James Roy - The Gimlet Eye

For the second time that night Tab sat on her bed, her eyes wide and her heart pounding. It was only a rat, that was true, but it was a rat which had, with its last thought, provided the passage for Stelka’s agonised plea for help as she was dragged off… where? And it was that which made her pull her cloak around herself, slip on her boots, and begin climbing the wall at the end of the stable. She didn’t know how yet, but she was going to find Stelka.

As she hurried through the deserted streets, Tab considered her options. Verris would have been her first choice, but even thinking about him made her feel terribly, terribly sad, so she quickly pushed the thought away. No point dwelling on things that could never be.

Should she go to Fontagu? No, he was too preoccupied with his precious play. He’d only be dismissive and selfish.

Philmon? Maybe, but most of the time he simply tagged along and did what was needed, but rarely came up with any good ideas of his own. Unless heights were involved, or knots, it wasn’t the right time to ask him for help. Besides, he hated being woken up in the middle of the night. He’d stay grumpy about it for hours, maybe even days.

Amelia. It had to be Amelia. She was once a magician as well. Two former magicians teamed up – even very young ones – had to be better than one former magician teamed up with a sky-sailor, a missing former pirate, or a self-obsessed actor.

The other advantage of choosing Amelia was that she was easy to get to. Her room was on the first floor of the Flegis Arms where she now worked, but there was a woodshed and a kind of lean-to at the back of the building that offered fairly easy access to her window ledge. Yes, it was something of a climb, but for someone as agile as Tab, it was about as difficult as climbing a flight of stairs.

She rounded the corner of a building and stopped, stepping lightly into the shadows of an eave. Something felt wrong. She had the distinctly uncomfortable feeling that someone was following her. It felt like something prickling at the base of her neck.

She looked behind her. The street was empty, except for a few barrels and crates stacked outside the door of the building on the opposite side of the narrow street. The windows of the houses and shops around her were all dark – not so much as a glimmer of light from a lamp or a candle. Somewhere far off in the distance a dog barked, and one or two lonely creaks wafted down from the network of rigging overhead. But other than that, nothing.

Tab considered closing her eyes so she could feel around for a mind with which to meld, but to close her eyes and concentrate on searching for a mind would be to lower her guard, and she didn’t want to risk it at that moment. Not here, when it was already so dark.

She cleared her throat, and the noise momentarily startled her, it sounded so loud in the silence of the laneway. With another glance over her shoulder, she stepped back onto the pavement, taking care to stay close to the walls.

A moment later she stopped again. She’d heard nothing, and yet she felt so strongly that there was someone very close behind her.

‘Hello?’ she called, her voice low and timid.

There was no answer, so she continued on. But then, a few seconds later, she felt the urge to stop yet again. ‘Hello?’ she repeated. ‘Is someone there?’

She jumped as a cat snarled nearby. Perhaps that was all it had been – a cat out in the night, off on a mission of its own.

‘Come on, Tab,’ she muttered, squaring her shoulders and heading up the hill again. It must have been raining while she was asleep, because here and there were small puddles. Some she stepped over, but the larger ones she had to walk around, which took her out into the brighter, more moonlit part of the street. Just as soon as she could, she returned to the shadows.

Again came the awareness that she was being followed, and she stopped once more. But this time the awareness was so strong, almost as strong as a certainty. Crouching down behind a handcart that had been parked near the darkness of a narrow alley, Tab swallowed down the hard-edged lump in her throat and tried to calm her thudding heart. ‘There’s no one to be afraid of,’ she murmured below her breath. ‘It’s just a cat.’

She wondered if it was time to go searching for a nearby mind again. Perhaps if she began feeling about, she’d find herself in the mind of a cat, she’d see herself crouching in the shadow of the handcart, and then she’d feel better.

Yes, that’s what I’ll do, she thought. It won’t take more than a moment.

She’d just squeezed her eyes shut when she heard a sudden shuffling noise behind her, a little like a…

Tab opened her eyes slowly, and flinched away from the pounding pain in the back of her skull. Everything was dark, and smelly, and stuffy, just as it would be if an old dung sack had been pulled over her head.

She tried to lift her hands, but she couldn’t – they were tied behind her.

Oh, well that’s just great, she thought wryly. Someone’s gone and knocked me over, tied me up and pulled an old sack over my head.

Judging by the rumble and jolting of wheels, the rocking motion, and the clop-clop-clop of hooves, she decided that she must have been in a cart of some kind. She tried to call out, but it was only then that she noticed the rag that had been stuffed into her mouth. The only sound she could make was something between a grunt and a moan.

‘Quiet,’ a man’s voice growled beside her. ‘You’ll get us all killed.’

By working her mouth back and forth, Tab was finally able to force the rag out. She spat a couple of times to get the musty taste from her tongue. ‘Where are we?’ she whispered. ‘And where are we going?’

‘I don’t know,’ the man said. ‘I can’t see anything.’

‘Have you got something over your head as well?’ Tab asked.

‘We all do,’ replied a third, woman’s voice.

‘I told you, be quiet,’ the man said again. ‘We’re heading somewhere, and I don’t know where, but I’m quite sure we’re not going to like it. One thing’s for certain, however – it’s going to be a lot worse for us if our captors think that we’re going to give their game away, whatever that might be.’

The man’s voice seemed very familiar to Tab, and she frowned to herself as she tried to place it.

‘Um… do I know you?’ she asked.

‘Are you talking to me?’ the man replied.

‘Yes.’

‘Then it’s best you don’t. Seriously, you need to be quiet.’

The cart continued rocking along the cobblestones.

‘We’re heading for starboard,’ said the woman’s voice. ‘We just went past the Quartermaster’s Inn.’

‘How could you know that?’ the man asked gruffly.

‘Because the Quartermaster’s Inn is the only place that has Fresni folk music on a Bursday evening. Hear that? That’s the sound of a grue-harp.’

‘You’re right,’ Tab replied.

‘Very good,’ the man muttered. ‘We’re heading starboard. That’s one thing we know, at least.’

‘Verris?’ Tab said, finally managing to place the voice.

‘Yes. Why – who’s that?’

‘It’s Tab. Tab Vidler.’

‘Tab!’

‘This is amazing, Verris! I thought you were dead!’

‘Not quite, although sometimes it felt like it. But listen, we must keep quiet. I don’t know where they’re taking us, but I quite suspect that they’d think nothing of killing us. So we need to lie low until we know better what’s going on.’

‘I can’t believe this,’ said the woman. ‘It all happened so fast. One minute I’m eating my dinner, the next I hear a sound behind me, and I’ve got a sack over my head. I don’t even know why. But what if they’re taking us somewhere to kill us?’