Post by Sire Halfblack on Dec 5, 2014 0:58:58 GMT
Deathly IM 1014: The Maggot King...
Cold as a Majius heart but worse outside, at least in the mining town if there was one thing anyone could be assured of it was a good fire. Or rather when that mining town belonged to the forge where through the wet those on the walls could make out those crowded about the smithy. There weren’t many of them. They all had their own labour and toil to see too as well as standing to on the wall where they shivered and they muttered and they watched where the snow falling about and within the walls simply melted a bowshot up so that it made a wet mist that got into just everything. “Boss is all right in the mine,” one muttered. He would be too; it was always warm below, something that surprised the sort of damp handed miseries that wouldn’t know a proper days work if it gave them a haircut. “Worrying at why all the ore comes here.”
They grunted at that. It was no great mystery to them, miners all. You found an ore seam and you worked it careful, not too much, harvesting just the right amount so that it grew back. It was a land where gods fought crime and the dead got up again after a little lie down. Barley grew in the same way, it was natural.
“You know I went to Halgar once,” another voice added. “I spoke to this old lad who hearing I was a miner said he knew about that sort of thing too. Never been in a mine of course, but he knew best.”
“Halgar!” a third added and stamped his feet against the cost.
“He reckoned it was all just lying there to be dug up. Then there weren’t no more. He wasn’t a miner, he just knew better. He had been to some world where that was true and so it must be true here.”
They laughed a little and hugged their spears to their chests, mittened hands crossed under their armpits. The boss was the walking, talking embodiment of metal or the like. He attracted it, well his mine did. ‘Course it came here. That was just good sense, and they had a lot of good sense did the mining folk of Forgeholm.
~
There was a strong rumour that he had been sent to the Eartholme Academy not so much as to acquire an education as to keep him safe. Where the Houses of Deci tended to encourage their scions to compete and to roam, to escape their tutors and to dwell secretly in the city so too did many of them learn rather more about the people than did the lords of other cities (albeit in the case of the Deci nobility of the people of Deci). Cheapside had once been a playground where the young had made their own gangs and one of which by tradition entirely made up of those of the Blood. Xanion had also heard that there were some moves to encourage select members of the young Blood to be more cosmopolitan, and certainly House Majius seemed intent on taking over the Empire piece by piece by the simple expedient of actually being a proper lord of the land. His relative Isaac for example, was probably the only Majius in four generations to be able to look at a plough and not wonder at what sort of giant had dropped its knife. But whatever the reason, and it might have been many, Xanion had been sent to Eartholme and then after only a year the city had been taken over by goblins.
Only weeks before he and the rest of those in the Academy had been hurriedly escorted from the city and he then peeled off with some plain looking fellows that had left him without ceremony on the House estate.
The square about the cathedral was one of the largest open spaces in the city. Fires burned high and people fragmenting from the last congregation filtered away and often steering clear of the fires entirely. Cathedral it might be, but the immense temple was not something to be confused with what in Deci they considered to be the dour, faceless worship of gods. Here they worshipped the black dragon, or the Great Serpent, since Deci had something of a history with dragons. Xanion had stood at the back and watched as elementals had been conjured, the shadows deep, and snakes of all kinds had slipped about the irregular floor and over his boots. There had been stories but mostly there had been what amounted to orders, to be wary of the shadows and to be like the snake. Cold and with purpose, always thoughtful and if one was in a pack only to be there in order to rise within it. Snakes needed no friends, they relied on themselves, and here they viewed the Black Dragon in much the same way.
Dragons fascinated Xanion. Each magical element was said to be ruled or embodied by one but these were creatures of pure magic, although in Eartholme he had known that their own, of earth, had been very real and deep below their feet. Once there had been other dragons but these had been hunted to near extinction centuries before by the questing knights and heroes of the Principalities. Now a dragon egg was rare, and most of those were said to be brought by the Ancient Folk from their own lost worlds. There were wild dragons still, and that was even then a wide distinction. There were brutes, animals, in the mountains, some large, many small and they hunted and were sly, cunning, but only as any hunting animal. Then there were the other kind. These might walk as men, they had magic and ritual, and at least two had been rulers of Deci in its long history. There was a dragon (many knew) in the Thorn’s estate of which his kinsman Davian was Lord. The greatest of the old dragons, the true monsters, were meant to be hidden away far, far to the south in the Baronies beyond the mountains.
“Young man?” a woman robed to her nose approached him.
“Young Master Majius,” he corrected her.
“Ah… I see.”
“I am on the business of Count Isaac. There was a promise made?”
The woman let nothing enter her eyes as she left him where he stood. He let his eyes admire the architecture, the pillars, the curling dome, all worked in stone to show serpents and dragons, wyrms and all made up themselves of smaller examples of the kind. By some trick of the Cathedral it was almost impossible to tell what were carvings, and what were actual snakes so still they were (and especially with the city so cold).
He was left for quite some time before the woman returned. Doubtless they had sought to see if he was who he had claimed. Xanion said, “Have you ever seen a dragon?”
“Young Master Majius?”
“A dragon, have you ever seen one?”
“Several times,” she admitted, “When the city was attacked three or five years ago now. Once when I was a girl in the mountains. I’m from the Scales?”
The name meant little to him and he said so.
“Almost where the mountains run into the true wild and beyond the Empire the Scales were once a kingdom. No longer, but each year one is chosen to be chained to a rock and the dragon comes to feast on them. I was chosen but the dragon did not trouble me, I sang to him. I was left and escaped, and I came here. I was chosen by a dragon you see, and so I am now chosen by the Great Serpent. Here,” she said handing over a chest, “this is what you have been sent for.”
~
There were fires in the squares that people occupied and fires in some that were not, but the latter burned better because in some cases they were not occupied at all. Sire Berry nodded. Tell a city it needed to burn a lot and provide them with the wood then some were bound to get overenthusiastic. In Deci where a fair fight was from behind (and which also by sheer process of elimination had left people less likely to offer their back) not a few considered setting fire to somewhere merely the next step in putting someone down. He sighed, he chuckled, he supposed they had all thought about it and so knew that where there was wood, and fire, and arsonists, there would be less wood, more fire, and less buildings afterwards. Anything worthwhile was made of good, seasoned stuff so he suspected that half the city that remained might not have otherwise.
He had been thinking. Which more precisely meant shaking people, or shaving them, or generally making it clear that the Black Hat was thinking about something in particular and so it would be best all round if everyone else did the thinking for him. The goblins had invaded Deci and apart from some early scrapping no one had much noticed. It made him proud to be of Deci, it really did.
Walls and gates cost treasure and the last the King and Anath wanted was to have to pay to have them made all over again. Or not, he wasn’t sure any more, Anath seemed determined to spend the treasury for reasons doubtless cunning. He respected Anath. He would have made a good goblin but had admittedly done well to overcome that handicap.
“In ‘ere?” he asked the procession that had gone to fetch him. The goblins nodded. They were really, definitely, wild goblins of the old tribes and old ways. They had told him that very definitely. They had feathers and everything. Sire Berry didn’t mind that. They could say what they liked. He had seen to the goblins in the city, given them work and status (admittedly as throttlers in some cases). But status certainly, and guilds, and probably gathers, he forgot most of it for he was a very busy fellow. He also knew what others did not, or chose not to see. Almost a fifth of the citizens were actually goblins. Half or more of the wastrel were goblins. Or a lot anyway (numbers weren’t really the Hat’s thing). They had proven with a little care and quite by circumstance to be pretty good workers. They understood being told what to do. A lot of the guilds actually preferred the short, nosey, Deci citizens for the wastrel work each day. They nicked stuff but everyone nicked stuff. But they worked like slaves and were often surprised when it came to being paid. And it was Deci and if anyone could probably understand how goblins might pop to the surface of the barrel of opportunity it was Trundleberry. Look at any barrel, it was where the scum floated and a lot of goblins could paddle like bastards.
~
The city scribes were kept so busy seeing to the paying for all the bundles that their hasty attempts to scribe mark were not always as effective as perhaps they might have been. Besides as Selgard soon determined, “People aren’t exactly short of sharp things are they?”
It seemed the call to the traders, lumber jackers, carters, and even peddlers had gone well and that didn’t even take into account the merchants. Furs there were less of, but plenty of wool. Deci ever seeing perhaps three quarters of its produce not sold at market was hardly about to change now and Selgard had been informed that in all likelihood somewhat lower prices were being paid in Forgetown with the benefit then that a lot of people didn’t then actually have to enter the city. “Master Halfblack of course is not himself taking advantage of the situation to enrich himself. We are not a corrupt city.”
Which was as well, thought Selgard, or the whole enterprise would have become a farce. No, good honest theft, bunco and smuggling was one thing but at least if that meant a lot of expense there was also a lot of wood and wool. And a lot of wood had been set about the city so that he was convinced that not a yard nor square was without its bonfire. Tenements had stoves and most homes a word burner. It was how most things were cooked. Baked was another matter, and the aldermen especially had roped the quiet, important bakers into knowing who, what and where. Admittedly there were also some buildings on fire too but it was a wet sort of burn that wasn’t much spreading.
Selgard had been busy. Mostly he had been busy stopping people dismantling the wood used in making the city to sell to it. A lot of fuddling around regarding where it came from was one thing. A good long jump over any hurdle about how many times it was sold was another (and besides, burned was burned). But there he had drawn the line. He said, “Only in Deci would people almost get away with stealing a building and selling it back to the city. Not always piece by piece. But then Anath has professed no wish to dampen the initiative, wit and treasure ardour of the people.”
“Which is as well,” said the tall, probably-scribe, in the little two tone hat. “Master Anath likes to think both big and far ahead. He explains that if one is looking far ahead then big is best as you can see it better over the distance.”
“You work for ‘Master Anath’ I take it?”
Sneertwice bowed his head momentarily, “A profitable city is one with people in it, Governor. And you are yourself more used to the Deathly in the mountains than many, are you not?”
“I suppose so…” warily now.
“Would you say then this is the worst Deathly you can recall?”
But Selgard had to hasten to where a pack of rough looking men and women had arrived with a lot of timber carried by honest, hard-working citizens (all short). “That won’t even burn!” he protested. “Put it back,” then seeing one of the Diviners watching in amusement, “Sort this out will you? Put whatever this is back up again before the scribes notice it’s gone and we shall say no more about it.”
Sneertwice bent low to say, “One could always call out the watch on them, Governor?”
Selgard waved away the suggestion. Had he wished to set the watch upon such, literal, property theft he would have attended to that. Besides which he was pretty sure the ones now shuffling away quickly (having been stopped in their little endeavour) had been the watch.
~
The city bustled and fires were being heaped high. He hurried to where his nose led him and always with eyes following his progress. It might have been the bird, the bird probably didn’t help. Or that in Deci so many of the great and mighty had taken great pains to be wary of everyone else (whether great, or debatably mighty) that the eyes of the city saw for many. It didn’t perhaps matter and the city so occupied at least no one saw fit to approach him. Then again he had spied only the most reluctant of watchmen upon the southern gate more interesting in warming themselves than cottoning onto trouble so quite who might trouble him he couldn’t imagine?
~
Water dripped to the ground. The ice barely formed was vanishing over a day that whilst chill in the morning had bloomed into something rather wonderful. People, surprised, stared suspiciously at where rising over the estate the thickly wooded hills were caked in snow. Lord Davian in short sleeves went to where the new arrivals wide-eyed tried to take in the mild day. “It’s not always like this,” Davian confessed.
“They won’t like it!” wailed one.
“Who won’t?”
“The druids, they won’t like you messing with the weather. How will the land heal and grow as it sleeps?”
Davian looked at where safe from the season within the rings of its hills and walls the Thorns was so obviously a mining town he couldn’t imagine how it might grow less crops. “Mostly food arrives by cart,” he explained, then, “The wonder of nature! Why are the druids so sticky anyway?”
Deci had not only conquered nature it had left it bloody, crying, and then dead. A land before anyone living could remember blighted anyway Jander and Deci had come upon it, bagged it, and thrown it into the river weighed down with unwanted stones. “So they say anyway…”
“Local then?”
Actually, they weren’t. The ones that had come here, stealing away from the spires of rock in the badlands, were mostly from the rolling plains of Alguz, some from the ‘Rest, and a few Scarlene. All so rural that they hadn’t actually seen a city and had fled having thought tax collectors were brigands. The worst of them, the real rogues, were from those forced out of Trovil. They had a cause, and causes were never good news. They were deep rural folk, used to chasing away wolves and trolls and making do and mending, even building without needing some grand chap in a big hat to see to it. They had in most cases fallen foul in some way, outlaws, though a couple were real bad sorts. Nonetheless handy, able to look after themselves, and practical they were in this as all things pretty much like everyone that had settled here. “And the dragon, there’s really a dragon?”
“Gruldamagh is a very reasonable fellow. He sleeps, it’s the Deathly; lizards do. Not always but he can be very grumpy.”
They had dreamed of the dragon. “And he walks as a man, a lord, he was once a man, a prince?”
“I’m not sure about that,” admitted Davian.
“And he sleeps and he searches the dreams of the countryside for his lady? Dark and with jewels in her hair? Insulted and taken from him?”
“I’d have to ask,” Davian said, then, “Is that what drew you here?”
They all nodded.
~
Drabbins was not his name but then it sounded like it might be someone’s name and that, Troy thought, might very well have been the point. The Heraldic Entire with its great fireplaces flickering treated those of worth as they should be. Here and where someone could be useful above the common herd they were tempted to where they might taste what they deserved. Only established a short time still it was seeing to its rolls but the King not bothering for the now had gone to where it had been suggested he would most likely care to be, “And what do you do, Drabbins?”
“I am not an assassin, your grace,” he used the term complicit with Troy’s title as earl. Then to an upraised eyebrow added, “No, really, the city is so rife with them you will find none such here. This is not the place for guilds, your grace. Exact then to that neither is it likely that you will find those who should be, else the guilds would demonstrate that whilst there are none here that certainly could, on a passing basis, be encouraged to change.”
Troy listened as the polite fellow explained why he would not speak of his former employment, “That would not do, your grace. You would not have me speak of you in my future.”
“You intend to leave?”
“It has yet to be established your grace, and I mean this with the utmost respect, if you are an unsuitable employer for a loyal retainer. This is not a hall for the ordinary, nor does it contain many beyond the kitchens and commoners where they might be had. Here your grace, are those of loyal quality. If one were to have an accident you would be quite surprised how little then this hall would avail you or yours. You might also be interested in Malloren, and the Coracas. I have not worked with them but they have some small renown.”
“You know of retainers?”
“Your grace, I know of every retainer.”
“You are a gentleman’s gentleman?”
“Alas no, your grace. You should seek out Lord Capstone for that and offer better employ to his own. Or perhaps your own Earl Hail for whom his man Bobbins would come much recommended. But I should not keep your grace for you have a long way to go and it is a hard road in this most dreadful of seasons. I would then recommend that in the stables there is a vile old sausage of a fellow called Scroff who would see you to your destination most swiftly.”
~
They stuck to the road. It wasn’t an enchanted trade road but it was more than a track and even with the recent snow feet and wagons had ground it clear so that literally ice hard two long ruts stood proud amongst the trees. It wasn’t kind to the boots but the ‘Blades were street fighters and these were mountains. To them any hill was a mountain but here where they rose and fell and all thick with pine and spruce these hills were more mountainous than many. They walked quickly, shivering and cursing, only stopping when they were challenged by a score of bundled figures with crossbows and mittens hanging from cords where they had been shrugged off to fight.
There were carts and wagons and a lot of people. Had the ‘Blades ventured to the border they would have found a long line of little treasures, pots and crockery, even tools and casks of ale left on the road, discarded as being too heavy. Master Dust raised a hand. What he saw weren’t goblins and if they were brigands then they were slavers and at least slavers would have to keep them warm to keep their value. He said, “Morning lads, nuts day for it.”
~
“Go away, pregnant dog,” said one newcomer either bolder or more stupid than his fellows. They might have been the watch, they might have been militia, the tattle said they were some sort of mercenary held that had been here so long they had settled. In Deci it was difficult to tell on a fair day and today was far from that. Alike the dozen men and women about the bonfire were bundled in so many cloaks, rags and big hats they could have been anything. That they were guarding was not in dispute, for they guarded a gate. Unique perhaps in Deci it was a gate that was shut. The Sunstar had shut it, which meant it wasn’t so much a gate any more since gates by their nature could be opened. His companions moved a little away from the reedy voice of young Mr. Mouthy.
Zen grinned, wolves were brilliant at that. They had all the teeth and some spare. She wasn’t armed, she didn’t need to be. Ambling over from doorways and their own fires came a score of lads and lasses that didn’t need to be quite so fearful of the weather. Or they had to pretend to be, which amounted in the short term to the same thing. She came close enough to mouthy to say, “That’s Top pregnant dog to you,” and with which she barked. He stumbled back, tripped and fell much to the amusement of all there and far from excluding his companions.
It was the goblins it seemed. There had been goblins and the wolves had fought them and then the goblins had gone below, and now a lot of local, born or near-dammit as well have been goblins, were if not creeping about with feathers in their hair certainly making treasure of them.
The wolves of Dog Town had taken to calling her the Little Mother, a term both respectful and affectionate. It was as good as Mother, and if Hag was the best of all Zen wasn’t about to adopt that one yet. She had years in her before that.
Later and walking the still icicle haunt of Dog Town she was approached by Misery. Misery she had learned was the chief Kallah in the quarter, a new one, and with some wolf in him even if he did mostly beg around the steps of the cathedral to the serpent. He said, “Wotcha,” and pressed a parcel into her arms.
“That’s nice,” it was a surprisingly well wrapped example of the kind. Long and of oiled fish leather, tied up with stout silk cord tightly clasped in a silver wax seal. “What is it?”
“Not for the likes of Misery to know, miss. Got told to give it you.”
“If this is a trap…”
“If it’s a trap miss, then it’s a trap as you’d better trigger. But it ain’t. That’s me done then, tara.”
~
It had needed no creativity to make the loan and his calling in of certain debts had resulted in a prompt delivery from all those concerned. This pleased Anath no end, so too the great work he had made and which run out along the floor in a gradual roll, in four different methods of describing words, sealed in silver and extravagantly beribboned. There was a chest to hold it on the table for the document was not only binding but weighty. The more he had looked into the matter he more he had made it binding to the extent that the Silversmith’s had witnessed it and had advised him to have the customer, when he himself accepted it, have it likewise marked by his own local Glassblowers. After all the customer was an important man with a great deal to lose and so therefore it made good sense to show such respect for the man and all he had achieved to ensure that in the unlikely event that he would be unable to repay what he had requested that his lands would be held by Halfblack Holdings until such time as he could do. If ever Halfblack Holdings finding itself in need of a good profit did in the meantime then sell on that debt in the form of land to someone of good blood then that was all just allowing his customer all the good graces he was of course worthy of.
He wasn’t even being mean about it. This arrangement went about as high as anything could actually go in the Empire and every squiggle, dash, mark, and clause not only looked pointedly at any hint of corruption but it showed it the door. Not the front door of course. The kitchen door. Where the riff raff were meant to leave by.
Anath knew all about corruption. He had studied it intently and for many years. He had decided long ago that he wanted none of it. He didn’t know it at the time but with events in Deci all around him this was being proven to have been a very, very good idea.
~
“Gobsh1te?”
“That’s Master Gobs if you don’t mind, Sire Berry.”
Fair enough, thought the Black Hat. Three, four years, whatever it had been ago. More perhaps? Anyway, Gobnutse had been one of the rascals left able to prove absolutely he hadn’t killed anyone when not-fighting for Blackjack. A right weasel that had been one of those told to leave Cheapside and by Sire Berry himself. He thought hard, “Ain’t you some big pair of boots in the Invisible now?”
“Well…”
He bloody well was! Sire Berry clicked his fingers, “Yuhs, went into trade, or summat. Don’t you buy from der honey? And der guilds get stuff off yer. And yet got an ‘ouse in bloody ‘Ightown too. Yer done all right, Gobby,” Sire Berry grinned. It was no skin off his considerable nose and no hard feelings.
They were in what might once have been a very grand building now long since compressed in that curious way Deci had where it built upon what had once been there before. It was decorated in a very tribal way. Also, warmed with backle. There were a lot of goblins here. They were very tribal and they were the chiefs of the invaders. And all of them without exception, were Deci goblins born and bred, or long enough here to make no difference, “Yer not the Maggot? Really?”
King Gobby grinned, “Not got a problem with that, as yer Sire Berry?”
He shook his head. Not really. “What yer do, buy ‘em out?” Trundleberry laughed at his own joke.
“Um…”
For once Sire Berry was almost astonished. “Yer bought ‘em out?”
“Well, I’m a bit short since the Halfblack called in me loans, but I paid prompt. Got a stick too,” he nodded to where two very thin goblins in feathers nodded. They had the tally to prove it, all above board and proper.
“Yer borrowed from ‘Alfblack, to buy the Maggot?”
“’Ave to look ahead, Sire Berry.”
Trundleberry had a think about that for a good long while. Finally and without having anyone else do the thinking for him he said, “Good on yer, son.”
~
He had heard the stories and hearkened to the information as to who was up to no good, who might be profiteering from the Great Wood Bounty, and who might be overstepping the mark. Now atop the wall Selgard stretched out his arms as if he might take in the whole of Deci and said, “You’re all nicked,” but no one noticed.
It was bloody cold. It was worse than bloody cold, it was icicles in the underclothes cold. It was a bad one, and it felt like a long one. The harvest hadn’t been up to much but unlike everyone else on the city council for whom the territory was a hobby, Davian excepted, Selgard actually knew that wood did indeed grow on trees. He said, “We might just have been lucky. I mean, we got so used to the druids making the Deathly what we know that we might have forgotten what it’s usually like? Tell me, since you’re a scribe, before the Empress was able to provide for the traditions and observances of the Empire, before druids sat in threes and made rites to make things what we expect, tell me before all that when had the harvest failed?”
“Most years,” admitted Sneertwice. There was so much wild stuff people hadn’t even bothered to farm it since the wars had ended, so many had been dead, and the Empire had been born.
And it was a bad one, but Selgard thought it wasn’t actually a Cor Saim. Not what they had north of the mountains. Not quite. Not this year. Not as such. “Maybe it’s not one thing but all sorts of things?”
“Very wise of you Governor.”
“But people would still die, and us and Alguz, probably Keys, would still be in a right old boot other than,” he waved at the fire lit city.
“I can only speak for Master Halfblack, Governor. He would say ‘yes’.”
“You don’t speak for yourself, but what you say is in effect what Anath says?”
“Indeed, Governor.”
“And how is that working out for you?”
“It would be more profitable if you great and dark lords of Deci were not quite so exact in the manner of your taxes.”
Selgard frowned, “I’m not a dark lord.”
“How very sweet of you.”
~
Buckling on his sword Jander led the assembled Holm Guard out of the gate. The usually ‘foolish boy’ that was the first to follow was not looking such a fool now in the big scarf his ma insisted he always wore and Jander asked details of the plump little martinet that had assumed command of the militia.
“An attack, but my men were up to it. Repelled them. That’s the thing about brigands, no backbone.”
An older man with his spear his own, a relic of his younger days thrust it upwards eagerly as in step behind Jander the old and the young went out into the last light of day. “They don’t like it up ‘em!” he declared for the fifth time.
“That’s enough,” the martinet admonished. Then more protectively towards Jander, “Old spear sir, bags of experience and enthusiasm.”
“Quite,” Jander agreed. They walked about the walls to where four dozen filthy looked troublemakers were calling up at the walls. They hadn’t brought ladders only a log half unbranched that every time they raised it had been slowly pushed back, so many were bruised and one looked to have a broken leg. Jander pointed with his sword and the Holm Guard sorted their selves into what looked to be a well-rehearsed little shield wall. Seeing Jander the attacking rabble charged.
“Steady men,” called out the martinet. Jander stepped forward and without even the sweat of beating out a good sword knocked instead the weapons of the attackers aside until the line caught up and in company with which he roundly put down the whole lot. The Guard somewhat less fit nonetheless cheered.
~
Having never had the cause to meet with Sire Smiles it was only after a few pointed enquiries that Anath did so now. There was no great account of whereabouts she had been born, but this was not unusual, but what was in her case was that this was the third guild of which she had been a member. Apprenticed as a Conveyer she had actually already been a member of the Assassins for reasons probably impolite to ask. When this was discovered no one could actually find anything to say why this wasn’t allowed and that particular tradition had been amended quietly three years ago. But not before she had become a Diviner and after which she had foresworn any former membership. Perhaps as much to her surprise as anyone’s she had done rather well and if not the very best Diviner in the city, she was certainly the one most unlikely to be removed or convinced to make way for any rivals in the usual manner of Deci.
Plainly dressed she listened to what Anath had to say, he having been told about her by Cruet, “After all,” Anath pointed out, “we as a city quite correctly have kept the balance of guild and wastrel as it should be.”
“Without which this sort of thing wouldn’t be possible at all.”
“Well quite, absolutely,” Anath nodded. “So you can do it?”
“I can see that it will be done, certainly.”
“Soon?”
“You mean now don’t you?”
“Please,” he offered a smile. He shook his head. He said, “But no, I am ambitious. Having set the city to being occupied with wood and fires the Governor has unfortunately ensured that everyone is rather too occupied for such a grand endeavour.”
“The Governor, of course. How silly of him.”
Anath ever three steps ahead in a conversation of his devising was now only two. “And the weather can’t help.”
“That would now be of less concern. In any case the ‘Dawn is almost upon us and things would be easier then, even had they not been all but impossible now. I trust you will be around to oversee the work? And will the King be present to punish laggards? Or will the Governor be making his hand felt, being worryingly nice to everyone?”
“I am but a humble servant of the city and could not hazard a guess as to what either of the city’s great rulers would care to do,” said Aanth, his face perfectly unreadable.
“You having not…”
“Advised them,” interrupted Anath. “So then, I trust I might leave the details of the great work of the Final Dawn in your hands?”
He could do, and in return she had a message for him.
~
The flat, dark skin of the statue that took the lord’s cloak shone only dully where it showed about the tunic and hose it wore. Every door was mounted with a silver sigil. Two servants took Davian to where Sire Brass sat by a very good elemental fire and nursed a goblet. Davian did not often see servants bearing the guild patch of the assassins. In point of fact he couldn’t recall seeing an assassin wear a guild patch for the assassins. He felt a slight hiss of ritual, “Death rite? Is it powerful?”
Brass sneezed, “Ought to be what I paid for it,” he apologised for the inconvenience, “Can’t be too careful, I was cursed the other week. Silly old woman is still probably hiding when it banged back on her. When it comes to being protected my lord, don’t scrimp.”
“Sire Slice warned you of something?”
“Time of the year, you never really know in Deci do you? Getting ready for the Final Dawn. This year or next,” he shook his head. “Did the goods not arrive? I’m so sorry you had to come all the way, my lord.”
“Nothing of the sort, Sire Brass. I came calling on behalf of my cousin. A matter of property.”
~
It was a brisk day with the dew thick on the rocks where having melted here at least the snow had flooded the river. A very surprised bear ambled past. Troy swore it yawned. Many deep his people stood around, shuffling. They could all see the dirty, snowy landscape from the hill and over the now flooded river that marked the boundary. Troy supposed that when the rite let up they might all go skating. Or whatever it was that the common folk did out here; toil he hoped. Not so far away something that might cause an orc to screw up its face sat and picked inside its trousers. Troy assumed the Scroff was a man because he had a beard. Beyond that he wasn’t about to risk even a little of his fortune gambling on the matter.
“You all look,” he beamed, “Very… servile. I’m jolly glad you’ve thrown off the terrible shackles of being serfs. Now toodle along and do whatever it is you do out here.” He pondered the matter, “Folk dancing? Paying your tithes?”
“Cheers!” shouted the Master of the Silver Guard, “Hup, hup?”
“Hurrah!” the commoners tossed their hats in the air as if they assumed that whichever went lowest was in for a bad night.
It was such a lovely Deathly day, thought Troy. He wondered what all the fuss had been about?
By Alan Morgan