need her. His truest friends were dead, and Kesk had demonstrated his ability to turn the rest of Oeble against him.
'What do you think?' he asked.
'I can make the shot,' Miri replied. A cool breeze, moist with the promise of rain before morning, shifted a lock of her close-cropped hair. 'And I don't like slavers. But the trade is legal in Oeble, isn't it?'
'Thank Mask I'm just a 'miserable thief,' ' he said. 'Such concerns don't matter to me. Yes, a slave emporium is legal in and of itself, even if an outlaw like Kesk owns it. But if it makes you feel any better, I'd wager a wagon full of gold that he didn't come by all his stock in a lawful manner.'
'That does make it better. Still, I'd rather not murder a man unnecessarily.' She glowered and added, 'If that makes me a squeamish fool in your eyes, so be it.'
'It doesn't,' he admitted. 'If you remember, I tried to steal The Black Bouquet without anybody getting hurt. We'll use the other plan.'
Keeping an eye out for those who were scouring the city hunting him, they stalked to the end of the bridge, entered a squat octagonal tower, and descended to ground level via the stairs inside. Aeron cracked open the match-boarded external door, peeked out, and frowned. Dead King's Walk was one of Oeble's primary thoroughfares, and despite the lateness of the hour, that particular section was both better lit and busier than he would have liked. He and Miri would just have to cope.
They sauntered to the slave market entrance. Aeron figured he had just a moment or two to make an assessment. If he took any longer, someone might conclude that he and his companion were loitering suspiciously.
The gate had a sturdy, well-made lock. Burgell could have opened it with a perfunctory mystical whisper, but it was likely to take Aeron a while. The high fence had long nails driven all the way through to catch and pierce a climber's flesh. He thought he could swarm over unscathed, but had no idea whether Miri could do as well.
All things considered, he felt the third option was the best. He positioned himself against the fence, where someone opening the gate wouldn't see him, then Miri took hold of the rope hanging from the brass bell and rang.
She had to clang it twice more before a surly voice replied from the other side, 'We're closed. Come back tomorrow.'
'I'm traveling at first light,' she said, 'and I need thralls to tend the pack animals. I'll pay well.'
The guard opened the gate a notch to peer out at what appeared to be a lone woman in a non-threatening stance, no blade in her hand or arrow on her bowstring. Squeaking a little, the hinges in need of oil, the portal swung wider.
Aeron threw his shoulder against it and slammed it all the way open, staggering the half-orc watchman in the process. He lunged onward and hammered his new cudgel against the guard's temple. The half-breed collapsed, and Miri closed the gate. The whole thing had only taken a second, and with luck, no one outside the fence had observed it.
Miri gave Aeron a nod of approval, and a second attendant, a human, stepped onto the stoop of the shack at the rear of the fenced-in yard. He'd plainly heard the bell, too, and come to see what was going on. He goggled, then whirled to run back inside.
Aeron grabbed an Arthyn fang and threw it. The blade plunged into the target's back at the same instant as Miri's arrow. The man stumbled, made a ghastly little gargling sound, and fell on his face, the top half of him over the threshold and the rest still stretched across the little porch.
Aeron sighed. They'd hoped to do their job without killing, but it simply hadn't worked out that way. They couldn't let the wretch raise an alarm. Anyway, the dead man was a Red Axe, wasn't he, or as good as. Aeron shoved the matter out of his mind.
The slaves slept in what amounted to lean-tos in the middle of the yard, with buckets provided for sanitation. Evidently no one had emptied them in a while, and the stink made Aeron's eyes water. The thralls stared at him and Miri apprehensively.
'It's all right,' the ranger said. 'We're here to free you. Where do the overseers keep the tools?'
An underfed, half-naked hobgoblin, its back and shoulders striped with whip marks, pointed at the shack. Miri stepped over the corpse in the doorway, then reappeared with mallets and chisels. Some of the slaves clamored for them.
'Keep quiet!' she hissed.
Once they obeyed, she passed out the tools, and they started striking off their leg irons.
'Kesk will puke blood when he finds out all this coin has grown wings and flown away,' Aeron said with a grin.
'Coin?' Miri repeated. 'Is that all they are to you? I suppose if it was practical, you wouldn't free them, but simply steal them to sell yourself.'
'You're wrong,' Aeron said. He didn't know why he should care about her opinion of him, but her scorn was starting to rankle. 'In my time I've stolen copper ingots, bales of silk, pots of jam, and as it turns out, a formulary. Why not? They're just things. What difference does it make whose pocket they wind up in? But I've never tried my hand at slaving-or kidnapping, or killing for hire. I don't have the stomach for any of that.'
'But you do hurt people, in the course of committing your outrages. You and your accomplices killed some of my mercenaries.'
'At least killing isn't the very heart of our trade. Unlike yours. A ranger's a warrior and manhunter, right? I don't suppose you would have joined your Red Hart Guild unless you liked shooting people.'
'I like defending the innocent. Sometimes that re-'
'This is madness!' one of the thralls, a rather pretty blond woman with an upturned nose, suddenly wailed. 'We can't escape! They'll only punish us, maybe kill us, if we try.'
'Not if you're smart,' Aeron said. 'If you were enslaved illegally and can prove it, run to your families or the Gray Blades. The rest of you, sneak out of town before dawn, stay off the roads, and head for the Barony of the Great Oak. It's not far, and they don't traffic in slaves there. They won't send you back.' He opened his belt pouch and handed one of the slaves a few coins. Miri probably suspected the funds he was spending were the same coins she'd been carrying before her fall, but so far, she hadn't made an issue of it. 'This will buy food, or pay a bribe if need be.'
'It won't help,' the blond thrall said.
'You gutless bitch,' snarled the hobgoblin with all the lash scars. 'Always whining, or tattling on the rest of us.'
The hobgoblin had already freed itself, and it lunged at her, swinging a length of broken chain like a morning star.
Aeron and Miri sprang forward and grabbed the goblin-kin, which, biting and thrashing, struggled madly to break free. It was surprisingly strong despite the mistreatment it had endured.
'Easy!' Aeron said. 'Take it easy!'
So intent was he on restraining the creature that when the other thralls cried out, it took a split second for the warning to register.
When it did, Aeron looked over his shoulder, just in time to see the Red Axes pull the triggers of their crossbows. The weapons clacked, and he dived forward with all his strength, bulling Miri and the hobgoblin down to the ground.
The goblin-kin grunted as one of the bolts pierced its body. Aeron was unscathed. He hoped Miri was, too, but didn't have time to check on her. It was more important to assess the threat. He scrambled around to orient on the marksmen.
He saw five Red Axes, three human, one long-legged, hyena-faced gnoll, and an orc. Perhaps they'd been prowling around the city hunting him, or else some other business had called them forth from the mansion on the river. Either way, they must have heard the clank of the thralls breaking their fetters and come to investigate, entering through the gate Miri had closed but neglected to relock.
A couple ruffians reached for their quivers.
A big man with a boil on his neck shouted, 'Don't shoot! That's him, Aeron sar Randal. Take him alive.'
His companions obediently dropped the crossbows and readied their cudgels.
Aeron was glad of that, at least. Their reluctance to kill the one person who could lead them to The Black
