Glen Cook - Garrett Files 02 - Bitter Gold Hearts

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OGRE TOWN WAS QUIET AS DEATH—

Until we sprang our attack on the citadel of the human plug-ugly nicknamed Gorgeous. This

cold-blooded killer's pack of ogres had been wiping out some people I'd had a personal interest in

keeping alive.

Right from the start the battle seemed to be going just the way we'd planned. Then Gorgeous let

loose with a roar that could wake the undead. I jumped him, but the damage was done. The stairs

were already drumming to stamping feet. And then the ogre stampede arrived!

There must have been twenty in the first rush. They pushed across the room, into the far wall.

Even my trolls, hammering ogre heads from above, scarcely slowed them. And more and more

ogres kept coming.

It was looking really grim for my little army as Gorgeous shrieked hysterical, bloodthirsty orders.

It was definitely time to try something desperate. . . .

Bitter Gold Hearts

Glen Cook

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First Printing, June, 1988 123456789

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

____ I ____

THERE WAS NOTHING to do after I wrapped up the Case of the Perilous Pixies. Two weeks of living with the

Dead Man's grumblings and mutterings would try the patience of a saint. A saint I'm not.

Worse, Tinnie was out of town indefinitely and the redhead refused to share me with anyone she didn't

know. It was a trying time to be alive. Nothing to do with my evenings but keep the breweries from going

into receivership.

It was early and a devil was doing some blacksmithing in my skull, so I wasn't at my best when somebody

came pounding on the door of our battered old house on Macunado Street.

"Yeah?" I snapped when I yanked the door open. It didn't matter that the woman was wearing a thousand

marks' worth of custom cloth or that the street was filled with guys in flashy livery. I've seen too much of

the rich to be impressed.

"Mr. Garrett?"

"That's me." I lightened up a little. I'd had a chance to give her the up and down, and she was worth a

second look. And a third and a fourth. There wasn't a lot of her, though nothing was missing, and what

was there had been put together quite nicely. A phantom smile crossed her lips as my gaze drew north

again.” I’m half fairy," she said, and for a moment music broke through the gravity of her voice. "Can you

stop gaping long enough to let me in?"

"Of course. Can I ask your name? I don't recall you being on my appointment calendar. Though I'd love to

jot you in as often as you want."

"I'm here on business, Mr. Garrett. Save that for your bar girls." She pushed past me a few steps, then

stopped and glanced back with mild surprise.” The outside is camouflage," I told her. "We leave it looking

like a dump so we don't strain the honesty of our neighbors." It wasn't the best section of the city. There

was a war on, and it was hot, so there were plenty of jobs available, but some of our neighbors hadn't yet

given in to the silly notion of personal gain through honest employment.

"We?" she repeated icily. "I wanted to consult with you on a matter that requires the greatest discretion."

Don't they all? They wouldn't come to me if they thought they could solve their problems through the usual

channels.

"You can trust him," I replied, nodding toward the other room. "His lips are sealed. He's been dead for four

hundred years."

I watched her face go through a series of changes. "He's Loghyr? The Dead Man?"

So she wasn't such a lady after all. Anybody who knows the Dead Man has roots solidly anchored in the

downhill end of TunFaire. "Yes. I think he ought to hear it."

I get around and hear a lot of things—some of them true, most of them not. I'd recognized the livery of the

Stormwarden Raver Styx outside and thought I could guess what was eating her. It would be fun springing

her on the heap of moth-eaten blubber who had become my permanent houseguest.

"No."

I started toward his room. The routine is for me to wake him when I have a business caller. Not everyone

who visits is friendly. He can provide powerful backup when the mood hits him. "What did you say your

name was, miss?"

I was fishing and she knew it. She could have skipped right around it, but she hesitated in an odd way

before confessing, "Amiranda Crest, Mr. Garrett. This is a critical matter."

"They always are, Amiranda. I'll be with you in a minute."

She didn't walk out.

It was important enough that she would let herself be pushed.

* * *

He was indulging himself in what had become his favorite pastime, trying to outguess the generals and

warlords in the Cantard. No matter that the information he got was scanty, out of date, and mostly filtered

through me. He did as well as the geniuses who commanded the armies—better than most of those

Stormwarden’s and warlords whose main claim to the right of command was heredity.

He was a mountain of rigid yellow flesh sprawled on a massive wooden chair. The works had been moved

several times but the flesh hadn't twitched since somebody stuck a knife in it four hundred years ago. He

was getting a little ragged. Loghyr flesh doesn't corrupt quickly, but mice and whole species of insects

consider it a delicacy.

The wall facing his chair had no doors or windows. He'd had an artist paint it with a large-scale map of the

war zone. At that moment he had hosts of bugs trooping up and down the plaster landscape, recreating

recent campaigns, trying to discover how the mercenary Glory Mooncalled had evaded not only the

Venageti out to destroy him, but our own commanders, who wanted to catch and leash him before his

string of triumphs made them look more foolish and inept than they already did.

"You're awake."

Go away, Garrett.

"Who's winning? The ants or the roaches? Better watch out for those spiders down in the corner. They're

sneaking up on your silverfish."

Quit pestering me, Garrett.

"I have a visitor, a prospective client. We need a client. I want you to hear her outpouring of woe."

You brought a woman into my house again? Garrett, my good nature has limits wider than the ocean, but

it does have limits.

"Whose house? Do we have to go back to talking about who's the landlord and who's the squatter?"

The bugs scattered. Some of them jumped on others. That's life in the war zone.

/ almost had the pattern.

"He does it with mirrors. If there was a pattern, the Venageti War Council would have spotted it months

ago. Finding Glory Mooncalled isn't a hobby for them. It's life or death." The mercenary was picking them

off one by one. He had an old score to settle.

I take it this one is not that redheaded witch of yours?

"Tinnie? No. This one works for the Stormwarden Raver Styx. She has fairy blood. You'll love her at first

sight."

Unlike you, who loves them all at first sight, I am no longer the victim of my flesh, Garrett. There are some

advantages to being dead. One gains the ability to reason. . . .

I'd heard this before — several dozen times. "I'll bring her in." I stepped out, returned to the front room.

"Miss Crest? If you'll come with me?"

She glowered. Even angry she was a gem, but there was a quiet desperation in her stance that gave me

all the handle I needed. "Amiranda, haunter of my dreams. Please?"

She followed me. I think she knew she had no choice.

____ II ____

AMIRANDA CREST STARTED shaking when she saw the Dead Man. I'm used to him and tend to forget the

impact he has on those who never have seen a dead Loghyr. Her cute little nose wrinkled. She whispered,

"It smells in here."

Well, yes, it did, but not much, and I was used to that, too. 1 ignored the remark. "This is Amiranda Crest,

who comes to us from the Stormwarden Raver Styx."

Please pardon me for not rising, Miss Crest. I am capable of mental prodigies, but self-levitation is not

among them. Meantime, Amiranda blurted, "Oh, no. Not from the Stormwarden. She's in the Cantard. Her

secretary, the Domina Willa Dount, sent me. I'm her assistant. She wants you to see her about something

she wants you to do, Mr. Garrett. For the family. Discreetly."

"Then you're not going to tell me what it is?"

"I don't know what it is. I was told to give you a hundred marks, gold, and tell you there is a thousand more

if you'll do the job. But the hundred is yours if you'll just come and see her."

She lies, Garrett. She knows what it is about.

He wasn't paying the rent with that. She had changed strategies while I was alerting the Dead Man.

"That's all? Nothing to tell me why I'm sticking my neck out?"

She had begun counting ten-mark gold pieces into her left hand. I was startled. I'd never met anyone with

fairy blood who was right-handed.” Save yourself the trouble, Miss Crest. If that's it, I'll stay here and help

my friend hustle cockroaches."

She thought 1 was joking. A man of my class turning his back on a hundred marks gold? A man in my

line? I ought to be sprinting uptown to find out who they wanted killed. Chances were she had run uptown,

bartering her good looks for the pretty things she wore.

She asked, "Couldn't you just take me on faith, and for the gold?"

"The last time I trusted somebody from up the Hill I got stuck in the Marines. I spent five years trying to kill

Venageti conscripts who didn't know any better than I did what we were fighting about. I didn't figure that

out till I came back home, and then I liked your lords and ladies of the Hill even less. Good day, Miss

Crest. Unless you'd be interested in some more personal business? I know a little place that serves

seafood you could kill for."

I watched her think it over, looking for angles she could use. Finally, she said, "Domina will be very angry

with me if I don't bring you."

"How sad. But that's not my problem. If you don't mind? Your boys out front are probably baking in the

sun, anyway."

She stomped out of the room, snarling, "You're throwing away the easiest hundred marks of your life, Mr.

Garrett."

I followed her to make sure she used the door for its intended purpose. "If your boss wants to see me so

bad, tell her to come down here."

She paused, opened her mouth to say something, then shook her head and slipped outside. I caught a

glimpse of the sweltering guards jumping to their feet before the door closed. I went back to the Dead

Man.

You were a little stubborn, were you not?

"She'll be back."

/ know. But what temper will possess her?

"Maybe she'll be ready to lay it out straight, without the games."

She is a female, Garrett. Why do you persist in such unreasonable optimism where that alien species is

concerned? This was one of our running arguments. He was a misogynist to the marrow. This time I

refused to play. He gave up.

Are you interested in the job, Garrett?

"My heart won't be broken if it doesn't develop. You know I told the truth when I said I don't have much

use for the lords of the Hill. And I particularly have no use for sorcerers. We don't need the money,

anyway."

You always need money, Garrett, the way you drink beer and chase skirts.

He exaggerated, of course. His envy was talking. His single greatest regret about being dead was his

inability to guzzle beer. Someone is hammering on the door.

"I hear it. It's probably old Dean, early for work."

The Dead Man would not endure a female housekeeper, and my tolerance for housework is minimal. I'd

only been able to find one old man—who moved with the flash and style of a tortoise—willing to come in,

pick up, cook, and clear the vermin from the Dead Man's room.

I was surprised to find Amiranda back already. "Quick trip. Come in. I didn't know I was so irresistible."

She strode past me, then turned, hands on hips. "All right, Mr. Garrett. You get it your way. The reason

Domina wants you is because my . . . because the Stormwarden's son Karl has been kidnapped. If you

insist on getting more than that, we're both out of luck. Because that's all I've been told."

And you certainly are worried about it, I thought.

She started for the door.

"Hold it." I squinted at her. "Give me the hundred."

She handed it over without a smirk of triumph. One point for Amiranda Crest. I decided she might be worth

liking.

"I'll be back in a minute."

I took the gold to the Dead Man. There was no safer place on earth. "You heard?"

/ did.

"What do you think?"

Kidnapping is your area of expertise.

I rejoined Amiranda Crest. "Let us fair forth, fair fairy lady."

That failed to put a smile on her face.

Not everyone appreciates a great sense of humor.

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OGRETOWNWASQUIETASDEATH—Untilwesprangourattackonthecitadelofthehumanplug-uglynicknamedGorgeous.Thiscold-bloodedkiller'spackofogreshadbeenwipingoutsomepeopleI'dhadapersonalinterestinkeepingalive.Rightfromthestartthebattleseemedtobegoingjustthewaywe'dplanned.ThenGorgeousletloosewitharoarthatcouldwaket...

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Glen Cook - Garrett Files 02 - Bitter Gold Hearts

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