Кейт Новак - Masquerades

“Miserable,” Alias reported. “They’ll have to improve it once we break up this operation, or lose their clientele.”

“I think we should hold off on breaking it up,” Olive said. “I followed my money from a young shake-down artist to a local tough to here. I’m very curious to see if I can follow this loot to its final resting place.”

“I had the same thing in mind,” the swordswoman admitted. “How about if I keep watch back here and you sit it out in the common room? Your cast-iron stomach could probably handle their ale better than mine.”

“I’ll give it a go, but they may not welcome halflings,” Olive remarked. “If the climate seems too frigid, I’ll be back in a few—”

Olive halted in midsentence and stepped deeper into the shadow, pulling Alias with her. The iron-clad back room door banged open, and someone within tossed out a teenaged boy.

The boy slid along the damp alley until he hit the wall of the building behind the bar with a thud. Two large men followed him out the door. They were dressed in leather armor like that worn by the muscle-man guarding the room’s front door.

One man closed the door firmly while the other grabbed the boy by his arms and pulled him up from the ground. The boy struggled, but the man gripped him more firmly and slammed him hard into the wall.

The boy let out a whimper, which made his attacker laugh. He slammed the boy twice more before presenting him to his companion. The second thug had just finished wrapping his knuckles with a leather band.

“Following the money’s just lost priority,” Alias said as she slid her sword from her scabbard.

“I can’t disagree,” Olive replied.

The second thug backhanded the boy once across the face before Alias managed to cross the alley. He would have noticed the swordswoman, but he was too engrossed in his mayhem against the boy to warn his companion of her presence. Alias brought the hilt of her weapon down on the back of the first Night Mask’s skull. He slid to the ground with his prisoner. Meanwhile Olive had run up to the boy’s other attacker and smacked him in the knees with a war hammer. The attacker crashed to the ground, and, with a blow from Alias’s sword hilt, joined his companion in unconsciousness.

Alias knelt beside the boy and helped him sit up. It looked as if the thugs had worked him over before they had brought him out to the alley. One of his eyes was nearly swollen shut, blood trickled in a thin stream from his mouth, and his uninjured eye appeared unfocused. “Are you all right?” the swordswoman asked. The boy waved his hand in his face as if to ward off a blow.

“He’s not going anywhere,” the halfling said. “Let’s get Brothers Bane and Bhaal here trussed and hidden just in case someone else comes out,” she suggested as she pulled out a ball of thick twine and began hog-tying one of the Night Masks.

Alias sheathed her sword and dragged the thugs down the alley, stashing them in the well of a basement door. When she returned, Olive was helping the boy rise to his feet. From the way he hopped and leaned, it was obvious he’d injured a leg, too.

“Easy, child,” Alias said, holding the boy’s upper arm to steady him. “You’re safe now.”

“Na’ a chil’,” the boy retorted and shook off Alias’s grip, but he was so disoriented that he began to fall backward. As Alias steadied him, he insisted, “I jus’ nee’ a minute. I’ll be fine.”

Alias guided the boy back to their hiding place behind the stack of crates. After a minute of steady breathing, he seemed to regain his balance and his senses. He touched his sore jaw and let out a string of curses—an imaginative array of gods’ names coupled with parts of the human anatomy that might have been amusing were he not so young.

“So what’s this all about?” Olive prompted the boy, all the while keeping her eyes fixed on the back door.

The boy shrugged. “Nothin’. My fault. There was some foolsilver in my payments, some bogus coins. They said I had to be made a ’zample for th’others.”

“Made an example? Who said that?” Alias demanded. “Who ordered those men to hurt you?”

The boy looked at Alias with suspicion. He withdrew into himself and would not reply.

Alias shook her head as she studied the boy. While nothing about his appearance attracted attention, making him the ideal delivery boy, he was obviously neglected and abused. His dark brown hair had been trimmed crookedly, probably with a knife, and certainly hadn’t seen a comb within the last month. He was rail thin and smelled heavily of unwashed flesh. His clothes, ragged gray trousers, a dingy white shirt, and a moth-eaten vest, were probably washed only when their wearer was caught in a rainstorm. Only his good eye, shining with savvy and cunning, set him apart from a zombie.

“Who was it?” Alias asked again.

“Leave me go,” the boy muttered. “I’m fine.” He turned and spat out some blood.

“You’re the picture of health,” Olive retorted. “Don’t let him bolt,” she warned Alias. “He’ll be right off to the head man to warn him about us.”

Knowing Olive was right, Alias positioned herself so that the boy could not slip past her. She couldn’t bring herself to play the bully, though. She pulled out a gold coin from the money belt beneath her tunic and held it out, twisting it so that it glittered in the late afternoon sun. “Tell me who gave those men orders to hurt you, and this is yours,” she offered.

The boy eyed the coin longingly but remained firm. “You think I’m stupid?” he asked. “One-Eye’d kill me if I told you anything. There’s nothing she don’t find out.”

“One-Eye?” Alias repeated.

“She?” Olive added.

Realizing he’d let slip this information, the boy muttered another string of curses. Then, apparently deciding he would be safer betraying his rescuers to One-Eye, he suddenly began shouting, “Help! Help!”

Alias shoved her hand over the boy’s mouth and pressed him against the wall. The boy struggled, trying to push her arm away, and when that failed, nipped at the swordswoman’s hand. “Be still and stop shouting,” she hissed. With her free hand she yanked her scarf off her head and shoved it in the boy’s mouth.

“Hold him tight,” Olive warned in a whisper. “Someone’s coming out.”

The back door swung open, and a short, dark-haired woman stepped out. She was dressed all in black leather, and her severe haircut and sharp facial features gave her a hawklike appearance. When she turned to look down the alley, Alias and Olive could see a black patch over her right eye. She held the straps of a heavily laden backpack, which clinked like chain mail when it bounced against her black-clad legs. She looked very annoyed.

“Knost!” she called out, then more uncertainly, “Marcus?” She looked up and down the alley, tapping her black-booted foot impatiently.

Alias noticed the boy had ceased struggling and had begun shaking with fear.

“Damned fools,” the black-clad woman muttered. She went back inside the tavern.

“One-Eye, I presume?” Alias asked.

“Undoubtedly,” Olive replied.

One-Eye reappeared in the alley, this time with the muscle-man, who doubled as a bouncer.

“—damn fools probably went too far again,” One-Eye was saying. “They’d better pick a better spot to dump the body this time. Come on,” she said, handing the muscle-man the backpack. He shouldered the pack and followed on One-Eye’s heels.

“You’ll have to hold onto the kid,” Olive said, “so I can follow the money.”

Alias nodded. “Be careful,” she whispered.

“You never let me have any fun,” the halfling sniffed. Then she sneaked off after the pair of Night Masks.