Den of Thieves

by David Chandler

  “My thanks,” Croy called as he dodged away from another tentacle bent on snaring his sword arm.

  “Save them. The damned thing is still growing. If we’re going to kill it, it’s best done soon. I’ll clear you a path—go for its heart, if it has one!” Acidtongue swung around and around like a scythe mowing wheat. Bikker did not even bother with proper flourishes and cutting strokes, instead engaging the demon with a series of sweeping moulinet cuts. Though he barely touched the demon’s arms, they were severed right and left, the tapered ends of the tentacles dropping all around them to writhe and die separately on the ground.

  Acidtongue looked like a piece of rusted old iron, like a sword cast aside in a field, left out in the sun and rain for centuries. Yet when its wielder slogged into battle its true virtue made itself known. It secreted a concentrated vitriol more powerful than any alchemist’s aqua regia, an acid that could cut through any substance known to man. The sword had to be kept in a special glass-lined scabbard just so it didn’t eat its way through and burn the man who wore it at his belt. It was one of the most powerful weapons in the world, and Bikker was a master at its use.

  Croy had to admit, not without a twinge of professional jealousy, that it made short work of the demon that had nearly overwhelmed him.

  “Now,” Bikker shouted, and Croy ducked under a flailing arm and into the gap Bikker made. A seeming wall of severed stumps lay before him. The demon had continued to grow even after the tower fell on it, and now it seemed as big as the palace. Severed arms beat at his head and shoulders, and smaller tentacles reached to grab his arms and legs, but Croy laughed as he brought Ghostcutter around with both hands wrapped about its hilt. He brought it up to his shoulder, then drove it down with all its might into the join between two tentacles. The blade met some resistance at first but then pierced the tough skin and sank deep into the demon’s body, all the way up to its quillions.

  That, it turned out, was enough to make the demon scream.

  Its voice was high and chirping like a bird’s, but loud enough to shatter glass windows in the palace. Its scream was wordless and atonal, a simple heart cry so pure and piteous that it could mean only the creature’s death. It screamed with its mind, not with any audible voice, like many demons of Croy’s experience. His brain was battered by a trillion small voices speaking gibberish, but pleading, begging, beseeching him to withdraw his sword. When Croy refused, the demon tried to pull back physically, to roll away from the sword, to thrash itself free. It redoubled its attacks, its arms wrapping around Croy’s body so thick they covered him head to toe. But its strength was already ebbing and he only held fast, grunting in pain. By the time Bikker reached him and cut him free, the demon was already dead and its tentacles slithered off of him as if he’d been buried in a pile of so much rope.

  Croy stumbled over its severed arms where they littered the courtyard and out into the moonlight, gasping for air. When he had a little breath back, he started to laugh. Bikker slapped him hard on the back and he nearly went down on one knee.

  By the mercy of the Lady, that had felt good. To do the thing he was sworn to do, once more. Demons were so rare upon the land these days that he’d had to find other uses for Ghostcutter’s puissance, and not always things he was proud of. He’d nearly forgotten the purity and the clear conscience that came from fighting demons.

  Beside him, Bikker looked possessed of the same emotion. He was smiling from ear to ear, all malice gone from his eyes. Perhaps, just perhaps, there was something of the hero in the man yet. Perhaps the man who Croy had once know was not yet dead. He’d thought Bikker lost to the tide of cynicism and shifting morality that sullied this world, but perhaps . . .

  The castellan came running from the palace, pulling a dressing robe around his withered frame. “Water!” the old man cried. “The Guardian must be doused in water, or it’ll keep growing until it chokes the world! Fetch water from the well, bring more from the river! Water! Water!”

  Eventually the castellan saw the corpse of the demon—his eyes had never been very good, and age had worsened them—and stopped his shouting. “Water,” he said with a dejected air. “Water would have made it shrink.”

  “Cold iron and acid seem to work, too,” Bikker said, taunting the old man. He laughed heartily. “Don’t tell me, castellan, that you’ve been harboring a demon inside these walls. Don’t tell me you made a pet of a pit fiend.”

  The three of them stared at the body as it began to smoke and dissolve. It was not a creature of this world, and lacking now its vital force, it had nothing to protect it from the abhorrence of nature. In moments its corpse would resolve to nothing but a stink of brimstone and a blackish residue on the stones.

  “It’s the Guardian of the—the—” The castellan’s face turned dark with congested blood. It was a high crime for any man to summon a demon or to keep one hidden. For decades Croy and knights like him had been hunting down sorcerers capable of performing the necessary rituals. Now only a handful of them remained, and all of them closely watched. If it could be proved that, say, Hazoth had summoned this demon, he would be burnt at the stake. Even for one as powerful as the Burgrave, harboring a demon could be a hanging offense. Should Bikker or Croy bring news of this to the capital—

  But then the castellan’s face creased with shrewdness. He pointed one long and trembling finger at the two swordsmen.

  “You are an escaped prisoner. And you have no right to be here,” he said.

  Croy looked at Bikker. “I’d hoped when we saved the palace from the demon, all might be forgiven.”

  Bikker grinned wickedly. “Did you expect justice in this life, lad? Have you learned so little of my teachings?”

  “Guards!” the castellan shouted. “Take these two under arrest!”

  Suddenly the walls of Castle Hill were crowded with archers, while men of the watch in their cloaks-of-eyes came streaming in through the Market Square gate.

  “I had hoped to talk to you more. But we’ll meet again,” Croy said.

  “You may be assured of it,” Bikker agreed.

  And then they split up, running in opposite directions as fast as their legs could carry them.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  “Curse you, leave off,” Malden whimpered. His strength was nearly gone. The joints in his arms and shoulders burned, and his legs had cramped where he used them to brace himself against the pull of the demon. He would not let go of the crown, but inch by inch, inexorably, the tentacle was pulling it closer to the debris of the tower room. Sweat poured down into Malden’s eyes but he didn’t dare wipe it away. He heaved backward with every muscle in his body but still gained no ground.

  And then—he did. He was able to straighten out a fraction, to pull the crown closer to his body. The tentacle throbbed and started to whip back and forth. Its grip loosened and then the crown slithered free of its embrace.

  Malden fell back, panting like a dog. He stared at the tentacle, expecting it to renew its grasp, but it did not. In fact, it flopped across the floor and did not move at all. As if the demon had perished, unseen by him, and could fight no more. Even as he watched, the thing began to melt.

  He could hardly believe it. He stared at the crown in his hands. It had not stretched or bent at all in the struggle, though it was made of gold, one of the softest of metals. Its crenellations had dug deep gouges in his palms and fingers, and his blood slicked its surface. He longed to put it down, to tend to his cuts, but he dared not let it out of his hands, even for a moment. He couldn’t bear the thought.

  Of course, he didn’t have to put it down, if he just set it on his head . . .

  You have done well, thief, the crown said.

  “Say no more, I beg of you,” Malden moaned. He thought how much he had risked for this prize. He could easily have been killed in that final moment before the tower fell—yet the voice had commanded him, and he obeyed. Now he knew it wanted more. It wanted him to put it on his own head.

  Surely
that was sacrilege. Wasn’t it? He was no Burgrave. He couldn’t legally wear it. If anyone saw him with it on, he would be arrested at once for impersonating a noble.

  And yet . . . what sweet justice it would be, wouldn’t it? It was almost maddening, it was so appealing. For a common thief, the son of a whore, to wear even for a moment the coronet of temporal power.

  Malden began to raise it toward his head.

  The thing was magic. Who knew what powers it might have? Maybe it would grant him wishes. Maybe it would turn him instantly into a man of estate, of power. Such things were told of in stories, sometimes, such things were . . .

  . . . were . . .

  . . . too good to be true.

  Malden lowered the crown again. He didn’t let it go. No, that would be too much to bear. But he forced down the urge to put it on.

  He had a horrible presentiment—a certain hunch—that if he put the crown on his head, he would never willingly take it off again. And that would have presented more problems than it was likely to solve.

  He felt the thing pulse in his hands, a little jolt of anger. He had thwarted its design and it wasn’t happy. Malden had to fight with himself to contain his natural impulse, which was to do anything, anything at all, to make the crown happy again.

  If you will not wear me, then carry me to the castellan. He will see to my safety.

  “Be still!” Malden said, though he felt like a field mouse issuing orders to a lion. The strength in that voice, the resolute, firm quality of it, was hard to resist. “I’ll do no such thing. I’m leaving now, and you shall accompany me.”

  Find the castellan.

  “He would have me slain on the spot.” Malden shook his head. He could feel the disdain radiating from the crown. It cared not a jot for his life or well-being. It only wanted its orders carried out. As far as the crown was concerned, he deserved whatever he got. Was he not, after all, a thief? And were not thieves hanged in this city?

  An upright citizen, a more honest man, would never have disobeyed. Any such would have marched to their doom, just for the honor of serving the crown—or been seduced into putting it on, whatever horrors that might entail. Whatever intellect might inhabit it, it remained a symbol of ordained power, a representative of an iron-bound class system where every man knew his place. Even in the Free City of Ness men were born into a system of rank and from childhood had one lesson drummed into them: know your betters, and respect their wishes to the letter. Those who disobeyed faced beatings and upbraidings. Those who went along were left alone. Though the free citizens were proud people, they were not unlike the bondsmen outside the city walls in this regard—they knew better than to challenge power.

  Yet Malden had never been a true citizen. He’d never been raised to be an honest man. His people were among the lowest of the low, and no one had ever cared to remind him of his rank because they assumed he would never rise above his station.

  That expectation, or lack thereof, had given him ambition. And ambition bred will. Taking care, he removed one hand from the crown and flexed the fingers to get the blood flowing through them again. Then he placed the crown on the floor. Oh, that was hard, but once done, he felt so much better. He knew at once he’d made the right decision. He eased his other hand and wiped blood from his palm.

  Then he began to consider, once again, how he was going to escape.

  The hallway was blocked by the portcullis spears, and even if he could have fled through the palace, he would only arrive in the courtyard where doubtless every armed man on Castle Hill was waiting for him. The tower was collapsed and impassible. It seemed he had but one choice for egress, though he liked it not.

  He could climb down the oubliette, the pit that nearly swallowed him before he reached the tower. He peered down into its inky depths now, and remembered what he had thought before—it could lead nowhere but into the Burgrave’s dungeons, some hundred feet straight down.

  It was the only way out.

  Jumping into that pit would be folly, of course—he would never survive the fall. He could attempt to climb down, but from what he could see of the shaft, its walls looked slick and free of easy hand- and footholds to facilitate such a descent. Fortunately he still had the rope he’d used to gain entrance to the palace, and Slag’s folding grapnel. The rope would be just long enough, if he could drop the last ten feet.

  He wasted little time. No doubt guards were headed to the palace already, to check on the Burgrave and his retinue and make sure they had not been injured when the tower collapsed. At least some of those guards would be coming to check on the crown as well. The crown. Best to secure it now, so he wouldn’t lose it. He picked it up again.

  Thief.

  “Be still!” Malden hissed. He would not let it control him again. He would let no man be his master, ever again.

  Well. Save for Cutbill. And Cythera and Bikker, of course. He scowled at himself, but wasted no more time on that line of thought.

  He threaded his belt through the crown—touching it gingerly, as if it were like to burn him—then fastened it again about his waist so he would not drop it in the shaft. Then he wrapped his grapnel around one leg of the statue of Sadu—it had been badly dented in the cataclysm, but was still sound enough to hold his weight—and lowered himself foot by foot down into the pit, with only the vaguest notion what he would find at its bottom.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Warm gusts of air chased up the shaft and made Malden’s hands sweat until he could barely hang onto the rope. The shaft was narrow enough that he could walk his way down, keeping his feet pressed against one wall while he climbed down hand over hand, but the walls were slick with condensation and gave little purchase to his soft shoes. For the first fifty feet or so of the descent he was in near total darkness, but as he passed the halfway point, the light from below grew strong enough that he could see the water forming thick, greasy droplets that held for a moment, then streaked down the walls around him.

  From below he could hear the roaring of warm air as it rushed up the shaft. And something else—something he had dreaded as he came down the narrow chimney, something he had formed a fledgling hope he would not hear at all. A quiet moaning, the fatigued sighs of a prisoner. He had hoped that the clamor in the courtyard would have brought the gaolers of the dungeon running. That when he reached the dungeon, he would find it empty of guards. Judging by the continued sounds of torment issuing from below, that hope was forlorn. Getting down into the dungeon was going to be the easy part. Dealing with its occupants might be decidedly more difficult.

  One problem at a time, he told himself, and kept descending.

  The light was not enough to reveal the bottom of the shaft until he was almost upon it. When he reached the last few feet of his rope and peered down with great curiosity to see where he would land if he just let go, his heart flipped over his chest.

  The floor at the bottom of the shaft was studded with spikes. Iron spikes mounted securely, three feet long and worked to nasty sharpness.

  Reaching the end of the rope, he hung onto it by one hand with his feet stretched down as far as they could go. Seven feet of empty air still remained between him and those wicked points. If he just let go, the fall would not break his legs but he was like to be skewered.

  He had no more rope to tie to the end, nor anything to extend his descent. Twenty feet of good stout cord were wrapped around the hilt of his bodkin, but it was not strong enough to hold his weight.

  Malden ran one hand down the wall of the shaft next to him. It had been cut through solid rock with metal tools that left marks in its surface, no more than shallow dents—hardly enough to get his fingers or toes into. Yet perhaps if his strength had not completely left him . . .

  He braced his feet against one wall as best he could, then pushed against the opposite wall with one hand. If he kept his legs bent and his arm straight, he could just about hold his weight up against the force of gravity. And if he used both hands, and if he was hea
ded downward—it would not be a graceful descent. It would be more like a barely controlled fall. But that was better than an uncontrolled plummet.

  It took a great deal of courage to let go of the rope. Malden might have been indolent, and not a valiant fighter, but when his life was in jeopardy, he rarely lacked for boldness. He let go of the rope and thrust both hands out against the wall at the same time, bracing himself in the shaft. The impact of his hands on the wall made a wet slapping sound that echoed up and down the walls, but he did not have time at that point to stop and listen to hear if anyone remarked on the sound. He was too busy rushing down toward the spikes, his feet and hands clutching at the tool marks on the walls for whatever small purchase they offered.

  The rough wall tore and picked at his hands, already sore from the long climb up the wall of Castle Hill. The air rushing past him whispered of doom and folly and why there were so few old thieves. His teeth pulled back in a terrible rictus as he smashed his feet and hands again and again into the walls, trying anything, anything at all, to slow his descent.

  The spikes hurtled toward him like javelins. If he didn’t time this perfectly—

  Just as his hands reached the bottom of the shaft and ran out of wall to grip, Malden ducked his head and kicked hard with his legs against the stone. He shot forward through the air, narrowly clearing the spikes, and curled himself into a ball as he made contact with the floor beyond them, to perform a perfect somersault and wind up sitting on the floor, his breath whooping in and out of his lungs.