Several times I was very nearly swallowed up by the multitudes as we walked along, but Hewspear stopped Braylar and allowed me to catch up, which must have irked him to no end, but Braylar never stopped long enough to scold me or pierce me with one of his looks.
We turned down several narrower streets as we wound our way through the city, and it was such an incredible maze that if I had to find my way back to the inn, no amount of enameled bars would help.
Every street was filled with the requisite jugglers, charlatans, and doomsayers, but the crowds thinned as we got farther from Wide Street, if only a little. After an infinity of turns, we stopped briefly in front of a building. There were several scrawny boys and girls hawking fruit near the doors, which were presently shut, and a large group waiting to enter. I was about to ask Hewspear what we were doing there when I saw the sign hanging from a broken hinge between two torches: three lion heads in dire need of new paint. A playhouse, then. In some ways, this wasn’t overly surprising-of low repute among the nobility and high repute among the lower denizens of any city, this seemed as likely a destination as any for my companions, though I was still in the dark about what their purpose might be.
Braylar guided us around the side of the building and down an alley that led to the rear. It was so narrow I could’ve touched the walls on either side without stretching, and it took several moments for my eyes to adjust as we stumbled over unseen debris.
We stopped in front of a small door, and Braylar knocked four times. It swung out quickly, and Braylar had to step back to avoid being hit. A short man in garish clothes peered out at us, likely having even more trouble seeing than we did. He addressed Hewspear, “Took you long enough. I was near to locking it.” He glanced at Braylar and me, and then back to Braylar. “This your master, then?”
Braylar took a step forward. “Indeed. And you must be the player my man spoke so highly of.”
The player didn’t look like a man spoken of highly very often, but he seemed immune to the praise as he cast a glance down the alley and then spoke to Hewspear, “You said nothing about three. Just your master. Didn’t even know if you were coming back, but even so, that makes two. Nothing said about three.”
Braylar held out a small pouch filled with coins. “I hope that doesn’t trouble you overmuch. While I’m sure this playhouse is above suspicion, a man can’t be too careful. I am, after all, entering in rather unorthodox fashion. I wish only to remain safe.”
The player reached out to take the pouch before Braylar considered withdrawing it. “Makes me nervous is all.”
Braylar smiled. “You’ll find it a bit sweeter than expected, for your trouble and nerves.”
The man gave the pouch a quick toss before slipping it in his tunic. “Trouble and nerves is right. Anyone finds out it was me that let you in, anyone at-”
“As I said, sweeter than agreed upon. Lead us in out of the rain, please.” Though this was phrased as a request, the tone made it clear it was an order and one to be delayed at peril.
The player let us through the door without another word. He closed it behind us and snapped a large rusty lock shut, mumbling as he did, “Big risk, big risk. Ought not to be doing this at all, but-”
As he was turning to face us he nearly touched noses with Braylar who had moved next to him. “Are you balking at our agreement, player?”
The short man took a step back into the locked door and looked at Hewspear and me, as if we might rescue him, and seeing no help there, replied, “No, no, course not. You paid. Extra, you say. No need to even count it. If I was filled with a little reluctance, I might, you see, but I didn’t. None at all. No need. But, it’s just…”
He trailed off as Braylar took a small step forward. “Yes?”
“If the baron were to find out it were me that let you in, it-”
“Concern yourself only with your lines, my friend. The baron will be overjoyed at the surprise, you can be sure. Now then…” He clapped the actor on the shoulder and moved out of his way.
The player stepped past him quickly. “As you say, as you say…” and led us down a hallway, vaguely lit by a horn lantern hanging at the end.
We followed the actor to a set of stairs and down into the bowels of the theatre, the lantern now bobbing from his hand. At the bottom, he guided us through a few more passageways, and we followed him to another door. The sound of the key in the lock was obscenely loud in the silence, and the lantern jiggled in his other hand as he struggled to fit the key and work the mechanism. Finally, the gearworks turned and he pushed the door open on rusty hinges.
The player hung the lantern on a hook on the wall. We were in a small supply room filled with dusty props and cabinets of all sizes. On the opposite side was another door, the paint of ages mostly peeled and gone.
Still clearly uneasy, the player pointed at the other door. “Close of curtain, we’ll be in there. The baron likes to see us in our masks and finery and such, so he comes down right away, just as I said. A real man of the arts, he is. We wouldn’t even be here, if it weren’t for his charity.”
Braylar smiled, and it appeared to be genuine and warm. But I suspected the player had no idea what skilled company he was in just then. “I, too, wish to offer my patronage, and you’ll find me only slightly less generous. I have no baronage, it’s true, but the fair has been most kind to me this year, and your company will be rewarded, as promised.”
The man nodded. “Sure then you don’t want to watch with the rest? Good show tonight, good show. Or you can come in now, meet some of the other players if-”
“I’ll have a seat tomorrow. Tonight, I want only to be reunited with my good friend. It’s been too long. And I do so want to see his face when I step out to greet him.”
The player said, “Well then, through that door, close of curtain, as I said.”
“As you said. Good show, my friend.”
The man nodded a final time and stepped through the opposite door, closing it behind him.
Braylar walked over to the door we entered through, tested it and found it still unlocked. “How far do you trust this man, Hewspear?”
Hewspear laughed as he tested the other door, also finding it unlocked, and replied, “As far as you can trust a man who takes a small pouch of coin to do something unscrupulous.”
Braylar looked around the small room. “And do you suspect the player will play us?” He asked this as if it were an exercise in rhetoric rather than a query with our lives staked on the wager.
Hewspear opened a cabinet door or two, investigating the age-old props stored inside. “I suspect he’s a man of low cunning, most likely happy to have stumbled into some extra coin to spend on women and wine. I’m not sure what his play would be, even if he was inclined to make one. If he reported our presence to the company master now, he’d likely lose his wages for a month for failing to do so earlier.”
“Unless he’s already done it,” I volunteered.
Both men looked at me in surprise, as if they’d forgotten I was in the room with them.
Braylar tilted his head. “Continue.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “He could’ve reported it to the company master just after Hewspear first contacted him.”
Braylar nodded. “And?”
“And this could be a ruse on his part, playing the role of, well, a player. While the exit is blocked off. Guards could be assembling now.”
Braylar countered, “A playhouse doesn’t have guards, lord scribbler.”
I pressed on, “But the baron does. I assume. Don’t most of them?”
Hewspear laughed then, coins jingling in his beard. “The player would have soiled himself if he tried to approach the baron. And then he would have been whipped for wasting baronial time, and then lost a month’s wages for being a fool.”
“Maybe. But the company master might not. If the player reported this, that is. He might have some standing with the baron. Or the Player’s Guild. That is, if the player were truly worried you were up to something.”
Braylar steepled his fingers together and smiled, and without a twitch to be seen. “Very good.”
Despite the meager praise, my former fears came rushing back. I asked, “What are we up to? Why are we here?”
Hewspear interrupted this discussion, addressing the captain, “Do you think the player plays us, then?”
Braylar sat down on an old trunk and leaned against the wall. “I can’t say. It’s certainly possible. And I mislike having so few exits to consider. But we are here, are we not? We’re here to play this out tonight, regardless
