Lord of Ashes

SEVEN

It was busy as all the hells in the tavern. Rag stood to one side just watching as Bastian’s men went about their business. They cleaned and sharpened their weapons like they was some precious trinkets, or played their card games in silence, swapping coins around like the money didn’t matter a shit. Some made their food and drank their drink but didn’t seem to take no joy in it, as though they couldn’t taste a damn thing.

They’d come three days previous. Just walked in all bold as brass and not saying nothing to no one. Shirl, Yarrick and Essen hadn’t known what to do or say, and luckily they’d decided on nothing. Even Harkas moved out of their way and let them get on with their business. Not even the big fella was gonna mess with these bastards.

Understandable, really, since these were Bastian’s best men. He was head of the Guild; ruthless and deadly and only interested in what could make him some profit. You didn’t get to be that powerful without surrounding yourself with the dirtiest cutthroats in the game.

Bastian had told them to ‘be ready’. He’d told Rag there’d be a chance to prove herself, but so far all she’d done was stand here trying not to get in the way. Something was brewing, of that there was no doubt. Just a matter of what and whether she’d be stuck right at the heart of it. Way her luck had been going lately, chances were she’d definitely be right smack bang in the frigging middle.

‘What are we even still doing here?’ muttered Shirl from the shadows. ‘We should be long gone.’

‘Gone where?’ Essen hissed. His annoyance with Shirl’s constant griping had only grown more intense over the past days. ‘There ain’t nowhere we can go that Bastian won’t find us. And in case you hadn’t noticed, there’s around forty thousand Khurtas camped just north of the city. I reckon they’re hungry too, just waiting for some fat fuck to stumble past so they can have a good feed.’

Shirl shut his mouth, looking equal parts angry and fearful at Essen’s dressing down.

Rag couldn’t help but feel for Shirl. Couldn’t help but think he might be right. Who was to say if trying to escape was any less dangerous than sticking around? There was every chance one of Bastian’s men would stab them in the neck before any Khurta got the chance.

The back door to the tavern opened, not with a bang but a whisper of hinges. Still, everyone in the place went quiet. Rag saw some hands stray towards blades while others just froze. She half expected it to be the Greencoats come to arrest them all, but deep down she knew they were too busy with what waited outside the city’s walls to be bothered about what lurked inside some backstreet tavern.

What walked in was scarier than any Greencoat, though.

Bastian had given her a chill ever since the first time she’d laid eyes on him. It was a chill that never left her, a cold spike down her back that was always there, lurking like a stray cat. Seeing him just reminded her that it was still there, that she was living on borrowed time and it was this corpse-looking bastard she was borrowing it off.

He walked into the centre of the room and his men went about making themselves look busy. Bastian’s cold eyes scanned the tavern, and Rag felt her heart begin to sink as they passed over all those lean, deadly blokes until they finally rested on her. He stared at her for some moments, dead fish eyes glaring, and Rag knew it was her he’d come for.

Best not keep him waiting, Rag. You should know better than that.

She walked across the tavern so slow it almost hurt. Rag had watched a man hanged once. Watched him walk to those gallows at a snail’s pace like he wanted every last moment on earth to stretch out and give him as much life as possible. As she walked across the tavern towards Bastian, Rag began to realise how that poor fucker had felt.

He stared at her all the while until she came to stand in front of him, regarding her like some giant bird about to eat a worm. She just stared back, not wanting to speak but needing to know what in the hells he wanted with her.

Then he smiled.

It looked horrible on that skeletal face; cracking his pale flesh and showing a set of teeth yellow as old parchment.

‘I have a job for you,’ he said in a voice that creaked like a coffin lid. Then he let that hang there so long she almost had to ask him what it was. But Rag knew better than that. Don’t speak until spoken to if you want to keep that tongue in your head. ‘Someone is waiting,’ Bastian continued. ‘At the other side of the Rafts. It’s important they are relayed a message. I need someone sly. Someone no one’s going to notice. Someone insignificant. Naturally, I thought of you.’

Thanks a fucking bunch.

‘Yeah,’ Rag whispered. ‘No problem.’

‘That’s the right answer,’ said Bastian, reaching into his jacket and pulling out a roll of parchment, sealed with black wax. He held it out to her and she took it in her hand. As she tugged on the parchment she realised he still held it in a dead man’s grip. ‘Don’t. Fuck. This. Up.’ He spoke each word so sharp it was like being stabbed in the ear with them. Then he let go of the parchment and let her take it.

‘I won’t,’ she said, sounding all small and mousey, but then what in the hells was she supposed to sound like? ‘But how do I know who I’m looking for?’

Fuck, Rag, don’t ask questions. Are you trying to get yourself offed?

Bastian regarding her with those blank eyes, as though mulling over whether her question was important enough to answer. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘They’ll find you. Just make sure you get to the other side of the Rafts and don’t lose that message.’

‘I won’t,’ Rag replied, and she bloody meant it. Right now she would rather have lost her own head, though if she fucked this up that’s exactly what might happen.

Bastian didn’t say nothing else. Didn’t acknowledge her or wish her luck or none of that shit. He just turned and made his way out of there, with the hardest men Rag had ever seen moving out of his way like he was ten foot tall and covered in spikes.

Once he’d gone, Rag went back to the corner of the room, in no mood to get in anyone’s way. She looked down at the roll of parchment still held in her hand. The black seal was blank, the paper crisp. For a moment Rag had a suicidal thought and almost considered breaking the seal and having a look. Who would know, anyway? When she eventually delivered it on the other side of the Rafts she could just say it happened by accident.

But what if Bastian found out? And she knew he would, he had his ways. Her life wouldn’t be worth living.

‘What’s that?’

Rag turned to see Yarrick looking down at the parchment in her hand.

‘Message,’ she replied. ‘Bastian gave it me to deliver over the Rafts.’

Yarrick raised an eyebrow, half impressed, but clearly half glad it wasn’t him had been given the job.

‘What’s in it?’ he asked.

‘Dunno.’ She held out the parchment to him. ‘But you’re free to open it and have a look.’

Yarrick held up his hands like he was surrendering. ‘Not a fucking chance,’ he said. ‘Who’s it for?’

‘Dunno that neither,’ said Rag. ‘But Bastian reckons there’s someone waiting over the other side of the Rafts and he’ll know me when he sees me.’

‘Sounds fucking dodgy to me,’ said Yarrick, a hint of sympathy in his voice.

‘Is there anything round here that ain’t dodgy?’ Rag gestured around the tavern, at the gathered crowd of maniacs sharpening their weapons and waiting for trouble.

Yarrick nodded his agreement at that. ‘When you off?’

‘Soon as, I reckon. No point hanging around.’

‘Suppose I’d better come with you then.’ Though even as he said it Rag could sense the doubt in his voice.

‘Bastian gave this job to me. No need for you to take the risk as well.’

Yarrick shrugged. ‘Looks just as risky hanging round here.’ He looked fearfully at the tavern full of cutthroats.

Rag couldn’t argue with that logic. Neither would she say no to the company. Maybe she’d be better suited to this alone, better able to move unseen and get the job done, but deep down she knew she’d feel better with someone watching her back, even if it was only Yarrick.

‘All right then. Let’s go.’

With that they made their way out of the tavern, neither of them daring to look any of Bastian’s men in the eye, just in case. Shirl looked at her, opening his mouth with a question on his lips, but Rag shook her head and he took the hint, sitting back in his chair and keeping it shut.

Out on the street the sun was just setting and the smell of smoke and fire drifted up on the sea breeze from the south. It was eerily quiet, as if all the folk off the street were hidden and just waiting for the chance to jump out on her and yell ‘Surprise’ like they was throwing her a bloody party.

‘What the fuck’s going on?’ asked Yarrick, also sensing something was amiss.

‘Wait here,’ Rag said, moving towards a derelict chapel building across the street from the tavern.

It was one of those old buildings, some place of worship for the Old Gods long since abandoned. They built them high back in those days, and Rag was hoping it would give her a decent enough vantage point to see what was going on.

The climb didn’t take long; the old stonework provided enough handholds for her to reach the top in no time. On the roof she could see out across most of the city, from the blackened seawall to the south all the way to the River Gate and beyond to the north.

Rag’s grip on the stonework tightened. At the curtain wall all along the northern battlements stood a mass of armoured men, all looking out to the plain beyond. Past them, filling the plain, was a massive horde moving towards the city. Torches shone in the night, showing their numbers, showing the mass of savages moving on Steelhaven. Amongst the horde were huge machines — catapults, siege towers, battering rams and things Rag didn’t even know the names for — all moving south like there weren’t nothing that could stop them.

She watched for as long as she dared before she realised her mouth was hanging open and her fingers were starting to hurt they were gripping the stone so tight. Almost as quick as she’d climbed she made it to the ground where Yarrick was waiting.

‘Well?’ he asked. ‘What’s happening?’

She stared up at him, hands shaking from the climb and the fear.

‘We need to get a frigging move on, is what’s happening.’