Adrian Tchaikovsky - The Scarab Path

'Fisher?' Petri pressed, knowing that things had gone awry, but unable to see precisely how or why.

In a single movement the Fisher stood up, her face still devoid of expression. 'Alas, what you ask is impossible,' she declared. Her servants had moved closer to her, as though expecting attack. Petri stood up as well, mouth working silently, searching for words.

'But …' she got out finally. 'I have money!' It was unspeakably rude, by local standards, but the Fisher did not visibly react to it. Instead she simply retreated further and further. What had seemed a wall of cloth parted for her, and then she had vanished beyond it, her servants following silently. Petri was left in sole possession of the tent, deep within the Marsh Alcaia.

Her heart was beginning to pound. She had the sense of something chasing her. The Fisher had known something, had known enough not to want anything to do with this. Petri was fast running out of places to turn.

There was someone, though: there was the very person the Fisher had alluded to. The Khanaphir loved middlemen. Even in the business of seeking another's death there was someone to go to, who would then find someone else to wield the knife. Petri had never met the current holder of the office, but she knew the name from a casual mention by Kadro.

When she asked for the name of Harbir, people drew back from her, turned away, refused to speak. She persisted, and suspected that carrying the name before her made her proof against the petty robbers and killers that haunted the interior of the Alcaia. Somebody who had business with Harbir the Arranger, however they might seem, was not prey for smaller fish.

But it was Harbir who found her . After she had spent a half-hour wandering at random through the coloured maze of the Alcaia, and regularly dropping his name, a cowled Khanaphir woman approached her, tugged once at her sleeve, and then retreated deeper into the gloom. Petri followed meekly, again because she had nowhere else to go.

Harbir's tent was bigger than the Fisher's, and inside it hanging drapes cordoned off the man himself. Petri found herself in a surprisingly large space, empty save for overlapping rugs on the floor. Two men stood by the door, bare-chested Khanaphir Beetles with axes in their belts, whose stare did not admit to her presence or existence.

'You have bandied my name a hundred times beneath the roof of the Alcaia,' came a voice from the tent's hidden reaches. It was a male voice, but Petri could tell no more than that. Even if this was the Arranger's tent, it could have just been another servant speaking.

'I … give you my apologies if I have caused any difficulties.' She stumbled over the words, which was poor, knowing the Khanaphir valued eloquence.

'There are many who come to me seeking a final arrangement,' the man responded, with the unhurried measure of someone fond of his own voice. 'The wealthy speak to me of their rivals, the bitter regarding those who have wronged them, the desperate concerning those who have more than they. Honoured Foreigner, have you been in our lands so long that you would be prepared to take part in our pastimes?'

'No …' The word came out as a squeak, so she calmed herself and started again. 'I only wish to know, great Harbir, whether a friend of mine has been arranged … has had an arrangement made about him.'

She hoped she had remembered properly what little Kadro had said of the traditions here. Amongst some assassins, she was sure, such a direct question would transgress etiquette — perhaps fatally.

'You have not come empty-handed, expecting to bear away such a weighty answer?' the voice enquired, upon which she finally relaxed a little. She reached into her purse and came out with a fistful of currency: Helleron Standards, the local lozenges of metal stamped with weight and hallmark, even a few bulky and debased Imperial coins.

There was a slight sound that might have been a snigger. 'And who is it that is so fortunate as to have you solicitous after their health?'

'Kadro … Kadro of Collegium, the Fly-kinden,' she replied. The words dropped heavily into the tent and left a silence.

'Please …' she said again, before biting off the words. The locals never said 'please'. Their indefatigable politeness danced around the word.

'Go,' said the voice.

'Please tell me!' she managed, suddenly very aware of the two axemen by the tent-flap.

'His name has not been passed to me,' said the unseen voice. 'Now go.'

The axemen had subtly shifted their stance, and Petri was suddenly very afraid. She tripped on the rugs, stumbled, and was out of the tent before she realized it, into the stifling alleyways of the Marsh Alcaia.

She looked around her, having no idea what path might lead her out of this warren of fabric. She had known she was intruding too far, but somehow had envisaged, after a successful quest, that the way out would open before her. But her quest was not successful, and no clear exit was to be seen. The one thing she could not ask the locals was How do I get out of here?

Petri started walking. She tried to make her gait seem determined, as of someone who frequented the Marsh Alcaia every day. But she was a foreigner, dressed like a foreigner, wearing a head of hair like a foreigner. She no longer had any names of power to awe the locals. She passed through avenue after cloth-roofed avenue, each lined only with the openings of tents. People stopped to watch her pass, and eyes from within the shadows picked out her movements. She was aware of this scrutiny but did not stop, just kept walking to who-knows-where.

A man fell into step alongside her. He was a Khanaphir Beetle, short, shaven-headed, wearing a simple robe. She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye and found he was not looking at her.

'Pardon this no doubt unwarranted observation but you look like one who is seeking the direction to where she should be,' he said, smiling out at the canvas sky.

'E-excuse me?' she stammered. She felt hope steal up on her, now, although she had no reason for it.

'I know where you need to be, and I can assist you, Honoured Foreigner,' said her companion. She stopped and turned to look at him directly.

'Please help me,' she said.

'Why, of course.' He smiled broadly. 'What you wish, of course, is to be in company with myself and my fellows. Who would not?'

She looked behind her and spotted the gathering of rogues that were his fellows. There were a full dozen of them, Khanaphir and silver-skinned Marsh folk, halfbreeds, and even a Spider-kinden woman from somewhere far, far off.

'No, please,' she whispered. 'I don't want to go with you. I just want to get out of this place.'

'Who would not want to leave here?' the Beetle agreed, still smiling at her. 'And what better companions to leave with than such stout fellows as we? We have a fine ship, too, which lacks only one of your elegance to complete her company. Surely you will be our guest.'

She understood then: slavers. The rogues were meanwhile drawing closer to her in a kind of casual saunter. Any one of them looked as though he could outrun her and they had broad-bladed daggers, short-hafted axes, sported spurs of bone.

'Please, I … I am a scholar of Collegium. I will soon be missed.'

'Then surely your friends will reimburse us for our hospitality,' replied the smiling Khanaphir. There was a dagger in his hand, its blade as bright as a mirror even here under cover of the tents.

She opened her mouth to protest again but he grabbed her tunic, twisting it at the collar and drawing her up on to her toes. His smile stayed robustly unchanged. Another of his men was abruptly close enough to take hold of her other arm.

'Please-!' she cried, just as a spear plunged so far into his chest that its leaf-shaped head emerged complete and red-glossed through his back. His eyes popped wide open but the smile, horribly, stayed quite intact as he dropped. Petri fell back and sat down heavily, staring.