by Martha Wells
"He didn’t see me and even if he had spotted Madeline in that get-up, I don’t see how he could have known who she was. I almost didn’t recognize her and I knew what to expect."
"That mirror in Octave’s room," Nicholas said. "If his sorcerer warned him through it. . . ."
"But how would he know? Is he following us?"
"Damned if I know." He shook his head. "I wish I could hand this over to someone else. This is too complicated, too urgent for me to deal with when all my attention and my resources should be devoted to the plot against Montesq."
"The sooner this is over with the better," Reynard agreed. "I’m a little confused as to how the Master Criminal of Ile-Rien ended up hot on the trail of a petty confidence man and his friend the murderer, and I was along from the first."
"Please don’t call me a Master Criminal. It’s overly dramatic. And inaccurate. And the bastard has one of Edouard’s spheres, that’s why I want him." He’s using Edouard’s work to murder innocent people, Nicholas thought. I can’t let that go on one moment more. If Edouard was still alive he would have been leading the chase himself; he had never meant his work to be used to harm anyone.
Reynard was silent a moment, what little light there was from the street limning his strong profile. "I’m thinking of Valent House. Who could you possibly hand that over to? A sorcerer?"
Nicholas hesitated, though he wasn’t sure why. "Inspector Ronsarde, of course. If he’s good enough to almost catch us—"
"He’s good enough to catch Octave and his friends. Of course. It’s too bad you can’t simply drop the whole matter on his lap, though I admit I would like to be in at the end."
It was too bad, but such a course was impossible. Octave knew too much about them. If Ronsarde found Octave, he found Donatien/Nicholas Valiarde, and if he found Nicholas, he found everyone else. Nicholas tapped his fingers impatiently on the leather sill of the cab window. I want this done and over with. I want to concentrate on Montesq. We’re so close. . . .
Reynard added, "Though I’m surprised to hear you say it."
Nicholas frowned at him. "Why?"
"You do have a tendency to become . . . unduly consumed with certain things, don’t you? Are you sure you aren’t putting off that plan against Montesq?"
"What do you mean?"
"When Montesq is hanged—a laudable goal in itself—that means you no longer have an excuse."
"I don’t need an excuse." Nicholas kept looking out the window, watching the damp mostly empty street, making sure that was still Octave stepping out of the shadows under the next lamp. Reynard was one of the few people who would say such things to him, but Reynard wasn’t afraid of anything. And if Nicholas became "unduly consumed" with things he felt Reynard erred in the other direction, by pretending not to care until it burned him away within. At least Nicholas wore his fire on the outside. "We all do what we have to do, don’t we?"
Reynard was silent a moment, his face enigmatic in the shadows. He finally said, "I worry about you, that’s all. All this can only go so far."
They reached a cross street that seemed completely deserted and Nicholas tapped on the ceiling, signalling for Devis to draw rein.
Nicholas waited until Octave turned the corner then swung the door open and stepped out. He motioned to Devis to stay back here, where there were still a few passing coaches and people to explain the cab’s presence, and he and Reynard hurried down the dark street.
They saw Octave still moving away as they reached the corner and followed him cautiously, avoiding the infrequent pools of gaslight from the flickering street lamps. This street was completely deserted, the buildings lining each side as silent and dark as immense tombs in some giant’s mortuary. Nicholas’s walking stick was a sword cane and for tonight’s work Reynard carried a revolver in the pocket of his greatcoat.
They stopped as Octave crossed the street and turned down an alley at the side of a tall, bleak building, a deserted manufactory that was solid and square, with dozens of unlovely chimneys thrusting up from the flat roof. Stone steps led up to a wooden double door, the street entrance, but Octave had gone down the alley. "It can’t be," Nicholas muttered.
"I agree," Reynard whispered. "Too many people about during the day. Why, we’re only two streets over from the Counting Row."
"The windows are boarded up," Nicholas said thoughtfully. "I don’t think he saw us."
"Perhaps there’s something behind it. We’d better move or we’ll lose him."
I suppose, Nicholas thought. He smelled a trap. Perhaps it would be best to spring it. They crossed the silent street and Nicholas said, "He didn’t see us, but still he knew he was being followed."
"Yes, dammit," Reynard said. "Someone could have warned him, but the only time he was out of our sight was when he went up to his hotel room. I suppose he could have been warned through that mirror thing you found, but how would they know about us?"
"If it was a sorcerer—a real sorcerer and not a damn fool like Octave—he’d know." And only a real sorcerer could have created that mirror. Nicholas had deliberately staged the meeting at Lusaude’s to keep Octave from having any time to plan or prepare or think, but someone hadn’t needed time.
They reached the side alley and went down it, ignoring the mud and trash their boots disturbed. The door was a small one, set into a slight recess in the stone wall. It was almost too dark to see it, the distant street lamps providing little illumination in these depths. Nicholas touched the door lightly, with the back of his hand, but felt nothing. He did the same to the metal handle, again without effect. I wish Arisilde were here, he thought, and slowly tried the handle.
He exerted just enough pressure to find that it turned. He stopped and stepped back. "It’s not locked," he told Reynard. "Fancy that."
"Oh, dear. The good doctor does have a gift for the obvious."
"But he set this trap under instructions from someone else. It’s that person I worry about." Nicholas rubbed his chin thoughtfully, then felt in the various pockets of his suit and greatcoat, mentally inventorying the various tools he had brought with him. Whoever had arranged this trap hadn’t had much time; he knew it took hours, often days for the casting of the Great Spells, even if the sorcerer already knew the architecture he was trying to create. And that would be a terrible amount of work simply to eliminate us. Especially when they have other resources at their command.
He found what he was looking for, a small holiday candle, ideal for causing mass confusion in snatch robberies in crowded places. "Step back," he told Reynard. "And watch the door."
Nicholas took out a box of matches and lit the candle. It sparked in the dimness, lighting the alley around them, its white light casting stark shadows on the dark walls. Then he flung the door open and tossed it inside.
The candle sparked, sputtered and burst, emitting dozens of tiny flares that lit up a dingy foyer, floorboards thick with dust and spiderwebs depending from the mottled plasterboard. It also cast reflections into a dozen pairs of eyes, some crouched near the floor, some hanging from the ceiling or apparently perched halfway up the wall.
Nicholas heard Reynard swear under his breath. He heartily agreed that they had seen enough. He yanked the door closed, took out a short metal bar used for prying at reluctant locks and thrust it through the handle to wedge it against the wooden frame. It wouldn’t last long, but they only needed a short head start.
As they reached the street Nicholas thought he heard the door burst open behind them and a frustrated snarl. That might have been his imagination. He knew the pairs of eyes, arrested by the brilliance of the sparking candle, had not.
The house was in an old carriage court called Lethe Square, off Erin Street across the river. It was only two stories and seemed on the verge of tumbling down. Surrounded by busy tenements with small shops crammed into the lower floors and right on the edge of a better district, it was an area where there were comings and goings at every hour of the night and the residents didn’t pa
y much attention to new faces in the neighborhood.
The coach let Nicholas and Reynard off at the top of the alley, then headed for the stables at the end of the street. The infrequent gas lights turned the rising ground fog to yellow and cast odd shadows against the walls. There were other people in the street or passing through the alley to the courts beyond: tradesmen or day workers hurrying home, a few prostitutes and idlers, a group that was obviously down here to slum among the cabarets and brandy houses, despite their dress and attempts at aping the manners of the working class. Why don’t they go to Riverside if they’re so interested in seeing how the lower orders live, Nicholas thought, as he and Reynard hurried up the alley. I’m sure our neighbors across the river would love their company. . . . The answer of course was that this was a safe slum, filled with the working poor and those living in genteel poverty. Riverside was something else altogether.
They crossed the old carriage court, one side of which was occupied by a lively brandy house and the others by closed shops. Nicholas stopped at the stoop of the little house and knocked twice on the door.
After a moment it opened and Cusard stepped back to let them enter. "Any luck?" he asked.
"Yes and no," Nicholas answered, heading down the short hallway.
"Yes, we’re still alive, and no, he didn’t lead us anywhere useful," Reynard elaborated. "It was a trap."
Cusard swore under his breath as he locked the door behind him. "We’ve done a bit better. You won’t believe what we been hearing from this poor bastard."
"I’d better believe it, for his sake." Nicholas opened the parlor door.
Inside was a small room, lit by one flickering lamp on a battered deal table. There was one window, shuttered and boarded over on the outside. Madeline was here, leaning against the dingy wall with her arms folded, still in male dress. She met his eyes and smiled grimly.
Lamane stood near the door and Crack, who was cleaning his fingernails with a knife, near the prisoner. Octave’s driver sat in a straight-backed chair, blindfolded, his hands bound behind the chair back.
Reynard pulled the door closed and Nicholas nodded to Madeline. She said, "Tell us again. Who killed the people we found at Valent House?" Her voice was low and husky. Nicholas would not have recognized it as hers, or even as female, if he hadn’t known her. Sometimes he forgot how good an actress she really was.
"The doctor’s friend." The driver’s voice was hoarse from fear. Nicholas recognized it as the voice of the man who had driven Octave’s coach last night, who had climbed down from the vehicle to search for him along the muddy riverbank.
"Why did he kill them?"
"For his magic."
Nicholas frowned at Madeline, who shook her head minutely, telling him to wait. The driver continued, "He needs it. It’s how he does his spells."
Nothing we didn’t already know, Nicholas thought. Arisilde’s explanations had been more cogent. "And who is this man?" Madeline asked.
"I told you, I don’t know his name. I don’t see him much. Before he showed up, it was just the doctor and us." Beyond the fear, the man sounded sulky, as if he resented the intrusion of the "doctor’s friend." "Me and the two others, his servants, I told you about them. The doctor held the circles for money. We started in Duncanny and he used that gadget he has."
Nicholas pressed his lips together. The "gadget" must be Edouard’s device. Madeline asked, "How did he get the gadget?"
"I don’t know. He had it before I came into it. He paid us well. Then his friend showed up once we were in Vienne, and everything changed. He’s a sorcerer and you have to do what he says. I didn’t have nothing to do with killing anybody, that was all him, for his magic."
Magic which was necromancy of the very worst kind. Nicholas remembered the melting of the plaster and wood on the walls in that horrible room and Arisilde’s opinion on it. He had been trying to decide what to do with the driver once the man had told them everything he knew of use. He was in that house. He knew what was happening. These facts made the decision considerably easier.
"But Octave himself isn’t a sorcerer," Madeline was saying.
"No, he just had that gadget. But his friend is. He knows things too. He told the doctor Donatien was after him, and it was the doctor’s fault, for mixing into things he didn’t understand."
"Where are Octave and his friend now?"
"I don’t know."
Crack reacted for the first time, snorting derisively. The driver flinched and protested desperately, "I don’t. I told you. We split up after they said we had to leave Valent House. I been with the doctor. He knows, but he didn’t tell me."
Nicholas glanced at Crack who shrugged noncommittally. It’s very likely the truth, Nicholas decided. It sounded as if Octave’s former compatriots were being increasingly cut out of the scheme.
"What did he want in the cellars of Mondollot House?"
"I don’t know," the driver said miserably, certain this further protestation of ignorance wouldn’t be believed either. "I know he didn’t find it. He told the doctor it must have been moved, when the Duke rebuilt the house."
That was why Octave had tried to arrange the circle with the Duchess. Octave’s sorcerer must have entered the house first, to break the wards and allow the ghouls to breach the cellar and search it. Somehow the creatures must have communicated to him that the search was unsuccessful, so Octave was sent to attempt to arrange the circle to speak to the old Duke of Mondollot. But something had been removed from the plinth in that room and not long before he and Crack had arrived. Did Octave’s sorcerer friend have a rival for this prize, whatever it was? A rival who had also broken into Mondollot House that night? No, we would have seen signs of him.
A sudden noise startled him, a muffled report like a pistol shot in the next room. Nicholas was the only one who didn’t reach spasmodically for a weapon in an inner coat pocket. Reynard was closest to the door and tore it open to reveal Cusard, standing unhurt in the center of the outer room, his own pistol drawn.
"Was that you?" Reynard demanded.
Confused, Cusard shook his head. "No, I think it was from outside."
Muffled cracks and bangs erupted from the direction of the street door. "Stay here and keep an eye on him," Nicholas told Madeline. She nodded and Crack handed her his extra pistol.
Reynard was already heading down the short hall to the outer door, Cusard behind him. There was another outside door in the disused pantry at the back of the house. Nicholas motioned for Lamane to cover it and stepped to the center of the parlor so he could see down the front hall. Crack moved up beside him. Vienne lived up to its unsettled past at frequent intervals, but gunfire in the streets was rare; this was more likely to be a trap arranged by Octave.
Reynard opened the spydoor and peered through it. Cusard, standing behind him, craned his neck to look over his shoulder. "Well?" Nicholas asked.
"A lot of people standing about and staring," Reynard muttered. He unbolted the door and stepped out, moving a few paces into the court.
Nicholas swallowed a curse at this incaution, but no shots rang out. He stepped into the archway. Through the open door at the end of the dim hall he could see a few figures milling in the center of the court. "Hey there, did you hear that too?" someone called.
"Yes," Reynard answered. "Did it come from the street?"
Suddenly the floor moved under Nicholas’s feet and he grabbed the wall for support. Reynard and the others standing in the court staggered. Nicholas felt splinters sink into his hand as the wood and plaster cracked from the stress of the shifting foundation. It was the most disturbing sensation he had ever experienced, as if something deep inside the earth had suddenly turned liquid. He thought of stories naturalists had brought back from Parscia and further places, of the earth moving and cracking; he thought of the spell Arisilde had made to hide valuables in the warehouse. Then the sounds came again and this time he heard them clearly. Not muffled shots, they were cracks. The heavy stones that paved
the court, snapping like twigs under some pressure from below. The sound was coming from behind him now, from under the house.
Madeline, Nicholas thought. He turned, plunging across the moving floor toward the parlor. He made it two paces before the floorboards in front of him seemed to explode. He shielded his arms as wood splinters and clods of dirt flew upward.
Sprawled only a few feet from the gaping hole in the floor, Nicholas felt cold air rush past. The single lamp winked out. The house was shaking, groaning as it shifted on the damaged foundation. Before he could try to stand, something massive shot up through the broken flooring and struck the ceiling.
Nicholas pushed himself away until his back struck the wall. All he could see of the thing was a dark shape against the light-colored walls, a deceptively large shadow in the dim light coming through the still-open door. He knew Crack had been standing near him, but he couldn’t hear anyone else moving in the room.
y The thing shifted and the wooden floor cracked in protest. It’s hunting for us, Nicholas thought. Standing up in the small room would be suicidal. He edged along the wall, toward the archway that led into the entry way. If Crack was still here but unconscious, he would be near that narrow opening.
He didn’t see the creature move but suddenly a more solid darkness loomed over him and Nicholas threw himself sideways, rolling away from it. He heard it slam into the boards just behind him, felt the tremor that travelled through what was left of the floor and upped his estimate of its size. He scrambled forward, knowing it would have him in the next instant. A door was suddenly flung open, throwing light across the wreck of the room. Nicholas fell against the side of the archway and looked back.
He caught only a glimpse of gray skin, knobby and rough like stone. It moved, turning away from him toward the light. A figure appeared in the door and fired three shots, loud as cannon blasts in the confined space, then the light went out again.