Among Thieves: A Tale of the Kin

by Douglas Hulick

  “You can’t fault her,” I said. “But what about me?”

  “As I said, you’re off-limits.”

  We walked in silence after that, away from the Imperial cordon and into friendlier neighborhoods. Kells indicated a small café down a side street. We sat beneath the crimson-striped awning. I ordered a pot of coffee, currant-laced pastries, and a young sweet cheese for spreading. Kells ordered a pitcher of wine.

  “You’ve heard about Nicco’s territory?” said Kells after the food arrived.

  “I’ve heard,” I said, breaking open one of the pastries. It was more biscuit than pastry—dry and crumbly, but buttery sweet underneath the tartness of the currants. I spread on some of the cheese and found it overlaid the whole thing with a nutty smoothness. “How much of it did Rambles manage to take?” I said.

  “About a third,” said Kells, “maybe a little more. The rest is still up for grabs.”

  I grunted and had another bite. I would have been happier if Rambles had taken three feet of steel through his ribs instead, but life doesn’t always work out that way. He had known the war was coming before anyone else; it must have been easy for him to position his people to take control once things went to hell—or maybe even before then.

  No, Rambles wasn’t stupid, but I was still going to need to kill the bastard one of these days.

  Kells took a sip of wine and stared out at the street. He cleared his throat. “I heard about you and Degan,” he said. “You seem to be on a roll with turning on people, if you don’t mind my saying.”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Have you heard from him?” said Kells.

  I thought back to the sight of Degan in the warehouse, of him turning away without a word. “No,” I said.

  “Are you going to try to find him?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Do you think anything I could say would make a difference?” I said. “That he would forgive me if we could sit down over cakes and drinks and have a chat?”

  Kells looked at the spread on the table and frowned. “No, he wouldn’t.”

  “Nor will you,” I said. “So why are you here? If you’re not going to dust me, and not going to forgive me, then why? I can’t believe that Solitude has you running messages to me—not after our last meeting.”

  Kells sat back in his chair. “To tell you you did the right thing,” he said. “You bucked me and you conned Shadow and you played Solitude, and I don’t think I could have done it, damn it, but you did. You put your head down and followed it through when just about anyone else would have walked. That’s worth something.”

  “Maybe,” I said, “but it’s not enough. Not when I consider all the wrecked people I’ve left in my wake.”

  “I never said it would be enough,” said Kells. “Just that it counts for something. That’s the price you pay for signing on to a cause. The sooner you realize that, the better—for you and for all the people you’ll end up using. And you’ll use them, trust me. You won’t have a choice.”

  “What about you?” I said. “Have you signed on for anything?”

  “You mean with Solitude against the emperor?” Kells stared out at the street. I was surprised he knew about that, but only mildly. He was Kells, after all. “I don’t know,” he said. “I was ready to work under Shadow, but that was different—that was climbing into bed with a Gray Prince. This other thing is”—he waved his hand vaguely in the air—“bigger. I don’t know.” Kells glanced at me. I took another bite of my food. “Why, are you planning on starting an organization?” he said.

  I nearly choked at the suggestion. “Me?”

  “You ran a hell of a game all by yourself, Drothe. The street is talking.”

  “Me?” I said again, swallowing. I hadn’t considered doing anything except surviving once I had gotten rid of the journal. That had been the final move, as far as I was concerned. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m on my own—no allies, no organization, no muscle. How the hell am I supposed to do anything?”

  “How were you supposed to juggle two Princes, as many Upright Men, a Kin war, and the empire?” said Kells. “A lot of the Kin may not like you for what you did, but they respect you for it—now more than ever. You did something no one thought could be done. That counts for a hell of a lot, believe me.”

  I stared at Kells. Did people really think I’d had some sort of plan, that I had meant for things to turn out like this? I stared down at the crumbs of my pastry and shook my head. “Angels help me,” I muttered.

  “Let me ask you something,” said Kells. I looked up. He was grinning.

  “What?”

  “How did it feel?” he asked.

  “How did what feel?”

  “Playing the Princes,” he said. “Conning the empire; balancing Nicco and me; doing the right thing, at least in your own book. How did all of it feel?”

  I looked into his eyes and saw a yearning there, a hunger to know what it was like to do what I had done—to beat the odds, to pick a side, to do something, right or wrong, for a reason. And I wondered for the first time how many other Kin—how many other people—felt that same yearning.

  “It felt good,” I said. “And it felt wrong. And it hurt, and it scared the hell out of me. And I still can’t say whether it was worth it.”

  Kells nodded once, sharply. “Fair enough,” he said. Then he pushed his chair away and dropped to one knee on the other side of the table. Before I could react, he had reached across and taken my hand in both of his. “In that case, you are my Prince, if you will have me.”

  I leapt back so fast, I nearly upended the table. “What?” I stammered.

  Kells laughed. “Sorry. I couldn’t resist.” He gestured for me to sit, then did the same. “But you have to admit, it makes the point.”

  “What, that you’re a twisted bastard?” I said.

  “No, that the street has given you a promotion.”

  I gawped. I knew I should have said something—or run away and hid—but all I could do was stare at my former boss with my mouth open.

  “It’s true,” said Kells. “Word has been going around about how a new Gray Prince is rising up from the ashes of the war, how he bested Shadow and Solitude and a host of Upright Men—me included—and is even now in the process of putting his people in place throughout Ildrecca.” Kells took another sip of wine and then examined something in the bottom of the cup. He dumped the rest of the contents out on the ground. “Did you know people are already sporting your colors?”

  “Colors?” I said. “I don’t have any colors!”

  “The street, and probably about twenty Kin wearing them, say otherwise. I hope you like gray and green, by the way.” Kells poured himself more wine. “There are even whispers that Blue Cloak Rhys wants to meet with you. I’d recommend demanding a straight twenty percent off the top, by the way, since he’s approaching you first, and then charging a higher cut for any Rufflers and Uprights who come after. That’ll make Rhys feel special—and put him deeper in your camp—while encouraging some of the fence-sitters to get on board sooner rather than later. You need to build fast right now.”

  “But I’m not a—”

  Kells stopped me with a look. “Yes, you are!” he hissed. “You are a Gray Prince. The street says so, the Kin say so, and, based on how Solitude was talking about you, she’s ready to say so as well. With that many people believing, it doesn’t matter whether you agree with them or not, because they’re going to treat you like a Prince. And so are the other Princes.”

  The other Princes. Shit. My stomach dropped even as I began scanning the street for likely Blades.

  “Now you’re getting it,” said Kells. “I think Solitude is amused by the whole thing, but you can’t expect that sentiment from everyone.”

  “Which means I need to recruit people and lie low. Fast.”

  “Hmm. Wish I’d thought of that.”

  I ignored Kells and continued to watch the street. Was that Purs
e Cutter looking at me strangely? And how about that beggar over there? Were they targeting me, or just checking out the newest Gray Prince?

  Or was I being paranoid?

  A woman with a child walked by and I caught myself following them with my eyes, my hand already on my dagger.

  Okay, I was being paranoid.

  I sat back in my chair and rubbed my face. A Gray Prince? Me? What the hell did that even mean? What was I supposed to do? The only firsthand examples I had came from a dream-walking woman who wanted to kill the emperor, and a glimmer-using schemer who had hidden behind a mask of darkness. Since I didn’t exactly see myself wrapped in a dark cloak and holding vague, mysterious meetings in abandoned mansions, there weren’t a lot of useful pointers there.

  What was a Gray Prince, anyhow? The head of an organization that ran underneath other organizations. A Gray Prince was a Kin who worked past the street and cordon level, even past the level of the city. Looking at what Solitude and Shadow had wanted, I knew they thought broad. And big. And long-term.

  And, I realized, deep down, they wanted to be as good as Isidore had been; as good as the man who had organized the Kin and made himself into the Dark King. Princes wanted to show they were kings.

  Except I didn’t want to be a king. I just wanted to be a Kin. Only I didn’t seem to have much choice about that now.

  I looked over at Kells. He was watching me, a hint of a smile on his lips, cold ice in his eyes. And I realized I didn’t need to look to Solitude or Shadow or any of the other Princes, or even Isidore, for examples; I’d had one of the best organizers in the Kin as my mentor for years. And I still did, if I was lucky.

  “The offer you made a few minutes ago,” I said. “Is it still good?”

  “It is. And it includes about a dozen of my people who are in Solitude’s organization as well. We’re yours, if you want us.”

  “I can’t offer you anything right now,” I said.

  “You saved us; the least we can do is return the favor. Once you start having some stronger sway on the street, we can talk price.”

  I shook my head and looked out past Kells, at the street, and Ildrecca. Drothe, Gray Prince of . . . what? A Jarkman who’d tried to have me killed? A Djanese Mouth for hire? A handful of Cutters who were wearing colors I hadn’t known I had? And now, thirteen Kin in another Prince’s organization. What the hell kind of a start was that?

  I shook my head and began to laugh.

  “What’s so funny?” he said.

  “My ‘organization,’ ” I said.

  “What about it?”

  “Almost half of them are Long Noses. Who the hell starts a criminal organization with a bunch of Long Noses and no money?”

  Kells began to laugh as well. “Sounds like a perfect fit for you.”

  I nodded. “I suppose it does.” I took a sip of cold coffee and considered. Yes. Those Noses would come in handy when it came time to bring Solitude to heel someday. After all, there was still an empire to save and the Kin to keep alive, and I’d be damned if I’d let her fowl it up.

  When we left, Kells insisted on paying for the meal. It was only fitting, he said; after all, I was his boss.

  Acknowledgments

  This book began on a breakfast counter in Juneau,Alaska, and ended at a cluttered desk in St. Paul, Minnesota. It was more than ten years in the making. In that time, it has endured four moves, numerous jobs, unemployment, the birth of two children, voluntary and involuntary hiatuses, a leaky roof that killed the computer it was on, a pretty serious rapier addiction, and heaven knows how many other distractions.

  When you spend that much time working on something, you end up telling a lot of people about it. Friends, family, coworkers, drunks in bars—sooner or later, everyone hears about the Book. Most of them are supportive; many are interested; some are even enthusiastic; but those aren’t the people who make it into the acknowledgments section. That’s reserved for the big money—the people who have, knowingly or otherwise, impacted the writer or the work in some important way. Even then, you can’t remember everyone, but you can try your best.

  Here’s me trying my best:

  First thanks go to the members of the best damn writers’ group I could ever want to be a member of, the Wyrdsmiths (in all its various incarnations): Lyda Morehouse, Naomi Kritzer, Bill Henry, Kelly McCullough, Eleanor Arnason, Sean M. Murphy, Harry LeBlanc, Rosalind Nelson, and Ralph A. N. Krantz. Without them, this would have been a very different book, and not for the better. Next, a big tip of the hat to my beta readers, who helped provide a thorough polish and detailing, as well as a few key adjustments under the hood: David Hoffman-Dachelet, Stephanie Zvan, Tracy Berg, and Kelly McCullough.

  Special appreciation to my editor, Anne Sowards, and my agent, Jack Byrne, for believing not only in the book, but also in me. Thanks to you both for all your hard work in making this dream come true.

  And from farther back down the line, and in no special order, kind words to Larry Lindenbaum, my first honest-to-goodness fan (and a true friend); Roger Siggs, for first showing me how they did it with a rapier back in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; David Biggs, for helping me refine that knowledge; Robert (aka Dorian) and Muriel Jackson, for their belief; Barth Anderson for the last-minute produce consultation; and Dan and Katherine Kretchmar, for not minding that one of my villains shared their son’s name.

  A special nod is also due to all the folks who populated the =dwarf and =nomad lists back in the day. You guys were my first audience in a very wild, crazy, and creative time. A bit of Too Tall, Madam, the Pope, Andre, Spyder, Carlos, M the U, and all the rest will always be with me (no matter how hard I try to manage otherwise).

  Big thanks to my family, who always made a point of asking how the book was coming, even when I didn’t always want to say: my mom, Verna Hulick, who has always been my greatest cheerleader; my brothers, Nick, Ted, and David; and my sister, Nancy. And to all the family I inherited when I said, “I Do”: Allene Feldman-Morris-Pine; Jerry Feldman and Al Morris (both fondly remembered); Stacy Fox; Ken and Gail Feldman; and Marmon Pine.

  A tip of the hat to Evan and Cameron, who deserve mention, even though they excel at preventing me from getting work done. The closed office door means Dad is writing, guys!

  Special thanks to my father, Nicholas Hulick. A hero is a hard thing to come by these days—I was lucky enough to grow up having one in my home. Wish you were here for this, Dad.

  And, lastly, immeasurable thanks to Jamie, who listened and encouraged and supported and did so much more. If it weren’t for her, I wouldn’t be writing this, or much of anything else.