Half a block. Ryle’s chest and throat ached. Every breath burned like he sucked air from a forge.
Ogrif shoved the door open and looked back, hunched over, his face pouring with sweat. There was pain in his eyes, but he was smiling.
Lastrahn’s mission was slipping from Ryle’s fingers, and with it any hope of finding his father. He pushed harder, knowing it was useless.
Sudden panic erased Ogrif’s smile, then he was yanked backward through the doorway.
Ryle grabbed for his sword. Lastrahn loomed in the doorway. Ryle’s mind reeled as he collapsed against the doorframe.
“What—” he started to ask.
Lastrahn jerked him inside, and slammed the door.
Ow. Just, ow.
Rattling hisses and gasps filled the room. It might’ve been Ryle or Ogrif, he couldn’t tell. It wasn’t Lastrahn; he remained unfazed. He wasn’t even sweating. The bastard.
Dim light entering through the remains of a window on the far wall illuminated a bare floor of rough boards, a wooden desk and chair. Opposite them, a narrow wooden staircase ascended out of sight to a second floor.
Ogrif lay curled in the corner, gasping. More hisses, and clanks filled the air. Somehow they were coming from the small man.
After a minute Ryle pulled himself to his feet and stumbled to where Lastrahn stood over Ogrif.
“Let’s hear it.” Lastrahn’s voice was pitched low. “Tell me where Hartvau is going tonight.”
Ryle gasped as he got a look at Ogrif. The man’s pants were shredded to his knees, and wooden feet and metal legs gleamed through dust and dirt.
Ogrif croaked out a rough laugh. A puff of steam leaked out along his neck. A rough clunk sounded from the hump on his back beneath his vest.
Sucking hex. The man was half steam engine and oldcraft. It made Ryle feel slightly better about his inability to chase the man down.
“Not bad,” Ogrif said. “Your man. He’s pretty fast, and I’m too old. A few years ago, it would’ve been a different story.”
Ryle believed him.
“Answer the question,” Lastrahn said.
“How’d you find me here?” Ogrif gasped.
Lastrahn sneered. “Six years ago you called me and a crew here to get you out of the city. Called it your ‘rat hole.’”
Ogrif’s head fell back against the wall with a thump.
“Tonight, Ogrif,” Lastrahn demanded.
Ryle’s breath slowly came back under control. Ogrif’s did not. He wheezed harder, his chest rising and falling rapidly. The hisses and clanks faltered, petered out.
A bad feeling seized Ryle.
Lastrahn frowned. “Ogrif.”
No response.
Lastrahn nudged him with the toe of his boot. Ogrif stopped wheezing, he let out a breath and didn’t draw another.
“Shit!” Lastrahn grabbed Ogrif and pulled him away from the wall.
Ryle crouched at his side. He remembered the sickening crunch as Ogrif crashed into the edge of the roof, and he ripped Ogrif’s shirt open. An enormous crimson and purple bruise was forming on his chest. Angry red marks radiated out along his ribs and up this throat. Ogrif’s eyes rolled back, and he fell still.
Ryle looked to Lastrahn. The champion’s eyes blazed, at Ryle, at Ogrif, at the entire city. He half expected Lastrahn to lash out. Instead his master drew a long hissing breath. When he let it out, his eyes went cold and his hands started across Ogrif’s body in quick efficient motions, patting him down, checking pockets. Ryle followed suit, his own hands feeling numb, his chest hurting for entirely different reasons.
They pulled loose coins, wads of parchment, paper tags on strings, a smelly bag Ryle dared not open, and a pocket knife with a pearl handle. Ogrif’s leather sack of coins had disappeared, but Lastrahn yanked the necklaces from his neck. None of his belongings looked especially useful, but everything went into the champion’s pockets.
And that was it. Their only lead in this chaff sucking city lay dead and cooling on the floor. And it was Ryle’s fault.
He backed away from Ogrif’s body until he stumbled against the stairs and let himself collapse. He sat motionless there for a while, staring at everything and nothing at the same time.
At some point Lastrahn stood and turned to the broken window. His back straight, his hands squeezed into fists. Glass crunched under his boots.
Silence filled the room, heavy, and oppressive but fragile at the same time. The strain of it almost killed Ryle, but he didn’t want it to break because he knew the words Lastrahn would speak. Their mission was over. The trail cold. Now he would be kicked to the gutter.
Other words sliced uncontrolled through his mind. Ragged, hot, and bloody. Time and again you fail. Nothing changes. And nothing will. Do something useful with that knife for once and cut your own throat. That would make me smile. He’d heard those words many times, echoing through many dark nights. Kilgren had really been one hex of a gentle soul.
Ryle couldn’t push it all away this time. He simply didn’t have the strength. His back hurt, his hands burned, his throat ached. But nothing compared to the pain inside his skull. The mission was ruined; the entire realm was doomed. And his father—he could already picture Kilgren slipping back into the shadows once more. Lurking, ready to sow further chaos.
A new, fresher memory clawed its way through the gruel of Ryle’s brain. Dark burning eyes and a murderous smile. Just like the night that had thrown his life out into the cold dark.
He couldn’t guess at the odds. How was he the one following Lastrahn? Ryle knew only two Praeters in the whole blasted realm, and one of them was dead. He’d left this one behind with his father after Kilgren had betrayed his family. Now Ryle stumbled into him again while looking for the same. Was that the connection? Were his father’s mad schemes still entangling him after all these years?
It hurt to even think about, but one thing was clear, he had to tell Lastrahn. Ryle cursed bitterly when he realized that he’d be the one to break the silence.
He cleared his raw throat. “There was a Praeter up there. On the roofs.”
For a few long breaths Lastrahn didn’t respond, he didn’t move a muscle. When he finally spoke, so much time had passed that the champion’s voice made him start. “Describe him.”
Ryle didn’t have to try hard to remember. Every line of the man’s face was etched into his mind. That part was easy to recount; the rest burned in his chest. He knew more. Clues that might make a difference. Connections that might mean something to Lastrahn. But they were details Ryle couldn’t know. Not without revealing who he really was.
In the end he couldn’t make himself say them, and his words trailed off.
“I see.” Lastrahn said before he fell silent again.
Shame and rage scalded Ryle’s insides. Tears seared his eyes, but he wouldn’t let them fall. He didn’t realize he was shaking until he heard his teeth chattering. He clenched his jaw so Lastrahn wouldn’t notice.
Minutes stretched on. The light in the room shifted until Lastrahn’s shadow stretched back to conceal Ogrif’s waxy features. Ryle barely noticed. He’d long since stopped seeing the man he’d chased to his death.
He didn’t realize Lastrahn was moving until the shattered glass crunched again. He looked up as Lastrahn crossed to the front door. Would Lastrahn make it clear he was no longer needed? Or would he walk just walk out and leave him behind?
Lastrahn pulled the door open. Afternoon light poured in and Ryle saw the crowds outside had thinned even further. Even if the words hurt, Ryle needed him to end it. He needed to know it was over. “Sir?”
The champion looked back over his shoulder, and Ryle steeled himself. “Get your ass up. We need to see a man about a party.”
CHAPTER 30
On the edge of Purses, at the center of a small plaza, a lone wooden post rose from the paving stones. It might’ve been a tree trunk once, but Ryle couldn’t tell because it was coated in bits of white, yellow, and brown pape
r that fluttered in the wind. Amidst those, garish shades of violet and green stood out like flowers in a field. He couldn’t guess how many layers encased the thing.
Dark clouds pressed upon the city. Hours remained until sunset, but the light was already failing. The air felt thick and tight, like wet wool wrapped around his skull. An unremitting ache throbbed at the base of his neck.
A sea of children ran around the post. The scene held a macabre feeling he couldn’t place until they circled the plaza further. Then he saw the wooden arm extending from the post. A lantern dangled there instead of a hangman’s noose.
Lovely, and fitting for good old Del’atre. He shook his head, but stopped when his neck screamed in protest.
Beneath this lantern, small children darted to the post, handed papers to older children, and ran off again.
Ryle’s initial guess that this was a bizarre quirk of the holiday quickly proved incorrect. Their movements were too efficient, their faces too serious. This was no game. A small letter S tattooed below each child’s right eye only added to the bizarre scene.
A pair of them, brown haired, barefoot, and no older than nine, shot past, bits of paper fluttering in their fists. He thought he also glimpsed an S tattooed in the web of their right hands.
Lastrahn paid them no mind and headed to the post. Ryle followed behind wondering at this curiosity.
He and Lastrahn weren’t the only adults in the vicinity. Other men and women dressed in clothing ranging from high hats and silken gowns, to dirty caps and worn through shoes were coming and going. Each would approach one of the older children and exchange coins for bits of paper before departing.
Ryle finally decided the whole thing must be some kind of message relay. No doubt another artifact of the city’s obsession with secrecy.
Lastrahn approached a teenaged lad and made his own exchange with a few of Ogrif’s coins then moved to edge of the plaza to inspect the papers he’d received.
There were three pieces, a much thinner stack than Ferrel had back at the inn. Lastrahn didn’t look pleased.
Based on the thickness of the papers and the complexity of their wax seals, they looked like missives from people of some means. Ryle didn’t want to jump to conclusions, but he kept thinking about the questions Lastrahn asked about Houses and who was in power.
While Lastrahn read the letters Ryle paced back and forth in a short arc. His abused joints kept trying to seize up. His shoulder was already a constant, throbbing, ache. He flexed his hands in his jacket pockets. The burns on his palms throbbed. The soft line of the old scar on the left tugged at the skin. He was lucky that his thick callouses had prevented a couple nasty gashes, but his gloves had been ruined and discarded. From here on, his hands would stay in his pockets. He didn’t want his swordmark drawing any more attention they didn’t need.
The rest of his clothes weren’t in much better shape. His thick leather and wool jacket had saved his back from scrapes, but his legs hadn’t been so lucky. His pants were torn in several places. Beneath them his legs felt equally abused.
As Lastrahn inspected the papers his face shifted between grimaces, frowns, and one half-smile. Not all bad news then. Ryle wondered if it would be good enough to offset this enormous setback.
He spotted a couple bald men across the square, but none were him. His eyes flickered up to the roofline, but he found no looming figures.
Lastrahn tucked the papers into his coat.
“Good news, Sir?”
Instead of answering, the champion produced a new sheet of paper and a stub of pencil and motioned for Ryle to spin around so he could write on his back. When Lastrahn finished he held up the paper and a swarm of children descended on him. He selected the oldest of the bunch, a straw-blonde girl of perhaps twelve in a somewhat clean shirt and short pants. He handed her the paper along with another of Ogrif’s coins and the words, “Lady Volvare.”
She took off as if launched from a trebuchet, and vanished into the sea of children. Lastrahn headed in the opposite direction and left the plaza.
Ryle’s guess about Lastrahn contacting Houses had proved correct. Though he still didn’t know how it might improve their situation. “What’s the plan, Sir?”
“We see a man.”
Irritation ground against the inside of his skull. “He have a name?”
Lastrahn looked sideways. “Most do.”
More unsatisfied than ever by the champion’s constant secrecy, Ryle trudged along beside Lastrahn on hollow legs. Fatigue hung around his neck, but he’d be blasted before he gave into it. There might be Praeters and Skivers, and who knew what the hex else out there. He swept the streets and rooflines again, checked their tail for the dozenth time. Faces flowed past, and none of them stood out.
“Tell me what it was like training with the Maelstrom,” Lastrahn suddenly said.
“Sir?”
“People say Mero’s a harsh bastard. A sandstorm with a face.”
He wanted to talk about this now? Blast he had the worst timing. Ryle tried to answer his question without losing focus on the crowd. Sandstorm with a face. He doubted anyone would call the Professor that to his face. “He’s strict, Sir.”
Lastrahn’s lips twisted. “I know he’s more than that. I’ve heard stories of the extreme methods inside his walls.”
Ryle’s mind reeled back along that spool of time. You couldn’t undergo the Professor’s treatment and not think he was crazy. At least at first, but then you overcome the first impossible task, and the next, and you wonder what else you could accomplish if you pushed yourself.
The tattoo across the back of his sword hand tingled. The seal was sought after for a reason, and somehow, he’d earned it. “The Professor gets results, Sir.”
They turned a corner and a loud group of singing men stumbled past. Mugs of ale filled all of their hands. Their tune sounded like a war march.
“I’ve heard stories,” Lastrahn said. “Days of training at a time. Tests of speed and strength that leave students crippled. Duels to the death among classmates.”
Ryle wasn’t sure if he was serious, but his master watched him from the corner of his eye. Waiting for an answer.
They’d all sworn not to discuss the training, but Lastrahn wasn’t far off. Snippets of time flooded back, strangely cleansed of the suffering. The way a practice stick creaked in his hands. The old, worn, stink of the mats. How his blood looked as it splattered the floor. All that work, days of it, and here he was slogging along because he was tired from lack of sleep and a short chase. He shook himself free of the memories, drew his head up and shoulders back.
“The training was hard, but, no, students didn’t fight to the death, Sir.” No one would graduate if the Professor allowed that.
Lastrahn turned into an open stone doorway and started down a descending spiral staircase. Ryle’s throat twinged with all too familiar tightness, but he followed after the champion. A few dozen steps later they emerged onto another street, and Ryle knew exactly where they were. His thoughts took a second to catch up after that.
Red lit lamps cast the underground street in dark, seductive tones. Men and women, wearing little more than glitter and gauze, leaned from second story balconies, and beckoned with subtle movements and brazen looks.
Ryle stared, felt himself blushing, and turned away. His eyes landed upon the muscled silhouette of a man dancing in a street level window. The clarity of his shadow made his lack of clothing starkly apparent. A doorway beside the window emitted a music of soft strings and a scent like jasmine. Beside the door, a dark haired young man wearing a white vest over his bare chest, smiled and gestured inside. A pair of laughing bearded fellows hurried through the door.
Ryle’s face burned. He thought Lastrahn chuckled.
He shouldn’t have been shocked. He stood on one of the most infamous streets in the world. The Satin Road. The underground Satin Road, and on the rowdiest day of the year.
Cheering crowds waving black and yellow banner
s spilled from huge sprawling bars. Nearby, patrons of dim lit lounges lay akimbo upon cushions, surrounded by the strange-scented substances they smoked or imbibed.
A thick-chested man walked past, a woman under each arm, a bottle in each hand. Their short dresses were beyond sheer, their makeup thick as a mask. They were unbuttoning his shirt as they headed for the nearest doorway.
This dark world was so distant from the wealth and poverty in the rest of the city. Was this the true beating heart of Del’atre? Did this passion drive the rest of the city? Or was this something else? Some deep-seated madness to be expelled, like the hot breath of a thousand fevered souls.
Casyne would love this place. The wildness, the discarding of propriety, the freedom. It was if the street was made for her. She’d want to revel and partake, and experience it all. Ryle laughed to himself. That would last until she discovered all this wildness came at a price. Malevolent forces behind the scenes probably drove it for commercial purposes, forcing at least some of these people into these positions. And then she’d want to go after them, pull them from their holes and cause her own form of chaos.
Ryle felt her there beside him, soaking it in, turning her sunshine eyes on him, and smirking. And then, like everything soft and warm in his life, the moment passed, and he clenched his jaw against the ache behind his breastbone.
When Lastrahn spoke a minute later, it took an effort to drag his attention back.
“If you trained with Mero then you must’ve dueled,” Lastrahn said.
Blast, again with this. Ryle drew a breath to gather his thoughts. “I did,” he finally said with some reluctance.
The idea of dueling for coins disgusted him. but he’d eventually learned to cherish the Professor’s commitment to the art of one-on-one combat. The true soul of it, not some sport for the seething masses. Picking up a sword and facing your opponent head on carried more honor than he’d ever seen with his father.
Gearspire: Advent Page 26
