Shadowbridge

by Gregory Frost

  Bogrevil reached out and dropped three coins into her hand then. “Excellent,” he said and drew the boy closer to him. “And if you find yourself with any other boys to be rid of, you know where to find me, m’dear. I’m always in need of stock.” He reeled the boy through the doorway and shut the door with the kick of one foot.

  “There’s an end to that,” said Bogrevil. Outside the door, the woman was expressing a similar opinion, though with a curious pang of regret. She had foolishly put her faith in that boy simply because he hadn’t died. She’d let herself become sentimental. Never again, she swore. Never again.

  In the dusty and dimly lit foyer Bogrevil took him by the shoulders and pressed them back, tilted his chin up, then stepped away from him. “You’re skinny as fishbones, but that’s from her feeding you on air and dreams. Otherwise you’re well turned out, or will be when you’ve had sommit to eat. Waste of talent, though. None of my clients will want to inhale an idiot. Still, we’ll find a use for you. See if you can juggle a tray, hmm?” When the boy did not respond, Bogrevil patted his cheek and released him. “Well, come on, then, follow me.” He threw back a curtain, and light from a distant source below him splashed his shadow across the ceiling of the foyer. “We’ll get you fed and bathed and into some whole clothes.” He started down a steep stairwell. The boy had forgotten about the chain, and nearly stumbled as it snapped tight and pulled him to the edge of the steps.

  “I wonder what the gods gave you,” Bogrevil said as he descended. “Many’s the time I’ve said the gods are capricious. Sometimes they give us what we need, and sometimes they offer so much that it drives us mad. Sometimes they see the greed inside and they curse us for it. Sometimes the gifts don’t mean nothin’ at all.”

  They went down into the belly of the tower.

  True to his word, Bogrevil had the boy fed. It was more food than he’d seen in a single serving ever. After the near starvation on the dragon beam, he couldn’t eat half of it. All the while he watched the other boys sizing him up. They seemed envious of the attention being paid him, though it was no more than had been paid to them upon arriving. He kept his eyes on nothing and focused on the meal. The other boys took this to mean that he was harmless and ignored him.

  After the meal, Bogrevil had one of the other boys pick the lock on the cuff and removed the chain from his ankle. Two older boys led him to a steamy chamber, stripped him of his clothing, and dropped him into a large bathing pool. A dozen others swam in it, a few laughing and squealing but most just floating, withdrawn, it seemed to him. He luxuriated in the warmth. He had no memory of anything like it. Finally, to his shock, a woman waded into the pool. She headed straight for him and took hold of him by one biceps. As naked as the boys, she might have been ten years his senior, but she wasn’t much larger than he. However, she proved to be a good deal stronger. She caught hold of him, and then scrubbed him with a brush so hard that he thought she was flaying him, but he couldn’t squirm out of her grip. A couple of the boys hooted at his predicament but stayed beyond the woman’s reach while they did. She poured something into his hair that she worked in. Whatever it was, it burned terribly, and he struggled furiously to get free of her and dunk his head. She must have expected it, for she wrapped her legs around his belly to keep him in place. Finally, when he thought his hair must be sizzling, she shoved his head underwater, then hauled him up again. He spluttered and spat, sure that his scalp had been burned away. Without a word the woman let go of him and stalked one of the jeering boys, who hadn’t been far enough away after all. The other squealers scrambled naked out of the pool for their lives, while the rest watched her and the goings-on in the water as if none of it mattered. The boy patted his head and was surprised to find that he still had hair.

  Later, the same woman lifted him out by the arm and wrapped him in a great cloth. She was wearing one, too. He saw that she had an odd, dark birthmark on one shoulder. She said, “I hope you have the sense to bathe yourself, because I’m not going to do this for you every day.”

  Bogrevil came in while the other boys were dressing. “How is he, Eskie?” he asked her.

  “Clean,” she replied, and pushed the end of the cloth through his hair. “I rid him of his lice, though it peeled the skin from my fingertips.”

  “Good.” Again Bogrevil lifted his chin and studied him. “How old you think he is?”

  “Old enough, I’m sure. He has hair, hasn’t he? But he’s been underfed so very long, it could be he is seventeen or more and simply looks twelve. He does not know?”

  “Not likely. Anyway, doesn’t matter, he’s not on the menu.”

  “He has the looks for…the menu. Fill him out a little and an attractive enough body will appear.”

  “Don’t need attractive to clean and serve. Can’t sell half-wits anyhow. Most clients are superstitious enough to think it’s contagious—an idiot’s essence will make them the same.”

  “Mmmm,” she replied. “I’m not afraid. Or else it’s too late for me.” She fluttered a hand in front of her face as if to cool her fevered brow.

  Bogrevil chortled. “You think you can get a rise out of him, my Eskie?”

  “Is that a request?” She shook her head. “I am only saying that he’s a pretty one, though starved.” She snatched the drying cloth off him, left him standing naked while she retrieved clothes for him from a table. “Come, then, give us your arm,” she said as she drew a white tunic on him. “Come,” when she wanted him to raise a foot. Her fingers touched him everywhere, but didn’t linger. She buttoned the tunic down his chest. Its stiff collar nearly reached his chin. Her hazel eyes studied him closely. He blushed at the way she looked at him: He couldn’t help it. She noticed the color in his cheek, and her careless gaze became curious; but she said nothing. Her fingers brushed his hair from his forehead. “A proper server,” she commented and stepped back to let Bogrevil see the boy dressed in white finery, loose silk trousers, and a slender jacket.

  “He wears the clothes well enough, don’t he? Superb, Eskie, superb. Now we must find out if he can balance a tray.”

  She considered him. “I shall be surprised if he cannot.”

  Bogrevil turned to leave. “Oh,” he said and raised a finger. “We have to give him a name. Can’t keep calling him boy. If I were to call out Come here, boy, whenever I wanted him, I’d be crushed by the onslaught.”

  “He has no name?”

  “I don’t know. His former keeper didn’t bother to assign him one, and he can’t tell me, if he even knows.”

  She put a finger to her lips and tapped them. “Let’s call him…something like divers.”

  “What?”

  “Because he is different.”

  “Diverus,” he repeated, mispronouncing what she’d said. “Yes, we got others like that, don’t we—Delicatus and Draucus. Like a—what, lineage, yes.”

  Rather than correct him—never a good idea with Bogrevil—she concurred. “Diverus, then.” It was not a bad name in any case.

  “Different. Oh, yes, he is. Nice job, Eskie. I can always rely on you an’ your upbringing.” She bowed her head at the compliment. “You go take him to his room, show him about. Maybe some of it’ll stick. We’ll try him out tonight if he can balance a tray.” He went off to see to the rest of his “merchandise.”

  . . . . .

  Eskie had put on a long white robe. Her black hair cascaded down the back of it. She wore bangles on her wrists and a small chain of bells on her ankles, so that her every movement tinkled and chimed as she led him through a warren of rooms and tunnels. Something about the sound created odd warmth in his belly.

  The main parlors of the paidika—there were three—had intricate tapestries hung upon the walls. Two had carpets on the floor, and pillows strewn upon the carpets. The room farthest from the stairs had a square pedestal in the center, and small, backless cushioned chairs ringing the sides of it, as if a show of some sort was about to begin. Lamps and candles of various sizes and shapes filled
every corner, and lanterns dangled from the ceilings. Bowls containing some sort of aromatic herbs floating in liquid stood off to each side of the doorways. Their entering the room swirled spice around them. The rooms were not occupied.

  Leading from the parlors were narrow halls. The one she led him along opened onto a wider corridor lined with curtained doorways, with leather settees in between them.

  Eskie saw him trying to peer into the rooms, and she stepped up to one and drew the curtain back. It was sumptuously decorated, though small and dark. The central feature of the room was an immense sinuous hookah, the cap of which nearly reached the ceiling. Two hoses depended from the side of it and snaked around the bulbous base, mouthpieces resting on pillows as if the smokers had just left the room. In the shadowy recess behind it lay a peculiar lacquered box big enough for someone to lie in. Curving tines of bone like the rib cage of a monster as big as the hookah rose from the side of the box and curled over it toward the center. Symbols painted in the lacquer were meaningless to him. Along the rest of the walls were shelves and niches that held candles, small lamps, and assorted odd objects—tiny silver pillboxes, a few statuettes of fish and other creatures, some carved from wood, others blown from colored glass, and more things he couldn’t identify. When he’d had a good look, Eskie dropped the curtain again.

  Owing to the nature of the paidika’s business, she said, the boys generally slept the day through. She led him down another hall and a short flight of steps, taking them even farther from the public part of the paidika. At the end of yet another hall, a set of double doors barred their way. She opened one quietly and ushered him in.

  The stone walls of the dormitorium bore brown water stains in jagged rills. The smell in the room reminded him of the underspan itself. High up near the ceiling he saw a grate, no larger than his head, which let in all the light there was, and he imagined that if he could climb up to it he might find himself looking out upon the same makeshift platforms and hovels from which he’d been removed.

  The boys slept on pallets appreciably better than the one he had known at home, most of which were occupied now. A few boys’ eyes opened as chiming Eskie led him through the room, and he thought he recognized some from the bath.

  She explained softly, “Everybody sleeps here, unless they’re purchased for a longer time. Even so, they’re carried back here after, to recover…but there’s no reason for me to explain this to you, is there? You won’t be serving in that way. And we’d better determine now if you’re capable of serving in other ways, which I hope you are. I would hate to see you cast into the laundry. Whatever you do, you don’t want to displease your master. He’s nice enough, providing you do as you’re told. Like most of his kind.” She stared hard into his eyes. “I hope you can understand what I’m telling you. It’s a matter of survival here.”

  He sensed eyes observing him—gazes like those of lizards, watchful and cold.

  Eskie took him to the kitchens next. The two connected kitchen chambers were smoky, the walls blackened with years of soot from cooking fires, even though the hearth built into the far wall exhausted into a chimney hole. The place smelled of old, rendered fat. The bald cook looked up at them as they entered, but his hands continued to work, grinding seeds with a pestle in a wide mortar.

  Eskie led Diverus to an area full of polished silver trays, utensils, and pitchers. She selected a tray with an oddly shaped base and straps hanging off it. She lifted it over him and lowered it upon his head like a crown. His head was small, though, and the tray tipped. Eskie fitted the straps together beneath his chin and cinched them tightly. She tipped the tray with each hand. “Still too loose, we’ll have to find you a smaller one.”

  The third one she tried seemed to fit him well enough that she didn’t cinch the straps. She placed a silver cup upon the tray, right at one edge, and filled it with liquid. He could feel the weight tipping the tray and tilted his head enough to counterbalance it.

  “That’s good,” she told him. “That is what you want to do.” She set down the pitcher and strode across the kitchen. “Now,” she said from the far side. “Carry my drink to me.”

  Diverus started forward. Liquid splashed his arm. He stopped and looked down at it and immediately the rest of the liquid spattered the floor in front of him, soaking his feet, followed by the clang of the cup itself as it bounced across the stones.

  Eskie laughed and walked back to him. “You must not get distracted by things if you’re serving. You can’t go studying your feet without dousing the entire clientele should you be supporting a full tray.” She picked up the cup and filled it again. “Let’s try once more, see if you can do it.” She put the refilled cup on the tray and walked off again. “All right, come to me,” she called from across the room. The bald cook stopped to watch. Diverus cautiously walked across to Eskie without spilling the cup. When he reached her she said, “Now can you lower yourself so that I can reach the cup more easily?”

  He thought about it for a moment before extending his back leg out, widening his stance to lower his torso. She took the cup. “Wonderful, Diverus! You learned that right away, faster than a lot of boys would’ve done.”

  The cook said, “Clever lad, innit,” then went back to grinding.

  She replaced the cup on the tray. “Now let’s see how you do with a full tray.”

  . . . . .

  After he had successfully walked the length of the kitchen twice while balancing a tray covered with cups, Eskie had the cook feed him again. She maintained that he was in need of extra nourishment. If Diverus passed out in the middle of the evening, a disaster would ensue. And while he might be forgiven, Bogrevil would certainly blame, and punish, her.

  Once he’d eaten a cup of the soup that he would have again for dinner, she took him down to the lowest level of the paidika: the laundry.

  This proved to be a large room at sea level with a square, shallow pool in its center. There were boys already at work in the laundry. They were different from the boys he’d seen above. A few were cruelly formed, with lumpish backs or twisted limbs, or heads too small for their bodies. Some of them were brutes, too large to be boys except that they were. They had dull faces, childish faces, faces expressing their inability to grasp anything beyond the work they were doing. The rest shuffled about with dirty or wet linens clutched in their arms. They seemed incomplete in some manner, like sleepwalkers, ignoring him and Eskie and everyone else. The ones in the pool plunged bedding and tunics into the water, sponged and squeezed and pounded the cloth, and every bit of their minds must have been focused upon the labor. One of the sleepwalkers noticed Eskie and Diverus, and stopped, gaping. His face looked old and wan; the eyes expressed a veiled panic, as if the source of his fear was inaccessible, and the lips were pulled back in a kind of rictus that drew the skin of his face tight across the bones. Diverus didn’t comprehend what the look meant, but he saw in these boys his old life beneath Vijnagar, and what Bogrevil intended for him if he failed in his other duties.

  Because of Eskie, he had other duties.

  Across the pool a wide barred gate revealed a view of dark water. He circled the pool and walked up to the gate. His fingers curled around the vertical bars. The padlock securing it was nearly as wide as he was—a giant’s padlock stolen from some other world. He pressed his face into the bars to see as much as possible. Where he stood lay at the very bottom of the span, looking out toward the pier of another tower on the far side of it. A boat with a single sail trolled past through the narrow channel, so close that he could make out the weathered features of the single occupant. If he could have gotten outside the gate, he might have jumped from the narrow ledge into the boat. Overhead he could see nothing save for the hint of an arch curving above the far pier. No platforms had been constructed in that space between the spans.

  Eskie had come up behind him. He felt her press against him as she put a hand upon his shoulder. “It’s the way out in emergencies, this gate. If we’re raided. Which has onl
y ever happened once or twice, because some of the magistrates are regular customers and they protect us. They don’t think we know—they come in disguise, most clients do—but Bogrevil has an informative network, and he knows things he’s not supposed to. He takes care of himself, which takes care of us.”

  He slid his hand down and fingered the keyhole cover on the padlock…a small keyhole for so large a lock.

  She must have noticed, for she said, “Far too big for anyone to remove it alone. Some of the boys were street pickers before ending up here, and they surely know their way around locks. That one—even if they can work it, they can’t get out without two more boys to help lift it.”

  He glanced back toward the pool.

  She looked at the pool, too, seeing what he implied. “Oh, they’re big enough, but they have no wish to leave. The paidika is the only proper home most of them have ever known. Many were horribly treated where they were before. You could never get them to help. In fact, they would probably stop anyone who tried to get out. Some of them sleep down here, in the corners. Like the demon sentinels of Nechron’s underworld, they are.”

  He shifted his gaze, met hers with his brow furled.

  “What, you’ve never heard the name of the god of the underworld? No. I suppose you wouldn’t have, would you. Who would have taken the time to educate you? They would have considered it time wasted, but I think you’re cleverer than they know, Diverus. You’ll learn everything here—especially now as you’ll be a server rather than a scrub boy.”

  He looked out at the water once more before turning away and accompanying Eskie back up to the higher level. The laundry boys watched him leave as though watching him walk out of their memory.

  Eskie left him at the dormitorium after assigning him a pad to sleep on. She told him to sleep as long as he could during the day. Once the paidika opened for business, he would be on his feet the rest of the night.