“Perhaps,” Bakar replied. “There’s just a small matter. While the god tells me all, no harm in making sure we have the advantage in the coming hours and days. Besides, I’ve seen it in the movement.”
Petri’s stomach coiled in on itself as Eneko turned to stare straight at him. Later, he’d wonder why, whether this was something cooked up between Bakar and Eneko, that his guild leader had sacrificed him days ago and was only now telling him.
“Just a small matter of leverage, of making sure the movement doesn’t break, as you say, Eneko.” Bakar smiled, serene like a priest who knows he basks in the glow of the god’s good regard. “There are no choices. There is only what must happen. And right now what will happen is you, Eneko, will give me a hostage for your good behaviour. For your guild’s good behaviour, and with that I will leave you the goodwill of the people of Reyes, because know this: if you go against me you will see how fleeting that love is. Pick one. Whoever you like. It will be the right one because that is how things are meant to be. The clockwork moves along its rails and you can’t stop it because you too are just one of the cogs that make up the universe. One hostage out of these here. Choose, and the guild may yet stand a while. You are merely turning like the cog you are because today we rule this city, and you.”
Eneko couldn’t hide the sneer or the twitch of his hand. Wanting to use his blade or fear? Or both? Petri couldn’t decide.
More men and women were congregating around the reanimated god, offering it their truths. Eneko seemed as made of brass as the god, but he took in the crowds, the surge of people cheering, the tide of them welling up behind Bakar and muttering, more than muttering some of them.
The guild was something apart in Reyes, and that was its strength and right now maybe a weakness. Because it wasn’t just apart, it was above, or at least above the crowd of people that glared at it now. It took in dock rats and smiths’ children sure enough, but it then kept them for itself. It had what these people didn’t – food and money enough. Petri hadn’t seen much of what life was like down in the docks or Soot Town, but he’d seen some of the new recruits come in on Apprentice Day. Thinner than whips, all sharp knees and elbows and eyes too big in their faces as they were herded down to the mess and promptly fell on the food like the half-starved waifs they were. Later he’d shared dorms with some of them, and his eyes had begun to open.
Add to that the certainty of being fed, a certain position and, most importantly, those who passed the initial weeding-out process had a near immunity to being arrested and having their heads chopped off. Even the king wasn’t stupid enough to antagonise the guild. The guild was revered for the link to the past it was, but it was something else too, a reminder of what all the rest of Reyes didn’t have. It was a force to be reckoned with because of the people’s goodwill, but it also existed only because of their goodwill. Now Bakar was telling the people they could have everything because it was all going to be fair, because he’d woken the old god, and that god had told him so. Even Petri could see how that had fired them up. It stirred something in him too, if he was honest, because being noble or having money didn’t mean you had a good life. Just made it easier to cope with.
He thought he understood this, and he wanted to understand more, but that wasn’t enough to prepare him.
Eneko eyed the glowering crowds and their makeshift weapons. Bakar gave his serene smile again, a smile that held secrets behind it, and pulled out an odd-looking contraption. Petri couldn’t make it out – it looked like a pipe with a winding mechanism attached – but it meant something to Eneko, that was plain. He looked back at the duellists behind him and licked his lips. Maybe the guild could survive an attack and maybe not, but Petri was sure that Eneko would fight. The guild was everything to him, as it had become to Petri. A family, his