Guilds & Glaives

by David Farland

  She fought back those racking sounds and continued: “Yeah, he’s young and he’s puny but he’s mine. I hauled the brat into Miss Lulu’s, to see if he belonged to any of the girls an’ they told me he was street sweepings. Showed up on the doorstep one night and acted worse’n a cat. Wouldn’t let ‘em take him in, wouldn’t move on, though he was willin’ enough to eat whatever they gave him. They gave him plenty, too, to hear them tell it. Far as we could learn, he was orphaned with nothing to his name but his name. Only keepsake he had from his kindred was a ring of braided goldy hair. Said it was his ma’s. Said yes when I asked if he’d like to range with me. It just seemed … right to take him on.” An odd look crossed her face when she said that. “We’ve been together ever since. Taught him all I know, I did, and damned thankful I trained him proper.”

  “Nice story, Mimosa,” I said. “Very touching. But what’s it got to do with—?”

  She didn’t give me time to finish the question, just undid her belt and dropped her breeches.

  I’ll tell you, friends, there was a sight I’ll not soon forget. Her flesh—well, it wasn’t flesh any more, not so’s you could call it by the name. Trolls are thick-skinned creatures, but this was leagues past that. Ankles, calves, knees, thighs, everything’d had gone hard and gray and crazed with countless cracks, every one of ‘em leakin’ grit. I cast a look around back of her and saw a trail of it in the street marking her passage up to the Guild house door. No denying the worst: Mimosa’d caught that scourge of all scourges, Rocky Pneumonia. It can sweep away a troll’s life that quick and completely unpredictable, leaving their ruined bodies as no more’n a heap of stone.

  I confess, I teared up something shameful when I saw what was afflicting her. Then she coughed and I just missed getting a blast of sand in the face. The disease had progressed even farther than I first thought. No wonder she wouldn’t come inside! A loyal Guild member to the last, she wouldn’t burden us with the effort and expense of hauling away several tons of her remains.

  “I’m sorry, Mimosa,” I said, and I meant every word. “It’s going to be hard on the Guild, losing you. You’re one of our oldest, most respected members. If there’s anything we can do—”

  “Take him,” she said, and shoved the young’n into my arms so sudden, so forceful, that the pair of us went tumbling backwards in a tangle. By the time we managed to get back on our feet again, she was gone.

  I suppose I could’ve trailed her by the grit, but what would be the use of that, except to rob her of the dignity of dying the way she wanted? I took the kid inside, gave him a place by the fire, a plate of bread and cheese, and a mug of cider. He dropped all of it, flung himself into my arms, and bawled. To tell you the truth—Lil, if I’ve got to tell you to shut up one more time, I’ll stuff a hamster in your gob, see if I don’t!

  Ahem. As I was saying, to speak truly, I joined my tears to his and we both mourned Mimosa together. He clung to his grief longer’n me, as you’d expect, yet even so, he came to accept his new circumstances eventually. You all remember how he was raised, eh? No single one of us guildfolk wanted the responsibility of replacing his foster ma. I would’ve done it—Mimosa did say she wanted me to have him—but with seven of my own kids at home, an eighth on the way, and a wife who pitched the sharp and heavy cookware at me for no reason whenever I came home, it wouldn’t’a been safe for him. Our brood knew how to duck. Ash might’ve been less adept.

  No one else volunteered to step in and help the boy. Our poorer brethren couldn’t hardly feed themselves, nor their own brats. Our more successful members picked up gentry ways and found excuses more readily than pity for the poor mite. Fact is, ‘twas Bela Goldtouch first suggested we make Ash’s upbringing a community project, so we found the lad some space in one of the Guild house storage closets, a bed that once belonged to old Goldtouch’s favorite hound, and added his feeding and training and such to the To Do list of anyone on duty. It worked.

  Except for the training. Even though Mimosa claimed she’d trained him proper, let’s just say that the hard evidence of it was sore lacking. I never met a being less cut out for the thief’s life. Ash was eager to please and he tried his best, such as it was, but he couldn’t even get the hang of a simple maneuver like Pennikin’s Grabchat or master the art of the Tilt-Topple-Toddle. When it was my lookout to give him lessons, I started him out with easy targets to build his confidence. I took him into dark alleys hard by the worst taverns in our fair city, a resting place for sodden drunkards sleeping it off so soundly that the rats managed to marry, start families, and raise their pups atop the poor guzzlers’ bellies. Some of ‘em—the sots, not the rats—wore their coinpurses so plain to see that a rank amateur could cut ‘em without laying so much as a fingertip on the client.

  Not our Ash. Whenever I’d sic him on a mark, the boy always managed to touch ‘em. Always. And not by accident, neither. I caught him doing it deliberate, putting a hand on the tosspot’s brow before going for the man’s purse. It roused the prey every time! What’s more, it brought ‘em back to their unaddled senses same as if they’d never had a drop of ale. Good thing we were both fast runners, in those days, else we’d’ve seen the whipping post or worse more times than I find healthy.

  It was no good remonsterating with him after. “Damn it all, Ash,” I’d say once I got my breath back. “Why’d you have to go and do that for?” He’d say sorry, and say he didn’t know why, just that it seemed like something he was supposed to do, and swear he wouldn’t do it again.

  But he did. Every time.

  “Now look here, boy,” I’d say. “You’re growing up. There’s likely lads younger’n you who’ve already passed from Trainee to ‘Prentice, and even some ready to take their Housebreaking exams. If the rest of us in the Guild didn’t hold your foster ma’s memory in such high regard, you’d’ve been out on your own hook long since. Is that how you want to live your life? As a debt and a burden on them as cares for you?”

  Because that was the truth: we all did care for Ash, even them of our proud membership who didn’t fancy kids at all, except as a side dish.

  Huh. I guess that joke worked better back when we still had a couple of ogres on the membership roll.

  Anyway, there was just something about the lad. We didn’t know what it was, back then in the lean times, and we didn’t have the leisure to think about it much. Too busy trying to earn our livelihoods while staying three steps ahead of Duke Sal’s patrols.

  For a while, we thought we’d found the answer: magic lessons. We had more’n one failed wizard in the ranks, men who’d done well enough learning the basics of the craft but washed out when it came to casting the serious spells. It never hurts to have a little of the old hey-presto-look-at-that-phantom-giant-marmot-I-just-whipped-up on your side when the lawmen got you cornered and you need a distraction. If the boy couldn’t filch, he could still learn a trick or two and be a valuable getaway asset for his cronies.

  Except no, he couldn’t. Grendel “Stumpwrist” Borgumvetter tried teaching Ash the simple tricks even he’d mastered before the incident that led him to earn his nickname. No joy, my friends, no joy. The lad could not deliver the goods on something as simple as a fake fireball spell. It was the fake part that tripped him up, and that’s why we had to rebuild the north tower. Twice.

  So we got on with our lives and we kept trying to turn Ash into a halfway decent thief and he kept bollixing up his every lesson until we simply couldn’t handle it no more and a Guildwide meeting was called.

  It was held here in the Guild house, as is only proper, and Ash was told to shut himself up in his storage closet and cover his ears until someone came to fetch him. It was a grim get-together, I’ll tell you that. We all knew what was coming: Mimosa or no Mimosa, we couldn’t afford to carry deadweight any longer. Jennie One-Eye-Seven-Fingers-Extra-Toe was weeping when she said what no one else had the heart for:

  “He won’t make ‘Prentice an’ he don’t make profit. He’s gotta go.”
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br />   I volunteered to give Ash the verdict, though I could feel my poor heart breaking with every step that took me closer to his hidey-hole. I could picture his face, especially those big, sad eyes of his. That boy could teach cats how to improve their gods-given talent for making a man feel guilty. By the time I rapped on the supply closet door, I’d resolved that I was going to adopt the lad right off and have it out with the wife later. She might get angry, but I trusted that one look at Ash’s gaze would bring her around.

  It wasn’t needful. I knocked at the door once, twice, three times, and … nothing. I opened the door slowly and found he was gone. All that remained was a message on the floor and the ring of braided golden hair he’d always carried with him. I guess he’d dropped that and never noticed.

  The message said: I know it’s wrong to eavesdrop but I couldn’t help it. I overheard what you all decided. I’m sorry I’m no good as a thief. I’m leaving and I’m not coming back until you can be proud of me. Thanks for everything. Love, Ash.

  Now here’s the funny thing—no, two of ‘em—about this:

  First off, he’d managed to sneak out of the Guild house without any of us being the wiser, which was really strange when you recall what a blunderfoot he was and how the only escape route passed through our meeting space.

  Second, he hadn’t left his farewell note on a scrap of paper or cloth or chalked up inside the closet, no. The letters were etched right into the stone wall, wide and deep enough for me to fit the first joint of my smallest finger. When I fetched the rest of meeting to witness this, more’n one of us swore they could smell the tang of something burnt. Someone suggested maybe it was done with sorcery, but ol’ Stumpwrist said Ash didn’t have the spell, the talent, nor the concentration needed to pull off a feat like that.

  We were still puzzling over this weeks later when word came about the public execution. You all remember who the main attraction of that little bit of street theater was gonna be, right?

  No, Lil, not me. Do I look executed to you?

  Don’t answer that.

  I broke with Guild policy and went to see it happen. We guildfolk know better’n to show our faces at executions. No sense giving the authorities any ideas. I didn’t care. I wasn’t about to let that boy go to his death without him seeing at least one friendly face in the crowd. I made sure to take that ring of braided hair with me. He was going to have his one treasure back in his hands when he died, I was set on that.

  The scaffold was set up in the plaza in front of the duke’s palace. The space was big enough to accommodate a healthy crowd and convenient enough for His Loathsome Lordship to have a good view of the proceedings while he had brunch and wenches on the second-floor terrace.

  I used all my skills to slip through the mob until I was close enough to the execution platform for my purposes. I was right by the path from the ducal dungeon to the three steps Ash would have to climb to meet his doom, close enough to reach out and tap the lad right quick when the guards brought him past. Good thing my hand could move like lightning in those days, else one of the duke’s hired swords would’ve lopped it off at the elbow for my daring.

  Ash turned his head at my touch and gave me a look so full of love and regret that I felt my lips begin to form the words, Don’t kill him, my lord! Take me instead. No idea where that came from. Not then.

  They marched him onto the platform kind of slow. That was odd, seeing as how the usual way was a brisk pace up the steps and over to the noose or the block or the cauldron or one of Duke Sal’s more inventive devices for parting souls from bodies. The guardsmen acted like they was … reluctant, you know? That, in spite of how some said they’d had their hearts replaced with lumps of sun-dried beef to keep ‘em from feeling anything human. Our Ash was young, but some of Duke Sal’s victims was younger yet. The guards could either lose their hearts or lose their minds.

  Did I hear one of you lot say, “Or lose their jobs”? Ha. And their heads along with that! Our duke always did have a different notion of employee severance.

  All of which made the guards’ actions even more bizarre. I caught a glimpse of Duke Sal’s face while his men dawdled Ash up the scaffold steps. He wasn’t happy. I swear, I could hear his teeth grinding, he was that furious at the delay. His fist closed over the jeweled medallion he always wore, the lawful mark of office passed down from one city ruler to the next. Fencing that gewgaw could provide funds to feed the poor hereabouts for half a year; more, if you threw in the thick gold chain it hung by. The commander of the guard was on duty up on the terrace and recognized the danger signs as the duke’s complexion went from its usual sallow shade to bright red, to deep crimson, to—what’s the name of that color? Puke?

  Oh, right, puce. Thanks, Lil.

  Like I was saying, when the commander saw Duke Sal’s face go through that rainbow-from-the-Demon-Teeming-Pits-of-Garnoth display, he acted fast, shouting at his men to move things along. Before you could say boo, Ash was on his knees at the block and the executioner was testing the ax, making sure the edge was nice and dull, just the way his nasty master liked it. A dull ax means it takes more than one chop to get the job done. That’s Duke Sal for you: rush the condemned to where they’ll die but make sure they take their painful time doing it.

  I shoved my way to a spot in front of the block and hissed Ash’s name real low. He looked right at me. The boy always did have the most uncanny keen hearing, like we all learned when he overheard that meeting. I held up the braided ring of hair and it would’ve broke a heart of iron to see the gratitude in his eyes.

  “I thought it was lost,” he murmured. His hands weren’t tied—Duke Sal got his jollies watching the futile way some poor souls tried fending off the ax—and he stretched them out to take the keepsake. The boy pressed that circlet of golden hair to his lips and wet it with his tears, then tucked it safe into the bosom of his tunic. He turned his gaze to the executioner and nodded. There was a grand dignity in that simple gesture, a calm acceptance of fate you don’t usually see in someone that young. The headsman jerked back, like a thunderbolt’d gone through him. He wore a half-mask for the job and everyone up close could see how he licked his lips nervously as Ash laid his head on the block.

  The ax rose, shaking. I gritted my teeth, saying a prayer that against all odds the blade fall straight and true and do the job in one blow. There wasn’t a single sound in the plaza. Even the dogs and the birds fell still.

  A roar from the duke’s terrace broke the spell. Old Sal was on his feet, bellowing with rage. “Do I have to do everything myself?” he shouted as he leaped over the stone railing. You wouldn’t think he was such a nimble bastard, to look at him, but he had no trouble landing on his feet from that height. The crowd fell back as he plowed his way to the scaffold. He grabbed Ash by the hair and yanked his head off the block.

  “What have you got there, damn you?” he demanded. Ash just crossed his hands on his chest. I began edging away, but I reckoned without the duke’s sharp eye. “Guards! There’s the man who gave it to him,” he said, jabbing a twiggy finger right at me. “Seize him!”

  That’s how I found myself sharing the scaffold—and likely the upcoming execution—with our Ash. Unlike the way they’d dealt with him, the guards didn’t show a crumb of reluctance when it came to pinning my arms behind me and awaiting the duke’s twisted pleasure.

  Duke Sal wasted no more time questioning his prisoner. He slapped Ash’s shielding hands aside and grabbed the boy’s tunic, tearing it wide. The glimmering ring of hair fell to the planks. The duke scooped it up and glared at it with all the lip-curling disgust you’d use while dangling a dead rat by the tail. “What is this filth?” he sneered.

  “Please, your grace, it was my mother’s,” Ash said. “I scarcely knew her before we were parted.” A few scattered sobs rose from the crowd to hear all the sorrow and yearning in the lad’s voice.

  “Indeed?” The duke grinned. He turned his head toward the terrace where his commander of the guards stil
l dithered and said a single word: “Torch.”

  The flame was brought fast. Duke Sal motioned for Ash to be hauled upright, then pressed the tiny golden wreath back into his grasp. “Burn it,” he snarled.

  Ash gaped at the heartless order, then shook his head. “I can’t, my lord. It’s all I ever had of her. You may do what you want with it—I’m powerless to prevent you—but I—I can’t do it,” he said.

  “You can and you will,” the duke replied. “For if you won’t, your friend here will have a death in my dungeon that will make him envy yours.” He grinned at me like a death’s head. It was all I could do to hold my water, I’ll swear to that. I closed my eyes and prayed that the Guild wouldn’t let my poor wife and kids starve once I was worm food.

  I heard Ash take a deep breath. “All right. I’ll do it,” he said.

  I opened my eyes and saw him holding the circlet of golden hair above the torch. “No, lad!” I shouted. “Don’t let this filthy bastard make you sacrifice what’s dear to you! He’ll kill me anyway, and slow, and make you watch while he gloats for having tricked you. Don’t—”

  One of the guards backhanded me hard, so hard my eyes were blinded with dancing lights and my mouth filled with blood. The duke laughed.

  “Come on, boy, do it! It’s rude to keep your betters waiting,” he called, in the best of humor. “Ha! But where are my manners? Calling you ‘boy’ when you’re facing a man’s doom. They told me your name is Ash. Is that so?”

  Our Ash bowed his head and answered, “Yes, m’lord.”

  “How fitting,” said Duke Sal. He grabbed Ash by the elbow and forced the lad’s hand into the flames.

  His hand and more. The duke made sure that Ash’s sleeve caught fire, too. My nostrils reeked and my belly churned at the smell of burning hair and flesh. The blaze raced up Ash’s arm and engulfed him so quickly that it was all the duke could do to leap back and save himself. The crowd shrieked and groaned and wailed, their hearts torn to witness such a barbaric death.