Once Caro reached his side, Agis pointed down the alley and said, “The old man warned me not to go to Shadow Square. Have you ever heard that there’s anything particularly dangerous about it?”
“No, but I doubt that your friends would have suggested you meet there if that were the case,” Caro replied, squinting up at Agis.
On one of Caro’s wrinkled cheeks was a yellow bruise the size of a fist. Hidden beneath the dwarf’s robe were several similar marks and a few lash wounds. Though the evidence of his valet’s beating angered the noble, he was relieved that the old servant had not suffered more. From the violence Caro had described, Agis had expected his slave to have any number of broken bones and deep, purple bruises from head to toe. Still, the senator knew even a minor wound could be painful, if not dangerous, for someone as old as Caro.
“It’s only been two days since your escape,” Agis said. “Are you sure you’re up to this?”
“Didn’t I say I was?”
“Yes, but I know how dwarves are,” the noble replied. “You’d die before you admitted you need to rest.”
“I’m fine,” Caro replied. “Let’s go.”
Agis started down the cramped street, his servant walking a step behind to watch for pickpockets. Though the midday sun could have baked bricks, the heat did not hamper the bustle of activity in the Elven Market.
The street was lined by two- and three-story buildings that had not been plastered or painted, but simply left the natural grayish brown of their bricks. The first story of every building contained a shop with a broad door and a pass-through counter that opened to the sidewalk. The sly, leathery faces of elven merchants leered out of every window or door, inviting passersby inside to examine the exotic wares their tribes had brought to Tyr: unbreakable giant-hair ropes from Balic, fingerbone necklaces from Gulg, shields of impenetrable aga-fari wood from Nibenay, even fleece from the legendary Silt Islands.
Sometimes an elf stretched his slim torso over a counter to tug at the sleeve of a well-dressed human or to pinch the purse of an unwary wanderer. Other times, one of the seven-foot shopkeepers blocked the path of an intimidated customer, babbling in a melodious voice about some worthless trinket.
In the center of the street, men and women of all races scurried along in a tight-packed stream, their hands clutching their purses and their eyes alert for trouble. Here and there, the stream temporarily parted as it passed a pile of debris or a pair of brawling elves, no doubt serving as bait for cutpurses working the crowd.
Agis walked down the middle of the avenue, for he had no interest in anything the elves had to offer. Most represented nomadic tribes that bought goods plentiful in one city and hauled them across the desert to sell in another place where such items were rare. In theory, this was what any merchant did, but the shifty elves were seldom satisfied with an honest profit. Elven tribes usually bought inferior goods and sold them at outrageous prices, or they raided legitimate merchants in the deep desert and sold the stolen cargo as their own.
After several minutes of struggling through the crowd, Agis reached the point the old man had indicated-a dilapidated pawnshop, identified by the three ceramic spheres hanging over the door. He slipped out of the throng and stepped toward the alley, pausing to make sure Caro followed.
“Hey, fellow!”
The voice belonged to a golden-haired elf who leaned against a wall just outside the alley. Taller even than most of his kind, the elf wore a tawny burnoose wrapped around his lanky body and had a bronze, weatherbeaten face with cloudy blue eyes. “You lookin’ for magic components? I got glowworms. I got wychwood. I even got powdered iron.”
“Isn’t that stuff against the king’s law?” Agis asked, hoping to silence the huckster.
The elf raised his peaked chin. “You a templar?”
“No.”
“Then what d’you care?” He looked away indignantly, leaving the noble to stare at a pointed ear caked with dirt.
Agis stepped into the alley, Caro following behind. The tall buildings provided some shade from the sun, but little relief from the oppressive heat of the day. Nevertheless, paupers and beggars had taken refuge in its shadows and lined both sides of the narrow corridor. As Agis picked his way through their legs, they silently extended their bony hands and filled the lane with desperate pleas for water and money.
Resisting the temptation to part with a handful of coins, Agis glanced over his shoulder at Caro. “This is what comes when a king cares more about magic than he does his subjects,” he said angrily. “If Kalak hadn’t rejected my proposal to set up relief farms outside Tyr, these people would have food, water, and beds.”
“They’re free,” Caro replied. “At least they have that.”
“Freedom won’t wet their throats,” Agis snapped. “You’ve been a servant for most of your life. You know that such service means you’ll always have enough to drink and eat, and a soft bed to sleep in.”
“I’d be glad to go hungry and thirsty a few days in exchange for my liberty,” Caro replied, stepping to Agis’s side.
“Ever since you escaped from the press gang, you’ve been talking like this. Why?” Agis demanded. “Is there something you need? Just ask and you know I’ll give it to you.”
“I need my liberty,” Caro answered stubbornly.
“So you can join these wretches? I won’t do it. You’re better off as my servant,” Agis said. He swept his hand at the alley of derelicts. “They’d all be better off as my slaves.”
“But-”
“I won’t discuss it any further, Caro,” Agis said, reaching the other end of the rank-smelling lane. “Don’t bring the subject up again.”
“As you wish,” the dwarf said, once again falling a step behind his master.
The alley opened into a plaza, as the old man had promised. The scene in Shadow Square seemed more chaotic than the merchant row on the other side of the alley, but Agis saw nothing particularly dangerous. Dozens of tents had been pitched by elves either too poor or too cheap to rent a storefront. These elves were vainly accosting the dozens of half-elves, dwarves, and humans who carried large ceramic pots toward the center of the square.
There, a templar and a pair of half-giant guards collected a small tax from the pot-bearers for the privilege of filling a jug from the public fountain. It was a slow and tedious process, with a long waiting line, for the fountain consisted of a single trickle of water spilling from the mouth of a stone statue. The artist had shaped a braxat from the stone, a huge, hunchbacked creature resembling a cross between a baazrag and a horned chameleon. It walked on its hind legs and had a thick shell covering its back and neck. Agis could not imagine why the king’s sculptors had selected such a grotesque beast for a fountainhead, save that the city populace was always curious about the seldom-seen creatures that roamed the wastes.
Looking away from the fountain, Agis walked along the edge of the square, carefully studying the symbols painted above the building doorways. There was no writing on the signs, for in Tyr, as in most other Athasian cities, only nobles and templars were permitted to read or write.
At last, Agis came to a red sign portraying a man mounted upon a kank, one of the giant insects that caravan drivers often used as beasts of burden. The insect had an abdomen from which was suspended a globule of honey. Judging that he had reached the Red Kank, Agis entered the suphouse, Caro close behind.
Lit only by a handful of narrow windows, the interior of the building was quite dim. As Agis stood near the door, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, the babble of voices inside quickly died.
Once his eyes were accustomed to the shadows, he found himself standing in a small square room. Dozens of surly-looking elves stared at him with intolerant expressions, their hands firmly closed around mugs of fermented kank-nectar, known locally as broy.