Screams of Steel by Mike Stagg

Author:Mike Stagg [Stagg, Mike]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-02-16T22:00:00+00:00

Torant awoke at dawn the next day despite how late he and Laden had gone to bed. He walked into his main room to find some breakfast bread and check on Laden. When he did, he found the mattress was empty and the blankets scattered about. A quick look around the small room confirmed it.

Laden was gone. So was the sword.

4

Torant made straight for the Toad Dragon Inn. The squat, two-story building was indistinguishable from those around it but, as the First Stone Warden of Slate, Torant knew better. He knew that, although the nooks, crannies, and asymmetrical design gave the appearance of being many small buildings, the Toad Dragon Inn actually covered a full city block. He knew that the entire, block-wide expanse was covered by a single slate roof, the cost of which rivaled Lord Slate’s Keep itself.

Most important of all, he knew that the inn was the base for Grimson Bleat, the Thief-General of Slate.

The broad windows on the first floor were shuttered, as they usually were at this hour. Torant walked up to the great oak doors and knocked. When no one answered, he balled up a blunt fist and began to bang, hitting the door methodically in a slow constant rhythm. When the silence on the other side continued, he switched to hitting the door with the bone-pad of his knuckles, putting dents in the wood. He ratcheted up the speed of his strikes until the wood began to splinter. When he heard a scrabbling at the latch, Torant paused and the door cracked open.

“I don’ care what you heard,” said the voice on the other side. “We don’t serve from dawn to noon.”

“I’m not looking for service, Rollie,” said Torant. “I’m looking for your boss.”

A scruff of beard and squinting eyes stuck out the door opening. “I’m the boss here, Stone Warden.”

“Rollie. Open. Or I’ll come back with my men and start checking whatever’s going on in these rooms of yours.”

Rollie rolled his lips together so that it looked like he was munching his grayish beard. “Don’t think as you would.”

“Because it would make who mad, Rollie?”

Rollie squinted at him.

“Exactly. Your boss. Now let me in.”

Rollie muttered and backed up, opening the double doors. “Come in, come in. Now close the doors before the whole neighborhood thinks we’re open.” Once Torant entered, Rollie slid the great oak latch back across the door to lock it. Only a few candles and a lamp glimmered in the shuttered room, leaving it in almost complete darkness. “So now you’re in,” said Rollie. “We closed at dawn and I’ve not had but an hour of sleep since so tell me what ya want and be off.”

“I told you,” said Torant. “I want to speak with your boss.” As Rollie opened his mouth, Torant waved, “I know, I know, you don’t have a boss. Tell you what, let me speak to your best patron. The one that keeps your doors open and your inn safe even though you’re in the most dangerous part of town.

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