Thief of Lives

by J. C.

  Leesil stared down until he was satisfied the truth had been spoken, then leaned over. The man recoiled, but the half-elf simply ripped the man's pants leg open to examine the burn. The skin was merely singed.

  "If you tell the captain I was here, he won't care. All that will matter to him is what information you told me, not that I was here. And I can find you again." Finished, he carefully repacked his tools, grabbed the lantern, and headed for the door.

  "Would you have cut my hands off…" the man whispered, "taken my eyes?"

  Leesil left without pause, fastening the door securely behind him.

  Chapter 5

  Magiere stood near the schooner's prow in black breeches and worn leather hauberk, with her falchion on her hip, and watched sunlit shimmers flit across the water. This morning, they would reach Bela. Strands of her hair had loosened in the autumn wind, so she retied the tail of black hair. The thong's tension aggravated the ache in her head, but the pain had decreased overnight, her body recovering quickly.

  The assault in her cabin was common knowledge, and she noticed the crew pausing in their duties to stare at her, at her hair and skin. Glancing back along the deck, she spotted the captain standing beside the helm watching her as well.

  Magiere faked as much indifference as she could and looked out beyond the prow. Despite Leesil's distinct features, she was now as much an oddity as him. In their backwoods travels through Stravina, her appearance hadn't been so noticeable. Thickly treed, spotted with bogs and marshes, the damp forest filtered the sunlight through its canopy on clear days. But under a cloudless morning sky at sea, she could imagine the bloodred shimmers visible in her black hair. And more.

  She tugged back her left shirtsleeve to expose her forearm. Recently she'd noticed a strange sensation, neither pleasant nor distasteful, and only when she was exposed to the open sun for prolonged periods. A subtle tingle ran across her white skin. She'd always assumed it held its severe pallor because of night travels and the dim Stravinan forests. When she and Leesil had first hit the open coastline on their way to Miiska, she hadn't noticed anything. But after months in town and days at sea under the autumn sun, it became obvious that her skin didn't tan at all. Standing next to Leesil's darker elven tint, she must look as pallid as the dead. Another reminder of her tainted heritage.

  Blood-marked, raven-haired, corpse-colored, and now with night assassins with slit throats in her cabin. Who wouldn't stare at such a creature from a safe distance? Magiere wanted to order the ship about, as if that were possible, and return to Miiska, where she wouldn't have to become some half-thing again, no matter the compensation.

  Light footsteps approached her from behind. No one else might have noticed such a soft sound, but she'd grown accustomed to it. She sent a cold glare over her shoulder.

  Leesil stood rubbing his arms and hands in the crisp wind's chill. A once-green paisley scarf was wrapped around his head and held his hair tucked back. His clothes were wrinkled and creased, as were hers, from being slept in all night. Once the fight was over, he'd settled her in bed with a cold rag on the back of her head. She'd turned away from him as he sat silently on the floor, refreshing the rag now and then from a pan of water. Neither of them spoke. When she'd awoken the next morning, Leesil was in the upper bunk, snoring like a drunk.

  The ship took a sudden swell, rolled slightly, and Leesil grabbed the rail, eyes scrunched shut until the ship leveled out. He was still discolored from seasickness and hadn't eaten in more than a day. Added to this, his eyes were now bloodshot and, even in the open air, Magiere still caught the thin, lingering odor of stale grog or whatever he'd been drinking the night before.

  "How much longer… farther?" Leesil asked. It would have sounded exasperated, except it was clear he lacked the strength for his usual dramatics.

  "Not far," she answered. "Soon." And she turned her attention to the coastline.

  "Magiere…" Leesil began. "Listen, I'm—"

  "I don't want to hear it. If Chap hadn't been there…"

  "I know—"

  "No, you don't!" Magiere turned long enough for her gaze to pass once over his disheveled appearance. "Not now, or last night."

  There was nothing he could say that would justify his behavior. Three assassins had entered her room, and he was out drinking again. If it hadn't been for Chap…

  She suddenly wondered where the hound was, now that both she and Leesil were out of the cabin. She spotted him midship, perched upon a stack of crates lashed in cargo netting. Fur rustled by the wind, he watched the sailors, who in turn gave him a wide berth. Word had spread as well about how the hound had mauled a large, armed man into submission.

  "There, look!" Leesil said, a bit more strength in his voice. He pushed in close to Magiere and pointed ahead of the ship.

  The coastline curved inland out of sight. In the far distance, Magiere could see where it turned outward again to continue north. The southern point of the Outward Bay was finally in view, and her ire with Leesil subsided for the moment to be replaced by a rising edge of anxiety.

  Although they'd passed through large cities in their travels, they'd rarely stayed long. It'd been many months since their last and final visit to Bela, when Magiere collected the tavern's deed on their way to Miiska. Over the years, they'd briefly stopped in the capital, where she'd stored away funds, little by little, at one of the less notable moneylending and changing establishments near the southern land-side gate. Venturing farther into the city's business district for an upper-class bank would have attracted too much attention for an armed woman on the move.

  The king's city of Bela rested at the base of an immense peninsula reaching over thirty leagues into the ocean from the northwest corner of Belaski. On each side of the peninsula's base were two large bays with mouths some eight to ten leagues wide. They were known respectively as Vonkayshae u Vntitorna Zaliva, the Outward and Inward Bays, the former on the peninsula's ocean side while the latter faced northeast into the Gulf of Belaski. Bela was situated at the innermost point of the Outward Bay.

  "Oh, grateful praise!" Leesil muttered. "Dry land again. Maybe tonight I get to keep the food I eat."

  Returning ire quickly snuffed Magiere's pang of sympathy. The schooner aimed for port.

  She knew nothing of sea vessels, but all sizes and makes were anchored throughout the bay's expanse. Some were as small as the schooner, but many were twice its bulk or more. Several were of unimaginable size. Passing near one hulking monstrosity, she watched its crew scurry over it like ants on the branches of a leafless bush, its six masts a maze of cables and ropes crisscrossing through the sky.

  Vessels dotted the water all the way to the port ahead. Then a shimmer from the corner of Magiere's vision drew her attention. It came from the north.

  At first, she couldn't be certain it was more than a glint on the water. It sparked like polished metal, but the light wavered, as if what reflected the sun fluttered in the wind or rolled on the ocean. It was a vessel, riding smoothly, perhaps even a bit high, as it skimmed across the top of the water. The shimmer came from its sails, iridescent as white satin. Magiere squinted and shaded her eyes.

  Long and sleek, the bow reached out to a point like a spear. The hull gleamed sun-tinted green one moment and rich golden tan the next, and its lip appeared delicately curved like a holly leaf's edge.

  Leesil pointed to it and called to a nearby sailor on deck. "What's that over there?"

  A young, sandy-haired man paused from coiling his rope to glance across the bay. "Elven," he answered shortly, "from the far north, on the east side of the cape."

  "Never heard of them having ships."

  "Never heard…?" The sailor looked at the half-elf as if he were a half-wit.

  "Too bad we can't get a closer look," Leesil added.

  At that, the sailor took one step toward Leesil and Magiere.

  "I'd sooner sail a dingy into a winter squall!" He tossed the rope aside and walked quickly away.

  Magier
e didn't understand the sailor's caution, but she wouldn't forget it either. The elven people were so reclusive that she'd seen only a handful in her lifetime. If Loni back in Miiska was unusual for his kind, having settled away from his homeland, she wondered what these all-but-hidden people were truly like.

  "How is it you know so little about your own people?" Magiere asked, still reluctant to exchange words with him.

  "They're not my people," Leesil corrected. "They're my mother's, and I know nothing more of them than what I'd seen in her… and that was long ago."

  He finished more quietly than he began. Magiere left the subject alone, at least for now.

  "Oh, please, please let us dock directly." Leesil looked longingly toward the shore, his words nearly a prayer. "I don't even want to ride a skiff in from anchor after all this."

  "Enough whining," Magiere retorted.

  The land at the bay's back was a massive, rising slope that extended all along the shore. At its center was Bela, the king's capital city. More than three centuries past, before Belaski was so named or known as a country, Bela had been a small walled keep settled at the slope's crest. Over time it grew, until now it was a visible behemoth of white granite.

  Villages closest to the castle spread into a town, and a defense wall had been erected around all. But the town, eager to become a city, wouldn't be contained. The population grew, new structures sprang up, the castle expanding as well, and the capital sprawled ever farther along and down the slope. A second fortification was erected around Bela, as it came to be called. Mixed buildings hid this wall's base from sight like unkempt, wild foliage against a stone cottage. Given more years, the city still wouldn't be confined.

  Now, a third ring wall with regularly spaced towers existed, which reached almost down to the shore and the expansive docks that supported moorage for scores of ships.

  "I don't remember it being this big," Leesil muttered.

  "Because we always came from the flat, land side," Magiere added, "and never ventured far into it."

  Magiere felt even more uneasy. Foolishly, she'd not considered Bela's size, a further argument against accepting the city council's manipulative offer. In Miiska, out of necessity rather than choice, they'd hunted three Noble Dead who'd already exposed their presence. Bela was at least twenty times the size of the little coastal town. Within its three ring walls, they must now find one undead—if an undead it was—with no clue but a girl's corpse.

  As the schooner drew near the docks, the slope filled Magiere's view and the outer ring wall obscured the inner city from sight. Buildings of mixed size, make, and color were mashed together so closely she made out only a few vertical roads running outward like wheel spokes from the city's center. Each such passed through the third wall via a towering, fortified gatehouse with raised iron portcullis. Trails of smoke like a thinned gray forest in the air curled upward from chimneys all about the city. Warehouses lined the shore, and the air was suddenly tainted with a myriad of scents from fish to oiled wood, salt water to people and livestock.

  A noxious breeze blew across the deck, and Magiere wrinkled her nose. Down the right coast at the city's edge was a building the size of two or three warehouses. On its bayside, massive wooden sluices dribbled water into the bay, while on the structure's side towering wheels turned, carrying seawater up and into wide troughs running into the building.

  "Salt mill," Leesil choked out. "They're harvesting salt from the sea."

  The smell clearly affected him the most, and his face turned pale and sallow before Magiere's eyes.

  There were people everywhere. Uncomfortable numbers of them. Dockworkers and sailors clambered over the piers' upper and lower levels, moving cargo to and from vessels, handling mooring and rigging, and shouting to each other over the general din.

  "This is impossible," Magiere said under her breath. Her gaze panned across the sprawling city. "How are we to find anything in all of this?"

  "One step at a time," Leesil replied.

  As they drew near a lower dock, the schooner's crew was in the rigging, taking in the last of the sails. Several sailors tossed out lines to men waiting to moor the ship, and the schooner settled to a stop.

  Chap barked repeatedly, until Magiere's and Leesil's attention turned his way. He leaped from his perch of lashed crates and trotted toward the ship's dockside, where a boarding plank was being lowered.

  "Come on. Time to get started," Leesil said.

  He was off at a trot toward their cabin to gather their belongings. Magiere followed in silence, sharing little of her companion's desperate hurry. As they reached the hatched stairway, the captain was waiting for them.

  "No need to go below," he said, dour and stiff, as if he disliked having to speak with them at all. He shoved a folded parchment into Leesil's hand. "Your baggage is gathered and being offloaded. You can turn over the billing to the council's secretary."

  "Well, that's very kind," Leesil responded with an elevated politeness his expression didn't match. "And our thanks for the passage."

  The captain looked briefly at Magiere and then turned a hard stare toward Leesil.

  "Get off my ship, before I have anything more to explain to the port officials." He turned and walked away.

  Magiere was puzzled by the last remark. The one dead assailant had been tossed overboard at sea, and another had managed to jump of his own accord. There was the third locked in the cargo hold, but the captain had questioned him and learned no useful information.

  "What was that about?" she asked Leesil.

  "Likely nothing," Leesil offered, and rubbed his head before walking around to the ship's dockside. "I think it's definitely time to disembark."

  When they walked down the lowered boarding ramp, Chap already stood waiting on the floating dock. Beside the hound sat their packs and chest, and Magiere looked to the main pier overhead, uncertain as to how they were to get both dog and luggage up to the city level.

  "This way," Leesil said. Grabbing his pack and one end of the chest, he waited as Magiere did the same.

  Following him toward the docks' shore end, Magiere saw another floating walkway along the shoreline's rock wall beneath the overhead piers. At intervals spaced between every other pier were switchback ramps and stairs leading to the city level. Along the stone wall of the shoreline, she spotted archways to the sewers beneath the city that drained brackish water into the bay.

  They headed upward, hauling their belongings. Chap ran ahead, stopping now and then at turns in the walkway to look back and be sure they were following. When they reached the city level, Magiere's anxiety peaked.

  Every five or six steps, they were forced to maneuver around hurrying dockworkers, milling passengers, and wandering vendors and porters hawking their goods and services. At one point, a rolling cook's cart with dangling racks of smoke-cured beef came out of nowhere, almost running them over. Magiere stopped, dropping her end of the chest and causing Leesil to stumble.

  "Valhachkasej'a," he muttered. "Give me some warning next time!"

  "This is insane." Magiere looked about, but all she could see were crowds and warehouses everywhere. "We haven't got the slightest idea where we're going."

  "Well, perhaps we should find someplace to put this stuff," Leesil added sarcastically. "Nearer the castle grounds, where we're supposed to go in the first place?"

  "I know where we need to go," Magiere answered in a threatening tone. "Near the castle is too costly. We need an inn that's close enough but isn't going to eat up all of our coin. I have no idea where that is! Do you?"

  Leesil crossed his arms. "All right, men we find someone who does."

  Magiere looked through the crowd. Even the hawkers seemed unable to pause long enough for a short conversation.

  "Hey, sir, help with the luggage?" a high-pitched voice wailed out.

  Standing nearby, head craning to see around passersby, was a boy no taller than Leesil's stomach. His frayed hair was plastered down on top and in need of a was
h, and his secondhand muslin shirt and pants were too large for his frame. He pointed at Leesil.

  "Yea, you, sir," he said, ducking between the taller bodies in his way. "Help with the luggage? Best porters on the piers, right here." The boy's tapered, dirty face was as serious as that of any journeyman hawking his services.

  Magiere let out a deep sigh as Leesil cast her a sidelong glance, something between a frown and a snicker. She scowled at him with a slight shake of her head.

  Leesil rolled his eyes and looked down at the lad. "And what do you charge, sir, for your services?"

  "We'll take you anywhere in the city," the boy answered, folding his arms firmly across his narrow chest, "for two copper pennies."

  "What?" Magiere took a threatening step toward the boy, but he didn't budge. "That's a day's wage for the strongest dockworkers, not some runt. Leesil, no!"

  Chap shoved his head between Magiere and Leesil to peer at the young newcomer. The boy remained standing firm, chin up. His attention passed briefly to the hound in casual appraisal before returning to his prospective customers.

  "Nice mutt," he said.

  A low growl rumbled from Chap. Leesil raised one eyebrow at the dog, shook his head, and turned back to the boy.

  "Who's this we you keep mentioning?" he asked.

  The dour little pier boy put two fingers to his pursed lips, and Leesil visibly cringed at the shrill whistle that followed.

  Weaving varied paths from out of the crowd came four more boys in equal disarray. Two carried wooden poles and worn straps over their shoulders. They ganged themselves up around the first, and a fifth appeared directly from behind their leader.

  This last member was barely half the spokesman's size, with cropped blond hair and a fat-cheeked face of freckles above his spindly little body. He gave Magiere a smile that scrunched his eyes almost closed. His two front teeth were missing.

  "Leesil, I said no," Magiere repeated.

  In answer, Leesil simply dropped his pack on the chest. "Give me the purse."

  "I already gave you coins back on the ship."