The Thief Who Pulled on Trouble's Braids by Michael McClung Page B

gauge the passing of time. My cell was three paces by four, and the ceiling higher than I could reach with outstretched arms. The door was oak banded in iron, and had been gouged futilely by unknown numbers of former occupants. All the stonework was tight; there were no chinks that I could find by fingertip, though someone at some time had made a concerted if futile effort to loosen a stone in the back right corner. The stones around it were gouged and rough. A thin layer of fouled, louse-ridden straw lined the floor. I kicked it all into a corner. After a time, I stopped noticing the stench, and started noticing the lice.
    All my knives were gone, of course. In the darkness I felt carefully in my boot, and came up with a single strand of Bosch’s hair. I didn’t see how it would do me any good now, but I wound it carefully around the back of a button on my shirt, just in case.
     
    ~ ~ ~
     
    After an unknowable time, I noticed a creeping light coming from under the door. I heard muffled orders repeated at regular intervals, and sometimes blows and shouts of pain. By the time they arrived at my door, I knew the drill.
    “Face against the back wall, hands on your head, eyes shut. You have until five. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.” Then a bar was lifted and the door swung open. Even turned away with my eyes closed, the flickering torchlight was dazzling.
    From the sounds, there were at least two, possibly three. Probably three. One to hold the torch, one to serve the food, and one to stand ready with the billy. I didn’t make any trouble. I’d had enough beatings for a while. The light retreated, the door closed, the bar slammed home.
    My first meal in Havelock was gruel; stale, poorly ground rye bread; and water that, from the taste and smell of it, had most likely been drawn straight from the Ose.
    To this day, just a whiff of rye bread is enough to make my stomach turn.
     
    ~ ~ ~
     
    Mother-man, as I came to think of him, was never truly quiet. Even in his sleep he would moan for her. I assume he was sleeping. And when he woke, he’d scream “Mother! I’m blind! Moooother!” On and on until they came to beat him quiet. Then, at most a few hours later, he’d start again with that monotonous call for maternal comfort.
    Eventually I couldn’t stand it anymore. I screamed at him, “Your whore of a mother is dead, shit brain. Shut it!” It only made him go on louder. Which made me invent ever more gruesome ends for her. Run over by a carriage. Gored by bulls, made into meat pies. Drowned in a cesspit. Gnawed to death by rats, face first. Dead of syphilis. It only made him carry on the louder, which made the guards come. They beat us both.
    I found myself hoping they’d come to hang either him or me soon. I started not to care which.
     
    ~ ~ ~
     
    My second meal was the same as the first, and my third. That was how I measured time, though I honestly couldn’t have said at the time if we were fed every day or every other or at random intervals. Hunger warred with nausea, and time had no meaning.
    I thought a lot. Not much else to do. I went over the entire situation, and realized they might just be holding me until the killers arrived from Courune. They’d probably want to question me before they took me to Harad’s Square for my short drop into oblivion. I didn’t think they would be gentle about the questions, either.
    I also thought about the situation as a whole. I went over everything I knew, and everything I thought I knew. I didn’t reach any new conclusions. I still thought the Elamner must have had Corbin killed, for the statue. There were thirteen, Corbin had said. Heirus or Bosch had gotten twelve, and still wanted the last, the toad, so the others must not have been terribly important to him. Not what he was looking for, perhaps. Which suggested he knew when he commissioned Corbin that the one he was looking for was in that temple, but he didn’t know which one it was. Or maybe he just needed