14 Gwaks have principles, blasthell!

The dining room was quiet. Samfen was scribbling on a sheet of paper, looking studious; Sarova was twisting his mouth and glaring at his own sheet as if he were trying to discover some great mystery; Mili was playing with Nat and Lioayza on the floor. From the room came the “clack, clack” of the barber’s snipes, which continued to work. As for the lady, she was sitting in a little armchair near the stove, mending clothes while humming.

As for me, I was sitting at the other end of the table, cutting onions for dinner. I was crying like a convict.

Five days. I had been at the barber’s for five days already, almost as cut off as in the valley. Twice I had suffered the punishment of silence, and just as many times the punishment of the belt, and all because of my “rude” language or because I had failed to keep quiet. Nothing very painful or traumatic, but each punishment filled me with perplexity, because I never knew when the barber would consider this or that word to be acceptable or intolerable. For the first two nights, I kept repeating in my head the forbidden words for which I had received a slap on the head or a warning… The list soon became endless, and logically, I got tired of it.

For the past two days, I had been in charge of cutting the vegetables. The barber had caught me giving Sam advice against his persecutors from Elms School, and when he asked what we were up to, Samfen had assured that I just wanted to help him with his homework. To which the barber had replied: well then, from now on, Ashig will take care of the household chores you normally do, and that way you’ll have more time to study; hopefully you’ll even manage to improve your grades and take advantage of the money we paid for your enrolment.

Samfen had received the answer with a wave of repentance, and for the next two days, he did not lift his head from his books. And that’s how the great architect was now wielding the pen like a scribe.

I finished chopping the damn onion and went to put it in the pot. Yalma looked up from her sewing, looked at me, smiled, and said something in the language of the valley. Sarova and Samfen chuckled. I looked confused.

“I don’ andersdand,” I confessed.

Sarova burst out laughing, and Yalma apologized in Drionsan:

“Oh. Sorry, I didn’t realize what language I was speaking. I was saying that, if you were given a part in a tragedy right now, you’d play it wonderfully.”

Ah. She said that because my eyes were full of tears and my nose was running, I understood. I tried to wipe my face. My mother huffed, amused.

“Hold on. Please don’t fill the pot with snot. Here, blow your nose with this.”

She handed me a handkerchief. It was not as fine as the handkerchiefs I used to get from the nail-pinchers, but it was not like old Fiks’ holey rag either. I accepted it, surprised, and was wiping myself as well as I could, when suddenly I heard a voice in the shop which I recognized. It wasn’t the barber’s, nor was it a customer’s voice. It was that of a child who was innocently asking: Is Sharpy here?

I breathed in deeply, and excitedly threw away the handkerchief and rushed to the shop. As I poked my head through the half-open door, I was filled with joy. Standing at the entrance of the shop were my…

“Cronies!” I exclaimed.

I stepped forward, and they rushed towards me, despite the barber’s thunderous “out!”. Dil smiled broadly; Manras threw out:

“We ran out of the charity house! Adoya came to me and asked my name, and I told him Nat, but he looked at me with such a weird face that…”

“That I told him: he recognized us, let’s leg it,” Dil completed.

“And we did,” the little dark elf concluded. “Come on! Let’s go back to the street. Let’s go look for the Priest…”

He was pulling me by the sleeve, worried at the look on the barber’s face now. And his concern increased when he saw that I was resisting. The barber stepped in, freeing me from the hands of my cronies. Then it was I who tried to go to them, but after pushing Manras and Dil towards the exit with an “out or I’ll call the guard!”, the barber grabbed me.

“Let me go!” I protested. “Cronies, I’m going with you!”

The barber did not let go of me, and I understood that if I did not take urgent measures, my young cronies would go off blindly, and if they did not find the Priest, they would certainly go to Swift’s shelter, and on the way, they would run into Adoya and his seven dogs. And then, who knows what would happen? So I used one of those tricks to get away: I kicked the barber in the shin, pulled away sharply, and rushed to the door, which had closed by itself. I opened it with a bang. At first, I intended to go out, but then something made me change my mind, and I shouted:

“Shyurs! Go to my cousin and explain the problem. Tell him I sent you. Don’t go to Swift. He’s—”

I did not have time to finish the sentence. I was yanked backwards, the door closed, and I was hit with a shower of blows. This punishment, at least, I understood: I had hit my father, I had disrespected him. It was for a good cause, but the barber didn’t know that. He didn’t know the Black Hawk: it would have been useless to explain to him how dangerous he was.

The barber was in a black mood.

“You’ve crossed the line, rascal,” he growled at me.

He only let go of me to go and close the locks of the shop. It was clear that he had made an important decision, a decision which concerned me… He wouldn’t go so far as to kill me, right? I felt in danger, and as I saw the razors, I had a frightening thought. I did not touch them, of course, but the barber caught my eye, and his temper grew terrible.

“Don’t even think about it,” he croaked.

He grabbed me by the neck and shoved me carelessly into the kitchen and from there straight into the storeroom, locking me in. I could only catch a glimpse of my brothers’ and mother’s distraught expressions before I found myself in the dark.

I sat down, and after a moment’s silence, I let out a quiet:

“Blasthell.”

A moment later, on the other side of the door, there was only the sound of cutlery and some murmurs. The family was having dinner. I thought I heard a comment about Samfen’s studies, and there was a slight disturbance when Xella, the florist, arrived, apologizing for the delay and saying that there had been a lot of work in the shop. They didn’t say much more until Samfen asked:

“What are you going to do with Ashig, Dad?”

“Mmph. None of your business, son. Has everyone finished? Then go to your rooms.” A murmur was heard, and the barber replied, “You’ll revise your literature tomorrow, Samfen. Right now, go to your room.”

The tone was inflexible. There was the scrape of chairs, and then a heavy silence. The clock struck nine. There was still a faint light through the crack in the door, so the kitchen must still be occupied. I put my ear to the wood, and in the silence, I heard a sound, as if someone had turned the page of a book. Then Yalma’s soft voice said:

“You worry too much, Arol. Let me tell you what this boy needs. A good dose of discipline and affection. You can’t blame him for not having anyone to teach him those things.”

“No? I suppose not. But that doesn’t make him a better person,” the barber replied. “He’s a delinquent, my dear. And some day we may very well wake up and find that he’s emptied our safe and made a run for it. That in the best case scenario…”

“Shh,” Yalma silenced him. “Maybe he can hear us right now.”

There was a silence. Then the barber said:

“Tomorrow I’ll take him to the center. I’d rather pay extra and have them accept him now.”

I heard a sigh.

“It is a wise decision, I suppose,” Yalma replied.

I heard nothing else. But that was enough for me. It was enough for me to know that in these five days I had tried to behave like the best gwak… for nothing. My parents still wanted to lock me up in the youth centre. I felt betrayed, cheated, belittled. Because I believed that, despite our differences, they had begun to love me a little. I thought that, if the barber corrected me and gave me a beating, it was because he wanted to teach me, not because he wanted to prepare me to be sent to prison. Hell, it wouldn’t make any difference if they sent me directly to Carnation! All you had to do to get in was throw stones at a carriage, and they’d send you there for free. Blasthell.

It was after ten o’clock when the kitchen light went out and I was left in complete darkness. Well. Time to decide: would I stay or would I leave?

I closed my eyes and thought of my nakrus master. What had he said to me again?

‘That’s the most important thing, Mor-eldal. Always be the person you love to be.’

And well, how could I not despise myself after leaving Manras in danger, pursued by Adoya, seven dogs, and an evil father? My brothers were safe. My cronies were not. From that point, the decision was simple. I looked up at the door, invisible in the dark. I fumbled and found the lock.

Having made up my mind, I felt a sudden burst of enthusiasm, cast a harmonic light spell, and rummaged through all the objects. I finally found a tool that could help me. This time, I didn’t bother to preserve the lock, but I was careful to be as quiet as possible. I cast several silencing spells, worked for a while, and… Clack. The bolt of the lock popped off.

Once in the dining room, I rummaged through Samfen’s schoolbag, tore a blank sheet from his notebook, and, without bothering to get out a quill and ink, dipped my finger into the coals of the stove and wrote a: Sorry. Signed with my name: Draen. That way they would understand that they didn’t have to worry about the family’s reputation any more: I was disowning myself.

I went to the only window in the kitchen. It was at the top of the wall, because on the other side it looked out on to a dead end further up the Rock. I pulled myself up, placing a stool on a chair. The opening had bars, but in cleaning the windows the night before, I had noticed that one of them was corroded with rust. Breaking it was child’s play, and before midnight, I was already walking through the streets of Tarmil. And I hadn’t emptied the safe or killed anyone. Because I was not a scoundrel, nor a murderer: I was simply a free gwak and a Black Dagger, and that meant that I could not stay locked up. So: ayo, ayo, and to each his own bread and sorrows.

It was the night of Kindday to Sacredday, it was not especially cold, and the streets were still busy. I headed for the Esplanade. I did not arrive directly at Yal’s, because on the way I met Garmon and some other newsboys I knew, and seeing them playing dice in a corner with the papers under their arms, and dying to do something and loosen my tongue and my cheerful temper, I approached them and said:

“Hey, Garmon, good to see you!”

Natural, they remembered Sharpy, and they welcomed me with joy. I spent a good hour with them, an hour which awakened my spirit after a moon in the mountains and five days of playing the obedient son. But then the group dispersed, between those who had to sell their remaining papers on pain of punishment and those who were going to return them to the press office. I followed the latter to the Esplanade and bid them farewell.

Well, all I had to do was cross the square and enter the house where Yal lived. I had seen it twice before in the two weeks since the Solance was stolen. I knew exactly where it was.

I walked across the huge, silent square, avoiding the streetlights so as not to attract the attention of the officers, and stopped at the door of the house. All the windows were dark. After a moment’s hesitation, I knocked. Normally there was a caretaker. He did not come to open the door. I knocked harder. Nothing. I looked up at Yal’s window and tried to climb the stone wall…

“Hey, you!” a voice behind me called out.

Blasthell. I let myself fall, landed, and saw a fly approaching. I skedaddled. I called myself an isturbag a few seconds later. What could the fly do to me? I had just climbed a wall a little, hadn’t I? The fly blew his whistle and almost immediately another fly appeared in front of me. I braked suddenly in a street next to the Esplanade, turned around, and… seeing myself trapped, I protested:

“I didn’t do anything!”

Hoping that this would break their concentration, I took off running, this time towards the Esplanade. I managed to escape the open arms of the fly. And… wham, I suddenly felt a shock. At first, I thought the fly had used a magara, but then I thought of Azlaria’s amulet and remained perplexed for an instant before I thought: no, it’s a magara. Wasn’t it? My hesitation cost me dearly: the flies caught me.

“Don’t you know that, at this time of day, good children sleep at home?” one of them, the taller one, asked me. “Where do you live?”

I did not loosen my lips. It was one thing to wake Yal up at one o’clock in the morning and another to wake him up, accompanied by the flies. If I had had any money, they would have let me go for sure. But no, I didn’t have a nail.

Something about my attitude and my silence made my captors guess my situation. The taller one said:

“You’ll spend tonight in jail if you don’t answer, kid.”

He didn’t wait for my answer, which wouldn’t come anyway: he pushed me towards the Esplanade and made me cross it all the way to the central police station. I almost told him: I know the way. I would have done the Patron Saint of an impression. But a touch of caution held me back.

So I went into the police station, where they asked me my first name. I told them: Draen. And when they asked me my family name, I said:

“I don’t have one.”

They didn’t insist. They didn’t even search me. They put me in the cell and forgot about me. Casually, I said:

“Ayo.”

And I went and sat down in an empty seat. There were five drunks, an old man of the Valley with a hobo look, and a gwak a little younger than myself. I sat down beside the two latter, pulled my cap down over my eyes, and sat down to sleep. The drunks bawled amongst themselves and stank like demons, but I had slept in worse conditions. After a while the gwak whispered:

“My name is Davik.”

I did not bother to lift the cap, I had already observed the subject briefly: he was a small earth-elf, with particularly large ears and the air of having lived on the street since he had been able to walk on two legs. And yet he did not seem to be familiar with the police station. I replied:

“Draen the Sharpy.”

I heard him breathe in.

“I know ya!” he whispered. “You’re the one who saved the sokwatas, right? From Swift’s gang.”

I lifted my cap for a moment to look at him and gave a simple affirmative “hmm”. Deep down, I was flattered. That gwaks I did not know knew me was both disturbing and pleasing to my self-esteem. With enthusiasm, he asked me:

“What did they nab you for?”

I smiled. Something like “gwak vagabondage” would have sounded too typical. So I replied:

“Because I was running my mouth too much. You know how sensitive flies are. Delicate-eared damsels. What about you?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Davik bite his lip and think before saying:

“Because I bit something.”

“Really? What did you bite?” I asked, mockingly.

“A-A nail-pincher’s watch,” he said.

I smiled, because it was clear that the gwak was lying to make himself look good. I made an appreciative gesture and congratulated him:

“Not bad, gwak. Nail-pinchers don’t need to wear a clock. Anyway, they don’t work and there’s no shortage of beans in their cellar. Because if you stole a chicken from a poor household, well, that’s just plain wrong. But a nail-pincher’s watch? That’s ragingly all right. The main thing in this business is to have principles, blasthell.”

Davik nodded at everything I said. It must be recognized that what I was saying was ragingly interesting and true. And how easily I could find all the forbidden words and how much fun I was having saying them. At last, I was being myself again, Mor-eldal, and not the falsely repentant gwak who, for the opportunity to know his family, had endured hours of bestial boredom.

After a while, I said to him:

“Tell me. Do you know who the Black Hawk is?”

“The… Natural, the Black Hawk, yes, he’s the devil of the sokwata mine,” Davik said. “Everyone knows the story. A friend of mine says that you sokwatas are mutants.”

“We’re cured,” I assured him. “Well. And what else do you know about this devil?”

The elf shrugged.

“Nothing.”

“What about the guy with the seven dogs? Adoya. Do you know him?” I questioned.

A drunkard fell off his bench and laughed loudly, cursing. Davik nodded, frowning.

“I do know that guy. The other day, his dogs threw themselves at me. Look, I still have marks.”

I saw them and also understood more easily his lamentable appearance. His clothes were torn in many places.

“Thunders of thunders,” I snorted. “And what did Adoya do to you?”

The elf shook his head.

“Nothing. When he saw my face, he said ‘stupid dogs, it’s not him’, and just left. I thought I was going to be eaten. A friend of mine says they’ve done it before, that these devils have eaten little kids before. They have huge teeth.”

I remained thoughtful and preoccupied. After a silence, Davik added hesitantly:

“He asked me one thing.”

I turned my head sharply towards him.

“What?”

“If I knew a gwak named Manras.”

I stiffened up.

“And what did you tell him?”

“Well, that I didn’t know him. And he asked me something else,” he confessed.

“What?” I pressed him.

Davik looked at me curiously.

“If I knew a copper kid about ten or eleven years old, whose name was Draen.” I gasped, and he added, “I told him there were a lot of copper gwaks in the Labyrinth but I didn’t know any named Draen. I don’t peach.”

I wondered at that moment if he had covered for me on purpose or simply because he didn’t know until he saw me that I was a human from the Valley. Bah. Davik seemed to be an honest and upright gwak, so I gave him a knowing smile.

“Well done, comrade.”

Still, the idea that Adoya was looking for me was perplexing. What did I have to do with the Black Hawk? Except that I’d undermined his fortune and the Salbronix mine, but Yerris, Sla, Aberyl and, well, a good handful of Black Daggers had contributed to that too.

Unless… I blinked. Unless Adoya revealed to the Black Hawk that it was me who killed Warok. In which case… Blasthell. In which case, I was doomed.

Korther, I thought. He could help me. Despite the bad tricks I had played on him in the past, the Black Dagger kap wouldn’t want to see a sari popped off by an isturbag like the Black Hawk, would he? Except I couldn’t go to his house in broad daylight. And besides, Korther had asked me not to set foot in his white house again. But, if no one saw me enter, what did he care?

I made up my mind. I stood up, walked over to the gate, and stammered to a passing fly:

“Sir. I’m not doing well.”

“Well, learn to do better, kid.” he replied, mockingly.

I counted to twenty. And I repeated my complaint. And again. And again and again. Then suddenly I fell to the ground, spasming and emitting choking sounds. It lasted only a few moments for all to notice. Then I lay still, as if unconscious.

For a moment, I feared that they would leave me there until dawn, and so my little theatre would have been pointless. But no, at last a fly opened the gate, and I was taken out and carried away. They put me on something hard. Perhaps a table, or a wooden stretcher. I waited, and when I heard nothing I opened my eyes. I had been left alone in a room waiting for the doctor. Fantastic.

I glanced at the windows. There were two of them. One was large, with bars. The other was small, but it had no bars. It had no glass either. With a leap, I left the stretcher, took a chair that was there, climbed on it, pulled myself up to the hole, and bingo, I found myself outside, in an alley next to the police station. I smiled, quite proud of my move, and ran up the slope, towards Atuerzo. It was the direction they would least expect me to take, the direction of the rich neighborhoods.

I crossed the Artisanal Street, passed by the Great Temple, and arrived near the Court of Justice. I walked around it. I crossed Imperial Avenue as quietly as I could, and a moment later, I was walking through the rear garden of Korther’s house.

I did not knock at once. I prowled about the veranda, from window to window, and, seeing that all was dark inside, was about to return to the door, trying to convince myself that Korther would not wring my neck, given my untimely visit, when I suddenly heard a rustling of leaves behind me, and… I pressed myself against the wall and surrounded myself with harmonic shadows.

“Too dense,” a dull voice suddenly said.

Tense, I scanned the shrubs and vines. Who the…?

“The harmonies,” the voice explained. “Too dense. And you used them too late. You still have a lot to learn, sari.”

I widened my eyes in disbelief.

“Elassar?”

The figure came from a different place from where the voice had seemed to come. My suspicion was only dispelled when I recognized Yal’s face in the moonlight.

“Good mother,” I blurted out. “What the…? Where’re my cronies?”

The question seemed to disconcert him. No doubt he was expecting an explosive: “Yal, how glad I am to see you!”. However, his presence at Korther’s puzzled me. I made a nervous gesture.

“I sent—I sent my cronies to your house. Didn’t you see them?” I asked.

Yalet huffed, stopping beside me on the veranda.

“Well, I didn’t. I haven’t seen them since they came a moon ago to tell me you’d gone to see your master in the valley. I have to admit, you left us all, uh… pretty surprised,” he coughed. “Rogan stopped by to see me when you got back. I see you didn’t last long at the barber shop.”

I sighed.

“Well…” I didn’t know what to say on the subject, so, after a silence, I explained, “I want to talk to Korther.”

“Mmph.” Yal leaned against the wall beside me, probing the darkness. “He’s not here. He specifically instructed me to stay so as not to leave his daughter alone. This is the first time he’s asked me for a favor like this. Lately, the kap has been very busy.” He paused and added, “Let’s go in.”

He had gone out through a window which was behind the corner of the veranda. We slipped in, and he closed it. He whispered:

“Don’t make any noise. Zenira is sleeping.”

We had landed in the kitchen. In the near darkness, Yal guided me to a seat and sat down in front of me.

“I heard fragments of what happened in the valley,” he murmured. “But only fragments. What really happened?”

I smiled, and putting aside my concern for my cronies for a moment, I told him what had happened in a whisper. I could tell Yal everything. I even told him about my fears and worries. After all, even though he was only eighteen years old, he was my second teacher. And the only one I had left to hand. I even showed him Azlaria’s amulet.

“The worst part,” I finally whispered to him, “is that I don’t know if the shock I felt came from the fly or the pendant.”

Amused, Yal shook his head in the darkness of the kitchen.

“Well, I guess it’s better to think it came from both. So, just like that, the Black Hawk is looking for Manras?”

I nodded, darkening.

“And he’s looking for me, too.”

There was a silence. Then a surprised gasp:

“You? Devils. And why would he?”

I was left speechless. Oh. Right. Yal didn’t know about Warok. I became nervous and said:

“Dunno. But he wants to pop me off. Adoya is asking around about my whereabouts.”

Yal rubbed his forehead, clearly altered.

“Let’s see, Mor-eldal. Why on earth would the Black Hawk want to kill you?”

I sat paralyzed in the chair, not knowing what to say. After a silence, Yal insisted with a touch of real concern in his voice:

“Why, sari?”

I swallowed and was about to tell him the truth when suddenly we heard a cracking sound. The next second, Yal was up and out of the kitchen. He stumbled against a figure who gave a little cry of surprise.

“I’m going to… get some water,” Zenira excused herself.

I arched an eyebrow, and certain that the half elf girl already knew that Yalet had company, I did not bother to hide. With great naturalness, Zenira lit a lantern and went to the tap to get a glass of water—yeah, the houses in Atuerzo were very modern and had sinks with taps. She was in her nightgown, and when her brown eyes met mine for barely a second, she whispered:

“Hello.”

And, to my surprise, instead of answering “ayo”, I answered:

“Hello.”

I saw her raise the glass to her lips. I wondered if she had been listening to our conversation. I had spoken in a low voice, hadn’t I? Yes, most of the time, but perhaps I had raised my voice at times. And if she had heard anything about a nakrus and a necromancer… Korther knew, all right, but that didn’t mean he’d told his daughter. Then, suddenly, a startling possibility crossed my mind. It had nothing to do with necromancy, but with… Oh, devils, I thought, horrified. If Korther was a demon, could it be that Zenira was too?

Never in my life, when I thought of her, when I saw her, had I thought of such a possibility. And yet it was so obvious! For a moment, we looked at each other like two statues. Then she smiled, put down her glass, and said:

“Good night.”

“Good night,” I said, my voice choked.

She gave me a curious look, and as she crossed the threshold, she turned and said:

“By the way. I have a geography test tomorrow. Wish me luck.”

“Oh. Natural. Good luck,” I replied, surprised. Then, regaining my composure, I said, gwak-style, “Have a good swim all the way, shyurine.”

I saw her smile, and she went back to her room. When I heard the door close, I let out all the air in my lungs. Yal laughed out loud.

“If Korther hears you call her shyurine, he’ll kick you out, sari. Anyway. I think you’d better leave. Before Korther comes back. This Black Hawk thing… I’ll talk to him about it. But seriously, Mor-eldal, I don’t think it’s that bad. Stay out of the Labyrinth. Tell Manras the same thing. And nothing will happen to you, you hear? You don’t have to be afraid.”

I frowned, and although I was disappointed that he didn’t take things as seriously as I wanted, the fact that he implied that I was afraid made me contain myself, and I assured:

“It runs. I’m not afraid. I just thought Korther might… Okay. Never mind. I’m off.”

Yal nodded vigorously.

“Come to my house tomorrow afternoon. At six o’clock. I invite you. There’s someone I want you to meet. Will you come?”

“Natural,” I huffed. “Who do you have to introduce me to?”

“Well. A friend. Since I told her a little about you, she wants to meet you. But don’t worry—”

“I’m not worried,” I cut him off, in suspense. “But… this friend, is she the lady you were going to the theater with?”

I could see Yal’s broad smile in the darkness.

“That’s right.”

I smiled back at him.

“Blasthell.”

Yal cleared his throat.

“Yeah. Well. Take care of yourself, sari, huh?”

I nodded, patted him on the shoulder, and a few moments later, I was outside. I headed for the Bivouac, my thoughts racing. Why didn’t Yal believe me when I told him that the Black Hawk wanted to kill me? Because he obviously didn’t know I’d killed his son. And why did I feel so awkward when I met Zenira? Devils. I couldn’t explain it.

I shook my head in confusion, and taking a deep breath, I sped through the darker streets of Estergat. I reached the Cat Quarter when another disturbing question came to me: what would I do if Adoya suddenly appeared with his seven dogs and set them on me?

It was a question that would give anyone nightmares.