The man stopped twenty feet away, and his face unfolded in a brilliant smile. “Thanks, and more than thanks for all this, friends. My name’s Tapp, and I wish to high, holy horse knobs I could have done it myself. Thank you, and everybody in Caislin thanks you even more than me. Especially those kids.” He nodded at Halla, Whistler, Bea, and me. Then he stared at Leddie, and his smile wilted. “Not her. She can die of a disease that makes her guts squirm like snakes.”
“I hate her too,” I said. “We’re just using her, and then we’ll throw her off a cliff. Don’t tell.” I made no effort to lower my voice as I said it.
“Huh. You help us, which we do like, but you travel with our enemy, which makes you evil or stupid.”
Halla sniffed. “Bib, are you done here? Can we leave?”
“Hell no, I’m not done! Tapp, I need to talk to Lord Babardi. I have a gift for him. Or if you can’t swing that, tell your superior officer.”
Tapp shifted his helmet to the other arm. “I wouldn’t say I’m the most superior soldier in His Lordship’s army. In some ways, I’m average, really average, or maybe not that good. But Lord Babardi put me in charge, so I have to do what he says, and not what anybody else says.” Tapp gazed away as he explained that but then smiled at us again.
“Does that mean you’re the general or whatever?” Whistler said. “Where are your men?”
“To be honest, really honest with you folks, you’ve been out here killing sorcerers and throwing spears that burn and who knows what else.” Tapp stopped smiling. “Maybe you’d like to kill a few dozen soldiers next—not that I’m accusing you, but it had to cross my mind. If you just have to kill some soldiers today, maybe you could kill me and leave my men alone.”
Halla said, “We killed all of Leddie’s soldiers. We are satisfied with killing soldiers for now.” She jerked her thumb at me. “My idiot friend wants to meet your lord. Then we will ride away.”
Tapp said, “I’m sad—and you can ask my wife, I don’t get sad so easily, so this is unusual for me—very sad to say that Lord Babardi hesitates . . . well, hesitates isn’t the right word . . . as he contemplates our welfare—that’s ‘our’ as in ‘his people,’ not as in ‘you and me’—he judges that a further show of goodwill is required before granting an audience since you travel with that poison-spewing whore who has caused us so much pain.”
Whistler said, “Screw this. Beg pardon. What’s so important about meeting this turtle-face bastard in person? Does he puke up gold coins or something?”
“I don’t know why we’re still here!” Bea stepped up and punched me on the arm, the one that wasn’t numb. “You saw those children. We should leave this minute!”
I held up my hand. “Tapp, what show of goodwill are you talking about?”
The solider stepped closer for easier conversation. “Things have been poor in the city for months now. That’s when these child-stealers showed up, may they stab their own mothers in the tits. His Lordship, who is the wisest man in the city, and probably in all of the northern kingdoms, and undoubtedly the handsomest too, has determined that these bad things are happening because the hereditary city signet ring has been lost. He requests that you find it for him so that . . .” He reached into a pouch, fetched a slip of vellum, and read aloud. “‘So that beautiful peace and great, astounding happiness may be restored to the city and all the lands around it.’”
Without a pause, Bea asked, “Where did you last see this ring?”
“Ah, I haven’t ever personally seen it. I’m pretty sure His Lordship hasn’t, either,” Tapp said.
“How do you even know the damn thing exists?” I crossed my arms. “Maybe it’s a fairy story!”
“Oh, I have a drawing of it!” Tapp pulled a piece of parchment from his pouch. It had been folded several times and was heavily creased. He handed it to Halla.
The ring appeared to be unexceptional, although the huge “C” on it was ornate. The edge of the parchment was stained.
Halla waved the parchment. “Blood?”
Tapp raised his eyebrows and nodded. “Don’t worry, though! We have an excellent idea of where to start looking, and it’s right here in the city. In a cellar on His Lordship’s grounds.”
“That shouldn’t be hard to search. What kind of cellar?” I said.
“Big. Quite sizable, really.”
We stared at Tapp.
“More than a cellar, if you want to split hairs. Maybe a basement.”
“Or a cavern?” Halla asked.
Tapp lowered his eyebrows and shook his head.
“A vault?” Halla said. If possible, her voice had gotten flatter.
Tapp rubbed his nose. “From a certain point of view, an open-minded person might say that.”
I slapped my leg. “Is it a damn dungeon?”
“Definitely not!” Tapp said. “No prisoners have ever been held there. It’s more of a, oh, I’d say more of a crypt. Ancestors and that sort of thing.”
I took a step toward the soldier and growled, “Haunted?”
Tapp grimaced and shrugged.
Halla said, “Has anyone else searched for the ring?”
“Oh, a few people. Nobody important.”
“Can we talk to them?” I asked.
“Not so much.” Tapp smiled. “But this place is full of valuable things, according to lore and documentation. Really, and you can keep anything you find apart from the ring.”
“We have no interest in this,” Halla said.
“Wait! Just wait!” Tapp was digging in his pouch again, and he came out with a cracking sheet of parchment that he unfolded. “Just listen! ‘Gold and silver pots, platters, symbols, and jewelry buried with thirty-three dead ancestors. At least six nice swords, a few rare books, a golden swan with emerald eyes—or maybe that’s golden spawn with emerald eyes, it’s hard to read. And listen to this list of possibly enchanted objects! The Tongue of Saint Vigitiss, the Ironbent Bow, the Infinite Regression Ruby,
