8
WHERE THIEVES FEAR TO TREAD
‘Come on boy, don’t dawdle!’ Master Sy marched away
from the temple in big swinging strides, forcing Berren to run to
keep up. The thief-taker was positively steaming. ‘If you ever have
any trouble, boy, go to Teacher Garrent. He’s kind and he’s safe
and he’ll look after you. If you ever want any actual help, though, then you might want to consider
looking somewhere else.’ He cut sharply right off Moon Street and
wove between the alleys into the traffic of the Godsway. The road
here was every bit as busy as Weaver’s Row, but it was a different
kind of busy. This was a steady, orderly procession of carts,
rolling up and down the hill between Four Winds Square and the
river docks. No, the Rich Docks, that’s
what the priest had called them. Berren wondered why.
At the top of the
hill in the huge open space of Four Winds Square, the carts
scattered. Master Sy ignored them. He marched straight across the
middle towards the city courthouse on the other side, the place
where the execution scaffolds had been. As Berren walked beneath
where they’d stood, the hairs on the back of his neck prickled. He
stopped to peer at the ground and look for traces of blood; but
before he could find any, Master Sy was yelling at him to keep up
and he had to run again.
The thief-taker
passed the courthouse. He went down a narrow street that ran
alongside it and arrived at a much smaller square that opened out
along the back. On the far side of this square, the smell of beer
and a loud rumble of talk washed out of a low house wrapped in ivy.
In the middle, a small fountain in the shape of an octopus bubbled
and gurgled. Berren stared. He’d never seen anything like
it.
‘Oh come on, lad.
Have you never seen a fountain?’ Berren shook his head. He reached
out to touch the water with his hand and then drank a few drops. It
tasted clean. ‘Where does it come from?’
Master Sy shook his
head impatiently. He pointed up to the roof of the courthouse.
‘Rain. They catch the rain in great big buckets the size of
houses.’ He pulled Berren gently away. ‘Come on. They use it to
make beer, too. I’ll get you one. Proper beer, lad. Not like the
rat-piss they sell in Shipwrights.’
As they ducked under
the ivy and in through the wide-open door of the drinking house,
the conversation died away. People looked up and stared. They
stared at him, Berren realised, not at
Master Sy. Then their heads dropped, one by one, and the chatter
resumed.
‘This is the Eight
Pillars of Smoke, or the Eight as most of us call it,’ murmured
Master Sy. ‘As I said, if you need looking after, go to Teacher
Garrent. If you need some actual help, come here.’ He made a
gesture at the barkeeper and wandered in among the low tables and
the squat stools that surrounded them. The air, Berren thought, was
unusually fresh and he could even feel a wind. Then he looked up
and saw that the house had no roof. Just a criss-cross of beams
thickly wrapped in ivy. The thief-taker picked his way to a far
corner where three grim men sat together. Life had taught Berren a
great deal about reading faces, but these three were impossible.
They were blank. He didn’t like blank. Blank made his skin crawl.
Whatever they were talking about, they stopped long before Berren
could overhear anything. They looked up, waiting patiently as
Master Sy approached them. They obviously knew him. Berren found
himself nervously scanning for a clear path to the door, for a fast
way out, but the floor was too cluttered, the tables and the stools
too closely packed. From table to table, over the top. That was the
only way to do it . . .
The nearest of the
men got up. He was taller and heavier than Master Sy, with thick
curly black hair and a thick curly black beard. The man’s eyes
narrowed. He bared his teeth and clenched his fists, and then he
leapt at Master Sy, wrapped his arms around the thief-taker and
crushed him. Berren jumped a yard backwards. He almost
bolted.
‘Syannis! Where have
you been?’
The black-haired man
had arms like posts, but if anything, Master Sy only looked
slightly embarrassed.
‘Mardan.’ The
thief-taker smiled weakly. The black-haired man let him go and
glared down at Berren instead.
‘And who’s this
tiger?’
‘This is my
apprentice, Berren. Berren, this is Master Mardan. Another
thief-taker. If you ever have need of aid and I can’t help you,
come to him. You’ll find him here much more often than you
should.’
Mardan threw back his
head and laughed. ‘That’s so true. Teaching your boy a few lessons,
are you? Send him to me, Syannis. I can give him a few of my
own.’
‘Oh I’m sure he can
learn drunkenness without any help. But either way he can wait
until I’m done with him.’
Mardan wagged a
finger in front of Master Sy’s nose. ‘It’s an art to do it well and
then win a fight, though. As you well know, my bloody-nosed
friend.’ The black haired thief-taker laughed. ‘I suppose you’re
here to see Kol, eh? Well we’re done with our business. Sharing a
cup or two for the pleasure of it, we were, but I don’t suppose
you’d wish to join us.’ He chuckled to himself again. ‘Come on,
little imp, let’s be going.’ He picked up a bulging bag from the
floor and threw it easily across his shoulder. The second of the
three men rose from the table. This one was smaller, slighter, much
more like Master Sy. He wore a hood that cast most of his face in
shadow, except for the sharp point of his nose. He almost seemed to
float across the floor as he left.
‘That other man was
Teacher Orimel,’ said Master Sy after they were gone. ‘He’s a
witch-breaker. Don’t be fooled. Mardan is taking his coin, not the
other way around.’ The thief-taker pulled up one of the now vacant
stools and sat down. Berren fidgeted from one foot to the other.
The last man wore clothes that spoke of money, but he was bald, his
lips were thin and bloodless and his eyes were the eyes of a
killer. He looked like a snuffer and he made Berren
scared.
‘Sit, lad.’ Master Sy
patted the other empty stool. Berren did as he was told. He sat,
stiff and straight, still ready to flee. The bald man raised an
eyebrow and pretended to smile.
‘Hello,
Syannis.’
The thief-taker gave
a solemn nod. ‘Justicar. This boy here is my apprentice. His name
is Berren. I brought him here so you would know him.’
Watery eyes looked
Berren up and down from the inside out. ‘He reminds me of you,’
said the bald man. ‘Well then, Berren, good day to you. I am
Justicar Kol. I am charged with keeping the peace in this
city.’
Berren’s jaw dropped.
He knew this man. This was the bald man
he’d seen at the execution! The man on the platform! The one who’d
come out with the executioner. The man who’d . . .
The bald man blinked.
‘Does my name mean something to you?’
‘You were at the
execution!’ he blurted. ‘It was you who gave Master Sy that purse.
Ten golden emperors, that’s what you said. And it was all
rubbish!’
For a moment, the
table fell silent. Then Master Sy rolled his eyes. ‘He waited until
I came out and then he snatched the purse.’ He sighed. Justicar
Kol’s lips quivered.
‘He stole your
purse?’ He was smiling for real now. ‘Your purse. This boy stole your purse?’
The thief-taker
shrugged. ‘I was somewhat distracted.’
‘Yes, you told me.’
Justicar Kol was chuckling now. ‘I heard all about you gutting
three cut-throats down in Speakslate Alley. I don’t remember
hearing the bit where some boy snatched your purse in the middle of
it all.’ He looked at Berren and shook his head. ‘Boy, you must
have balls of steel.’ He laughed again as the barkeeper wound his
way among the tables and plonked three full foaming tankards down
in front of them. ‘Syannis, when I’d heard you’d taken on some boy,
I have to admit that I wondered what in the name of Kelm’s Teeth
you were up to. Now I think I have a much better idea.’ He took
hold of his tankard and raised it at Berren. ‘To you, young man. I
was a thief-taker once. No one steals a
thief-taker’s purse. Really. No one does. It’s a bit like walking
up to the Overlord and spitting at him. Dim as a donkey’s
arse.’
‘Or telling him that
you like the Sun Tower better than his,’ muttered Master
Sy.
The bald man laughed
some more. ‘Yes, or that. Much the same really.’ He shook his head
again. ‘I hope you know what you’re doing, Syannis. So why are you
really here? Have you found my pirates yet?’
The thief-taker
pursed his lips. He hesitated and glanced at Berren.
Kol’s face grew sour.
‘He’s either with you or he’s not, Syannis. If he’s not, you should
never have brought him here. People have seen his face now. So have
you found them?’
‘It’s not as simple
as that, Kol. I know parts of it. I could bring you a few faces you
might recognise, but that wouldn’t stop it for long.’
‘Then go and get
them. Syannis, my privates are on the block here and if mine are
then so are yours. Stopped for a bit is better than not stopped at
all.’
Berren couldn’t stop
himself. ‘Pirates?’