The Hand That Takes Page 5

  Prince Andrej rode in the center. His black stallion stood a good eighteen hands, an ill-tempered beast that reared and tossed its head as the prince drove his spurs into its ribs. The prince’s long blond hair blew in the wind; his nose was upturned, his eyes forward as though the cheering crowd were invisible. Prince Andrej was the younger of the two princes of Pargeche, the heir presumptive. Though if the rumors were true, he was the more entitled of the pair.

  Next to Andrej rode his older brother, Prince Matej, second son of Duke Tadej and the heir apparent. Matej rode a roan mare. Unlike his younger brother, Matej wore his hair short, yet his golden beard reached nearly to his breastbone. Matej waved, and the smallfolk cheered as the procession passed.

  The crowd seemed to love Matej, the way they waved and shouted his name. Strange how much it reminded Sal of a time not so long ago, another day of End that he’d spent at the Gold Gate. He’d watched, standing beside his sister, as another prince had ridden past on a roan mare, just like the mare Matej rode. The other prince had looked much like Matej as well, only his beard had been cropped short, his golden hair just long enough to blow in the breeze.

  Nicola had pointed him out to Sal, and he had waved excitedly with the rest of the smallfolk. They had cheered and shouted his name as he had waved and ridden past. “Jadrej,” they had said, but that was then. Now they said “Matej.” It was as though no one recalled the prince who had been. As though Jadrej had never been.

  Following the princes was another host of guards marching afoot, dressed in the ducal colors and armed with pikes as well as longswords. Behind them a team of horses, eight strong, clopped across the paving stones of the bridge. They pulled a carriage—

  A stinging, throbbing pain thudded though Sal’s ear. Few things hurt like a clout to the ear, and the ringing that followed was nearly as bad as the pain. Sal spun around, fully ready to lay fists into whoever had smacked his ear, when he realized it was the woman in the blue dress standing before him.

  She was younger than he’d thought, and quite striking now he’d had a look at her face. Her dress brought out the true blue in her eyes, like two depthless pools of lapis lazuli that he’d be happy to drown in. Her lips moved, but Sal didn’t hear the words they formed. He was too distracted by the movement of her pink lips. They looked soft, apt for kissing.

  She shouted something and slapped him on the ear once again. The slap jarred Sal back to the present, at least enough that he realized she was walking away through the crowd.

  He went after her. His ear hurt like Sacrull’s hell, and he should have been furious. Yet for all that, he couldn’t think of anything but the fact that she was getting away, and he knew he didn’t want that. Nothing in the world seemed so important as learning the woman’s name, or anything that would help him to find her later.

  When finally Sal spoke, his tongue felt clumsy, as though he’d not used it for so long that he’d forgotten how. He tried again, willing his tongue to do his bidding.

  “Please, wait,” Sal said, clapping a hand on the woman’s shoulder. “My Lady, what—”

  There was a crack of pain in his jaw. For an instant everything went black. Then Sal realized he was on his hands and knees. His jaw was on fire, throbbing hard enough to make him forget all about the pain in his ear.

  “Keep your filthy hands off the lady,” said a man standing over him. “Next time I take the hand.”

  The man was big, mustached, and wore a bastard sword slung on his back. He reached over a shoulder and unsheathed the blade just enough to show the glint of steel.

  Sal coughed and spat a glob of blood onto the paving stones. He nodded to show his understanding, and the big Bauden moved off. Sal could no longer see the woman in the blue dress; as he stood he found she had disappeared into the crowd along with the mustached man that carried the bastard sword.

  Everything had happened so fast. The woman in the blue dress must have realized he’d been the one who’d clouted her on the ear, and she’d decided to do the same in return. Only, who had the man been? Most like, he was a bodyguard, a hired sword or some such, and based on the punch he’d given Sal, a damned capable one.

  Sal shook his head like a wet dog to clear the ringing in his ears. By the time he had grounded himself, he realized the duke’s carriage had long since passed. The tail of the retinue was departing from the bridge, moving up High Hill. The crowd slowly reverted to the usual goings-on of a congested market.

  As he watched the last rider of the retinue cross beneath the High Town bridge tower façade, Sal realized he had missed his chance to see Duke Tadej and learn whether there was any truth to the rumors of his ill health.

  As Sal considered his misfortune, he cursed himself for being such a fool. Rather than take full advantage of the distraction the duke’s retinue had provided, Sal had been struck dumb by the display. He had stood idle and made himself an easy target for the woman in the blue dress. All the while he could have made some coin, and instead he’d taken a few licks.

  Sal was rubbing his jaw, looking for another good place to pick some pockets, when he spotted a mummers show across the bridge. He turned, walked headlong into someone, and stumbled back. Sal was quick to regain his feet, but he quailed the instant he realized he’d crashed into a steel cap.

  The man wasn’t much taller than Sal, but the armor and coned helm made him seem a giant. His face was covered in small, pitted scars, no doubt the result of some pox in his youth.

  “Oy,” said the pox-scarred steel cap, leveling his poleaxe. “Watch where you’re going, boy, or I’ve a mind to skewer you.”

  The other steel cap had a thick red tangle of a beard. He merely growled before the pair moved on, leaving Sal to regain his breath and slow his racing heart. When he’d stumbled into the steel cap, Sal had nearly dropped his day’s takings to the paving stones. Luckily, the steel caps had not been the most observant of patrolmen.

  He crossed the rest of the bridge vigilantly watching his surroundings. The mummers show was being performed with string marionettes. For the day’s performance, the mummers had decided upon The Sundering , and they were nearly through the third act .

  A puppet wearing robes of white walked across the small stage, his little wooden hands raised high.

  “I have seen what you did to our father, Sacrull. I charge you, Brother, release our mother, and resume your banishment in solitude.”

  The black-robed puppet laughed a dark, resonant laugh.

  “This realm does not belong to the Light. Nor does this realm belong to you, wandering son. This realm is mine. In darkness it began, and to darkness it has returned.”

  Sal moved through the captivated audience, hoping that they’d not already been picked through, as the play was so far along and the morning grown so late.

  “You murdered our father, I have seen his body scattered among the heavens!” shouted the little Susej puppet in the little white robes. “A covenant was forged. A place was made, and for your crimes, banishment. For these new crimes, I can see no fitting punishment.”

  “And they say I am he who is blind,” replied the miniature Sacrull. “With your open eye you see all that I cannot, but I can see what you do not. I see within, and to the depths which one can reach. You tell me what you see, but I say to you it is wrong.”

  Sal searched the crowd for easy targets and possible competition, and out of the corner of his eye he spotted Bartley. Even had Sal not known his friend was picking, he’d have been able to spot Bartley for a thief a mile away. Bartley was far from the city’s most talented snatcher; if not for the big jobs, and some help from Sal, Bartley would have likely starved on the street long ago. To his credit, Bartley was an excellent climber and was small enough to fit places that most others couldn’t, which was why he got work when the big jobs came around.

  Sal sighed, hoping against hope Bartley wasn’t going to get himself caught. Gods knew it wouldn’t be the first time.

  The little black puppet waved
his arms above his head and sounded a nonsensical chant. The crowd gasped as two grotesque puppets came onto the stage, clearly meant to represent the guardians of the Under Realm, the Beasts of Six. One of them was vaguely doglike, the other a lion. The beasts moved toward the white-robed Susej, pawing at the air and roaring fiercely .

  But the little Susej did not budge. The puppet raised its hands and called fire from the sky. Another mummer appeared torch in hand and lit the grotesque beasts aflame, and the crowd burst into cheers as the puppets burned.

  Sal slipped through the crowd like a fish in the river, hand sliding in and out of jerkin pockets, finger-knife cutting purses and purse strings without his victims feeling even the slightest touch. If there was one thing at which Sal was truly good, it was picking.

  “It is too late,” said the little Sacrull marionette. “I have bound her. Forever will this world be burdened by the child which I have sown. Malevolence shall be her name, second daughter of Tiem.”

  “That which was broken shall be mended.”

  The little black-robed Sacrull laughed. “None can defy my rule. Father Order is dead, I have killed him.”

  “I am all that is true. I am the Son that is Light!”

  “A curse upon thee!” shouted the little Sacrull.

  The Susej marionette wobbled, his little wooden arms waving above his head.

  The black-robed Sacrull began to writhe upon the stage, gurgling and moaning.

  Sal felt something like a stillness in the air, a palpable tension, when out of the corner of his eye he saw a commotion. As he focused, he realized Bartley was being held by the wrist by a big, balding man.

  The man shouted, “Thief! Thief! Bastard thief!”

  Sal saw heads turn in the direction of the commotion, but no one moved to help. That is, until two steel caps began pushing their way through the crowd. They were the same two steel caps Sal had run into earlier—the pox-scarred guard and his red-bearded companion.

  Sal looked around frantically.

  Suddenly the big, balding man let out a shrill cry, as Bartley slashed at him with his finger-knife. The man clapped his hand to his wrist, blood streaming between his fingers.

  Bartley shoved his way through the crowd, trying to get away from the man who’d grabbed him. Unfortunately, the Yahdrish was headed straight for the two steel caps.

  Sal pushed his way into position. When the steel caps came close, their attention intent on Bartley, Sal stuck a leg out and tripped the pox-scarred one.

  The steel cap fell headlong into the crowd. A man shoved him. He collided with his red-bearded companion and they fell to the paving stones in a tangled heap of armored limbs and ungainly weaponry.

  Sal ran to Bartley, and together they slipped through the crowd and back onto the bridge. They were headed for Low Town, which was a problem, as six armed steel caps waited beneath the arch of the Low Town bridge tower, while three crossbowmen waited above.

  Sal and Bartley both knew they would never make it. If they tried to fight their way through, they were as good as dead.

  “We have to jump!” Sal shouted to Bartley.

  “Sacrull’s balls, that’ll kill us,” Bartley said.

  Sal shook his head. “We can make it, just try not to drown.”

  Without another word, Sal pushed his way to the edge of the bridge, stepped up onto the parapet, and jumped. He felt a rush of vertigo, and a flash of terror just before he struck the water’s surface.

  The contact was like hitting cobblestones, a shockwave that shuddered through his feet, up his legs, up his spine, and into his skull. His jaw snapped shut so hard he thought he’d shattered his teeth. He was dazed, yet he scrambled for the surface.

  He needed air, but the Tamber had swept him into its rushing current. He tumbled and rolled beneath the water, too confounded to know which way was up.

  He panicked. His ears pounded. His lungs burned as though at any moment they would burst.

  He thrashed, limbs flailing for purchase, until his head broke the surface of the water and he gasped for breath. One quick suck of air before he twisted beneath the water once again. Another breath as fury sprayed around him, and he rolled, once, twice—crack!

  Sharp, blinding pain, and blackness.

  4

  The Bells

  Interlude, Eight Years Earlier

  S al stepped as quietly as he could, his nerves on edge. He could hear them within the solar, indecipherable voices muffled by thick stone walls. They were the voices of prominent men. Men whose business was as secretive as it was significant. Scarvini, Novotny, Dvorak, Moretti, and Svoboda, the five families that made up the Commission. All together in one place, at one time.

  Sal continued down the hall, picking up his pace as he passed the closed door of Uncle Stefano’s solar.

  A floorboard creaked underfoot. Sal held his breath but moved on, fleet of foot and shaking with fear.

  He gripped the jar all the tighter and made for the stairway at the end of the hall. Up the steps and along another hallway, then out onto the terrace and he was finally able to breathe easy.

  His sister stood at the edge of the terrace, hands on the stone parapet as she looked out over the city. Funny how much she’d begun to look like Mother.

  Sal stepped up beside her. He looked down upon Dijvois, the city walls stretching as far as the horizon, all the buildings and roads laid out below him like a map. The black water of the Tamber, so peaceful from this distance. High Bridge, the Bridge of the Lady, and South Bridge, the Big Island and the Little Island. Knöldrus Cathedral, with its great rose window and colossal façade towers, the abbey’s vast lawn and extensive orchard. His gaze moved south across the Singing Bridge to the clock tower, Town Square, and the great fountain of Uthrid Stormbreaker. He scanned over East Market, then back across the Tamber to South Market and farther west to the Gold Gate.

  “Beautiful, isn’t it?” Nicola asked.

  “It’s only the city.”

  “Only the city?” Nicola said, turning on him with narrowed eyes.

  Sal shrugged, and his sister sighed, her look softening. Gods, how she was beginning to look like Mother.

  “I suppose it’s not the view from the Red Tower of the High Keep, but it’s certainly something. You can see all of Low Town from here.”

  “What was it like, living in the castle?” Sal asked.

  “In the High Keep?” Nicola said. “I suppose you wouldn’t remember, would you? You were so young when we left. There were always strangers coming and going all hours of the day. And the other children. They were all about, bastards and stafflings and the sort. I had my friends. Funny, I don’t remember their names now, but we used to play in the practice yard and the stables.” Nicola smiled a big, wide smile. “Mother used to hate when we played in the stables. One time the stable master caught us, and Mother, she—”

  “She still hasn’t come out of bed,” Sal said. “Not since those bells began to toll.”

  Nicola pursed her lips.

  A season from her seventeenth year, Nicola had grown into a woman. By the way the men watched her at market, others had noticed this long before Sal. Nicola was long of limb, slender, and taller now than Mother, almost of a height with Uncle Stefano. Even the way she spoke now, like an elder speaking with a child. Though Sal didn’t mind so much. He preferred his sister’s condescension to the outright indifference of his uncle.

  “Do you think he’s really dead?” Sal asked. “The prince, I mean.”

  “What a thing to say. Though he must be, that’s what the bells were for. Five bells. It means a death in the ducal family. Why would you ask?”

  Sal shrugged.

  “There was an execution, I’ve heard,” Nicola said. “The killer confessed and everything.”

  “I went, you know.”

  “You what?”

  “To the execution,” Sal said, “of that man they say killed the prince.”

  “Salvatori, why?”

  Sal h
esitated as he considered telling the truth. “I was only wondering, I guess.”

  “Wondering,” Nicola said. “What’s to wonder? That man murdered the prince, and he was executed for his crime. Why would you want to see such a thing?”

  “Curious, I guess,” Sal lied.

  “You shouldn’t have done that. You should never have gone.”

  “There was this man, he was shouting all the while. He shouted at me,” Sal said.

  “Shouted at you? Who, when?”

  “During the execution. An old man. Shouted at most everyone he could.”

  “What was he shouting about?”

  “Said the man, the killer, you know, said he was his son. Told everyone that his son was innocent. He shouted it, but nobody listened.”

  “You shouldn’t have gone there,” Nicola said.

  “Uncle Stefano said it would be good for me.”

  “Ah, now I see.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He made you go? ”

  Sal shrugged and Nicola’s look sharpened.

  “Mother wouldn’t have approved,” Nicola said, her lips pursing.

  Sal looked out over the city.

  “Do you think he could have been?” Sal asked.

  “Been what?”

  “Innocent. Not the man shouting, but his son. The man they say murdered the prince. Do you think he really could have been innocent?”

  Nicola frowned. “Is anyone innocent?”

  “But it would be difficult to kill a prince, right?” Sal asked. “Just about impossible?”

  It was Nicola’s turn to shrug. “I’ve not tried.”

  Sal felt a smile form at the corner of his mouth.

  A moment of silence fell, and Nicola joined him in looking out over the city.

  “What’s that?” Nicola asked, nodding at the jar Sal held.

  “Honey,” he said.