King Pinch (22 page)

With a light, almost joyous step, Pinch spanned the concealed gap, taking a mind to keep well away from the suspicious hanging Maeve's scroll had detected. Regretting the loss of his fine tools, Pinch gathered up what little gear remained, unbound a slender rope from his waist, and prepared to leave. He'd slide to the ground, feed back the rope and be gone without a trace of having ever been there to start with.

The sharp nip of a dagger point into the small of his back killed Pinch's jaunty mood.

"Please give me cause to thrust this home, Master Janol," whispered a voice at his back. It was a deep voice, familiar and cold, luxurious with the ripeness of cruelty. It was a voice filled with the resonance of a massive chest and strong lungs.

"Iron-Biter…"

"Chancel Master Iron-Biter of the Red Priests, Janol -or should I call you Pinch like your friend did before I stuck him?" The dagger pricked sharper into his skin in response to the contraction in Pinch's muscles at hearing the news. "Hold steady, thief. This is a dagger of venom at your back. All it takes is one prick, and then do you know what will happen?"

"I thought priests were above poisoning."

"The temple does what it must. Now give up the Cup and Knife. Just remember, one trick and you're dead. The venom on this blade is particularly nasty. It'll be a long, painful death for you."

Pinch very carefully nodded his understanding. Iron-Biter's expertly applied pressure kept the blade a hairs-breadth from piercing the skin. He reached into the pouch and very carefully removed the Knife. He offered this behind him, handle first. The rogue was not about to do anything to aggravate the dwarf.

"Perhaps we can come to an understanding…"

The dwarf hissed like angry steam. "Unlike some, I am loyal to my temple -"

"And to Prince Vargo. That's who you're doing this for, isn't it. You just didn't happen to be wandering through the garden in the dark."

The dwarf plucked the dagger from Pinch's grasp. "The prince is the rightful ruler of Ankhapur. We won't let Cleedis's little games change that."

"We -or just you? What has Vargo promised you?"

"The Cup. Give me the Cup!"

"Why? You'll kill me if I do."

"I'll kill you if you don't give it to me. If you do, I'll let you live."

"Why?"

"It would be better if no one asked questions about your disappearance."

"And what if I talk?"

There was a sharp laugh behind him. "I know what you are now, Pinch. Suppose the entire city knew."

The regulator paled. Exposure -it was the most fearsome threat any rogue could ever face. To be named and branded a thief was as good as death and worse still. Brokers would avoid him, marks grow wary in his presence. Old partners would frame him for their jobs, and the constables would pressure him to spill what he knew. He'd seen it happen before, even used the knowledge against his rivals. He'd reveled in how they had squirmed helplessly on the hook. It led them to penury, drink, and even suicide-and it could do the same to him.

There was no choice in it, Pinch grimly knew. With hateful reluctance he passed over the Cup. It was snatched from his fingers.

"Turn around," the dwarf ordered.

As Pinch did, he understood now how a dwarf of no skill and monumental size had managed the catch. It was not right to say he came face-to-face with his captor, for where the dwarf should have been was nothing, just empty air. The only signs of any presence were the Cup and Knife half-visible in the folds of an invisible cloak.

"God's cursed spells!" Pinch hated the way they upset his plans.

The air chuckled. "With them I can move quieter and more unseen than you'll ever hope to, scoundrel. Now, to the wall." A poke with the dagger indicated the direction Pinch was supposed to move -toward the trapped arras.

"You said you wouldn't kill me."

"I need to make sure you won't trouble me while I put things right. Move."

Pinch took a hesitant step and, when nothing happened, the dagger urged him forward again. The thief's mind was racing with desperate plots. Could he fight an invisible foe? What there any chance he could lure the dwarf into the trap instead of himself, or even get the little priest to take one step too close to the maggot-infested pit below?

With one more step, it all became futile speculation. Barely had he moved forward under the poisonous blade's urging than the arras that had hung so thick and limp on the wall suddenly writhed with inanimate life. The tassels at the top, draped over the iron hanging rod, released like little hands and lunged forward in an eager embrace. The thick cloth wound tightly around him, hugging him in its grip like the wrappings of a corpse. The speed and the strength of it spun Pinch to the floor and left him gasping and choking as the rug tried to crush the cage of bones around his heart.

Pinch fought it as best he could, writhing like a worm to brace against the pressure and steal enough air to prevent suffocation. At the same time he had to be mindful of the floor, lest he wriggle himself over the concealed lip and into the fetid pit below. Iron-Biter's dark laugh showed the dwarf's sympathy for his struggles.

At the limit of Pinch's attention, the air shimmered and a swirl of form emerged from nothing, like a curtain parting in space to reveal another world. From the play of folds and fabric, it was clear the dwarf's invisibility came from a magical cloak that he now neatly folded and stowed away. Ignoring Pinch's mortal struggle, the priest carefully spanned the gap to the shelf, barely able to cross with his short legs. There he made a few passes over Pinch's fakes and then casually replaced them with the goods the rogue had handed over. The dwarf studied the frauds for a moment and then casually tossed them through the insubstantial floor.

By the time Iron-Biter leapt back to Pinch's side of the concealed pit, the rogue could feel his ribs creak, crushed to the limit of their bearing. "I… die," he struggled to say with the last air in his lungs, "there will be… questions."

Iron-Biter looked down, his beard bristling as his lips curled in a broad smile. "You are a fool, Janol, Pinch, or whomever. No one at this court cares about you. Your disappearance will ease their worries. You were never missed and never wanted here."

With that, the dwarf seized the edge of the arras and spun Pinch to the edge of the pit. "Let the worms have you!" and with a single, twisted syllable, the rug suddenly released its hold and Pinch rolled through the floor and into the darkness.

I'm going to die as maggot food. Not the best of epitaphs -but at least nobody will know.

Pinch smashed into the squirming mass, writhing in eager expectation of his arrival as if the blind, pulpy white worms could sense his coming. It was like landing in a bed of eggs, although eggs don't wriggle and scrape underfoot. They were a deeper churning sea of corruption than expected, and Pinch's body crashed into them like a rock hurled into the waves, splattering the maggots against the tower walls

Nonetheless, there was solid rock below, and though his plunge was slowed by the greasy, hungry mash, Pinch cracked the bottom with a brutal blow. Ribs aching, wind gone, bleeding from his scalp, the rogue lay dazed in the center of an ichor-stained crater of grublike life.

Almost immediately the living walls of that crater began to flow inward, the vermin tumbling over each other in a churning, squeaking wave. Collectively they hungered for him. They flowed over Pinch's legs, flooded through the rips and tears of his doublet, poured into his eyes and ears, and wriggled into his mouth and nose. They crawled over his tongue with their sweet, wet bodies. Pinch could not hold back his desperate spasms for air, but each breath ended in a choking gurgle as the fat maggots plopped down his throat. Things crawled under his hose, rippled beneath the cloth of his doublet, and burrowed into his hair. And all the time the little rasping mouths gnawed and scraped, a thousand stings until his skin was awash with slime and blood.

The morbid detachment of his fall was strangled out of the rogue by the doom that was upon him. His death was real and here, choking in lungfuls of mindless larvae, eaten slowly and helplessly alive in this bed of maggots. Frantic, without thought, without plan, Pinch thrashed madly, puking his guts as he weakly fought to gain his feet. The weight of the vermin crushed him, the smooth stone floor was slick with their pulped bodies, so that all he could do was flail like a drowning man. Kill them, smash them, pulp them -it was all he could think of to do; a completely hopeless effort against the countless numbers that filled the pit.

Like a madman Pinch slipped and smashed all about the floor, scattering the bones of his unfortunate predecessors, tripping over their now-worthless weapons. He raged and choked and spit, but none of it made a bit of difference. The maggots kept crawling, greedily lapping up the oozy stew of skin, ichor, blood and sweat that coated Pinch's skin.

In desperation, the man ripped at his clothes, determined to eliminate the hiding places of his tormentors. His boots were full of a squishy mass, his hose drooping with pockets of larva. Without a concern for the cost or the tailoring, he rent it all to shreds: the parti-colored stockings from Waterdeep, the Chessentian black silk doublet. He was determined to have it all off, even in patches and shreds. It was the only thought his panic-gripped mind could fixate on.

It was in the process of that tearing and rending that Pinch's fingers closed on something hard and metal next to his chest. The man didn't consider what it was or why it chose now to come to his grasp, but seized on it as a weapon, something to crush the hateful maggots with. Fingers clenched about the object and swung it over his head to strike with more force than was ever necessary.

Just as he was about to hammer home, a sun exploded in his grasp. Coruscating light flared from between his fingers and probed throughout the pit. Where it touched the maggot-thick floor, the ground bubbled and sizzled in a seething roast of putrid flesh. The maggots shrieked with the hissing pop of their fat bodies as their guts boiled away. Cloying smoke, the scent of burned fat and boiled vinegar, filled the tower and roiled out the pit-hole like a chimney. It was wet and thick, half steam, half ash, and it clung to Pinch but he was too amazed to notice.

The rogue was frozen, too incredulous to move. His hand burned like he'd pulled a coal from the fire, but even that could not break his paralysis. At best he twisted his gaze up, trying to see what was happening to his hand, but the light burned until his eyes ached and his forearm vanished into the brilliance. It was as if he had thrust his hand into the sun like a protean god playing with the heavens.

What is happening to me?

There were no answers. The blaze continued until Pinch's eyes could no longer stand it. The pain racked his hand. Gradually the sizzling squeaks of the maggots faded and the roils of smoke began to fade away. And then the light was gone.

Pinch dropped the thing like a hot stone; it had scorched his hand like one. It hit the ground with a metallic clank. Pinch looked at his hand and there, crusted in the burned flesh of his palm, was the brand of a half-sun. The edges were charred black and the impression oozed no blood, the flesh seared shut by the heat. Gingerly, Pinch tried to flex his hand, only to be stopped by a wave of pain.

Around him the smoke was clearing and as it went, the man's eyes, watering almost shut, also slowly cleared. In the dim light, he could see the room clearly for the first time. The maggots were gone, save for a feeble few that wiggled in the heaps of powdery ash that covered the floor. The bones of other thieves were still there, scoured whiter than they had ever been. Their weapons gleamed in the dim light from above, spotlessly free of rust, like a knight's armor after his squire has finished with it. The walls were pinkish white and marked with fountains of soot.

Numbly Pinch brushed away the larva that still clung to the shreds of his clothes or had wormed their way into his curly hair. He sweated blood and slime, his clothes were in tatters or burned to ash, and his hand throbbed with pain, but Pinch could only marvel that he was still alive.

He spotted the thing he'd held, lying in the ash at his feet. It was the half-sun disk of the Morninglord, the artifact he'd stolen in Elturel. He was afraid to touch it.

Wisps of smoke seemed to rise up from the amulet, but at last he hesitantly lifted it by its broken thong. Close up it looked unchanged, the same chunk of inert jewelry it had always been. When he compared it to his hand, he could see immediately that the brand and the design were the same.

What had happened? This was the amulet of the Dawnbreaker or something like that, Lissa had claimed. Somehow, he must have triggered its power or done something that brought it to life. Try as he could, though, he couldn't figure what. Fear overrode all his memories of the moment when it had happened.

"Pinch!" Sprite's thin voice echoed from above. Pinch looked up to see a little curly head peering through the floor.

"Sprite?"

"Gods, you're alive!" they blurted in unison.

"What happened, Pinch?"

"Sprite, get me a rope."

"First I gets jumped by a dwarf and then when I come up here I nearly choke in the smoke coming out of the floor, and that's how I knew you was down there."

"Sprite-Heels, shut up and drop me a rope!"

"Oh… right. Right away." The head disappeared to do his bidding.

While he waited for the rope, Pinch probed through the ash, mindful of the goods others had left behind. There was little of account, a few daggers with promise and some loose coins, but Pinch wasn't really searching for them anyway. At last he came across the things he really wanted -the false Cup and Knife that Iron-Biter had casually discarded. He also found his gleaming set of custom tools, though the black cloth wrapping was nothing more than a few burned scraps. By the time these things were carefully bundled up, the rope dangled within his grasp.

Getting back up with only one good hand was no easy task, not made any better by the fact that Sprite was hardly a match to hoist him. When at last he finally thrust his head through the shimmering field of false marble and rolled himself over the lip, the man collapsed on his back and panted for breath.

"Iron-Biter said you were dead. Pricked you with that skene of his."

Sprite turned from the window where he'd been keeping watch and pulled open his cloak. Half his shirt was a great red stain, and at its center was a crude bandage the halfling had applied.

"Iron-Biter, eh? That's dwarves for you, thinking with their weapons and not their heads. See -if it were you he would have been right, but I'm not your kind. You'd think even a stupid dwarf would know a halfling's got a strength against poisoning just like them.

"He jumped me in the bushes and poked me with that blade of his. That venom was caustic, but it didn't kill me. Knocked me flat for a time, it did, so he must've figured he killed me. What I don't see is how such a cousin could get on me unadvised."

"Magic," Pinch croaked. His throat was raw from smoke and dry for lack of drink. "The bastard's got more magic than any proper dwarf I know. Snared me the same way."

Sprite nodded. "What happened down there? Was he down there?"

The regulator struggled to his feet. "He's bolted. Back to Vargo, I'd think. We're best off before more priests come. There's more to say later."

"What about that?" Sprite nodded toward the shelf where the artifacts rested.

"Let them rest," Pinch said with a smile. "Pater Iron-Biter wasn't quite as clever as he thought."

Working together, the two thieves managed to lower themselves out of the tower, not an easy task for two walking wounded. Sprite-Heels had made light of his wounds, but by the sheen of sweat that rose with every effort, Pinch could tell fighting the poison had taken more from him than the halfling let on. There wasn't much to be done for it but press on, though. By the time they'd crossed the last wall and reached the safety of the heavy shadows in the alleys outside, the two could barely stand on solid legs. Given that they were staggering anyway, Pinch paid a coin at a tavern window and bought them each a skin of good wine. His tattered and dirty state hardly raised an eyebrow with the wench who served him. In the hours before dawn her establishment had all manner of customers, and Pinch was just another filthy beggar up on his luck.

Fortified, refreshed, and rewarded, the two went lurching through the streets. "What now, Pinch?" Sprite asked after a long medicinal pull at the jug. "I could use a touch of comfort for me side."

"Healing," Pinch grunted, pulling the jug from the halfling's hands. Sweet wine trickled through his beard as he gulped down their improvised painkiller. His hand throbbed mightily, so much that he could barely flex it. "Got to get this fixed 'fore it ruins my trade.

"Can't go back to the Red Priests," the rogue muttered to himself, pondering their problem with excessive effort. A night's worth of black work and the beatings he'd taken made the alcohol doubly potent. "Don't want no one knowing of this…"

"What about Lissa? She's still around, ain't she, Pinch? It's a wager you could persuade her into helping us -especially if you got me there to cross-lay the tale."

The suggestion made Pinch grin. " 'Struth, she stands mostly favorable with us -and I've got just the tale for her. Come on, Sprite. We're off to the house of the Morninglord."

Half-lurching, the two walking wounded wound through the alleys to the temple of the Morninglord. Being mindful of their previous company and made worrisome by drink, the pair watched their trail closely for any sign that might reveal an invisible shadow. Only when no alley cats hissed unexpectedly, no splashes appeared in empty puddles, and no gates opened of their own accord did the two set course for the temple.

The Morninglord's shrine was a pizzling affair compared to the grand glories of the house they'd just left. As was the custom of the Dawn Priests, the temple was at the easternmost end of the easternmost street in the city. It was one building with a single tall tower, both featureless from the west. The eastern side of the building was no doubt lavishly decorated for the dawn god to see, marked by stained glass windows that opened onto glorious altars. This was all well and good for the faithful but did little to create an impressive public facade, and the temple languished as a consequence.

It was an elf who answered the door, dressed in the garish yellow, orange, and pink robes of the order, although the colors were faded and his sunburst tiara a bit shabby. Though it was near enough dawn for worshipers to come to service, the sallow-faced elf viewed their arrival with a start of surprise, as though visitors here were as unexpected as rain in the desert. He murmured expressions of greeting profusely as he showed them in, and for a race noted for its haughtiness, he managed to bow and scrape most ambitiously. It was a sign of how hard up the temple was if this elf was willing to fawn for donations from a pair as raggedy as them. The regulator put up with it as long as was necessary to send for Lissa.

When the priestess appeared, it was in the full robes of her order, and Pinch was frankly shocked at the transformation. The robes imbued her with a radiant femininity that had been hidden beneath her plain working dress. It was clear he'd been too quick to dismiss her before. The orange, the pink, the golden ribbons, and the sun-sparkled headdress that had looked tawdry on the elf shone on her like cloth of gold. Her hair escaped the edges of her headdress, and her face beamed with fresh-scrubbed brightness.

"Greetings, Lissa," he began with an unfeigned awkwardness, so suddenly taken aback by her beauty, "I – we-have come for you help-"