Lessek's Key

ORINDALE’S SOUTHERN WHARF

‘Great rutting whores,’ Jacrys exclaimed, ‘what’s happened to you?’

Carpello Jax pulled the door closed and took a seat beside the spy. He did look different – thinner – and his beard had filled in nicely. The sore on the side of his nose was disgusting: raw and festering, obviously infected because he’d constantly picked at it. Now Carpello dabbed at it periodically with a handkerchief. He stretched his feet towards the fireplace. ‘I am making some rudimentary changes to my appearance. It has come to my attention that this may be an appropriate time for me to fade into the background for a while.’

‘You?’ Jacrys laughed, ‘when everyone knows who you are? Half the city works for you. Your captains cross the Ravenian Sea to Pellia on a timetable more predictable than the Twinmoon. Your cargo is hauled upriver on gigantic barges for everyone in Malakasia to see. You’re supplying an army, Carpello… forgive me, but I don’t believe shedding some excess blubber and carving a hole in the side of your face are going to make much of a difference. And good gods, why did you cut off half your nose, anyway?’

‘It’s no matter,’ Carpello replied, waving the question away. ‘It is something that needed to be attended to, and I have attended to it.’ Versen’s warning echoed in his memory: you’ll be dead and she will make it last for Twinmoons. ‘So tell me. Why are we meeting here and not at my home? And if you don’t mind me saying, you are hardly one to talk about personal appearance: you look hideous yourself. When is the last time you slept in a real bed, Jacrys? And your clothes – you were always such a smart dresser!’

Jacrys resisted the urge to reach out and slap the bigger man across the face. ‘We’re meeting here, because I have Sallax Farro of Estrad here, and I look like this because I have been sleeping here, eating here and working here for I don’t know how many days now, trying to get some information out of him.’

Carpello grimaced. ‘I’m sure you’ve dealt with challenging prisoners before. What’s the problem?’

‘The problem is that he genuinely doesn’t appear to recall that he is Sallax of Estrad,’ Jacrys said. ‘Last time I spoke to him was in the Blackstone Mountains, near Seer’s Peak – he and the others had survived the grettans, a platoon of Seron, even an almor, and they were making good progress on their way here.’

‘So what happened?’

‘I don’t know.’ Jacrys rose and fetched a flagon of wine from a shelf behind the desk. He didn’t offer any to Carpello. ‘But while I was crossing, our prince told me to move west and then north, breaking off my pursuit of the partisans to meet with him here. He told me he was bringing something terrible, something to address the issue, and to retrieve the stone key.’

‘And you think that whatever he sent to deal with the partisans left Sallax half mad?’

Jacrys nodded. ‘I don’t know how they survived the Blackstones. I killed Gilmour. The foreigner, Steven Taylor, had run off by himself and the other, the South Coaster, Mark Jenkins, was trailing him. An unholy storm blew through, snow almost to my waist – I thought for certain we were all going to die. The prince gave me a deer and even with that I barely made it here alive.

‘Sallax’s lot were broken, distraught at having lost Gilmour, and lost and separated in the worst storm I have ever seen – and yet they made it to Orindale and made their way through the pickets into the city, all without Gilmour’s help.’

‘How do you know they all arrived?’

Jacrys was not accustomed to explaining himself to the likes of Carpello, but for now, he needed the merchant’s help. ‘I know they made it here because I shot and possibly killed Garec Haile and because I have Sallax tied up in your warehouse, you horsecock!’

‘All right, all right.’ Carpello raised his hands in apology. ‘Calm down, I’ve been away and I just need to catch up with what’s been going on, that’s all.’

‘You’ve been away supervising a shipment – a likely story, Carpello; do you think the prince will believe you?’

The merchant mopped at the beads of sweat that trickled across his forehead. ‘Look at you, Jacrys, you’re a rutting mess yourself; it’s glaringly obvious that you’ve fallen from the prince’s good graces. All right, I admit it; I had a wretched trip. I lost both partisans. The whoresons jumped ship, even bound, they jumped and then – and you’re going to love this – the rutting Seron he sent me jumped in too. No one could have survived, so yes, I did think it might be best to hide for a few days and maybe let the prince move on.’

‘He’s still here.’

Carpello stifled his gasp, swallowing hard.

‘Actually,’ Jacrys continued, ‘no one has seen him in nearly a Moon, but he hasn’t left the city. I’m assuming you know about the Prince Marek.’

Carpello nodded, then changed the subject back. ‘So what exactly have you managed to get out of Sallax?’

‘Not much.’ Jacrys examined the wine goblet. ‘He keeps talking about wraiths, a rock and a river.’

Carpello shrugged. ‘It doesn’t mean anything to me.’

‘And he’s a gods-rutting disaster. His shoulder looks like it was broken and left to heal in a horribly unnatural position. I brought a healer in a few days ago to re-break it and that was a nightmare – he’s still as strong as a grettan. He was all bent over, twisted in pain all the time. He’s tied up now in that cot you had back there.’ The spy gestured towards the large storage area behind Carpello’s office.

‘You re-broke his shoulder?’

‘Yes, I want him whole, healed, friendly with me again. He trusted me once and we helped each other get to Gilmour.’

‘But that’s done. Why keep Sallax alive now?’

Jacrys lowered his voice, leaning across the table and staring into Carpello’s eyes. ‘Because I want the stone and I want the-’ He paused, deciding to leave out any mention of the curious staff Steven Taylor had wielded against the almor. ‘I want the stone, and I want to deliver it to Prince Malagon in person: my last assignment before I retire. That’ll be my grand gesture, handing the stone over to him. And then I want to get out of here.’

‘So what role do I play?’ Carpello lifted himself from his chair and rose to pour his own goblet of wine.

‘I need information, and I want to know that every barge captain, every crewman, every carriage and wagon driver, every stevedore and every whore you have working for you is out looking for them. I need to know where they are and where they’re going, and what they are doing when they get there – and I want to know it all yesterday.’

‘So what’s in it for me? Why should I help you with this?’

Jacrys’ face reddened. ‘Why should you help me? How about to keep me from cutting your bloated black heart out of your fat chest and feeding it to Sallax? And trust me, Carpello, the thing I have tied up back there would find it delicious.’

Carpello cringed; though a bully, he was a coward. Jacrys had no idea how the merchant had gained such power, but right now he didn’t care – he would be very happy to kill Carpello as soon as he knew the whereabouts of Steven Taylor, the wooden staff and the keystone Prince Malagon wanted so badly.

Carpello marshalled his courage. ‘Threatening me won’t do you any good, Jacrys, not if you want me to help find your lost quarry. Again, what do I get out of this?’

Jacrys smiled. It wasn’t reassuring. ‘What do you want?’

Carpello leaned forward, his words almost tumbling over each other in his rush to speak – and before he was halfway through he was silently cursing himself for showing his naked desperation. ‘I want to come with you, I know it’s dangerous, but I want to be there when you hand the stone over. I want it to be from us. I want him to know that although I lost the bastards overboard, I didn’t fail him.’

Jacrys sat back, contemplating his colleague. A wise decision, Carpello. You might just save your own life.’

‘Is that yes?’

Jacrys said, ‘You’ll have everyone in your employment combing the country for them?’

‘Done.’ Carpello raised his glass in anticipation. ‘There will be no place for them to hide.’

Jacrys reciprocated. ‘Then we have an agreement.’

‘Excellent,’ Carpello said, draining his glass. ‘Shall we visit your prisoner?’

The spy pursed his lips and nodded.

‘Wake up, Sallax.’ Jacrys tugged at the big Ronan’s toes, exposed where they stuck out at the end of his blanket. ‘Wake up, please.’

Jacrys had been thorough in his care: Sallax had been bathed, shaved and given a much-needed haircut. His leggings were clean, and his bare chest crisscrossed with bandages.

Carpello was impressed: Sallax was a powerful-looking man. The merchant wiped at his nose and said, ‘I thought he was a mess. He looks just fine to me, apart from the shoulder and all. Healthy skin tone; and well-defined muscles: he looks good.’

‘You should have seen him when I brought him here. Lucky for me he was so weak from malnutrition and dehydration because even so he nearly killed me. I had to cut him a couple of times across the chest – I stitched the slashes and wrapped them before the healer came in to re-set his shoulder.’

‘It seems like a lot of trouble to go to for one man.’

‘One man who knows more about the organised resistance in the southeast than anyone in Eldarn – the one person who knows how to get to Gilmour’s home in Estrad, how to find Gilmour’s writings, his personal effects – whatever I want. This man is too valuable to kill. I need him to trust me again.’ He turned back to the cot. ‘Sallax, wake up.’

With a groan, the man on the cot, clean and well nourished now, after who knew how long, tried to roll onto his side, but he was bound in place. He opened his eyes with a start, struggled for a moment to get free and then relaxed, obviously saving his strength. It was apparent he had been well trained, for as soon as he realised he was unable to break loose, he quieted. His gaze moved from Jacrys to Carpello. Even worn down and lashed to the cot as he was, Sallax still terrified the fat merchant.

‘How are you tonight, Sallax?’ Jacrys sat on the edge of the cot.

‘Girl – the girl knew his name.’ Sallax’s voice came out more a groan that anything else; it sounded unused, grating.

‘What girl, Sallax? You mentioned her before. Who is she?’

‘She knew Sallax.’

‘She knew Sallax? Well, that’s interesting. Sallax, tell me where Steven and Garec are tonight. Do you know?’

At the mention of the partisans’ names, Sallax bellowed, an anguished cry, devoid of hope. For a moment Carpello felt sorry for him as Sallax rocked his head back and forth across the pillow, screaming, ‘Can’t see him, can’t see him. He’s blurry, can’t see him, too far away.’

Jacrys asked again, ‘Who is, Sallax? Gilmour, Garec, or Steven Taylor?’ His question elicited another despondent cry.

Carpello interjected, ‘That certainly sets him off doesn’t it? Can you stop asking him that?’

Jacrys frowned. ‘He was there that night. He wanted Gilmour dead almost as much as I did. I don’t know what this means, why he would be suffering about it now – this man is a killer; he has no problem with death. Why he’s beating himself up about Gilmour is a mystery.’

‘Pain or guilt, or sadness.’ Carpello threw up his hands. ‘Take your pick.’

Jacrys ignored him and continued to press the point. ‘Sallax, tell me what happened in the Blackstones.’

Tears slipped from his eyes and tracked down his cheeks to soak into the pillow. ‘Can’t see him, he’s too far away,’ he wept. ‘The girl knows. She knows Sallax.’

‘The Blackstones, Sallax, what happened in the Blackstones?’

The big man’s voice dropped to a coarse whisper. ‘River… wraith.’

Carpello leaned in a little closer. ‘What did he say?’

‘River… wraith in the river,’ Sallax repeated.

‘A wraith?’ Jacrys clarified. ‘What kind of wraith?’

‘In the river.’

‘Did a wraith attack you in the river? Was it here in Orindale?’ Jacrys rested one palm on the clean bandage strips wrapped across the partisan’s broad chest, the touch of a caring friend – the Malakasian would have gutted him then and there if he had known about Sallax’s nocturnal killing sprees in the alleys near the wharf.

‘How did Sallax survive in the mountains? The wraith attack?’ Jacrys’ voice was soothing.

‘River.’

‘He was in the river? Was it cold?’

‘Cold.’ Sallax tilted his head towards his injured shoulder. ‘Cold.’

‘He must have fallen, broken his back, maybe,’ Carpello said softly. ‘He was in the river when Prince Malagon sent a wraith or a spirit or something up there after them. Maybe he was trying to treat himself with the cold water.’

‘Or hiding in the most unlikely place,’ Jacrys said.

‘I wonder how they survived the wraith,’ Carpello said, ‘especially if they didn’t have Sallax to fight for them – could they all have hidden in the water? That must have been deadly cold.’ The fat man shivered sympathetically.

Jacrys shrugged. ‘We’ll not know anything for certain until we get him back on his feet.’ He was confident that it would have been Steven and the staff that had ensured their safe passage, and wondered again if the stone somehow loaned its power to the deadly branch, for no one had defeated an almor in thousands of Twinmoons. Jacrys shook his head, and started again, calmly, quietly, insistently. ‘Why was Sallax in the river?’

The big man gestured towards his bound shoulder. ‘River – cold.’

Carpello joined the questioning. ‘Does Sallax know if Steven has the stone key?’

Sallax opened his eyes and laughed, almost a bark, making both Jacrys and Carpello jump. The laugh was a punctuation mark that said, absolutely not.

‘We don’t understand.’ Carpello tried to make his voice sound as gentle and as soothing as the spy’s. ‘Does Steven Taylor have the stone key?’

‘No key – no key,’ Sallax smiled an unlikely grin and said, ‘no stone key.’

Carpello was frustrated; this was the wrong answer and he was bored of playing question and answer games with an addled enemy of Malakasia. Emboldened by his sudden anger, he stepped up close to the partisan leader and launched into a barrage of threats, culminating in the ultimatum, ‘I want you to understand, Sallax of Estrad, that I don’t care in the slightest that you feel oh-so-bad for your precious Gilmour.’

Sallax strained against his bonds and growled something unintelligible at the mention of the old man.

‘I’ll say it again: Gilmour, Gilmour, Gilmour. Does that make you feel sad or guilty? I don’t care. I want to know about the key!’ Carpello’s jowls jounced in time with the finger he wagged in Sallax’s face.

Jacrys, fully expecting Sallax to scream again, moved to shove Carpello bodily away from his patient – he needed the merchant, but he’d send him home that evening minus a finger or perhaps even an eye if Carpello insisted on badgering Sallax further.

‘Ren.’

Jacrys turned back to the trussed-up figure and Carpello said, ‘What’s that? Have you come to your senses? Lucky for you.’

Carpello mopped again at his brow; this was working. He had already got further in one evening than Jacrys had managed in all the time he had been sequestered in this hole. ‘Now, say it again.’

Sallax stared up at the merchant, his eyes ablaze. He drew a rattling breath and repeated, ‘Ren.’

Jacrys suddenly realised that if the big Ronan had been free, he would have torn the fat man’s throat out with his bare hands.

‘Ren?’ Carpello looked to Jacrys. ‘What’s Ren?’

Before Jacrys could reply, Sallax spoke again, his voice gravelly with disuse, but still recognisable. ‘You cut off the mole.’

Carpello blanched. His throat closed and his limbs felt as though they were molten rock. ‘I’ll kill you,’ he whispered down at the helpless man. ‘Do you understand, Sallax? I’ll kill you.’

‘Ren,’ said Sallax, his gaze fixed on the merchant. ‘Sallax killed Ren and you cut off your mole.’

As Carpello’s terror welled up, he screamed a string of curses that echoed through the great warehouse like the long-ago cries of the young women and girls he had beaten and raped. ‘I’ll kill you, you whoreson rutter!’ Carpello screamed, towering over the Ronan with his fists clenched.

Sallax glared at him, daring him to strike, as if the surfacing memory was of a hatred so powerful that it had cleared his mind, even if just for a moment.

Finally Jacrys intervened, grasping Carpello by the collar and dragging him away from the cot. ‘What’s wrong with you, you stupid, stupid man?’ he whispered furiously. ‘Did you not hear a word I said?’ He stood over Carpello, nearly incandescent with rage – but also interested in the merchant’s response: Sallax had clearly touched a nerve. ‘What’s a ren?’ he asked, more calmly.

Carpello was too agitated to answer. Shaking, he lifted himself off the floor of his own warehouse, a business he had built with his own superior intellect and crafty economic sense, and looked back at Sallax. The patient appeared to be grinning at him, daring him to come forward for another bedside visit.

Carpello ran a finger across the open sore where his mole had been.

She will make it last for Twinmoons.

There was no way to change his appearance; he would never be free. This broken man had recognised him even with the beard, much thinner and without the mole. He turned and, without a word to Jacrys, ran through the warehouse and out onto the pier. He shouted something as he left the building, but Jacrys couldn’t understand what Versen! meant.

Brexan waited her turn at the bakery window, almost salivating as she eyed a plump loaf on the third shelf. A short woman with a kerchief on her head and a battered basket over one arm pushed in front of her – either she thought she was old enough to ignore social graces, or she had come to Orindale from some part of Falkan where queuing was not common practice. Brexan shoved her hands inside her tunic and bit down hard on her tongue; she had too much to do this morning to draw attention to herself thrashing some old bird. When the rude woman indicated Brexan’s loaf with a bony finger, though, Brexan lost it.

‘That one is mine.’ She leaned over the woman to illustrate that she was both younger and taller.

‘Nonsense. You’re behind me.’ The woman didn’t give Brexan more than a glance.

‘Only because you ignored the queue,’ Brexan said. ‘I don’t care that you broke in here. And you can take as much time as you like, buy whatever you need, but that loaf on the third shelf, that one is mine.’ She cursed herself for skipping breakfast; she’d intended an early start locating Jacrys, Sallax or one of the Ronan partisans. So far all she had discovered was that it had grown significantly colder in the port city and the chance of finding a decent mug of tecan was remote.

‘You are a rude young woman-’ The old woman cut off each syllable, ‘-and you will learn to wait your turn.’

Brexan smiled, and as unobtrusively as possible, grasped the woman’s wrist and bent it back enough to generate a mind-numbing pain. Unable to speak, the rude customer glared in horror at Brexan.

‘Please listen,’ Brexan whispered. ‘If you buy that loaf of bread, I will ram it so far up that fat backside of yours that you will be shitting crust for the next Moon. You broke into the line, a line I have been standing in since before you awakened this morning. I am not in the mood for rudeness today. So choose another loaf, pay the gentleman and be on your way.’ Brexan released the woman’s wrist but continued to hold her hand, as if the two were friends.

The old woman shivered and without speaking, she pointed to another loaf, paid with a copper Marek and hurried away along the pier, careful not to look back.

‘Enjoy your breakfast,’ Brexan called after her; ‘see you tomorrow!’ She waved before turning back to the bakery window. ‘Miserable old hen. Don’t you hate it when someone does that?’

The baker, a gigantic man who appeared to have lived on nothing but unleavened dough for the past three hundred Twinmoons, had missed the whole by-play; he was far more interested in what his assistant, a much younger man, but already well on his way to baker’s girth himself, was saying about an incident along the southern wharf the previous night.

‘Ran all the way? Gods-rut-a-whore, but I would pay a Moon’s wages to have seen that. I can just imagine it, all those cheeks and chins of his all jouncing along! And crying, too?’

‘I heard he was crying,’ the apprentice said, ‘but I didn’t see it. I guess he ran all the way across the bridge and out to his place near the barracks. He’s probably still out of breath, hey.’

‘Well,’ the baker shrugged sympathetically, ‘I know what that’s like. And old Carpello, he’s not quite as big as me – but I don’t go running scared, hey. I stand and fight, you know.’

‘Hey, I know, but running full-on and terrified of something, hey – maybe he saw old Prince Malagon? I mean, no one else has, hey.’

‘Nah.’ The bigger man laughed, a wet throaty chortle that left Brexan staring in wonder that he was not already dead. ‘Old Carpello probably ran into one of his wives, huh, or maybe his wives ran into one another and he was running to get the coffers locked up, hey?’

‘Yes and down on the southern wharf, too. If his wives are spending time down there, they’re making their own money. You know what I’m saying?’

The baker laughed again and nodded towards Brexan. ‘Which one, girly?’

Brexan gaped: she needed to find this man. She had been frightened in the alley, feeling Jacrys’ breath on her skin as he pressed his dirk into her ribs, but had she not been attacked by the Malakasian spy she would never have known the man’s name: Carpello, the Falkan merchant with the mole on his nose. ‘Um, that one up there, please-’ She indicated the loaf on the third shelf.

‘This one?’ The baker grabbed the wrong loaf, but Brexan was too busy trying to come up with a reasonable question which would keep the men talking.

‘Something scared old Carpello last night?’ she asked, controlling the quaver in her voice. Anyone know what it was?’

‘His wives had a meeting.’ The baker nearly howled at that as he sprayed the counter.

‘Oh, really? Well, I think my mother was married to the fat old horsecock once or twice – I wonder if she was there.’ Brexan was getting into the spirit now; all she had to do was pretend she was back in the regiment.

Both men roared and the younger of the two nearly lost his balance.

Brexan continued, ‘The southern wharf, huh? Well, maybe I’ll go down there and see if she’s around. Actually, you’d better give me another loaf in case I find her.’

The baker’s face reddened and broke out in a sweat. This was apparently the funniest thing he had heard in his lifetime. Unable to breathe, he coughed long and hard into a piece of soiled cloth, hacking up whatever was festering in his lungs. ‘Oh girly, but that is the best I’ve heard in a Twinmoon. You come back any morning, any morning and visit us. If you find old Carpello down there, you tell him if all those wives are going to meet, he needs to build a bigger warehouse, huh.’

Brexan laughed herself, and repeated, ‘Bigger warehouse, you bet!’ She paid for her bread and waved cheerily before turning to hurry down the wharf.

Brexan had met Sallax Farro near the last pier on the southern wharf and she thought she knew the warehouses the bakers were talking about. She would be able to eliminate most of them just by asking around, although she might have to sneak inside two or three for a quick search. Gnawing thoughtfully on one of the loaves, she forgot her desire for a decent cup of tecan and instead bought a beer at a dockside tavern, one where she could sit and observe the pedestrian traffic outside.

The sun was bright this morning and except for the same black cloud that looked as if it had been hanging sentinel over the harbour since the day she arrived, the skies above the waterfront were clear. There was a pervasive chill, and the passersby all looked the same: bent over and clutching their cloaks tightly closed. They reminded her of Sallax; he had been stooped over as well.

Carpello would know. He would know where she could find Jacrys, too. She had originally planned to torture the bloated merchant simply because of what he had done to Versen. Now she could do both: Carpello’s imminent interrogation would be closely followed by an agonisingly long session of creative revenge. Anyone who had ever told her that revenge felt hollow had obviously not been doing it properly – bleeding Haden to death had ranked among the most gratifying things she had ever done. She hadn’t killed the scarred Seron to revive Versen; she had killed him out of a passionate lust for vengeance.

Now that lust flared again: as soon as he revealed Sallax’s whereabouts, she would quench that fire with Carpello’s blood. His mole, Brexan decided, she would hang from a string and present to Brynne if she ever managed to catch up with the rest of the Ronan freedom fighters.

By the evening, Brexan had worked out a rudimentary map of the southern wharf. There were numerous warehouses, owned by a mixture of individuals and companies, as far as she could make out, and roving teams of Malakasian guards patrolled the area. At least two of the buildings provided permanent offices for Malakasian customs officials, so those were discounted – though Carpello was working for Prince Malagon, Brexan didn’t believe for a moment that all his business was legitimate.

Several storage facilities were obviously owned by the same person: they were marked with a red slash through a white triangle. She had chatted idly with a stevedore stacking empty crates – the only one who would to talk with her, for work was hard to find in Orindale and most of the dockers had learned to keep their mouths shut. He mentioned that he did not often see his employer, a Malakasian shipping magnate who lived most Twinmoons in Pellia, and Brexan struck five more warehouses from her mental map.

Finally she found someone who directed her to a series of storage units as far down the pier as she could go – he knew the ships loading and unloading along those piers were bound for Malakasia. ‘You said he was from Falkan but that he had done well.’ The brawny young man tossed a pallet up and through a roughly hewn window in the warehouse wall. Brexan heard it jounce over several others before coming to rest somewhere inside. ‘No locals do well unless they run shipments back and forth for the prince. Try down there. You’ll find him.’