The Age of Heroes Read online

  Rawk sighed. “You won’t be having breakfast, Adalee. At least not with me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You should get your things and go.”

  “You... But...”

  Rawk turned to look at her. “What did you think was going to happen?”

  “You can’t treat me like one of your tavern sluts, Rawk. I am Adalee Dan Beketh. If my parents—”

  “Wait? What? Who?”

  The girl looked a bit smug. “That’s right. My father is Edwin Dan Beketh and if he hears—”

  “You’ll tell your father?”

  “Well...”

  But Rawk didn’t care about her father. “How old did you say you were?”

  The sudden change of topic confused her. “I will celebrate my twentieth name day in four weeks.”

  Rawk tried to think. He tried to calculate. Melia Dan Beketh? The two headed snake, what a crock that had been, or the giant bear thing? He couldn’t remember; it had been so long ago. And even if he knew if it was the snake or the bear, how long ago had they been? Maybe Weaver would know. He sighed again. “Go home to your mother, girl.”

  He turned to watch as she flounced from the bed and made her way around the room collecting her clothes. He had to admit, she was beautiful, and it had been fun. The first time had been fun. Even the second. After that it had just been hard work. When she had laced her shirt up over her breasts Rawk thought he should do something about finding his own clothes. But she paused on her way out the door.

  “You’d think a man like you would have more in his life than...” She looked around and gestured at the room. “Than this.”

  Rawk looked as well. He shrugged. “So people keep telling me. Apparently I’m supposed to grow up.”

  “Maybe this frugal, monk-like existence impressed women when you were my age, but now it’s just sad.” Adalee huffed and slammed the door behind her.

  Rawk winced. “That went well.” He thought he might well have a visit from Melia in a couple of days. It was years since he’d even seen her so that would be nice.

  Rawk wondered if he should do something about redressing his arm when there was a knock at the door.

  “Yes?”

  Travis came in with a jug of hot water and a large copper bowl. Again. “I saw Adalee leaving.”

  “You knew who she was?”

  “Of course.”

  “You didn’t tell me.”

  “I assumed you would ask her.”

  “Well... Was she going quietly?”

  Travis laughed. “Do you want to do a fresh poultice or just, you know, breathe?”

  Rawk worked the muscles in his arm. “A bit of poultice, I think. But I was going to do some more of the breathing thing too. It really cleared my head yesterday and, seeing I drank a bit too much last night, I was hoping it would work again.”

  While Rawk worked at the bandage, Travis set about organizing the bowl. He cleared his throat but didn’t look up. “I’m not going to be working tonight,” he said.

  Rawk raised an eyebrow though the other man still wasn’t looking. “You aren’t? It’s Faraday, isn’t it?”

  “It is.”

  “You always work on Faraday.”

  “Normally, yes.” Travis started working on the poultice. “Can’t trust anyone else.”

  “So...”

  “There’s a show on at the Veterans’ Club. I thought I’d go to see it.”

  “A show? You?”

  “Yeah. What of it? I can see a show if I want.”

  Rawk held up a hand. “Of course you can. Do whatever the hell you want.”

  “I was going to ask somebody...”

  Rawk raise the other eyebrow. “Oh. Right.”

  “Only...”

  “No. There’s no ‘only’. You’re too old to be waiting. At your age if you stand still too long you fall over dead. I’m sure I heard that somewhere. Sylvia would know. You do it, Travis. That’s an order. Ask whoever it is and have a great time.”

  “Do you think?”

  “Get out of here, I’ve got some breathing to do.”

  Rawk shoved his head under the towel and listened to the other man leave. Travis was just a couple of months older than Rawk. Was he too old to be waiting? Too old to be standing still?

  Do you think? Not as often as I should, apparently.

  Rawk kept his head under the towel for a few minutes. It did help, but he had too much on his mind for it to calm him as it had the night before. With a sigh his sat up and looked around.

  His trousers were at the end of the bed. His shirt was in the corner, but it was almost torn in half. He remembered something about that but the details were lost amidst a flurry of thighs and breasts and eager hands.

  He donned some new clothes, threw a cloak over the top, collected his sword and headed down stairs.

  -O-

  No strenuous activity for a week? Who was she kidding?

  After breakfast, Rawk wandered out to the front of the Hero’s Rest. The Faraday Festival was in full swing in Placton Square. Hawkers were calling their wares as people wandered beneath the trees, moving from performance to performance or pausing to watch roving entertainers. There were singers and jugglers, mimes and impressionists. Bubbling laughter and noise filled the air. Cafes around the outside of the square were doing a roaring trade, serving spiced wine and sparkling ale.

  Rawk rubbed his knee as he watched the people passing by, returning greetings but trying not to get involved. He sat on the step. Anyone else who did the same thing would have been chased away by whoever was serving in the common room at the time, but he was Rawk, the greatest of the great Heroes.

  Greatest of the great Heroes? What did that mean? A few years ago he could have told you but now he wasn’t so sure. It meant the City Guard came to him when a wolden wolf needed killing instead of just going and doing the job themselves. He knew that much. It meant people thought it was all right to ask him for money at any time of the day or night. He knew that, too. With a sigh, Rawk reached into his money pouch and held out a coin for the young, raggedly dressed boy who watched him from not far away. The boy hadn’t asked for money, but smiled and darted forward. He nodded his thanks as he took the coin then disappeared down the street.

  It had been worse years ago, of course. The Age of Heroes was passing, drifting away into history like the Age of Gods had before, so those last few men and women plying their trade did not garner the interest they once had.

  Rawk threw his pebble at an iron ring set into the cobbles, the only evidence that the dwarves had been through the area digging their damn sewerage drains. Hundreds of dwarves doing hundreds of hours of work all over the city, and soon, that ring and others like it would be all that was left to remember what had been done. The rings and the shower upstairs. And the tap in the kitchen. And...

  “Path.” Rawk rose to his feet and looked around, as if a great deed might be waiting to be done right there in front of him. An old man dropped a bag of apples but before Rawk could even think to help, a girl started to gather up the fruit. Rawk swore again. “The last of the great Heroes.”

  He pulled some dried meat from his belt and chewed as he walked down the hill towards the river. He could see the canal construction zone beyond that. As Clinker had said, there was one small section left to dig. Fifty or sixty yards of dirt and stone, depending on who you asked, was all that stood between the Yanandar Sea and the Bay of Kata.

  Lost in thought, wondering what to do with himself that didn’t involve anything strenuous, Rawk turned at the next intersection. It was some time before he took notice of his location. The street was narrow and looked as if it hadn’t seen the light of day in years. The buildings were three stories high with balconies reaching out overhead. Clotheslines crisscrossed what was left of the sky, full of clothes that sent a patter of rain down to the worn cobbles. Someone, somewhere, was baking bread.

  He’d never been here before. Five minutes walk from ho
me and he’d never seen this place. An old lady sat on a step peeling carrots with quick easy strokes. She smiled and nodded. “Rawk.” But she didn’t jump up to get a blessing or talk about wolden wolves, though it looked like she could have done with the former.

  “Good morning, ma’am.”

  The woman laughed, though if at the idea of a good morning or at being called ma’am was impossible to tell. The sounds echoed around the narrow space. Up above, a crow landed on a clothes line, squawking and flaring its wings as its new perch swung and danced beneath it. Big drops of water came down in long, slow arcs.

  Rawk grunted and kept walking.

  At the next corner an even narrower street ran off at an odd angle. There was no room for balconies or clotheslines. There was just a thin line of blue above the black line of cobbles. Rawk didn’t like the look of it and was about to move on when he heard a scream. And a second later, someone yelled, “Fire.”

  Huh! There were deeds to be done. Perhaps. He had to decide where the shout had originated. There were three possibilities and nothing to give him a hint. After an agonizing moment, Rawk thought to look up again and saw a trickle of smoke drifting overhead. He turned right and ran. A hundred yards on, after pausing at two more intersections to look some more, he came to a halt in a small square near a burning building. The exposed frame at the front was already black and smoldering and the plaster between was cracked. Flames were flickering out the second floor window. A small group of people were standing not far away, waving away smoke, chattering as they watched.

  Another woman wailed, wringing her hands and looking up at the window. When she looked down, she wailed even louder and raced to Rawk. She grabbed his hand. “My mother is inside,” she said. “You must help her.”

  Rawk looked up again. The building was well alight and it could collapse at any moment. The fire was already spreading. He didn’t know that he must do anything. His heart raced. His palms were sweating just at the thought of doing anything. It felt as if the smoke was gathering on his tongue, sucking the moisture from his mouth.

  “You must help her.”

  Rawk swore but dropped his sword belt to the ground and ran to the door. He lashed out with his boot but it had no effect. Despite the flames, the door still stood strong. So he reached out carefully and lifted the lock so he could push the door open. A shower of sparks came out the gap, quickly dwindling away to nothing. Covering his face with his arm, little good that it would do, Rawk ducked inside. The heat was terrifying. He thought he could feel his skin peeling away from his face and hands. He almost retreated, but there were people waiting outside, watching.

  He looked around instead, trying to remain calm. A kitchen and sitting room down stairs with a burning table and a sturdy bench that looked like it might survive for a while yet. As Rawk had feared, there was nobody waiting to be rescued. He swore again, louder this time, seeing nobody could hear, and headed for the stairs. He stayed to the side, hoping they would hold. The first floor landing led to two doors, both closed, as the stairs continued up. Door on the left, an empty bedroom that was alive with flames but not with people. Another bedroom on the other side and an old woman lying in the middle of the floor, screaming and wailing twice as much as her daughter had been outside. Flames were climbing the walls and racing back and forth across the floor. He expected it to collapse at any moment.

  Rawk didn’t know how the old woman still lived but did wonder if she would appreciate being rescued, even if he could get to her. Living with burns...

  But that wasn’t for him to decide. Taking a deep breath that scorched his mouth, Rawk darted into the room and crouched by the woman’s side. She looked up at him when he touched her arm but didn’t stop screaming. Rawk swatted flames from his breeches as he wondered if going out the window would be the better option.

  He started to lift the woman, painful though it would be for everyone involved, when he saw movement from the corner of his eye. In the burning room, everything moved, but this thing seemed to move against the flow of the flames. When he spotted it again, Rawk gasped.

  A creature, no more than a foot high and seemingly made from flames, danced, twirling and leaping from the bed to the floor and back again.

  “What in Path’s name...”

  There was a jug and basin on the small table beside the bed. Rawk raced to the table. Using his sleeve to cover his hand, he took up the jug. It was empty. The basin was full though and he used his other hand to snatch it up without even thinking. The metal was cool to the touch.

  Bells clanged outside while the exot danced, oblivious to everything around it. Rawk threw the water, flinging it from the bowl.

  The creature looked, horrified expression on its flickering face. It coughed and spluttered. And with each paroxysm the flames in the room flickered and died, just a little. Finally, after being hit with a particularly violent cough, the exot winked from existence. The flames went with it. One moment they were there, the next they were gone. The old woman wailed and, outside, the bells rang.

  Rawk wished they would all shut up.

  He crouched beside the closest of the annoyances.

  “Hello.” He touched the old lady on the shoulder but she writhed and screamed louder. It was understandable, in a way; he was only just starting to get himself under control. He took a deep breath and the scent of a thunderstorm filled his nostrils.

  A few seconds later the woman opened her eyes. Her screams died away to whines, then to nothing as she looked around the room. “Did you do that?” she asked.

  Rawk looked around too. “I think I might have.”

  “How?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t think there was any fire at all.” He remembered the cool metal of the water bowl. “I think it was just a sprite or demon or something making us think there was a fire.”

  “And you killed it?”

  “I threw water on it. That’s all I know.”

  Rawk help the woman to her feet and then preceded her down the stairs. Outside, a huge crowd had gathered. And there was a horse-drawn water tank with a dozen dwarves sitting on top and clinging to the side, getting them above the press for a better view. They all cheered when Rawk stepped out through the door. The old woman hobbled over to speak with her daughter. They both sobbed while Rawk reclaimed his belt. He checked the pouches for his cutlery, money, and all the other odds and ends he carried.

  “Excuse me, Mr Rawk, sir.”

  Rawk looked down at the dwarf. “What?”

  “It looked like there was a fire.”

  “Yes.”

  “The whole building was engulfed.”

  “No.”

  The dwarf looked confused. “But you said...”

  “I agreed that it looked like there was a fire, I never said there was a fire. Who in Path’s name are you?”

  “I’m Fallow, Captain of Station Five”

  Rawk’s face must have shown his confusion.

  “The fire brigade.”

  Rawk was still confused.

  Fallow sighed. “We have a tanker full of water and if there’s a fire we get there as quickly as possible and try to put it out.”

  Rawk looked at the wagon. “You think that little bit of water will put out fires?”

  The dwarf shrugged. “Probably not. But once Thacker gets the water organized we’ll be able to make a difference.”

  Thacker again. Rawk was going to have to find out who Thacker was and what he was up to.

  Fallow scratched his head. “So, it looked like there was a fire, but there wasn’t really?”

  Rawk nodded.

  “It looked real.”

  “I know. It felt real, too. But nothing else was hot, just me. There was a fire sprite or something in there. Some exot that made us all think there was a fire.”

  The dwarf nodded. “So, the wolden wolf, or whatever it was, and now this fire sprite thing.”

  “What of it? They aren’t related.”

  Fallow shrugged. �
��I’m not suggesting they arrived at the station on the same train or anything. But we get no such creatures for months—”

  It had been years, actually, but Rawk was still trying to work out what a train was.

  “—and now we have two in two days? I guess I just think it’s a bit of a coincidence, that’s all.”

  “Whatever. They’re both dead.”

  “Well, I guess we aren’t needed then.”

  “No. So go back across the river.”

  “Got four hours left on my shift yet, Mr Rawk.”

  Rawk shook his head and walked away.

  A coincidence? Maybe, maybe not, but it didn’t really matter. Not when there were huge not-wolden-wolves wearing collars. He swore and flexed his sore arm. No strenuous activity for a week? His knee complained already.

  Satyrday

  Rawk breathed in the tea while the poultice worked on his arm.

  “A fire sprite?” Travis asked.

  “Well, I don’t know if that was its proper name,” Rawk replied.

  “Two in two days?”

  “I know, and there’s something I want to go and look at this morning.”

  “Well, it looks like business is picking up for you.”

  Rawk grunted. “I don’t know how long this will last. Weaver will probably make it a law that exots aren’t allowed to appear at all, even if they don’t have the help of sorcerers.”

  “And I’m sure they’ll all listen.”

  “Everyone else seems to. Do you really think the canal and the sewers are going to work?”

  Travis shook his head. “I’d say the sewers are already working. You’ve got running water right next door. And if you ever work up the courage you can use the crapper instead of making me carry around your buckets of shit.”

  “When was the last time you carried a bucket of shit?” Rawk finally pushed away the towel and sat up.

  “Do you know what we do with the buckets of shit now?”

  “No. And I don’t want to.”

  “We pour them in the sewer, Rawk.”

  “And what happens to it then?”