John Anderson - The Dungeoneers

His father’s mouth worked back and forth, like he was chewing leather. Then he growled like a wild dog and pointed a raw, rough finger at Colm. “First thing tomorrow, we are going to take this to the magistrate and beg for leniency. Then we will spend all day, if we have to, tracking down every single person you stole from and returning their money, along with an apology and a promise to work off the debt you owe them for their forgiveness.”

Colm stood silent.

“Do you understand?” his father yelled.

“Yes, sir,” Colm mumbled.

“Go to your room. No supper. You probably stole something to eat already today.”

Colm wanted to protest. As a point in fact, he had passed by a fruit seller and noticed that several apricots had fallen beneath the cart, and he had actually helped the man gather them — he’d had no intentions of stealing from a peddler. Should he say something about that? Should he mention Seysha’s medicine or the empty pantry? Say something about how he had gathered in only a few hours what it would take his father months to earn?

And how easy it had been?

Instead he blurted out, “I didn’t get caught. Nobody saw me.”

But apparently that wasn’t the right thing to say, either.

“ I caught you,” his father said. “ I know. And even if I hadn’t, I’d hope your conscience would catch up to you eventually.”

“Dad, I…,” Colm started to say, but his father raised a hand.

“I don’t want to hear it right now. Just go.”

Colm looked to his mother, who nodded. He noticed his sisters’ eyes on him. Celia gave him a sympathetic shrug.

Colm walked to his room and quietly shut the door.

That night his stomach hurt. He sat and listened to the dinnertime conversation, what little of it there was. His father had demanded that no one speak of the money or of Colm, which, apparently, was all any of his sisters wanted to talk about, so nobody said much of anything. When Elmira asked where Colm was, his father said, “Hopefully on his knees in his room, praying for forgiveness,” and left it at that. After supper, the sisters were sent to their own rooms to read.

Colm listened to the doors close, then heard his mother scraping the dishes. Even over the rumbling of his stomach, Colm could hear his parents whispering about him, his father’s voice still gruff but at least quieted.

“What was he thinking?”

“He was thinking he could help,” his mother replied. “He’s a smart boy. And resourceful. And it’s not as if you make any attempt to hide our troubles, always griping about how much everybody eats, how much it costs to fix things, how there’s never enough to go around.” Colm heard the clatter of dishes being stacked on one another.

“That’s still no excuse,” Rove Candorly hissed. “I won’t have my son skulking about like a scoundrel or some petty thief, dipping his fingers into pockets, fishing for coins. Where’d he even learn to do something like that, anyways? I’m certain none of his sisters taught him. You know what the penalties for thieving are.”

Colm looked at his right hand. He had gotten used to being short a finger. In truth, it hadn’t been much of a hindrance — there were very few things five fingers could do that four couldn’t — and today being short a finger almost seemed a blessing, his one hand slipping more easily in and out of pockets. But to lose the whole hand? Colm tucked them both under his chin for safekeeping.

“What does it matter where he learned it?” he heard his mother say. “He’s obviously good at it.”

“Mina!” His father’s voice rose, then lowered again. “You can’t be serious.”

“I’m only saying that it’s remarkable, if you think about it. To pickpocket that many people in broad daylight and not get caught.”

“You’re not suggesting it’s admirable , what he did? He stole from people. Innocent, hardworking people.”

“Well, as to that, I’m not sure how innocent or hardworking every person in town is, not to speak of those sleazy merchants from upriver who charge twice what they should for half of what you need. And you tell me if you’ve ever seen a nobleman lift a finger to help someone beneath him. And no, I’m not suggesting it’s a good thing. I’m just saying it’s… astonishing . It’s a shame that he can’t put that talent to better use.”

“Now it’s a talent ? Our son is a criminal, and you are singing his praises? You’re incorrigible, woman.”

“Lucky for me you’re too stubborn to leave.”

Colm held his breath, waiting for one of them to speak again. When they did, it was his father’s voice, its edge blunted. Now resigned and thoughtful.

“It is a lot of coin,” he mused. “I wonder how much is there.”

And then his mother’s voice, an even softer whisper, nearly impossible to make out through the crack beneath Colm’s door.

“Let’s count it. Just to see,” she said.

A few hours later, after the table was cleared and all the candles had been snuffed, Colm heard his door open a crack and saw a wooden bowl of cold, congealed stew pushed inside, a hunk of bread sticking out of the top like a plume. He caught the flash of long strawberry curls before they disappeared, and he thought that there was more than one thief in the Candorly house that night.

Colm’s father was gone the whole next day, leaving a small pile of shoes waiting by his bench to be repaired. He was gone, and so were all the coins Colm had taken. Colm’s mother said that his father had decided to go to see the magistrate without him, afraid that Colm might do or say something to make it worse. The magistrate was the authority on most things in Felhaven, mediating disputes and enforcing the laws, elected by the villagers and nobles alike and serving as the chief official — though it was said those with deep coffers could persuade him to more consistently see their point of view. The plan was to see what the magistrate had in mind for punishment and then bring Colm before him afterward to have it meted out.

Colm tried to picture the magistrate. He had seen him on occasion, during festivals and funerals. A large figure with a plump, pink face and jowls that sagged like a bloodhound’s. He didn’t seem intimidating himself, but he no doubt had intimidating men who worked for him. At least his father and the magistrate were on good terms; Rove Candorly always fixed the man’s shoes for free.

Colm spent the day on his chores, trying to hide behind his work, dodging his sisters whenever possible. Not because they were being mean. If anything, it was the opposite. It took an evening of whispers among themselves, he guessed, but they understood what he had done, and more important, why. Kale and Carmen, the other two triplets, managed to corner him behind the barn, where they proceeded to smother him in hugs.

“It was stupid,” they said.

“You shouldn’t have done it.”

“I’ve never seen Father so angry.”

But also, “It was very sweet.”

And “How did you do it?”

And “Don’t worry. He’ll get over it eventually.”

The elder twins, Cally and Nila, promised that they would not let the magistrate touch one hair on his body and vowed to fight tooth and nail if some armed guard showed up at the door. Elmira called him a “widdle feef,” but in such an admiring way that he didn’t take the slightest offense. They all brought him oatcakes and tried to distract him, and left him alone when he asked. Colm tried to focus on what he was doing — weeding or milking — but his eyes kept coming back to the road leading from the house to the center of Felhaven. A road that his father would be coming back on. Maybe trailing the magistrate. Or someone worse. Someone with a butcher’s blade.