Among Thieves: A Tale of the Kin

by Douglas Hulick

  The emperors were dead.

  And then, seventeen years later, Markino proved them wrong and emerged from hiding at the head of an army out of, of all places, Djan. Things had gotten interesting after that.

  “Are you to the Cleansings yet?” I asked. On the march from Djan to Ildrecca, Markino had ordered his troops to deface every depiction of his former incarnations they came across. He claimed he was “cleansing” the temples and promoting a fresh start after the Regency; his other selves had had other opinions. They didn’t like being erased when they weren’t around. And so had begun the centuries-long, ongoing spat among the incarnations of the emperor. Lyconnis had hinted that he had found a new source on the topic, but he hadn’t been willing to elaborate on it.

  Today was no different. Lyconnis smiled a crafty smile—or, at least, he tried to; it didn’t really fit his face. “I’m not telling,” he said.

  “You wouldn’t be.” I considered pressing him—he loved to talk about his work, and it wouldn’t be hard to get him to relent—but sighed instead. “No, as much as I’d love to read it, I have to see your master on business.”

  Lyconnis’s face clouded over. “Ah. I’ll leave you be, then.” He didn’t know the specifics of my relationship with Baldezar, but he was smart enough to realize it was something he would rather stay ignorant about.

  I walked to the back of the shop and climbed the narrow circular stairs to the gallery. Baldezar was waiting for me at the top.

  “Young Lyconnis does not seem to appreciate your trade as much as you do his.” The sentence rasped out of Baldezar’s mouth, his words dry and brittle as the parchments that surrounded us.

  “I think it’s your business with me he disapproves of,” I said.

  “Most likely.” The master scribe turned away and paced slowly toward his office. “But since the opinions of my lessers matter nothing to me . . .” He let the sentence drift to the floor, stepped past it.

  I let my eyes brush the works that resided here. Books and scrolls filled the narrow spaces between the windows in the gallery, the shelves running floor to ceiling. Many were of little use to anyone except the scribes, but there were enough histories and collected tales here to keep me busy for ages. Baldezar consented to rent some out to me now and again, but only grudgingly, and always at a high price.

  “No touching or taking,” he warned over his shoulder. There was no humor in the tone.

  I bristled at the implication. “Mind your words, Jarkman.”

  “It’s my trade—how can I not? You just mind your trade, burglar.”

  “I haven’t cracked a den in years,” I said.

  Baldezar sniffed but otherwise stayed silent.

  We stepped into his office. The master scribe arranged himself like a potentate behind his reading table. I took the narrow seat across from him. The shutters to the room had been thrown back for light, but the glass windows themselves were closed against the dust and noise of the street. It made the space feel tight and bright and warm. I fought a yawn and sneezed instead.

  For most people, such a basking would have made them appear healthy, or at least alive; but all it did for Baldezar was highlight the sharp crags of his face. I could make out a similar collection of jutting angles and projections beneath the ink-stained tunic, which hinted at the sparseness of his frame. He let his eyelids droop halfway closed as he regarded me.

  “I hope you are not here for the work you commissioned,” he said. “I told you it would not be ready until next week. I’ve not even received the proper linen paper from the presser yet.”

  I waved my hand. “No, no rush on that. Take your time.” I was having him do a bit of forgery for my sister, but it wouldn’t hurt to let her wait a bit. It might even teach her some patience, though I had my doubts. “I’ve come here for your opinion on something.”

  The scribe nodded as if this made perfect and natural sense, which I’m sure it did to him. He was Baldezar, after all.

  I reached into my ahrami pouch and drew out the piece of paper I had taken from Athel.

  Baldezar’s eyebrows formed themselves into a brief pair of peaks, then settled down again. “May I?” He held out his reedlike fingers. I obliged, and he held the strip of paper up to the light.

  “And what are you looking for here?” he asked after a long moment.

  Even after giving him the paper, I hesitated. My instincts were to keep as many people out of my business as possible. I had to remind myself why I had come here in the first place.

  “I’m hoping it’s a cipher you might recognize,” I said.

  “As in a coded message?”

  I nodded.

  “Where did you get it?”

  I regarded the Jarkman silently.

  “I only ask,” he said, “because the provenance might help me to—”

  “It doesn’t matter where I got it,” I said sharply, my fatigue getting the better of my patience. “What matters is what you can tell me about it.”

  “I see.” Baldezar rubbed the paper between his fingers. “Do you know what it pertains to?”

  “This is dusty stuff, Jarkman—don’t play the Boman.”

  Baldezar lifted the side of his mouth in distaste. “I may understand your canting, Drothe, but it doesn’t mean I enjoy hearing it. Use the imperial tongue in my presence, or get out.”

  I snapped forward in my chair, stopping myself just before I came out of it. Baldezar’s eyes went wide as he almost fell back in his own.

  I took a long, slow breath.

  “All right,” I grated. “In plain Imperial, I’m not happy about what that paper implies. In fact, I’m downright pissed. I’m having a bad day because of what’s on that paper, and I don’t expect I’ll be the only one. Now, we both know what that means, so my advice is to tell me what you see here. Otherwise, my using the cant won’t be the only thing you don’t enjoy.”

  Baldezar opened his mouth, shut it, and cleared his throat. “A code, you say? Intriguing.” He laid the strip out on his desk, studying it. After a minute or so, his hands stopped shaking. Baldezar rotated the strip a few times, looking at the markings from all angles, and then turned it blank side up. He ran his fingers over the paper and hemmed to himself. Then he sat back.

  “I don’t know.”

  “What?”

  Baldezar held up his hands placatingly. “It’s not any language I recognize, if it is a language at all. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to the markings. Nothing indicates a code or message of any sort.”

  I stood up and leaned over the table. “There’re pystos and immus right there,” I said, pointing. “And what about the repeating marks . . . here . . . and here, and here again? And these two here and here. Those might be fragments of common cephta.”

  “Not everyone uses imperial ideographs for writing, Drothe.”

  No, just most of the people in the empire. “Okay, so maybe they’re those things the western Client Kingdoms use for writing. . . .”

  “Letters?”

  “Right, letters.”

  Baldezar let out a long sigh. “Perhaps. Or they might be a portion of an illumination exercise. Or unsanded errors. Or an attempt to use one of those useless new printing machines. But I see no traces of any cipher here, Drothe. What you have is a scrap from some scribe’s rubbish.” He flicked the paper. “Hardly worth threatening anyone over,” he added as he began to crumple the slip into a ball.

  I held out my hand. “All the same . . .”

  Baldezar stopped, looked at the paper, and then held it out in his palm. I took the slip and put it back into my ahrami pouch. When I looked up, he was studying me.

  “You’re convinced the paper is that important?” said Baldezar.

  Hell, no. It could have been a scrap, a pipe taper, even a bit of trash that had fallen to the bottom of Athel’s bag. But it was also the only thing I had gotten from Athel that hadn’t come to me under duress. Even with his last breath, Athel could have lied, and I needed somethin
g to confirm or deny his story. The paper was the best lead I had, no matter how pathetic that lead might be.

  So naturally, when Baldezar questioned the paper’s importance, I lied.

  “Positive,” I said.

  The scribe began drumming his fingers on the table. “It occurs to me,” he said slowly, “that I may be able to impose on one of my colleagues who know more about these things than I. It would cost a bit, and I would need the ‘document’ in question to show him, of course, but it might provide you with some answers.”

  I could tell it pained him to admit anyone might know more about a subject than he did, let alone that he needed to consult them. Good.

  “Tempting, but no,” I said. “The paper stays with me.” A thought stuck me. “Who is this ‘colleague’?”

  He hesitated a moment too long before answering. “No one you would know.”

  I regarded the Jarkman, smiling slightly as I did so. Was he trying to keep me from going to his friend on my own, or had he been hoping to up the price for the consultation and take a cut of the profits himself? Either way, I’d likely end up paying a steep price for little gain.

  “Nice try,” I said. Baldezar’s eyebrows rose in surprise. I waved away the beginnings of his protestations, yawned and stretched in the chair. “No games,” I said. “I’m too tired for games. Either you help me or you don’t.”

  Baldezar stared at me for a long, hard moment. Then, without taking his eyes off me, he called out, “Lyconnis!”

  I heard the large scribe thumping quickly up the steps and along the walkway to his master’s office. He wasn’t quite breathing heavily when he entered the room.

  “Yes?” he said, ducking his head toward Baldezar.

  “Drothe has some garbage he wants you to look at. He thinks it may be a cipher of some sort.”

  “A cipher?” said the scribe. If his master hadn’t been here, I expect he would have rubbed his hands together in delight; as it was, the excitement that came over him was practically tangible. “May I?”

  I sent a quizzical look at Baldezar even as I pulled out the strip and handed it to Lyconnis.

  “Lyconnis here has made a study of secret messages and early imperial spymasters,” said Baldezar drily. He sniffed. “Imagine my surprise at it suddenly proving useful.”

  Lyconnis bit his lip at his master’s rebuke and bent over the slip of paper. He manipulated and examined it in a manner that was fast becoming familiar to me. He frowned. “Where did you get this?”

  I crossed my arms and stayed silent.

  Lyconnis blushed. “Of course. Excuse me for asking. You noticed the cephta for pystos and immus, I take it?” he said. I nodded. Lyconnis held the paper up to the light again, then shrugged and handed it back to me. “There might be something there, but I think it’s more likely a bit of scrap of some sort. Is it important?”

  “Life and death,” I said, thinking of Athel. Lyconnis’s face became solemn. I smiled despite myself at that, wondering if the scribe was more worried for me, or for the person who had had the paper. Likely both.

  “How about someone named Ioclaudia?” I said.

  “Who?” said Baldezar.

  I turned back to the master scribe. Had he been peering at me? “Ioclaudia,” I repeated.

  “Outside of some of the more obscure histories, no, I’ve never heard of anyone by that name. Lyconnis?”

  Lyconnis shook his head. “No,” he said. He smiled timidly at me. “Not anyone living in the last three centuries, anyhow.”

  “The way my morning has been going,” I said as I rose, “that doesn’t surprise me.” I nodded to Baldezar, gave a respectful bow to Lyconnis—mainly to irritate his master—and headed out of the shop.

  On a normal day, it was a short walk from Baldezar’s to my home; today, it took just as long, but felt like five times the distance. The sun seemed brighter, the crowds denser, the streets dirtier. I didn’t have the energy to deal with any of them.

  By the time I arrived at the apothecary’s shop I lived above, I was little more than a shambling mass of dulled senses. I let out a small sigh of relief. For a moment, I considered going into the shop to pester Eppyris for some ahrami, but the thought of my disheveled, lumpy mattress won out. I began moving toward the stairwell.

  “Nose.”

  The voice came from somewhere far, far away—maybe ten whole feet behind me. Turn around? No, ignore him instead; he’d go away.

  “Hey, Nose!”

  Still there? Angels, this person couldn’t take a hint! I made an eloquent, sincere, and highly profane gesture without turning, and continued on my shuffling way.

  “Dammit,” said the voice. Something heavy laid itself on my shoulder and spun me around.

  Habit and adrenaline kicked in. As I turned, I let the small dagger (the poisoned one) drop from my wrist sheath into my left palm. At the same time, my right hand sought out my rapier.

  There were two of them and they were big—obelisk big, blot-out-the-sun big—and they were good.

  One blocked my left arm and took away my dagger, a bored look on his face. The other put his hand on my right wrist and stopped the rapier in middraw.

  I knew them.

  “Niccodemus wants to see you, Nose,” said Salt Eye. “Now.”

  Chapter Four

  In the “argot of the underworld,” as Baldezar would no doubt call it, I am what is referred to as a Nose. This means I make a living by sticking myself in where I don’t belong, sniffing around for dirt, and generally making a nuisance of myself. I’m an information broker, and I gather what I can by almost any means I can: paid informants, bribes, eavesdropping, blackmail, burglary, frame-ups . . . and even, on rare occasions, torture—whatever it takes to get the story.

  That’s what sets a Nose apart from a run-of-the-mill rumormonger: We not only collect the pieces; we also put them together. Any Mumbler can sell you a rumor for the right price; but if you want to know the why behind the rumor, when and where things are coming together, and how it got started in the first place, you go to a Nose. Noses don’t just gather whispers off the street—we sift and assemble them, putting together the pieces most Kin miss. We don’t just find out something is happening—we find out why it’s happening in the first place.

  And then, we sell the information.

  Whom you sell it to depends on what kind of Nose you are. If you’re a Wide Nose, you work the street and sell what you learn to the highest bidder, pure and simple. It’s dangerous work, since not everyone wants you sharing what you learn, but a smart Nose knows how to hold just enough information back to keep people from bothering him.

  Long Noses, on the other hand, keep their heads down and their information tight. They ply their trade by infiltrating a rival crime lord’s organization and feeding information back to their real boss. Being a Long Nose takes that special mixture of guts and stupidity usually reserved for mongooses and imperial tax collectors. You typically don’t find out someone’s doing the Long Nose until he turns up floating in the harbor.

  The third kind of Nose is the Narrow Nose. That’s what I do for Nicco—keep tabs on his people, find out who is or isn’t cheating him, and generally solve minor problems before they get big. It doesn’t exactly make me popular with my fellow Kin, but it does give me something the other two types of Noses don’t have—backing. If anyone wants to come after me, he has to think about what Nicco will do to him in return. That’s not a bad place to be. However, like everything else, it has its trade-offs, one of which is that I have to answer to Nicco—a lot.

  It’s that last part that comes back to haunt me, usually at the worst possible times.

  The door at the top of the stairs opened, and I was ushered into the office by the two Arms. It was a bare-bones affair: a desk, two chairs, four blank walls, and a small window looking out onto the street. A wooden platter with the remnants of Nicco’s breakfast sat on the desk, giving the room a greasy, meaty smell. Two men were waiting in that smell.
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  Nicco was standing at the window, heavy hands clasped behind him. I blinked at the beam of sunlight streaming in, but didn’t look away. That would have been disrespectful.

  In his prime, Nicco had been a slab of bone and muscle, easily big enough to make two of me. Now, he was a late-afternoon shadow of himself—still big, still strong, but losing some of his harder edges. Jowls were beginning to gather under his jaw, and more of the meat on his frame came from food than from fight. Gray smudges had settled under his eyes, making them look haggard in the wrong light. His hair was thinning. But even aging, Niccodemus Alludrus was harder than most men. He’d proved as much three months ago, when he broke an assassin’s back even as the garrote had tightened around his neck. No one questioned whether Nicco still had what it took.

  The other man in the room stood leaning against the far wall, arms crossed, silver rings glittering on his hands and in his ears. Long and thin, he had a sharpness about him—in his face, his clothes, his mind. His name was Rambles, and he was one of Nicco’s senior street bosses. But whereas Nicco favored the lead pipe when it came to solving problems, Rambles took after the stiletto. By all accounts, Rambles and I should have gotten along famously—similar approaches, kindred spirits, and all that crap. Instead, we managed to make oil and water look tight.

  Neither man seemed in a particularly good mood. I made it unanimous.

  Nicco spoke without turning toward me. “Drothe, good of you to come. Sit down.”

  I sat. Behind me, I could hear the Arms taking up positions on either side of the door. Between them and Rambles, this wasn’t a good sign. Nicco and I usually met alone; he didn’t believe in anyone getting information before he did.

  “I’m not used to waiting two days for people,” said Nicco.