“You misunderstand.” Stone leant forward, palms flat on the table. He remembered how he used to feel so nervous every time he came here. But not anymore. “I’m not here to pay off a debt. I’m here to collect one. From you, as it happens. You owe me eighteen crowns, one half-crown and four pennies. You took it from me in Old Lanridge Street six years ago. I want it back.”
“Six years?” Dak frowned, then shook his head. “I don't recall such a transaction between us. You must be mistaken.”
“I'm not.” Stone pushed himself away from the table, a movement that caused Mutter to flinch. “Let me refresh your memory. You jumped me in the square. You and your bully boys. Took my money. All that I had on me. I couldn’t take it back from you then. So I’ve come to take it back now.”
“You’re having a laugh?” Dak chuckled and turned to Mutter. “He’s having a laugh.” The sandy-haired bludger laughed on cue. The bald bruiser belatedly joining in. Just like good little henchmen.
Stone waited for the laughter to die out. “I’m deadly serious,” he said, fixing Dak-Trur with a hard stare. “And I’m a little pushed for time.” He pointed towards the old wooden box sitting on the table. “That still where you keep the money?”
Dak-Trur’s brow furrowed and he closed the box. “I ain’t paying you no eighteen crowns, scrapper. In fact, I ain’t paying you at all. So, if you ain’t selling, you’d better hop it. Go on. Back to the shit with you. Where you belong.”
Stone stood his ground, eyes still firmly fixed on the bully.
“Oh, I see. Grown some bigger balls have we?” Dak stood up, chair sliding back. He slowly rounded the table, Mutter following him. “That why you're here, is it?” Dak shrugged off his jacket, shirt open to his naval, tufts of black hair showing. “Think you can take it? Well, come on then… I’ll take great pleasure in cracking your big egg of a head.”
Stone sighed. Five years of training... The long runs, the early morning combat sessions, getting knocked down, told to get back up again. The endless lance work, parade square drills, trench-digging and kit-cleaning; route marching, learning the various Fura and Ampa classes, cooking, signalling, reading, writing and arithmetic; all the while barely getting any sleep and not knowing where in the Empire he was living, or when he’d be ready.
“Eighteen crowns, one half-crown and four pennies,” said Stone. “Last time I’m going to ask.”
Dak winked at his cohorts and waved them forward. Three against one.
“Just try and take it,” he sneered.
Stone smiled. “I thought you'd never ask.”
***
Stone walked out of the Firebird Rising and out onto the Blood Road, coins jingling in his pocket. Two tasks down on his list, two more to go.
Settle the debt.
Free his mother.
Repay Mistress Yali for her kindness.
Kill the warden.
Buy the biggest sugar-dusted, lemon cream-filled chocolate roll he could afford.
Punch Dak-Trur in the face (repeatedly) and get his money back, all eighteen crowns, one half-crown and four pennies of it.
Outside the tavern, Caster Roon-Kotke Khundhan waited for him, leaning up against a lamp post, biting into a chocolate roll. They’d met each other at the Testing. Mila had told him to make a friend and, with his mop of flame-red hair, Roon-Kotke could easily have been his brother. He wasn’t the strongest of the candidates. Nor the quickest. In fact, had he not stopped to help him, Roon-Kotke might not have finished the Testing at all. But there was something about him. An honesty and a sense of honour that reminded Stone of the boy he used to be.
“You were right,” he said with a mouthful of cake. “These are delicious… How did your reunion go? Was your old friend pleased to see you?”
Stone rubbed his jaw. “He was certainly surprised to see me. Knocked him sideways. Couldn't believe how much I'd changed. But I don’t think we’ll be seeing each other again. We’re different people now.”
“That’s a shame,” Roon-Kotke said, swallowing the last of his roll. “So does that mean we’re done? Because I’d like to get a game in on the tables before we ship out. I'm feeling lucky.”
“Almost. Just a couple more things I need to do. Meet you later?”
“Sure.” Roon-Kotke turned to go.
“Hey,” Stone called after him. “Watch yourself. Don't gamble away all your wages. You still owe me four crowns, remember?”
Roon-Kotke responded with a grin. “You know I'm good for it. Besides, it’s just a bit of fun. I know when to stop. Besides, what do you need the money for?”
“I owe someone a debt and paying it back is long overdue.”
***
Stone joined Mistress Yali at the river. He found her leaning on the wall, watching a pair of scrappers trudge along the muddy foreshore.
“They’re too close to the water,” he pointed out.
“Aye. They’re new to the mud. Think they know everything. But they’ll learn the hard way, just like you did.” Yali stared at him. “What happened to your hair?”
“Shaved it all off. Easier to manage in the legion. Besides, I’m not Stone any more. I’m Caster Hannar-Ghan Hrardhan.”
“Ah.” Yali smiled at him. “So you made it then? Raised yourself up and out of the mud, just like you said you would.”
Stone nodded. “You too by the looks of it?” The last time he’d seen her, she’d been working the river, wicker basket on her back, same old brown dress and leather apron. Now she wore a pale blue dress with a black waistband, her grey hair pinned up with a brass flower hair comb. She looked like a lady.
“Aye. My scrapping days are done. A fencer made an honest woman of me. I now buy penny-treasures rather than sell them, helping out these poor wretches where I can. Just like the Rook did.”
“What happened to him?”
“Nobody knows. Just disappeared. Maybe Dak killed him. At least that’s the story as he tells it. But I like to think that the Rook walked away. Deep down, there was a good man ‘neath that painted skull. One who never gave himself fully to the dark path Dak-Trur now walks. I reckon he could be anywhere now. Or anyone. Nobody ever saw him without his mask on.”
“Do you really believe that?”
“I do. For ‘tis a happier fate than the stories suggest. The Rook was a scrapper once and he helped us all out when he could. So I follow in his footsteps. I do my bit, small as it may be. But I hope it makes a difference.”
Stone looked out over the Eene, where river barges ploughed through the dark water. He hoped the Rook wasn’t somewhere at the bottom of it.
“Gods, you’ve grown,” said Yali, changing the subject. “Filled out and then some. How many years has it been? Five?”
“Six.”
Stone watched a young scrapper crouched on the foreshore, rooting around in the filth. He remembered the cold embrace of the mud; the effort it took to walk from Eddo’s Wharf to the Eng-Zo warehouses. He had only scrapped for seventh months, but there were times when it had felt like years.
“That long?” Yali whistled. “So what brings you back?”
“My legion gates out tomorrow. We are to walk the eastern border and keep you all safe from the Wilders. I came to save you before I left. Just like I promised.”
“Aw.” Yali laid a hand on his arm and patted it. “Sweet of you, boy. But I don’t need saving.”
“So I see.”
The old scrapper stared out across the river. “But they do. I do what I can for ‘em, but there are more every year and they’re getting younger too…” Yali sighed, still staring out over the water. “I was sorry to hear about your mother. Terrible business. How did she die, if I might ask?”
“Murdered,” Stone said flatly. “By the Warden at Ash House. A nasty bugger by the name of Orin Fowley. I went to see him before I came here. He was on my list too.”
Stone set a blackiron-cornered wooden box on the wall, a small key still in its lock.
Yali turned
to him, a concerned look on her face. “What did you do, Stone?”
***
“They’re coming,” spat Fowley, pulling at the irons that shackled his feet to the metal ring set into the floor of his office. “Any moment now. The Justices will arrest you and throw you in jail. I’ll see to it personally! And if you think this place is bad, just you bloody wait! I’ll petition for you to be sent to the dungeons in Thorn Cross or one of those Pillars the Crick are building.”
Stone shook his head, watching flames flickering at the bottom of the room’s cherry wood-panelled walls. “Nobody’s coming, Mister Fowley. Nobody can hear us. It’s just you and me. But our situations are now reversed. You’re now standing where the people in your care once stood. Wearing the fetters your warders placed upon them; restraints you then charged a fee to remove.”
“Why are you doing this?!”
“You need to ask? You killed my mother! You will pay for what you did.”
“You want money? I have money. Take it. Take it all! It’s in the drawer in my desk. Go look!”
Stone crossed over to the Warden’s desk. “You don’t deny murdering my mother then?”
“Of course I deny it. We have a duty of care to the residents of Ash House while they stay with us, one that we take very seriously…”
“More lies. Don’t you ever stop?” Stone pulled open the drawer in the desk. There was a wooden box inside, blackiron-cornered, a small key still in its lock. He lifted the box out and opened it.
“There are six hundred crowns in there,” said Fowley. “Surely that’s enough?”
Stone closed the lid of the box. “Ah, but your debt has gone up. Didn’t you know? You don’t just owe me for the death of my mother. You owe me for your brutality to those you kept in this gods-awful place. You owe me for a toy soldier I had to sell. You owe me for all those days I spent picking through the mud trying to pay off your ridiculous fees and fines. You owe me the life I lost…”
“I… I can get you more money...” Fowley pulled at his chains. “If you let me go, I can—”
“It's not about money! Don’t you understand? I want you to see your life slipping away. I want you to know the hopelessness that my mother felt. The despair she endured in your so-called care…”
“Mister Hannar. Please. Think about what you’re doing…”
“I’m done thinking. I’ve done nothing else but think for the past six years. You… You made me into what I am today. You sent me down this path. I’m going to see this world changed for the better, the Empire broken, the Mulai defeated… And I’m of a mind to start with you.” Stone stopped, stood tall, shoulders back. Took a deep breath. “But I’m not a monster. Not like you. Admit that you killed my mother and I’ll give you the key to those irons you’re wearing. It’s in my bag over there…” He gestured to a small canvas sack he’d left near the door. “It’s your only chance to get out of this office before it becomes an oven.”
The flames behind the Warden’s desk licked ever higher.
“Time’s running out, Warden. It’s getting hot in here. If you’re unwilling to talk, maybe I should just leave you to it?”
Stone turned towards the door.
“Alright. Alright. I killed her. I didn’t mean to. I wanted her, but she fought me. She was stubborn. She said ‘no’. Nobody says ‘no’ to me. Nobody! This is my prison. I paid good money to run it. Everything and everyone in it belongs to me!”
“What happened? Tell me.”
“Scratched my face, she did. Bit me! Screamed at me. So I hit her and…” Fowley stared down at the floor. “Put my hand over her mouth to keep her quiet. Squeezed a bit too hard. I didn’t mean to. It was an accident.”
“An accident? You forced yourself on my mother and you say her death was an accident?”
“That’s right. That’s what happened. Now give me the key!”
“Where did you bury her?”
“I don’t know. In some pauper’s grave with the rest of the city’s dead.”
Stone fought back a tear. Gritted his teeth. He’d never find her. Never be able to say goodbye.
“Are you sorry?” he said.
“Yes, yes! Of course, I’m sorry. I wish it had never happened.” Fowley dropped to his knees, sobbing. “Please, give me the key. You promised.”
Stone sighed. “I did.” He stared at the flames. They were raging now, devouring the wooden panels on the walls, spreading across the floorboards, almost at the Warden’s desk. “And I am a man of my word, Warden. I have it right here...”
He retrieved the bag, a small canvas sack, the sort they sold flour in down the markets. He squatted down next to Fowley and looked the man in the eyes, seeing the fear in them. Then he tipped the contents of the bag onto the wooden floor. Not one key, but hundreds, all shapes and sizes, scattering across the boards.
“There’s your key, you bastard. Good luck finding the right one!”
***
Mistress Yali stared out over the Eene. Black smoke rose above the city and distant bells clanged as fire wagons raced to Ash House.
“Aren't you worried he'll find the key?”
“No,” said Stone flatly, patting his pocket. “I've got the real one right here...”
Another task checked off his list. Only one more promise to keep. He unlatched the Warden’s money box and opened the lid.
“What's in there?”
“A little kindness,” he said. He whistled to a boy in the mud, picked out a coin and tossed it towards him. It hummed as it span through the air. “Did you deliver my message?”
“Aye, I told everyone I saw to pass it on. See, here they come.”
Slowly, the scrappers of Ocos gathered, a crowd of ragged, dirt-caked boys and girls, struggling through the mud. He waited for them to cluster below him, dirty faces staring up, those bold enough asking why he'd called them over; why he was wasting their time while the tide was low. Some scrappers he recognised, others he did not. But they were all hard faces. Hard as stone. You had to be to work in the filth, hour after hour, day after day. He remembered all too well what it was like. For a brief moment he was one of them again, shared their dreams of raising themselves up. He smiled. If he could do it, so could they. Yali held his arm as he tipped the Warden's money into the mud.
41. GOOD TO HAVE A WEAPON
ROON-KOTKE PACED BACK and forth in front of gate twenty-three, staring at the triple-locked seal, wondering how long Hannar-Ghan had lasted on the other side of it. Considering that the Sergeant had dropped his lance in defiance of Mila, probably not long. It was lost on the other side of the world. Just like his friend.
Former friend.
How had he not seen Hannar-Ghan’s duplicity? How had he been so stupid? He felt his face tingle, cheeks blush, a tear forming in the corner of his eye. He brushed it away, hoping nobody was looking. Dammit. Maybe he’d acted too rashly. Maybe he should have saved Han’s life. After all, the big caster had saved his skin countless times. They could have sorted out the whole gods-awful mess back here. But Han was gone and life had just got a whole lot more precarious without him. “Farewell you old bastard,” he whispered, touching his palm to the metal seal on the gate. “I’ll miss you.”
He turned his back on the gate and walked back towards the barracks. Ahead of him, technicians fussed around the sixth gate. The last one. Five dials on it. Far more difficult to crack. Rahi-Khun would probably get it. Roon-Kotke doubted the Captain would trust him with another outing after gate twenty-three. But maybe he’d done enough. He’d fulfilled his commission. Time to move on. Time to start thinking about life beyond Refu Ruka — returning to Ocos, repairing his reputation, marrying Eani-Oka if she’d have him. Yes, that sounded good. Once again he could be a man of substance. A Roon befitting the name. His father’s shame a little less bright.
The only cloud lurking above this beautiful scenario was a big one. Twelve thousand crowns worth of big. Hou-Mar Ghandhan and his thugs weren’t going to let him go home
without paying off his gambling debt. And he didn’t have the money to pay it off. In the past, he’d stole and fenced some of the loot they’d brought back through the gates. A Witching Jar here. An old book there. But someone had obviously noticed, because the technicians now catalogued every item that they brought back with them.
Nor could he ask any of his fellow casters for a loan. None of them had pockets that cavernous.
As much as he hated the idea, Lokke de Calvas could be his salvation. If he turned the renegade Colonel in, it would be worth twenty-five thousand crowns.
He turned into one of Refu Ruka’s twisty-turny corridors.
Legally, ratting out De Calvas was the right thing to do. The Mulai had been marked Enemy of the Empire. It was Roon-Kotke’s duty as a good Imperial to report him. Only he wasn’t a good Imperial, was he? Everyone at Refu Ruka was searching for a way to topple the Empire and free Ocoscona. Morally-speaking, betraying Lokke was a reprehensible idea. It would make him no different to Hannar-Ghan. Worse, Lokke had saved his life. Several times over. There was still a blood debt to be paid.
But twenty-five thousand crowns… That would solve all his problems. Leave him money to spend. To start again.
He turned the idea over and over in his mind as he walked back to the barracks. He found Lor-Qui lying on his cot, staring up at the ceiling.
“Where’s Junn?”
Lor sat up. “He was waiting for the two of you to come out of the Captain’s office. Where’s Lokke? I mean, Ember. What name do we call him now?”
“Ember. If we want him to stay with us, nobody else can know.”
“Ember it is then. I can keep a secret. Uh, and I just wanted to… Well, what I wanted to say was… I’m sorry about the sarge. It was as much of a surprise to me, as it probably was to you. But you knew him the longest. Are you…”
“I’m fine,” the Corporal lied. “Han’s dead. Let’s leave it at that.”
“I wonder why…”
“I said, leave it.”
Once Called Thief Page 27
