A Fistful Of Rubies Read online

  A Fistful of Rubies

  The Chronicles of Breed

  K.T. Davies

  1

  A Fistful Of Rubies

  Stay where you are, lizard, or I’ll rip yer—”

  Before the guard could impress me with his knowledge of thoasan anatomy, I punched him in the face. ‘’Scuse me,’ I said and neatly sidestepped the fellow who, after a moment’s pause, slid down the wall clutching his bloody face. I tapped politely on Mother’s chamber door.

  “Come in.” The instant I opened the door, she fixed me with her scrutinizing gaze. “You’ve got some explaining to do.”

  My bravado vanished, and I almost closed the door and ran, but I held my ground because it was pointless trying to outrun the wrath of a sorcerer. “Good day, Mother.” I entered and sketched a bow, careful to keep an eye on the old demon as I paid my respects.

  Mother’s audience chamber was in the bowels of the sewer beneath her inn, The Mouse’s Nest. Incense burned the air to a soft, velvet blue and did a reasonable job of masking the fragrant stink of what flowed above. Mother was reclining on the Rat Bone Throne, casually flicking a ball on a string into a cup. It was a child’s game, but nobody who valued their wotnots would ever point that out to her. The Throne was flanked by her bodyguards, the Dumbrovski twins. As one, the grey-furred goblins leveled their handcannons at me. It was at this point that I considered I might have made a dreadful mistake in coming back here.

  “Where’s my fucking pel?” Mother demanded, her tone as sharp as a freshly stropped razor.

  “You’re looking well today, Mother. Have you done something with your hair?” I said as I knew human women cared about such things, Mother amongst them.

  The ball froze in mid-air, and she gave me the kind of look that could curdle milk. “I said, where’s my fucking pel?” The ball plopped into the cup, not unlike how the severed heads dropped into the baskets in Executioner’s Square. I pushed the unwanted and possibly prophetic image from my mind and drew a deep breath.

  “I don’t have your pel,” I said. A dull chorus of alarm bells rang out across the city. “But it’s not my fault, honest.”

  Mother snorted. “I doubt you could be honest if your life depended on it, but we’ll see, eh?” She flicked a speck of lint from the sleeve of her wine-colored gown and folded her arm. “Go on then, you miserable dung-pudder, I’m in the mood for a good story.” Not for the first time, I wondered what my thoasan father had seen in the monster wearing the guise of a pretty, little human who was possessed of all the warmth and charm of a week-old corpse.

  “So, what happened to my shipment?”

  “Aye, what ‘appened to the shipment?” a sneering Klaus Dumbrovski echoed.

  Mother had a fair old punch for a small-handed creature, and so it came as no surprise that the goblin’s tiny eyes almost popped from his skull when she backhanded him in the wotnots. I did not laugh as he doubled over. I dug my claws into my palms until blood flowed, but I did not laugh.

  Mother snarled. “If I wanted your opinion, I’d fucking give it to you.” Repentant and winded, Klaus looked at his feet. I would have laughed but the next instant she turned her venomous gaze upon me. “You better start talking.”

  The sewers under Appleton are my home. I was born down here and will most likely die down here. But not tonight. I had a good feeling about this job. My accomplice in this venture was a Guild Blade called Bird. He was a grim miller and as skilled at killing as his namesakes were at flying. He was a head shorter than me but twice as broad and made of solid muscle with a neck as thick as the arse end of a bull urux. His prodigious strength and habit of breaking necks had earned him the nickname ‘Snapper’. For all his bloody-handed accomplishments, I didn’t know much about him, or why he’d joined Mother’s crew. He kept himself to himself, had few friends, and no family. He didn’t take obvious pleasure in his work, he didn’t go whoring or gamble or even drink overmuch. It was as though life was a hole he’d fallen into and for want of something to do while he waited for rescue, he’d become a killer.

  “Pick up the pace, Snapper, I’m getting old waiting for you.” The echo of my whisper skittered into the darkness of the sewer accompanied by the constant pitter-patter of filth dripping through cracks in the slime-covered tunnel.

  “What’s your rush? It’s not like Dashin’s crew are going to leave without their sparklies.”

  “I don’t trust those fuckers not to smoke all the spice while they’re waiting. So, if it please you, sirrah move your arse.” I sketched a mocking bow.

  He grunted. “Easy for you to say with your claws. It’s fucking slippery down here. I do not want to end up in that.” He jabbed a stubby finger at the effluent flowing beside the walkway. “And I’ll thank you for not calling me Snapper.”

  The narrow walkway was slick with slime, rat droppings, and other rotting garbage I had no desire to examine too closely. “I’d swap my claws for a nice pair of boots right now. So just get a shift on would you before this muck melts my feet off, and be thankful you haven’t stepped in what I just stepped in.” I flicked whatever it was off my foot. Having clawed toes gave me excellent purchase on slippery surfaces, but the broad span of my feet precluded the wearing of boots. It didn’t often bother me, but the rains had been particularly heavy of late, and the sewers had overflowed leaving all manner of revolting morsel beached upon the narrow walkways. Despite my urging, Bird plodded on behind me at the same, lumbering pace only now he grumbled with every step.

  “Come on, old love, time’s pressing,” I urged.

  Bird narrowed his eyes. “Call me ‘old love’ again, and I’ll shove my foot up your arse.”

  I huffed. “‘Don’t call me Snapper’, ‘don’t call me old love’. You’re a picky bastard.”

  He snorted. “Bastard’s fine.”

  I wasn’t afraid of Bird. True, he was a strong cove, but he was slow and tipping past his prime for a human. I patted my chest, felt the pouch of rubies snug against my ribs. Worth nine hundred royals, those dandy sparklers entrusted to me by Mother were a tempting prize for any cove with guts enough to have a go at robbing me. Pel was a different fish entirely. Pretty stones could be disappeared easily. The drug and more importantly the supply of the drug was strictly controlled by the Midnight Court, and few would risk setting up in opposition to Mother or her colleagues in crime who had the business stitched. That being the case I was eager to remove the target from my back and exchange the one for the other.

  We turned north into a tunnel that ran parallel to the river. After a short stroll, we came out near the docks where warehouses on stilts jostled for space on the crowded banks of the Silverlight. It was quiet down here at night. To avoid being savaged by mosquitos or choked by the stench of night soil illegally but routinely dumped upriver the fishermen and merchants didn’t stick around after sunsdown. Aside from us, the only other creatures frolicking near the water were rats that were fighting over the choicest pieces of river fruit floating out of the city. The rodents’ savage antics were lazily applauded by the occasional slap of waves against pilings and moored boats.

  The warehouse where Dashin’s crew were supposedly waiting with the shipment of pel, wasn’t far, but every step we took towards it was an exercise in tolerance because every step Snapper took made the boardwalk creak like hell’s gates. The rubies I was carrying made me grateful that I had back-up, but the lump-footed Bird would not have been my choice of accomplice for this bit of quiet work. I gritted my teeth and continued until the clumsy cull knocked a tar bucket into the drink as he stumbled along. At the end of my limited store of patience, I rounded on him. “Pick your fucking feet up.” I hissed.

  “Or what?”

  “Or I’ll vent yo
u and feed your giblets to the fish, that’s what.”

  “Try it, you yellow-eyed bastard.”

  “At least these yellow eyes can see where they’re going you, lump-footed cretin. Why did she send a fucking human?”

  Bird spat. “Because you can’t trust a warspawn.”

  My hands drifted to the hilts of my swords, and I would have done as I’d threatened if at that moment there hadn’t been an almighty splash, followed by the sound of a kinchin cove yelling somewhere behind us.

  “Help! Please, help. My brother can’t swim,” a childish voice begged.

  My accomplice had got me so annoyed that I’d neither seen nor heard the brats until one of them had decided to take a swim. “Wonderful. Next time let’s bring a drum and a fiddle and make a night of it.”

  Bird shook his head and looked at me like I was the one making all the noise. I didn’t have the time to disavow him of his idiocy and made to head off to the warehouse. To my surprise and annoyance, he stomped in the opposite direction. “Where are you going?” I angry whispered but my words merely rebounded off his brick wall of a back. Cursing, I followed him to the end of a jetty where a stick thin, barefoot streetling was pointing and yelling at someone thrashing in the water.

  Snapper turned to me. “Go on then,” he said, waving in the direction of the splutterer in the drink who looked much like the one sniffling on the jetty.

  I put my hands on my hips, at a loss. “Go on what?”

  “Get him.”

  I drew my swords. “I think it’s unnecessary as he’ll be quiet soon enough but have it your way.” The girl shrieked and recoiled.

  Bird slapped his forehead with his meaty palm. “No, you halfwit, get him out, alive and in one piece.”

  I sheathed my blades. “You go get him if you want him that much.”

  “I can’t swim.”

  “That’s unfortunate. Now come on, we have work to do.” I made to leave, but knowing a soft touch when she saw one, the girl threw herself at Snapper and wrapped her skinny arms around his leg. I would have chucked her in the water to join her kin, but Bird just stood there like a sap-skulled pitymonger.

  “Please, sir, please save my brother,” the little molly begged him, her eyes as big as the moon and as bright as the stars.

  Bird laid a pleading look upon me.

  “Sweet salvation.” I shoved the useless cove aside, wrapped my leg around a mooring post, and lowered myself towards the water. The lad was half drowned and thrashing less by this time which made dragging him from the drink an easier task than it might otherwise have been.

  As soon as his face was out of the water, the little fish came to life and threw his arms around my neck. I pulled myself up and dumped the limpet on the jetty. Gasping and blorting he wrapped his arms around my waist. His sister rushed to join him and tried to wrap her arms around both of us.

  “Thank you, thank you so much,” the girl exclaimed with relief and delight.

  “Let go, or I’ll throw you both in the river.”

  Snapper laughed.

  “You too.”

  The brats unhanded me. “Thank you for saving him.” The girl was all eyes and wild hair. Her bare arms were dappled with bruises.

  “Alright, you’ve thanked me, now get lost.” I bared my fangs which had the desired effect and set the pair to flight.

  “You surprise me, Snapper.”

  He shrugged. “I’ve a soft spot for kids.” It was a shocking admission of weakness, one that I’d be sure to exploit when we got back to the Guild where information was currency. A sharp wind blew off the river and snaked inside my jerkin. I reached down to fasten the laces but found that they were still done up as tight as a priest’s pink piece.

  My heart tore loose of its moorings and sank into the pit of my gut when I looked down and saw the neat slit in the fabric. I slapped my chest, just in case I’d somehow failed to feel a pouch full of rubies and thrust my arm into my jerkin, but they were gone. And even as I cursed the little fucks and sought their scent upon the brisk night air, I had to admire the skill that could cut the cloth but not so much as nick my skin.

  “Clever little bastards,” Snapper said when he kenned what had happened.

  “Be sure to tell them that before I rip their scrawny limbs off and feed ‘em to the rats. Now come on.”

  I’m faster than your average cove by a long way; unfortunately, Snapper was slower than your average cove, so the little shits made it back to their roost before we caught up with them. Had Snapper been on his own he would never have found them, but I had their smell and tracked them to a filth pit on the edge of a deserted square framed by clusters of dead-eyed hovels.

  The trail of scent led to a ramshackle flop where a bead of light poked through the broken shutters of an upstairs window.

  I turned to Snapper who was red in the face from having to jog to keep up. “You go around the back and wait for my signal.” I would have preferred to tether him somewhere out of the way, but I hadn’t brought a leash with me.

  “What are you going to do?” he asked, rightfully suspicious.

  “I’m going to climb up and take a look-see through the shutter. You alright with that?”

  He jabbed a stubby finger at me. “Just see that’s all you do.” He bumbled off down the alley which ran along the side of the house.

  Wattle and daub was easy to climb, and before long I was beside the window. With claws hooked deep in the wormy timber frame, I peered through a crack in the broken shutter. The only furniture in the room was a bed, a table, and a chair. Sitting on the bed was a pale, skinny human wench who going by the resemblance must have been the nippers’ dam. Sitting at the table was a human-ish male who was as broad in the beam as the wench was narrow. He had one, lazy eye and a patch over the hollow where the other one should have been.

  A couple of rough looking bravos loitered either side of the door. The nippers were standing before the table. They kept throwing nervous glances at the woman, who I noticed was chained to the rusting frame by her ankle. On the table, glittering in the light of a single candle were Mother’s rubies. One eye poked the stones with a dimpled finger and sniffed.

  “These ain’t enough to pay your ma’s debt,” he said.

  “But… you said.” The girl sounded more furious than upset. “You said they’d be enough.”

  “Well, they ain’t.”

  “Cal almost died. Didn’t you, Cal?”

  The boy nodded. The woman on the bed buried her face in her hands and began to sob.

  The boy reached for his sister’s hand. Their skinny fingers interlocked, their knuckles bleached, tight with fear and anxiety so powerful I could taste it.

  One Eye gave a toothless, humorless grin. “Well he didn’t fucking die, did he? Now shut your whiny yap hole and listen up, princess.”

  I didn’t know about the nippers, but I’d heard enough. I took a two-handed grip of the lintel, tested my weight upon it, and swung inside, shattering the shutters on the way. The woman lunged for the children, a look of terror on her face, but she was pulled up short by the chain. The bed groaned as it scrapped against the wormy floorboards.

  “Don’t you hurt my babies,” she screamed at me, her voice the only weapon left to her.

  I pointed at One-Eye. “Stay where you are. Those are Mother Blake’s rubies, and you are in a right pot of arse-pickle.” One of the bravos pulled a knife, the other a studded cudgel, typical weapons for whore house bullies and absolutely useless against someone like me. I drew my blades. The color drained from their faces.

  One-Eye raised his hands. “Easy there, friend. I didn’t know, I swear. I would never go against Mother Blake,” he spluttered. He stank of liar’s perfume; a sickly concoction mostly comprised of piss and fear.

  The kinchin-coves ran into the waiting arms of their ma.

  I sheathed one of my blades and went over to the table. One-Eye shuffled his chair back. I held my sword a hand span from his face and level with hi
s remaining eye. “I don’t give a monkey’s fuck piece what you did or didn’t know. Put the stones in the bag and shut your whining yap hole.”

  Shaking, he did as he was told and put the stones in the pouch. I kept an eye on his thugs, and when he was done, I snatched it from him and shoved it in my shirt. Keeping the scallywags in view, I turned to the children. “One of you little muck grubs owes me a jerkin.”

  Just then, Snapper burst through the door. Already on edge, the bravos reacted before what sense they possessed could halt them. The one with the cudgel cracked my pie-brained comrade across the face. Snapper’s cheek reddened, a thread of scarlet dripped from his nose, he blinked. The bravo swung again. This time Snapper caught the chancer’s hand and squeezed. Locked within the vice-like grip bones cracked and knuckles popped. The man screamed.

  “Fucking kill them,” One-Eye shouted. To their credit the bravos were trying, but Snapper was a Guild Blade, and for all that he was no match for me, he was more than enough for the scrawny toughs. I stood back as he swung the cull he had hold of into his partner who stabbed her comrade in the gut instead of Bird. Shocked, the pair stared at each other until in an effort not to bleed out, Cudgel pushed away, grabbed his belly and sank to his knees.

  His partner backed against the wall, swinging at Snapper who was advancing towards her. She stabbed at him, but he batted her blade aside and grabbed her by the throat. The wench on the bed shielded her brats from the gruesome sight, but she couldn’t stopper up their ears against the sound of someone’s neck being broken. Now that the bravos were on the cold road to damnation, our attention turned to One-Eye.

  “Wait, we can sort this out,” he said, trying to ward me away with his pudgy fingers.

  “You’re right there,” I said. He started to lower his hands but then must have caught the look in my eye and opened his mouth to try and beg or bargain his way out of trouble. Whichever it was the case was closed, and I cut his throat before he had a chance to assault my ears with any more wittering. “There you go. Problem sorted.” I flicked his blood from my blade as he sank into deathly gurgling.