Salim stepped out the front door of Canary House, a newly heavy purse weighting down the inner pocket of his robe. Outside, the bustle of the street seemed louder than it had before, a sharp contrast to the songs of the caged girls inside.
A’kaan had been busy entertaining several of his guests—a woman with purple hair and sleek leather armor, and a man so fat he seemed ready to burst out of both his skin and his straining robes—and thus Salim had approached the halfling bartender instead. The diminutive man was dressed even better than his employer in a formal black vest and gray trousers, with several tasteful silver chains running between the pockets. His feet, bare in the tradition of his people and covered in curly brown hair, tapped lightly on his catwalk as he dried a glass with a swatch of silk. He introduced himself as Moggan.
“Salim,” Salim said. “I believe you have something waiting for me.”
The halfling didn’t even blink, simply reached under the bar as if he’d been waiting for precisely this moment and lobbed over the purse. Salim caught it, grunting in approval at its weight. He tucked it away.
“Will you be needing a room, sir?” Moggan replaced the glass in the hanging rack above him and draped the cloth over one shoulder. “A’kaan said you might be staying for some time.”
“He’s correct.” Salim hadn’t actually thought that far ahead, but no doubt Ceyanan had. As much as it galled him to follow the angel’s plan, stated or otherwise, he had to admit that there were far worse lodgings than Canary House. He pulled a number out of the air. “Perhaps a week.”
“Very good, sir.” The bartender stepped backward off the ledge and disappeared, his three-foot-tall frame swallowed by the chest-high mahogany bar. Salim leaned over the counter just in time to see the little man swing himself deftly back onto the catwalk, a lemon-yellow key in his hand. He held it out. “Third floor, room seven. Just pull the bell if you need anything.”
Salim accepted the key and reached for his recently acquired pouch, but Moggan caught the motion and shook his head. “No need for that, sir. Master A’kaan has already made arrangements with your church to cover your stay, and whatever else you may require.”
Better and better. Salim thanked him and turned to go.
“And your friends, sir? Will they be needing rooms as well?”
For a second, Salim had no idea what the barman was talking about. His closest friends were oceans away. Worlds. Lifetimes.
Then it clicked. “Ah, no. Or at least, I don’t think so. The dark-haired woman, perhaps. I’m not sure what her plans are. But the others won’t be returning.”
Moggan just nodded, as if making room arrangements for angels and devils were something he did every day. Salim had to admire the man’s poise.
They wouldn’t be back, though. Of that, Salim was sure. It wasn’t Ceyanan’s way to stick around and help. The angel simply delivered the jobs; after that, Salim was on his own, up to his elbows in whatever mess the angel had dropped him into this time. When it was all over, and the tears and blood had dried, the angel would be back with a wry joke and a condescending pat on the head, reminding Salim that it was all in a day’s work as a servant of Pharasma. And then it would send him somewhere else.
Salim felt the fire building in him again, and turned away before the halfling accidentally caught it. “Thanks,” he said over his shoulder, and this time the barman let him go.
Now he was outside, breathing in the dung, sweat, and smoke that was the flavor of cities everywhere. Salim paused on the doorstep, getting his bearings, and saw several people in the line of potential guests looking at him with a mixture of jealousy and anticipation, clearly hoping that his departure meant there was a newly open space for them inside. He stepped out of the way, and the half-orc doorman nodded to him amiably. Apparently anyone A’kaan allowed inside was worthy of the bouncer’s respect.
“Anyone I can call for you, sir?” The doorman spoke in a surprisingly cultured bass. “A porter? Guide? Sedan chair?”
“A guide would be perfect,” Salim said. “Thank you.”
The half-orc bobbed his head, then pursed lips around protruding tusks and blew a whistle blast that nearly deafened Salim.
A figure dispatched itself from the crowd and ran up. It was a boy, perhaps fifteen, with bare feet so dirty and road-hardened that they might have been leather moccasins. His clothes weren’t much better, just shreds and patchwork, but beneath them his back was as straight as any noble scion.
“Ah, Karus, you handsome scholar—your dulcet tones have summoned me like a sailor to a siren. What might this humble prince of the groundlings offer you today?”
The half-orc snorted, but the sound was clearly affectionate. He hooked a thumb at Salim. “This gentleman is in need of a guide.”
“Of course, of course.” The boy turned to Salim and bowed low, tugging one sandy lock of hair out of its bird’s nest and pulling on it respectfully. “The name’s Gav, my lord, and whatever you may have heard about me, I assure you it is both absolutely true and a crass understatement. What you need, I can find, and what I find, you may find you need. Many claim to know this city, but to me, she’s like my own wife.” He looked up and winked. “And for a handful of copper, gov, she’s yours for the night.”
Karus laughed for real this time and kicked at the boy, who danced easily out of reach. “Enough of your filth, boy. Can’t you see he’s a holy man?”
“A priest who can’t take a joke is no priest at all,” the boy opined. “For what is life but a joke, and a cruel one at that?”
“You make a fine point,” Salim broke in, “but I’m afraid I’m in the market for a guide, not a philosopher.”
“And you’ve found one!” Gav’s narrow chest puffed out like a pigeon’s. “The best street-runner the Warren’s ever produced. And today only, because you’re a servant of the blessed Gray Lady and obviously respected by my good associate Karus here, I’ll throw the philosophy in for free, though it steals bread from the mouths of my yet-unfathered children.”
Karus rolled his eyes. “He’s telling the truth, sir. If you can stand his chatter, he’s a fine guide, and more honest than most in this city.”
“Good enough.” Salim flipped a small coin to the half-orc. The doorman caught it without looking and turned back to scrutinizing his line. “Come,” Salim said to the boy, then picked a direction at random and began walking.
The boy materialized at his side, keeping pace with an easy lope. “A man of action, neh? I like that in a client—straight to the point, without a lot of jawing. Commendable.”
Salim said nothing. Inside, he was still gathering his thoughts, combing through what little Ceyanan and the devil had given him to work with.
“Quiet, too. That says a lot about a man, it does. They say that a man who keeps his opinions to himself is right most of the time. Most people open their mouths and all their brains fall out.”
Salim began to wonder if he’d made a mistake. The boy opened his own mouth to continue chattering, and Salim snatched at the first thing to come to mind.
“Corpses.”
The boy paused, then glanced sideways at Salim. “Beg pardon, sire?
“Corpses,” Salim said again, and even as he said it, an idea began to take shape in his mind. “Dead people. Where do they end up?” It wasn’t much to go on, but when dealing with a murder, best start by going where the bodies were.
“Of course,” Gav said easily, as if it were a request he got all the time. “Corpses. Right. Well, that depends a lot on the nature of your particular stiff. If’n a family has money, then the dearly departed are usually taken to your people down at the Godsmouth Cathedral.” He gestured at the amulet hanging on Salim’s chest, the silver spiral of Pharasma catching the sun. “The priests there do ’em up proper and take ’em down the cliff to the ossuary. If money’s tight, though—and really, when isn’t it?—most folks end up smoked at Heaven’s Ladder, down in Cavalcade.”
“Smoked?”
The boy pointed south, and Salim noticed a greasy black pillar of smoke drifting up and out past the city’s walls, where the updraft off the cliff caught it and tugged it high into the sky.
“Ah.” No point bothering with either of those, then—ash wouldn’t tell him anything, and the Pharasmin cathedral was Maedora’s turf. “And what about those with no family? No money?”
“Some of those still end up climbing the ladder,” Gav said, nodding toward the smoke. “The gnome who runs the place is a charitable sort, if a bit eccentric—but then, aren’t they all, neh? The rest end up washed over the cliff, or sold to the necros up in Ankar-Te.”
“Necromancers?” Salim had heard rumors that dark spellcasters worked in the city, some of them even conducting their trade openly, but he’d presumed most of that was hyperbole, especially considering the presence of a Pharasmin church in the city.
“Who else?” Gav eyed Salim sidelong. “Not that people don’t honor the Lady of Graves, but life’s tough, and the necros pay hard coin for cold bodies. Most folk don’t like the idea of their dead sister walking around or turning tricks at the White Lady, but money is money. And there’s always a few coppers to be made fishing folks what met a bad end out of the rivers down in the Bottoms.”
The rivers. Ceyanan had mentioned something about that. “Take me to the necromancers.”
“Can do, gov.” The boy stopped abruptly, and Salim was several feet beyond him by the time he turned.
“All apologies,” the boy said, grinning, “but you’re going the wrong way.” He pointed north, back the way they had come.
Salim spread his hands and bowed, mimicking Gav’s own overwrought gestures. “In that case, I cede command of this expedition to its more experienced member.” He straightened. “Lead the way.”
The two headed north, not precisely back to Canary House, but through a web of narrow alleys winding between buildings of similar function, if not quality. Inns of wood and brick leaned against brothels and shops like drunken soldiers using each other to remain upright, and colored lanterns littered eaves and porches, waiting for dusk. Prostitutes, male and female and anywhere in between, leaned out of windows or lounged against railings. Most were the run-of-the-mill catamites and doxies found in any city, but a few were something else entirely. On one balcony, a tattooed harpy perched in a birdlike squat, wings spread and all-too-human physiology clearly visible. Beneath an awning farther down, a centaur mare wearing a low-cut blouse preened and postured, her enormous equine hindquarters displayed prominently. Though Salim had worked with plenty of horses in his lifetime, including mares in heat or ready to drop foals, he’d never before thought of a horse in this particular context, and quickly looked away.
Several of the harlots waved to Gav, their manner friendly rather than professionally seductive, and he waved back cheerily. Clearly the boy hadn’t been lying about his connections. Still, Salim found himself breathing easier once the press of brothels gave way to more conventional inns, the sort of hostels more suited to traveling merchants and other less adventurous itinerants.
“So, Father—” Gav began.
“Don’t call me that,” Salim said.
“Sorry, Your Holiness, I—”
“Not that either. Salim is fine.”
“Certainly,” the boy said, and was silent.
Salim got the sense that he’d offended the child. He’d long since grown to accept the black Pharasmin robes as a necessary evil—lay people didn’t question a death priest, and it made interactions with church officials easier. But some days the costume was more trouble than it was worth.
He sighed. “My apologies, Gav. I’m not exactly as I appear.”
“What man is?” Gav’s grin reappeared. “So what are you really? A fugitive in disguise? A confidence man? One of the fairy kings of the First World, come to offer me my heart’s desire at a terrible price?”
Salim ignored his patter. “Have you ever heard of the Rahadoumi?”
The boy’s smile dropped into a slack-jawed gape. “You’re one of the Godless?”
Salim let his silence speak for him.
Gav closed his mouth and frowned. “Then if you don’t mind me asking, gov, why in Baalzebul’s frozen ass are you wandering around in all black with a Pharasmin holy symbol?”
“It’s a long story.”
The boy was quiet for a moment, digesting that bit. Then: “So how exactly does that work?”
“How does what work?”
“Being Rahadoumi. Being a … what’s the word? Apiarist.”
“Atheist.”
“Yeah, that. I mean, I can take you to half a dozen real priests who’ll show you magic, both the healing kind and the kind’ll scare the beard right off your face. If you’ve got the coin, they’ll even sing down the spirits and let you ask questions of the gods yourself.”
“I’ve known priests, boy.”
“No disrespect intended, gov. A man like you, a traveler—I’m sure you’ve seen things a cityborn street kid like me hasn’t dreamed of. Which is why I’m wondering how you can not believe in gods.”
Salim sighed again. A crowded street wasn’t his first choice of venues for a theological debate, nor the boy his first choice of opponents, but he couldn’t quite resist the chance to correct the child’s all-too-common misconception.
“The gods are real,” Salim said.
“But I thought—”
“Do you believe in the Ruby Prince? The Pharaoh of Osirion?”
“I don’t see—”
“How about Her Infernal Majestrix, Queen Abrogail of Cheliax?”
“Of course.”
“Would you fear her?”
“No.” The boy’s eyes flashed defiance.
Salim smiled. He’d been such a boy himself once, barefoot and ready to take on the world.
“Fair enough. But would you show respect?”
“Sure,” Gav replied. “Pissing off a queen is stupid and dangerous. Any fool knows that.”
“Very true. And if she offered you gold and power to serve her, would you do it?”
“Maybe,” Gav said reluctantly. Then, “Okay, probably.”
“So you’d do as she asked. Because she’s very powerful, and can reward you handsomely or punish you as she sees fit. You might well become her paid servant. But would you worship her? Would you give her your eternal soul, and become her slave?”
“Of course not!”
“Then you see my point. Queen Abrogail has power—as far as folks like you and I are concerned, she can do anything. We might serve her, out of fear or greed. But we don’t worship her.
“Gods are the same way. They exist—there’s no denying that. And they’re powerful. They shelter and fund those who pledge their souls to them—but make no mistake, they’re getting the better end of the deal. A few coins and spells is nothing to a god, but the soul is the most precious thing a man has to offer. In the end, it’s the only thing he has. And a soul lives on long after spells have faded and silver has tarnished.”
Gav frowned. “I thought only devils tried to get you to sign away your souls.”
“Ha!” Salim couldn’t quite contain the bitter laugh. “No, boy. Every god wants the same thing. Asmodeus and his minions are just the most honest about it. For good or ill, when you pledge yourself to a god, you give him or her total authority over you—a power that lasts long, long after you’ve grown old and turned to dust.”
The boy mulled this over, and they took the brief break in the conversation to dodge around a gnome with a cart of what appeared to be fruits and vegetables grown into the shapes of faces.
“Still,” Gav said, sounding unsure. “A god’s protection is worth a lot, neh?”
“Certainly,” Salim said. “So, when we’re done here, will you be setting out for Cheliax to pledge your fealty to the devil queen?”
Gav opened his mouth—then shut it. He glared at Salim. “I’m Kaer Magan, sire. Native-born, not some gawk or dropjaw from the lowlands. I’m no one’s vassal.”
“Spoken like a true Rahadoumi.” Salim felt another brief burst of paternal affection. Oh, to be so young and certain again …
Ahead of them, the white stone wall of the city’s ring rose up, blocking out the sky. Buildings nestled right up against its foot, and a great number of these seemed to be three-walled structures, using the stone as a convenient fourth. Two arches with decorative voussoirs and keystones carved with the faces of puff-cheeked cherubs stood in the wall, each ten feet tall and large enough to accommodate the flood of foot traffic passing through them. Gav led them through the leftmost one.
Then they were inside. Since arriving in Kaer Maga, Salim had only seen the open-air districts locals called the Core, but he knew from the stories that the scene before him was more indicative of how Kaer Magans truly lived. In front and to either side, the shops and streets of the city continued uninterrupted, spreading out in a web of narrow alleys and disparate architectural styles. Yet above him, the sky was replaced by a stone ceiling that rose and fell seemingly at random, in places no more than twenty feet high, in others at least sixty or seventy, perhaps as tall as the ring-wall itself. In areas where the ceiling was lower, the sea of rooftops was periodically interrupted by great columns or sections of wall holding up the rest of the giant stone structure. Likewise, several stone ramps and stairways led up from the floor to holes in the ceiling, presumably feeding into tunnels higher up.
Gav watched Salim’s face. “It’s something, neh?”
“It’s amazing,” Salim said, with total honesty.
The boy swelled with pride. “Some outsiders don’t get it. They come in here and see it as cramped and smoky, too loud and close. They don’t understand that we like it that way. It’s cozy inside the Ring, and you’re never without a warm tunnel to crawl into or a wall to put your back to. Try saying that about one of those sprawling lowlander cities! I’ve head that in Korvosa, poor folk who can’t afford a roof die of cold when it snows. Can you imagine that? Snow coming down, and you with nowhere to go?”
“I can,” Salim said solemnly.
“And they call us uncivilized.”
But Salim wasn’t paying attention. “What’s that?” He pointed off into the distance, to where a huge structure rose up out of sight behind a lower section of ceiling. It looked like a ziggurat, one of the stepped pyramids you sometimes saw in the jungles of the south. Salim had never encountered one this far north before.
“That’s the Palace of the Child-Goddess,” Gav said easily. “You’ll likely see her people soon, but they’re not part of our present concern. And speaking of which: as you’re paying by the hour, I’m certainly not averse to spending a little time sightseeing—I’m a veritable font of local color, I am—but if you’re in a hurry to finish your business …”
“By all means,” Salim said, motioning Gav forward.
They began making their way down one of the narrower streets. Now that Salim looked closer, the buildings here were not only an architectural hodgepodge, but most of them were foreign to this continent, and certainly to this particular region. He saw pagodas and torii gates of the far east, plus buildings that did their best to ape the desert mud-brick of his own southern homeland, or modeled themselves off the palaces of the Empire of Kelesh. Along with this physical incongruity came a similar cacophony of scents: incense and curry and urine and cinnamon, wet dog and fresh blood and smells he couldn’t begin to put a name on, all spinning together into a miasma both mouth-watering and repulsive.
“Are we in the foreign quarter?” he asked.
“More or less,” Gav replied. “Though as you’ll see, that doesn’t really mean a lot in Kaer Maga. As far as we’re concerned, we’re all foreigners here, which means none of us are—but yeah, some of the more foreign foreigners, the switches and new arrivals, they tend to settle here.”
They kept walking, Salim trying to move as if he belonged, rather than as the tourist he was.
“I think I understand,” Gav said abruptly.
“Oh?”
“The Rahadoumi choose independence over safety. I can get behind that. But it still doesn’t explain why you’re dressed like a priest.”
Salim frowned. “Let’s just say that even a Rahadoumi can make poor decisions. Now, let’s concentrate on—get behind me!”
Before the warning was halfway out of his mouth, Salim had his sword drawn and the boy shoved roughly back on his off side, giving him room to move. As before, the crowd flowed apart at the sight of naked steel, leaving the center of the street open.
Four zombies shambled forward through the crowd with their distinctive, puppetlike gait. The two who still had hair had it incongruously slicked down or braided. One had its cheeks rotted straight through, displaying the tendons and teeth that Salim knew from personal experience were still more than able to take bleeding chunks out of living flesh.
There were too many people around, too many potential victims. But there was nothing to be done about it. The best he could hope for was to take them down quickly, and keep their attention on him. Salim tensed, ready to spring.
“Stop!” Gav shouted. “Cailean’s sotted balls, you want to get us killed?”
“I can take them.” Salim held the sword lightly in front of him, ready to move any direction without warning. “I’ve done it before.”
“And what about their owner? You got enough gold in that robe of yours to buy your way out of a feud? Blood and tits, gov, look at the scarves!”
Now that the boy mentioned it, the zombies were dressed strangely. Most of the walking dead Salim had killed—and he’d killed many over the years—had been half-rotted things fresh from the grave, or else mummified husks still coated in the dust of the tomb. They wore molding rags swarming with maggots, or else time-eaten garments that crumbled like burnt parchment. If they were the intelligent sort, they might drape themselves in the raiment of their former lives, ancient armor or jeweled bracelets that rattled around bony wrists.
These clothes looked freshly washed, perhaps even pressed with steam and a hot iron. The creatures inside them were undoubtedly dead—there was no mistaking the pallor of their skin, and one had bone showing bloodlessly through a fleshless elbow joint—but all were relatively well preserved. They continued to walk down the street on a course only tangential to Salim’s, blank eyes fixed straight ahead, heedless of the dark-robed man with the ready blade. Around each of their necks, Salim saw what the boy had indicated—scarves dyed brilliant chartreuse, a blood-red sigil in the center covering their breathless throats.
Gav tugged urgently on Salim’s robe. Still uneasy, Salim straightened from his fighting stance and sheathed his sword. As soon as the hilt clicked home against the scabbard, the crowd filled back into the street as if nothing had happened. The zombies moved past, and were gone.
“What the hell was that?” Salim asked.
“The Twice-Born.” Gav’s relief was palpable. “You almost carved up four of somebody’s servants. And let me tell you, gov, the dead are not cheap.”
“You use zombies as servitors?” Salim tried and failed to keep the disgust out of his voice.
“Not everywhere,” Gav said. “Just in Ankar-Te—which, incidentally, is where we are now. Since we passed through that archway.”
Salim looked around at the crowd. “You have a whole district of necromancers?”
Gav shook his head. “Not at all, and thank the gods for that—those bone-sorters give me the chills. But Ankar-Te is their safe ground, where they don’t have to worry about people causing problems for them or their creations. You’re not the only newcomer who draws first and asks questions later.”
“I see.” Salim deliberately moved his hand away from his sword hilt. “And the Church of Pharasma allows this?”
“The crows?” Gav shrugged. “They don’t like it, but they know better than to try to purge it—Kaer Maga doesn’t take kindly to folks who deal in absolutes, and the necros’ potions heal as well as any, and cheaper than some. They’ve got an agreement: the Pharasmins don’t try to shut the necros down, and in exchange the necromancers stay mostly to Ankar-Te, and maintain total control over the Twice-Born—every undead thing you see walking around is obeying somebody’s orders. They’re not really people as much as puppets.”
Salim grimaced. “And the intelligent dead? The vampires and ghouls?”
“Forbidden. Everybody’s in agreement on that one.”
Salim doubted that. He’d yet to meet a necromancer who didn’t insist on constantly pushing boundaries. It was what led them to their profession, and often to their own graves when experiments went sour. But Kaer Maga had already surprised him several times today.
He got back to business. “You said that the necromancers sometimes purchase bodies. I’m trying to track down some specific corpses.”
Gav half-smiled in sympathy. “Friends of yours?”
Salim thought of what Ceyanan had told him about the souls who’d disappeared and shook his head.
“Strictly professional, then. Well, we’ve got some choices. I could ask around, but what kind of condition were they in? Fresh? Preserved? Beat-up?”
“They’d been hauled from rivers and trash heaps,” Salim said. “And likely weren’t in the best shape when they went in.”
“Perfect!” Gav motioned Salim left onto a new avenue. “That limits our choices significantly—most folk around here won’t bother with spoiled corpses. If you want your undead cheap, with only the flimsiest of guarantees, that’d be Mubb up at the north end.”
As they passed through the crowd, Salim noted that, despite all he’d heard, there were still relatively few of the so-called Twice-Born. Most of the people standing at stalls were human—or close enough—with clothing and skin that proclaimed a wide variety of ancestral homelands. A few times he caught the bleached white of a skull bobbing through the crowd, but the animated corpses never passed close enough again for a good look.
Only once did the crowd part, this time for four oiled men in brilliant ceremonial robes of orange and gold. All four had shaved heads, and bore on their shoulders something that was not quite a palanquin. Supported by long poles, the box they carried was easily six feet long and four high, and appeared to be made entirely of welded steel, with no window or obvious latch. As the men passed, several onlookers dropped to the ground and bowed their heads, while others tucked coins into the poles’ dangling tithe-bags.
“What’s that?” Salim asked.
“Church of the Child-Goddess,” Gav said. “They make the rounds a few times a day.”
Salim frowned. “I’ve never heard of her.”
“It’s a local thing.” Gav’s brow furrowed. “Or maybe a very foreign thing—I think they came from the Impossible Kingdoms originally. Anyway, they bring the goddess around in her box, and people pay for her blessing.”
Salim nodded. It wasn’t the first time he’d seen a sham god. As full as the world was with priests and authentic miracle-workers, there were always charlatans willing to work cheaper and leave out the miracle part. In Salim’s mind, the only thing sadder than a man who sold his soul for power was one who sold his soul for nothing. “Do you ever get to see her?”
“Never. Maybe inside the temple they let her out, but out here, the Child-Goddess stays in her palanquin.”
A hollow boom shook the air. In the street, the men with the palanquin did their best to maintain stoic expressions while wrestling with their poles. Between them, the metal box shook from side to side and boomed again, as if something inside were flinging itself against the walls. Abandoning their slow procession, the bearers began double-timing it down the street, back toward the ziggurat.
Inside the box, something roared.
Then they were gone. With the motion that was already becoming familiar to Salim, the people on the street went back about their business.
“Interesting,” Salim said. He’d had the box pegged for some sort of reliquary, if it held anything at all.
“That’s pretty much the watchword in my city.” Gav replied. “In any case, we’re here.” He pointed across the street.
The building was low and stone, a squat thing with windows that had been bricked up. The effect was that of a mausoleum, and not a particularly respectable one. A simple wooden sign over the door bore a picture of a skull and the word Reanimations.
“That’s Gerik Mubb’s place,” Gav said. “Not exactly the most popular spot in town, but he gets the job done, if’n you’re not picky about where things come from. If anybody’s going to buy a bubbler pulled from the streams, it’s him. If you don’t mind, gov, I’ll just wait for you out here.”
“Of course.” Hand on his sword once more, Salim walked across the street, pulled open the heavy wooden door, and stepped inside.