A Dragon In the Palace

by William King

  “It’s the dreamweed,” Jay said. “A lot of people around here use it.”

  “How can they afford it?” I asked.

  “They beg. They steal. They do casual labour. They work for less money than most.”

  It was the first time I had seen anything like this and it shocked me. It was only in one relatively small section of the city but still it held a surprisingly large number of people. “Why do they do it?” I asked.

  “The weed dulls hunger and pain and it makes you happy,” Jay said. “Or so I’m told. I’ve never tried it myself.”

  He sniffed the air. A sickly-sweet scent drifting on it. I saw people puffing away on pipes. They were not smoking tobacco. They sat together in small groups and passed the pipes around. They seemed happy enough and even calm. I said that to Jay.

  “They are now,” he said. “They won’t be in a few hours when the hit wears off.”

  “They give the same stuff to slaves in the Shadow Kingdoms,” Ghoran said. “It keep them pacified.”

  “These people might as well be slaves,” Jay said. “Actually, I suspect they are, but to the weed not to a human master.”

  “Where do they get it?” I asked.

  “We do you think?” Jay responded. “The gangs sell it, just like they sell other stuff, like girls.”

  “What do you mean?”

  He paused and swallowed and then seemed to be thinking of something really unpleasant. “Exactly what you think. Where do you think all those people who vanish from the street go?”

  “That’s horrible,” I said.

  “Welcome to East Tower,” Jay said.

  A group of hard-looking young men sauntered up to us. They looked us up and down contemptuously. Ghoran grinned back, not in the least troubled by the fact they outnumbered us two to one and were carrying knives.

  “What are you doing here?” One of the youths asked. He was wiry and muscular and his hair coiled in tight curls. A number of tattoos covered his arms. He spoke with an easy confidence.

  “I have business at the Black Skull,” Jay said.

  “And what would that be?”

  “None of your business,” Jay said. “It’s with Mercius.”

  “Is that so?” The youth would clearly have liked to have been more aggressive but the name of the moneylender had put him on the back foot.

  “Yes, that’s so, so I suggest you let us pass,” Jay said.

  “It good idea,” Ghoran said.

  “Do you think?” The gang leader said.

  “Yep,” Ghoran said. “Otherwise I take little knife off you and stick it up your arse.”

  “There was absolutely no need for that,” I said.

  The youths seemed shocked that someone could talk to them like this. The whole situation was spinning out of control.

  “Think you’re tough,” the gangster said.

  “Want find out?” Ghoran asked, displaying his terrifying ability to appear utterly calm and yet utterly prepared for violence.

  “You’re lucky you’ve got business with Mercius,” said the youth. “Otherwise we’d see where this dagger would go.”

  “That we would,” Ghoran agreed. He gave a mocking salute and turning side on, to move past the youths. Jay and I did the same.

  “What are you looking at, moondog?” The leader asked me. Before I could say anything, Ghoran said, “he no know but it ask dumb questions.”

  “So you’re a jester as well as a lunatic,” the gangster said.

  “That he is,” said Jay. “Now if you’ll excuse us, we have business elsewhere.”

  We pushed on down the alley leaving the youths staring sullenly behind us.

  “Did you have to do that?” Jay asked Ghoran.

  “No,” Ghoran said. “But I want to.”

  “Oh good,” Jay said.

  “Guy was dick.” Ghoran said.

  “You’ll get no argument from me, but he had a number of friends with him and they were all armed.”

  “Still dick,” Ghoran said. “Way you talk would think you never see armed man before.”

  “I like to get paid to fight,” Jay said. He jerked his thumb in my direction and said, “what do you think?”

  “I prefer not to have to fight at all, thank you,” I said. “Ghoran, please don’t start any trouble.”

  “It no be any trouble,” Ghoran said. I stared at him, not sure whether he was crazy or not.

  Eventually we found our way to a large brick building. It was not as high as the tenements and it looked like a fortress. A sign painted with a Black Skull hung outside it. I smelled alcohol and weed.

  Outside more tattooed men lounged, big hard and competent looking. They reminded me of the soldiers from the company that I had travelled with on my way to Solsburg. We strode up towards the door. One of them casually interposed himself between us and the stairs. “What are you doing here, son?” His manner wasn’t unfriendly. He was simply asking a question and expecting an answer.

  “I owe some money,” Jay said. “And I’m here to pay it off.”

  The man shrugged and indicated that we should go on then. As I walked up the stair one of them whistled and shouted. I kept walking certain that he could not be talking to me.

  “You, moondog,” he said. “Come back here.”

  Jay tapped me on the arm. I turned and looked back. The men were staring at me.

  “Leave that dagger here,” the man had spoken first said.

  “It was my father’s,” I said.

  “I don’t care whether it belonged to blessed St Austyn himself,” the man said. “Give it here.”

  I took the dagger from my waist and handed it over. Surprisingly, Ghoran didn’t object when they patted him down to get his dagger and neither did Jay.

  We went inside the tavern. The first I’d ever really been in. It smelled of beer and drink and food. A lot of men lounged inside and all of them had the same hard look as those on the door. They did not seem to be so much customers as employees. Something about them reminded me of soldiers. Of course, these did not wear any uniform except for the tattoos.

  “Oh, look,” one of them said. “It’s Jay, old Donal’s son. We were about to pay your old man a visit.”

  “I got some business with your boss,” Jay said. “Is he in?”

  “That he is, but he may not be seeing visitors, let me check.” The man disappeared upstairs and came back a few moments later. “He’ll see you.”

  “Thanks,” Jay said.

  We went upstairs and there were more armed men waiting. They made sure we had no weapons before we went in. A tall, lean and bald man sat behind a desk. His teeth were very white when he smiled. A Black Skull was tattooed on the side of his head.

  “Jay,” he said almost as if greeting an old friend. “What brings you here? Not looking for anything in your old line of work, are you?”

  “I brought you the money my father owes,” Jay said.

  “Let’s have it then.”

  Jay put a purse of coin down upon the table and Mercius turned it upside down till the coins fell out. He began to count them.

  “It short,” he said. “Short a lot.”

  “There’s over thirty lunars there,” Jay said.

  “So you still owe me seventy moons then.”

  “That can’t be right,” Jay said. “My father said…”

  “Your father is a lying swine,” Mercius said.

  Jay made a face

  “Are you calling me a liar?”

  Mercius’s two bodyguards looked at us. They seemed to want Jay to say something.

  Of course, it wasn’t Jay who spoke up. Ghoran said, “Maybe you just stranger to truth.”

  “What?” Mercius said. I sensed that he had been waiting for exactly this moment. I was not sure why. He wanted us to provoke him.

  “My friend is a barbarian,” I said. “He doesn’t know what he’s saying.”

  “Shut your mouth, moondog,” Mercius said. “When I want your opinion, I
’ll beat it out of you.”

  “Okay,” I said. I couldn’t think of anything else under the circumstances. Jay’s gaze darted from us to Mercius. He was panicked and clearly couldn’t understand how things had gone so wrong so quickly.

  “You’re a businessman, sir,” I said. “Surely you can take this money as a down payment. I can give you some as well.”

  “I am a businessman,” Mercius said. He was studying me more intently now. “Where did you steal money?”

  “My mistress gave it to me,” I said. I was going to mention who my mistress was but that might just have provoked him further. Still it was worth considering. I doubted that even he would want to risk the wrath of Mistress Iliana. As I thought about it, his bodyguards moved closer.

  “The boss said when he wanted your opinion, he would beat it out of you,” one of them said. He advanced upon me, arm drawn back for a punch. I flinched, remembering the beating Vorster and his companions had once given me.

  As the bodyguard got close to me, Ghoran moved with eye-blurring speed, arm locking the man. There was a snap. The gangster screamed as the bone of his arm gave way. Ghoran’s foot came down on his instep and there was another crunching sound. The bodyguard toppled over, howling.

  Ghoran head-butted the second bodyguard. The man’s nose broke. Blood splattered everywhere but he was made of tougher stuff than his friend. He managed to stay upright long enough to take a punch to the stomach that doubled him over. A knee to the jaw sent him sprawling backwards. Ghoran bent over and casually picked up one of his daggers. “You saying something?”

  Mercius’s eyes were wide with shock. I was probably looking at the Northlander the same way. He was terrifyingly quick and strong and he did not seem at all troubled by the fact that there was a hall full of armed men outside. That thought occurred to Mercius at the same time. “You’ll never get out of here alive,” he said.

  Ghoran smiled at him. “Worry about self getting out alive.”

  Mercius rose from behind his desk. As he did so he reached down and produced a crossbow. “One of us had better,” he said. “Now, my friend, you’re quick. But I doubt you’re faster than a crossbow bolt.”

  “You good with that?” Ghoran had not lost his grin.

  “Yes,” Mercius said. His finger never wavered on the trigger. The weapon pointed directly at Ghoran. During this whole time the idea of casting a spell never occurred to me. I was frozen by how quickly things had turned violent. That was the secret of people such as Ghoran and Mercius and Xander. Violence did not trouble them. Blood did not trouble them. While others froze in panic, they acted.

  “I good with dagger,” Ghoran said. “I put your eye out while you pulling trigger.”

  “I wouldn’t try, if I were you,” Mercius said.

  There was a banging on the door outside.

  “Any trouble?” From the tone of his voice it sounded as if the thug imagined all of the screaming was being done by us. Under normal circumstances that would probably have been a reasonable assumption.

  “A little,” Mercius said. “Tell the lads to be ready for some violence.”

  “We don’t want any trouble,” Jay said.

  “It’s gone a long way beyond that now,” Mercius said. “I would have been content just to take your sisters. Now an example will have to be made.”

  So that was it. Mercius wanted Jay’s sisters. Jay looked at him outraged. “You bastard.”

  “Language, son, language.” Mercius said. “You’re in deep enough trouble as it is.”

  “That make two of you,” Ghoran said. I sensed the tension in him now. He was listening intently. He was still smiling but his eyes were moving around the room. One of the bodyguards started to get to his feet.

  Ghoran kicked him in the head. The man’s head snapped backward. While Ghoran was distracted, Mercius pulled the trigger. The crossbow bolt smashed into the Northman’s shoulder and the impact knocked Ghoran off his feet.

  Jay dithered. Ghoran’s eyes went wide with pain but he started to pull himself to his feet. With surprising agility for a man his size, Mercius vaulted over the desk, landed near Ghoran and smacked him with the butt of the crossbow. The Northlander’s head snapped backwards. He lay on the floor, blood coming from his mouth.

  “Don’t do anything stupid, boys,” Mercius said. Thinking about it now, I can only admire his cool under the circumstances. If Jay and I had chosen to act we might have been able to do him some harm. As it was, we were both too shocked. On a battlefield Jay might have responded but we were not on a battlefield. We were in his hometown, confronting someone he had obviously been frightened of since he was a child. Mercius knew it too. “Anything happens to me, think about what will happen to your family.”

  He was close enough that I could have reached out and touched the tattoo on his head. I noticed the sweat on the back of his neck, a second smaller tattoo on the top of his crown. He looked over at his bodyguards and made a tut-tuting sound.

  “You all right boss,” one of the men outside shouted. Mercius proceeded to kick all of the weapons out of our reach. He still held the crossbow like a club. He was inspecting it now. “Thick skulled bastard. He damaged the mechanism.”

  He said it with genuine regret. Then he perched on the edge of his desk and studied us, before shouting, “Come in, lads.”

  The door opened and two of the bruisers from outside looked in. Their eyes went wide with shock. “One of them was tougher than he looked,” Mercius said.

  Blood was spreading from Ghoran’s shoulder. “He might die,” I said." That wound needs to be looked at."

  Mercius looked at me and said, “there’s no might about it, son. He’s going to die. And I told you about speaking before you’re spoken to.”

  The crossbow butt connected with my skull. Everything went black.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  It was dark. My head ached. My hands were incapable of movement. I was cold and wet on one side. I groaned then heard a voice in the darkness. “Thank the Light, you’re alright. I don’t think Ghoran is going to make it.”

  “What?” I said. My head throbbed. Dizziness and nausea assaulted my senses. I felt worse than when Vorster broke my nose. I wondered if any permanent damage had been done. It took some time for the memory of Ghoran lying bleeding on the floor to come back.

  “Now he’s done it,” I said.

  “Yeah, stupid northern bastard has really dropped us in the shit now.”

  “Did that yourself,” came a pained voice. It was terrifying how weak Ghoran sounded. His voice was somewhere nearby in the darkness though. At least I hoped it was. I glanced around and I still could only make out the blankest of outlines and those might have been my imagination.

  “Where are we? What happened?” I asked.

  “We’re in the basement of the Black Skull Tavern,” Jay said. “In the cellars. Can’t you tell by the smell?”

  I couldn’t smell anything. My nose felt blocked. “They dragged us down here?”

  “Not much gets past you, does it?” Jay said.

  “Remind me never to accept one of your invitations to dinner again,” I said. I was quite proud of how level my voice sounded. I wondered how things could have gone so badly so quickly. It seems such a simple thing. To pay off a debt the local gang lord. I would never make such a mistake again, I vowed.

  “Remind me not to invite him,” Jay said. “We wouldn’t be here now if it wasn’t for him.”

  “Ungrateful bastard,” Ghoran said. “I save you from beating.”

  He sounded dreadful in the darkness. I wanted to see if he was all right. I tried to stand up and I realised that my hands were tied and my legs were roped together. I could just about inch my way across the wet floor but I could not do anything else.

  “What are you to up to?” Jay asked. “Nothing too stupid, I hope.”

  Ghoran’s breathing sounded ragged. As I got closer, I smelled blood. I was suddenly glad that it was dark and I could not see h
im. I felt sick. It wasn’t just the smell that did it. There was something wrong with my head. The blow had messed me up.

  “Ghoran doesn’t sound so good,” I said.

  “None of us are going to sound too good in a while,” Jay said. There was an edge of panic in his voice. I could hardly blame him. We were trapped in a cellar beneath a building full of murderous gangsters. Ghoran was in a bad way and something awful was going to befall Jay’s family no matter what happened. Even if we found a way out of here, I could not see this ending well.

  Of course, I did not give much for our chances of getting out in one piece. Why had I left the safety of the Palace? It had been nice up there. I was just starting to get used to it.

  “Stop whining,” Jay said. It was at that point I realised I had been talking aloud.

  “You’re right,” I said. “I’ll start complaining loudly instead.”

  I tried to move my hands. Something rough sawed into my wrists. They had been tied with coiled rope. That realisation did not help me. I figured that my legs must be tied the same way.

  I groaned loudly. “What happened?”

  “After Mercius punched you, his bodyguards grabbed me and dragged me down the stairs, then they brought you and the madman along.”

  My brain started to work a little. “How did Ghoran look?”

  “Not good,” Jay said. “Very pale and dripping blood. They pulled the crossbow bolt out before they tossed us into the cellar, left him to bleed out.”

  “Look on the bright side,” I said. “Why don’t you?”

  “There is no bright side,” he said.

  “I needed you to point that out,” I said. It was difficult to keep the anger from my voice but bickering and recriminations would do nobody any good.

  I tried to break free. Nothing much happened. The ropes had been tied by an expert. I wondered if perhaps I could free them against something sharp. If I could find something with an edge, I might be able to do that.

  “What are you up to now?” Jay asked.

  “I’m going to try and get free of these bonds.”

  “Very good,” Jay said sarcastically. “I’m sure you’ll manage to get through them before Mercius and his boys come back.”