The perimeter of the district was marked by a low wall, hardly enough to keep anyone out or anything in. At regular intervals along its length were small stone watchtowers. In each was a priest, probably bored or asleep, whose duty was to be ready with his spells and his faith lest the dead wander from their tombs.
The group waited at a small arch while the priests there set aside their books and prayers and undid the iron gate. The rusted hinges squealed for oil as they pushed the grill open. Pinch barely gave them a notice until he saw a tousle-haired woman among them: Lissa of the Morninglord. He considered greeting her, asking her how the search had gone, perhaps even giving her clues that he suspected someone, but there was no privacy and no time. Instead, he merely let his hood slip back so she could see his face, gave her a wink, and set his finger to his lips. She practically jumped with a start and gave it all away, but that wouldn't have mattered much. Pinch just wanted her to feel a conspirator, to draw her farther into his web.
He and Cleedis left their horses and their bodyguard just inside the gate, and the commander gave word for the men to see to the animals and get themselves a drink. "What are you fearing?" the aged hero chided. "It's day. We'll be safe enough."
The old ghetto district hadn't been very large, and death was a popular pastime in Ankhapur-someone else's death preferred to one's own. The dead were crammed into the space so tight that the lanes between the crypts were barely big enough for a team of pall- bearers to wind their way through. There was no grid or path through the grave markers. The route had all the organization of spaces between a tumble of child's blocks. The way went straight, branched, and shunted constantly. In an effort to squeeze more space for the honored dead, crypts stood upon crypts. A staircase would suddenly wind up to another lane that ran along the roof of a mausoleum, passing the sealed niches of yet more bodies.
The ornamentation on each building was just as haphazard, dictated by the fashion of the decade and what the family could afford. In one dark corner a fountain perpetually splashed up bubbles of a tune loved by someone in the last century, now more a tribute to some wizard's art. From the cracks around a crypt door blazed rays of endless sunlight from within, as good an assurance against vampires and wights as any Pinch had seen. A foul-faced carven gargoyle fixed over another door howled aloud the sins of all who were buried within. Pinch stopped to listen a bit, rather impressed by the litany of villainies, until Cleedis testily urged him on.
They had plunged a considerable way in when the narrow path yawned into an improbable courtyard, not large but jarringly empty nonetheless. Nothing should be open here, so this space was the ultimate in conspicuous arrogance.
On one side was the royal tomb, of course. No other family could command such real estate in this cramped necropolis. The mausoleum itself was a fixture of restrained style, trumpeting its tastefulness in contradiction to its garish neighbors. The other crypts around the square, noble families all, sported hideous monsters, garish polychrome colors, and overwrought iron ivy. They were a mishmash of styles over the centuries. If Pinch were of the mind to, he could have read the tastes of Ankhapur as they passed over the years.
Cleedis sat himself on a bench some kin had thoughtfully provided just in case their dearly departed wanted to rise and catch a little sun. The old man, stooped and wrinkled, looked a part of the landscape. He fiddled with his sword, as was his wont when he was compelled to do nothing but wait. Waiting ill suited him; he was once a man of action and the habit of patience had long ago been marched out of him.
"Lo, here. You've escorted me this far to sit?"
"Bide your time, thief."
Pinch sighed and leaned himself against a wall. Knowing they were to wait, he could do a masterful job of it. Half his career was waiting with one eye to the mark and the other ever watchful for the constables. He fished two bales of dice from his pocket and practiced his foists, throwing first one set and then changing it by a quick sleight.
Some time went by in this manner, until the old man nodded into a doze on the sun-warmed bench. Just as Pinch was considering nipping the chamberlain's purse and rings, the door to the royal crypt creaked open.
"Janol, it has been a long time."
The blood ran in icy droplets down the length of Pinch's spine.
"No kind greeting?"
It was the voice that froze him, a bass growl where each word was sharply enunciated. He hadn't heard that voice in fifteen years. It was different, a little thinner and breathy, but there was no mistaking.
He didn't expect to ever hear it again, either.
"Manferic?"
A dry chuckle echoed from inside the tomb. " 'Your Highness, King Manferic,' my ungrateful ward."
"You're… dead. Or you're supposed to be."
There was a long pause. "What if I am? Death is only another challenge."
Pinch swallowed hard. For maybe the second time in his life, at least since he was old enough to appreciate his feelings, Pinch was scared. Deep, hard squeezing-in-the-gut scared. It was like a cold snake coiling around his throat, squeezing on his lungs till his breath came hard.
"Come here." The dark shape moved closer to the open doorway, always taking care to skirt the shafts of light.
Pinch shook his head fiercely against that suggestion. He was not about to step into the dark with that thing. The living Manferic had been enough to drive him away; an undead one, if Manferic was truly dead, could only be worse.
"State your business with me," the rogue croaked out, doing his best to sound bold.
"I've watched your progress, son." Manferic had always called his ward "son." Pinch was never sure if it was mockery or done just to irritate Manferic's true sons. It certainly wasn't love. The king hadn't an ounce in him then, and there was certainly none left now. "You did me proud."
"I wasn't trying to. What do you want?" The rogue kept fear at bay through his bluster.
The shadow sighed within. "And I hoped this would be a warm and touching reunion. I need a thief."
"Why me? There's ten score of them in Ankhapur, and more than a few are a match for me." Pinch bumped into something solid behind him. He jumped, but it was only a pillar.
"I need someone discreet and with no connections here in Ankhapur. You."
Pinch assumed this was a lie. In life, Manferic had never been this direct.
"You are to steal the Cup and the Knife."
The Cup and Knife! Ankhapur's symbols of royal prerogative and the two holiest artifacts in the city. It was only through them that one of the four princes would be able to claim Manferic's throne. Now Pinch was beginning to understand why Cleedis had been stalling the ceremony. Cleedis and Manferic, or more likely Manferic and Cleedis, were plotting something.
"It won't stop them from choosing a new king. They'll get their king with or without the test."
The voice chuckled again, and Pinch imagined hearing the echoes of heartless mirth.
"They will never know. You're going to switch them with another set. Another Cup and Knife. I have them here. Cleedis arranged for them to be made. Come and get them."
Pinch was immovable. "Bring them out."
The dark crypt echoed with a rasping hiss. "That would be difficult. At a future time."
"Set them in the light, then."
A charcoal gray bundle slid just barely into the light that poured through the ajar door. No hand or foot came into view.
"And after I've made the exchange?"
The voice from the crypt answered. "Give everything to Cleedis. He will know what to do."