Guards of Haven: The Adventures of Hawk and Fisher (Hawk & Fisher)

  “Being a Guard doesn’t give us the right to beat up someone just because we think they might have information that might help us. There are procedures, proper ways of doing things.”

  Hawk sighed. “I know. I’ve read the Manual too. But the procedures take time, and for all I know, the super-chacal’s already seeping out onto the streets. I could threaten to arrest Short Tom, maybe even drag him down to Headquarters and throw him in a cell to think things over. But I couldn’t hold him for long, and he knows it. I don’t have the time to be a nice guy about this, and to be blunt, I don’t have the inclination. My way works, and I’ll settle for that. I’ve never laid a finger on an innocent man, or killed a man who didn’t deserve it.”

  “How can you be sure? How can you be sure you haven’t killed an innocent man by accident? The dead can’t defend themselves from other people’s accusations. We’re Captains in the Guard, Hawk—not judge, jury, and executioner.”

  “I go by what works,” said Hawk flatly. “When the people in the Northside start playing by the rules, so will I. Look, there are just four Captains and a dozen Constables to cover the whole Northside. We can’t be everywhere at once, so we have to let our reputations go ahead of us. It’s a big area, Burns, and rotten to the core. All we can ever hope to do is keep the lid on. Now, I don’t care if you approve of how I do my job or not; just watch my back and don’t interfere. The only thing that matters now is stopping Morgan and his stinking drug.”

  Burns nodded slowly. “Of course, finding the super-chacal would go a long way towards reinstating you in the Guard, wouldn’t it?”

  Hawk looked at him coldly. “If you think that’s the only reason I’m doing this, then you don’t know me at all.”

  “Sorry. You’re right, of course. Hawk, can I ask you something ... personal?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. What?”

  “What happened to your eye?”

  “Oh, that. I pawned it.”

  Short Tom’s place was a two-storey glorified lean-to, adjoining a battered old warehouse on Carlisle Street. The street itself was blocked from one end to the other by an open-air market and the tightly packed crowd it had drawn. The tattered, gaudy stalls crowded up against each other, and the vendors behind them filled the air with their aggressive patter. Most of them were bundled up to their ears in thick winter furs, but it didn’t seem to be slowing them down any. Some of them were all but jumping up and down on the spot in their attempt to explain just how magnificent and amazingly affordable their goods were. Hawk glanced at a few stalls, but wasn’t impressed. Still, with Haven’s Docks closed by the winter storms, goods of all kinds were getting scarce, and even rubbish like this was starting to look good. The smell was pretty bad, particularly around the food stalls, and Burns pulled one face after another as he and Hawk made their way slowly through the crowd. Even their Guards’ uniforms couldn’t make them any room in such a crush.

  Short Tom’s lean-to loomed up before them, looking more and more unsafe the closer they got. It looked like it had been thrown together on the cheap by a builder in a hurry, trying to stay one step ahead of his reputation. The walls weren’t straight, the wood was stained and warped, and the door and window frames were lopsided. It was a mess, even by Northside standards. Still, it was no doubt cheap to rent, and for a man in Short Tom’s line of business, that was all that really mattered.

  Two large bravos in heavy sheepskin coats stood before the main door, arms folded, glaring impartially about them. Hawk walked up to the one on the left, and punched him out. The second bravo yelped in disbelief and started to unfold his arms. Hawk kicked him in the knee, waited for him to bend forward, and then knocked him out with the butt of his axe. No one in the milling crowd paid any attention. It was none of their business. Burns looked at Hawk.

  “Was that really necessary?”

  “Yes,” said Hawk. “They wouldn’t have let us in without a fight, and if I’d given them a chance to draw their swords, someone would have got seriously hurt. Most probably them, but you never know. Now follow me, watch my back, and let me do all the talking. And try to at least look mean.”

  He stepped over the unconscious bravos, pushed open the door and stepped through, followed closely by Burns. Inside, all was surprisingly neat and tidy, with clerks sitting behind two rows of desks, shuffling pieces of paper and making careful entries in two sets of ledgers. One of the clerks shouted for them to shut the bloody door and keep the bloody cold out, and Burns quickly did so. Hawk glanced at him, and shook his head. Far too long in the Westside. He looked back at the clerks, who had finally realised who the newcomers were. One clerk opened his mouth to shout a warning.

  “Don’t,” said Hawk.

  The clerk looked at the axe in Hawk’s hand, thought about it, and shut his mouth.

  “Good boy,” said Hawk. He looked about him, and the clerks shrank down behind their desks. Hawk smiled coldly. “My partner and I are going upstairs to have a nice little chat with Short Tom. Just carry on as normal. And by the way. if anyone was to come up after us and interrupt our little chat, I will be most upset. Is that clear?”

  The clerks nodded quickly, and did their best to look as though the idea had never entered their heads. Hawk and Burns strolled casually between the desks and up the stairway at the back of the room. Burns watched the clerks’ faces out of the comer of his eye. They’d all recognised Hawk by now, and there was real terror in their faces, and not a little awe. Burns frowned thoughtfully. He’d heard stories about Hawk—everyone had—but he’d never really believed them. Until now.

  They found Short Tom in his office, right at the top of the stairs. It was a nice little place, neat and tidy and almost cosy, with thick rugs on the floor, comfortable furniture, and attractive watercolor landscapes on the walls. Short Tom looked up as they entered, and his face fell. Not surprisingly, given his name, he was a dwarf, with stubby arms and legs and a large head. He wore the very latest fashion, and it was a credit to his tailor that he didn’t look any more ridiculous than anybody else. He was sitting at a normal-sized desk, on a custom-made chair, and he pushed it back slightly as he reached for a desk drawer.

  “I wouldn’t,” said Hawk. “I really wouldn’t.”

  Short Tom nodded glumly, and took his hand away from the drawer. “Captain Hawk. How nice to see you again. Absolutely marvelous. What do you want?”

  “Just a little chat,” said Hawk. “I’ve got a problem I thought you might be able to help me with.”

  “I’m clean,” said Short Tom immediately. “One hundred per cent. I’m entirely legitimate these days.”

  “Of course you are.” said Hawk. “In which case, you won’t mind my bringing in the tax inspectors to go through all your invoices, will you?”

  Short Tom sighed heavily. “What can I do for you, Captain?”

  “Morgan’s got a small mountain of drugs on his hands that he has to move in a hurry.”

  “He hasn’t contacted me. I swear he hasn’t.”

  “I know he hasn’t. You’re not big enough for this. But you can give me some names. With a deal this urgent, there’s bound to have been talk already.”

  “I’ve heard about your run-in with Morgan,” said Short Tom carefully, “and I can’t afford to get involved. I’m just a small-time operator, dealing in whatever odds and ends the big boys can’t be bothered with. As long as I know my place, no one bothers me. If I start talking out of turn, Morgan will send some of his heavies round to shut me up permanently. You’ll have to find your help somewhere else.”

  “Thousands of people could die if we don’t stop this drug hitting the street.”

  “That’s not my problem.”

  Hawk raised his axe above his head and brought it sweeping down in one swift, savage movement. The axehead buried itself in Short Tom’s desk, splitting the polished desktop apart. Hawk yanked the axe free and struck the desk again, putting all his strength into it. The desk caved in, sheared almost in two. Splinters fle
w on the air, and papers fluttered to the floor like wounded birds. Short Tom sat very still, looking down at the wreckage of his desk. He raised his eyes and looked at Hawk, standing before him with his axe at the ready.

  “On the other hand,” said Short Tom very politely, “I’ve always believed in co-operating with the forces of law and order whenever possible.”

  He came up with four names and addresses, all of which Hawk recognised. He nodded his thanks, and left. Bums hurried after him, having almost missed his cue. His last glimpse was of Short Tom staring glumly at what was left of his desk. Burns followed Hawk down the stairs and back through the rows of clerks, all of whom were careful to keep their eyes glued to their work as the Guards passed. Hawk and Bums stepped out into the street again, and Burns winced as the bitter cold hit him hard after the comfortable warmth of the offices. He stubbed his toe on something, and looked down to find the two bravos who’d guarded the front door still lying where they’d fallen. Only now they were stark-naked, having been stripped of everything they owned. Their flesh was a rather pleasant pale blue, set against the dirty grey of the snow. Hawk chuckled.

  “That’s the Northside for you.”

  “We can’t just leave them like this,” protested Burns. “They’ll freeze to death.”

  “Yeah, I know. Give me a hand and we’ll dump them back in the offices. Short Tom will take care of them. But let this be a lesson to you, Bums. Never give a Northsider an opening, or he’ll steal you blind. And the odds are there’s not one person in this crowd who would have lifted a finger to help these two bravos. They’d have just left them there to freeze. In the Northside, people learn from an early age not to care for anyone but themselves.”

  “Is that where you learned it?” said Burns.

  Hawk looked at him, and Bums had to fight down an urge to look away from the glare of the single cold eye. When Hawk finally spoke, his voice was calm and unhurried.

  “I think we’re going to get on a lot better if you stop acting like a character from a religious pamphlet. I don’t know how you’ve managed to survive this long in Haven; I can only assume they’ve had a hot flush of civilisation in the Westside since I was last there.

  “Look, Burns, let’s get this clear once and for all. I’m only as hard as I need to be to get the job done. I take no pleasure in violence, but I don’t shrink from it either, if I decide it’s necessary. I didn’t see you holding back when we were fighting for our lives in Morgan’s factory.”

  “That was different!”

  “No, it wasn’t. We’re fighting a war here in the Northside, against some of the most evil and corrupt sons of bitches this city has produced, and we’re losing. For every villain we put away, there are ten more queuing up to take his place. The only satisfaction we get out of this job is knowing that things would be even worse without us. Now, am I going to have any more problems with you?”

  “No,” said Burns. “You’ve made yourself very clear.”

  “Good. Now help me get these two bravos inside before they freeze their nuts off.”

  It didn’t take long to discover that none of the distributors knew anything about Morgan’s super-chacal. The word from every one of them was that Morgan had gone to ground after his release from custody, and no one had heard anything about him since. Hawk gave them all his best, menacing glare, but they stuck to their story, so in the end Hawk decided he believed them. Hawk and Burns stood together in the street outside the last distributor’s warehouse, and looked at each other thoughtfully.

  “Maybe Morgan’s set up his own distribution network,” said Burns.

  “No,” said Hawk. “If he had, I’d have heard about it.”

  “You didn’t know about the super-chacal.”

  “That was different.”

  “How?”

  “The drug could be produced and guarded by relatively few people, hidden away in the pocket dimension. A new distribution system would need a lot of people, and someone would have been bound to talk. No, Morgan has to be using an established distributor. Maybe someone who doesn’t normally move drugs, but has the right kind of contacts.”

  “Maybe.” Burns pulled his cloak tightly about him, and stamped his feet in the snow. “So, what’s our next step?”

  “We go and talk with the one man who might know what Morgan is up to; the man who knows everything that’s going on in the Northside, because nothing happens here without his approval. The big man himself: Saint Christophe.”

  Burns looked at him sharply. “Wait a minute, Hawk, even I’ve heard of Saint Christophe. He takes a cut from every crime committed in Haven. Word is he has a dozen judges in his pocket, and as many Councillors. Not to mention a personal army of four hundred men, and a private mansion better protected than Guard Headquarters. We don’t stand a chance of getting in to see him, and even if we did somehow manage it, he’d probably just have us killed on sight. Slowly and very horribly.”

  “Calm down,” said Hawk, amused. “We’re not going anywhere near his house.”

  “Thank all the Gods for that.”

  “I’ve got a better idea.”

  Burns looked at him suspiciously. “If it involves bursting in on him where he works and smashing up his desk, you are on your own. Saint Christophe is the only person in the Northside with an even worse reputation than you.”

  “Have you finished?” said Hawk.

  “Depends,” said Burns darkly. “Tell me your idea.”

  “Every day, at the same time, Saint Christophe has a bath and sauna at a private little place not far from here. It’s pretty well guarded, but there’s a way to get in that not many people know about. I did the owner a favour once.”

  “And at what time of day does Saint Christophe visit this bathhouse?” said Burns.

  “About now.”

  Burns nodded glumly. “I thought so. You’ve had this in mind all along, haven’t you?”

  Hawk grinned. “Stick with me, Burns. I know what I’m doing.”

  Burns just looked at him.

  The private baths turned out to be a discreet little place tucked away on a side street in a surprisingly quiet and upmarket area right on the edge of the Northside. It stayed quiet and upmarket because the Northside’s more successful villains used the area for their own rest and relaxation, and everyone else had the sense to stay out of their way. Everyone except Hawk.

  He walked breezily down an alleyway and slipped into the baths through a door marked “Staff Only.” Burns hurried in after him and shut the door quickly behind them, his heart beating uncomfortably fast. Hawk looked around once to get his bearings, then set off confidently through a maze of corridors that Burns wouldn’t have tackled without a map and a compass. Every now and again they encountered a member of the staff, but Hawk just nodded to each attendant briskly, as though he had every right to be there, and the attendant just nodded back and continued on his way. Burns grew increasingly nervous, and felt a growing need to find a privy.

  “Are you sure you know where you’re going?” he whispered harshly.

  “You must learn to trust me, Burns,” said Hawk airily. “The owner himself showed me this route. We’ll find Saint Christophe in cubicle seventeen, just down this corridor here. Assuming he hasn’t changed his routine.”

  “And if he has?”

  “Then we’ll just walk up and down the corridor, slamming doors open, till we find him.”

  Burns realised with a sinking heart that Hawk wasn’t joking. He thought about the number of major villains who were probably relaxing all unknowing behind the other doors, and swallowed hard. He started to plot an emergency escape route back through the corridors, realised he was hopelessly lost, and felt even worse.

  Cubicle seventeen looked like all the others, a plain wooden door with a gold filigree number. Hawk put his ear against the door and listened for a moment, then stood back and loosened the axe at his side. Then he kicked the door open, strolled casually into the steam-filled sauna and leaned
against the door, holding it open. Bums stood in the doorway, keeping one eye on the corridor, in case some of the staff happened along. The steam quickly cleared as the temperature dropped, revealing Saint Christophe sitting at the back of the room, surrounded by twelve muscular female bodyguards wearing nothing but sword belts.

  The bodyguards surged to their feet, grabbing, for their swords as they recognised the Guards’ uniforms. Hawk just leaned against the door, and nodded casually to Saint Christophe. Burns wanted desperately to draw his sword, but had enough sense to know it wouldn’t help him much if he did. His only hope was to brazen it out and hope Hawk knew what he was doing. He squared his shoulders and lifted his chin, and gave the bodyguards his best intimidating glare. If it bothered them at all, they did a great job of hiding it. And then Saint Christophe stirred on his wooden bench, and everybody’s attention went to him. He gestured briefly to his bodyguards, and they all immediately put away their swords and sat down again, ignoring the two Guards. Burns blinked. He couldn’t have been more surprised if they’d all started speaking in tongues.

  Saint Christophe was a big man, in more ways than one. Though no longer personally involved in any particular racket, every other villain in the city payed him homage, not to mention tribute. He funded a great many operations, and planned many more, but never took a single risk himself. He ran his organization with brutal efficiency and was reputed to be one of the richest men in Haven, if not the Low Kingdoms. He had a partner, once. No one knew what happened to him. It wasn’t considered prudent to ask.