“I’ll double your fee. Give me six hours.”
“I don’t know you, Captain…”
“Johnson. My crew normally moves between—”
The watch captain raised a hand. “Spare me your life story. I don’t want to hear it. The fact is you’re unknown to me and I won’t chance you pulling some trick. This is a place of commerce and you have no one to vouch for you. Your ship is impounded until your cargo can be inventoried and removed by my sergeant. Order your men to disembark.”
Middle Finger’s voice remained calm. “Captain, this is unreasonable. All I’m asking for is a few hours. It’s my first time here. I see us having a lucrative future, but you have to give me something to work with.”
“You should have thought of all your excuses before setting in here, Captain Johnson.”
Spicy climbed off the boat and reached into his satchel, producing the clay bomb. “How much is this worth to you?”
The watch captain’s eyes went wide. “Why is there a goblin talking to me?”
“He’s our ship’s mascot,” Middle Finger said. “You know—for luck.” He rubbed Spicy’s head. The sergeant did too, but then stiffened when the watch captain glared.
Middle Finger tried to take the bomb away but Spicy moved it out of reach.
“Do you know what this is?” Spicy asked the guard captain.
“I have no idea. Looks like a clump of wax or clay.”
“It’s a bomb,” his sergeant said.
The captain held out his hand. Spicy gave him the bomb.
“It’s a rare item,” Spicy said. “Worth more than a docking fee. That’s yours, if you let us go about our business.”
Middle Finger struggled to maintain a neutral expression. “Captain, it would be better if we concluded our business in coin and scrip. Pay my mascot no mind. You’re a reasonable man, and I hope to do business here and establish a solid relationship between my company and your office.”
The watch captain held the bomb so the sergeant could see it. The sergeant gave it a sniff. Then he whispered in the watch captain’s ear. The watch captain grew more and more interested in the white lump in his hand.
“Welcome to Orchard City,” the watch captain said. “This buys you a few hours. I’ll expect your fee by the end of the day. And Captain Johnson? Don’t try to leave without paying up.”
He and the sergeant collected their men and moved back up the dock.
“Where did you get that?” Middle Finger asked.
Any momentary relief Spicy felt was replaced with apprehension at the man’s chilly tone. “Dragon treasure,” Spicy said. “He’s paid off, Captain. The problem’s solved. Now we can go look for Alma.”
“You have a lot to learn, little goblin. With the bomb, he’ll know who we are soon once he asks the right people. It means our time in Orchard City is limited before they come back, and this time to arrest us or shake us down for a lot more money than we could ever pay. Let’s go to town. We have a dragon head to sell.”
Chapter Ten
Spicy hurried to keep up with Middle Finger as they walked quickly through the cramped streets of Orchard City. The captain had said little since departing the boat.
Goldbug caught up to them and gave Spicy a nudge. “Pretty clever back there.”
“I think the captain’s angry with me.”
“Nah. He’s always looking on the dark side of things. Keeps us from getting too comfortable with our successes. Never let your guard down. That’s a rule.”
Spicy nodded, half listening. He had to step aside to make way for a gang of men carting bricks on wheelbarrows. A pair of riders on horseback passed by dressed in fancy clothes of shining fabric, bedecked with jewelry and hats and lacy fringed garments no working human or goblin would ever wear. A woman bumped him aside as she struggled to hang on to a pair of chickens.
No one paid Spicy any attention. A goblin in this city wasn’t anything unusual, he concluded. He was nudged by another pedestrian and almost stepped on by a tall girl who shot him an accusing look as if he had committed some infraction.
Spicy ran to catch up to the captain.
Orchard City was both terrible and fascinating, dirty and built higher than Eel Port or Bliss, ugly and gaudy with flashy ribbons and signs and banners advertising all manner of products and services, yet grand, if only someone would wash the place down top to bottom.
The place was so big. And the humans had at least one larger city, Pinnacle. It made Spicy feel frightened of the possibilities of what else humans could be capable of.
But unlike Eel Port, there was no undercurrent of fear in the air. People were laughing. At several merchant stands, there was someone playing music on flute or guitar. One stall selling oranges had a juggler.
Orchard City wasn’t about to fall to any attacker. In fact, he saw few guards on the street now that they had moved beyond the harbor.
Wes and two of the crew had taken the crate with the dragon head off to be sold.
Spicy wondered what such an awful commodity would sell for.
Meanwhile the three of them turned down a street where the blacksmiths worked their trade. A steady loud banging echoed between the buildings. In a large courtyard beyond a wall, at least twenty men were busy at the trade. The largest oven Spicy had ever seen sent up a plume of gray smoke.
Without being asked, Goldbug stopped to linger at the courtyard entrance, his eyes on the street.
A slim man gnawing on a smoldering cigar approached Middle Finger. “Picking up or placing an order?”
“Getting a feel for who’s making the best product.”
“Quality check? Certainly, sir. Tools? Weapons?”
Middle Finger rubbed his chin. “Let’s start with something simple. Arrowheads.”
The blacksmith walked them to where a few crates were stacked. One was filled with straight arrowheads of dark iron. A second held more refined arrowheads of steel.
“Bodkin, broadhead—tell me what you need and for what kind of work. I can arrange for fletchers who use the straightest shafts you’ll find.”
Middle Finger dug into a barrel and took out an arrowhead. The metal tip snapped when he bent it.
“Bit soft, isn’t it?”
The blacksmith grinned and flicked cigar ash to the ground. “You have a score of archers putting arrows on targets, you don’t want them shooting back, do you? It’ll also leave the men struck with something to think about.”
Middle Finger nodded sagely and surveyed an arrangement of spears on a rack nearby.
Spicy cleared his throat. “We’re looking for a woman with white hair. She might have had a man with him in dark armor with red hair.”
The blacksmith spat a wad of brown. “Not buying today then, are we?”
“Not today, friend,” Middle Finger said. “Have you seen them?”
“No. Now if you excuse me, sir, I have workers to oversee.”
Middle Finger walked quickly as they exited the courtyard. “It would be best to let me do the talking.”
“I was trying to help,” Spicy said. “We have a lot of city to cover and limited time.”
“Unless you have coin, you have to ease into getting people to give up what they know. And we’re fresh out of coin, remember?”
They paused at a running fountain where a group of women were doing laundry. Goldbug openly stared.
“Goldbug, reel your tongue in,” Middle Finger said.
There was a goblin girl among the women. She was scrubbing stains on a sheet using a brush and a bucket of sudsy water. The overwhelming aroma of soap made Spicy want to sneeze. The goblin girl eyed Spicy briefly but showed no signs of recognition or interest. She also wore no collar.
“So there are goblins here,” Spicy said.
Middle Finger nodded. “Aye, a few. Here and there.”
“Which means I won’t completely stick out. This is like a hunt. I think we should spread out.”
“You seem a tad nervous to be alo
ne out here. But it’s a good idea. Goldbug, stay with Spicy. Meet back at the dock in three hours.”
Goldbug nodded but was still ogling. The goblin girl had collected her wash and bucket and vanished, but the other women continued to work. Spicy tugged Goldbug’s arm and pulled the young pirate down the street with him.
Getting merchants to talk to him didn’t go well. He had no way to show he was a serious customer and was quickly dismissed or ignored. All his questions about Alma turned up nothing. Middle Finger had been right. Coin would get tongues moving, but he had none.
After several tries at the smiths along the avenue, Spicy was already exhausted by the gruff dismissals and rude comments. Goldbug continued alongside him with a pleasant smile.
“She could have bought more arrows anywhere,” Spicy said.
“Possibly. Or maybe she was never here. It’s a big city. Again, what if you find her? What will you do?”
“I honestly don’t know.”
They stopped at a busy corner. Another fountain lay in the circle of a large courtyard. This one sprayed water from a group of cherubs who appeared to be spitting. Spicy counted hundreds of people. How many of them wearing scarves or hats might be hiding a full head of white hair? Alma and Blades might pass right before him, and he wouldn’t know.
When he turned around, he saw Goldbug was no longer beside him. He felt a moment of panic, but then he spotted the young pirate. He was hurrying into the crowd and crossing between traffic. His head was low, and it was obvious that he didn’t see the larger man in a dark coat and tall hat until they collided.
“Watch where you’re going!” the man barked, shoving Goldbug aside.
Goldbug stumbled back and offered a bow before hurrying off. Spicy was about to follow when Goldbug came jogging over. He took Spicy by the arm and led him along a street and away from the courtyard. In his hand was a billfold. Goldbug checked the contents before sliding it into a pocket.
“You just stole that?”
“Aren’t you the brightest goblin?” Goldbug asked, but he couldn’t conceal a massive grin. “Now we have money to make tongues wag. It’s only scrip, but never steal anything that makes noise. That’s a rule, right?”
“Can you show me how to do that?
Goldbug stopped. “It’s not complicated, but it takes time. And you have to be fast. Your target can never know you’re even there. And you need a distraction. A nudge, a stumble, knocking something from their hand. Those all work just fine. You won’t learn in a day. But let me show you a quick one.”
He handed Spicy the billfold. Spicy took it. Then Goldbug placed a knife on Spicy’s hand and pulled it along the skin.
Spicy yanked his hand away. “Hey!”
But Goldbug had been using the rear of the blade and it hadn’t even left a mark. Now the young man was holding the billfold.
“See? Made you let go, just like that. But be sure to run. If you cut them, they’ll scream and curse but usually they won’t chase you if they think they might get cut again.”
“Let me guess—that’s a rule.”
“See? You’re learning. Because in the big city, even a goblin can’t really go on luck all the time.”
Chapter Eleven
Several merchants sold finished arrows. One shop looked promising, as it sold fancy bows, crossbows, and arrows of every sort with fancy fletching, and even had an archery range so a customer could test the product. The friendly merchant hadn’t even needed a bribe before he gave up the fact that no such woman had been by to purchase anything. Business the past two days had been slim enough that he was able to describe all his customers in detail.
Spicy and Goldbug extricated themselves as the man went on and on about how bad war was for business, how Pinnacle scrip was bad for the economy, and how the recent turn in weather hadn’t done much for the lingering bumper crop of summer mosquitoes.
Store after store and street after street, they continued their search.
Spicy had lost track of time. Soon they would have to return to the boat. Perhaps Middle Finger would have had some success. But Spicy was starting to realize that if Alma was here, she would be able to avoid being found so easily.
A sharp smell tickled his nose. It overrode the aromas of sweaty bodies and horse dung and smoke and cooking foods. The smell reminded him of the women doing their laundry at the fountain. Spicy headed down a lane where a horse-drawn cart was being loaded with baskets of bundled cloth. Only a few signs hung above these shops. One showed a needle and thread, while another featured a shirt dripping with water. An open yard had fabric of vibrant red and orange hanging on clotheslines.
“It’s not time for a bath, is it?” Goldbug asked with a laugh.
Spicy paused by the entrance to the yard. “It’s the smell of soap or the dye. It’s so pungent.”
A woman whose arms were pinkish brown from her work was finishing stacking baskets near the hanging fabric. She eyed Spicy and Goldbug warily as they approached.
“I’m paid up,” she said.
Goldbug ran his hands along one of the sheets of cloth. “We’ve just come to admire the colors.”
“No, we haven’t,” Spicy said.
The woman looked fearful. Spicy took the billfold from Goldbug and pulled out a note. It was yellow with a one on each corner and a crown around a tree in the center. From what he had learned, the scrip was not valued as much as coin but still held some worth. The paper got the woman’s attention.
“The ingredients for your dyes—do you purchase them or make them?”
“Both,” the woman said. “A lot of gathering work. So when business is good, I pay for the ingredients to be brought to me. It hasn’t been good.”
“What kind of gathering are we talking about?”
The woman’s expression warmed. “Berries, flowers, some shellfish. All depends on what colors you want.”
Spicy felt his heart sink. Whatever intuition had inspired him to talk to the woman had led him astray. The rank smells weren’t from anything the woman mentioned.
“But it’s the fixing agents which I don’t like to bother with,” she added.
“Fixing agents?”
“It’s what you add to the dyeing recipe to keep the colors from running. It helps them set. Can’t have a purple rubbing off on a lady’s fancy white undergarments when she’s sweating.”
“Where do you purchase those?”
The woman was looking at the note. “Perfume seller. I can take you there.”
The perfume seller wasn’t even a block away.
The woman plucked the note from Spicy’s fingers. “May the Divine Mother bless your day,” she said as she strode off.
“I could have found this place and we could have saved a whole gold note,” Goldbug said. “We need to get back. If the captain has what he wants, he might not wait.”
“Give me a minute.”
The sharp smells persisted. They weren’t as pungent as they had been near the laundry and dyer shop, but a new astringent note was impossible to miss. It smelled so familiar. Then Spicy sniffed his own fingers. The smell reminded him of the bomb he had surrendered to the guard captain and the residue that had hung in the air after every explosion.
The sign above the shop featured a round bottle with a puff sprayer. Inside, a counter was lined with many fancy bottles of every glass color imaginable. When he and Goldbug entered, a stately woman in a purple dress perked up, saw them, and scowled.
“Out, urchins!”
“Wait, we’re customers,” Spicy said.
“By my heart, you’re not.”
“My master may just have been here.”
“Well, he wasn’t. I don’t want a scammer in my shop, and if you steal any one of those bottles, I’ll put a bounty on your heads. Assuming I don’t catch you myself.”
Goldbug made a show of keeping his hands to himself.
“My master is a woman with white hair,” Spicy said. “She may have had two employees with her,
a red-haired bodyguard and another man.”
Spicy prepared himself for the usual replies, or worse. The woman appeared angry enough that she might physically toss them from her store.
He held his ground. “It’s important that I catch up with her.”
The woman’s scowl deepened. She gripped the edge of the counter.
Goldbug tugged at his elbow. “Come on,” he whispered.
Then, to Spicy’s surprise, the perfume shopkeeper’s face softened and she visibly sagged.
“Was she here?” Spicy asked. He pulled out a gold note.
The shopkeeper raised a hand. “You’re not really looking for your master, are you? The two of you are up to something. I can tell when I see trouble. But right now, I don’t care. Keep your money. Yes, she was in here with her white hair and her two attendants. They spoke with my husband, Arturo, for a couple of hours, got him all excited, and then they left.”
“Your husband is with them? Who is he?”
“He’s a good-for-nothing is who he is. And on the word of your ‘master,’ he drops everything. Never mind the store or me. ‘Going to make us rich,’ Arturo says. And then he empties our strongbox of our money and tells me they’re catching the Cat’s Cradle.”
Spicy shook his head. “I don’t know what that is.”
“It’s a boat. It makes express runs to Pinnacle, and it left this morning.”
Chapter Twelve
Just missed them. The idea kept circling in Spicy’s head as they waited on board the Sin Nombre for Captain Middle Finger to return.
It felt like everyone was watching them. There were two guards who unabashedly stared, but several people working nearby boats kept giving them the eye. Meanwhile, the remaining pirate crew was hardly on alert. Two were fishing off the back of the boat while the others slept.
Goldbug kept chucking Spicy on the shoulder. “Told you you were lucky. Told you. But you didn’t have to give her the cash.”
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