Thief of the Ancients

by Mike Wild

  While at the same time getting some serious drinking done.

  She quaffed the rest of her ale in one and signalled Aldrededor for another – no, make that two. The swarthy, grey-haired and ear-ringed Sarcrean winked and blew her a kiss as he set the golden brews down, pleased to have her back where she belonged. Behind him, down a small flight of bowed, skewing steps, business in the Here There Be Flagons was busy and lively, the air thick with laughter and banter, and a cloying mix of pipe, rolly smoke and sweat whose strength could still not mask the heady aroma of Dolorosa’s Surprise Stew. The stew had been on the menu – was the menu, in fact – for as long as Aldrededor and his wife had been at the Flagons, and the surprise about it was the reaction anyone got if they were stupid enough to enquire what was in it. “Why you wanna know?” the tall, thin and equally swarthy woman would demand loudly. “You think Dolorosa trying to poison you, ah? You think maybe she cook witha the weebleworm anda the flopparatta poo? Well, Dolorosa tell you, iffa Dolorosa wanna you dead she would sticka the cutlass inna your belly and she woulda laugh! Like-a this – ha-ha-ha-ha-haaar! Now go! Getta outta theees taverno! Go away, go, shoo, go, go, go...”

  Kali smiled. Dolorasa’s more... unusual approach to business was, along with the captain’s chest in a tavern landbound for leagues in every direction, a clue to the fact that before the elderly couple had fetched up here, they had pursued their own, long career on Twilight’s roiling seas. Exactly what that career had been she had never felt the need to ask, because as far as she was concerned the ear-ring and the cutlass and the hearty laugh said it all.

  It was what she loved – had always loved – about this place – the mixed bunch all of them were. Looking down towards the bar, she could see Fester Grimlock and Jurgen Pike engaged in a game of quagmire, the merchant and the thief staring daggers at each other as usual. There was Ronin Larson, the local ironweaver, and Hetty Scrubb, the herbalist. Between them weaved Peter Two-Ties, who had prepared the render for her expedition to the Sardenne. And then there, perched on his groaning and perpetually buckling stool, as he was perched every day – but only during the day – was Red Deadnettle, the flame-haired giant of a man who was the reason she was here in the first place.

  All of them had made her welcome over the years, and all of them were friends, but to Red she owed it all. Kali knew nothing of her parents or her origin, only that she had been found, twenty-two years before, abandoned and naked as the babe she was, by an unknown adventurer exploring an Old Race site – a site she had never since been able to find. The becloaked adventurer had rescued her and walked the roads on a storm-lashed night, looking for somewhere or someone to take her in. That someone had been Red, who, seeing dawn coming, had brought her here. The rest, as they said, was history – and the adventurer had never been seen again.

  A number of shadows darkened the outside of the small, whorled-glass windows of the tavern, before continuing on towards the door. Kali would not normally have given them a second thought – more customers – but their bulk and the way they had skulked for a second outside gave her cause to suspect something might be amiss. Sure enough, a second later, five half-uniformed thugs entered the tavern and headed straight for Red. They were heavies for hire, guards in the employ of local landowners to protect their interests on their estates, and while they had every right – at least in the eyes of the law as it had conveniently been written by their employers – to apprehend people on their land, they had no right to do so in a public place such as this.

  “Mister Deadnettle?” their somewhat obese leader enquired. “Mister Red Deadnettle?”

  Still hunched at the bar, his back to the man, Red did not move or respond to the question in any way. The thug swallowed and thumped him on the shoulder.

  “Deadnettle, I know it’s you. I insist you –”

  There were sharp intakes of breath – warning hisses, really – from the others seated along the bar, and then a slow and universal shaking of their heads. The hubbub of the tavern quietened as Red rose from his seat, dwarfing the hulks before him as his fists balled.

  Kali sighed. She was tempted to let Red continue but if she didn’t want her relaxation – and indeed the Flagons itself – ruined by the earthquake that would suddenly and inevitably come, she knew she had better intervene. She leaned down and opened the captain’s chest Aldrededor let her use, pulling a small blackjack from beneath a pile of maps, diagrams, schematics and other Old Race paraphernalia, just in case. Then she picked up her ale, descended the steps, and with a slow lowering of her hand bade Red sit down. That done, she tapped the guard on the shoulder.

  “Is there a problem, officer?”

  “No problem,” the guard said tiredly, without even looking at her. “This gentleman and I needs a little chat, that’s all. A matter of a small misdemeanour.”

  “He was taking a short cut across your boss’s fields, unless I miss my guess,” Kali said, though she knew full well that Red had been poaching again – it was in his blood. “Don’t you think misdemeanour is a little strong?”

  “It’s the law of our lands, Miss. Or do you think that folk should just be allowed to wander wherever they want, eh?”

  “I do, actually, yes. To wander... and explore.” She gestured outside, beyond where the ramshackle tavern was slumped like a knackered cat beside Badlands Brook. “To see what’s out there.”

  The guard turned and looked Kali up and down. She’d only got back to the place an hour before and, having spent a chunk of that time stabling Horse and reassuring him that Dolorosa’s stew did have bacon in it, as yet hadn’t changed, and the guard took in her sap-stained and torn clothing, the general dishevelment of her appearance. He sniffed as he saw the toolbelt at her waist.

  “Oh, you’re one of those. Take my advice and stay out of this, adventurer,” he said with undisguised disdain. “Our business with Deadnettle is no flight of fancy – and no concern of yours.”

  Kali immediately railed at his attitude. She had never understood how people such as him could live on a world such as theirs and not be curious about it. As Merrit had said, their lives were mired in the mundane, obsessed with petty issues and their own selfish concerns. When all they had to do was look up at Kerberos and wonder –

  Hells. She would have given him a lecture but he wasn’t worth the bother. “Red is a friend of mine,” she said.

  “Yeah, he looks like he would be. Now off with you before I have the innkeeper eject you from the premises.”

  Red said something for the first time, then, leaning down to whisper quietly in the guard’s ear. It was still a rumble. “That might be difficult, Mister Policeman. ’Cause Miss Hooper, she owns the place.”

  The guard guffawed and looked Kali up and down again. “Don’t make me laugh. A strip of a girl like her owning a grub’s den like this in the back of beyond. Why would she want to do that?”

  Kali took a sip of her ale and stared at the guard measuredly. What Red said was true – the tavern had hit hard times a few years ago, and so, when she’d had the funds, she’d bought it, simple as that. But she hadn’t changed anything. Except the name. You just didn’t with this place. The year before one of the local gentry had objected to the fuggy atmosphere and had suggested it became a non-smoking tavern. After the laughter had died down – a non-smoking tavern? – Red had dragged the man to Bottomless Pit and thrown him in. After setting him on fire.

  “It relaxes me.”

  Fatso guffawed again. “Bet that don’t take much, either. Size of you, it’d only take a thimbleful before you was off your bloody head!”

  “And ready for a good time, eh?” Kali said, calculatedly.

  The guard’s eyes narrowed, and he smacked his lips. “Tell you what – why don’t we put that to the test?”

  “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

  “A little competition. You, me, a few drinks. And if you’re the one that remains standing, I let Deadnettle off the hook. Whaddya say?”

/>   Kali slipped the blackjack back into a pocket, relieved she hadn’t needed to use it. “You’ve got yourself a deal.”

  “Whoa, careful, little lady,” another of the guards interjected. “At the Dead Duck in Miramas they call Sarge the Ale Whale.”

  Kali stared at the Ale Whale, hardly surprised. “Phoo. Well, it won’t be a problem, then, will it?”

  “’Ere, Sarge,” another said. “You’re supposed to be on duty.”

  Kali smiled her most girlish smile. “Surely he can hold his own against me? A thimbleful and I’m gone, remember?”

  “Go orrrn, Sarge,” one of the other guards snickered dirtily. “’Old your own against ’er, eh?”

  “Why not, eh?” the sergeant cackled. “Why not indeed.”

  Kali looked at the bar but Dolorosa was ahead of her, having the first drinks lined up in readiness – four flummoxes with ale chasers. She dipped her head towards Kali as she swept them up.

  “Poor bastardo,” she whispered.

  “Hush, woman.”

  Kali and the Sarge retired to the nook, and it began. One drink. Two drinks. Three drinks, four. An hour later, the Sarge’s mates had lost count.

  “’Ere, jush ’ang on a mo’,” the Sarge said at last, slurring and straightening himself none too successfully in his chair. He made circles with his tankard, spilling great slops of ale over the side. “If thish is your hosteryl... your hotslery... your hoslerurry...” He hiccupped and frowned, determined to get something out. “If this is your pub, how am I to know your shour-faced wench ain’t sherving you shome speshal watered-down muck?”

  Kali looked down at her own ale, a thwack, triple the strength of his own. She’d tired of flummox and, besides, liked a challenge.

  “Taste it for yourself,” she said, smiling and proffering her tankard, which he took and quaffed greedily. All that was left, just to be sure.

  “Okay?” she asked.

  “Ish very nishe, yesh. Blup. Orf.”

  Nodding, Kali motioned to Dolorosa to bring two more of the same. None too keen on being referred to as a sour-faced wench – or, indeed, any kind of wench at all – the concavity of the tall woman’s cheeks clearly signalled she was sucking up to deposit a small present into the guard’s beer, until Kali shook her head subtly. Dolorosa shrugged – okay, maybe the man was suffering enough – and instead slammed his tankard down hard, soaking his lap with beer. The guard looked down vaguely, his head bobbing, as the ale penetrated the cloth of his pants.

  “Gawds, ah fink arve gone un me pished meself.”

  “No need to waste time going, then, is there?” Kali observed as he giggled. She raised her refreshed tankard to show she was still willing and able. “Come on, Sarge, drink up.”

  “Wha – ?” the guard said, startled. “Oh, yeah. Cheershh!”

  The Sarge raised his tankard to his lips and stared hard at Kali. Or at least as hard as he could when he had finally managed to pull her into focus. Almost got her now, he thought to himself. Ah mean, look at the state of the bloody woman... so betwattled she’s blurred and swaying all over the place. Ey up, she was bringing on a reserve now, and all – another one who looked just like her. Nah, stood to reason that, as a gentleman, like, he was gonna have to say something for her own good, or she’d be off the bleedin’ chair.

  “Wimmin,” he bemoaned to himself. “They jush can’t take their drinksh.”

  “Dolorosa!” Kali called. “Another!”

  “Dolorosha,” the sergeant repeated. “Godsh, sheesh uggle... uggloo...” He gave up and jabbed a finger across the table – jabbed it everywhere, really, including into his eye. “But you, Mish,” he warned, “youse pretty an’ oughts to givvup before youse lose your looksh... ow, bloody ’ell.” He looked stunned, suddenly, and then added, “Oh gawds... oh, bluurrrfff!”

  Kali’s tankard froze in mid-air as the sergeant’s head hit the table with a thud. She sat back with a smile then motioned to his men to take him away, which they did, bundling him out of the door while their heads shook in disbelief.

  Another triumph for the Tavern Tot, Kali thought.

  She bounced down the steps and slapped the now reseated Red on his back. “Next time,” she advised, “wait ’til Long Night, eh? Dolorosa, get this man another ale. Me, too, while you’re at it. Please.”

  “You musta be hungry? You wanna some Surprise Stew?”

  “Don’t know. What’s in it?”

  “Oh, the beer hassa made the bossgirl funny, now! Hey, why not washa that outfit of yours because you steeeenk. Anda while you at it, sew uppa the pants because your bum it sticka out! Hoh, she smiles! Aldrededor, where issa my sharpeeest knife?”

  Kali was halfway back up the steps when shadows darkened the windows again. Another group of men entered, clothed in common travellers’ garb, but she recognised the leader of them immediately.

  New recruits but same old story. The Munch Bunch.

  But something was different. From the shapes that were barely concealed beneath his and his men’s cloaks it was clear that they were more heavily armed this time. It wasn’t the weapons themselves that worried Kali but the fact that their Final Faith talismans were absent from their sleeves, too. Munch and his cronies had obviously gone to lengths to distance themselves from looking like agents of the Final Faith, and that could mean only one thing. The gloves were off.

  “Miss Hooper,” Munch said. “You have been really quite difficult to track down.”

  “I like it that way. How’s tricks, Stan?”

  “They will be better when I have recovered what belongs to me. The key, Miss Hooper? Please?”

  “The key? Oh, that key. Little difficult – I don’t have it any more.”

  “You... don’t... have it.” Munch repeated, slowly.

  “That’s right. I threw it away.”

  Munch laughed out loud, spun to face the watching locals in the tavern. “Did you hear that?” he shouted. “She doesn’t have it! She threw it away! Oh, well that’s all right, then – we’ll all just leave and go home to –”

  Go on, Kali thought. Say it. Say Scholten and give yourself away. Let all these people know who you thugs really represent. But instead of continuing Munch slammed his fist down on the bar and with a roar swept away the drinks standing there. “Hey, watch out there,” Red said, and made to move on him, but in under a second Munch had whipped a shiny new gutting knife from under his cloak and held it to the big man’s throat. He pressed the point into Red’s flesh until he was forced to sit back down.

  Munch turned back to Kali. “Go home?” he said again, as if pondering. “No, I don’t think so.”

  “I already told you, I don’t have the key,” Kali said. “Now, why don’t you just leave before I tell everyone here who you are?”

  “That would not be wise,” Munch said. “Because then we would have to kill them all.” As one, his cronies took crossbows from beneath their cloaks and trained them on the regulars.

  “Miss Hooper, if you really do not have the key then I fear I have no choice but to change my plans again. This involves causing you great pain. Do you understand? Oh, and if you are thinking of fleeing from us as you did from the Sardenne Forest, I’m afraid that without the means that might prove a little problematic.” Munch smiled coldly. “But if you doubt me, why don’t you take a look outside?”

  What the hells is he talking about? Kali wondered. Automatically her mind flicked back to her flight from the Spiral, the escape from its conflagration, the gallop away on Horse. No, she thought suddenly. No!

  Surely even this bastard...

  Kali pushed past Munch and his cronies and burst out of the door of the tavern into the stable-lined courtyard beyond. There she stopped dead. Horse was being led towards her by another of Munch’s men. But something was wrong. Very wrong. Horse stumbled as he came, sweating, whinnying sadly, his eyes rolling as they always did, but this time in pain. As Kali fought to take in what it was that was wrong with him her eyes were drawn to t
he reason for Horse’s weak and unsteady gait. The fetlocks on both of his hind legs had been cut almost through. Sinew and cartilage dangled from raw and sliced wounds that bled freely and left a trail behind them, like red ribbons on the ground. The trails, Kali saw, led back to his stable, where this vicious deed had obviously been done, for there a puddle of blood the size of a small pond had already begun to soak into the straw. With that much blood gone and the wounds that he had, it was a wonder that Horse could walk at all. Kali already felt sick enough but then the true cruelty of what had been done to him – and to her – became clear. Horse’s fetlocks had been sliced with an almost surgical precision, to the degree where they were held together only by the finest threads of gristle and tissue, and the fact that he was being forced to walk towards her now was providing the strain that would finish them off. As Kali watched in horror, the remaining threads of the fetlocks snapped away and, with a loud whinny of pain, Horse collapsed, dropping onto his rear, the blood beginning to run from him more freely than ever.

  Kali roared and attempted to run to him, but Munch had stationed two more of his men on either side of the tavern door and they each grabbed one of her arms, holding her back. At the same time, more of Munch’s men appeared on the roofs of the stables, aiming crossbows down. Munch stepped casually through the door behind her and said, “The nag was old. If the strain of fleeing once again hadn’t killed it, the knacker’s yard would have finished it soon enough.” He stepped around to Kali’s front, and smiled. “Trust me, Miss Hooper, I was doing you a favour.”

  Kali spat in his face, and struggled anew in the hands of her captors. Over Munch’s shoulder she saw Horse fold down onto his front legs and then, with a winded and tremulous expulsion of breath, collapse heavily onto his side, his legs kicking spasmodically. Blood began to pool there, too, and he began to shake, soaked in his cold sweat. His dazed large eyes – as innocent as a child’s eyes – rolled in confusion, for there was no way he could understand what was happening to him.