Dread Brass Shadows

19

You get wary when people have been pounding on you. Even when you're so tired even snazzy redheads have begun to lose their appeal. Before I'd gone a block I sensed I was being watched. I'm not sure what it was. Certainly nothing I could spot. The watcher was that good. Maybe it's a sense you develop in order to survive in this business, in this city.

I decided I'd stay out of places so tight I'd have nowhere to run, which was just common night sense anyway.

I was halfway to Morley's place, dodging low-flying morCartha, when suddenly I was no longer alone. "Shee-it! You guys got to stop doing that. My heart can't handle it." Despite my wariness, Crask and Sadler had surprised me, appearing out of nowhere. An object lesson, most likely. In case I ever became inclined to line up against them. They like to play those games.

I supposed it was their people who had tracked me from my place and sent them word I was coming.

Sadler smiled. At least I think that was supposed to be a smile. Hard to tell in the dark. "Really thought you'd appreciate some good news, Garrett. But if you ain't happy to see us .

"I'm overjoyed. I'm thrilled right down the quicks of my toenails." Thrilled like they were double pneumonia with a raging dysentery tossed in. "Why can't you guys just walk up to me like normal people? You always got to be jumping out of alleys and stuff."

Crask said, "I like to see the look on your face." He wasn't smiling. He wasn't kidding.

Sadler said, "My, my. We're crabby tonight. Did we have a bad day?"

"You got your kicks. So tell me what's the good news?"

"We found your man Blaine."

"Huh?"

Sadler said, "Come on. You ask, we deliver."

Deliver, sure, but without any guarantees about condition. It's hard to read those two, but I did get a feeling all was not well during our stroll to see Blain. So I wasn't surprised when, after we'd passed a platoon of henchmen and climbed to a third-floor one-roomer, he turned out to be in a poor state of health.

Some unaccountably thoughtful soul had covered the body with a blanket.

I glanced around. The room's door had been busted off its hinges. And I don't mean just kicked in but torn up like it had gotten in the way of a troll in a hurry who didn't want to be bothered with latches. The room itself was ripped all to hell, like a squad of werewolves had gone berserk there. But there wasn't any blood. "You guys get a little overwrought?"

Sadler shook his head. "Somebody else. We come here when he heard about the racket."

"Who did it?"

He shook his head again. "Everybody cleared out before we got here. You know how it goes. See no evil, hear no evil, you don't got to worry about comebacks. We only caught one old guy who was too slow. He didn't know nothing but the dead guy's name. Dipshit was so thick he used his own name."

"Bright." But what did that mean? None of us knew Holme Blaine. The dead guy could be anybody and we wouldn't know the difference.

I glanced around again. Looking more closely, I could see the damage wasn't just insane destruction after all. "Somebody wanted it to look like crazies did it."

Crask smiled at me like I was a dull pupil who had seen the light at last. "Somebody was looking for something. Maybe some of them looking while some of them were asking. Then we come along unexpected, they do a quick cleanup and fade."

Ha! "So where are they?"

"Gone. Saw us coming."

Huh. I wondered why anyone would bother hiding the fact that they'd searched Blaine's place and fixed him so he couldn't talk about it. Did we have somebody looking for the book who didn't want somebody else looking for it to know they were looking, too?

That came to me off the wall but felt so right I went into a trance trying to figure Out why.

Sadler said, "You want something to exercise your mind, check this out." He yanked the blanket off Blaine.

I gaped. I managed a one-syllable expletive after about fifteen seconds, and a quarter of a minute later said, "That's impossible."

"Yeah. Prime example of a mass hallucination."

Damn. Everybody was getting sarky.

Blaine was half-man, half-woman. Actually, more woman than man. Running from three inches above the waist on the right diagonally to his left shoulder, he was a he. Down below he was a she. Very much a she. In fact, a familiar one. I'd seen that end before.

"What do you think of that?" Crask asked.

I chewed some air. I made my eyes bug. "Looks like he had trouble making up his mind." I made funny noises. "Bet he had trouble on dates." They must've thought the circus was in town and I was practicing for my audition.

"First time I ever seen him without some wiseass remark," Crask said. I bet he'd waited a year to pick a time to drop that one.

Sadler asked, "What you know about this, Garrett?"

"I know it's weird. I never saw anything like it." Well, like part of it. That bottom had been in my small front room for a while. "It's like something out of a freak show."

"Not what I meant."

I knew that. "Zip."

"You sure? You wanted this guy."

"Because he was supposed to have the answers."

Sadler gave me the fish-eye. "Don't look like anybody's going to get to empty him out, now."

"No. I guess that's the point." I leaned against a wall, where nobody could get behind me, and gave the room another took. But there wasn't anything there to see. Except that body. Whoever did the job, they left nothing of their own. And they didn't find what they were looking for, else they wouldn't have been there still when Crask and Sadler showed. "Nobody saw nothing, eh?"

"This's TunFaire. What do you think?"

I thought they were lucky to have caught the old man they'd caught. I told him so. He grunted.

"You sure you ain't got nothing to tell us, Garrett?"

"Actually, I do. But let it ride a minute. I want you to understand something. I don't have a client. There's no percentage in me holding out." What's a little white fib amongst friends?

Crask said, "Would you look at this?" He'd gotten distracted in a big way.

"What?" Sadler.

Crask pointed at the body. We looked. I didn't get it till Sadler said, "It's changing." A little more of it was male than had been before.

Crask knelt, touched it. "And it's dead enough it's cooling out. This is weird."

"This is sorcery," Sadler said. "I don't like this. Garrett?"

"Don't look at me. I can't change water into ice."

They both scowled, sure I was holding out. Sure. Blame it on Garrett when weird things start to happen.

Crask said, "I don't like it. We ought to get out of here."

I said, "That sounds like a good plan." I headed for the door. "You guys rounded up any other news? You get a line on those dwarves yet?"

They both got a funny look. Sadler said, "Not yet. And that's weird, too."

Crask said, "Yeah. They got to leave a trail. They got to be staying somewhere,"

True. Curious. It bore some thought. Where could they stay and not catch the eyes of the kinds of people who work for Chodo, or who work for the people who work for Chodo? Couldn't be many places like that around.

I paused in the doorway. "Somebody really blew in here."

"Yeah," Crask said. "Hope I never have to arm-wrestle him."

I went over the fragments, looking for maybe a thread from a knit sweater that came only from one small island off the coast of Gretch, or something. You go through the motions even when you think they're pointless. A matter of discipline. They pay off sometimes, so you do them all the time. When I found a big lot of nothing, I wasn't disappointed. I'd fulfilled my expectations. If I'd found something, I'd have been overjoyed, having struck it rich beyond my wildest fancy.

Sadler said, "Let's not slide out so fast, Garrett. You had something to tell us."

"Yeah." I'd been vacillating. Information given up is advantage surrendered.

"Well?"

"Found out about another character who's got something to do with whatever's going on. Called the Serpent. She's the one this guy is supposed to have stolen a book from." Blaine was changing faster, maybe because he was getting cold.

"Well?"

Sadler ought to get together with Puddle for a gabfest. Sparkling. "The Serpent is a witch. She hangs out with dwarves." I took it from the top. They had some of it already but I didn't know how much. I gave them everything I thought they needed to know. I was real ignorant about why the book was a big deal.

"Witch, eh?" Crask eyed Blaine. That was the salient point for him.

"Tattoo?" Sadler asked. He lifted an eyebrow. "That would be a sight to see."

It would, but I was surprised he thought so. He never showed much interest along those lines. He asked, "You figure she cut Squirrel?"

"If she didn't, she knows who did."

"We'll find her. We'll ask."

"Be careful"

He gave me a look. Most'y it wondered about my smarts. He'd be careful. He'd survived his five in the Cantard. He'd survived in his line of work long enough to get to the top. Careful was his middle name, right between bad and deadly.

I took a final look at Holme Blaine, who hadn't been careful enough. He still didn't have anything to tell me. I didn't have anything to say to him, either.

I'd done my duty. It was time to get my bones moving toward a bed. If the morCartha took pity maybe I could get some sleep.