Stephen Deas1: The Thief-Takers Apprentice

The air had grown still and heavy, like a warm, damp blanket. Berren took a deep breath and dived in.

The sun was sinking low by now and the buildings on either side of the alley were tall in this part of the city. The air was gloomy and dank and smelled stale, of sweat and piss as well as the ever-present stink of rotting fish. Berren found the deepest shadows and darted from one to the next, hiding in doorways. He could see the two men in front of him and he could see the knives cupped in their hands. The man with the small fortune was a little way ahead. He seemed unaware that he was being followed. Berren crept closer.

The first fat splats of the evening rains began to hit the cobbles. A moment later, sheets of it were hissing down, soaking everything. The thief-taker had almost reached the end of the alley. As he drew close, the third man, flushed and out of breath, entered in front of him. Through the blurring roar of the rain, he held one hand cupped loosely at his side. Like the others. Berren pressed himself into a doorway and froze. He knew how this played out. The first man would stick his knife into his victim’s guts as they passed and walk on as if nothing had happened. The other two would jump in from behind and force him to the ground. When they’d got what they wanted, they’d either slit his throat or simply leave him to bleed to death. And then they’d run. All Berren had to do was watch through the rain as carefully as he could. He had to make sure he knew exactly which one of them made off with the purse. That was all. Didn’t have to do anything else. Just had to use his eyes and not be fooled.

And then what? He didn’t know. Follow the fortune in gold, probably. He didn’t have time to think about that. It was happening. He held his breath, as the man with the money and the man with the knife came together…

… And then something happened that Berren couldn’t quite explain. The rains cascaded down. Rivulets of water were already running through the crevices of the alley. Fat drops ran into Berren’s eyes. He blinked, and the man with the knife doubled up and crumpled to the ground. Berren hadn’t even seen the thief-taker move, yet now he was suddenly facing back the way he’d come. He held a short and stubby sword that glittered wetly all the way to its hilt, bloody rainwater dripping off it. The two men who’d followed him faltered. They seemed paralysed as the thief-taker leapt between them. The sword blurred in several arcs. Blood and rain sprayed all across the alley. The men fell over. It was done in a blink, so quick that the two throat-cutters had barely even moved. Berren stared, frozen in awe…

The thief-taker walked straight at him, grabbed him by the arm and pulled him out of his shelter and into the twilight and the rain. Close up, there was something odd-looking about the man. Something exotic. Not someone who’d been born to this city, that was for sure. Didn’t look right. Didn’t smell right either.

‘Are you with them, boy?’ Through the hammering of the rain, the voice sounded refined and educated. There was another hint of something foreign there, too.

Berren shook his head. The man with the sword let him go.

‘I’m not going to kill you, boy. So if you weren’t with them, what is it? Keeping an eye on me for someone else? Or were you thinking of having a go at my gold yourself?’

Berren said nothing. His mouth wouldn’t move. The man crouched down in front of him.

‘You’re not old enough to be working someone like me on your own. Who sent you, boy? Who looks after you? You tell me who he is and where I can find him, and there’s a crown in it for you.’ The man put his sword away somewhere under his coat and pulled out a silver coin. Berren stared hungrily at it.

‘Master Hatchet, sir…’ His voice sounded feeble.

‘Speak up, boy!’

‘Master Hatchet, sir. That’s who gives me shelter.’ He had to shout to make himself heard over the roar of the rain. Master Hatchet would never send one of his boys to do something like this. Safe and soft, that was Hatchet’s motto.

‘And where might I find your Master Hatchet?’

‘Please, sir, he’ll kill me if I tell.’

‘Maybe I’ll kill you if you won’t.’ The man moved closer. His coat opened. Berren caught a glimpse of the sword again. And something else. He lifted his face and looked the man in the eye.

‘Please, sir. Please don’t hurt me. He lives in the Fishing Quarter.’

The man sneered. ‘I can tell that from the smell of you.’ He gave an exaggerated sniff. ‘That’s not the only thing I smell on you. Where in the Fishing Quarter?’

Berren backed away. The man followed, until Berren was pressed against a wall.

‘Where?’

‘Shipwrights. Behind the toolmaker on Loom Street. There’s an alley there. That’s where. Near to where all the…’ He hated himself for hesitating. The younger boys laughed and giggled about the brothel next door. They made up all sorts of names for the women who worked there. The older ones, they just called it what it was and got on with things. ‘Near to the brothel,’ he said firmly, jutting out his chin.

‘Ah. I know it.’ The man smiled nastily. ‘Hatchet, is it? Yes, the dung collector. In the one alley in this rotten city that stinks of something more than fish. I went into that brothel once to take a man. It had been raining. The cobbles were slick with shit.’ He frowned. ‘You look a bit like someone. Anyone ever tell you that?’ He straightened himself and stared at Berren. He stared hard, and behind his eyes his mind seemed to wander. For a moment he seemed to relax. Berren lashed out with both arms at once. One to punch the man between the legs. The other to take what he’d seen beneath the coat. And then he ran, skittering on the wet stones. He didn’t stop or look back until he was out of the alley and half a dozen streets away. When he did, and when he was sure that the man with the sword was nowhere in sight, he found a place to shelter from the rain and opened his hand. In it he held a purse. He let himself feel the weight of it, listen to the coins jingling. He didn’t dare stop for long enough to look inside. He didn’t need to. He knew what was there.

Much later, when his curiosity finally got the better of him, he opened it.

All that was in the purse were a few coppers and some rusty iron.

In the days that followed, Berren tried to forget those few moments in the alley. Watching three men have their heads cut off from a comfortable perch several dozen yards away had been a fine thing. Watching three men killed right in front of him, fearing he’d be next, had been quite another. But worst of all had been opening the purse, sure he was rich beyond his wildest dreams, and finding nothing but junk. When he’d finally returned home, he’d taken a beating from Master Hatchet for being away too long. By then he was so numb with disappointment that he’d barely noticed. He hadn’t even remembered to stash away a couple of pennies for himself. Hatchet could have searched him and found nothing.

He’d been one of Hatchet’s favoured boys before the execution. Not any more. Now he lay awake in Master Hatchet’s attic in the middle of the night, listening to the muted breathing of the other boys, straining his ears for sounds from downstairs. Hatchet had a visitor. An unwelcome one, from the sounds of things. It had started with the crash of a door being kicked in. Hatchet was a big man, a barrel of fat and muscle, built of beef and beer, with hands like hams and arms as strong as a ship’s mast. Berren had seen Hatchet batter a man nearly to death over a few pennies, and he certainly wasn’t the sort who’d take kindly to having his door staved in. Instead of a fight, though, all Berren could hear was a tense exchange of words.