Page 6 of The Uncrowned Prince

“If he is under the table,” the woman continued, “I would like you to show me.”

The man in the black coat dropped his chin, closed his eyes, and cursed his luck. This was not going to end well.

He turned just in time to see the drunken cad reach for the woman’s arm. Started to rise from his barstool, knowing full well he would not reach them fast enough to stop what was about to happen. Even so…

There was a crash, a scrape of chairs, and the sound of a full mug of ale splashing across the floor.

And then there was silence, but for the sound of whimpering.

The previously giggling man lay on his back on the table, his legs dangling over the side, trembling uncontrollably as his eyes goggled from an ashen face. Blood had already begun to spread from where one of his hands had been pinned to the table by a dagger. A second dagger, held in a steady, dark-gloved hand, hovered in the air only a hairsbreadth from the imprudent fellow’s left eyeball.

“Is it customary here to remove a liar’s tongue?” the woman inquired, her tone even and unaffected, as if she were speaking of the weather. “I am willing to choose another body part, if that would suit you, but choose quickly. My errand will not wait.”

The remainder of the tavern quickly sorted itself into two kinds of people—the ones who were wise enough to understand that no one moved that way by accident (and that daggers could easily appear in more vital parts than hands) and the ones who were far too drunk to understand much of anything.

Like gulls on a dead fish, the second set swooped in to defend their offended comrade, and the man in the black coat sighed as he recognized the need for intervention.

Clearly, the cloaked stranger was not helpless, but just as clearly, she had no sense of self-preservation or subtlety. She wasn’t going to get far asking questions if she murdered an entire tavern’s worth of locals simply for being unmannerly cads.

On the other hand, perhaps it wouldn’t hurt to let her thin their number by a few before he intervened…

Sadly, as attractive as that option was, if he wanted her available for questions later, he was going to have to do something, and fast. And he was going to have to do it in a way that didn’t end up with him on the receiving end of one of those daggers.

Mentally sorting through the contents of his pockets, the man in the black coat noted regretfully that he was low on suitable options. First, the onyx marble, perhaps followed by the string…

How another of his kind would have solved this problem he had no idea—he’d not been blessed with a teacher to explain such things—but he had his own methods, ramshackle though they may be.

A far cry, he thought with a grimace, from the suave and polished surface he’d affected for so long.

First, he wrapped the knotted string loosely around the fingers of his right hand. When the loops were arranged just so, a flick of his left wrist sent the enchanted marble flying up and across the room, right at the oaken beams of the ceiling. It impacted with an odd whoosh, and every light in the tavern suddenly went out.

As was usual in such moments, the immediate response was silence, followed by cacophony. And in the midst of that cacophony, the man in the black coat slid off his chair and made his way in the direction of the altercation.

Only to collide quite firmly with a small, lithe body covered in pointy bits of metal. The smaller body bounced off, giving him just enough time to announce his intentions before he was skewered. “I’m trying to help you,” he hissed. “So I suggest you come with me unless your goal is to spend the next few days in a cell.”

When the only response was the whisper of a blade leaving its scabbard, the man sighed and slid the fingers of his left hand into the loops of string.

Had there been any light to see by, it might have appeared he was playing the child’s game of cratch. But as the string around his fingers drew tighter, he flicked his wrists again, and the loops flew forward, expanding strangely to wrap themselves around his target with a brief flare of light.

Had the tavern been quiet, the patrons might have heard a dull thud as the cloaked newcomer’s body hit the ground. But it was still dark and far from quiet, so no one noticed when the man in the black coat bent down and dragged something heavy across the floor.

The tavern lamps did not flicker back to life until he was already halfway out the door into the dimly lit alleyway beyond. Only the tavern keeper seemed to notice his exit, or that he was not alone, but as the woman was a troublemaker, the greasy, bearded fellow made no effort to stop him. Instead, he shot them a dismissive glance as the door swung shut, leaving the man in the black coat alone in the alley with a woman who likely would be happy to see him dead. Her hood still covered her face, but he could feel the rage and hostility emanating from her cloaked form without any need to glimpse her expression.

Thankfully, she was still completely immobilized, so his back was safe from her daggers for now. But the only way to get her out of the street was to carry her, so with a muttered apology, the man hoisted her onto his shoulders and started down the street.

Considering the collection of pointy metal bits beneath that cloak, it was a bit like carrying a large, angry hedgehog. If hedgehogs were five feet tall and trained as assassins. Depending on her skills, the man in the black coat reckoned he had no more than a minute or two before his captive regained the ability to move and freed herself, which meant he had a bit less than that to convince her not to kill him.

Not far from the tavern, an empty spice warehouse listed depressingly to one side, its windows broken and mostly boarded up. It was near enough to the docks to be a perfect haven for criminals and the unscrupulous, but for some reason, it appeared to have gone unclaimed ever since a gang of smugglers had been cleaned out by the city guard several months back.

For some reason…

The man in the black coat maneuvered himself and his burden through a door that squeaked far less than its appearance suggested it should, then crunched his way across the debris littering the floor of the outer warehouse. Brushing aside a tattered fabric curtain, he ducked through another doorway and entered his shabby but comfortable lair.

A warm glow emanated from the small fireplace, spreading both light and heat throughout the cozy room. A rag rug brightened the floor near the fire, while a couch sat nearby, with a pile of neatly folded blankets and a pillow at one end. The remainder of the space was filled with tables, crates, an assorted collection of oddments, and a one-eyed calico cat who did not appear to care for the intrusion.

She yowled to show her displeasure and leaped off the couch just as the man lay his burden on its worn cushions. A single quick motion released the string, which shrunk back to its original size and disappeared back into his pockets.

“First of all,” the man in the black coat said, “I would like to establish that I have no ill intentions towards you whatsoever. It appeared that things were getting out of hand, and I felt you would have a better chance of finding whoever it is you are looking for if you remained on theoutsideof His Majesty King Trevelian’s dungeons.”

---