by Jon Skovron
“Sorry for dragging you all over the city like this,” Red said to Hume. “It’s just that I needed someone to help me out with this, in case… things went leeward.”
“I am pleased to be of service, my lord,” said Hume.
“It’s also a personal problem of a real… delicate nature, keen?”
“I will of course speak to no one about it,” said Hume. “But might I suggest you discuss it with His Highness? The two of you seem quite friendly, if you’ll permit me saying so.”
“I thought about it,” admitted Red. “But this is a sort of… biomancer problem. I know he has to walk carefully with that lot, being prince and all. Don’t want to put him in an awkward situation, you understand.”
“I do indeed, my lord. And am I to assume this matter is also too delicate to discuss with Ambassador Omnipora?”
“I get on well with Nea. She’s a fine molly and clever as claws. But my biomancer problem is the sort of complicated inner government stuff you don’t want anyone outside the government knowing about, no matter their quality. So—”
“My Lord Pastinas! Is that you?” came a familiar voice from behind him.
Red whispered to Hume, “Is that Lady Hempist behind me?”
“It is, my lord,” murmured Hume, his lips not moving.
“Can you cause a distraction so I can escape?”
“I would be happy to, my lord. Although if I may be so bold as to make a suggestion, I have noticed that Lady Hempist seems eager to please you, and within certain circles, she is well known for her… anti-biomancer sentiment. Perhaps she could be of some assistance to you with this… delicate problem of yours.”
“Hume, you are a gem.” Red squeezed his boney shoulder.
“You’re kind to say so, my lord.”
Red took a deep breath, put on his best smile, and turned to face his pursuer.
“Lady Merivale Hempist.”
She wore an emerald-green gown that was slightly more modest than the one she’d worn to the ball. Red appreciated that he wouldn’t have to exert quite as much effort to keep from staring at her cleavage. She also wore cream-colored gloves that went past her elbows, and a small round hat that was set precariously on top of her hair. Red suspected this was her “going into town” look. She was flanked by serving men in gray, their arms filled with packages.
“How absolutely slippy to run into you like this,” she said, sweeping toward him, her servants hurrying to keep up.
“What was that now?” asked Red.
“Slippy?” she asked, looking suddenly in doubt. “Isn’t that one of your folk words? I feel quite sure I’ve heard you use it at some point. Doesn’t it mean crazy?”
“It means crazy as in unreasonable or insane, not as in ‘oh how wild.’”
“Oh dear.” Her pink-painted lips curled into a pout as she flipped through a small book in her hand. “Oh, I see. Yes. My mistake.”
“And what do we have here?” Red tried to peek at the book.
She snapped it shut and tucked it under her arm, then gave him a mischievous smile. “Nothing you need to concern yourself with at present.”
Red refused to take the bait. Instead he nodded to the two burdened serving men behind her. “Bit of shopping, my lady?”
“You know how it is.” She sighed dramatically. “I was just popping down to the bookshop, but a few items along the way caught my eye. Must keep the wardrobe fresh, you know.”
“Of course, my lady.”
“Don’t think I don’t know when you’re patronizing me, my lord,” she said sweetly.
“I always assume you catch all my cleverness, my lady. It’s what makes you special.”
“Oh, I think you’ll find that I have any number of appealing qualities, my lord.” She slipped her arm through his. “I have one more stop to make before I return to the palace. Will you be so kind as to keep me company? My servants are lovely people, but I’m afraid they lack your advanced conversation skills.”
“It would be a pleasure, my lady.”
Red had no illusion that if he wanted something from Lady Merivale Hempist, he would have to let her get close and think she had the upper hand. But as they walked, and he felt her soft warmth press against his arm, he wished it didn’t feel quite so nice.
“If you’ll permit me to say, you smell remarkably un-perfumed today, my lady,” he said. “More like an actual woman and less like a bouquet of flowers.”
“I have observed that strong smells, even pleasant ones, deter you, my lord.”
He tapped his smoked glasses. “I’m afraid my vision is not the only sense that’s delicate, my lady.”
“I thought as much. So I entreated my perfumer to employ a quality she had never had occasion to use before.”
“And what quality was that, my lady?”
“Restraint.”
Red laughed. “You shouldn’t go through so much trouble on my account.”
“On the contrary, since I had every intention of getting close to you, it seemed only courteous to make certain it was as pleasant for you as possible.”
“And is this mysterious book another of your ingenious plans to lull me into a false sense of security?”
“False?” She gave him a look of playful outrage. “I can assure you, Lord Pastinas, that you are completely safe in my presence.” Then a glint of steel appeared in her eyes. “Certainly safer than you are with Ambassador Omnipora.”
“Nea? She’s safe as shores.”
“She is a foreigner.”
Red gave her a sincere look of disapproval. “Don’t be like the rest of those close-minded lacies. You’re better than that.”
She paused for a moment. Then her pink bow mouth curved down into a pout. “You have been spending quite a lot of time with her.”
“Wait. Are you jealous?”
She sighed. “Here I spend all this time and effort tangling you up in my webs and she comes along and unknowingly tears them all to tatters. It’s quite vexing.”
Red was fairly certain she was joking again. “Now, now, she’s the prince’s honored guest, and as his best wag, I need to make sure everything is sunny for her. Besides, you might not know this, but there are people who want her dead.”
“That’s just palace gossip, I’m sure. Who would ever harm such a lovely creature?”
“I’m afraid it’s not gossip.”
“Oh? And how have you come by this intelligence?” she asked teasingly.
“There were five of them who came to kill her the night she arrived,” Red said quietly. “And I stopped them.”
She seemed to consider that for a moment, but she was so hard to read, Red couldn’t tell what she made of it.
Finally, she asked, “Did you kill them?”
“I did.”
“Pity.”
“Why’s that?”
“You could have questioned them and found out who hired them.”
Red hadn’t expected such a pragmatic response. Lady Hempist continued to surprise him. Maybe Hume was right, and Merivale could be an ally against the biomancers. But he didn’t want to risk it with his own problem without testing her first. And Nea’s assassination attempt could be the perfect opportunity to find out where Merivale’s sympathies really lay.
“I’m pretty sure I know who it was,” he said at last.
“Oh?”
“Biomancers.”
“Really,” she said noncommittally, which itself was something of a comment.
“But I gather you wouldn’t be overly surprised to find out that the biomancers sometimes meddle in politics.”
Merivale’s well-shaped eyebrow arched, and she turned back to Hume, who walked behind them with her serving men. “Have you been telling stories about me, Hume?”
Hume’s expression didn’t show the slightest trace of embarrassment. “I hope you will forgive me, my lady, but I did give Lord Pastinas to understand that you were not overly fond of biomancers.”
“I see.�
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They continued on down the street for a little while in silence. Red wondered if he had overstepped. Maybe Hume had been wrong. Or maybe Merivale thought Red was trying to lure her into a trap. And yet, she didn’t draw away from him, and her face remained calm, as if they were out on an innocent stroll through the city. He decided it would be best not to push. She knew where he stood. If she wanted to continue that line of conversation, she could. If not, he would let it drop and try to figure something else out.
Just ahead, Red noticed a wagon in front of a tavern called the Wheelhouse. It was hitched to a horse with gold and white imperial livery. One imp sat at the driver’s seat, looking bored. As they walked past, two imps came out roughly carrying a corpse between them. It was of an older man, clearly a commoner. His throat had been cut and his chest was covered in dried blood. The imps tossed him unceremoniously into the wagon, then went back into the tavern.
“Oh my,” said Merivale. “It appears there was a bit of trouble here.”
Red had a sinking feeling he knew what the trouble was. Between Nea’s arrival and the discovery that the biomancers had given him a secret weakness, he hadn’t given much attention to the murderer who still stalked the streets of Stonepeak.
“Would you mind waiting a moment?” he asked Merivale.
She pressed herself into his arm and smiled. “I have no urgent business elsewhere at the moment.”
“Thanks,” he said distractedly as he watched the entrance to the tavern. A minute later, the two imps came out again. This time they were carrying a young woman. There was a big, bloody wound in her side and there was dried blood on her lips. It looked like someone had slid a knife through her ribs to puncture her lung, then let her drown in her own blood.
“How grisly,” remarked Merivale.
“It is,” agreed Red as he watched the imps throw her into the wagon on top of the old man. “If you’d like to continue on to your errand, I understand. I need to watch this a bit longer.”
“If you can stomach it, so can I,” said Merivale, with an oddly wry tone to her voice.
When the imps returned with a third body, this time a young man who looked like he had been stabbed in the heart, and dropped him just as disrespectfully as the others, Red decided he was done playing well-behaved lacy.
“What happened here?” he demanded, walking up to the imp on the wagon.
The imp looked at him and Merivale apprehensively. “Begging your pardon, my lord and lady. Nothing you need to concern yourself with.”
“How many people were killed here?” pressed Red.
The imp frowned thoughtfully. “Six?”
“Seven,” called one of the other imps as he and his partner headed back into the tavern. His tone was surly, as if it was the dead people’s fault he was being made to do so much work.
“Seven, then,” said the imp on the wagon indifferently.
“It’s another killing, then,” said Red. “I’ve heard there’s been a string of them over the last few months.”
The imp shrugged. “Folk have been calling him the Shadow Demon, because he comes and goes like a shadow, and kills without mercy or honor.” He seemed mildly amused by that for some reason. But then he looked anxiously at Red and Merivale again. “Nothing for you to worry about, though, my lord and lady. This Shadow Demon, whoever or whatever it is, never goes after the nobility.”
“What a relief,” said Merivale, although Red was surprised to hear a measure of acid in her tone. “Yet, aren’t the common folk subjects of the emperor?”
“Of course they are, my lady.”
“Then as the emperor’s enforcers of the peace, shouldn’t you be more concerned with catching this murderer?”
“Oh… well…” The imp looked mildly panicked. Red guessed he’d never been directly admonished by a noble before. “It’s just, we don’t have any leads at present, my lady. We’ll keep looking, of course. But you know, if it really is a demon, well, I don’t know how much we can do about it.”
“Demon or no, we cannot allow a killer to run loose on the streets of the imperial capital,” said Merivale, the steel returning to her eyes.
“Y-yes, my lady.” The imp couldn’t even look her in the eye. “We’ll redouble our efforts.”
“See that you do.” She turned to Red. “Shall we continue on, my lord?”
“Yeah. I think we’re finished here.”
Red looked at Merivale in a new light as they walked down the street, leaving behind the imp and his wagon of the dead.
“Perhaps you will do me the honor of taking lunch in my apartment?” asked Merivale. “Where we may discuss your… biomancer problem in a more intimate setting?”
The apartments of Lady Hempist on the thirty-second floor were as surprising as their resident. The furniture, rugs, drapes, and decor were finely made, but there was a simplicity to her home that bordered on austere. The few paintings and sculptures on display were geometric shapes in bright colors that popped out immediately in the predominantly beige setting, yet gave nothing away about their owner, except perhaps a very mathematical mind. He couldn’t help but wonder what kind of stones player she would make.
As they sat down at her spotless glass dining table, he noticed there was something different about his host since they’d arrived at her apartments. No, not different, but rather something additional. She was still the cheerful and flirty lady as she discussed with her cook what to serve for lunch, but the occasional hints of steel he’d seen before were now fully present.
“Now, then, Lord Pastinas,” she said as the cook hurried off. She looked as though she was about to declare a shocking revelation of some kind, her eyes clear, her face calm. But then she smiled and said, “Care for some wine while we wait?”
“Sure,” said Red. “Ale is more my preference, but wine seems to be what the lacies drink, so I’m learning to like it.”
“How adaptable of you.” She nodded to another servant, who had been standing by with a carafe of wine. Red wondered if all her servants were men. It seemed appropriate, somehow.
As the servant began to pour, she asked as lightly as she had about the wine, “So you think the biomancers mean to assassinate the ambassador?”
Red glanced at the servant.
She nodded. “Your caution does you credit, my lord, but rest assured that everyone in my employ has been carefully vetted.”
“I’m taking a chance on you, Merivale,” he said quietly.
“But you need an alliance. Someone with more extensive connections in the palace. Someone you know who isn’t frightened by the biomancers.”
“Well, someone who won’t buckle to them, anyway,” said Red. “You’d have to be bludgeon not to be scared of what they can do, once you’ve seen it.”
“Trust me, my lord. I am far from stupid, and unfortunately, I am intimately familiar with what they are capable of. So I am an ideal choice. Also, you’re terribly charmed by me.”
Red grinned. “Am I?”
“Naturally. Most intelligent men are.”
“It seems that you may have fallen victim to my rakish charms as well.”
“It’s possible,” she conceded.
“How do I know that you’re serious about this, and it isn’t an elaborate plan to trick me into marriage?”
Her eyes twinkled with amusement. “I fail to see how that would conflict in any way with our alliance against the biomancers.”
“Well…” Red had been expecting her to at least make some effort to deny it.
“Besides,” she continued, “you’re so clever, I’m sure you’ll be able to use my affections to your advantage and still slip the noose of matrimony well before I pull it tight.”
Red was beginning to suspect that he was not actually the most skilled con artist at the palace. “You flatter me, my lady.”
“Are we done dancing around, then?” she asked.
“I suppose,” said Red. “So, here’s the length of it. The biomancers have used
the fear of invasion from Aukbontar as justification for their cruel experiments on common folk for decades now. If Nea is able to convince the emperor that Aukbontar doesn’t want conquest, the biomancers lose a great deal of their power. Naturally they’d want to stop this.” And of course, if there was a way for Red to reduce the biomancers’ power, it might help him escape their grasp.
“It’s a sound theory,” said Merivale. “But where’s your proof?”
“It’s true I killed the five boots who were after Nea and her people, but they were being led by a gaf named Brackson, who I knew back in New Laven as someone helping kidnap people for the biomancer experiments. Brackson escaped, but not before he made it crystal he was still working for the biomancers.”
“That may confirm your suspicions. But if you want to bring a legitimate claim to the emperor, you’ll need the testimony of this man.”
“My testimony isn’t good enough?” asked Red.
“All testimony needs corroboration.”
“What about Nea? She was there.”
“Ah, but she has a vested interest in discrediting the biomancers. Also, she’s not a citizen of the empire, so I’m not sure she would even be allowed to testify.”
“That might be a problem.” Even if Red did manage to get ahold of Brackson, and somehow force him to testify, there was the risk that Brackson might reveal Red’s own connection to the biomancers. On the other hand, maybe Red didn’t need to actually get him to confess. Maybe he could simply threaten it, which might give him enough leverage against the biomancers to bargain for his freedom. Once he had that, it would change the entire game.
“A problem?” prompted Merivale.
“I’m… not sure how I would track him down.”
“Then perhaps you could draw him out of hiding,” suggested Merivale.
“I don’t follow.”
“If the biomancers assassinated Nea while she’s here at the palace, that would draw down the wrath of Aukbontar. If they fear it as much as you say, they will avoid that at all costs. But if Nea were to leave the palace—better yet leave the city entirely—that might prove a tempting enough target for this Brackson of yours to make another attempt on her life.”