Blood Rites by Peter North

Author:Peter North [North, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: anonymous
Published: 2023-06-04T16:00:00+00:00

22

Fresh Meat

The market wasn’t busy enough that Lazarus felt comfortable walking through the middle of it. Hundreds of people had seen him fighting in the pits and might recognize him as the prisoner who’d killed Gomrash and the overseer.

Despite the fact that the baron had sent him on this mission, he didn’t seem to have communicated the fact to his guards. Whatever creature was possessing Baron Xander Blackwood didn’t care much for how humans conducted their business, just so long as the blood pact was fulfilled.

Sylvia had confirmed as much when she had him sneak out of the manse and warned him about Rolf and the possibility of guard dogs at the gatehouse.

Unfortunately, if he didn’t walk straight through the center of the courtyard, he had no choice but to sneak past Bailiff Fane’s house, which was attached to the main jailhouse. That would put him between the jail and the gatehouse—next to the entrance to the dungeons belowground—which would mean sneaking right past Rolf and the dogs.

Lazarus stood at the edge of the bustling market in the shadow of a large tree growing behind the fence in the manse’s garden. He inspected each stall, its merchant and patrons, and tried to determine the best line past the courtyard and toward the stables.

One stall intrigued him more than the others. A butcher, dressed in a blood-stained white apron and dingy white undershirt, made a show of sawing at a massive animal haunch. The shadow of a black beard made his pale skin appear blueish in color, and the stain stretched all the way down his neck and into the collar of his grimy shirt.

The man’s heavy brows almost covered his eyes as he drew them into a scowl of concentration. Every so often he would tear off a piece of wet, pink flesh from the haunch and hang it from a hook on the frame above his table, where it would drip onto the wooden surface, spill down the front of the table, and pool on the cobblestones. Flies buzzed around the meat, landing on the hanging slabs, only flying away when the butcher came to hang another piece.

Lazarus noticed most of the patrons avoiding this stall, though occasionally a well-dressed noble woman and her maid might approach and look over the selection with discerning eyes. The butcher nodded politely to the wealthy patrons, showing them his wares. But for the poor, stooped townspeople who neglected to stop, he had a different look. Almost hungry.

Lazarus examined the haunch of meat once more, trying to determine what kind of animal it might have come from. Deer, maybe? Or pig? It was difficult to tell from that distance.

But he recognized the look in the noblewomen’s eyes as they selected their cuts of meat. It reminded him of the frenzied hunger he’d seen on their faces during the baron’s private fights. Lazarus remembered the way he’d be led away, leaving his defeated opponent in the room with Baron Xander, Captain Ebonsang, and the glassy-eyed nobles, their faces flush with excitement.

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