Luck in the Shadows

33 Among the Scavengers

By virtue of its function, the Scavenger Guild was the caretaker of Rhнminee's unwanted dead. Combing the streets and sewers for refuse, the Scavenger crews were often the first to find the murdered and destitute, the cast-off, cast-out, and abandoned ones.

There were three charnel houses in the city: two in the upper city, one in the lower. Seregil and Micum had often visited them as a final recourse. For Alec, however, they proved to be a harsh new experience.

They began with the closest, which stood near the north wall of the city. Alec had hardly set foot inside the place before he staggered out again, hand clamped over his mouth. Retching, he grasped the top of a street marker to steady himself. He'd gotten a good look at the interior of the plain building, seen the corpses lying face up on the stone floor in rows like bundles of used clothing in the marketplace. Even on such a cold winter night, the smell was appalling, and all the more so to a Dalnan nose.

After a moment, he was aware of Seregil beside him.

"They ought—they should have been burned before now!" he gagged.

"The Scavengers have to keep them for a few days after they find them, in case they're claimed," Seregil explained. "The ones dragged up out of the sewers are the worst. Perhaps you'd better stay with the horses."

Torn between shame and relief, Alec watched through the open doorway as Seregil returned to his unpleasant task. He and Micum paced up and down the rows, looking into bloated faces and examining clothing until they were satisfied that none of the three people they sought were there. Scrubbing their hands in a basin of vinegar provided by the keeper of the place, they rejoined Alec outside.

"Looks like we get to keep hunting," Micum told him grimly.

The second charnel house was situated a few streets away from the Sea Market. Alec kept silent during the ride, listening to the even rhythm of Patch's hooves as they galloped through the lamp shadows of the Street of the Sheaf. By the time they reached their destination, he'd made up his mind. He dismounted with the others.

"Wait just a second," Seregil said. Ducking in through the low doorway, he came back with a rag soaked with vinegar. "This helps," he told Alec, showing him how to drape it loosely over his nose and mouth.

Clasping the acrid rag to his face, Alec moved among the dozen or so bodies laid out for inspection. The air was uncomfortably damp, and a fetid stench rose from the glistening drainage channels cut into the floor.

"Here's a familiar face," Micum remarked from across the room. "Not one of ours, though."

Seregil came over for a look. "Gormus the Beggar. Poor old bastard—he must have been ninety. His daughter begs over by Tyburn Circle most days. I'll send word to her."

Again, they found no sign of Teukros or the others. Returning gratefully to the fresh night air, they rode down the echoing Harbor Way to the maze of wharves and tenements that clung to the eastern curve of the harbor.

Leading the way into the poorest section, Seregil reined in at a sagging warehouse. It was the largest of the city charnel houses and the stench of the place hit them before they opened the door.

"Sakor's Flame!" Micum croaked, clapping a vinegar rag over his nose.

Alec hastily did the same. None of the evening's activities had prepared him for this place; even Seregil looked a bit queasy.

More than fifty bodies were laid out on the stained wooden floor, some fresh, some with the flesh already slumping from the bones. The cresset lamps set around the room to consume the evil humours burned with a foul, bluish light.

A hunched little woman wearing the grey tabard of the Scavenger Guild limped up to them with a basket of wilted nosegays.

"Posies for you gentlemen? Makes the bitter search so much sweeter!"

Seregil tossed a few coins into her basket.

"Good evening, old mother. Perhaps you can make our search a shorter one. I'm looking for three people who'd have come to you within the past day. A young, dark-haired servant girl; a manservant of middling years, also dark; and a young nobleman with a blond mustache."

"You may be in luck, sir," the old woman cackled, hobbling off toward a corner of the room. "I've got the fresh ones over here. Is this your girl?"

Callia lay naked between a drowned fisherman and a young tough whose throat had been cut. Her eyes were open, and she looked vaguely worried.

"That's her, all right," said Seregil.

"Now that's a damned shame," Micum sighed, holding up the hem of his cloak as he squatted down beside the girl. "She can't be more than twenty. Do you see her wrists?"

Seregil fingered the brown bruises circling the pale wrists. "She was bound, and gagged, too. See here, how the corners of her mouth are raw?"

Shivering with nausea, Alec forced himself to watch the examination. The past few hours rolled over him like an oppressive nightmare, leaving him sickened to the core.

The front of the body was unmarked except for the bruises. When they rolled her over, however, they found a single small wound between her ribs just to the left of the spine.

"A professional job," Seregil muttered.

"Through the great vessel and straight up into the heart. At least it was quick. Where was she found, old mother?"

"Poor lamb! They pulled her from under the docks, end of Eel Street," the Scavenger woman replied. "I took her for a doxy. Is there family to collect her?"

Seregil laid the body gently back into place and stood up. "I'll look into it. See that she's kept a day or two longer, won't you?"

Outside again, all three sucked in lungfuls of the tar-scented air, but the stink of vinegar on their hands and faces seemed to keep the stench of death about them.

"I want to jump into the sea with all my clothes on!" said Alec, casting a longing look toward the glimmering of water visible at the end of the street.

"Me, too, if we wouldn't come out of that water dirtier than we are now," said Seregil. "A good hot tub will put us right."

"That's your answer to just about everything," Micum observed wryly. "In this case, however, I have to agree."

"At least we know for certain that we're on the right track," Alec said hopefully. "I wonder where Teukros and Marsin will turn up?"

"If they ever do," answered Seregil. "For all we know, it could have been them who did away with the girl, in which case they could be halfway to anywhere by now. Then again, they could both be floating dead in the sewers. Between this and Barien's sudden death, though, I think it's safe to assume that we've got more enemies out there somewhere and, whoever they are, they've got the wind up their tails now. Teukros spilled something to someone!"