Gord recalled the whole incident from his past with crystal clarity. It was one he would never, never forget. The young lad paused a moment, reflecting on what had taken place nearly three years ago to the day. He and San had been part of the roving force of the Beggars’ Union that had brought the war to the Thieves’ Guild. In one of their “illegal” thieving excursions, Gord had obtained his cherished ring by slaying a vicious killer in hand-to-hand combat. Thereafter, he and San had roamed the Low and River Quarters, hidden among the Rhennee bargefolk, and done everything else they could to defeat their enemies, even though both young boys had despised Beggarmaster Theobald. It was a matter of sheer survival, and despite their lack of years, both of them understood that all too well.
Suddenly a summons had come to them. The war was over, a peace was about to be negotiated. Gord and San had no choice; they returned to the vast old warehouse that Theobald had made his headquarters and palace. Gord laughed inwardly at the term. Palace, indeed! The building was a gross exhibit of shabbiness and decay, a monument to the sick and perverted mind of the beggarmaster and his hubris.
The slaughter of the beggar-thieves and all who associated with them occurred the very night of the boys’ return. Perhaps Chinkers had been in the old building, but Gord doubted it. He imagined that the chubby rascal had slipped away beforehand. Considering his current position, there was no doubt in Gord’s mind that Chinkers had served as a spy for Arentol and the Thieves’ Guild.
Gord and San had been very lucky indeed not to have been murdered in their beds when the assault came. Fortunately, San had fled his quarters on the top floor of the building when he heard noise from below. Gord, who had been sequestered on a lower floor, was assaulted in his room and had been forced to kill a man who was bent on stabbing him to death. That brush with death still gave him nightmares occasionally. It had also earned him a superb short sword to complement the dagger he had won from his very first fight to the death.
Gord had tried to escape by going into the bowels of the building, where he met up with San and Theobald, who promptly forced the boys into carrying out a load of treasure for him. It had been poetic in a way… Gord had driven the fat devil to his demise with his own metal strongbox-a coffer containing coins of unguessed value, used to smash a disgusting monster of no worth whatsoever.
What had been the beggarmaster’s plan after commandeering the two boys to assist him in his flight? Gord thought there could be no doubt. Theobald certainly would have stabbed or strangled both of them, dumped them into the cistern, and pleasurably gone on his way. Ironic, then, that the gross murderer had gone to his end in the very place he had intended to dispose of Gord and San, the hundred-foot-deep well hidden beneath the secret subcellar of the beggars’ headquarters.
The scene floated before his eyes, the memory clear enough even now. “Give me that box!” Theobald roared. He had been poised, waiting, just a little below the rim of the cistern’s mouth, expecting Gord and San to ease the heavy coffer down to his waiting hands. Instead, Gord had hefted the great metal box all by himself. It took all of his strength for him to raise it all the way up to his scrawny chest-not the muscular torso he now had; in that respect, as in most others, the change in him had been great. The uncomplicated but difficult act of lifting the chest, Gord thought later, had been part of a catharsis for him, part of the purging of boyishness to make way for the man to develop.
Why did he do what he did? A flurry of thoughts had raced through his mind as he staggered with the chest over to the rim of the cistern. Gord had despised Theobald. But beyond that, he feared the man, as one would fear some ravening demon-only more so, for this monster was there to threaten the boy day and night. The beatings and torture of his early days as a beggar-boy had not been repeated after Gord’s skills had become noticed and appreciated, but Gord always knew that the gross beggarmaster could resume such punishment at will, and the likelihood was strong that he would do so one day when the mood was upon him.
As his way of proving this assumption to himself, Gord recalled the day that Theobald had killed Violet. Like himself, she was a young member of the union with much promise. But she had incurred the wrath of her master and had paid the ultimate price-not that anger had been the man’s only emotion at the time of her murder. Gord was sure that Theobald had actually enjoyed the act.
In retrospect, Gord found consolation by telling himself that the girl had been unworthy of his admiration, which may actually have been love. That assessment was not meant to fault her; “unworthy” was a poor choice of word. It was simply that her mindset, her ethos, everything about Violet was very different from what he had become. At the time when they worked together, though, the difference had been less sharp. She had erred in greed, possibly helped to undo one of Theobald’s schemes-unwittingly, Gord was sure-and the beggarmaster had killed her for it, strangling, beating, and assaulting her slowly, methodically, with relish. Oh, yes, he remembered that all now… and then. It was for himself, for San, and for Violet too that he did what came next.
As Theobald demanded his cache of money, Gord had hurled the heavy chest down with all the force his puny arms could muster-quite enough to do the job. The fat man’s outstretched hands could not absorb the force of the downrushing iron box. The metal struck his bald head, hitting it sufficiently hard to cause the beggarmaster to topple off his precarious perch and plunge to his death in the depths below.
Only Gord and San knew of Theobald’s fate, and that fact they kept strictly to themselves. To speak of it would be to implicate themselves as part of the organization that had been expunged from Greyhawk. Even this much time thereafter, it was likely to mean a death warrant if the thieves or city officials should learn of it. So afterward they almost never discussed the execution even between themselves. Perhaps San still thought about it, but Gord knew his former companion was not the sort to take unnecessary chances. To San, he suspected, a chest full of coins was not sufficient reason to risk one’s life when plenty of less perilous ways existed to make an income. Gord had other thoughts, however.
Since becoming a trained thief, Gord had utilized his skills to make his livelihood. In fact, he and San had managed both by exercising and by putting their talents into play, as it were, not to just retain their skills but improve upon them too. Now his former comrade had gone off to become a member of the Thieves’ Guild, and Gord recently had worked strictly alone. He rationalized that he had to be an independent thief, a rogue, since he had no other means of supporting himself as a student.
“Don’t kid yourself,” Gord said aloud, startling himself out of his reverie temporarily by the sound of his own voice. Fortunately he was alone in the little storage chamber that housed the plans he was memorizing. He didn’t dare try to copy them here, but at his own place he drew from memory each night, carefully duplicating the information gained that day.
He tried to refocus his concentration on what was before him, but his mind wandered once more… Gord knew he had become a thief by force of circumstances, and he also realized that he remained one by choice. Other avenues, such as that Tapper had offered, were open to him. Gord wasn’t interested in such opportunities, though, partly because he liked the thrill of illicit thievery, the excitement of planning and executing a theft. He felt that the city owed him much while he owed it, and particularly its Thieves’ Guild, nothing but his revenge. Perhaps this was rationalization, but he thought not.