood like that.’
As Narin went to fetch a bowl, Sheti started to untie the cord around the unconscious man’s ankles. ‘As for after, how about you just leave a note on your door for him ? When he wakes he can come find me.’
‘I can’t risk him running away !’ Narin protested. ‘He’s probably a fugitive, remember ? The word of a God’s good enough for me—’
‘Then take him to the Palace of Law !’ Sheti interrupted angrily. ‘That’s where you take criminals isn’t
it ?’
‘It’s complicated.’
‘Enough to make you act like a fool ?’ She rose and faced Narin. ‘You’ve told me often enough how much of a stickler Lawbringer Rhe is – what would he say about all this ? Would he approve of you confining a man without record or trial ? You are still trying to impress him, aren’t you ? Prove to him you’re worthy of promotion ?’
Narin raised his hands to stop her. ‘I know, I know, but please listen. I have no evidence, no crime under Imperial law, no clue what is going on other than a God giving me orders I don’t understand. I’m going to speak to Rhe tomorrow – tell him everything and ask his advice. You know what he’s like ; Rhe is the most scrupulous and uncompromising Lawbringer in living memory.’
‘So you’ll take his opinion but not mine ?’
‘He’s a Lawbringer,’ Narin protested, ‘my superior and as much an expert in the Emperor’s law as anyone I can trust. I don’t mean it as a slight on you.’
‘Enchei – are you just going to stand there silently and not offer any sort of opinion ? Normally we can hardly hear ourselves think for your thoughts on every subject under the stars.’
The older man looked up. ‘You want me to help persuade him ? Sorry, I’ve never been one for rules and regulations. Anyways, our friend there looks like he’s seen his fair share of trouble. Doubt he’d be so happy if he woke up at the Palace of Law.’
‘So you’re happy to tie him up and keep him hidden ? Let him disappear from the world no matter what he wants or who might be looking for him ? Have you no morals ?’
Enchei grinned. ‘Sold ’em off years ago. Got a good price too.’
‘Now is the time for jokes ?’
He stopped and put down his knife, the smile vanishing from his face. ‘Jokes ? Who says I was joking ? You strip and wash him ; I’ll even help you if you want. You look at the marks on his body and I’ll tell you what most likely caused ’em. That man’s lived a violent life and if he’s goshe he’s probably good at it. Men like that live by different rules and Imperial laws of confinement don’t figure much in them. I doubt he’ll be overly upset by being cared for and hidden for a week, whatever the constraints.’
He walked around her with a grim look on his face and knelt at the goshe’s side. ‘But sure, we could try it your way and worry about Lord Shield later. Gods are notoriously easy to stop when you’ve pissed them off.’
Sheti didn’t reply. After a moment she joined the two men in stripping off the remainder of the stranger’s clothes and sponging the sweat and dried blood off his body. It didn’t take them long, half the job already having been done, and swiftly she saw Enchei was right. The tattoos on the man’s shoulder proclaimed military service, but she doubted all of his injuries had come from that. A life of crime afterwards seemed likely. Gang fights or assassinations she had no way of telling, but this was a lifetime of injuries unless he had been a remarkably inept soldier.
‘Now his belongings,’ Narin declared once they were finished, retrieving the pile from the other side of the bed. Enchei left them to it, returning to his cooking while they picked over each item in turn and looked for clues.
It didn’t take long, everything being plain and unremarkable, but at last they found something tucked into an inside pocket of the man’s tunic – a rough piece of paper with small, neat writing on it. Narin spent a while peering at it then handed it over to Sheti. ‘A list of street names ?’
She didn’t reply immediately. There were numbers on the paper as well, accompanying some but not all of the words, while each string of numbers and words ended in one written just a shade more definitely than the rest.
‘I know some of these streets – Tessail leads off Grand Adahn over in House Dragon’s district. I don’t see where all the numbers fit in though.’
‘Door numbers ?’
She shook her head. ‘Tessail’s a poor street ; I doubt any of the houses will be numbered there. The next words are Cettas Han though, that’s a few streets away from Tessail – they’re not connected.’
‘If you’re following a route, you need to count streets to know when you’re turning,’ Enchei called. ‘Otherwise how do you tell where you’re going ? Half the streets won’t have posted names so you can’t go directly from one to the next.’
‘Does that fit ?’ Narin wondered aloud. He took the paper back and ran his finger along the words, muttering each one under his breath. ‘Ah, I can’t tell, I don’t know these districts well enough to remember.’
Sheti pushed the goshe’s weapons under the narrow bed and stood. ‘There you go then, there’s your evidence. Tell Rhe your story and show him the paper. Between the two of you, you should be able to follow these directions. There are what, four destinations by the looks of it ? Find something to tie them and you might know what you’re involved in. Don’t find something, maybe you stop assuming this man is a dangerous criminal. There are enough disappearances in the Empire without you adding to their numbers.’
Narin looked down again at the paper and nodded briefly. ‘Got to start somewhere, I suppose.’
‘And come and eat your greens, young man,’ Enchei added with a laugh. ‘Your mystery will still be there once we’ve eaten.’
Chapter 3
With the ascension of mortals to the heavens, some hoped the old Gods would simply fade into history or be destroyed. One must now wonder whether the God-Emperor and God-Empress instead felt kinship for beings they would now share eternity with – or more worryingly, they are not strong enough to defeat those we now call demons.
From A History by Ayel Sorote
Cotto padded noiselessly along the peak of the roof until he reached the great clay-brick chimney at its centre. He glanced back and nodded to Shir, watching the small man hop the gap between houses and follow Cotto’s path. The breeze was faint on his skin and a layer of clouds hid all but a glimmer of the moonlight. Despite the dark he could see the lines of the city clearly, each roof and tile outlined in pale starry white. On the streets below was a veil of mist, creeping tendrils enveloping the city’s houses like an octopus’s embrace.
‘No sign ?’ Shir whispered, crouching beside Cotto to present a smaller outline against the sky.
‘Sign of what ?’ Cotto growled back. ‘This is a fool’s errand. What in the seven hells are we likely to find out here ?’
He remained standing, one hand hooked on the hanging jaw of a terracotta dragon’s head that protruded from one corner of the massive chimney. His skin was so dark that the whites of Cotto’s eyes seemed to shine by contrast.
‘Our lost brother !’ Shir insisted. ‘Some clue about what happened to him.’
Cotto scowled. ‘Just shut up,’ he muttered, watching Shir’s jaw clamp shut. He felt a pang of contempt at that, at how obedient the man was. ‘Whatever happened to our brother, he’ll be long gone – dead or alive.’
Little more than dogs, they are, he thought to himself. Starsight’s wasted on them ; they’ll always be less than a normal man. I can hardly see why the Elders bother giving them any of the Blessings – ’cept it means fewer true men like me to give the orders.
He moved around the chimney to look north from where they were, toward the palazzos of the Dragons where lesser men ruled ; his countrymen, who’d likely not even acknowledge his presence except to summon their guards. Blade-like towers reached up into the sky, set with long curves of glass that faintly glowed green or blue. Ancient magic, a jealously guarded secret that illuminated the towers and arches of House Dragon’s district, but mere toys compared to the Blessings Cotto now possessed.
‘Keep moving,’ he muttered, giving the docile Shir a nudge with his boot. ‘We search these streets and return to report.’
They set off at a faster pace, Cotto leading the way along the rooftops of the district’s lower-caste areas. As they went, the city seemed to close in on them ; mist rising up from the Crescent and the sea to fill the streets with a pale, insubstantial blanket even their Sta
rsight could hardly penetrate. They kept to the rooftops, working their way into the corners between buildings and ornate chimneys for their lost brother or a clue to his disappearance.
It was slow going – even with the Cat’s Paw Blessings the Elders had imbued into their muscles to let them walk silently – but they moved steadily down the lines of houses as the night drew on. They paused at a crossroad, peering down at the dirt-packed ground below with wary, unblinking eyes.
All was still, the mist undisturbed by man or beast, God or demon. Over the crossroad stood a grand structure, a four-pillared archway canopied by a shallow roof of red tiles. A black dragon statue stood at the very peak of the roof, facing north-east down the larger of the streets leading away from the crossroad – claws raised and silently roaring a challenge to the cliff-top palazzos of House Eagle.
Cotto was about to leap onto the tiled roof when he heard a faint sound from his companion, a hiss of warning. He froze and heard a click of the tongue come from Shir, then a second. Turning his head slowly, Cotto scanned the street to the right as the signal had told him to. At first he saw nothing, then he noticed a slight disturbance in the white spread of mist on the street below. He shifted his body slightly and felt the reassuring press of a long-knife in its sheath as he watched the mist drift like a lonely spectre.
Something moved in the street, something smaller than a human. Against the mist it was hard to tell what, but Shir had been right to warn him. There was no sound coming from that direction, no pad of feet or panting that might indicate a stray dog. Cotto eased himself back against the peak of the roof and slowly slipped a hand behind his back, reaching for the small crossbow stowed there. With practised fingers he unshipped the weapon and brought it in front of him, ratcheted the string back and locked it into place without taking his eyes off the curls of mist below. It wasn’t a powerful weapon, but if that was a fox in the street, it would be enough to kill it and send any demon inhabiting its body fleeing.