Honor among thieves

Chapter Sixty-Seven

He already knew what his Helstrovian second-in-command wanted, but still he let Velmont explain it in the most dramatic terms. That, at least, meant spending some time on the rooftops. The two of them raced each other across the Stink and up into the no longer aptly named Smoke, that zone of manufactories and work yards that girdled the city and now lay mostly quiet, cold, and unproductive. Even the terrible smell of the place had dissipated. “There, brother, what do you see?” Velmont asked, pointing down into the courtyard of the city’s biggest grain mill.

“I see wheels that aren’t turning, and wheat rotting in sacks,” Malden said. The giant mills needed oxen to turn them, and the rich merchants had taken all the best livestock when they fled the city, long before Malden’s return. Now the mill wheels stood silent and unmoving. Some needed replacement, too, but none of the workers remaining in the Smoke-a bare handful of those who’d been there before the Burgrave enlisted all their fellows-knew how to lever a mill wheel off its axle.

“Slag says he has a solution,” Malden told Velmont. The dwarf had been working even longer hours than Malden on one project or another. “A way to use the current of the river Skrait to turn the wheels.”

“Won’t the grain get wet if you put ’em in yon river?” Velmont asked, looking confused.

“Don’t second-guess a dwarf when he says he’s invented something new,” Malden told the Helstrovian.

“Won’t matter, anyroad,” Velmont said, his shoulders slumping. “Come, keep up if you can, and follow me uphill. There’s more to see, and worse.”

The two of them hurried across the roofs of the Smoke and up the Golden Slope toward Castle Hill. It was not a place Malden truly wanted to see ever again. The burnt-out stones of the palace and the fallen public buildings were a mute accusation of guilt he would never be able to atone for. Yet when Velmont led him along the fire-besmirched wall to a place near the back of the courtyard, Malden saw why they’d come, and his stomach fell.

Six square towers stood along the back wall of the hill, each of them windowless and very tall, with a single thick door at the bottom. Each once possessed a steep conical lead-lined roof to keep snow and rain off, but the roofs had all melted in the fire.

“Not the granaries,” Malden moaned.

“Aye, yer lordship. Ever last one of ’em.” Velmont squatted on the battlements and then leapt over to the top of the nearest tower. Malden followed him down through the ruined top of the granary and they clambered down through scorched support beams to the level of the grain inside.

An entire harvest’s worth of wheat had gone into these towers before the barbarians came to Skrae. A winter’s worth of flour, once it was ground and sifted. Winter was always a lean time in Ness, a time of hunger when many of the poor died for lack of bread. The Burgrave kept these granaries full so that when the coldest months came, he would have something to distribute to his people, if only to keep them from rioting while he dined on succulent venison and rare sweetmeats in his palace.

This year there would be nothing to hand out. Malden knelt in the grain and picked up handfuls of it to study in the dim light. What wasn’t burnt outright was soaked through by exposure to the elements.

He dropped his hands and let the roasted grain fall from his fingers. It smelled wonderful, frankly. Its smell made his mouth water. In one way the fire had probably done them a favor. Malden had spoken with enough bakers and millers since his ascension to learn more than he ever cared to know about the proper storage and processing of wheat products. For instance, he knew that roasted grain was harder to mill into flour, but it didn’t spoil as quickly.

Which was one small saving grace on top of a very serious problem. Roasted grain might be better preserved, but only if it was kept dry. It had rained several times since the fire melted those leaden roofs, and Malden could feel the damp rising off the stored food. Mold was probably already spreading through the towers, and rats wouldn’t be far behind. He could repair the lead roofs of the granaries, but the damage was already done.

Malden had lived through enough famines in his brief life to understand that what he saw here, what Velmont had shown to him, could easily be the end of his career in politics.

He tried to think of what they could do. “We’ll need a small army up here to move the grain to better bins,” he said. “We’ll salvage what we can.”

“Won’t be near enough,” Velmont pointed out.

“You have a better idea?”

The Helstrovian shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe you and me don’t go home tonight. Maybe we light out for greener hills. Surely there’s a need for high-toned thieves like us in the Northern Kingdoms, or maybe the Old Empire. Bein’ Lord Mayor’s a plum job, certes, but-”

“But once people start starving, it won’t be mine for long.” Malden nodded unhappily. “How I wish I could do what you say. But no-the people of Ness are depending on me. I have to find an answer.”