“You would be wise to employ the child,” said the man. “The order is past due. It must be finished tonight or you forfeit all payment.”
“Why, you-” The smith brandished his tongs. The other man recoiled.
“Well, sir?” Broad continued to pump.
With a snarl of frustration, Hoglin the blacksmith took out his aggression on the helpless curl of metal he plunged into the flames.
***
Years went by and Broad learned the trade and, as his knowledge grew so did his physique and at last he began to live up to his name. He was trusted with increasingly complex jobs - it was not all bashing out horseshoes. Hoglin proved to have a gentler side and could turn his thick fingers to surprisingly delicate work, fashioning tracery and ornamentation.
“To work in gold is every smith’s dream,” Hoglin was wont to say. It sounded like something that might be true to Broad’s young ears, even though the blacksmith had made it up. “But to work in goldinium, well...” The sentence was always left half-formed; it was more tantalising that way.
“What’s goldinium?” Broad had asked the first time he had heard the word. Hoglin was surprised.
“Why, goldinium, boy, is the most precious metal known to man. It is rarer than a kind word from the Duke and it is said to be possessed of magical qualities. It can be made to do many things beyond our ken.”
“Who is Ken?” Broad had asked, and Hoglin had thrown back his head and roared with laughter.
In all the time he was there, Broad never saw any of this rare and precious substance, and Hoglin only seemed to mention it when drink provoked a philosophical mood. Broad slept in the shop, working to earn his keep. Hoglin built him a cot in the corner and had a leather, sleeveless jerkin made. “The arms need to be free,” he pronounced. “Besides it gets bloody hot in here, as I’m sure you’ve noticed.”
Broad idolised the smith and soon came to regard the man as a second father. Life in Boglund was good - the work was hard but rewarding and Broad felt he had found a new home.
Occasionally, word would come to his ears about the gaol. A regular job of Hoglin’s was to repair shackles and heavy lengths of chain, and the men who came to conduct the transaction would try to scare the boy with tales of the Ghost of Boglund Gaol. “Saves the headsman a job,” the men would report. About once a month, a prisoner facing execution would be found dead in his cell, not a mark on him. The inmates talked of a man of steam and smoke who roamed the corridors at night, looking in on them, and asking them what they had done to end up incarcerated.
Shade!
Well, who else would it be?
Broad was heartened to learn that his friend appeared to be adhering to his vow of not killing those who did not deserve to die.
“The men long to be visited by him,” the gaolers would say. “He takes them in their sleep and spares them the agony of the execution. Of course, the headsman doesn’t mind: he gets paid the same whatever.”
But, as time passed, the men had nothing new to say. For all Broad new, the Ghost of Boglund Gaol was still abroad, and while there would always be criminals Shade would always be fed.
And then the prefect of Boglund repealed the law that allowed capital punishment. Only those guilty of the worst kinds of treason would be put to death. Other felons would serve their time and be released - or rot in gaol until their lives ran out. Shade was thrown into a quandary. He had relied on the justice system of men to judge and condemn those who were to wind up as his food. With the death penalty lifted, who could he choose? Yes, there were murderers and plenty of them, but who was he to judge them? The ways of men were still alien to him. He did not always understand their motives and moral standards.
He cast his mind back to that first time, that first man, who had threatened the life of Broad. That was the difference. That was the measure Shade needed. If anyone hurts my friend, they are fair game for me.
And besides, he missed his childhood friend. A life of eavesdropping on humans but never conversing with them was too lonely for Shade to bear, and he could not go back to his own kind - that was forbidden.
Shade left the confines of Boglund Gaol and drifted around the town. Broad was still near; he was sure of it. If his friend had moved on at any point, he would have felt it, like a string that linked them being pulled taut and snapping. No, Shade still felt very much tied to the human boy who had befriended him in that paddock all those years ago.
Even by night, the town was a smorgasbord of potential dinners. He would never, never swoop down on an unsuspecting soul and gorge himself on his or her life. In that respect he was unique of his kind. He held to his vow, despite the hunger pangs his - what do the humans call it? - conscience gave rise to. He roamed the streets, flitting from shadow to shadow, seeking out his erstwhile friend.
Where are you, Broad? I sense you are near... Where are you?
In a smithy at the foot of the town, a youth plunged a searing white blade into a bucket of water. Shade grinned. He has grown! He is almost a man now and strong! Shade felt the place where his heart would be surge with pride, and where his tear ducts might be, drops of water condensed.
The steam from the bucket cleared. A man of mist and smoke was left hovering in the air.
“Hello, old friend,” said Shade.
“Hello,” said Broad, gasping for joy.
***
It became their practice to take a stroll around Boglund’s midnight streets. Broad would sneak out of the smithy and Shade would follow him, aping his gait like a shadow, and they chattered and gossiped and argued and joked as if they had never spent any time apart. Broad could tell his friend wasn’t feeding. Every night, Shade was a little paler, a little less opaque.
“Someone will come along,” he tried to sound cheerful and Shade appreciated the effort if not the sentiment.
One night they were wending their way back to the smithy by a route that led them through a network of alleyways rather than the main streets where the Watch patrolled and kept the peace. They had just had a row about whether the moon was habitable for either humans or Shade’s kind or both and so were not speaking. Broad, affronted to hear that humans would not survive up there, was striding along with his head held high. Shade, piqued because Broad had pointed out that without humans on the moon, Shade’s kind would have nothing to feed on but green cheese, sulked in his friend’s wake; and so neither of them noticed the three men lurking in doorways until Broad was surrounded.
“Coins!” barked the first man, the smallest of the trio. The other two blocked Broad’s way in both directions.
“Sir, I have none,” Broad said apologetically, for he had been brought up to be always polite.
“Your boots then,” the smallest man would not be deterred. “Hand them over or we’ll take them with your feet still in them.”
“You will pardon me, but these boots won’t fit you,” Broad stood his ground.
“I know that!” cried the man. “I was thinking more of their resale value.”
“Fair enough,” Broad conceded. He lifted his foot and hopped around as if trying to pull off the boot. He kicked the man in the jaw, knocking him against the wall where he struck the back of his head and slumped to the ground. The other two, bigger men, were slow to react. Broad circled around, boot in hand, smacking them both across the chops. They grabbed for him but he was hopping away, unwilling to set his bare foot down in the filth of the alley.
The men gave chase but the alley was too narrow to let them both pass at once. There was a delay as they tried to sort out who should follow whom but by this point, Broad was out of reach.
They turned to gather up their confederate and were horrified by what they saw. A shadow of smoke and mist was stooped over their fellow robber and there was a terrible sucking sound. They watched as the figure, fuller and denser, ros
e into the sky and flew away, leaving their leader (there was no doubt who was the brains of the outfit) dead on the ground.
Shade caught up with Broad at the smithy door. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah!” Broad enthused, pushing his foot back into his boot. “Did you see me? I was all-” he replayed the kick, “and then-” the smack of the henchmen’s faces. “They didn’t know what hit them.” His celebratory smile dropped from his lips. “You look - fuller.”
“He deserved it,” said Shade, almost offhand.
Broad shook his head. “I can’t believe you. I had the situation under control.”
“He bashed his head on a wall. He was out cold; didn’t feel a thing.”
“He would have got up again.”
“You don’t know that. You’re no doctor.”
“You’re not even human.”
“I have to feed, Broad. Just as you do.”
“It’s not the same and you know it.”
“Fine. Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow night.”
“Maybe.”
“Fine!”
Shade floated up and away over the rooftops. Broad snuck back into the smithy and to his bed near the forge, but he could not sleep. Shade had been seen and, what was worse, he had been seen feeding on a human soul. How could there not be repercussions?
***
Hoglin noticed his apprentice was more than a little distracted the next morning and ordered the youth to go out for fresh air before he hurt himself, his employer or, worst of all, bungled an order. Reluctantly, Broad put down the bellows and lumbered to the doorway only to find the exit barred by a crowd of people, headed by members of the Watch and the two big fellows who had tried to rob him in the alleyway.
“That’s him!” one of the big men pointed a sausage of a finger.
“What’s going on?” said Hoglin, clutching a hammer.
“Master Hoglin,” the head Watchman nodded in respect, “We have reason to believe your boy here was involved in a murder in Stretch Alley last night.”
“I wasn’t!” Broad cried.
“He wasn’t,” said the smith. “He was asleep here all night.”
“I wasn’t,” Broad admitted. “I slipped out. For a walk.”
“A walk up Stretch Alley?” Hoglin mastered his surprise, determined to defend the lad he had taken in and regarded as a member of the family.
Broad nodded and hung his head. “But it wasn’t me; I didn’t kill him.”
“Huh!” scoffed the second big man. “He was just the decoy. He led us away so his - friend - could do away with Magglen.”
“Is this true?” the smith turned to the apprentice with a chuckle. “You have a friend?”
Broad didn’t respond. The head Watchman stepped toward him.
“Things will go easier for you, son, if you tell us where we can find this friend of yours.”
Broad shook his head, his eyes watering. Even if he knew where Shade was, he would never tell.
“Then I’m going to ask you to come with us,” the head of the Watch put his hand on the apprentice’s shoulder. The smith roared in anger.
“Get your hands off him!” He swung the hammer over their heads. “If he says he didn’t do it, he didn’t do it.”
“Now, now,” the Watchman put up his hands in surrender. “Let’s all keep calm, shall we?”
“And get out of my shop!” Haglin advanced on the crowd, who backed away but did not leave. “My boy is innocent! He would never - he-”
He stopped abruptly. His face contorted and twisted. Eyes bulging, he dropped his heavy hammer and clutched at his chest, trying to pull the apron away from his heart. The good people of Boglund stepped back and watched in morbid fascination as their friendly, local blacksmith, keeled over face first, and expired.
“Haglin!” Broad cried, rushing to the smith’s aid. The Watchmen grabbed his arms and pulled him from the shop, despite his struggles to get free.
“Shop’s closed,” said the head Watchman. “Nothing to see here, folks; go home.”
***
Broad was taken to the gaol to await trial. He sat morosely on a pallet stuffed with straw, ignoring the rats that played leapfrog with his feet and the stench of the long-term prisoners who had been sentenced to hard labour without soap and water.
It’s not fair, he sulked. But if I tell them that what I did was in self-defence, they will be lenient. I didn’t kill that man and he was trying to rob me. It’s not my fault. And - a dark thought slithered through his mind like a serpent - I can deny all knowledge of what happened after I hopped it.
“Boy!” said a voice from the other side of the iron bars. Broad didn’t hear it at first but after the third repetition of the word, he looked up and saw he was being addressed by a withered figure in a hooded cloak.
“Can I help you?” said Broad.
“I wish to speak with you,” said the hooded figure in a cracked voice. “Come closer.”
Broad rose from his bed of straw and approached the visitor. A gnarled hand like a bunch of twigs darted between the bars and seized Broad by the wrist. The old man turned the boy’s hand palm upwards and pored over it. He nodded, cackling to himself.
“That’s quite a history you’ve got there,” he said, releasing the boy.
Broad peered at his palm. “I washed it this morning.”
“You can’t wash off what is written,” said the old man. He cast his beady eyes around the cell. “Is he here now? Is he with us? Watching?”
“Who?”
“Your shady friend.”
“I - I don’t know what you mean.”
The old man chuckled. He lifted his hood to reveal a pate that was shiny and bald, save for a few wild sprouts of white hair hither and thither.
“My name is Pezzackeron,” the old man smiled, but his eyes were sly and twinkling. “I work here at the prison in a somewhat specialised capacity.”
Broad shrugged. “What’s that to me?”
“I was brought in,” the old man continued, “when the condemned men started dying before their executions. There is a presence here, I was told, and I must use my arcane bag of tricks to remove it.”
“You’re a wizard,” Broad said flatly.
“Of sorts,” conceded Pezzackeron. “I brewed a few herbs, muttered a few incantations, tried to summon the thing but nothing happened. All my efforts were in vain and I feared I should get the sack. But then, the dying stopped - and our hangman was rendered jobless. The thing - whatever it was - was gone. And now, here you are, and the story is that you are embroiled in the death of a ne’er-do-well, reminiscent of the deaths that took place here. Our thing is back and at large in the town. You must tell me what you know so I may formulate the best way to rid us of it.”
“You can go to hell,” said Broad. “And take your mumbo-jumbo with you.”
Pezzackeron laughed but there was no humour in it. “I can make you tell me, boy, if it comes to it. But tell me of your own free will and things shall go better for you. The judge will surely take your cooperation into account. You might even get a medal.”
“Piss off,” said Broad. He returned to the pallet. “I have nothing to say.”
The wizard stood watching him for quite a while but Broad neither moved nor spoke again. Oh, you’ll speak, boy, Pezzackeron chuckled to himself as he made his way back to his office, and I shall enjoy myself in the process.
***
The following morning, Broad was fetched at first light by a couple of brawny guards. They bound his hands and led him out into a quadrangle, where the wizard Pezzackeron was waiting with some equipment set up on a dais. There was a small cauldron over a fire and an array of vicious-looking instruments with spikes and moving parts. Broad was tied to a table and
the guards withdrew; they didn’t want to see what was going to happen up close and personal.
“Good morrow to you, boy,” the wizard smiled. “Now, before we begin, have you anything to tell me of your own accord and save us both a good deal of trouble?”
Broad’s reply was unprintable. Working for the blacksmith had extended his vocabulary. The wizard laughed.
“Have it your way.” He made a show of selecting the largest, meanest-looking implement and held it up to gleam in the morning sun. “Let’s see how cocky you are without fingernails.”
He plunged the prongs of a pair of pincers into the cauldron. Steam hissed upward. Broad watched it coil into the air and forced himself not to think of Shade, fearful of what the wizard might read in him without him having to utter a word.
“Is he close?” Pezzackeron glanced at the sky.
Damn it, Broad cursed. The wizard grinned.
“From what I know of these things, he won’t be able to help you now, not in broad daylight.”
Shows what you know, thought Broad.
“Oh?” the wizard’s unruly eyebrows went up. “He’s not strictly nocturnal then?”
Damn it, thought Broad. Think of something else, think of something else, think of something else...
Impossible. Every thought he had led him back to Shade. The wizard watched with interest as the youth’s face changed like the onset of bad weather.
Intriguing... The wizard decided to change tack. He would summon the thing and he would capture it and keep it for himself. With such a thing working for him, Pezzackeron would be unstoppable and not wasting his time in a malodorous prison, consorting with scum and lowlifes.
He fished in the pockets of his voluminous robe, until he found exactly what was needed. He had carried it ever since he had guessed what he was dealing with, in anticipation of being confronted with the creature - and now that meeting was at hand! He placed the object on the table of frightful instruments.
Nice ring, Broad observed. He decided to focus on it rather than trying to marshal his thoughts into anything other than memories of Shade. Working for Haglin, Broad had learned a little about jewellery, which had been the smith’s hobby and something of a lucrative side-line. The ring’s shank was simple and unadorned but the prongs, rather than holding a mounting for precious stones, held an ornate construction that was almost shaped like a raspberry. There was a clasp and a hinge - it was a poisoner’s ring, Broad realised! It was easy to imagine Pezzackeron fixing someone a drink and, with his back turned, opening the ring to drop poison into the goblet...
Navarin, Thunder and Shade Page 11