Dead End

Although Silver could not outright prove his claim about Ryker, he knew in his gut that it was true.

Jay had not been able to see the notebook, but Silver, who had been stationed in the rafters overhead, had gotten a very good look.

It was a strange shorthand, not standard writing. Silver had seen it before, many years ago.

When running with the gang as a youth, one of the bandits had also had a similar book. At one point, the half-starved boy had gotten it in his head that he would use it to teach himself to read, but all the half-letters, half-pictures only confused him.

Silver spent a few weeks sneaking into the bandit's pack while the men were out looting, trying to make sense of the crude handwriting. Making no progress except an increase in headaches, the boy was eventually caught and beaten for the invasion of privacy.

The writing that had earned him the beating was etched in his memory, and until today, he had not seen it again.

That did not mean the inspector was a criminal. If that was the only similarity, then the correlation would have been weak at best. But that was not where the connections ended.

As much as the man had tried to hide them with his sleeves, the snake tattoos on Ryker's arms were also very distinctive. If the man were not much larger and younger than his former fellow bandit, Silver would have been tempted to think they were the same person. Their writing and their tattoos were identical...

Which could only mean one thing in Silver's mind. 'He's a Viper.'

The man who had beaten Silver for stealing his notebook was, like the rest, a wanted man. But unlike the rest of Silver's gang, he had not been from Marek or Birle; the tattooed bandit had been from Lakyle. Once when he had been drunk enough, the bandit's tongue had let loose about his sordid past.

As the Guardian ghosted through the military camp, Silver recalled the man's words like they had just been spoken.

"All of you lot have always been trash," the man had sloshed his drink at the other's grumblings, "but not me. I used to be someone. I worked for a king. I was his elite crew. Trained by the best to be the best, I was! Any dirty work that Willric wanted done, we did.

In Lakyle, the Vipers are only spoken about in hushed tones. Some think we don't exist, but when their friends go missing in the night, they blame the king's secret guard quicker than anything. That is not to say they are wrong. If someone disappears in Lakyle, we Vipers are usually to blame."

At that point another criminal had challenged his claim. "And how, oh mighty one, did you end up with us if you were such an asset to the king?"

The first man held out his tattooed wrists. Slithering snakes entwined each of them as a bracelet, biting their own tails to complete the circle. Silver had leaned in just enough to examine the details without drawing attention to himself.

"These are the marks of the Vipers. King Willric said it was a badge of honor, but really, it was just to remind us that, like the rest of his servants, we are really just his slaves. So as long as I stole and murdered in his name, I was treated well.

And I was the best. I never met a target I couldn't conquer. I brought in more in owed taxes than all of the other Vipers combined, and I made anyone the king even suspected of treason disappear. You want to know how nobility sounds when begging for their lives? They sound just like the rest of us..." the man took a swig from his bottle as he chuckled. Then his face became sour.

"But the moment I made a decision His Majesty did not like--accepting half payment for a debt when the man promised the other half by morning--Willric condemned me to death. One of the other Vipers gave me enough warning to get away, and probably paid with his life. I went from hero to fugitive in barely a second. Now I am stuck with you sorry lot, drinking away my sorrows..."

'Vipers? Like deadly snakes?...' At the time young Silver had not been sure if the man's drunken ramblings were the result of an idle mind or simply the typical boasting that went on at such fireside chats. Now he knew it was neither of those.

The Vipers, a secret guard of King Wilric, were real. And one of them was with Silver in the fort right now.

But how could he prove it? Fireside ramblings and strange writing were hardly enough to condemn a man. The Guardian needed proof of wrongdoing. And that could only come from a few sources.

One of those was the stable master.

The portly man did not see the Guardian until Silver was right in front of him. The pitchfork Max was holding left his hands mid-heave. The tines headed straight for Silver's torso, but the agile hero stepped aside and grabbed the implement by the handle as it passed. He handed the pitchfork back to its owner with a dip of his head.

"Sorry, Guardian!" The stable master humbly took the pitchfork and lowered his eyes. "You startled me."

Silver chuckled lightly. "I have that effect on people. I do not mean to disturb you while you are doing your duty, but I have a question or two for you about what happened with Sir Kent's and his soldiers' horses."

Max's face darkened. "You and everyone else. I swear I had nothing to do with it. I was not even in the stable at that point, though I wish I had been."

"I am not accusing you of anything," the Guardian tried to sound sympathetic.

Silver had seen from the report that the man had been called away to deal with a horse that threw a shoe. Somehow, the Guardian did not think Max was enough of a mastermind to orchestrate one of the officers having a problem at just the right moment, unless the officer were in on the plan. While he would not rule out the possibility, the most simple solution was that both of them were innocent.

"Who was supposed to be here?" Silver scratched his nose, causing his hand to disappear beneath his hood.

The stable master shuddered. "Eriak was supposed to be minding the horses, but I found the blasted boy asleep like the grave. Says he didn't hear a thing."

"That would make sense if he had been drugged." The Guardian muttered to himself.

The portly man raised his eyebrows and leaned on his pitchfork. "You think he was drugged? That's news to me! Though that would explain my own heavy nap after I returned to my lunch. Thought I was just overworked."

Silver's eyes flashed. If the inspector knew about the sedative but not the men who received them, then it was very likely that Ryker had given the dose himself. "I want to speak to Eriak."

"Me too, but the boy had been missing since yesterday. We think he up and high-tailed it home. That's why I'm stuck mucking out the stable until we find a replacement…" Max grumbled.

Silver's heart sank slightly. Without the boy, there was not much more information he could gain from the stable. The tracks and clues would have been covered over in the days since the incident.

And there was no point in looking for the child. Either someone had paid him off or the Viper had made yet another person disappear.

Either way, it was a dead end.