Take A Thief v(-3 Read online

  Still —

  Alberich didn't look disgusted, and he didn't look annoyed, but Skif got a distinct impression that he was poised between being amused and being angry. “You — ” he said at length, leaning back in his chair and pointing a finger at Skif, “ — are the sort who would find a way around any order, so I shall not give you one. This information interesting is — useful, possibly — ”

  “But if I was to go out all ragged an' kip down on th'street where I know they's been snatching?” Skif asked. “While you kept a watch? It'd be more'n useful, I'm thinkin'. We got what we need for the makings of a nice little trap. An' it's one you can't set without a youngling for bait.” He stabbed his thumb at his chest. “Me. You daren't use anyone else.”

  Alberich's face went very, very still. “If you did not Mindspeak with Cymry — ” he said, very slowly.

  “But I do. An' you got Kantor. So 'tween them we can Mindspeak each other. An' I got some ideas that'll keep me from gettin' coshed, 'cause I know how they been workin',” Skif replied, and sat back himself. “You'll know when I get took, an' you can follow. You'll know when th' man hisself shows up. We can do more'n figger out who he is. We can catch 'im.”

  “It is very dangerous. You could be hurt,” Alberich pointed out immediately. “You can attempt to protect yourself, but that does not mean you will succeed.”

  “Then I get hurt,” Skif dismissed, feeling his jaw tense and his own resolve harden. “It'll be worth it.”

  Alberich half-closed his eyes and laced his fingers together, occasionally looking up at Skif as though testing his mettle. If this long wait was supposed to test his patience as well, it wasn't going to work that way, for the longer Alberich thought, the better Skif reckoned his odds to be.

  And when at last Alberich spoke, he knew he'd been right.

  “Very well,” the Weaponsmaster said. “Let me hear the whole of this plan of yours. I believe that you and I must do this thing.”

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  SKIF widened his eyes pleadingly and held out his bowl to anyone who even glanced at him. He certainly looked the part of a beggar boy. He hadn't worn rags like these since he'd been living at the Hollybush. It was a good thing that it was still very warm at night, or he'd be freezing in the things. They were more hole than cloth, and he couldn't imagine where Alberich had found them, couldn't imagine why anyone in the Collegium would have kept them.

  At least they were clean. His need for authenticity didn't run to dirt and lice, and fortunately, neither did Alberich's; a little soot smeared across his forehead, chin, and cheekbones provided the illusion of dirt, and that was all that was required.

  This time the place where Skif's transformation had taken place had been supplied by Alberich, not that Skif was surprised at the Weaponsmaster's resources. Alberich couldn't have walked out of the Complex in his sell-sword gear, after all.

  Alberich brought him to an inn where a Herald and a Trainee could ride into the stable yard unremarked. No surprises there; the innkeeper greeted him by name, and they took Cymry and Kantor to the stable, to special loose-boxes without doors. Then came the surprise, in the form of a locked room at the back of the stable to which Alberich had the key, and which contained both a trunk of disguise material and a rear entrance onto an alley. A beggar boy slipped out that entrance into the shadows of dusk somewhat later, and after him, a disreputable sell-sword whose face would be moderately familiar in the Exile's Gate quarter. Another purpose for all that soot on Skif's features was to disguise them. It wouldn't do for him to be recognized.

  Skif made his way quietly to Exile's Gate itself; then as if he had come in the Gate, he wandered the street in his old neighborhood, training his voice into a tremulous piping as he begged from the passersby. Mostly he got kicks and curses, though once someone gave him an end of a loaf, and two others offered a rind of bacon and a rind of cheese. Beggars here got food more often than coin, though there was little enough of the former. Skif went a little cold when he thought about a child trying to live on such meager fare.

  He got a drink at a public pump and wandered about some more as the streets grew darker and torches and a few lanterns were put up outside those businesses that were staying open past full dark. There were streetlights, but they were very few and often the oil was stolen, or even the entire lamp. He was ostensibly looking for a place to sleep on the street, out of the way of traffic. Actually he knew exactly where he was going to go to sleep, but he had to make a show out of it, because the child snatchers were almost certainly watching him. He also kept hunched over, both to look more miserable and to look smaller. The younger the children were, the more timid they were, the better the snatchers liked them.

  And behind him, going from drink stall to tavern, was Alberich. There was great comfort in knowing that.

  :Kantor says Alberich is very surprised at how good you are at this.:

  :A thief that gets noticed doesn't stay out of gaol long,: he replied, though he was secretly flattered. Now, if he'd really been trying to make his way as a beggar, he would never be doing it this way. He'd have bound up his leg to look as if he'd lost it, or done the same with an arm. No sores, though; people around here would stone him into some other quarter for fear of a pox. Then he'd stand as straight as he could and catcall the people passing by, a noisy banter that was impossible to ignore. He'd be cheeky, but funny, and not insulting. People liked that; they liked seeing a display of bravado, especially in a cripple. He'd be making a better go of it than this thin, wistful waif he was impersonating. And the child snatchers would avoid him. A child like that would never tame down, and would cause nothing but trouble.

  In his persona of woeful beggar child, he had a single possession that was going to make this entire ruse work — a wooden begging bowl. Perfectly in character with what he was, no one would even remark on it. And it was going to keep him from being knocked unconscious, because it was much deeper than the usual bowl and fit his head exactly like a helmet. Once he curled himself up in his chosen spot for the night and pulled his ragged hood over his head, he'd slip that bowl over it under the rags. When the snatchers came along and gave him that tap on the head to keep him from waking up when they grabbed him, he'd be protected.

  He also had weapons on his person; his throwing daggers were concealed up his sleeves. Alberich hadn't needed to tell him to bring them. Having them made him feel a good deal safer, although his first choice of weapon wouldn't have been one that you threw at the enemy. Or it wouldn't have been if he wasn't so certain of his own accuracy. It was very unlikely that he'd be searched. These beggar children never had anything of value on them. If they once had, it was long snatched by those older and stronger than they were.

  As he trudged away from the streets where people were still carrying on the minutiae of their lives and toward the warehouses and closed-up workshops, he felt eyes on him. The back of his neck prickled. The warehouse section of Exile's Gate was where most of the children had vanished from, and he knew now, with heavy certainty, that the snatchers were somewhere out there watching him, waiting for him to settle.

  Alberich was out there, too, and had taken to the same covert skulking as Skif's stalkers. He was hunting the hunters, watching the watchers, to make sure that if anything went wrong, Skif wouldn't be facing it alone.

  : He's seen two of them, anyway,: reported Cymry.

  He would never, ever have attempted this by himself, or even with someone who didn't also have a Companion. The key to this entire plan was that Kantor and Cymry could Mindspeak to each other, keeping Skif and Alberich aware of everything that was going on.

  The buildings here were large, with long expanses of blank wall planted directly on the street — you didn't want or need windows in a warehouse. There weren't a lot of places where a tired child could curl up to sleep. But where there was a doorway that was just big enough to fit a small body, or a recessed gate, it w
as dark and it was quiet, and no one was likely to come along to chivvy one off until dawn. Mind, any number of adult beggars knew this too, so the first few places Skif poked his nose into were occupied, and the occupants sent him off with poorly-aimed blows and liberal curses. He lost his bacon rind to one of them, not that he fought for it.

  But when he did find a place, it was perfect for the child snatchers, and thus perfect for his purposes. It was a recessed doorway, a black arch in a darkened street, with no one in sight in either direction.

  He sat down on the doorstep and pretended to eat his crust and cheese rind, then with a calculatedly pathetic sigh that should be audible to his stalkers, he curled up with his back to the street and his rags pulled up over his head. If that wasn't an invitation, he'd turn priest.

  As he stirred and fidgeted, “trying to get comfortable,” he slipped his wooden bowl over his head, exactly as he had planned. Once he had, he felt a good deal safer, and the back of his neck stopped prickling so much. There had been the possibility that the snatchers, lured by how harmless he seemed to be and the loneliness of the street, would try for the grab before he curled up for the night. He was glad their caution had overcome their greed.

  Gradually he stopped moving around, as a child would who was settling into sleep. He wouldn't find a tolerable position on this stone doorstep anyway, not after he'd gotten accustomed, not only to a bed, but to a comfortable bed.

  Spoilt, that's what I am.

  Once “asleep,” he held himself still as a matter of pride, although the stone under his hip was painfully hard and his arm was getting pins and needles. Eventually, he had to shift off of that, but when he moved, it was only the formless stirring that a child would make when deeply asleep. He should be asleep; the beggar child he was counterfeiting was in the midst of one of the better moments of its short life. It had a full belly, a quiet place to lie down, it was neither too cold nor too hot. No one was going to chase it away from this shelter until morning, and if rain came, it wouldn't even get too wet. Never having known a soft bed, the stone of the doorway would be perfectly acceptable since countless feet had worn the step down in a hollow in the middle into which Skif's body fit perfectly.

  Well, he hadn't had to sleep on the street, ever. That was partly because he was smart, but there was no telling how much he'd accomplished was because he'd been lucky. Mostly, he liked to think, it was because he'd been smart — though if Bazie hadn't taken him in, his life probably would have been a lot different. Harder, maybe. It depended on what he would have done after Beel warned him away from the Hollybush. If he'd gone back to Beel, he'd have had to make a statement against his uncle —

  That could have gone badly for him. He'd known that even when he'd been that young — it was the reason he'd run off in the first place. Maybe he'd have been safe in Beel's Temple, maybe not. Finding out which could have been bad.

  If he'd run, though… I think maybe I'd have hidden in the storage room of Orthallen's wash house. Then what? He didn't know. How long could he have gone on, sleeping in hidden places, stealing food from kitchens in the guise of a page?

  Cymry interrupted his speculations. :Kantor says they've all gotten together. There are three of them,: Cymry reported, interrupting his thoughts. She sounded indignant. :Three of them! For one little child!:

  Skif wasn't surprised. A pretty child, or one that was strong, was a valuable commodity. Having two to make the snatch and one to stand guard meant they could grab it with a minimum of damage to the merchandise. :That's so one can be a lookout in case their target's gone inside a yard or something,: Skif told her. :But I have to agree. Even two seems kind of much for someone my size.:

  :It's disgusting.: He had to smile at the affronted quality in her words. :Not that the whole thing isn't disgusting, but — :

  :I understand,: he told her. And he did. It was disgusting. He could think abstractly about a child as “merchandise,” but the minute he allowed himself to get outside of those abstractions, he was disgusted.

  :Skif, be ready; they're moving in.:

  He heard them in the last few paces; if he'd really been asleep, particularly if he was an exhausted child with a full belly, it wouldn't have disturbed him, but he heard their soft footfalls on the hard-packed dirt of the street. They were cautious, he gave them that, but waiting for them to finally make their move was enough to drive him mad. He had to grit his teeth and clench his muscles to stay put when every instinct and most of his training screamed at him to get up and defend himself.

  Then they were on him, all three of them in a rush.

  He was enveloped in a smelly blanket. Instinct won over control and he felt the mere beginnings of a reaction — but before he could even move, much less come up fighting, someone hit him a precise blow to the head.

  The bowl took most of it, as he'd anticipated, but his head and ears still rang with it. In fact, for just a moment, he saw stars. He went limp, partly with intent, partly with the shock of the blow, and when he could move again, he regained control over himself and stayed properly limp.

  They didn't dally about. They bundled him up cocoonlike in the blanket, one of the snatchers threw the bundle over his shoulder with a grunt of effort, and they were off at a lope. Whoever had Skif must have been a big man, because he carried Skif as if he was nothing.

  Cymry did not ask “Are you all right,” because she knew he was. And what she knew, Alberich knew. So there was no point in wasting time with silly questions, when Alberich needed to concentrate on following Skif's captors, and Skif had immediate concerns of his own to deal with. Skif concentrated on breathing carefully in that foully smothering blanket, staying limp, and keeping up the ruse that he was as completely unconscious as that blow to the head should have rendered him. This was the hardest part of the plan — to literally do nothing while his captor carried him off, and hope that Alberich could keep up with them. They only had to get to their goal, which might or might not be Londer's warehouse. Alberich had to stay with them while remaining unseen.

  Not the easiest task in the world; Skif had shadowed enough people in his life to know how hard it really was.

  He'd have to get the bowl off his head, too, at some point in the near future, or they'd figure out he wasn't what he seemed and he wasn't unconscious. Definitely before he got unwrapped, or he'd be in a far more uncomfortable position than he was now. So as the man jogged along, Skif worked his hands, a little at a time, up toward his head.

  The blanket smelled of so many things, all of them horrid, that he hated to think of what had happened in it and to it. It wasn't so much a blanket as a heavy tarpaulin of something less scratchy than wool. Was it sailcloth? It could be. He wasn't so tightly wrapped up in it that he couldn't move. He'd been “sleeping” with his arms up against his chest, so he shouldn't have too far to work them to get his hands on that bowl…

  He was glad he hadn't eaten much, since his head and torso were dangling upside down along his captor's back, the stench of the blanket was appalling, and the man's shoulder essentially hit him in the gut with every step. If there was a better recipe for nausea, he didn't know it. He'd have been sick if he hadn't been cautious about not eating much beforehand.

  Bit by bit, he worked his arms higher, moving them only with the motion of the man who carried him, slowly working his hands up through the canvas towards the bowl. Then, at long last, with the tips of his fingers, he touched it.

  With a sigh of relief, he pushed with his fingertips and ducked his head at the same time as the man stumbled. The bowl came off his head and fell off into the folds of the blanket. He was rid of it, and now he could —

  — not relax, certainly. But wait, be still, try to ignore the reek of the blanket, and remember the next part of the plan.

  :It looks as if your uncle's warehouse really is the goal,: Cymry said.

  He wished he could see. Hellfires, I wish I could breathe!

  But if Londer's warehouse was the goal, it couldn't be very m
uch longer. Alberich was supposed to have scouted the place during the day, so he'd be familiar with the outside, at least. Skif just wished that the Weaponsmaster was as good at roof walking as he was — if only they could have switched parts —

  Don't worry about your partner. If he says he can do something, and you've got no cause to think otherwise, then let him do his job and concentrate on yours.

  Well, that was easy to say, and hard to do, when it all came down to cases.

  It seemed forever before the men stopped, and when they did, Skif was gritting his teeth so hard he thought they might splinter with the tension. They knocked on the door, quite softly, in a pattern of three, two, and five.

  :Got it,: Cymry said. :Alberich doesn't know if he's going to try going in that way, but if he does, that will make it easier.: