The Man in Shadow

by Taylor O'Connell

  Moretti flinched, and Amato grinned all the wider.

  Kael merely returned the man’s glare, wide-eyed, nostrils flaring, an open challenge if the sniveling bastard wanted to accept it. But Kael knew that was only wishful thinking.

  Scarvini dropped his gaze as tears welled in his eyes.

  Fucking twat. Kael sneered.

  Scarvini’s bottom lip trembled as though he might start squalling.

  Kael turned back to Moretti in disgust. “Well?”

  The fat bastard gave one of his typical frowns, and Kael found himself wanting nothing more than to flatten the man’s snub nose right through his fucking skull.

  How much longer did Kael need these cocksuckers anyhow? Why not do it now? The time was ripe for war. The Commission was coming apart at the fucking seems. Summer was nearly there. Why not do it now? Strike first, strike last—the old way.

  “There was that hit on Eighth Harbor,” Moretti eventually said, “but it seems nothing was taken. And at—”

  “Fucking Eighth Harbor,” said Kael. “What happened there, Giotto?”

  The teary-eyed don’s face puckered up like a whore’s asshole. “The porters were thieving.”

  “So you take a fucking hand or two,” said Kael, barely able to keep himself from shouting. “I heard you had the bastards executed, but you couldn’t even do that much right.”

  “I don’t answer to you, Dvorak.”

  “No. Because if you did, things wouldn't be in such a right-fucked state.

  Scarvini sneered. “No? Funny, I've heard things aren’t so right with your own household. What is it they say of men who build homes of glass?”

  “Wasn’t my house let the supply line take two fucking hits, it wasn’t.”

  It was difficult to tell if Scarvini shook from anger or fear, but Kael knew if he went for the man, the little bastard would piss his breeches before Kael had him in his grips.

  The tension between them built, and Kael wondered if now was not his moment—strike first, strike last. The air seemed to be sucked from the room, tension building.

  Until it snapped as Alonzo Amato spoke. “Fear not, My Lords. For I have endeavored tirelessly in pursuit of these ner-do-wells who sought to make an attempt upon the supply line. It pleases me to bestow my knowledge upon your very—”

  “Say what you mean to say, or shut that fucking yap,” Kael spat.

  Amato met Kael’s eyes with a level gaze. There was no anger in those eyes, no fear either, merely laughter—the bastard was laughing at him.

  Kael tightened his hand into a fist and gritted his jaw as he stared Amato down.

  Alonzo’s smile only broadened as he spoke—a cocky fucking grin plastered across his foppish face. “Very well, on to the veritable crux of the diatribe. As I previously intoned, it pleases me to announce that I have not only uncovered the identity of the porter who escaped from Eighth Harbor, as well as the identity of the man responsible for the attack on the supply warehouse, but I have received confirmation that these men are, in fact, one in the same.”

  By the looks Renaldo and Giotto flashed, Kael surmised he'd not been the only one left in the dark.

  “Who?” asked Giotto, his eyes now dry of tears.

  Kael waited on tenterhooks, hackles on rise as goose-flesh trickled down his arms.

  But the smile never left Alonzo’s fucking face as he spoke the name: “Dominik D’Angelo.”

  1

  Vendetta

  The shadows in the alleyway stretched ever longer as the sun sank beneath the horizon and dusk slowly settled in.

  “What in Sacrull’s hell is taking them so long?” Vinny asked, the torch in his hand aflame, black smoke willowing into the dying twilight.

  “It shouldn’t have taken—you don’t think someone stopped them?” Aurie asked, her eyes hidden by the raised hood of her cloak. She wore all black and seemed to meld with the shadows whenever Sal looked away.

  “We should go around back,” Vinny suggested, shifting from foot to foot.

  “She’ll be here,” Sal said, putting his ear up against the cellar door and listening for footsteps. “I mean, it’s Valla.”

  Odie leaned lazily against the alley wall. His great war hammer was unslung; the well-defined muscles in his forearms rippled as he tightened his grip on the leather-wrapped ebony stalk. The polished iron head of the hammer, forged in the shape of a fist, glinted in the torchlight.

  “Lad’s right,” said the big man. “We all need to take a breath. They’ll be here.”

  Neither Vinny or Aurie looked convinced, but Sal thought it best to keep moving.

  “You two,” he said, motioning to Vinny and Aurie. “It’s time you took care of our little dog problem, and I’ll go ahead and get myself set up. Big Man, wait here for Valla and Dominik, and the three of you can make your way in together.”

  It seemed no one had any objections, until Vinny raised his hand high for attention, a broad grin spreading across his visage.

  “That was the white one needed poisoning, right?”

  Sal smirked, and the big man let out a little chirp of a laugh.

  Aurie narrowed her eyes. “You had best be japing.”

  Vinny winked and clicked his tongue, but Aurie only shook her head.

  “Right, then,” Sal said with a nod.

  “We'd best get to it.”

  At the alley mouth, he waited a moment, took a deep breath, and slipped out; turned the corner, and went through the door of an unmarked building.

  The foyer was empty, but he could hear the faint hum of a crowd somewhere close by.

  As Sal crossed the room, the noise grew louder. He went down a stairway, through a door, and into a vast hall.

  A man on Sal’s immediate right put a hand out to halt him. The man’s look was skeptical. He seemed to be readying himself to speak when Sal cut him off.

  “I was just in here,” Sal said. “Had to find a place to piss.”

  The door guard grunted, brow wrinkling. After a moment’s hesitation, he nodded and slowly pulled his hand away.

  The arena hall was massive. It was filled with shouting men, the air thick with dust and smoke. Even still, the slanted floor allowed Sal a view of the arena all the way from the back.

  At the center of the hall was a shallow pit with a sand floor and a short fence that lined the edge. Men leaned up against the iron grates of the fence, spitting, shouting, jeering, and laughing.

  Two dogs, massive beasts that rippled with slabs of muscle, fought at the center of the pit. Powerful jaws snapped as slaver flew. Growls rumbled like rolling thunder, barks pitching above the cacophony of crowd noise as they fought on.

  Sal made his way through the crowd, a hardened lot of alley pushers and dock thugs, cheering on the fight. He approached a lonely looking man smoking a pipe.

  The man with the pipe seemed as focused on the crowd as he was on the pit. On his thick neck was the tattoo of a black sickle, the mark of the Scarvini Family.

  “Who’d you put in on?” Sal asked the Scarvini, nodding to the dogs in the pit.

  The man lazily looked to the fighting pit. “I didn’t bother. Pot was too low. Everyone knows Barbari fights them too young.” He nodded to Sal. “You?”

  “Got my coin on the black,” Sal lied.

  “That black is a big boy, but he’s a pup yet. The mottled bitch is just biding her time. You’ll see, soon as she gets an opening.”

  Sure enough, just as the man stopped speaking, the black hound yelped and reared. The mottled hound dropped low and lunged, sinking her massive jaw about the black dog's neck. The mottled bitch's entire body snapped taught, as though she were an iron padlock.

  The black hound arched, and for an instant, it looked as though he might wriggle free; before his head drooped, and the mottled hound dragged him to the dirt.

  Sal turned away, not wanting to watch the rest.

  “What did I tell you?” said the man, as Sal scanned the crowd for a sign of his mark. “Age
will out over beauty everywhere ‘cept the whorehouse, and don’t you forget it.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind next time,” Sal said absently, his attention still on the crowd.

  “Next fight should be something more of a crowd-pleaser,” said the Scarvini man. “Two of the dons going to go at it. Well, Dvorak, he’s a don, but my cousin, he’s next in line now.”

  “Your cousin?” Sal asked, his attention snapping back to the conversation.

  “Garibaldi,” said the man.

  Realization struck, Sal wasn’t just speaking with a made man, but one of Don Scarvini’s true kin.

  “Torvald’s the name,” said the Scarvini man, biting down on his pipe and extending a hand.”

  “Sal,” he said, accepting the gesture.

  Torvald flashed an innocent grin. “Well, Sal, I hope you got your coin on the right pup this go. It’s aiming up to be a fight with some real promise. For a tick I was worried it wouldn’t happen.”

  “Oh, and why’s that?” Sal asked, feigning ignorance.

  “It’s my cousin, you see, Garibaldi; he hasn’t left the Scarvini stronghold in a week, and well, on account of what happened to Giuseppe and all—guess I’m just saying I didn’t think he would show.”

  Sal flashed the man the emptiest smile he could manage, hoping it would convey the proper amount of pitiable stupidity to keep the man talking.

  “You do know what happened to Giuseppe, don’t you?” Torvald asked.

  Sal shook his head. “Who?” he asked, as the memory of burning hair and charred flesh filled his nostrils—he could still smell them cooking—still see the blood and viscera strewn across the floor—painted on the walls.

  “The Shark,” said Torvald Scarvini, looking somewhat incredulous. His voice loud enough to turn a few heads in their direction. “You telling me you don’t know who Giuseppe Scarvini is?”

  Sal frowned and shrugged.

  Torvald’s eyes went wide, his lips pursing tight. He shook his head and took a draw from his pipe. “How can a man live in this city and not know of Giuseppe the Shark?” he asked, as smoke rolled from his mouth. “Gods be damned if you ain’t new to Dijvois.”

  “What gave it away?” Sal asked.

  Torvald scoffed and nudged Sal with a friendly elbow. “Just you wait. This next one is going to be something. Don Dvorak himself is pitting one of his own. Dvorak, their one of the Five Families of the Commission, you know?”

  Sal nodded. “Sure, sure, the Commission, right.”

  Torvald smirked and shook his head. “Top-level gangs around the city. Don Dvorak is a pretty big deal. But around here, not even Don Novotny, the Golden Dragon himself, is more important than my uncle, Don Giotto Scarvini. This is the Pit, and the Scarvini Family owns the Pit.” Torvald took a hit from his pipe and shrugged. “Still, Kael Dvorak has raised more champions than any other breeder in the city. Some think the pup he’s brought today could be too young, but he’s come from a champion’s line. The stud that sired him and the bitch that whelped him were both undefeated in the Pit in their time.”

  The way the man went on about it, Sal almost forgot he was speaking of a Sacrull damned blood sport. Sal hated dogfighting; it was truly sadistic. Still, there was a certain reverence in the way Torvald spoke that peaked Sal’s interest, even while it made him sick to his stomach.

  Sal almost felt bad, for what he was about to do—for what Vinny and Aurie were doing that very moment. Yet what was the value of one hound’s life? Surely, it was a small price to pay in exchange for six lives.

  “And the other one, your cousin, Garibaldi?” Sal asked as he watched a pair of young men turn the soil in the pit, where a pool of blood had stained the sand from the previous match.

  Torvald's nose wrinkled. He looked over both of his shoulders conspiratorially before he leaned close and spoke in low tones. “Everyone knows Garibaldi’s not half of what Giuseppe was. Probably, he’s down in his rooms right now, just trying to muster up the courage to step out. But that beast of his is a red-eyed mongrel. A right monster she is.”

  An uproar sounded, and Sal looked toward the pit as a sharply dressed man stepped onto the sand. He wore Miniian leather boots, a silk cravat, and a sharply tailored coat. Sal recognized the man right away. Don Kael Dvorak.

  The don looked down at the dark patch of sand where the black dog had laid dead moments before. Then Dvorak looked out at the crowd, raised both arms above his head, balled his hands into fists, and roared like a savage beast. He straightened his jacket, slicked back his hair, and exited the arena, poised as though he had just delivered a manifest disquisition.

  “It’s been good chatting,” Sal said. “I’ll keep your advice in mind.”

  “What, just as it’s getting going?” Torvald asked. “This is the big one, you’ve got to stay and watch.”

  Sal wordlessly slipped through the crowd and down the slanted floor to the lower-level. He cut back and went through a door that led him away from the main arena and into a hallway.

  Sal could still hear the noise of the crowd, though it dulled to a hum when he closed the door. He knew what he was missing, and he wasn’t the least bit sorry.

  Very soon, Garibaldi Scarvini and Don Kael Dvorak would release their dogs into the fighting pit. The beasts would come out snarling, hackles raised, teeth bared.

  Sal moved along the hallway and down another stairway before he found himself in another hallway, three doors on either side and a pair of neckless guards at the other end.

  One of the guards turned around slowly, as though the effort taxed him. “Oy,” he said, reaching lazily for the cudgel that hung at his hip. “What are you doing down here? The fight's going to start soon enough.”

  A burst of excited cheers, shouts, and boos, expelled from the room just beyond the door, and Sal imagined Garibaldi Scarvini releasing his red-eyed beast, a smug smile twisting his peevish features.

  Sal imagined Don Dvorak roaring as his hound padded onto the sand, the blood of champions flowing through its veins—along with the poison. Tension over the entire crowd. Bated breaths, awaiting the outcome—an outcome that Sal already knew. One he’d known since before he’d even set foot in the Outers that evening.

  So long as Vinny and Aurie managed their part, that is.

  “Which room is Garibaldi Scarvini using?” Sal asked.

  “And why should I tell you that?” said the neckless guard. His shelved brow wrinkled.

  The other guard turned around. He was equally as fat as his companion, only every bit of his exposed flabby flesh was tattooed in the Dahuaneze fashion.

  “I have a gift for Garibaldi,” Sal said. “He’ll be expecting it after his bout.”

  The guards shared a look; then the first man turned back to Sal.

  “Ain’t going to tell you to bugger off, but I can’t go letting you into people’s rooms and all. See, that’s what we’re here for. To, uh, stop that from—well, you know.”

  “I was told to give it to Garibaldi in his room, directly after his bout. Win or lose he’ll be expecting me. How I can I do what I’m supposed to do if you’re unwilling to tell me which room is his?”

  Sal heard another boom of crowd noise from beyond the door at the end of the hall. He imagined things were just about over. Garibaldi Scarvini would soon be in a mood to celebrate.

  “Well,” said the guard rubbing his chin, an aloof look in his eyes. “Suppose you could just give me what you got, and I can give it to Garibaldi soon as the match is over.”

  Sal smiled placatingly. “Let’s just say it’s not that kind of gift. You, uh, wouldn’t want me giving it to you, and you sure as Sacrull’s hell wouldn’t want to be giving it to him yourself—unless of course. . .”

  The guard’s eyes widened with realization. It seemed he wasn’t so dumb as he looked. “That one there is his room. Should be unlocked. Bjorn here is got the keys if you needs them.”

  The tattooed one grunted as though he’d not been so quick on the take,
but Sal didn’t give him time to object before he moved for the second door on his left and tried the handle.

  The door was unlocked.

  Seated upon the divan, Sal could hear them as they laughed and jeered in the hallway just outside the room. He breathed deep and rubbed his hands together, feeling the thick coating of the skeev dust on his fingertips. Nerves on end, he crushed more of the cap between his thumb and forefinger.

  The door swung open.

  Garibaldi Scarvini had his father’s look. Sal had seen Don Giotto Scarvini a handful of times at his uncle’s home, and there was no doubt Garibaldi was his son. Still, there was something about this Scarvini that seemed to fall short of the name. Some quality of his father’s which he lacked.

  But as Garibaldi’s eyes met Sal’s, he knew what it was that seemed wrong.

  When Sal had looked into the eyes of Don Giotto Scarvini, it had sent a shock of fear right through him. Yet when Sal looked into the eyes of Garibaldi Scarvini, there was only fear. Not the predatory look of Don Scarvini, but the wild look of fleeting prey.

  “The fuck is this then?” said a second man, entering just behind Garibaldi. An unfamiliar face, lean and hard. He gestured to Sal. “Baldi, you know this one?”

  Sal sank into the divan as though he were relaxing all the more. When in truth, his nerves felt taught enough to snap.

  Garibaldi Scarvini shook his head. His weasel-like face merely showed bemusement.

  Two more men filed in and stopped short when they saw Sal lounging on the divan, just as the others had.

  “Who are you?” asked Garibaldi. There was a slight tremble in his voice. His left hand shook ever so slightly.

  “Name’s Salvatori. You must be Garibaldi.” Sal said in his most sultry tone. “Giovani sent me over.”

  Garibaldi didn’t show so much as the hint of a smile. His restless eyes narrowed and flicked quickly between his companions as though gauging their reactions.

  It was then that Sal realized his mistake. He’d had Vinny drug the wrong dog. If they’d drugged the white bitch, Garibaldi would have lost. He might have come back to the room alone. Dispirited, he may have been somewhat moody, but might still have been interested in the bait, for a source of comfort.