River of Thieves

by Clayton Snyder

  The wights scattered as it launched itself into the air, a deep intake of breath sounding like a massive bellows. Cord stared at it a moment in shock. I grabbed his collar, yanking him along with us as Rek and I sprinted away.

  "What the actual fuck, Cord?"

  "I don't actually fucking know," he replied.

  "Typical," Rek rumbled.

  We ran for some distance before I risked a glance back to see both the sky and the plain were empty. I paused, snaking an arm around Cord. Rek skidded to a halt alongside us. We peered around at the now-silent hills.

  "Huh," Cord said.

  "Understatement of the year," Rek said.

  "Holy shit. You didn't fuck that up," I said.

  "I stand corrected," Rek said.

  Cord just grinned and turned, making his way back to the boat. After a moment of stunned silence, Rek and I followed.

  ***

  We reached the boat by late afternoon. Three days already passed, and we were just getting started back. We knew we’d have to use the engine once more, and no one was happy about it. Rek pulled the ship into the current, and we drifted west, Cord and I entering the cargo hold to inspect the engine.

  It sat as it usually did, squat and menacing. The hearts chained to it looked scorched, but still beat in their containers. The central heart however, was blackened and useless.

  “Fuck!” Cord swore.

  “What now?”

  Cord shifted from foot to foot. I could tell he was keeping something from me.

  “Spit it out,” I said, finally.

  “We’ll need Rek’s heart.”

  “Why Rek?”

  “Because he’ll come back."

  "We can’t just go cutting hearts out every time the engine dies.”

  “I beg to differ. Why not your heart?” I asked.

  “I have the eye. Besides, it’s me Rook’s expecting.”

  “He’s expecting the eye.” I fingered my blades and Cord backed up a step.

  He raised his hands. “Now is not the time to go around dismembering people. Look, I didn’t want it to come to this, but here—" he drug a bloodied sack from behind a crate. It smelled like three-week old carcass.

  “What. Is. That.”

  “Goblin hearts.”

  “Oh, all fucking right.”

  We got to work. Rek had collected about ten of the things, and with a little thread and a lot of gore, we were able to stitch them into the engine. We stepped back, looking at our handiwork.

  “Looks like someone made a meat atrocity.”

  That’s the idea,” Cord winked. He called up the stairs. “Ready?”

  Rek’s voice echoed back. “Fuck no.”

  Cord shrugged and pulled the lever.

  The world flicked and went to black. In its place, a new world flickered in being, lives never lived and only half-seen in dreams.

  ***

  Camor flickered into my vision. A flame, then a body without substance. Their voice echoed as if from a distance.

  “What I’m going to show you is the last secret of Oros, Nenn.”

  “Why not Cord?”

  Camor sighed. “I love him, but he needs guidance. He needs a reason. You are that reason. Should he falter, tell him this story.”

  They faded without further discussion, and worlds opened before me.

  The barbarian tribes that fled from the icy northern corridors named him when the first of the green things took their flesh and fed on it, verdant life thriving on carmine vitality. Oros. It was a fitting name, brutish and short in their language, the glottal stop hard on throats burned with spore and bitter liquid from the trees they tapped for water. They sat around their camps and heard it in the buzz of flies in the soft decay of the greenery and other, wetter things. The vines that strangled their children in cribs fashioned from leaf and branch spelled it out in twisting sign. It was there in the sound of rain pounding the broad leaves of the canopy, OrosOrosOrosOros. He was the whisper and the shout, the choke and the crush. He was pervasive and insidious, and now, he was perplexed.

  Behind the veil of flies, beneath a crown of wizened thorns, his brow wrinkled. He stared at the child in confusion. She was small, curly hair spiraling out from her scalp in a whirlwind, her gaze fierce. For all her size, she held herself as someone not to trifle with. She leaned back on the mat of vines she co-opted, shooing the scuttering and slithering things away.

  "Who are you?" he asked, his voice like the sound of kudzu in silence, a creeping, creaking thing.

  He had no recollection of her entering, none of her sitting. She simply seemed to be, and it was disconcerting, even for a thing like himself. She tilted her head to one side and tipped the end of the staff she held toward him. For a moment, she looked older than her few years, though he dismissed it as a trick of the light, chiaroscuro deepening lines and shading flesh until she looked a woman.

  "Your end." It was a statement, said plain and clear in the dark of that place, and not for a moment did Oros believe it. This was flesh, pink and soft and warm. His was the cold of the night, the dark of the cave, the heat of venom. He relaxed into his throne, the black wood creaking under his weight, and smiled behind his veil. He would entertain her. It had been so long since anyone visited. So long since the last of the beasts bent the knee at his foot, since the green consumed his thought and action. He thought maybe he would entertain this small pink thing, and in return, perhaps she would entertain him. He let her words hang in the air, and when he didn't reply, she went on.

  "Would you like to hear a story, Eater?"

  He flinched at the name. Though he held no love for the fleshlings that found their way to his jungle, their hatred still stung. Eater was their way of deriding him, of reducing him to a maw that only consumed. Mindless, small. He swallowed the rage that boiled up and raised a magnanimous hand in assent. The girl settled herself into the vines, thrusting her staff into the ground beside her. She leaned forward, elbows on her knees, and spoke.

  "My family was the last to come over the shelf- the place where the ice meets the warmer places of the world. We were five - mother, father, sister, brother, and myself. At my birth, the ice was close, but not too close. It hovered on the edge of our village, but there was still room for us to move, to get to the caribou and rabbit and fill our larders. That year, the ice moved a few feet closer, but it seemed a warm summer. My parents named me Elysh, 'hope' in the language of our people. There's a unique cruelty in that - naming a child something that means nothing in a broken world. The ice claimed my brother that winter. He was out tracking rabbits. He didn't come back.”

  A spark of envy lit in Oros’s chest. Death was his demesne. The right to pluck life, pink and squalling from the green and crush it. A question formed on his lips.

  “Who is your god?”

  She paused. “Was. Rhyn, the White. The Cold Knife.”

  “Was?”

  “Even the ice took him, in time.”

  Satisfaction rose in Oros’s chest, replacing the envy. Hubris was unfortunate, but necessary to survival for those who knew its signs. It was an abject lesson in the ways of men and gods—become comfortable, become complacent, and you soon found that power turning inward, eating, chewing at bone and sinew until it reached your heart and stopped it cold. He would do neither. These pink things, these scaled and green things, obeyed. They feared. They trembled on the cold fringes of night. As they should. He raised his hand again, indicating she should go on.

  “When we saw the fringes of the jungle, we rejoiced. Here was shelter from the dead brown lands between the shelf and the sea. Here was life, abundant. Here was survival and warmth,” she spat, and Oros tasted it through the vines. Salty, thick. He wondered if she would be enough to feed his vines when she finished.

  “And what did you find, little one?”

  “More death. Our father was next. He climbed a tree to pull at the gourds there—great yellow things with thick shells - we suspected they contained perhaps m
eat or water. Instead, a thousand stinging bodies emerged, piercing his flesh. He screamed as he fell, his body swelling with their venom, his eyes mercifully shut to the horror of impact.”

  “My mother wept for four days, and in that time, my sister wandered to the edge of our camp. Something cold and slithering, something black of scale and sharp of tooth took her. She never screamed. After, my mother took her own life, cutting her own throat with a sharpened piece of flint.”

  Oros snorted. “This is less a story, and more a recounting of your unfortunate genealogy.”

  It was Elysh’s turn to hold up a hand. “You wish to hear a story, or prattle on like an old man?”

  The girl’s bravado impressed him. He thought it interesting to see someone so small embrace what would surely be a tragic legacy. “And how did you survive?”

  “There is another story you must hear to understand mine.”

  Layers on layers, like a wasp’s nest—despite himself, Oros leaned forward in his chair, and even the black flies that swarmed and buzzed for his veil stilled while he listened.

  “In my homeland, they tell the tale of Huska. When he was perhaps no older than myself, he joined a ship’s crew hoping to learn the sea, of feeding his family, and making some coin. He was young, but strong, and in his own way, clever. So, he found a home on a small vessel and set out among the fjords.

  “It was three days they were at sea when the first of storms hit. Though the captain was good, he was also greedy, and hoped to fill his pockets before the frost came that season. The snow and wind blew in great gales, and ice seized the hull in a matter of hours, like the fist of Rhyn punishing a heretic. For a time, spirits were even—they had provisions and whale oil for a week. Everyone agreed to cut rations, to light the lanterns only when needed. For a time, they were fine, if cold.”

  “They were there for four weeks. The depredations that happened in that third week—Huska would not speak of them, but when the boat returned, he was at the helm, and a mass of burned bones lay in the ship’s furnace. He was hale and hearty.”

  Oros was enraptured. “What happened?”

  “I heard my father ask him, when he was well into his cups. Huska looked up from his drink and shrugged. ‘Meat is meat,’ he said.”

  Oros looked at the girl, at her pink skin and full limbs. At her sharp eyes and white teeth. His hand trembled a little. This he understood, eating, devouring—but not family.

  “Why are you here?” the question nearly rose to a shriek.

  She tipped her staff again, and this time, he heard the slosh of liquid. He turned his gaze on it and noticed a gourd attached to the top, liquid spilling clear. It tasted oily to his vines, wicked and sharp. He willed them into action, but they lay still, perhaps in fear, perhaps poisoned.

  “To end you,” she replied, again as matter-of-fact as stating that the sun was hot, or the wind chill.

  She tipped her staff again, and he saw it was bone lashed to bone, long femurs held together with vine. Liquid poured from the gourd—a wasp home, he thought—and brought the sharp smell again.

  “There are no whales here.”

  Her statement took him off guard.

  “You might ask why they didn’t use the lanterns to melt the ice. Whale blubber doesn’t burn that hot. It would have been a waste.”

  She tipped the staff again.

  “But this—what a gift. Something the wasps leave behind when they abandon the nest.”

  She lay the staff down and the last of the liquid dripped and pooled at her feet. From her tunic she withdrew two stones and knelt. She struck them together, bringing a spark and the acrid smell of smoke. She looked up at him, and horror filled his heart. He struggled to escape his throne, but vines grown long and strong and old in his complacency held him in place. He fought, commanding them to free him, but they only slept. She struck the stones again, and a flame blossomed, and he gibbered. It was so bright. So hot.

  As the flame touched them, the vines withered and smoked, and fire crept along their length, reaching blazing fingers toward his crown. He screamed and screamed again. Through the flames, he saw the girl, flesh melting like tallow from her bones, grinning.

  ***

  I blinked as the world slipped into focus again, the hull of the Codfather regaining solidity. Cord looked at me, and pushed his hair back.

  “Okay, goblin hearts make things weird.”

  We went above deck, Rek greeting us with a raised eyebrow.

  “That was less fucked up than normal.”

  The Codfather sat in the same spot we’d departed from, just outside Orlecht. We gathered on the quarterdeck, wind in our hair, the world eerily quiet, aside from the call of gulls and the occasional splash of a wave.

  “Rek, I need you to stay here,” Cord said.

  “What? Why?”

  “Because he doesn’t plan on coming back,” I said.

  Cord nodded. “And if everything goes to shit, you and Nenn need to get out alive. I owe you that much for dragging you into this.”

  Rek looked like he might argue, then with a heavy sigh, nodded, and sat on the bench, drawing Mr. Meowington into his lap. Cord turned to me.

  “Ready?”

  “I thought you wanted me to live.”

  “I do.”

  We jumped in the rowboat and Rek lowered us, Cord taking us to shore.

  "Got any pithy Gentian sayings for this one?" I asked.

  "A man on fire doesn't ask why. He simply screams until he can't," Cord said.

  "That's... morbid."

  "Yeah, they're a dour people. Just really miserable. Want to hear a Gentian joke?"

  "Do I have to?"

  "Trust me, it's the worst."

  "Try me."

  "The king of Gentia is riding through the woods with his hunting crew and on that day, they were out hunting elk. All of a sudden, a naked beggar comes running through the forest and sees the king and his hunters, throws his hands up in the air, waves them around and starts screaming, "Don't shoot! I'm not an elk! I'm not an elk!" And the king raises his bow and shoots the beggar dead. The prince taps the king on the shoulder and says, "Your Majesty, why did you shoot that beggar? He was screaming 'I'm not an elk!'" And the king replies, "Ohhhhh, I thought he was saying, "I'm an elk! I'm an elk!"

  "Thanks, I hate it."

  Cord chuckled. "Ready to have some fun?"

  “Fun, huh?” I asked.

  “The most,” he said, and his eye glittered.

  That's A Filthy Joke, You Dickhead

  There's an old saying. It goes something like 'man makes plans, and the gods laugh, then burn them down, piss on the ashes, then mix them with shit and paint the walls with the leftovers'. Or something like that. Cord told me once, but he was drunker than six sailors, so he may have gotten carried away.

  When we arrived at the docks, one of Rook's pale servants was waiting for us. He handed over a card, then disappeared into the crowd the way they'd been able to slip through shadow. It read one word, in that same calligraphy Lux admired so much at Rook's estate.

  BLACKGATE

  Cord swore and threw the letter into the sea.

  "You know that whole trap thing?" Cord said.

  "Yeah?"

  "Massive fuckin' trap, Nenn. Trappy McTrapface."

  "Gonna walk right into it, aren't we?"

  "Yep. But first I have to visit an old friend."

  ***

  We found ourselves in a part of town made of squat stone buildings and thatched roofs, the people preferring to stay inside, and the guards out of the street. Cord made his way through the neighborhood with confidence, navigating like a man who knew the stars better than his own hand. The few people on the streets either kept their heads down and hurried by, or slunk through the alleys, eyes averted. Here it was prey or be prey, and our appearance apparently heralded the second instinct.

  "Who's this friend?" I asked.

  "An old campaigner," Cord said. "He was an officer when I served. He
's holding a few things for me. Oh, and he's jumpy, so keep your hands away from those knives."

  We stopped in front of a building much like the others in the row, though it bore signs it received better care than the others. The stone walls bore the signs of a recent wash, the thatch on the roof was fresh, and the front door looked like the planks were of a thicker build than others on the street. Cord knocked and waited.

  No answer came, and he knocked a second time, this time calling out. "Clane! Open the fuck up, you old pigsticker!"

  A small door opened in the door, and a pair of eyes framed by bushy eyebrows peered out.

  "Cord? Gret's sack, I thought you were dead sixteen years ago."

  "I get that a lot. I need to pick up my belongings."

  Clane's eyes widened, and the door opened. He peered both ways down the street and ushered us in. The interior was neat and well maintained, the floors swept, and the ceilings web-free. He slammed and bolted the door after us, then walked to a nearby chair, a pronounced limp in his step.

  "You must really be in the shit if you've come home," he said.

  "Doing a favor for a friend."

  "No shit? Some friend. Who's this?" he jerked his chin at me.

  "Nenn," I said.

  "Of?"

  "Myself," I said.

  He grinned. "I like her. Few words. Nice tits."

  I glared at him. "Can't I cut him a little?" I asked.

  Clane laughed. "I really like her. Got any sisters? About twenty years older than you?"

  "Nope. Just me."

  "Thank the gods," Cord muttered.

  "Your shit's in the closet there," Clane said, pointing to a small room hidden behind a hanging sheet.

  Cord swept the sheet aside and after a moment, pulled a large chest out with a grunt. He undid the clasp and started pulling items out. A black leather cuirass. A pair of matched short blades. A pair of bracers, and a matching pair of greaves, and finally, five small orbs, each with a silvery finish.

  "Gods above, those were in that chest this whole time?" Clane said.

  "Yep. Safest place for them."

  "What are they?" I asked.