Ghost Nails by Jonathan Moeller Page A

that.
    Hundreds of them lined the street. Some were missing
arms and legs, veterans of the fighting in the Argamaz Desert. Some
had the look of peasants driven from their lands to seek their
fortunes in the city. Others were old, their faces marked with
brands. Slaves who had grown too old to work, put out by their
masters to die in the streets. She wanted to help them, but she
dared not. If she gave a beggar a single coin, the rest would swarm
her, and she might well be robbed and killed.
    So she kept walking, trying to ignore their pleas.
Fortunately, there was a great deal of traffic upon the street, and
she was just one more face in the crowd, another ragged Caerish
mercenary dusty from travel.
    And then she felt the faint tingle of sorcery.
    Caina stopped, surprised. A cart nearly ran her over,
and she sidestepped, ignoring the driver’s outraged curses. At the
age of eleven, half her life ago, a necromancer had murdered
Caina’s father and wounded her with sorcery. Ever since then, Caina
had been able to sense the presence and intensity of arcane
forces.
    And she felt sorcerous power now. Faint, but it was
there.
    She turned, and saw one of the beggars staring at
her.
    He was an old man of Istarish birth, his hair white
and wispy, his bronze-colored skin scored with a thousand lines. A
steady tremor went through his limbs, and the muscles of his neck
twitched and danced. He looked sick, and Caina doubted the poor man
would last another week.
    Yet the faint aura of sorcery came from him.
    And his eyes were…wrong.
    They were blue. Most men of Anshani and Istarish
descent had brown or black eyes, but there were always exceptions.
Yet this man’s eyes were a pale, ghostly, blue. The color of flames
licking at the bottom of an iron pan.
    No one had eyes that color.
    The old beggar looked at Caina, his eyes
widening.
    “Who are you?” said Caina in Istarish, remembering to
keep her Caerish accent in place.
    “Wraithblood,” he whispered.
    “Wraithblood,” said Caina. “That is your name?”
    “Wraithblood,” said the old man. “Coins. Give me
coins. I will buy the black blood again. And then I shall see my
wife and sons and my daughters. They all died so long ago. I can…I
can tell them I am sorry. I can…coins.” He raised his wasted hands,
as if to paw at Caina’s legs, but they dropped into his lap.
“Coins. I will buy wraithblood. Buy the black blood.”
    “What happened to you?” said Caina.
    “I…I do not remember,” said the old beggar. “The
blood…the blood takes away the pain. I…I think…”
    His strange eyes grew huge, and he shied against the
wall.
    “I can see you,” he whispered.
    “Of course you can,” said Caina. “I am right
here.”
    “The shadows,” said the beggar. “I can…I can see all
the shadows. So many shadows! They are following you! All the
shadows!” He began to weep. “Don’t let them hurt me, please, don’t
let them…”
    “I won’t hurt you,” said Caina. “I…”
    “Here, now,” said a gruff voice. “What is this?
Begging is illegal.”
    Caina turned, and saw a stout man approaching. He was
about twenty-five, and unlike the slaves and the beggars, he looked
well-fed. He wore gleaming chain mail beneath a jerkin of black
leather, and a scimitar rested at his belt. A steel badge pinned to
his jerkin showed a hand holding a coiled, thorn-studded whip.
    The sigil of the Slavers’ Brotherhood of
Istarinmul.
    This man was a Collector, one of the Brotherhood’s
lowest ranks, a hunter who ranged about seeking new slaves for the
Brotherhood’s markets.
    Or one who kidnapped solitary foreigners from the
docks.
    Such as Caina.
    “His eyes,” said Caina.
    “Eh?” said the Collector, surprised. “What about
them?”
    “Is he sick?” said Caina.
    “What?” said the Collector. “No, he’s addicted to
wraithblood.”
    “What is wraithblood?” said Caina, watching for the
Collector’s associates.
    “A drug,” said the Collector. “The poor