David Wragg - Articles of Faith

‘Oh,’ the prince said. Then, after a moment, ‘ What? ’

***

For a time, Chel slept. He woke to the sound of raised voices beyond the door. The sky visible through the grille still offered the crimson streaks of sunset. It could not have been long. The prince was snoring again beside him, and Chel nudged him with his good arm.

‘Voices.’

Tarfel stirred and sat up. His bruise had darkened.

‘Who do you think they are?’ Chel said. ‘Those that took us.’

‘Oh, they’ll be mercenaries,’ the prince said with a grimace.

‘Not Rau Rel?’

‘Of course not, partisans would have murdered me immediately. You know, “death to tyrants” and all that nonsense.’ The prince shifted uncomfortably. ‘I imagine I’m to be ransomed. Question is, who would have the gall to order my abduction?’

‘Well, considering we’ve just seen Grand Duke Reysel murdered by his own son, perhaps the usual rules don’t apply right now, highness?’

The prince put one hand on his weak chin. ‘A little patricide isn’t uncommon, especially among northern Names. Notoriously emotional bunch, prone to hysteria.’

‘Morara and Esen meant to kill you, too, highness, and make it look like the Norts were responsible. Unless … Unless …’ Chel had told no one of the confessors beneath the Nort masks, but he had announced in front of Count Esen that he knew that the Norts were false. Had he doomed all those present in doing so? Was this his fault?

Tarfel ignored him. ‘Exactly, and now I’m kidnapped! Who would dare hold the kingdom to ransom?’

‘I’m not convinced that our kidnappers and your would-be assassins were working toward the same ends, highness.’ Seeing as one lot seem to have murdered the other.

‘Since Father’s Wars of Unity ended – the first time, at least – a few outposts of resistance to his rule have lingered: the southern territories, of course, the so-called free cities of the North, that grubby lot in the south-west … But none of them would risk bringing down the fury of the crown by stealing a prince.’

‘Are you sure it wasn’t the Rau Rel?’

‘Don’t be absurd. A gaggle of mud-farmers have no coin for mercenaries, even barely competent ones. Mud-farmers, dissidents, disgraced minor nobility, barely a name to their, er, name.’ He rubbed at his elbow, bruised from impact on a vegetable sack. ‘This was one of our continental rivals. They were imperial colonies when the Taneru ruled, and now witness their impudence. They shall pay for this, the moment I am freed. I shall not forget this insult.’

Chel nodded, turning away and rolling his eyes. ‘Of course, highness.’

Tarfel’s pout froze, gradually replaced by a faraway, fearful look. ‘Our bargain stands, doesn’t it? Chel? See me to safety, I’ll see you released.’

‘On my oath, highness. And if it’s really mercenaries on the other side of the door, maybe we can make them a better offer.’

Chel crept forward, feeling every ache of the damage the previous twenty-four hours had wrought on him, and pressed his ear to the door.

***

‘… cutting it fine, boss. Any finer we’d have been wafers.’ A rumbling, gentle voice. Peeved.

‘Not my choice. We had a run-in with some of our friends of the cloth.’ Chel remembered that voice: the beggar’s growl. He rubbed his good hand over his strapped shoulder and bared his teeth. So that was his kidnapper after all.

‘Ah, hells. I thought we’d be rid of the pricks at least.’

‘They had freelancers. Half a dozen horse-archers. Mawn if I’m any judge – and I am. They butchered some local militia they must have taken to be us.’

‘Twelve hells, boss, Mawn this far east?’

‘Forget it. We’re alive, and back on track. Despite enough cock-ups to leave a convent smiling.’

‘Ah, don’t be blaming me again, man!’ A reedy voice with a strong accent. Somewhere over the southern waters, Clyden most likely. ‘Told you before, friend Spider was covering while I took care of business. It’s not my fault I get tummy trouble, I’m delicate downstairs. You know, come to think it, could be a waterborne parasite from that last crossing. You ask me, it’s a wonder that we’re not laid low more frequently, given how often—’

‘Stop eating half-pickled fucking fish for breakfast, Lemon!’

‘I wasn’t the only one dropping bollocks out there, man! If Loveless could hold back on fucken every pretty thing she lays eyes on, we’d—’

Chel heard the creak and thump of the outer door.

‘We were just talking about you,’ the beggar said.

‘Nothing good, I hope,’ came the reply. ‘She’s aboard, by the way. In case you were worried.’

‘Not for a moment.’

‘No doubt. She wants a word. Or equivalent.’ The newcomer chuckled at that, for no clear reason.

Chel heard the beggar growl at the others and stomp away, then the groan of the door in his wake. All seemed quiet. He shifted, trying to catch something, when the bolt thunked and the door flew open. He pitched forward into an aching heap on the boards of the hold.

A sinewy, shaven-headed man with an aquiline nose and an abundance of earrings stood over him, a nasty grin on his face. He wore a tight, sleeveless tunic, exposing arms marked with a fearsome quantity of company tattoos. ‘Hello there, fuck-nuts. Having a good snoop, were we? Hear anything good?’ He rolled him over with the toe of his boot.

Chel said nothing for a moment, feeling his body throb beneath the pressure of the boot. Two other figures were in the low room, but he was struggling to make them out from where he was pinned. ‘Only,’ he said after a moment, his voice cracked, ‘that the little one should eat less fish.’

The bald man bellowed a laugh at that, as did the woman behind him.

‘Little one? Little? I’d wear your balls for earrings if you had any, chum,’ came the Clydish voice. ‘I’ve got a fucken name.’

Chel spread his good hand, still prone. The bald man’s foot hadn’t moved. ‘We’ve not been introduced.’

The man laughed again and removed his boot, then reached down with a muscular hand and dragged Chel upward until he was sitting against the wall. ‘Fair’s fair, now. Tell the sand-crab your names, boys and girls.’ He added under his breath, ‘Not like it’ll make much difference in the long run.’

A woman stepped forward from the gloom. She was the most striking woman Chel had ever seen: maybe a hand shorter than him, with a short shock of hair, alchemical blue, and a jawline so strong it could have been sculpted from marble. She kept one loose hand on the hilt of a short sword that hung from her hip. He had to wrench his gaze away from her, worried she’d think him simple.

‘Well, you’ve met the Spider here,’ she nodded at the bald man. Spider leered at him. Her accent was soft but distinct, something foreign but eroded to little more than uncommon vowels. ‘And the large and amiable gentleman back there is Foss.’

Behind her, a shape shifted against the wall, something Chel had at first glance taken to be a pile of sacks. He was enormous: big hands, big face, wide around the middle. He looked like a small hill. His hair was tied back in a thick bundle of dark braids, and his curly black beard boasted two streaks of grey at the corners of his chin. He offered Chel an awkward smile.

‘I go by Loveless,’ the blue-haired woman went on, ‘and this fine specimen of Clydish stock is Lemon.’

The final figure bowed her head in acknowledgement. She was small and wiry, her pale skin splashed copper with freckles. A mountain of orange hair bounced above a face that was round-eyed and squarish. She still looked irked.

Tarfel shuffled out of the store’s darkness beside and above him. ‘Why are you called Lemon?’