* * *
Skif woke stiff and cold, with his head aching so much it hurt to open his eyes. He would just as soon have rolled over and gone back to sleep, but the pounding pain behind one ear and the cold prevented him from doing so—as did the sudden and electrifying realization that he wasn't in his bed.
He sat up abruptly, despite a stab of agony that made him yelp.
The cold, gray light of the street coming in at an open door next to where he sat completely disoriented him. Where was he?
This isn't home—
Then it all came back, in a rush. The triumph of the successful run.
The fire.
The man who'd grabbed him, keeping him from—from—
With an inarticulate howl of grief, he scrambled to his feet and staggered out into the street.
He coughed in the miasma of fog and stale smoke that met him like a wall. He fought through it, staggered a few paces—and stared, unbelieving, at the absolute ruin of his home.
Gone. All gone. A few blackened timbers stuck up out of the wreckage, marking where the staircase had been. The rest—was an unidentifiable pile of charred wood and still-smoldering wreckage.
The vultures were already hauling away whatever they could claw out, for in this place, even charcoal could serve to help eke out firewood and grant a few more hours of warmth. They had baskets, barrows—their clothing and faces black with soot.
Somewhere under there was his home—Bazie—and the boys.
Another howl tore itself out of his throat, and he hurled himself at the burned-out building, scrambling over what was left of the wall to the corner where the secret stair should have opened to Bazie's little den. It was underground—surely it was safe, surely they were safe—
They have to be safe!
But he couldn't help thinking… how long it took them to get Bazie out on the rare occasions when he emerged from the room. What a struggle it was to get him to the latrine, much less up the stairs. And that was on a bright spring day, not amid choking smoke and flames—
He began to dig, frantically, first with his bare hands, then with a piece of board until that broke, then with the blade of a shovel he found, still hot enough to blister. His throat closed, his gut clenched. He welcomed the pain in his hands—he should have been there! If he'd been there—if only—
He dug, with his eyes streaming tears and his heart breaking, dug and dug and dug until finally he was too exhausted to dig anymore.
He collapsed among the wreckage, and wept, leaning against a broken beam, until his sides ached and his eyes burned, and still he could not weep himself free of the pain.
Gone. All gone… I should have been here. All gone… it's my fault. All gone, all gone…
Around him, people continued to scavenge, oblivious to his grief, or ignoring it. His grief turned to anger, then, and he stood up and tried to scream at them for the plundering ghouls that they were—but his throat was raw and his brain wouldn't work and all he could do was moan.
In the end, it was Jarmin, unlikely Jarmin, clerkly proprietor of the shop who bought their plundered silks, who found him there, whimpering like a whipped dog. Jarmin, who stepped mincingly into the wreckage, looked him up and down and asked, without any expression at all, "Got swag?"
Skif, shocked out of his grief for a moment by the sheer callousness of the query, began to shake his head. Then, suddenly remembering that triumph that seemed to have happened a hundred years ago, nodded.
Jarmin took him by the elbow and hauled him to his feet. Shock sealed his mouth and made him docile, though his aching eyes still streamed tears, his gut ached, and deep inside he wanted to strike out at whatever was nearest.
To strike out at himself.
Gone, all gone!
They picked their way to the street, with Jarmin still holding tightly to Skif's elbow, and once there, Jarmin headed determinedly toward his own shop. Skif just went along, too heartbroken to think, too full of bottomless mourning to care if Jarmin was about to lead him off somewhere to kill him for his loot.
Let him. I deserve it. I wasn't there.
They entered the shop, all of its tawdriness only too apparent by day. The girls were nowhere to be seen as Jarmin shoved Skif before him, past the counter, through a flap of hanging cloth, then up a narrow staircase that ended in a room just under the roof. A single dirty window covered with oiled parchment let in enough light to see by. There was a pallet there, and blankets, and some storage boxes; nothing else. Jarmin had to stoop to fit under the rooftree, and he shoved Skif roughly down onto the pallet, and gestured impatiently at his tunic.
Skif read the gesture for the demand that it was, and slowly undid his clothing to pull out the jewelry he'd taken last night. He laid it out on the pallet. Jarmin squatted down beside him and examined it piece by piece, grunting a little, but otherwise saying nothing.
Now he's gonna kill me. Skif could form the thought, but couldn't muster anything beyond the grief to care what happened to him. Care? No, that wasn't true. He cared. He deserved death. If he'd gotten back sooner, if he hadn't been so determined to bring back every damned piece that couldn't be traced—
I'd have been there. I'd have noticed in time. I'd have gotten them out.
Gone. All gone.
He just sat where he was, staring at his own hands, while Jarmin turned the jewelry over and over in his hands.
Finally the fence pulled the kerchief off his own neck and bundled it all up. He shoved the ends under his belt and knotted them, got up slowly and painfully, then descended the staircase. It looked from where Skif sat as if he was sinking into the floor…
Tears began again, burning his eyes and his raw cheeks, and Skif didn't even bother to wipe them away. His nose closed up, his gut spasmed, and his thoughts ran around and around in a tight little spiral, like a mouse in a trap. Gone. My fault. I should have been there.
A moment later Jarmin was back again, a bundle of cloth under one arm, a jug in his hand.
"Here," he said gruffly. "These ought to fit you." He dropped the clothing down next to Skif, who stared at it without comprehension. "Even swap; the swag for these, food, and this room for three moons. After that, you get another place or start paying." As Skif stared at him as if he was speaking in a foreign tongue, he glanced at the jug in his hand as if he was surprised by its presence. "Oh, aye. And you get this."
He shoved it at Skif until Skif took it from him perforce.
"Go on. Pop the cork and drink it," Jarmin said fiercely.
Numbly, Skif obeyed. The cork came out with difficulty; the liquid inside tasted of cherries and burned like fire, burned him from his tongue to his gut, all the way down.
He knew as soon as he tasted it what it was, though he had never done more than sip a bit before this, the dregs left in some rich man's glass; spirits-of-wine, and worth its weight in silver. He gasped at the fire in it, but didn't spill a drop; it would bring blessed oblivion, which now he wanted more than he'd ever wanted anything. It went to the head quickly; in a few swallows, he was dizzy. A few swallows more, and he had trouble holding the jug. Jarmin, his eyes gleaming fiercely in the half light, steadied it for him and helped him lift it to his mouth.
"Keep drinking, boy," he heard, as from a far distant land. "'Twon't take the hurt away, but it'll numb it for a while."
Numb… Numb was good. Maybe if he was numb, he wouldn't keep seeing Bazie and the boys… and the flames.
He swallowed again, the stuff burning its way down into his belly. Now he was more than dizzy; the room swam around him and tilted disconcertingly. Jarmin took the jug, corked it, and set it aside as he sagged down onto the pallet.
The room was definitely moving, but he didn't care. He just didn't want to have to watch it, so he closed his eyes. "Best thing for you, boy," he heard, then footsteps on the stair.
He didn't actually pass out; he hadn't drunk quite enough for that. But every time the numbness and the dizziness started to wear off, he heaved
himself up onto his elbow and took another long pull at the jug until it came back again. Now and again he tired of simply feeling the room circling him and opened his eyes to watch the ceiling rotate. When the light started to fade, Jarmin appeared again with a lantern and bread and sops, a chamberpot, and a big jug of water. He made Skif eat and drink all of the water before he took the lantern and the plates away. Skif took some more pulls on the jug, then, and as shrill voices and the cajolery of the girls drifted in through the window, he let the liquor take him away to a place where nothing mattered anymore.
* * *
Jarmin told him later that he'd stayed drunk for a week. Sometimes he cried, but only when he was alone. Sometimes he heard someone moaning, and dimly realized that it was himself. All he knew was that the jug was, temporarily, his best friend. Jarmin kept it full, but insisted on his eating and drinking water, an annoyance he put up with because it meant that Jarmin would top off the jug.
He retained enough of sense and the cleanliness Bazie had drummed into him to make proper use of the chamberpot. It never seemed to stink, so Jarmin must have kept it clean as well.
Jarmin also came up to talk to him now and again. For a while, he ignored the words and the man because he didn't want to go to the place where words meant something. For a while, that is, until something Jarmin said jarred him back into thinking.
"Word is," Jarmin said, into Skif's rosy fog, "That fire was set."
Set? Skif opened his eyes with an effort. "Wha?" he managed, mouth tasting of old leather and liquor.
Jarmin didn't look at him, and his tone was casual. "Word is that the landlord got a surprise inspection, and was going to have to fix the place. Or get fined. Going to cost him dearly, either way. So he burned it instead, and is calling it a terrible accident."
Understanding—and anger—stirred sluggishly. "He—burned it?"
Jarmin shrugged, as if it all mattered not a whit to him. "Word is, that's the case. Don't who the landlord is—was," he corrected. "You know how it is. Probably some high-necked merchant, or even highborn. Couldn't possibly be connected with us, nor where we live. Couldn't soil himself by openly owning the place, but takes our copper right enough. So long as no one knows where he got it. But he wouldn't want to have to spend good coin either, not when burning it costs him less and allows him to sell the lot afterward."
Anger burned away the fumes of the liquor—hot as the flames that had destroyed his only family. "He burned it?" Skif repeated, sitting up, fists clenching.
"Word is that. Whoever he is." Jarmin shrugged, then with a sly look, pushed the jug toward Skif.
Skif pushed it back, still dizzy, but head getting clearer by the moment.
He burned it. Or ordered it burned, whoever he is.
"No warning, of course," Jarmin continued casually. "Because that would tip off the inspectors that he didn't mean to fix it. And the highborn don't care how many of us burn, so long as an inconvenient building is gotten rid of. That is how it is."
There was light in the window and relative quiet on the street. It must be day, and the girls were asleep. Skif was still drunk, and he knew it, but he was getting sober, more so with every breath, as his anger rose and rose, burning like the flames that had taken his family. He looked down at himself, and saw that he was still wearing the filthy clothing he'd been brought here in. The pile of clean stuff still lay at the foot of the pallet. "Wanta bath, Jarmin."
"Comes with the room," Jarmin said indifferently. "I'll tell madam. Get yourself downstairs when you can."
He descended the stairs, and Skif waited until he could stand without too much wavering. Then he picked up a shirt, trews, and socks, and followed.
Jarmin was behind the counter tending to a customer, but waved him out the door. Skif tottered out, blinking owlishly at the daylight, and the door of the brothel next to Jarmin's shop opened. An oily-looking fellow beckoned to him, and Skif went in.
He wasn't given any time to look around the shabby-luxurious "parlor" where customers came to choose from the girls if they hadn't already picked one. The oily fellow hustled him into the back where there was—
A laundry.
Only the remains of the liquor and the firmest of controls kept Skif from breaking down right there and then. The urge to wail was so great he practically choked.
There were several tubs, two of which had girls in them, three of which had laundry. Before he could lose his head and bawl, a burly woman with work-reddened hands and a tight, angry mouth stripped him before he could open his mouth and shoved him into the last of the tubs. She didn't give him a chance to wash himself either; she used the same brush and lye soap that she used on the linen on his hide, with the same lack of gentleness.
The bristles lacerated his skin, his scalp. He didn't let out a single sound as she scrubbed as if she intended to take his skin off, then made him stand, rinsed him with a bucket of water cold enough to make him gasp, and bundled him in a sheet. His own clothing went into one of the tubs with laundry in it, and she handed him the plain trews, socks, and shirt he brought with him, leaving him to clothe himself as she turned back to her work. He noticed that the girls didn't get the same ungentle treatment. They were allowed to bathe themselves and did so lazily, completely ignoring his presence.
Well, that was all right. He didn't want any stupid whores fussing over him like he was some sort of animate doll. He didn't want their sympathy. He didn't want anyone's pity.
Hard. I gotta be hard. That's what I gotta do.
He dried himself off—the laundress snatched the sheet away from him before he could lay it down and popped it back into a tub—and got the clothing on. It was rather too big, but that hardly mattered. All he had left now were his own boots, which he pulled on, and left without a backward glance.
His head was clear enough now, and while the laundress had scrubbed him, his grief had somehow changed, shrunk, condensed down into a hard, cold little gem that formed the core of a terrible anger that seemed almost too large to contain in so small a compass as his heart.
Revenge. That was what he wanted, more than anything in the world. And he wasn't going to rest until he got it.
He walked into Jarmin's shop, and the old man gave him a sharp glance, then a nod of satisfaction. "You'll do," was all he said, and tossed him a pouch.
It clinked. Skif opened it and found a little money; mostly copper, a bit of silver. He tucked it inside his shirt. It was little enough. Jarmin was cheating him, of course. The room, the food, the clothing, the baths—none of that was worth a fraction of what he'd stolen. Jarmin wasn't giving him anything.
And Skif didn't want anything but this—the expected cheating, the usual grifting. No more kindness. No more generosity. He could move on from here without looking back or regretting anything. This was a business transaction for Jarmin. Save one of the best thieves he knew and ensure a steady supply of goods for his shop—as simple as that.
So he didn't thank the man for the money; he just nodded curtly and went back out into the street. He knew what the money was for—tongues weren't loose without money. And Skif was going to have to find a lot of tongues to loosen. It was going to take a long time, he already knew that. That was fine, too. When revenge came, it would come out of nowhere. The enemy would never know who it was that hit him, or why.
Just as disaster had come upon him, and with equal destruction in its claws. When he was finished, whoever had killed Bazie would be left with nothing, contemplating the wreckage of what had been his life, with everything he valued and loved gone in an instant.
Just like Skif.
Skif smiled at the thought. It was the last smile he would wear for a very long time.
9
SMOKE drifted over the heads of the customers; it wasn't from the fireplace, but from the tallow dips set in crude clay holders on the tables and wedged into spaces between the bricks around the room. Skif sat as far from the door as it was possible to be, in the "odd" corner of The Broke
n Arms, a kind of rectangular alcove just before the walls met, into which someone had wedged a broken-legged stool, making a seat hemmed in on three sides with brick. The brick was newer here, so this might be an old entrance; gone now, since the next building over was built right up against this one. Or maybe it had been a window slit; you couldn't have used it as a door, not really. It was too short and too narrow. Maybe a former fireplace, before the big one was put in, before this room became a tavern. No, it wasn't big enough for a man to be comfortable sitting here, but it was perfect for him. Here he could spend hours unnoticed, the wenches had gotten so used to it being empty.
Before things got so crowded, he'd bought himself a jack of small beer and a piece of bread and dripping, so his stomach was full but not full enough to make him drowsy. Meanwhile the number of customers rose, and the place got warmer. This nook was a good place to tuck himself into when he wanted to eavesdrop on conversations. Eavesdropping was almost as good as paying for information, and it cost nothing. He'd become adept at being able to sort one set of voices from all of the babble and concentrate on them. Once in a while one of the wenches would notice that he was there, and like this afternoon, he'd buy a mugful of small beer and a piece of bread so that they'd leave him alone, but that was only when the place was less than half full. When it was crammed tight, as it was now, he'd be overlooked all night.
He'd already wedged himself up onto the seat, knees just under his chin and his arms wrapped around them, so not even his feet were in anyone's way. Every bench and stool at every table was full; not a surprise with rain coming down in barrel loads outside. Not a good night for "business," except within walls.
Not that anyone in the Arms was going to do any business. That sign over the door wasn't there for a joke. That was what made and kept the Arms so popular; when you walked in here, you knew you'd come out with your purse no lighter than the cost of your food and drink. The women wouldn't try and get you drunk so they could talk you into paying for wine for them either. The wenches here weren't hired for their looks, gods knew—absolute harridans, most of 'em. They'd been hired because they knew the liftin' lay, and how to spot someone at business. One whistle from one of them, and the miscreant would find himself on the street with his own arms looking just like the ones on the sign. It was a good dodge for the wenches, for certain-sure; a young thing, plain though she might be, would still have an excuse to come sidling alongside of a fellow with a bit of an invitation. An old hag wouldn't; and though her fingers might still be wise, they weren't as nimble as a young thing's, so if she tried the old dodge of stumbling into a fellow, the odds were that he'd be clapping his hand to his belt pouch before she could get into it. And if he didn't, and she got it, her feet wouldn't carry her as far or as fast anymore. The older you got in the trade, the likelier it was you'd be caught that fatal third time, and unless she got herself a gaggle of littles to teach the trade to—taking everything they lifted, of course—there wasn't much an aging woman could do to turn a penny. There weren't a lot of women who learned the high roads or the ketchin' lay, professions that could keep you going for a long time, so long as you were limber enough to climb or bold enough to cosh.
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