Chapter 3

So, as might have been utterly predictable to at least a certain handful of people, apparently with every new chapter I'm mounting up a larger word count. This may be lousy editing, or too much might be going on. Maybe I'm just a gloriously spammy person. Either way, I don't have a problem with it right now, it just bore noting - if nothing else because I'm now past 10,000 words. That's approximately 10% of the way toward a proper-length novel.

Glancing at my notes, I may overshoot this. Editing?! Haha.

Music, maestro, please:

CHAPTER THREE

Alicia emerged into torchlight with a choking cough she could only half-suppress, eyes remaining lidded against the downpour of chill saltwater and fetid runoff from the tunnels beneath Eastport as she moved in a stumbling, water-logged crouch up the stinking ramp into the Thieves' Way; better known, to the eminently pragmatic, as the city sewers.

“Any port in a storm.”

A devil-may-care quip from Kett might often have lifted her spirits, but the flame-haired vagabond's mind was racing. They'd barely escaped on the dockside, in a way that stupid men might believe they'd surface further along – or drown in the choppy ocean.

Men informed as to their true intent might conclude quite dangerously otherwise.


“The storm's done us a small favour,” muttered Alicia, scraping a sodden boot-tip through a streak of putrid matter, glancing across at her companion's crooked grin and raised brow. “We'll still stink.”

“Better a hot bath than a cold grave,” countered the nomad, one shoulder lifting in a shrug.

Her cloak shed in the dive, Kett's slim frame was wrapped now only in a tunic and trousers of plain cloth bound in a hempen rope. She'd retained one of her blades, holding it loose in her right hand, though appeared barely large enough to wield it.

Alicia felt a surge of frustration; trapped like a rat, she felt no larger. A wild stare shot over her shoulder told her friend all she needed to know.

“Come on,” urged Kett, her tone suddenly businesslike – smile vanished, “We need to keep moving. If he's alive, he'll find us.”

“He's alive.”

“Then,” the Utheri's voice was soft as she plucked the smouldering torch from its bracket nearby, “You've got nothing to worry about. You asked me to have faith, Ali. Now it's your turn to do the same.”

Alicia hesitated, one hand clenching at her side as the other reached past her breast, checking that the oiled leather pouch within her own cloak remained in place. That their mission still had hope for success.

“Fine,” she responded after a moment, with an abrupt nod, “Faith. In slime and crumbling brick.”

With a calm inclination of her head, Kett turned away to cast the shadows of the Thieves' Way alight. Ahead of them, the tunnel narrowed, and grew thick with slurry. It wasn't a welcoming sight.

Striding forward, Alicia reached for the sloping ceiling, fingers fastening on the first of many paired rings of corroded metal, all but invisible in the gloom.

“Faith,” Kett echoed in a dissonantly cheerful chime, “In pitted iron, and our aching backs.”


They moved in relative quiet through the labyrinthine network of tunnels, navigating from meticulously-drilled memory – and blind, the torch abandoned by necessity. Communication came only in wordless grunts and brief, breathless murmurs as the two girls focused upon their task. Time became meaningless, minutes crawling like months until an hour had passed in the merest flutter of a second, and when the thickly-scented pitch yielded to the oncoming blaze of a second torch, it was an awakening relief to them both.

Straining her frame to one last swing, Alicia struck damp stone with a heaving gasp. Taking one shaken step to provide Kett space for a similar landing, she fell to a crouch, breathing hard and heart pounding now she'd relented from the painful, repetitive grind.

There they remained for some time longer, silent but for the spitting of the single torch and the pitter-patter of sweat and filth draining in intermittent droplets from their bodies.

As she recovered, Alicia kept her gaze resolutely fixed upon a point some yards hence, where the  walkway diverged; heading left (or, she knew, roughly northwest) into a wider tunnel, or right into another dank, submerged passage – and another set of rings.

“Ali,” Kett broke the revery with a murmur, “I tried to tell you earlier, but I'm not--”

“Quiet!”

The hissed command brought a subtle flare of anger to the nomad's brown eyes, but as she started to speak again she heard the same sound that distracted her friend. Footfalls, from the righthand fork, stealthy enough that most ears would have missed them.

On any other night it would have been clue enough to remain calm – thieves could trust thieves – but now, even this single moment's wait was so laden with tension it drew a gasp once the figure stepped into light.

“Jerros...”

Once again it was Kett who spoke first, offering an uneasy smile to the tall, swarthy man clad in like style to Alicia. Momentarily frozen in his approach, he settled his posture with a deep frown, pushing back curtains of thick black hair from his face. An outcast like the girls, when he spoke his accent carried the telltale hint of his homeland; Aleiro, a humid island nation far to the south.

“You shouldn't be here. Either of you.”

“We haven't been given much choice,” Kett explained quietly as she eased upright, the dead weight of her braid slapping at her back. “Estan's guards hounded us through the streets, and surrounded us at the docks. It was close. If it wasn't for Darik...”

Trailing off, she shook her head, meeting a mirroring gesture from the exotic man before her.

“Those with sense are getting out. What we've done tonight--” He cut himself off with a muttered curse, a hand cutting through the air. “The Guild is done for. This is no time to earn a dishonest living.”

“What about the Guildmaster?” Kett asked with a hollow edge, looking askance to her companion.

“Darik’s a dead man! Whether he dies tonight, tomorrow, or simply soon, nobody can help him.”

The fiery vagabond surged to her feet.

“I could.”

“No, Alicia de Vries, you couldn’t.”

Jerros silenced her protest with another wave of his hand, voice growing firm and insistent.

“You can outfight half of us, and outsneak most of us, but that makes you no better than me. And no noble name will give you the edge you need.” She balked at that, green eyes flashing as she took a step forward. He continued heedless, readily matching her stare, “This matter’s between Darik and the Duke, and a deadly matter it is. One for the sword or the gallows.”

“So what'll you do? Run away?”

“I’m headed to Eldon with a handful of our best. We'll take up as mercenaries, take jobs for whoever can afford us. It's not an easy life, but it's...” A wry, somewhat bleak chuckle broke his lips, “Well, it's more honest. You’d be welcome to come, if you wanted.”

“Some of us,” came the icy reply from Alicia, both hands now clenched, knuckles white beside her hips, “Have still got business to finish here. Besides, we can fend for ourselves well enough.”

Looking to Kett, she found the little nomad pale, and her gaze averted.

“I'm... one of the handful, Ali.”

Tired and distracted, it took a moment for Alicia to process that, her lip slowly curling as emotions began to surge in response; disbelief, confusion, and that old, uncomfortable rage she knew so well.

“You're going with him?”

She all but spat the words, each echoing off the slime-slick walls. Kett cringed, but strove to keep her tone calm and her words a rational appeal to whatever common sense might override stubborn anger.

“All we've ever done is try to survive. The best way for us to do that is to leave this city, and seek other fortunes. We stay here and we all hang, or worse. Wasn't the whole point of tonight to change our lives?”

“I'm not coming with you.” Alicia's refusal was as blunt and hard as a cudgel blow, her fury taming itself by turning inward. Becoming further focus for the task ahead, however tough it might be. “This ain't over.”

The Utheri had heard this tone before, and seen the white-hot mask over her friend's face. Her eyes lidded against a breathed sigh, a stiff nod marking their unveiling. Soft brown met unrelenting green.

“At least do me a favour,” Kett began quietly, forcing a smile as she continued, “And try to let it be over before it kills you. If for nothing else, then for the love Darik bore you; he wouldn't want you hanging beside him, any more than I would. Deal?”

“I'll do what I can.”

Words curt, Alicia threw a simmering glare toward Jerros, finding on her return to Kett that she'd been extended a hand. She gripped it with reluctant ire, drawing a slow, respectful nod from the younger girl.

“Good enough. I'll see you, then...”

It was Alicia's turn to throw out a shrug, a twist of her lips making a cruel pass at carefree whimsy.

“Someday, somewhere.”

The friends parted hands and ways, leaving the air tense but for the mild clearing of Jerros' throat.

“I doubt we can leave until morning,” he offered, making a loose gesture toward the redhead, “If you want to join us, you can at least seek us out.”

“I won't need to.”

“Then, best of luck.”

His pause drew a fierce smirk from Alicia even before he finished the sentence. Shaking her head, she moved as though to step past him, lingering at his side.

“You'll be telling me I'll need it?”

“Aye, you will,” he replied without apology or preamble, shifting his footing in readiness to leave, “And more besides. Stay sharp.”

“Jerros.”

She hadn't moved an inch. The man raised an inquisitive brow, half-turning to face her.

“Aye?”

“Should know I don't trust you. Someone's betrayed us; any one of a handful,” she used the word deliberately, punctuating it with a threatening cant of her head, “We'll part clean, but if I find out it was you--”

“Then I'd have likely lied about where I'm going, aye? Where was this land Darik wanted?”

Stood meekly to one side, Kett glanced toward Alicia, and the breast of her cloak – where the deeds lay – as though to ask the same question.

“You either know already,” the fiery vagabond responded flatly, “Or I've no reason to tell you.”

“Truth.” Jerros appeared more amused than insulted, running a hand once more through the curtain of his hair. “Then, if we meet again...”

“Let's hope I'm not trying to kill you.”

She didn't match the man's smile, but he couldn't withhold a chuckle from his acknowledgement.

“Aye. Truth, again. Farewell, Alicia de Vries.”

With a bow and a flourish of his dirty cloak, Jerros turned and strode away from the redhead's frosty form, pulling her oldest and only true friend into his wake with a quick hand-signal. Unable to meet Alicia's eye as she left, Kett slipped into the wider path of the fork, soon disappearing beyond the guttering torch's light. It was hardly the first time Alicia had been left in the shadows, but it seemed there was a far cry between merely solitary and absolutely, utterly alone.

A harsh, frothing out-breath left her mouth, the backswipe of a raised hand casting the thick saliva from dried and cracking lips as she strode to the nearby sconce. Snatching its burden ferociously, she spun on her heel and made for the right fork, retracing Jerros' step until she reached the edge of bilious ooze. Another bracket sat upon the wall alongside it, rusted iron barely clinging to purpose. The torch she held was almost extinguished – promising, perhaps, a few minutes of ebbing brightness – and ordinarily she'd replace it, light another from the oilskin bundle secreted in an alcove behind. A simple courtesy paid between fellow thieves, lighting each other's way in the undertunnels.

She considered for a moment before mounting the dying flame upon the wall. If all but he has turned from me, she thought, let none find their way.

Let them be lost.


Alicia was right to feel hunted, to perceive herself as a lonely beast gone to ground, for elsewhere in the sewers a pack of hunters roamed.

There was no clean and easy entrance to the Thieves' Way; it was why they'd chosen to use it in their times of need. A fully-armoured man would only get so far without sticking or drowning. One had to travel light, and travel fast to avoid the intermittent flooding of the rank tunnels. So it was that Estan's captain had chosen a group of five unfortunate men to strip to their waist and mount the chase, at their vanguard one Jon Kelty. Up to his hips in glutinous runoff, he groped along a tunnel, calling back to the group of four who remained behind.

“It's around here, I swear it! She told me!”

“If you're wrong, Kelty,” came the responding call, laden with tedium, “It's your neck this time.”

Jon was a simple man, a fact which did precious little to excuse his insidious behaviour. Born to a regular working man's life, destined for the docks and a labourer's humble cot, he'd chosen instead to seek other riches esconced within the shadows. But the Guild had treated him rough, assigning the talentless recruit only the most mundane and least lucrative of tasks...

Few whipping boys are ever content with their lot, but Jon Kelty was in a greater minority still.

Jon Kelty had ambition.

“This time I'll show you, sir. A Kelty keeps his word. A Kelty always keeps his word.”

How many times had he repeated those words? More even than the sum total of hours he'd spent painstakingly trimming his plain, brown, bowl-cut hair. More than the nights he'd spent dreaming of a lavish, palatial estate brimming with fine wine, sumptuous banquets, and pretty serving girls.

It would be fair to say that Jon had little imagination, but he was nothing if not tenacious.

“Any moment, sir. A Kelty--”

There was a tremendous splash, sewer water erupting as the former thief fell through a sudden, narrow opening in the tunnel wall. A ramp rose a short distance beyond, entering a low crawlspace; originally built to divert clean water from a central chamber.

Jon Kelty surfaced, huffing and spitting. Squinting into the darkness, he tentatively stepped forward, raising a hand to feel for the sloping stone.

He found it and smiled, emitting one last spurt of stench-ridden fluid before turning about.

“--always keeps his word!”


Death.

It was the first thought in Alicia's mind as she dropped from the next set of rungs, boots skidding a few inches on slick stone. For the first time in too long she became aware of the wound in her own chest, a hand lingering toward the punctured spot. It came away spotted with blood, but was not the source of the sweet, coppery scent filling her nostrils...

She'd not bled that much in her life, and wouldn't – couldn't – live through it if she did.

Ignoring the torch within its sconce, she crept forward into the next tunnel, following the low-arching walls as they snaked right toward her goal. In days to come, superstitious souls would insist that the Guild slept beneath the streets, in the disease-ridden depths, during the day; that they awoke only at night to divest the innocent of their hard-earned belongings.

The truth was far less chillingly demonic. Alicia and her fellows had inhabited the Thieves' Way only when forced to take desperate shelter. Around the next twist-turn lay their damp, decaying home-from-home, a trio of square reservoirs that once held fresh water, before Estan's policies had deemed clearance of the sewer system fit for the elements alone.

Now, the people relied upon stormy weather for any chance at hygiene, while the burglars and pickpockets of the city found an unpleasant sanctuary. Even that place, it seemed, had now been compromised by the night's treachery.

Following the trail of blood deeper within, Alicia came upon a heavyset figure bundled in rags at the threshold of the first chamber. The scent grew stronger as she approached, mingling with the darker tones of vomit and faeces. Urging, she pulled at the sodden hood of her cloak, hauling one edge over her face to stave off the worst. Another step brought her near enough to extend a foot, nudging experimentally.

Flesh too firm to merely be lost in slumber yielded too far to belong to any waking man. The figure rolled aside, folds of soiled cloth falling away to reveal a homely moon-shaped face, and a shaven head she knew well. Only one man would be down here with a tonsure.

Pate, they'd called him, for all the obvious reasons; and few souls knew or ever questioned his real name, assuming him either a former acolyte of the gods or an everyday eccentric with a talent for sleight-of-hand and confidence tricks. He'd won his way into the innermost circle by way of kindness, acting as a quirky uncle to the orphans taken in by Darik – and forming a strong friendship with the Guildmaster.

Alicia drew away with a scowl, finding a rickety seat in the sparsely-furnished chamber beyond before allowing her gaze to drift back toward the fallen figure. He'd been dead a few hours, perhaps, the blackening pool around him still fluid and tacky. She didn't need to inspect the body further to know how he'd died.

Her breathing had quickened independent from her will, and the girl cursed, drawing the fingers of her right hand inward until they bit her palm. Every member of the Guild committed atrocities against society, earning their keep by taking from others; but if they all deserved to die, at least those like Pate ought to find a better fate than a dagger in the back and the foulest of open graves. The list of suspects was narrowing, at least...

Unless the old man had spilled their secrets down here before being betrayed in his turn.

She had trouble imagining it, helped in great part by a distracting flash of memory: a younger, less-rancid Pate bouncing her upon his knee, attempting to cajole a smile or laugh from the dour child who delighted only in dropping from his lap a moment later with his coinpurse in one hand. Offering him, at least, a tight smirk.

Violently shaking her head, Alicia pushed her chair back and stood, casting a sweeping glance around the boxlike room. Spacious and high-ceilinged, it had been appropriated as a common room of sorts for the half dozen who'd known of this location. Two large tables filled Alicia's half of the room, while the other held cupboards and chests cobbled together from whatever materials they'd been able to either drag here or appropriate from support beams in the sewer tunnels. A fire pit sat cold in the centre, the blackened form of a large iron pot balanced over it on crossed poles.

The second and third chambers, to either side, held bunks and a scattering of personal belongings. Enough to make a day's stay an iota more tolerable, if not exactly enjoyable. She'd shared one room with her guardian, and on occasion Kett, though they tended to remain alone when they were together. Recalling that now made her realize how comparably little time the others did spend with their Guildmaster; when he wasn't with her, he was alone or drinking with Pate.

Beyond that, it had always been business. Even with the other children. Even with Kett.

It was a humble revelation that shook her. All the meaning she'd ascribed to her existence, the foundation in trust and honour – albeit of a particularly bleak sort – had meant nothing to anybody else. Survival. That's all that had counted, and all that did.

Striding to the next chamber, she located the small crate held her personal effects. There was nothing in there she wanted, not now, but she was after something else. Unceremoniously, Alicia bent and pushed it aside, nudging her boot against a flagstone underneath until it came loose. A hole here ran at least a few yeards deep; when she'd been a child, she once tried to hide a dagger here, but could never reach to pull it out. Older and wiser, she'd reached as far as she could and scraped another nook in the cavity's side. It wasn't visible from above, even if one knew where to look. Then, she'd used it to conceal an old keepsake, long since retrieved and sold in a time of need. But now...

Now, it formed the perfect hiding place for her treasure. She stowed the deeds and stood, replacing the brick and pulling the crude chest atop it. From this moment on, she thought, she need only flee this place, find her father and survive. In a day or two she could return, and find their future buried here.

Nothing, and nobody else mattered.

Lost in her brooding, she stepped back into the central chamber and came up almost nose-to-nose with a man she mistook, at first, for a stranger. She started but he remained in place, even appearing rather jovial. Her first conclusion: that this interloper was a buffoon.

“Right where I was told, eh?”

Not a large man by any means, he nonetheless bore a double chin and the swelling of a potbelly. More noticeable still was his plain, brown bowl-cut.

She recognized him.

He'd betrayed her, too, and betrayed the Guild, but Alicia knew without doubt he wasn't responsible for the travesty this night. A hungry, petty, and desperate man, he'd flown the coop because they'd driven him out – and ever since, he'd been no more a thorn in their side than any of Estan's barely-competent enforcers.

Seeing him now, Alicia almost laughed, twisting it into a sneering grin as she slowly, deliberately spoke his moniker. Or at least the one she'd always used.

“Callow Jon.”

“I--” He stood for a heartbeat or three, his jaw trembling over an habitual stammer, “I have a name, you nasty little whore! You use it or I'll m-make you suffer!”

That he took a step forward failed to threaten the flame-haired girl; and this time, she did laugh, at least until a surprise backhand caught her in the mouth. Backing away, she rubbed at her stinging lips, green eyes suddenly bright and wary upon her aggressor.

“Kelty,” she hissed, “Jon Kelty.”

“Th-That's better.”

“Callow Jon Kelty.”

Weak, and nervous around women, he'd always made easy entertainment for the wolves of the city's underbelly. Cornered as she was, Alicia was all the more vitriolic, regaining the ground she'd lost with such a savage lunge that the former thief practically fell back in his haste to escape. She kept upon him, the remembered barbs pouring all too naturally from her throat.

“Can't sneak, can't fight, can't have his wicked way without another man to hold his cock.”

With the last mocking syllable, there was a shimmer of steel in the dark, a hiss of parting leather as Jon drew his dagger and waved it toward her.

“I warned you!”

“What's that you've got, Callow Jon?” Demanded Alicia, halted now, but holding her ground with a cruel grin. “Need me to show you where to stick it?”

Reaching to her chest, she thrust aside the wet fold of her cloak and tore at the front of her tunic, expression not changing until the instant that her ruffled, sweating target took the bait.

Yelling incoherently, he slammed the small blade forward; but Alicia was faster, stepping aside as she caught his knife between her cloth-wrapped hands.

Her actions bought her space, and protection enough to wrench him past her, then raise her lead leg and push him hard across the room. Crashing into a makeshift cupboard, wood cracking and splintering, he ended up a graceless tangle of spitting outrage.

“W-What are you waiting for?” He cried from his side, clutching at his skull. “S-Seize her!”

She sprang for the exit, hearing the heavy smack of leather soles colliding with hard stone behind her. There was another entrance, concealed up near the ceiling of the third chamber; she'd known that, and she knew she had ground on anyone who'd used it.

What she didn't know, until she heard the telling thunk, was that at least one of them had a crossbow.


“Hit her again.”

That voice was new to Alicia, though it carried enough air of command that she could safely assume its owner held some rank in Estan's city guard.

She also, rightly, concluded that she'd blacked out for a few moments. A few had called her tireless, others determined, and many bestowed crude and unfavourable epithets. Sadly these were all inaccurate; as Kett had told her, she wasn't untouchable, nor unbreakable. The night's activity, and her chest wound, had all conspired together – but a crossbow bolt through the thigh proved her final undoing.

As she stirred, she became aware that her hands were bound. Her feet were not, but she could hear people moving to either side. That made at least three.

“W-Why do you want her awake so badly?”

“Unless you're volunteering to carry her out of these tunnels, Kelty, she'll need to walk.”

“Limp,” Alicia interjected, snapping her eyes open and glaring defiantly in what she estimated was the direction of the presumed authority figure.

She came near enough, though he had to lean down slightly to match her stare in the gloom. For a fleeting instant he smiled, then jolted toward her, and slammed a fist into her left eye.

It hurt, and then some, threatening to plunge the girl once more beneath a sea of pain. Lessening her outward response to a mere grunt and a daring toss of the head took every bit of focus she had, and did nothing to impress the bored, tired-looking officer.

“Pick her up,” he stated flatly, gesturing to the man on both her flanks, “And see that she follows.”

Mounting token resistance, Alicia found herself pulled upright between two bodies considerably more powerful than her own. It came as no shock when Callow Jon stepped into view in front of her.

“Who betrayed us, Jon?” She asked, as much to take her mind off the dual throbbing in leg and eye than because she expected an answer. “You never knew about this place, and you ain't got the courage to come without knowing. Who's been whispering in your ear?”

“Y-You'll never catch her now, you spiteful, verminous bitch,” he spoke quietly, tone distant as she kept a wary eye upon the retreating back of his commanding officer, “You'll rot and you'll hang.”

Alicia didn't even hear the last.

'Her', he'd said. It was all she needed, though the conclusion had been dancing just out of reach for some time; either she'd been lied to directly, or there was an obvious culprit in both the bloody murder of old Pate and the greater betrayal. The third woman within the circle of Darik Stenman's closest confidantes, older and more cunning than either Alicia or Kett.

“Nenwe.”

The pot-bellied man betrayed nothing more, lowering his gaze and moving away. But Alicia hadn't meant it for confirmation. His reaction didn't matter; he'd given her all she needed, bar a way out, and that would come in time. As soon as she was alone, with a lock to pick, she could make her own opportunity.

Then, in time, she could hunt the traitor down.