He wished he could see. Hellfires, I wish I could breathe!
But if Londer's warehouse was the goal, it couldn't be very much longer. Alberich was supposed to have scouted the place during the day, so he'd be familiar with the outside, at least. Skif just wished that the Weaponsmaster was as good at roof walking as he was — if only they could have switched parts —
Don't worry about your partner. If he says he can do something, and you've got no cause to think otherwise, then let him do his job and concentrate on yours.
Well, that was easy to say, and hard to do, when it all came down to cases.
It seemed forever before the men stopped, and when they did, Skif was gritting his teeth so hard he thought they might splinter with the tension. They knocked on the door, quite softly, in a pattern of three, two, and five.
:Got it,: Cymry said. :Alberich doesn't know if he's going to try going in that way, but if he does, that will make it easier.:
The door creaked open. “Got 'nother one?” said a voice in a harsh whisper, with accents of surprise. “Tha's third'un tonight!”
“Pickin's is good,” said the man to Skif's right, as the one carrying him grunted. “Got'r eyes on two more prime 'uns, so le's get this'un settled.”
“Boss'll be right happy,” said the doorkeeper, as the men moved forward and closed the door behind them.
“Tha's th'ideer,” grunted the man with Skif.
They moved more slowly now, and to Skif's dismay there was a fair amount of opening and closing of doors, and direction changes down passages. This place must be a veritable warren! How was Alberich supposed to find him in all of this if he got inside?
:Let us worry about that,: said Cymry — right before there was the sound of another door opening, then the unmistakable feeling that his captor was descending a staircase.
Descending a staircase? There's a cellar to this place? There isn't supposed to be a cellar here!
Skif was in something of a panic, because part of the emergency plan figured in the Companions coming in as well as Alberich, and the Companions were not going to be able to get down a narrow, steep set of stairs into a cellar.
He had to remind himself that he was not alone, he was armed, and he was probably smarter than any of these people. No matter what happened here, sooner or later they would have to take him outside this building, and when they did, he could escape.
Even if he and Alberich couldn't actually catch the head of this gang of slavers right now, so long as Skif could get a good look at him, they'd have him later.
What's the worst that can happen? he asked himself, and set himself to imagining it. Alberich wouldn't get in. He'd be held for a while, maybe with other children, maybe not. The master of this gang would inspect them; Skif could make sure he saw enough he would be able to pick him out again. Then — well, the question was how attractive they found him.
He had to stop himself from shuddering. Just by virtue of being healthy and in good shape, he was as pretty as most of the street urchins they'd been picking up. Which meant there was one place where they'd send him.
Now the panic became real; his throat closed with fear and he had trouble breathing. Oh, no — oh, no —
In all his years on the street, he had never really had to face the possibility that he might end up a child-whore. Now he did, for if he couldn't get away from these people, or they found out what he was doing —
His imagination painted far worse things than he had ever seen, cobbled up out of all the horrible stories he had ever heard, and his breath came in short and painful gasps. He went from stifling to icy cold. What if their — the brothel was here, in this building? They wouldn't have to take him outside. They wouldn't have to move him at all. He wouldn't get a chance to escape — they could keep him here as long as they wanted to, they could — they would! strip him down first and find his knives. What would they do to him then? Drug him, maybe? Kill him? Oh no, probably not that, not while they could get some use out of him —
Don't panic. Don't panic.
How could he not panic?
:Chosen — we won't let that happen. We'll get to you, no matter what — :
But how would they? How could they? It would take a small army to storm this place, and by then —
The man carrying him got to the bottom of the stair and made a turning. “This brat's awful quiet,” he grunted to his fellow. “Ye sure ye didn' 'it 'im too 'ard?”
“No more'n the rest uv 'em,” the other snapped. “ 'E's breathin', ain't 'e?”
“Aye — just don' wanta hev'ta turn over damaged goods. Milord don't care fer damaged goods.” The man hefted Skif a little higher on his shoulder, surprising him into an involuntary groan, caused as much by desperation as by pain.
“There, ye see?” the second man said in triumph. “Nothin' wrong wi' 'im. 'E's wakin' up right on time.”
“Les’ get 'im locked up, then,” said the one from the door.
There was the sound of a key turning in a lock, a heavy door swinging open. Then, quite suddenly, Skif found himself being dumped unceremoniously onto something soft.
Well, softish. Landing knocked the breath out of him, though he managed to keep from banging his head when he landed. He heard the door slam and the key turn in the lock again before he got his wits back.
He struggled free of the stinking confines of the blanket, only to find himself in the pitch dark, and he was just as blind as he'd been in the blanket. He felt around, heard rustling, and felt straw under his questing hands. The “something soft” he'd been dumped on was a pile of old straw, smelling of mildew and dust, but infinitely preferable to the stench of the blanket.
He got untangled from the folds of that foul blanket, wadded it up, and with a convulsive movement, flung it as far away from himself as possible. The wooden bowl that had saved his skull from being cracked clattered down out of the folds of it as it flew across the room.
Which wasn't far, after all; he heard it hit a wall immediately. His prison was a prison then, and a small one. He got onto his hands and knees, and began feeling his way to the nearest wall. Rough brick met his hands, so cheap it was crumbling under his questing fingers, a symptom of the damp getting into it.
He got to his feet, and followed it until it intersected the next wall, and the next, and the next — and then came to the door.
A few moments more of exploring by touch proved that this wasn't a room, it was a cell; it couldn't have been more than three arm's lengths wide and twice that in length.
Not a very well-constructed cell, though. Rough brick made up the walls, and the floor was nothing more than pounded dirt with the straw atop it. And when Skif got to the door, he finally felt some of his fear ebbing. The lock on this door had never been designed with the idea of confining a thief. He could probably have picked it in the pitch-dark with a pry bar; the throwing daggers he wore were fine enough to work through the hole in the back plate and trip the mechanism.
I can get out. That was all it took to calm him. These people never intended to have to hold more than a few frightened children down here. As long as they thought that was what he was, he'd be fine. If this was their child brothel, he could get out of it.