The Executioner's Apprentice (The Executioner's Song Book 2)

by D. K. Holmberg

  “That is another lesson you will one day need to learn, Mr. Jagger. Eventually, you’ll want to know who you can trust as you acquire supplies. Some will know more than others, and some will be skilled at their acquisition, while others…”

  “What about others?”

  “Others might think they have acquired one thing when they have gathered another. If you’re not careful, they’ll mislabel it, and if you follow their labeling, you may mix something unintentionally.”

  “What about your shop?”

  She frowned at him. “Nothing in my shop is mislabeled.”

  Finn grinned at her. “Should I test it?”

  “Of course. You should believe I know my way around my apothecary, but you should also question it. I believe Henry does the same. He recognizes he must test everything he acquires, mostly to ensure it is exactly what he intended to acquire in the first place.”

  Wella set the jar of oil down and grabbed a ceramic bowl with a top on it. She pulled the sky-blue painted top off the jar and dipped a finger in a white paste before pulling it out and bringing it to her nose. “This is a particularly nasty liniment. If you find that you need to use this, the person that you have worked with would have been infected with a significant illness.” She turned to him. “Can you tell me what it is?”

  Finn shook his head. “How can I tell what it is just by looking at it?”

  “Looking? I didn’t ask you to simply look at it.”

  He took the jar from her when she offered it, and he dipped his finger into it the way that she did. Bringing the finger to his nose, Finn took a deep breath and immediately wished that he hadn’t. It was bitter, almost stinging his nostrils, though there was an undercurrent of something almost minty to it. A hint of a floral edge mixed alongside it, though maybe that was his imagination and something that he wished were present. He couldn’t tell based on what he smelled.

  Finn looked over to Wella. “Is it safe to taste?”

  “Do you think that will help you better understand what is in it?”

  “It might. It depends upon what is inside the concoction.”

  Wella smiled tightly. “Nothing in this liniment is fatal. I doubt you will find anything in any of the liniments you will work with that are fatal.”

  He touched his tongue to it, and it went numb.

  His whole mouth went numb.

  His eyes widened, and Wella started cackling.

  “It’s not fatal, but I warned you that some things are not quite what they seem. And I also warned you this one was a particularly nasty liniment.”

  “What is it?”

  Finn could barely get the words out, and when they did come, his tongue felt thick, as if he’d been drinking heavily the night before.

  Wella handed him a towel off the counter, and he wiped his finger before handing the jar back to her. “This is a mixture of several different compounds I suspect you are familiar with. Henry would have worked with you on them.” She put the top back on the jar and set it on the counter, shifting it around with the others. “It has a base of meren oil, that’s what gives it the white consistency, and mixed in with meren oil are holar wort, neverthorn, and cinzel berries.” She turned, smiling at him. “So simple, and so few ingredients, but quite effective. As I suspect you’ve discovered, it does lead to a little bit of numbness.”

  “A little bit?” Finn tried to get out.

  “A little. There are other compounds that can lead to longer-lasting numbness. This one gives you an opportunity to numb the skin before you attempt to incise and drain an infection.” She cackled and looked up at him. “The fools from the university don’t think it’s much of use, and they would prefer just to have their patients bite down on a leather strap. Torment, if you ask me. I would much rather take the time to apply the appropriate medicines before tormenting my clients.”

  His tongue started to get feeling back into it. It surprised Finn just how quickly the liniment had worked.

  “The challenge, as in all things, is in knowing what might work and not overdoing it. You can mix the most complicated compound, but if you don’t target the right aspect of the illness, even a complicated compound is going to be of no use.” She tapped her cane on the ground. “That is something Gisles never seems to mention in the entirety of the work, but which, in my opinion, needs to be clarified.”

  Finn swallowed. Finally, his throat was starting to feel a bit more normal. There was a reason he had come there today, and he wondered if he might be able to convince Wella to answer his questions, or if perhaps she was unwilling.

  “Do you remember when I first came with Master Meyer to your shop?”

  She glanced over, nodding. “Of course.”

  “What was that concoction?”

  Wella regarded him, arching a brow. “What do you remember of that concoction?”

  “I don’t remember all that much. I was a bit distracted at the time.”

  “You were still trying to learn your way. Henry can be a bit intense.”

  “A bit.”

  “What can you tell me about what you came for that time?”

  Finn remembered the compound well, though he didn’t have all the ingredients memorized. He’d struggled to know what Meyer had wanted from him and had tried to do everything the executioner had asked of him.

  “There were a few things that he wanted. Thistledown. Jasper berry.” Finn closed his eyes. He usually had a good memory, and when it came to the various items that he’d used with Meyer, he had done a good job of keeping that with him, but this had to do with Finn’s mother. “I think he had wanted crispon leaves and thender bark.”

  “You’re missing something, but you’ve got the gist of it. What does that concoction tell you?”

  Finn had studied most of the elements that had gone into the concoction in the time that he’d been working with Meyer. There shouldn’t be anything in it that would be terribly difficult for him to determine. “The crispon leaves are for alertness.”

  “Only in the right quantity. You can overdo it, much like I’ve told you about many things.”

  Finn nodded. Knowing what he did of Master Meyer and his skill, he had a hard time thinking he would have overdone it. Master Meyer had more skill than almost anybody else Finn had met in the time that he been working with him, and there was a level of detail to his work that mattered.

  “The thender bark is little bit more complicated. I’m not sure what purpose that would have.” Finn frowned as he thought through it. “Thistledown is just a binding, used to bring the other ingredients together. The jasper berry would probably just add a little bit of flavor, more than anything else.”

  Wella nodded. “Very good. You’re starting to piece it together.

  “But you say I’m missing something.”

  “A bit of fennel, though as you can imagine, it’s unlikely that was the key ingredient.”

  “The thender bark.”

  She nodded. “Very well.”

  “What does it do?”

  She cackled. “I think that you need to uncover that on your own. I can’t tell you everything. Sometimes, studying makes a difference.”

  “Even for this?”

  “Especially for this,” she said, laughing again.

  Finn realized she must know exactly why he was asking.

  The door to the shop opened, and an older woman came in. She glanced from Finn to Wella, nodding politely as she wandered around the back of the shop.

  “I have another customer, Mr. Jagger. If you would like to discuss Gisles’s volume later, I am more than happy to offer my corrections.”

  “I would like that.”

  Finn swept his gaze around the inside of the shop again before sighing and heading out.

  He needed answers, but it seemed as if answers for his mother would come back to studying, trying to understand just what the thender bark component had done for his mother. He might be able to ask Master Meyer, but Finn wondered if he would even shar
e that with him.

  As he made his way down the street, the Teller Gate came into view. Wella’s shop was near the edge of the city, close enough to the gate leading outside, and close to the Raven Stone, which was probably how she acquired so many of her human remains.

  He had spent enough time on his own needs, and now it was time for him to get back to his pursuit of whether or not Sweth was guilty of the fire. Not only did he need to study, but Finn needed to dig more into that piece. If he failed, he could imagine Master Meyer’s disappointment.

  He turned and saw a familiar figure hurrying along one of the side streets.

  Finn hesitated a moment before deciding to dart after it.

  There was no mistaking Oscar. The man known as the Hand was tall and lean, and moved with a strange sort of lumbering grace that had always made him easy to spot but difficult to catch.

  Finn hadn’t seen Oscar much since executing the King. It was not for lack of looking, though. Oscar was Finn’s oldest friend, so far as friends went. He didn’t have many people he was close to, and Oscar had been the one who had helped him the most after losing his father, bringing him into the crew and giving Finn a little bit of meaning and purpose to his life. Without Oscar, Finn wasn’t sure what he would’ve become.

  He hurried forward, trying to catch up to him but also alert and curious.

  Oscar had a way of looking around him at all times, a careful and measured manner of surveying the street all around him, as if he were always aware of the Archers who might be patrolling him at any given time.

  He turned a corner, trailing after Oscar, and saw him duck into a shop in the distance. Finn slowed, keeping the shop in view as he headed toward it, nodding politely to people on either side of him.

  All he had to do was wait.

  “You’ve gotten stale,” Oscar said.

  Finn spun, taking a step back. “Dammit, Oscar.”

  “You were obvious the moment you stepped out of the apothecary back there,” Oscar said, tipping his head toward Wella’s shop. “I probably saw you before you even saw me.”

  “Maybe,” Finn said. It wouldn’t surprise him to learn that Oscar had, but at the same time, he thought that he had caught sight of him as soon as he had emerged onto the street. “How are you?”

  Oscar flashed a wide smile. “I haven’t seen you in the better part of a few months, and that’s your first question?”

  “Is there a better one?”

  Oscar chuckled. “I suppose not. What are you doing right now?”

  “Running a few errands.”

  “That’s what he has you doing these days? Errand boy?”

  “It’s a little more complicated than that,” Finn said.

  “Just a little?”

  Finn glanced back to Wella’s shop. “It’s quite a bit more complicated than that. Is that what you wanted to know?”

  Oscar grinned at him. “You know they’ve asked about you at the Wenderwolf.”

  “Have they?” Finn said carefully.

  “Not who you might be afraid of. I haven’t seen the Wolf or Rock around in quite some time. Of course, the Mistress would make sure of that.”

  “They were both banished, Oscar,” Finn said, and Oscar shrugged. “Annie?”

  Oscar shook his head. “Not her. Another. Runs things in the city. Does a damn good job of it, too, keeping most of the crews from fighting for jobs.” He shrugged. “Annie wonders how you’re doing, though.”

  Finn smiled tightly. “I’m sure she just wants to know how to get revenge for what happened to the King.”

  Oscar’s face darkened for a moment. “Leon got what was coming to him. Don’t you forget about that, Finn.” He looked along the street for a moment before turning back to Finn. “You might’ve gotten off the streets, but there is no way you can deny justice was served in that case. The bastard tried to double-cross us.”

  “I know,” Finn said. He debated how much to mention what he knew of the hegen, but realized Oscar wouldn’t say anything about his role in that. He’d paid his debt.

  What Finn wanted to know was why Oscar had owed the hegen. That would be a worthy story—and likely another the Hand wouldn’t reveal.

  Oscar smiled tightly. “I suppose you do. You were the one he targeted, after all.”

  “It wasn’t just me. He intended Rock to get pinched.”

  It was strange for Finn to have this conversation after all the time that had gone by. Stranger that he had moved past everything that had happened and no longer worried the way that he once had. Finn no longer cared. The only thing that he cared about was having lost his friends. He missed Oscar and Rock.

  “Yeah,” Oscar said, flicking his gaze in either direction. He tensed just a little bit, enough that it told Finn he had seen something. “Leon had gotten himself involved in something more dangerous than I think he intended.”

  It was the most Oscar had admitted to what he knew. “I’m sure.” Finn resisted the urge to reach into his pocket for the hegen card. “Would you like to catch up?” Finn asked.

  It wasn’t the way that he should be using his time, but at the same time, Finn did want to sit with Oscar, ask him a few questions, and he needed to know a little bit more about what happened with Wolf after he had gotten away. More than that, Finn needed to know more about Bellut. He might not be able to investigate who he worked with, but that didn’t mean Oscar couldn’t.

  Oscar watched him, and Finn had an unsettling feeling that he knew exactly what Finn intended. “Where would you have us go?”

  “Not the Wenderwolf.” When Oscar arched a brow, Finn shrugged. “I don’t feel like I’m going to be welcomed there.”

  “You might be surprised. But if you’re not comfortable going there, then we can go someplace else. I know just the place.”

  Chapter Nine

  The Brinder section of the city was one of the oldest, run-down with narrow streets covered in filth, children running along the alleys, chasing each other and shouting. The few people who were wandering along the street all had heads tipped forward, shoulders slumped, and were dressed in tattered and dirty clothing.

  “Your father and I used to frequent a place over here,” Oscar said. “He was the one who wanted us to stay local, but I always wanted to push. It was my fault we kept taking bigger jobs, you see.”

  It was strange for Oscar to elaborate on all the jobs that he and Finn’s father had taken.

  “I’m sure he didn’t mind. He loved working with you.”

  Oscar paused with his hand on the door to a narrow building. A faded sign hung overhead, though Finn couldn’t make out the details on it. There were quite a few places like this in Brinder. Most of them had once been thriving businesses, or had some history to them, but time had turned them into these run-down establishments.

  “He would never have worked with me if he didn’t have to,” Oscar said.

  He stepped inside and Finn followed. The tavern was dark, with a single lantern hanging from a pole in the center of the tavern. The hard-planked flooring was clean, unlike so many of the poorer establishments. A dozen or so tables were scattered around the inside of the tavern, and there weren’t many people at this time of the day. Smells of roasting meat and fresh bread drifted from a kitchen somewhere nearby.

  “This isn’t what I expected.”

  Oscar sniffed. “You getting so classy you forget what your section was like?”

  Finn frowned. Was that what this was about? Did Oscar want to remind Finn about who he’d been and where he came from? Finn didn’t need those reminders. He was all too aware of where he’d come from. “It’s not a matter of getting too classy. It’s just I didn’t know there were places like this in Brinder.”

  “There are places like this all over the city. You just have to know how to find them.” Oscar took a seat at a table along one wall, positioned so he could look toward the door. Finn just smiled at the precaution. It wasn’t surprising, coming from Oscar. “I haven’t been here in
a long time, but it don’t look much different than it did then. They always made a point of keeping it clean. Food is pretty good too.” Oscar nodded to an older man with a dirty apron on who came to the table. “Food and ale, if you don’t mind.”

  The man glanced from Oscar to Finn. “You need to pay up front.”

  “How long that been the case, Jimmel?”

  Jimmel frowned and leaned close to Oscar. “That you, Hand? Damn, but it’s been a minute since I’ve seen you around. You working this section again?”

  “Not this section, so you don’t have to worry.”

  “Nah. Not worried about the Thirsty Flute. You and the Goat never caused much trouble for me. Brought in a bit of business, too.” Jimmel leaned back, clasping his hands across his belly. “Haven’t seen the Goat in a while, neither. He doing all right?”

  Oscar glanced to Finn. “He got himself pinched.”

  “Aw, that’s not what I wanted to hear.”

  “I’ll give him your regards when I see him next.”

  “You do that.” He wrapped a knuckle on the table. “I’ll get you boys some drinks. Looks like you’ve got a new employer, Hand, so don’t want to offend him.”

  He hurried off, and Finn watched him leave. “New employer?”

  Oscar chuckled. “Dressed the way you are, I can see how he’d think that.”

  “I don’t think I could pass as an employer.”

  “You’d be surprised. Men change quickly.”

  Finn leaned back in the chair and looked around the inside of the tavern. “He knew my father.”

  Oscar sighed. “A lot of men in this section knew your father. He was a good man.”

  “Is,” Finn said.

  Oscar’s brow darkened, but he nodded. “Sure, Finn. Is.”

  “I didn’t know he was called the Goat.”

  Oscar smiled. It was a real smile, not one that looked forced. He shook his head slightly as he leaned back against the wall, resting his hands on the table, tapping his fingers in a steady rhythm while he did. “He had a bit of a reputation.”

  “As what?”