From the southeastern tower of the Palace of Patience there dangled a half dozen cages on long steel chains, swaying gently in the wind like little spiders on cords of silk. Two of these were moving, one slowly headed up and the other rapidly descending. Prisoners condemned to the spider cages were not to be allowed a moment’s peace, so other prisoners condemned to hard labor would toil at the huge capstans atop the tower, working in shifts around the clock until a subject in a cage was deemed to be sufficiently unhinged and contrite. Lurching and creaking and open to the elements on all sides, the cages would go up and down ceaselessly. At night, one could frequently hear the occupants pleading and screaming, even from a district or two away.
The Old Citadel wasn’t a very cosmopolitan district. Outside the Palace of Patience there were canal docks and stables reserved for the yellowjackets, offices for the duke’s tax collectors and scribes and other functionaries, and seedy little coffeehouses where freelance solicitors and lawscribes would try to drum up work from the families and friends of those being held in the Palace. A few pawnshops and other businesses clung tenaciously to the northern part of the island, but for the most part they were crowded out by the grimmer business of the duke’s government.
The district’s other major landmark was the Black Bridge that spanned the wide canal between Old Citadel and the Mara Camorrazza: a tall arch of black human-set stone adorned with red lamps that were fixed up with ceremonial black shrouds that could be lowered with a few tugs on a rope. The hangings were conducted from a wooden platform that jutted off the bridge’s south side. Supposedly, the unquiet shades of the condemned would be carried out to sea if they died over running water. Some thought that they would then be incarnated in the bodies of sharks, which explained why Camorr Bay had such a problem with the creatures, and the idea was not entirely scoffed at. As far as most Camorri were concerned, turnabout was fair play.
Locke stared at the Black Bridge for a good long while, exercising that capacity for conniving that Chains had so forcefully repressed for many long months. He was far too young for much self-analysis, but the process of scheming gave him real pleasure, like a little ball of tingling warmth in the pit of his stomach. He had no name for what he was doing, but in the collision of his whirling thoughts a plan began to form, and the more he thought on it the more pleased he became with himself. It was a fine thing that his white hood concealed his face from most passersby, lest anyone should see an initiate of Perelandro staring fixedly at a gallows and grinning wildly.
3
“I NEED the names of any men who are going to hang in the next week or two,” said Locke, as he and Chains sat the temple steps the next day.
“If you were enterprising,” said Chains, “and you most certainly are, you could get them yourself, and leave your poor fat old master in peace.”
“I would, but I need someone else to do it. It won’t work if I’m seen around the Palace of Patience before the hangings.”
“What won’t work?”
“The plan.”
“Oh-ho! Nervy little Shades’Hill purse-clutcher, thinking you can keep me in the dark. What plan?”
“The plan to steal a corpse.”
“Ahem. Anything else you’d like to tell me about it?”
“It’s brilliant.”
A passerby tossed something into the kettle. Locke bowed and Chains waved his hands in the man’s general direction, his restraints clattering, and yelled, “Fifty years of health to you and your children, and the blessings of the Lord of the Overlooked!”
“It would’ve been a hundred years,” muttered Chains when the man had passed, “but that sounded like a clipped half-copper. Now, your brilliant plan. I know you’ve had audacious plans, but I’m not entirely sure you’ve had a brilliant one yet.”
“This is the one, then. Honest. But I need those names.”
“If it’s so, it’s so.” Chains leaned backward and stretched, grunting in satisfaction as his back creaked and popped. “I’ll get them for you tonight.”
“And I’ll need some money.”
“Ah. Well, I expected that. Take what you need from the vault and mark it on the ledger. Screw around with it, though…”
“I know. Lead ingots; screaming; death.”
“Something like that. You’re a little on the small side, but I suppose Jessaline might learn a thing or two from your corpse anyway.”
4
PENANCE DAY was the traditional day for hangings in Camorr. Each week a sullen handful of prisoners would be trotted out from the Palace of Patience, priests and guards surrounding them. Noon was the hour of the drop.
At the eighth hour of the morning, when the functionaries in the courtyard of the Palace threw open their wooden shutters and settled in for a long day of saying “fuck off in the name of the duke” to all comers, three robed initiates of Perelandro wheeled a narrow wooden pull-cart into the courtyard. The smallest of the three made his way over to the first available clerk; his thin little face barely topped the forward edge of the clerk’s booth.
“Well, this is odd,” said the clerk, a woman of late middle years, shaped something like a bag of potatoes but perhaps not quite as warm or sympathetic. “Help you with something?”
“There’s a man being hanged,” said Locke. “Noon today.”
“You don’t say. Here I thought it was a state secret.”
“His name’s Antrim. Antrim One-Hand, they call him. He’s got-”
“One hand. Yes, he drops today. Fire-setting, theft, dealing with slavers. Charming man.”
“I was going to say that he had a wife,” said Locke. “She has business. About him.”
“Look, the time for appeals is past. Saris, Festal, and Tathris sealed the death warrant. Antrim One-Hand belongs to Morgante now, and then to Aza Guilla. Not even one of the Beggar God’s cute little sprats can help him at this point.”
“I know,” said Locke. “I don’t want him spared. His wife doesn’t care if he gets hanged. I’m here about the body.”
“Really?” Genuine curiosity flickered in the clerk’s eyes for the first time. “Now that is odd. What about the body?”
“His wife knows he deserves to get hanged, but she wants him to get a fairer chance. You know, with the Lady of the Long Silence. So she’s paid for us to take the body and put it in our temple. So we can burn candles and pray for intercession in Perelandro’s name for three days and nights. We’ll bury him after that.”
“Well now,” said the clerk. “The corpses usually get cut down after an hour and tossed into holes on the Beggar’s Barrow. More than they deserve, but it’s tidy. We don’t usually just go handing them out to anyone who wants one.”
“I know. My master cannot see, or leave our temple, or else he’d be here to explain himself. But we’re all he has. I’m supposed to say that he knows this is making trouble for you.” Locke’s little hand appeared over the edge of the booth, and when it withdrew a small leather purse was sitting on the clerk’s counting-board.
“That’s very considerate of him. We all know how devoted old Father Chains is.” The clerk swept the purse behind her counter and gave it a shake; it jingled, and she grunted. “Still a bit of a problem, though.”
“My master would be grateful for any help you could give us.” Another purse appeared on the counter, and the clerk actually broke a smile.