they reached the intersection, Sparhawk led his friend up a muddy alley. They had gone about halfway when a thick-bodied man with a rusty pike in his hands stepped out of a doorway to bar their path. ‘Where do you think you’re going?’ he demanded.
‘I need to talk to Platime,’ Sparhawk replied.
‘I don’t think he wants to hear anything you have to say. If you’re smart, you’ll get out of this part of town before nightfall. Accidents happen here after dark.’
‘And sometimes even before dark,’ Sparhawk said, drawing his sword.
‘I can have a dozen men here in two winks.’
‘And my broken-nosed friend here can have your head off in one,’ Kalten told him.
The man stepped back, his face apprehensive.
‘What’s it to be, neighbour?’ Sparhawk asked. ‘Do you take us to Platime, or do you and I play for a bit?’
‘You’ve got no right to threaten me.’
Sparhawk raised his sword so that the fellow could get a good look at it. ‘This gives me all sorts of rights, neighbour. Lean your pike against that wall and take us to Platime – now!’
The thick-bodied man flinched and then carefully set his pike against the wall, turned, and led them on up the alley. It came to a dead end a hundred paces farther on, and a stone stairway ran down to what appeared to be a cellar door.
‘Down there,’ the man said, pointing.
‘Lead the way,’ Sparhawk told him. ‘I don’t want you behind me, friend. You look like the sort who might make errors in judgement.’
Sullenly, the fellow went down the mud-coated stairs and rapped twice on the door. ‘It’s me,’ he called. ‘Sef. There are a couple of nobles here who want to talk to Platime.’
There was a pause followed by the rattling of a chain. The door opened and a bearded man thrust his head out. ‘Platime doesn’t like noblemen,’ he declared.
‘I’ll change his mind for him,’ Sparhawk said. ‘Step back out of the way, neighbour.’
The bearded man looked at the sword in Sparhawk’s hand, swallowed hard, and opened the door wider.
‘Pass right along, Sef,’ Kalten said to their guide.
Sef went through the door.
‘Join us, friend,’ Sparhawk told the bearded man when he and Kalten were inside. ‘We like lots of company.’
The stairs continued down between mouldy stone walls that wept moisture. At the bottom, the stair opened out into a very large cellar with a vaulted stone ceiling. There was a fire burning in a pit in the centre of the room, filling the air with smoke, and the walls were lined with roughly constructed cots and straw-filled pallets. Two dozen or so men and women in a wide variety of garments sat on those cots and pallets drinking and playing at dice. Just beyond the fire pit a huge man with a fierce black beard and a vast paunch sprawled in a large chair with his feet thrust out towards the flames. He wore a satin doublet of a faded orange colour, spotted and stained down the front, and he held a silver tankard in one beefy hand.
‘That’s Platime,’ Sef said nervously. ‘He’s a little drunk, so you should be careful, my Lords.’
‘We can deal with it,’ Sparhawk told him. ‘Thanks for your help, Sef. I don’t know how we’d have managed without you.’ Then he led Kalten on around the fire pit.
‘Who are all these people?’ Kalten asked in a low voice, looking around at the men and women lining the walls.
‘Thieves, beggars, a few murderers probably – that sort of thing.’
‘You’ve got some very nice friends, Sparhawk.’
Platime was carefully examining a necklace with a ruby pendant attached to it. When Sparhawk and Kalten stopped in front of him, he raised his bleary eyes and looked them over, paying particular attention to Kalten’s finery. ‘Who let these two in here?’ he roared.
‘We sort of let ourselves in, Platime,’ Sparhawk told him, thrusting his sword back under his belt and turning up his eye patch so that it no longer impaired his vision.
‘Well, you can sort of let yourselves back out again.’
‘That wouldn’t be convenient right now, I’m afraid,’ Sparhawk told him.
The gross man in the orange doublet snapped his fingers, and the people lining the wall stood up. ‘You’re badly outnumbered, my friend.’ Platime looked around suggestively at his cohorts.
‘That’s been happening fairly often lately,’ Kalten said with his hand on the hilt of his broadsword.
Platime’s eyes narrowed. ‘Your clothes and that sword don’t exactly match,’ he said.
‘And I try so hard to co-ordinate my attire,’ Kalten sighed.
‘Just who are you two?’ Platime asked suspiciously. ‘This one is dressed like a courtier, but I don’t think he’s really one of those walking butterflies from the palace.’
‘He sees right to the core of things, doesn’t he?’ Kalten said to Sparhawk. He looked at Platime. ‘Actually, we’re Pandions,’ he said.
‘Church Knights? I thought it might be something like that. Why the fancy clothes, then?’
‘We’re both fairly well known,’ Sparhawk told him. ‘We wanted to be able to move around without being recognized.’
Platime looked meaningfully at Kalten’s blood-stained doublet. ‘It looks to me as if somebody saw through your disguises,’ he said, ‘or maybe you just frequent the wrong taverns. Who stabbed you?’
‘A church soldier.’ Kalten shrugged. ‘He got in a lucky thrust. Do you mind if I sit down? I’m feeling a little shaky for some reason.’
‘Somebody bring him a stool,’ Platime shouted. Then he looked back at the two of them. ‘Why would Church Knights and church soldiers be fighting?’ he asked.
‘Palace politics.’ Sparhawk shrugged. ‘They get a little murky sometimes.’
‘That’s God’s own truth. What’s your business here?’
‘We need a place to stay for a while,’ Sparhawk told him. He looked around. ‘This cellar of yours ought to work out fairly well.’
‘Sorry, friend. I can sympathize with a man who’s just had a run-in with the church soldiers, but I’m conducting a business here, and there’s no room for outsiders.’ Platime looked at Kalten, who had just sunk down on a stool that a ragged beggar had brought him. ‘Did you kill the man who stabbed you?’
‘He did.’ Kalten pointed at Sparhawk. ‘I killed a few others, but my friend here did most of the fighting.’
‘Why don’t we get down to business?’ Sparhawk
