01 - The Burning Shore Read Free Page B

figure stumble through.
    It was the dealer.
    He looked no better in daylight than he had in lamplight. In fact, he looked
a lot worse. The network of scars that marred his face was as pale as death
against the red brick of his complexion, and the broken angle of his nose looked
more predatory than comical. It resembled a vulture’s beak that arced out over a
grin of broken teeth.
    “Good morning, boss,” he nodded towards Florin, his beady eyes slipping past
him to rest on the stained leather of the purse.
    “Good morning to you, Lorenzo,” Florin greeted him, and relaxed back into his
chair. “What took you so long?”
    “I didn’t want to be followed,” Lorenzo replied, closing the door behind him
and pulling up a chair. “You’ll be shocked to hear this, but a couple of those
fellows last night weren’t quite gentleman.”
    “You don’t say?” Florin raised his eyebrows and passed the wine across to his
old retainer.
    “No,” Lorenzo took a deep, gurgling pull of wine before continuing. “No. They
expected me to help them cheat you.”
    The two men, servant and master, peasant and gentleman, old and young, turned
their eyes to the purse that lay between them.
    And suddenly they were wracked with laughter. Tears streamed down their
cheeks and their heads were thrown back as they howled at the sun like confused
wolves.
    “Well, gentlemen or not, they came just in time,” Florin said, recovering
first. “Mordicio wanted his money two days ago.”

 
 

CHAPTER TWO
     
     
    “Ah, my boy, there you are!” Mordicio exclaimed happily as Florin was led
into his office.
    “Yes. I’m sorry that I’m a couple of days late, but…”
    “Nonsense!” Mordicio waved away the apology. He rose arthritically from
behind his desk and hobbled over to embrace his guest. Before Florin could
react, Mordicio’s liver-spotted hands had descended upon his shoulders and he
was clasped to the old man’s bony chest.
    An onlooker could have been forgiven for thinking that this was a favourite
nephew returned from some long and dangerous voyage, rather than a defaulting
debtor. And at another time he might have been right. With Mordicio, loan
sharking and family weren’t mutually exclusive.
    “Come, sit down, sit down,” the old gangster smiled happily, his eyes as warm
as honey beneath the snow-white bushels of his eyebrows. “Would you like a
drink?”
    “Well, perhaps a little wine,” Florin said politely, and pulled up a chair.
    “Brioch, wine for my guest,” the old man, arthritis forgotten, snapped his
fingers. Florin heard the shaven-headed thug who’d escorted him into this inner
sanctum amble wordlessly off into the carpeted distance.
    “Ah, Florin, Florin, Florin. It’s been too long.” Mordicio stumbled around
the corner of his desk, paused briefly to rub his stooped back, then folded back
into his chair with a sigh.
    “Yes, I know. I’m sorry about that, it’s just that…”
    “Please, no apologies. Why apologise? You’re here now, shouldn’t that be
enough for a poor old man like me?”
    Florin bit his lip, and tried not to look at the gilded books and jewelled
trinkets that lined the old man’s shelves. He tried to ignore the silver
astrolabe and the thick Arabyan carpets. In fact the only thing that looked poor
in the whole room was its owner. Mordicio never wasted money on new clothes or
jewellery.
    Or barbers. The unruly bush of a beard that softened the bony angles of his
face might have belonged to a dwarf, if a dwarf could ever have grown so tall
and lank. Mordicio’s fingers burrowed into its depths to scratch his chin as he
regarded his guest.
    “No, my boy, no apologies. I’m just an old man glad to see an old friend’s
boy. Of course, if you have my money…”
    “Right here,” Florin told him. He unhooked his purse and, without further
ado, started to count the coins out onto the scuffed leather surface of the old
man’s desk.
    “Oh, well, if you have