A Burning Sea by Theodore Brun (snow like ashes series TXT) 📗

way through the maze of back streets that made up the coppersmiths’ quarter, avoiding grey puddles and fetid gutters, listening to the street-hawkers’ cries and tinkers’ songs as they went about their work.

Usually Alethea could be found seated outside a certain wine shop on a little lane known as Bakers’ Alley. Sure enough, there she was, propped in her little box, wrapped up for midwinter even though the air was milder now. A cracked cup sat beside her, half-filled with cheap wine.

Gerutha called out to her.

‘Well now – what have we here?’ the beggar woman cried. ‘Didn’t I say to myself this morning, “Today will be a blessed day! You mark it, my girl – something fine will turn up.” And see, here you are!’ Gerutha clasped her filthy, mottled hand. Alethea’s knuckles were cold as a barrow stone. ‘And look now, His Holiness, Father Domnicus! A double pleasure.’

‘Bless you, sister,’ Domnicus said warmly.

‘No miracle for me today, have you, Father?’

‘God willing. In any case, I remember you in my prayers every night.’

‘Is that so? Seems you’re out of favour with the Almighty then, Father – since today I woke up with no legs, same as every day.’ She cackled long and hard at that. ‘Anyhows, I ain’t complaining. Old Red Nose in there has spared me a cup or two of charity so I’ve some fire in the grate, eh?’ She and the wineshop keeper, a man called Cornelius, had an understanding. He gave her the dregs of abandoned wine-jugs in return for her noting the face of any man entering his shop, in case there was trouble. ‘Usual piss, naturally.’

‘You look well,’ Gerutha lied. In truth, she looked wretched; the infection that was eating away the flesh across her face was livid and purple. ‘Here.’ She passed Alethea two small loaves of bread out of their basket.

‘Oh, God bless you for your kindness, girl. Now then – what’s been keeping you from visiting your dear old friend?’

‘Far too much to tell.’ Which was true. And she didn’t want to worry the old crone about Lilla.

‘You’re still keeping company with this firebrand, eh? You watch out, girl. He’ll bounce you into the Kingdom of God soon as look at you.’

Domnicus smiled. ‘Oh, sooner than that if I could. There’s room enough for all of us in God’s house. Even you. . . Especially you. Our Lord said that the last shall be the first.’

‘Well, he can keep my place for now, Father,’ she sniffed. ‘I’m happy right where I am.’ The beggar woman raised her broken cup and took a slurp, then leaned forward in her box with a conspiratorial glint in her glassy eye. ‘Interesting times round here, I tell you. I suppose you heard about that poor lampros fellow?’ Gerutha started at mention of the fire-maker. She had hardly been able to think of anything else. ‘A horrible business, that. Mother of God, the state he was in when they found him. . .’

‘They still haven’t caught the man who did it.’

‘That’s because they ain’t looking for a man. They say it was a woman. Some say it was that grand lady used to come here with you.’

‘Whoever says that is a liar,’ said Gerutha sharply.

‘Oh, I know it!’ Alethea cried. She beckoned her two visitors closer with a long, gnarled fingernail, so close Gerutha could smell her rotting teeth. ‘Because I saw him.’

‘Who?’

‘The man that did it. Yes,’ she nodded slowly. ‘They found the poor fellow’s corpse not two streets from this spot. Did you know that?’

‘What do you mean you saw the man that did it? How would you know it was him?’ asked Domnicus.

‘I was right there. Just there, look!’ She pointed to a murky corner along the street where Gerutha could make out a small heap of dirty rags. Evidently Alethea’s bed. ‘I couldn’t sleep that night, I remember. It was that cold. And then I hear footsteps coming up from that end. Slap-slap – and I’m thinking, “Hey there, someone’s in a hurry.” I look up and he stops right there on that corner.’ She pointed to the entrance of another alleyway twenty paces or so past the wine shop. ‘That’s when I saw his face. No woman. No! A moonbeam settles right on his face and he glanced upwards for a second and I saw his eyes. Dark as the Devil’s, they were. And his jaw – sharp as a knife. That face – oh, it chilled me to the bone. I’d never forget it.’

Gerutha exchanged an uncertain glance with Domnicus. ‘You’re sure it was the same night.’

‘What do you think? I ain’t no simpleton.’

‘There was another man found guilty of treason,’ said Domnicus. ‘He was steward to Lord Arbasdos, the curopalates. He had a long beard dyed red—’

‘No, no, no! No beard, I tell you. You listen to old Alethea. Here – you want proof?’ She suddenly turned her attention to her filthy robes huddled about the stumps of her legs, and soon produced from their fragrant depths a curved dagger, some six inches long. It was in poor condition and stained black all over. ‘He dropped it.’

‘The man?’

‘The killer, you mean! He tossed it right there in the gutter.’ She pointed at the revolting stream of effluent oozing down the side of the lane. ‘I saw him do it, and fished it out after he’d gone.’

‘Let me see.’ Alethea passed it up. Gerutha breathed a sigh of relief when she realized she had never seen it before in her life. For an awful moment, she had feared she would recognize it as one of Lilla’s possessions.

‘Why didn’t you tell someone,’ asked Domnicus, ‘if you saw all this?’

‘Who says I didn’t try, hey? For a start, it ain’t so easy to get around, you know. But I still found a nightwatchman and told him what I’d seen. And what do you think? The son of a slut told me to crawl back into whatever hole I’d crawled out of. Well