City of Masks by Kevin Harkness

Author:Kevin Harkness [Harkness, Kevin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy
Publisher: Tyche Books
Published: 2015-08-28T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

Talk at the Point of a Spear

THE REASONING HAD to wait because the door was locked and no one answered their persistent knocking. Dorict searched under his jacket for a moment, reaching this way and that until he produced a remarkable set of tools.

“What under Heaven’s Shield are those?” Garet asked.

Dorict smiled and shook his head. “Marick begged me to carry this thieve’s vest of his until he got better. I think he was afraid Banerict would confiscate it.”

Garet leaned over to look at the small blades and picks in Dorict’s hands.

“He might have, just to use some of those tools on injured Banes! Can they open this door?”

The Blue slipped the thin knife into the gap between the door and the jamb. He wiggled it back and forth until it stopped.

“If this is a simple bar, I might be able to raise it,” he said, and tried to force the blade up. It refused to move. He withdrew it and reached again into his clothes until he pulled out a long key-like tool. It was thin enough to slip through the gap, and its teeth were as long and sharp as a comb’s.

“The bar might be one that slides rather than lifts,” Dorict explained. “So this might move it back.”

“You seem very educated in this,” Garet said. “And yet I always thought you were an honest Bane!”

“I suppose a long friendship with Marick has ruined me,” Dorict said, and twisted the shaft of the tool. There was a grating sound, then another, and the door swung in a bit.

“Corruption be praised,” Garet said. “Here, put those back in your pocket and ready your club.”

He pushed the door wide and jumped in and to the side, but no attack came. Dorict followed. They edged inside, each taking a different direction and waiting for their eyesight to adjust to the dimmer light. Garet swung the door shut behind them and threw the bar across it. When they could see, they found themselves in a storehouse of sorts, with boxes and bales stacked against the walls and in the middle of the floor.

“Nobody here,” Dorict said. He moved further inside the room, checking behind each pile of goods.

“Wait, these carpets are meant for the Third Ward, or so the tag says. And this cask of wine has the Palace symbols on it!”

“There’s a cot here, and a bit of bread,” Garet said. He looked at all the stuff around them and shook his head. A gallery above them, reached by a ladder in the corner, had even more barrels and boxes.

“Perhaps the uncle is a thief.”

“Who says so?”

Garet and Dorict both turned to see a bearded, middle-aged man standing in the doorway, a tool remarkably like the one they had used still in his hand. In his other hand was a skin of wine.

He waved the wine skin at them, and a few droplets sprayed out.

“You two clear out or I’ll call the guard!” he slurred.

“Do you have that rope handy?” Dorict asked.

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