He’d taken the book because, if the Watch found that, there was no telling what lies they might spread. He hurried down the steps, swinging the pack onto his back. Once on the shop floor, he started for the loading door that was still open to the alley.
He stopped as he saw the staff still leaning against the wall, then dashed to the far side of the shop and grabbed it. No one questioned staffs, and it was something else he didn’t want to leave, although he couldn’t have said why.
“Hurry!” hissed a voice from the loading door. “The Watch is almost out front.”
Kharl whirled.
Jekat gestured through the partly open loading door. “This way, ser! You got to run! Watch’ll get you otherwise.”
Should he follow the urchin?
Who else could he trust-who knew the alleys and the back streets?
Kharl ran, straight through the loading door. Abruptly, he stopped but for an instant to close the loading door behind him, before sprinting to catch up to the urchin who had begun to run, if slowly, toward the northeastern end of the alley.
“Can’t catch me!” Jekat yelled as he ran out of the alley and turned on Fifth Cross.
“I’ll get you!” Kharl yelled back. “You miserable urchin!”
Some of those on the cross street looked scandalized, others amused, and only one man tried to grab the elusive Jekat as Kharl raced after the urchin, trying to counterfeit the rage of a man robbed by a light-fingered boy.
Jekat darted into a serviceway, and Kharl followed, panting heavily. He might work hard in the cooperage, but he had not run so fast nor so far in years. The urchin slowed some and turned westward into the alley, again downhill. Kharl lumbered after him, down another road and up Fourth Cross, finally catching up with the beggar youth near the intersection of the alley off Fourth Cross and Old Mill Road, some five blocks southwest of where the chase had started behind his cooperage.
Jekat ducked into another serviceway, moving into the shadows.
“…give it to you, ser…can run…” panted Jekat.
“…give it to you…good idea…counterfeiting…theft…”
“No one…heeds…man…chasing a beggar lad…”
Kharl took some more deep breaths, half-bent over. He was still panting and soaked in sweat. “How…did you know?”
“…was watchin’. I saw the Watch run off. Coward.”
“So…now what do I do to keep out of Lord West’s hands?” asked Kharl. “Or Egen’s.”
“Same as I do,” replied Jekat. “You’ll learn.”
XXVI
In the twilight of early evening, Kharl leaned against the stones, trying to get comfortable in the narrow space between the two walls, one ancient brick and the other even more ancient stone, while attempting to ignore the greater stench from beyond the stone wall and the lesser from beyond the brick. Overhead was a roof of sorts, composed of odd pieces of timber and wood and covered with layers of discarded fabric and molded leather, but there was open space on each end of the makeshift roof. To the east the space ended in a wall of yellow brick. At the west end was a jury-rigged partition of woven branches and cloth. The ground had been scraped smooth and clean, but it was still hard.
“No one’s going to come here,” Jekat said.
“With the rendering yard on one side and the tanner on the other…and with no one knowing this space is here…I can see why,” observed Kharl.
“Even Werwal doesn’t know.” The towhead brushed back ragged-cut hair.
“You sure about that?” asked the cooper.
“Maybe…he does. But he wouldn’t say. Him and Sikal, they understand. Drenzel, he doesn’t know, never even comes back behind the dumping vats.” After a moment, the urchin looked at Kharl. “Suppose you don’t have many coppers?”
“I have a few,” Kharl replied. “I could only grab a handful or so before I got out of the cooperage. Didn’t have long.” For some reason, the deception bothered him, necessary as he felt it was.
“You give me a pair…I can get us a good chunk of fowl. Clean and hot. Tasty, too.”
“How will you manage that?”
“Enelya-she’s at the White Pony. Long as I got coin, they’ll get grub for me.” Jekat grinned. “Won’t do ale. She says Durol watches the barrels too close. See…what she does is put the fowl or whatever on the tab for someone. Slips it off to me then. Durol doesn’t care, so long as the coins match.” Jekat frowned in the dimness. “Mayhap, need three to get enough for us both.”
“You’re still a thief,” Kharl said, ruefully.
“Watch what you say. Without me and yer friends…”
“I know. I’d be dead or laid out in a gaol chamber, waiting to be hung.”
“If you were lucky. They took Quelyn and flogged him, then poured salt and tanning acid across his back-that was before-”
“Don’t think I need to know that, young fellow.”
“You should…Egen don’t like you. Never seen him put so many men after a fellow.”
“It’s enough to know he’ll do his worst if he catches me.”
“Real pissprick…girls at the Bardo say he doesn’t get excited ’less he thinks he’s hurtin’ ’em. Likes ’em young, too. Some of ’em cry real quick…real tears…They have to…”
Kharl winced. How could a lord accept that kind of man as his son? The more he learned about Captain Egen, the more despicable the image of him became in Kharl’s mind.
“You got those coppers?” questioned Jekat.
Kharl fumbled with his belt wallet and handed three to the boy.
“Good. There’s not a clipped one there.”
“You don’t think it’d be better for me to come with you?”
“Nah. Egen’s still got the Watch lookin’ for you, and you don’t know the alleys and the serviceways. Maybe we can find you some rags tonight.” Jekat eased along the uneven stone wall until he came to what seemed the dead end of yellow brick. There, after putting his foot up on a projection of stone, he climbed over the wall and vanished.
Kharl wondered if Jekat would ever return, but looking toward the cavelike area in the stone wall, where there were items like candle stubs, a rough pallet, and even a battered chamber pot, he had the feeling that the youth had nowhere else to go.
Like Kharl himself, the cooper reflected.
As the oblong of sky that Kharl could see to the west dimmed, he wondered how long before Jekat would return.
He looked from one wall to another, a space narrower than the gaol cell he’d been thrown into, if longer, and then back up at the patch of evening sky. He still had to ask how so many people accepted the evil around them. He shook his head. Most were like Charee. So long as things seemed orderly and life went on, they didn’t care about what didn’t affect them. After a moment, he laughed. He’d been no better.
The sky darkened into full night, and still Jekat had not returned.
Kharl frowned, more worried about the boy’s safety than about whether he would return.
Then there was the faintest of scraping sounds, a scuffing, and a muted thump, and the small figure in shapeless gray reappeared out of the darkness.
“It took Enelya a while tonight. White Pony was busy, but the bird’s good.” Jekat handed a bundle to Kharl, a goodly chunk of fowl wrapped in two huge slabs of bread.
“I take it back, Jekat,” Kharl mumbled after a large mouthful. “Couldn’t manage this…‘less you’re very good.”
“Wasn’t my doin’, not all the way, leastwise. Some sort of party. Had extras. Durol was probably happy to get the coppers. Or Enelya was.”
Even through the darkness, Kharl could make out a grin as the urchin raised a crockery mug without handles. “Have a swallow.”