The Girl on the Liar's Throne by Den Patrick

Author:Den Patrick [Patrick, Den]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Orion Publishing Group
Published: 2015-11-19T07:00:00+00:00

The taverna was not far from where the whores had their pitch. Eris contemplated her revenge during the short walk. She would have them thrown in the oubliette – once she had managed to get inside the castle. She luxuriated in the planning of her retribution, impatient to see the looks on their haggard faces as the Myrmidons arrested them. She imagined setting the iron grille in place as they screamed for mercy.

The taverna shed golden light from latticed windows. Eris knocked at the door with numb fingers, wincing at the pain. The door opened onto a gruff face. Grey stubble and creases were drawn into a frown. The man’s main attribute was an overlarge nose featuring a slew of broken blood vessels. This was a face well acquainted with late-night drinking and all the regrets that accompanied it.

‘You’re not covered in shit, are you?’ Eris looked at her muddied clothes. ‘Because it smells bad enough in here as it is.’ He gestured back over his shoulder with a hand like a shovel.

‘Ah, let her in, before she catches her death,’ shouted another voice from inside.

The sleet had thickened to snow, falling with greater intensity, promising a miserable journey home for the revellers.

‘You’d best come in,’ he grunted. Eris stepped over the threshold, clutching her shawls about herself, shaking a flurry of white from the fabric.

‘Close the door against the draught, Peppino!’

‘Ah, look! She’s like a drowned kitten,’ said a female voice much slurred with drink.

Eris couldn’t disguise the revulsion she felt. The man behind the bar was broad shouldered with a neck as wide as the blunt dome of his skull. He wore a singlet beneath a greasy leather apron, arms maps in flesh, pale scars tracing every route to pain and hardship. She’d been here before. This was the taverna where Marchetti had stayed.

‘Come in, dearest, come in.’ A woman in her fifties grinned. There was a great deal lacking in her smile – of teeth and humour. ‘We’re drinking to the end of the world. Can’t be long now, dearest, can it?’

The cittadini were every bit as disgusting as the wretches attending Erebus. They were scarcely human, shambling things awaiting an unnamed apocalypse, too lazy or stupid to escape. A dozen of them took succour from tumblers, fussing at dice or cards. The smell of cooking lingered on the air, its rank fumes diminishing any appetite Eris had.

‘Here! Look, there’s someone else.’ Peppino wrested a cudgel from a place of concealment. ‘Bravo in a cloak with a black bird on his shoulder.’

Eris turned so hard she stumbled, silencing the ragged assortment of patrons. Peppino fixed her with a look, then locked the door. Furtive glances were directed at the windows, the glass smeared and misted with condensation. None could mistake the shadow that fell across the panes, deeper darkness in the winter night.

‘He’s not coming in here,’ said Peppino, ‘not while I’m standing.’ The drunk drew himself up to his full height, made ridiculous by the vast gut that hung over his belt.

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