Sequels always stink, but not this time! Here's a portion of chapter two of my fantasy novel, Winter's Heart.
Two

Wuster


The town of Wuster lay down in a valley surrounded by gentle hills and farmland. From where he stood, Steven could look down past the high walls and into the town itself. Here some of the old buildings still stood, great constructs of concrete and glass. There was a library, with a wide staircase contained within pillars and a domed roof, and there were still some books left in the stacks. The Tecks of the In-Betweens congregated here and in Hatis City off to the east to study the books that remained and try to make sense of them. Some of the old roads survived as well, rising up into the air on tall concrete supports. Steven passed under one of these on the way into town and could almost imagine the shining steel Autos that had once run on these, hurtling people to their destinations in minutes or hours instead of hours or days. In an Auto, Steven could be at the market and back home again in less time than it had taken for him to get this far, but these highways stood empty now, cracked, decaying paths for the dead.
If wishes were fishes, he thought, then none would starve.
The gate stood open, flowing with a busy town’s morning traffic of traveling Merchants and workers. Men, pertminh, and even dwarves with old-fashioned cloaks draped over their broad shoulders milled about. Tension wormed its way into Steven’s stomach, and his hand lingered near the hilt of his sword. His mother had often told him stories of the dwarves when he was a child; of their great stone halls underneath the mountains, and the bravery of their warriors, and the skill of their smiths. And, while Steven believed in the tales of the Long an Long Ago, he knew that times had changed. Dwarves were not to be trusted unless you knew them by name, and even then it was a gamble.
Wuster made Steven uncomfortable. Too many people crammed into one place. The gate gave way to an open market that seemed to go on for days, boasting items the simple grocer in Deadbuck had never dreamed of. Merchants from every part of the world called out to the passerby, boasting everything from wine made of the forbidden fruits of Manjan to rugs from the mystic land of Ishtani. Here there were taverns with names like The Pierced Nipple and Flower’s Dew Inn and The Sticky Beard, and shops that sold clothing of poor quality, apparel for the Lace-Cunnie Girls, and shoddy boots that were all the vagrant workers could afford.
A noble woman in fine dress passed him. She was young, beautiful in an evil sort of way, and surrounded by an entourage of serving girls and young men. They all wore face paint in the latest style; giant rings of ultrabright purple or green around their eyes and harsh lines shot down the cheekbones, white base underneath it all. They were all laughing and falling out of their clothes, stumbling through a street filled with the poor and desperate. It seemed to amuse them. The noble lady wore shoes with long, sharp heels. As Steven watched, she took a careless step and drove one of these spikes into the back of a man who was either dead or unconscious in the road. He moved on, passing a drunk lying with one foot still in the doorway of The Hair of the Goblin, holding the door open. No one was coming to move him. A dog with blood-clotted fur growled at Steven and then went back to lapping up the man’s black vomit. Two doors down, a Merchant in a satin waistcoat was standing just inside the mouth of a narrow alley with a Lace-Cunnie on her knees before him, his hands gripping her hair as one would hold a horse’s reins.
Lord Jesus, Steven thought. Help me finish my business quickly an be on my way home. This town stinks.
He walked on, and just barely felt the weight of his leather purse lessening slightly on his shoulder. An instant later the strap was shifting, falling away from him. He gripped it with his left hand and whirled, sword out, on a thing that might once have been a man underneath all the dirt and stink. The thin creature’s face contorted in a grimace of fear and hate that made Steven’s heart flutter in his chest. The thing hissed at him and actually pulled on the purse; he was rail-thin, but strong. Cursing, Steven used his sword and cut the front of the creature’s stained shirt open, drawing thin, red cut across a scrawny chest the color of old ashes and a pitiful stack of ribs. The thing bared his black gums at him once more, and fled.
“Ye didn’t have to do that,” a voice said. Steven turned and found himself face to face with a young girl. She was obviously a Lace-Cunnie, though it hurt his heart to see one so young. She might have grown to be a beautiful woman, with her sheaf of black hair, white skin, and light blue eyes, but none in her profession grew old with any grace. In a few years, there would be nothing left but a dull, flabby shell dancing on table tops for a handful of Nepos. “Peter rides the Black Snake, as so many do here, an can’t help himself. Ye didn’t have to hurt him.”
“I didn’t hurt him,” Steven said, studying the girl. He wondered what brought a girl into such circumstances. Maybe her family had been left without a father, and she had no choice but to work for food. Or maybe she just enjoyed it. There were plenty of girls in the world who joined the Lace-Cunnie Guild because they wanted to. Plenty who gave themselves up for nothing and to anyone. “But I could have.”
The girl seemed to be studying him as well, pale blue eyes locked on his face, arms crossed over her small breasts. She was dressed only in a gown with thin straps, more a slip than a dress, slit up the side all the way to the bottom of her ass, and a pair of leather boots. Her bare shoulders were turning red in the cold and wind.
“How old are you?” Steven asked.
“Young as ye want me to be,” the girl said, standing closer to him and letting her arms drop away from her chest even though it was freezing cold.
“That’s not what I meant,” Steven said, stepping back to compensate for her getting closer. “I don’t want anything from you, dear. An I am sorry for attacking that man, but it couldn’t be helped.” She was already turning away, now that she had seen he wasn’t interested in doing business.
“Hey,” Steven said, taking a gold coin out of his purse as she turned back. He tossed it through the air and she snatched it, just opening her delicate hand and letting it come to her, not drawing any attention to it. “Buy yourself a coat, for the love of the Carpenter! It’s freezin out here.”
The girl’s eyes lit up, filled with the coin. She ran off, leaving him alone in the crowd. Steven prayed that she would use it for food and clothing, and not drink- or something worse.
Anything a person might want could be found here, in the back alleys of the market. The law had no presence here. In this twisting, labyrinthine network of bars and shops a man could easily obtain a young girl (or boy), weapons, drugs of all kinds. There were potions that made a man feel as if he could fly, powders that made his manhood throb and grow, herbs that could give him the inner peace of a Dalli or the blind rage of a Berserker. Most popular, and cheapest, was pipe weed. Curse of the poor and ignorant, it was cheaper than drink and easy to find because it could be grown anywhere. It burned with a thick, pungent smoke that irritated the eyes and dulled the wits.
Wuster was built over a series of small, gentle hills, naturally low ground. The earth was always marshy in the spring and smelled of muck and waste. Poor laborers dwelled here, while the wealthy sought out the higher ground. And even in the back-market there were different classes of Merchant.
Steven made for the high ground, sword clearly visible at his side. The poorly constructed taverns and drug shops gave way to a campus of run-down stone and brick buildings covered in dead, black ivy. Gold plaques were embedded in the mossy stone, some of them still readable. The buildings had names like Bowie Hall and Cedar Dorm. A crumbling wall and an arched gate separated the buildings from the dirty street. The words Wuster University were worked into the iron bars. In a different time, Steven would have been trying to save money to send his boys to a place like this.
That time had passed.
Now was the time of the Guilds. It was the Age of the Guards and the Hunters, the Merchants and the Tecks, the Runners and the Carpenters. It was the time of the Lace-Cunnies, the Thieves, and the Mercenaries. Magic and gods. The world of lights that banished darkness, the world of Jesus and Allah and Buddha, of the Auto and PIP-SEE, was gone, washed away like a child’s sand castle lost in the tide.
The way was steep and Steven knew he was passing through a type of border. Dream Street, the low market, was behind him. On the other side of the hill the real town of Wuster sat peacefully, separated from the markets and all the noise and filth by the earth’s own wall. Keeping watch over this border were the Guild Halls, which needed no golden plaques. They were known on sight by anyone, long wooden buildings built only for function. In Wuster they all stood in a row on one side of a cobbled street named Libbey’s Road, squat and ugly next to the grand building that was the library. The only thing that designated one Hall from the rest was a small wooden sign hanging over the door of each building. On the signs were the simple insignias of each Guild; a revolver for the Guards, sword for the Hunters, an open book for the Tecks, a strongbox for the Merchants, a hammer for the Carpenters, a sprinting figure for the Runners. A neat stone path lined with torches ran from the door of each Hall out to the street, each path complete with a pair of Guards.
In Wuster the Guards were easy to spot, in their denim pants and loose white shirts. Older members also wore a pounded silver star. And of course they carried the guns, the heavy revolvers of blue steel and oiled sandalwood. The Guards watched him pass, eyeing his weapon, some young and itching for action, hands lingering near the grips of their guns, others old veterans who nodded at him over thick, crossed arms covered in scars. Steven saluted each one he passed, using a sign that was known between their Guilds.
The shops were of a better quality now, due to their close proximity to the Guild Halls. Some even had real glass display windows. Steven started looking into some of the shops. There was a man he knew- not someone he would call his friend, but they knew each other- who owned a shop that dealt in things like his PIP-SEE can. He called them Antiquities, which to Steven seemed to be a nice way of saying useless old shit. This not-quite-a-friend was of the Brown Clans, who came from the lands across the Western Sea. Some said these people invented the barter, a game Steven was not very good at. He would have to be good today.
He found the name he was looking for and stepped into the dusty, crowded front room of a shop filled with junk from the Age of the Old Folk. Furniture stood in cluttered heaps, whole forests of tables and chairs and chests of drawers marked with price tags and placards bearing unbelievable sums (two hundred and fifty kwic for a foot stool?). But there were also strange machines of metal and Plastik, that magical material that had dominated the Third Age. Here was an odd little box with cords hanging from the back of it and a series of small buttons along the front. A piece of glass was embedded in the front of the box, black and dead like the eye of a shark. The only other thing on the table was also Plastik, black like the box. There were dozens of buttons on its flat surface, each one bearing a letter, or a number, or some other symbol Steven didn’t recognize. This seemed to go along with the box. A small card set up in front of the two items read: VIDSCREEN. There was no price, so the thing had to cost a fortune.
The Antiquities Merchant himself was almost invisible amid the heaps of stuff in his shop. Steven finally spotted him, a tidy little man in a plain white shirt and brown vest, the chain of a pocket watch (these were still manufactured, both by the pertminh and skilled human craftsmen on the continent of Uthurnia, the land that most of the folk in Vondellius traced their roots back to) hanging from his pocket. His hair was a little thinner, and maybe he’d put on a few pounds, but Steven still recognized his small face and his quick, dark eyes.
“Hello, Shams,” he said, giving the man a polite bow.
The Merchant drew back a bit, surprised to hear his name. Who was this? Who had sent him? One of the numbers men? Surely not. Surely not yet. He still had some time, praise belong to Phabos, and with luck he would come up with enough of the money by then to avoid getting anything broken. His brother had warned him, before he got on the ship in Ishtani, not to let himself be corrupted by the temptations of the Rich Land. Ah, but it was so hard, and he was just a simple man. He felt the words “I have the money!” rising to his lips, but he choked them back and looked at the man in front of him. There was something familiar about him.
“Do not tell me,” Shams said. “Do not tell me, give me half the second.” He stared at his guest for a long moment. “Steven of Deadbuck!” he said at last, filled with more relief than his guest could know. He came around the counter with his arms already outstretched to embrace Steven, who grinned as he was enveloped by the small man. Shams smelled of strange oils, some earthy cologne, but Steven returned his gesture. “Welcome. A thousand welcomes to you, my friend!”
Steven and Shams weren’t exactly friends. He saved the man’s life once, though- Shams swore to it. When he first got off the boat and set his feet on the shores of Vondellius (the Rich Land, he called it- his home of Ishtani he called the Dirt Land), he set up shop in Deadbuck for some reason. Steven could only blame it on the fact that the man obviously knew nothing about his new homeland. Deadbuck was like any other village; poor and uneasy about strangers. After a few weeks of watching the small man standing in front of his shop, hands stuffed in his pockets and an uneasy look on his face (Shams had been, in fact, very uneasy; he went into this venture with his brother-in-law and his family, and if Phabos was not kind he would have to return home and work off his debt on the family’s olive farm), Steven sat down with him over a small meal and suggested that his business might do better in Wuster. Wuster was not as rich a town as Gileon, where the nobles of Leeland “summered”, nor was it as big a city as Hatis, but there were many nobles on the hill and many prosperous Merchants. Shams took his advice, moving and joining the Merchant’s Guild to get their backing and support, and soon prospered. Some time later, he sent Steven a mahogany chest of drawers and a barely legible letter thanking him for saving his life.
“How have you been?” Steven asked.
“Thank you,” Shams said, smiling. “Wonderful, just wonderful.” He was up to his neck in debt because of his addiction to playing the Numbers, he may have gotten a Lace-Cunnie girl pregnant, and recently sold a music box to an important noble that he’d sworn dated back to the days of the Second Age that was nothing but a trinket made by a poor craftsman in the Carpenter’s Guild. “I have been never better. I am sending for the wife and son soon. They come on the ship, to the Rich Land. Very exciting.”
“That’s great,” Steven said.
“And what brings you to Wuster?” Shams asked. “It is many miles to get here from your home. Dangerous in the cold.”
“I brought you something.” He put his purse on the counter and brought out the PIP-SEE container.
“And what do we have here, my friend,” Shams said, going back to his place on the other side of the counter. The smiling face had vanished quicker than a thief’s dagger, replaced by a look of bland disinterest so good that Steven had to smile. The man was a stranger in a strange land, but he was good at what he did.
“I think you know what it is,” Steven said, pushing it closer to him on the counter.
Of course Shams knew what it was. A man would have had to been born blind to not know what it was. And the price it would fetch him! He could sell it today, this very hour, and pay off his debt to Richard Pope and all the other whoresons who were closing in on him, and still have enough left over to put a down payment on a house on the other side of the hill. He could move his wife and son into Hawethorne Ridge, where the other respectable Merchants lived, instead of packing them into the tiny apartment the Guild provided him. He could put the hill between himself and that bitch of a girl who had held him with her legs until he finished inside her (this was a common thing among the Lace-Cunnies- they targeted Merchants and tried to get pregnant by them, hoping to get a house of their own in trade for their silence about who the baby’s father was). His seed was growing in her, and his wife and son were coming soon from Ishtani, and this one thing could solve all of his problems. He knew a dozen collectors who would purchase this from him before the sun set. And if he set up an auction for it, the price would rise to heights unknown (but not undreamed of).
The only problem was, this white beggar knew what he had.
Hunters, Shams thought. No better than vultures. A Merchant of his standing depended on the Hunters to survive, but that didn’t mean he had to like it. They were always bringing him jewelry with blood grimed into it, broken tools, all manner of unusable trash they found that they thought might be worth something. And now, of all the cruel luck, here comes someone he knows, someone he owes a life debt to, with something they both know to be quite valuable.
“Let’s not play games,” Steven said. “I’m not in the mood. I know the value of this thing, an so do you.” Steven had no idea about the thing’s actual value, and was sure he was going to get ripped off. But he thought he’d come away from this with more than enough to suit him. After a moment of silence in which Shams only stared at him, weighing and measuring him, Steven sighed and took it back. “Well,” he said, “I can see you’re not interested. Sorry to bother you. It’s a real shame though,” he went on, turning toward the door. “I heard there’s a visiting noble in town lookin for something just like this. He wouldn’t see a man like me, of course, but the Merchant who brought him this would surely make a fortune off the deal. Oh well. Good to see you, Shams.”
Steven put his hand on the door. Turned the brass knob. Started to pull the door open.
“All right,” Shams said. “All right. Come back.”
Steven let the door swing shut and came back to the counter.
He set the container back down. Shams pulled down a large glass on a brass arm, looking through it. His face swam behind the glass, two giant brown eyes and a preposterous nose that shifted and elongated whenever he moved the slightest bit. Steven didn’t know why he had to inspect it so closely.
“There is very little damage,” Shams said, mostly to himself. He was immersed in his business. The first trick any Merchant had to learn, his father had told him, was how to look as if he is an expert in things for which there is no expertise. “Very good condition. And the pull tab is intact! This is full?” He took the container and set it on a small silver scale. “Weight is... thirteen ounces.” He brought it back to the counter. “No rust, no dents, this was kept well.” He looked at Steven through the glass with huge, watery eyes. “Where did you get this, my friend? It will help the sale if I can give the potential buyer a little history.”
“A friend,” Steven said. “I believe it’s been in his family for a very long time.”
“Well, I- wait just a moment,” Shams said, turning the container over. “What is this?” The Merchant found a small metal pick under his counter and used it to chip something off the bottom of the container. Something small and stained pink fell to the counter with a click. Shams took it up between his thumb and forefinger and held it under his glass. “Part of a tooth? Something tried to bite through the container. There is a dent, and this chipped... fang is the word, I believe. Now what would try to do that, my friend?”
Steven sighed. “You know what I do for a living, Shams.”
The Merchant laughed. “I cannot sell this. Take it away from me at once.”
“What?” Steven said. Shams backed away a step. “However I got it doesn’t change what it is. It’s of the Old Folk! There’s pictures of PIP-SEE in every magazine book I’ve ever seen. You could sell that before I even got halfway back home, an for Jesus knows how much.”
Shams shook his head. “No respectable client of mine will purchase this thing. But,” he went on, seeing Steven’s face darken, “we have a history. Let me see what else you have, and then we will discuss a price for everything. But I do not like it. For no one else will I do this, so do not go telling your Hunters that Shams Alkehn buys your foul spoils.”
Steven emptied his purse on the counter, knowing he’d been defeated. There was a mostly empty vial of some liquid called SLEEP-RITE, some rings, a book with most of the front cover torn off. Shams looked it all over for a long time, paying no attention to the way Steven was crossing his arms and staring at him. He inspected things with his glass, picking them up with a gloved hand (he put the glove on after discovering the goblin tooth embedded in the PIP-SEE container, but it was only for theatrics). The only sound in the dry, dusty shop was the ticking of his pocket watch.
I am going to be able to close for the rest of the year after this, Shams thought. He was careful not to smile as he thought this. Steven Boughmount was a little smarter than he looked. But only a little bit, the praise be to Phabos. Shams was going to be debt free by the time the moon rose tonight. And he had plans for that Lace-Cunnie girl as well. In a couple of days she would no longer be a concern.
“These things are all worthless,” he said after an appropriate amount of time had passed for it to seem as if he’d been in deep deliberation about the value of the items on his counter. “Even the PIP-SEE container is now little more than garbage. But for you, because we are old friends, I will say seventy-five.”
Steven smiled. Things weren’t as bad as he’d thought. “Seventy-five gold?”
Shams looked at him, studying his face, and then burst out laughing. “You have fallen into a dream! Wipe Tullken’s sleepsand from your eyes and return to the world of men! For these things I will give you seventy-five kwic, and not one nepo more. Believe me,” he continued, pointing one brown finger at Steven as he stood there with his mouth hanging open, “this is a good deal. This is best price!”
“That’s an insult, not an offer,” Steven said quietly. “You could sell the rest of the potion left in this bottle for seventy-five kwic. An you could get one gold just for the Plastik, with its label intact the way it is.”
“You don’t tell me my business!” Shams said. “What do you know?”
“More than you thought, I guess,” Steven said.
“All right,” Shams said. “I do not like it, but I will pay one gold. Best price.”
“I don’t think so.” Steven started shoving things back into his purse. “I thought that, with our history, you might be fair with me. Guess I should have known better. I think I’ll go an find someone who speaks my language.”
Unbelievably, Shams saw the deal of his life slipping through his fingers. That could not be. His mastery of the trade was indisputable in Ishtani. His father once said of him, “Shams could have sold Kilgor the Void.” But that was in Ishtani, where in every circumstance there were strict rules to fall back on, and everyone observed them. Things were not like this in Vondellius. Here, tempers flared without the slightest provocation. Blood was shed in the streets on a daily basis, with no justification.
“Wait,” Shams said as Steven got to the door again. “Wait, for the mercy of the gods! What did you have in mind?”
“Forget it,” Steven said, pulling the door open so hard the bell above it almost cracked. “I should have let you die in Deadbuck, you damned sandeater.” He walked out, disappearing into the crowd. Shams ran after him, his face dark red. Never had he been so insulted. No, never had he dreamed that he might one day be that insulted!
“Vulture!” he said, hurling the insult out into the crowd to find the white beggar. “When you die, not even the wild dogs will eat your foul flesh! Take it all of your worthless trinkets and sell them to the Culters!” He made a fork of his forefinger and pinky on his left hand and spit through it, and stormed back into his shop.
Steven walked off, not really paying attention to where he was going, sick in his heart and shaking with anger. He couldn’t believe he said that to someone who, though he wasn’t exactly a friend, was an acquaintance he’d been on good terms with. What was he thinking? It’s the town, he thought to himself. It’s the stink of the town. But that was only an excuse. One of his father’s favorite sayings (never spoken when Steven’s mother was around) was “Excuses are like assholes- everybody’s got one.”
He’d lashed out in anger, and there was no getting around it. The Merchant tried to rip him off, and he attacked him. Seventy-five kwic was fine, really, for his purposes. Steven knew a man who would sell him an evergreen tree for ten. Buck was his name. Buck’s father had planted whole fields of sapling trees before his son was even born. He called it an investment in the future, and he was right. There weren’t many people who celebrated Christmas, but the evergreen tree was an important part of many winter celebrations. Those who worshipped Aukwine got a tree and decorated it with silver charms, to thank her for the last year and pray that the next one would bring good things. Followers of Makross burned one as a token sacrifice. Buck made so much money during the winter that he didn’t need to work the rest of the year, and Steven envied a man with nothing better to do all summer long than go fishing and stroll along the fields. Steven’s tree wouldn’t be burned, or prayed over. It would only stand in a corner of the living room, a symbol of green and life in the coldest night. It would say another year was done, and thank the Carpenter that all was well.
And there still would have been some money left over for gifts. Steven would have done for his family what his father was never able to. But he lost his temper. There was still money in his purse, but that was spoken for. It was for the stuff of life. He was depending on the sale of his goblin spoils for the holiday. Another of his father’s sayings occurred to him; a child buys what he wants, an adult buys what he needs. And what he needed was meat for his children; and eggs, and milk, and bread, and new clothes for spring to replace the ones they had outgrown since the last time it was warm and green.
What did the Merchant scream at him? Take all of your trinkets and sell them to the Culters. Was it worth the risk? Heather wouldn’t think so, but she didn’t understand how important this was to him. She couldn’t care less about Christmas, being a casual follower of Aukwine and the other gods. And there was no way to be sure if there was a risk at all. All of the In-Betweens shared a village mentality, and probably only half of what was said about the Culters was true.
One thing he knew for sure was that they called themselves the Children of Kilgor, some god Steven knew very little about. Supposedly he was a dark god, what the people called Black, worshipped by goblins and trolls. Sir Tristan’s Bestiary made no mention of the Black races having anything like organized religion, so he doubted this was true. It was said that the Children practiced magic, and made human sacrifices, and, wildest of all, mingled with the Black races and even laid down with them. All of it was ridiculous, the product of perverted imaginations and bored housewives.
But he asked himself again: was it worth the risk? He decided that it was. Odds were he had nothing to fear from these Culters, and if they were interested in buying the things he had to sell then he should pursue the opportunity.