Episode Seventeen

Ses Netrasso hated these sort of evenings. The Last Drop Inn was supposed to be a welcoming pub, a friendly pub. He wanted it to be a safe haven for all, regardless of whatever warfare was being conducted outside its doors. Mostly it was. Then there were evenings of this kind, however, when the battles were essentially conducted on his property. One day, he vowed, one day… But he knew that was meaningless. Whatever else he changed, he would always have to condone these arrangements as a price for being a landlord in somewhere like Jakks Way.
So he let Boldan and his gang have the back room for the night; the room officially closed due to leaking drains. He often turned it over to Boldan or another of the gangs and usually didn't mind. The would just gamble or take illegal herbs or do whatever else came into their limited minds. Overgrown louts, Netrasso considered, best out of the way of anyone decent. Tonight was different, however. Netrasso had been instructed to ensure nobody else came into the room. Even if they gave any of the secret codewords or knocks which usually allowed admittance. Nobody was to be let in – except Yaxi and Radav Tanson.
They'll be coming at eight o'clock, Boldan had said. And they did, with remarkable punctuality. The brass saloon clock was still striking when they sauntered into the pub. Netrasso studied them as they approached and tried to reassure himself: they know what sort of an evening this is too. They've faced them before and survived. They only gave the saloon one quick glance apiece. It was intense rather than casual, however, and seemed to tell them everything. Netrasso couldn't see any weapons on them. He also knew of a great many weapons which could be concealed, a great many places to conceal them; and he was only an outsider. They know what they're doing, he told himself again.
"Hey there, Mr Landlord," Yaxi grinned as they reached the bar and Netrasso wished she was acting a little less carefree. "Sorry to jump straight to business but I hear there's a guest list tonight and, hey, we're on it." She glanced significantly at the empty corner normally commandeered by Boldan.
"He's waiting in the back room." Netrasso nodded towards the door. "He said to go straight in."
"Well then, we'll just snog you and scarper if that's OK." They started to walk off.
"Wait," Netrasso said suddenly. He then looked around himself. Nobody officially on Boldan's payroll was left in the saloon, which didn't mean he had no presence there. There were always men looking for payments or favours. Still, he had to say something at least. Leaning across the bar and dropping his voice he urged, "You don't have to go in there. You can just walk away, you know."
Yaxi raised her eyebrows, still smiling. "Just walk away? When such a, you know, big important guy asks us round for drinks?"
"He said he were buying too," Radav supplied.
"The second invite we've had in a week too. First dinner with the neighbours, now this. I've a feeling Jakks Way's taking us to its heart. And what, we're supposed to turn it down? I think not. That'd be… what would that be, hon?"
"Shitey."
"Well I think you just made that word up but we'll kind of let it pass. No, we-"
"He's brought a lot of men with him," Netrasso said.
"See? Everyone wants to welcome us to the neighbourhood. I bet they're all in there waiting to, you know, shout "Hurrah!" the second we step through the door."
"Summit like that," Radav nodded as they moved away.
Netrasso watched them knock on the back door. Watched them step back, be scrutinised, be admitted, step inside; and so pass from his protection. He could do nothing now except hope that they were only playing with him, that they trusted him no more than they did Cepu Boldan.

"Radav Tanson and Yaxi Celcetto," Boldan said with a minatorial smile. "Been hearing quite a bit about you these last few days. Some real interesting stuff. Let's see… You've ridden the caravans up and down the Moretti Road. Passed right through Bladebranch Forest and fought off the Dark Elves. Took care of some seriously heavy business for some merchants on the coast, they were sponging the blood off the walls for weeks. Sailed on one of those ships that prey on fucking pirates." Boldan chuckled. "A nice legend you two are building. Any of it true?"
"All scripture so far, except now my name's Tanson as well," Yaxi replied. Her eyes flickered to the four men standing round the table, then back to Boldan. He was sat opposite them, his posture seemingly relaxed and friendly. "We kind of got married last spring but one."
"A spring wedding? Sweet. And here's my favourite tale. How you two were the ones who knocked over the Four Stars Bank in Chorley last year."
"You know, I told you that was a mistake," Yaxi told Radav. "We build one hell of a career, do all sorts of crazy things, most of which I'm so not going to repeat here. And what do we get remembered for? Knocking over a bank. Like, whoopee."
"Sweet job, by all accounts."
"Yeah, well, my point is, it's not really our kind of job. We only did it to get at something inside one of the vaults."
Boldan chuckled, glancing around his men. "That's the point of bank jobs, ain't it?"
"A specific thing, I meant, which we were hired to get specifically. By a guy who claimed to be its owner, by the way, and we did ask, why don't you just go to a counter and, you know, withdraw it yourself. But he gave us so much financial mumbo-jumbo, in the end it just seemed kind of easier to cut our losses and rob the damn bank. A-a-a-and, to get back to my point yet again… While we're not whaling on bank robbers, the team we put together were a real charming bunch-"
Radav looked at her sharply. "You reckon?"
"I thought they had a certain rough-hewn charm, didn't you?"
"I ended up having a punch-up with one of 'em."
"Were in the main a real charming bunch of guys – and thanks, hon, for that helpful intervention there – it's so not our favourite line of work. And nor's what you do most of the time, Cepu, 'cause I've sort of guessed where this is going already. We've done a bit of homework on you too. Cepu Boldan, 'Blood-Eyes' Boldan, real sweet nickname there by the way. Head of a little gang of scamps in central Jalkin for way longer than the Guards would have liked. Bank robberies, wagon robberies, the odd kidnapping, counterfeiting and, as a bedrock to the finances, that good ol' extortion racket. Plus the occasional murder as part of your ongoing push to be the only gang in central Jalkin. How's that one going, by the way?"
Boldan stared at her for a few seconds. "That's what we're here to talk about."
"Hey, you're going to give us a blow-by-blow account of the latest knife fights? Or do you kind of mean, you want to dragoon us into joining your gang?"
"Guess."
"You think he can guess what our answer's gonna be, hon?" Yaxi asked Radav. "I'm so hoping he hasn't so I can tell him and watch his face fall."
"It'll be a picture."
Boldan smiled slightly. "Yeah, that's it. Look at my face. Both of you. Thing is, you've given me a problem. If you were just more wogs coming into town to cream off the state, I could ignore you. Another couple of wog shits, I'd think, an'-"
"Nice," Yaxi smiled. "But kind of not too accurate when it comes to Radav. I'm looking into your face as directed and, hey, very sweet it is, but it's no paler than his. A bit less pale, you know, as you seem to be getting a bit tetchy. What's that all about?"
"Reckon you interrupted him there," Radav said.
"Oh yeah. I did, didn't it? Sorry. Carry on."
After a moment Boldan said, trying to keep his voice level, "I'd think some monkey an' his wog wife."
"That's better."
"But you ain't that, are you? There's these legends. I'll bet every bit of gold I've ever stole you've got some hardware stacked away in that flat of yours. And yeah, I know which flat it is."
"Well, duh."
"And you're putting out this story about how you're on holiday. I think that's a piece of shit. You're here for a reason. So what I'm saying is… You think I'm just gonna let a pair like you run around free in my neighbourhood? Talking to whoever you like? Doing any deals you like? Fucking well think again." Another pause, then Boldan added, "I'm not asking for much. I'm not saying, join my boys or else. Not sure I'd have a pair like you, to be honest. But we come to an agreement tonight. We make a… a treaty, understand? Then everything's settled, we're all good mates and we'll have that drink together. Right?"
Yaxi leant back and asked, "And if we don't agree to some of the sub-clauses in this treaty and, you know, refuse to sign it?"
"Just seven of us in this room. Me, my boys and you two. How many do you want to walk out?"
"Uh-huh. Hey, just out of interest, does this approach work a lot?"
"It does it's job."
"And do you think it's working right now?" Before anyone could react she asked Radav, "You know that thing you do under the table with your dagger?"
"Aye. Just got it in place now."
"What's it pushed against?"
"Dunno. Reckon it's his dick."
"Yeah? Is that right, Cepu, is the tip of his dagger right against – Yeah, look at his expression, hon. It's his dick." Yaxi looked up at the men stood around the table and announced, "In case you kind of missed that development, my husband's got a dagger pressed right up against your guy's dick. Anyone does anything to make him tetchy, it's going to go a foot further forward and won't that be fun to watch. You know, hon," she added, "I sort of wish you'd stop choosing the dick. It does a job but, you know, lacks class."
"Weren't out of choice. I were aiming for the belly but seemed to get lost."
"Yeah, right." Yaxi's hands dropped. When they came up again each was holding a knife; tight, angled, ready to throw. She swivelled on her chair so she could see all of Boldan's men at once. "OK, what I could do with now is for you guys to all take a few steps back." She waited. None of them moved, apparently frozen in uncertainty towards this new situation. "Guys?" Yaxi said lightly. "You kind of want to start listening to me? Otherwise I've a feeling your boss is gonna spend the rest of his days talking in a high pitched voice. Which I admit would be pretty funny but-"
"Do what she says," Boldan rasped.
"Thanks, Boldo. Want to repeat that in that high pitched voice just to give them a taste? No? Oh well, it would've been a scream. OK, that's far enough, guys," she called to the men who had been slowly shuffling back. "Sort of awkward throwing knives at people when they're standing real close, did you know that? I think I've got you in the, like, optimum range now. So why don't you put down your dagger and you drop that dinky little crossbow and you – well, you're so tooled up you'd better take off your whole belt. Don't be, you know, embarrassed if your pants fall down. I'm a pretty worldly gal."
They were good, she conceded, now that they had recovered from their shock. They moved very carefully, very slowly. And their concentration was locked on her, waiting for the first stutter in her attention. She was good as well, however. Her eyes moved evenly from one man to another, noting every movement. Her hands held the knives in a steady, vigilant grasp. Radav, meanwhile, continued to stare at Boldan, his own dagger maintaining its gentle but steady pressure.
There was a pause after the gangsters had put down their weapons. Thinking he had detected uncertainty in it, Boldan demanded, "Now what the fuck are you going to do?"
"We-e-e-ell," Yaxi replied brightly, not turning around, "Seven people entered this room, like you said, and I think us two are gonna leave it now. The rest of you don't have to. You can stay here, settle down and grow crops. But it's sort of beddy-byes time for me and the husband."
"This'll be good," Boldan sneered. "You watch this, lads. See how she gets out like that with her bad leg."
"Oh. Yes. Me and my bad leg. Oh deary, deary me. What is, what is –"
She tapped her foot. Then she and Radav rose swiftly and simultaneously. Yaxi tossed one knife up; Radav snatched it out of the air. Now he had two daggers ready to be thrown; Yaxi had her walking stick in her free hand. The whole manoeuvre had taken perhaps three seconds.
"-What is a poor old cripple to do?" Yaxi continued. "Hey Boldo, why don't you get up kind of real carefully and go over to join your guys. It's so, so sweet to see a little gang all sticking together. And why you might be thinking is, three daggers, five of us, wa-hay, no problem here. But we will be aiming at the very first guy who moves wrong and after all you've heard about us, do you really want to be that guy? You know, really? What's more, Radav will still be tossing a blade right at Boldo and, being Radav, he'll be tossing it right at Boldo's dick."
"It's a big target," Radav said. "You've got to give him that."
"Well, I'm kind of disturbed you've even noticed that. But after a number of years I'll probably be able accept it and move on." Boldan had reached his men. Yaxi and Radav began circling towards the door, eyes still clinging to the gang.
"And what do you reckon'll happen to you when you get out there?" Boldan demanded, his tone still belligerent and disdainful.
"Well, I'm hoping we'll all be able to look back on this one day and laugh together," Yaxi said. "We are on holiday, Boldo, despite this weird belief of yours that we never can be, and we so want to get on with it."
"Then you should holiday somewhere else. And start packing tonight."
"Yeah? OK, but we've already done the coast, we've done the hills, we've done the two lakes… Nope, I think the Cities suits us fine."
"Then you don't have the first fucking clue who I am," Boldan spat.
They had reached the door. "No, we've met you before," Yaxi said. "We kind of meet you in every town and city we roll into. And hey, it's always a pleasure." She leant her stick against the wall. Radav tossed a knife back to her and turned the door handle. "And you know who we are, Boldo," Yaxi continued. "'Cause you took the trouble to read up on us which, I've got to say, is kind of touching. You know what we can do. We knocked the Four Stars Bank over and that was pretty much a rest day for us. I'm not even bothering putting that on the résumé, 'cept maybe in the 'Other Experiences' box. So you so need to ask yourself if you want to be dragging us off our holiday. 'Cause if you do we might be a bit… is 'narky' the word, hon?"
Radav opened the door a sliver, glanced out, turned back. "Aye. Narky." Again the knife was thrown between them and Yaxi was holding her stick once more.
"And when we get narky… well, it's kind of not good. Just think about the alternative though. All of us sat down together, laughing about this evening. You guys getting on with your busy little deeds, me and the husband just taking it easy. Sweet picture, isn't it?"
Then they were out of the room and the door was kicked shut. The knives vanished as soon as they re-entered the saloon of the Last Drop Inn. They proceeded cautiously, however, Radav walking backwards while Yaxi scanned the drinkers in the pub. Nobody stopped them. Everyone, in fact, tried to avoid looking at the little procession for more than a second. When Boldan commandeered the back room for an evening, it was best not to be interested in what came out.
Boldan himself didn't. Not while the Tansons were shuffling through the saloon; not while they were hurrying down the street. They stopped walking back-to-back and flitted their concentration around the shadows, aware that the gang could have found a different exit and a different angle.
"You know," Yaxi remarked after a short distance, "If this is gonna become a thing, I'll have to find a way to take my bow out with me. 'Cause one day they're kind of gonna find out I can't throw a knife for shit."
"You could just learn how to," Radav pointed out.
"Well, that's not really very likely, is it?" The tapping of her stick on the flagstones grew more rapid. She was now moving at the fastest pace she had short of the uncoordinated lurch which approximated a run. Radav looked behind him again and the street was still empty. Yaxi stared ahead, though she could now detect their tenement block – and the street was still empty. She tried to move quicker. "He knows where we live," she said unnecessarily.
"Zokou can look after herself."
"Yeah. Only there's a certain method she might choose to look after herself which could cause, you know, complications afterwards. Not that she'd choose to do that if there were any other-"
"Aye," Radav said heavily. It was the closest he ever came to telling his wife to shut up.
"You know," Yaxi ventured, "We could try the coast again."
"It stinks of fish an' the folks are all tossers an' the bloody cliffs keep falling down," Radav said with uncharacteristic venom. "Don't talk to me about the damn coast. Anyway, we need to get Zokou sorted. Reckon we could do that in Port Sea Shanty?"
"True."
"Besides which, you said it yourself. We meet Boldans everywhere. Want to start running from 'em all?"
"And if Zokou's had to kind of adopt that method of self-defence."
"Oh, aye. We'll leg it then. First coach out of here."
Zokou had not. She had been enjoying a quiet evening alone attempting to study. Therefore she was somewhat nonplussed when Yaxi and Radav barged in abruptly, barricading the door behind then with any spare items of furniture, unlocking the chest where their proper weapons were stored. Boldan hadn't attacked the flat. He didn't launch an attack the whole of that first tense night. And if he did, when he did, he would fail. The Tansons were all confident of that. They had survived far worst than Cepu Boldan before.
Nonetheless he had changed them. And in one way he had damaged them. They had to be vigilant now. They had to plan. They had to consider other people properly, not simply targets to be courted or deceived for amusement. Their idyllic first period, when they were indestructible players in a game nobody else understood, was over. They were at risk and they were just a little afraid. In short, the Tansons had properly arrived in Jakks Way.

Episode Sixteen

Hanging around street corners on an evening. The activity which Stonnie Heppac's parents seemed to believe he prize above all others. He encouraged this illusion. "Just hanging around" was a euphemism he found useful when interrogated about his plans. It disguised some of the other things he did on an evening which his parents emphatically wouldn't approve of. Nor, on occasions, would the Guards.
In fact, just hanging around was often dull and dispiriting. Especially as the corner he usually chose was the intersection of Mankho's Passage and Ashel Street. This kept him firmly inside Jakks Way, that district which managed to be both beside the world's epicentre and next to the back end of nowhere. Doing nothing all evening except watching humdrum Jakks Way conduct its menial life, Stonnie would find, confirmed your irrelevance. It stated that you had no home which was truly yours. That you had no money either and no woman. That you were still too powerless to escape your birthplace, and too timid to even visit another district after sunset. All these accusations were in fact true for Stonnie. Which meant that many nights were indeed spent "just hanging around."
Enforcing the sense of scraping a near-empty barrel this evening was the fact that he was alone with Marksen. Marksen was the default, the one could always be relied on to always be around, having even less money and even less parental control. Stonnie liked the boy in a way; he was clever, he was exciting. He preferred, however, a few of his other friends to be around as well. They acted as a buffer for Marksen's excesses and sometimes kept them in check. Alone, Marksen's cunning could turn him into a smartarse. And the recklessness which made so exciting often gave him the look of a psycho. As he matured, Stonnie was increasingly sharing the opinion which the adult world held about Marksen – he was unsettling.
For example: earlier a particularly obese man had waddled past. Both boys, of course, immediately began the chant:
"Who ate all the spuds?
You fat bastard, you fat bastard
You ate all the spuds!"
Without looking round, the man gave an equally traditional response. He waggled his right hand up and down to imply that his tormentors were unduly attached to masturbation. That for Stonnie was the end of the episode. Both parties had continued their customs and satisfied their honour. Marksen, though, started scooping up stones and hurling them at the fat man. He even pursued him a little way down the street, still hurling vigorously. All the missiles missed their target in the gloomy air. The man pretended not to notice, perhaps genuinely did not. If he had turned and confronted his assailant, however, Stonnie was sure that Marksen would continue throwing. And if the man got close enough he would probably start attacking him. Stonnie recalled that when his friend was younger he was particularly fond of torturing cats and lizards. He sometimes thought Marksen desisted because he had grown more ambitious rather than less cruel. That he was still searching for more satisfying victims.
And he was trying company even when relaxing. Stonnie had made the mistake of imparting details of the Tanson dinner party. That had been three nights ago and Marksen still hadn't shut up about it.
"What she look like again?" he demanded.
Stonnie sighed. He was rhythmically kicking a wall with his heel, his usual habit when bored. "Which one?"
"Who you think, nob-end? Not the big one. Seen that fucking dyke lumbering around mesen. The lass. Zoko or whatever."
Stonnie had already given an extensive description of Zokou. He tried capturing in words her odd dichotomies of exoticness and conformity, of timidity and confidence. He always failed and knew the only parts his friend was interested in anyway.
"How good you say her tits were?" Marksen specified helpfully.
"They're OK. Can't complain."
"Big as Lalai's?" Lalai was always used as a marker in these conversations, the girl known to have the largest breasts in their school.
"Naw, but Lalai's a fucking barrel," Stonnie said harshly. "This Zokou's pretty slim. Thin girls always have smaller tits."
"Not the dead good ones. The best ones, they're like…" Marksen sketched in the air the outline of a woman who, Stonnie felt, would be a circus freak. "An' this Zokou's their ward, you say? What the fuck's a ward?"
"Dunno. Mum said it means they're looking after her though they're not her mum an' dad."
"Sounds like bullshit. Bet they use her as a sex toy," Marksen sniggered. "Both of 'em. No way they're shagging each other."
"How d'you reckon?" Stonnie demanded.
"Well, look at that big fucking ape. All them muscles an' stuff. Clearest fucking dyke I ever seen. She'd never be sharing a bed with a bloke."
"You're full of shit."
Marksen laughed. "She probably grabs that Zokou an' shoves her right up her fucking twat. Head first. Then pushes her in an' out." And with that he began to sing:
"Fat ugly dyke
Do I not like
Your ugly hairy body
You stick to lasses
Ones who need glasses
An' keep the fuck away from me."
He seemed about to continue but then abruptly stopped himself. Perhaps he had noticed Stonnie's habitual kicking of the wall increasing in speed and ferocity. Marksen slumped beside his friend again, giving him the occasional glance and giggling to himself.
The evening grew darker. A highly stacked delivery van clattered past. The boys watched it expectantly but the donkey was pulling it carefully and no produce bounced off the back. And they weren't going to risk raiding it just to get an armful of potatoes and swedes. In its wake, a lone youth appeared and turned down Ashel Street. He too was scrutinised closely. He was a stranger. Stonnie and Marksen exchanged looks, wondering whether to challenge him; just as they would be stopped from entering a rival district at this time of night. The youth was rather older and bulkier than they were, however. He also clearly had a short sword fastened to his belt. Even Marksen decided to let Jakks Way be violated by intruders on this occasion. An evening of just hanging around could contain a hundred such episodes. Encounters which promised excitement for just a second; before the wind shifted and evaporated it.
"Boldan's got his eyes on 'em, I heard," Marksen said eventually.
"Who?"
"Your fucking dinner mates. Ugly an' Uglier."
Stonnie pushed his anger down again. Thee was no point hitting Marksen. The boy always lost his fights. And always afterwards managed to find ways to contort his defeats into victories. "How come?"
"I dunno. Wants to know what they're playing at, I reckon. You could get in with Boldan here, you know. He's looking for anyone with info on 'em."
"Yeah? Well, I don't know shit."
"You had fucking dinner with 'em," Marksen exclaimed.
"Yeah, but they didn't say shit when I were there. Not stuff Boldan'd want to hear. Just a load of toss about Ellniss. Reckon that were all bullshit too."
Marksen often talked about 'getting in with' Boldan. It appeared to be his one ambition in life. He might eventually succeed too. Boldan's henchman occasionally joined the street corner loiterers if there was a decent crowd out. Seemingly just for the sake of it. But they always reminded Stonnie of the recruiting officers from the Forgar workshops who sometimes visited his school. Well, let them all try. He wouldn't say so out loud, not yet, but Boldan had even less chance of ensnaring him than the factory who had crippled his father. Stonnie thought that Marksen was a psychopath. He had absolutely no doubts about Cepu Boldan. He owned memories which ensured that.
"I reckon that-" Marksen began then broke off, peering down Mankho's Passage. "Hey," he called out. "Evening, lasses.
Jaricta and Nostell, both girls in their year at school, sauntered into view and stopped in front of them. Stonnie immediately fixed all his attention on Jaricta. All his thoughts and memories too. It was a sign of the flittering qualities of his nascent libido that Yaxi and Zokou were forgotten in a breath. Though possibly also an indication that he recognised the difference between the fantastic and the just about obtainable. He had been very aware of Jaricta for some time now. She was smart and clever, he thought, certainly by the standards of her peers. Her body was just the right side of plump and her breasts were emerging nicely. She had bad skin, legacy of a short but savage smallpox epidemic three years ago which had taken some of his friends. He couldn't see the little craters in the dark, however. And he hadn't been able to see them on the few occasions he had kissed her and felt her up. That was the extent of their relationship thus far, isolated entanglements facilitated by alcohol. He believed they both wanted to start an actual romance and wished at least one of them could find the nerve to begin one. It probably wouldn't happen tonight. Jaricta stared at the ground while he studied her. As soon as she glanced up, he turned away hurriedly. This occurred a lot.
He would also have to get her away from Nostell for once. Nostell always struck him as a female version of Marksen. Not as dangerous maybe, but just as smug and probably even nastier. She and Marksen also always assumed they were the superior halves of their partnerships, dominating the conversation and only addressing each other. "Hey," she answered. "You two here again?"
"Best place in the world."
"Yeah, whatever. What you up to?"
"Just hanging around. Looking for some kicks."
"Found any yet?"
"Maybe have now," Marksen leered. "Now you're here."
Nostell snorted. She did at least have the sense to treat Marksen's suggestive comments with suitable contempt. Stonnie looked up again and managed to hold Jaricta's gaze for a few seconds.
"All right, Jarry," he offered.
"All right, Stonnie," came the shy reply.
"'All right Jarry all right Stonnie,'" Marksen mimicked in a grotesque falsetto. Stonnie started kicking the wall again.
"You hear about Olbaran?" Nostell asked.
"Heard he got kicked out for twatting a teacher," Marksen said. "Old No-Dick weren't it?"
"Yeah. He did more than take a swing at him though. He went fucking psycho. Jarry saw it all. Just launched himself at him. Even fucking bit him."
"That No-Dick's a fucking wanker."
"Yeah, but biting him," Nostell insisted. "What sort of poof does that. He must be a right headcase."
"I dunno," Marksen shrugged. "Sometimes a bloke gets hungry. An' there's plenty of meat on No-Dick."
Nostell giggled. "You're a headcase yourself. Surprised they ha'n't chucked you out yet."
"If they knew half the stuff I'd done…"
Nostell rolled her eyes. "Yeah, big man. Whatever."
The conversation expired. Marksen seemed to want to do more bragging but couldn't find an excuse. Nostell wasn't inclined to give him an opening. Stonnie knew his friend had an eye on her but didn't believe girls of her cast ever went for boys their own age. "OK, we're off," she announced eventually. "Good luck finding them kicks."
"Bye, Stonnie."
"Bye, Jarry."They managed to exchange one more glance as she was walking away. She stared over her shoulder shyly, perhaps wistfully. And then she turned back, guided by Nostell's firm arm, and quickly vanished into the darkness. Stonnie continued gazing after her, ignoring Marksen's predictable parody of their farewell. Moments promising excitement for a second, he thought. Then the wind shifts.

Episode Fifteen

Myran Smithson dropped five toad eye berries into the pan. Each reacted slightly curiously when they hit the boiling water, sizzling ferociously as if covered with scalding fat. They started behaving after a few seconds, however, and sunk to the bottom of the pan. As they slowly dissolved, they stained the water an unwholesome dark red and began emitting a faint acrid scent. Smithson stirred the brew gently, thinking while he did: somebody at some time discovered that this is a very good cure for constipation. Boiled red berries; blocked orifice. How on earth had the connection been made? Such questions often troubled him as he practised herblore, which relied a great deal on magic and ancient wisdom and therefore not a great deal on logic.
"Be about five minutes, Mrs Horstice," he declared. "Come back later if you want."
"I'll wait, if that's convenient, Mr Smithson."
Smithson shrugged and set up stools on the other side of the room, for the smell from the hearth was becoming quite strong. It was not just convenient, it had been expected. Calli Horstice was not merely seeking a cure for constipation. She was Showing Her Face. The Last Drop Inn was but one place where Calli was suddenly visible since being elected praetor. Smithson's the herbalist, Ramac the blacksmith, Golting the fruit and veg man; all the local traders previously ignored by a woman who preferred buying expensive goods from outside the neighbourhood were now given her patronage. Not everyone got her custom. But she carefully selected the businesses which were seen as integral to Jakks Way, who composed its character. Doubtless if she had any documents to forge she would call on Kalinka the Inker round the corner.
"Has there been any further news about your trading license?" she asked politely, shuffling uncomfortably on her stool. Smithson wondered if she personally was plagued with the constipation.
"No. The Gods still seem to have that inside their mills."
"Yes, I see. One does wonder sometimes if they are really grinding at all. I'm sorry I have been unable to help you further. My influence with Jalkin Council's Trade & Industry department is very limited, unfortunately…"
Smithson nodded. Calli Horstice's influence almost everywhere was very limited. He knew why and knew that it would mean she would probably never be more than a praetor. She was not brilliant, not well connected and not, save by Jakks Way standards, rich. She had nothing to sell, be it patronages, ideologies or oratories. He liked her, however. Her attitude to his trading license epitomised why. When she heard he still didn't have a licence, despite his palpable skills as a herbalist, her sole concern was to try and help him obtain one. She hadn't seemed to ask why he was quite happily trading without one, nor whether she should try to end this blatant flouting of the law. Such myopic humanitarianism was another reason why she would most likely not rise far.
"Don't worry about it," he said equably. "There is something you can tell me though. My payment, if you like."
Calli's eyebrows rose. "Mr Smithson, I believe I have already paid you in full for today's-"
"Not for the toad eye berries. Payment for not spending the next five minutes harassing you about your Councillor friend."
"I assure you, I'm quite willing to fully answer any questions about that affair."
"Not the ones I'd ask, you wouldn't," Smithson said, smiling faintly. Because she knew of his reputation, Calli hesitated and finally conceded,
"What do you wish to know instead?"
"Tell me about the law of paternal acknowledgement. I know of it but not the specifics."
Calli looked at him and broke into a snorting laugh. "What on… Why by Garrath do you want to know about that?"
"Let's call it a school project," Smithson said calmly.
"Oh, very well. Paternal acknowledgment… let me try to get this right… It says that if a man declares an infant to be his child, and I think the maximum age of the child is five years, if he makes the claim, the mother agrees and if there are no contrary claims for paternity… Then the infant is his child and he must fulfil all obligation. Most importantly, the claim cannot be rescinded later."
"That's all there is to it?" Smithson frowned. "Does he have to sign anything?"
"No, the claim can be an oral one providing there are two independent witnesses… And I understand your expression, Mr Smithson. Paternal acknowledgment is an extremely archaic law, older than Christoté itself. It is almost never used now. But it somehow found its way onto our statute books and has never been revoked."
"'Welcome to the brand new world / Just like the last one, so I'm told,'" Smithson quoted. "Does the midwife at the birth count as an independent witness?"
"I imagine she would, providing she is not related to any party. The priest also."
"I'm sorry?"
"A priest or priestess is sometimes asked to be present at difficult births. In case of…" Calli paused delicately.
"Of course. A midwife, a priestess. And a father pointing at a screaming infant shouting, 'Bigods! The feller's mine!' Words he can never take back. It sounds like a scene in a farce."
"I believe that it was used in one," Calli smiled. "A rather good piece by Myers Cass. Perhaps that's where your recollection comes from."
"I don't go to the theatre much. Real life is entertaining enough." And surreal enough, he thought. He had refused to pass Morran Ceppac's commission to anybody until he had checked it was at all feasible. This didn't seem at all likely. The pitiful last hope of an abandoned mother. At the same time there was always that small chance. Because real life, and especially real statute books, could contain almost any lunacy.
"And is the law in force across all Christoté?" he asked.
"I think, though I'm not entirely sure, that it was always an exclusively Dorlafan law. Not entirely surprisingly, it hasn't proved very popular."
""So it wouldn't apply to, say, a father from Elsey?" He relished the swift, sharp look which Calli gave him. Smithson was known to be from Elsey. She believes she's just found out something new about me, he thought. And let her carry on believing that.
"That rather depends," she said thoughtfully. "I would have to check, but I imagine that it's covered in the Confederacy Family Acts. A great many of these obscure local laws were."
"The… ah, one of those attempts to unify laws across Christoté, right? To make us look like a single proper country. Rather than seven separate countries stuck together with rather substandard glue."
"That is correct."
"How's that going, by the way?"
Calli gave her rueful smile again. "It is, as ever, a work in progress."
"So tell me how the Family Acts would work in the case of paternal acknowledgement," Smithson requested, hobbling across the room to give the pan of toad eyes another stir.
"As I said, the law can only be enacted in Dorlaf. But if it took place here then it would apply to any Christotan citizen – not simply, I mean, to Dorlafans. Furthermore, it would continue to have effect even if all concerned left Dorlaf again afterward. The man is the father of the child and that is that. It works on the same principle of a marriage being legally binding across the Confederacy wherever it occurs."
"And what happens," Smithson asked slowly, "If another Province, Elsey say, has their own little law covered by the Family Acts saying a dad can denounce a child whenever he fancies it?"
"Well, of course."
When she offered nothing else, Smithson looked at her quizzically. "No, I mean-"
"That is why," Calli said, "This country has a great many lawyers and some are very highly paid."
The toad eyes were almost ready. Smithson made himself focus on completing the potion which, for no good reason, required a pinch of sand to be added at the end. A little string of other customers came in after Calli left. He kept this other problem stored away until he had dealt with them all. Herbalism requires absolute concentration. Years of mental training had given Smithson an orderly mind filled with small compartments which he could open at will.
An hour latter he allowed himself a sit-down and time to examine the Morran Heppac commission again. "I know you know shady blokes who do this sort of stuff," she had claimed. She was right, though many weren't especially 'shady.' They were mostly former Guardsmen, who had left the force due to injury or old age or politics or, at worst, some small corruption scandal. A lifetime in the Christotan National Guards had trained them to fight and follow suspects and interrogate witnesses and do absolutely nothing which might earn them a proper wage. They now called themselves private detectives or freelancers. An objective observer would label them unemployed drunks who spent most of their energy bitching about how soft Guardsmen had become since their day.
Now Smithson had a commission for one of them. It involved Notrufans; unless Morran had another heavily pregnant and clearly desperate friend she was hiding away. There wasn't a great deal of time, if the size of Zesheyek's belly was any indication. A detective had already been involved and had, allegedly, done more hurt than help. The target was apparently a powerful aristocrat. There was a heavy cloak of absurdity covering the whole affair which could only grow thicker. And there was the likelihood that it would all be in vain and would leave the clients no better off. Which of Smithson's contacts were cynical enough to accept?
Well, that removed perhaps two names. He started working through the long list again, this time looking at whom he trusted and who might actually succeed. This removed possible candidates somewhat more effectively.

Episode Fourteen

Stonnie Heppac was growing up. His mother noticed the true extent when the Tansons came round for dinner. He was simply mesmerised by Yaxi. By her black skin, by her muscular body, by what Morran had come to recognised as her powerful air of sexuality. The poor fourteen year old boy had never seen anything like her before. Certainly not in close quarters, not sat in his very own apartment. Certainly not giving hi the occasional wink. He looked close to fainting the first time she did, through either terror or lust or possibly both. The rest of the time he managed the composure of a slowly boiling haddock.
The only element which broke his obsession with Yaxi was Zokou. She was older than him, Morran estimated, but not by much. And despite her foreign appearance, she was his type. Another scrawny street kid. Morran had seen him hanging around with girls like her. He had possibly gone further with them; his mother, at present, didn't want to know. If Stonnie fixed Yaxi with an awestruck gaze, the looks which he spared Zokou were calculating. And Morran had placed the girl next to him at the table and the woman directly opposite. Happy early birthday son, she thought. Normally it was a struggle keeping Stonnie in place for ten minutes before he wanted to be out with his mates again. Tonight she foresaw a fight to get rid of him after the meal.
Zokou had affected Morran strongly for different reasons. Yaxi had asked her beforehand if they could bring another person. No details were supplied. Morran's sense of hospitality made her agree but she had reservations. She was expecting another Tanson. Or rather, another Radav, just without the good manners or restraint. Some foul-mouthed traveller wanting a free meal. Instead they had presented this strange girl. Announcing, for good measure, that she was living with them as their ward. A peculiar word which belonged to the aristocracy, not nouveau riche barbarians.
And the declaration shocked Morran. It showed her how far she still stood from being friends with Yaxi. Her notion of friendship, that is, where affection is built slowly and in conjunction with candour. At first she expected to be taken aside and given at least a truncated explanation about Zokou. Again, though, Yaxi gave no more details. She was amiable immediately with people she met and then used this as a wall. Any truths had to be tricked and teased out of her. Morran realised she was being treated as an absolute stranger would be and this hurt her a little.
Zokou didn't have the self-assurance of her guardians, if guardians they really were. She seemed to have inherited their ways, however. Treat an interrogation as a game. Never refuse to answer outright but always say something even more intriguing, which creates five more questions. Morran decided to play, at least for now. While serving out the substantial meal she asked the girl,
"You're their ward, then, love? So what does that involve?"
Zokou smiled and nodded across the table at the Tansons. "Doing what they say, mostly." Yaxi stuck her tongue out at her.
"So they've kind of taken over from your mum an' dad?" Morran persisted.
"Kind of, yeah."
"An' your real mum an' dad? Are they..?"
Zokou caught the implication after a moment. "Oh, no. Not as far as I know. They were still living back in Blacksheln."
"Where?"
"Port Blacksheln. Place I was born. You know, that big port in Ellniss."
"You're from across the water?" Stonnie squawked. He was not doing well. This was virtually the first thing he had said and really not uttered in an alluring tone. Zokou gave him a suitably haughty look.
"Yeah? What about it?"
"But Yaxi an' Radav here just came in an' took you over?" Morran asked. "Got made your, whatsit, legal guardians?"
"Yeah, I don't think we should look too closely into the legal aspects of it," Yaxi warned. "It's a bit, you know…"
Morran was still looking at Zokou. "Di'n't kidnap you, did they?"
For some reason the girl erupted into giggles. "Well…" she eventually managed.
"Hey, consent was asked and consent was granted, thank you," Yaxi said.
"Eventually," Radav observed.
"They got me out of Blacksheln," Zokou told Morran. Yaxi breathed,
"And let's all say a prayer of thanks to that."
"I like Blacksheln," Radav protested..
"So you keep saying, hon. And every time we visit this place you like so much, boy, do you whip us out of it again fast enough."
Finally everyone's plates were stacked high with food. Morran took her place at one end of the table, looked around slightly nervously and told her guests, "We normally say a prayer before dinner… Are you Church of Ella yoursens?"
"Narlat," Yaxi said.
"The Great God Garrath," Radav said. And Zokou replied,
"It's pretty complicated explaining what I am."
"Then we'll skip the prayer. The Goddess don't want us ramming our faith down other folks' throats. That's what the food's for."
They began to eat it. Morran was a very good hostess by Jakks Way standards. She stuck to the basics, the foods she knew well. Lamb, potatoes, peas, dumplings. When entertaining, the temptation is always to wander into strange lands looking for the items which aristocrats consume Food which you cannot afford and which the guests are uneasy eating because they know you cannot afford it. They are also unhappy because they can taste that you don't know how to cook it either. Morran was faithful to the wares she had prepared for years. Which she could blend with a sprinkling of salt, a pinch of parsley and rosemary to make into something subtly delicious.
She made too much of it, however. That tended to be her failing. Each portion was a huge, unstable tower on the plate. The Heppacs could afford this meal but Morran had wasted a whole week's food allowance on it. She tried to stop herself but anxiety had bit her at strategic times, pouncing when she was buying the lamb and putting the potatoes in the pot. More, it always cried, or they won't like you, they'll think you a miser. The result was a meal bluff and normal on the surface but whispering of inner insecurity. Which rather summed up Morran's attitude towards both the Tansons and entertaining in general.
Still, she told herself, she was trying. She had approached newcomers whom everyone else merely peered at from a distance and whispered about, and she was making a gesture. She was displaying acceptance and tolerance towards strangers, those qualities which are supposed to be a feature of the Triple Cities and so very rarely are. She was ensuring this very disparate gathering was only slightly awkward. And she was doing it alone – or at least, without the help of her own family. Stonnie was still in his lust-induced trance. Dryden was a mute, as he had been for the past few days; Morran vowed that soon she would find the energy to beat his latest woe out of him. Saska and Temes were talking but only to each other, in low murmurs and accompanied by much giggling. It was the only real bad habit which the girls possessed but was a trying one; especially now, as Morran suspected they were mainly laughing at Yaxi. Ignoring her daughters for the time being, she asked her guests,
"You travelled in Ellniss a lot then?"
"Yeah, a reasonable amount," Yaxi said airily. "'From mighty mountain to dusty desert' as they say, even when I ask them not to."
"Were that on work then?"
"A pinch of work, a pinch of sightseeing. You know, the usual."
"You see any dragons?" Stonnie blurted out. His eyes may be maturing, his mother noted, but his mouth was regressing. She remembered fondly the little boy who loved hearing tales about the dragons and centaurs of Ellniss, the magical continent.
"Well, just once. We saw one kind of gliding overhead, didn't we, hon?"
"Ha," Radav replied scornfully. "All they ever do."
"What do you mean?" Stonnie demanded.
Yaxi rolled her eyes. "And now you've gone and set him off. Part 157 of What Radav Tanson Hates About The World."
"Forget about dragons, lad," Radav told Stonnie. "Hopeless things. Can barely even fly, for one. Body's too heavy, wings too weak. Just have to glide the whole time. Can barely even turn themselves. All that stuff about them sleeping on a heap of gold's rubbish too. We know 'cause we've looked. Cave's just full of-"
"As there's tots and parents in the room, shall we just kind of call it dragon guano," Yaxi interrupted quickly.
"An' they don't attack folks. Things are scavengers mostly. No better than coyotes. An you know what they like to eat most? Cows. Wilderbeast. Damn gnus, for Garrath's sake. Don't talk to me about dragons."
"Don't they even breath fire then?" Stonnie quavered.
"Oh aye. That's a decent trick. Don't use it much though. Don't seem to have much control over it. Just rushes out at random. That's what kills the most folk actually. Dragon accidentally breaths on them. Folks get killed 'cause a dragon burps. Says it all. Wyverns, now, they're the real business."
"What are they?"
"A kind of cousin of the dragon," Yaxi said. "They can't breath fire and they're about a tenth of the size but, oh boy, you'd better believe they've got ten times the attitude. They mostly live in the mountains of northern Ellniss. And they make travelling through those parts, well, something of an experience."
"Come at you with everything," Radav nodded approvingly. "Teeth, talons, the works. Hide up high on a ledge, leap down on you as you're going past. Lost count of the number of times we've been riding down a quiet valley, suddenly, bam, one of them little sods is on me trying to take me skull off."
"Yes, hon. Though since that one caught you right on the top of the head you've not been able to count too high, have you?"
"Do you always travel together?" Morran asked after laughing uncertainly.
"She's kind of a recent addition," Yaxi replied, indicating Zokou. "Me and apeface here have been meandering the world together for over a decade."
"Seems like longer," Radav muttered.
"And when you've got to fight stuff," Morran probed carefully, "Wyverns an'… an' suchlike. Do you both…"
"When we've got to fight, which is so more often than we want to, we both, you know, do our share."
A short, stunned silence was broken by another sotto comment from Saska and another wave of laughter from her and her sister. Morran's more restrained reaction was, "That's pretty uncommon, a woman…"
"She still does all the pansy stuff," Radav said deadpan.
"What the loving husband means," Yaxi snapped, "Is that I pick off our attackers with my bow with truly chilling accuracy. And he mops up the remains with his you-know-what substitute sword and, believe me, that really isn't much work."
"Still a man's job. More risky. Having to get up close."
"Well, I'll have to agree. Otherwise you're going to start another count-the-scars contest, aren't you, and we so don't want to do that in mixed company. 'Cause I've managed to unleash a typhoon of giggles," she added, suddenly rounding on Saska and Temes, "Just by mentioning my bow and arrows. Kind of wondering what's so funny about that. And boy, I hope it's not what I'm thinking."
The girls froze for a second, then turned to their mother for help. Her blank expression said: serves you right. Unless she turns nasty, you're on your own. "I were just…" Saska managed eventually. "I just heard… You know what you hear… About, you know… The Charlen women-" She smacked her hand over her moth. More hysterical giggles, given additional power by fear, were almost overwhelming the girls again.
"Uh-huh." Yaxi said with a straight face. "I've heard a lot about the Charlen women and, you know, haven't found much to laugh at yet. Except Radav's expression, when he hears what they do to their men."
"Just…" Saska spluttered. "Their archers… How they cut off one of their tits to-" She surrendered to the tidal wave of laughter. Yaxi waited until it had abated a little before remarking,
"You know, I guess that's a bit better than the obvious one about bows and arrows. But it must be said, a room containing a teenage boy and two men, one of who I know is a bit of a perv." She glared at Radav to make herself clear. Morran, though, noticed that Dryden suddenly jumped. "And who makes the leap straight to the boobies?" Yaxi continued. "The gals. Five generations of women's freedom fighters are screaming from their funeral urns, that's all I'm saying." She took another mouthful of potatoes and smirked at Saska and Temes.
"You ain't answered the question," Radav pointed out.
"No, that's true. Well, you remember what that Charlen gal said don't you, hon? Most of the things you hear about Charlae is just stuff other people invented. The rest is just, you know, stuff they made up themselves. Lady archers cutting off a breast… Well, we'll ignore the implied correlation between military effectiveness and defeminisation, though that so, so speaks volumes. I guess there might be a practical point. When you're firing an arrow you don't want anything, you know, bulging out and getting in the way of the bowstring. But take a look at my chest and tell me honestly if there's anything there big enough to get in the way of anything. And when I said stare at my chest, I was kind of only talking to the women present. Guys, avert your eyes."
Radav, the only one not staring dumbstruck at at least one part of Yaxi, asked mildly, "What, even me?"
"Well, take an ogle if you really want, hon. Though if you still need to look after all these years, there's something seriously wrong with either your vision or your memory."
"Wouldn't be surprised. Blow to the head from a wyvern, remember?"
Saska and Temes vanished as soon as the meal was over. Their interest in the guests was clearly confined to mocking them. Now Yaxi had made this impossible to their faces, the girls preferred to retire to their room to continue. Morran supposed it possible they might actually do their homework too at some point. She tried encouraging Stonnie to do likewise. When finally prised from the table, though, he announced that he had to go out.
"My warehouse needs me," he claimed. "They need someone to do a few hours on the evening shift."
"Oh ay," Morran said as she noisily cleared the table. "Then bake me a cake while you're there 'cause I were only born yesterday."
"It's true!"
"Any chance of you doing your school work any time?"
"I done it all."
"Yeah, right."
Stonnie jumped up somewhat melodramatically. "Don't believe me then. You never do. Anyway," he added, pointing at the Tansons, "I bet they never bothered with schoolwork."
"Yeah, not to sort of take sides in a domestic," Yaxi said, "But if you start modelling yourself on us, boy, you've got problems."
"But you've had great lives."
"What were we talking about earlier, hon?" Yaxi asked her husband. "Sleeping in ditches, being attacked by wyverns and getting lost in the Great Ellniss Desert. They weren't a whole load of laughs at the time, were they?"
"I weren't chuckling much," Radav confirmed.
"Hey!" Zokou exclaimed. "You kept telling me we weren't lost in that desert."
"Not with you, Zok," Yaxi said. "But the first time, on our own… Boy, we were going round and round like a spinning top. And as we were we kept saying, oh how I wish I paid attention to geography at school."
"Aye," Radav nodded. "That an' 'water, water!'"
Morran retreated to do the washing up. She tended to store a water tub in a corner niche so that she could retreat. It was a useful trick when she felt the need for a temporary withdrawal. Extract herself from the room under the cover of a necessary task until her strength could be mustered again. When she turned back ground, the guests were huddled on the flimsy, uncomfortable sofa. Dryden was sat in his favourite armchair, still silent, still contributing nothing. Stonnie had vanished, almost certainly to loiter on street corners with his friends once more. If his father had extracted any promises of return times before he left, Morran hadn't heard him. She eyed Dryden sourly as she lowered herself into her own favourite chair, drying her hands on her apron. He didn't need any excuses to retreat, she though. He just goes, and you can't reach him again until it pleases him.
"Sorry about Stonnie," she told the Tansons, having rehearsed this opener in her head for the past few minutes. "He shouldn't have just assumed you dropped out of school early. Most folks around here do, that's all."
"Well, he was kind of part true," Yaxi smiled. "Zokou here's still doing her studies."
"Whether I want to or not," the girl murmured.
"And Radav's school put up with him till he was seventeen, didn't they?"
"They were desperate."
"And how. But for me, puberty and schooling didn't, you know, coincide."
"Right." Morran paused, then asked, "That because of you getting taken from your home?"
"No, that came a bit of a while later. It was 'cause of the much cheerier factor of horrible, horrible poverty. As in, nobody in my family could kind of afford to eat. So I dropped out and got a job as soon as the law let me or, frankly, somewhat earlier. Then there were a few years spent in, 'cause this was East Zabrial and 'cause clichés kind of are true sometimes, a fish gutting factory. Believe me, getting kidnapped was almost a relief at first."
Morran blinked. Yaxi had already hinted at that, of course. But hearing the word first spoken was still a shock. Trying to make light of it, she asked Radav, "Weren't by you, were it?"
Yaxi laughed. "See, hon, you've clearly built a reputation as a guy who prowls the ports nabbing young girls. I hope you can live with that."
"Better than her thinking me a pansy," Radav said.
"There's probably a way to combine the two. Radav didn't grab me," she told Morran. "He was sort of the guy who saved me, actually."
"From who?"
Yaxi was silent for a moment. Morran was about to apologise for the question when she began, "Well, you know how the guys in government sometimes promise how they're gonna kick the asses of the pirates who prey on the ports? The ones who launch the lightning raids to burn down houses or grab helpless people. No? You hear the speeches more on the coast, I guess, and less than you used to. Could be that the government finally stopped talking and finally, you know, kicked some ass. Anyway, the guys who got me were part of the reason why those speeches were made."
It took Morran a minute to interpret this and another to truly believe it. "You were kidnapped by pirates?" she whispered. "In East Zabrial?"
"Yeah, it never happened too often there," Yaxi said easily. "They mainly stuck to the towns in Ellniss where the protection's often, you know, non-existent. Probably still do, actually. When they hit the Christotan coast it was usually the teensy-weensy isolated fishing villages. But sometimes they got cocky and had a go at East Zab. And I've got to say, my mom knew they did and that's why she told me to never go to the docks at night and sure never go alone. And did I listen? Did I, as they say round here, heckers like."
Morran hesitated again. But she felt the other side of Yaxi turning disclosure into a game. Anything could be asked. If the Zabric woman didn't want to answer she would simply joke it aside. She wouldn't, Morran believed, ever get offended or upset. "So they just… grabbed you? An' took you away?"
"Yup."
"You were a slave?"
"Well, I was never actually sold on the slave markets. Which do, by the way, so still exist, whatever we've been told. Not sure why. I guess my guys just wanted to keep me."
"What did they do with you?" Morran asked, unable to stop herself.
"Well, now, picture the situation," Yaxi replied in a quieter voice. "We've got a bunch of guys out at sea for months on end. Guys who, shall we say, are kind of not over-burdened in the morals ledger. And one of their possessions is a helpless fifteen year old girl. What do you think they, you know, used her for?"
Zokou stood up abruptly. They had forgotten she was there; a girl only a teenager herself and still learning the Tansons' style. "I'm off home," she said awkwardly. "I mean, I'm really beat. Thanks for the meal it was-"
"Hey, it's OK, Zok," Yaxi said, turning instantly. "Sorry. We're done talking about this now. We're done, right?" she asked Morran.
"Sure. Definite. Sorry," Morran also told Zokou. "Nosy cow here. You'll get used to it."
Zokou managed a shy smile and sat down again slowly. "No, it's… I've heard this before, that's all, and it's… At least hear the happy ending."
"Happy ending?"
"That'll be me," Radav said.
"Oh yeah," Yaxi smiled. "Him. Well, these pirates, yeah? Raiding and pillaging with impunity, if that's the word I mean. So they're the biggest psychos on the seas, right? Nope. There were headbangers even more whacked out who actually preyed on the pirates. And I don't mean government ships, I mean sort of freelancers. They figured, these pirates may be tooled up to the eyeballs but at least no-one'll miss them. Which I guess makes sense if your mom, you know, dropped you on your head when you were a baby. That's what the Eastern Ocean's like and when guys call it the Civilised Sea, I laugh so, so hard. Anyway, when my hero here was about twenty he couldn't find anything better to do then join a boat of these headbangers. And one day they hit my pirates. I guess they knew what they were doing 'cause they took them apart pretty quickly though, it should be said, not into as many parts as I'd have liked. Anyway, that's how I got released."
"Bloody hell," Morran whispered, and asked Radav, "You find many captives on these pirate ships?"
"Aye, a fair few. We'd take 'em home if we could, otherwise to the nearest port. We kept all the treasure, mind."
"Well, duh," Yaxi rolled her eyes. "That was kind of the point of the whole exercise, wasn't it?"
"But were you looking for Yaxi this time?"
"We were strangers till he, you know, dragged me out of the hold. That's how we met." They exchanged a rare look of genuine love and Radav said,
"That's how we saved each other."
Morran frowned at him. "She saved you an' all."
"Aye. Course. Till I met her I were nowt but a headbanger who hit bloody pirate ships for fun. She gave me purpose."
True or not? Morran wondered. If they were fantasists, though, they were the most skilful ones she had ever met. They told their tales in precisely the same way most people relate accounts of their lives. In a self-mocking, self-depreciating way which always downplayed the heroic. They hadn't fought dragons. They had seen a dragon, that was all, and didn't think much of it. They had only fought the stunted cousin of a dragon. And Morran noted that they hadn't even claimed to have actually killed a wyvern. They had just been attacked by them. As the evening progressed they continued to offer scraps of stories in the same manner. Only after prompting and always in accounts laced by pragmatism and in-jokes.
Morran wanted to believe them. And not simply because the alternative was that she was sharing a building with three advanced schizophrenics. It would be nice if all fairy tales, which tended to depict heroes as either braggarts or saints, could be wrong. Heroes should be ordinary people who just had a little more courage and a lot more sense than most. Who, moreover, didn't believe in their own surfeit of bravery but were certain about their lack of sense. Who could be charming and modest and were secretive simply because this was more fun than boasting. Ordinary people with the inner strength to survive ordeals as horrific as Yaxi's experience with the pirates – the one part which Morran hoped wasn't true.
Really, though, she would have wanted to believe them however they behaved. Even if they were breathing clichés, she would wish them to be true heroes. For the same reason why Stonnie couldn't quite relinquish his childhood fascination with dragons. Probably why, too, Morran was adopting Zesheyek's predicament with such enthusiasm. There had to be more to life. More to the world than the grey, claustrophobic confines of Jakks Way. She knew that there was and yet couldn't find the courage herself to seek it out. So she wanted to trust these emissaries who had come to her and spoke of lands where everything was both brighter and darker.
Dryden barely said anything for the rest of the evening. Morran wasn't sure if he slept either, after their guests had left and they went to bed. As she drifted into slumber herself she sensed him lying rigid beside her, still staring into space. She knew she ought to at least try and find out what was wrong. That too would belong to the greyness, however. Some imagined slight or rumour of redundancies. At worst, the onset of one of his trivial little bursts of depression. Nothing concerning her husband ever seemed important. So she fell to sleep thinking of the Tansons and dreamed about fighting dragons.

Episode Thirteen

When Dryden Heppac stole out to meet Lady Sosia Kemble, he always told his wife the same thing. He said he was visiting his friend Sebsen. It was a useful story. Sebsen was the only person to whom Dryden had confided his adultery. He was, and had almost always been, the only man Dryden trusted entirely. He would always supply an alibi if given enough notice. The story was also a credible one. Morran wouldn't believe her husband if he said he was going out to do voluntary work or night school classes or anything else of any redeemable value. She did believe that he was going to waste another few hours drinking bootleg rum, reminiscing about lost childhoods and bemoaning his fate. There were, after all, many more occasions when Dryden did genuinely call on Sebsen and do all of the above. He enjoyed these afternoons so much that the sometimes wondered why he bothered with Lady Sosia at all. Nonetheless, whenever she agreed to meet him he reduced his best friend to a mask again.
The story was useful for another reason. Morran was sharp with him before he left and even sharper when he returned. (He made sure he was always half-drunk and reeking of rum.) She wondered frequently why he couldn't manage a full day's work yet always found the energy to lift a bottle repeatedly to his lips. She lambasted idle husbands who drank through the family coffers. She raised complaints on a great many related themes. Dryden felt in some vague way that he deserved his liaisons with Lady Sosia. They were his compensation for having been cheated by life on many occasions. On a baser level, they were a way for him to treat somebody as badly as the gods had treated him. Yet he also believed, far more vividly and far more frequently, that he was doing wrong. And so he should be punished. Morran was attacking him for the wrong reason, and much more mildly than she would if she knew the truth. Nonetheless, she was given a moral superiority which she deserved.
Dryden didn't know what excuse Lady Sosia gave her husband. Or even if she bothered giving one at all. She boasted that they enjoyed an 'open relationship', whatever that mean, and had even once hinted that she told him about her lover. Dryden didn't know if this was true. He didn't really know anything which occurred before or after they met. He always contacted her to arrange the time and place but Sosia claimed the address he wrote to was owned by an 'intermediate.' That may have been the truth; or it may have been a device to prevent him ever visiting her home. He didn't know how she got to their meetings. He would surely have heard the gossip if an aristocrat's carriage was seen regularly in Jakks Way, where the smartest vehicle was usually a dray cart. Yet it was hard to imagine her walking any distance through the streets. She always arrived before and left after him mainly, he suspected, to keep him in ignorance. He didn't know a great many things about her, including why she kept meeting him.
She did, however. She had even submitted to another meeting in Kiely Alley, despite having declared the flat at that address unsatisfactory. Perhaps she thought he had overcome his qualms and agreed to pleasure her on the filthy cobbles. She followed him inside the tenement block, however, after they had exchanged their usual unaffectionate gestures. He sensed her irritation growing as he led her up the stairs. It built as the route became familiar, as it became increasingly obvious that he was taking her back to the same flat. Curiosity held her in check at first. Perhaps too a fascination that he had finally found the courage to disobey her.
With Sosia, though, petulance always triumphed eventually. When they reached the third floor landing, she stopped dead and issued a crisp,
"Heppac!"
Dryden did not turn round immediately. The landing had always fascinated him. Somebody in the past had actually tried to gentrify it, decorating the walls with murals of roses and lilies. As if it were a respectable building, as if the paintings would be lovingly retouched when they started to fade. The artwork which did come later also entertained Dryden. The words were fairly predictable but, as if to compensate, the variety of spellings were immense. One four letter noun was often attempted with only three letters, the final 'k' omitted. Presumably, like Dryden's surname, it would be pronounced 'fuch.' When Sosia was waiting for him in the flat he would always spend some time staring at the walls of the landing, another part of his mind debating furiously whether he should really enter.
"Heppac," she snapped, "Where are we going? Because I believe I made my feelings quite clear. That flat is not satisfactory." He turned but did not reply. "You were to find a place which met my needs," she continued. "Your message indicated that you had succeeded. Now I find that – and what are you smirking at, Heppac?"
"Have another look at it." He paused, then when she was about to begin another tirade added, "I've made a few improvements."
She opened her mouth but closed it again. A confused frown landed on her face. Then she nodded reluctantly. She was unbalanced. Dryden also felt dizzy as he led her to the flat, but his vertigo came from triumph. Just for a moment he had conquered her. And she was right: the thought of conquering an aristocrat was glorious. He felt himself growing stiff. And just wait until he had shown her those improvements…
They had worked remarkably quickly. Only a fortnight had passed since he gave the two beggars access to the flat. He made sure they were the right type of beggars. Not men made destitute by the fickleness of the gods and the cruelty of economics, men determined to scramble back to redemption. But ones who had drunk themselves into the gutter, who would drink whatever they could while lying there and drink away any chance of salvation. Dryden wasn't looking to give anyone a hand up. He was essentially hiring internal decorators. Still, he hadn't expected them to make quite so many changes in only a fortnight.
The stench of urine, both stale and fresh, struck him as soon as he opened the door. Most came from the rudimentary bed. Even from the doorway, Dryden could see that the tattered mattress was dark with moister. There were, however, also damp patches on the walls, a fresh pool slithering across the floor. The drunks seemed to have relieved themselves wherever they pleased. The chamberpot lay halfway across the room, upturned and empty. Presumably the sight of such a restrictive device had offended their sensibilities. Faeces was less evident in the stench but lingered there as a subtle undercurrent. As he surveyed the rest of the room. Dryden noticed a large lump in one corner and a few brown crumbs scattered around haphazardly. Then there was the vomit. It did not literally cover the ground. A few patches of relatively virgin boards still existed. There were, however, swamps of it almost everywhere, some growing old and crusty, some still possessing the slick gleam of the freshly laid. The engine of this destruction was also in evidence. Overturned flagons, scattered bottles. And a great deal of broken glass, giving the disgusting bog the tang of danger.
The drunks had done splendid work. For a moment Dryden thought they had succeeded too well. Sosia took a step back when he opened the door, pummelled by the physical force of the stench. She tiptoed forward again but her face was creased with disgust. She started shaking. For a second she swayed, as if she were going to faint. This is what the absolute bottom looks like, Dryden thought grimly. He believed she had only imagined it before.
Then whatever urge had perverted her upbringing, her basic human instincts, took over. Sosia took one long stride into the room and another. She looked around, carefully studying the destruction. To Dryden's horror she breathed in deeply, determined to experience every nuance of the bouquet. Finally she whirled round with an expression of pure delight and burst out laughing.
"Oh, Heppac!" she exclaimed. "You have done me proud."
She had always understood him. That was the rope which kept him by her heels. His own human instinct had been to rush out of the room and slam the door shut. His body was pumping bile into his throat, threatening to add another lake of vomit to the floor. When she started to laugh, however, when she gave her approval and he knew what that meant, his clockwork suddenly turned another direction. Instantly he grew stiff again.
He was on her tether… but he could pretend otherwise when he was inside her. She became his creature. And he was pushing this beast further and further downwards. This haughty, high-born, beautiful woman; he was dragging her after him as he walked through the sewer pit. As he thrust in and out viciously, he imagined the new depths he would take her to. She would become his chattel, his whore, to be sold to whatever dregs wanted her. And she squealed her delight, like the filthy animal she had become.
They avoided the urine-soaked mattress. When she lay face-down on the floor, she chose a rare patch which was untouched by any moisture. Her head was very close to a patch of vomit, however. She would have been breathing it straight into her lungs. It made her pant more heavily and squeal even louder. Perhaps next time she would be instructing him to push her across the floor though all the human emissions and they wouldn't mind when broken glass lacerated her skin. Next time, too, the flat would be overlaid with another week's filth. It would get ever more satanic and they would descend with it.
And the agents of the degradation? Dryden had ordered them out for the afternoon. He had been slightly surprised that they obeyed. Perhaps they wouldn't next week. Perhaps he wouldn't even give the instruction. That would really test this arrogant bitch wouldn't it? She had talked of screwing one beggar. How about two taking her at once while she writhed in their excrement? With Dryden watching, ordering them to treat her worst and worst… And this thought brought him to a climax impressive for a man of his age.
The two beggars didn't return that afternoon. There was another presence in the flat though. It departed as soon as the act was over, as Dryden was beginning his freefall into shame and Sosia was resuming her command over him. However, it remembered what it had seen.
Menoney was visiting Kiely Avenue to try and recover a loan. Debt collecting was far from his favourite task but his boss, Cepu Boldan, often insisted. "You tell them how much they owe," Boldan would say. "Then some of my head cases'll come round to show why they should pay it." This was, however, just Boldan trying to be humorous. He had a layered approach to reluctant debtors. First Menoney went with his limited repertoire of threats and menaces. If necessary, one of the accurately described 'head cases' followed. Occasionally Boldan would call round in person. That usually mean that the alternative to full and instant payment would be fatal.
Menoney disliked debt collecting because he believed himself too intelligent for it. He was also depressed by the depths of stupidity he encountered. If somebody had borrowed a sizeable amount of money from Cepu Boldan, couldn't they then afford anything better than a Kiely Alley dosshouse? And why didn't they realise that their most important task each month was repaying Cepu Boldan? A surprising number failed to, however, including Menoney's latest client. "Tell that fucker I've not got his money an' he can break me legs if he wants," was the response. Even when Menoney promised to relay the message verbatim and mentioned that the offer would be accepted, the man was intransigent. Oh, he was a drunk and a gambler, of course. But even dogs responded when they sensed danger approaching, even insects had instincts of self-preservation. It was disconsoling to see that some people had managed to evolve backwards. And it caused a lot of extra work.
The noises, seeping around a sloppily closed door, cut through Menoney's thoughts as he walked down the landing. He stopped. His schedule was tight but he believed he deserved a few minutes of free entertainment. He pushed the door open a little further and sidled his head round. The stench, almost as vivid as the squeals, hit him. It almost knocked him backwards. Couple of dossers going at it, he decided as he noticed the debris surrounding the bare, writhing bodies. Not that he disapproved but it never made an inspiring sight.
About to withdraw, he noticed the woman's face and checked. She was actually quite attractive, even with her eyes screwed shut and her teeth clenched. A little old but then Menoney preferred mature women. He studied her plump limbs and full, squashed breasts in admiration. He also appreciated the vigour which the couple were bringing to their act. Most beggars just seemed to get it done in as cursory and half-hearted a manner as possible. As if they really had better ways to spend their time and energy. Menoney gave the man straddling over his prey a short glance. At least, it was intended to be that. The briefest look to complete the picture before he focussed on the woman again. But it hooked something in his memory. Menoney stared more carefully, trying to reconcile the flushed, triumphant face with the meek and battered one he usually saw. He studied the image until his disbelief was finally conquered and he was sure that it was-
"Who?" Cepu Boldan snapped without looking up. He was sat in his plush office, studying a complex legal document with poorly concealed desperation.
"Dryden Heppac," Menoney repeated. "Lives on Jakks Way in one of Delpess' flats. Son's Stonnie Heppac. One of the lads we've got our eyes on."
"Yeah, I know him. What about him?"
"Well, I got a good look at the tart he was rodgering an' it sure as fuck weren't his wife."
"Ah, for fuck's sake." Boldan sat back violently and thrust the papers at Menoney. "Can you make head or tail of this crap? It's all fucking Elvish to me."
Menoney took them obediently. "What is it?"
"Property deed. Some old tosser in Ashel Street offered it up. Mr Delpess said, take it, something like that's way more valuable than gold. Except now I can't figure out what the fuck we've really got."
"Sorry, boss. I don't know the legal stuff. Get Delpess to have a look at it."
Boldan snatched the documents back. "Mr Delpess owns half the neighbourhood as it is," he said sourly. "I don't think I want him managing the other half."
Menoney noted with interest this rare show of rivalry between his boss and the landlord. "Why did the bloke give you the deeds anyway?"
"Why do you think? He couldn't make the payments. Only thing he had left to give us. Useless tosser. Which reminds me. How did you get on with your mark?"
"Yeah, we're gonna have to break his legs."
"For fuck's sake," Boldan snarled. "Is it worth chucking him out of the window?"
"Doubt it. No-one'd notice."
"Right. Fine. Have a word with one of the lads. I'll tell you this though. Next fucker worth anything who pisses us about is really gonna get it. This is happening way too often."
He bent over the property deeds again. That should have been the cue for Menoney to exit. He vacillated, however, debated with himself and finally said, " Boss, this business with Dryden Heppac-"
Boldan threw the papers across the desk. "What fucking business?" he snapped. "Why are you still banging on about that? What do I care what that old cripple does?"
"You don't think it's-"
"So he's shagging around? Good luck to him? If I were married to that fat old cow what's-her-face, I’d be doing the same."
"The other day," Menoney said patiently, "You told us to look out for blokes in the legit community we could influence. A nice bit of bribery, you said, or a nice bit of blackmail. This'd leave Heppac open to influence, don't you reckon?"
"Blokes with a bit of pull," Boldan cried. "Blokes with power. Not some clapped out old – well, whatever the fuck he used to do."
"His wife's getting friendly with those Tansons, I hear. Could get us some info on them."
"We've got Mr Delpess to give us info on the Tansons. He owns their pissing flat."
"Aye, an' what's he given us so far?" Sensing Boldan's temper about to snap completely, Menoney added quickly, "It were just a thought, boss."
"Fine. Great. Keep it up. Go have more thoughts. Go blackmail the old cripple. Go do whatever the fuck you want, just get out. I need to look at these damn deeds."
Menoney was already backing out of the room. His boss often struggled to think, at least in any patterns outside the old grooves. He tried, however. And through sheer persistence he generally succeeded eventually. That alone was what distinguished him from the role carved on his soul: a straightforward street thug. He remained one, but kept attempting not to be and often managed it. And that was gradually lifting his gang to pre-eminence amongst all the other street thugs in the locality. Plus he has me, Menoney told himself smugly.
Once Boldan stopped trying to understand legal documents and turn to what was possible, he would realise the value of Dryden Heppac. He would trudge to the point Menoney had reached instantly, guided by the markers set by his treasurer. Dryden the father of Stonnie Heppac. Dryden the neighbour of the Tansons. Two sets of people which the gang were hoping to influence and, ideally, recruit. The processes might go smoothly. However, at some point they might need a lever. Boldan would ask for one and Menoney wanted to have it already prepared and oiled. Anticipating a master's wishes: always easier if you have helped create them.
Menoney first asked a henchman to break the legs of the reluctant debtor in Kiely Alley. His next call was a little more delicate and a lot more rewarding.

Episode Twelve

When Morran's household needed fresh water, which they seemed to almost constantly, she took all the pans and buckets to the street pump herself. It used to be Dryden's task and he took an amusing amount of pleasure in carrying it out. Unlike most household duties, it felt like Man's Work. "I'm going to the pump," he would announce in the same bold tone which patriarchs in other societies used to declare that they were about to fell trees or hunt tigers. Since his back collapsed, however, Dryden no longer dared do any Man's Work. (Apart from the onerous duty, Morran added acidly, of lifting a full pint pot to his lips.) Stonnie ought to have inherited the job. But Morran found that haranguing her son into acquiescence and then ensuring that he came back with them rather than ditching them all and running off with his friends was far too onerous. It was easier to just do it herself. And it wasn't really too difficult, even though the pump was almost twenty yards down the street. Like most Jakks way women, much of her bulk was pure muscle.
Her trips to the pump were carried out very early. She had always been in the habit of rising when the sun did, which in May was around six o'clock. Immediately after dawn the air was still pleasantly cool. Sometimes she even felt a chill, a rare experience in the Cities at that time of year. And few other women shared her habits, which meant that she could get to the highly desired pump. She always derided the idle ways of her neighbours even as she thanked the Goddess Ella that she didn't have to wait in a long, sweating, grouching line of them.
Somebody else was up early this morning, however. As Morran tugged on the squeaking pump handle, sending globules of faintly cloudy water into a an, she spotted Zesheyek's husband Kriyas exiting his apartment building. She often did. He leaves before I'm awake, Zesheyek had told her, and sometimes doesn't get home until very late. Kriyas paused a moment to glance u and down the street, his usual habit. Then he turned left to head for Mistletoe Square, Dorlaf Avenue and, ultimately, Forgar. They exchanged their customary greetings as he passed the pump. Kriyas bade his neighbour good health. Morran wished him a pleasant day at work and once again resisted the temptation to demand what he actually did.
She rather liked Kriyas. He was always polite, if somewhat formal, towards her. She knew that he treated his wife decently. Zesheyek had never complained and Morran was skilled at spotting signs of abuse even among stoical wives. She wished, however, that she knew how he actually made his living. Half of Jakks Way worked in Forgar, of course, but all at the workshops. Kriyas had denied they employed him with a supercilious tone hinting that he believed he had found something better. That, together with his erratic hours, suggested he had a proper profession. Yet he was a poorly educated farm boy with no connections. He wouldn't have become a lawyer or even a clerk. He was also young, naïve, desperate for money and prone to delusions of being more cunning than he actually was. And secretive. Even though he earned very little and never returned with any blood on his clothes, Morran still though he had dropped into one of the Cities' many illicit trades.
She was pragmatic about these. Some, such as forgery or smuggling, were necessary ways for people to earn a living. They only harmed a government which passed laws solely in the interests of its own excessively rich members. Morran was, however, always aware of possible consequences. And unduly confident farm boys unversed in the ways of the Cities tended to be the ones who got arrested first. Zesheyek's position was already dangerously precarious. She didn't need a husband trying to be sharp.
She had once admitted, in a conversation draped with insinuation and metaphor, that she suspected Kriyas was breaking the law. The notion didn't seem to worry her particularly. That was, Morran believed, because she didn't understand the Cities either. She was still thinking in terms of Notruf, where illegal trades started and ended with poaching and gin stills. The Cities had taken them to uncharted new lands, as it did with all forms of activity. It had made them complex, sophisticated, sometimes unrecognisable. A man could be working regular hours, sitting at a desk all day – and actually committing treason. True treason as well. The blend which would earn him a brief meeting with the noose at Swallow Square.
Morran saw Zesheyek later the same morning. The elder woman was heaving down rather than hauling up this time. Dragging, amidst much muttered cursing, a heavy weight of cloth in her old handcart which was eternally on the verge of total collapse without ever making good its promise. Zesheyek was no more composed. Also pausing outside her door, she seemed to be trying to observe the whole street at once while staying unseen herself. When Morran bawled a friendly "Zesh!" she jumped in apparent terror. Though relaxing slightly when noticing her friend, she still approached her reluctantly.
"Morning," Morran nodded. "Just on me way to kick some sense into me contractor."
Zesheyek, still taking regular looks over her shoulder, spared the handcart a glance. "Have you finished another batch?"
"I wish. Got a right load of shite dumped on me. Cloth that comes apart soon as you put a needle through it. Reeks of damp too. Mrs Amecco, she got given the same. No way we can shift owt we make with it. So I'm taking it back an' telling the contractor, buck your ideas up. Exploit us, fine, rip us off, super. But don't bugger us about. Taking Mrs Amecco's at the same time. Well, you know what she's like. Nice woman but a spine made of jelly. You off… No, you ain't off shopping, are you? Where you off to?"
Zesheyek moved closer. Muscles on her face were twitching Morran noticed, and her hands were kneading together restlessly. She looked like she had been crying recently. "I'm just… We got a note, you see. I've got to go and see our…The man we asked to… You know, that business I told you about. He… he needs to see me."
Morran finally understood. And she reflected how poor Zesheyek was at subterfuge. She really should have invented a euphemism for her private investigator. The Busy Bloke, Our Mate With The Nose… Anything would be better than these pauses which begged to be filled in by a passing eavesdropper. Especially when uttered by a woman almost bursting apart with guilt.
"Oh aye," Morran said neutrally. She nodded towards Mistletoe Square. "You heading that way? Me too. Let's walk together." The handcart started squealing and lurching as they set off. Morran tightened her grip and ignored it, however, treating it as she would a disobedient child. "An' you're off to see him alone?" she asked neutrally.
"Kriyas didn't want me to," Zesheyek replied wretchedly. "But he only sent the note yesterday and said he needs to see us right away. Something about how he'd be leaving the Cities for a while tomorrow. You know how he needs to be… be elsewhere sometimes. And Kriyas tried getting off work but he couldn't so..."
"Stopping down in Southmarket ain't he, this bloke? Aye, well, that's one thing. Plus there's the type he is."
"He seems, I thought he seemed nice enough when I-"
"If he were nice," Morran said grimly, "He'd have picked another trade. No, I reckon I'm coming with you. Wouldn't want you going into Southmarket alone at the best of times an' this sure ain't one of 'em."
Zesheyek grew even more agitated. "But you can't… I mean, Kriyas might… And you said you had to talk to your contractor-"
"You'll have to wait for me. Don't worry. If I can't sort out this damn nonsense in five minutes flat I ain't the woman I was."
Mistletoe Square was unusually empty. It was not a market day or even one of the many more unofficial market days. Mr Golting was there, however, manning his usual stall on his usual pitch. Apparently lost in a reverie, he came to life suddenly as the women walked past. "A fine morning to you, ladies," he called out. "And how lucky you came at this moment. I've two splendid pumpkins, just two left from the whole batch, with your names on-"
"Don't bug us now," Morran warned. "I'm having one of my 'don't trust any men' days."
Mr Golting remained cheerful. "Ah, seems to be that sort of day every other day, don't it?"
"Aye, I'm getting 'em more an' more."
Morran's contractor operated from premises on the corner of Dorlaf Avenue. She did not, as promised, resolve her dispute inside five minutes. It was nearly half an hour later when she emerged from the house. In her defence, though, she required over ten minutes to find the man and another fifteen to get him to see her, leaving only five minutes to shout at him. And she did indeed batter him into submission during that time. She exited the house without the defective cloth and with quite a substantial reimbursement. Not quite the amount she had hoped for but much more than the contractor, who had not tried cheating Morran Heppac before, ever dreamed he would have to pay.
Zesheyek waited outside and recovered her composure while she did. It was the same process as when she first told Morran about her plan. Panic about involving another person, something forbidden by her husband, dominated at first. Yet that was only temporary. The anxiety was soon obliterated by her relief at having Morran by her side. Somebody who was obstinate and worldly and eternally reassuring. Who was far stronger than Zesheyek thought she was and probably stronger than Kriyas too.
Zesheyek wanted to take her friend's arm as they walked through the intimidating bustle of Dorlaf Avenue. Morran was still pushing her now-empty cart with both hands, however. At first she used it as a broom to clear a path through the busy pavements. Increasingly, however, she kept it close to her body, clinging to it with an ever-tightening grip. It became a comfort blanket, a piece of Jakks Way to safeguard her on her journey. Perhaps she thought that in extremes it could serve as a weapon. They both needed their reassurances, Zesheyek in Morran and Morran in her handcart, to let them cross the bridge and enter Southmarket.
Jalkin was a city with very definite right and wrong sides. The River Brulos weaved an approximate north-south through it. You tried very hard to live on the west bank. On the east there was a remarkably degenerate artists' colony. There were a lot of large, sinister warehouses. There was the cattle market of Drayers Square ringed, none to subtly, with slaughterhouses. And there was Southmarket.
Before the Triple Cities were constructed, Southmarket was the only settlement in the area where Jalkin now stands. It is wrong, however, to revert to the usual cliché of saying that the city was 'built up around it.' The original Southmarket had been a farming hamlet. None of its cottages or seed barns were allowed to remain when Jalkin arrived. they were ripped down and replaced by the usual precarious tenement blocks. However, Southmarket in 1334 did offer some sort of testament to the past. It looked like all poor districts did before Christoté liberalised, before taxation allowed some sort of poverty relief and infrastructure development. None of its buildings had enjoyed even the half-hearted improvements of those in Jakks Way. They were basic, grim, damp and dangerous. Grills covered almost every window, excrement covered the roads. The few street pumps never worked; water had to be drawn from the nearby, heavily polluted, Brulos. Guardsmen were rarely seen during daytime and never at all at night, surrendering to the gangs. There were no amenities, no industries, few shops and little hope.
Most newly arrived immigrants, whatever Mrs Coplan's complaints about Jakks Way being swamped, got dumped in Southmarket. Or in another of the Cities' slum districts, Astor Square in Forgar or Yaleth's Brekklinside. Some managed to haul themselves out after a few years. The rest remained in the pit, paying phenomenal rents for a tiny and decaying flat, unable to find an employer who would look at them, wondering what had happened to the vision of gold and marble which was the Triple Cities. Because they hadn't arrived there, not truly. As Morran walked past the tattered women and the naked children playing in filth, she felt she had left the Cities. Not, she told herself sternly, because the women were talking in half a dozen different languages and the skin of the children ranged from albino white to virtual black. Or, she then conceded, not only due to that. Because she didn't feel safe. There were many areas which she wouldn't enter at night. During the daytime, though, the whole of the Cities ought to have been hers. It belonged to her because she was part of it. But districts like Southmarket had been cast away, freed from all civic and moral laws. Her only protection here was Zesheyek and her handcart.
"This mate of yours we're off to see," she said to distract herself. "He any good?"
"I… I don't know. He seemed to know what he's doing."
"Guess that's summit we might be about to find out. You only met him once before, you say?"
"Yes."
"Aye, well, I'll give him a look. It's a trade with a lot of chancers, I hear. An' he can't be doing too well for himself," Morran added sourly, "If he can't afford to stay anywhere better."
"He's not in the Cities for long. He moves about a lot, I think. And I suppose if you're… if you're in his line of work…"
Not much frightens you, Morran thought. Not even Southmarket. Not even the vile alley which held the private investigator's lodgings. A sliver between buildings where the shadows almost turned the day into night and unnamed liquids virtually flowed over the cobbles. As they splashed along, trying not to retch from the smell, Morran thought how far she was from Jakks Way. Not just because of the foreign land which had engulfed her. Because of the man lodged in its depths and the mission he was carrying. The scheme which Morran had blundered into with her usual blustering altruism, treating it as she did all the usual imbroglios. It was not, however. It was strange and frightening and had possible consequences she barely dared contemplate. That characteristically impulsive gesture earlier, insisting on accompanying Zesheyek to the meeting, had taken Morran further from home than she had ever been before. The handcart hopped and bounced on the cobbles but she clung to it as tightly as she could.

"Well," she said afterwards. She used a very traditional tone which made that one short word convey a great deal. Disdain, contempt, disappointment – and the grim satisfaction at being proved correct. "Well, I dunno about that." Again, an expression which many local women used. It meant Morran did, in fact, know about the meeting and didn't approve at all.
They were sat on a rock in a small, nondescript quay by the Brulos. On the west bank, the right bank, of course. Neither woman had wanted to stop until they crossed the river again. However, they found that they were unable to face the long, anarchic haul of Dorlaf Avenue without a sit down first. Southmarket, land of terrors, stood directly across the waters. It wasn't quite invisible but was hard to notice, overshadowed by the line of tall warehouses which began just to its north. From the river, east Jalkin always looked like a fortress.
"What I reckon," Morran continued, "Is your mate's been taking your money an' doing nowt with it."
"He said he's not finished yet," Zesheyek protested.
"Well, he'd better get a move on," Morran said, glancing at her friend's swelled belly. "'Cause the day ain't far off now. An' I got the impression he reckons he's done pretty much all he needs to. An' I reckon he's got pretty much nowhere. What were all that he were banging on about, all them servant girls an' dairymaids which your lord got knocked up?"
"He explained about that, didn't he? Said hit established… what was the word, precedence."
"Precedence? What good does that do you? We know what that lord's like. He's a lech. He knocks up his servants, he knocks up his farmer's daughters, he-" Morran stopped. 'He knocked you up' she was about to tell Zesheyek. Which was a truth her friend had confessed but still hated to hear. "So what good does that do?" Morran said instead, redirecting her tirade. "We say all that to your lord, he'll just say, 'prove it.' An' your mate over there can't do that, can he? He's been snuffling around Notruf for months an' what's he found? Some poor lasses with bastards on their hands. A few servants who can account for your lord's movements the night he called on you. Anyone who'll come over here to the Cities to say any of that? Don't reckon so. Notice how our mate tried covering up that part too?"
"He did say he hoped-"
"To go back to Notruf to get 'em to change their minds? Aye, well, good look to him. Truth is, everyone over there's scared shitless of your lord. An' you ain't got enough to bribe some courage into 'em. An' even if he gets someone to testify, it still ain't gonna be good enough. Our mate's been coming at this the wrong way. He's been trying to collect witnesses for a court case. You know an' I do that there's no way you can afford to take this to court. It can't drag on. You get one punch an' that's it."
"I know."
"So what I'm thinking is this. Get rid of our bloke over there an' hire someone who can really pack a blow."
Morran smiled in satisfaction. Already her sense of bewilderment was fading. The case no longer felt alien to her. She was taking command of it, dragging it into frameworks which she understood. To further the process she had to change it. One step would be to replace Zesheyek's investigator with somebody she knew herself.
Not that she didn't think this necessary anyway. The detective probably wasn't a conman but he was still a waste of time. He was a fop, Morran believed, and an actor. Maybe his funds were low, maybe Southmarket did indeed hold no terrors for him. But she thought he had picked the address solely for dramatic effect. He had presented his 'discoveries' like a mummer in a bad melodrama, the bombastic delivery hoping to disguise the paucity of the words. Morran also sensed that he was enjoying himself.
All of this would be fine for most of the nonsenses which detectives were hired for. Adulteries, inheritances, industrial espionage – let the fops mess about with them. Zesheyek, though, needed somebody who took her life seriously.
"But we can't," she cried. "I mean, we… it's too late now…" The objections were purely instinctive, however. she too was calming down. As Morran took the case in her arms it was being taken away from Zesheyek as well as the investigator. All control was sliding away from her; and her relief at losing that weight was immense.
"No it ain't," Morran said decisively. "Our mate over there's got some distance. You're paying him on an hourly basis, ain't you? You up to date?"
"Yes, more or less, but-"
"Then just settle up with him. An' say, let's have the files, ta for your work, have a nice ride home love. Easy."
"But who else can we… If we hire someone local they won't know anything about Notruf. That's why we went to-"
"Aye, but he's already dug up the Notruf side of things. Dug it to death if you ask me. This ain't gonna get played out in Notruf, is it? Gonna get settled here in the Cities. We need someone who can handle that."
"Hiring someone else, though… It means someone else knowing."
Morran gave her a sympathetic look. "You're gonna have to face that sooner or later," she said gently. "More an' more folks are gonna know an' eventually everyone will. Your lord might've noticed summit's up already. If he got wind of our mate snooping around back home." Zesheyek shuddered. Morran wondered how afraid she still was of 'her lord.'
"Who can we go to?" she asked in a tight voice.
"Off the top of my head, I'd say ask Myran Smithson for a recommendation. 'Cause he might play the respectable little herbalist but I know he's got some funny mates stashed away. Either that or go straight to the Tansons an' see if they're interested."
"The Tansons?" Zesheyek repeated in horror. "But I don't know them at all. And they look so… They seem…"
"Aye. They ain't, I reckon, but I grant you that they seem that. I'll have a word with Myran Smithson, then, soon as I can. Don't worry. I won't use your name. An' even if he guesses, he can keep his mouth shut when he's asked to."
"Kriyas won't like this. He didn't want anyone else involved."
Morran shrugged. "Up to you if you tell him just yet."
As soon as she said that, they both knew that Zesheyek wouldn't. Not just yet. Kriyas too had been excluded. For the moment, Morran was in sole command. So another layer had been added to the deception which Zesheyek was practicing against Kriyas. It was remarkable how thick they grew simply because she had a strong friend and a weak husband.
"You're going to ask Mr Smithson for..?"
"A recommendation." Morran nodded. "Aye. Any dodgy characters he knows are looking for some work. Though chances are he'll just say, why not speak to that scary looking couple who've just moved in upstairs from you."