A Dance of Chaos: Book 6 of Shadowdance (14 page)

“That tile nearly knocked Daryl out,” Cole said. “You sure it’s a good idea doing this?”

“No, I’m not,” Muzien said, turning about to watch after ensuring there were no nearby travelers on the road west. “But unless one of you four feel like volunteering, that’s why we have our idiot over there doing it for us. Speaking of, tell him to start.”

Cole cupped his hands to his mouth and yelled for Boy, who’d remained still as a statue before the tile, to begin. At first Boy stared at the tile for a moment, then lifted up the sledge by its long wooden handle. With a motion akin to that of chopping firewood, a task Muzien had a feeling Boy had performed many, many times, the enormous man lifted the sledge up into the air and then swung it down with all his impressive might.

The metal head cracked the tile, and with the crack came a sound like a great release of air. Silence followed, incredibly brief, and then the explosion rocked the ground. Purple flame rolled in all directions, consuming the wagon and turning the grass to ash. The loudest stroke of thunder Muzien had ever heard struck him like a physical blow to the chest. Staggering a step back, he watched with mouth open as the fire slowly dwindled, revealing an enormous crater in the earth where the tile had been. All that remained of the wagon was broken wood and scattered, burning wheat. Of Boy and the other three he saw nothing, not even bodies.

“Holy shit,” Cole said, eyes wide as saucers. “Shit, shit, shit. What was that, Muzien? What the fuck was—”

Muzien slashed open a red smile beneath Cole’s blond beard, twisting to dodge the sudden flow of blood. As Cole dropped to the grass, body convulsing, Muzien let out a sigh.

“I’m sorry,” he said, turning back to the smoking remnants, “but no one can know, not even you. It’s a matter of trust, Cole, and right now, I trust no one but the dead.”

He doubted the man heard, but he felt better offering that parting wisdom anyway. Watching ash flutter about, listening to the crackle of dwindling fire, Muzien felt his stomach harden into an iron ball. Luther had been tricking him, that Muzien had always known, but to accomplish this … madness? This insanity? If every tile could erupt in the same way, then all of Veldaren was an idiot with a sledge away from becoming ash and rubble. It went beyond anything logical. Anything sane.

Plan forming in his mind, Muzien turned to the city and began trudging back, chastising himself along the way. He should have known better. He should have seen this coming. When dealing with a fanatical man of faith, what meaning did logic and sanity hold? But at least he still had a chance to correct things, even if doing so meant visiting with yet more fanatics.

That night he would have a word with Karak’s priests in Veldaren, and he knew just the woman to show him the way.

   8   

T
hree hours. That was all Haern had slept in the past day and a half, and he felt the effects of it wearing on his nerves. After they’d hung the mutilated body, Haern had insisted he and his father lie low for a while to rest and plan. Finding an inn on the opposite side of the city, they’d crashed, Thren in the bed, Haern on the floor. Pretending not to notice the cockroaches skittering in the corners, Haern had closed his eyes and slept, though not nearly long enough.

“Get up,” Thren had said, pushing the tip of his boot into Haern’s chest to wake him. “It’s almost midday. Enough rest.”

Haern had disagreed, but he would not appear weak before his father, who acted as if sleep were something he occasionally flirted with. Unwrapping himself from his cloaks, he’d risen, rubbed his eyes, pulled his hood lower over his face, and then prepared to face another day of hunting and bloodshed. Neck aching from the uncomfortable sleeping position, Haern pushed the pain into a far corner of his mind and tried to focus through the groggy fog on the task at hand.

“Ridley’s death is bound to upset Muzien,” Thren said as he led Haern through the open market and its buzzing crowd of men and women. Stomach grumbling, Haern swiped an apple and tossed a copper all without the seller, a young girl, noticing until the coin landed in her lap.

“Good to know our efforts will annoy the bastard,” Haern said after taking a bite. “But I’m still not sure how that helps us.”

“Ridley was important, which means he’ll need to be replaced,” Thren said, twisting sideways to slide between two big men who stood chatting in the middle of the pathway as if oblivious to the traffic on either side of them. “Until then, Muzien will need to be more hands-on when it comes to his various enterprises … and that means someone might actually know where he is.”

So that’s why we’re in the market
, Haern thought as he glanced about. His father was searching for members of the Sun Guild, no doubt hoping to take another for interrogation as he had Ridley. His gut said the result would be a similar dead end, but it wasn’t like Haern had any better ideas, so he followed.

“We’re getting an awful lot of strange looks,” Haern whispered to his father as they neared the center of the market.

“Most cloaks have turned themselves over to the patches, coats, and earrings of the Sun,” Thren said softly back. “Soon the style of the west will become highly fashionable among even the noble bloods. You and I, we’re walking relics of a dying past. Plus, you’re wearing that damn hood. You might as well write ‘thief guild’ in blood across your chest.”

“You’re cheery in the morning, you know that?”

“It’s midday. Keep up.”

Throughout the stalls, Haern saw young street rats trained to pilfer the pockets of the wealthy and unaware. Nearby would be a taskmaster in charge of them, and to whom they’d bring their score immediately in case they were later caught, and more importantly, so they didn’t sneak off to spend it themselves. That taskmaster would be on the lower end in terms of rank, but at least it was a place to start. Near the northern corner of the market, back to a wall with arms crossed and eyes alert, Haern spotted such a taskmaster. The symbol of the Sun was sewn proudly onto the front of his shirt, and folded at his feet was a long gray coat. Haern made sure to not meet the man’s eyes, instead nudging his father’s elbow.

“There,” he said, nodding his head slightly.

“I saw him,” Thren said. “His name’s Halloran, used to belong to my guild. Muzien would never let someone like him know anything of the slightest importance. Keep moving. We’ll find someone else.”

“How about we let Halloran lead us to that someone else?” Haern asked, and before letting his father answer he turned about, looping past a stall of blueberries to get a closer look at the former Spider. The man’s garments were clean, yet his hair was long and ratty, his hands dirty. It made him resemble an ugly animal stuffed into fine clothing, and he looked fittingly uncomfortable. Taking one last bite of his apple, Haern flung it sideways, aiming for the man’s forehead. It smacked him straight between the eyes, eliciting a furious howl.

“Get back here, you piece of shit!” Halloran shouted, wiping at his face with one hand while drawing a dagger with the other. Haern turned, and he spread his arms out to either side as if confused.

“Oh, sorry, I didn’t see you there,” Haern said as Halloran came rushing toward him.

“The fuck you didn’t,” the other man said, and he punched his free hand into Haern’s stomach. Letting it connect, Haern doubled over, exaggerating the pain while keeping an eye on that dagger. The second he looked ready to use it …

“Damn it, I said I didn’t see you!” Haern cried, taking an uneven step backward. A glance about showed those passing by only mildly intrigued. Good. Halloran punched again, a roundhouse that might have impressed a foe in a bar fight. For Haern, who’d endured blows from men like Ghost and Grayson, it was an easily ignored tap to the jaw.

Not that he let it show. No, Haern sold the punch the best he could, stumbling back another step and then falling to his rump. Halloran pointed his dagger at Haern and then spit.

“Watch what you’re doing,” he said. “I might not be so nice next time.”

“Now, now, no need to lose your temper,” Thren said, stepping between them and grabbing the wrist of the hand that held the dagger. Before the man could react, Thren had pushed him to the wall, then to an alley that formed a shaded exit from the market. Wiping blood from his swelling lip, Haern rose to his feet, giving another glance about to ensure they’d gotten the proper reaction. To anyone casually observing, Thren was just someone preventing a beaten foe from enduring more punishment. After fixing his hood, Haern followed them into the alleyway. Thren stood before Halloran, a huge grin on his face.

“How’s life been treating you in your new guild, Hal?” he asked.

“I didn’t know you were back, I swear,” Halloran insisted, eyes wide, hands shaking. Thren had drawn no weapons, but the way the former guildmember stood with his back to the wall, arms raised, there might as well have been a blade to his throat. “You disbanded, that’s what everyone said, you were gone and we were free to do whatever. So I did. I did what everyone with half a brain would do and joined the Darkhand.”

“But you only have a quarter of a brain,” Thren said, leaning closer so all Halloran would see was his eyes. “So I hope it doesn’t tax you too terribly when I ask where I can find Muzien.”

Halloran swallowed.

“You know I don’t know that,” he said. “Muzien keeps to himself, always does.”

As Haern kept watch on the alley entrance, Thren reached into Halloran’s pants pocket, pulled out a pouch of coins, and held it before the man’s nose.

“Who do you take these to?” Thren asked.

“Leoric,” Halloran said. “Leoric Goldear. One of Muzien’s men he brought with him from Mordeina.”

“Where is he?”

The man looked over to Haern as if noticing for the first time he was there, and his eyes widened further.

“The Watcher?” he asked. “You’re working with the Watcher?”

“Strange times make strange bedfellows,” Thren said, grabbing him by the front of the shirt and shoving him hard against the wall. “Now where’s Leoric? I’m not asking a third time, Halloran…”

“Corner of West and Bronze. He’ll be waiting there for money from people like me, I swear!”

“How will I recognize him?”

Halloran tapped his left eye.

“This eye’s all white, with a scar running along here toward his hair.”

“Excellent,” Thren said. “For once, Hal, you were helpful.”

Halloran’s smile lasted only a heartbeat before Thren yanked the dagger out of his hand, flipped it around, and jammed it into the same eye Hal had tapped. Muffling the death scream with his arm, Thren guided him to the ground, then let him plop onto his stomach. The brutality of it left Haern shocked. He should protest, he knew. Demand the unnecessary killings cease. A bad taste filled his mouth. Given the many of the Sun Guild he’d slaughtered the night before, did he really have much of a leg to stand on?

“I thought he was one of your own?” Haern asked, trying to dismiss his confusion.

“I hardly wanted him even when he was,” Thren said, wiping a bit of blood and fluid from his hand onto his pants leg. “When I reform the Spider Guild, no one will miss him, least of all me. Now would you like to stand here and mourn for that idiot, or come with me to Bronze Street so we can have a chat with someone of much higher intellect?”

Spotting Leoric was simple enough, the older man with a clouded eye waiting on the street corner, his long coat sporting the symbol of the Sun just shy of the front left pocket. A second man was with him, smaller, his body nearly enveloped by his coat and the wide-brimmed hat he wore. Thren and Haern spied on the two from farther up the road, using the uneven jut of the buildings to hide.

“They’re both in the open,” Haern said. “Grabbing Leoric and getting him out of sight won’t be easy.”

“There’s a little space between the two buildings behind them,” Thren said, nodding toward the small glover’s and milliner’s shops. “We can drag him there.”

“I see. And what will you do when Leoric starts screaming from your persuasions to talk?”

Thren glared his way.

“Less sarcasm, more ideas, if you wouldn’t mind.”