by Conrad Mason
If Fayters were the town’s lifeblood, then the harbor was its beating heart.
Newton nodded. It was a beautiful day, all right. Damp air, clear blue sky, and a nice breeze. Just the way he liked it. His own messenger fairy, Slik, fluttered just ahead of him, pale sunshine glinting off his tiny wings.
“Morning, Newt,” called a fisherman.
“Jonas. Fish biting?”
“Aye, plenty.”
Yes. Today was going to be a good day.
As busy as they were, Fayters took care to keep out of his way. Captain Newton was a human but as big as a troll. His head was shaved and scarred, and on his right cheek he wore a blue shark tattoo—the mark of the Demon’s Watch. Protectors of Port Fayt, friends to all honest townsfolk, and enemies to any thief, smuggler, or pirate who crossed their path.
In short, picking a fight with Captain Newton was a seriously bad idea, and it didn’t take a magician to see that.
Newton stopped at a run-down wooden food stall beside a pier and bought a pastry. It was hot and sweet, and he munched it appreciatively. Slik folded away his wings and settled on the edge of the counter, leaning back against a pepper pot and swinging his legs over the side.
“How do you like it, Mr. Newton?” asked the food seller, a young elf, tall and slender and almost as pale as his white apron.
Newton nodded slowly, stuck a finger in his mouth, and picked at his teeth.
“Not bad. Not bad at all.”
“I made it specially for you, see?”
“Hmmmm.” That didn’t seem very likely.
“Special ingredients, Mr. Newton. For a special customer.”
Newton broke off a small piece and handed it to Slik.
“What do you reckon?”
The fairy crammed the pastry into his mouth, chewed it for a few seconds, then spat it out and made a face.
“Horrible. What’s it made of—moldy leather?”
“Excuse my fairy,” said Newton, giving Slik a look. “It’s delicious.”
The elf sniffed and began wiping down the counter meaningfully. Slik took the hint and leaped into the air, hovering and landing lightly on Newton’s shoulder.
“Well, it’d better be, that’s all,” said the food seller. “It’s for the Grand Party tonight, see? Special order from the Cockatrice Company. Gotta make three hundred by this evening. I’m going up in the world, see, Mr. Newton?”
“Congratulations,” said Newton. He brushed pastry crumbs from his lips, fished around in a pocket of his battered blue coat, and laid a half-ducat coin on the counter. “The company’ll be pleased.”
“How about you, Mr. Newton?” said the elf, tucking the coin away in his apron and hunting for change. “Is the Watch busy these days?”
Newton had just opened his mouth to reply when there was an angry shout from the far end of the pier.
“We had a deal, you lazy good-fer-nothing!”
Newton recognized that voice. He grinned at the elf.
“Looks like we’re going to be. Enjoy the party. And keep the change.”
At the end of the pier, a small goblin was shaking with rage and bellowing at a troll captain more than twice his height. Newton had never seen the troll before, but he knew the goblin all right.
Jeb the Snitch.
There was a saying on the harbor front: What the Snitch don’t know ain’t worth knowing. Jeb was always a little vague about how he got his information, but the Demon’s Watch had made enough arrests with his help that Newton was prepared to overlook the details.
After his knowledge of Port Fayt’s criminal underworld, Jeb the Snitch was best known for his outfits. This morning he was dressed in an orange waistcoat and a purple jacket with diamond buttons—both slightly too big for him, as if they’d been made for a human. Gold rings flashed in his pointed ears. Newton didn’t know much about the latest fashions, but he could see that the Snitch looked like a mad parrot.
The troll was grumbling as Newton strolled up.
“Look, a tormenta ain’t exactly my fault, is it? There ain’t no sailing in a flaming magical storm, Jeb. You know that.”
“Oh yeah? Well, in case you hadn’t noticed, knucklehead, the tormenta was last night, and today’s today, if I ain’t mistaken, and you promised you’d get my griffin bile out before the festival, didn’t yer?”
The troll shrugged.
“Ain’t been a tormenta in years, Jeb. And on the eve of the festival and all. Bad omen that is, sure as the sea.”
“Oh, omens, is it? You’ve been listening to too many old wives’ tales. Next you’ll be telling me it means that the Maw is angry and stirring in the depths and blah, blah, blinking, blah. And this from a grown troll.”
Newton came up behind Jeb and laid a hand on his shoulder. The goblin flinched and turned his gray face toward Newton, his small, pale eyes darting around nervously. In Jeb’s line of work, it paid to be a little paranoid.
“Oh, it’s you. Morning, Newt.”
“Jeb.”
The troll took his chance and slipped away.
“What a load o’ walrus dung,” muttered Jeb. “Talk about gullible. Omens!”
“Got any leads for me today, Jeb?”
The goblin licked his lips and made a big show of looking over both shoulders before leaning in.
“Funny you should ask actually, ’cos it just so happens I do. Got something very tasty indeed, if I say so myself.”
“Go on.”
“Whoa, not so fast, mate. Let’s talk price, eh?” He grinned.
“The usual. Plus the usual bonus if we catch someone. Same as always.”
“Come on, Newt. Here’s me, trying to make an honest living …”
Newton raised an eyebrow.
“All right, all right, if that’s the way it is. But we can’t talk here, see? Gotta go somewhere a bit more private.”
Two minutes later, they had found a quiet table in Spottington’s Velvethouse. The sweet smell of velvetbean hung heavy in the air, mingling with the smoke from customers’ pipes. Spottington’s was one of the oldest and most respectable velvethouses in Port Fayt. The tablecloths were clean. The waiters were polite. The customers were few, elderly, and mostly half-asleep. It was a safe place to talk.
They sat, Jeb patting down his coat and rearranging the cuffs. Up close, Newton noticed that the goblin’s diamond buttons were fake and that the earrings he wore weren’t gold after all, but polished brass. The rest of his clothing was still just as alarming though.
“You know you look like a mad parrot?” said Slik, from Newton’s shoulder. For someone so small he had a very loud voice.
“Tell your fairy to keep his gob shut.”
“You heard him, Slik,” said Newton sternly. “Watch it.”
Slik muttered something under his breath, yawned, and fluttered down to the tablecloth for a nap.
A waiter bustled over with two steaming cups of velvetbean.
“How about that tormenta last night, gents?” he said cheerily. “Bad omen, that is, and no mistake.”
The Snitch rolled his eyes.
“So, Jeb,” said Newton, hoping to cut the goblin off before he launched into another rant. “How’s the griffin bile business?”
“Bad,” said Jeb, when he was sure the waiter had gone. “Very bad. Can’t shift it out of the Middle Islands these days. And it ain’t just bile neither. Indigo merchants are going out of business. Zephyrum ingots are as rare as cockatrice teeth. Saw a warehouse yesterday, stuffed to the rafters with sacks of velvetbeans just sitting there, and what ain’t being stolen by fairies is just rotting away. It were a sad sight, Newt, I can tell yer. Trade with the Old World’s drying up, thanks to the League.”
“Hmm.”
“Word is they’ve got their grubby mitts on most of the mainland now, and they don’t want to do business with us Fayters. Anyone who ain’t human is just scum to them.”
“Aye.”
“Worse than scum. Creatures of darkness. De
monspawn. All that bilge. Maw’s teeth, the Old World’s gone crazy, Newt. Almost makes you—”
“Right,” cut in Newton, more gruffly than he’d intended.
Jeb shut up at once.
Newton frowned and massaged the red, blistered marks that ran around his wrists. The League of the Light. It had been twenty years since the League’s men had given him those scars. But the memories were still fresh.
He sipped his drink, wiped away a velvetbean mustache, and changed the subject.
“Let’s have this lead then, eh?”
“Down to business, is it? Right you are.”
The Snitch leaned forward, his eyes scanning around the room, checking that no one was listening.
“Word is, there’s a new smuggler in town. Came in last night with a cargo, something big … right in the middle of the tormenta.”
Newton raised an eyebrow. It was a good lead. Superstition or no superstition, smuggling in the midst of a magical storm was about as safe as playing kiss chase with a shark. That meant this smuggler was either very stupid or very clever indeed.
“Any idea where to find him?”
Jeb grinned, revealing his pointed goblin teeth.
“He’ll be at the Grand Party tonight. Whatever the cargo is, it’s going to be handed over after sundown, belowdecks on the Wraith’s Revenge. You can nab the smuggler and ’is customer at the same time. Kill two dragons with one fireball, see?”
Newton nodded. Smugglers. Always picking the most inconvenient times to do their dirty work. Of course, that was to be expected. But even at the Grand Party, the Demon’s Watch would be ready and waiting.
“All right,” he said. “C’mon, Slik.”
He gave the snoozing fairy a gentle prod.
“Whassammmfff leemealone …”
“Wake up.”
“Mmmff no, no, the blue one … with the lacy bits.”
“I said, wake up.”
Slik sat up and rubbed his eyes. “Oi! I was asleep, you big oaf.”
“Too bad. Round up the Watch and have them meet me here at dusk, armed and ready for the Grand Party. We’ve got a smuggler to catch.”
“What about a bit of sugar then? I haven’t had a granule in three days.”
Newton pulled a chunk from his coat pocket and broke off a piece for the fairy. “Don’t eat it all at once. You remember what happened last time.” The vomit stains still hadn’t washed out.
Grumbling, Slik tucked the tiny sugar lump into a tiny knapsack, flapped his wings, and set off through Spottington’s haze of tobacco and velvetbean. Newton watched him go.
“That fairy,” he muttered. “Cost me eight ducats and gives me nothing but trouble.”
“Ah, he ain’t so bad, Newt. Now, what about my payment, eh?”
Newton replaced the sugar and brought out his money pouch. “One last thing. This smuggler. Has he got a name?”
“Thought you’d never ask. He’s a podgy old soak, with a crazy left eye and not much use for baths. Goes by the name of Clagg. Captain Phineus Clagg.”
Grubb hummed as he washed the dishes. Mr. Lightly didn’t like him to sing, so he ran through the words in his head:
Scrub the dishes, scrub them clean,
Cleaner than you’ve ever seen.
It was something his mother used to sing, a long, long time ago, in their little house with the green front door. Grubb tried to go through it at least once every day. After all, there was no one else to remember it for him, and it felt good to have something of hers. Even if it wasn’t an actual, real thing.
They’d all worked together to do the dishes in those days, Grubb bringing the plates from the table, Mother washing, and Father drying with a tatty old dishcloth. Mother always tied her long brown hair back, and as she sang, Father would lean in to kiss her on the cheek …
Grubb sighed, set aside the plate, and looked at the mountain that still remained, towering over him. He’d already been going for half an hour, and it looked the same as when he’d started. Just focus on cleaning one thing at a time—that was the way to do it.
“Mongrel? MONGREL?”
Grubb shook water from his hands, smeared them dry on his apron, and scurried out of the tiny kitchen into the bar, as quickly as he could. He had learned long ago not to keep Mr. Lightly waiting.
His uncle was staggering down the stairs, stinking of perfume, and dressed in dirty white breeches, a filthy red waistcoat, and a golden jacket that had seen better days. The clothes looked like they’d been made for someone a lot smaller, and a lot more graceful.
“Where in all the bleeding blue sea is my blasted wig?” roared Mr. Lightly. “You know I can’t go to the Grand Party without it.”
“I don’t know, Unc—Mr. Lightly, sir.”
His uncle crossed the floor in three giant strides, lifted him up by his apron strings, and shoved him back against the wall.
“Don’t lie to me, boy.”
Grubb’s feet scrabbled against the plaster behind him.
“Maybe … Maybe it’s in your closet, sir?”
Mr. Lightly dropped him.
“You think I didn’t look there already? You think I’m stupid, mongrel?”
Grubb scampered around behind the bar. He didn’t like the color of his uncle’s face. It was always the best way to tell what mood he was in. Pink, and you were safe. Red, stay out of his way. Right now, Mr. Lightly wasn’t too far from purple. Grubb tried to work out what he could say to make him calm down, knowing it was hopeless.
“I’ll help you look,” he offered.
Mr. Lightly’s eyes narrowed until they were barely visible in his fleshy face.
“You goblins are all the same,” he snarled. “I told Eleanor that, before she married your father. But would she listen? Thieves, the lot of you. I must be the kindest innkeeper in the whole of Port Fayt, taking on a sniveling, sneaking, wretched runt of a grayskin like you. What have you done with my wig, mongrel? Answer me!”
“I …”
Mr. Lightly lurched forward.
“You sack of scum! You’ve lived with me for six years, and every single day you’ve been a disappointment. Now for the last time, WHERE IS MY—”
He stopped, distracted by something beyond the bar. Grubb turned to see what it was, silently thanking Thalin for the interruption.
The tavern door was open, and standing there in the frame was the silhouetted figure of a slim young man. He was freckled, ginger-haired, and dressed in a smart, dark green jacket. Something about him gave the impression of a gentleman—although, of course, no real gentleman would come within a mile of the Legless Mermaid.
Grubb’s relief ebbed away. He could have sworn that he’d locked that door, and now Mr. Lightly was going to be furious with him for forgetting. He had locked it though. Hadn’t he?
“We’re closed,” said Mr. Lightly.
“I am aware of it,” said the man, with a hint of an Old World accent. He reached into his coat pocket, drew out a leather money bag, and dangled it by its strings, jingling it meaningfully.
Within seconds Mr. Lightly’s color went from purple to red, and then back to his usual deep pink. He pinched the point of Grubb’s right ear between finger and thumb, steering him toward a barrel of Finest Bowelbuster.
“And what can we do for you, sir? A mug of grog?”
“No grog,” said the stranger. He moved closer, his footsteps making no noise at all. No wonder they hadn’t heard him come in.
“I’m looking for something that belongs to me. Something that I lost. It’s valuable, and I want it back.”
His eyes glinted in the gloom, and Grubb saw with a shock that they weren’t blue or brown like a normal human’s eyes. They were yellow.
“Well, yes,” said Mr. Lightly. “Naturally, naturally. Mongr—er, boy, bring out some of the best firewater for our friend here.”
“I dropped it here earlier today,” said the stranger, as Grubb headed for the pantry. “A small black velvet package, tied with
a silver cord.”
Grubb froze. A black package with a silver cord. A moment passed before he managed to recover and start walking again as if nothing was wrong. As soon as he was out of sight around the corner, he stopped, breathing deeply. He felt for the package, hidden under his shirt. Yes, it was still there.
The man was lying. It was Phineus Clagg who’d dropped it. So that meant this man was … he was …
Trying to steal it.
“Black velvet, eh?” said Mr. Lightly. He’d put on an exaggerated accent, which he probably thought made him sound refined. “That doesn’t ring any bells, unfortunately. Here, let me check our lost-property box.” There was a brief sound of rummaging. “No,” Mr. Lightly muttered. “It’s not here. Just a moment.”
Grubb backed farther into the passageway, blood pounding in his ears. There was no telling what Mr. Lightly would do if he found out that his nephew had kept the package hidden from him.
He started off toward the storeroom. But he’d taken no more than three paces when a hand fell on his shoulder, and he turned to find Mr. Lightly looming over him, his face hidden in shadow so that Grubb couldn’t tell what color it was. That was probably for the best.
“Mongrel. Small black velvet package. Belongs to a customer. Have you seen it?”
Grubb shook his head.
“No, sir.”
Mr. Lightly leaned in closer, and Grubb saw that his eyes were narrowed and his face was halfway between pink and red. The stench of perfume was overpowering.
“Are you sure?”
He had no choice. He’d already told a lie. Now he had to stand by it.
“I’m sure, sir.”
“You cleared up after that fight, boy. If this gentleman dropped something, you should’ve found it. So I’m asking you again, have you seen a black velvet package?”
Grubb swallowed hard.
“Maybe … Maybe someone took it?”
There was a long silence. Mr. Lightly glared at him, hands resting heavy on his shoulders, and Grubb became very aware of the soft feel of the velvet against his skin.
