by John Conroe
The man standing behind a worktable, amidst numerous spans of thick cloth, shelves holding spools of thread, and racks of scissors, was stooped and elderly, with a thinning head of white hair, long white mutton chops, and a bushy grey mustache that wouldn’t have looked out of place at the end of a broom handle. He had light grey eyes that looked up at us through a pair of actual spectacles, with real metal wire holding in the thick lenses. He wore a workman’s apron and had a cloth measuring tape hanging around his neck.
“Oh, there you are. Right there,” he said in a surprised voice.
“Good day, good sir,” I said, studying the old man who looked nothing like Freyla’s description.
“Well, good day to you fine gentlemen,” he said, looking from me to Drew and back again. I could see him trying to place our position in society, the same exercise that virtually all merchants go through with new customers.
We were both dressed in the worn work clothes and the heavy boots that we favor for travel and for blending in, with Drew’s longer hair pulled back and tied and a scuff of whiskers on both of our faces. We should look to be maybe tradesmen or laborers. Exactly the type of customers he would be used to, so why the flicker of a frown racing over his features?
“You have a fine shop, Mr…” I said, raising my brows.
“Oh it’s not my shop—I just work here,” he said, bushy brows raising in surprise, a slightly nervous surprise.
“Well, it seems a fine place for us to buy some replacement clothes,” I said with a nod toward Drew, who waved a hand at the now completely torn-out knee of his trousers. Under his left arm, he had a new pair he must have grabbed on the way through the aisles.
“Well, that we can certainly handle, although might I also suggest a repair. I’ve fixed much worse, and clothing is too expensive to waste,” he said, eyes focused on Drew’s leg.
“Really? You can fix these?” Drew asked, glancing down.
“Absolutely. Tough material like that stiches up tight and strong,” he said with a smile.
“Do I just wait for them, then, Mr…” Drew asked.
“Kazilionum, and I’m afraid I can’t do them today. I’ve got several orders ahead of you. I won’t be able to get to them until tonight.”
“So maybe I should buy a pair to wear home and leave these with you, then?” Drew said.
“Absolutely,” Kazilionum said with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
“Well, I grabbed this pair out front and they look like they’ll fit, so can I change somewhere?”
The tailor pointed to a cloth-covered opening just to Drew’s right. The Shadow nodded and pushed the hanging material aside to reveal a tiny booth just barely big enough for one person to switch clothes.
“So, who is the proprietor if not you, Mr. Kasilionum?” I asked, pretending to examine a work jacket.
“Ah, that would be Mr. Andru,” he said, his hands busy pinning one piece of fabric to another. He glanced at me over his spectacles, then back down at his work.
“Well, this is a much nicer shop than we’re used to,” I said.
“Oh? Just where do you hail from?” he asked, eyes flicking to the booth Drew was now noisily changing in.
“All over, but Lil most recently.”
Drew stepped out, buttoning the front of his new pants, the torn pair slung over his shoulder.
“I’ll take those then,” the tailor said, starting to come out from behind his worktable. Just then, the crabshells on the front door rattled loudly and a deep voice yelled out, “I’m back!”
The tailor froze in place, his expression startled, maybe even slightly panicked before shifting to something like relief. “That would be Mr. Andru just now. Back here, boss, with a pair of customers.”
His whole demeanor set me on edge, and I could see Drew turning so that his back was to the side wall, a move that I was already copying.
Heavy boots thudded on the floor as the unseen proprietor headed our way. The clothing shelves and racks weren’t as high as my head, but I still couldn’t see the individual moving noisily through the aisles. And then he suddenly appeared between two shelves of clothes.
Heavy was the word that came to mind. He was shorter than Soshi, maybe as tall as Rose, but his meaty shoulders brushed the clothing on each side of the aisle and his head was covered in thick, dark hair tied in a long ponytail, and his face was hidden under a truly impressive beard that hung down to his broad chest. Dark eyes zeroed in on me for a second before shifting to Drew. The smallest furrow appeared between his eyes. He looked like someone had taken a big man of two span in height and shoved him down into a span and a half.
Motion from the tailor caught my eye as the old man literally threw himself forward to grab the pants hanging from Drew’s shoulders. His hand had no sooner touched them when his whole body locked up. “Agents!” he yelled, his free hand moving toward the Shadow. Drew lifted his own arm to block the perceived strike, only to jerk backward as soon as he connected, his body shaking and his eyes rolling up as he fell.
The stocky Andru turned with startling speed and thundered toward the front of the store.
I spun and fired the single shot bolter I yanked from under my shirt behind me. The dart hit the old tailor and dropped him like a bag of rocks. Then I was running for the front of the store. The door was hanging from one hinge, the other ripped free from the wood by the violence of its opening. Outside, I found Cort picking himself up off the ground.
“Sorry, boss. He ran me over like a crazed mule,” the sturdy sapper said.
“Damn it!” I said, looking at the thick crowd in the market for any sign of my quarry. A few startled people looked our way, but Andru was long gone.
“Will this help?” Cort asked, his expression trying for innocence while his eyes were gleeful. His right hand held out a small piece of red cloth with some long black hairs twisted about it. “I grabbed for his hair and this came off in my hand.”
“Outstanding,” I said, giving him a grin, then a frown. “You okay?”
“A little dizzy, boss. That guy hit like a battering ram.”
“Yes he does, Cort. Like all his people,” I said.
Chapter 26
“He’s a what?” Cort asked when we were back at the Lost Lobster.
“Nuk. Or at least of Nuk descent,” I said. “He’s too tall to be pure blood.”
“Nuk? I thought that was a fairy tale that mothers and bards told,” Cort said, shooting Trell a confused look.
The bard raised both hands to shoulder height, palms out. “I didn’t know they were real, either.”
The rest of my team turned my way: Drew and Kassa, who were securing Mr. Kazilionum inside a wool blanket, the old man still unconscious from my drugged bolter dart; Cort, who was sitting on his bed rubbing his chest where Andru had stiff-armed him; Soshi, who was next to him; and Trell, sitting in the chair at the small table opposite me.
“The Nuk are decidedly real. The Drodacians have traded with them for a hundred years. They mostly stay far, far north of where the ice fields begin. All of their dwellings and communities are deep under the ice and usually underground as well,” I said.
“And you’ve met some?” Trell asked, eyes gleaming.
I nodded. “My first year with Jella.”
“When you were an absolute nightmare,” Jella said from the window. Kassa jumped and I saw Trell’s eyes twitch, but the rest of us didn’t so much as blink. We were either used to her stealth or, in my case—and possibly Soshi’s—had heard the slightest sound on the roof to forewarn us. “You are certain?” Jella asked me.
“That he is of Nuk stock? Absolutely.”
She stared at me for more than a few seconds, her head tilted in thought. “You saw him too?” she then asked Drew.
“Yeah, as did Cort when he got run over,” Drew said with a smirk.
Jella turned her hard gaze on our sapper. Cort is a bit shorter than I am but weighs just as much. He’s stocky and strong.
/> “He hit me like a runaway freight wagon,” he admitted, shaking his head. “Short but wider than I am and really, really strong. That’s all I had time to see. Dark hair and a long beard.”
“That is… troubling,” Jella said. “Who’s that?” She nodded at the unconscious tailor.
“We have pretty strong reason to believe he’s the eslling who created the artifacts that are at the heart of this growing problem.”
“Eslling created?” Jella asked, eyebrows going up.
I explained our findings and how the mysterious Mr. Kazilionum had taken down Drew with a touch, which brought a smirk to Cort’s face.
“I still can’t believe the Nuk are real,” Soshi commented.
“Very. Seldom seen and very reclusive. They hate most other races, but they will trade with my people,” Jella said. “Like Drodacians, they have been greatly changed by the diseases of the Punishment. Very short, extremely dense bones, excellent hearing, not great eyesight, but a better sense of smell than you all. And strong—wicked strong.”
“I didn’t think anything could live up on the ice fields,” Kassa said.
“There is always life—creatures that have adapted to the cold and bleakness. But the Nuk have found ways to grow food where it should be impossible. They farm an amazing variety of fungus in underground chambers, as well as raise blind fish and freshwater crabs.”
“Why would a Nuk be down here, deliberately creating dangerous conflict?” Trell asked.
“I have absolutely no idea,” Jella admitted. “Too bad you all lost our only lead.”
“Oh, he’s not lost,” Kassa said. “Just temporarily misplaced,” she added with a nod my way. I held up the hair tie, hanging from a thin cord.
Jella blinked; I know because I was watching her closely. We’d surprised her, and that happened so infrequently that I cherish each and every time. Throwing my mentor off stride was always awesome.
“What the hells have you been doing all this time?” she asked, frowning as she stepped off the windowsill. Good cover, Jella.
“Waiting on you… Where you been?” I shot back.
She gave me a level look, one I had seen many times before. The kind that promised a beat down. I ignored it and just raised a brow.
“I’ve been doing my own recon,” she said archly. “On the road south of Porye is a contingent from Berkette; an escort for Gawron Tarpinian, the regent of Stoneport. To the north is another, led by Turgeon Collind, chief magistrate of Kittwell in Mandrigo.”
“Shit!” I said.
“Yeah, so what happens, Shadows, if those two come into conflict?”
“War,” Soshi said.
“That’s just the beginning. What happens to Porye?”
“Damaged or destroyed, with the victor likely laying claim to it,” I said. “We can’t let that happen.”
Of the two connected guys’ rooms, the one we were in had a round table just big enough for maybe three people to sit at. I had already cleared it of everything except for a piece of slate and a stick of chalk. Now I moved to it and started sketching a rough map of Porye, drawing the main roads into the town, then adding a number of buildings, including our own and Andru’s shop. The result lacked detail but it was a beginning.
I looked up and found the entire team observing me. I glanced at our captive, who appeared to be still out cold, then gave Drew a nod toward the other room. Immediately, he grabbed the top of the blanket and pulled the man into the other room, shutting the door between us when he came back in.
“He’s secure?” I asked, which was perhaps a bit insulting, but both Soshi and Drew nodded.
“Stripped naked, bound hand and foot, then bound inside the blanket and gagged,” Drew said.
“Which is what I did when we stripped him,” Soshi added. “Old men ain’t my thing.”
“All right, let’s see what we can see,” I said, holding the hair tie over the crudely drawn map.
At first it just hung there, twisting a bit from the natural motion of my unsteady human arm. I shut my eyes and thought about the brief look I had gotten of Andru. Carefully, I built the image in my mind, pulling up everything I could remember, no matter how fuzzy. The color of his shirt (brown), the shape of his beard-covered face, the heavy leather boots on his feet. Exact detail wasn’t as important as the overall impression.
Someone, Trell maybe, sucked in a breath and I opened my eyes. The piece of cloth that had held Andru’s hair was pulling on its string like a dog on a leash, pointing at the northwest section of Porye.
I put down my pendulum and flipped the slate over. On the other side, I started to draw another rough map, with details of the northwest section. My team all leaned in and offered landmarks and corrections. After a minute, I tuned most of them out and listened to my sniper’s comments. Soshi’s eye for range and direction is excellent, as you would expect. My drawing skills are so-so. I stopped when the map felt complete enough. This time, the swinging tie pulled immediately to a blank spot on my map between a pub that Trell knew well and a seafood seller that Drew recommended.
“What’s in between?” I asked.
Both of them paused, Trell closing his eyes in some kind of visualization thing and Drew tapping his chin as he thought about it.
“Just doors, I think.” Drew answered first. “Apartments, I would guess.”
Trell’s eyes popped open when Drew said apartments and he suddenly tensed up. “Yeah, that sounds right,” the tall bard said, his eyes locked onto me. Like afraid-to-look-anywhere-else locked on to me.
“Have either of you been in them?” I asked. “Information about the layout would be vital.” I watched Trell, as I knew Drew would have spoken up.
“Um, it’s possible, like a long time ago,” Trell admitted. “I was likely pretty drunk, so I don’t really remember too much.”
Kassa frowned and looked at him closely.
“You sure about that? Drunk even the next morning, stud?” Soshi asked with smirk.
“Well, now that you mention it, I have a vague memory of walking downstairs and then a long hall before leaving out a front door,” Trell said, shifting his feet and rubbing the side of his head. “Maybe one or two buildings down from the pub.”
“How many doors in that hallway?” Jella asked.
“Not super clear on that. Maybe two on each side. Possibly three?”
“I can’t tell exactly where he is in this space, so we’re gonna have to do it the hard way,” I said.
Chapter 27
It turned out to be easier than we anticipated, by virtue of the fact that Andru was coming out the front door of the middle building as we approached. Unfortunately, he saw us just as we saw him.
There were three buildings jammed together between the fish shop and the bar, with no spaces or alleys to run into. He took his only option, which was to run back into the building and slam the door.
Jella and I were right behind him, blasting the door open in time to spot him at the far end of a dark hallway. Two people were lying or sitting on the floor, either passed out, dead, or stoned into a coma. They were both on Jella’s side, but she easily hurdled each of them as we raced after the stubby bastard. He was shockingly fast for such a short man, yet not fast enough, as we were gaining on him. He ran right through the grease-paper window at the far end, tearing the paper and smashing the rickety wooden frame right out of the wall. Two seconds later, we arrived at the newly formed opening just in time to see Andru run right into a wooden beam that Cort swung into his face.
The sound was like a door slamming and the short bundle of muscle was laid out flat—for a second. Then he sat up, shaking his shaggy head just as Drew stepped up and hit him from behind with a weighted cudgel. He still didn’t drop, instead starting to growl like a wounded animal.
That’s when a pair of bolter darts appeared in his back and neck, one right after the other. Coated with enough of our special knockout agent to stun a woldling, it had an immediate effect. Andru stiffen
ed up and fell back, his body locking up tight.
I looked around and spotted Soshi up on the roof of the seafood place, a barely visible trail of gas rising from the long-barreled bolter she was already reloading.
The back door of the pub opened and a seedy-looking man with a mop and bucket started to come out, only to see us and change his mind. Quick as a wink, he was back inside, the door almost slamming, the thunk of a wooden beam sounding as he no doubt barred it.
“Damn, it was like I hit a rock,” Drew said, shaking out his arm.
“No shit, this guy is tough!” Cort said. “I think he was starting to get mad.”
“You should thank your leader’s foresight in having Soshi on overwatch,” Jella said. “When a Nuk goes into a battle rage, you pretty much have to take out his or her brain or spine to stop them. Even a heart shot will leave them as much as ten seconds to wreak unbelievable damage. Foresters tend to just put an arrow in their eye socket.”
“Tricky shot,” Soshi noted as she climbed nimbly down from her perch.
“Eye socket, nose, or open mouth are all good, as is a center neck shot,” Jella instructed, using a long hunting knife to point at each anatomical target as she said it. “Their skulls are so thick that only bodkin points are assured of getting through all that bone.”
“Let’s get him bound and out of here,” I said, looking around.
“Use the steel manacles I told you to bring,” Jella said.
Cort pulled a set of super expensive chains and cuffs from a pack. “I thought you were crazy when you told us he would just break most rope but now…”
“Yeah, I don’t want to try wrestling this squatty dude,” Drew agreed.
“He would literally pull your arms from your sockets,” Jella said. “Hand-to-hand, you either choke them immediately or bleed them out with multiple artery cuts.”
“What if you don’t have a blade?” Soshi asked.
“Run,” Jella said without a hint of a smile. “They are surprisingly quick, but only for short bursts. All that mass takes too much oxygen to keep it moving.”