Among Thieves totk-1

by Douglas Hulick

  I hadn’t seen Sylos’s body, but I’d gone over Athel’s things well enough to be able to see them again in my head. “A pipe,” I said. “Athel had a long-stemmed pipe. Sylos may have had the same.”

  “I don’t suppose you still have it?”

  “No,” I said. “But I remember what it looked like.” I began to tuck the papers away. “If I get over to Ash Street right now, I ought be able to cover at least a halfdozen pipe sellers before-”

  “Nonsense,” said Christiana. She clapped her hands. “You’ll do nothing of the sort. And I’ll not sit around waiting while you do.”

  Josef came gliding into the room, stopped at a respectful distance, and bowed.

  “I find myself in need of tobacco pipes, Josef,” Christiana pronounced. “A wide array of tobacco pipes.”

  “Very good, madam. How many tobacconists would you care to interview?”

  “Start with a dozen.”

  “And when would madam wish them to call upon her?”

  “Immediately.”

  Josef bowed again. “I will send runners at once. Shall I have them assemble in the solar?”

  Christiana inclined her head. “Please. And inform Cook that Drothe and I will be taking an early dinner in the garden.”

  Josef bobbed a third time and hurried from the room.

  Christiana turned back to me and arched a satisfied smile. “And that, dear brother,” she said, “is how a baroness does ‘legwork.’ ”

  Chapter Sixteen

  They were just bringing down the shutters and closing the main door when I bulled my way into Baldezar’s shop. One of the older scribes stepped forward and tried to cluck at me about the place being closed for the day. I gave him the back of my hand. By the time I reached the stairway to the upper level, there was a visible trail of scattering scribes and drifting paper in my wake. I took the steps two at a time, strode to the master scribe’s door, and threw it open.

  Desk, parchment, books, quills and ink, but no Baldezar.

  I turned around and looked out over the shop, leaning on the walkway’s wrought-iron railing. I’d come straight from Christiana’s. The continued lack of sleep hadn’t improved either my mood or my appearance. “Where?” I demanded.

  The room fell silent. I heard a piece of paper settle to the ground. A bottle rolled off a scribe’s stand and clattered on the floor.

  “Where is your thrice-damned master?” I yelled.

  “Gone.”

  Lyconnis was standing in the doorway to the palimpsest room, where they scraped and cleaned parchment for reuse. His sleeves were rolled up, displaying a pair of thick, hairy arms. His apron had done little to keep the pumice and chalk dust off his scribe’s robe.

  “Gone where?” I said.

  Lyconnis shrugged.

  “Up here,” I said. “Now.”

  I went back into Baldezar’s office. Books and scrolls filled the shelves behind the desk, along with small boxes full of penknives, sharpening stones, mortars and pestles, uncut quills, seashells for holding pigments, and ink-stained rags. Save for a neat array of sealed ink pots, the desktop was bare.

  I slipped in behind and tried the two drawers in the desk-locked. I pulled my spiders from my pocket, bent down, and got to work.

  Feet thumped heavily along the walkway, came into the room, and stopped. I didn’t glance up.

  “What are you doing?” said Lyconnis.

  “Not what I was hoping to do, I can tell you that,” I said. I felt the pick catch on one of the wards in the lock, then slip free. I shifted the pick slightly, felt it miss again. Wrong head, I decided. I pulled the spider out and fished for another.

  Lyconnis sighed and settled into the narrow chair on the other side of the desk.

  “What has Master Baldezar done?”

  “Lied, for a start,” I said as I selected a pick with a heavier curve and slipped it in alongside the tension wrench. “Forged a letter from my… patron. Set me up. Maybe even put a Blade on my trail.” I felt the pick slip past the ward, tickle a tumbler, and push it home. I moved on to the next one, then the third. I turned the tension wrench, felt the lock give, and heard a scraping click. I pulled the drawer open.

  I looked up to find Lyconnis staring at me.

  “He tried to have you killed?” he said.

  “He sure as hell didn’t send flowers.”

  “But… he hired… a… an…”

  “Maybe,” I said, sitting down in Baldezar’s desk chair. “Maybe not. I doubt he could afford the people who were sent. But he had a hand in it.” I pulled the scraps of paper from my ahrami pouch, then reaching into my herb wallet, drew out the pipe Christiana and I had gotten from the sixth pipe merchant who had come calling.

  “You know how a scytale cipher works?” I said as I set them on the desk. Lyconnis nodded. “Have a read.”

  Lyconnis wrapped, read, unwrapped, and wrapped again as I scoured the contents of the drawer. I didn’t need to see his face to know what he was seeing-I’d read and reread the strips so many times at Christiana’s, I’d committed them to memory.

  The message from Athel’s bag had been straightforward. The thief is getting anxious, it read. Trade imperial relic for book. Stall the Nose until we can make other arrangements. There is new action in Ten Ways-act with haste. Whoever Athel had been dealing with, he had decided it was better for him to trade the relic than to sell it to me. I suspected “the thief” was Larrios, and that he’d demanded payment sooner than they had expected. I didn’t know if the book was supposed to be a final payment or just collateral until they could get him the hawks, but, either way, the plan had gotten Athel-and likely Fedim-killed.

  Why hadn’t Athel told me what he’d done with the book? Had he or his masters been afraid I would go after it? Why had it been worth dying for?

  Or killing for, for that matter?

  The message to Sylos had been a more hastily scrawled thing: Jarkman says Nose got to Athel. Has made arrangements. Blade will deliver the message, arrange for cleaning. Cooperate. I had no doubt the Jarkman in question was Baldezar, but I had been wanting to confirm it in person. That, and find out why they had felt it was necessary to dust me in the first place.

  The first drawer held nothing more than a few incriminating letters on some minor gentry and a handful of falsed seals. I dumped it out on the desk, checked the bottom and sides for hidden panels, and then got to work on the second lock.

  “He said it was an exercise,” said Lyconnis as I tickled the second set of tumblers.

  “What?” I said.

  “The letter to you,” said Lyconnis. “An exercise for me. And a lesson for you.”

  I stopped picking the lock and looked up over the desk. Lyconnis was staring down at the strips in his hand.

  “You forged the letter to Chr-To the baroness?” I said.

  “ ‘A good scribe should be able to compose his cephta in almost any style,’ ” recited Lyconnis. “At least, that’s what Master Baldezar says. I don’t agree, but he’s a master of my guild, and I’m in his shop. If I ever want to be a master in my own right, I have to heed him. So I do copies and minor forgeries from time to time.”

  “Didn’t you wonder why he was having you forge a letter to me?”

  “Yes.”

  “And?”

  “He’s a master in my guild,” repeated Lyconnis, this time almost pleading. “He told me it was to show you up-to teach you a lesson. You have to believe me when I say I didn’t know what it was about! If I had even thought he was capable of hiring a… an…”

  “I get the idea,” I said sourly. “Baldezar was covering his ass, and he used you to do it.” I bent back to the lock. “If things didn’t work out and I came hunting, he could point out the flaws and deny writing it.” And, I thought, point to Lyconnis if I got too close. I had no doubt that if it had come to that, Baldezar would have made sure Lyconnis wasn’t in a position to argue by the time I made it to him.

  The second lock gave way mor
e easily than the first. Among a collection of castings for chops and silk sealing ribbons, I found four blank strips of paper that matched my own and a narrow wooden rod. Beneath the rod was a fifth strip of paper with markings on it. I picked it up and wrapped it around the rod. The symbols lined up perfectly.

  Heard the second attempt failed, it read in a shaky hand. Nose suspects me. I need protection. I need- The message ended in midsymbol, unfinished. That meant Baldezar had either been in too much of a hurry to finish it, or that he had been interrupted by someone before he disappeared. I hoped it was the former, because I wanted him alive.

  “Best tell your guild they need a new master here,” I said, standing up.

  Lyconnis stared at the slip as I unwound it and put it in my ahrami pouch.

  “Is he dead?” he said.

  “If he’s not,” I said, “he will be by the time I’m done with him.”

  I put the word on the street to watch for Baldezar, but I didn’t hold out much hope. If he was smart, the scribe was already out of the city; if not, he was likely hiding or dead. Either way, the chances of someone spotting him in passing were slim.

  Which left me Ten Ways.

  Kells was right: I needed to stop Nicco from going to war, or at least delay him. Ten Ways was an avalanche waiting to happen-one that could very well sweep me along if I wasn’t careful. There were too many things tying me to the cordon now, and too many ways they could go wrong. Long Nosing aside, if Kin started killing Kin down there, someone could use it as an excuse to take care of me. Loose ends and vendettas are easy to resolve when blood is already running in the gutters.

  A little asking around told me Nicco had gotten back into Ildrecca earlier in the day. I found him at his favorite gymnasium on the east side of Stone Arch cordon. Stripped to his smallclothes, he was working in the sandpit with a towering slab of muscle almost half his age. I couldn’t help noticing that the younger wrestler was both dirtier and bloodier than his opponent, which didn’t surprise me. Even when training, Nicco made a habit of using nasty tricks whenever he could.

  I approached the ring and was stopped a dozen feet away by Salt Eye. That wasn’t a good sign.

  “What the hell?” I said, staring up at the Arm.

  “He’s busy.”

  “And?” I said, throwing on a heavy dose of bravado.

  Salt Eye hesitated. He was used to letting me pass, used to not giving me a second glance. That he now had to do both told me my status had changed. That he hesitated told me the change had happened recently.

  “Screw you,” I said as I feinted left and dodged right. I could hear Salt Eye spin and come after me. I sped up my pace, but not so much that I lost any dignity in the process.

  “Drothe,” said Nicco, not looking away from his opponent as I neared the oval pit. “Nice of you to come see me on your own for a change. Salt Eye, it’s all right.”

  I heard Salt Eye stop, then retreat behind me.

  “I tried last night, but you were out,” I said.

  “I heard.” Nicco feinted low at his opponent, went high, and locked his arms around his neck and behind one shoulder. It didn’t seem like a good hold to me, and the other man began to easily twist his way out. That was when Nicco brought his knee into the other man’s midriff, lifting him off the ground. When the younger man hit the pit floor, Nicco was there in an instant, managing to kick sand in his face even as he got the pin.

  Nicco rose, dusted himself off, and strolled over to the edge of the pit. He didn’t spare a backward glance for the man busy trying to brush sand out of his eyes; nor for the scowling trainer who handed the Upright Man a bowl of water but kept his mouth shut. No-Nicco merely drank, spit, and stepped out of the pit. All that mattered was that he had won.

  “Come with me.” Nicco led me to a series of doorways on one side of the training room. He opened one and gestured for me to enter. I did.

  The moist heat hit me immediately. It was a hot room-the first room of a three-room private bath, used for scrub massages and steam baths. Beyond the opposite door were the warm and cool rooms, for washing and relaxing respectively. I hoped Nicco would head to the last; instead, he sat down on one of the benches and started filling a shallow bowl from a tap beside him in the wall.

  The sweat started gathering beneath my arms and along my forehead almost immediately. Nicco ignored my loosening my collar and cuffs, and instead sluiced water down his back. Then he refilled the bowl.

  So, it was going to be like that.

  I helped myself to one of the towels stacked in a corner, wiped my face with it, and sat on the heavy marble massage table in the middle of the room.

  “You have to know you’re on my shit list,” said Nicco as he watched the bowl fill. “I’ve been hearing things about how you’ve been sitting on information; about how you tried to keep rumors of a Snilcher from me; about how you paid some piece of shit named Larrios to dust that Dealer for you. Hell, people are even saying you’re trying to sabotage Rambles-and my operation-in Ten Ways.”

  “People?” I said.

  Nicco shrugged. “All right, Rambles.”

  “You talked to him?”

  “About an hour ago,” said Nicco.

  Shit! While I had been hunting Baldezar, Rambles had gotten to Nicco. That was exactly what I hadn’t wanted to happen. I was starting to have too many balls in the air to manage.

  “And you believe him?” I said.

  Nicco looked at me sidelong. “Shouldn’t I?”

  I let out a derisive snort. “Well, if you want to listen to Rambles’s fairy tales, then of course I’m going to come off as a complete-”

  Nicco held up a hand. I stopped talking.

  “I know how to pick through what Rambles tells me,” he said, “just like I know how to pick over the information you supply. Don’t look so surprised-I don’t take anyone completely at their word, including you. But things are adding up, Drothe. You’re fucking up, and it’s costing you. And me.”

  “I…”

  “I’m not finished,” said Nicco. He paused to pour the bowl over his head and sighed. “You don’t want to fall out of my good graces, Drothe,” he said, “but you’re damn close to doing just that.”

  I watched as he sat there, nearly naked, letting the water run down his face, his eyes closed. And me across from him, fully clothed-and fully armed.

  It was tempting. One step, one cut, and it would be over. No Nicco meant no war in Ten Ways, or, at least, not as ruthless a war for Kells. I could live with that.

  My fingers began to itch for my dagger handle.

  Then I remembered the wrestling pit and Nicco’s seemingly weak grab, followed by a hard kick and a footful of sand in his opponent’s face. Was he setting me up? Testing me? Me?

  I studied the Upright Man without seeming to. Yes, there-Nicco’s eyelid twitched ever so slightly, revealing a sliver of color beneath it.

  The son of a bitch was watching me. He was ready. Waiting. Testing.

  And in that instant, I knew I was in trouble. If Nicco had to see if I would go after him, to see if I would confirm what Rambles had been saying, then I was already on my way out. Rambles had the upper hand with him now; anything I might accuse the Ruffler of would only seem petty-or defensive.

  I put my hands on the massage table in easy sight and pretended not to have noticed Nicco’s test. “All right,” I said, “maybe I’ve been fucking up lately, maybe not. Either way, I’d like to think everything I’ve done over the years would count for something, maybe give you reason to cut me a little slack. But that’s not the point right now. The point is what’s been happening in Ten Ways. You’re being played down there, and not just you, but the whole cordon. Someone’s been setting up a war for months and-”

  “I know,” grated Nicco. “Kells.”

  “No,” I said. Almost shouted. “Not Kells. That’s what-”

  Nicco’s eyes snapped open.

  “Don’t tell me he isn’t behind it!” yelled Nicco.
“I have five people lying in the street in Ten Ways. Five, with two of their killers next to them. And do you know what those other two are wearing?”

  I felt a sinking sensation inside me. “I can guess.”

  “Gray-and-red ribbons on their arms,” said Nicco. “Kells’s war colors. He’s not just trying to embarrass me anymore, Drothe-he’s fucking calling me out.” Nicco stood and began stalking about the massage table, circling me. “War cords! I didn’t think he had the balls, but if he wants to throw that glove in my face, I’ll pick it up. Cord for cord, man for man.”

  I shook my head. A pale imitation of the colored sashes that identified the different arms of the imperial military, war cords were the closest thing we had to uniforms among the Kin. Wearing a cord was the same as declaring your allegiance. It was an invitation for attack, an excuse to let blood and take revenge. It was war among the Kin.

  Except it was all a dodge. I knew firsthand that Kells hadn’t put cords on anyone in Ten Ways-not yet.

  “Think about this for a moment,” I said, turning to follow Nicco as he paced his circles around me. “This is Kells we’re talking about. It’s not a matter of his having the balls to do something-it’s a matter of his even considering doing this. War cords? Unannounced, and in Ten Ways? That’s not his style. It’s too obvious, too direct. Kells doesn’t work that way.”

  Nicco gave me a dark look. “Since when did you become a fucking expert on Kells?”

  I raised the towel and wiped at my face, hiding my expression. I was suddenly grateful Nicco had brought us into a steam bath-in here, I had every reason to be sweating.

  “You forget,” he continued, not noticing my reaction. “I know him. Knew him… damn well. He’s a cold, calculating bastard, but he’s not half as smart as he’d like everyone to believe. Kells can be as hottempered and bloodthirsty as the next man, and there were plenty of times I was the next man. I wouldn’t put this past him if he thought he could pull it off. Especially against me.”