Page 7 of The Ragpicker King
On Anchor Street in the Maze, almost up against the walls of the Sault, stands a temple over whose front doors have been carved a frieze of dancing skeletons. It had once been the fashion to worship Anibal, the God of death, and it was to this purpose that the temple had been dedicated long ago, when the area that was now the crime-riddled Maze had been swampland and shacks. A million black-clad worshippers had worn down the wide front steps with their comings and goings over the years, even as worshipping the death God fell out of popularity and those who prayed to him began to be looked upon with suspicion.
Finally, when worshippers stopped coming in earnest, the Hierophant, chief priest of the city, had padlocked the doors, covered the windows, and declared the temple closed to the citizens of Castellane. The place is not a ruin, though; fear of Anibal and his wrath has kept vandals away.
Marcel Sandoz, professional drunkard and poppy-juice addict, often drowses on the steps of the old temple. Superstition means that few bother him here, even in the small hours of the night. Lost in his usual colorful, poppy-addled dreams, he is imagining himselfin a meadow surrounded by laughing girls in bright silk dresses when he hears the strangers approach.
He blinks his eyes open, wincing at even the dim light. Perhaps the noise was part of his dream, he thinks, or perhaps he heard the Shomrim calling to one another on the Sault walls. But the hard ache in his head and the cold stink of the stone beneath him soon dispel that notion. This is reality, and the footsteps are only growing louder.
On hands and knees, he crawls up the last steps to the portico, where he hides behind a column of chipped marble. Vigilants, he guesses. They were always hurrying him along as soon as he found a comfortable place to sleep. But as three shadowy figures ascend the temple steps, a chill runs down his spine. They aren’t wearing the usual Vigilant uniforms of red and yellow. Instead, they are dressed all in black as though they mean to disappear into the night.
One of the figures—a man whose shaved head gleams in the moonlight—speaks in a language that is not soft like Castellani, but full of hard edges and grunts. Strange, Marcel thinks. Travelers from Malgasi are rare. It is a secretive kingdom, east of Sarthe, about which dark rumors swirl. “Cza vayuslam. Vaino sedanto anla.”
In a cold voice, the slimmest of the figures—a woman—says, “Bagomer, remember what I told you. You need to practice your Castellani.”
Thickly, the bald man says, “I was just saying, my lady, that the temple is unused. No one will bother us here.”
“It’s quite grim, isn’t it,” she says, sounding pleased. Marcel is able to see what she wears now—a close-fitting suit of all black, tight as a snake’s skin, as if she has been painted with black oil. A hood covers her hair, but the face that looks out from the darkness is as pale and bony as the skulls of the dancing skeletons above. “Janos,” she snaps at the second man, across whose face a wicked scar leaves a puckered line. “Get a message to Artal Gremont.Tell him that the Princess of Malgasi, heir to the Belmany throne, has arrived in his city. That should bring him running.”
As Janos nods and melts away into the night, Marcel feels a terrible fear grip him. Princess of Malgasi? If there is one thing he knows after living most of his life in Castellane, it is that no sensible citizen wishes to get caught up in the affairs of royals. Not ever.
Belly-down like a snake, he begins to wriggle away across the portico. Unfortunately for him, his bare, dirty foot collides with an empty bottle lying in a drift of garbage. It rolls across the marble with a scraping sound.
Marcel lumbers to his feet; he means to run, but his heavy legs will not obey. He sees the two figures on the steps glance up at him. Sees the face of the woman—the Malgasi Princess—twist in annoyance.
A great, invisible hand seems to seize him and catch him up. He thrashes, but to no avail. He is flung down on his back, the cracked marble of the steps biting into his spine. As he stares up in terror, the figure of the Malgasi Princess looms over him, a cruel smile twisting her predatory features. “Look at this, Bagomer,” she says. “A little Castellani mouse.”
The man behind her on the steps grunts again. “Get rid of him,” he says. “Before anyone sees.”
There is blood in Marcel’s mouth. He sputters around the copper of it, tries to push himself up on his elbows. “Don’t hurt me, please. Please. I’ll go. I won’t tell the Vigilants nothing—”
“No,” the Princess says with an almost dreamy look. “You won’t.”
The last thing that Marcel ever sees might well have been a vision out of one of his poppy-juice dreams, all color and fire and danger. The foreign Princess holds her hand up, palm out, and from the center of it comes a bolt of flame: gold and red and bronze at the edges.Magic,Marcel thinks, and barely has time to gape at the beauty and the surprise of it before he is charred away to ash.
CHAPTER TWO
Ikeep telling you,” said Jerrod, “use the edges of your feet, not the points of your toes. You’re Crawling, not dancing.”
Kel glanced down in order to glare at Jerrod and immediately felt a little sick. He’d never realized before he started Crawler training—learning to shimmy up and down walls with only the barest of hand- and footholds—how much heights bothered him.
It had never really come up before Jerrod had gone to work for the Ragpicker King and offered to teach any of his current team—Kel, Merren Asper, and Kang Ji-An—his Crawling skills.
Only Kel had taken him up on it, which was somewhat ironic. On the face of it, Kel had less reason than his friends to trust Jerrod Belmerci, who—when he had worked for Prosper Beck—had once ambushed Kel in an alleyway. They had papered over their differences, though, and it had been Merren and Ji-An who had been stiff with Jerrod at first. Their loyalty to Andreyen was paramount, and Beck had been a threat to the Ragpicker King until he had abruptly departed Castellane, leaving Jerrod unemployed.
It was Andreyen who had calmed their doubts, assuring them that Jerrod would be more of a useful asset than he would a drawback. He had even ordered the construction of a model climbingwall, made of smooth granite with irregular indentations, which was installed into the solarium. (Jerrod had suggested they construct the climbing wall above the interior river, feeling the crocodiles would give Kel additional incentive not to fall, but Andreyen had nixed that idea. “Those crocodiles are expensive,” he had said, “and eating Kel would certainly give them indigestion.”)
“And don’t lookdown,” Jerrod now said. “I’ve told you before never to look down. And don’t look sideways. Or up,” he added. “Don’t look for the handholds. Feel for them.”
Glaring directly in front of himself, Kel adjusted his position. When he’d arrived at the Black Mansion and found Andreyen closeted in a meeting, Jerrod had suggested they get in some Crawling practice. Kel, still antsy from the Dial Chamber meeting and with the wordsthe Gray Serpentechoing in his head, had agreed—though he was beginning to regret it now.
Crawling required all one’s concentration, so he’d hoped it would calm him. When he was a boy in the Orfelinat, clambering up rocks with Cas, he’d dreamed of one day being a Crawler. It had seemed the peak of what a Castellani orphan could achieve: perhaps not a mastery over one’s own life, but at least a mastery over the city’s vertiginous peaks—its sloping roofs and towers, its arches and high windows.
He missed a foothold now, slipped a little, and swore. It was one thing to feel for a handhold with well-chalked fingers and another entirely to try to wedge one’s shoe against a vertical wall—
“Leanintothe wall,” Jerrod called, sounding exasperated. “Visualize it below you— Oh, hello,” he added in an entirely different tone. “Meeting’s over, I take it?”
Kel couldn’t help himself; he looked down. The floor of the solarium seemed to blur under him, and he slid halfway down the wall before he was able to arrest his fall with an ungraceful scrabbling at the nearly featureless surface.Embarrassing.
He dropped the rest of the way, landing nearly on top of Jerrod, who ignored him. He was looking at the Ragpicker King, who hadjust come into the room, flanked by Ji-An and Merren. Ji-An wore her usual silk jacket and trousers, embroidered with peonies. Her black hair was gathered up on her head, held in place by a copper clip. Beside her, Merren looked the student he was in faded black, his blond hair bright as Antonetta Alleyne’s.
