Book 03 - Cold Copper Tears by Glen Cook Page A

was Brother Jercé. He wanted Snow to do some work. He was
a front guy, like, you know? He wouldn’t say who sent him.
But he brought enough money so Snow’s eyes bugged and he said
the Vampires would do whatever he wanted. Even when Doc tried to
talk him out of it. He never went against Doc’s advice
before. And look what that got him.”
    “Yeah, look.” I knew what it got him. I wanted to
know what he did to get it.
    The priest wanted the Vampires to keep tabs on me and a priest
called Magister Peridont. If Peridont came to see me, the Vampires
were supposed to make me disappear. Permanently. For which they
would get a fat bonus.
    Snowball took it because it made him feel big-time. He
didn’t care that much about the money. He wanted to be more
than a prince of the streets.
    “Doc kept trying to tell him that takes time. That you
can’t go making a name without the big organization noticing
you. But Snow wouldn’t back down even after word hit the
streets that the kingpin was saying lay off a guy named Garrett. He
was so crazy he wasn’t scared of nothing. Hell. None of us
was scared enough.”
    He had that right. They were too young. You have to put a little
age on before you really understand when to be afraid. I gave him a
small drink. “Better? Good. Tell me about the priest. Brother
Jercé. What religion was he?”
    “I don’t know. He didn’t say. And you know how
priests are. They all dress the same in those brown
things.”
    He had that right, too. You had to get close and know what to
look for to tell Orthodox from Church from Redemptionist from
several dozen so-called heretical splinter cults. Not to mention
that Brother Jercé’s whole show could have been cover.
    I asked myself if any man could have been dumb enough—or
confident enough—to have given these punks his right name and
have paid them in the private coin of his own temple. Maybe it was
just my dim opinion of priests, but I decided it was possible.
Especially if Brother Jercé was new to all this. After all, how
often does a job get botched up as thoroughly as the Vampires had
done? I should have been dead and nobody the wiser.
    I asked many more questions. I didn’t get anything useful
until I took out the coins Crask brought me. “Was all the
payoff money like this?”
    “The money I seen was. Temple stuff. Even gold. But Snow
didn’t make a show. I bet he lied about how much he got
paid.”
    No doubt. I hit him with the big question. “Why did this
priest want me hit?”
    “I don’t know, man.”
    “Nobody asked?”
    “Nobody cared. What difference did it make?”
    Apparently no difference if smoking somebody is just business.
“I guess that’s it, then, kid.” I took out a
knife.
    “No, man! Don’t! I gave it to you straight! Come
on!”
    He thought I was going to kill him.
    Morley would say he had the right idea. Morley would tell me the
guy would haunt me if I didn’t, and that damned Morley is
right more often than not. But you have to do what you think is
right.
    I wondered if surviving this mess would scare the kid off the
road to hell. Probably not. The type can’t see danger until
it’s gnawing their legs.
    I moved toward him. He started crying. I swear, if he’d
called for his mother . . . I cut the cord holding his right arm
and walked out. It would be up to him whether he got loose or
stayed and died.
    I stepped out into another gorgeous evening.
    I marveled at my surroundings. Once I got out of Black Cross
Lane I saw elfish women sweeping and washing their stoops and walks
and the streets in front of their buildings. I saw their men folk
manicuring greenery. It was the evening ritual.
    The elfish do have their dark underside. They have little
tolerance for breed offspring. Poor kids.
     
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13
    It was thoroughly dark before I got home. I spotted several
shooting stars, supposed by some diviners to be good omens and by
others the opposite. One gaudy show-off broke up into