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workers rose before the sun in winter but no strangers. Bezul dug the cord,
the stone, and the cloth out of his scrip. He held them out for anyone to see.
People hailed him left and right the master of the changing house was known to
nearly everyone in the Shambles but no one noticed the cord, not in the
quarter, nor on the
Wideway where the wharves were empty, the tide was out, and the air smelled
like the cord dangling from his left hand.
From the Wideway, Bezul headed northwest, toward the bazaar and past streets
that would have him quickly back to the changing house, had he been returning
home. Toward the raw, knocked-together tournament stands as well. Perrez, that
epicure of rumor, claimed that both Ranke and Ilsig had put up the gold and
silver to host a first-blood tournament short of the old gladiator matches the
Vigeles clan used to run in the Hill, when it was still the estate quarter. If
Bezul believed Perrez, Sanctuary's importance in the minds of kings and
emperors was growing daily. If Bezul were ever fool enough to
believe his brother.
What Bezul did believe was that his brother's great scholarly talents were
currently being employed as oddsmaker and bookkeeper for scores of ordinary
folk who were squandering their savings on one duelist or another. Bezul
didn't care a tinker's damn who won the tournament; he'd made a point of
ignoring it, even forbidding Jopze and Ammen inveterate gamblers, like all
career soldiers to mention it inside the changing house. Time enough for that
when the tournament was over, debts were due, and the losers trooped into the
changing house to sell their clothes, their tools, anything short of their
wives and children.
Bezul reminded himself he needed to visit the palace soon to do some changing
himself: a sack of their valuable, but slow-moving, jewels in exchange for a
chest or two of Sanctuary's near-worthless shaboozh for cutting into padpols.
He came to the footbridge below the bazaar that connected the Shambles with
the fishermen's quarter where knotted, oiled nets hung by the armful over
every fence and wall. The bridge-keeper held out his hand for a padpol. Bezul
dug the smallest, blackest bit of pot-metal from his scrip and crossed the
footbridge, holding his breath against the stench rising from the midden ditch
beneath.
The men and women who crewed Sanctuary's fishing fleet lived by the tides, not
the sun. Their boats were out aad had left their moorings long before the
stone thumped against the changing house door. But there were other ways to
harvest a living from Sanctuary's waters. Across the White Foal River, the
Swamp of Night Secrets sprawled as far as the eye could see.
Night Secrets Swamp was larger than it been when Bezul was a boy. He could
just about remember how this part of Sanctuary had looked before the Great
Flood rechanneled the White Foal River. The slum-quarter his father had called
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Downwind had stood or slouched where thickets of swamp-scrub now grew. "Good
riddance," Bezul's father had said when he'd brought him to see the damage. Of
course, Sanctuary wasn't truly rid of Downwind. The Hill quarter every bit as
treacherous and squalid had sprung up before the flood waters receded and the
swamp wasn't exactly empty.
A hardy breed they called the Nightmen eked their livings from the shifty
waters. They were trappers, mostly, and not particular about what they snared:
fish and crabs, plume-y birds, soft-furred predators, or the occasional man.
When the Hand couldn't find better targets or victims for their madness,
they'd combed the swamp; and the people of Sanctuary Bezul included had heaved
guilty, but relieved, sighs: Better the Nightmen, than kith or kin.
For their part, the Nightmen did nothing to improve the impression they left
behind. They stood out in any crowd if only by the tang of their unwashed
flesh. The Irrune shaman, Zarzakhan, in all his fur-clad, mud-caked glory,
looked no more unkempt than the average Nighter. And as much as the Imperials
complained about the guttural belching of the Wrigglie dialect or the
Wrigglies complained about high-pitched Imperial chatter, both agreed that it
was impossible to converse intelligently with anyone reared in the swamp.
Still, Nightmen their women almost never crossed the river in their reeking
leathers were regular visitors at the changing house. They found things in the
mud old coins or bits of jewelry that weren't useful until traded away. Bezul
gave them what they wanted, Chersey gave them a little more, but the changing
house showed a profit either way. Fact was, a good many thieves had lost their
hoards when the White Foal flooded and there were rumors undying rumors of
riches hidden in the Swamp of
Night Secrets: the beggar king's hoard, the slaver's mansion, the treasure
troves of a half-dozen immortal mages, to name only a few.
Perrez Father Ils have mercy on his greedy heart believed every rumor and
Gedozia encouraged him.
She wouldn't forget that the family had once been jewelers goldsmiths and
gem-cutters on the Path of
Money. They'd never been as wealthy as their clients, but they'd lived very [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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