Four and Twenty Blackbirds (40 page)

As it was, the tavern-keeper put up with her sullen disposition and her acerbic comments to the customers, because the customers themselves, who were mostly brutes a bare step above the cattle and sheep they drove to market or slaughtered, hadn't the least idea what she meant by the things that she said to them. She wasn't pretty enough or friendly enough for any of them to want to bed her, but as long as she kept their plates and mugs full, they didn't particularly care what she said or did around them.

What Orm hadn't bothered to tell Rand was that Shensi was one of a small band of malcontents intriguing to overthrow Duke Arden. The constables knew all about them, of course, and left them alone because they were so totally ineffectual. Orm had taken the relatively bold step of reporting them to the constables just to see what they would say, and the results had been laughable. According to the constabulary records, they spent all their time arguing about the structure of their group and not a great deal in anything else. They had no fixed addresses, because the members of the group, disdaining such plebeian pursuits as employment, usually squatted in the ruins of buildings until they were evicted, lived with relatives, or left their lodgings when the rent came due. Shensi wrote what
she
thought were stirring songs about Arden's tyranny; what she didn't know was that most people who heard them thought they were comic-songs, and bad ones at that.

Orm hadn't bothered to tell Rand about this, because he was afraid that Rand would consider it too dangerous to target a member of a rebellious political group. Not that anyone was going to miss Shensi, or even consider her a martyr to the cause—her death wouldn't even make the constables heave a sigh of relief, except for those few who were music-lovers. But it was a possibility that Orm could find the knife-wielder in that group, and he was hoping to see some of them here tonight.

As he ate his tasteless stew and equally tasteless bread, he looked over the occupants of Shensi's tables.

Two were drovers, who shoveled in their food with stolid obliviousness to their surroundings. There was a butcher at a second table; evidently he had been working past his normal quitting time, for he hadn't even bothered to remove his leather apron before coming here to eat. But at the third table was a group of four, clearly some of Shensi's coconspirators.

There were three men and a woman. All four wore shabby, ill-fitting black clothing, all four had identically sullen, furtive expressions, all four sported the pale complexions of people who seldom came out during daylight hours. They huddled over their food and spoke in hushed voices, casting suspicious glances at the drovers and the butcher. The former ignored them with indifference, the latter with amusement.

They might have resembled footpads, except that they were armed with ostentatious knives instead of sensible saps and cudgels, and they all wore great clumping boots instead of soft, waterproof shoes.

From time to time, Shensi came over on the pretext of renewing their drinks, but she spent longer than she needed to, and she whispered to them while she filled mugs. Orm also noted that she didn't take any money from them; evidently they were meeting here more for the free beer than because it was a good place to meet.

He watched them closely, although they had no idea he was doing so. Any of them would make a good tool, even the woman, who watched Shensi with the worshipful eyes of a puppy. In fact, that would be a very amusing combination, now that Orm came to think about it. He wondered how Rand would react to that idea.

Probably poorly, he decided. He has to identify to some extent with his tool, and the last thing he would want to identify with is a woman. Or maybe by now for him the term is "sow." 

When his plate was empty, he signaled to his wench that he wanted a refill; the portions here weren't particularly generous, and it wasn't difficult to find room for another round. As he finished that second helping, the conspirators at the table got ready to leave; he left what remained and followed them out into the darkness.

The snowfall had eased to mere flurries, but the snow still covering the street reflected all the available light and made it quite easy to follow the group. They stood out against the white snow quite remarkably well. He didn't stay close enough to them to hear what they were talking about; what he wanted to know was where they lived, not what they were saying. They were completely oblivious to the fact that he was trailing them, in spite of the fact that he was not being particularly subtle about it. His presence actually protected them, ironically enough; he saw more than one footpad assess them and give them up as not being worth the trouble when he came into view.

Interestingly enough, they led him to a cheap storefront which displayed a few badly-printed books in its window. This was evidently their headquarters and their sole source of income—unless more of them had finally stooped to take on jobs, as Shensi did. This must be where she slept at night. He wondered which of them she shared her bed with—or was it with all of them in turn? That would have suited the stated philosophy of the group, as Orm understood it—share and share alike in everything, with everyone equal to everyone else, and nothing held in private, not even personal secrets.

Well, that was all the information he needed. He turned and headed back to his own cozy dwelling, with a rudimentary plan already in mind. He could go into the store by day and buy one of their silly books. He could leave the dagger behind, dropping it on the floor in a corner where it probably wouldn't be noticed for a while. When it was, obviously
someone
would pick it up and put it on; he'd watch them to see which it was, then inform Rand. Rand could do the rest, forcing the tool to wait outside the storefront for Shensi.

Easy, simple, neat. Everyone would assume it was a lovers' quarrel, or had something to do with the power-struggle within the group. Or both. There would be nothing to connect
this
killing to the others.

From here, it was no great distance to the stockyards, which stood beside the river. The tool could go right down the blood-sluice into the river itself. He might even get eaten by the fish that lived there, which fed on minnows that fed on the tiny creatures that in turn fed on the blood.

It was as nearly perfect a plan as possible, which was probably why Rand wouldn't like it. He hadn't thought of it himself.

So now came Orm's second-hardest job; convincing Rand that he
had
thought of it.

But that could wait for tomorrow. Tonight, he intended to enjoy himself, with Rand's money, in places that Rand could never go. And just possibly, he would see if there was anyone out there who might be willing to pay for information about the mysterious killer of musicians. Who knew? The price might be high enough to risk betrayal. There was, after all, a price for anything and anyone, if only you could find out what it was. Especially in cities.

Shensi was going to be an ideal kill, so far as Orm was concerned; as he had it laid out, everything would be accomplished quietly, with an absolute minimum of fuss.

The day of the kill, Orm went into the shabby little bookstore as he had planned and purchased a book—the only title for sale, which might account for the scarcity of customers—explaining the philosophy and goals of Shensi's group. Orm wondered where they got the things printed, and how they managed to afford the printing costs. But the poor quality of the work made him think that they might be printing the things up themselves in the back; certainly the binding was incredibly crude, reminiscent of the little chapbooks children made up to draw in or to use as journals. The sullen boy who sold him the book sneered at him as he made incorrect change; Orm didn't challenge him on the sneer or on being shortchanged, but dropped the dagger in a corner as he had intended. He lurked about in a doorway, waiting to see who would pick the blade up. It pleased him no end to see that same dark-haired, lanky boy leave the place wearing it not more than a quarter hour after Orm had left the shop.

By now, of course, Rand was in the form of the Black Bird, and was lurking up among the chimneys. Except for Orm and the boy, there was no one else on the street. When the boy's back was turned, Orm gave Rand the signal to tell him that the boy was wearing the dagger, and began looking for a place to spend the day—and night, if need be.

He found a place, somewhat to his surprise, directly across the street from the bookshop. It was some indication of the poverty of this group that they were all crowded into a single room at the back of the shop when the building across from them had plenty of real living-spaces. There were several sparsely-furnished rooms to let by the week; he hired one for a week that had a window overlooking the street and moved in immediately. The proprietor was incurious; evidently this was a place where transients moved in before moving on. Then again, there wasn't much that could be damaged in Orm's room, and nothing that could be stolen, so perhaps the proprietor's indifference didn't matter. The bed was a shelf bolted to the wall and furnished with a straw mattress, the chair was too large to fit through the narrow doorway or the window, the wardrobe was also bolted to the wall. The tiny stove, meant for heating and cooking, was of cast-iron, and burned coal provided in a pile beside it. This was supposedly a week's worth of fuel; the stone-faced proprietor informed Orm that if he burned it all, he'd have to provide more at his own expense. Probably the owner didn't care what happened here as long as the resulting stains could be scrubbed off or painted over.

The room was icy, and Orm started a fire as soon as the landlord left. The fuel would barely last the night, by his current standards, but he could remember when it had been otherwise in his life.
And I can remember when this would have been a haven of luxury.
 

As soon as the sun set, Orm opened the window, and the Black Bird flapped clumsily down to the sill.

"I'll be just above," Rand croaked, then pushed off from the sill and flapped up to perch somewhere on the roof. Orm already knew the plan; Rand would have the boy waiting when Shensi appeared just after midnight. There probably wouldn't be any witnesses, since the group couldn't afford candles or much in the way of fuel, and generally went to bed right after returning from their free meal at the tavern. It would be a long wait, but Orm was prepared for it; he amused himself with a little pocket-puzzle he'd purchased from a street-vendor. That, and keeping the stove stoked and the ashes shaken out kept him busy. These tiny stoves needed a lot of tending, but he managed to get the room tolerably warm.

Night fell, the group across the street went out by fours and returned the same way, until everyone had been fed at the expense of Shensi's employers. When the last one returned, the dim light visible through the shop window went out. The midnight bell struck in a nearby Chapel, and Rand's tool walked stiffly out of the front door of the shop. A few moments later, Shensi appeared at the end of the street, walking towards the shop with a careless swagger.

A few moments after that, it was over. In a way, Orm was disappointed; he had thought that the girl, after all her posturing, would have at least sensed that she was in danger soon enough to put up a struggle. But Rand wasn't taking any chances; he waited for the girl to pass his tool, then, with a single blow to the back, dispatched her. Shensi lay face-down in the street, with a spreading puddle of blood staining the snow, the knife-hilt protruding from the middle of her back. The tool moved down the street in a jerky, uncoordinated fashion that suggested that Rand was having difficulty controlling him, but he was headed in the direction of the nearest slaughterhouse. Orm trotted silently down the stairs and out the front door; he plucked the knife out of Shensi's back and kept going in the opposite direction, keeping the knife well away from him to avoid getting any blood on his clothing. Not that he intended to do anything other than burn this outfit as soon as he got home. Blood could be traced, and Orm never left anything to chance.

He stopped just long enough to clean the blade in a stream of water from the public pump at the corner, and went on. He took care to go by way of major streets so that his tracks were muddled in the midst of hundreds of others. By the time he reached home again, Rand was already waiting for him in the foyer shared by their apartments, in human form again.

The light from the entry-way lamp cast a sickly yellow glow over his features; the mage held out his hand wordlessly, and just as silently, Orm dropped the dagger into it. Rand turned on his heel and climbed the stairs, and Orm knew by his silence and glower that the kill had not given him the power that he had hoped for. His current tenure as a human would be short-lived.

Well, that was too bad, and it was hardly Orm's fault. At least they had another couple of easy prospects with the pickpockets; long before Rand transformed again, they'd have the next kill set up.

But the next day, when he went out to check on the pickpocket pair, he got some bad news. While he and Rand had been setting up Shensi, the pickpockets had been caught in the act by a private bodyguard and taken off to gaol. And on looking into the third prospect, he learned that one of her clients had set her up as his private mistress, which was evidently the goal she'd had in mind all along. She was no longer to be found in her old neighborhood, and even if he could find her again, she would no longer be accessible to strangers. It would take longer to find her and her patron than it would to locate a new set of targets—and even if he did find them, they were now dangerous to use. If a man of wealth suddenly slew his mistress and killed himself,
someone
would investigate. They'd gotten off lucky with the young fop; they couldn't count on that kind of luck a second time.

He had hardly anticipated
this
!

Is it Rand's luck that's gone bad, he wondered, as he returned home, or mine? 

Whichever it was, Rand took the news badly, and Orm found himself the victim of a torrent of verbal abuse as well as physical intimidation that strained even his patience.