Crown Thief

by David Tallerman

  "I trust you've been keeping up your duties in our absence?"

  Abruptly, all humour vanished from Navare's expression. "Of course, Guard-Captain. But truth be told, I doubt I've found much you haven't already guessed. There are rumours aplenty, but facts are tough to come by."

  "Go on."

  "Well… four days ago, a contingent of Moaradrid's troops entered the city. Soon after, all the gates were barricaded from the inside. I've seen northern soldiers, family retainers and men I recognise from the gangs, all apparently working together. The place is sealed up tighter than a priestess's…" Remembering Estrada's presence, Navare caught himself and finished weakly, "No one's been in or out, sir, except I heard they destroyed the barracks – and even that they did at night."

  "I didn't know about the troops. I'd hoped they'd flee back north," said Alvantes darkly. "That makes it even worse."

  "What about the families?" asked Estrada. "Even with Panchetto gone, would they really be desperate enough to side with criminals?"

  "They think of themselves as Ans Pasaedans, even after all these years," replied Alvantes. "To them, Altapasaeda is an island surrounded by enemies. The gangs are as Castovalian as anyone else, and more dangerous than most. On their own initiative, it's the last thing they'd do."

  I thought I followed his implication. "So if it's not their own idea, it's someone else's," I said.

  "I've heard word there's one man pulling the strings," agreed Navare. "If it's true, he's doing a damn fine job of keeping his name quiet."

  I was beginning to see why Alvantes was so worried.

  Combined, the household retainers of the many wealthy northern families numbered in the hundreds. Working apart, they'd always kept each other in check. Working together, they amounted to a military force perhaps half the size of the one Moaradrid had invaded with, and considerably better trained and equipped.

  Add to that Altapasaeda's sizable criminal underground and the dregs of Moaradrid's army. Now have them put aside their differences in favour of some common goal. What did that leave you?

  It left an army.

  And if that army was guided by a single individual, there was a good chance we'd done nothing but exchange one would-be tyrant for another.

  "Whoever he is, he's smart," said Alvantes, breaking in upon my thoughts. "Keeping the city bottled up will make the families even more paranoid, and everyone on the outside too." He glanced behind him, as though he could somehow see the city through the intervening wood. "It seems the only concrete answers lie within those walls."

  "Getting inside would be tricky," said Navare. "I'd try it myself, but if they caught me and traced me back to the guard…"

  "Yes. That could prove difficult. Better to keep our presence secret for as long as we can."

  "They'll be watching the bridge and the wharfs."

  "I think there's a way. It wouldn't be pleasant, but it might work. It would take someone who knew the city, who was familiar with its seamier side. Someone with contacts on the inside, who could pass unnoticed. Someone…"

  "Hey," I said. "Stop looking at me like that."

  For Alvantes's eyes were firmly fixed on me, and everyone else's had swung to follow. "Why, Damasco?" he said. "You wanted to spend a night in Altapasaeda so badly. Now here's your chance."

  CHAPTER TWO

  "I get it, I really do. Coalition of dangerous forces, shadowy figure lurking in background pulling strings. I've followed all that. It's quite a problem you have here, Alvantes. Do you know what else I followed? It isn't my problem."

  Estrada looked at me in horror. "Damasco… if Altapasaeda's in trouble, it's everyone's problem."

  "You see, I'd swear I just covered that point. Alvantes's, yes. Mine, not at all. Not yours, either, Estrada, and definitely not Saltlick's. I say, back off, let the dust settle. There's a fair chance the families and the gangs will fall out and kill each other off, probably sooner rather than later. The streets might run red for a day or two, but after that everything will go back to normal. They'll welcome you with open arms, Alvantes. You can be the hero of the hour."

  Not one of the faces turned on mine showed any hint of agreement. Saltlick's bemused smile came closest, but I was confident it meant he simply wasn't following the conversation. How could they be so stupid? Altapasaeda was like an hysterical child; always wailing over something, only to forget it the moment a new threat or annoyance distracted its minuscule attention. This current crisis, whatever its true nature, was bound to pass the same way.

  Well, I wasn't about to let weight of numbers convince me to sign on for Alvantes's suicide plan. I'd started off with flat refusal; moved through anger, abuse, self-ridicule; listed the failings that made me so unsuited to the job; returned to stubborn negation; spent half an hour cataloguing the deficiencies in his logic… on and on, until I began to suspect I'd win by simply dying of exhaustion.

  No such luck. Now I only had one argument left – the most obvious, the one I'd found myself shying away from again and again. "The fact is, Alvantes, I'm through jeopardising my life to solve other people's problems. I'm leaving."

  "I can't stop you," said Alvantes.

  "That's right. You can't."

  "But I can make sure that bag of stolen coins you've been carrying around doesn't go with you."

  I winced. "It's mine. I've earned it." And I had. Stealing from half a dozen of Panchetto's guests in a single night had been no easy feat.

  "A room full of guardsmen says different."

  There it was, as inevitable as dying. There was a basic incompatibility in how Alvantes and I viewed the world, and the bag of money in my pocket was a prime example of that. I couldn't leave without it. I couldn't walk away empty-handed. Doing that meant returning to the life I'd been leading – a life that had left me desperate enough to try stealing food from a notoriously homicidal invading warlord.

  "This is the last time," I said. "This cleans the slate. You don't throw my past in my face. You forget about the money. If I do this, Alvantes, it gets you off my back until the end of time."

  It was all the more frustrating that he didn't even pause to consider. "All right," he said. "A clean slate."

  "And the coin stays with me. I might need it in there."

  "You keep a quarter. The rest back when you return with answers."

  "A third. Anything I spend in bribes, you refund."

  "Agreed."

  Far too late, I saw it. Alvantes had known how this conversation would end before he'd ever started it. Moreover, whatever the reasons he'd given for choosing me, it was the one he hadn't said that clinched it. Guardsmen's lives mattered. Mine was expendable.

  I felt the first fluttering of panic. Here, then, was the price of my future. One last gamble. One final job.

  In my line of work, those never went well.

  We'd waited through the remainder of the night and the next day. The hours had passed interminably. I'd slept a little, in bursts that always ended with me starting awake, heart vibrating with vague fear. Navare had fed us, but I'd hardly tasted the watery stew he'd served up, or managed to stomach very much of it. Alvantes's men went out in small groups throughout the day, no doubt to listen for news from within the city. No one spoke much. Even Saltlick, sitting hunched in a corner, looked moody and dejected.

  I was almost glad when the time came. Risking my neck couldn't be worse than another minute in that cramped and increasingly ill-smelling room. My relief lasted fully as long as it took Alvantes to insist he be the one to accompany me. Anyone else would have had the decency at least to pretend they weren't keeping tabs on me.

  Even long after dark, the Suburbs were a riot of activity. Drinking, gambling and whoring were by far the most popular local activities, and none of those suffered from a lack of daylight. I hoped no one noticed the frown of disgust Alvantes wore beneath his hood as we wandered through the narrow, torchlit streets.

  As it turned out, however, no one seemed eager to pay us any attenti
on. Everyone we passed was conspicuously keeping to themselves, and looked shiftier than was required even for the Suburbs. Time and again, I noticed how their eyes darted towards the looming city walls.

  "They're nervous," I whispered to Alvantes, when no one was close. "Scared of the city."

  "Perhaps they're right to be."

  It was busier still by the waterside, for that was where the majority of drinking dens were to be found. Away from those havens of local culture, however, the din of shouted conversation died to a murmur. It wasn't too difficult to find a spot where we were out of sight – which made stealing a boat that much easier.

  "We're not stealing," muttered Alvantes. "We're borrowing."

  "That distinction means a lot to you, doesn't it?"

  "More than it ever has to you."

  Many of the Suburb-dwellers kept decrepit coracles and rowboats, for communing with passing river barges and fishing useful debris from the Casto Mara. We settled for a mould-blackened skiff that looked as though it might at least last the night. Even then, it floated much as a drunkard would walk, and leaked more than seemed reasonable.

  "I mentioned your plan is idiotic."

  "Quiet, Damasco. They'll be watching the bridge."

  The Sabre, the Castoval's largest river crossing, continued the northward boundary into Altapasaeda begun by the walls. It was the only entrance to the city not gated, which meant barricades and armed men if you wanted to keep unwelcome visitors out. Alvantes was right, of course; as we entered its vast shadow, I thought I could hear voices drifting through the stonework overhead.

  Of course, the first, most obviously cretinous flaw in Alvantes's so-called plan was that if they were watching the Sabre, there would certainly be archers guarding the dockside. I'd already decided that if we were spotted I'd take my chances in the river and hope the effort of perforating Alvantes kept them distracted long enough for me to make my escape.

  Then again, perhaps Alvantes wasn't quite the idiot I frequently took him for. Beneath the Sabre, he ma noeuvred us towards the bank, until we were close enough that our oar blades almost brushed the naked stone. Though we'd slipped from the impenetrable shadow beneath the bridge, we remained hidden by the harbour wall, higher here than where it dipped for the landing stages further on. Unless someone was directly above and looking down, we'd remain invisible.

  We were drawing close to the most objectionable part of Alvantes's scheme. Even if I hadn't known what to look for, the smell would have been a sure giveaway. It was a good job in a way, for the closer we drew, the more my eyes watered, until I could barely see at all. Through the tears, I could just make out a large round hole, levelled into a channel at the bottom. Something far too thick and viscous to be water flowed from its mouth into the river below.

  Of the virtues that made Altapasaeda unique, its sewers were the least spoken of. I suspected the wealthy brought them up in only the most drunken moments of dinner-party braggadocio. There was no question they were impressive in their way, though. I understood how much skill and thought must have gone into their construction – to harness two underground tributaries of the Casto Mara, to force them into the distasteful function of evacuating waste from the South Bank manors and the palace and temples further west.

  But some marvels were better appreciated at a distance – or not at all. Maybe there really were things in life more important than money. "Turn around," I said. "I can't do it."

  "Keep your voice down! You can and will."

  Whispering made it even harder not to gag. "The smell…"

  "You'll get used to it."

  "How do you know? When have you ever done this?"

  "You'd be surprised."

  I tore my eyes from the reeking outlet to look at him. "You're serious."

  "There's more to being Guard-Captain of Altapasaeda than someone like you could understand."

  "There you go again. Someone like me. That's the last one you get, Alvantes."

  I crouched, grasped the first of the metal rungs driven into the wall, swung myself over. If Alvantes could crawl through a sewer then Easie Damasco could as well.

  In the instant it took me to realise how absurd that logic was, Alvantes had already turned the boat around.

  "Hey!"

  "Remember… I'll wait under the bridge. Whistle three times."

  "Hold on…"

  Our muted conversation was interrupted by the rap of footsteps on the cobbles above, distant but drawing nearer. I cursed foully beneath my breath. There was only one place to hide. It was the sewer or handing myself over to whomever was approaching on the harbour wall.

  Even then, I had to think hard about it.

  Alvantes had given me a cloth to tie around my mouth and nose. It couldn't have helped less. The stink was dizzying. I could taste it, as though it plastered my throat and tongue. I could even feel it, a physical force buffeting me. It was impossible to break it down into component stenches. Yet every few moments a particular odour – rotten cabbage, spoiled meat, week-old slops – would force its way through the general miasma. The only constant was the reek of human waste.

  I moved crab-wise, back pressed to the wall. Not that the wall was anything like clean, but it was as far as I could get from the central channel. The stones beneath my feet were wet with slime – or what I chose to consider slime. My worst fear was that I'd lose my balance and plunge into that evil-smelling stream. The very thought made me want to scream. If I could have done it without opening my mouth, I might have.

  (Alvantes had refused me a light. "Believe me, Damasco, you don't want a naked flame down there."

  "Then how exactly am I supposed to find my way?"

  "It isn't far. You can't go wrong.")

  After minutes that seemed like hours, I was certain I'd done exactly that. I couldn't see the pale glimmer from the entrance any more. I couldn't see anything. There was only me, the wall, and the stench, wrapped like a living presence around me. Then I took another step, the wall behind me disappeared, and I really did scream. I tripped backwards, as the stink climbed into my throat.

  My hands found something cold and hard. I spun round, too close to vomiting to feel relief. I reached up. Sure enough, there was another rung.

  I flung myself up the ladder hammered into the wall, discovered the trapdoor at its top by crashing my head against it. For one horrible moment I was sure it wouldn't budge. However, one firm shove, with my hand this time, was all it took. I hauled myself the last distance, slammed the hatch behind me and flopped to the ground, panting blissfully fresh air.

  I'd come out in a closed courtyard, hemmed in by three low buildings and a shallow wall on the fourth side. One of those houses must belong to the poor wretch who maintained this stretch of sewer. Though it felt as if ages had passed, I couldn't be far from the river. Likely I was somewhere in the Lower Market District.

  Once I had my breath back and the worst of the sewer's aftertaste had passed, I scrambled to the top of the wall to get my bearings. Beyond was a narrow alley, opening onto a wider concourse to my right and another passageway to my left. If neither looked entirely familiar in the darkness, I still had a fair sense of where I must be.

  Having satisfied myself no one was nearby, I dropped down the far side of the wall. One advantage of my revoltingly unusual route into the city was that nobody would be eager to ask me questions. Then again, they might just skip the interrogation and move straight to grievous wounding. All told, the main roads were a bad idea.

  I opted instead for the passageway. It led roughly northward by my reckoning, in the direction of the walls. Those were something else I'd do well to avoid; but if my remembered map of the city was correct, I wouldn't be travelling anything like that far. In small recompense for its horrors, the sewer had deposited me almost on the doorstep of the address I sought.

  Sure enough, I soon passed through a cramped courtyard I recognised, and from there ducked into a dead-end lane, whose ramshackle houses leaned madly inwa
rd as though eager to touch roofs. Everything about those crumbling abodes spoke of poverty and desperation. In most cases, that was undoubtedly what lay behind their crooked portals. The door I opted for, however, was sturdy and – to the trained eye – doublelocked and reinforced. Though its occupant wasn't quite rich, the penury of his location was carefully chosen and studiously maintained.

  I rapped three times. After a few moments, a narrow hatch slid open, just wide enough for a pair of wrinkle-skewed eyes to peep through the gap.

  "Hello, Franco," I said.

  Franco had been old when I first came to Altapasaeda. He'd been around for so long that there were those who claimed he'd invented the very concept of crime. However, to say his best days were behind him was an understatement. They were so far in the past that probably even he didn't remember them. It didn't stop him from keeping a voracious eye on the city's underworld, though – that being the first and most crucial reason I'd sought him out.