The Keys to Paradise Page 2

  But it ended quickly. Giles won both rounds and pocketed the key.

  The sailor stood up, knocking over the bench. ‘You cheated me!’ he yelled.

  The room grew quiet. Mousie’s work-roughened hands clenched at his sides. Giles stood quietly, pushing his pouch around to the back of his belt so that it wouldn’t get in his way. As casual as the gesture was, it carried professionalism and deadly resignation with it. Giles’ mind settled into fighting calm as he appraised his would-be foe.

  He realised that the rest of the men in the room had backed off, watching silently.

  ‘Easy, now, friend,’ Giles said. ‘I gave you the chance to quit twice. I asked if you were sure you wanted to bet.’

  ‘The man’s face flamed. ‘You cheated!’ he roared.

  ‘You can’t cheat at this game, Giles said. ‘It’s all luck. You checked the dice.’

  A call came from the corner of the room. ‘That’s right, Mousie, you know you can’t cheat in that game. The stranger won right squarely.’

  ‘But it’s not fair,’ Mousie argued. ‘He took all my money.’

  ‘I didn’t take it. You wagered it and lost,’ Giles said.

  The man shook his head, not wanting to believe what he had done.

  ‘Come on, friend. Sit down and share a brandy, and we’ll talk about it.’ Giles raised his voice. ‘Landlord, brandy here for me and my friend. Brandy for everyone!’

  A cheer went up around the room. The landlord looked at Giles as if to reassure himself that the stranger meant it. Giles nodded. The expression on his face made the innkeeper blanch. He had seen veterans before, that look, the deadly quality that they carried with them wherever they went.

  Mousie looked around him at the beaming faces. He didn’t want to believe that his mates were abandoning him. Giles reached across the table and laid his hand on the other man’s thick arm.

  ‘Come. Sit down and have a brandy. We’ll work something out. I don’t want to take your last coin. I’ve been without a hope, much less a pair of coppers to rub together. I know what it’s like.’

  The man stared up at Giles to see if he was serious. The serving maid quietly set glasses of brandy on the table and scurried away. Mousie watched her go, a perplexed look on his dull face. Finally, with a sigh, he righted the bench and sat down. He picked up th glass of brandy and swallowed it in one gulp. Giles shoved the second glass over to him.

  ‘Go ahead. She’ll bring more. Drink it down, then we’ll talk.’

  The second brandy took two gulps. The crimson wrath had gone out of Mousie’s face. Giles was certain that he no longer wanted to fight. He fingered the coin and key on the table.

  ‘You shouldn’t have continued to gamble until you lost everything. Excuse me for saying so, but that’s a stupid thing to do.’

  Chagrined, Mousie hung his head.

  ‘I don’t want you to go hungry before the next catch,’ Giles said. ‘I’m not giving it all back. After all, I did win fairly.’ He let the coins riffle from his cupped, calloused fingers. ‘Maybe next time you’ll be more cautious. But probably not, eh?’

  Mouse stared at Giles, then laughed. ‘Probably not. This is not the first time.’

  ‘I suspected so.’ Giles shoved a stack of five coins over to Mousie. ‘See if you can hang on to that for a week. Friends?’

  Mousie stared bemusedly at the coins in front of him. He reached out and grasped Giles’ hand. ‘Friends,’ he said.

  Giles slipped the rest of the coins into his pouch and stood. ‘I’ll be back and drink with you later. I need to speak to the landlord.’

  When he had finished assuring the landlord that he would stand brandy for all, and ale when that ran out, Giles retired to his seat by the fireplace. Stranger things had happened to him. While not afraid of the sailor, Giles was pleased that he had been able to placate Mousie. He wasn’t sure that he could have bested the burly sailor, even knowing a thousand ways of fighting learned over a lifetime. Bumps and bruises were a thing of his past.

  Giles reached into his pouch and pulled out the key. Leaning forward to catch the light from the fire, he examined it closely. It was gold, and the small peridot caught the dancing firelight and winked at him, as if sharing a wondrous secret.

  The runic inscription ran in a tight circle around the small stone. Giles puzzled it out, rune by rune. ‘The Key to Paradise,’ it read. Giles frowned.

  A man much older than Giles limped over to the table. he carried his tumbler of brandy with him.

  ‘I came to thank you for the brandy, stranger. It warms these poor old bones. May I sit with you?’

  Giles gestured to the empty bench opposite. He looked at the key again and started to place it back in his pouch.

  The old man’s wizened, blue-veined hand reached across the table. ‘May I?’ he asked.

  Giles laid the key in the man’s outstretched palm.

  After careful scrutiny, he returned the key to Giles. ‘I thought so. The Key to Paradise.’

  ‘So I read,’ Giles said. ‘What does it mean?’

  ‘Don’t you know?’ The old man looked to see if Giles was poking fun at him

  ‘It means nothing to me.’

  ‘I could tell you a story, but my throat’s dry,’ he said slyly, feigning a harsh cough. Giles raised his hand to the serving maid. He pointed at the old man’s glass.

  ‘Ah, you’re a rare one, sir. Thankee. Now, the Key to Paradise. Somewhere out there is the Gate of Paradise, and if we can believe the tales, this key will unlock that gate. Now, what’s behind the Gate… ah, the stories! Gold, jewels, beautiful women, power, wealth, your heart’s desire! Nobody knows, but the stories say that it’s everything you could ever want.’

  ‘Do they? And just where is that Gate to Paradise?’

  ‘Ah, there’s the rub. Every story I’ve heard puts it in a different place. North, south, east, west, take your choice. Might be it’s in all those places – or none.’

  ‘Sounds like just another tall tale to me,’ Giles said. ‘Have you ever heard of anyone who actually saw the Gate?’

  ‘No,’ the old man admitted. ‘But that fits the story, too. The story runs that you’ve got to have the key in your hand to actually see the Gate.’

  Giles threw back his head and laughed.

  ‘You laugh, sir. But people believe that story. I do. And here you are with the key in your hand. Best keep it safe – unless your charity extends to offering an old crippled man the key as a token.’

  ‘I spent twenty years at the Wars. Promoted to sergeant and broken to the ranks three times. Through it all, I learned one lesson: be generous to beggars, but not too generous.’ The grizzled veteran stood, saying, ‘Your story is worth another brandy. But no more. I’m off for a drink with my erstwhile gambling partner, and then to bed. Thank you for your company. Come round tomorrow night and I’ll buy you another.’ He laid his hand on the old man’s shoulder.

  After a quick drink with Mousie, Giles nodded to the landlord and mounted the stairs to his room above.

  The wind had blown the threatening storm clouds away, and Giles stood at his window for a brief while, looking down over the moonlit waterfront.

  The night had been unexpectedly profitable, and had provided a moment’s diversion in what had become a life of pointless drifting. Pointless. No home, nothing to tie him down. Giles rubbed his aching joints, wishing the storm would come and get it over. The threat of rain only protracted his pains. He stretched, yawned, thought on the fable the old man had told. Absurd maunderings, nothing more than superstition. Giles had heard it all before, in a dozen places, over the years.

  And what if it were true? Riches to carry him into his old age, which wasn’t so far off. He straighted his arm, wincing as joints protested at even this small movement.

  Giles kicked off his boots and lay down in the bed, pulling the covers over himself. The Gate of Paradise. Why not go looking for it? He had nowhere else to go or anything of a pressing nature. Why not wander with a purpose? But no hurry, no hurry.

  Those were his last thoughts before his eyes closed for the night. By the time the rains pelted wet and cold against the window, Giles Grimsmate snored loudly, his dreams about Paradise.

  Two

  The Leather Cup was deceptively quiet even though it stood just off Kelpht’s main street. A few labourers from the shipyards stopped in to end their working day, but they lingered only long enough to drink a couple mugs of watery ale. One by one, they shouldered their tool bags and departed, worn men on their way home to families. Some would be met with love, others with the shrilling of wives and the snivelling of children. None noticed the small, dark, quick-gestured man lounging in one cobwebby corner of the tavern.

  An oddly cheerless lot, Keja Tchurak thought, even for such an undistinguished delta town. Not for the first time, Keja cursed the treacherously unkind fate that had driven him from a comfortable berth and a willing woman and sent him fleeing, to hide from shadows, to jump at the slightest of sounds behind him. But such kept him free – and alive.

  He cut a bite-sized morsel of beef from the greasy slab on the plate before him. It was awful, tasteless.

  Keja leaned back, chewing thoughtfully. Rosaal had been quite a woman. Raven hair, long slender legs so willing to part for him, the sumptuous body of a courtesan. He stopped chewing as he remembered with real fondness their nights together. It had been a favour of the gods that her family had money, too. That she showed herself to be a bit on the dim-witted side rankled after a few passionate nights, though. Keja eventually had become sated enough to realise that her body and loving ways weren’t everything.

  Keja resumed chewing. The tough beef required many swallows of ale to get it down. The bread was little better, and it wasn’t f
resh. Yesterday’s, probably. Keja hated inns where the owner took so little pride in what he served. No doubt this accounted for the other patrons simply swilling the pitiful ale and then leaving to go tup their mistresses or wives. That’s what Keja would rather be doing than sitting in the Leather Cup, had he mistress or wife.

  He looked around the nearly empty room. Not good. If the city guard came a’ checking, he would stand out like a red silk bow on a swine’s snout. He prayed for a quick change in the innkeeper’s penurious policies, for good ale and food, for the room to fill up. Perhaps some locals would come in after their suppers and a lusty roll with their mistresses. That would make it easier to remain inconspicuous. If patrons didn’t show up soon, Keja saw no choice but to retire to his dismal room upstairs.

  He tried another bite of beef. As he feared, it had not improved. Keja waved to the serving wench to take it away. ‘Bring me a couple of hard-boiled eggs,’ he ordered imperiously. ‘This beef is a disgrace even to the bottom of Klepht’s sewer, if there is one.’ He pointed to his cup. ‘And another ale.’

  The serving wench said nothing, accepting his order with ill-concealed bitterness. Keja watched her walk away with a grace no human shared. A Trans, and part cat. He hadn’t seen many in Klepht. Keja eyed her critically and decided she’d be a pretty one if the landlord didn’t keep her on the run so much. She was a bit dishevelled, her hair mussed, and a streak of soot ran across her forehead, probably from stoking the kitchen fire. But she was slender, with clean, sharp features, and that unmistakable feline quality in walk and gesture. Keja shivered a little when he saw her yellow eyes; definitely catlike, with vertical slit pupils – and predatory.

  Keja wondered what it would be like with her, all night long, releasing those animal passions. He had heard tales of love-making with a Trans. Keja had to admit the idea excited him.

  The cat Trans serving maid returned with his ale and two eggs rocking to and fro in a small wooden bowl. He picked a speckled brown egg and rapped it against the side of the bowl. Egg white oozed out onto his fingers. He glanced up at her. Those fierce yellow cat eyes shone with defiance, daring him to complain again.

  Keja shoved the bowl away, silently picked up his ale and carried it over to the fireplace, standing with his back to the flames. The young man felt nothing but disgust at the service, at Klepht, at everything. Under different circumstances he would have complained loud and long. Not now. He dared not. He peered across the room, trying to study the weather outside, but the windows were too dirty. It figured.

  Keja needed to get away from this provincial jerkwater town, to keep on the move. At the moment, however, he needed rest. He had been hounded too long. This slovenly inn provided him a good enough respite; it was not the sort of place guards would expect an accomplished thief like the great Keja Tchurak to choose.

  Keja’s left arm still ached where one of Werlink l’Karm’s personal guards had sliced it with a lucky thrust. Idly, he rubbed it. It hadn’t hurt this badly in days. It must be turning to rain outside.

  Keja smiled. Master thief that he was, he’d escaped, and with a tidy haul, too. But l’Karm didn’t give up easily. The merchant’s private guard had dogged Tchurak’s steps at every turn, only overwhelming cleverness saved him on several occasions. But Keja had to admit that when they closed in on him along the River Kale, escape had come through pure luck. The story he had told the old fisherman about jilting a lover rang too true, but the fisherman being at the right place could only be called luck. Hiding under a wagonload of fish was not at all pleasant, but seemed like high times at Gresham’s Fair in comparison with what the guard would have done to him.

  And the haul stayed intact. A hefty bag of coin, some baubles he would sell off when he got to a bigger city, and the gold key. If he had thrown the guard off his trail, and it looked as if he had, he might follow up the chimerical story behind the key told him by loving, lovely Rosaal.

  His backside good and warm from the fire, Keja sighed at the memory of the fiery Rosaal gracing his bed, then wandering back to a bench near the corner. Locals drifted in, bringing with them gusts of fresh air from the windy weather outside.

  Keja ordered another ale and watched the patrons playing a board game. They were a quiet lot, glum and dour. They played with too much seriousness for his taste.

  He reached into his pouch and pulled out the golden key. His thoughts drifted far from booty or key. Unconsciously, Keja turned the key over and over in his hand.

  ‘Bring more wood in from outside, and there’s two hands up out there looking for their ale.’ The landlord’s loud, grating voice stirred instant dislike in Keja. He had heard that tone too many times, times when he had been down on his luck and actually doing menial tasks to survive. ‘When you’ve done that, the baking pans haven’t been washed from yesterday. And don’t give me any of your dark looks, my Pet.’

  ‘Don’t call me Pet.’ Keja looked from the Trans serving wench to the landlord. The way the light caught her face highlighted the cat-portion over the human. He wondered if she would rip out the insulting landlord’s throat. If Keja had been in her place, he would have.

  The landlord of the Leather Cup wiped greasy hands across the expanse of his apron and laughed. ‘Don’t we have our pride? Get on with you, don’t stand idle.’ He turned back to stir the pot of ill-smelling stew.

  Petia Darya made an obscene gesture behind his back and stormed into the taproom to fill two cups for the thirsty patrons. She’d been working at the inn for a week and would stay only long enough to earn a few coins before moving on. Servitude did not suit her at all.

  She carried the brimming cups across the room to the men who scowled at her. They were the same two who had harassed her all week. ‘Filthy Trans bitch,’ she heard one of them mutter as she turned away.

  Petia felt the desire to turn and show them a bit of her cat nature, but she subdued her temper. She vowed to get her revenge, not only on them, but on the landlord, too. Soon.

  Two more men came in and ordered, and for the next few minutes she busily fetched ale. By the time she had caught up with the orders, her anger only smouldered.

  She brought wood in from outside until her arms ached, then set to washing the baking pans. She was interrupted from time to time with calls for more ale. The landlord was being his usual obsequious self to the customers, but drawing and serving was beneath his dignity – which he let her know at every turn. Petia was kept busy between kitchen and the public room.

  She wished that she were anywhere except here in Klepht. Petia had left Trois Havres in a hurry, her burglaries too careless. It was a case of overconfidence. If she had not seen the handbill seeking her arrest, she might now be working off seven years in the Duke’s gold mines. Luck had come her way when she found a ship crossing the Everston Sea and a cargomaster willing to look the other way for a few coins to augment his paltry wages.

  Escape had not been without other penalties. She had arrived in Bericlere with only a few coins to show for all the troubles besetting her. Petia stoically accepted that; it was part of her heritage. Trois Havres, her home and the home of many of the Trans, was pleasant enough, but had few opportunities for the ambitious. Petia almost sneered at the idea of ambition in the Trans.

  For over two hundred years they had been scorned, reviled, made into little more than slaves by a sorceress far too quick with her curses. Cassia n’Kaan had turned the people of an entire continent into part human, part animal for a relatively minor offence. Petia often wondered if the broken trade treaty with Lord Lophar had, indeed, been the cause for so much misery for her and the untold others turned into Trans. She guessed at more between sorceress and merchant-lord. It mattered little now. The sorceress had perished, and the Trans had slowly evolved, regressing to human form.

  And she had been indentured and escaped, become a thief and escaped, and now Petia tried her hand at serving. From this she’d escape, too.

  Petia held out her hand and sharp talons snapped out like the blade of a folding knife. The Trans became more human with every passing generation, but many traits remained. For that, Petia thanked gods living, dead, and to be.

  Because of the partial humanity, Petia and others of her kind worked harder to prove themselves, to get ahead, to survive. That driving ambition had provided fuel for the Trans War. A demagogue with honeyed voice and inflammatory mind rose to condemn the Trans for economic setbacks. Even now, even after twenty years or more, Petia felt anger rising at Duke Pattch. His coin was not of gold, but of hatred.