The Twilight herald

Shandek reached over and gave his comrade a friendly cuff on the shoulder. 'Shut it, Brohm. Even in hidin', the man's still a high priest. He'd turn you insides-out soon as you burst through the door.'

'I thought they had to brew up potion to use magic? Can't see that bein' quicker than the time it takes to shove a knife in his gut.'

'That just shows your ignorance, Brohm,' Mayel declared. 'He can draw energies out of the air – I've seen him light fires with a snap of his fingers, so unless your underclothes are made of steel, I doubt you'd get the chance to use that knife of yours. And if that didn't work, he

still has an Aspect of Vellern to call upon at a moment's notice, one that will certainly take exception to you trying to hurt the abbot. His Aspect-guide is called Erwillen the High Hunter, and he has claws large enough to rip off your head and a trident to place it upon after¬wards. You'd wet your drawers just to look at him in the flesh.'

The larger man took a step forward, fist bunched, but Shandek stepped between them with a chuckle. 'Peace, friend. Mayel, keep your bloody mouth in check until you have the muscle to back it up. Brohm in't the fool you think he is, but he is three times your size. Brohm, let me talk to my cousin alone. You keep an eye out for our dark man.'

Brohm grunted, glaring at Mayel, then walked the few yards to the corner of the street.

'Dark man?' Mayel asked as he watched Brohm go.

'Rumours we've been hearin'; nothin' to concern a man of letters such as you. Maybe somethin' to do with the disappearances round here. Normally I'd say it's folk being fanciful, but with all the bad sorts that've turned up since the turn of the year, I'm not so sure. It may be nothin', but best you keep an eye open. Strangers walkin' these parts alone, that sort a' thing.'

'I will. Thanks for the warning, cuz.'

'Good. Now, what do you have to tell me?'

'Little. He's researching some ancient history, the Great War, among other things. I didn't get much time in there. Do you know if Jackdaw has followed us into the city?'

'Not that I've heard, but my people ain't entirely welcome in some districts, so it's hard to be sure.'

'He's not hard to miss, not with his tattoos,' Mayel pointed out, earning a warning look from Shandek.

'Nor is your abbot, and keepin' his presence a secret was not easy. You cost me money, boy. I don't begrudge it, not to family in need, but this abbot means nothing' to me and I'm startin' to wonder why I'm puttin' meself out so.'

'It will be worthwhile, I promise. He has some sort of artefact – at the very least it will be a relic – and you can sell that to a collector without any difficulty.'

And at best?'

At best it's some magical item. Our libraries at the monastery were extensive, and had many locked cells. Some things I think they intentionally kept away from the rest of the Land, afraid men would attack the island if they knew what was kept there.' He looked at Shandek, who was still scowling. The man didn't like being kept in the dark, and Mayel could tell his patience wouldn't last long.

Finally, he nodded. 'Fine then, just you don't waste my time, you hear? We've not yet discussed a price for you when you do get it. Best we get that out of the way early, since you're family. Nothin' worse than bickerin' with your blood, eh?' There was something of a smirk creeping onto Shandek's face. His cousin always liked negotiating from a position of strength.

'Well, you'll have guessed that I don't want to go back, so if it's a relic, we split the proceeds of any sale and I come to work for you. I've got clerking skills that will be useful to you.'

'And if it's somethin' more?'

'Then after your costs, the money is mine.'

Shandek gave a splutter of laughter and slapped him on the back.

'Wait, hear me out first,' Mayel protested. 'The condition will be that I use the money to buy a share – I'm not asking to be an equal partner, of course not, just to have a stake. I know you're not happy to stay another man's vassal, and this could help.'

'You better be careful, talkin' like that,' Shandek said softly. 'Spider, he don't like to hear such talk, and he hears more than me. It could mean both our deaths if someone overheard you there, mine just because we're cousins, and he'd not trust me again after he had you killed.'

'Is he really so paranoid?'

'You have to ask? Man's still a mystery to me, ten years on. Never met 'im, never even heard his real name.' Shandek raised his left hand, waggling the stub of his little finger, which was covered in twisted scars. 'This was a friendly reminder after I tried too hard to find that out. Other men've been killed for not getting' the message.' He pointed at the road leading to the city centre and, his voice still lowered, said, ' I hear he went back on an order a few days back. Not somethin' I've ever heard happen before. Fancy a wander through the Shambles? Tread old haunts once more? I hear there's a theatre company renovatin' the sunken theatre – it's been derelict since your old friend set fire to it two years ago.'

'Old friend? Who-Shirrel?'

'That's the bastard. Never understood why you were friends with the boy but-'

'Why we were friends?' Mayel exclaimed. 'I might have been young, but I wasn't so stupid as that. If Shirrel wanted to be your friend, you were his friend. Lest o' course you wanted to wake up on fire.'

'Well, that won't happen now. Mad bastard decided to stay inside the theatre as it burnt. Perhaps he was watchin' his own perform¬ance?'

'Don't ask me to explain how his mind worked.' Mayel was too lost in his memories of poverty and childish spite to notice Shandek's effort at a joke. 'Anyway, what about this theatre company?'

'Ah yes. Someone was sent down to collect a little token of their respect to Spider, and it turned out they had none.'

Are they mad?'

'Perhaps. The man sent got a bad beatin'. Apparently they have a few albino boys workin' for them, vicious, hairless shites, who walk around barefoot, jabberin' in some language no one else can under¬stand. They must have come from the Waste or somethin', never seen their like before. Started more than one fight in the taverns too, drink like Chetse, so I'm told. Anyway, they worked the messenger over and dumped 'im in the street. Don't talk so well now, might not walk again, neither.'

'So Spider said to burn the place down again?'

'Exactly. Only it didn't happen, for reasons I didn't get told, and Spider called back the order the next day. Said he'd come to an "accommodation" with them and they were to be left alone.' Shandek sounded less than pleased at being kept out of the loop: the theatre bordered his own fiefdom.

'Sounds scared.'

'That's what I think. Those albinos must be pretty nasty, to frighten that bastard.'

'So why are we going there?'

Mayel's expression must have betrayed what he was feeling, because Shandek look one look at him and burst out laughing. 'No, I'm not takin' you to fight them, you fool! Spider said we couldn't lean on them, and I'm not inclined to.' Shandek waved an admonishing finger In Mayel's lace. 'But he didn't say nothin' about talkin' in a friendly manner. We're just going down for a chat see what we can see. It might be that they're just insane and got lucky, hut I doubt it. No, they've got somethin' nasty up their sleeves and I'd be interested to find out what. And of course, there's my golden rule of life-'

'Which is?'

'When someone's got somethin' to hide, there's money to be made. There's somethin' going on there; might be they could find some use of a man with local knowledge, a man who knows how to find things quietly and quickly. Either that, or the authorities might pay to know more about them.'

'And if you make a powerful friend in the process?'

All the better, my lad,' Shandek declared with a chuckle. A new friend warms the heart, that's what I always say.'

The Shambles was a place of dark, narrow alleyways. The two proper streets that cut through the district had been crammed with stalls and carts almost as soon as the cobblestones were laid. The smell was just as Mayel remembered: rotting vegetables, sewage, and meat gone bad in the sun. The gutter down the middle of the street was invariably clogged with bloody entrails and what off-cuts were too rancid for even the feral animal population. The area was a warren of tiny houses that brought back a host of memories. This was where Mayel had been born; this place had been his first education. For all the squalor, the sense of community was palpable, and right now he could feel fierce eyes watching him without recognition, resenting the outsider being publicly paraded by the man whose word was law in the shadows of the Shambles.