Mountain of Daggers (13 page)

The waiter licked his lips nervously.

“Now,” Ahren growled.

With a nod, the waiter hurried from behind the counter to a doorway. The instant he vanished from sight, Ahren scooped the coins back into his purse and quickly removed the unopened bottle from its display. Holding it under his cloak, he dropped one of the raven’s quills onto the bar and then strode across the tavern and out through the door. He felt the doorman’s eyes on his back as he followed the road away until turning down a side street.

Opening his satchel, he nestled the bottle inside. Falkeblut was only three points, but it was a start. He unfolded the list and found the next closest target: Vathristern Cathedral.

Several blocks later, the streets opened up and the imposing walls of the great cathedral rose before him. White-cloaked church knights in polished breastplates stood watch beside the entrance. Slowing his jog to a casual walk, Ahren crossed the square, passed the grand pouring fountain, and ascended the steps to Vathristern’s great bronze doors.

A waft of incense smoke greeted him as he entered. Men and women knelt along the mostly empty pews, their muted whispered prayers softly echoing through the great chamber. Marble statues stared down from the walls above with pupiless eyes. Keeping his head low, Ahren entered a deep alcove to the right. Short, fat candles of every color flickered along a high tiered stand coated in hardened wax, forming an almost wall of flame. Across from them, a gold and jeweled urn rested inside a wrought iron cage between a pair of golden candlesticks.

Ahren knelt before the stand and lowered his eyes. A pair of young women prayed beside him, asking for their brother’s health to return. Ahren remained silent until they finally left. He glanced around making sure he was alone, then rose and faced the great urn behind him. Still feigning contemplation, he brought a hand to his lips while his other removed a black quill. He checked one more time to be certain no one was watching, then licked his fingertips and snuffed out the slender taper burning beside the metal cage. Pulling the candle free, he tucked the heavy gold candlestick under his cloak and dropped the raven feather in its place.

He turned and slowly walked from the alcove as a hooded figure stepped inside. As he neared the arched front doors, a woman’s voice pierced the cathedral’s silence.

“Thief!”

Ahren looked back to see Katze standing before the golden urn, her finger pointed at him. Both candlesticks were missing.

“Thief,” she shrieked. “I saw him.”

Two dozen eyes turned to Ahren still standing twenty feet from the door. A bearded priest nodded to one of the soldiers.

Whirling back around, Ahren bolted toward the door. A church knight’s gloved hand reached for him, but he ducked, and plowed straight into his hard breastplate. Screaming, the soldier fell back and tumbled down the wide steps to the street.

“Stop him!” someone shouted.

Hurtling down the steps, Ahren ran back across the square and down into a narrow alley. Shouts and bells sounded behind him. Unclasping his billowing gray cloak, he let it fall as he turned into another lane. He followed the tight alleyway to an intersection. Pulling the thin green cloak from his satchel, he threw it over his shoulders then casually stepped into the street.

The candlestick was five points, but if Katze had one as well, they were in vain. He sighed deeply, trying to quell his hot anger. Mutilation was the price for stealing from the Church. The golden sticks would have cost him his eyes; maybe his hands. She would have been happy to let them do it. This was more than a simple challenge now. It was personal.

Sticking to the narrow valleys of lanes, he briskly entered the Merchant District. Pale light spilled from only a handful of stores. Closed wooden shutters sealed off most of the shops’ windows. His eyes studied the painted signs, dimly lit by street lamps. As the street slightly curved, he spied a hanging sign cut into the shape of a key: Hetstier’s Locksmith. A large silver inlaid padlock dangled from the painted door.

Stopping before it, Ahren looked around. A group of teenage boys lounged on the steps two shops away. Beyond them, several pedestrians roamed the streets and a clump of people gathered at a still open boutique.

“Nice night,” Ahren said approaching the young men. “Any of you interested in making some easy coin?”

A pimple-faced boy with a faint moustache nodded. “Wherever we can.” The others chuckled in agreement.

Ahren held up two of the dreins from his purse. “How about these?”

The boys’ eyes widened as they eyed the gold.

“Who do you want dead?” one asked.

He shook his head. “Nothing so brutal.” Ahren gestured to the open shop. “Does that store sell rings?”

“Yeah.”

“I want you all to go in there, and grab everything you can.” He tossed one of the coins into the boy’s hand. “Meet me in Kammhar Park in twenty minutes and I’ll pay you the rest.”

The grubby teens nodded eagerly.

“Don’t get caught. Now go”

Laughing to themselves, the boys got up and hurried to the boutique. Ahren turned back to the locksmith’s. A slender keyhole adorned the padlock’s side face. He removed his leather roll of picks and selected a pair of slender wires when a commotion erupted from the store.

“Halt! Halt!” someone shouted. Glass broke followed by furious cries. The boys charged out into the street, their arms full. Knocking people aside, they raced the other direction toward the park.

“Stop them. Someone stop them!”

Quickly, Ahren slid the picks into the keyhole and worked them around. Picking a lock on the side of an open street was suicide. Hopefully the diversion would work.

“They’re getting away!”

“They went that way,” a woman cried.

Ahren stuck one of the picks between his lips and selected a different one. He worked it into the keyhole until he found the tumbler latch inside. With a twist of the wrist, he wound it around the central post until the lock’s curved iron shackle bar popped out. Removing the bar from the door, he dropped it and the lock body into his pouch. He slipped a black quill through the door latch and walked the other way down the street.

Hetstier’s unmarred lock would fetch him ten points. Better still, they were points Katze wouldn’t be able to duplicate. There was only one.

He checked the list again for his next job: the small azure vase from Widow Dinstet’s window. Her late husband had been a well-known captain when Ahren had lived in the city before. It was an easy five points. Holding the heavy satchels against him so they wouldn’t bounce, Ahren hurried across the city.

A pair of Church Knights in white tabards marched down the lane toward him. The bells of Vathristern Cathedral still tolled not six blocks away. Fighting the urge to run, he remained calm, and casually strolled past them. He let out a sigh as they continued on, not giving him a moment’s glance.

Shops and taverns gave way to packed narrow homes. Ahren followed for several blocks before stopping in front of a white and brown house. The simple dwelling was no more than fifteen feet wide, but rose four stories high. A tiny blue vase, holding a single tulip, rested in the top window above. Smoke trickled from the chimney, and lights on the first and third floors verified its occupancy. Getting in would be difficult. Scanning the sloped rooftop, only inches away from its neighbor, Ahren knew what he needed to do.

He circled the block trying to find a stairway or other means to reach the roofs but found none. Following the road, he came to an alley three streets further with an outside entrance to the top floor.

The worn steps creaked as he followed them to the top, then climbed up onto the landing rail. Stretching, he grabbed the overhanging eaves and pulled himself up.

Salt wind from the harbor greeted him as he crawled up onto the wood-shingled roof; a refreshing change from the city’s foul stagnant air. The tightly packed buildings were much closer at the top than on the streets. Their overhanging roofs hindered almost any air flow below. Rising to his feet, Ahren looked out across a wide sea of rooftops and smoking chimneys illuminated by the pale moonlight. Blocks away, he could see the towers along the city walls as silhouetted guards patrolled the parapets. Staying low so no one might see him, Ahren headed back toward Widow Dinstet’s home.

It was said a man could travel the length of the city without ever touching the ground. Ahren had never tried it, but had on several occasions traveled the shingle highway to enter upper windows or escape the city guards. Other thieves swore by the tunnel roads within Lichthafen’s vast sewers, but the dark and dangerous maze-work never appealed to him. Many of the daring souls who entered the tunnels never returned.

Following the easiest path between buildings, Ahren circled around the block before finally nearing the widow’s house. Careful not to slip on loose shingles, he hopped onto one of the adjoining rooftops then froze.

Katze stood on the roof before him, her dark cloak blowing in the breeze. Smiling, she held up the vase in her hand.

Bitterly, he nodded back.

A shadow moved on the rooftop beside her. Marten stepped out from behind a chimney clutching a thick-bladed knife. Another man rose from behind a peaked rooftop holding a cudgel. Katze whistled and the two men charged toward him.

Spinning around, Ahren retreated in the other direction. Katze might have agreed not to kill him, but her thugs had made no promise. He raced down a steep rooftop and leaped across to the neighboring building.

Footsteps pounded wooden shingles behind him, racing to catch up. The heavy satchels jostled into Ahren’s hips as he ran. He jumped down onto a lower roof and hurried along the slender peak stretching to the neighboring block. A wide canyon opened before him, dropping four stories to the street below. He glanced back, finding his two pursuers not fifty feet behind him. Ahren took a breath, and leaped across.

A loose shingle slipped under his foot, nearly toppling him over the side. Lunging forward, Ahren rolled onto the slanted roof and raced to the other side. Finding no windows or access to the street, he pulled himself up onto a decrepit apartment building. Scanning the roof’s edge, he spied a dilapidated balcony. He ran to it and dropped. Gray boards cracked loudly and sagged under his feet.

“What in Saint Vishtin’s name—” a wide-eyed man shouted, stumbling back against the railing.

Ahren shot down the steep stairs two at a time to an alley below. Looking back, he spied the men on the roof above. He turned and raced along the narrow lane.

A maze-work of cluttered and cramped alleyways opened before him. Taking one, he followed it around a corner until coming to a dead end. With nowhere to hide, he doubled back and followed another one. The men’s shouting echoed behind him.

“Where is he?”

“Check down there!”

Panting, Ahren turned a corner only to find an eight-foot wall blocking his way to the street beyond. He jumped as a gravelly voice rose from the shadows beside him.

“Spare a coin?” A white-haired beggar extended his hand, his mouth filled with blackened teeth. Two more sallow and ragged men huddled beside him next to a broken barrel.

“This way,” he heard Marten shout.

Ahren reached into his pouch and removed two gold dreins. The beggars all sat up, their eyes fixated on the coins.

“There are two men following me,” Ahren said. “Make sure they don’t leave this alley.”

The men fervently nodded and Ahren dropped a single gold into the beggar’s filthy hand. “You’ll get the other one once you’ve won it.” He turned and jogged to the brick wall blocking the passage.

“There you are, Ahren.” Marten stepped into the alleyway behind him; his face beaded with sweat. “I thought we might have lost you.” His accomplice moved up beside him, still clutching his wooden club.

“I don’t want to hurt you.” Marten drew his bone-handled knife. “So give me the bags and we’ll call it even, for an old friend’s sake.”

Ahren said nothing.

A half-smile curled on Marten’s weaselish face. “Very well.” Holding the blade out front, he and his thug stepped into the alley. “I didn’t want to hurt you. Not after what happened to Tretan. But business is—”

A broken brick smashed into Marten’s arm as the three beggars leaped like hungry wolves. One jumped onto the other man’s back, striking him again and again with boney fists. Screaming, the two men staggered back fighting off their sudden attackers. Turning, Ahren grabbed onto the rough-mortared wall and clambered up. Before dropping over the side, he tossed the second coin back into the alley.

Leaving the shouts and cries behind him, he trotted down the street and pulled the list from his pouch. He had eighteen points. Katze had at least ten that he knew of. She probably had twice that, if not more. He scanned the page, searching for the more valuable items, the most difficult. He bypassed the highest, wondering if it had graced every Thieves’ Duel list in the past decade, or if Griggs just put it there as a sick joke. He stopped just below it. Artisan’s Row lay only a few blocks away; a short jog for fifteen points. Returning the list to his satchel, he hurried toward Flagref’s Anvil.

The nighttime street grew busier as he neared the market area. Soldiers in chain shirts and private guards in hardened leather vests patrolled the rich shops lining the avenue. Gold and sparkling jewelry glistened from behind iron-barred windows. Turning down a wide lane Ahren passed white marble statues and the colorful pottery shops along Artisans’ Row. Ahead, a rhythmic ring echoed from a wide two-story shop. An armored guard dressed in a gleaming breastplate etched in spiraling designs stood beside the door. The hand at his belt rested beside a white inlaid sword grip accented with bronze.