CHAPTER 4 - Camon
After an extended span of flight, Frost landed softly on a rooftop and stripped his mistcloak off. He was now left in a tight old work shirt. It clung to his form with sweat and caked blood. He glanced to Jana. "You may want to tear up that skirt a bit, to blend in. Or at least to look more distraught."
"Blend in?" Without stepping away, Jana glanced down at the street below, at the pathetic people huddling in the ash. "Oh." Without a second thought, she stepped on the already ash-stained hem of her dress, tearing a few holes in it. A handful or two of ash made the dress look older and less expensive, which, Jana thought wryly, was definitely not the point when her maids had chosen it for the party so long ago.
"Better?" she asked.
"It'll suffice until we can find you handmaiden's clothes." Frost stepped up to the edge of the building and held up an arm. "The crew we're visiting is just below. You'll have to hang onto me one more time."
After tightening the skirt tied around her shoulders, Jana reclaimed her position next to Frost. It was an unusual thing to her, being so close to a male who wasn't her brother or father. But she had gotten sort of used to it through the last thirty minutes, so she took the spot without complaint.
Girl in arm, Frost gently dropped off the roof, keeping the descent slow with the false rain grate below. When they landed, he let Jana let go. "Alright," he told her. "Now I'm going to need you to stay here. I'll speak with the crew leader, then whistle when it's clear for you to come down. Think you can manage?"
Jana nodded without really comprehending what Frost had said. The strain was catching up with her, and unlike Frost, she had no magic to keep her alert. Half of her heard the part about whistling and wondered where the door was. The other half focused more on the uneven, ashy ground beneath her and unpleasant smell in the air.
He huffed at her lack of attention, but forced himself to accept it for now. He knelt down and lifted the rain grate out of his way. "Oh, and try not to show too much dissatisfaction with the area. You'll stick out more than you already do."
With that, the Mistborn dropped into a hole and down a precarious flight of stairs, into the den of thieves run by a man known as Camon. He did not telegraph his entry, but a guardsman still stepped out of the dark and put a blade to his throat. Frost gently Pushed it downward, and the guard backed away. He called out into the crowd.
"Camon! I need to talk to you!" the room silenced. Everyone in the den, including a small girl and a slightly older boy in a corner, turned to face him. The den's patrons glanced around to each other for a moment, whispering about one thing or the other. When no response came, Frost asked to the crowd. "Is Camon around? I need to speak with him." Again, he got no response. After a minute however, a scrawny man with an odd air of confidence about him approached the Mistborn.
"Camon wasing on the outs, strangering." A street cant. Frost never had a good time understanding these.
Steam practically coming out his ears, he worked through it and asked, "Do you know when he'll be back?"
The thief shook his head "Wasing not in the asking for my knowing. He did the leaving of charging on me."
"Well I need the key to one of Camon's backup safehouses, and some skaa work clothing. Can you get those for me?"
Jana was suddenly left alone on the streets of Luthadel. People stared, and she stared back. After a moment, Jana decided it best to sit on the soft ash with her head down, better matching the other people around.
It was strange to sit so still after the events of the night. Jana's thoughts circled back around to her former home, her family. Despite never liking them much and being sure they would find a way to get rid of her, she mourned their loss. It hadn't hit her, not yet, and Jana tried to keep the brunt of the impact away. She could break down later, in safety.
Skaa workers kept walking by, as it was almost time for them to begin work. They seemed hopeless and mirthless, a good reflection of the decrepit street around them. A good reflection of Jana's change of heart.
A figure brushed by Jana, large in all the wrong ways. He walked with his own odd air of confidence. He was well dressed, for a skaa, and he descended into the stairwell Frost had just used along with two lackeys. None of them paid any attention to Jana.
Frost was, to his own surprise, happy to see Camon enter the den. Anyone would be better to speak to than the cant-spouting kid he'd just 'talked' to. "Camon, there you are."
"Efrossine, would that be you?" Camon spouted in a thick street accent. Thankfully he also spoke without an unintelligible dialect.
"Frost now, thank you very much."
"Right of course. To what do I owe the pleasure?" Camon grinned, bearing rotten teeth. Frost turned his gaze away.
"From what I recall, you own me a favour from when I save your skin last month. I've come to cash in."
Camon paused, the smile leaving his face. "Right. What do you need, lad?"
Frost had Camon wait a moment, and whistled up the entryway. "I've got a noble to guard. We need a place to lay low."
A low but sharp whistle broke into Jana's thoughts. She was grateful for something else to focus on. In her tiredness, she all but stumbled down the narrow stairwell she had seen Frost disappear into.
"Well now," said an unpleasant voice that definitely was not Frost's. Jana looked up in alarm, but saw Frost standing off to the side, evidently in his element.
"A noble lady," the man continued, his lips quirking upward as his eyes traveled. Jana was lucid enough to sneer in revulsion at him. She stood up straighter and crossed her arms, determined to at least give some illusion of competency.
"Careful how you look at her," Frost told Camon. "She may be a lady, but she's smart and cunning. And she's got me watching her back."
The words obviously came through as a threat to Camon, for he quickly changed the subject. /Still a coward at heart, I see./
"What do you need from me?" Camon asked.
"A safe house, ideally, and some skaa work clothes. We need to lay low for a while."
Camon laughed deeply. "What else, then? A warm bath and a feast? If you're going to ask for too much, you might as well go all out, lad!"
Jana held back a biting comment or two, since she was unsure of how the situation stood. Breathing more slowly on her own two feet, and with a problem to work through, Jana felt much better.
Obviously, the fat man was the leader of this ... den. Frost had done something for him and never gotten paid. Now, apparently, access to a house and some clothing was too much to ask. Not to mention food. A twinge of loss sparked inside Jana as she realized that practically everything she had ever taken for granted she would now have to work for. It was an unpleasant, but realistic, thought.
"Don't give me your bull, Camon. If it weren't for me, you wouldn't even have this den. That's the truth, and anyone there the day I pulled your sorry rear out of that garrison outpost would say the same."
Camon grunted his dissatisfaction. Before he could talk back, he felt the whole den starting at him. "Fine," he said simply. "But this'll make us even."
"Perfect. Then I don't have to do anything more for you ever again."
Again, Camon grunted. He turned and shouted at the young man Frost saw in the corner. "Reen! Vin! Fetch clothes and some bread for these two. Not much, though. Don't want to empty our stocks for a couple mooching lugs."
The young man and the girl rose quickly to their feet and retreated into the next room. When they returned, Frost thanked them and slipped each of them a boxing as covertly as he could. He hoped they'd keep them to themselves.
Camon left the room as well and returned with a key and a roll of paper. "Here. Smallest safe house I own, and a map from here to it. Now get outta here."
"Oh thank you, Your Grace." Frost bowed mockingly before spitting on Camon's boot. The crew leader scowled and raised a hand to smack Frost, but the Mistborn Pushed on Camon's coin purse. The fattened crew leader backed off then.
"C'mon, Lady Jana. We're done here."
Jana was slightly shocked by the condescension of the conversation that was simmering under a thin layer of politeness. It was much like other interactions she had witnessed among powerful noblemen, but this was so much nearer the surface. She also noticed the small kindnesses Frost showed to the little girl and boy who brought a box out to them. It gave her hope that perhaps he wouldn't just leave her to fend for herself in an entirely new environment. Of course, Jana was beginning to formulate her own plan that did not end with her in a brothel or even a servant in another noble house.
As she and Frost turned away, Jana reached for his arm by instinct. She had barely brushed the fabric of his sleeve, however, before calling her hands back. This was not the place to fall back on courtly manners, Jana reminded herself. Things were different here. She looked back and noticed the tiny girl, eyes downcast, hair cut short. Very different indeed.
The two climbed the staircase again, their business done.