ONE BENT COPPER – PATRICK HONOVICH
I.
Night. Dark doorways, damp streets, little motion and little sound. The deep thick of it, when scarcely anyone still moved about Correm. A man crossing one of the bridges with the steady pace of a familiar route and a fixed destination. Heavy clouds draped over the city from the storm that had blown in this week, but unpredictable gaps in the clouds meant a darkened street might suddenly be lit by full moonlight. Pretios moved with purpose but without hurry. The man he was going to see would still be there whenever he got there. Pretios preferred nights like this—though the dark of the moon might have been a little better, marginally, this would do just fine. He preferred that the light not reach the things he did. They knew not to summon him during the day, he wouldn't have come. As far as he was concerned, the days of darkness at the end of the war, when the whole world was still topsy-turvy and a man might get away with anything, they could’ve lasted forever and it would have been just fine. While everyone else hid from the crazy skies in their homes, afraid the world was ending, he’d felt free, as if he had the blessing of the gods themselves to do what he might. Night was the time when he was almost his own man, so he did his best to hole up somewhere safe when the sun was out and sleep his days away. Thankfully, it was Correm, and the ‘family’ never stopped moving so there was always something to do, no matter the time of day. As one of the corava, he'd sworn on his blood to see the dirty work and all the other terrible somethings done. In Old Imperial, pretios (to the very few higher-ups who knew it) meant ‘expensive’. No one ever called him by that (chosen) name. To everyone, high or low, he was simply corava, addressed as such without intent to slight and without any offense taken. A nameless man. One of the body-men who were used for the hard-edged hard-knuckle jobs. One among many nameless men, a vast crowd—he couldn’t have said how many. He didn’t concern himself with such things. Only what was directly relevant, what was directly ahead of him, what he needed to do now, and what he needed to do next.
Tonight, he was heading to the river-house, a ‘family’ holding. There he would meet with Adajanni. He would be given either a copper or a crown. The value of the coin would tell him what came next and how the 'family' wanted it to play out. A crown was special treatment, something more discreet, something more refined. A copper, especially if it was bent, meant he would play it ugly and mean. He was fine with either. Likely he would go back to his room above the Cocked Hat, where he had painstakingly shut out the light, call his day done, perhaps have a sip of cheap Corremantean whiskey and turn in. The next step would be the next night, when he rose. He hoped the storm held, but he was careful not to want it too badly. ‘Wanting’ led down a bad path, and he knew well enough to keep himself perpetually the empty vessel. It was not just his work, it was his nature.
In the West, he would’ve been well-built but a little on the short side, since they tended to be taller out there. In the South he would’ve been terribly underfed, but he’d always been thus, would never not be gaunt. In the Middle Kingdom he would’ve been jailed on suspicion. In the North, under control of the Hessar since the war, who was to say? Could fit right in, could be drawn and quartered on a whim—the new King was rumored to listen closely to his mad sister, which meant anything could happen. The Northern Wastes? Best not consider what that might be. The old blood there was better avoided. The East where he’d worked the most—Correm, Jearnum, Telek, Sackett, even Kerun once or twice—in the East he looked ordinary. Might be a drover, or a sailor, or a carpenter, or someone else entirely. Simple dress, a bald head, worn but well-made boots, sometimes a satchel sometimes not. His eyes had conclusively been said to be brown, green, gray, and once even pale blue. He bore no distinguishing marks—part of being corava. The body-men’s bodies must be unmarked, visibly unscarred, and thoroughly average, both a philosophy and a selection technique. There were ways to make sure of it, to erase even the traces left in the flesh.
He crossed the bridge, turned towards the bay and harbor, crossed back over another bridge and walked uphill. He turned left, went down a few more, and knocked on a pale green ashwood door with brass fittings slowly giving way to verdigris. The doorman knew him by sight, knew who and what he was, and let him in without a word.
Twenty-eight paces down a hallway he knew by heart. Left at the grand door, twelve paces, right to the smaller door, and he waited as usual while whoever was there before him finished up. He kept his gaze down, on the floor, careful calm eyes tracing the intricacies of a delicate pattern in the Shufarri weave. It was almost a game, or as close to it as a man like himself could come, following a thread from the border into the deeper pattern, seeing where the twists and turns came out. In some ways it mirrored his work, at least the part where he found people who definitely didn’t want him to find them. At the half-thought his hands gave a small tremble, stirred a little as if coming out of sleep. He waited a little longer. A man came out, hooded, his half-hidden face flecked with stubble, and brushed past him, hurried away with boots clomping down the hall. A voice called, “Enter,” so he did.
Adajanni, the second man in Correm, did not get up from the leather-backed chair behind the desk. It wasn’t necessary or customary to show more than a cursory notice of the corava at all—it was better for everyone, for the whole ‘family’ and the way it worked. Within the ranks, they were held at some remove, he and the others like him somewhat sheltered, somewhat shunned, outsiders even after many years of faithful unquestioning service. He didn’t mind it. None of the nameless men wanted to be part of the internal maneuverings, only to be used, the way a sharp blade wanted to be used but held no place itself. He was content to be the blade.
“Yes.” Adajanni, looked at him for a few moments, no more. He slid a coin across the surface of the desk, almost to the edge.
Pretios picked up the coin. A mis-stamped copper with dirt in the engravings, as worthless a coin as could be found, and as he picked it up, yes, slightly bent. He nodded. The family didn't want it quiet or clean. This time he was a messenger, sending a loud message to echo within the ‘family’ and in greater Correm as a whole. Adajanni tapped a small slip of paper on the desk, and Pretios picked it up, read it once to memorize the names. The real target wasn't on there, but the two or three others would tie up ends he couldn't see, and he felt no qualms about collateral damage. Pretios turned to the hearth, fed the note to the flames, holding it long enough to watch the names blacken and curl away to nothing, then dropping it down among the rest of the ash. Neither man spoke, but with a flick of the eyes he acknowledged the coin, and the list. He put the coin in a separate pouch at his belt, gave a half-bow, turned, and left. Forty-odd paces later he was outside again, and heading back to the Cocked Hat. It was another step. Three nights from now all would be carried out. Tonight all that remained was sweet oblivion, and dreamless sleep. He turned back towards the harbor.
It was winter in Correm, still the darkest time of the year. The few working lamps stood like uneasy sentinels in the falling snow along the few streets rich enough to still maintain them, too far apart to do anyone any good. They were too rare to make the Correm nights any brighter, instead making little pockets in the city feel like illusions, dreams of light and an eventual spring that seemed oh so far away. He skirted the lights where he found them, sticking to the comfort of the shadows, and his face remained expressionless, his hands tucked into pockets, his steps measured but not hurried.
This time of year it would snow in fits and starts for a few months, yet. The flat flakes, like little pieces of shattered saucers, were caught by the wind, swirled around in the air like some mad dance or the motions of ants after someone had kicked in the mound. Snow laid claim to everything, turned the streets and footpaths into messy grey slush which caked on the soles of his boots and made his toes ache. Where it stuck it frosted over the forgotten corners with a layer that settled and quickly grew a thin cap of ice. The wind found the cracks in the windows, the spaces between the jamb and the door, and the city shivered, drawing close its cloak or its blanket. The wind whipped through Correm, but as he walked with determined, steady steps, Pretios did not raise his head to look at the featureless grey sky. When the snow found its way under the collar of his black woolen shirt, he didn't brush it away. While the people he passed made a show of shivering, stomping their feet, trying to fend off or play-act the cold away, Pretios simply went about his business, neither hurrying nor dawdling, each step deliberate, both feet properly braced on the increasingly icy cobblestones. A corava must never appear unnerved, never react, never feel. This was duty, as he thought of it. His sole responsibility in this cold white world: to appear to be made completely of stone. Or solid ice. Pretios regarded the streets, the gusts of snow in the air, the few people still out and hurrying to get indoors and home, with the same expressionless gaze that took in everything, betrayed nothing.
He crossed one of the seven bridges, angled his head towards the distant sound of the surf in the harbor, followed the curve of the older cobblestones towards the west wall, towards the room he called home. Beneath his feet the cobbles, sometimes brown, or grey, or red, were all stained black with snowmelt and water. He had been more of a person, once, with a mother and father, an older brother. His mother stayed at home, doing washing and mending for a few extra coins. As he remembered, she had long fine blond hair which went silver early, and rough hands perpetually burned pink from hot water and the lye in the soap. His father had been a butcher, with too-kind brown eyes, a bald pate on top, long whiskers. He'd always smelled of blood, always spoke a little too loudly—an illness one winter had left him deaf in one ear, but father had been too proud to ask anyone to repeat themselves, so he guessed, and answered with finality whatever he'd thought he'd heard. His older brother had never seemed to be around. His name—but no, he was Pretios, now. It was what the ‘family’ had chosen to call him, and there was nothing else. No home, no place, no name left, and almost no one who even knew that much. Whatever family he'd been born into, the ‘family’ he had in darkness was all of it, the memory of his childhood no more than a passing fancy.
He passed a doorway, glanced to his left, slowed his step a fraction. There was a bundle on the stoop, easily mistaken for trash, once a man. One of the poor and starving, either frozen to death or soon to be. He paused. He was a guild man, too, even if long away from the actual business of thieving, and he wasn't going to pass up an opportunity for a few quick coins. He bent over the still body, looking for signs of life, keeping out of arm's reach, one hand ready to draw the knife at his belt. Aside from this poor soul, he was alone on the street, with night drawing on in earnest. He cocked his head to the side, listening to the liquid music of the water under the bridge behind him, understated and murmuring, little plips and slaps, everywhere half-hushed by the weight of the air and the whisper of falling snow. He looked again. The man was in middling age, clothes in tatters, face too pale—Pretios guessed he'd had too much to drink, found the walk back to his home too long, stopped to rest and now lay at anyone's mercy, more than likely to freeze solid by the morning. This lost soul would have nothing worth stealing. Pretios straightened up. He could wield some of the magics of the corava, a couple tricks, there were tricks he could pull but it wasn't worth it. Not enough coin, if there was any coin in the man's purse at all. He turned back to the street. Let the man freeze, there was no profit in it. Pretios walked on through the falling snow, turning on the next street to take the long way around. There was slim chance he was being followed, but caution was an instinct not easily ignored, and with measured steps he went a good six streets out of his way, only turning towards home at the last minute, ducking into the right doorway, quickly turning his key. There was a treacherous staircase running along the alley side, and he climbed, let himself in, locked everything up after.
He tossed his cloak on its hook, smoothing the fabric down as he did, brushing off the snow. There was no fire, and he was inured to the cold but not stupid, so he spent time fixing one. His stomach growled, and he couldn't recall when he'd last eaten, but hunger could be managed. He took the rough-stamped copper coin out of his pocket, and looked down at it. There was a language the 'family' spoke with coins like these—the bent metal, the scratches on the face, the dab of blue paint on one side, all of it meant something. He peeled back the paint with a fingernail, tossed the little blue chip into the fire, and rubbed the coin clean with his thumb, then tossed it into the small clay pot on the room's one table so that he could pick it back up later. Blue, eh? He looked to a lopsided rack on the wall where several glass jars of ingredients waited, one end higher than the other. After a few minutes of quiet consideration, he took two of the jars down, and picked up a bowl from its spot by the hearth. A touch of preparation was needed, which meant a trip to the under-market later in the day. He was expected that night. Plenty of time.
II.
The little girl sat outside the building's front door, downstairs from his room, bent over what looked like a plank of someone's roof, scratching and scraping away at the wood to reveal, in reverse, a crude image. The thing in her hand—it looked like a screwdriver, maybe an awl—likely came from her father's workbench, and more than likely she wasn't supposed to mess with his things. Her name was Lenci. A girl common as a raindrop, hardly anything to her, maybe six stone, dirty blonde hair down around her face. She was looking down but he knew her eyes were green. As he knew her father was an engraver, and her mother a passable cook. The family lived downstairs, and he'd passed them enough to know the bare details.
“Might want to get inside, eventually. Gonna rain.”
She didn't look up, shook her head slowly as if half-paying attention.
“Apa said it was going to threaten, then skive off again.”
“Might be, kid.”
She looked up at him.
“If it's going to rain, where are you going without a coat?”
“I'm big enough the rain doesn't bother me much.”
She nodded, apparently satisfied with the explanation, went back to her scraping.
He let her be, headed out into the streets. The wind tickled his cheeks and ears, but the rain hadn't started yet—it was a touch too warm today for snow, although his breath still came out as a cloud. He followed the street down for six blocks, turned left, followed the new street around, turned right, slipped through an alleyway and skirted a pile of rubbish to creep up to the back door of a tailor's shop. The tailor had looked the wrong way, at the wrong time, and besides Pretios was here to pick up a coat. The corava stopped, brushed nimble fingers over four different spots in his clothes, checking—a few feet of rope around one wrist in case, a knife in his belt, a Sibalese toothpick in his boot, four picks in a small pocket inside his shirt near the bottom hem—everything as it should be. He eased the picks out, slid in the spacer, and began raking, listening for the right click. A moment later he was in the tailor's storeroom, surrounded on three sides by metal racks with rolls of fabric, facing a workbench. This time of day, the tailor closed the front of the shop and sent away the help, but the man usually stayed late, sewing and cutting and marking patterns, and there he sat, as expected, bent over the workbench with three lamps lit to provide enough light to measure by. The late afternoon had grown cooler as he walked, and now the clouds that were threatening blew in, blocking the sun, dropping the light in the room enough to make the tailor curse and turn up the wick on the closest lamp.
He crouched as he crept forward, hands low, drew the toothpick and rose up on his toes. There was a charm the new ones liked to rely on, to let a corava see through clothes, to pick exactly the right spot to slide the knife in, but he hadn't used it in years, he was beyond such tricks. He didn't need to be shown where to strike, he knew a dozen spots from this angle and he'd already decided. He raised his off-hand with a crumpled handkerchief, raised the toothpick to the right height, and didn't hesitate to bring his knife hand down again. There was no comment, no reflection. He'd chosen the base of the neck between the sixth and seventh bones. When the blade slipped through flesh and found the space between, not only did the tailor lose sight, but that particular spot locked up the throat and shoulders, so he couldn't scream, and simply slumped forward. He yanked the toothpick free, and the motion pushed the nerveless body to the floor. He wiped the three sides of the blade on the dead man's shirt. The tailor couldn't move as he bled his life away, couldn't hear or focus on anything, but still his unseeing eyes held a plea, begging for some mercy or explanation or help, none of which was forthcoming.
Pretios looked to the left of the desk, where if the others had done their work… Yes. There was a black coat, heavy, woolen, with a high collar. Well made but carefully nondescript. One of the other 'family' men had put in the order, with Pretios' measurements, so the coat fit. He nodded, mostly to himself, shifted his shoulders a little to settle it in better, stepped back towards the workbench.
Pretios turned out the lamps, stood a moment in the darkness for his eyes to adjust, then let himself out the back door. From the mouth of the alley he went out towards the wall, then a half-dozen streets uphill, across the river, and a few more streets to cross back over. Back the other way, a left, two more blocks, a 'family' man handed him a small pouch of silver (payment for the tailor) as they crossed paths in the middle of the street. Three blocks more Pretios arrived at his home. Lenci, the little girl, had finished whatever she was playing with, leaving a small scattering of wood shavings around the space where she'd sat. He looked in through the window, saw the family gathered, and made as little noise as possible climbing the stairs to his room. As he let himself in and locked up after, the rain tapped its fingers against the roof, then with a crack and a crash it came down in buckets. He looked out the window. Correm wore grays and blacks as the rain soaked the cobbles, the buildings, and anyone fool enough to still be outside. He eased open the window a crack to let the scent of the rain into the room, and pulled his chair to the window to watch it fall, his face expressionless. He didn't move from the spot or make a sound until the rain petered out and stopped. He didn't have the right facing to see the sunset except in the lengthening shadows—the buildings around were all taller, so he couldn't see the sun. He fed himself, hardly paying attention to taste or texture, and stretched out on the room's cramped cot to get a little rest. There were other things, tonight, but not until the streets cleared out a bit more.
III.
Pretios climbed the stairs, a thin line of blood down the side of his left hand. The corava didn't wear the silver earring like the rest of the 'family', so the stevedore who'd bumped into him and then tried to make an issue of it hadn't known what he was getting into—although he certainly did now. As he counted the stairs he took a small rag out of his pocket and absently wiped it away. He let himself in, locked the door after, checked the lock four times, then crossed the room and lit the lamp on the wobbly table. He rolled back his sleeve, looked down to examine the wound. He wiped it again with the rag, watched the blood well up, estimated the depth by how quickly the trickle curved down towards the tabletop. He wiped it clean again, then took a small box from a spot under the floorboards beneath the other chair, unlocked it, opened it up. Pretios took out a few jars and packets, and a small silver plate, his face blank.
Pretios would need to visit the supply boys before his assignment. What he had on hand would suffice for the pre-work, but not for the work itself. Eight or nine packets of Dragon's Tears. Six of Dream. Four of Traveler. One packet of Gravesend left. He left the Gravesend alone. It wasn't needed, nor (he hoped) would it be. He took out a packet of Tears, for courage and resolve, sprinkled half onto the silver plate. Two thirds of a packet of Dream to numb it away and provide a certain necessary detachment. A few golden grains of Traveler, not enough for visions but enough to sharpen up his eyes and his sight, he stirred the powders together with a curved Healer's needle, raised the plate to eye level, and summoned the magic charm to light a pipe or a cigar, conjuring an ember, dropping the flame onto the mixture. He brought the plate closer, under his chin, and breathed deep through his nose as the ember burned the powder clean again, inhaling the smoke. Pretios carefully stitched together the slash in his forearm, rinsed the blood out of the rag, and stretched the rag out over the back of the chair to dry.
With slightly lagging steps (the drug was working well) he walked to the room's one window and looked out. Lenci was playing in the street again. He marveled that the girl could be so unaware of the misery, or the tenuous delicacy of her situation. She got cross, he'd seen it, every child was liable to get cross from time to time. But she never seemed discouraged. In his world, in his experience, it was incomprehensible. Pretios watched for a while, turned back to the table. The remaining third of the packet of Dream he tapped out onto the stitches, then rubbed it in with a finger to make the wound stop feeling. It would scar a little but he could charm it once it had finished healing up, to make the skin smooth again. He put the box back under the floorboard. With the extra nudge towards drowsiness from the powders, he curled up on his pallet, rolled to keep facing the door, and drifted off. It wasn't sleep exactly, but it was the best he could do. When he rose the sun had finished setting, and it was still overcast so the moon cast little light on the city or the street below. Pretios brushed away a little sleep from each eye, and fussed with his shirt to pull it back in line. Below, one of Correm's thankless lamplighters was making the rounds, coaxing the street lights into life.
IV.
Pretios made the sign with his fingers, four, four, five, then a very important 'one', and the supply man nodded. Pretios didn't want the supply man to hear his voice, and kept his hood up. For his part the supply man didn't want to get any closer to one of the corava than he had to, so the transaction was nearly soundless. He'd given the password at the door (necessary and unavoidable), but Pretios walked in silence to the back of the room, where he placed the order and stood motionless, still in silence, as the supply man gathered the things. When the supply man returned with the right assortment of little wax paper packets, Pretios looked over each one, making sure they weren't off-color, tainted or spoiled—it was worth more than his life for the supply man to intentionally cross one of the corava, but accidents could still happen and the powders were a part of his work, so he double-checked. The one 'special' packet he checked three times. Once he was sure everything met his satisfaction, he passed over the silver he'd been paid for the tailor. Even the corava still paid for supplies. The man nodded, took the coin, crossed arms over his chest. He muttered something, pointed at the door. Pretios was hardly listening, he was thinking of the little bit of work he needed to get done in the afternoon, and he left without comment.
Down towards the harbor, then a left, up towards the hills, across one bridge, down a half-dozen more streets, back across another bridge. He wasn't followed but it was habit, so deeply ingrained he hardly thought about it, letting his body choose the path without much calculation, randomly turning and backtracking in case someone was paying attention. He checked his belt. The ball-head hammer was still there, thumping against his hip. If he'd had enough emotion left, he would've smiled in satisfaction, but he was corava, so instead he gave a half-nod, mostly to himself, hidden beneath the hood.
The clouds rolled in, gray and low and promising more rain, throwing a hush over the city, and the wind kicked up in erratic gusts, blowing around the rubbish on the streets and making the people turn up their collars, drawing coats and cloaks closer, and made them bow their heads as they hurried home. No matter. The wind still found a way to slip through, regardless, this was still Correm, and winter was lingering as it usually did. Pretios hardly paid it any mind—if he could be said to 'like' anything, he did at least appreciate a good thunderstorm. Something about the cacophony of the heavens, the flashes and crashes and the relentless drum of the rain was soothing, although he was not one for contemplation and would've dismissed any discussion or attempt to puzzle it out with a shrug. He had his errand for the day, and if he was out in it, well, he could dry his clothes when he returned to his room. Pretios pressed on through the Correm streets.
The hammer at his belt had been purchased yesterday from a vendor who'd never seen him before and would never see him again, and Pretios had made sure the man got a good look at his nondescript face, so that in the unlikely event he was questioned he would have only a vague description to offer the Watch. It was an utterly ordinary tool, and he'd picked up a small pouch of nails and a bit of wire to go with it, to make the exchange as unremarkable as possible. Pretios had long years' practice at 'ordinary', and didn't need to go out of his way to get an exotic poison or some fancy means of execution when a hammer would get the job done just as well. He crossed the street, and looked up at the ratty little boarding house's second floor. There were lights on, since the day was fading away and the storm was darkening everything even further. He counted to himself, soundlessly but with lips still moving, waiting in the alley across the street, and once he'd waited long enough, he crossed again, stepped in through the front door. The doorman looked him over, didn't think him too much, and a few coins (but not too many) made sure he wouldn't be remembered. His man was upstairs. The poor sod had been paid by someone else, enough to indulge his bad habits, so that he wouldn't be standing at the door for the wedding and a 'family' man could take his place.
Pretios climbed the creaking stairs, running one hand along the wobbly bannister, his eyes straight ahead and his steps even. Twenty steps to the landing, a turn, twenty steps to the next floor, and his man was in the big room to the left. Before he walked in, he checked the hammer at his belt, and took a measured breath. Pretios didn't have nerves, not the way anyone else would, they had been replaced with rhythm and routine, and there was a certain way he'd been trained to do things, so taking a deep breath before the business started was just another means to an end. His hands didn't tremble, and he certainly didn't sweat.
The room had three windows (one shattered and boarded up) facing the street on the long side, and one smaller at the other end, the short side, facing the alley. Perhaps fifteen beds, most in poor repair and most empty. There were three men stretched out on the cots, one asleep, one tossing and muttering to himself, one sitting on the edge of the cot staring at the wall. Broken and discarded men, in a part of Correm more run-down and hard-luck than usual, one of the poorer quarters off the harbor that offered a bed for a penny, no blanket, no food, no guarantee your few things wouldn't be stolen in the night. It was a place for castoffs, or sailors on shore leave, a place to sleep it off or a place to take a little powder and not be disturbed. The room stank of dirt, sawdust, and oil, an overfull chamber pot, clothes that hadn't been washed, a pall that didn't come from any one thing but still spelled out 'misery'. The man asleep he ignored, and the man tossing and turning and muttering he passed by, walking calmly towards the far end of the room, two beds in from the wall, where the poor sod was staring into space. The man might've just woken up, or might've been so damaged he could do nothing more than sit and stare. He didn't look up as Pretios approached, and the corava didn't announce himself.
The ball on the end of the hammer was harder than the claw-face on an ordinary one, and the style was usually used by smiths, to hammer metal, usually to help harden the steel, but it would suit his purposes fine. He raised the hammer about halfway, and the vacant man lifted his head, seeing the shadow of Pretios' arm as it fell across his knees and the foot of the bed.
“Oh.”
It was the only thing the man said. A moment later the ball crashed into his forehead, shattering the bone, sinking in a little to scramble the brain. Pretios took no chances, jerked it free—a spurt of dark blood came from the hole, the man trying to stand but without success, starting to slide to the floor already. Pretios bent, grabbed a handful of the man's stinking shirt with his free hand, holding him mostly upright, and hit him three more times. By the third, so much was shattered and broken in the poor sod's face that his features could no longer be clearly seen. Pretios wiped the small bit of blood off his cuffs, picked a little chip of bone out of a fold in the fabric of his sleeve, and gently pushed the man's body back onto the cot. One of the dead man's arms draped to trail on the floor, his legs bent at the knees. Apart from the ruined face, he might have been sleeping. Pretios didn't rifle through the dead man's clothes—nothing to steal. This man had delivered the message to the jeweler, he would be replaced at the door, and he was well past talking, his corpse already cooling on the wobbly cot. Good. Pretios took a rag out of one pocket, carefully wiped down the hammer, and left. Three streets uphill, a turn to the east, four more streets (and a bridge), he ducked into an alley, dropped the bloody rag. He went to the west, across two more bridges, then south again towards the harbor, back across the Bridge of Sighs, and the hammer went into the Arrendyll with a plunk. Pretios turned back towards his side of town, and took measured steps to his room.
The little girl, Lenci, was sitting on the short porch, marching little bent and banged-up tin soldiers in the dust. She looked up as he approached.
“Uram.” In her parents' tongue, from the old country, it meant, 'mister'.
“Ayuh.” He nodded, looked down at the little soldiers. “Your apa make those?”
She nodded, looked down, set the soldiers up in some sort of pattern he didn't try to puzzle out.
“Rain's coming again,” he said. “You'd do well to get inside.”
She looked up at him. Shrugged. Went back to playing with her soldiers. “Rain en't here yet. I got a little time.”
Pretios looked up at the skies, grey-black and threatening. He looked down at the girl again. Nodded.
“Just see you get in out of the rain when it gets here.”
“Yeh. Igen,” was her response.
Pretios left the girl to her play—it was harmless, and mattered little, and he knew too well that there was not enough joy in the world to go around, so nothing made him feel like cutting short her play, even if it was the sensible thing to do. He paused, outside the door to the family's small flat, listening. By the sound of it the girl's mother was making supper. He thought about it for a moment, and carefully reached into his purse. He left two (clean) silver on the doorstep, where either the mother would step on it when she came out to fetch her daughter, or the daughter would stumble over it when she came back inside. If he'd been asked, he wouldn't have been able to explain why. Only that there was something there, something he felt should be helped, encouraged. It was hard enough to survive in Correm, everyone could use a hand. Why this family, he didn't know. Something resonated, even if he couldn't put a word to it. Pretios wasn't one for self-examination, or come to it, for words. He climbed the steps to his own flat, let himself in, and checked his clothes for stray splatters of blood. Once he was satisfied he was clean, he stretched out on his small bed still dressed and waited for night, sleeping a little here and there as the storm came in, rattling the windows, sneaking in through the cracks, pounding on the roof.
V.
By the time he got back up again, the rain had turned to snow, and the snow in the streets was already halfway to ice where it had been crushed down and compacted. A knife-edge wind blew through every gap in his clothes as he stepped out into the hushed and mostly deserted street. He wore gloves, his cloak and hood, and the new coat with the collar turned up, because Pretios was not immune to cold, simply unconcerned. He wouldn't be out in it long enough to worry, so he didn't waste time and energy feeling uncomfortable or complaining. His boots crunched on the ice, soles scraping against the uneven surface and his feet crunching in here and there, but he didn't stumble, simply took more care choosing his steps. It wouldn't do to slip and turn an ankle or break a toe on the slippery streets, he had business to attend to. His coat pockets were empty except for the bent copper he'd been given by Adajanni, although he walked into the whiteout with a full purse at his belt—he'd still need a little coin.
There weren't many out, and the shops were closing up early, but he crossed two bridges and covered fifteen blocks and rapped on the door of a little jeweler, up the hill where the better classes lived and loved. The stooped old goat who ran the place looked up from his bench as Pretios came in and stamped off some of the ice and snow on the mat. He raised an eyebrow, and put down his glass of wine.
“Still snowing, I see. Looks like you're the last one I'll do business with tonight, about time to turn in. What can I do ye for?”
Pretios glanced around the shop, noting the locked cabinets, the strongbox under a table in the inner room, the wide desk with pliers, several little vises, rolls of wire, other tools he couldn't easily identify.
“I'm here for a wedding present.”
“Oh? Well, you've come to a good place for it. For the groom or the bride? What did you have in mind?” The old man swiveled on his stool, stood, dusted off his hands on the thighs of his trousers, took a few steps closer.
“Something in silver,” said Pretios. “For the bride. I thought moonstone, or amber, or maybe turquoise.” He took the bent copper out of his pocket, and gently put it in the old man's hand. The old man squinted down at it, rubbed his fingers against it, looked back at Pretios. The corava kept his expression blank. The old man rubbed the bent copper again, and nodded, making a show of thinking it over. After a moment or two, he motioned Pretios over to a cabinet on the farther side of the room.
“I do have just the thing… ” The jeweler's hands trembled as he opened the cabinet, and he made sure not to turn his back. Although he wasn't truly in any danger, he didn't know it, so it took an extra tug of his knobby hands to get the cabinet open.
A moment or two of negligible conversation later, and a small tip in silver from his pouch for a job done well and with discretion, Pretios was back out in the snow again, with the necklace wrapped up inside a small box, stuffed in a pocket, the pocket buttoned and double-checked to make sure it stayed put. He glanced at the sky. The clouds weren't moving quickly, which meant the snow would continue to fall instead of blowing on through, and he could almost see it coming down like a curtain on the under-edge, as if the clouds were wearing fancy dress and trailing a gauzy diaphanous train behind as they shifted here and there, lingering, hesitating, undecided. Pretios continued uphill and upriver, into the richer parts of Correm where the Watch kept regular patrols and asked difficult questions. He wasn't concerned. Three over, two more down, two turns, across one bridge and he stopped at the end of the street, looking at the hall where the wedding was being held. It was about time, the doors would be open, the guests filing in to pay their respects. He didn't want to be first, or last—his best chance at being largely unnoticed was to slip in with the middle lot. He looked up and down the street, crossed over, and stood behind two couples waiting to be let in. The pair of guards at the front doors of the expensive hall didn't even blink, and the family man on the left just waved him in, standing as close to the doors and the warmth as possible, breathing on cold hands to keep the feeling in them, shivering in the cold.
He shuffled in with the other guests, enjoying the warmth from the two large hearths on the other side of the room. There were chairs set up along the walls, a space up front for the bride and groom, another space behind the chairs, presumably for dancing. He stepped up to the receiving table when it was his turn, and smiled as if he was some other kind of man entirely, made a mark in the book.
“Are you here for the bride or the groom?” asked an older lady, dressed in finery, rings on most of her fingers.
“I'm, ah, a business associate of the groom.”
She smiled, and indicated which side of the room he should sit on. He nodded, and took a seat. There would be a good long wait, now, as the guests filed in, and another good long wait for the ceremony. Part of the plan was already set—the necklace. He'd charmed it with a very specific kind of spell, a base enchantment known to the corava and almost no one else. By itself the charm was nothing. Only if the person putting on the necklace had been treated with a certain counter-dust would it react. He had a small vial of the trigger-agent in his purse. Pretios would shake hands with the bride and make sure he left a good amount of dust on her palms as he wished her well in her new life, and his smile would be as genuine as it ever was. Even if someone suspected, there were always people at a wedding who neither the bride nor the groom could name or remember inviting, and his too-common face would ensure no one could give the Watch a proper description. They would certainly see his face—the 'family' wanted it public—but no one would be able to agree on the details of his appearance. Plenty of time. All he had to do was wait. The 'family' wanted it this way, and he didn't give a moment's thought to the 'why', only the 'how'.
Outside the snow continued to come down, which was a good thing. Once he slipped away from the wedding he would be able to disappear in the storm, and the streets would be nearly empty as he made his way back to his rented room. He sat, not speaking to anyone, waiting for the right moment to shake hands and offer his best wishes, then to head back out into the swirling snow.
When the time came, he stood and filed into the receiving line, standing between a man who looked like a he counted coin for a living and a woman who kept sniffling and dabbing a dainty kerchief to the corners of her eyes. The line moved, elder relatives putting small purses in a wicker basket just behind the bride, as was tradition—above and beyond the gifts, the purses were meant to help the new couple get started in their new life. Only the very rich could afford such a gesture, and his hands twitched a little at the idle thought that a single missing purse could feed a poor family for months. Pretios didn't philosophize, as a rule, but some situations begged it. He took a few steps forward, looked at the groom with some mild interest, keeping his expression fixed and warm despite the grim thoughts beneath the surface. The coating on the necklace would stay good for a while, but eventually it would lose its potency, so he would have to hang back and wait, hunched over the bar with the in-laws and other well-wishers who weren't about to turn down free drinks. The line moved a little more.
“You with the bride, or the groom?” asked the man ahead of him, turning back, taking stock in a single casual glance.
“Groom. I, ah, well, my boss did business with him, couldn't be here, sent me instead.”
“Oh? Who's your boss?” It was an idle question, the man didn't really care, but Pretios had an answer prepared.
“Jonas Auldenwhell. He did some cabinets for the groom's summer house in Sackett.” Which was the truth of it, if anyone asked. And Auldenwhell had refused to pay protection money, so the 'family' wouldn't mind seeing him tossed into the fire, if it came to it.
“Hm. Yes.” The man took another sip, held it in his mouth, then clapped Pretios on the shoulder as he swallowed and cleared his throat. “Well, then, more's the welcome! Get a good snort or two o' the good stuff before ye head back out 'n the snow!”
Pretios smiled and nodded, although he couldn't have felt less like smiling, or nodding.
The line moved another pace or two, and the man turned his attention away to offer his respects, kissing her cheek, slipping the bride a small purse, which she passed to the groom, who put it in the wicker basket.
Pretios stepped forward. They were a pretty enough couple, young and rich, as carefree as anyone in Correm could ever be. By the way the groom looked at her he loved her. By the way she looked back it was mutual.
“So happy for you both,” he said, part of his act. “My boss sent me with a necklace for you, he couldn't be here—did some work for you, sirrah—and wanted so much to see you put it on.” He indicated the box, still on top of the pile. The groom reached for it, raised an eyebrow. Pretios nodded.
The bride's eyes lit up as she looked into the box, and she smiled. “Of course, of course, I'd love to.” If she had any suspicions about him, or if her new husband had any doubts or questions, neither showed it.
“Here, love,” said the groom. “Let me help you.”
The groom lifted the necklace—silver and turquoise—out of the box, and gently draped it around her neck, frowning a little as he struggled with the clasp. She raised a hand to touch the stones, clearly moved.
“Thank you so much, I love it.”
Pretios extended his hand, took her slim fingers in his own, and shook it. “I only wish you every happiness.” He smiled a sincere and forgettable smile.
She smiled back, eyes gleaming with the day's rush of emotions, shook back. She clasped his hand in both of hers for a moment, then the sniffling woman behind him gave a small cough, and Pretios stepped aside. He turned from the receiving line, and claimed a good spot at the bar, where a cheerful face in livery poured him a drink he only pretended to sip. He turned. He had a good view of the room, the exit, the rest of the line. He waited. The contact had been good, he'd made sure of it, the activating powder was all over her gloves, and she'd almost immediately touched the necklace to adjust it. All that remained was the wait. As the line moved, his forgettable face would become less and less distinct, even more forgettable, erased in the memories of the guests as it always was. He pretended again to sip, wetting his lips without swallowing, holding it casually in one hand with the base in his palm, fingers curled. Another guest bumped into a spot beside him, and Pretios didn't like being touched but he allowed it, simply took a half-step forward to give the man (who seemed to have come from generations of dock-men, by his shoulders) a little room. He watched the bride, watched the line move along.
She was an attractive young woman, he had to admit, if he'd passed her in the street it would've been unusual not to look twice. A full head of wavy brown hair, green eyes, a warm wide smile. She might have even been the kind of woman who didn't mind a few strangers at her wedding, he was a fair judge of character (or at least of expression) and her smile seemed to be real. He didn't for one moment experience any nagging shred of conscience. It was what the 'family' wanted, so he didn't question. Another man, one who hadn't seen and done the things he'd seen and done, might have felt a bit bad for her. She was being punished for some business with her new husband, the details of which hadn't been mentioned when he'd picked up the copper piece. Pretios casually tipped his hand the smallest bit, spilling a little of his drink as if tipsy and not paying attention, then righted it again. He pretended to take another sip with his gaze (like everyone else's) focused on the line, the bride, the happy couple. The guests shuffled along, with their gifts and well-wishes.
“Beau'ful, aren't they?” asked the man beside him.
Pretios made a noise of agreement, nodded his head with the glass to his closed lips. He waited...
There. She gave a cough, and a frown. Pretios put the glass down on the bar, and paid it no further mind, watching the line, watching the bride as he eased towards the back of the room. She cleared her throat, tugged a little at the silver necklace, coughed again. By the time she turned to her new husband with a stricken and questioning expression, it was too late. The second touch to the metal, with the activating powder on her gloves, simply sped things along. The necklace began to contract, and quickly. She coughed again, reached for a glass of water, still not fully understanding what was happening. She opened her mouth to ask her husband something, accepted the glass of water, then let it spill from her hand as she grabbed for the necklace. Too late. The links of silver grew smaller and smaller, making the thing tighten up. Already it was creasing her skin, soon it would grow smaller still. There was no way to get the thing off, it was already too tight to get anything underneath, and even if someone had the right tool to hand there was no room to work, nothing to brace against for leverage except the skin of her rapidly-purpling throat. The bride clutched at it again, this time in desperation, her fingers leaving red furrows above the necklace, which continued to bite.
Someone shouted (Pretios was almost certain it was the father-in-law, and not the groom), someone else rushed out of the room. Pretios watched, expression blank. The bride went to one knee, then both knees, clawing at the necklace, eyes bulging, trying to breathe. Too late for that. She sucked in one ragged breath, half a breath, a wheeze, still clawing at her own throat. Blood began to run from the gouges she'd cut with her nails, and then began to flow in earnest as the necklace grew smaller still, the silver links breaking the skin and continuing to contract, relentlessly chewing through muscle and tendon. The bride topped over onto her back, and for a moment he lost his view—several different people were screaming (no mind), half the men in the place were running this way and that, and in the absolute panic someone stepped in his way. Pretios stepped around the man, a flustered groomsman who was wringing his hands and starting to weep. The necklace, relentless, continued to shrink. There were the sounds, now, the sounds he'd waited to hear, the links of silver tearing into her throat. She would be dead in a moment more. The necklace, silver coated in blood, turquoise pieces black with it and crackling and curling like dead leaves, continued to shrink. There was no saving her now, it was less than a palm's width across (the palm of someone with small hands). As he got a good look again, the bride threw her hands out, abandoning her attempts to tear it off, flailing instead at the people around her, desperate to grab someone or some thing to make it stop. It wouldn't.
Pretios made appropriate sounds of horror, staggered his feet and raised his hands, looked to and fro (for show) as if he was a decent person who was trying to figure out what to do, but he kept his eyes on her bloody throat.
“Someone send for a Healer!” he shouted, but the room was an uproar and no one listened.
With another crack, a half-choked breath, a kick of the feet, another crunch, the necklace shrank smaller still, tearing through throat, then through spine. Her body jerked, thrashed, blood smeared all over her pretty cheeks, tears streaming, snot running from her delicately powdered nose. She choked, went still with a gurgle as the flowing blood rushed in to fill her throat. A moment later the necklace finished shrinking, now a featureless hoop of silver about the size of a ring for the pinky-finger, or a small earring, severing her head completely. With a spurt of blood from the stump that had been her neck, she was certainly and absolutely dead. The head thumped to the floor, turned on its side, eyes wide with shock and frozen that way. Several people screamed, the screams blended in with the shouts, and men of substance and standing rushed around in their fancy dress trying to find salvation for a situation that was already wholly lost. Pretios put a hand to his mouth, acting as if he was going to be sick, and staggered out into the snow. He bent, breathing heavy, pretending to be fighting off the urge to retch, staggered a few more paces out of the light, turned up the collar of the new coat, and two steps later he was gone into the Correm night. He would not be remembered.
VI.
Lenci was playing on the porch again the next morning. He'd come in late but not too late, gone upstairs, carefully washed his hands and stretched out on his cot without sleeping, watching the shadows stretch across the ceiling. He was headed to the house by the river, to report to Adajanni. The snow in the streets had started to melt, was half-melted, would freeze again into ice as the afternoon bled away into evening. All of Correm winter, encapsulated in a single day. He stepped out onto the porch, looked down at her. She didn't look up. He had a moment, shocking in its brevity, in which he saw beyond himself, beyond his own emptiness, past the inner void and out into some nameless, shapeless other place… He looked up at the dirty gray sky, then up and down the street, as if to see if he was being watched when he knew he wasn't. Pretios didn't usually look over his shoulder, but this time… He double-checked, to make sure. Took a deep breath. Couldn't explain why he did it, but Pretios reached into his purse, took out a crown, dropped the heavy coin on the boards of the porch with a thunk.
“Looks like you dropped that.”
She looked at the coin. Looked up at him. There was a very good chance she'd never seen that kind of money in her whole life. She frowned.
“Looks like you dropped it, uram.”
He shook his head. “Nope. Saw it fall out of your pocket. You'd best snatch it up quick before someone comes along and steals it from you. Might should take it in to your mother.”
She frowned again. Wiped her nose with the back of her hand.
Lenci reached very carefully and picked up the coin. She held it, looking down at it, then looked back up at him. She smiled. He smiled back, the expression feeling distinctly out of place, but not completely false. Pretios stepped back, off the porch and into the street, and once he was sure no one was looking, smiled at her again.
“You be careful, uram. It's icy out. Y'know?”
Pretios nodded.
The little girl with her dirty knees and dirty elbows hurried into the house, leaving her toys out on the porch.
Without a further word, he turned and walked away.
Pat Honovich has been gleefully making things up for as long as he can remember. He lives in Urbana, Illinois with his wife and his towering to be read pile.