Downtown Druid

Chapter 63: One bite at a time

Dantes didnt react, simply continuing his walk as if he hadnt heard anything.

How many?

Three.

He looked at the window of a nearby pub and took note of the three men following him in its reflection. One of them he recognized immediately as being the man hed had tossed out of the Vixen earlier in the day. Had he been following him for long? Or did he just happen to see Dantes when hed come to the docks?

He shook his head. He needed to be more alert. He couldnt rely on Jacopo all of the time to watch his back. Still, it had been easier to keep track of things in the Underprison where following people relied on darkened alcoves rather than crowds of people that he was still getting used to again. Even once he regained enough favor to have groups of rats and roaches acting as his eyes and ears, hed still need to adjust his strategies to compensate.

He sighed as he looked out across the ocean, making his way into the seedier areas closer to the water. A man escapes from prison and gets laid a few times and thats all he needs to start losing his edge. He cracked his neck. Hed take this as an opportunity to sharpen himself.

He broke into a run down the street.

The three men tailing him started afterward once they realized what he was doing, drawing knives and clubs as they moved.

Dantes wove easily through the narrow and busy streets. Feeling where people would and wouldnt be with the rat senses hed gained since his first transformation. He ducked down a few alleys, leapt over a cart full of dead fish, and scaled a fishmongers thatch roof. Staying just slow enough that his pursuers could keep sight of him.

Dantes saw, through Jacopos eyes, one of them give up. Heaving heavily and leaning against a wall as the other two continued doggedly.

Eventually Dantes ducked down an alley that was a dead end, at which point he shifted into ratform, and made his way with Jacopo calmly behind a pile of refuse.

The two men were breathing heavily as they entered the alley.

Where the fuck is he? asked one of them.

Stay calm. Im sure the ratfuck is here somewhere. Check the trash piles.

He kicked you out of the whorehouse. You check the trash piles.

The man shook his head. Fine you craven bastard. He started to go from pile to pile. Giving each of them a quick stab with his dagger.

Dantes and Jacopo scurried behind the other man who was watching with his arms folded. Dantes returned to his human form behind the man, while it was a loud and painful process for him, it seemed near silent for everyone else. He smashed the hilt of his dagger on the side of the mans head. There was a sickening crunch and the man crumpled, and Dantes grabbed his club as he went down.

You! yelled the other man as he whipped around to charge him with a knife.

Dantes threw the club hard with his left hand forcing the man to dodge and briefly avert his eyes. In that moment, Dantes got within his guard and drove his elbow into the man's ribs, then followed up with a slash at the arm that held his dagger

The man nearly lost his grip on his own knife, but managed to keep a loose grip and slash at Dantes face.

Dantes dodged, receiving only a light slash across his nose. He took another step away to create more distance. He held his dagger up and pointed at the man. Is getting kicked out of a brothel really worth killing or dying over? he asked.

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Fuck you! said the man, pushing forward with a few more slashes that Dantes managed to avoid.

Man you really did need to get laid, huh? said Dantes, lowering his dagger and leaving an obvious opening. I thought you sailors from Tymond just used your cabin boys for that sort of thing?

The man let out something between a grunt and a yowl as he lunged for the opening Dantes had left.

Dantes stepped forward, rather than back, under the mans guard. He drove his dagger up through the mans chin.

He stood there for a moment with a surprised expression balanced on the hilt of Dantes blade.

He tore his dagger free, and the mans body crumpled. Dantes knelt down and wiped his weapon on the mans jacket. The other one moaned from the heap Dantes had left him in. Dantes weighed his dagger in his hand. He could kill him, but there wasnt much point to it. He was a sailor, and would leave with his ship, dead friend or no. Still, it was better to be safe than sorry, so he quickly slit the mans throat. He took a moment to rob both of them, finding twelve silver and eight copper that he slipped into his jacket pocket.

He reached out his senses to the nearby vermin.

Fresh meat

Dozens of rats and roaches began making their way for the lead sailors corpse, then a few seabirds swooped down as well to fight the rats over the mans eyes. Dantes didnt have a lot of favor still, but that didnt mean he didnt have any options. He knelt down, looking at the nearest rat as it tore off the dead mans earlobe.

Hey cuz, you and your friends answer some questions while you eat?

It shrugged. Questions? Answers? Yes.

Dantes raised an eyebrow,

Theyre dumber up here, said Jacopo within his mind. Much dumber.

The boats and storehouses nearby. Whats in them?

Crates and barrels.

Dantes nodded, keeping his patience. And what is in those crates and barrels?

Most have food.

Red water is in some of them, another said as he tore a bit of cheek off with his teeth.

Hmm, do any of them have different things in the barrels and crates that are under those?

Some have sharp shiny things, chimed another.

Some have white powder.

One has black powder and long metal long tubes

I was on one with green leaves that made me hungrier when I ate them.

One just had small sticks and chewy squares.

Chewy squares? asked Dantes.

He felt Jacopo go through his mind for a moment. He means books.

Dantes nodded, thinking. So guns, dust, weed, tomes, and weapons. That was an ambitious haul to smuggle in. All of it, but dust couldve just gone in the normal way, but the fees were incredibly high to do so. Except for the tomes, why those would need to be smuggled in was beyond him. Dust was high risk not only because it was illegal, but because the majority of it was smuggled in over land by the Gatemen, led by the so-called little finger of the five fingers. Moving dust by boat seemed like a sure way to piss him off. Did they know? Or was Mondego working to take a piece of his market share.

The weapons were likely for the adventurers guild or the mercenary companies that occupied the lower east side. They were always in the market for cheaper steel. The guns could also be for them, or the dwarven enclave, and the books could only be for the Academy. All of that indicated a very strong ground operation. If Mondego was making a profit off of each item that was smuggled, that more than explained his success. The only question was how he had managed it. The fingers obviously stood to benefit as he likely paid up to each of them and assisted with their own smuggling, but the city itself was losing profit for every speck of dust and ounce of weed he managed to get in, and the city loved its gold.

Dantes stood up and brushed off his coat. He still needed more information, but this was a good start. He now knew that Mondego had built up connections all throughout the city, and outside of it. Smuggling by boat had never been centralized before, but had rather been something that everyone has a small piece of. Taking full control of it was certainly a path to power, but with so many connections that had to be made to make it, there had to be a weak points along the chain. Dantes just needed to find them.

Dantes momentarily felt the temptation to do as Jacopo had suggested. Simply slip into Mondegos house and slit his throat while he slept rather than dismantle what was clearly a massive operation that spanned the docks, and flowed like blood to every other part of the city.

He stood and nodded to the vermin as they ate. Enjoy your meal.

They were too busy eating to acknowledge him, and he walked out of the alley and started to head toward Midtown. He paused for a moment to look out at the ships at the dock. A leviathan hunter was coming into port, its quarry tethered to its hull, its skull already cracked open to gather the valuable fluids within. The rest of it would be processed for oil, its blood for alchemical sanguine that would be watered down depending on how pure you were willing to purchase it, its meat for food, and its teeth for scrimshaw.

He smiled, remembering the one good piece of advice his father had ever given him.

How do you eat a leviathan? hed asked him with a crooked smile, his copper topped tusks gleaming.

How? Dantes had asked.

Same way you eat everything else, one bite at a time.