A sick feeling twisted inside of me and I took the wooden steps slowly, careful not to make a sound. I drifted toward my room, my whole body cold, and after I closed the door and lit the candle, I sank onto my bed with my heart in my throat.
My mother and father were stealing six crates of gemstones from a pier on the night they died. It was a carefully planned job gone horribly wrong when the man Henrik paid off to miss his shift at the harbor watch was replaced by another.
My uncle had sent my parents to their deaths for gemstones and tonight, he’d sent me into harm’s way, too. It occurred to me just how close to death I may have come. If Arthur thought I was with the watch, he could have killed me. Maybe Ezra would have watched as he dumped me into the dark water to be devoured by the sea’s creatures.
I swallowed down the nausea in my belly as I unlaced my boots with numb fingers and pulled them off. They toppled to the floor, the candlelight moving over the muddy leather. A tear slipped down my sore cheek as I got back to my feet and picked them up, opening the door. I set the boots into the dark hallway and then closed it, staring at the wood.
Sariah had tried to tell me, many times. But the words were only beginning to make sense. There was family, and there was business. And there was more to the Roths than the name.
EIGHT
The boots practically looked new. I stood in the open doorway in my nightdress, staring at them on the wooden floor. They’d been lined up perfectly side by side and were fit with new laces, the nutmeg-stained leather glowing rich in the morning light.
I’d always taken Sariah’s preoccupation with presentation as vanity. Eccentricity, even. But now, it was beginning to make sense. Tidy and timely. She’d grown up in this dark, damp house with the same rules as the other Roths and I was less and less curious what the consequences for breaking those rules were.
Beside the boots, my frock was neatly folded on a short stool. I bent low to pick it up, letting the violet fabric unroll before me. The blood had been scrubbed clean and the button at the wrist replaced with another that was almost identical. Everything was as it should be. As if the previous night had never happened.
The door beside mine suddenly swung open, filling the hallway with bright light, and I jumped, clutching the frock to me. Ezra came out of his room and shut the door heavily behind him, barely glancing in my direction as he made his way to the stairs. There was a coldness to him that filled the air every time he entered a room, and it made me shiver beneath my nightdress.
I didn’t know what kind of hard-heartedness it took to stand in the shadows and watch someone be slapped across the face. More infuriating was the knowledge that he’d probably watched me cry in that alley, wiping the blood from my chin.
I swallowed down the thought and picked up my boots by the laces. When my door shut, I let out the breath I was holding. Maybe Ezra thought his problem had been dealt with, his point proven. He’d made it clear that he didn’t want the long-lost niece from Nimsmire here and that his part in the family business was his alone. Maybe he and Henrik had schemed together on whatever plot they’d been discussing in the study last night. But Ezra didn’t know me, and neither did Henrik. I’d spent years dressed in petticoats with combs in my hair, but I was still a Roth. And if I was going to avoid another incident like the one at the pier, I needed to act like it.
I tossed the frock on the bed and went to the mirror, inspecting the bruise at the corner of my mouth. My face looked much worse this morning. Even though I’d told Henrik I didn’t want Sylvie’s help, he’d still sent her to my room, and she’d done her best to clean it by candlelight. She’d also ordered me to use a compress every hour that she’d had delivered to my room throughout the night. Clearly, she’d seen her fair share of cuts and bruises in this house. I didn’t doubt that it came with the territory. And if he troubled himself with the upkeep of my boots, I could only imagine what Henrik would think about my looking like this. There was a part of me that relished the idea.
I got dressed quickly, checking myself in the mirror more than once to be sure nothing was out of place. This time when I went downstairs to the busy breakfast room, I wasn’t late.
Casimir, Murrow, and Ezra were waiting beside their places at the table. When I came into the room, Casimir stared at my cheek, studying the bruise.
“That’ll smart for a few days,” Murrow jabbed. That seemed to be his way—making light of heavy things.
But I wasn’t laughing. “Yes, it will.” I enunciated the words, speaking more loudly than was necessary as I set my gaze on Ezra. I waited until his eyes lifted.
The corners of his mouth turned down just slightly, giving him away. He knew that I knew. I may not have known who my allies were in this house, but I’d definitely marked an enemy. And I wanted him to know it.
Murrow’s fingers tapped the back of his chair impatiently as Sylvie set out a silver tray of cheese and two pots of tea. When he took the watch from his pocket to check the time, the hand moved to seven. The very same moment, Henrik’s footsteps sounded from the hall and he appeared, his own watch in hand. He snapped it closed as he took his seat and the rest of us followed, pulling out our chairs.
“Any messages?” He glanced at Casimir, reaching for the tea.
Casimir answered with a shake of his head. “Not yet.”
“It’ll come,” Henrik said, almost to himself.
I was beginning to recognize when there was something at play, and this was one of those times. Henrik had asked the same question at dinner two nights before and again at breakfast yesterday.
“What do you have on this business with the Serpent?”
Casimir tore the piece of bread in his hands. “Looks like both Violet Blake and Simon are vying for the contract. Won’t be pretty by the time all is said and done.”
“Violet Blake,” Henrik echoed, the wheels turning behind his eyes.
That one was easier to decipher. Simon was the watchmaker, and the Serpent was the ship they’d spoken about at family dinner. The contract was likely an agreement for trade. If Simon was bidding on it, then Violet Blake was his competition, another gem merchant in the guild.
“Wouldn’t want to be caught between those two,” Casimir added. “Violet Blake is playing with fire. No one crosses Simon and lives to tell the tale.
I took a bite, listening. The Simon that Casimir described didn’t sound like the Simon I’d met. But I knew enough about the guilds to know that there was plenty of dirty business to drown every single merchant in.
“I have a feeling Simon has underestimated Violet. There’s a snake beneath all that pretty silk and lace,” Henrik mused. “Either way, Simon and Violet at each other’s throats will only help us. I couldn’t have planned it better myself.”
Ezra set his elbows onto the table as he sipped from his cup, barely touching the food on his plate. He was quiet as usual, giving one-word answers to Henrik’s inquiries, and the set of his brow made him look indignant. But this morning, his gaze drifted to me more than usual.
Henrik went over the day’s agenda, checking things from his book as he went from Casimir to Murrow to Ezra. Not a word was spoken about the night before and I was glad. It had been humiliating enough to stand there in the study with blood on my frock, and Henrik had made it clear that it was the least of his concerns.
When they were finished, they dismissed themselves one by one, setting out to the day’s tasks, and finally Henrik turned to me. “You’re with me today, Bryn.”
I folded my napkin without question and followed him out of the breakfast room, happy to be released from my unfinished food. The hot tea hurt my lip and chewing woke the furious ache in my jaw. I’d lost my appetite anyway.
I followed him past the kitchens to the black door at the end of the hallway that I had yet to see open. He pulled a key from inside his vest pocket and fit it into the lock, turning it with a click. The damp scent of wet stone came from inside and my eyes trailed over the long rectangular room. Thr
ee worktables were set into even rows before a forge that glowed in one corner and a furnace in the other. Dim blue light cast down from the grimy glass ceiling, the corner of the slanted panes darkened with moss and soot. A few of the panes were propped open to let the heat of the forge and furnace escape.
At the end of the table to the right, Ezra was slipping an apron over his head and tying it around his waist.
So, this was where he disappeared to during the day.
Henrik took another apron from a hook on the wall and put it on unceremoniously as I studied the details of the room. It was a workshop. There was only one other door that looked as if it led outside and the wall beside the forge was covered in hammers of all shapes and sizes, hung by their heads on rusted nails. They were one of the only things in the room that shined brightly, the iron polished and gleaming. Beneath them, a long shelf was filled with other tools—picks and files and hand saws.
“We all have a job, Bryn,” Henrik began, weaving through the tables to the opposite corner.
I followed, watching Ezra from the corner of my eye. He kept his back to us as he stoked the coals in the forge, giving no indication that he’d even heard us come in.
“You’ll earn your keep, like everyone else.” Henrik pulled up a stool in front of a set of scales and motioned for me to sit.
The table was filled with gems. Obsidian, sapphires, tiger’s-eyes, and emeralds glittered in small wooden trays. Another pile that looked like raw-cut rubies was sitting in one end of the scales.
I picked up one of the tiger’s-eyes. It was tumbled smooth, revealing the black veins within the stone.
“Every day, after breakfast, you’ll check the weights and mark them down,” Henrik continued, dropping a small book beside me. He opened it to the last recorded page, showing me where the date and labels should go.
“They’re all fakes?” I asked.
“Not all of them. We use the real ones to create uniformity and to pass inspections. Some will be used in commissioned pieces, others will be sold to merchants. But all will fetch coin.”
“How do you tell the difference?”
Henrik smirked. “You can’t. That’s the point. The only eyes that can spot these fakes are those of a gem sage. Luckily for us, there are few out there anymore.” He took the tiger’s-eye from my fingers, setting it down. “I trust Sariah taught you your gems?”
I nodded. She’d painstakingly taught me from the time I was little. I could tell you their names, the ways they were cleaned and cut, and I could identify the impurities and patterns of every single one. I wondered now if that had been part of her deal with Henrik, too.
“Good.”
He set himself up beside me, taking me step-by-step through the process with a surprising amount of patience when I asked questions, or requested he show me something a second time. There was an ease to Henrik within the walls of the workshop that I hadn’t seen before. He worked with steady, thoughtful movements, talking me through every aspect with care. It was evident that the work was important to him. He hadn’t shown even half of that concern to me the night before, and that told me more about him than I’d been able to put together in the few days I’d spent in Bastian.
“Three times,” he said. “Always three.” His finger tapped the page, where each weight had been written in triplicate down the columns. “If a single stone goes missing, I will know. And if the weights are off, I will know that, too.” His brows lifted, waiting for me to acknowledge what he’d said.
When I did, he got up, going to the opposite side of the table, where he had long, flat trays of glass sorted by color. Muted blues, dusty greens, and pale ambers were broken into pieces of every size and shape.
He set his focus on the glass and I watched him as I placed the tiger’s-eye onto the scale. There was a delicate balance between Henrik’s warmth and the brittle cold in him. They shifted so fast that I couldn’t tell the difference between the two until I felt the pointed edge of his displeasure. He was like a knife that appeared deceivingly dull but was sharp enough to cut through bone.
I set another stone into the tray, getting to work. I didn’t want to find myself beneath that blade.
NINE
By the time I finished the weights, Henrik had another tray waiting for me. They were a couple dozen red beryl fakes that were cut into various sizes and more than convincing.
I understood the basic process after watching him for only a couple of hours. He carefully chose the glass remnants from his extensive collection, mixing the colors with precision to recast the shattered pieces. They went into the furnace, where they were reheated, and when they first came out, they appeared to be no more than large, glowing droplets of liquid. But once they began to cool, he meticulously formed them and worked at their shapes with fine-edged tools to create convincing rough cuts. It looked as if they were straight from a gem merchant’s turnover.
It was incredible, really, a series of very specific steps that produced very specific results. It was the kind of process that took generations to perfect and I guessed that he’d spent his childhood in this very workshop at my grandfather Felix’s side, learning it.
What I couldn’t figure out was how he managed to get the weights right. Each fake looked like it was made with the same few ingredients, but the weights were all different. Each tray he handed me was right where it should be for whichever stone the glass was impersonating. It was a mind-boggling feat, and one I hadn’t been able to decode in my quick glances between recording the numbers.
I picked up one of the red beryls and held it up to the light coming from the furnace, turning it slightly. There was no apparent distinction between the glass and the real thing and some poor bastard in Ceros would pay a purse full of coppers for it.
I set it into the tray, my eyes drifting to Henrik, who was taking a large jar from the shelf. It was filled with what looked like a black powder. I squinted, watching him remove the lid until my eyes refocused on what lay beyond the table. Across the room, Ezra was polishing the head of a pointed hammer with a clean rag. But his gaze was on me.
I froze, making the scales swing on the table and his attention cut quickly to Henrik, who was scooping the black powder from the jar. In the next instant, I could have sworn that Ezra gave me the slightest shake of his head.
My eyes instinctively dropped before I glanced over my shoulder. Henrik had a long pick clutched in his teeth, his brow furrowed anxiously as he searched the box of tools on his workbench for whatever he was looking for. When I looked to Ezra, he had his back turned again.
I didn’t know if I’d imagined it or if my eyes were playing tricks on me in the low light of the workshop. But it appeared as if Ezra was giving me a warning. And not one laced with a threat.
A rattling knock sounded at the workshop’s entrance, making me jump, and Ezra dropped what he was doing, hanging the hammer on the wall. I watched as he walked toward the door, cracking it only a few inches until he saw who it was.
“Henrik,” he called out, letting the door open wider.
Murrow stood in the hallway, waving the folded parchment in his hand. There was a devious smirk on his lips. “It’s here.”
I turned on my stool to see the same wide, wicked grin spread across Henrik’s face. “All right”—he dropped the pick on the table with a loud ping—“get everyone in the study.”
“I’ve already sent for Noel,” Murrow said. He was beaming.
Henrik abandoned the jar of black powder and untied his apron with quick fingers. Across the workshop, Ezra did the same before disappearing through the door.
“Well?” Henrik said, staring at me. “Come on.”
Surprised, I slid from the stool and followed him. There were voices coming from the study, where the fire was lit, and Henrik immediately took to his pipe, sitting before the closed envelope on his desk. Beside it, there was a small package wrapped in brown paper. Henrik’s name and the address of the house was penned in a delicate script acros
s its front.
Casimir sat in one of the armchairs with Murrow stationed behind him, and Ezra was leaning into the corner, which I was beginning to think was his usual spot. I wasn’t sure where my place was, but I was sure that in Henrik’s mind, there was one. Unspoken expectations were drawn beneath everything in this family.
When no one directed me, I went to stand next to Murrow, the only place in the house I seemed to be the slightest bit comfortable. He continued to grin, as if there was a delicious secret in the room, but still, no one spoke. Henrik puffed on his pipe silently until we heard Noel come into the house.
It had taken him only minutes to arrive, and Tru was on his heels, stopping at the study door before his father closed it. It wasn’t until Noel was sitting in the other chair that Henrik finally looked up from the message. He cleared his throat before he picked it up, and that mischievous smile returned as he tore his silver letter opener through the wax seal.
Everyone waited as his gaze skipped over the contents and when he looked up, there was a bright twinkle in his eye. “Five days.”
Casimir clapped his hands together with a loud pop, making me wince. When I searched the faces of everyone in the room, they all looked delighted. More than delighted. But Ezra still stood in the corner, looking grim. He was the only one who wasn’t celebrating.
“Is it enough time?” Noel asked. He was on the verge of an uncharacteristic smile himself.
Henrik dismissed the question with a wave of his hand. “Of course it is.”
“But—” Noel started, and Henrik cut him off.
“Don’t worry. Bryn will be ready.”
“Ready for what?” I said it without thinking. My hand gripped tight to the back of Casimir’s chair and Murrow stiffened beside me.
Silence fell over the study and Henrik set down the letter, sticking the pipe back into his mouth and folding his hands in front of him. “You didn’t think you were only here to work the scales, did you?” He laughed. “No, we’ve got more important plans for you, my dear. We’ve been officially invited to a dinner at a very influential merchant’s house. And in a matter of days, we’ll have his patronage to the guild.”
The Last Legacy Page 6