Forged in Blood I Read Online Free PDF Page A

at his flat.”
    “So your Plan Two is similar to mine, except it employs a man.”
    Amaranthe lifted a fingernail to her mouth and nibbled thoughtfully. Going to Mancrest’s home was plausible, though, with all the Gazette -worthy news occurring in the city, he’d likely be home late. He might even be sleeping in his office here. Also, she wondered what all those soldiers were doing behind the Gazette building. Was it possible Ravido was inside, meeting with Mancrest? She hated to think of Deret schmoozing with Forge’s chosen figurehead, but Maldynado had said the Mancrests and the Marblecrests had always been close. If such a meeting was happening inside at that moment, a chance to listen in could prove pivotal. Besides, if Deret was working for the other side, he’d be less than truthful when she questioned him.
    Maldynado cleared his throat. “I notice we’re not moving. Won’t that be required? To enact either of our Plan Twos?”
    “The Gazette building is a few hundred years old,” Amaranthe mused, too far down the trail of her own thoughts to answer his questions. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it had a basement. What are the odds that there’s access somewhere down here? Or… if it’s been retrofitted with indoor plumbing…”
    “You’re not thinking of entering through the sewer, are you?” Maldynado asked. “That’s not whining, by the way. It’s righteous indignation.”
    “Let’s take a closer look at the tunnel walls by the building.” Amaranthe led the way back past the first ladder. “As I learned in my enforcer days, there are lots of forgotten underground passageways in the city, especially in the older parts of town.”
    “To facilitate secret trysts with lovers?”
    “Not exactly.” Once near the Gazette portion of the tunnel again, Amaranthe started searching by touch. “The brothels, drinking houses, and hotels used to have deals with the gangs. They’d get their patrons drunk and lure them into the basements where thugs would knock them out, tie them up, and drag them out through the tunnels, all the way to the docks. The victims would wake up chained to an oar bench on some freighter on its way to the Gulf.”
    “Oh, right, I remember reading about that in school. I think there was a Lady Dourcrest book that used that as a plot device. Of course it was a woman who was kidnapped, and the pirate who owned the ship was roguishly handsome and—”
    “Finding anything?” Amaranthe interrupted. She didn’t need the plot summary.
    “Not yet, no.”
    She grimaced when she encountered a moist, fuzzy growth too hearty to succumb to the frost. She wiped her hand and contemplated finding a lantern. Of course, if she saw the walls she’d feel compelled to scrape off the grimy patches, not simply avoid them. The soldiers might notice the light seeping through the storm drains and the sounds of her scouring the tunnel clean of decades of accumulated gunk.
    “Didn’t most of those old passages get walled up?” Maldynado asked. “On account of… Wasn’t some emperor kidnapped?”
    “Yes, Guffarth the Third. Apparently, he was visiting a brothel to—”
    “Get his snake greased?”
    “Er, yes. But he went anonymously and without much in the way of security, so his shrewish wife wouldn’t find out. He was kidnapped and nobody believed his claims of imperial greatness. He died from an infection while at sea. It wasn’t until a year later that an enforcer investigator put the ore cart on the right rail and figured out what had happened to Guffarth. The freighter involved in the kidnapping was hunted down by the navy, and all the officers were put to death. It was surmised that such a mistake never would have been made if Guffarth’s face had been better known amongst the populace. After that, the mint started putting the emperor’s head on coins and ranmyas. And, yes, many of the tunnels were walled up, but some of them have been reopened by the gangs in recent decades.