The long-goatee man cleared his throat. “So, if a man were to challenge you to a duel, would you fight it yourself?”
No duels, Tyvian had said. “No. Duels are stupid.” Hool didn’t look at him, instead craning her neck and cocking her head to listen—where was Tyvian? Didn’t he know she hated this? He had to know—and that meant this was all part of his stupid plan. He was deliberately trying to embarrass her. He had talked her into this, only to sneak away at the last minute. Oh, when she got her hands on him . . .
She looked back to see the goatee-wearing man was bristling at her, his mouth locked tight. One of the women laid a hand gently over her own. Hool’s instinct was to attack her, but she held perfectly still, as though the woman were a butterfly she was allowing to alight. “Sir Arving is one of the finest duelists in Eretheria, Lady Hool. He is Countess Velia’s personal champion. He has bested sixteen men in duels to the death!”
Hool considered the bearded man more closely. He was old, but strong and lithe. Still, he had a big belly and his balance was off just a tad—he was sitting back on his heels, probably because of his big belly. She tried to think of a polite thing to say that wouldn’t make him angrier. Tyvian said they needed friends here. “I’m sure your duels were not stupid.” It didn’t seem to work—the man looked somehow even more offended. She tried to come up with a compliment. “You must be very good at killing people.”
“My Lady Hool!” Hool turned away from Sir Arving to see Sir Damon bowing to her. He was dressed in a powdered wig and lacy doublet like the rest of them, but his big nose and his kindly eyes were the same. “I have an urgent message for you.” He nodded to Sir Arving and the two women with him. “If my lord and ladies will pardon us?”
They murmured their assent, though Sir Arving was still glowering at her as they walked away. When they reached an out-of-the-way corner of the garden, he stopped and wiped his face with a handkerchief.
“Well?” Hool put out her hand.
“Well what?” Damon looked at her hand. “Oh! Oh no, my lady—there’s no message.”
“So you lied to me?”
The knight blushed. “I . . . well . . . I really meant to lie to them.” He jerked his head in the direction of Sir Arving. “Old Ironsides Arving looked about ready to run you through.”
Hool glared at him and waited for a sensible explanation.
Damon stammered for a minute and then shrugged. “I just thought you needed to get away from them for a few minutes. That’s all.”
“Really?” Hool frowned. “How did you know?”
The knight laughed. “You really don’t know, do you?” He pointed at her face. “Everything you think is written all over your face, all the time.”
Hool cocked her head. “How often are you watching my face?”
Damon blushed again. “I . . . uhhh . . . not . . . well . . .”
Hool had very little idea what to make of this. She noted that the man was again holding his breath a little, as though he was trying to fit through a tight hole. His eyes kept touching upon her face and neck and sometimes her breasts and then quickly would dart away, as though he were worried about being caught. He had spent most of this conversation staring at the hedge over her left shoulder. “Are you my champion?”
Damon breathed a sigh of relief for some reason. “I have sworn myself to your service, milady, and will serve in that capacity if called.”
“So when you were champion to your last master, you would do whatever he said and tell other people what he wanted them to hear?”
Damon nodded. “Well . . . yes. Mostly. That and the duels.”
Hool cocked her head. “What duels?”
“As His Grace the Earl of Mollary, Hann rest him, was of advanced age, it would have been considered poor form to challenge him to a duel.” Damon squared his shoulders. “However, honor needs to be satisfied from time to time, no matter how gracious the gentleman in question. When he was challenged, I stepped in to fight on his behalf.”
Hool looked at him and sniffed lightly, so as not to be obvious about it. He smelled a little bit of shame, she thought. Not much, but a little. “Did you miss saying whatever you feel like saying?”
Damon laughed. “I? My lady, I daresay I have not done that in my entire life.”
“You should. And you should never fight my battles for me. My enemies are mine to kill,” Hool said, nodding. Sir Damon kept chuckling at her. She resisted growling. “What is so funny?”
“Nothing,” he said, choking on his own laughs. “It’s . . . it’s just that you are . . . you are a remarkable woman, Lady Hool.”
Hool snorted. She knew flattery when she heard it. “I told you to call me Hool.”
Damon blushed. “Are all women in Eddon this . . . indiscreet?”
Hool decided to hedge her bets. “No. I am special.”
Sir Damon held out his arm. “Then I feel very fortunate to be in your service, Hool. Shall we charge back into the fray?”
Hool considered the arm and then, on a whim, decided to take it. His biceps were small, but very firm. Not bad for a human. They walked back to the crowd together, and Hool noted that he grew tense as they got closer. “What are you worried about?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he said and, when they arrived at the edge of the fountain, he released her arm. “Would you care for wine?”
“No. I would like water. Please.”
Damon bowed deeply. “Thy wish is my command, Lady Hool!”
Hool watched him go, frowning. What an idiot.
Though she felt compelled to add, But he is nice.
The salon continued around her, polite conversation masking sidelong glances her direction. They were talking about her, but whispering behind fans or with their backs turned. What they didn’t realize was how good Hool’s hearing was. Some of the group had some kind of magic that made their words unintelligible from a distance, but others were not so clever. She tried to ignore them, and instead spent a little time watching Brana entertain the ladies.
Brana was currently balancing two wineglasses on his nose and a lady was standing on a chair, ready to add a third, while people stood about in breathless anticipation. Humans didn’t always realize how many muscles one needed to hold perfectly still, and her pup had them in spades. He was steady as a pillar. And the humans love him, too.
But it was the love of a pet or entertainer, not a fellow person. Brana, who was really only a pup of about six years old, had no idea how people saw him. He just liked people. He was happy and kind and loyal, and none of these withered, selfish people would ever see that. They just saw a handsome shroud over a puppy that liked to play. He never would have been like this on the Taqar. By six, I had brought down my first gazelle myself. I was a hunter, not a pet.
A conversation drifted to her ears from across the garden. It was Onion Breath and Sir Arving. And Countess Velia.
“She is beautiful, that I’ll grant, but she is as rough and unpolished as a river pirate.” Sir Arving chuckled. “And her looks are only glamour, anyway.”
Onion Breath snorted. “Oh yes—oh yes, I know. She’s wearing a shroud, I’d swear to it! Probably a toothless, tanned laborer under there. Probably a thief on the run.”
The Countess said something from behind a fan, and some manner of socerery kept Hool from understanding what exactly was said, but the expressions and postures of her two lackeys shifted instantly. They went from amused to horrified and then disgusted—Hool knew the body language well. She had seen it every day of her life from the moment she and her pups had been captured on the Taqar to the moment Tyvian Reldamar broke open her cage all those years ago.
Velia Hesswyn, the Countess of Davram, could see through Hool’s shroud.
A spike of panic shot through her. She almost bent her back and tensed her legs in a gesture natural to a gnoll but resisted and kept herself upright. No. Remain poised. She was stronger than these people. She was a lady, even if she was a gnoll.
But they would tell other people. Rumors would spread. She already had a reputation for being a harsh creditor. There were those that said she was a cannibal, too. All that, though, was based on the assumption that she was at least human. That she at least, on some level, belonged here.
Hool watched the three of them whispering to each other and tried to think of what to do. Surely Tyvian had known this might happen! Why didn’t he warn her? Where was he?
She saw Sir Arving look over at Brana, his lip curling beneath his moustache. “Great Hann,” he muttered to Onion Breath, “can you believe that creature, aping the behavior of a man? Disgusting.”
Onion Breath nodded, face behind her fan, and whispered back. “A thing like that belongs in the circus. In a cage.”
A cage. He had been, of course. Hool’s memory flew backward to that stinking dungeon in Freegate, to Brana, three years old, cold and alone and abused. Crying in the dark, blood matting his fur, whimpering for his mother.
And of Api, Brana’s sister. The one who had not come back. The one Hool hadn’t been able to save.
Despite herself, Hool felt her hackles rise. She looked over at Brana, who had finished his balancing trick to the applause of a few young women. He had his tongue lolling out the side of his mouth, happy as a bird in summer.
Hool threw her shoulders back, rose to her shroud’s full height, and marched across the garden, knocking aside anyone who got in her way. Her eyes were fixed on Onion Breath. On her every movement, her every gesture.
They noticed her when she was about ten feet away. Sir Arving’s hand darted to his rapier and he stepped partially in front of the woman. The countess still sat in her chair, her fingers clutching the crystal top of her cane, watching from one side.
Hool pointed at Onion Breath. “Say it to my face, bitch!”
The salon fell silent, completely and utterly. Even the birds in the trees held their song.
Sir Arving stiffened. “Are you, by chance, addressing my wife, my lady?”
“Yes, I’m addressing your smelly wife, you awful, skinny old man!” Hool drew close enough that she could have reached out and tugged off his moustache. Arving remained in place, stone still. Hool felt a hand on her upper arm.
She whirled to see Sir Damon bowing to her again. “My Lady Hool, Lord Waymar has sent a message—”
Hool waggled a finger in his face. “No! Not this time.” She pointed at Onion Breath and Arving. “This stinky bitch and her mate want to put my Brana in a cage. In a cage!” She pushed past Arving and got in Onion Breath’s face. “Just try it, woman. See how long it takes me to kill you.” Her teeth were bared, which of course just looked to everyone else like she was smiling. She did not care.
Color drained from the woman’s face until she looked practically corpse-like. “I don’t . . . I don’t know what you’re—”
Hool faked a lunge at Onion Breath and the woman fainted dead away. Sir Arving dropped to his wife’s side, his eyes bulging.
“Are you perfectly finished, Lady Hool?” The voice was from the Countess Velia, creaking and old.
Hool turned to face her. She could hear everyone breathing around her, smell their fear, their confusion. They were tensed, ready to bolt, ready to attack—something. Hool knew she couldn’t attack this old woman—who knew what kind of magic she had hidden away in the folds of her massive dress or in those half dozen rings or in that cane? Still, Hool wanted to hurt her. She wanted to hurt her more badly than she’d wanted to hurt anyone in a long time.
“Be very careful about what you say next, madam,” Velia said, her sharp little eyes glittering in the sun, her thin lips twisted up into a smile. “I am not a woman lightly crossed.”
“Easy now! Easy, my lady!” Sir Damon interposed himself between Hool and Sir Arving.
Hool pushed him off. “I am not your lady. These titles are so stupid!” She pointed at the countess. “Her Grace? This old carcass is anything but graceful.”
Sir Arving had his glove off and made to strike Hool, but Hool blocked his blow and punched him hard enough to knock him flat on his back. Blood poured from a broken nose.
And then people really started to get mad.
Two things became immediately apparent as soon as Tyvian stepped off the grounds of the House of Eddon. The first was that it seemed as though every single Defender of the Balance in Eretheria was marching around, firepike lit, and that every griffon in their service was cruising the air above. They were quite clearly looking for somebody, and Tyvian was fairly certain he knew who that someone was.
The second thing was that Adatha Voth was following him. Either that, or another assassin of similar skill. Again, it was his sixth sense about these things that tipped him off—an odd shadow on the roof of a barn, a flash of motion from the corner of his eye. Meeting Myreon in Davram Heights was suddenly a lot more dangerous. He probably should have turned on his heel and walked right back into the house, but then he thought of how angry Myreon would get if he didn’t show and how much helping her at this moment might do to repair their relationship.
Gritting his teeth, he pressed on.
Voth couldn’t risk taking a shot at him—she had to assume he had bow wards—but then again, Tyvian wasn’t too keen on being shot at, bow wards or not. The first thing to do was to ditch his horse. He tethered it at a likely-looking tavern and went inside.
The place was crowded with old men and men who had disguised themselves to look old—fake beards of wool, an affected limp. Dodging the press-gangs, Tyvian thought. Yet, it almost certainly had the opposite effect, since places like this were probably a popular place to hit for those wagons—you could nab seventeen, eighteen men on a raid.
Tyvian drew a lot of attention, just by his dress. The press of sweating, filthy laborers parted for him as though he were on fire. A number of them knuckled their foreheads. Two men knelt. Tyvian elected to ignore them.
“The heir!” somebody whispered. “Perwynnon’s own son!”
Tyvian grimaced. How in hell can they know who I am? He scanned the assembled rabble, trying to pick out the man closest to his size and with the least soiled shirt. It turned out to be a mathematics equation lacking a satisfying solution. He pointed his cane at an entirely too-large fellow who had, by some feat of gluttony, never spilled a spot of food on his tunic in his life. “You. We’re going to exchange clothes, you and I.”
The man blinked. “Beggin’ your pardon, but why?”
Tyvian held up his cane. “This is worth one-hundred and eighty-five gold marks, and it is the cheapest thing I am wearing. That’s why.”
The man was naked inside of seven seconds. Tyvian took rather longer—he had selected this outfit specifically for the salon, and the idea that he was forced to give it up before its debut rankled. At last, though, he was clad in the overlarge tunic and the breeches that needed to be cuffed so as not to get caught beneath his boots. His boots he kept.
“Now . . .” He addressed the assembled old men from the bar, where they all clustered, hanging on his every word. “There is an assassin in the streets, hunting me as we speak. I haven’t much in my purse at the moment, but any man who assists me in evading this killer can come to my house for a gold mark this evening, no questions asked.”
The old men exchanged glances and muttered among themselves. Tyvian held his breath—taking on trained killers probably wasn’t in these gentlemen’s repertoire. If they threw him out the back door, he was no better off than before.
At last, their spokesman—the naked man who was now holding Tyvian’s clothes—stepped forward. “Begging your pardon again, sire, but, well . . .” He looked back at the men, who all nodded, “you don’t need to pay us a thing. For you, we fight for free.”
Tyvian felt simultaneously relieved and also incredibly disturbed. He put a brave face on it. “She’s a short woman, dark hair, one eye, and probably watching the front door of this place as we speak. Let’s go get her.”
The men raised their fists as one
. “HUZZAH!”
Tyvian grimaced. He found himself hoping Voth was a talented enough professional to avoid killing any of these brave, stupid yokels.
They charged out the front door of the tavern, screaming battle cries that probably hadn’t been uttered in thirty years, brandishing empty bottles, walking sticks, and knives. Voth might be good enough to pick Tyvian out of a crowd, but not if that crowd was an armed mob looking specifically for her.
Tyvian charged out with them and, as soon as he could, melted into the crowd in the confusion. After a few more blocks, he was confident he wasn’t being followed.
But there was now no way in hell he was making it back to the salon in time. He took a deep breath. Maybe it would be fine. Maybe Artus and Hool and Brana would control themselves without his help. Besides, the whole thing was supposed to be a mess, anyway. Yes, it would probably be fine. Almost certainly.
Tyvian snorted.
Who am I kidding? We’re doomed.
Chapter 18
Well, THAT Went Well . . .
By daylight, the great game hall of the House of Eddon was a world transformed. The great windows poured sunlight on the t’suul tables, the grand hearths stood cold and empty, and all the leather furniture seemed a bit drab and careworn without the firelight to make it glow. Here, sitting around the biggest t’suul table of them all, were a variety of young gentlemen and ladies who, while not strangers to Artus, also seemed transformed.
Valen Hesswyn was the center of everyone’s attention. He was sitting in one of the high-backed chairs and wearing clothing that seemed just a touch more impressive than everyone else’s. His dimples and white teeth showed with every joke and jibe and, when he saw Artus, his eyes lit up and he stood. “There he is! Artus of Eddon, our esteemed host! It’s about time you found your way back here!”
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