He turned about, face-to-face with Mihali. Mihali glanced out the door. “I don’t really want to meet anyone yet, thank you,” he said. “I don’t want to cause a fuss. Meeting a god is an awfully big thing. I think.”
“What are you, an actor?” Tamas said. He poked the man in the belly, checking for a stuffed shirt. It was all fat. “A mighty good show, but I’m not in the mood.”
Mihali pointed at Tamas’s forehead. “You were hit quite hard,” he said. “I know it’s a lot to take in. Maybe you should sit down for a moment. My memories are imperfect in this body, but I will do my best.” He cleared his throat. “Did the dying Privileged warn you as they were supposed to?”
Tamas froze in the act of feeling his head wound. He grabbed Mihali by the lapels of his jacket. “Warn me about what?”
Mihali looked truly puzzled. He gave an apologetic shrug. “As I said, my memories are not what they should be.” He seemed to perk up. “They will improve over time, though. I think.”
“No more jokes now,” he said. “Who the pit are you?”
Tamas flew against the doorjamb, hitting his shoulder hard, then was tossed to the floor. For a moment he thought Mihali had hit him, but then realized it was another earthquake. His heart in his mouth, he gripped the doorframe, watching more plaster fall to the floor and praying the whole building wouldn’t come down this time. It was over in seconds.
He climbed up and dusted himself off, searching the room. The man was gone. Tamas gritted his teeth and looked out into the hallway. Olem was there, steadying himself up against the wall.
“Where the pit have you been?” Tamas asked.
“Finding runners,” Olem said. “Everything good, sir?”
Tamas eyed him suspiciously. Not even a smirk. No one could play a joke that well.
“Fine. You see someone pass by here?”
Olem glanced at him, looking back and forth down the hallway. He reached down into the rubble at his feet and fished out a still-smoking cigarette. “No, sir.”
Tamas stepped back into the command post. There was a back door to the house, he was sure, but no one could have crossed the room with the ground shaking like that.
How hard did I hit my head?
Chapter 10
Adamat stopped by his home for his pistols. Five days since he’d hired SouSmith, and the cordon around the center of the city had left no opportunities for them to sneak into the Public Archives. That had changed with the quake. The whole city was a mess. Buildings were down, roads filled with the homeless. Adamat had taken the opportunity to scout the royalist positions for a way to get to the Archives. He’d had no such luck.
There had been rumors Tamas would bring his entire army into the city and push through the barricades, but it seemed he’d turned his soldiers and mercenaries alike to helping the citizens rather than taking the barricades. Once the fighting began in earnest, it would be very dangerous in Centestershire. Then there was the rumor that Tamas’s powder mages were still hunting a rogue Privileged through the streets of Adopest. Being out and about in the city was not for the faint of heart.
Every three days, Adamat received a messenger from Tamas. Every three days, he was forced to report he’d made no headway. It was frustrating having the field marshal breathing down his neck and not being able to report any kind of success.
Adamat stooped just inside the front door to pick up the post. At least Tamas kept that running. It was hard not to admire him for that. Adamat waited for SouSmith to come inside, then pushed the door closed with his foot. SouSmith tapped his shoulder.
The back door through the hallway and past the kitchen was ajar. He dropped the post on a side table and removed a cane from the holder near the door. SouSmith headed to the sitting room. Adamat came around the corner behind him, cane held high. He lowered it slowly.
“You saved me a trip,” he said.
Palagyi sat in Adamat’s favorite chair, next to the fireplace, hands folded in his lap. He had the same two goons with him as last time. The lockpick lounged on the sofa, boots on, and the big one with the coal-stained arms studied his family portrait above the mantle. A fourth man sat behind Adamat’s desk, hands folded serenely in his lap.
Palagyi’s eyes grew wide at the sight of SouSmith. “You were coming to see me?” he said.
“Yes, I just was.”
“I can’t imagine why. There’s no way you have the money you owe me.” Again, he eyed SouSmith nervously.
Adamat took a deep breath, gathered his composure. “No, but I have some of it. You said you’d leave me be until my time was up.”
“And I have,” Palagyi said.
Adamat looked around the room. “I’ve got well over a month left.”
“You gave me the wrong address for your family,” Palagyi said.
“I gave you my cousins’ address,” Adamat said.
“Your cousins are a family of brawlers?”
“Seven sons, all take after their father,” Adamat said. “Very successful prizefighters.”
“Yes,” Palagyi said, “Well, that may be, your family wasn’t there.”
“Really?”
“And when my boys pressed the question, they were forcibly removed from the town,” Palagyi said. “In tar and feathers.”
“I can’t imagine why,” Adamat said. He smiled inwardly but kept his expression flat.
Palagyi worked to control himself. “I’m willing to let this go.”
Adamat froze. Palagyi was up to something. “Why?” he said.
Palagyi examined his fingernails. “I want to introduce you to my new friend,” he said. He gestured to the man sitting at Adamat’s desk. “This is Lord Vetas. He’s a man of various talents. And he has powerful friends.”
“Pleased to meet you.” Adamat gave the man a curt nod and a quick inspection. He had the dusty, yellow skin of a full-blooded Rosvelean. He wore all-black clothes but for a scarlet vest and the gold chain of a pocket watch visible at his breast pocket. He sat in Adamat’s chair like a schoolboy with perfect posture and his eyes traveled around the room with the steady inspection of someone who sees everything.
“You knew about the coup,” Palagyi said, bringing Adamat’s attention back to him. “Even before the papers. The night before, you were gone half the night. Summoned somewhere. My man saw you leave. You returned and immediately put your family in a carriage to-”
“Somewhere safe,” Adamat finished.
“Somewhere safe,” Palagyi continued. “And then you wrote a lot of letters. Sent them who knows where? You practically ran up to the university, skipping the execution-which seems strange, because not another soul in Adopest did. Since then you’ve been prowling around Adopest, hiring carriages to the north and east, writing more letters. You’ve been to every library in southern Adro.”
“I see you’ve hired better people to follow me,” Adamat said.
“Yes, I did.” Palagyi polished his fingernails on his waistcoat.
“Even so, it took you this long to add things up?”
“I won’t let you spoil my mood,” Palagyi said. “You’re working for Tamas. I know you are. And Lord Vetas knows as well. Along with his master.”
Adamat studied the man behind his desk. “And who might that be?”
“Someone with a vested interest in the affairs of Adro and the rest of the Nine.” It was the first time Lord Vetas had spoken. His voice was quiet, measured with the enunciation of a man educated at the best schools.
“A criminal?” Adamat said. “Palagyi rarely deals with people who aren’t. The Proprietor, perhaps?”
Lord Vetas gave a dry chuckle. “No,” he said.
“Stop trying to change the subject,” Palagyi snarled. He stood up. “You work for Tamas now, don’t you?”
“Sit down,” Lord Vetas said. Palagyi sat.
“And if I do?” Adamat said.
Palagyi opened his mouth.
“Quiet,” Lord Vetas said. He spoke the word softly. Palagyi’
s mouth snapped shut. “You may go now, Palagyi. You’ve made the introductions.”
Palagyi glared at Lord Vetas. “Don’t think you’ll take the credit for this yourself. I discovered this. I told Lord-”
The garrote came up around Palagyi’s throat and snapped tight from behind. Adamat drew his cane sword, SouSmith his pistol. Lord Vetas held up a single hand. Adamat froze. He watched in morbid fascination as Palagyi struggled against the strong hands of his own goon, the coal worker with the quick reflexes. Palagyi’s face turned purple, and the goon kept his garrote tight around Palagyi’s throat until long after the life was gone from him. Adamat lowered his cane sword.
Lord Vetas folded his hands back into his lap. “I’ve just taken over your loan from the late Palagyi. It’s in your interest to work for me now.”
“Doing what?” Adamat’s mind raced. Palagyi had been a predictable thug. Adamat could deal with him. This Lord Vetas, however… he was a dangerous man. Dangerous like the Proprietor: the kind that made policemen retire early.
“I want to know everything about Tamas. Everything he does, everything he says to you. What he has you looking for.”
“My loyalties are not for sale,” Adamat said.
“You’ll have to change your loyalties, then.”
“I don’t know who you are, or who your master is,” Adamat said. “I’m loyal to Adro and I will not change that.”
“My master has the Nine’s best interests at heart, I assure you,” Lord Vetas said. His quiet, sibilant voice was beginning to irritate Adamat. He almost had to strain to hear the man.
Adamat said, “The Nine is not the same as Adro. For all I know, you work for the Kez. The newspaper says they’re sending ambassadors and that they still want Tamas to sign the Accords.”
“I don’t work for the Kez.”
“Then who?”
“That is of little consequence to you.”
“You aren’t endearing yourself,” Adamat said. “You come into my home, kill a man in my very living room, and threaten me? How do you know I won’t send for the police this instant?”
A shallow smile flitted across Lord Vetas’s face. “I am not the sort of man one summons the police on,” he warned. “You of all people should know that.”
“Yes. I’d already realized that.” Adamat gritted his teeth. “You’re the type of man who gives face to evil.”
Lord Vetas seemed taken aback. “Evil? No, good sir. Just pragmatism.”
“I know your kind,” Adamat said. “And you seem to know me. Or you think you do. Now, get out of my home.”
He glanced at SouSmith. Palagyi had been strangled by his own man. Would the same thing happen to Adamat? Was SouSmith really a friend? The boxer looked troubled. He watched both the goons and Lord Vetas all at once and cracked his knuckles like he did when he was ready for a fight. “I will pay you your money,” Adamat said, “if you have indeed taken over the loan. Or I will face the streets when you kick me out. I will not betray a client or my country.”
Lord Vetas examined his hands thoughtfully. He stood up and took his hat off the desk. “I’ll return when I have leverage.” The statement was matter-of-fact, yet the word “leverage” sent a chill down Adamat’s spine. “Meanwhile, as a show of my master’s good faith, we’ll suspend your loan.” He passed by Adamat and tipped his hat. “Consider our employment offer.” He gave Adamat a small card with an address printed on the back.
It was not until Lord Vetas and his thugs were gone that Adamat remembered the body in his favorite chair. He regarded SouSmith grimly. “Find us some lunch in the pantry. I’m going to figure out something to do with that.”
“Jakob has a great attachment to you,” the woman said.
Nila sat across from the woman at a cafe table and sipped from a warm cup of tea. The sun shone overhead, a stiff breeze moving through the streets, and she could almost forget about the barricades just around the other side of the building, where royalist partisans held a wary standoff with Tamas’s more numerous and better-trained soldiers.
“I can’t stay,” Nila said.
The woman examined her over a cup of tea. Her name was Rozalia and she was a Privileged. The Hielmen said she was the last Privileged left in all of Adro, but no one knew where she’d come from. She wasn’t a member of Manhouch’s royal cabal. Why she had any interest in Nila was impossible to say. Nila had no idea how to act in the presence of a Privileged. It was impossible to curtsy sitting down. She kept her eyes on her tea and tried to be as polite as possible.
“Why not, child?”
Nila sat up straighter. She didn’t consider herself a child. At eighteen, she was a woman. She could wash and press and mend clothes and she might have one day married Yewen, the butler’s son, if the whole world hadn’t gone to the pit with Tamas’s coup. Yewen was gone now, maybe fled, maybe killed in the streets.
When Nila didn’t answer, Rozalia went on. “We have a parley with Field Marshal Tamas in the morning. If he comes to his senses, if General Westeven can make him see reason, you may find yourself nursemaid to the new king of Adro.”
“I’m not a nurse,” Nila said. “I wash clothes.”
“That doesn’t have to define you, child. I’ve been many things in my life. A Privileged is neither the greatest nor the least of them.”
What was greater than a Privileged? “I’m sorry,” Nila said.
Rozalia gave a sigh. “Speak up, child. Look me in the eye. You aren’t a duke’s washerwoman anymore.”
“I’m lowborn, ma’am… my lady.” Nila tried to remember how to address a Privileged. She’d never even met one before today.
“You’ve saved the life of the closest heir to the throne,” Rozalia said. “Baronies have been gifted to the common folk for less.”
Nila swallowed and tried not to imagine herself baroness of some barony in northern Adro. This kind of thing didn’t happen to her. She could feel the Privileged’s eyes studying her.
“You think we’re going to lose,” Rozalia said. She waited a moment for Nila’s response, and then somewhat impatiently added, “Speak up, you can talk to me.”
Nila did look up then. “Field Marshal Tamas has every advantage,” she said. “He won’t execute half the nobility only to put Jakob on the throne. Within a few weeks he’ll have torn down the barricades and sent Jakob and all the nobles that backed him to the guillotine. I would like to be gone before that happens. I don’t want to see it.” She wondered, not for the first time, if it had been a mistake to bring Jakob to General Westeven. She could have fled with him to Kez. The silver she took from the townhouse would have more than paid for the trip.
“Smart girl,” Rozalia said, placing a finger on her chin.
Nila folded her arms across her chest.
“What will you do?” Rozalia asked. “Once you’ve gotten past Tamas’s blockade and made your way out of the city?”
What interest could a Privileged possibly have in that? Nila realized that she didn’t know what she’d do. She had the silver. Most of it, anyway. She had needed new clothes and some medicine for Jakob, and a place to hide during the riots. “I can join up with the army. They always need laundresses, and the pay is good,” she said.
“At best you’ll wind up a soldier’s wife,” Rozalia said. “What a waste.”
“It’s better that,” Nila said quietly, “than to die here for a lost cause.”
“What did you think Tamas’s soldiers would have done if they’d have caught you smuggling Jakob out of the duke’s residence? You have courage, child, and don’t try to pretend that you don’t love that little boy. If you cared only for yourself, you’d be halfway to Brudania by now.
“Stay here,” Rozalia continued. “Watch over Jakob. If the parley tomorrow goes well, you’ll wind up a rich woman. If it doesn’t… you may need to save his life again.”
If she stayed by Jakob’s side, she could, like Rozalia said, become a wealthy woman. Or follow him to the guillotine block. She re
membered the soldier’s hands holding her down, the feelings of helplessness and horror. No bearded sergeant would save her the next time Tamas’s soldiers came through a door. She had silver buried in the corner of a graveyard just outside of the city. She would never have to feel that fear again.
Nila couldn’t help but wonder if Rozalia had other motives for wanting her to stay. A Privileged used the common folk. She didn’t help them. There had to be a reason she was showing such interest in Nila.
Jakob came into sight over Rozalia’s shoulder. His pallor had improved despite the stress of the last two weeks. Rozalia had done something for his cough. He smiled and waved to Nila, then was distracted by a butterfly flitting through the rubble of a building knocked over by the earthquake. She watched him dance off after the insect, followed by a pair of vigilant Hielmen.
“I’ll stay,” she said. “For now.”
“You can end this quickly,” Julene said.
Tamas examined the woman lounging in the chair on the other side of his desk. She’d come alone on her own initiative, leaving Taniel and the magebreaker who knew where. She wore a low-cut shirt that revealed enough cleavage to get the imagination going but that was tight enough for her to move quickly when she wanted. Tamas knew the effect was not accidental. Yet he was not a man to make the same mistake twice. Julene was a dangerous woman. She was the type to use any weapon available to her in order to get ahead. He looked away from her chest and at the scar running from the corner of her mouth to her brow.
He wondered at that scar. There were Privileged who dealt in healing sorcery. It was a tricky art, and they were rare, but with the amount Julene charged for her mercenary services, she could easily afford it. Perhaps she just liked looking deadly.
“How?”
“Assassins,” she said. “Send men behind the barricades. Wipe out all their leadership and the rest will surrender easily.”
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