Broken Crown

by Drae Box

  He moved forwards confidently, easing slightly to their left, knowing roughly where the footholds were in comparison to the city gate they had been aiming for.

  “Good. I don’t want to take anybody else out if we can help it. Even if it’s just knocking them out,” stated Aldora.

  Raneth nodded his agreement. “It’s a good call. The less attention we attract right now, the better. At least until we know what’s going on in there.”

  “Sounds like general thuggery,” said Pedibastet. “Hurry up. I want to see.”

  “Seriously, Pedi?” said Aldora before Raneth could tell the cat off himself. Not that I’d dare that often anyway. Aldora gets a much better response when she tells him off, noted the royal official.

  “Go at a snail’s pace then,” grumbled the cat. “Aldora, when we climb over the wall, I will go in your bag.”

  When they reached the footholds, Raneth quickly showed Aldora how to find each foothold, before he stormed up and over the wall, and down the other side. He turned his back on the wall as he waited for Aldora to come over with Pedibastet. The back of the hotel in front of him obscured any clear sign of what was going on, but the city wasn’t completely in darkness on this side of the wall; Green had been the first to put all of their street lights on Southern Kingdom electricity. Raneth prowled over to the alley that ran up the side of the hotel. The street ahead was lit, but the building directly in view on the other side had had its window smashed, and the remains of a metal drainpipe lay on the ground. Raneth looked back to the footholds and spotted Aldora at the top of the wall.

  “You OK up there?” he called to her.

  She looked down at him and he could just spot her turning the same colour as seaweed. “I’m OK,” she lied.

  “Just take it slowly,” he offered with a smile.

  She nodded, before straddling the wall and bringing both legs over into the inside of the city. She started her descent.

  “I’m just going to take a peek at the next street,” warned Raneth.

  Her voice cracked as she acknowledged what he had said.

  Raneth slowly advanced to the edge of the alleyway and peered out into the lit street. Men and women were strolling along the wide street, many wearing jackets with their hoods up to obscure some of their face, scarves wrapped around the lower half of their features. No people in those weird uniforms. At least that’s something. He watched as one of the women grabbed a horseshoe that was on the ground. Must have come from that building, realised Raneth as he glanced at the building opposite the alleyway – it was an equine supplies shop. He refocused on the woman as two men came up to her side. They strolled over to a furniture shop and Raneth winced as the woman smashed the store’s front window with the horseshoe. The men drew their swords and helped to widen the damage to the glass, making it large enough for all three of them to step inside. Then everyone surged forwards, voices tumbling over one another as they all started talking.

  “What’s going on?” whispered Aldora as she joined Raneth’s side and peered out.

  “Burglary, I think,” murmured Raneth. He pulled his hood up. “Never seen anything like this before.”

  “Told you it sounded like general thuggery,” stated Prince Pedibastet, poking out from Aldora’s bag just enough that he could rest his front paws on her left shoulder. “Although ‘general’ doesn’t appear to be the right word.”

  “Don’t get any ideas about stopping it,” whispered Aldora as she gently took hold of Raneth’s elbow. “There’s too many of them and we don’t know what’s going on. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  Raneth eyed Aldora, before turning his gaze back to the furniture shop. I could easily use my gift to subdue them all, but I’d have to make them bleed.

  “I have no intention of stopping it,” he admitted.

  They quietened as the first newly minted criminal stepped free of the furniture shop and whooped into the air. More came out behind him – two carrying a sofa between them.

  “Let’s go and get some alcohol!” roared one.

  “Yeah! Oi, oi! Let’s go get some drink!”

  Raneth watched as the people inside the furniture shop started ploughing back through the window at the call of the others carrying the sofa. They headed right, away from Aldora, Raneth and Pedibastet, towards the nearest off-licence.

  “This isn’t good,” murmured Raneth.

  “It’s not your problem right now,” Aldora reminded him. “Come on. Where do you want to go?”

  Raneth mulled over who to speak to first. A lot of his assignments to arrest criminals had resulted in him spending time in Green City, and a good handful of civilians here were his friends, some eagerly helping him out every time he came by.

  “Ali’s,” he decided. “He’s always had a good ear for stuff I needed to know, and he’s always looked out for royal officials.” Raneth stepped clear of the alleyway, watching the small mob prowling off down the street. “He owns Ali’s Paintings over on High Street. He helped me when we were here looking for the Dagger. When you were resting and I was looking for Denman.” Turning his gaze away from the mob, Raneth strode to the left. “We’ll have to go the long way around to avoid them.”

  Aldora slipped her hand into Raneth’s. “Fine by me.”

  As they progressed deeper into Giften’s capital city, the royal official noticed that some of the street lights had been smashed. Their tall bodies didn’t all match – the Southern Kingdom electrics had been hooked up to all the established street lights, instead of erecting new matching lampposts from scratch. Still, a good throw of a stone could knock any of them out, and that had clearly happened here.

  As they turned into another street, Raneth hesitated. The new street was lit only by a large fire, and black smoke rose up into the air, choking the sunrise. A line of homes were on fire, and men and women stood on the other side of the street looking on, avoiding getting too close.

  What the heck? Where are the firemen? Raneth turned to Aldora. “We have to find out what happened here,” he insisted.

  Aldora didn’t look impressed. “No. We keep moving.”

  “I need to know for Ali’s sake,” explained Raneth. He pointed at one of the buildings near the centre of the fire, which was spreading down the row. “Most of these are homes, but that one was a clothes shop. Handmade. Ali’s shop is his livelihood. I need to what caused this in case his shop’s under threat too.”

  “Let him,” urged Pedibastet as he purred into Aldora’s ear. “We need to know too.”

  Aldora nodded.

  Raneth jogged up to one of the women at the edge of the crowd of onlookers and tapped her shoulder. “What happened?”

  She turned and faced him, tears trailing down her cheeks. “Some of the rioters came and attacked Sarah’s shop. Half of them ran off with clothes and shoes, and one of them threw a Barbaric Swirl.”

  Alcohol-fuelled bomb, remembered Raneth, turning to glance at Aldora. She stood a small distance away and Pedibastet watched him over her shoulder. “Why are people riot–”

  “Wait, I know you.” The woman grabbed Raneth’s wrist and lowered her head, trying to peer under his hood.

  Raneth pulled free. “No, you don’t,” he warned in a low voice, before backtracking to Aldora.

  “Time to go.” He grabbed Aldora’s hand and led her in a run past the fiery buildings. “There’s a riot on,” he warned her as they raced down the street.

  “That’s obvious,” said Pedibastet.

  “Did you find out why? Is it because of what happened while we were gone?” asked Aldora.

  “Green’s always been a vocal city,” stated Raneth as he almost dragged Aldora down a side street and burst out onto another. “Makes sense it would rebel against someone seizing the kingdom.”

  He jerked to a halt when he realised there were men and women all around them, but none were facing them. Name-calling was rippling through the air on his left, so Raneth turned his focus there. A line of men in the
black jackets were advancing on the crowd he had led Aldora and Pedibastet into. Damn it. Each of the black jackets had their palms held out towards the staggered group. Three of them had white mist spewing from their hands, which crept towards the citizens caught between them and another line of black jackets behind them. A few of these had fire crackling in front of their palms, and one more had the white mist of the Common Gift of Ice.

  “Raneth, how are we going to get out of this?” asked Aldora, shouting the question as the cries increased around them.

  “Lie on the ground, now!”

  “Back off, Brethren!”

  “Let us go!”

  Raneth eyed what routes were available to them between the two groups of black jackets. No drainpipes. No side exits except where we came from. Best option. He tapped the shoulder of a man standing close to him, who was yelling at the black jackets on their left.

  “There’s a way out this way,” Raneth stated, pointing towards the alley they had just come through.

  The Giften civilian looked at the other street and then turned to a woman next to him. He pointed at the escape route and yelled so the others who were trapped could hear.

  “This way.” The royal official turned and led Aldora back down the street, ignoring the thuds of the men and women running behind them, providing them with some cover by being between them and the black jackets. That guy called them Brethren. Is that what they’re officially called?

  As they raced down the street, Pedibastet growled. “Get on the rooftops.”

  Raneth grabbed the first drainpipe he saw and pulled himself up, then waited for Aldora on the edge of the roof. The men and women who had run with them were racing past, ignoring Aldora and Pedibastet as she slowly climbed up the drainpipe. Raneth looked towards the black jackets; they were drawing closer. Unlike the civilians, they weren’t running. They’re cocky. Confident just because a lot of them have Common Gifts. Is that why they’re wearing those jackets? Because they all have gifts they can use to keep people in line? He grabbed Aldora’s offered hand and hauled her onto the rooftop before the Brethren spotted her. He kept her hand in his and led her to the other side of the sloped rooftop.

  “Whoa.”

  The city’s streets were peppered with multiple fires and, as Raneth watched, he spotted more groups of people running around, smashing the windows of shops. Carriages were on fire, their horses thankfully elsewhere. Raneth watched one group of looters as a whirlwind of dirt rose up beside them, reaching higher than the buildings on either side of them and then smashing down onto the mob. Brown dust swept upwards, masking the street until a rogue wind swept it away. Someone with the Common Gift of Earth and another with the Common Gift of Air working together. He turned his eyes away from the bodies, grateful it hadn’t happened near them.

  “Are they dead?” whispered Aldora, pointing in the same direction.

  Raneth’s stomach churned as he nodded. “I doubt anyone survived that.”

  “Despicable,” said Pedibastet. “Where’s Ali’s, Raneth?”

  The royal official glanced around the streets and pointed to the right, three streets in front of them. “There.”

  “That doesn’t look too bad,” said Aldora. She pointed out a route. “Doesn’t look like we’ll bump into any trouble.”

  Wary, Raneth glanced towards the spot where the two Common Gifts had been used to kill. “Let’s hope it stays that way.”

  They reached Ali’s Paintings without further incident, Aldora’s chosen route easing them through quiet streets. Raneth knocked on the door, eyeing the green paint around the glass panel in the centre of the door. There weren’t any marks to hint that anyone had tried to break in, but with this much glass at the front of the shop, it would be easy for the mob to smash their way in if they chose. Beyond the main window, the shop floor looked barer than normal; the easel that normally sported Ali’s latest work in progress stood empty in one corner. The bright white wall facing the window was bare; the hooks for the paintings that normally hung there were the only sign that something should be on show.

  Raneth thumped the side of his fist against the wood again and this time the white door opposite the front door opened, revealing Ali Hemmington. He was holding a cricket bat, and as he inspected Raneth and Aldora, Raneth lowered his hood and gave him a small wave.

  Ali’s mouth dropped open. Then he rushed forwards and drew a bunch of keys from his trouser pocket. He quickly unlocked the door and grabbed Raneth by the arm. He yanked the royal official inside, before doing the same to Aldora and locking the door.

  Raneth tapped the glass of the door with a knuckle. “Told you this glass was stupid,” he stated.

  “You did,” replied Ali.

  He grabbed Raneth’s head in his hands and looked him over, whilst Raneth inspected him in return. Ali looked concerned but calm; his grey hair was now receding at the temples and he was slightly overweight.

  “You’ve lost some weight, Ali,” complemented Raneth as the man let go of his head.

  “That was before all this started,” admitted Ali. His grey eyes swept over to view Aldora. “Though I dare say I’ll lose a lot more now. Is this Aldora Leoma?”

  Raneth nodded as Aldora blushed. “Can we go in the back before we’re seen through the glass, Ali?”

  “Yes. Come on through.”

  Ali led the three friends through a short corridor that held only the stairs to the upper floor and a doorway into the back kitchen, which they followed Ali through. He’s renovated. The royal official eyed the changes to the small square kitchen. Though the fireplace and the stove were still in the same place, Ali had cut out some of his work counter and added a door to access the back of the property. Raneth shrugged off his bag and sat down cross-legged next to the lit fireplace with his back to the wall. He watched as Ali started to make some fresh drinks on the work surface to the left of the fireplace.

  “What’s happened?” asked Raneth. “Where’s Cray, and who exactly are Broken Crown?”

  Ali raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean, what’s happened? Where have you been?”

  “We’ve been in Newer. We reached Aldora’s village, Brown Buzzard, yesterday, but it had been attacked, and when we went to Wisner to find out what had happened, we found out that her uncle’s now called the Kingdom’s Guardian and I’m wanted for murder–”

  “–and for kidnapping me,” added Aldora, helping Pedibastet climb clear of her bag. The Prince of the Cats stepped into Raneth’s lap. He rested his head and paws against one of Raneth’s knees and started purring.

  “Oh, well,” Ali frowned suspiciously at Aldora before he looked to Raneth. “King Cray and his whole household are said to be over in the Southern Kingdom, but that’s mostly rumour,” stated Ali, as he reached for a glass jar of sugar. “Aldora, how do you take your tea? Or do you prefer coffee like Raneth?”

  “Tea, please. No sugar,” said Aldora, sitting down next to Raneth. “Green tea’s my favourite, if you have any.”

  “I do,” replied Ali, reaching for a cupboard above his head. He withdrew two glass jars – one with coffee already ground into a fine powder and another of bagged tea leaves.

  “Cray, Louise and Lemuela would go to the Southern Kingdom for this sort of thing, if they didn’t get killed,” uttered Raneth. “That’s the protocol anyway. How did this happen, Ali? How did Giften get like this?”

  Ali placed the kettle on the stove to warm it and turned to face the three friends with his arms folded. “Brown Buzzard and Icoque were the first clues that something was wrong. Wisner and Green followed pretty quickly, and Seeth City pretty much locked itself up like a father would lock up a daughter who wanted to work in a Newer brothel.”

  “What do you mean, locked itself up?” asked Aldora.

  “Closed its gates and refused to let anyone in or out. When Denzel took power, The Giften Daily had the Royal Southern Air Force give them a bird’s eye view of the city to see inside. Newspaper said it all looked a mes
s. I imagine they meant like Green is right now.”

  “Seeth’s always been a criminal hotspot that Giften couldn’t quite clean,” stated Raneth. “The city’s representative was probably just trying to contain the problem before it spread.”

  The kettle whistled. “Fat lot of good that did,” muttered Ali.

  He quickly poured the drinks and placed the cups on the floor in front of Raneth and Aldora. For Pedibastet, he took a glass of milk from the work surface and poured some of it into a bowl, which he placed next to Raneth. Pedibastet climbed free of Raneth and lapped at the milk, gulping it down quickly.

  “What happened to my village, Ali?” asked Aldora.

  “Brown Buzzard was upset,” explained Ali gently, taking a third cup for himself and sitting down slowly next to Pedibastet, facing Raneth and Aldora. “There were posters up there and in Icoque calling all sorts of things into question about royal officials. Statistics about misidentification causing a few thousand wrongful arrests last year. One hinted that the number of missing people might be caused by royal officials thinking they were killing their assigned murderers; another called royal officials licensed murderers. Pretty nasty finger-pointing, all at royal officials and how Cray uses you lot.”

  “After Raneth helped me find the Dagger in 2005, my village became pretty loyal towards royal officials, more than the average Giftens. Did the village leader, Haethowine Sairnot, give any public addresses?” asked Aldora.

  Ali frowned as he thought. “Not that I can recall. A lot’s happened since then. Icoque was the first to riot – kids bunked school to take part. Business were destroyed, abandoned buildings were set on fire, and I heard that there were quite a few murders too, both of royal officials and of people who lived or were visiting there. It spread to Brown Buzzard – mostly teenagers from what I heard – and the army was called to the village when there was a report that it had come under attack.” Ali smiled weakly at Aldora. “At least they were around to help this time.”

  Aldora nodded, but she didn’t smile. I know that look, thought Raneth, watching her carefully. She’s blaming herself for the kids acting out because she wasn’t there.