The Goatee kept his hand on his sword, fingers tapping the hilt. ‘From what I understand, Salvatore Erridian has eyebrows about as smooth as a bucket of nails.’
Cam would need to pick a better name to hide behind in the future.
‘Yes, my uncle does have quite the peeper-hair,’ Cam said with a gulp.
The Goatee’s smirk somehow grew larger, so large it would have broken any normal face in half.
‘Do you have any tokens to prove your lineage, Salvatore Erridian?’ he asked.
Cam made an innocent turn of his palms, his face going red. ‘Well, you see, I was with this young Noblewoman last night, and she was incredibly attractive, mind you, so obviously I didn’t have all my wits about me, and in the morning she’d taken—’
‘Tokens,’ Francis barked out from behind. ‘Unless you’re liars.’
The Goatee made a tsk-tsk sound, which either completely negated or completely matched the amused look on his face. ‘Francis, we’ve discussed this.’
No apology was offered from the Khatfist behind, only a folding of skinny arms over the protruding belly.
Cam’s face soured, huffing in that way only High Nobles could. My friend was probably ten stations above these Khatfists, and it really was a shame he hadn’t grabbed a fistful of Tavor tokens before leaving the Manor.
‘So let’s see. I’ve got two Khatfists to report for unprofessional conduct,’ Cam said, eyes narrowing. ‘What are your names and ranks in the law?’
The Goatee slowly withdrew his sword from its sheath, the sound long and shrill. The tip of the blade swung back and forth playfully in front of Cam. ‘What’s unprofessional is a Pedlar refusing to give over his papers to two respectable Khatfists, and a supposedly High Noble, of House Erridian no less, having no way of identifying himself.’
‘Very unprofessional, Harrold,’ Francis said with a sneer from behind. ‘Unless they’re thieves.’
Split held up his hands defensively, shooting Cam a dangerous glare while grabbing the scrolls from the cart. ‘No one’s refusing anything. Here, take a look.’
Harrold kept the tip of his sword swinging, making all of us tense. He kept eyeing Shilah, his glance resting in places that made me cringe. I was secretly hoping they didn’t believe Split’s scrolls, so I was forced to use my own.
Without removing his lingering glare, Harrold nodded back to the much larger Francis, who stepped forwards and snatched the scrolls out of Split’s hand. The parchment crunched under fat fingers as he wrenched the scrolls open without care, his eyes narrowing.
‘Stamps are out-of-date,’ Francis said.
‘And I’ll gladly pay the fine,’ Split said without missing a beat. ‘Anything for the Khat’s grace.’ The Pedlar sighed dramatically, but gave the lawmen a conspiratorial wink. ‘That’s what I get for losing sense of time in the Glassland Pleasurehouses. Lots of pleasure to be had. Yes, lots of pleasure. Now how many Drafts is that again for out-of-date stamps? Three, I believe? Let’s make it a clean Shiver? The Khat’s law deserves the utmost respect and it’s my honour to—’
‘Ten years out-of-date. And it says here two girl slaves for transport.’ Francis pointed at me, tearing the parchment in half and tossing it on the ground. ‘That is a boy slave.’
‘Might have to check down below,’ Harrold sneered.
‘Ten years!’ Split exclaimed, aghast. The tone was believable, but his forehead was betraying him, sweating profusely. ‘Outrageous! I must have grabbed the wrong papers. Or maybe the last checkpoint accidentally switched them on me. Please, first let me give you some scarves for your women, and then we can—’
The point of the sword aimed at the Pedlar’s throat. ‘Are you attempting to bribe members of the League of Khatfists, Pedlar? Francis, what’s the punishment for such a transgression?’
Francis cracked his knobbly knuckles. ‘Out here? Anything we want.’
Split gave a nervous laugh. ‘I’ve never heard such a thing.’
Harrold beamed, the tip of the sword moving away from Split’s throat and instead caressing the folds of Shilah’s shirt. ‘We are joking, of course. Bribes are the preferred communication between respectable Nobles like us. The question is, what’s the quality of the bribe? Is the bribe diseased? Can the bribe handle what’s coming to her without bleeding out? Because she’d better be able to handle all these things, or she is no bribe at all.’
And that was enough of that.
I gave Cam the double-cough we’d practised.
Harrold’s attention swung to me. ‘Why are you carrying that against your body instead of in the cart, slave? What’s your master got you lugging?’
Cam sighed loudly. ‘Fine. You caught us, okay?’
‘Hmmph,’ Francis grumbled from behind. ‘Can always spot lies.’
Harrold drew the tip of the sword across Shilah’s chest, examining her curves with the metal. His hand wasn’t entirely steady, and he clumsily drew a line of blood. Maybe it was on purpose. Shilah remained unflinching, refusing him the satisfaction of so much as a squeak.
‘Caught you, you say?’ Harrold’s smirk outlined by the yellow goatee was a work of sinister art that could rival anything in the Paphos library. ‘Caught you doing what exactly?’
‘I’m going to grab our real scroll from the bottom of the cart,’ Cam said, keeping his hands up as he scuttled sideways. ‘Just don’t stab me.’
‘Stab Salvatore Erridian’s nephew?’ Harrold said, making a sarcastic flap of his hand over his mouth, the tip of his sword still dangerously close to Shilah’s heart. ‘Who would dare do such a thing?’
Cam bent low, pulling loose the thread that held the invention in place.
‘But if you come back up with a blade, boy,’ Harrold growled, ‘it goes down your gullet. High Noble or not.’
‘No sword,’ Cam said innocently. ‘Just secret information. More valuable than blades in the right hands.’
Harrold’s sword was now plucking away the lower cloth covering the swell of Shilah’s chest, the small new cut on her breast dripping red onto the metal. The lawman was only half paying attention to Cam, the dark hunger obvious in his face. Shilah didn’t give him so much as a flinch, her cheeks tight and eyes narrow. Her hand was poised dangerously close to her thigh, and I hoped she would let the invention get us out of this before trying something drastic.
‘Haven’t had a good bribe in a long time,’ Harrold mumbled to himself. ‘And this bribe looks like she needs a breaking. Do you concur, Francis?’
The large man grunted, scratching under his sword belt. ‘Concur.’
Split’s face was stuck in helpless shock, clearly oblivious to what was going on. I probably should have informed him about our scroll plan, but I had my reasons for keeping him out of the loop.
‘Here,’ Cam said, looking at the rolled-up parchment wistfully before holding it out. ‘Just … this information is extremely secretive to the Erridian family, and I would ask that once you read it, please—’
Francis grabbed the scroll with a grunt, beginning to unroll the end.
‘Manners,’ Harrold said with a scoff, dropping the sword and taking a step closer to his companion. ‘Now let’s see what’s so secretive that—’
The reaction was explosive.
And as the cloud of grey powder erupted against their faces, the name ‘Snapscroll’ shot into my mind. Francis had ripped the paper low enough to trigger the side-spring I’d coiled inside, smashing the plunger through the glass trap, making the back-up Glassland Dream spray out like a sandstorm. The paper itself kept the cloud from travelling backwards, so the powder was left with only one direction to escape.
Right into those bastards’ faces.
But I never expected it to burst so hard.
Francis got the brunt of the cloud in his mouth, immediately making him cough and splutter, staining his entire face grey. Harrold unfortunately was still a few feet away the moment the trap was sprung, turning his face away from the puff of Dre
am, and only receiving a weak dusting on the yellow goatee. It didn’t much matter though, because in the commotion Shilah had swung around behind the man, holding Mama Jana’s blade firm on his windpipe.
Just like we’d discussed, should a situation like this arise.
And, unlike her captor, Shilah’s hand didn’t shake.
Francis, his face now the colour of a dead man, made some garbled sound, dropping the Snapscroll. With the amount of Glassland Dream now in his lungs he had no chance of staying upright. The normal dose of the powder for relaxation purposes – from what I understood – was supposed to fit on a fingernail. A full vial could last an addict weeks, and the lawman had just had the entire supply in one flurried dose.
As expected, Francis’s eyes rolled back and his oddly shaped body collapsed, his arm making a sickening crack as it slammed against a large rock on the ground.
‘Drop to your knees, Khatfist,’ Shilah commanded of Harrold, her voice steelier than her weapon.
Harrold’s face was pure vengeance, but he couldn’t quite hold the menacing expression beneath a fit of coughing. As he jostled, the knife cut into his skin, but Shilah didn’t back off.
‘Knees!’ Shilah shouted.
This time the Khatfist decided to listen.
‘Hands behind your back,’ I said, trying to match Shilah’s ferocity and failing. ‘Now.’
Instead of listening to me, the Khatfist hesitated, his eyes judging how quickly he could pick up his sword. Shilah let the knife dig further into his neck, and soon enough both of Harrold’s arms were behind his back. I had coils of thin rope ready in my pocket, and I quickly bound him at the wrists and ankles, using a technique Leroi had taught me that was far more binding than an Assasiknot.
Cam went over to Francis’s limp body, checking for a pulse.
‘He’s alive for now,’ Cam said, keeping his head as far away as he could from the fallen lawman, transferring the grey powder from his fingers to his sunshirt. ‘And I think his arm is broken.’
‘It is. And his breathing is slowing,’ I said, moving back to our other captive. ‘Now listen closely, I will leave you here, also alive, and put a sharp piece of metal and a waterskin a thousand paces North of this spot. After we leave, you can crawl to the metal and cut your bindings—’
‘You listen to me, slave,’ Harrold spat, trying to blow the powder out of his once-perfectly-yellow goatee. The whites of his eyes had gone red from Dream and disgust. ‘I swear on the Khat’s law that I will find you and end you and make you obey like no slave has ever done before.’
‘How are you going to make him do things no slave has ever done after you end him?’ Cam joked, a nervous lump in his throat. ‘You’ve got to get your timeline right.’
Shilah let her blade taste more of the Khatfist’s flesh. ‘You sure you want to make that threat?’
‘Shilah,’ I said with a bit of warning. ‘It’s fine. Now, as I was saying, your release will be one thousand paces North, and I’ll put a Wisp in the waterskin. Now, I know that’s asking a lot of crawling, but we have to be sure—’
A gob of spit carrying flecks of powder splattered into my face. I saw it coming enough to be holding my breath as I spoke, but I made sure to wipe it away quickly with my sleeve. Picka gave an excited grunt from behind, Split trying to calm her with ear scratches. The Pedlar had had his back turned to us ever since the grey cloud burst, muttering something to himself and presumably doing his best not to look at all that powder.
‘Respect, Khatfist,’ Cam said in a taunting voice. ‘Do we need to discuss this?’
Harrold’s breathing had grown ragged, from a combination of the powder and emotion. ‘And you, girl,’ he laughed, so high-pitched it was almost a giggle, ‘oh, just wait to see what I have planned for you. Your body is just the beginning. Shilah, was it?’
‘Watch it,’ Cam said, at last serious.
Shilah was smiling, stroking a hand against her captive’s cheek. ‘You sure you want to make that threat?’
Harrold’s breathing was now so fast I wondered how much longer he’d be able to stay awake. ‘You don’t understand. You’d better slice my throat with that blade, Shilah, otherwise I’m going to track you down and you will be my rug, and my dirty bathwater, and my soft boilweed that I rub in the cracks between—’
‘Watch it!’ Cam warned again.
Harrold’s eyes were wide and frenzied, and I worried that he might try to bite Shilah’s fingers. ‘Do you know how much practice I’ve had with your kind, girl? Do you know how many Jadan slaves I’ve consumed whole?’
Shilah looked poised to cut his throat, the muscles in her arms tense.
I quickly reached in and put a hand on her wrist. ‘It’s fine. Remember. There’s a reason the Crier chose us.’
‘Chose you!’ Harrold giggled, high-pitched and fast. ‘Amazing. How droll. I hope she makes jokes like that while I have her tied to a post, giving her my cudgel. I’m swelling just thinking about it. Oh, the fun we’re going to have. Let me tell you, the last time I took a bribe in the form of a Jadan girl—’
‘Just stop,’ Split said quietly, finally turning around, all the composure he’d gathered since Gilly’s gone.
‘It’s okay, Split,’ I said. ‘Let’s get on our way. He won’t be able to follow us in those bindings.’
‘Absolutely. On our way.’ The Pedlar sucked in a breath, puffing out his cheeks as he picked up the large rock the other lawman had broken his arm over and moved next to Shilah. Split gently brushed her aside with one arm, so he could loom behind the bound-up Khatfist, raising the stone high.
‘Excuse me, dear,’ Split said, his eyes on fire.
Then he brought the stone down with all his wrath, splitting open the Khatfist’s skull with a single blow.
The reaction was explosive. Split lifted his weapon and stepped sideways.
The second blow was just as violent.
We buried the bodies.
Two pools of blood marked the sand.
Split insisted on keeping the rock.
Chapter Eleven
‘Well I’ll squeeze puss from an old wound and sit on a pile of bleached bones,’ Split cursed under his breath, grabbing the parchment with Shilah’s likeness off the wall and squeezing with such fury that I thought he might set it aflame. The Wanted Scroll was just one of many that featured Shilah’s picture, all within view of our hiding place behind the hovel. They were tacked up all over the port, littering the walls and signs and even a few Pedlar carts near the entrance to the Great Bridge, so everyone would know our faces. A quick glance across the main corridor allowed me to see a few Cam scrolls and at least a dozen Micah scrolls as well.
‘They beat us here,’ Split continued. ‘These blasted things are everywhere!’
A part of me was flattered that the Khat’s scribes would waste so much paper and ink on our images, although I still couldn’t figure out how it had been done. I had to blink away my light-headedness at seeing my drawn face staring back at me. The scrolls peppering the walls of the buildings were all uniform, perfect copies of each other, all drawn up with our likenesses, and really the only difference from reality was that their creators had somehow skewed our faces to look menacing and evil.
The Pyramid obviously held inventions to which the rest of the Khatdom was not privy – the Khats always snatched up the best minds for themselves – and I could only imagine the beautiful slab of machinery that had produced these papers with such swift and perfect abundance. The images were rather accurate, and if I ever had ample time in a tinkershop again, I’d try and figure out the process. Such a thing would come in handy when trying to spread truth.
We had made our way to the port city surrounding the Great Erridian Bridge. I understood these shabby half-communities popped up around all of the Great Noble Bridges not only out of convenience, but out of sheer necessity. Fruit merchants, Imbiberies, brothels, Coldbaths, fishmongers, and temples were just some of the attractions for weary Noble tra
vellers who intended to cross the Singe.
Even though, as far as I knew, Cold was only Cried in Paphos, the Khatdom’s major cities were still numerous and spread out. Crossing the Singe was necessary for merchants who wanted to expand their businesses and work their way towards higher house status. The Priests had taught us that the Great Bridges had all been erected long ago, stout, strong, and glorious to behold. Monuments to the power of the Khat. They were wide enough to fit three caravan carts side by side, the raised stone easily spanning the boiling waters.
There seemed to be a problem at the port, however.
The massive doors to the bridge were barred shut, the jostling crowd of travellers bottlenecking before a line of armoured guards standing in front. Our group kept to the back, hidden behind a clay hovel, watching the irate travellers waving Noble tokens and yelling vulgar things at the guards, including insults regarding the integrity of their mothers’ bedroom affairs. A few of the merchants had regular-sized camels to help carry their wares, but most of the travellers had their own Jadans instead, burdened, chained, and with signs of recent beatings.
I wished I had enough spare Abbs to sneak one into each Jadan pocket.
I vowed that one day I would.
Split’s blasphemous rant about the Wanted Scrolls went unnoticed in the mess of noise, but we were still conspicuous just being so close to our likenesses. The headscarves and thin disguises that Gilly had bestowed would only do so much if any of the merchants decided to take a closer look. We needed to scatter to a more deserted section of the Singe as fast as possible, perhaps to the next closest Great Bridge – which belonged to House Swarn, according to Shilah’s map.
Cam reached around the side of the hovel, peeled another Wanted Scroll off the wall, whispering as he held it up to my face. ‘You’re much uglier in person, Mic—’
Shilah coughed and snatched the parchment out of Cam’s hands. She folded it in half, tossing it on the ground. ‘Idiot. Don’t draw attention.’
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