Tracato: A Trial of Blood and Steel Book Three (16 page)

The Torovan maps called it Panae Achi, or Harbourtown, but the locals called it Reninesenn, or Renine’s Town, in Rhodaani. Errollyn walked the cobbled streets, past wagons loaded with cargo, and wholesalers crowded with buyers. The haggling spilled onto the streets.

Blackboots chatted easily with a barber before his shop, cleaning a razor on his smock. A tavern did a rowdy business of sailors and dockers. In front of a bakery, women piled fresh bread into a handcart.

The Civid Sein liked to paint Tracato’s divisions as entirely of class, the wealthy against the poor, but Reninesenn showed otherwise. Noble families had always controlled the trade in Tracato. Today the old ties lingered, and the Dockside folk had not embraced the idea of a future without the nobility, preferring instead the old ties of patronage and wealth. Noble families owned most of the ships and nearly all of the warehouses, and any merchant or trader looking to move goods had to establish good connections.

Errollyn did not sense any hostility toward him but, equally, he knew he should be careful what he said.

Questions on the docks took him to a tavern opposite a grain warehouse, where carts crowded three deep, and men heaved heavy sacks onto waiting shoulders. Errollyn walked straight to the barkeeper, past tables of loud-talking men.

“I’m looking for
Duchess Teresa
,” he said to the barkeep, who waved him toward a table by the windows. Errollyn saw a table of sailors, rough looking yet not quite as disreputable as popular myth. Some had good coats, though hard wearing, and many wore braids in the fashion of seafarers. All looked as though they’d bathed in the last day or two.

“Welcome, sir!” said one man in Torovan as Errollyn approached the table.

“I thank you,” said Errollyn.

“And what can I do you for?” Conversation at the table ceased, yet Errollyn sensed no ill will. Serrin business on the docks was common and, for the most part, welcomed.

“I’m looking to buy raw silver and gemstone,” said Errollyn, hooking his thumb into his belt by a money pouch. “I’d heard the
Duchess Teresa
was in the business this run?”

“Ah,” said the man, “I was the quartermaster for that run, but I’m afraid we’re all pledged to other customers; my apologies, sir.”

“Not at all. Might I buy the table a drink and ask of the conditions of trade?”

“Absolutely!” beamed the quartermaster, and his mate pulled Errollyn a chair from a neighbouring table.

Errollyn asked the usual questions, of wind and currents, but also of Larosan naval activity and what news of ships lately sunk or in action.

“So you’ve been in Voscoraine then?” he asked the quartermaster.

“Oh no, sir,” said the sailor, sipping the ale Errollyn’s coin had bought. “Poscadi.”

“I wasn’t aware there was good silver and gemstone in Poscadi.”

“A new mine,” the sailor replied easily. “Up in the northern Ameryn hills.”

“Council won’t allow us in Telesian ports anyhow,” said a second man. “There’s a war on, you know.”

“Telesia has not declared for one side or another, the last I’d heard,” said Errollyn.

“And the Torovan army’ll be marching straight through Telesia on their way to Larosa,” said the sailor, waving to an acquaintance who entered the crowded inn. “Excuse me, I spy a friend. Thanks for the drink.” He got up and left.

“I heard they charge a tariff to enter Poscadi these days,” said Errollyn, edging his chair aside as more sailors crowded onto a neighbouring table. It was hard to hear above the din of conversation. “Three per cent of cargo value, what impact does that have on the silver trade there?”

“That’s a terrible thing,” the quartermaster said. “Damned inspectors, they overestimate our cargo value then pocket the extra for themselves. I’ve made barely enough to feed my children on this run, the next won’t be any better.”

Errollyn talked until the man’s ale was nearly gone, then thanked him and his companions and left, to empty-mug salutes from the sailors. But he already knew what he wanted to know. The
Duchess Teresa
had been in Poscadi Port in Ameryn. He knew from many conversations with Petrodor sailors that the Poscadi Port harbour tax had recently gone up to five per cent, not three, giving the quartermaster another chance to whine about how high his expenses were, if he’d known about it. The quartermaster had definitely not been in Poscadi Port recently.

That left Voscoraine, in Telesia. Telesia remained an independent kingdom, having at various times been a part of Torovan or Algrasse. Now they attempted to maintain neutrality, being greatly dependent on Saalshen and Rhodaani trade, yet squeezed on land between neighbours determined to wrest the Saalshen Bacosh away from Saalshen’s influence by force. Telesia’s port of Voscoraine was not far by road from Larosa and Sherdaine. The
Rhodaani Council had barred Rhodaani flagged vessels from berthing there, knowing the port to be full of Larosan agents, and fearing a trade of spies, or the loss of vessels. For the
Duchess Teresa
to have been in Voscoraine Port would have violated the Council’s order. They must have remained there a long time, to simulate the time it would have taken to reach Ameryn.

Further questions directed him to a laneway, in search of the
Duchess Teresa
’s captain, the man the quartermaster had professed not to know. The building was clearly a brothel—red lanterns hung between cramped tenements. Errollyn entered, and pushed past several drunken sailors in the hall. It opened onto a main room, where girls dressed like noble ladies coiffed and preened—another of Tracato’s strange tastes, every ale-drenched, salt-stained sailor wanted to bed a noble lady.

“My, my,” said the madam, leaving another customer in female hands to come to Errollyn, looking him up and down. “Dear sir, welcome. Can I interest you in…”

“I’m looking for someone.”

The madam sighed. She wore much jewellery, all fake. “I should have guessed, you serrin never did appreciate the business.”

“That’s because we fuck for free,” Errollyn said drily. “I was told the captain of the
Duchess Teresa
might be here?”

“My customers’ business is strictly confidential,” said the madam airily. Errollyn pressed a large coin into her hand. “Second floor, the third room on the left,” she said, pocketing the coin.

He walked up the cramped stairs, edging past customers and working girls. At the room, he rapped on the door. It swung open. Errollyn was fairly certain such doors were supposed to be locked. He pushed it wide, a hand straying to his belt knife—the walls were too close for swords, he could barely spread his elbows. On the bed he found a naked man, face down and unmoving. The sheets beneath his upper body were soaked in blood. Somehow, Errollyn was not entirely surprised.

The windows were closed, but the small room had a closet. Errollyn flung open the closet doors. Within huddled a girl, dressed like the others. Her hands were flecked with blood. Errollyn grabbed her, and slammed her against the wall.

“That’s the captain of the
Duchess Teresa
, yes?” The girl remained mute, eyes flicking back to the bed. “Why kill him? What was the
Duchess Teresa
doing in Voscoraine Port?”

The girl tried to drive a knee into his groin, but Errollyn had played rough games with a far more dangerous girl than this. He blocked her with his leg, and slammed her harder back against the wall.

“An honourable serrin gentleman wouldn’t hurt a girl, surely?” she taunted him. Errollyn was getting tired of humans who thought behavioural codes could excuse all evils, and hit her in the face. He picked her back up, her nose bloody, and slammed her back against the wall.

“Murderers don’t get to plead delicacy,” he told her. “Why kill him?” Her stare was defiant.

“Family Renine aren’t playing fair,” Aemon had told him. There had been a courier on the
Duchess Teresa
, heading for Voscoraine Port, bearing the Renine Family seal.

“There was someone on the ship, wasn’t there? Someone carrying letters for people in Telesia?”

The nobility of Algrasse? Algrasse was an ally of Larosa, they had stood with the Regent Arrosh when he had been but a lord of Larosa, and assisted him in his rise to regent of all the Bacosh. Their position was strong, there was no chance they’d be scheming with the Renines against their sworn feudal lord. Which left just one serious option. “Lady Renine is negotiating with Regent Arosh, isn’t she? Behind the Council’s back?”

“I’ll not say anything to foulblood scum like you!” the girl hissed. “Murderer!” she screamed. “Murderer, come quick! Save me!”

Shouts came from the neighbouring rooms. Then a scuffling under the bed itself. Errollyn spun, and saw a man scrambling from beneath the mattress, and cursed himself for a fool.

The door crashed in, and Errollyn flung the girl hard across the room. A man rushed him, knife in hand—a house guard, protection for the girls. Errollyn caught the man’s thrusting arm, broke it, and threw him back into the face of the second guard. Behind him the windows crashed open and the man from under the bed leaped out. Errollyn sheathed his knife and leaned out the window. Below was a canvas awning, protecting the brothel’s rear entry in a narrow lane. Beneath the awning, the jumping man was scrambling to his feet.

Errollyn got a foot out for leverage, and jumped. Somewhat heavier than the first man, he hit the awning hard and it tore…he crashed to the ground in a tangle of canvas, scrambling to extricate himself while thankful it had at least broken his fall.

Finally up, he ran after the other man in time to see him vanish around a corner. Errollyn dashed around it, struggling against the stiffness of a bruised thigh. Down the next lane, past an unloading cart and tethered horses, he saw the man run into a crowded main street.

Errollyn followed, sunlight suddenly bright to a serrin’s sensitive vision. Errollyn shielded his eyes and peered up the street. Was that him? He had
spots in his eyes, and nothing was clear. There were crowds around him, some looking at him, others evidently startled by the recent passage of a sprinting man. Even if he caught the man, what could he do, in this crowd? These were feudalists, some of them even royalists, or restorationists, or whatever fancy term the clever scholars in the Tol’rhen liked to apply. Serrin were welcome so long as they did not swim against the stream. A serrin accosting a local in the street would be mobbed.

Errollyn took a deep breath, wincing as the bruises from his fall began to hurt.

“Everything okay there, sir?” a local man asked him.

Errollyn shook his head. “A murder in the Fletcher Street brothel,” he said loudly enough for others to hear. “The captain of the
Duchess Teresa
, a man of a noble family.” He pointed after the escaped runner. “That man cut his throat. Pass the word and have him caught, I can’t do it myself.
Reninesen shendevan soni Reninesen shendevan.
Renine’s Town business is Renine’s Town business,” that was, in Rhodaani.

The local nodded warily, and rushed to tell others. Soon, the Blackboots would be summoned. Errollyn turned and walked down to the docks, figuring he could do little more here, and satisfied that whatever Family Renine thought to gain by killing the captain, they could lose in having killed one of their own.

Soon he found one of the few people in Renine’s Town he could trust to give him a straight answer.

“Captain Aimer was a renowned drunk and gambler,” a red-coat drily informed him, sipping tea outside his customs house. “Frankly I’m not surprised he’s dead. In a brothel, did you say?”

Errollyn nodded.

The red-coat shrugged. “I’ve heard he was in debt, then out of debt, then in debt again. Possibly someone got tired of constantly bailing him out. Then again, he also had a very big mouth, which is never a good thing.”

Errollyn recalled his conversation with the quartermaster at the inn, and the sailor who had risen from the table to go and talk to a “friend.” Had that been the same man as had been hiding under the bed? He hadn’t got a close enough look. Either way, he thought it reasonably clear what was going on.

“Thank you, sir,” he told the red-coat. “I have to head back to the Mahl’rhen.”

“What do
you
think is going on?” the red-coat asked him.

“Noble games, my friend,” said Errollyn.

“Those are the least entertaining kind,” the red-coat said, and sipped his tea.

When Errollyn returned to the Tol’rhen, he found Civid Sein rallies being held upon the square. Leading them were Tol’rhen Ulenshaals, black robed and shouting, to massed cries from the thousands-strong crowd. If the philosophies of his people spoke of anything, it was the supremacy of one person’s rightness to think alone. Here on the square, before the walls of the institution dedicated to the teaching of serrin thought, thousands of individual minds concentrated as one, and yelled in unison. They yelled for justice, yet it was emotion that spoke, not reason.

He left the square before some well-meaning fool spotted him and tried to make him a part of their dangerous game. Tracato was supposed to be above such human nonsense, yet here he could feel it slipping toward a precipice. His own people were supposed to embody the final word in enlightened thought yet, too often, in their own gentle way, behaved just like the mobs outside.