Thieves of Islar: Book One of The Heirs of Bormeer (22 page)

A
rdo moved in a stuttered walk back across his small apartment and sat down in his chair. He looked again at the three deAltos and the chest that they had brought to his doorstep. When he agreed to help them, he had never imagined that they would bring him this kind of trouble. When Avrilla had asked him to fence something from their new guil
d’
s firs
t
– no secon
d
– job, he imagined it would be something simple. The contents of a couple of cut purses, a bit of cheap jewelry from a second-story job, or goods from a mercantile break in.

But this.
Tabbil shook his head.
Hairless balls of Oundull! State silver from the treasury of Bormeer.

“How did you get that?” he asked.

Avrilla smiled, beginning to speak when her brother interrupted her.

“You’ll hear about the wagon heist soon enough, Uncle,” said Jaeron. “It’s late and we need to pay our guild.”

The boy hoisted a bar from the chest and lifted it toward him. “You’re a jeweler. Can you get us cash for this?”

Tabbil got back to his feet and took the bar from Jaeron’s hand. One pound. It felt heavier than it looked. The silver shone in the candlelight. The Bormeer stamp on the top of the bar was sharp with fresh angles and curves. He had the equipment to do what they asked. He could melt it, cut it down a grade. Start distributing it to other smiths in the city. It would take some time.

Jaeron’s words hit him suddenly and he looked at the deAltos.

“You have to pay your guild?”

Chazd grinned at him, an alley cat discovering a discarded slab of tuna. Avrilla was smiling, too. Jaeron remained serious.

“Uncle, Avrilla explained our plan to you. We’ve been recruiting and you have helped us with equipment and supplies. We have debts to pay now, and frankly, we are completely broke. How much can you get us for this?”

Ardo considered again, his mind working through the costs and the normal fencing fees and black market escalations.
No, this is family. Or as near as I am ever going to see.
The standard price for a pound of silver was seventy-five
dozecs
.
If I am careful…

“I can get you fifty-five
dozecs
per bar, but not all of it now.” Ardo paused, wondering how much cash he had stashed away around his home.

“I think I can manage two hundred
dozecs
now, if you don’t mind the smaller change.”

Jaeron nodded, but looked at Chazd. The youngest deAlto’s grin had not wavered.

“More than fair,” Chazd said and Ardo came to realize that the boy was familiar with the black market.

“Okay, Uncle. That sounds good. We will leave the chest with you, assuming you have a secure place to hide it?”

Ardo laughed.

“How long have I been at this, boy?”

Jaeron nodded at him again, but still did not smile. In fact, the lad became more serious.

“I have to ask, Uncle… have you made any progress on our other request? Do you know who murdered Father?”

Ardo sighed. He stood, shaking his head, and moved back around the kitchen to put the kettle back on the fire.

“I…” Ardo stopped himself, still wondering how much of a part he had played in the death of his best friend.

“I’ve started following some leads, Jaeron. But it’s all rumors and guesses at this point.”

“Well, tell us.”

“No,” he said, then seeing the heat start to color Jaeron’s face, Ardo continued. “Not yet, son. I may be chasing a wild goose, and you… well, you have more important things to do.”

“Uncle Ardo, just so you understand. There is nothing… nothing more important to us than finding our father’s killer. And once we establish a true guild, we are going to start making inquiries of our own.”

Ardo almost spilled the boiling water on his hands. He spun back around to the small table.

“No! You don’t want to do that, son. If Henri was right… If you were right, and it was another guild…”

Ardo struggled, trying to figure out how to explain it.

“Some of these guilds, these men, are very dangerous, Jaeron. You will need to be careful. And you will need someone to navigate in the guilds’ waters to make sure you are not getting in too deep. You can’t just go pissing in their ale!”

Ardo stopped himself and looked at Avrilla. “Sorry, girl.”

“Promise me that you will talk to me before you do anything… before you ask questions of the wrong people. I am as dedicated to finding out as you are.”

Jaeron frowned at him, but eventually nodded his agreement.

“All right, Uncle. But we have something else to show you.”

Jaeron turned to take a cloth sack from his sister and placed it on the table. As he did, Ardo noticed that for the first time tonight, Chazd had stopped smiling. The boy rolled his eyes, almost sighed, and reached for his teacup to hide the reaction.

“Have you ever seen these before?” Jaeron asked.

Ardo looked at the unusual objects arrayed on his kitchen table. They were three of the most beautiful wooden toys he had ever seen. He shook his head no. He did not recognize them.

“May I?” he asked, reaching for the jester.

Jaeron dipped his head.

Ardo picked up the figure, running his fingers over the polished wood. He brought it close to his eyes, wishing he had his jeweler’s glass. The stitching was even and strong. The material had vibrant color. The joints were exact and fitted seamlessly, giving Ardo the impression that there were metal mechanics beneath the wood.

“They are magnificent.”

Jaeron’s face fell, and Ardo became confused.

“What?”

“Nothing, Uncle. We… I was hoping that you knew what they were or where they came from. Why Father would have kept them from us all these years?”

Jaeron handed him a letter. Ardo concentrated as he read the lines.
By Mara!
He remembered the woman, Sarah, who had helped Ardo and Liadee take care of the children when they were young. He always had the impression she was a tough old woman, in mind and spirit. He also did not think that Sarah liked him very much.
Or Henri either, for that matter.

But she loved these children. Of that, Ardo was sure. He told Jaeron so.

“We barely remember her, Uncle. What happened to her? Is she dead?”

Ardo shrugged, “I don’t know, Jaeron. She went a little odd after your… your mother died. Disappeared.”

Ardo cleared his throat, twisting his head to stretch out the sudden discomfort. He never liked dredging up the past.
What was done, was done. Nothing good came of sifting sands long passed through the neck of the glass.

“How do you mean?” Jaeron pressed.

“She started traveling a lot. Disappeared for weeks at a time. Drove your father crazy. I asked Henri where she was going, but he said he didn’t know. I think he did, though. He just didn’t want to tell me.

“I got up the nerve to ask her once, if she was away visiting family. She got the strangest look at the question. Then she told me that you children were her family.”

Ardo stood and puttered in his kitchen once more.

“The trip durations got longer near the end. Then she never came back. I’d guess that was a year after this letter, but it’s hard to be sure. My memory isn’t so good about things like that.”

He handed the letter back to Jaeron, trying to ignore the frustration on the boy’s face. He did not know what else to tell him.

“Thank you, Uncle Ardo,” Avrilla broke into the conversation. “We thought there might be a connection between the toys and Father’s death. They were the last things he gave to us before… well, at the end.”

The girl seemed on the edge of tears, but she remained hard, demonstrating her strength to her brothers. Chazd fidgeted. Ardo looked at the wooden figures again. They were valuable, but finding a buyer would be a task. Anyone who could afford such extravagances for their children would not need to buy them from the black market.
A collector, perhaps.
Ardo admitted that he knew little about such commodities, other than to recognize quality work when he saw it.

“I don’t see why Henri would have died for these, Jaeron. Perhaps it was just guilt at the end there… having kept them from you for so long?”

Ardo could see his answers did not satisfy the eldest deAlto, but he let the matter drop. The group settled into a quiet, only Avrilla breaking the silence to comment on some aspect or other of Ardo’s kitchen. Once their tea was finished, Ardo went around the house, gathering up the money he promised them. Having been paid, Jaeron thanked him and ushered his siblings off into the night.

As Ardo cleaned up the pottery and silverware, his head swam.
These children were jumping all around the pot!
He worried for them, but he worried about Jaeron the most. Finding justice for his father’s death was not going to be enough. The boy was not going to be satisfied until he understood all the reasons behind Henri’s death. In Islar, Ardo knew, people sometimes died for no good reason. And sometimes for no reason at all.
Would Jaeron be able to handle that?

H
olger did not have time for diplomacy or for filtering through the lies he expected to hear from most of the names he obtained from the courthouse. For being a patricide and the son of a thief, Jaeron deAlto had an impressive list of friends. A ranking priest of the Church of Teichmar, once considered for appointment as Cardinal, vouches for Jaeron as a devoted follower of the god of Justice. Lord deLespan, an operating partner of the Islar Silver Mine, claims that the three deAltos were working for him on the night that their adoptive father was killed.
Preposterous.
Perhaps the three orphans were blackmailers too.

But there was one name on the list where he could have some leverage. The so-called weapons master, Niles Yarvin, had been volunteered to the court as a character witness on behalf of deAlto’s sister, Avrilla. He had not been questioned, but stayed through the end of the hearing.

Holger recognized Yarvin’s name. A veteran of the Soanic Expansion crusades, he briefly held a hero’s status in Islar for his action in the Battle of Martine Hollow. The man’s popularity turned, however, when he publicly protested the enslavement and forcible relocation of the Hinterland tribes’ people. Holger also heard that Yarvin had built up a gambling debt and was having difficulty making his payments. Holger’s face broke into a jackal’s smile. Yarvin could be persuaded.

As to his reasons for being so outspoken for the Hinterlanders, deLocke believed the common rumor that the man had gone native during his military service, taking a local tribeswoman as wife or concubine. Since then, the lingering war with Rosunland had brought an end to the Hinterland invasions and the man settled down to open a small training academy. Holger found out that he taught various weapon techniques to classes of a half-dozen students. Most trained in preparation to join the Bormeeran Army or the Islar Guard, though a fair number ended up in the Islar Arena or were hired as private guards for the city's merchants or nobles. Perhaps Yarvin was trying to use his knowledge of his students to gain an edge with Arena wagers?
I guess that isn’t going too well.

The training hall was located at the southern edge of the city, its crumbling frame only a block from the Islar wall. The location did not protect the building from the midday sun and Holger felt that heat on his back as he arrived at the hall’s front doors. Despite the slum-like environs of the neighborhood, the training hall doors were open when Holger walked inside.

The hall was a large open space with a dirt floor, marked with divots, deep footprints, sweat and blood from the morning students. The walls were plain. Simple white plaster covering stone and mortar. Wooden racks stood along the back of the room with weapons on the racks grouped according to their size, style, and weight.

At the opposite end of the room a short platform had been erected, just a step up from the dirt. On the wooden planks sat a small desk and chair next to a long table holding clay pitchers, basins, and first aid materials. The smells of the room, stale sweat and muscle liniments, brought back old memories.

Holger had been in a field hospital only once. He had taken a laceration across the arm and chest during a morning skirmish on the Rosunland border. They were not near a town or village and supplies were meager. The troop surgeon had given him a couple of swallows of the vile liquid the Rosunlanders called
tsipouro
. The liquor was strong, but too sweet for Holger’s taste, and ran thick even in the summer heat.

The man yelled at him in his delirium and pressed a leather strap into his mouth. Then the surgeon stitched him back together with no regard for his pain. The ointment applied to the wounds afterward was even worse, a stinking poultice that burned like fire. Holger was convinced he would have killed the man had he not been strapped to his cot. He could not stand that scent ever since that day. The medicine smell in this room was not the same, but similar enough to make Holger grimace.

Where in the hells was Yarvin?

Holger looked around the otherwise empty room and wondered if he could have done this. Made different choices and settled down with his own business. Unfortunately, he had no idea what those choices had been. The thoughts made him tired and he walked over to the desk and sat down. He did not have a lot of patience, but he had plenty of time to fume.

~

The weight of new coins slapped gently at Jaeron’s hip. The soft comfort of a new flaxen shirt settled against his chest. The Pevaran blade at his side was sharpened and freshly oiled. His shoes and belt were new. He was clean and well fed. In short, Jaeron deAlto no longer looked or felt the part of an orphan just a step away from Islar’s destitute.

However, Jaeron was not content. He stalked Salasse Street in purposeful strides searching for the boy with the
gomjom
ball. He took no joy in the bright day or in the sound of children’s laughter. He had finally convinced Chazd to agree to look into the old address Avrilla discovered. No, he amended his thoughts. He had convinced Avrilla. Then Chazd finally relented, perhaps realizing that Jaeron was never going to give up on the subject.

He could not let it go. While all reason told him that there was little chance that the expensive toys and strange letter from their nanny had anything to do with Henri’s murder, he also knew what he saw in Henri’s eyes that night. Beyond the fear, the pain, and the reflection of the flames. Beyond the tears induced by smoke and the knowledge he was never going to see his adopted son again. Beyond the gratitude at the chance to say ‘goodbye,’ Henri had expressed something else. Jaeron had seen something there about the importance of the package that the dying man could not explain, did not have time to explain.

Which meant that Jaeron needed to get back inside that townhouse.

There!
Jaeron finally spotted the curly red hair running behind the houses on the next block. He took off after him, chasing the sounds of feet on pavestone and the dull ‘thunk’ of a
gomjom
ball being kicked.

The short chase emerged into a weedy yard, semi-enclosed by small two and three story buildings. Two groups of kids were running and shouting in a scrum, trying to maneuver the ball across the field. Jaeron paused at the edge of the play area, waiting for the current score attempt to play out. He watched the ball break free and spin across the yard, two of the kids pounding after it. The first one to reach it, a skinny, shirtless boy of ten, swept his leg back and connected with the ball in a solid kick. The other runner had moved out ahead of his opponent and blocked the soaring shot with his chest.

It was a good play, but the boy paid the price for it. The ball had knocked him to his back and he lay, panting and wheezing, trying to catch his breath. He was barely able to get to all fours when his teammates were all over him, with thumping fists and cheers. The celebration did not last long, and in moments, both teams had started back toward the center of the court to begin another round.

Jaeron took the opportunity to call out to the red-haired boy before he got into formation. The kid looked and came running over, calling to his friends to play on without him. Jaeron could see the excitement in his eyes, the flush from the game, and the eagerness to earn another
mizec
.

“Nice play,” Jaeron smiled. “You need to watch their left flank, though.”

Jaeron pointed out a heftier boy, with tan pants and a blue shirt. “He’s faster than he looks, and he can put some weight behind a kick.”

The boy looked at the field, watching his team struggle to keep their field position a man short. He turned back to Jaeron with a wicked grin.

“He’s got piss for aim. Nearly broke a window yesterday. So, you have my copper?”

Right back to business.
Jaeron could respect that.

“Come with me. I want to make sure we’re talking about the right houses.”

The boy shrugged and followed Jaeron back to the street and up to the corner that connected with Salasse. He gave a brief review of the tenants of each home. Jaeron only half listened to the descriptions of the houses in which he had no interest. An older couple waiting for word on their son from the warfront. A widow who worked for a nearby cobbler during the day and the Ivanava’s Rose in the evenings. A grocer with a wife and three boys and another child on the way. Then the boy began his description of Jaeron’s old address.

“Master Harisham and his wife have lived there since I was born. He works for the city. Mom says Lady Harisham volunteers at the church orphanage. They are at the Cathedral a lot. I don’t think they’re looking to rent or sell the place.”

He let the boy continue on, but his mind was racing. If the Harishams were as pious as the boy made out, they would be attending the observance of the Covenant of the Bond of Devotion. Not to attend was a grave sin.

Jaeron felt a weight settle on his spirit.
Were these choices never going to end?
Until just this moment, Jaeron had no doubt he was going to attend the Covenant observance. Now he was not, and the realization ruined the happiness that had grown watching the simple game of
gomjom
. He pressed two
mizecs
into the boy’s hand and walked away.

He did not know how he was going to explain it to Matteo, but here was an opportunity to get inside that house. He could not let it pass.