The Complete Darkwar Trilogy: Flight of the Night Hawks, Into a Dark Realm, Wrath of a Mad God. Raymond E. Feist
listened as Caleb gave him instructions. After he had left, Caleb told Jommy and Tad, ‘I need to go somewhere before I join you. If I do not arrive at the inn by first light tomorrow, go to the innkeeper and tell him you must leave the city on the first caravan north. Go to the caravanserai, but do not travel with the caravan. It is a code, someone will be there who can take you home quickly. Understood?’
‘Where are you going?’ asked Tad.
‘To see a man about what went wrong last night—’
‘Two nights ago,’ Tad corrected.
‘Very, well, two nights ago,’ said Caleb. ‘Someone knew we were coming, Tad, and we were given a proper thrashing. I’m sorry to lose so many good men, but what I need to discover now is how they knew we were coming and how they knew that you boys would be at the Willows, and if any other mischief has been done while I’ve been unconscious.’
‘Be careful, Caleb,’ said Tad. ‘I don’t want to have to tell Mum you’re dead.’
Caleb said, ‘That makes two of us, son. Now, wait for a few minutes and then go where I told Zane to go. Jommy, you first and Tad, you leave shortly after. If anyone’s looking for you, they’ll be looking for three boys together, not a single one on some errand. May Ruthia smile on you,’ he said, invoking the Goddess of Luck.
‘You, too, Caleb,’ said Jommy.
After Caleb left, Jommy said to Tad, ‘You’ve got yourself a hell of a dad there, mate.’
Tad just nodded.
Caleb had gathered his hair on the top of his head and stuck it under his hat. He wore a cheap cloak which hid his leather vest and trousers. He didn’t plan on being in public for long, but he didn’t want to run the risk of being spotted. Without a corpse to prove he was dead, Varen’s men would certainly be on the lookout for him.
He had left the safe house, surprised it was midday – he had lost all track of time since he had entered the sewers two days before. He worked his way through the city, just another outland traveller not dressed for the Keshian heat, but hardly the first foreigner to insist on wearing such outlandish garb.
Caleb’s first stop had been a modest moneylender with a shop on the edge of a minor plaza. After that he had visited a sword maker, where he purchased a new blade. Then he had headed to his present location – an alleyway leading into one of the more unsavoury parts of the city.
He had lurked in the shadows for nearly an hour, before what he’d been waiting for appeared: a young boy – but not too young; he had no use for urchins – he needed a youthful, inexperienced thief or beggar.
As the youth passed him, Caleb reached out and grabbed his collar. Pulling him backwards, he almost lost the boy as he tried to wriggle out of his tunic. Caleb tripped him and then put his boot on the boy’s chest.
He was scrawny, with black hair and dark eyes, and his skin could have been the colour of cocoa, but it was hard to tell under all the dirt on his face. He wore a simple grey tunic and shorts matching in filthiness, and his feet were bare.
‘Mercy, master!’ he cried. ‘I have done you no harm!’
‘No,’ said Caleb, ‘and I shall do you none, if you do me one service.’
‘Name it, master, and I will serve.’
‘How do I know you won’t run off the moment I lift my boot?’
‘I swear on all the gods, master, and by my grandmother, blessings upon her, and in the name of the Emperor, blessings be upon him!’
Caleb took a coin out of his purse and held it up. The boy’s expression instantly turned from terror to overt greed. Caleb removed his foot and the boy was up in a bound. He reached for the coin, but Caleb pulled it away. ‘After you have served me.’
‘Master, but how shall I know that I will be rewarded when the task is done?’
‘Shall I take an oath on my grandmother?’ asked Caleb.
‘No, of course, but –’
‘No argument, Little Lord of Lice,’ Caleb answered in idiomatic Keshian. ‘If you do not as I ask, then another shall see my gold.’ He knew that a single gold piece was more than the boy could steal or beg in half a year.
‘What must I do?’
‘What is your name?’
‘If it pleases you, master, I am called Shabeer.’
‘Go hence, Shabeer, and carry a message for me, then return here with an answer.’
‘And if the answer displeases you, master?’
‘You shall still be rewarded.’
‘Then what is the message, and to whom do I carry it?’
‘I must meet with whoever speaks for the Ragged Brotherhood. I need to speak with he who may bind the thieves and beggars of Kesh to a bargain. Much gold may be had, though there is equal danger.’
‘In matters of gold and danger, there is someone, master.’
‘Then go at once and I will remain here, but know that I have powerful friends. Treachery will bring you death; faithful service will bring you gold.’
‘I hear and obey, master,’ said the boy and he scampered off.
Caleb faded back into the shadows and waited.
TAL MOVED SILENTLY THROUGH THE SEWER.
He had no doubt about the authenticity of the message he had received earlier that day from Caleb and had been relieved to discover he was alive. Caleb had relayed messages between him and Kaspar, and now the three of them were to meet.
Tal’s only concern was the location of the meeting. He was following a filthy beggar boy named Shabeer through a river of sewage in a huge culvert under the slaughterhouse district of the city of Kesh. ‘My eyes are bleeding,’ said Tal.
‘In truth, master?’ asked the boy, concerned that if anything went amiss on this journey it would be considered his fault. The other foreign master had been generous beyond imagining and the beggar boy was desperate to keep him happy.
‘No, just a manner of speaking.’
‘You get used to it, here, master,’ said the boy.
‘How long does that take?’
‘A year, two maybe.’
Tal would have laughed, but he was trying hard not to breathe too deeply. He had been in several places over the years that he had judged to be unequalled in stench – Kaspar’s prison, known as the Fortress of Despair being foremost among them – but nothing could have prepared him for the overwhelming smell of this Keshian sewer.
He appreciated the reason for holding the meeting here – the slaughterhouses, tanners and other malodorous enterprises had been sectioned off near the edge of the lake, so they were far from the residential areas of Kesh, and lay on the lee side of the city so that the prevailing breezes blew the stench away. But the entire area still reeked.
They reached an outflow and Shabeer stepped on an uneven stone which was a cleverly disguised toe-hold. He levered himself into the outflow, and disappeared into the darkness.
As he was holding the lantern, Tal said, ‘Slow down, boy.’
He followed Shabeer and had to duck to stop his head from hitting the ceiling of the smaller outflow tunnel. The boy led him about two hundred yards, until they came to what appeared