The King's Thief

Chapter 7

Kallis stumbled over a rock, but somehow kept his feet under him. He continued at the punishing half-jogging speed that his new captors had set. From the jail cell, which had turned out to share a wall with the outside of the Royal Barracks, his ‘saviour’ had directed him towards a shadowy group of about five people. One of the figures was somehow creating the blinding light, but as Kaliss approached, a deep voice said “That’s him. Snuff that, let’s go.” The light had instantly disappeared and darkness had returned. Even though his night-vision slowly returned, the figures were all dressed in black and, as they trotted towards a raised entrance to the sewer, no more details were forthcoming. A quick glance behind showed that the tall man with the bow had taken up station behind him; this simple fact told Kaliss that staying with these people, for now, was the wisest course of action.

Once they had gained the sewer, the figures had started what had begun as a gentle trot, but had quickly become faster. This section of the sewers was a part he had not visited since his initiation into the Thieves Collective, and he was relatively unfamiliar with it. Just before dawn, The Runs tended to be fairly empty, a fact on which his current companions were obviously counting. There was no conversation, and everyone but Kaliss seemed to know where they were going.
The dank smell of the moist brick walls invaded his nostrils, mingling with the smell of his own putrescence, for washing had not been part of his daily routine for nearly a week. The faint smells of the city wafted to him as they passed the iron ladders that lead back up to the street. Turning on to a main section of The Runs, Kaliss was suddenly aware of where they were, heading under Market Square and towards the river. The path was split either side of a deep canal of human and animal waste which oozed slowly away to enter the river at a point downstream of the city. Unidentifiable things bobbed to the surface before disappearing again, and once Kaliss thought he saw some eyes on stalks; legends abounded of the strange mutative lifeforms that made their home in the effluent.
The dark figures seemed to know exactly where they were going, and after only thirty seconds they turned sharply left to enter another small culvert. Here there was no central channel, and Kaliss found himself ducking to avoid scraping his head on the curved ceiling. Their feet splashed in the filthy water, tapping on the floor with a strange sound and the thief, still without his boots after his arrest, felt something squish between his toes. He managed to resist the temptation to look down.

Suddenly, they were there; the troupe stopped at another of the innocuous iron ladders, and the first person climbed up. As the manhole cover was opened, pre-dawn light streamed in and Kaliss was able to see them more clearly. They all wore black cloaks which kept their faces in shadows, and all seemed to be wearing a sort of brown breastplate which laced up at the breastbone. Each seemed to be slightly different to the next, but before Kaliss could investigate further he was shoved forwards by the tall man who seemed to be his appointed warden. Climbing the ladder, he found himself in a familiar side street, although it took him a moment to realise that he was back at the place where he had last been among friends; the merchant Dangha’s empty toba warehouse. The strange group of people guided him into the open door and into darkness.

*    *    *

“He what?” screeched the King’s Principal Magician. Malketh was having a bad day; as dawn had broken, a nervous messenger had tapped at his chamber door and given him the news that the prisoner had escaped. Malketh had immediately thrown the closest robe on, a sobre black affair with white silk cuffs that cleverly concealed pockets filled with small magical items. Rushing to the door he had marched straight down to the Officers’ Quarters and almost immediately saw the target of his ire. Lieutenant Beck sat slumped in a chair, apparently asleep, but around him a group of officers were talking loudly enough to wake the dead. Grabbing the nearest man, a captain, the magician pinned him to the wall and demanded to know what happened.
“He fell asleep? The man was on guard duty! He’s supposed to be one of the best! Get those men out of the way, let me have a look at him…”
Shooing the crowd of officers out of the way wasn’t hard; one look at their superior approaching, apparently furious, was enough to cause even the most battle-hardened among them to step back a  pace.
Malketh grabbed Beck’s head by the hair, which was slumped onto his breastplate, and gave him a ringing slap across the cheek. The only reaction was a slight parting in Beck’s lips, causing a thin column of drool to emerge and sully the shining armour. Releasing the head, Malketh paused to take in the scene and, closing his eyes, sent his magic out unobtrusively towards the man. Invisible to the naked eye, the magician could see a fine web of energy, brown in colour, looping over and around the head of the sleeping man, slowly unravelling. Suddenly, all was clear; a sleep spell, the equivalent of a mild soporific, gently bringing the soldier to sleep over the course of about fifteen minutes. If left to run its course, he would not awaken until noon.
Tempting though it was to have the man stripped naked and tied to a pole in the street for being so easy to overcome, Malketh knew that this was not Beck’s fault. He had been outmatched by a superior magic user and signature left in the sleep spell was unmistakably alien, something the Sylvan Horde could not hide. Keeping his eyes closed, Malketh held his hand up before his face and muttered “Kyelnoth, terrin, blade of air, to me, to me…” The air above his hand flickered slightly, and as the magician swept his hand across Beck’s face he could see the brown strands of the sleep spell falling away. The magical blade of air, useful in some respects but unable to cut anything more substantial than air, faded as Malketh closed his hand and opened his eyes.
Beck’s eyes fluttered open, and suddenly he was on his feet, sword half drawn, before he took in his surroundings and froze. Seeing that the fun was over, the remaining officers began to dissipate, leaving the man and the magician alone.
“What happened?”
“You were attacked. A sleep spell, Sylvan is my guess, and they broke the wall of the cell down. Kaliss is gone.”
“They have him?” Beck’s eyes widened. “You told me that he could be a great weapon when you asked me to help with the interrogation; can they use him?”
Of course they can, you stupid man, just like I should take your sword now and end you with it!” The magician backhanded Beck across the mouth. Surprised at the sudden ferocity, Beck merely stared as Malketh continued. “You know nothing. I told you the barest minimum to secure your services, and now I find you can’t even guard a single man without being beaten. Get out of my sight, Private Beck.”
The newly-demoted man’s eyes widened slightly, then narrowed into a hard stare. Picking himself up off the chair, he walked past Malketh without a single word. He did not look back.
Completely alone now, Malketh considered Beck’s question. Yes, Kaliss could be a weapon for the Sylva, had they the wit to see it, but they were just savages; still, nothing could be assumed, everything had to be planned for and considered. It may be that the Sylva had done him a favour, as his agent was now unable to introduce Kaliss into Sylvan society, but that depended on how the savages had treated him. And there was still the C-mag on the man’s wrist, and the temptation of the knowledge of his heritage. However, it might be best not to trust a man whose trade consisted of breaking the law. Things began to look a little better in his mind. Stroking the stubble on his cheeks, Malketh’s mind began to concoct various backup options as he planned the path ahead of him. His hand froze as he realised that, not only was he appallingly unshaven in public, he was also wearing a robe which was hideously unfashionable, as well as ill-fitting in some important areas. A slight reddening of his cheeks was the only outward sign of his displeasure as he began to stalk quickly back to his chambers.

*    *    *

As his eyes adjusted to the dim light inside the warehouse, Kaliss saw exactly what he expected to see; the empty warehouse, dusty, a single mouse running over the floor in the far corner; high windows were grimy and let almost no light in, giving the whole room a dusky, yellowish tinge to it.
The tall man with the bow put a hand on Kaliss’s shoulder and announced “Desyncing in three… two… one…” and to a man each of the black-cloaked figures raised their wrists and pressed a button on their revealed C-mags. There was a ripple of energy and Kaliss’s vision seemed to blur, and then suddenly the warehouse was full of people. So stunned was the thief that he hadn’t even the sense to joke about it. Instead, he gazed around, taking the sight in.
Immediately in front of him a central corridor had been made with desks each side, small workstations, each with an attendant. Towards the top end of the warehouse there was a carpeted section which held a long rectangular table which was strewn with papers. On the left, behind the bank of desks, there appeared to be a field, a crop of some cottony plant impossibly growing, surrounding a small tree which had enormous brown nuts dangling from the branches. Behind the field, against the wall, there were pallets which Kaliss supposed contained food and other supplies. Possibly, the mythical shipment of Toba would be in there, but somehow the thief doubted it. To the right, behind the other set of desks, a wide area was set up as a practice area for warriors. Two tall men, dressed only in a kind of roughly-woven kilt, stepped back and forth with short lengths of wood, obviously practising a combat drill.
There were well over a dozen tall figures walking purposefully around the room, or working at the desks, as well as the two combatants. Excepting those two, they all seemed to be wearing the same diaphanous black cloaks. A gentle nudge in the small of his back informed Kaliss that his small group was moving forwards. Looking at the desks on either side, he caught tantalising glimpses of what was being worked on; tiny tools being poked into a sparkling geode, making unseen adjustments; a quick glance, and then on to the next desk, a mannequin, about three feet tall, with no head, revealing that the inside appeared to be cast from metal, cogs and gears exposed to the air; the next, a tailor’s station, one of the kilt-like items the warriors were wearing being run through a gem-powered sewing machine; to the left, a cat apparently frozen in place, the worker touching it with a gauntleted hand, but as Kaliss watched the gauntlet was withdrawn and the animal began to escape. Quickly the figure touched the cat again, freezing it in place by some enchantment.

As they passed the last pair of desks, the thief turned his attention to the table ahead, three figures moving around it, moving the paper in an apparently random fashion. A single man was stood behind the centre of the table, the hood on his robe thrown back to reveal a blond head of hair, brown eyes and chiselled features, with sharp cheekbones and a cleft chin. Kaliss stopped a foot away from the table and stared at the man, whose attention was drawn to one of the sheets of paper being shown to him. Now that he was closer, Kaliss could see small inconsistencies in the man’s features; the ears were strange in their makeup, with raised veins as if they were leaves, tinged green at the end. Then, as the man turned his head to stare back at the thief, a shiver ran unbidden down his spine; the eyes didn’t just have brown rings around the pupils, they seemed to be fairly uniformly brown but for the pupils, looking for all the world like knots in a piece of wood. Holding the gaze of those apparently wooden eyes, Kaliss began to realise that he had gone from being a prisoner of the crown to being in the company of the Sylvan Horde.