David Chandler - Den of thieves

Malden lowered the crown again. He didn’t let it go. No, that would be too much to bear. But he forced down the urge to put it on.

He had a horrible presentiment-a certain hunch-that if he put the crown on his head, he would never willingly take it off again. And that would have presented more problems than it was likely to solve.

He felt the thing pulse in his hands, a little jolt of anger. He had thwarted its design and it wasn’t happy. Malden had to fight with himself to contain his natural impulse, which was to do anything, anything at all, to make the crown happy again.

If you will not wear me, then carry me to the castellan. He will see to my safety.

“Be still!” Malden said, though he felt like a field mouse issuing orders to a lion. The strength in that voice, the resolute, firm quality of it, was hard to resist. “I’ll do no such thing. I’m leaving now, and you shall accompany me.”

Find the castellan.

“He would have me slain on the spot.” Malden shook his head. He could feel the disdain radiating from the crown. It cared not a jot for his life or well-being. It only wanted its orders carried out. As far as the crown was concerned, he deserved whatever he got. Was he not, after all, a thief? And were not thieves hanged in this city?

An upright citizen, a more honest man, would never have disobeyed. Any such would have marched to their doom, just for the honor of serving the crown-or been seduced into putting it on, whatever horrors that might entail. Whatever intellect might inhabit it, it remained a symbol of ordained power, a representative of an iron-bound class system where every man knew his place. Even in the Free City of Ness men were born into a system of rank and from childhood had one lesson drummed into them: know your betters, and respect their wishes to the letter. Those who disobeyed faced beatings and upbraidings. Those who went along were left alone. Though the free citizens were proud people, they were not unlike the bondsmen outside the city walls in this regard-they knew better than to challenge power.

Yet Malden had never been a true citizen. He’d never been raised to be an honest man. His people were among the lowest of the low, and no one had ever cared to remind him of his rank because they assumed he would never rise above his station.

That expectation, or lack thereof, had given him ambition. And ambition bred will. Taking care, he removed one hand from the crown and flexed the fingers to get the blood flowing through them again. Then he placed the crown on the floor. Oh, that was hard, but once done, he felt so much better. He knew at once he’d made the right decision. He eased his other hand and wiped blood from his palm.

Then he began to consider, once again, how he was going to escape.

The hallway was blocked by the portcullis spears, and even if he could have fled through the palace, he would only arrive in the courtyard where doubtless every armed man on Castle Hill was waiting for him. The tower was collapsed and impassible. It seemed he had but one choice for egress, though he liked it not.

He could climb down the oubliette, the pit that nearly swallowed him before he reached the tower. He peered down into its inky depths now, and remembered what he had thought before-it could lead nowhere but into the Burgrave’s dungeons, some hundred feet straight down.

It was the only way out.

Jumping into that pit would be folly, of course-he would never survive the fall. He could attempt to climb down, but from what he could see of the shaft, its walls looked slick and free of easy handand footholds to facilitate such a descent. Fortunately he still had the rope he’d used to gain entrance to the palace, and Slag’s folding grapnel. The rope would be just long enough, if he could drop the last ten feet.

He wasted little time. No doubt guards were headed to the palace already, to check on the Burgrave and his retinue and make sure they had not been injured when the tower collapsed. At least some of those guards would be coming to check on the crown as well. The crown. Best to secure it now, so he wouldn’t lose it. He picked it up again.

Thief.

“Be still!” Malden hissed. He would not let it control him again. He would let no man be his master, ever again.

Well. Save for Cutbill. And Cythera and Bikker, of course. He scowled at himself, but wasted no more time on that line of thought.

He threaded his belt through the crown-touching it gingerly, as if it were like to burn him-then fastened it again about his waist so he would not drop it in the shaft. Then he wrapped his grapnel around one leg of the statue of Sadu-it had been badly dented in the cataclysm, but was still sound enough to hold his weight-and lowered himself foot by foot down into the pit, with only the vaguest notion what he would find at its bottom.

Warm gusts of air chased up the shaft and made Malden’s hands sweat until he could barely hang onto the rope. The shaft was narrow enough that he could walk his way down, keeping his feet pressed against one wall while he climbed down hand over hand, but the walls were slick with condensation and gave little purchase to his soft shoes. For the first fifty feet or so of the descent he was in near total darkness, but as he passed the halfway point, the light from below grew strong enough that he could see the water forming thick, greasy droplets that held for a moment, then streaked down the walls around him.

From below he could hear the roaring of warm air as it rushed up the shaft. And something else-something he had dreaded as he came down the narrow chimney, something he had formed a fledgling hope he would not hear at all. A quiet moaning, the fatigued sighs of a prisoner. He had hoped that the clamor in the courtyard would have brought the gaolers of the dungeon running. That when he reached the dungeon, he would find it empty of guards. Judging by the continued sounds of torment issuing from below, that hope was forlorn. Getting down into the dungeon was going to be the easy part. Dealing with its occupants might be decidedly more difficult.

One problem at a time, he told himself, and kept descending.

The light was not enough to reveal the bottom of the shaft until he was almost upon it. When he reached the last few feet of his rope and peered down with great curiosity to see where he would land if he just let go, his heart flipped over his chest.

The floor at the bottom of the shaft was studded with spikes. Iron spikes mounted securely, three feet long and worked to nasty sharpness.

Reaching the end of the rope, he hung onto it by one hand with his feet stretched down as far as they could go. Seven feet of empty air still remained between him and those wicked points. If he just let go, the fall would not break his legs but he was like to be skewered.

He had no more rope to tie to the end, nor anything to extend his descent. Twenty feet of good stout cord were wrapped around the hilt of his bodkin, but it was not strong enough to hold his weight.

Malden ran one hand down the wall of the shaft next to him. It had been cut through solid rock with metal tools that left marks in its surface, no more than shallow dents-hardly enough to get his fingers or toes into. Yet perhaps if his strength had not completely left him

…

He braced his feet against one wall as best he could, then pushed against the opposite wall with one hand. If he kept his legs bent and his arm straight, he could just about hold his weight up against the force of gravity. And if he used both hands, and if he was headed downward-it would not be a graceful descent. It would be more like a barely controlled fall. But that was better than an uncontrolled plummet.

It took a great deal of courage to let go of the rope. Malden might have been indolent, and not a valiant fighter, but when his life was in jeopardy, he rarely lacked for boldness. He let go of the rope and thrust both hands out against the wall at the same time, bracing himself in the shaft. The impact of his hands on the wall made a wet slapping sound that echoed up and down the walls, but he did not have time at that point to stop and listen to hear if anyone remarked on the sound. He was too busy rushing down toward the spikes, his feet and hands clutching at the tool marks on the walls for whatever small purchase they offered.