Richard Byers: The Black Bouquet

He opened the sour vintage with a corkscrew, and he and his father passed the green glass container back and forth until the scarlet rim of the sun cut the hills to the west.

Nicos said, "What's wrong?"

"What makes you think anything's wrong?"

"I know you, don't I? I can read it in your face and the way you carry yourself."

Aeron sighed. He sometimes tried to avoid telling his father about his various jobs, because it made him fret. But somehow he generally wound up confiding in him anyway.

"I stole something this afternoon."

"I assumed you didn't buy the pouch," Nicos replied, "or what's inside it."

"No. It was a complicated kind of job. I needed help, and things went awry."

Nicos nodded somberly. Probably he was remembering times when his own thefts didn't go as planned.

"I take it one of your helpers came to grief."

"Not one. All three. Kerridi, Gavath, and Dal."

"Damn. I'm sorry." Nicos took a slug of wine, then passed the bottle and asked, "Are they dead, or did the Gray Blades take them alive?"

"I think they're all three dead."

"Well, that's sad, but likely best for you and them both."

"I know. It's just… I had to dry Dal out to make him fit to work. I had to buy him new powders, trinkets, and whatnot to cast his spells. I felt smug-proud of myself for being a true friend and helping him out that way. Now it turns out what I was really doing was digging his grave."

"You can't blame yourself. He knew the risks. They all did."

"I suppose."

Nicos hesitated, then said, "You needn't feel guilty, but you can learn from what happened. Rethink the path you've-"

"Please," Aeron snapped, "let's not argue about that all over again. I relish stealing as much as you did in your day, I'm just as good at it, and I can't think of any honest work I could do that would bring in enough to pay for all your poultices and medicines."

Nicos spat, "Don't put it on me. I never asked you to risk your neck just to ease my aches and pains."

"You didn't have to."

"Anyway, if you're such a clever thief, why did your plan turn to dung?"

"Because I dared to steal something inside the walls of the Paeraddyn, I suppose."

Nicos blinked and said, "You're joking."

"No. Kesk Turnskull hired me to do it."

"The tanarukk? You're even madder than I dreamed. I'd better have the story quickly, before you take it into your head to jump off the balcony, just to find out if you can fly."

And so, as the sky blackened, the stars twinkled into view, and the fishermen plying the river in their skiffs lit the colored lanterns hanging fore and aft, Aeron told the tale. Nicos hunched forward, intent, fascinated despite himself. He might worry about his only son's manner of living, but he enjoyed hearing about his escapades. Aeron knew he remained a thief at heart, and would still be robbing folk himself if only his broken body would allow.

Perhaps it was his father's grudging admiration, or simply the wine warming his belly, but as he related the events of the afternoon, Aeron's sorrow receded somewhat, making way for a swelling of pride. Because, though he'd paid a heavy price for his boldness, he'd taken loot from within the Paeraddyn, and in all Oeble, what other knave could say the same?

The story and the wine finished together. He set the empty bottle down carefully. Put one in the wrong spot, and it would topple over and roll off the slanted platform, perhaps to brain some luckless soul passing in the street below.

His scars and infirmity veiled in darkness, Nicos sat quietly for a few more seconds, evidently pondering, then asked, "If you'd known, would you still have tried?"

"Known which?"

"That someone cast spells of warding on the saddlebag. That it had so many able warriors looking after it."

Aeron shrugged and said, "Probably. If we'd known about them, maybe Dal could have neutralized the other mage's enchantments. Then, using the potion, I could have stolen the prize without anyone noticing, and it wouldn't have mattered how many guards were hanging around. But of course, we didn't know. If Kesk had any notion how well protected the prize would be, he didn't see fit to warn me."

"Maybe for fear you'd pass on the job."

"Maybe," said Aeron. "I certainly wouldn't put it past the ugly bastard to withhold vital information."

Aeron pulled open the mouth of the scuffed old saddlebag, slipped out the steel lockbox inside, and hefted it in his hands. It weighed several pounds, and didn't clink or rattle when shaken. Almost any sort of treasure might rest inside.

He rose and fetched his pigskin pouch of picks and probes.

Nicos gave a disapproving grunt and asked, "Do you think Kesk would like you opening the box?"

"Since he specifically told me not to, I doubt it, but I want to see what my partners died for."

"Well, if you must do it, at least make sure you don't break the lock, or-"

"Or leave any telltale scratches around it I know."

Though he wasn't as adept at teasing open locks as some thieves, Aeron thought he could manage it.

As soon as he inserted a fine steel rod in the keyhole, however, a thunderclap boomed. The blast of sound jolted pain through his bones, kicked the strongbox out of his lap, and sent him tumbling backward in his rickety old chair. Worse, it set the whole balcony bouncing up and down. Aeron lay perfectly still, terrified, certain that the platform was about to tear free of its moorings at last.

Gradually, though, the oscillation subsided, and he lifted his head. Nicos's seat had remained upright, but scooted to the very brink of the balcony, where luckily the older man had fetched up against an intact section of railing, which sufficed to keep him from falling over. Aeron scrambled forward and hauled his wide-eyed parent back from the edge.

Then he thought to look for the case. It had slid to the brink as well, and he felt a sudden impulse to kick it off. Naturally, though, he picked it up instead.

Nicos spoke to him, but he couldn't make out the words through the ringing in his ears. The day had been hard on his hearing. A few more such magical mishaps, and he'd likely be deaf.

"Say it again," he requested.

"I said, another ward," the scarred man repeated. "Wards on the bag and the coffer, too."

"Do you think that was the last of them?"

"I'm not a wizard. How would I know? I wouldn't count on it."

"You're right," said Aeron. "I'll leave off trying to open it. But damn it, the thing got Kerridi, Dal, and Gavath killed, and now it almost did the same to us. To be so well defended, it must be incredibly valuable." He smiled slowly. "Too valuable to hand over for a single bag of gold, even a big one."

"Don't talk crazy. Nobody crosses the Red Axes."

Aeron smiled and said, "I won't. Kesk can have the booty. But first he's going to have to renegotiate our deal."

Sefris Uuthrakt sensed that something was abroad in the night, something, perhaps, spawned in the famously abomination-haunted Qurth Forest to the northeast, but no matter how she tried, she couldn't yet pinpoint its location. Perhaps she would have had better luck if she stood still, but that she was unwilling to do. A task awaited her in the city ahead, and one didn't dawdle when the Lady of Loss called her to serve.

So, trusting in the skills she'd worked so hard to master to protect her if necessary, her legs tirelessly eating up the miles, she simply jogged on down the trail that wound across the hilly grasslands. Her one concession to prudence was to pull a cestus, a leather strap loaded with iron pellets, onto the knuckles of each hand. She was supposed to look like a meek and inoffensive traveler, a pilgrim, perhaps, seeking a shrine of the Morninglord, the Binder of What is Known, or some other weak and contemptible deity, and the enchanted weapons rather spoiled the illusion. But at the moment, she had no companions to remark on them, and in any case, certain creatures existed that even the naked fists of a monastic couldn't damage.