Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell (2 page)

William Ann scurried back and craned her neck over Silence’s shoulder. At fourteen, the girl was already taller than her mother. A fine thing to suffer, a child taller than you. Though William Ann grumbled about being awkward and lanky, her slender build foreshadowed a beauty to come. She took after her father.

“Oh, God
Beyond,
” William Ann said, raising a hand to her mouth. “You mean—”

“Chesterton Divide,” Silence said. The shape of the chin, the look in the eyes . . . they were the same. “He walked right into our hands, with four of his men.” The bounty on those five would be enough to pay her supply needs for a year. Maybe two.

Her eyes flickered to the words below the pictures, printed in harsh, bold letters.
Extremely dangerous. Wanted for murder, rape, extortion.
And, of course, there was the big one at the end:
And assassination.

Silence had always wondered if Chesterton and his men had intended to kill the governor of the most powerful fort city on this continent, or if it had been an accident. A simple robbery gone wrong. Either way, Chesterton understood what he’d done. Before the incident, he had been a common—if accomplished—highway bandit.

Now he was something greater, something far more dangerous. Chesterton knew that if he were captured, there would be no mercy, no quarter. Lastport had painted Chesterton as an anarchist, a menace, and a psychopath.

Chesterton had no reason to hold back. So he didn’t.

Oh, God Beyond,
Silence thought, looking at the continuing list of his crimes on the next page.

Beside her, William Ann whispered the words to herself. “He’s out there?” she asked. “But where?”

“The merchants,” Silence said.

“
What?
” William Ann rushed back to the peephole. The wood there—indeed, all around the kitchen—had been scrubbed so hard that it had been bleached white. Sebruki had been cleaning again.

“I can’t see it,” William Ann said.

“Look closer.” Silence hadn’t seen it at first either, even though she spent each night with the book, memorizing its faces.

A few moments later William Ann gasped, raising her hand to her mouth. “That seems so
foolish
of him. Why is he going about perfectly visible like this? Even in disguise.”

“Everyone will remember just another band of fool merchants from the fort who thought they could brave the Forests. It’s a clever ruse. When they vanish from the paths in a few days, it will be assumed—if anyone cares to wonder—that the shades got them. Besides, this way Chesterton can travel quickly and in the open, visiting waystops and listening for information.”

Was this how Chesterton discovered good targets to hit? Had they come through her waystop before? The thought made her stomach turn. She had fed criminals many times; some were regulars. Every man was probably a criminal out in the Forests, if only for ignoring taxes imposed by the fortfolk.

Chesterton and his men were different. She didn’t need the list of crimes to know what they were capable of doing.

“Where’s Sebruki?” Silence said.

William Ann shook herself, as if coming out of a stupor. “She’s feeding the pigs. Shadows! You don’t think they’d recognize her, do you?”

“No,” Silence said. “I’m worried she’ll recognize them.” Sebruki might only be eight, but she could be shockingly—disturbingly—observant.

Silence closed the book of bounties. She rested her fingers on the satchel’s leather.

“We’re going to kill them, aren’t we?” William Ann asked.

“Yes.”

“How much are they worth?”

“Sometimes, child, it’s not about what a man is worth.” Silence heard the faint lie in her voice. Times were increasingly tight, with the price of silver from both Bastion Hill and Lastport on the rise.

Sometimes it wasn’t about what a man was worth. But this wasn’t one of those times.

“I’ll get the poison.” William Ann left the peephole and crossed the room.

“Something light, child,” Silence cautioned. “These are dangerous men. They’ll notice if things are out of the ordinary.”

“I’m not a fool, Mother,” William Ann said dryly. “I’ll use fenweed. They won’t taste it in the beer.”

“Half dose. I don’t want them collapsing at the table.”

William Ann nodded, entering the old storage room, where she closed the door and began prying up floorboards to get to the poisons. Fenweed would leave the men cloudy-headed and dizzy, but wouldn’t kill them.

Silence didn’t dare risk something more deadly. If suspicion ever came back to her waystop, her career—and likely her life—would end. She needed to remain, in the minds of travelers, the crotchety but fair innkeeper who didn’t ask too many questions. Her waystop was a place of perceived safety, even for the roughest of criminals. She bedded down each night with a heart full of fear that someone would realize a suspicious number of the White Fox’s bounties stayed at Silence’s waystop in the days preceding their demise.

She went into the pantry to put away the bounty book. Here, too, the walls had been scrubbed clean, the shelves freshly sanded and dusted. That child. Who had heard of a child who would rather clean than play? Of course, given what Sebruki had been through . . .

Silence could not help reaching onto the top shelf and feeling the crossbow she kept there. Silver boltheads. She kept it for shades, and hadn’t yet turned it against a man. Drawing blood was too dangerous in the Forests. It still comforted her to know that in case of a true emergency, she had the weapon at hand.

Bounty book stowed, she went to check on Sebruki. The child was indeed caring for the pigs. Silence liked to keep a healthy stock, though of course not for eating. Pigs were said to ward away shades. She used any tool she could to make the waystop seem more safe.

Sebruki knelt inside the pig shack. The short girl had dark skin and long, black hair. Nobody would have taken her for Silence’s daughter, even if they hadn’t heard of Sebruki’s unfortunate history. The child hummed to herself, scrubbing at the wall of the enclosure.

“Child?” Silence asked.

Sebruki turned to her and smiled. What a difference one year could make. Once, Silence would have sworn that this child would never smile again. Sebruki had spent her first three months at the waystop staring at walls. No matter where Silence had put her, the child had moved to the nearest wall, sat down, and stared at it all day. Never speaking a word. Eyes dead as those of a shade . . .

“Aunt Silence?” Sebruki asked. “Are you well?”

“I’m fine, child. Just plagued by memories. You’re . . . cleaning the
pig shack
now?”

“The walls need a good scrubbing,” Sebruki said. “The pigs do so like it to be clean. Well, Jarom and Ezekiel prefer it that way. The others don’t seem to care.”

“You don’t need to clean so hard, child.”

“I like doing it,” Sebruki said. “It feels good. It’s something I can do. To help.”

Well, it was better to clean the walls than stare blankly at them all day. Today, Silence was happy for anything that kept the child busy. Anything, so long as she didn’t enter the common room.

“I think the pigs will like it,” Silence said. “Why don’t you keep at it in here for a while?”

Sebruki eyed her. “What’s wrong?”

Shadows. She was so observant. “There are some men with rough tongues in the common room,” Silence said. “I won’t have you picking up their cussing.”

“I’m not a child, Aunt Silence.”

“Yes you are,” Silence said firmly. “And you’ll obey. Don’t think I won’t take a switch to your backside.”

Sebruki rolled her eyes, but went back to work and began humming to herself. Silence let a little of her grandmother’s ways out when she spoke with Sebruki. The child responded well to sternness. She seemed to crave it, perhaps as a symbol that someone was in control.

Silence wished she actually were in control. But she was a Forescout—the surname taken by her grandparents and the others who had left Homeland first and explored this continent. Yes, she was a Forescout, and she’d be damned before she’d let anyone know how absolutely powerless she felt much of the time.

Silence crossed the backyard of the large inn, noting William Ann inside the kitchen mixing a paste to dissolve in the beer. Silence passed her by and looked in on the stable. Unsurprisingly, Chesterton had said they’d be leaving after their meal. While a lot of folk sought the relative safety of a waystop at night, Chesterton and his men would be accustomed to sleeping in the Forests. Even with the shades about, they would feel more comfortable in a camp of their own devising than they would in a waystop bed.

Inside the stable, Dob—the old stable hand—had just finished brushing down the horses. He wouldn’t have watered them. Silence had a standing order to not do that until last.

“This is well done, Dob,” Silence said. “Why don’t you take your break now?”

He nodded to her with a mumbled, “Thank’ya, mam.” He’d find the front porch and his pipe, as always. Dob hadn’t two wits to rub together, and he hadn’t a clue about what she really did at the waystop, but he’d been with her since before William’s death. He was as loyal a man as she’d ever found.

Silence shut the door after him, then fetched some pouches from the locked cabinet at the rear of the stable. She checked each one in the dim light, then set them on the grooming table and heaved the first saddle onto its owner’s back.

She was near finished with the saddling when the door eased open. She froze, immediately thinking of the pouches on the table. Why hadn’t she stuffed them in her apron? Sloppy!

“Silence Forescout,” a smooth voice said from the doorway.

Silence stifled a groan and turned to confront her visitor. “Theopolis,” she said. “It’s not polite to sneak about on a woman’s property. I should have you thrown out for trespassing.”

“Now, now. That would be rather like . . . the horse kicking at the man who feeds him, hmmm?” Theopolis leaned his gangly frame against the doorway, folding his arms. He wore simple clothing, no markings of his station. A fort tax collector often didn’t want random passers to know of his profession. Clean-shaven, his face always had that same patronizing smile on it. His clothing was too clean, too new to be that of one who lived out in the Forests. Not that he was a dandy, nor was he a fool. Theopolis was dangerous, just a different kind of dangerous from most.

“Why are you here, Theopolis?” she said, hefting the last saddle onto the back of a snorting roan gelding.

“Why do I always come to you, Silence? It’s not because of your cheerful countenance, hmmm?”

“I’m paid up on taxes.”

“That’s because you’re mostly exempt from taxes,” Theopolis said. “But you haven’t paid me for last month’s shipment of silver.”

“Things have been a little dry lately. It’s coming.”

“And the bolts for your crossbow?” Theopolis asked. “One wonders if you’re trying to forget about the price of those silver boltheads, hmmm? And the shipment of replacement sections for your protection rings?”

His whining accent made her wince as she buckled the saddle on. Theopolis. Shadows, what a day!

“Oh my,” Theopolis said, walking over to the grooming table. He picked up one of the pouches. “What are these, now? That looks like wetleek sap. I’ve heard that it glows at night if you shine the right kind of light upon it. Is this one of the White Fox’s mysterious secrets?”

She snatched the pouch away. “Don’t say that name,” she hissed.

He grinned. “You have a bounty! Delightful. I have always wondered how you tracked them. Poke a pinhole in that, attach it to the underside of the saddle, then follow the dripping trail it leaves? Hmmm? You could probably track them a long way, kill them far from here. Keep suspicion off the little waystop?”

Yes, Theopolis was dangerous, but she needed
someone
to turn in her bounties for her. Theopolis was a rat, and like all rats he knew the best holes, troughs, and crannies. He had connections in Lastport, and had managed to get her the money in the name of the White Fox without revealing her.

“I’ve been tempted to turn you in lately, you know,” Theopolis said. “Many a group keeps a betting pool on the identity of the infamous Fox. I could be a rich man with this knowledge, hmmm?”

“You’re already a rich man,” she snapped. “And though you’re many things, you are not an idiot. This has worked just fine for a decade. Don’t tell me you’d trade wealth for a little notoriety?”

He smiled, but did not contradict her. He kept half of what she earned from each bounty. It was a fine arrangement for Theopolis. No danger to him, which was how she knew he liked it. He was a civil servant, not a bounty hunter. The only time she’d seen him kill, the man he’d murdered couldn’t fight back.

“You know me too well, Silence,” Theopolis said with a laugh. “Too well indeed. My, my. A bounty! I wonder who it is. I’ll have to go look in the common room.”

“You’ll do nothing of the sort. Shadows! You think the face of a tax collector won’t spook them? Don’t you go walking in and spoiling things.”

“Peace, Silence,” he said, still grinning. “I obey your rules. I am careful not to show myself around here often, and I don’t bring suspicion to you. I couldn’t stay today anyway; I merely came to give you an offer. Only now you probably won’t need it! Ah, such a pity. After all the trouble I went to in your name, hmmm?”

She felt cold. “What help could you possibly give me?”

He took a sheet of paper from his satchel, then carefully unfolded it with too-long fingers. He moved to hold it up, but she snatched it from him.

“What is this?”

“A way to relieve you of your debt, Silence! A way to prevent you from ever having to worry again.”

The paper was a writ of seizure, an authorization for Silence’s creditors—Theopolis—to claim her property as payment. The forts claimed jurisdiction over the roadways and the land to either side of them. They did send soldiers out to patrol them. Occasionally.

“I take it back, Theopolis,” she spat. “You most certainly
are
a fool. You’d give up everything we have for a greedy land snatch?”

“Of course not, Silence. This wouldn’t be giving up anything at all! Why, I
do
so feel bad seeing you constantly in my debt. Wouldn’t it be more efficient if I took over the finances of the waystop? You would remain working here, and hunting bounties, as you always have. Only, you would no longer have to worry about your debts, hmmm?”