As luck would have it, he was busy tipping a tankard to his lips. Singe slapped at the vessel with his free hand, and beer cascaded over the man’s face. Wet and reeking, the man roared in fury and grabbed for him, but Singe skipped aside and stuck out his foot. The man went sprawling into another knot of merrymakers, who also let out furious roars. Singe didn’t wait to see what happened but whirled to two hatchet-faced women who had draped themselves in the colors of Karrnath, raised his rapier, and shouted “Graverobbers! Aundair is the true heir to Galifar!”
Sharn might have been set to celebrate Thronehold and peace, but the wounds of the Last War were still fresh, and it didn’t take much to tear them open again. The Karrn women howled and sprang forward.
And were met by a trio of Aundairians leaping to Singe’s defense with nationalistic pride. “For the Queen!”
Singe slipped back behind the other Aundairians, letting them take the edge of the Karrns’ attack. Or tried to. Abruptly, he felt the prick of dagger on his side, and a man’s voice with the accent of Cyre murmured in his ear. “Slick as the Traveler, my friend, but what do you say to going back to the Deneith enclave. Whatever they want you for, I could use the rew-agh!”
His words ended in a straggled sound as he and his knife were ripped away. A moment later, he went reeling past Singe toward the battling Karrns, propelled by Ashi. One of the women turned with lethal instinct and buried the hand-axe she fought with in his shoulder. The Cyran’s scream was gruesome, and some of his fellow countrymen rushed to his aid, turning indiscriminately against Karrns and Aundairians alike.
The beads woven into her hair sliding and clacking, Ashi whirled back to Singe, and although her scarf was once more tied firmly over her face, he could tell she was smiling. “I like Deathsgate much better than Overlook!”
Singe looked around. In a matter of moments, a wide swath of the crowd had been transformed into churning chaos as drunken brawl merged with patriotic violence. The people in the street who weren’t already embroiled in the fighting were in retreat, pushing and shoving to get away. The mercenaries from the Blademarks hall hadn’t even made it across the square yet.
He jammed his rapier back into its sheath and pulled Ashi along with the moving crowd. In moments, both fighting and mercenaries were lost to sight. Singe turned down another street, then another, finally stopping on the edge of a courtyard where the only hint of violence was a loud argument about a game of sundown. He leaned against the wall of a tavern with one hand and beat the other against his forehead. “Bloody moons!” he cursed. “Twelve bloody moons! Of all the times to lose the scarf …”
“It wasn’t my fault,” Ashi said. “At least we lost the Deneith guards.”
Singe drew a deep breath and tried to rein in his anger. “We lost the guards. We won’t have lost Mithas-he’s going to be looking for you now. You heard him. He recognized the Siberys Mark of Deneith.”
Ashi’s eyebrows drew together. “He only saw my face.”
“That would be all he needed. He knows what he saw. I told you, he’s ambitious. He knows what bringing you to the lords of Deneith would do for his status in the house.”
“You know a lot about him.”
Singe let out a sigh. “When I first joined the Frostbrand, he was Robrand d’Deneith’s lieutenant. Robrand dismissed Mithas when his gambling nearly put the company in danger-and not long after that, he made me lieutenant in his place.” He pushed himself upright. “I suppose we were rivals before that, though. Sorcerers and wizards don’t always get along. His magic is instinctive. I had to work at mine, but I surpassed him. Mithas is the kind of person who doesn’t like seeing anyone get ahead of him.”
“Do you think he’ll send House Deneith after us?” Ashi asked.
“Probably not. That would play his hand too soon. I wouldn’t underestimate what he could accomplish on his own, though. This isn’t good. It isn’t good at all.” He rubbed fingers across his eyes in frustration.
The motion brought a crinkle of paper from his vest. He reached into his pocket and extracted the message that had been waiting for him and looked at it. “You know,” he said, “I don’t even know that this is from Geth. I told him to send a message by Orien post, not Sivis messenger.”
“Are you going to look?”
Singe shrugged and broke the wax that had sealed the message-if Mithas had read it, he managed to seal it up again-and scanned the few lines written on the gray paper in the neat script of a gnome scribe. His mouth twitched, and he squeezed his eyes shut, but he could still see the words.
“Is it from Geth?”
“It’s from Geth,” he said. He opened his eyes and read the message:
5 Aryth
Singe,
We got to Zarash’ak yesterday. Staying with Bava. She gave us money for Sivis and says hello to Natrac. Buying a boat and heading up river to Fat Tusk tomorrow. Good luck in Sharn. Send word back to Bava if you’re still alive when this is over.
Geth
He folded the message again. His jaw ached, he was holding it so tightly. “I suppose I shouldn’t have expected anything more than that, but twelve moons-all that trouble and this is what we get!” He crushed the message in his hand.
“We got something else,” Ashi said. She held out the scrap of paper she had acquired in the Deneith enclave. “This was on the pillar by the Sentinel Marshals display.”
“The pillar of warrant-notices?” Singe took the paper and smoothed it out.
It was indeed a warrant-notice, now somewhat torn by Ashi’s removal of it from the pillar. It had yellowed with age, and Singe guessed that it was many years old. Many years also separated the face printed in woodblock on the notice from the face that Singe knew, but both the face and the name below it were familiar.
Natrac of Graywall. Wanted in Sharn for extortion, arson, armed assault, assault and battery, fraud, theft, suspicion of murder, suspicion of slave-trading …
The hood of his cowl pulled low, Natrac slid a few copper crowns across the bar. The wood was rough, cracked from moisture and scarred by blades. The old goblin on the other side of the bar had a face to match and big eyes that didn’t look like they missed anything. He made the coins disappear with the practiced ease of an old pickpocket and said in the guttural language of his race, “I’ve seen someone like that second fellow. Wears a hat that shades his face and covers his ears, so I don’t know if he’s a half-elf for sure, but he’s got the build and he doesn’t bother to hide his hair. Long and blond. I know people who would kill for that hair. Wigmakers pay good money.”
Vennet. Natrac’s gut tightened and his belly gurgled from watery ale consumed in nearly a dozen vile taverns. “Where did you see him? When?” he asked in Goblin.
“Two Boot Way near Nightpot Close.” The bartender shrugged skinny shoulders. “I’ve seen him a few times. I cut that way when I come to work.”
“Was there anyone with him? The pale human with green eyes I asked about?”
The goblin examined him for a moment as if assessing whether he could get another bribe out of his mysterious visitor, then shrugged again. “No. Haven’t seen anyone like that.”
“What about a heron … a big, skinny bird with black feathers and green eyes?”
This time the goblin snorted. “You look like you know your way around, chib. When have you ever seen a bird in Malleon’s Gate?”
Natrac had to admit that he had a point. He took a sip from the mug of ale that the goblin had put in front of him when he’d first approached the bar.
Dandra and Singe weren’t going to be happy that he’d risked going down to Malleon’s Gate alone. Ashi would be furious that he’d gone to the dangerous district without her. If he’d been going anywhere else, he would have brought all three of them along-Lords of the Host, he thought, I’m not stupid! — but he had told Dandra the truth. Malleon’s Gate wasn’t the place to start a fight. One person could pass through the dens and lairs of the district with far less trouble than four. Especially if he knew his way around. In spite of the years since he’d left Sharn, the important things in Malleon’s Gate hadn’t changed. A couple of taverns closed, a couple more opened, a few old acquaintances dead, but he didn’t want to see old acquaintances. He’d made a point of talking only to people he didn’t know and who presumably didn’t know him. It had taken longer to get answers, but it had kept his head on his shoulders.