Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 429 of 619

Morning found Ajax at the hall table with Grayson. He spread the road map flat and marked the Crossing gate. Grayson leaned over it, arms folded, silent as always. Ajax told him the plan. The gatekeeper held the road east. Before Ajax broke that hold, he needed to know the man's weaknesses. He needed Marco. "Send Marco alone," Grayson said. "He reads them. You don't." Ajax shook his head. "The gatekeeper's men count faces on the road. Marco goes as a trader looking to buy. Nothing more." Grayson stared at the map a moment. "Risk sits on him, not you. He knows that?" "He knows." Marco came in with his shirt half buttoned, his gold bracelet loose. He looked at the map, then at Ajax. "You want me back at the Crossing." "I want his mind," Ajax said. "Sit near him. Buy something small. Listen. Tell me what he fears and what he wants." Marco pulled a stool over. "He guards his thoughts?" "He's a merchant, not a mage," Ajax said. "He won't guard against you. He won't know you're there." Marco rode out at dawn with two of Grayson's men and a cart of plum wine as his cover. He was gone three days. Grayson doubled the gate watch while he waited. Ajax slept poorly. If the gatekeeper caught Marco reading him, the road east would close for good. On the fourth morning the cart rolled back through the gate. Marco climbed down stiff from the ride. He came straight to the hall and dropped onto the bench across from Ajax. "I sat with him two afternoons," Marco said. "Drank his wine. Sold him nothing worth mentioning." "And his head?" Marco rubbed his bracelet. "Wide open. Loud man. He thinks in coin." He leaned forward. "He's not afraid of you. He's afraid of the council. They put him where he is. They can pull him down." Grayson had come to stand at the wall. He said nothing. "There's more," Marco went on. "He owes the eastern city. Borrowed heavy to buy the gate rights. Two of the five council traders hold his debt. If they ever called it, he'd break inside a month." Marco met Ajax's eyes. "That's the weakness. Not his walls. His purse." Ajax sat back. The gatekeeper looked like stone from the outside. Inside he was a man leaning on borrowed silver, hated by half the men who kept him standing. "He suspect you?" Ajax asked. "No. He thinks I'm a wine trader who drinks too slow." Marco almost smiled. "He'll never know I was in there." Ajax rolled the map closed. He had come for a knife point and Marco had brought him one. The gatekeeper's monopoly rested on debt held by rivals. Ajax did not need to storm the road. He needed to buy that debt. "Rest," Ajax told Marco. "Then find me the names of the two men who hold his paper."