The Republic of Thieves, Page 2

  Yet she was undeniably a she. For the first time in Locke’s life some unpracticed animal sense crept dimly to life to alert him to this fact. The Hill was full of girls, but never before had Locke dwelt on the thought of a girl. He sucked in a breath and realized that he could feel a nervous tingling at the tips of his fingers.

  She had the advantage of at least a year and a good half-foot on him, and even tired she had that unfeigned natural poise which, in certain girls, makes young boys feel like something on the order of an insect beneath a heel. Locke had neither the eloquence nor the experience to grapple with the situation in anything resembling those terms. All he knew was that near her, of all the girls he’d seen in Shades’ Hill, he felt touched by something mysterious and much vaster than himself.

  He felt like jumping up and down. He felt like throwing up.

  Suddenly he resented the presence of Tam and No-Teeth, resented the implication of the word “minder,” and yearned to be doing something, anything, to impress this girl. His cheeks burned at the thought of how the bump on his forehead must look, and at being teamed up with two useless, sobbing clods.

  “This is Beth,” said the Thiefmaker. “She’s got your keeping today, lads. Take what she says as though it came from me. Steady hands, level heads. No slacking and no gods-damned capers. Last thing we need is you getting ambitious.” It was impossible to miss the icy glance the Thiefmaker spared for Locke as he uttered this last part.

  “Thank you very much, sir,” said Beth with nothing resembling actual gratitude. She pushed Tam and No-Teeth toward one of the vault exits. “You two, wait at the entrance. I need to have a private word with your friend here.”

  Locke was startled. A word with him? Had she guessed that he knew his way around clutching and teasing, that he was nothing like the other two? Beth glanced around, then put her hands on his shoulders and knelt. Some nervous animal in Locke’s guts turned somersaults as her gaze came level with his. The old compunction about refusing eye contact was not merely set aside, but vaporized from his mind.

  Two things happened then.

  First, he fell in love—though it would be years before he realized what the feeling was called and how thoroughly it was going to complicate his life.

  Second, she spoke directly to him for the first time, and he would remember her words with a clarity that would jar his heart long after the other incidents of that time had faded to a haze of half-truths in his memory:

  “You’re the Lamora boy, right?”

  He nodded eagerly.

  “Well, look here, you little shit. I’ve heard all about you, so just shut your mouth and keep those reckless hands in your pockets. I swear to all the gods, if you give me one hint of trouble, I will heave you off a bridge and it will look like a bloody accident.”

  6

  IT WAS an unwelcome thing, to suddenly feel half an inch tall.

  Locke dazedly followed Beth, Tam, and No-Teeth out of the darkness of the Shades’ Hill vaults and into the late-morning sunshine. His eyes stung, and the daylight was only part of it. What had he done (and who had told her about it?) to earn the scorn of the one person he now wanted to impress more than any other in the world?

  Pondering, his thoughts wandered uneasily to his surroundings. Out here in the ever-changing open there was so much to see, so much to hear. His survival instincts gradually took hold. The back of his mind was all for Beth, but he forced his eyes to the present situation.

  Camorr today was bright and busy, making the most of its reprieve from the hard gray rains of spring. Windows were thrown open. The more prosperous crowds had molted, shedding their oilcloaks and cowls in favor of summery dress. The poor stayed wrapped in the same reek-soaked dross they wore in all seasons. Like the Shades’ Hill crowd, they had to keep their clothes on their backs or risk losing them to rag-pickers.

  As the four orphans crossed the canal bridge from Shades’ Hill to the Narrows (it was a source of mingled pride and incredulity to Locke that the Thiefmaker was so convinced that one little scheme of his could have burnt this whole neighborhood down), Locke saw at least three boats of corpse-fishers using hooks to pluck bloated bodies from under wharves and dock pilings. Those would sometimes go ignored for days in cool, foul weather.

  Beth led the three boys through the Narrows, dodging up stone stairs and across rickety wooden foot-bridges, avoiding the most cramped and twisted alleys where drunks, stray dogs, and less obvious dangers were sure to lurk. Tam and Locke stayed right behind her, but No-Teeth was constantly veering off or slowing down. By the time they left the Narrows and crossed to the overgrown garden passages of the Mara Camorrazza, the city’s ancient strolling park, Beth was dragging No-Teeth by his collar.

  “Damn your pimple of a brain,” she said. “Keep to my heels and quit making trouble!”

  “Not making trouble,” muttered No-Teeth.

  “You want to cock this up and go hungry tonight? You want to give some brute like Veslin an excuse to pry out any teeth he hasn’t got to yet?”

  “Nooooooo.” No-Teeth stretched the word out with a bored yawn, looked around as though noticing the world for the first time, then jerked free of Beth’s grip. “I want to wear your hat,” he said, pointing at her leather cap.

  Locke swallowed nervously. He’d seen No-Teeth pitch these sudden, unreasonable fits before. There was something not quite right in the boy’s head. He frequently suffered for calling attention to himself inside the Hill, where distinctiveness without strength meant pain.

  “You can’t,” said Beth. “Mind yourself.”

  “I want to. I want to!” No-Teeth actually stomped the ground and balled his fists. “I promise I’ll behave. Give me your hat!”

  “You’ll behave because I say so!”

  No-Teeth’s response was to lunge and snatch the leather cap off Beth’s head. He yanked it so hard that her kerchief came as well, and an untidy spray of reddish-brown curls tumbled to her shoulders. Locke’s jaw fell.

  There was something so indefinably lovely, so right, about seeing that hair free in the sunlight that he momentarily forgot that his enchantment was expressly one-way, and that this was anything but convenient for their task. As Locke stared he noticed that only the lower portion of her hair was actually brown. Above the ears it was rusty red. She’d had it colored once, and it had grown out since.

  Beth was even faster than No-Teeth once her shock wore off, and before he could do anything with her cap it was back in her hands. She slapped him viciously across the face with it.

  “Ow!”

  Not placated, she hit him again, and he cringed backward. Locke recovered his wits and assumed the vacant expression used inside the Hill by the uninvolved when someone nearby was getting thrashed.

  “Stop! Stop!” No-Teeth sobbed.

  “If you ever touch this cap again,” Beth whispered, shaking him by his collar, “I swear to Aza Guilla who numbers the dead that I will deliver you straight to her. You stupid little ass!”

  “I promise! I promise!”

  She released him with a scowl, and with a few deft movements made her red curls vanish again beneath the tightly drawn kerchief. When the leather cap came down to seal them in, Locke felt a pang of disappointment.

  “You’re lucky nobody else saw,” said Beth, shoving No-Teeth forward. “Gods love you, you little slug, you’re just lucky nobody else saw. Quick, now. At my heel, you two.”

  Locke and Tam followed her without a word, as close as nervous ducklings fixed on a mother’s tail feathers.

  Locke shook with excitement. He’d been horrified at the incompetence of his assigned partners, but now he wondered if their problems could do anything but make him look better in Beth’s eyes. Oh yes. Let them whine, let them throw fits, let them go home with nothing in their hands. Hell, let them tip off the city watch and get chased through the streets to the sounds of whistles and baying dogs. She’d have to prefer anything to that, including him.

  7

  THE
Y EMERGED at last from the Mara Camorrazza into a whirl of noise and confusion.

  It was indeed unseasonably fine hanging weather, and the normally dreary neighborhood around the Old Citadel, the duke’s seat of justice, bustled like a carnival. Common folk were thick on the cobblestones, while here and there the carriages of the wealthy rattled through the mess with hired guards trotting alongside, passing out threats and shoves as they went. In some ways, Locke already knew, the world outside the Hill was much like the world within.

  The four orphans formed a human chain to thread their way through the tumult. Locke held fast to Tam, who clung in turn to Beth. She was so unwilling to lose sight of No-Teeth that she thrust him before them all like a battering ram. From his perspective Locke glimpsed few adult faces; the world became an endless procession of belts, bellies, coattails, and carriage wheels. They made their way west by equal parts luck and perseverance, toward the Via Justica, the canal that had been used for hangings for half a thousand years.

  At the edge of the canal embankment a low stone wall prevented a direct plunge to the water seven or eight feet below. This barrier was crumbling but still solid enough for children to sit upon. Beth never once loosened her grip on No-Teeth as she helped Locke and Tam up out of the press of the crowd. Locke scrambled to sit next to Beth, but it was Tam that squeezed up against her, leaving Locke no means to move him without causing a scene. He tried to conceal his annoyance by adopting a purposeful expression and looking around.

  From here, at least, Locke had a better view of the affair. There were crowds on both sides of the canal and vendors hawking bread, sausages, ale, and souvenirs from boats. They used baskets attached to poles to collect their coins and deliver goods to those standing above.

  Locke could make out groups of small shapes dodging through the forest of coats and legs—fellow Shades’ Hill orphans at work. He could also see the dark yellow jackets of the city watch, moving through the crowd in squads with shields slung over their backs. Disaster was possible if these opposing elements met and mixed like bad alchemy, but as yet there were no shouts, no watch-whistles, no signs of anything amiss.

  Traffic had been stopped over the Black Bridge. The lamps that dotted the looming stone arch were covered with black shrouds, and a small crowd of priests, prisoners, guards, and ducal officials stood behind the execution platform that jutted from the bridge’s side. Two boats of yellowjackets had anchored in the canal on either side of the bridge to keep the water beneath the dropping prisoners clear.

  “Don’t we has to do our business?” said No-Teeth. “Don’t we has to get a purse, or a ring, or something—”

  Beth, who’d taken her hands off him for all of half a minute, now seized him again and whispered harshly, “Keep your mouth shut about that while we’re in the crowd. Mouth shut! We’re going to sit here and be mindful. We’ll work after the hanging.”

  Tam shuddered and looked more miserable than ever. Locke sighed, confused and impatient. It was sad that some of their Shades’ Hill fellows had to hang, but then it was sad they’d been caught by the yellowjackets in the first place. People died everywhere in Camorr, in alleys and canals and public houses, in fires, in plagues that scythed down whole neighborhoods. Tam was an orphan too; hadn’t he realized all this? Dying seemed nearly as ordinary to Locke as eating supper or making water, and he was unable to make himself feel bad that it was happening to anyone he’d barely known.

  As for that, it looked to be happening soon. A steady drumbeat rose from the bridge, echoing off water and stone, and gradually the excited murmur of the crowds dropped off. Not even divine services could make Camorri so respectfully attentive as a public neck-snapping.

  “Loyal citizens of Camorr! Now comes noon, this seventeenth instant, this month of Tirastim in our seventy-seventh Year of Sendovani.” These words were shouted from atop the Black Bridge by a huge-bellied herald in sable plumage. “These felons have been found guilty of capital crimes against the law and customs of Camorr. By the authority of his grace, Duke Nicovante, and by the seals of his honorable magistrates of the Red Chamber, they are here brought to receive justice.”

  There was movement beside him on the bridge. Seven prisoners were hauled forward, each by a pair of scarlet-hooded constables. Locke saw that Tam was anxiously biting his knuckles. Beth’s arm appeared around Tam’s shoulder, and Locke ground his teeth together. He was doing his job, behaving, refusing to make a spectacle of himself, and Tam was the one that received Beth’s tenderness?

  “You get used to it, Tam,” Beth said softly. “Honor them, now. Brace up.”

  On the bridge platform the Masters of the Ropes tightened nooses around the necks of the condemned. The hanging ropes were about as long as each prisoner was tall, and lashed to ringbolts just behind each prisoner’s feet. There were no clever mechanisms in the hanging platform, no fancy tricks. This wasn’t Tal Verrar. Here in the east, prisoners were simply heaved over the edge.

  “Jerevin Tavasti,” shouted the herald, consulting a parchment. “Arson, conspiracy to receive stolen goods, assault upon a duke’s officer! Malina Contada, counterfeiting and attendant misuse of His Grace the Duke’s name and image. Caio Vespasi, burglary, malicious mummery, arson, and horse theft! Lorio Vespasi, conspiracy to receive stolen goods.”

  So much for the adults; the herald moved on to the three children. Tam sobbed, and Beth whispered, “Shhhh, now.” Locke noted that Beth was coldly calm, and he tried to imitate her air of disinterest. Eyes just so, chin up, mouth just shy of a frown. Surely, if she glanced at him during the ceremony, she’d notice and approve.…

  “Mariabella, no surname,” yelled the herald. “Theft and wanton disobedience! Zilda, no surname. Theft and wanton disobedience!”

  The Masters were tying extra weights to the legs of this last trio of prisoners, since their own slight bodies might not provide for a swift enough conclusion at the ends of their plunges.

  “Lars, no surname. Theft and wanton disobedience.”

  “Zilda was kind to me,” whispered Tam, his voice breaking.

  “The gods know it,” said Beth. “Hush now.”

  “For crimes of the body you shall suffer death of the body,” continued the herald. “You will be suspended above running water and hanged there by the necks until dead, your unquiet spirits to be carried forth upon the water to the Iron Sea, where they may do no further harm to any soul or habitation of the duke’s domain. May the gods receive your souls mercifully, in good time.” The herald lowered his scroll and faced the prisoners. “In the duke’s name I give you justice.”

  Drums rolled. One of the Masters of the Ropes drew a sword, in case any of the prisoners fought their handlers. Locke had seen a hanging before, and he knew the condemned only got one chance at whatever dignity was left to them.

  Today the drops ran smooth. The drumroll crashed to silence. Each pair of hooded yellowjackets stepped forward and shoved their prisoner off the edge of the hanging platform.

  Tam flinched away, as Locke had thought he might, but even he was unprepared for No-Teeth’s reaction when the seven ropes jerked taut with snapping noises that might have been hemp, or necks, or both.

  “Ahhh​hhhh! Ahhhh​hhhhh​hhhh! AHHHH​HHHHH​HHHHH​HHHHH​HHHHHH!”

  Each scream was longer and louder than the last. Beth clamped a hand over No-Teeth’s mouth and struggled with him. Over the water, four large bodies and three smaller ones swung like pendulums in arcs that quickly grew smaller and smaller.

  Locke’s heart pounded. Everyone nearby had to be staring at them. He heard chuckling and disapproving comments. The more attention they drew to themselves, the harder it would be to go about their real business.

  “Shhh,” said Beth, straining to keep No-Teeth under control. “Quiet, damn you. Quiet!”

  “What’s the matter, girl?”

  Locke was dismayed to see that a pair of yellowjackets had parted the crowd just behind them. Gods, that was worse than anything! What if they w
ere prowling for Shades’ Hill orphans? What if they asked hard questions? He curbed an impulse to leap for the water below and froze in place, eyes wide.

  Beth kept an arm locked over No-Teeth’s face yet managed to somehow squirm around and bow her head to the constables.

  “My little brother,” she gasped out, “he’s never seen a hanging before. We don’t mean to cause a fuss. I’ve shut him up.”

  No-Teeth ceased his struggles, but he began to sob. The yellowjacket who’d spoken, a middle-aged man with a face full of scars, looked down at him with distaste.

  “You four come here alone?”

  “Mother sent us,” said Beth. “Wanted the boys to see a hanging. See the rewards of idleness and bad company.”

  “A right-thinking woman. Nothing like a good hanging to scare the mischief out of a sprat.” The man frowned. “Why ain’t she here with you?”

  “Oh, she loves a hanging, does Mother,” said Beth. Then, lowering her voice to a whisper: “But, um, she’s got the flux. Bad. All day she’s been sitting on her—”

  “Ah. Well, then.” The yellowjacket coughed. “Gods send her good health. You’d best not bring this one back to a Penance Day ceremony for a while.”

  “I agree, sir.” Beth bowed again. “Mother’ll scratch his hide for this.”

  “On your way, then, girl. Don’t need no more of a scene.”

  “Of course, sir.”

  The constables moved away into the crowd, which was itself coming back to life. Beth slid off the stone wall, rather gracelessly, because No-Teeth and Tam came with her. The former was still held tightly, and the latter refused to let go of her other arm. He hadn’t cried out like No-Teeth, but Locke saw that his eyes brimmed with tears and he was even more pale-looking than before. Locke ran his tongue around the inside of his mouth, which had gone dry under the scrutiny of the yellowjackets.