Harmless directed the cart towards him.
“Morning, good sir,” Harmless called.
The sniggler cast an eye towards them. He pulled his hand from the water and thrust it into the warm folds of his cloak.
“Good day to you, traveller,” he croaked in return.
Harmless stopped the cart a short distance from him and flashed a smile.
“How is the day’s catch?”
“Fair.” The sniggler placed a hand atop the pail. “Quite good actually.”
“Really?” Harmless said, jumping down from the farmer’s cart. “That’s splendid news.”
“Yes,” the sniggler said with a tight smile. “So good in fact, I was about to call it a morning.”
Rye saw the sniggler rise slowly, his shoulders slumped. His bones must have ached from years at the backbreaking work. He picked up his pail.
“I am so glad to have caught you then,” Harmless said taking a step forward. “I do enjoy a fresh eel. Might I buy one or two from you before you are on your way?”
On the cart, Rye exchanged glances with Folly and shrugged her shoulders. Her father seemed to have an insatiable appetite for slimy creatures.
The sniggler stiffened. “I’m afraid these eels are spoken for. The butcher will be expecting me.”
Harmless cocked his head. “You can’t spare but one? I have silver shims and will pay more than a fair price.”
The sniggler eased himself down from the rock on to the sand, his back so stooped that he stood barely taller than Rye. He dragged a foot behind him, the hem of his cloak covered in sand. Rye could tell that he must be lame.
“I’m sorry, but no. I must honour my bargain.” He looked Harmless over carefully.
“I can certainly appreciate a man of scruples,” Harmless said, and came to a stop a short distance from the sniggler. “But perhaps you will at least allow me to see your catch? For surely these are extraordinary eels.”
The sniggler stopped as well. He cast his eyes towards the cart, examining Rye and Folly in a manner that seemed less than friendly.
“I’m but a simple fisher,” the sniggler said. “Mine are ordinary saltwater eels. And small ones at that.”
“Don’t be so modest, sniggler. You must have a magic touch.” Harmless looked him hard in the eye. “For the Great Eel Pond was fished dry long ago. It has not been home to eels in my lifetime.”
The sniggler hesitated. “Odd luck is in the air,” he said, carefully removing the top from the pail. “You may see my catch,” he went on, reaching inside. “But take care. They bite.”
The sniggler snatched his hand from the pail and flicked his wrist so fast that Rye hardly saw it. A flash of steel caught the sun and Harmless dropped to all fours like a cat. A thud echoed below her. She looked down. A sharp throwing knife had just missed Harmless’s chest and embedded itself in the side of the farmer’s cart. A second blade cut through the air. Harmless rolled quickly and it only pierced the tail of his cloak, pinning it to the hard sand.
The sniggler cursed. He shook his own cloak from his shoulders as he stood at full height. He darted towards the culverts at a speed that would put Rye and Folly to shame, his lame leg and bent spine miraculously healed.
Harmless ripped his cloak free and checked on the girls. Finding them unharmed, he eyed the culverts. The sniggler had already disappeared inside.
“He’s a scout,” Harmless said. “For who I don’t know. But my gut tells me we must make it to the village before him.”
Harmless reached back over his shoulders. Two short swords appeared in his hands.
“Ride that way,” he said pointing the tip of a blade down the shoreline. “It will bring you straight to Drowning. But stay clear of the main gate. And, to be safe, don’t take the hole in the wall.”
Rye knew exactly what he meant. Mud Puddle Lane ended at a crumbled hole in the village’s protective wall. Harmless wanted her to stay away from the cottage.
He pointed the other blade towards the culverts. “I’ll follow our friend the sniggler.” He flashed a predatory smile. “Perhaps, with luck, I can slow him down.”
And with that, Harmless disappeared into the dark mouth of a culvert, the splash of his footsteps trailing behind him.
“We’ll want to move quickly through the streets,” Folly was saying as they splintered off from the pack. “The Constable and the Earl’s men have been stopping villagers for questioning ever since Silvermas. Considering who your father is, I don’t think we’ll have the right answers.”
“And what about the Shambles?” Rye asked. The Shambles was the part of the village where Folly and her family lived. “Will soldiers be there too?”
“The Shambles still keeps its own order – or disorder,” Folly said with a touch of pride. “No constable or soldier dares to go there. Just as it’s always been.”
Drowning rose up around them as they walked briskly through the neighbourhood called Old Salt Cross. The day turned balmy as winter finally surrendered, the spring snow mashed into mud on the cobblestones under the traffic of boots, hooves and wheels of horse-carts. Rye and Folly kept to the middle of the roads like the others, wary of sharp-toothed icicles that dripped from the eaves and rooftops, promising a wicked braining for anyone caught underneath one at the wrong time. The faces of the villagers were dour and they seemed to go about their daily chores with little cheer. As Folly had warned, the Earl’s soldiers were conspicuous and plentiful, stationed at every corner, and ever-watchful with suspicious eyes.
Rye spotted a huntsman loping past with what looked to be bundles of withered black leaves in each hand. Upon closer inspection, she was stunned to see that they were the feathers of a dozen black birds the man carried by their lifeless feet.
Rye grasped Folly’s arm. “What’s he doing with those rooks?”
“Off to the butcher’s, I’d guess,” Folly said without stopping. “The Earl’s put a bounty on them … a bronze bit per pound. Rook pie’s sure to become a village staple.”
Maybe that was what happened to her mother’s message, Rye thought, chewing her lip. A bounty on rats she might understand, but one on rooks – the Luck Uglies’ messengers – that seemed like more than just coincidence.
Rye didn’t have a chance to ask anything else before she was interrupted by the sound of a jingling bell coming their way. She looked to find its source, expecting a donkey or perhaps a farmer’s cow, but instead a woman hurried by them with a small child in her arms.
The woman wore a locked, iron-framed mask over her face. A metal bar stretched between her teeth like a bridle. Between her cheeks, the branks were fashioned into a long pointed nose like that of a mole, and the bell dangled at the end. The woman’s eyes caught Rye’s for an instant, then dropped to the street in shame as she passed.
Rye heard the mocking jeers and laughter of two nearby soldiers. She stopped to gawk in disbelief. Folly clutched her by the sleeve and pulled her forward before