Crown Thief

by David Tallerman

  It was trust. Trust in me.

  "All right," I said. "Here's what we're going to do…"

  We gave it an hour.

  Alvantes and I stationed ourselves near the bend that closed off the cliff road, and Huero insisted on joining us. "You told Lupa you were going to talk with peasants, didn't you?" he said. "Well, I'm a peasant. Always better not to be caught in a lie."

  Meanwhile, Saltlick had taken his people further back towards the Hunch-proper, where they'd be well out of sight. If Lupa had spies out, as no one doubted he would, there would be no way for them to see the giants without passing us. I could only hope they'd give up when they saw us leave, not thinking to wait in case anyone should follow. The possibility that they would was the first great risk in a plan that seemed to consist of little else but risks.

  Everything rested on the element of surprise. Without it, we were all dead.

  The hour passed, Alvantes and I set out by starlight for the town gates, while Huero headed in the other direction, a final corroboration of our story for anyone who might be watching. At the entrance to town, the two thugs who'd escorted us were waiting, slouched against the arch of the already open portal. They didn't acknowledge our return, except to draw the gates shut after we'd ridden past. Then they led us once again up Dancer's Way, back towards Lupa's gaudy mayoral mansion.

  Alvantes and I rode as slowly as we dared. In the unlit streets, it wasn't difficult to encourage a leisurely pace. Almost as much as surprise, we needed time on our side. Every moment of delay was a moment in our favour.

  Still, our arrival at the mansion-barn seemed to come all too quickly. This time, there were nearly a dozen of Lupa's fake guards waiting outside. Security had obviously risen in Lupa's priorities since our last visit.

  We dismounted, let ourselves be led inside.

  Everything was practically as we'd left it. Lupa and Estrada still sat in their respective places on the platform. Here as outside, the only difference was in the increased number of armed men spaced around the walls. Whether or not Lupa was really expecting some move on Alvantes's part, he certainly wasn't worried about giving the impression of distrust.

  Yet his tone was hearty as he called, "Guard-Captain, good to have you back. You've had ample time to consider, I trust?"

  "I have," replied Alvantes.

  "And you've concluded, no doubt, that what is right for Mayor Estrada here, what's right for Mounteban and the people of Altapasaeda, is right for you too. You can return to your post – and so long as you keep yourself within the bounds of the new regime, your life can more or less return to what it was before all this… unpleasantness."

  Alvantes's face gave nothing away. "Yes. A nice idea – in theory. What I'd like to know is what I can expect in practise. Do you have leave to talk terms on Mounteban's behalf?"

  Lupa looked uncomfortable. "Terms? Well… to a degree, of course."

  "A degree? Lupa, can you negotiate or not?"

  "Certainly, if a little negotiation is called for, then…"

  "If it's called for? If you're offering me a job, surely I've a right to discuss details?"

  Despite my fears, despite all my doubts, it was hard not to enjoy the show Alvantes was putting on. Even he seemed to be warming to his part. I'd told him to keep the conversation going for as long as possible, but I was beginning to suspect he had far more in mind than that.

  Lupa flicked sweat from his brow with a rubbery palm. "Guard-Captain. The situation is one where compromise on your part is both expected and required. You must see that…"

  "You must see that this arrangement of Mounteban's is one possibility amongst many. I have other options, Lupa."

  "But would those options be so beneficial to all involved?" Lupa made no effort to hide the sudden edge of danger in his voice. "To the good folk of Altapasaeda, say, or to my lovely co-mayor?"

  "I hope that wasn't a threat."

  "A threat? Aren't we simply discussing possibilities and their repercussions, as civilised men will?"

  "Because," continued Alvantes, "the only good threat is one you can back up."

  As though on cue, a booming crash assailed the room. It came from the direction of the western walls, and resounded for a very long time. Even if I hadn't been expecting it, I'd have recognised the crunch of falling masonry.

  Lupa almost jumped from his great seat. I watched his expression vacillate between horror and denial. "Perhaps," he said, "you haven't noticed how many of my men surround you?"

  Alvantes smiled – and if that smile chilled my blood, I could only imagine what effect it had on Lupa. "It might take more than a few men."

  From outside came a beat like a hundred great drums pounding with no guiding rhythm. It was steady, and it was rapidly drawing nearer.

  Lupa cocked his head towards it, his eyes round. "Whatever it is you're doing, make it stop!"

  Alvantes held his one hand up, palm out. "I'm doing nothing."

  "Whatever that is…"

  Outside, someone shouted. Another voice joined the first, and another. Then they were drowned out by the hammering swell of noise.

  Just as it seemed about to overwhelm us, the cacophony abated. It was the briefest reprieve – barely enough for Lupa to begin a sigh of relief. A moment later, impacts resounded from all four walls, each deafeningly loud. A shiver ran through the floor, setting every man, every piece of furniture, quivering like a tuning fork.

  "Damn you!" Lupa had to bellow to make himself heard. "Stop this!"

  "Stop what?" Alvantes looked perfectly, terrifyingly at ease amidst the chaos. Dust rained from the ceiling. Chunks of brick rolled in cascades from its edges, as if a great fist were closing around the building. Lupa's lackeys stumbled towards the centre, arms raised to shield their heads.

  Then everyone looked skyward, all together.

  Everyone except Alvantes and me. I didn't need to look. I knew the roof had begun to heave aside, buoyed upon a sea of massive hands. Instead, I pictured the scene outside in my mind's eye. Saltlick had brought only a quarter of the giants, the youngest and strongest. That still meant more than twenty, each twice the height of a man – and each more than capable of reaching the top of the walls.

  Maybe some of Lupa's lackeys would attack them. I hoped against hope they'd be too afraid, but fear was as likely to make them dangerous and stupid. Perhaps swords would be unsheathed. Perhaps arrows would be loosed.

  The giants were tough. I'd seen Saltlick shrug off wounds that would have felled a man on the spot. Every one of them had endured Moaradrid's battle against the Castovalians, and all the hardships that had followed. They would keep going. And if a mob of giants tearing the roof from a building was a chilling sight, how much worse if those giants seemed impervious to pain, oblivious to injury? Cowards – and the kind of men who followed a creature like Lupa were always cowards – would not fight an unwinnable fight for long.

  At least, that was what I kept fervently telling myself.

  "Make it stop! Agree to Mounteban's proposal!" screamed Lupa.

  "I have an alternative proposal," shouted Alvantes over the din of tumbling masonry. "You and your men leave Muena Palaiya tonight."

  As he spoke, Alvantes began walking unhurriedly across the space between them. With each step, Lupa cowered deeper into his makeshift throne.

  "You'll go back to Castilio Mounteban," Alvantes continued, "like the lapdog you are, and you'll carry him this message. Muena Palaiya is off limits. Soon, Altapasaeda will be too. Then there'll be no rock anywhere big enough to hide him."

  Alvantes stepped onto the low platform.

  "Or, if that's all too much to remember, simply tell him this."

  One last step brought his face a hand's breadth from Lupa's.

  "Tell him we're coming for him next."

  Abruptly, Lupa tumbled from his throne. It looked as though he'd tipped over in his panic – but in another moment, he'd dragged Estrada from her seat, and had a knife pressed to her neck. It w
as a short blade, hardly more than a stiletto. That didn't change the possibilities of what it would do to Estrada's throat.

  "I'll kill her!" Lupa's voice was a squeak now, quite unlike his usual croak. The expression on his face was one of sheerest terror.

  Alvantes made no move towards him. "You won't," he said. "I know you, Lupa. You're gutless through and through."

  "Tell them to stop!"

  "I couldn't if I wanted to."

  "I'll kill her."

  "No, you won't."

  Lupa twitched massively, as though lightning had jolted his rubbery body. Suddenly, the noise of the giants' impromptu demolition was gone, leaving weighty silence in its wake. Lupa's eyes swung up, acknowledged the naked rectangle of night sky above.

  He dropped the knife. It clattered off the platform, spun, lay still. "No," he said. "I won't."

  "Leave," Alvantes told him. "Take your men. If you're not gone in an hour…" Alvantes also turned his gaze upward, studied the cavity that until recently had been the roof. "Well. That could just as easily have been your head."

  Lupa nodded ponderously, eyes not leaving the starspecked blackness overhead. For all his swollen bulk, he looked small before Alvantes. He climbed from the platform, with a grunt of exertion. When he stumbled towards the doors, his men fell in behind him. Every one looked petrified at the prospect of what awaited them outside – but no less scared at the prospect of staying to face this man who commanded monsters.

  Perhaps they'd have been less afraid if they'd stayed to see the tenderness with which Alvantes held out his hand to Estrada. "Marina. Are you all right?"

  She managed a tentative smile. Even from a distance, I could see she was shaking. "Yes. No. Not really." She reached with slim fingers to touch Alvantes's arm.

  Then suddenly, with no intervening movement that I could make out, they were holding each other – hanging on to each other fiercely.

  Even I could recognise two people in need of privacy. I turned away.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  I was happy to give Alvantes and Estrada a little privacy. The sight of so many costly and easily pocketed knick-knacks arrayed around the room had awakened an instinct recently dormant. For the first time in days, I felt an almost uncontrollable need to steal something.

  I turned back at the sound of Alvantes's yelped "Ow!" in time to witness the last of the ringing slap Estrada had struck him across the face.

  "But damn you, what made you think I needed saving?" she demanded, her voice wavering at some indefinable point between anger and tears. "And how dare you behave as if I'm some damsel in distress?"

  "It was Damasco's idea," Alvantes replied, not without a note of petulance.

  "That's right," I told him, "blame it on me. Of course, left to your own devices you'd have either surrendered to Mounteban or charged in here single-handed." Realising what I'd just said, I added hastily, "We just wanted to help, Estrada."

  "Both of you," she said, "what were you thinking? I had everything under control. I have friends here. We'd have dealt with Lupa, sooner or later. Now he's going to run back to Mounteban and likely return with three times as many of his thugs."

  "No," said Alvantes, "he isn't."

  "You can't be sure of that."

  "Yes, I can. I meant what I told Lupa. Mounteban's time in Altapasaeda is over."

  "So you'll charge in there like you did here? Probably get yourself killed?"

  "If that's what it takes." There was a note of baffled anger rising in Alvantes's voice.

  "No, you won't, damn it! I won't let you."

  "Let me? Marina, it isn't your decision. Just as I, apparently, had no say in you staying here alone to be molested by Mounteban's lackey."

  "I can assure you," said Estrada icily, "that Lupa never came anywhere near molesting me."

  What was wrong with these two? Even watching them shout, it was impossible to miss the attraction between them. "Will you both be quiet!" I cried. "Estrada, you're safe and Lupa's gone. Alvantes, you've just rescued the woman you love. So maybe the recriminations can wait until tomorrow – or at least until we've had some dinner."

  I was surprised by Alvantes's failure to come over and strangle me, even more so by the flush of crimson in his cheeks. It never failed to amuse me how helpless the man was in the face of his own emotions. Fortunately for them both, Estrada was a little more capable. With a small step forward, rising on her toes, she replaced her arms around Alvantes's neck – more gently this time, less urgently. "I'm sorry," she said, "and thank you, Lunto. I would have dealt with him. But I'm glad I didn't have to."

  Then, before I could realise what was happening, she'd released Alvantes, darted from the stage and wrapped me in a suffocating embrace. "Thank you too, Easie. It was brave of you to come here."

  I levered her far enough away that I could draw air. "It was this or another night sleeping in a ditch," I said. "Now can we please get out of here?"

  Outside, the giants were already gone. We'd agreed that they'd spend as little time within Muena Palaiya as possible, lest the entire town be reduced to panic. The roof of the barn-cum-mansion was propped carefully against its flank. To the west, I could see the crescent scar in the town wall where they'd made their entrance. It was an unsettling sight – strangely, less because of the extent of the damage than its orderliness. Men could have achieved such destruction, but only giants could have made it look so neat and easy.

  There was no sign of Lupa or his henchmen. I couldn't believe he'd dare try to stay. Whether Alvantes had made the right call in letting him run back to Mounteban was another question – but that was a problem for tomorrow and for someone other than me. With Saltlick and Estrada safe, my part was played.

  Speaking of which… "Estrada," I said, "there's someone waiting outside town who I think would be glad to see you safe."

  Her face lit at the realisation of whom I meant. We found our horses tied in a stable abutting the building and, Estrada mounted behind Alvantes, we headed for the fourth time that night down Dancer's Way. With no one standing guard upon the gates, we had to open them ourselves; still, it was worth a little effort for so clear a sign that Muena Palaiya was free of Lupa's thugs.

  We rode in silence across the scantily wooded ground outside the town. Turning onto the northern cliff road, I thought at first that the giants must still be hiding further along – until they edged in ones and twos from the shade of the cliffs.

  The sight sent a shudder down my spine. I understood then that nothing Lupa did, no amount of cajolery or bribing, would make his men return to Muena Palaiya. If I'd witnessed these colossi tear the roof from a building, no reward or threat would make me cross their path again.

  They all looked more or less identical to me in the gloom. Saltlick's eyes were evidently better than mine, for he rushed forward with a bellow of "Marina!"

  "Saltlick! Oh, it's so good to see you." Estrada looked as though she'd have liked to fling her arms around him too. She settled for clasping her two hands round one of his. "And your people are here. Thank you so much for what you did."

  "Glad to help," Saltlick replied, framing the unfamiliar syllables carefully.

  Estrada stepped back to appraise him. "Around your neck… is that…?"

  He nodded bashfully.

  "It… ah… it suits you."

  "There's a story there," I inserted.

  "I don't doubt," said Estrada, an invisible smile clear in her voice. To Saltlick she said, "We need to get you and your people out of this cold."

  "Not cold," he replied.

  "Nonsense. Give me an hour and we'll see what Muena Palaiya's hospitality can produce."

  All of a sudden, Estrada was full of energy and good cheer. I wondered if I was the only one to notice the fragility behind it. It was as if, Lupa gone, she felt the need to prove herself once more as the woman who could lead a town as well as or better than any man. I wasn't at all surprised when despite the late hour she managed to not only rouse a party o
f volunteers but to have them construct a giant-scaled shanty town on the waste ground outside Muena Palaiya that put the one we'd left two days ago to shame.

  I was so entertained by watching the workmen labour frantically to meet Estrada's near-impossible deadline – whilst keeping as far away as possible from the giants – that I hardly realised how exhausted I was. Only as the show drew towards a close did I properly notice the yawns threatening to dislocate my jaw. I was relieved when Estrada materialised from the darkness, Alvantes in tow, and said, "I've arranged tavern rooms for you."