Thief's War: A Knight and Rogue Novel (9 page)

The thugs returned next morning. Hannibas and I crouched upstairs, listening while Fisk “handled them.”

I had great faith in Fisk’s ability. But I’d also gone back to our lodging house last night to pick up a few things we might need—including my sword. My hand rested on the hilt, as I listened to Fisk ply his trade. If things went awry, I’d not hesitate to use it.

The thugs introduced themselves by throwing the shop door so wide it crashed into the wall. All the doors between the front room and the staircase had been left open, so we could hear.

“Can I help you…ah…gentlemen?” I’d never heard Fisk sound so nervous, so timorous. Not even when we faced death. Come to think of it, facing death makes Fisk brisk, bossy and snappish. I’d add sarcastic, but he’s sarcastic most of the time.

“Where’s the chandler?”

The last time I’d heard that voice, I’d been lying behind a crate preparing to run for my life. Now, safe, and probably facing nothing alarming, prickles of rage and fear ran over my skin and my palms began to sweat.

“Uncle Martin? He…ah! You’re the…um… You’re here to collect a payment, aren’t you? I’ll get it right—”

Fisk’s words ended in a squeak and a thump, as if someone had grabbed his vest and banged him into the wall.

“We don’t want the money.” The thug’s voice was so threatening, ’twas almost a growl. “We want that cheating cur of a chandler. And then we want that interfering bastard who led us a chase yesterday.”

“He’s gone!” Fisk squealed. “My aunt and him, they got scared. I mean, my cousins are girls, and that guy said he was leaving town that afternoon anyway, and why didn’t— Hey!”

“You’re lying,” the thug said. “We left word at the livery stables; anyone tried to rent a carriage or horses, they were to notify us.”

“Didn’t rent.” Fisk’s voice rasped now, as if his collar was being twisted around his neck. “That guy, he said you’d be looking. Said he had three pack horses, and if the younger girl rode double with his groom they could get to the next town. But Uncle was sorry, very sorry, for any inconvenience you were caused. He left the money for me to pay you, and to…ah, reimburse you for your trouble, and please I…I can’t…”

A thud as his feet hit the floor, and an extravagant gasp. If they’d really been strangling him, he couldn’t have been so verbose. But my hand still tightened on my sword hilt.

“You’ve got the money?” The thug sounded thoughtful. Reluctant to give up his vengeance, but if his victims weren’t here…

“Money, yes. For you and your…ah, for the city tax. Yes, of course.”

A wooden clack as Fisk opened the hidden compartment behind the counter, revealing its location in his eager haste.

“Here, here’s ten silver roundels for the payment, and an extra six! One for each of you, to apologize for that little misunderstanding. Because we’re all very, very sorry.”

“There’s some silver left in there,” another voice said. “Almost another ten, I think.”

“Yes, yes. I’ve already started saving for the next payment,” Fisk babbled. “Wouldn’t want to fall short again. I won’t fall short. I really, really won’t.”

“Take another five,” the first voice said. “Call it Master Roseman’s interest.”

“Interest?” I swear, Fisk’s voice shot up a full octave. “But that’s half a— No, wait!”

A crash, as one of the remaining glass candle lamps dropped to the floor.

“No, that’s fine, interest is fine! I’m happy to pay it. Delighted. Delirious. Just don’t break anything else. Please?”

“Week after next, Master Roseman wants twelve silver roundels from this shop. And every week after that, till he’s satisfied.”

“Twelve? But that’s… That will be fine. I’ll get it. Somehow. But I’ll have the money. Promise.”

The door closed.

Silence, for a long moment, then a derisive snort from Fisk. A cupboard door opened and a brush swept glass into a dust pan, then ’twas emptied into a bin.

I came down the stairs quietly, Hannibas thumping at my heels. Fisk greeted us with the lazy grin of a well-fed cougar.

“Told you. Nobody bothers to intimidate someone who’s already cowering. And the ‘tax’ only went up twenty percent. Master Roseman must be feeling generous.”

I glimpsed bruises beginning to darken under his loose collar, but I wouldn’t sully his victory by saying so.

“That was brilliant. What next?”

“Next, we need to get this place running again,” Fisk said. “You mentioned something about workers?”

* * *

On the way to acquire our new apprentices, I took a detour to pick up the rest of our gear and make a deal with the landlady. The shop had beds for the family and a number of workers on the second floor, but there was no stabling. Chant and Tipple seemed content in the landlady’s care, even putting up with the gaggle of girls who’d taken to braiding flowers and ribbons into their manes, so we’d decided to leave the horses there.

As for True, it seemed to me that there were other children who might like a dog.

* * *

I put True on collar and leash, to take him to the abandoned warehouse where the orphans had rescued me—only yesterday, though so much had happened I felt as if a longer time had passed.

To use the door on the street might attract unwanted attention, so I led my child-bait into the alley where I’d so nearly been trapped. It seemed rude, and possibly dangerous, to enter uninvited. I pulled the heavy bin a bit farther from the wall, and knocked on the loose board to announce myself.

Then I stepped back into the open to wait. I could feel their eyes, behind the knotholes in those weathered boards, but several long minutes passed before One-eye came from behind the crate to confront me.

“Did you figure out a way for us t’ get the Rose?”

“Already? That will take weeks. Months, mayhap.”

I had, of course, no intention of involving them—but I knew better than to say so.

“Then what’re you doing here, wasting our time?”

In the daylight he looked to be about ten, but his young voice held an adult’s terse challenge. His gaze strayed to the brindled hound who sat beside me. True wagged his tail and grinned invitingly.

“I’m still thinking about how to bring down Master Roseman, but I do have another need you and your friends might fulfill. One that may fill a need of yours, as well. I don’t think you have much money?”

The word “money” drew his gaze away from the dog, which told me I was right.

“What do you need, and what’s the pay? We got a couple can steal, but we won’t put no one down. Not ‘less they deserves it.”

It sounded as if they’d been offered such jobs before, which probably shouldn’t have shocked me, but it did. Fisk calls me naive, and mayhap he’s right.

“Nothing like that,” I said. “My friend and I have acquired a chandlery, but we’ve no workers beyond one senior apprentice. He says we need at least six men.”

Actually, Hannibas had said three. But these workers were half-size, so I thought I could persuade Fisk to take that many.

One-eye was patting True by the time I finished listing my requirements. And if I’d had any doubt that the whole orphan clan was listening on the other side of that wall, it vanished as my new employees began trickling out.

First came two burly lads, about thirteen, one with straight brown hair and the other with black curls.

“What are your names?”

As their employer I had both right and need to know, but they froze, turning to One-eye. The younger boy hesitated a moment, then shrugged.

“They’s Bran and Talts. I’m Timasus.”

Next came a boy, mayhap fourteen, who introduced himself as Jig and made a bee-line for the dog. After him was a girl, about eleven, with fine, flyaway hair. She said nothing when I asked her name, but she gave me a shy smile and offered True a hand to sniff before she started petting him.

Timasus, who had somehow gotten the leash out of my hand without my noticing, told me Alessa didn’t talk much, but she had deft hands for fine work.

I had known Fisk long enough to guess this meant she was good at picking locks.

The last boy barely fit through the gap in the planks. He must have been at least sixteen, with a scraggly beard. His britches were too small and his shirt too large. But his open, eager smile was that of a much younger boy. When I asked his name, he said he was Jer. Timasus added, a bit defiantly, that he was strong, willing, and a hard worker.

“Then he’ll be perfect,” I assured them. “In fact, I think all of you will do just fine.”

We set off for the shop, which I hoped these waifs would soon be calling “home.” They were more interested in True than me, and Timasus had to settle a quarrel about who got to hold his leash. He also ordered Jer to carry my packs, and I began to see that while Hannibas might be the master craftsmen, Timasus was clearly the shop foreman.

Noting that True had stopped to scratch, I made another stop at a herbalist’s shop and picked up a large batch of fleabane.

I knew better than to try to keep True from sharing the children’s beds. And I probably wasn’t the first employer to insist that his workers start their job with a bath.

* * *

I didn’t really think the neighbors were reporting to Roseman’s thugs, but I took my workers in though the back of the shop anyway.

Fisk had been going through the chandler’s accounts, but he looked up when we came in. His eyes widened, then narrowed, and his expression became very bland as child after child trooped through the door.

Hannibas’ dubious expression was more open. “Bit young, ain’t they? For a whole shop, at least.”

“You’ll have Fisk and me and Jer here—” I slapped his shoulder, and after a blink of surprise he beamed at me. “—for any task that needs a man’s strength. And how many such tasks are there, making candles?”

“A standard slab of wax,” Fisk glanced at the ledger to confirm it, “weighs thirty pounds.”

His voice was as neutral as his face, and I opened my mouth to reply. But Timasus stepped forward, glaring from him to Hannibas and back.

“We can do anything a man can do, ‘tween us. ‘Cause we work
together
.”

All the children nodded firmly, and I realized that this creed was how they’d survived on their own.

“Well then,” said Fisk. “I’d better figure out how to feed you. Unless Michael is prepared to handle that?”

I’m a fair camp cook, for one or two, and might manage a simple breakfast for nine—but anything more was beyond my skills, and Fisk knew it.

“You wanted a labor force,” I told him. “I brought them. It’s your turn to figure something out. But baths before food.”

Several young faces fell.

Despite his initial resistance, Hannibas proved competent at heating water and setting up baths for one child after another.

We offered Alessa the first, as she was a lady, and Jer went in last, when the tub was most full. I threw True in after him, and gave the dog a thorough scrub. He got his vengeance, shaking dirty water over me and half the shop floor, to the children’s glee. It must be admitted, the fleabane stank.

We had just emptied the bath and mopped the floor when Fisk returned, with two boys from a local cook shop helping him carry bread, soup, and hot meat pies.

“Why does Trouble smell like burning sewage?” The dog was nudging, Fisk who carried the pies.

“Master Michael made him bathe, ‘long with the rest of us,” Jig said. “And he didn’t like it, either. But I thought his name was True.”

“So does Michael,” Fisk said. “But Trouble and I know better. Call him, and you’ll see.”

In point of fact, True will go to anyone who calls him by any name, including “that cursed mutt.” But the children had some fun discovering this, calling the dog using any name that took their fancy, while Fisk and I set out our dinner. I forgave the commotion when Alessa called True “Kitty,” and then doubled over laughing when he came. ’Twas the first time I’d heard her speak.

I thought that Fisk had ordered too much food, until I saw the hungry children tucking in. As we ate, he told me he’d paid the cook shop to send us luncheon and dinner daily. Since I’d brought him six when Hannibas asked for three, I could hardly tease him about the extra expense. Not even when he added, “You know the difference between a bandit and an apprentice? At least with bandits, you don’t have to feed them too.”

This startled snickers out of several children, but for a moment I still hoped these simpleminded jests hadn’t found their way to Tallowsport.

Then Jig said, “What’s the difference between a bandit and an apprentice master?”

“I don’t know,” Fisk completed the formula. “What?”

“A bandit don’t call you a lazy lout when he beats you and takes your money.”

Even the sensible Hannibas was grinning. “What’s the diff—”

“Please,” I begged. “Not a whole tribe of you. Fisk is bad enough! No more bandit jokes. Not in my hearing.”

They were new enough to our employ that they did as I asked. Though in the days to come, I would hear them whispering behind my back, followed by a storm of giggles as they “sneaked” their jokes past me.

I feared that easy trust would be disrupted when they saw the broken circles that mark me unredeemed upon my wrists. It happened the day after they came to work for us. I’d rolled up my sleeves to keep them clear, as we poured hot wax from one kettle to another, and the laces on the leather guards kept flopping into the wax so I took them off. I was so relaxed in the children’s presence by then that I thought nothing of it, till I noticed the widening circle of silence. Jer, holding the other kettle, looked around in puzzlement. Timasus stared at my wrists wide-eyed. Hannibas was scowling…not at me, but at Fisk.