David Tallerman - Prince Thief

I looked down at myself. She was right, and a goodly portion of the sheets were now black with filth. “Oh. Sorry.”

I rolled to the edge of the bed, plunged more than climbed off it. Estrada was already halfway out the door by the time I’d righted myself, and so I hurried after. She was in the street before I managed to catch up. “How’s Alvantes?” I asked.

“Alive,” she said. “He’s sleeping.”

The faint chill in the air was going some way to bringing me back to my senses. “That’s good news,” I said, and meant it. “Now will you tell me what this is about? You obviously know more than you’re letting on.”

Estrada slowed a fraction. “I’ll tell you what I can,” she said. “Before we set out this morning, Mounteban told me about a deal he’d made with the giants… with Saltlick. He told me how he’d had smiths and carpenters working for days to ready that armour they wore this morning, back when he thought they might be convinced to join our side.”

“Then Saltlick came back and threw that plan right out the window,” I put in.

“Exactly. There was no way Saltlick could be talked into letting the giants fight. So Mounteban made him a proposition. Only, Mounteban’s gone now, and it falls to me to honour his promise.”

“I can’t believe Mounteban had anything to offer that would make Saltlick take the kind of risk he took out there today,” I told her. “If it had only been his own life on the line than maybe…”

“Free passage,” interrupted Estrada. “A way out of the city. That’s what Mounteban offered. He would remove the barricades from one of the southern gates and let the giants leave.”

“That’s ridiculous!” I cried. “They should have been allowed to go days ago. Why didn’t they just tear down the barricades and make their own way out?”

Estrada didn’t bother to answer, merely waited for my brain to catch up with my mouth.

“Oh. Right,” I said. “ Giants .”

It would never have occurred to Saltlick to force his way out of the city. His mind simply didn’t allow for solutions that relied on force of any kind. For that same reason, Mounteban had had to think of another way of using the giants; a way that would fit with their rigid morality. They couldn’t be made into a weapon, but a rescue party was different — especially when there were people Saltlick cared for amongst those in need of rescuing. Though Mounteban couldn’t have known at the time that such a situation would arise, it was at least a probability — and anyway, the deal had cost him nothing.

If only I’d helped Saltlick when he’d asked. If only I hadn’t been so damned selfish. If I could have persuaded the giants to make their own way out of the city then… well, then I’d be dead, Estrada too, and Altapasaeda would surely be in the hands of Ludovoco and Panchessa by now. But a giant wouldn’t have died, and Saltlick wouldn’t be bearing that death on his conscience, as I knew he must be.

“So now you’re letting them leave?” I said. “At least that’s something.”

“The thing is, Easie,” Estrada said, “there’s more to it than that. But I think Saltlick needs to tell you the rest himself.”

We passed the rest of our journey in silence; Estrada seemed no more interested in further conversation than I was. Minutes had passed before I recognised the former tannery that now served as home for Altapasaeda’s giant population. Just as when I’d last been there, a giant stood guard to either side of the entrance.

While the day’s cool breeze might have unmuddied my thoughts, it did nothing to shift the stink that hung around the place. I was ready to point out that there was no way I could go inside and listen to what Saltlick had to say, since I never heard well while gagging and passing out — but fortunately Estrada was ahead of me. “We’re here to see Saltlick,” she said, “he’s expecting us.”

Estrada’s credit with the giants was apparently better than mine, for there were no communication problems this time. One of the sentries ducked inside and less than a minute later he was back with Saltlick. Saltlick looked every bit as spent as I’d expected and more; his wounds were lurid and inflamed, his face haggard and shadowed.

“Hello, Saltlick,” I said. “It’s good to see you.”

He strived for a smile, but the vague upturn of his mouth didn’t make it very far.

“Estrada tells me you have something to say,” I tried.

Saltlick nodded. Even then, however, it took him a few moments to reply — and when he did, he spoke slowly, hesitantly. “This…” he said, taking in Altapasaeda with a sweep of one plate-sized hand. “No good. No good for giants.”

“It hasn’t been all that much good for people lately either,” I pointed out.

Saltlick’s obvious frustration told me I’d misunderstood. I watched as the effort of pursuing the right words contorted his features. “No kill,” he said. “No fight.”

“He means,” said Estrada, “that it’s not their fight.”

I scowled at her. “I knew that. But Saltlick,” I said, “no one expects you to fight. All of that was Mounteban’s doing.”

Saltlick shook his head. “Done,” he said. “Too late. Must leave now. Go home.”

“Estrada told me,” I agreed. I couldn’t understand why he’d said it so mournfully, with such clear remorse. Did he imagine I’d expected him to stay and help us? As far as I was concerned, the giants had done everything that could be asked of them and more; if they wanted to leave instead of being slaughtered with the rest of us then no one could possibly blame them.

“Not come back,” Saltlick added — and there was something in the way he mangled those particular syllables that gave me my first glimmer of comprehension.

“Wait,” I said. “You mean, not ever? Not even… well… not even to visit ?”

“Not come back,” he repeated, solemnly.

“But… Easie friend, right?”

“Easie friend,” he agreed.

“All right. So I’ll come and see you, then. If I survive the next couple of days, that is, which is unlikely enough I know. But if we somehow get through this, I can visit you?”

Saltlick paused for so long that I thought he’d failed to understand — and I was about to start again, more slowly, when he shook his head once again. “No more,” he said.

“You’re saying…” But I didn’t finish. I knew what he was saying. It wasn’t Altapasaeda that Saltlick was turning his back on; it wasn’t even the Castoval. It was the entire world of men — the world that had brought such immeasurable harm to his people. And however I might not like it, however I wished it weren’t true, I was a part of that.

My first urge was to shout at him. Did everything we’d been through mean nothing? All of our adventures, our last minute escapes, our victories large and small… could he really have forgotten?

Except, I knew I had no right to argue. I understood perfectly. Saltlick had had to make a choice, a choice inevitable since the moment Moaradrid had first turned up at the giants’ door. The one way he could protect his people was to return them to their own world and make sure that ours never intruded on their solitude again. Otherwise, there would always be someone who saw their size, their strength, their power, and mistook them for weapons.

Saltlick crouched and held out his hand. I placed mine inside it, though it barely covered two of his fingers, and we shook awkwardly. He repeated the gesture with Estrada. Then, before I could say even one of the hundred things I suddenly, urgently felt the need to tell him, he had turned and ducked back inside. The doors swung shut. The sentries retook their posts. And a lump of raw pain swam from somewhere in my chest and lodged hard in my throat.