Bloodhound

I shook those worries off and headed for the Daymarket, listening to the pigeons on the ground and the window ledges as I walked. The ghosts they carried were still quiet. If folk were getting killed, they knew why and accepted it. I loved these calm weeks before the harvesters returned to Corus. They were restful not just for me as a Dog, but for the Beka who heard the pigeons' ghosts. Once folk with big hauls and then money in their pockets reached the city, it would be another matter. Killings would pick up then.

  I located Phil easily. He was at the Daymarket fountain with his fellow carters, as I expected. They were hunkered down in a circle, their eyes on the ground. As I walked up to them, I heard the clatter of a dice cup.

  I grabbed Phil by his ear. He came up with a yelp, scrabbling at my wrist. His friends started to laugh.

  "That your woman, Phil? Looks a bit skinny for your usual taste!" one of them japed.

  "Stuff yer gob!" someone said. "Don't you know who she is, you crackbrain?"

  Phil twisted around to look at me. "Mithros's staff, Beka, wha'd you want with me? You ain't in uniform! You got no call to haul me about like some Rat!"

  "I don't?" I asked. I leaned in so his friends wouldn't hear me whisper, "Coles to Baker Garnett, Phil." I looked at the coins in front of the gamblers. All were coppers. "Any of those yours? Do you have a bet down?"

  His mouth opened and closed like a fish's. Then he shook his head.

  I let go of his ear and tucked my hand in the crook of his arm. "We'll talk, all nice and cousinly." Gentle-like I towed him out of earshot of his friends.

  "If you was nice and cousinly, we wouldn't have this talk at all," he groused.

  "I didn't hit you, did I? It's just a few questions, and I'll be on my way. Oh, and maybe a look in your purse." I've never had to deal with family as a Dog before. I can't say I care for it.

  We perched on the driver's seat of his cart. I looked at Phil as he wiped his brow with a ragged handkerchief. When I was eight, before fortune smiled on us and my Lord Provost brought Ma and our family to live in his house, Phil was my handsome older cousin. He helped Mama carry baskets of laundry and brought us bundles of food from my Granny Fern. Now he was a husband and father to four little ones of his own. There were crow's-feet at the corners of his blue eyes, and he didn't laugh so much anymore. Providing for a family did that to Lower City coves. I hoped I wouldn't have to deal hard with him.

  "Your purse," I said, and nudged him with my foot.

  He glared at me. "I'd think you'd trust family." He edged away and upended his purse on the bare spot of bench he'd left between us. I took the worn leather bag from his hands and made sure he'd kept no coins back from me. "You're a cruel, suspicious mot, Beka Cooper. You always were. Doggin's the right work for you."

  His coins were all coppers. "You gave your only silver to Garnett?"

  "No. I had two other coins. Once I knew they was tainted, I went to a friend with a forge – no, Beka, I'll not give up her name! She melted the coins down and separated silver from bronze. She bought the raw metal, so I saw a bit of money back. Not what my day was worth for curst certain, the sarden belly robbers."

  I'd no interest in anyone who melted down the coles only for the metal. "You saw them melted?"

  "Mithros strike me if I lie. Goddess tears, Beka! Mayhap I weren't raised in Provost's House, but I know what harm coles do."

  I patted Phil's arm and picked up his coppers, sliding them back into his purse. "So where'd you get the coles? Gambling? You know Delene will have your hide if she catches you dicing." I jerked my head toward his friends and their game.

  "Ah." Phil shrugged. "This here? It's a stupid little two-and three-copper game. I'm out if I lose that much. I'll not play with my little ones' bellies, no, nor Delene's, either. If I lose, I go without. And I never gamble for silver. That's beggin' to get bit. I made that coin on the straight, Beka. That's what turns to glass in my gullet. One of the boats from Port Caynn brung in bales of Copper Isles silks. The coves as was bringin' it in hired me to cart it up to Starshine Warehouses. Durward, him as hired me was called, and the other fellow was Talbot."

  "Had they last names?" I asked him.

  The look he gave me could have peeled whitewash from stone. "Like they'd give their lineage to the likes of me," Phil said. "They showed me coin and goods and asked if I could do the work. We haggled over price and I did the job. Pus suckers was probably laughin' at me all along. They was the gamblers. Durin' the ride up Palace Way they was talkin' about how they cogged some slick port coves out of a purse of silver." Suddenly Phil grinned. "Mayhap they're the ones that got bit, if the coles came from that purse."

  "What boat did they come on?" I asked. "Did they say where they were going once they'd sold their goods?"

  "The boat?" Phil squinted at the sky. He flinched. "Beka, there's a demon bird a-glarin' at me. He's – " He flung up his arms as a pigeon came flying down at us.

  I ducked, but Slapper caught me on the head anyway, two good, sound buffets with his wings. "Stop it, you ungrateful louse!" I yelled. I grabbed for the dreadful beast. He fastened his beak on my hand and wrenched. I yowled, scrabbling in the small bag of feed I carried in my tunic until I had a handful of corn. I shoved Slapper onto the seat between Phil and me and dumped the corn before him. The moment the crazed pigeon saw there was food nearby, he yanked his beak from my flesh and stood on the bench. He stumbled, his clubbed foot skidding on the wood. I balanced him and got pecked for my pains. "Curse you, I'll yank a wing feather if you do that again!"

  He was too busy eating to listen.

  "Goddess save me and mine," whispered Phil. He now sat all the way at the edge of the seat, eyeing the bird. "You're sure he's no demon?"

  "He's just cracked, is all. This is Slapper." I didn't blame Phil for being flinchy of the bird. He looks like any moment he'll start to spout prophecy.

  I set down more corn. Slapper stabbed at me with his beak, but I yanked my hand clear in time. "Missed me," I told him. He smacked me with a wing. "A love tap," I said, and looked at Phil. "I need the name of that boat and where else they might have been going."

  "You do talk to 'em," Phil whispered, staring at the bird. "I heard you done, but I thought it was just gabble."

  "Did you hear they don't listen? My life is wearing on, cousin, and so is yours. Give me all you know and I'll take myself and this cracknob feather duster out of your way." Slapper hit me again. I swear, the pigeons that know me best have gotten saucy.

  Phil wiped his forehead again. The sweat rolled from his face in beads. "The boat... 'Twas the Merry Molly. She comes upriver twice a week. And she only returns to Port Caynn."

  Slapper had finished his corn. I scooped him up carefully, gripping both wings one-handed. He couldn't even get his head around to bite, which pleased me to no end. "Very well, then, Phil. We're done, unless I find you've lied to me. And then it won't be me you explain yourself to. It'll be Goodwin, or Tunstall."

  He winced. "I didn't lie, Beka. There's no point to it. I'm already out five coppers to Garnett that I didn't have, thanks to those two merchants. Though I'll say this, I'd prefer dealin' with any other Dogs than get this kind of treatment from family."

  It hurt like a pinch in the peach, I won't deny it. But what could I have done? "If you think other Dogs would treat you better, you've been buying dreams from hedgewitches. Be on about your game, then, if you're fool enough to play."

  I jumped down from the wagon, Slapper tucked under my arm. When I found a quiet corner, I put down another handful of corn and let him go. I jumped back, so he missed smacking me yet again before he settled to his meal. "You're getting slow, bird," I told him.

  Otho Urtiz lives on Lambert Street, on my way to Nipcopper Close. I knew I would find him there, it not even being eleven. He is a minstrel who works steady and late at Naxen's Fancy and some of the city's other fine eating houses. He'd be abed yet, or just waking up.

  His landlady interrupted her washday work just long enough to tell me where
his rooms were. When I knocked on his door, a slave answered. For a cove of Urtiz's reputation I expected someone prettier, and smaller, too. This mot topped my five feet and eight inches by six inches more. Her hair and brows were brown and straight, her eyes brown, her nose lumpy, her teeth bad. She had a scar across her forehead. Her shoulders and waist were broad as a man's, her scarred hands like stone. In a tan wool dress she looked a joke on the very idea of a woman. Her apron was a parting giggle. She would have done better dressed in a tunic and breeches.

  "Who wants to see Master Urtiz?" she asked. Her voice was as dull as her clothes.

  "Say that I've come regarding his recent visit to the baker Garnett," I told her. "I doubt he'll be wanting me singing more of it than that out here in his hallway."

  "Ashmari, it's well enough." Otho Urtiz even spoke musically. He stood in the doorway to his bedchamber, wearing plain breeches and a tunic and carrying a lap harp. I'd interrupted his morning practice. Interesting to think that a Player so accomplished still did that. He was as I'd seen him before, scarce five feet and five inches in height. He is fifty-three by all accounts, with long black hair he wore loose today, and a short-cropped black beard. His eyes are green-hazel. "So Garnett has noised the truth of those coins about, Mistress – ?" He looked me over with eyes as sharp as a veteran Dog's. His brows went up and he set his harp aside. "He swore to keep it to himself, but perhaps you were more persuasive than most."

  "It depends on what you have to say. For now, I only need information. How did you come by the coles you paid to the baker?"

  Urtiz sighed. "It was gambling. You know there are horse races on the Common?"

  I nodded.

  "I've an eye for horseflesh, so I like to go there and wager against the sheeplings who believe they know horses. There were crews up from the riverboats. I found myself a likely coney, fresh from Port Caynn, and won twelve silver nobles from him. I bought some bread on my way home. That was when I learned he'd paid me in coles. Lucky for me I had enough copper to pay off Master Garnett. Word hasn't gotten around the city about false coin. I went to the slave market and bought Ashmari." He grinned, showing teeth. "Money changed hands so fast the slave peddlers barely had time to count it. No one was bidding on her. They meant to sell her to the mines. They were glad to take eight silver nobles for her, what with the King's tax and the market fees. The other coins I threw in the river."

  "You paid for a slave with coin you knew was false. That's a crime, Master Urtiz." I wanted to laugh at the trick played on the life peddlers. I hated them. One of Mama's men had a buyer for my sister Diona and was waiting for him to get the papers when Mama and I caught them and told the buyer her man had no right to sell her. We almost lost her that day.

  Distracted by memory, I forgot to watch the woman Ashmari. She rushed me from behind, her hands gripped together over her head in one giant fist. Only my instincts got me out of the way, or my head would have been crushed. The blow glanced off my left elbow, numbing it. I spun and tried to trip her. It was like trying to trip a tree.

  She grabbed me by the waist and lifted me over her head. All the while she cursed me: "Sarden puttock – gutter piece – hedgecreeping scummer..."

  I seized her hair and swung my legs up, then down, kicking her in the chest. She grunted and dropped me. For all her size, she'd had no training in fighting. I kept my hold on her hair and dragged her head down until I could slam my knee in her forehead. It was as square a hit as ever I'd made. She went loose, falling to her knees. I darted around and got my arm about her throat. Only when she was purple did I yank off her apron and use it to hobble her arms at her back. There were rawhide ties in my purse. I never go out without some. Those I used to bind her ankles.

  "You've got my trade all wrong, you looby," I told her once she was properly done up. "I'm a Dog, not a whore."

  "You whore for the law," she mumbled.

  I looked at Urtiz. He was dead white, frozen in place by the hearth. "She tries my patience," I warned him. "You know the law about masters who keep vicious slaves." Except I couldn't send this ugly creature back to be sold for working meat. No more could I send the man who'd saved her from the mines to the cages.

  "Let me kill her," Ashmari begged, struggling against my bonds. "I'll not slave in mine or quarry! You saved me, let me save you!" She fought the apron binding her arms. "Master, I'm beggin'! You know the colemongers' fate!"

  "I'll give you five gold nobles. Let me free her, let her escape, before you hobble me," Urtiz said, with sweat on his brow. "Guardswoman, I swear, the coin is right here. Only let me free her, and I'll go with you quietly. She was trying to protect me! Not just five nobles – I have jewels. Let me buy Ashmari's freedom and you can have the rest. It's enough for you to retire on."

  I stared at them both. Goddess save me. Urtiz was one of those who liked to free slaves. That's why he'd bought Ashmari. And now he'd pay a fortune to bribe me so he could do that. Not get me to turn a blind eye while he escaped, but wait until he'd freed her. Why? Was it a vow to a god, or his ancestors, or something? Whatever it was, I didn't care. I only wanted to know how Urtiz had gotten his coles.

  Look at this mess I've written. Maybe this is what Ahuda means about my reports.

  The truth is, I must think of a way to write this up for Ahuda so she, Tunstall, and Goodwin don't suspect about Urtiz's bribe. They'll never forgive me for turning it down.

  "Listen to me good, you crackbrain pair of scuts." I kept my voice soft, in case the landlady was listening. "I came here for answers about the baker's coles. That's all" I was shaking, I was so angered. "Has neither of you the sense to grow herbs in dirt? Getting me involved in fooling with the slave laws! Leave me out of that!"

  I knelt and untied Ashmari's feet, pocketing my rawhide thongs when I was done. As I worked, I warned her, "Kick me and I'll break your toes, understand? I'm that vexed with the pair of you." I undid her apron to release her arms. Then I looked at Urtiz. "You'd best free her now, before she gets the two of you in real trouble. Not every Dog's a looby like me."

  Ashmari rubbed her hands and then her feet, staring at me. "You're one strange cur," she said.

  "That's no way to talk to the Guardswoman," Urtiz told her.

  "You're both featherbrained. Why do the likes of you two care what happens to the likes of me?" Ashmari clambered to her feet. "Everything made sense before I ran into you." She went to a corner of the room and pulled a standing screen around it so we couldn't see her.

  Urtiz shrugged. "I make apologies for both of us, Guardswoman – ?"

  "Never mind my name. Who lost those coins to you? Tell me that and you can forget I ever came by." I just wanted to get my information and go, before they acted out any more tragedy for me.

  "Hanse. His first name was Hanse," Urtiz said.

  I tapped my toe, letting him know my patience was running out. "Hanse is a common name, minstrel. I've two Hanses in my watch. No one will know I've gotten the name from you, so cough it up."

  Urtiz sighed. "Hanse Remy. I don't know what boat he came on, I swear."

  "Describe him for me."

  Now, at last, he stopped toying with me. "He dressed well. Like a merchant, though he wore his hair cut only a quarter of an inch thick, like the professional soldiers do. He was near six feet tall. Blue eyes. Brown hair and eyebrows. A mole on his left cheek. Scarred hands. In his late twenties. His accent was from the valley of the River Tellerun. There were worn places on his belt where he would normally keep a sword and a fighter's dagger."

  I nodded. His memory was good, but I expected that. Minstrels, the best ones, are trained to use their memories the same as Dogs. "Is there aught else you can tell me?"

  "Only that when you hobble Master Remy, give him my regards." There was a flinty look in Master Urtiz's eyes. "I like being cheated no more than the next man."

  I took my leave, before Ashmari decided she ought to try to kill me again. The day was wearing on. At least I have a full budget of news for
Tunstall and Goodwin for tonight.

  On coming home, I stopped at Kora's open door. She sat on the floor making written charm designs as Pounce and Achoo looked on. Cleaned up, Achoo was skinny, with greenish ointment that glistened in a couple of open sores and welts. There weren't as many sores as I remembered, so Kora had used her magic ointments. Achoo's fur was cropped ragged and short, none of it more than an inch long. It looked more amber-colored than it did when it was long. She was clean from nose to tail.

  "She was mostly white when I left here," I told Kora while Achoo sniffed me.

  "Sometimes it happens, when you cut their fur short." Kora blew on her charm to dry the ink. "It'll grow out white again, you'll see. I charmed off the fleas and ticks, and gave her something for worms." Kora wrinkled her nose. "Be glad you weren't here for that."

  I was glad. There was only one way for a creature to rid itself of most kinds of worm. "What do I owe you?" I asked. "I don't know what the mages for animals charge – "

  Kora waved it off. "Don't be a fool, Beka." Her eyes glinted wickedly at me. "Or let me go at that Hempstead."

  Pox. She remembered his name. "He's not worth it," I said.

  Kora rubbed Achoo's ears. "Being friends with such an upright Dog is very bad for my spirits," she told the hound. "Mind she doesn't make you feel low. Not that you'd notice, being trained to the work and all." Kora gave me Achoo's leash.

  I took the hound on up to my rooms. Pounce talked to Achoo softly as we climbed, in animal sounds I did not understand. Only when we were inside did I inspect Achoo's leash and collar. Kora had cleaned and oiled both, but that did little to improve them. Both were made of worn, twisted, dirty leather, not at all up to Dog standards.

  There is naught I can do now. I can only hope that Hemp-stead left none of his hairs tangled in the leather. Mages can do a fearful lot with a cove's hair.

  It is stifling in here, even with every shutter open. There is no breeze at all. While writing in this journal, I have sweated through my clothes.

  Tonight's watch will be nasty, if the heat does not break.