He paused a moment to consider the unconscious man in the room that was now on fire, wondering if he should do something. Did the evil man deserve any help? Not from him, Azerick decided and ran for the stairs. His only effort at helping the innkeeper and anyone else unfortunate enough to live in the inn was shouting “fire!” at the top of his lungs. He raced down the stairs, lifted the simple bar that held the front door closed after hours, and raced back into the night. He paused long enough to scoop the clothes he left next to the door back into his bag before darting around the corner.
Azerick peered around the edge of a distant building and looked back to the inn he had just fled. The roof was now nearly engulfed in flames. He spied the cook, a barmaid, and the woman who had told him of his mother’s death now standing outside in their nightclothes, looking on at the burning building along with a few citizens who lived nearby and had come out to see what the commotion was.
He saw nothing of the innkeeper, and he was far beyond caring at this point. The accidental arsonist ran off into the darkness of the early morning and pondered his next move.
CHAPTER 5
Azerick knew that there was several abandoned building in the old industrial district. Years ago, this had been the center of commerce for the many trade goods that went in and out of the city but, over the past couple of decades, the economy of the nation had been continuously declining and fewer goods and trades came into and went out of the city. The district was a sore reminder of better times, and many of the abandoned warehouses and trade goods shops now served as shelter to the city’s many homeless.
As Azerick picked his way down the dark, deserted streets, he spied several buildings that had burned to ground. Sometimes an entire block would show the ravages of past fires. Fire was always a real fear of those who dwelled within the city. The Watch kept close tabs on the abandoned buildings, chased out, and sometimes arrested anyone they found residing within them. Everyone feared that a vagrant’s cook fire or a fire built for life saving warmth during the winter, might set the buildings aflame and spread to the more inhabited sections of the city. Azerick found these fears did not lack merit as he passed by another fire-scorched building.
He spied an abandoned tannery that looked promising. Unfortunately, there was a man standing in the darkened doorway, apparently keeping some sort of watch. Azerick watched him for a few minutes before another man appeared in the doorway and the two began a quiet conversation of some kind. With the anxiety of what had happened to him in the alley still fresh in his mind, Azerick decided it was best to avoid everyone and was about to move on when his ears picked up the sound of marching feet.
The men loitering in the doorway came on alert, and one quickly ducked back inside. Several people poured out of the building. At least three or four men, two women, and a couple of children made their way out of the building and ran off into the night ahead of the approaching city watch.
As the Watch came upon the building, they quickly spread out to cover all avenues of egress. Four circled around the side and to the back; probably to check and guard for a rear exit, six stormed inside, while another four guarded the front for anyone who might try to duck past the invading guardsmen and escape that way.
In a few minutes, the guards reappeared and regrouped. Since they had no prisoners in tow, Azerick figured everyone who was in the building must have already fled. As the guards continued on their way to check another building, seemingly chosen at random, Azerick continued to watch the building from the safety of the dark shadows of a small alley across the way. After about twenty minutes, he decided that the original inhabitants chased off by the Watch and the guards themselves would not return to a building they had already cleared.
Azerick slinked across the street and ducked into the dark opening of the doorway of the now vacant building. He looked carefully around the dusty, cluttered room to ensure that it was indeed unoccupied.
The building appeared to be a long-abandoned tannery given the many barrels that probably once held various oils and chemicals used to treat the hides of animals. He thought he could even detect a faint lingering odor even after so many years of disuse.
Azerick crept across the large room and went through a doorway on the far side. He came to a smaller room that had a single closed door in the far end. He crossed the room and slowly pulled it open, holding his knife firmly in his grip just in case the building was not as empty as it appeared.
Behind the door was a small storage room. Shelves lined the walls and empty, wooden barrels occupied a good portion of the floor. He figured this was as good a place as any to sleep for the remainder of the night. The newly orphaned boy cleared a small area behind the empty barrels that he hoped would provide some concealment just in case someone did take a cursory glance into the room. Azerick laid his bag on the floor and rested his head on the clothing-filled half. His stomach growled ferociously, but exhaustion quickly won out and he drifted off to sleep, silently weeping his newest loss.
Azerick, the voice called softly from within the blackness.
Azerick barely heard the voice that called his name, and saw only darkness before his eyes. It was faint and feminine. For a moment, he thought it was the voice of his mother.
Azerick, be my hand. Be my hand of vengeance and bring death to those that have wronged you. Give death to all who deserve their fate, the voice whispered.
“Who are you? I can’t see you,” Azerick called out into the darkness.
I am your fate, I am your future. Embrace me. Be the hand of Sharrellan.
Someone was playing tricks on him. Everyone knew Sharrellan, goddess of death, vengeance, and all things dark. Gods did not talk to street rats.
“Who are you? What do you want? What do you mean?”
Be Sharrellan’s hand, the voice repeated before fading to nothingness.
“I’m having nightmares,” Azerick said aloud. “It was nothing but a nightmare.”
The last few hours of darkness passed while he slept in the small storage room. Not even the horrors his nightmares brought were able to wake him from his exhausted slumber. The sun was just beginning to burn away the veil of evening along the horizon when footsteps and voices woke him once again.
Azerick went on alert immediately and listened intently from his hiding place. He could hear low, muffled voices and footsteps shuffling about in the rooms outside the door. The voices cut out, but he could still hear the footsteps coming closer to the door of his hiding place. His hand flew to the hilt of his knife as the footsteps stopped right outside of the door to the small storage closet.
As the door was slowly pulled open, he swiftly pulled the knife out and held it in front of him in a guard position. Standing in the door, silhouetted by the waxing morning light, was a large, bearded man. Azerick could just make out two other figures beyond the open door in the gloom behind the man.
“Well, well, what have we here?” the man rumbled in a deep baritone voice. “You thinking to cut us all down with that pig-sticker in your hand, boy?”
“Your life will be the least you’ll lose if you think to put hands on me,” Azerick replied, breathing in quick, shallow breaths. “Just ask the previous owner of this knife if you think I do not speak the truth!”
“Oh, I believe you, boy,” the large man said. He saw the dark spots of blood slightly visible against the metal when just enough light happened to reflect off it as well as the dark spots along Azerick’s shirt cuff. “You’re lucky the guard didn’t come back. Sometimes they like to double back to try to catch us sneaking back into a place they already checked. Now put away that knife, boy. You don’t need it against us, and I’m no more intimidated by it than the guard would have been if they would’a caught you here. I give you my word, we’ll treat you a damn site better than they would have.”
“Why should I trust you any more than the rest of the alley-born I’ve run afoul of?”
“I’ll pardon your insult to my good character and intention
s and tell you true. Whether you were alley born or a cast off prince like your highborn way of talking marks you, from the looks of you, you’re one of us now. Me and my group take care of our own. Come on out. I got a bit of bread and some cold beans I’ll share, and don’t try to tell me you ain’t hungry. It was your rumbling belly that led us right to this closet you’re hiding in.”
Azerick pondered his options a moment then sheathed his knife. The man sounded honest enough, and the odds were not exactly in his favor regardless. If they turned on him, he only hoped he could count on their underestimating him enough that he could break free of them.
The nervous boy slowly walked toward the small group with his hand still on the handle of his knife. They parted ranks and made way for him to leave the tiny room unmolested. He followed the big man into the large room he had originally entered a few hours earlier.
There were a couple of men, two women, and three children already sitting in the room as he and the three men entered it; about a dozen people in all. The large, bearded man bade him to sit down near the wall and took up a seat next to him. He then offered Azerick the piece of bread and a cup of beans he had promised a moment ago. Azerick mumbled a brief thanks to the man and quickly devoured the proffered meal. As he finished off his breakfast, using the bread to swipe the inside of the tin cup clean, the man spoke again.
“I guess I’ll start the introductions now that there’s a little something other than air in your belly. My name’s Jon Locke,” he said, and then pointed around the room introducing everyone else in turn. “That’s my wife, Margaret; my oldest boy, Patrick; and my younger boy, William. That’s Maggy over there with her little girl, Beth and her man, Steven. Ryan is out foraging.” He continued introducing the others around the room, and then he looked pointed pointedly at Azerick when he had made the last of the introductions.
Margaret was a comely woman with auburn hair. Patrick looked to be maybe two years older than Azerick, and William about two years younger. Maggy was a tiny woman with dark brown hair and a severe look. Her daughter, Beth, had light brown hair and was perhaps four or five years old. Maggy’s husband had dirty blond hair and was whipcord lean.
“I’m Azerick, and I thank you for your hospitality.”
“I think ya got it right when ya called him a lost prince, Jon. Just listen to the pretty way he talks!” one of the men crowed, eliciting a round of soft laughs form the group.
Several people in the shabby room got a good chuckle out of Steven’s remark, but Jon quickly spoke up for him.
“Don’t you mind him none. Like I said, it don’t matter where you came from, it’s where you’re at that matters. You can tell us your story if you’ve a mind too whenever you’re ready. You still look rather tired out. Why don’t you go back and get some sleep? A couple of us will stay here and keep watch over you while the rest of us go take care of some business,” Jon suggested.
Azerick was still exhausted from all the activities of the last day as well as the stress and pain of his newest heartbreaking loss. So he excused himself, thanked them all again for their kindness, and went back to sleep in his closet.
It was late afternoon by the time Azerick once again awoke to the sounds of people talking and milling about the abandoned tannery. He left the tiny room that served as his sleeping chamber and joined the others in the main room where he had met them earlier in the day. Jon hailed him and called him over. Several others gave him a short greeting as he entered the room.
“Just about everyone is back from their forays,” Jon informed Azerick as he took a seat on the floor. “We always meet back here or wherever we’re camped at the time. We divide everything up equally amongst us from whatever we’re able to scrounge up whether it’s food, clothes, coin, or whatever else of use or value we come up with.” Jon looked at him seriously and continued. “I’ve talked it over with the group while you slept, and if you want, and if you can abide by our rules, then I’d invite you to stick with us for as long as you like.”
Azerick thought about it for a moment; thought about not being alone and having someone else that could help watch his back. The streets were not a safe place when one was alone and were even more so when one was still just a boy.
“I would like that very much, sir,” Azerick replied.
Jon nodded his big, shaggy head. “All right, first rule is you call me Jon; none of this sir business. Likely go to my head and I’d make everyone say it, then I’d be tossed out on my arse. Second rule is we are all family and we treat each other as such. We have our squabbles from time to time but in the end, we always stick together. Third rule, as I already told ya, is we share what we find. So if that’s agreeable to ya, then welcome to our little family.”
“That’s all fine with me, sir, um, Jon,” Azerick stammered.
Azerick remembered his accidental run in with Ewen and pulled out the small coin purse his tutor had given him. He had completely forgotten until now. He did not even know how much was in it.
“I have this pouch of coins a friend gave me. I don’t know how much is in here, but I’m sure it can be of some use,” Azerick offered as he handed it to Jon.
Jon took the small leather pouch and turned up a satisfied grin at the weight of it as he hefted the purse in his big, calloused hand. He opened the drawstrings, poured out the contents into one beefy palm, and his eyes opened wide in surprise.
“My goodness, lad, you certainly earn your keep quick don’t ya,” Jon said as he looked at the coins of copper, silver, and even a few gold mixed in. “This’ll do well, lad, this’ll do very well; especially with winter comin’. Some things are just too darn hard or risky to pilfer, and this will come in right useful it will. Thank you, lad.”
“I’m glad I could contribute. I am afraid I am not much of a pickpocket, and I really have not stolen much more than a piece of bread or a meat pie. I imagine I’m going to have to learn how rather quickly if I’m going to make it out here.”
“That you will, but not to worry, we’ll train ya up real good before we throw you out the boat and into the water,” Jon said with a grin. “We’re just waiting for Steven to get back and we’ll settle in to eat, and then maybe you can tell us what exactly brings a boy of your breeding to living in the streets.”
Jon had no more than just finished speaking when Steven strode into the building carrying a sack from which something heavy bulged out the bottom of it.
“What luck today, Steven?” Jon inquired looking at the sack.
“Only the best kind of course; the good kind,” Steven replied and pulled a large, smoked ham out of the bag.
Everyone's eyes widened at the smoked bounty that dropped from the bag. “By the gods, how’d ya manage to pinch that thing?” Jon asked as everyone scooted closer to take a better look.
Steven’s eyes lit up as he grinned widely. “It was the darndest thing. I was in the butcher’s shop hoping to pilfer a small sausage or something. I knew it’d been a long time since we had meat, but I was about to give up and leave because that butcher is an eagle-eyed penny pincher, you can bet. Then the ugliest mongrel dog you ever did see runs in and snatches up an entire chain of those linked sausages."
Steven was doing a good pantomime of the actual event by this point. "Now, the butcher sees this and vaults the counter like a thoroughbred jumpin’ a hedgerow and starts chasing the dog around the shop. This woman had just gotten this nice smoked ham all wrapped up and was just about to pay the butcher when the dog made his move. She starts wailing as if her knickers are on fire and runs out of the shop, followed shortly by the mutt chased by the butcher. So I grab the bag with the ham in it and walk out like any good payin’ customer!”
“That’s good to hear. For sure we haven’t had a good piece of flesh in some time. Here, look what the boy has chipped in,” Jon said as he passed the coin purse to Steven. “We should be able to get mittens, scarves, and decent blankets for the winter this year.”
“That’s fantastic! Thank
you, kid. You know we almost lost little Beth last winter when the cough caught her something fierce,” Steven said earnestly.
“I’m glad I could help, and I’m glad you got that ham. I’m starving.”
Everyone got a good chuckle as they passed around some bread, ham, and a few bites of cheese. As everyone was finishing their meal, Azerick began his tale of misfortunes that had brought him to this point in his young life. He told of his happy life and fine home in the wealthier part of the merchant district, his murdered father, being forced from his home, his past year running the streets while his mother worked to provide for them, the way his mother had been killed, and finally about the man he had gotten the knife from and killed.
Everyone was silent as he told his tale. A few even had tears glistening in their eyes as the boy told his tragic story. Jon finally broke the silence.
“Now don’t you worry about that man in the alley, son. You did what you had to do, and he got what he had comin’ to him. That inn you were living in, was it in the common quarter?” Azerick confirmed that it was. “You wouldn’t happen to know anything about the fire that took an inn over there last night do ya?” Jon asked.
Azerick swallowed hard and stared at the floor before answering. “He wouldn’t give me my books back. He said the constable needed them for evidence, but he was going to sell them. I know he was! He had them in his room. The fire was an accident,” Azerick said as he looked down at the floor.
“Son, you’ve had some hard times and been through some rough spots, and nobody holds anything against you. But you need to know when to pick your fights and when to let alone. You go chasin’ down everyone who wrongs you, and you’re going to be chasin’ and runnin’ all your life. Sometimes revenge may come at a price too high to pay,” Jon said wistfully while shaking his head.
The Sorcerer's Ascension (The Sorcerer's Path) Page 7
