Tribute-Of-Flesh by Baron Blackswell

Author:Baron Blackswell [Blackswell, Baron]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-05-25T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Thistles

Enk and the three raiders-to-be peered over the edge of what seemed a mountain ledge, so tall was the rooftop of the tenement they stood upon. A rope ran from a tall block behind them down to a squat building below them. The Golden Cutpurse, Xanus announced, appalled and excited despite the toll of having to carry the young scion up dozens of flights of stairs. The sanctioned gambling den Panas Verga, the leader of the Dark Fang, called home.

“You sure we couldn’t just stroll through the front door?” Senet asked. Her hands gripped the edge of the rooftop, as if in terror of the dizzying plunge.

Sumula gestured at the gambling den’s barred doors. “This is the only way into the Golden Cutpurse when it’s closed unless you want to fight your way in. . . ?” He glanced in Enk’s direction while making the last part sound a question.

Enk coughed into his scarf, shook his head. He felt clothed in flames, yet was impossibly cold at the same time. “No,” he wheezed, “we can’t afford to bring the Peacebringers down on our heads. We need to do this as quietly as possible.”

Sumula nodded, turned and motioned one of Enk’s new thralls forward; Moss, a teenage boy with a shuttered lantern. He shuffled forward, wiping his runny nose on the sleeve of his overlarge overcoat.

Enk found himself studying Moss. In the rush to enthrall the thugs standing guard on the tenement’s rooftop, he had not paid any particular attention to any of them individually. But now he could not help but be bewitched, the same way he had been by his reflection in the sheet of ice. The boy’s face bared too many similarities to his own for him not to be. Moss even had the same blond hair, if spotted with strains of brown.

This, the young scion realized, is what he could have become in another life. The Runner for some gang, begging for his betters’ scraps.

The thought revitalized as much as it stung, made his blood boil in determination. So far, everything had gone to plan, but if anything were going to go wrong, it would be now. He knotted his hands into fists, inhaled into congested lungs, noticed that Xanus was speaking to him.

“What?” he asked.

Xanus motioned at the lantern. “What do you want us to tell them?”

“Tell them,” Enk intoned. “Tell them, it’s Waydell and three of his men. Say, we have important information to share.”

“You heard him,” Sumula told Moss. “Get on with it.”

Enk placed his gloved hand over Senet’s trembling own, and she glanced at him, tearing her gaze away from the distant ground. The fear retreated from her eyes as she stared at him. She tried to pull her hand free, but he held her fast.

“You don’t have to do this,” he told her. “You can stroll through the front door after I make the Dark Fang my own.”

Senet snorted. “Don’t worry about me; worry about staying conscious. You appear as if you’re about to slump to the ground at any moment.

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