Point of Sighs

by Melissa Scott

  “Thank you, Drowe. Madame says she’ll see him now.”

  “Very good, dame.” Drowe sketched a bow and turned away, and the woman favored Rathe with a brisk smile.

  “I’m Hyris Telawen, Madame’s assistant. If you’ll come with me?”

  “Dame,” Rathe acknowledged, and followed her down the long corridor. The ceiling was low, but painted white and gold to match the false panels; oval windows like portholes offered the only light, and brief views of a narrow garden to one side and a graveled yard on the other. He caught a glimpse of a gate wide enough for wagons, and then the corridor turned sharply to the right, and Telawen tapped briskly on the closed door.

  “Adjunct Point Rathe, madame,” she announced, and flung the door wide.

  The smell of tea filled the room, sweeter than any teashop, and Rathe lifted his head in spite of himself. He could make out smoke and the rich vegetal scent of one of the dragon-bush teas, but there were a dozen subtler flavors as well, green and herbal fragrances he couldn’t recognize. The room was well-lit, with a skylight above the workbench and long windows on the courtyard side. The workbench itself was covered with small containers and blown-glass bowls; there was an enormous black stone mortar and pestle at one end, and a set of balances at the other. An iron stove was lit in one corner, and a kettle simmered loudly. Meisenta sat on a tall stool at the workbench, but turned gracefully to face them, dusting her hands with a clean cloth.

  “Adjunct Point. I understand you had further news for me?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  Meisenta’s mouth curved into a wry smile. “Not good news, then.”

  “Nor bad, madame. Point of Sighs has required that we enforce the letter of the bond, that’s all.”

  “And what does that entail?”

  “Someone from Point of Dreams will have to see Mattaes—in person—every day until the bond is lifted or the matter goes to the courts.”

  Meisenta grimaced. “Not very trusting, the folk at Point of Sighs. Tell me, Adjunct Point, should I have turned my brother over to them and spared myself this trouble?”

  “Not if you believe he’s innocent.” Rathe heard his tone sharper than he had meant.

  “Hah.” Meisenta sounded genuinely amused. “A fair point, that. Mattaes has always been a peaceful sort—he’d always rather talk than fight, from when he was a child. And none of us in the trade have any time for murder.”

  “I understand it’s your busiest time of year,” Rathe said, tentatively, and Meisenta laughed again.

  “My dear Adjunct Point, you don’t know the half of it. And this year is worse than most.” She gestured to the table behind her, though her pale eyes didn’t follow. “Our ships are all driven ashore south of here, or never came at all. And for most houses, that’s profoundly inconvenient, and costs them money, to be sure, but for us….” She turned abruptly back to the worktable, long hands moving easily among the litter of tools and containers. “Our Old Year blends are the best to be found in the city. We have an arrangement with the Malassy, they own two of the finest plantations in the Bight of Ghar. We buy their final thinning sight unseen, and at a price that ensures they’ve no reason to look for another buyer. It’s all Dragon’s Beard, there, on stony ground—there’s nothing better even in a bad year, and this year was excellent. But we’ve only received a third of what we paid for. Another dozen chests sit on bes’Anthe’s ship, damn the man, and the rest is—we hope!—somewhere along the coast and making its way north by caravan. But we won’t know that until it arrives.” She brushed her hands as if ridding her palms of old tea leaves. “And in the meantime, I must contrive something we can sell that doesn’t disgrace us utterly.”

  “If everyone is in the same position,” Rathe said, “surely you’ll suffer no more than any other house?”

  “Most likely,” Meisenta agreed, “but I’m in no mind to cut my losses unless I have to. When I create a blend that pleases even in these conditions Staenka will be first among the tea houses.”

  Rathe couldn’t help lifting his eyebrows at that. Staenka was certainly one of the important families, but Three Ships and Mazeline House and even Filipon and Daughters generally ranked above them. And Perrin and Pett was more profitable.

  “Are you a tea drinker, Adjunct Point?” Meisenta gave a hard smile. “What’s your choice?”

  Rathe hesitated, hoping this was not the prelude to offering a fee. A man had offered him tea once, when he was much younger, and it had taken all his will to turn it down. “Unsmoked ordinary. Davyt Sisters makes a decent stone-and-iron ordinary at a reasonable price.”

  He had hoped to discourage her with the mention of the least important of the city’s tea merchants, but instead she nodded thoughtfully.

  “That’s not a bad choice. Here, smell this.” She held out a metal cylinder, and Rathe advanced to take it.

  “Smell it,” she said again, and Rathe lowered his head obediently.

  It was tea, of course, but such a tea…. Rathe closed his eye in spite of himself, savoring the heavy scent. A smoked tea, not usually his favorite, but this smoke was lighter, smelling of burnt leaves rather than oily ash. Smoke and a hint of pepper, but most of all a deep, rich tea, better than anything he’d ever tasted. He took another deep breath, and handed it back with some reluctance. “It’s lovely.”

  “That is last year’s Old Year—Golden Dragon, I called it, for the pot-gold petals.”

  That would explain the touch of pepper. Rathe glanced back at the cylinder, and now that he was looking, picked out the flecks of bright yellow among the twisted leaves. “I imagine that would be hard to match.”

  “Hyris, brew us a tasting cup—the Golden Dragon and this year’s batch.”

  “Yes, madame,” Telawen answered, and turned to the stove.

  Meisenta held out a second cylinder. “See what you think of this.”

  Rathe took it, realizing that the outer surface was scored with dozens of horizontal lines. A way for Meisenta to tell one size of container from another? But that was hardly the point. He sniffed: more smoke, sweeter than before, and a definite hint of wine; the smell of tea was not as strong or as deep as the Golden Dragon. He hesitated, looking for tactful words, and Meisenta laughed again.

  “Even you can smell it—I mean no insult, Adjunct Point, but we both must admit your senses are nowhere near an expert’s. It’s a good tea, but not what we usually produce. It’s possible no one can make better this year, but I’m reluctant to put this out without knowing that for certain. If you were looking into raids on other tea blenders’ workshops, Adjunct Point, you’d have leave to look at me.”

  “The teas, madame,” Telawen said, and Rathe turned to see her holding out a tray with four small cups. “On madame’s right is the new blend, and on the left is the Golden Dragon.”

  Meisenta reached across, not quite unerring; her fingertips brushed the edge of the tray, and she adjusted instantly, taking a cup of the new blend. ”Please, help yourself.”

  Rathe took the cup, the plain glaze hot under his fingers, and sipped warily. It was still smokier than he liked, but it didn’t try to claw its way down his throat the way the cheaper smoked blends did. Brewed, the smell of wine became a hint of berries, a sweetness that would sit well with a spoonful of honey. And with cakes, he thought, taking another drink. Philip would like this.

  He had finished the cup in spite of himself. Telawen pushed the tray forward, and he set it back where it had been. A moment later, Meisenta set hers down as well. “Your thoughts?”

  Rathe shrugged. “It’s better than anything I usually drink. It’s—sweeter? Lighter? I know someone who’d like it a lot.”

  Meisenta’s expression twisted. “Yes, that’s exactly the trouble. It’s good, but…. We must strive to do better.” She gestured to the tray again, and Rathe took the other cup. He tasted it, and sighed in spite of himself. This was definitively the best tea he’d ever tasted, made what he kept in his tea chest seem like dried di
shwater. The overlay of leaf-smoke and pepper only emphasized the extraordinary flavor.

  “You see?” Meisenta said, and Telawen shrugged, the cups rattling.

  “You can’t make a Golden Dragon every year, madame.”

  “No, but I can do better than this.” Meisenta set her own emptied cup back on the tray, visibly shaking herself back to other matters. “Adjunct Point, we have other things on our minds than one tea captain’s fees.”

  “And yet the man is dead,” Rathe said.

  “Mattaes should have paid what he asked. Instead, he came home to ask what he should do. I wouldn’t have him hang for inexperience.” Meisenta settled herself on her stool, while Telawen bundled the tray back into the corner. “I’ll tell the household to expect someone from Dreams—and I’ll tell them to admit her, whatever the hour, and be sure that Mattaes obliges. Will that suit you?”

  “Thank you, madame.”

  He started toward the door, but Meisenta spoke first. “You’re the one who doesn’t take fees.”

  He felt himself stand taller. “That’s right.”

  “When this is settled, whatever way it goes—if I were to offer you an ounce of the Golden Dragon at the dealer’s price, would you count that a fee?”

  “Possibly not,” Rathe said, after a moment, “but I still doubt I could afford it, madame.”

  “Wait and see.” Meisenta smiled and turned back to her table.

  The clouds had closed in again by the time he left the Staenkas’ house, and the wind had strengthened, coming hard from the west carrying a promise of cold rain at its core. Rathe tugged up the hood of his cloak and considered where he might find the cap’pontoise. Properly speaking, the pontoises’ headquarters was at the Chain Tower, at the city’s western edge; the pontoises were in charge of the great chains that could be raised to block the river against an invading fleet. Not that anyone had dared try to take the city that way in centuries, but the merchants resident were practical souls. It cost them little to keep the chain in order, and put everyone on notice, Leaguers, Chadroni raiders, and poor nobles alike, that the city was not to be trifled with. But that was a bitter walk, in this weather, and there was a decent chance Cambrai might be at the boathouse below the Queen’s Bridge, where Sighs and Graves met. Besides, it would be easier to catch a low-flyer along the river if he had to go all the way to the Chain.

  The open yard in front of the boathouse was busy, an apple-seller with her cart at one end and a boy with a tray of crisp sugared cakes at the other. A fire was lit in the iron basket in front of the boathouse’s wide doors, and a blue pennant flew from the flagpole jutting from the eaves, warning of higher tides than usual. That was no surprise, given the rain and the generally bad weather, and Rathe paused, looking for familiar faces. He didn’t recognize any of the pontoises sitting on the benches under the wide eaves, but one of the men at the apple-seller’s cart looked up sharply.

  “Rathe! What brings you to the river?”

  “Saffroy,” Rathe said, with some relief. Saffroy was Cambrai’s tillerman, his personal second-in-command: if anyone would know where Cambrai was, it would be Saffroy. “I was looking for the cap’pontoise, actually.”

  “Were you, now?” Saffroy pocketed his apple. “That’s fast for word to travel.”

  Rathe frowned. “I had a question for Euan, that’s all.”

  Saffroy’s shoulders relaxed. “Well. I expect he’ll be glad to have a word with you.”

  “What’s going on?”

  Saffroy started toward the boathouse, beckoning for him to follow. “A man was seen to fall from the Hopes-Point Bridge an hour or so ago. Euan took the boats out, he should be back any minute now.”

  “A leaper?” Rathe asked. “But, no, you said ‘fall.’”

  “That was the word we had.” Saffroy waved to a bench turned into a corner of the boathouse, sheltered from the wind, and Rathe settled himself, glad of the protection. For the first time, he realized that two of the three long rowing boats were missing from their slips. “It’s an odd time—too much traffic for a suicide, someone would be bound to stop her. And it’s hard to have an accident on that bridge. Graves, now, there’s spots where the gutters drop straight to the water, and the gratings are none too well tended, but Hopes…that’s another matter.”

  Rathe nodded in agreement. The Hopes-Point bridge was crowded with shops for most of its length. “You’d think the same would apply for an attack, unless you dropped someone out a back window?”

  Saffroy spread his hands, the nails black with tar. “You know what I know.”

  A whistle sounded from the water, three shrill blasts and then three more. Saffroy shot to his feet as the other pontoises came running. “Stay here, Rathe,” he said, and darted toward the center dock.

  Rathe flattened himself against the rough wood of the wall, watching as half a dozen pontoises scrambled out on the center dock, some carrying heavy boathooks. The whistle sounded again, followed by indistinct shouting, and the blunt nose of one of the pontoises’ rowing boats poked into the dock. The pontoises with the boathooks caught it, dragging it forward, and the heavy craft surged into the narrow space, thumping heavily against the leather fenders. All sixteen oars were raised upright like masts, and the oarsmen held them steady while their fellows secured the boat to the dock and someone shouted for a doctor. One of the pontoises detached herself from the group at the dock and darted away, and at the boat’s stern another group lifted free a dripping bundle. A body, Rathe amended, naked and drowned, one arm trailing like river-weed, and the group rushed past to lay it on the ground by the fire.

  It looked safe to move now, most of the pontoises already in the courtyard, only the last few busy securing the boat, and Rathe moved cautiously toward the doors. One of the pontoises knelt by the body, working the flaccid arms like pump handles, while another pounded on the chest and thighs: sovereign remedies for drowning, Rathe knew, but they didn’t seem to be having much effect.

  “Nico!” Euan Cambrai detached himself from the group around the body. “How’d you get here so fast?”

  “He says he came on another matter,” Saffroy said, sliding into place at Cambrai’s side. He was carrying a towel, and the cap’pontoise took it gratefully. He was stark naked and as wet as the dead man, golden hair plastered to his head: presumably he’d gone into the river after the body, Rathe thought.

  “It’ll have to wait,” Cambrai said. “Oriane’s tits, where are my clothes—”

  “Here you are, Cap’,” one of the younger men said, and passed over a bundle of linen.

  Cambrai snatched at it, found the patched smallclothes and tugged them on, hastily looping the tapes at his waist. He was shivering, Rathe saw: no surprise, in this weather. He waited until Cambrai had pulled on shirt and breeches, and then said, “Your dead man?”

  “Dead?” Cambrai stopped, blue eyes going wide. “No, he’s not dead—not yet, anyway. But you can help me put a name to him, I think.”

  “Me?” Rathe followed Cambrai as the junior pontoises made way for them. The doctor had arrived—the local apothecary, by the badges on her coat—and was kneeling in the dirt to prop the man on his side while he choked and coughed up a thin stream of river water.

  “Let him down,” she said, and the pontoises at her side rolled him carefully back onto his back. Rathe winced at the sight. Someone’s fists had blackened both his eyes, split his lip and broken his nose, the skin angry red and swollen even though the Sier had washed away most of the blood. There were more bruises along his ribs, and a deep gash gaped purple beneath the lowest rib on his right side. The doctor was busy packing it with clean rags, but the man didn’t move.

  “Beaten and stabbed,” Rathe said aloud, “and likely robbed first.”

  Cambrai nodded. “Look again. Do you know him?”

  “No.” But as Rathe spoke, the features seemed to shift in his mind. “Astree’s—it’s Edild Dammar, isn’t it.”

  “That’s what I thought,” C
ambrai said, his voice grim. “Saffroy! Send to Point of Sighs, see if they’re missing an adjunct—and don’t mention Rathe, he’s here on other business entirely. Aren’t you?”

  “In point of fact, I was,” Rathe said.

  “In the meantime,” Cambrai said, “take him—should we move him, Galais?”

  The apothecary looked up. “Let me get him wrapped up first, he’s a mess. Then—yes, better to bring him into the warm, see if that won’t help. You can lodge him in my surgery, I’ve a good fire there. But it’s even odds if he’ll live no matter what we do.”

  “That’s the Sier for you,” Saffroy said. “I’ll see to it, Cap’.”

  Cambrai nodded, another shiver racking through him. “Good. Come on, Rathe, let’s within.”

  The cap’pontoise merited a tiny enclosed workroom at the corner of the boathouse, with oiled paper in the window in place of glass or horn, but at least the walls and door cut the wind. Cambrai pulled a coal from the stove to light the single lamp, and Rathe said, “Let me.”

  He built up the fire while Cambrai finished dressing, pulling on thick stockings and a knitted vest beneath a battered leather coat. A full kettle sat on the hob, and Rathe pulled it to the front. He could see the river’s muddy bank through the cracks between the floorboards—falling tide—but the air above his knees was beginning to warm.

  “There’s tea on the shelf,” Cambrai said. “The red box. I’d take it kindly if you’d start a pot.”

  Rathe did as he was told, measuring the leaves into the heavy pot. After the Golden Dragon he’d tasted that morning, this smelled plain and bitter, but he told himself he’d no better at home. After a taste he set down his cup. He did keep better.

  “Right,” Cambrai said. “So what brought you here on what turns out to be the most eventful day of the quarter?”