Aftermath tw-10

by Robert Asprin

  "For three nights I waited,"-he stood up, his muscles taut with the memory-"until they went to sleep. Then I took my rope and brick, and one by one I found those who had done it." His eyes were wild. "I found them." He sighed. "I caught them and I smashed them with the brick." His hand pounded the air. "I smashed them over and^over and over." He took a deep breath, then stood still.

  "I found them. I didn't kill them. I found them and afterwards they never drew either." He sat down, not looking at her. "Terrel was thir- teen. I was eleven ..."

  The room was quiet. Sarah stared at Cade, but he would not look at her. She realized he was embarrassed. He had told her something that he hadn't had to, at least not that way. He had showed her his secret. In it she knew was the real Cade, the answer to all his riddles, but she could not see it. All she could think of was Cade. He had only been about Toth's age ...

  "Sarah-" Now his voice was soft, and he hadn't used that tone with her before. "Whoever killed him knew; knew what had happened to him; knew of his fears."

  "He still had nightmares," she answered.

  "I thought so. They knew, Sarah, and I don't know how. But I do know the answer is in Downwind. And it's there I have to go ..."

  Cade stood at the end of the decrepit bridge. Across its rotting length lay his goal-Downwind.

  The smell from the slow-moving White Foal River was noxious, full of refuse and dead things. Cade ignored it. After all, it should smell like home to him.

  He wore old riding leathers with a weather-stained cloak thrown over them. He carried his sword openly, though several other weapons were concealed about his body. He looked like a down-and-out mercenary, between jobs, but one who knew his business well. Tough enough looking that the dregs of Downwind would leave him alone, obscure enough not to draw attention, except from those who noticed the warbraid and knew what it meant.

  The answer was here in Downwind. At first Cade thought he would have to find Zip, the leader of PFLS, and now apparently one of the military officers of Sanctuary. Cade didn't want to deal with the powers of Sanctuary if he could help it. There were several he'd rather not have to tangle with if possible. Take that madwoman Chenaya, building an army of gladiators. He smiled at the thought. Gladiators! Gladiators made poor soldiers, and were hardly equipped for the streets of Sanctu- ary. Everybody was insane here ...

  It seemed Zip had made several mistakes, and the PFLS had fractured into at least three recognizable factions. The hard-core stayed loyal to their charismatic leader, but some of the less patriotic and more power- minded had gone their own way. Cade followed the trail that led to money, and in a town like Sanctuary there were three quick ways of making money; prostitution, drugs, and slavery. The whorehouses were well controlled here. They were an important part of Sanctuary's econ- omy. And the slavery, well it seemed Jubal used to control that, probably still did, but there were rumors on the streets of a new organization.

  But whoever they were, they weren't in business yet when Terrel was caught, so the answer was drugs. That's where the faint trail became as clear as a paved road. Whatever Terrel had run first, he had ended up running drugs, something Cade doubted his brother had been too pleased about. That didn't fit into his image of a revolution. But the goals of the revolution had been revised, and the new rules were made here, in Down- wind.

  The many gangs of Downwind had become more entrenched in the last few years, less like youth gangs and more like organized crime fami- lies. The largest, next to the beggar king's, was a gang called the Sharp Side. A gang that ran a good portion of Downwind, a gang that con- trolled Cade's old turf and it seemed, much more. A gang that had originally been part of the PFLS, but had re-formed in the last months, re-formed to take control of some of the contacts once run by Zip. A gang that now ran a third of the drug trade in Sanctuary.

  So. It had all been there, easy to read, once you saw the pattern. Now Cade had to find the Sharp Side, and find out who had given the orders. Why they'd given them. And then he'd make them pay.

  Casually he strolled across the bridge, giving no outward sign of the fast beating of his heart, his disgust and agony, his despair.

  Slowly he headed toward his old house, his inmost self creating an ineffective shield against the world that passed before his eyes. Down- wind was pain, for its inhabitants and for any with the eyes to see. All about him, as he wound his way through the filth-strewn streets, the nightmare was acted out. The adults were empty husks of aimless mo- tion, the children dirty and mean. The toddlers plodded about, un- watched, their distended stomachs seeming to lead them about in their desperate search for anything remotely edible.

  But that wasn't the worst. There were the carcasses of shacks, like decomposing animals, in which the inhabitants played out their desperate lives. The little girls, and boys, offering their bodies for a piece of bread. And of course the blood. Everywhere apparent, drying on the walls, spilling fresh from ragged wounds, and behind the eyes of every poor bastard who walked the empty streets. Every one of them seemed to carry an ugly scar, a reminder of some time when a blade met their flesh ... or a thrown rock ... or a fist.

  He shuddered. Worse? What was worse? The term was meaningless. The blood? The hunger? No, the disease ... the corruption in every- one's veins. Scales and shingles covering thin limbs. Eyes oozing mucus, coughs racking whole frames. Their slow descent toward uncaring death.

  That was it, of course, the heart and soul of Downwind. Death. Com- ing at them from so many angles, attacking them, and they had no chance to defend themselves. Like his mother: the hard work she'd en- dured, the food she'd denied herself so that her children could have one more mouthful. What was it that finally killed her? Was it one of the many diseases ravaging her? Was it the fear? No, she was past that in the end. Past desperation. Past hope ...

  For her, as for so many, it had been the humiliation. The constant unending shame of being trapped, of having failed. The self-hatred for all those things she'd had to do just to survive. Cade still remembered the first night she had sold herself to a man. How she had bathed afterward in a decrepit washtub borrowed from a more fortunate neighbor. How he had stumbled upon her naked. The water red with her blood as she scrubbed and scrubbed, her skin floating like bits of dried leaves in the soft pink water.

  He sobbed once at that memory, but he didn't cry. He had only cried twice in his lifetime. The first time when poor Terrel came home with his broken fingers, the pieces of his slate clamped between two swollen and useless hands. The second time ...

  His mother had been thirty-one when she died. She had looked much Older. He could remember it so well. Her once thick black hair was gray Sod thin, the skin wrinkled with grime caught in the folds, her eyes dull and empty as they had never been in life. He remembered the hollow thump as her hardened corpse was tumbled into the shallow pauper's grave. He heard the sound all the time, every day-thump-thump-thump -as he waded through hell, his hands red with the blood of those he set free, to one fate or another.

  It was agony to remember it all. His sensitive nose twitched at the familiar hateful smells. The harsh odor of human waste warming in the sun, the tang of sweat and urine, the thick reek of corruption. The sights, the smells, even the sounds. They built up about him, surrounding him like a vast sea of mud.

  He moved through Downwind like a great black shark, swimming through the slime and seaweed of an ocean floor. About him were the remains of a thousand dark meals, bits of flesh and bone, floating in the silt-filled waters. Occasionally he bumped into a half-eaten corpse. And all around him were the unvoiced cries of the damned.

  Finally he came to the end of his nightmare, to where it all began. He stood before a broken wall, four feet high. It outlined the remains of a building, the mud bricks cracked and decaying in the sun. This had been his home, so long ago. The home he still dreamed about at night, in the dark, alone. This pathetic shell was all that was left of the passion and terror of his childhood.

  He walked through what
had once been the doorway, though there had never been a door, just a ragged piece of blanket. Standing in the middle of the room he was surprised to see how small it was. The house had been a single room, a shack. But it had seemed larger somehow.

  There had been no windows; the heat of the summer had been a living thing, latching on to him, drawing his strength out in a shuddering gasp. The winters were cold. He remembered choking from the smoke that never seemed to find its way out of the hole cut in the canvas roof. What monster conceived this? What had man ever done to earn such a pay- ment? How could there be any being alive that enjoyed such perverse cruelty! Was there no one he could make pay for this? Nothing, no one he could attack? Must this sickening non-life be reenacted for eternity?

  "Hey mister, you all right?" a voice intruded, calling him back. Cade was surprised to find that his two hands were held high above his head, making futile grasping motions in the air ... searching for a neck to grasp? Or begging for relief from pain? He couldn't understand what his actions meant. He didn't care, not anymore. He dropped his arms to his sides and turned to face the speaker.

  It was a boy, young, barely into his teens. He wore little more than a stained loincloth. His ribs were sticking out, though he had large shoul- ders, and his legs were well-muscled. He also wore a wicked-looking knife at his side.

  "What do you want?" Cade asked. It came as another shock to realize he had been wandering about for several hours, his mind caught in its mad reverie, a dangerous thing to do in Sanctuary.

  "I, I just wanted to know if you were all right," the boy answered. Cade looked at him again. He was Ilsigi, dark, dark. His thin chest had several scars, but he seemed in good health, if underfed. And he met Cade's eyes.

  "Kindness?" Cade asked. "Or are you looking for something, boy?"

  "Neither, who knows. Just asked." The boy's voice turned hard. "Sorry I bothered you, pud," and he moved away, not quite showing his back to Cade.

  "Wait!" Cade said. "Wait." He moved to catch up to the boy, but the youth kept his distance. "Who are you?"

  "What's it to you?" The boy crouched a bit, his body tense. Not wor- ried yet, but definitely wary. Cade threw the boy a silver piece which the lad caught deftly.

  "I don't sel! myself, pud," he said.

  "I don't want your body," Cade answered. He pointed at his head. "I want information." The boy looked interested. He bit the coin with stained teeth and then made it disappear.

  "Some information costs more than others. What did you want to buy, pud?"

  "How much can I buy about the Sharp Side?"

  "Shalpa's cloak," the boy swore, "you trying to get killed, friend?"

  "You wear no colors, you're an independent," Cade said. "You must have been smart to survive that way. You have to know things. I want to know those things."

  "Why?"

  "Because they killed my brother." Cade knew he should have lied, but he could always kill the boy later. The boy was dead meat anyway; an independent wouldn't last very long around here.

  "My name's Raif," the boy answered. He looked Cade up and down. "Can you use that sword?" he asked skeptically. Cade reached down, searched the floor for a moment, then pulled up a small piece of wood four inches long, half an inch wide. He handed it to the boy.

  "Hold it out." Raif did so, holding it in his right hand. Making no sign of his intention Cade drew his blade right-handed and cut the wood in half; simultaneously his left hand withdrew a hidden knife and threw it- all at a blinding speed. The knife pinned the two-inch piece of wood to the ground. Raif just stared at the other half in his hand. Cade smiled.

  "I do all right."

  "Shit." Raif shook his head. "I'll tell you what I know, if you pay me another silver, then keep your mouth shut that I helped."

  "Give me what I want, boy, and I'll put you under my protection." It was a lie, of course, but the boy's look was so open, so full of hope, and fear of that hope. Cade almost felt guilty about it.

  "Follow me," Raif said. "I'll take you to a place we can talk." Cade followed, shaking his head at the lad's foolishness. Someone was bound to see the two of them together and Raif would pay for Cade's revenge. The boy was truly desperate. Maybe he could use him. He shook his head again. No, the boy was a dead man. Of course, it could be a trap, but not likely. Cade silently padded after Raif. He kept his thoughts off his face: a dead-eyed shark in the sea of hell.

  Raif moved fast, avoiding all contact with anyone on the street. He led Cade through a series of winding alleys and unused paths. Eventually he stopped at a blackened wall at the end of a blind alley. Quickly he scam- pered over the wall. Cade followed warily.

  On the other side, Cade found himself in a walled space about ten feet long and three wide. Raif went to his knees and dug through the garbage, revealing a small passageway. The two worked through the rank-smelling tunnel. Cade realized it was the remains of some sewer lines built in better times. For about ten minutes they crawled through the mud, tak- ing several turns along the way. Finally Raif called a halt. There was a burst of light.

  The light came from the sun. Cade was in a small brick-lined room. Raif had removed one of the bricks to let in a shaft of sunlight. The place smelled like a rotting corpse.

  "This is my best hideout," Raif said. Cade smiled, acknowledging that the boy meant this as a gesture of trust. He looked Raif over again. The boy's face was lost in shadow but somehow those dark eyes gave the impression of giving off light, a silver light.

  "Why do you hate the Sharp Side?" Cade asked. "What makes you think I hate those punks?" Raif answered, but he couldn't hide his surprise at Cade's question.

  "You want to help me, not just because you might get something out of me. You want to hurt the Sharp Side." Cade squatted down; the boy mimicked his movement slowly. "Besides, you're not stupid. People would have seen us together. If I hurt the Sharp Side they'll know I talked to you. They'll get to you." Again Cade surprised himself. Why was he being so honest? Raif was quiet for a moment, digesting Cade's words.

  "You, do you know Downwind?" Raif asked, playing with his knife.

  "I grew up here."

  Raif nodded his head. "You have the look." The boy shifted uncom- fortably. "You can tell, the ones who don't know, but those who've been here, lived here, it marks you. Can't ever hide it." Cade just waited.

  "Born here," Raif grunted, looking past Cade's shoulder. "Father's a drunk, mother's a drunk. They sold my sister to a caravan last year. Father hits mother, raped my sister. Mom will do anything for another drink. Sometimes works at Mama Becho's. But my brother ..." Raif said no more.

  Cade understood. His family, destroyed by Downwind. He was an independent in more ways than one. He wasn't beat yet. And ..."

  "What of your brother?"

  "Old Ilsigi family." Raif's voice was quiet and small. The place, his "best" hideout, was cool, but Cade could smell the sweat on the boy. "That's why I talked to you." A pale hand waved in the strange light of the room. 'The warbraid, I know it. I remember what it means. Not many left who do."

  "Your brother."

  "PFLS. Thought, well, we're an old family." The boy shrugged. "He beat up my father real bad when they sold my sister. He and I left. He didn't make anything fighting, but we were fed. I ran errands. We worked Downwind, but my brother was due for a promotion." The light reflected off the boy's knife as he shifted to make himself more comfortable.

  "The Sharp Side broke off when the Rankan god-warrior pressured Zip. Things split. My brother stayed loyal. Sharp Side slit his throat." He leaned back on the wall behind him and waited.

  Cade could think of nothing to say. How old was this boy? Fourteen? Fifteen? They aged fast in Downwind; Cade knew that well enough. His whole story told in quick, short sentences. No explanation, no anger, no nothing. Just a story. The same story as always. The tale of the damned.

  "What was your brother's name?"

  "No name. They're all dead." And Cade knew that the boy included all his famil
y in his statement. Cade sat unmoving. Behind him he heard the slow drip of water, the sound loud and monotonous. Time. It was time. Melting this pathetic refuge away. Until the boy was left standing in the sunlight. Alone. Sacrificed to the madness men thought of as life.

  "Have you killed?" he asked.

  "No."

  "Have you raped?"

  "No."

  "Have you tortured?"

  No answer. So there were things here, deeds here. Cruelty. If he killed the boy would he free him? Or consign him to annihilation? Cade watched him for a moment. A choice must be made. It was so hard with the young. Kill them in their innocence and they are freed. Or are they? Is innocence ignorance? Mustn't they be given the chance to decide, to choose their path and therefore their destiny? Cade felt sorry for the boy, but then again he felt sorry for all men.

  But this one had no chance. And he was so much like ... but leave that thought. Still, one day Cade would die. Who would take up the war then? Who would defy the lords of hell when Cade finally felt and went to the emptiness? For of course Cade knew that there would be no better world for him. Madness can be a fine thing. Cade knew he was evil.

  Still, he could give the boy the chance.

  "Raif," his voice soft, "this is hell, do you understand?"

  The boy just stared.

  "In hell, all choices are hard." He took a deep breath. "We will sit here, you and I, in your best hideout. We will sit here and you will tell me of the Sharp Side. Then we shall leave together. And together we shall kill them all."

  "All?"

  "All. We might kill those we shouldn't, but we must kill them all, or they will retaliate, against you, against me. The burden is mine. I ex- ceeded my allowed debt long ago. You shall have a chance." And then he laughed. Laughed truly. For Cade would do it. He would free this boy of Sanctuary's chains, let him roam and fight hell on his own terms. Give him a chance to be a hero as poor Targ was always dreaming of. Yes, that was it. He would do this as so long ago at the same age he dreamed of someone saving him. And Cade laughed harder. The sound reverberated in the dank tunnels, but somehow it was a comforting sound. It had power, and passion. But it was a gentle sound.