Nightfire | The Whispering Wall #1 - Chapter 12: Chapter 12

If this Arlen bloke really wanted to be found, Jordan thought, he wouldn't have written his address in squiggles.
He stared at the slip of paper for a moment longer, but the foreign script made no more sense to him than it had when he'd first taken it out of his coat pocket. He almost felt stupid for hiding it. It wasn't any use to him anyway, and he'd unnecessarily made Yddris suspect him of something.
He glanced at the door to the inn's smallest bedroom, the other side of which the Unspoken was waiting for him. He sighed, shoving the paper back into his coat, and turned to the pile of clothes on the bed, which was little more than a straw mattress on the ground. His head brushed the ceiling as he changed into the woollen shirt and leather tunic, and he bumped it twice in the effort to pull up the hide trousers he had also been given, hand-me-downs from the innkeeper's son who was a fair deal taller than Jordan. Though he tightened the belt comically high up his midriff, the leg hems still trailed on the floor.
"I can't go out in public like this," he said a minute later, as the demon catcher knocked gently and let himself inside.
Yddris was silent for a moment, before a light snort escaped from the darkness of his hood.
"It's not funny," Jordan snapped.
"No," Yddris said, "It's hilarious. But yes, you're right." He cocked his head. "You look fucking ridiculous."
"That's not what I said."
Yddris stuck his head out the door. "Killian."
The innkeeper's son appeared in the doorway. Killian was a head taller than Jordan and built like an ox, but his manner was friendly enough. He looked politely concerned at the spectacle in the middle of the room, reaching up to scratch the back of his head.
"They're a tad big, aren't they?" he said. Jordan scowled.
"Don't suppose you have anything shorter in the leg?" Yddris said, and then glanced at Jordan again. "Significantly shorter?"
"Maybe," Killian murmured, "I'll have another look."
He shuffled away, leaving Jordan alone with Yddris again. He watched the man with unease from under his hair.
"So," he said, when Killian didn't reappear for a while, "how'd you know the innkeeper?"
"We go back a bit," Yddris replied. Jordan waited for a second, but the man said nothing else. He sighed.
"Just seems a bit weird," he muttered, "that this vacancy was conveniently available for a temporary time and he knows you already."
"Don't miss much, do you?" Yddris said drily. Jordan scowled at him, and after a moment in which they stared each other out, the Unspoken sighed. "Don't worry about it, boy. It's a favour from a friend so Harkenn doesn't string my guts around his turrets for not finding you a placement in decent time."
Jordan grunted, and then said, "So it has absolutely nothing to do with what happened with that Listener thing?"
Yddris didn't answer. Jordan sat down on the bed, heart pounding.
"Just tell me what's..."
"Found some." Killian walked in and stopped, trousers limp in his hand. He glanced at Yddris and then Jordan. "Did I interrupt something?"
"No," Yddris muttered, "I'll be outside, boy."
The Unspoken swept out, leaving Jordan gaping at his retreating back. Killian cleared his throat.
"So, um," the giant said, "You want to try these?"
Jordan took the trousers with a short nod, still glowering at the door. "Is he always like this?"
"Like what?" Killian asked. "Grumpy and cryptic? Yes."
Jordan smirked, but it vanished as soon as it crossed his face. "He's not telling me something. And," he grunted as he strained to pull the trousers off, "it sounds like it's important."
"If it's any consolation, it's not just you," Killian said with a grin, "Everyone gets the same treatment. Father always says that if it wasn't for how good he is at his job he'd have been chased out of the Reach by now." His grin dropped a little. "It might have been a minor exaggeration since the lord likes him and the lord doesn't like many people, but he can be frustrating to deal with."
"I thought he was pretty reasonable," Jordan muttered, "Until we got here."
Killian's hand strayed to his thigh and rubbed it absently. "Yeah. Yeah, he gets like that."
"Like throwing rocks through bedroom windows?"
"Mm. Doesn't always know anyone involved, either. I've seen him do it."
Jordan snorted. Killian smiled back.
A roar erupted from downstairs, and loud thumps echoed on the stairwell outside. Jordan froze and glanced at Killian, who seemed unconcerned.
"There were races on today, last of the season," he said, "Probably just found out who won."
The thumping continued on the landing outside the room. A faint frown creased Killian's brow. He went to the door and peered out as Jordan fastened his trousers and straightened out the tunic. He looked up as Killian threw the door wide and ran out into the hall, and a moment later Jordan heard him thunder down the stairs. A couple of women ran past as Jordan stood there, before he gathered the wits to move.
The rumble of talk from the taproom below was uneasy. Jordan lingered at the top of the stairs, trying to peer under the sloping ceiling and not seeing very much. He jumped as someone rounded the corner and started up the stairs, but relaxed when he recognised Kedrick.
"What's going on?" he asked. The big man stopped halfway up with a sigh and glanced over his shoulder.
"Trouble," he said in his deep, rumbling voice. "Lucky Yddris was here." He offered a smile that was warm despite his worry. "There's food in the back for you if you want it."
"Thanks." Jordan began to go down, and then hesitated. "Is it safe?"
"Aye," Kedrick said, "No one'll bother you now, boy."
Jordan crept down to the taproom, squeezing up against the wall to let Kedrick through. It smelled of beer and smoke and was filled with indistinct voices. Shadows loomed out of the haze at him as he edged along around the wall of the inn, aiming for the swing door to the kitchen, which stood behind the bar. He only caught glimpses through the gaps in the crowd of what was going on, and passed by unnoticed as Kedrick had promised.
He reached the bar and ducked behind it, and only then did he see the cause of the trouble. Three men lay on their fronts on the ground with their hands clasped over their necks and their faces against the floorboards. Above them stood Killian, who was talking in hushed tones to someone in kitchen uniform, and Yddris, who was simply staring at them and smoking.
The Unspoken looked up. Jordan wasn't sure how he knew they had met eyes, but it made him shudder all the same. Yddris raised his pipe, and then used it to usher him towards the kitchen door.
Jordan turned and ducked inside. His dinner was waiting on the table beside the entrance, but he looked around first and settled on a wedge of flint sitting on a shelf. He pushed it between the door and its frame and angled his stool towards the gap.
He heard Kedrick's heavy footsteps come back down the stairs and shovelled down a mouthful of potatoes, foot poised to roll the flint back out.
"I've sent a runner for the guards," the innkeeper said, "So you can put that knife down."
A thud and a cry of pain. Something metallic skittered over the floorboards.
"Who are you here for?" Kedrick said. There was no response.
"We know who it is you're after," Yddris said, "Just want to hear you confirm it. You've been following us since we left the merchants' quarter."
Jordan's food caught in his throat. He choked but held it in, eyes streaming, and leaned closer to the gap in the door.
"No proof," someone grunted, muffled by the floor.
"I don't need proof," Yddris grunted. "I don't wear this cloak for fun."
"Who sent you?" Kedrick asked.
The men were silent.
"Gentlemen," Kedrick continued, in a caricature of politeness. "Everybody has their enemies. But nobody brings it under my roof. Tell me what son of the Pit sent a troupe of knucklehead grunts to make trouble for me before I take the meat cleaver I sharpened this morning and bury it in something soft."
Jordan didn't hear the response. Footsteps approached from a few feet away, and he had just enough time to swivel on his seat and spear another mouthful before a woman burst through the door and tripped on the flint as it rolled out of the way. She huffed, frowning at it, and then noticed Jordan on the stool with a start.
"Well met," she squeaked, hand over her chest. "Didn't see you there."
"Hi," Jordan said, swallowing his mouthful so fast that it hurt as it went down. The girl was pretty, with dusky skin a few shades lighter and warmer than both Kedrick's and Killian's, and long silver hair pinned into an intricate braid. Her eyes, bright and pale brown, shot to the floor as their gazes met. She ducked a quick curtsey.
"You must be the new help," she said, leaning down to pick up the flint off the ground and putting it back on the shelf. Something about the smile playing on her lips told him that she knew why it had been there, but she didn't mention it. "I'm Laurel. I wait the tables." She nodded, and smiled at him fully. "I assume you've met my brother."
"Killian?"
"That's him." She put two empty jugs down on a counter already littered with dirty crockery, and picked up a large bucket. A large metal tank took up the back corner of the room, a rope and pulley suspended above it. As she tied the rope around the bucket's handle, she asked, "What's your name?"
"Jordan."
"What's your sister's name?"
Jordan blinked. Laurel laughed.
"Your reputation precedes you by a long way, Jordan," she said, "Everyone in the city knows you're here."
Jordan stabbed at his food, glowering. "Yeah. I'm getting that impression." He took a tentative bite of something red and wobbly sitting on the edge of his plate and grimaced, using his fork to scrape it to one side. "My sister's name is Grace."
The pulley rattled as Laurel wheeled it back up.
"Grace," she repeated, "That's a lovely name."
"Mm." Jordan fidgeted, Grace's face flashing into his mind as he had last seen it, tear-stained and scared. He cleared his throat and changed the subject. "What's going on out there, do you know?"
"Don't you?" Laurel said with a giggle, untying the bucket and lowering it to the ground. It steamed gently, and only then did Jordan notice the fire burning under the tank.
Laurel was still grinning at him with an eyebrow raised when he glanced at her. His cheeks warmed.
"Not really. I didn't hear very much."
"Someone came in looking for you," she said. She grunted as she heaved the bucket across the room, but before Jordan could get up to offer help, she'd poured it all into the basin.
"I saw more than one guy on the floor in there when I came down."
"Ah, there were three, but they're hired thugs. Might as well be one, the amount of brains they have between them." She pushed the dirty crockery into the basin and began to wash up. Jordan watched her work for a moment, hypnotised by the shine of her silver hair in the lamplight, and blinked when she spoke again. "You have to be stupid to try and get past any Unspoken, and you have to be dumb as a rock to try and get past Yddris."
"Who do you think sent them?"
"That's what they're trying to find out." Laurel gestured to the kitchen door with a soapy ladle. "Could be anyone, really. I wouldn't worry."
"I'm not sure how that's supposed to make me not worry."
Laurel smiled at him over her shoulder. "You could lose your whole life to worry, Jordan. Yddris won't let anything happen to you, I'm sure of it."
The kitchen door flew open. Jordan dropped his fork into his food and Laurel shrieked. The next minute his head cracked against the kitchen tiles as the stool disappeared from under him.
A meaty hand reached down, a silhouette amongst the flashing lights in his vision. He couldn't make out features on the thickset man standing over him, but he could make out the smell of rancid sweat just before the hand clamped around his arm and pulled him up. Jordan thrust out with one leg and dealt a glancing blow to his assailant's midriff. It elicited little more than a grunt, and before Jordan could move again an arm like a tree trunk wrapped around his middle and the world turned upside down.
"You move and I stab 'im in the ankle," the man carrying him bellowed, carrying him out into the taproom hanging by his knees. His efforts to keep his face out of the man's sweaty shirt earned him a hard jerk that made his teeth rattle.
His food tasted even worse the second time.
"You attack and I crush his skull against this wall," his assailant added, lowering his voice in the dead silence of the room.
"You don't turn me the right way up and I'll puke down the back of your legs, you great pile of stinking...." His breath left him in a gust as he was dragged over the man's shoulder and left staring into his eyes. A trickle of blood ran from the man's nostril, and the beginnings of a shiner left one eyelid half closed.
"Stinking what, you little turd?"
"N-nothing."
He cried out as he hit the floor, jarring his spine against the boards. The man followed it up with a kick in the ribs that made him howl.
Emerald flames shot overhead, illuminating the walls and the thug's grin as he dodged. The grin vanished as a blade followed shortly after the blaze. It hit home with a thud in one shoulder, buried to the heel. Another followed, piercing through the wrist of the hand trying to extricate the first knife.
The man growled, sweat beading on his face. The other two with him were still on the floor, Jordan could dimly make out as he rolled over, held firmly under Kedrick and Killian's boots with pokers hovering over their bared napes.
"Plenty more where that came from," Yddris said, stepping forward. He still seemed too far away. Jordan's side ached, vision still flashing from the fall on the kitchen tiles, and couldn't seem to make his arms and legs move enough to crawl away. "You touch him again and the other two get it."
Panting, the mercenary wrenched the knife from his wrist and let it clatter to the floor. He smiled nastily.
"Kill 'em for all I care. More money for me if I bring 'im in."
His companions' protests were squashed against the floor.
"Five auriels for the runt," he continued, grimacing as he gave up on pulling the knife from his shoulder. "Five. Most folks don't see one. Got a wife and family to feed. I'll even give you one of 'em if you just let me take him."
"Morals are cheap these days," Yddris commented. "How much did you sell those for?"
"Not 'bout morals. 'Bout protecting family. Can't afford one of you sons of the Pit to protect us this season, what with you charging so dark-damned much." The man spat. "And you'll begrudge me that for a runt from another world."
"We sons of the Pit charge so dark-damned much," Yddris said coldly, "Because it ensures we're only called when we're needed. Gives people less time to stone us out of the neighbourhood or try and steal from us, and deters rock-brained morons like you fine fellows from calling on us just to piss from windows and name-call." A stretch of silence followed. "I assure you, my friend, if you've done this in the past the whole Guild will know, and no number of auriels will buy you personal service. You'd be better off moving your family to a communal shelter for the season."
The man had turned pale and begun to shake, but Yddris wasn't finished.
"You're not taking the boy. I think I know who your employer is, and I know what they think they can get from him. You can tell them to shove their lofty ideas right back up where they came from."
Jordan paused in his slow shuffle across the floor towards the abandoned knife, looking between the two men. Yddris, as always, was unreadable, but the other seemed to shrink in fear.
His fingers closed around the knife's hilt. It was slippery with blood, staining Jordan's fingers and making his gorge rise. All he had to do was hamstring the guy while he was distracted. He'd seen it on TV but it didn't feel quite the same when he was holding the knife.
"I'm taking him," the man said with conviction, but he didn't move.
Just one quick lunge. Jordan's fingers tightened on the handle. Don't even have to get both legs. Just enough to distract him.
He didn't move, eyes fixed on the man's feet.
I can't do it.
A piercing scream rang through the room and Laurel burst through the kitchen door with a pan held aloft in both hands. The man turned just in time to receive it in the face. He roared, stumbling back, where Yddris delivered a kick to the backs of his knees and forced him to his front on the floor. Two kitchen staff ran forward to help bind his hands, and moment later five guards in full armour burst through the door of the inn.
Jordan let the knife fall to the floor and kicked it away.
"Are you hurt?" Laurel asked, coming over. She looked too calm for the situation. "Jordan?"
"I'm...." Jordan stopped to watch the three men marched out in shackles, "I'm..."
Laurel's fingers probed his scalp, still hot from washing up. He hissed through his teeth as she prodded a tender lump on the back of his head.
"That's a bad fall," she said to Yddris as the Unspoken approached. "He might need to see a physician just in case."
Yddris leaned down and picked the knife off the floor, wiped it down with a rag and stowed it in his cloak. Jordan averted his eyes.
"We'll see how he is in the morning," the demon catcher finally said. "Otherwise I might have to see about calling in a favour that I really don't want to be calling in."
The man turned and walked away as Laurel helped Jordan onto a bar stool and drew him a glass of water from a pump in the wall. He took a hasty sip, grimacing as his bloody fingers stuck to the glass. He felt her watching him but had nothing to say except, "Thank you."
"That's alright," she murmured. A moment later she giggled. "I wasn't exactly planning it."
Jordan swallowed more water. "I was going to do something. I was planning it. Couldn't make myself do it."
Laurel shrugged. "No one expected it of you, Jordan. It's okay."
She moved away to wipe down some spilled drink on the bar. He stared into his empty glass.
"I want to go home," he murmured.
Nobody answered.