by Stephen Deas
By which Master Sy meant women. Berren grinned to himself. Master Sy was deadly deft and agile about everything else, but when it came to women he was as clumsy as a coconut. Berren, on the other hand, had grown up two doors away from a cheap whorehouse. He’d already seen about as much as there was to be seen before he even knew what it was all for; and while he was waiting for Dorrm the Dumb to trip over and impale himself on a swordfish, he was quietly working his way through the various houses on Reeper Hill whenever he could slip away for an evening and had enough crowns in his purse to pay for it.
Yes. Another thing Master Sy wasn’t supposed to know.
The thief-taker held up his hand. ‘Stop for a moment.’ They were right under the prince’s window, about ten feet above them. The noises coming down from there didn’t leave much to the imagination. Berren puffed his cheeks, trying to ignore them.
‘Look around you.’
Plants and paths and walls covered in ivy. If he peered a bit, he could see the archway and the moonpool yard and the soldiers standing there.
‘Do you think anyone can see us?’
Berren shrugged. ‘I suppose. If they look hard enough.’
‘Go over to the archway. Tell me if you can see me.’
Berren trotted off as he was told. When he looked back, he was surprised to see that Master Sy was almost invisible between the leaves of the bushes and the trees. Easy enough to see him if you knew he was there to be seen in the first place, but even then he had to peer a bit to be sure. He trotted back. Master Sy glanced up at the window and the ivy-covered wall below it.
‘How long would it take you to climb up there?’
‘There?’ Berren laughed. ‘Easy! I’d be up in a flash.’
‘Yes. That’s what I thought.’ Master Sy nodded. ‘Right. Well. Off to bed with you then.’
‘What?!’ Berren looked up at the sky. The sun might have set but the sky was still light and they hadn’t even reached the spring festival. ‘There’s half the day left!’
The thief-taker gave him his best baleful look. It was the look he put on every time Berren forgot that he was a worthless apprentice who should be grateful to even exist. ‘We are here to perform a duty, boy. I will take my turn on watch here until the small hours. Then you will take your watch. At dawn, you will leave here and go to the temple for your daily lessons. Master Mardan or Master Fennis will relieve you.’
‘But …!’
‘Boy, you will do as you’re told. We are taking the justicar’s gold to protect the life of His Highness. Whatever you may think of him.’
Berren closed his eyes. He could see the future, clear as the sun. This was how it would be. Forever, probably. After all, if you were the prince, with women like that to take to your bed and soldiers and thief-takers to fawn at your feet, why would you ever leave? ‘You were going to show me how to fight with short steel. Before spring! You promised!’
The thief-taker growled. ‘In good time, boy. The festival of the equinox is weeks away. Now do as you’re told!’
They glowered at each other but that was a fight that only one of them was ever going to win. Berren walked away, saving his storming and stomping until he was out of Master Sy’s sight. The thief-taker had promised to teach him to fight with steel more than a year ago and still all they ever did was fight with sticks. He’d promised again for midsummer, spent a week showing Berren how to hold a real sword properly and then promptly gone back to sticks again. Then he’d promised for midwinter and just forgotten all about it.
Berren reached the room where he and Mardan and Master Sy would all sleep together. Thank the sun, Master Mardan wasn’t there. Berren threw himself down on the mattress. He was never going to learn swords. Master Sy just didn’t want to teach him, that was it.
Trouble was, neither would anyone else. Not for the meagre purse that Berren could muster. Sword-masters were paid in gold.
4
SECRETS BY MOONLIGHT
Most evenings, before this drunkard prince had come to Deephaven, Berren came back from the temple and had his supper with Master Sy. Then they’d go off about their errands, the sort that were best run after dark. They’d wander down into the night market to make a nuisance of themselves among the wagoners, or else they’d amble down to the taverns near the docks and listen in on who was selling what and who wanted to buy it. Sometimes they went as far as Reeper Hill or wandered the streets around The Peak. The thief-taker would talk to the snuffers, the ones who still had a vestige of decency to them. Once or twice every month they’d dodge the press gangs and head into The Maze, to the Barrow of Beer and Master Sy’s friend Kasmin from the old days that he never liked to talk about. Sometimes they didn’t go any further than the yard outside Master Sy’s little house, the thief-taker clucking and shaking his head while Berren tried to cut and lunge with his waster until the light failed.
That was before.
It seemed he’d only just managed to fall asleep when Master Sy was shaking him awake again to sit for hours in the dark of the scent garden, bleary and cold, listening to people snore. And then, as everyone else was getting up and thinking about breakfast, there was Master Fennis, chasing him on his way with nothing but a crust of yesterday’s bread in his pocket, back up the hill to Deephaven Square and the temple in time to catch a lash of Teacher Sterm’s cane for being late. And that was when he realised that he hadn’t asked Master Sy about Kelm, whoever he was, and sure enough, Sterm had him straight up to the front first to share his ignorance.
That was the way his days became – woken up in the middle of the night, cold and thankless hours sitting in the dark of the garden, more cold and thankless hours of sitting in the gloom at the temple, snatching leftovers to eat whenever he had a spare moment, always rushing from one misery to the next. His head was full of things he wanted, of princes and their women, swordplay and blade-dancing, and he was getting none of it, no swords, no thief-taking, nothing. He barely even saw the prince he was supposed to be guarding. In the temple, the other novices only jeered at him when he tried to tell them how important he was. The solar priests, it turned out, didn’t much care for Prince Sharda of Varr. If they’d known half the truth, they’d probably have rolled on the floor and wept with laughter.
The novices to serve the monks from Torpreah were chosen – not Berren of course. They might have been the most gracious and the most penitent but that didn’t stop them strutting like peacocks when none of the priests were looking, and for once Berren envied them. Monks of the fire-dragon were the best fighters in the world, even Master Sy said so, and now he’d probably never even see them. His misery was complete.
‘Here.’ Master Velgian beckoned Berren over one evening when the Watchman’s Arms was busier than usual. Velgian had replaced Master Mardan, who had apparently said something he shouldn’t and been thrown out. Velgian fancied himself a poet and always carried the same battered old book of verses from Caladir and Brons with him wherever he went. On quiet evenings in The Eight, he sometimes read to the other thief-takers whether they wanted him to or not. There were more soldiers than Berren was used to tonight; there were other faces too, men and women he hadn’t seen before, wandering in and out through the yard around the moonpool. They were dressed in the silks and satins of rich city lords from The Peak, laced with gold and silver and decked with jewels. They looked agitated.
Berren shrugged. It wasn’t as if he had anything better to do. As best he could tell, the prince was somewhere off and about, most likely up on Reeper Hill again. He’d taken Master Sy with him too.
‘Get a torch, lad.’
Velgian was sitting beside the archway to the scent garden with a square piece of metal on the ground in front of him. Berren got a torch and sat down beside him.
‘Keep that away for a moment.’ Velgian had a waxed paper pouch in his hand. He tipped it over the metal plate, shook out a little pile of black powder then shuffled back a little. ‘Go on. Touch the torch to that then.’
>
Berren poked the torch at the metal plate. There was a whoosh, a flash of orange light, a puff of smoke and a wave of heat. Berren reeled away. The smoke stung his eyes and the air stank of bad eggs.
‘What was that?’ He stared in awe at the black stain on the metal plate.
Master Velgian shrugged. ‘I don’t know what they call it. Comes from Caladir. Black powder but with something else as well.’
‘Does the witch-doctor make it?’ The witch-doctor, Master Sy’s old friend from across the sea who lived in an old warehouse by the river, was the only person Berren knew who dealt in potions and powders. Velgian, for some reason, looked petrified.
‘That devil?’ He shuddered. ‘I know Syannis speaks with him sometimes, but take it from me, Saffran Kuy is evil and nothing good comes from any who deal with him.’ He glanced up into the sky and leaned closer. ‘You know how everyone who goes to see him leaves a basket of fish outside when they leave? That’s because he has a pact with the cats and the gulls who live there. They’re his spies. He rides inside them, seeing the world through their eyes, listening to what people say with their ears!’ He shuddered again and then sat back. ‘No, this is what the Taiytakei use to make things that fly up into the air and make pretty lights. A ship came in with some kegs of it a few weeks back, a present ready for the Emperor’s spring festival in Varr. Turns out one or two fell off the back of a wagon on the way and ended up in the night market. Fancy, eh?’ He rolled his eyes and then shrugged again. ‘Bought a pouch of it. Too much money from standing watch over this prick of a prince. Bloody waste. Here, come look at this though.’ Master Velgian led Berren across the moonpool yard and back inside the Arms, into a wide hall that Berren hadn’t seen before. A delicious smell of food laced the air. Paintings and hangings lined the walls here, faces of men from Aria’s history that Berren had had beaten into him by Teacher Sterm, and other faces that he didn’t know. Uniformed servants hurried around them, speaking in whispers. Berren watched them.
‘What’s happening?’
‘The feast of the last moon before the spring, that’s what,’ whispered Master Velgian. ‘His Highness has guests too. They came into the Arms in the middle of the day. Apparently they’ve been looking for His Highness for a while.’ Velgian spat. ‘Can’t have been looking all that hard, that’s all I can say. They’re going to take him back with them though and they might take you and your master too if you’re lucky.’ Then he smirked. ‘If they can find him, of course. Sneaky bastard actually managed to slip out of here without anyone noticing, probably with a bit of help from Syannis. Glad it wasn’t on my watch. So now they’re going to have their big Feast of the Last Moon and some great announcement, and the person who should be the centre of it all isn’t even here.’ He snorted in disgust. ‘I was going to show off that black powder. Syannis said to bring some if I could. Meant for a prince it was, and instead I’m left with you.’
He nodded towards a large man with wild blond hair, leaning against the wall just inside the door. The man had an impatient look to him. His expression had something of resignation in it too, as though he was used to this sort of thing.
‘That’s Ser Elmarc Borolan. Story goes that he and the prince were up in the mountains a year back. Lost a lot of friends. No one says how or why. Be on your guard tonight. Right.’ He patted Berren on the back. ‘Go and get some rest.’
‘What?’ Berren gaped at the table and then looked at Master Velgian, imploring. Velgian shrugged.
‘This isn’t for the likes of us, young Berren. We get to stay outside with the dogs and the riff-raff.’
‘But!’
‘Would you want to stay? Forced to stand still as a statue and silent as a shadow for hours on end while the lords and ladies of the city stuff themselves with every conceivable delicacy and ignore you completely, all the while complaining bitterly about how the whole feast is a complete waste of time without His Highness? I’m sure Syannis is expecting you to sit your watch and continue with your instruction in the temple too. No, to bed, young man.’ Master Velgian frowned. ‘Isn’t it tomorrow that the monks of the fire-dragon arrive?’
‘Tomorrow is Abyss-Day. The monks would never cross the threshold of a foreign temple on Abyss-Day.’ The words came out by themselves, mechanical, exactly the sort of dull useless knowledge that Teacher Sterm drilled into him. He sighed. The food, wherever it was, smelled so good.
‘Sun-Day then.’
‘They might not be here for another week. Teacher Sterm says they won’t arrive until the month of Storms is out.’ He sighed.
Master Velgian shrugged. ‘Then it must be some other group of monks of the fire-dragon who caused such a fuss in Bedlam’s Crossing yesterday.’
Berren’s mouth fell open. ‘Really? They’re in Bedlam’s Crossing already?’ Bedlam’s Crossing was the last ferry across the river before the east bank turned into swamps and everglades. On a fast horse, that was less than a day’s ride away. ‘Wait – how do you know?’
‘Every imperial messenger who comes into the city has to go to His Highness first. Some daft old law. Not that His Highness cares, but that’s the way of it. Anyone else who happens to be around, they get to hear too.’
‘Then they will arrive tomorrow!’ Berren was hopping from one foot to the other, the feast completely forgotten in his excitement.
‘No, you’re probably right about them waiting until Sun-Day before they enter the temple. Unless they come here first.’ Velgian chuckled.
‘Here?’ Berren squealed, which got him a few glances from some of the other soldiers and the feast guests in the hall. Velgian glared.
‘Quiet, boy! No, probably not. There’s no love at all between the Sapphire Throne and the Autarch of Torpreah. I think letting dragon-monks and His Highness loose into the same city is quite enough cause for worry, never mind putting some of them in the same room. I very much doubt they’ll be coming here.’ He chuckled and put an arm around Berren’s shoulder and walked him out of the hall. ‘Khrozus’ Blood, Berren, I remember you when you came up to my shoulder. You’re as tall as me already. Now go and sleep.’
Berren went back to his room. He tossed and turned, trying to sleep before he was ready, and it was all the worse for having a head filled with fire-dragon monks. He’d never seen one, probably almost no one in Deephaven had, and he couldn’t help but wonder what they’d look like. Eight feet tall with sinewy arms and tree-trunk legs, with fierce and noble faces and wearing red silks, with long curving golden swords and maybe, just maybe, when you looked hard you might see a flicker of flame in their eyes …
He woke up to Master Sy, kneeling beside him with a candle, gently shaking him. Everywhere was suddenly black and silent. He yawned and stretched and rubbed his eyes and reluctantly sat up.
‘Bloody prince gave me the slip,’ murmured the thief-taker as they walked. ‘He’s not here. Keep your eyes open in case, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t come back at all tonight.’
The stairs down into the inner halls were guarded as ever, as were the arches into the moonpool yard and the scent garden. Berren walked through and settled onto his usual bench. There were all sorts of places for sitting in the scent garden. Mostly he moved about to keep boredom at bay, looking for a place where he could comfortably hide from anyone who crept in and still keep a careful watch on the wall with the prince’s window. Not that anyone ever would come creeping in past all the other guards with their swords and their armour. Besides, anyone with any sense would come over the rooftops. That was the second rule. First thing a Shipwrights’ boy learned were the three rules of not getting caught: Go somewhere narrow where big men will be slow. Go somewhere high where heavy men will fall. Go somewhere dark where you can’t be seen.
He couldn’t do narrow and he couldn’t do high, not down here in the garden, but he could at least do dark. He sat on the bench closest to the windows he was watching. He’d grown used to listening to the snores or sometimes the other noises that f
iltered down. Sometimes he could count how many of the ladies from Reeper Hill the prince had with him.
Master Sy left and then came back again a few minutes later carrying a wooden board piled up with food. ‘I hear the feast was a disaster.’ He laughed and sat down beside Berren. ‘Looks like the food was good enough though. Plenty left over at the end for the likes of us. It’s cold but it’s still the best food we’re likely see for the rest of the year. Enjoy! Velgian and Fennis are practically rolling on the floor, fat as pigs. There’s lots more where that came from if you’re still hungry. Probably doesn’t matter if you slip off for a bit. He’s got his cousin up in his room waiting for him anyway.’
They sat and ate together in silence for a while. Berren picked at the food. It was rich; slabs of meat in heavy sauces and not the sort of thing he was used to at all. In the end, he scraped most of the sauces aside. Meat was a luxury, but what was the point if you ended up making yourself sick over it?
When they were done, Master Sy patted Berren on the shoulder and stood up. ‘They’ll be gone in a few days. You’ll miss this.’
Berren snorted. ‘Miss getting up in the middle of the night? Not likely.’
‘Till the evening then.’ Master Sy left. The scent garden fell still and silent and Berren was alone to count the long dull hours of the night, grain by grain.
An hour had passed, maybe two, when sudden loud voices rang out of the tavern halls. Berren had been dozing. He jumped up and scurried to peer around the archway from the scent garden. The full moon was high overhead and it lit up the yard and the moonpool better than any lanterns could have done. The prince came out into the yard with a lady on each arm. ‘Good feast was it?’ he called. The guards around the doors bowed and murmured something in reply, too quiet for Berren to hear. One of the ladies laughed. The other one was looking nervously about. Berren stayed hidden in his shadows where she couldn’t see. He’d assumed the women with the prince were just another pair of ladies from the houses on Reeper Hill but now he wasn’t sure. They were dressed too well, too properly.