The Universal Mirror (7 page)

“If it’s true, it’s a problem for sure,” Taggart allowed, stroking his chin.  “But so’s just letting you go.  We’ve got a reputation to uphold.  Can’t just go around kidnapping people for no reason.  I’ve got a business to run.  This weren’t no part of the plan but now that it is…. See, if a man’s got to do a job, he ought to do it right.”

Another nod answered Taggart’s speech.  Taggart looked pleased at the acknowledgment, straightening his back and lifting his jaw up, appearing to grow half a head.  He took Quentin’s thoughtful silence as an invitation, sitting down next to him and lightly clapping him on the back of the shoulder.

“It’s alright,” Taggart said in a confidential tone.  “We don’t expect your lot to know much about these things.”  He was looking at Quentin’s hands now, his gaze fixed on the unblemished skin and unstained fingernails.  They marked him as useless in this world, Quent realized.  He saw with horror that Taggart’s own hands—battered and chapped red—reminded him of another’s.  Asahel’s.

“What… is it you do exactly?” was the best Quentin could manage through gritted teeth.  What gives him the right to make such assumptions?  He muttered inside his own head, looking again at the congealing mud on the floor.  He lives in a sty.  It angered him almost to the point of shaking.

Perhaps Taggart read it as fear.  The older man showed no sign of receiving Quentin’s inquiry as rage.  Instead, he puffed up as if he’d been waiting for that very question.

“Why—” Taggart began and then paused.  “Why, we rob graves.”

“Rob graves?”  His eyes travelled to the clothing hanging out to dry.  Meg had not lied when she’d hinted that they belonged to the dead.

“Aye.  You might say we’ve a union.  Plenty of business with the dead, you know.”

Quentin raised an eyebrow.  Taggart, noticing it, continued, “Oh, aye, more business than you’d expect even.  Selling clothes and rings… sometimes, a bit of information… Pig suggested we do something with protection once.  Going about taking money to keep graves from being undisturbed, robbing them whose families didn’t pay.  But I figure, that’s competing with ourselves and it’d be mad to do that---” 

He rambled on as Quentin leaned back, pondering the rest of the room in which they were sitting.  Now that Taggart had made his guess truth, he noticed more of the objects around him.  A small pile of metal was heaped on a table.  As Quentin focused his blurry eyes, the metal began to take shape.  Rings, necklaces, and brooches had been neatly placed in a stack for later sorting.  His eyes dropped down to the floor underneath the table.  He could make out the outlines of six pairs of shoes in varying condition, all lined up neatly, waiting for another owner.

“What do you do with the bodies?”  He asked.

“Bury ‘um back up,” was the curt reply.  Quentin hesitated and the other man took it for disbelief.  “What?  You don’t think we’d make them into pies or some such, surely?”

“No.  Not that.”  He frowned.  This is the turning point, isn’t it?  It felt more of one than picking up the shovel had been.  Asahel had been with him in that—Asahel who was loyal, Asahel who could be trusted.  If Quentin had managed to get that body from the ground, taken it home, and then not been able to finish the work, Asahel would have been with him in that as well.  He could count on the lips of his friend to remain sealed, despite the fear and the cost.  This would involve other people—men that he did not know and had no reason to trust.

Yet Quentin had something Taggart did not.  Coin—and status. 

“I could make you a better offer than any ransom you’re going to get,” he said quietly.  “And it wouldn’t require much more than you’ve already done.”

Taggart’s eyes shone like a rat waiting for his next meal.  He leaned towards Quentin.  The stench of sour barley hung on his breath and for a moment, Quent thought of taking the words back.

He’d come too far to stop, however.

“I want to buy the bodies you dig up,” he said before he could change his mind.  “But—only if they’re whole and not—not putrid.”  He grimaced, vivid worst possibilities running through his mind.  “Recently buried is what I need.  As fresh as possible and the closer to being laid in the ground the better.”

Taggart’s entire body seemed to shift, the bulk sliding away from Quentin.  His lower lip twisted in disgust but he asked, “What kind of pay?”

“Exorbitant.”  Quentin amended after he saw the disgust turn to confusion.   “Unbelievably good, rather.” 

“And how often would you need these… bodies?”

“Once a month,” Quentin answered.  He hadn’t actually thought it completely through and he hoped that he wouldn’t regret it.  “It’d be regular which is more than you’ll get from selling my shoes after I’m dead.”

“We already sold your shoes,” Taggart reminded him glumly.

“I’ll throw that in,” he sighed.  “Consider it a bonus.” 

The other man hesitated one last time, then held out his hand.  “Shake on it?”  Quentin’s fingers latched on his, strong and steady as he wondered what kind of deal he was making.  He only wished he wasn’t making it alone.

“Take a sailor out of the sea—”

“Don’t,” Asahel said to Felix, his voice quiet but firm as he stared at the narrow maze of

corridors and alleys in which Quentin was being held.  “I’m not.  Not anymore and I’d not be reminded of it.”  He started off down another turning—not because he knew where he was going but because he didn’t want Felix’s quick mind to seize on what he’d said.

It was, of course, too late.

“Was that difficult?”  Felix asked, his hand resting on his sword as he flanked Asahel.  His eyes moved as quickly as he spoke, darting to every moving shadow.

“No one ever asks that.” 

“I’m asking.”  Felix’s steps quickened a little until he was walking next to the other man, rather than behind him.

“This—that’s not important now,” Asahel said, frustrated.  “It’s Quentin.  We’ve got to find him.”  He turned towards another street, narrowing his eyes as if decreasing the amount of space he could see would make a path.  He kept walking, his face anxious enough that a huddled couple parted, staring at him as they passed.  Another man watched the pair with hunger-hollowed eyes but none of the Underbelly’s denizens said a word.

Quentin might have said something funny or clever in that moment, Asahel knew.  Felix simply listened. 

“I should’ve drawn a picture…” Asahel’s face was red, his cheeks so hot he felt feverish.  “Or made a map.  I didn’t think—”

“We could see the Geographer,” the other man said.  “His job is to locate men.”  Felix was pale as he made the suggestion, not looking at Asahel.  “That’s only if you’re dead certain he’s not done anything wrong.”

“I’ll not bring the law into it,” Asahel said, glad that Felix wasn’t looking at him.  The taller magician shrugged, his hand tightening a little more on his sword hilt as he took a few steps forward.  His motion propelled Asahel who began to walk again, simply to keep up.

They were moving into a darker area—one that looked familiar to Asahel.  The buildings leaned inwards, so worn by time and fire that in some places they seemed indistinguishable from one another.  It wasn’t quiet in the Underbelly even at night.  Loud singing from a nearby tavern drowned out the rising wail of a cat as they passed its doors.  Asahel could smell decay in the air—the scent of death and molding walls clinging to his nostrils.  Far different from the dockside breezes he was used to, he choked on it.

“Are you alright?”  Felix halted as Asahel coughed into his sleeve.

“Fine—it’s just the air.”  A knowing nod returned the statement as they walked.

“What was he doing at the Thana?”  Asahel had given Felix a version of events that told him almost nothing.  Felix continued speaking, watching Asahel carefully as he did so.  “No one goes there after they’ve buried their dead.  Not unless you’re Briere weeping and gnashing her teeth over her beloved.”

Then he smiled ruefully.  “But that’s a story one tells their children if they want them to believe in happy marriages and forever, till death do we part.  I’ve never actually heard of anyone who loved like that.”

“I don’t right remember how my mother was when my father… I was small.”  The legend of Briere had frightened and fascinated Asahel as a boy.  She had loved her husband so much that she waited at his grave until she turned to stone.  He believed her a magician for years until he’d grown up and learned that, not only was Briere a myth but that the Council had outlawed the teaching of magic to women long ago.

Felix was still listening, waiting for Asahel to continue his thoughts.  It was disconcerting to Asahel—he was used to Quentin filling the spaces in their conversations.  He didn’t feel comfortable allowing the silence to stretch on between the two of them—it felt too revealing with the steady gaze that followed him through the streets.

“Any road.  I don’t recall her gnashing her teeth.”  A shy grin touched Asahel’s lips, haunting them only for a moment.  “Not over that at least.”

He’d calmed down, Asahel realized, as they reached a small square of red cobble.  The distraction had given him clarity rather than panic.  He stopped as his foot stuttered on a ridge in the street, propelling him forward.  His head jerked up, turning as Felix offered him a hand that he didn’t accept. 

“That’s it,” he said, suddenly hoarse as he caught sight of the crest he’d seen before.  There was no other like it.  It was a shovel resting on a lily, scratched into the glass of a dusty window, too primitive to be the crest of any noble.

“You’re sure?”  Felix murmured.

“Aye.”

The two men stared at the building in which the crest had been scratched.  It was a broad structure but poorly made.  The boards constructing it were riddled with knots.  Once, the boards had been painted red but the color had been sapped out and mingled with the grime of dirty streets.  As they came to the front door, Asahel saw that it bore the crest that he remembered above its frame.

“You are quite sure,” the swordsman stepped in front of him, “that we don’t want to go to the Council.”  The blade slid from his scabbard, the iron dull in the shadows.

“Aye,” he said again.

Knuckles clenched around the hilt, going on angry red.  Energy was pulsing through the ground beneath the two men.  The force of it sent a wind across the earth, rippling the blades of grass in a fluid wave.  The sword itself began to hum, coming alive with the force.

“Felix,” Asahel warned and the hum stopped.  Drawing magic was a natural response but the Heresies had been created to still the thought of calling magic against man in any form.  He almost—he could’ve--  He didn’t finish the thought.  It was better not to imagine Felix a willing partner in their crime.

“It just happened,” the other man lowered his head.  “It does, you know.”   

Asahel didn’t say anything else.  It wasn’t safe, he realized.  None of it was.  He was placing the safety of his best friend in the hands of a man he hadn’t seen in years prior to this night.  For all he knew, Felix’s sudden spark of magic had been a trap meant to trick him into agreeing to use power against the men who lay beyond that door.

It was hard to believe, however, watching Felix.  His grip seemed nervous now, fingers quavering a little on the blade.  Felix’s face turned to Asahel’s, his lower lip pulled between his teeth.

“Look,” he said again.  “I wouldn’t use it like that.  Some people have an easy time drawing magic through conduits.  Metal’s mine and it’s damn hard not to call it out when I’m upset.”  Felix rubbed at his now puffy lip.  “Distracted, I meant.”

Asahel’s hand clenched as he turned his gaze from Felix to the door.  “Just don’t use it there, aye?”  There wasn’t time any longer to debate the point or to question the other man’s motives.

Felix nodded as Asahel’s hand reached for the door.

It opened before he could think to knock or push at the handle, a broad figure standing in front of him.  Embr.  The man was a good two heads taller than Asahel himself and he took a step backwards, looking up into a face that seemed little more than snarling lip.  A blast of fetid air swept into his nostrils as Embr leaned down, his hand reaching for Asahel’s shoulder.

It was stopped by the point of a sword.

Asahel stared uneasily down at the blade and took a step back.  Felix had moved swiftly between them, his weapon hovering at the edge of Embr’s hand.

“Don’t.  Move.  Closer.”  Felix slid in front of the other man, his slender body not a credible shield for Asahel’s bulk.  Yet Embr wasn’t moving, stuck seemingly to the ground as his mouth gaped at the sword.  “We’re here for a friend of ours.”  He quirked his mouth as he used the word “friend.”

“Friend?”  Embr wasn’t armed and he lifted his hands up in the air.  “We don’t got—”

“Invite them in, Embr,” A voice came from behind him.  He turned and the pair saw an older man behind him, leaning on the wall.  His eyes measured them both up before he said, “Quentin hasn’t left yet.”

“This doesn’t look good,” Felix muttered under his breath to Asahel.

Asahel could feel his muscles tensing as he stepped forward, taking the lead.  He was painfully aware that Felix hadn’t sheathed his sword—Taggart’s gaze remained on him as they made their way into the tiny room.  Their steps were quiet on the dirt floor, feet sticking a little in places where it had gotten damp from water.  The man thought nothing of it as he moved, remembering friends of his father when he was a child who had lived in houses much like these but much closer to the water.