A Discourse in Steel (20 page)

Veraal took his pipe from his mouth. “You telling me you two took the Upright Man
captive
?”

“Sounds crazy when you say it out loud,” Nix said.

“Why in the fak did you do that?” Veraal asked.

“Yes,” Tesha said. “Why?”

Nix made light of it. “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”

“A good idea?” Veraal said. “Gadd, I'll take one of those ales, too.”

While Gadd drew him an ale, Veraal kneeled down, took Channis by the hand, and examined his tat.

“Eight blades and no mistake. Shite, boys. You are a pair of crazy gits.”

“If I told you Nix's idea about how to help Rose,” Egil said, “you'd think we were crazier still.” He signaled to Gadd for a refill.

Veraal let Channis's hand drop. “Do tell.”

“Best no one knows but us, yeah?” Nix said.

“Of course,” Veraal said. “Right.”

Nix looked at Tesha. “We pinched the Upright Man for leverage. If you knew the whole story it'd make sense. Maybe.”

She seemed to accept that.

“So,” Nix said to the room. “Since we have the Upright Man and had, uh, harsh words for many other members of Dur Follin's esteemed guild of rogues, sneaks, and general bungholes, I suspect they'll be hard on our heels. And that means everybody's got to get out. Now.”

Veraal nodded and signaled his men, all of whom immediately started gathering up their gear.

“Leave? Where are we supposed to go?” Tesha asked.

“Anywhere that's not here,” Nix said to her. “You've got a quarter hour.”

“And no one comes back here until we say so,” Egil added, and finished off his ale. Gadd reached to refill it and Egil did not protest.

Mere appeared at the top of the stairs, still dressed, and called down.

“Thank the gods you've come back. Egil, Rose is—”

“Get her ready to travel,” Nix called up. “We leave in a quarter hour.”

“What? A quarter— Nix, she can't travel,” Mere said.

“She has to,” Egil said softly. “Do your best, Mere. We leave soon. The guild's coming.”

“Coming here?”

“Quickly now,” Nix said. “Tell Kiir and Lis to be quick, too.”

Tesha said something to Gadd in a language Nix didn't understand. Gadd nodded, eyed Egil and Nix, and retreated to his cellar and out the back. Tesha took a draw on her pipe, exhaled, and regarded Nix with the hard expression he'd come to know well. He held up a hand to cut off whatever she might say and donned his most disarming smile.

“You don't need to say it. Could be that we took a bigger bite than we could chew.”

She frowned. “There's nothing amusing about this, Nix. These are people's lives.”

Nix knew. He looked her in the face. “And I'm trying to save them, Tesha. You…sometimes. Argh! Listen, I jest all the time, yeah? That's just my way. But never,
never,
let that make you think that I don't understand the stakes. I understand them quite well, better than you, I expect. I've been running crosswise of bad people most of my life and some of things I've seen and done…well, I doubt you'd believe half of them. I know what people like these guildsmen are capable of and I
know
these are people's lives. Yours included. So do as I say.”

She started to speak and he cut her off.

“No one fakked up here, if that's what you're thinking.”

“It's not,” she said, but Nix kept going.

“Certainly not me and Egil. We're just trying to fix it. It was just bad luck that they clicked the old Upright Man in Rusilla's tent while she was in his head. But now we are where we are. All of us caught up in it. So we deal with that bad luck and make the best of it, yeah?”

She stared at him a long moment. “You done?”

He blinked. “What? Yes.”

“Then stop talking for once and listen. I agree with you. Apologies for misreading your humor.”

“Uh. Right, then.”

She pointed at his chest with her pipe. “But remember who you're speaking to, Nix Fall. I see through your shite. Now, you said you've got something in mind for Rose?”

He nodded.

“You don't want to tell me?”

“Should I?”

“No, you shouldn't. Not in detail. In the city or out?”

“Out,” he said.

“And this one”—she nodded at the Upright Man, whom Egil had placed on the floor near his stool—“he's key to that? Otherwise…”

Nix nodded. “Otherwise we'd have killed him already. He's just to ensure the guild doesn't harass us as we…go where we're going.”

She nodded. “Good enough, then. I sent Gadd around back to prep the cart. You can use that to move Rose and the Upright Man. Meanwhile I've got some people I can rely on, a place for our workers to stay. That's where I sent the rest of them. We'll be fine for a while. It'll cost though, so that comes out of our profits when we reopen.”

“Assuming the guild doesn't burn the Tunnel down.”

She looked genuinely alarmed, her beautiful eyes wide with concern. “You think they will?”

He shrugged. “No telling with these slubbers. But if they do, the main thing is that no one's in it at the time, yeah?”

She recovered herself. “Yeah. I'll keep everyone away from the Tunnel until you two send word that things are squared with the guild.”

“
If
they're squared.”

“Don't say
if.
Get Rose better and get them squared, then come back.”

Nix looked at Tesha, at Egil, who smiled and looked away, then back at Tesha.

“Is now the appropriate time for me to tell you that I love you?”

“That I already know,” she said, turned, and walked away.

Nix watched her go.

Veraal leaned in close. “Tesha's an interesting lass, I'd say.”

Egil guffawed. “Hate to be the man who crossed her.”

“Aye, that,” Nix said, and watched her ascend the stairs. “Like to be the man who made her smile, though.”

Egil grunted.

Tesha's voice carried from the upstairs hall as she barked orders. “Only necessities and small valuables. Don't bring anything else. Hurry now.”

Veraal gulped his ale. “That's a damned fine ale.”

“Gadd's a holy man when it comes to brewing,” Egil said.

“You've been sitting here this whole time and didn't try Gadd's ale?” Nix said. “You missed out.”

“So I see.”

The three men tapped tankards, finished their ales, and stood.

Veraal regarded Egil and the smeared gore that covered him. “How many'd you end?”

Egil shrugged, so Nix filled in.

“Somewhere between a dozen and a score, all told.”

“And this one,” Egil added, nudging Channis with his toe. The guildmaster groaned.

Veraal whistled. “You hit 'em hard. But still they're coming?”

“We've got the Upright Man, now,” Nix said. “They have to.”

Egil ran a hand over his tattoo. “They'd be coming anyway. Zealous fakkers.”

“We underestimated that,” Nix allowed. “Going to be hard to square this up without it ending with either us dead or all of them dead. And I'm rather fond of me. Egil I could take or leave.”

The priest smiled, as did Veraal.

“You boys manage to step in shite no matter where you walk,” Veraal said.

“Now and again scraping it off gets old,” Nix said.

“Aye, that,” Egil said.

“If it matters, I think you were in the right, here,” Veraal said. “They were going to keep coming for Rose until they got reason enough not to. You made your play and bloodied their nose and pinched their Man. They don't learn a lesson from that…”

“We cut their fakking throats,” Nix finished.

“And that's why you two are my boys,” Veraal said, and thumped the bar with a fist. “And look here, me and my men will escort your people to wherever they're going. I'll check on them, too.”

“We'll owe you for all this when we come back,” Nix said. “We already owe you for the mail. Those things saved us more than once.”

“Owe me you do and will,” Veraal said with a smile. “Feels right to be deeper in the game a bit, though.”

“Doesn't it?” Nix said with a smile.

Egil's dice appeared in his hand, rattled while everyone gathered their things. Gadd returned from the back of the inn.

“Cart set,” he said.

“What's with that blade, man?” Nix said, nodding at the tulwar. “It's as long as your leg. I don't think the guild has any giants in its employ.”

“Big steel,” Gadd said, playing dumb.

Nix smiled. “We weren't going to play this game anymore, remember?”

Gadd's expression turned serious. He looked around to see that no one else was listening. “It was my father's. It's a special weapon.”

“You know how to use it?”

Gadd smiled, his teeth making him look like a predator. “Yes.”

“Good,” Nix said, extending his arm. “Luck to you, Gadd.”

“And you,” Gadd said, taking Nix's arm.

“Help Tesha, yeah?”

Gadd nodded and headed upstairs. After he'd gone, Nix looked down on the Upright Man.

“I'm going to check this fakker.”

“For what?” Egil asked.

Nix hopped off his stool, grabbed the Upright Man under the armpits, and heaved him atop a table. Veraal's men watched him curiously.

“I don't know,” Nix said. He checked Channis's arms, feet, legs. He opened Channis's shirt—the man's torso was as scarred as his face—but saw nothing unusual. Throughout, Channis didn't make a sound.

“Check his eyes,” Egil said.

“What?”

“Like with Drugal. Check his eyes.”

Nix peeled back Channis's eyelid. The eye had vertical slits, like a snake's, and the whites were black as pitch. Nix cursed and shared a look with the priest while holding Channis's eye open.

“See this?”

“I see it,” Egil said.

“Thoughts?” Nix asked.

Egil shook his head. “It got to him somehow. Same as with Drugal. He's a dead man.”

It's beautiful and it wants me and I'll help it.

Free us.

Nix pried open Channis's other eye. It was normal, the pupil dilated, and Nix swore he saw terror in it. He smacked the guildmaster on the cheeks.

“Can you hear me, Channis? Channis?”

The Upright Man's mouth opened wide, as if he would scream, but no sound emerged. It was all the more terrible for the silence.

“This isn't good,” Nix said.

“This hasn't been good for about a day and a half,” Egil said. He nodded at Channis. “But if he goes out ugly, I'm not going to feel bad about it.”

“Nor I,” Nix said, though going out filled with whatever was in Blackalley seemed a hard way to go for anyone. “But we still have to bring him. He's all we've got. He keeps the guild off us until we get Rose help. And if we're to get square with the guild, it's going to be through him.”

Egil grunted.

“Why didn't it get us?” Nix said.

“It did,” Egil said.

“That's not what I mean.”

Struck by a sudden fear, he checked his hands, arms, chest, and legs. No sign of Blackalley's touch. Egil took his point and checked himself, too. No sign.

“Must have been something in them,” Egil said.

“Must have,” Nix said. “We have to get moving,” Nix said. He hollered up the stairs. “We about ready?”

Presently Kiir, Lis, Tesha, and two of Veraal's men descended the wide staircase, each burdened with a sack or small chest filled with their things. Mere followed, with Rose leaning on one of Veraal's men.

Egil and Nix hurried forward and Nix took Rose from Veraal's man. She leaned against him, smelling of sweat and sick.

“Hello, Nix,” Rose said with a wan smile. She looked as pale as marble, her sweat-dampened red hair pressed against her head. Mere fell into Egil's arms. He embraced her in return, putting guildsmen's blood on her cloak.

“We're going to take care of you,” Nix said to Rose. “I have an idea.”

“Nix with an idea. There's a frightening thing,” she said, and winced at some pain.

“I'm going to get you fixed,” he said.

“Applause,” she said softly.

He kissed her on the brow and she closed her eyes.

“We ready?” he said, looking about.

Nods around.

“That's it, then. Everyone out the back. Right now.”

Rusk and Trelgin, each with four of their trusted, hardened men, hurried through the predawn streets. All wore boiled leather jerkins and bore steel and crossbows.

The street torches had burned down to piles of charcoal embers and the moons had both set. The streets were quiet and dark. Guildsmen called them “killing streets,” the hours when the streets were bare of Watchmen and civilians, when clicks went down in dark alleys or rival gangs met on empty streets to sort differences with knives and truncheons.

Rusk would've clicked the old Upright Man during the small hours if he'd been able, but the whoreson had been so careful that a click in the Low Bazaar had been Rusk's best chance. And that one decision had fakked up the works. Somehow the faytor had learned guild business, Channis had ordered a torch job on her that'd been botched, and Egil and Nix had hit the guildhouse and pinched Channis in return.

And now the guild had to hit them back, and in the process Rusk had to appear as though he wanted Channis back alive, all while praying to Aster that the tough whoreson died. What a cock-up.

He considered sending a private word to Egil and Nix, suggesting they kill Channis, but then they'd have something over Rusk. And Trelgin was watching, always watching. The Sixth Blade would figure it out if Rusk didn't play things square. So Rusk reasoned it was best just to let matters proceed, maybe drag his feet a little, and hope at the end of it that Channis ended up dusty. That'd solve a host of problems.

Rusk surreptitiously checked his tat as they crossed the city. No change.

To keep up appearances and deflect suspicion, Rusk had put a pair of men on every gate out of the city. They ought to have been in position by now. Pairs also scouted the streets, all eyes. Dur Follin was a big city, though, and a pair like Egil and Nix could go dark if they really wanted to.

“Why'd they pinch the Upright Man, you think?” asked Varn, a hulking man who'd lost two fingers on his right hand in a knife fight.

Mors, a small, twitchy man they called “the bald mouse” said, “Could've just killed 'im, yeah?”

“They want him for something,” a third man said. “Torture, maybe. They was talking payback in the guildhouse.”

“They'll get their own payback,” said Varn, and the others nodded.

“They strike you as the torturing type?” Trelgin asked, his words punctuated by slobbery inhalations. He didn't wait for an answer. “They pinched the Man for leverage, probably to bargain for the faytor's life. If the torch job hadn't been botched, we'd all be sleeping right now.”

Ayes around.

“We're past bargaining,” Rusk said. “They attacked the guildhouse and left a score of our men dead. They're dust and the faytor's dust and that's that.”

Not even Trelgin disputed with him over that.

“Dustmen,” said Varn, nodding.

“But whatever happens,” Trelgin said, speaking slowly to avoid drooling. “The Upright Man comes back alive. Ain't that right, Rusky?”

Rusk wanted exactly the opposite but the requirements of guild law severed thoughts from words. “Yeah. No careless shots if you see them. Channis comes back alive.”

“No shots at all, I'd say,” Trelgin countered, smiling through his droop. “Just to be safe.”

Rusk had to walk with a light step, so he merely grunted noncommittally. Trelgin's eyes lingered on him, but he ignored the look.

“We hit the inn hard,” Rusk said. “Anyone inside shows any fight, you put them down. Clear?”

“Clear,” said the men.

“Make it a slaughter and the Watch'll have to look into it,” Trelgin said.

“I didn't say make it a slaughter,” Rusk said, irritated. “I said put down those that show fight. And fak the Watch anyway. We got enough of 'em bought. There won't be any blowback whatever we do.”

“I want a go at that big fakker,” Varn said, cracking his knuckles. “I heard he strung up Zren the Blade by the chain.”

“I heard that, too,” said Mors.

They drew blades as they turned onto Shoddy Way. Decrepit buildings lined both sides of the street. The Slick Tunnel stood out among the smaller shacks and shops for its size and long-faded grandeur. Rusk assumed it had once been the manse of a nobleman, before the rich had moved to the west side of the Meander.

They kept to the darkness on one side of the street, but otherwise did little to mask their approach. This wasn't a click that required precision or surprise. It was a straight muscle job and Rusk and Trelgin had manned the team with some of the guild's best blade men. He also figured the eyes he'd stationed on the inn would fall in with them.

The Tunnel sat on a square parcel of land bounded by narrow alleys on two sides, Shoddy Way and Tannery Row on the other. The building was two stories of stone and wood, with once ornate windows on three sides, most of the panes cracked or missing. A poorly built wooden fence bordered the back of the parcel, the slats leaning this way and that between the posts. A balcony with a balustrade stuck out from the second floor, but the posts that held it up sagged under its weight. Like most of Dur Follin, the building gave the impression of imminent collapse.

No light glowed in any of the windows.

“Maybe they're sleeping,” Varn said.

“They ain't sleeping,” Mors said, his voice low and dangerous.

“No,” Rusk said, though he wondered if maybe Egil and Nix hadn't come back to the inn. “Do the front door. I need at least one person taken alive for a chat.”

“Front door, aye,” Varn echoed, his tone eager.

They picked up their pace.

Egil, Nix,
Tesha, Veraal, and all the rest poured out the back of the Tunnel. The fence gate around the back of the inn was thrown open, manned by Gadd and his tulwar. A covered wagon waited for them on Tannery Row, a threadbare mule harnessed to it.

“Wagon will serve?” Gadd asked Nix.

A thick layer of straw and two bales were inside the wagon. Gadd had stocked it with two hogsheads of beer, a few water skins, two bags with several loaves of bread each, and several bags of roots and tubers taken from his cellar.

“That's well done, Gadd,” Nix said, once more shaking the easterner's hand. “Take care of Tesha like I said, yeah?”

“Tesha can take care of herself,” said Tesha, gathering off to the side of the wagon with the rest of the group.

Egil and Nix placed Rose in the wagon, wrapped her in blankets. Nix smiled at her.

“Ain't much of a rattler, is it?” Rose said. She shook her head. “Wagon, I mean. It's not much of a wagon.”

“We won't be in it long,” Nix said.

Egil took Mere by the waist and lifted her onto the wagon.

“You and Rose will stay back here,” the priest said.

He gave her a dagger he produced from somewhere.

“Nix and I will drive. Channis stays with us.”

“Veraal,” Nix called. “Can your men spare a pair of crossbows?”

Nix had his sling, of course, but a loaded crossbow on the bench beside him would be an easier thing to fire.

“Make it three,” Mere said from inside the wagon.

Veraal nodded, gave the order, and Nix, Egil, and Mere all armed themselves with borrowed crossbows. The men supplied them with wishes of good luck and ten bolts apiece. Egil tossed Channis onto the floorboard and he and Nix took their seats on the driver's bench, Egil driving.

“Sorry-looking mule,” Egil said.

Nix eyed the points of the skinny mule's spine, its threadbare fur and bent head.

“If we have to make a run for it, I say I drive and we yoke you to the bridle.”

“Aye,” Egil said with a smile, but it faded right away. “Be nice if we could wait a day. They're likely to spot us. The streets are empty at this hour. They're going to have eyes everywhere.”

Nix knew Egil was right. But he also knew they had no choice. They couldn't hole up at the Tunnel. And Rose needed aid as fast as they could get it. “There's nothing for it. We risk it.”

“Thoughts on getting us through a gate?” Egil asked.

“Working on it.”

Mere's voice sounded through the canvas from behind them. “A gate? We're leaving the city?”

“Aye,” Nix said. “If we can. I'll explain as we go.”

Mere was quiet for a moment, then said, “I can get us through the gate.”

“How?” Egil asked, then, “Mindmagic? Won't that hurt you, Mere?”

“I'll be fine, Egil.”

“There,” Nix said, and grinned. “Problem solved.”

“That's one solved, anyway,” Egil said. “Take odds there won't be more?”

A pile
of debris in the street caught Rusk's eye, the flutter of loose material in the breeze.

“Wait,” he said.

“Wait for what?” Trelgin said, irritated, but the men held up and followed his gaze. What Rusk had first taken for rubbish he now saw for what it was.

“Bodies,” he said, and they all hustled over to the two corpses lying in the mud of the street. The shattered wooden remains of what looked like a wall lay under them.

Rusk recognized them right away—guildsmen. They'd been two of the three eyes on the Tunnel. One had a dagger still lodged in his throat. The other had a snapped neck and broken leg. Rusk looked up at the abandoned, dilapidated building from which they'd probably fallen. The men followed his gaze up to the second floor of the building, muttering angrily.

“I'll check the top of that building,” Mors said in his high-pitched voice.

“They ain't up there,” Rusk said. “They were just blinding the eyes.”

Rusk turned to the Tunnel, windows dark, doors closed. He'd be surprised if it wasn't already abandoned.

“Just left 'em in the street,” Varn said, shifting on his feet. “Whoresons.”

“There were three men on this duty,” Trelgin said.

Rusk nodded. “We'll look for him later. Could be they pinched him, too. Right now, get these two onto the walkway. The mud's no place for our brothers. We'll collect them on our way back and give them the rites later. Meanwhile, throw a pray for 'em.”

“We're wasting time,” Trelgin hissed.

“No we ain't,” Rusk said.

The men quickly gathered their fallen comrades, lifted them out of the mud, and placed them on the walkways, removing the wooden symbols of Aster they wore on lanyards.

Once that was done, Rusk said, “Let's see to this business, yeah?”

“Yeah,” all of them echoed.

They stormed up and across the street to the Slick Tunnel, all of them with a blade in one hand and a cocked crossbow in the other. Varn took the door, splintering the bar in two kicks. The rest poured in behind them.

A crash
sounded from inside the Tunnel, the crack of splintering wood.

Everyone out back froze. Nix put a finger to his lips.

“That was the door,” he whispered to Egil.

“Those slubbers move fast,” Egil said. The priest hefted his crossbow, trained it on the back door of the Tunnel.

“What is it?” Mere asked through the canvas.

“They're here,” Nix said.

Veraal hurried to the wagon. Tesha followed him.

“Cutting it close,” Veraal said softly. “You good?”

“We're good.”

“Then good luck,” Veraal said. They shook his hand.

Tesha came around to the other side of the wagon where Kiir would not see.

“I want to tell you something,” she said to Nix. “Come here.”

Nix leaned down and she took his face in her hands and kissed him softly, fully, deeply on the mouth. She tasted of citrus and smoke leaf, and Nix was so surprised he barely returned her kiss.

She let him go and smiled. “That's for luck.”

Stupefied, he said, “You've made me blush, milady.”

“That must be a first,” she said.