Den of thieves

Chapter Eight

The accused was brought into the square on a hurdle, hoodwinked and bound. He wore nothing but a pair of breeches and a white nightshirt. His hair was blond and cut very short, and his chin had been shaved for his execution. Even with a filthy cloth tied around his eyes, Malden could see he had the face of a poet but the body of a warrior. Under the loose shirt the man’s body rippled with muscle. More than one woman in the crowd turned to whisper excitedly to her neighbor as the cart trundled past on its voyage to the gibbet.

Malden hated the man instantly, just on principle.

Leaping down easily from the gallows, the masked hangman grabbed up the prisoner’s bound hands behind his back and heaved. The bound man’s back arched in pain and he grimaced (showing off perfect white teeth), but he refused to make a noise of agony. Struggling to stand up properly, he kicked out with his legs and found the first step of the gallows. Without hesitation he climbed to the top.

The crowd pressed close, murmuring with excitement. With barely checked glee. Up on the platform the criminal was on proud display, and the little chill of terror a hanging always evoked ran in waves ran through the people gathered to watch.

A list of charges was read out, but Malden didn’t listen. He was far too busy at that moment lifting purses. The real trick to it wasn’t deft fingers, really. It was choosing the perfect moment. You had to wait until your mark’s attention was fully on something else, until he was totally unaware of the people all around him.

Then it was child’s play. Snip-snip went the shears, and coins fell into Malden’s hands. The fat merchant in front of him didn’t even turn around to see who’d touched him.

Up on the gallows the show was just getting started, it seemed. Mouths fell open and eyes went wide as the condemned man lifted his chin and interrupted the reading of the charges. “May I not see my accuser, before I am put to death?” the prisoner asked in a voice as clear as a bell.

Over on the viewing stand the Burgrave rose from his throne. A sardonic smile twisted his lips. “I suppose you have that right, as a peer. Let him see me.”

The executioner pulled off the prisoner’s hoodwink, and for a moment the blond man simply blinked and squinted in the bright sunlight. Then he looked up and saw Ommen Tarness gazing silently in his direction.

“Ah,” the prisoner said. “Greetings, milord.”

“Exactly, Sir Croy,” the Burgrave replied. “I am still your lord.”

The crowd erupted in surprise. Apparently they had no idea that the man waiting to be hanged was, in fact, a knight of the realm. A man of property and good family-which made his execution that much juicier. Most interestingly, the dwarf envoy, Murdlin, jumped up on his seat at the news. The dwarf looked conflicted by varying emotions-in which state he mirrored the people who surrounded Malden on every side. A great chaos of voices and opinions raised itself, and it seemed no two citizens could agree on what this meant.

Tarness held up both hands for silence. “Croy, I warned you, when last we met, that I would not suffer you to return here. Yet you broke the letter of your banishment. I hope you have a very good reason.”

“I do,” the knight said, bowing his head. “I came for love.”

The crowd erupted in noise. Some jeered, some expressed the utter disbelief that Malden felt on hearing this. Others, many of them, cried out in sympathy. Tarness shook his head and sat down on his throne. “Enough of this nonsense. Proceed.”

“Wait! Let me speak in my defense, I beseech you!” the knight shouted. “When you hear my tale, I am sure-”

Tarness made a gesture with one hand and the hangman struck Croy across the face. The Burgrave looked away in disgust and said, “Gag him so I don’t have to listen to this. And then proceed.”

Even Malden had to admit he found that a trifle unfair. The man was about to die-he ought to be allowed to prattle on if he liked. He gave in to his instinct to join the chorus of boos and hissing that welled up from the crowd.

Still, he had not come to see the knight’s final distress, but only to do a little hard labor and reap a harvest of coin. He looked away from the scene on the gibbet and moved through the boisterous crowd, now looking for a final victim before he retired for the day. It would be easy to take a purse at the moment the hanged man dropped. At that moment every eye in the square would be turned to the same place. Few easy marks presented themselves, however, and suddenly Malden was in danger of being trampled. Some among the crowd had begun to shout for the prisoner’s release, raising their fists in the air. They drew closer to the gallows, as if they might storm it and save the man themselves. The bailiff waved for the watch. The town’s policing force, dressed alike in cloaks patterned with embroidered eyes, rushed into the throng and pushed back with their quarterstaffs until the crowd gave some way.

Knowing it would be folly to try to take another purse right under the noses of the city watch, Malden shrank back, away from the gallows, and stumbled backward directly into what felt like a wall of jangling iron.

He whirled about, a curse on his lips, but this he forestalled as he saw whom he’d tripped over. A man much broader and taller than himself who loitered at the back of the crowd, aloof from it as if immune to its bloodlust. He wore a hauberk of chain mail covered by a jerkin of black leather. His head was covered in a wild tangle of brown hair that didn’t end until it wrapped around his chin in a full and glorious beard. The man peered down at him as if from a considerable height. A jagged scar crossed the bridge of his nose, nearly bisecting his face.

“Steady on there, boy,” the big man said. “Are you hurt? Ah, but now I see you are. I’m a blasted pillock for not seeing you there.”

Malden licked his lips. He’d been ready to call the man far worse than that until he saw the massive sword strapped to his back. So instead he kept his mouth shut, because he had a brain in his head. He never argued with a man wearing a sword. He held his peace for another reason as well. Under his sling, his long thin fingers had touched a fat purse on the swordsman’s belt. By the way it hung low and heavy, it must contain something more precious than copper.

Up on the viewing platform the dwarf Murdlin was trying desperately to get the Burgrave’s attention. Malden was barely aware that anyone else in the square existed. He was too busy running his fingertip across the milled edge of a coin inside the swordsman’s purse. It must be silver, he thought, just based on how it felt.

It was folly to steal from a man so heavily armed, recklessness of a sort Malden never permitted himself. Yet the oaf had bruised him. Malden feigned unsteadiness and let the swordsman grasp his left arm. With his right hand he made a quick pass with his shears and felt the weight of the coins that dripped from the cut purse. They were heavy enough to be gold, even though he wouldn’t know until later when he could examine them in private.

“The fault was mine, and I will beg your pardon, rather than insult you further,” Malden said. He reached up and touched the cowl of his cloak in salute, then twisted away and pushed into the crowd before the swordsman could say another word.

Up on the gallows, the hangman draped the noose around the knight’s neck, then pulled it fast. Better you than me, Malden thought. Best to get away now in the noise when the poor fool dropped. He took no more than a few steps into the comforting anonymity of the throng, however, before the swordsman behind him spoke the two words Malden dreaded most.

“Hold! Thief!” the man shouted.

From no more than five strides away, a watchman in an eye-covered cloak looked up and right into Malden’s eyes. The watchman took a step toward him-but then something miraculous happened.

“Wait!” the dwarf envoy bellowed, up on the viewing platform. “I cannot let this go on. This man is beloved by the king of my people. Lord Burgrave, I demand you spare his life!”

It was enough to turn the square into a bedlam. The watchman had all he could do to hold the crowd back from tearing the gallows down with their own hands. Long before he and his fellows had the mob under control, Malden was off and away, his scrawny legs flashing under his cloak. It was the best chance he would get to make good his escape, and he planned on milking the opportunity for every drop of grace. Yet his luck was not unalloyed at that moment. As he fled he glanced behind him only once-and then only to confirm what he dreaded. The watch had lost sight of him, but the swordsman had not. The big man was right behind him.