Thief Who Pulled on Trouble's Braids

by Michael McClung

  “The big fish eat the little fish,” Holgren murmured, echoing my thoughts in a way, “Except, I suppose, when the little fish band together to eat the big fish.”

  I grunted. If these surroundings made Holgren philosophical it shouldn’t have surprised me. He chose to live next to the charnel grounds, after all. For myself, it just reminded me of the bad old days. Bellarius. Another city, another time, even another life, it sometimes seemed to me. But not long enough ago and not far enough away, and if I happened to forget, I needed only to look at my own scarred face reflected in a mirror, or a stranger’s eyes.

  I took in the leaning, ramshackle two story building in front of us. It was all of wood, and rotting. It hadn’t seen paint in a generation. The termites probably had to hold hands to keep it standing.

  “Do termites have hands?” I asked Holgren.

  “I doubt it. I’ve never checked. Why?”

  “Come on,” I said, “let’s get this done. The sooner we’re out of here, the better.” And I walked in through the slightly skewed door of the Cock’s Spur, Holgren at my heels.

  In a place like the Cock’s Spur, they don’t even bother putting out chairs or benches that don’t face the door. Nobody wants their back to any trouble that enters. As I came through the door, a couple dozen pairs of eyes skewered me. Well, except for the one hairy brute that had lost a beady, pig-like peeper somewhere, and in the not-too distant past, judging from the puss weeping out of the socket. He really should have considered an eye patch; if not for himself, then at least for anyone forced to look at him.

  After a heartbeat, all the eyes slid right off me onto Holgren, which gave me faith in the fetish he’d given me. Or maybe it was the quality of his clothes. I heard Holgren sniff behind me.

  “What’s that smell?” he murmured.

  “I think they’re brewing ale.”

  “Oh. I thought it was cat urine. Is it supposed to smell that way?”

  “Maybe the house recipe calls for cat piss.” I’d heard of stranger ingredients, if not less disgusting. Bludgeoned roosters and the like. There was a reason I generally stuck to wine.

  “I find myself appallingly unthirsty,” said Holgren.

  “Come on, let’s brace the bartender.”

  “About the ingredients?”

  “About the owner.”

  “Good idea. Take your complaint to the top, I always say.” Holgren was nervous. He joked when he was nervous, I’d finally figured out. That Holgren was nervous made me nervous. Which made me pissy. I strode over to the bar along the left-hand wall where the tap man was pushing a filthy rag along the filthy bar top.

  “When you’re done rearranging the dirt, I want to speak to Gavon.”

  “Ee innt ear,” the spindly man said, or something like it.

  “Sorry, could you speak a human language?”

  He hawked and spat. “Gavon’s not ‘ere.”

  I lifted the heavy satchel to the bar top and lifted the flap so he could see. “Get him here, and soon, or I’ll let everybody in the place have a look at this. If I do that, they’ll try to take it away from me, and then me and my friend will have to kill them all. That won’t be good for business.”

  He stared at me for a second. “You couldn’t take um all.”

  “If they take Gavon’s gold, it won’t matter if we could or couldn’t. Not to you, anyway, because he’ll kill you for pissing around instead of minding his business.”

  He thought about that. “That’s a point. Stay ‘ere.”

  He drifted up a set of decrepit stairs into the gloom above. Three of the bigger patrons seemed to take that as a signal of opportunity. They got up and walked toward Holgren and me, bad intent written all over their faces. I slipped a knife into the palm of my hand, but Holgren stepped between me and them.

  “Gentlemen,” he said, purple light suddenly arcing from hand to hand, “the tap man will be back shortly. I’m sure he’ll see to refills then. Until such time, I suggest you remain seated.”

  Two of them saw the sense in that. One, a lean man with enormous hands, fingered something under his shirt. Some sort of talisman. I could see him deciding to place his faith in it.

  “Why, I just wanted to have a word, all private-like,” he said. “You being newcomers to this fine establishment and all, I thought—” and the knife came from his waist and towards Holgren’s throat in a blur of reflected lantern light.

  Holgren was quick, quicker than I would have given him credit for. He twisted away, and the knife blade kissed his earlobe on its way to being buried in the wall behind the bar.

  The man wasn’t waiting to see if his blade would do the job; he was already rushing in with those big hands clenched into fists. Holgren put his own hand out, palm forward, and that purple arcing light leaped from his hand to the would-be killer’s face. Where it began to gnaw at the flesh like a hungry animal. In an instant I could see the man’s teeth through a hole in his cheek. He screamed and stumbled, and clawed at his own face. He fell to the hard-packed dirt floor and screamed some more. Holgren fingered his cut earlobe. His hand came away red. He pulled a handkerchief out of his sleeve.

  “That’s enough, mage.” A voice from the stairs, mild, a little high pitched. I glanced up and saw a supremely nondescript man drumming his fingers against the railing, the tap man behind him.

  “He started it, Gavon.”

  “So finish it, Angrado.”

  “Fine.” Holgren did nothing that I could see, but the weird light playing on what was left of the man’s face winked out. The man stopped screaming after a few seconds. I glanced at him, then took a double take. The only wounds on his face were the claw marks he’d made himself.

  Holgren leaned down, elbows on knees, and said conversationally, “That trinket around your neck has never been within a mile of a mage. Until tonight.” Then he stood and walked toward the stairs. After a moment, I followed.

  Chapter Eighteen

  “Why didn’t you kill him, Angrado?” Gavon asked as he motioned us to sit at a candlelit table in the center of the upstairs gloom.

  “Why should I bother?” Holgren replied.

  Gavon chuckled. “You always were too squeamish for your own good. That one won’t thank you for sparing him. He’ll kill you if he can.”

  “But he can’t. Not on his best day. And if I’m squeamish, what does that make you?”

  “A man unconcerned with niceties.”

  “You mean morals. Or is it scruples?”

  Gavon smiled, mirthlessly. “No one can hold a grudge like a Low Countryman, it seems.”

  “You would know, wouldn’t you? But I’m only half Low Country, as you seemed to take every opportunity to point out.”

  “I believe I also said you were half a man.”

  Holgren grinned, and I knew things were about to turn ugly. “Mariette seemed to think I was man enough,” he said. “How is you sister?”

  And that’s when the knives came out. Gavon suddenly held two huge pig stickers, and Holgren a spitting, hissing blade of white light. They were both standing, chairs knocked back.

  “I’ll see your half-breed guts on the floor for that,” said Gavon. Holgren just smiled.

  I cleared my throat. “So I guess you two know each other?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Gavon. “Holgren Angrado and I have a history.”

  I turned to look at Holgren. “You might have mentioned that,” I said.

  “You never asked.”

  “I have an idea,” I said. “Let’s put away the blades and do some business. Gavon, you can still kill somebody, and make a profit to boot.” I heaved the satchel up onto the table in front of him. His eyes flickered to all that gold. His knives disappeared and suddenly he was smiling. He deliberately turned away from Holgren to face me directly.

  “Knowing that one won’t get you a discount, you know. In fact I should charge extra.”

  “Believe me, I am regrettin
g his acquaintance at the moment.” Holgren took the hint and extinguished his blade.

  “So talk to me.”

  I heaved an inner sigh of relief. Outwardly, I put on my dubious face. “To be honest, I don’t think you’ll touch this contract.”

  “I have never yet come across one that couldn’t be fulfilled.”

  “I’d want you to execute it personally.”

  “Now that is a problem. I don’t really do that anymore. Only on special occasions, you might say.”

  “Well then, I’m sorry to have wasted your time.” I flipped the satchel closed and began to heave it back on my shoulder.

  “Let’s hear it, at least,” said Gavon, taking his seat again.

  I took off Holgren’s fetish. “You inked a contract on one Amra Thetys. I want to take out a contract on anyone who turns up to get paid for it.”

  He laughed outright. “Oh, you’ve got balls, I’ll give you that. It’s almost clever. I suppose you’d want it to be public knowledge, as well.”

  “Naturally. The dead don’t care about revenge.”

  “What made you think I would agree to something like this?”

  I put on a puzzled expression. “Money, of course. One chain just for saying yes, and ten more on the off chance you have to kill someone.”

  “I could kill you right now, earn the original contract, and take what you brought.”

  “That’s what he’s here for.” I jabbed a thumb in Holgren’s direction. “Besides, you wouldn’t. Bad for your reputation, killing prospective clients.”

  Gavon sat back, drumming his fingers on the arm of his chair. “If I agree, I’ll open myself up to all kinds of headaches. People trying to outbid contracts. It will be a mess.”

  “Yes. I can see it escalating, people trying to outbid each other. And every one of them paying a ten per cent, non-refundable commission to you. All that gold piling up will be very messy indeed.”

  Slowly, he smiled. “I do like the way you think. But unfortunately, I can’t personally take this commission. I have to maintain my impartiality.” He leaned forward. “I’ll ink the contract, and I’ll spread the word, and you will just have to take your chances that it’s enough. And if the original client wishes to up their offer, well...” He shrugged.

  “I suppose that will have to do.” It wasn’t everything I had hoped for, but I thought it would be enough. For a while, at least. I stood, and he followed suit.

  “I’ll be wanting my ten chains back soon, Gavon. Once I kill your other client.”

  “We’ll see.”

  “I know who it is, but confirmation would be nice. You wouldn’t want to help me with that, would you?”

  “I’m afraid I have to keep that confidential, being part of the service and all. It’s been a pleasure, Amra Thetys. May I suggest you leave through the back? I imagine there are a half-dozen cutthroats waiting for you in front by now. News travels fast in the Rookery when the news is gold-colored. Holgren, of course, is welcome to leave the way he came.”

  #

  News indeed travelled fast, but Holgren blew through the motley collection of murderers waiting for us outside like an autumn storm off the Dragonsea. Quite literally. It’s hard to stick a knife in someone when you’re rolling down the street, being pushed along by gale-force winds. Holgren was proving to be a lot more powerful—and versatile—than I’d ever imagined. And I have an active imagination.

  We made it back to civilization in time for last call at Tambor’s. Holgren bought a jug, owing to the fact that I was now virtually destitute, and we sat outside at one of the scarred tables and sipped vinegar. After a silent while Holgren finally spoke up.

  “You know what you’ve done, don’t you?”

  “Um, saved my own neck?”

  “Yes, that. Probably. But you’ve also changed the face of low justice in Lucernis forever.” He shook his head. “Gavon has been running the murder-for-hire racket in Lucernis for nearly a decade. Given twice as long, he never would have thought of your ploy. You’ve made that bastard richer than he ever dreamed, in one night.”

  “So you did know we were going to see him! Why didn’t you tell me you knew him?”

  He smiled. “As I said, you never asked. To be honest, I was hoping things would get out of hand so I could kill him.”

  “What is it between you two?”

  “We grew up together, in Fel-Radoth. He is my cousin, once removed. We were never what you would call friendly.”

  “He’s got to be twenty years older than you.”

  “One of the advantages of being a mage, Amra, is that you don’t have to look your age.”

  “Did you really sleep with his sister?”

  He shuddered. “Mariette? I’d sooner sleep with a pheckla. Certainly less dangerous, and probably more pleasurable. Guache was considered the nice one of the brood.” He shifted his gaze from the bowl of wine in front of him to the street running beside Tambor’s arbor, where we sat.

  I don’t remember what I was going to say next, because suddenly Holgren was lunging over the table at me, knocking me down to the ground. I do remember getting a hand around a knife hilt, and then the world erupting in flame.

  “Stay low!” Holgren hissed, then rolled off me and sat up. He made an intricate gesture with one hand, face grim as death, and suddenly the flames vanished, leaving charred, smoking ruins around us that, seconds before, had been Tambor’s arbor. And some of Tambor’s other customers.

  In the street, people were screaming and running. A dray horse bolted in its traces, and in its fear reduced the cart and its driver to pulp. The immediate surroundings were complete chaos, but the chaos was fleeing the vicinity as fast as it could, leaving a stillness in its wake.

  I heard clapping. I looked out into the street and saw Bosch walking toward us, half a dozen swordsmen at his back. He was clapping in time with his own dragging footsteps.

  “Excellent negation,” he said, “especially extemporé. I applaud you, sir.”

  Holgren stood up and brushed himself off. “I am going to kill you for that,” he said mildly, and sauntered out into the street towards Bosch.

  “Please, let’s avoid unnecessary confrontation. For my part, I apologize,” said Bosch. “I had no idea a fellow magus would be in the thief’s company. I will happily make amends. As soon as I secure her corpse.” He pointed his stubbled chin towards me. “What do you say?”

  “I say you talk too much.”

  “So be it,” said Bosch, and another inferno burst forth from his open hands, engulfing Holgren in a maelstrom of flame. I could barely make out his form, a dark, wavering blur at the heart of a torrent of fire. I saw his smudged silhouette crumple. I saw Bosch grin, beads of sweat rolling down his face, dripping from his nose and unshaven chin. The men with him stood watching, most with mouths agape. A mage’s duel isn’t something you see every day.

  Finally the river of fire sputtered, slowed to a trickle, failed. It was eerily silent.

  Holgren was down on one knee. His clothes smoked, but his lean face was cold.

  “My turn,” he said, and flicked the fingers of one hand.

  Bosch’s body literally exploded, splattering his swordsmen and twenty yards of the cobbled street with blood and bloody gobbets of flesh. All that was left of him was his head, which fell to the ground and, I swear to Kerf, blinked for a few seconds. My stomach did a backflip at that.

  “You’d best be on your way,” said Holgren to the sell-swords, and they saw the sense in that. Holgren picked up Bosch’s head by its lank, greasy hair. Stared into the shocked, blinking eyes.

  Bosch mouthed a word and his eyes went cold and dead. Nobody home.

  “Bloody hells,” Holgren spat. He looked at me, and there was something feral in his eyes. “He’s jumped.”

  “What? What does that mean?”

  “It means we haven’t seen the last of him. He'll be back, in some form or fashion. That's a tr
ick you can only get by treating with infernal powers. Bosch” Holgren said with plain distaste, “is a daemonist. Let’s go.”

  I nodded. The watch couldn’t be far away. We needed to leave. “Go where?”

  “Back to Gavon’s. Where else?”

  “But if Bosch isn’t really dead–”

  “He is. It’s just that he’s bought himself a short encore. Do you want the contract on you cancelled or not?”

  “By all means, let’s go see your cousin.”

  We set off down the nearest alley. We stopped only once, while I stole somebody’s freshly laundered shirt from a second story drying pole. Holgren took it from me without a word and wrapped Bosch’s noggin in it, using the tag-ends of the sleeves as a handle.

  You can’t just go walking around with a severed head in Lucernis. But you can, I discovered, walk around with a lumpy head-shaped item, wrapped in linen and dripping blood. I think it’s just that nobody really wants to know you’re walking around with a severed head, and are appreciative of the courtesy of leaving room for doubt.

  In any case, nobody gave us more than a second glance, and the second-glancers made sure to move along quickly, giving us a wide berth.

  Whatever Holgren was feeling, he kept it bottled up. I stole the occasional glance at him as we walked, and the best I can say was his face had gone from cold to stony. As for me, I was coming to terms with what I’d seen him do.

  I have seen and caused death. It’s never pretty. There is no ‘right’ way to kill – if you need to kill somebody, you do it any way that works. It wasn’t the fact that Holgren had been so cold about turning Bosch into a red smear, and it wasn’t that Bosch had met such a spectacularly disgusting demise. What bothered me was just how easily Holgren had done it. He’d decided Bosch was going to die, and just like that, Bosch was dead. Messily, spectacularly, violently dead.

  That kind of raw power was terrifying.

  It seemed impossible that I’d been joking with someone who could, just by wiggling his fingers, turn me into a fine red mist.

  So. There was a certain reserve that sprang up between us on that walk.