Amongst Thieves

The blow landed hard and heavy against the boy’s cheek, though his face showed nothing of the pain that beat against his skull. Even children knew that to show weakness in the slums was to invite death, not that he was a child anymore. Children were protected, fed and sheltered and though the fifth cut on his arm was yet to scar everybody knew what it meant: five years. Fair game. The beatings, like the scars, had almost become a rite of passage in the slums, a taste of the world that sent a clear message. You are weak, you are alone and nobody cares enough to save you.

The assault gradually tapered off and the two bodies above him began to move away but wise to the trick the boy only allowed his body a moment to relax before bracing for the parting blows that always came. Sweat matted dark blonde hair to the sides of his face and his lip was cut and bleeding but his bright blue eyes were clear.

‘Actually thought you fell for it. Almost left you here.’ The girl’s voice acted as a signal, for now at least he was safe.

‘You okay?’

He groaned in response, untangling his arms from around his head before spitting a bloody tooth onto the dirt at his feet. ‘Been waiting for that to come out,’ he mused to aloud.

‘Gross!’ She squealed as she leapt back.

As his vision cleared he began to separate her figure from the haze of light. Skinny and short but still taller than him, she had short brown hair and pale green eyes. Like many he had assumed she was a boy when they had first met.

‘You okay or not?’

‘Fine.’ He groaned again, uncurling his legs and squatting in front of her. ‘I can still run.’

‘Nobody’ll believe that act,’ she said with a smile. ‘You aren’t that tough.’

‘Am too!’ He cried. ‘I’m seven now.’

‘You don’t know that.’ she said in a blunt tone.

‘Could be, I have the full tally!’

‘One scar for every year in the safe-house. That’s only five,’ she responded, smug as ever.

‘I could still be seven,’ he mumbled into his chest.

‘I could be seven,’ jeered a boy as he appeared from the around the corner, ‘but you aren’t smart enough.’

Taller than the pair of them by at least a head, the boy had shaggy dark hair and eyes so brown they seemed black. Like the others he was caked in dirt and wore little more than rags. ‘So how was it?’

‘Longer than I thought. How’d you do?’

‘They all say that,’ he said with a knowing smile. ‘Who knew having the snot kicked out of you took that long? It sure made a great distraction though.’ His smile grew larger as he passed them each a chunk of bread.

‘Bread mould is the best mould,’ he laughed, biting into his own portion. ‘Happy tallyday’.

‘All that time and all they had was bread?’

It sounded harsh but sensitivity was almost unheard of in the slums, particularly from those beaten and bleeding.

‘Some people are never happy,’ the boy replied, smiling through his mouthful before tapping the small pouch he wore strapped to his leg, hidden beneath loose-fitting burlap shorts. Instead of the all too familiar silence or occasional clatter of wooden coins there was a dull metallic thud.

Bread and bruises forgotten the boy stared wide-eyed. ‘Actual metal coin? Irons? Coppers?’

‘Both!’ He replied, smile widening further. ’Probably worth half a silver Del all up. I don’t know how those idiots did it. They couldn’t even think of a better place to hide it than the bedroll.

The girl looked up from the careful portioning of her chunk of bread. ‘Only you two could smile in a place like this,’ she chided, ignoring her own smile at the news. ‘Do you want to lose it all?’

‘Actually, I wanted to try again,’ the eldest boy said with a knowing smile. ‘Tallyday beatings are the best distractions we get and nobody has died from one in ages,’

‘But we’ve already had our beatings?’ The smaller boy replied, returning his attention to the bread and trying to ignore the pain that streaked through him with each movement.

‘Now that I have been booted from the safe-house I get no more protection or handouts and a beating given to pay back people who had to donate the food to keep me alive. Nobody will try anything with me looking like this.’

‘Well, yeah,’ his friend droned. ’I’m not that thick. That’s why I’m stealing that rag round your arm. A bloodstain like that only comes from a final tally cut; nobody will hesitate to beat me senseless if I wear it so one of you just has to rob ‘em blind while they do it.’

There was little protest, tally beatings were mostly for show and the reward was worth the risk.

The boy laughed as he tied the bloody rag over his own full tally. ’You two are lucky I’m here, ‘cos I’m the brain and she’s clearly the looks,’ he said with a poorly executed wink in the girl’s direction. Both boys laughed again as she blushed angrily, trying to hide behind her knees.

‘Well what does that make you then?’ She said, glaring at the smaller of the two.

‘Everything else, obviously.’ he said with a wide smile.

They chose the area carefully, far enough from their usual spots that they wouldn’t be recognised as having passed their tallydays but close enough that they could escape to the streets they knew well if need be. They settled on the markets by the southern river where the water had long since become stagnant and putrid, unable to flush out the filth flowing relentlessly into it day after day. The three of them had held their noses as they stood by the bank of it, trying not to wonder where the sick or injured in the slums eventually ended up.

The marketplace itself was a mass of sprawling stalls and screaming merchants; if the worst happened they hoped the twisting paths between stalls coupled with the stench of the river would deter anyone willing to put up a chase. Finding the target wasn’t so easy. Though it was expected that anyone who had contributed to the safe-house’s food supplies give out a tallyday beating in return, most people with anything worth stealing had better things to do than beat a seven-year-old. By this point many gave food to the houses, be it only rotting scraps and old stewing bones, as repayment for what they received themselves many years ago. The beatings had simply become tradition.

‘Not him.’

‘Oh c’mon, he’s perfect! With clothes that clean he must have money, and you saw how busy his stall was. He has plot to himself and everything! Plus, you can tell he is the type to enjoy dishing out a good thrashing.’

‘He’s huge!’ The younger boy cried.

‘He just seems huge because you are tiny. To everyone else he is just very, very, big,’ his friend replied with a smile. It was not a convincing argument.

‘Why do you care anyway? I’m the one he is going to be hitting. You just steal his stuff while he’s at it.’

‘Well if you start crying he might give up and come back,’ the boy snapped.

The larger boy glared. ‘I never cry. But if you are too scared she can go in your place,’ he said, motioning at the girl to his side.

The smaller boy glared back as she nodded in agreement, knowing he had lost. Since the moment the three had met the boys had done their best to keep her safe, even though she hated them for it.

A mumbled ‘fine’ was all he gave them as he retraced their steps back through the rows of rough housing to the man’s plot. At roughly 25 hands square it was larger than most, walled on three sides with the same rough material that acted as a front covering, all supported by thick bamboo poles. There wasn’t much time, the beatings sometimes only lasted minutes and there wasn’t even a guarantee of that.

Doubt crept into the boy’s mind as he walked. It was stupid, there was too much left to chance. Earlier they had just been making the best of the inevitable but now they were being greedy and greed led to mistakes. And mistakes lead to…he pushed the thoughts from his mind, there wasn’t time for them. He glanced quickly around the small room but save for a bedroll, stool, bucket, and small pile of clothes the space was bare.

He focused his attention on the clothes before upending the bucket and checking the stool for hollow pockets cut into the wood. Finding nothing save for a few wooden coins in a pants pocket he focused on the bedroll but there was nothing to be found between the folds of the rough material and only straw to be found within.

Despair threatened to overwhelm him, starting as a distant worry but becoming more apparent with each parting moment. In a final desperate act he pushed the bedroll aside completely and fell to his knees, running his hands along the hard earth. Focusing on touch rather than sight he finally found what he was searching for; a patch of dirt no larger than the palm of his hand that gave slightly under his fingertips. He had the small pouch out in seconds and didn’t even bother checking its contents before pushing it down his trousers into his own secret hiding place. There wasn’t time to cover the hole before he heard a soft laugh behind him.

‘You’re a clever one, I will give you that, but you forgot to listen. That’s rule number one, always be listening.’

The boy turned as the rag landed on the dirt beside him, bloodier than it had been when he gave it to his friend.

‘From the look of things, this belongs to you.’

Heart pounding in his chest the boy pushed it into his pocket, hoping that there hadn’t been time for the man to inflict any real damage.

‘You almost had me too,’ the man continued, taking a step into the plot, ‘but that other kid took the beating too well. No way was he fresh out the house.’

He paused, suddenly becoming serious. ‘Now give me what’s mine and I will make sure you can still walk tomorrow.’

The man moved to take another step forward but the boy rolled to the side, throwing dirt with one hand while dragging the bedroll beneath the man’s feet with the other. The stunt earned him a reminder of the mornings beating, pain shooting to his fingertips as he landed heavily on his shoulder but it was worth it for the precious seconds gained as the man stumbled. Within moments he was dashing down the narrow paths between plots towards the markets.

His speed was no match for that of a full-grown man but he had bought enough time to reach the market proper before his pursuer. Breath catching in his throat he sprinted down rows of stalls, darting between salesmen and customers alike with curses flying after him like so many arrows. He ran until he reached the river and its stench forced him from his panicked haze. In his mindless flight he hadn’t bothered to keep track of where he was running but now stalls and storage blocked his way to either side, leaving only the path he had just run down and a small winding alley to one side. The man he had robbed clearly knew the area and had somehow kept track of him, but with his bulk now working against him he was still pushing his way through the crowd. Fear sat like a lead weight in the boy’s gut but with his mind finally clear he didn’t hesitate as he turned back the way he had come.

Digging into his pocket for the bloody rag and the few wooden coins he had found in the man’s pants he ran towards the merchant’s son had passed moments before, pressing one of the coins into the boy’s hand before throwing the rest down the nearby alley, praying that the man he had robbed noticed the movement as the boy scampered after his prize. Keeping low he turned back to the only option he had left, pausing only to re-tie the bloody rag over the open wound across his arm as he stepped into the rancid depths of the river. Filth engulfed him, making him gag as he fought to keep his mouth above the vile liquid that threatened to force its way into his lungs. The thick layer of waste and slime reformed quickly and to those on the bank he became part of it, fading into the muck.

Finally given the chance his body screamed at him, reminding him with agonising detail of every bruise and ache. His shoulder stung, his jaw throbbed, his legs burned and the tally on his arm had re-opened; he prayed the rag would be enough to save it from rot. He cursed his own stupidity as he lay in the dying river, feeling the filth seep into his skin as he ran over the events in his mind, correcting himself. If he survived the night he would not be caught so easily the next time.

Whoever the man was he had been right about one thing, forgetting to listen was almost unforgivable. He had been so focused on his hands and the prize they had found that he’d missed the slap of the sandals all merchants wore. Surely the man had been running and still he had missed it. He cursed himself again.

On top of that he hadn’t known his escape route through the housing plots, or the markets, and that could have gotten him killed even if he hadn’t been running like a mindless panicked mouse. Being caught would have meant being beaten bloody and he wasn’t sure if his body would have survived a second assault that day. He marveled at his luck at finding the wooden coins, vowing to keep some on hand in case he even needed the distraction again. Or maybe a fistful of dirt…

Disjointed thoughts continued to rush through his mind in a desperate attempt to distract him from the aching of his body and the stink of the river but he stayed where he was until both faded to the back of his mind, still present, but as a fact of life rather than a reminder of his position.

He wiped the filth from his eyes before opening them, finding himself in darkness. Forcing his legs to move sent burning pain lancing up his back but he fought through it, pushing his way to the bank before slowly working on relaxing his seized muscles. If he had to run again this pain might be what saved him. Slum-rats that couldn’t run never lasted long, everyone knew that. When he could trust his legs to carry him the boy made his way through the silent market, barking dogs waking merchants sleeping at their stalls as he passed preventing him from stealing something to wipe the stinking river off his body. As quickly as his body would let him he moved towards where his friends would be waiting, already fearing the night spent sleeping on the cold dirt still soaked in filth and death.

The girl eyed him coldly as she cleaned the cut on his arm with a stolen rag while he wiped the rivers filth off the rest of his body. The bandage had kept the worst of the river out of the wound but even if rot didn’t set in the final scar would be bigger and uglier than the rest.

‘Stupid. Selfish. Dumb. Dense. Dim.’ Eventually she ran out of insults and trailed off.

‘What happened?’

‘He realised you two were a distraction,’ the stinking boy replied, wincing as the rag bit into his arm.

‘Well yeah, we got that,’ replied the other boy. ‘A few hits in my nose starts bleeding, he stops, takes off the bandage, sees the old scar and runs off. How did he know?’

’You took the beating too well, probably ‘cos you didn’t react to the blood. He guessed what we were up to and ran back to his plot.’

‘Oh... Yeah. I probably should have thought of that,’ his friend replied sheepishly. ‘We practice stealing in the house but I never figured we would need to practice what happened when you got caught.’

‘Damn right you should have thought of that,’ the boy snapped, though there was no real malice in his voice. ‘Anyway, he ran back, found me and chased me into the markets. I lost my way and had to hide in the river.’

‘Idiot.’ She mumbled beside him.

He grunted in agreement as he peeled the filthy trousers away from his body.

‘I did manage to grab this before he found me,’ he added, untying the pouch from his leg after his pants were in a pile on the floor. ‘Never got a chance to check inside though.’ He weighed the stolen purse in his hand, now soaked in the rivers filth before pouring out the contents.

‘Some irons, seven coppers and two silvers.’ He looked at the pile of filth soaked clothes at his feet. ‘Hardly worth for what I went through.’

‘Oh stop being such a baby,’ the girl laughed beside him. ‘After today we are practically rich. What should we do with it?’

They were silent, imagining the possibilities that yesterday had seemed beyond hope.

‘We should buy a plot.’

The smaller two looked up from the coins held lovingly in their hands.

‘Buy?’ The girl asked, confusion clear in her voice. ‘Why not just rent one and save the rest?’

‘Renting is stupid,’ the boy replied. ‘We miss one payment and we are back on the street, broke and beaten. Back where we started. At least this way we have somewhere safe no matter what happens and we can always sell it later, maybe even for a profit. Not to mention that saving it is just giving someone else the chance to steal it from us.’

‘It would be nice to have a home,’ the smaller boy added. ‘A home would mean we could all survive.’ A smile split his grimy face. ‘And if we are going to survive, we should have names.’

The girl beamed at him. ‘I’ve always wanted a name.’