Honor among thieves

Chapter Thirty-One

Just outside the gates of Ness a recruiting serjeant had been broken on a wheel and hung up on a pole. The man’s kettle hat had been nailed to his head so it wouldn’t fall off, and so anyone passing by would recognize his occupation. Then his legs and arms were broken in several places so his limbs could be woven through the spokes of the wagon wheel, and then the wheel had been lifted high in the air so all could see.

Malden just hoped that he’d already been dead beforehand.

The message this grisly execution sent was clear. Recruiters had swept through all the counties and baronies around Ness, calling up every man who could fight for Skrae. Ness had refused that call. As a Free City it technically owed no obligation to the king-he could not conscript Ness’s citizens, nor could he demand they pay taxes to fund his campaigns. Clearly, at least one serjeant had been foolish enough to think the people of Ness were patriots all the same.

It was that independent streak that had birthed Malden and made him who he was, that unique Nessian truculence in the face of authority. Still, he doubted the serjeant deserved such treatment. Surely the Burgrave who ruled Ness could just have had the man tarred and feathered and sent on his way.

But of course Malden knew it had probably been the Burgrave himself who ordered the death of the serjeant. Ommen Tarness, the current Burgrave, was fiercely independent of nature. He answered only and directly to the king, and even then he excelled in sticking to the exact letter of the city’s charter. Tarness saw the Free City as his own personal fiefdom, and he would not have looked kindly on any attempt to recruit from among his people.

“Poor bugger,” Slag said.

Cythera didn’t even look at the dead man. Her eyes were on the city walls. “Home,” she said, with some weary measure of relief and hope. Malden took her hand, not caring who saw it. Their journey from Helstrow had been an endless round of nights spent slogging through muddy fields and long days hiding in abandoned barns when they saw signs that bandits were about. Velmont and his crew had given them numbers, and a certain degree of security, but Malden hadn’t been willing to chance an encounter with desperate men.

Funny, that. It wasn’t so long ago he’d considered himself as desperate as they came.

“It’ll be good to get back to my workshop in Cutbill’s lair,” Slag said, rubbing dust out of his eyes.

“Aye, Cutbill should be glad to see us,” Malden said.

The dwarf shot him a meaningful look. Malden chose to ignore it.

The city gate was manned by a single guard, a lame old watchman in a shabby undyed cloak embroidered with a pattern of eyes. That made him a watchman, one of the bailiff’s enforcers of public order. Normally the watch didn’t stand gate duty. Malden worried that the oldster might recognize him, but the guard took one look at the sword on his hip and waved him through.

The street beyond the gate was empty. Usually it would have been thronged with hawkers and beggars, hoping to make some coin from any newly arrived travelers. Malden couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen this street-or any street in Ness for that matter-when it wasn’t crammed with people. “Where is everyone?” he asked.

The watchman laughed. “Gone to ground if they’re smart, or run as far and as fast as their feet could carry ’em. You haven’t heard there’s war coming?”

Malden bit his lip. “We heard rumors, I suppose.”

“Where are you coming from, if I may ask?” the guard said, giving the thief a second look. Malden realized he shouldn’t have asked any questions. “I’ve been told to expect refugees from Helstrow. You’re dusty enough for a refugee, I suppose.”

“We’re late of Redweir,” Malden lied, unsure what the guard’s orders might be regarding such refugees. Most likely he’d been told to drive them away-no city wanted new immigrants in time of war. Refugees were extra mouths to feed who would come with nothing but the clothes on their backs. “We’ve come to do business with Guthrun Whiteclay, the master of the potter’s guild.”

The guard snorted. “Fare well with that, then, for he’s not here. Him and most of the burgesses’ve already run for it. Some to the west, some as far as the Empire, I hear tell. Is that a dwarf you’ve got with you? They were the first to go-hightailed it for their own kingdom days before we even knew there was barbarians coming. Nobody knows why.”

“Because we’re smarter than you humans,” Slag pointed out.

“Well, that’s what they say. And yet, you’re here, little fella.”

Slag was discreet enough not to react to the barb.

“Whiteclay wouldn’t just have abandoned his business altogether. He must have left some agent inside,” Malden said, trying to get the conversation back on track. “I’ll need to speak with him, then.”

“More luck to you, if you do find someone to do business with. Get on inside.”

“My thanks,” Malden told him, and headed through the open gate.

He found his city changed enormously since he’d left. Oh, the buildings were the same, the streets just as winding and close and full of filth as he remembered. Yet every shop sign, every standard in the street, every gable of every house, had been strewn with hawthorn branches-that tree most sacred to the Lady, for it wore her colors. It seemed like every door had been hung with a hawthorn wreath.

And yet there was no one about to appreciate all this decoration. It wasn’t just the street by the gate. Every street in Ness was empty. Occasionally Malden would spy someone through a window, or hear footsteps echoing in a side street, but otherwise the city might have been abandoned, deserted-silent. Or nearly so.

“Do you hear that music?” Cythera asked.

Once she said it, he did hear it-the high strains of a fife and the dull, slow beating of a drum. “Sounds like it’s coming from up on Castle Hill.”

Ness had been built on a massive hill, constructed in concentric zones around the Burgrave’s palace. Market Square was up top, surrounded by the Spires-the district of temples, public buildings, and the university. Malden led his crew up the Cornmarket Bridge, intending to investigate the music and see where all the people had gone. Weary as they were, Velmont and his thieves followed close behind. They had never been here before and most likely just didn’t want to get lost.

It was a long walk up a steep slope, but the cobblestones were so familiar under Malden’s soft leather shoes that he didn’t feel the fatigue of climbing. Slag grumbled but Cythera kept drawing ahead, as if impatient for Malden to get to the top. When they reached the side of the counting house, just outside Market Square, Malden stopped them all and just stood there, staring.

An army had formed in the square, perhaps a thousand men in tabards of russet and green. No two of them seemed to carry the same weapons or wear the same sort of armor, but they marched around the edges of the square in scrupulous order, their feet moving to the beat of the drum. Some of them carried flags with the coat of arms of Ness, while others held campaign banners so old and decayed they frayed visibly as Malden watched.

He’d seen those campaign banners before. They had hung in a secret chamber inside the Burgrave’s palace. They were the souvenirs of Juring Tarness, the first Burgrave of the city, a general who had helped found the kingdom of Skrae eight hundred years ago. Ommen Tarness, the current Burgrave, was Juring’s direct descendant.

“Ye men, will you come, and heed the call?” someone asked in a high, clear voice. Malden looked up with a start and saw an old man with one leg come hobbling toward him on a crutch. There was a sprig of hawthorn pinned to his tunic. “Skrae has need, for this is a dark hour. But the Free Army will show these barbarians a thing or two yet!” The cripple held out sprigs just like the one he wore.

Malden looked again at the soldiers in the square. He thought he recognized some of them. Joiners, cobblers, redsmiths, ropewalkers-men from a hundred other occupations. These were the good solid citizenry of Ness, all right, men who had worked the city’s many trades when last he’d seen them. Men who grumbled about the Burgrave’s policies and taxes, and spoke open treason against him in taverns and gaming houses. Men who thought of government as an evil rarely necessary but somehow inescapable. Now they were soldiers, recruits-could it be, volunteers?

“What happens if we say no?” Malden asked.

The cripple looked as if he’d bitten into a lemon. “Well, that’s your right, of course. As citizens you cannot be forced to serve. But you look able-bodied to me. Why would you turn down this opportunity? You’ll get to see the kingdom, and the pay’s better than anything the guilds offer. Look how many of your neighbors have joined up already! See how dashing they look. And don’t forget-every good girl loves a soldier. Isn’t that right, mistress?”

Cythera shook her head in disbelief. “Malden,” she said, ignoring the cripple, “they’re not bewitched. I would see it if a spell had been cast over them. Beyond that, I have no explanation for this. I should go and talk to my mother.”

Malden grasped her hand and looked deep into her eyes. “Be safe,” he said, “I don’t like the look of this… Come,” he told Slag and Velmont. “Let’s go find Cutbill. Maybe he knows what’s going on.”