Shadow Weaver (Back on Wattpad 2020!)

Chapter 8

We slink through backstreets of the Hybourg, Tug and Brin with their knives drawn, Kel and I wedged between them. My brother trembles and in the occasional flicker of firelight I catch sight of the new bruise on his face. I am terrified too. Behind these crowded walls, inside cramped homes built from the same black slabs as the giant market pit, there are more minds than fish in a river.

The relentless fragments of memory disorientate me. It is difficult to focus on the real danger; men who pass by hunched under the weight of giant hemp bags; the occasional group of gamblers gathered around dumpster fires, smoke twisting on the crisp air and cloaking their movements.

Beneath the smoke lingers an acrid, burning stink that sticks to my nostril hairs. Along with the animal dung and the dirty water coursing in drains, it is enough to make me clutch my stomach, and breathe through my mouth. We curve into a long street of tilted houses, and are met by the thunder of running boots echoing off the close walls.

Five boys appear from the shadows, tearing towards us. The oldest is about my age, the youngest smaller than Kel. Tug crushes Kel and me against a wall and Brin jumps to his side to conceal us. The boys fly past hollering and screeching before they whip into an alley and vanish, slapping boots and voices vanishing with them as though they have been swallowed into another world.

A ghostly silence hangs on the air, broken a second later by two men running up the street, shouting obscenities. They blunder past, knives glinting, fury in their eyes and their voices. My ears thrum with blood. I press Kel's head against me, feeling more naked here without my knives than in the forests and outlands.

I have not been near a town for nearly six years, since Kel was born. My yearning for a life beyond Blackfoot forest has grown with every passing long-sleep, but this is not the sort of place you can relax for one minute. This is not the sort of place anyone would desire to go.

Tug eventually allows Kel and me to breathe again by removing his crushing bulk. We hurry down the street, following Brin into an empty tavern with one torch burning in the arched doorway.

If Tug intends to take Kel straight to the Pit and leave me with Brin, I have only moments to bargain. But before I can do anything, Brin pushes Kel towards a wooden stairway while Tug greets the innkeeper. Relief pools out from my stomach making my arms and legs limp. I want to hug Kel and cry. Instead, I reach for Kel's hand as he hovers before the first step.

"It's OK, Kel," I say. "They're just stairs."

Brin bustles us up, then Tug arrives with the key to the room, and we all enter. One double bed, a fireplace, a bathroom. The bare essentials, but Kel has never been inside a room before and his face opens, fascinated and afraid. Tug checks the window and closes the wooden shutter. Both men unload their packs. Brin sets about tying Kel to the bed frame.

"You think anyone saw his eyes?" Brin asks.

"We'll soon know one way or another."

"How are we going to get him to the Pit?" Brin finishes with Kel's hands and ties his feet, linking the rope so that Kel cannot stretch out. Tug picks up the dog and strokes its muzzle. Its tongue lolls, and it's panting though it's been riding in Tug's backpack.

"The same way we've made it here so far," Tug says.

I keep my head lowered, trying to decipher if Beast-face is treating me differently after my stunt with the dog. If anything, he seems to pay less attention to me than before. He's seen what I've got and it doesn't stack up to much. But if I can get him to believe taking me to the Pit is in their interests, I could find valuable information about the man who buys Kel.