by Ari Marmell
But then, there were those who scoffed at the danger, either refusing to believe the rumors or pointing out that the odds were pretty dramatically against any one specific person falling victim. There were those willing to take any risk, if it meant the success of this endeavor or that. And there were those whose livelihoods or objectives simply required that they brave the late hours.
Such was the case with Faustine Lebeau. The young woman-just a sliver older than Widdershins, though such a comparison would have meant nothing to her, as the two of them had never met-served as a messenger and courier for several of the city's wealthier merchants. As such, she was a common sight on the streets whenever she was required, day or night; long limbs pumping as she ran, her hair trailing behind her in a streamer of blonde so pale it was almost silver. Tonight, one particularly careless vendor had neglected to pay his supplier of fine textiles-for the third time this year-and had sent Faustine to deliver his last-minute apologies and to assure the good fellow that his fee would be forthcoming first thing in the morning.
A fairly mundane errand, all things considered, but one that kept Faustine out into the late hours of the evening. The walkways and alleys by which she passed slowly emptied, the sounds of footsteps faded into the distance, until she felt-no matter how much she told herself it wasn't true-that she was the only soul left in Davillon.
A moment later, as the soft laughter sounded from above, as some dark silhouette scuttled downward along the side of the nearest home, she wished she were.
She ran, then, ran as she never had while on a simple commission, her deep-blue skirts and formal blouse soaking up the not quite rain as efficiently as bath towels. She refused to slow even long enough to look behind, biting back a whimper and speeding up even further-though her legs began to ache and her side to burn-when she heard the chilling laughter still close to heel.
And then Faustine rounded a corner, and couldn't help but scream. The shape had somehow gotten in front of her, was now dropping from another wall to land before her in the street. Faustine fumbled for the dagger she kept in her skirts-she carried a small flintlock, too, but even had her hands not been shaking too violently to aim, the drizzle would assuredly have spoiled the powder-and raised it before her in a competent knife-fighter's grip.
The creature only laughed harder. With impossible speed, as though moving between heartbeats, it darted forward. Faustine got a glimpse of heavy black fabrics, covering the form from head to toe, before it lashed out at her wrist. A shock of pain traveled up her arm, and the dagger flew harmlessly from her numbed fingers.
Whether Faustine would have been injured and terrorized, as most victims of the peculiar apparition had been, or whether she would have been the first to suffer a more terminal fate is unclear, because neither occurred. Even as the dark-wrapped figure straightened an arm to strike, the scuff of a boot in the shadows snagged the attention of creature and courier both. Both craned their necks to look, and it was only the assailant's inhuman speed that allowed it to leap away from the path of a whistling blade.
Faustine couldn't make out much about her savior-not between the dark, the drizzle, and the rapid movement. She saw only a tall man in a dark coat, wielding an elegant rapier against the thing that had attacked her. His feet practically danced across the cobblestones, and his sword wove elaborate designs in the air. Faustine had seen more than her share of duels, and though it was difficult to tell when he faced such a peculiar opponent, if he wasn't easily one of the best swordsmen she'd ever seen, she'd eat the dagger she'd recently lost.
Still, he was human (or so he appeared, and so she assumed), and his adversary didn't seem to be. The man in the coat launched a series of rapid thrusts from a variety of surprising and sometimes nigh-impossible angles, and each time the silhouette shifted away at the last moment. Yet neither could the phantasm penetrate the woven web of sharpened steel long enough for even a single counterattack.
They settled swiftly, even instinctively, into a pattern that was nearly a dance, with each specific slash or thrust leading to a particular twist; each attempted riposte resulting in a specific parry. Step, step, cross-step, twist; thrust, slash, parry, lunge. Their feet on the cobbles provided a musical accompaniment, and the entire affair was borderline hypnotic.
And then, without so much as a flicker or a tremor to give himself away, the man in the coat broke that pattern. Rather than parry the dark figure's attempted grab, as he'd done half a dozen times now, he instead lunged forward on bended knee, dropping so low as to pass beneath the outstretched arm, and drove his blade home. Only the tip of the rapier, the first inch or so, penetrated whatever flesh lurked beneath the heavy black fabrics.
The result was a very human scream, immediately followed by the figure scampering off far faster than any normal person could have pursued. Something about the acoustics of the street and the heavy, rain-drenched air made it sound as though the shriek of pain echoed back at them from a different direction the same instant it erupted from the cloth-wrapped throat.
Faustine darted forward to stand beside her rescuer, who was currently examining the tip of his blade. Although it was already starting to run in the gentle rain, the liquid beading on the steel certainly appeared-so far as the feeble lighting allowed her to see it at all-to be normal, red blood.
Even as she opened her mouth to speak, however, the man shrugged and faced her. “Would you, m'lady, happen to have a cloth or a handkerchief you'd be willing to part with?”
Puzzled, she reached into her bodice and removed a scrap of linen. He bowed from the neck, then proceeded to clean his blade. “I can, of course, reimburse you for this…,” he began.
“Oh, don't you dare!” She smiled, even as she shouted. “I think I can afford the cost of a handkerchief for the man who saved my life.”
He returned her smile, sheathed his rapier, and began casting around as though looking for something. “I'm just glad,” he said, “that my own errands have kept me in this part of town. Otherwise, I'd never have been near enough to hear your cry.”
Faustine shuddered briefly at the implication-and then knelt as something caught her attention. From the shadows where he'd first emerged, she lifted a sodden tricorne hat.
“Is this what you're looking for?” she asked.
He bowed once more. “Indeed it is. My thanks, m'lady…?”
This time, there was no mistaking the question. “Faustine. Faustine Lebeau. And you, sir?”
“Evrard.”
“And have you a family name?” she asked after a moment of silence.
His smile widened, and he chuckled softly, as if at some private joke-or, perhaps, a memory of earlier that day. “I do,” he told her.
And just like that he was gone, vanished once more into the Davillon night.
CHAPTER FOUR
For several minutes-actually, rather longer than several minutes, if truth be told-Widdershins stood on the sad Ragway street and just glared at her destination. Her hands were clenched into pale fists, her hair plastered to the side of her face by the gentle but constant rain, and she really wanted nothing more than to turn around and go home.
“No, of course I'm not going to,” she answered Olgun's concerned query. “They want me to talk to them, I talk to them. I'm not that stupid.” And then, before even the god could possibly reply, “Shut up.”
Olgun responded with wounded innocence-a feeling not quite capable of hiding his amused self-satisfaction-and allowed Widdershins to return to her brooding.
The building across from her was a decrepit, dirty eyesore of a structure. Ostensibly, it was home to a rundown business specializing in pawnbrokering, caravan insurance, and similar endeavors, and was always on the verge of shutting down. At this point, though, Widdershins wondered why they even bothered maintaining the front, since pretty much everyone in Davillon-or everyone involved in either the law-enforcement or law-breaking communities, anyway-knew what the place was really for.
She herself had
only been back a few times in the last half year or so, partly because she hadn't been stealing much-she really had tried to run the Flippant Witch as Genevieve would have wanted her to, no matter how unsuccessful (and, to be blunt, bored) she was at it-but primarily because a rather disturbing number of her fellow guild members were pretty eager to see her dead.
It had been here, six months ago, that Widdershins had come in a last-ditch effort to escape the clutches of a demon (yes, a real one), and the religious fanatic who had summoned it. She'd succeeded in doing so, thwarting their schemes in the process, but the creature had slaughtered over a dozen members of the Finders' Guild before it fell. The Shrouded Lord, leader of the Finders, had decreed that Widdershins's actions had actually saved the city and the guild from something far worse, and the guild's priests had backed him. As such, Widdershins's standing in the Finders' Guild was officially just fine, and she should be perfectly safe. Unofficially, not everyone in the ranks was so forgiving.
“Well, fine!” she announced abruptly, startling not only Olgun, but a small mockingbird that had landed for a brief rest on a windowsill nearby. “I'm supposed to be here, yes? So if they want trouble, well, they're welcome to it!”
As announcements go, it probably wasn't the most reassuring she could have made, seeing as how she could literally feel the sudden doubt radiating from her divine companion. But by that point, having made up her mind, she was already marching across the street. Chin held high, she pounded heavily on the door.
“Appointment with the taskmaster,” she announced as a concealed panel in the door slid aside, allowing the sentry within to get a good look at her.
“Hey!” She didn't recognize the voice, but then, it wasn't as though she could possibly know everyone in the guild. “Aren't you the one who-?”
“Yes! Yes, I am. And I don't want to hear it. I'm sorry about whatever happened to you, or at you, or near you, but it wasn't my fault. The Shrouded Lord said so and the priests said so, so get over it!” By the end of the brief but heartfelt tirade, she was actually panting.
“I…Uh…I was just gonna say, you have serious guts coming here. I don't know if I could do it if I were you, even if I was summoned. I'm impressed.”
“Oh.” Widdershins felt her face grow warm even in the chilling rain. What was that, three times today someone's made me blush? What in the name of Banin's overcoat is wrong with me?! The fact that she could feel Olgun laughing at her certainly wasn't helping matters any. “Uh, thank you?”
“You're welcome.”
Silence, save for the faint patter of the rain. Then, “Um, can I come in now?”
“Oh, sure.” A loud clatter as several bolts drew back, a single, louder thump as the bar (a relatively new addition) was removed, and the heavy portal swung inward.
The hall beyond was largely as she remembered it, save for certain portions of the walls that had been more recently repainted-hiding bloodstains, for the most part. The door guard, a young man with a scraggly beard and so many acne scars that he looked as though he'd been shot with a miniature blunderbuss, might not have held any animosity toward Widdershins, but the same couldn't be said for a number of the others. As she made her way through the winding, twisting hallways beneath the pawnbroker's-the halls that were the true headquarters of the Finders' Guild-she couldn't help but note that one of every three or four faces went sour at her approach. A few frowned unhappily, but most of them twisted in angry scowls, baring teeth or mouthing profanity-laden threats. A few hands even dropped toward daggers or flintlocks, but invariably the fact that the Shrouded Lord had forbidden any retaliation was sufficient to prevent the potential violence from turning into actual violence.
Widdershins, for her own part, marched through the halls as though she were thinking of buying the place (but found it too drab and distasteful to seriously consider), ignored Olgun's worried chatter as best she could, and struggled not to quiver or look over her shoulder every time she turned her back on the angriest of those hostile faces. She briefly considered trying to find her old mentor Renard, if only for the comfort of a friendly face down here, but she decided, reluctantly, that she couldn't really spare the time such a hunt might require.
Ostensibly, she should make a point of stopping by the shrine before proceeding to her appointment. The Shrouded God-patron of the Finders' Guild, member of the Hallowed Pact, and the inspiration for the Shrouded Lord's own title-was not a demanding deity, but the guild still had customs and rituals its members were supposed to follow. The idol itself-mostly stone but with a hood of thick fabric hiding its features, because anyone other than the priests or the Shrouded Lord who looked upon that face was subject to an awful curse-stood in a thick-walled, carpeted chamber at the very heart of the guild's labyrinthine headquarters. Convenient to most of the organization's offices, it would have been a matter of minutes for Widdershins to swing by and offer a few prayers; and Olgun, since he knew full well that she didn't mean a word of them, certainly wouldn't have objected.
Widdershins, however, went nowhere near the heavy metal doors providing ingress to that shrine; shuddered, in fact, when she passed them by, and smelled the faint traces of incense from beyond. Lots of memories lurked within the shadows there, and not a one of them pleasant.
Instead, she moved straight for a door in one of the passages adjacent to said shrine. The wood had scarcely ceased vibrating from her first knock when a voice called, “Get the fuck in here!”
“Well,” she said to Olgun as she pushed the door open, “at least he's in a good mood, yes?”
Laremy Privott-or “Remy” to most Finders-had been taskmaster (that is, lieutenant to the Shrouded Lord) since the dismissal of Lisette Suvagne late the previous year. Imposingly tall and broad-shouldered, bald as a stressed tortoise from the neck up but hairy as a northman everywhere else, he looked very much like someone had simply shaved an ape's head. (Though this was not, it should be noted, a comparison that anyone actually made aloud when Remy himself was in the room.)
Today he was clad in heavy trousers, which helped to minimize said simian comparisons, and a white tunic, which might have done so if individual hairs hadn't been protruding through holes in the weave.
He also, Widdershins couldn't help but note, wasn't alone in the chamber.
“Taskmaster,” she greeted him with a bob of her head. And then, turning to his other guest, “Hey, Squirrel. How's the jaw?”
“Go to hell, bitch.”
“Hey!” Remy snarled across his desk-a massive, antique monstrosity that was clearly too nice for the otherwise frugal office and had most probably been stolen from somewhere fancy. “None of that! Both of you, sit!”
They sat. The office contained four rickety chairs (not counting Remy's own); perhaps unsurprisingly, Widdershins and Simon took the ones on the edges, leaving two empty seats between them.
“Good. Now, we're gonna have a couple of words about your little disaster at Rittier's manor last week.”
“She ruined-!” Simon began, simultaneous with Widdershins's own, “If that idiot-”
“Shut up!”
They shut.
“Widdershins, you haven't worked a lot of jobs since the Shrouded Lord promoted me, so maybe you've forgotten, but we're a guild, not a gods-damned social club! That means that if you're hitting a big target-such as, just for instance, anything likely to attract other Finders besides yourself-you coordinate! You keep us the hell informed!”
“But I-”
“That wasn't a question!”
“Got it,” she grumbled.
“And you!” Remy continued, swiveling to face his other victim. “Wipe that fucking smile off your face before I carve it off you! You're a bigger fool than she is!”
“But-”
“What the hell were you thinking, you diseased jackass? You bring an entire crew with you? Try to rob a noble estate at knife-point? To take hostages?!”
“Finders rob lots of people,” he protested.
; “Not the aristocracy, gods damn it! You want to steal something from one of the blue bloods, you do it quietly! You trying to bring the whole fucking Guard down on us?!”
“What are they going to do? They've known where we are for years, and they haven't…they…” Simon trailed off, looking as twitchy as the rodent for which he was named, as Remy slowly rose and leaned over the desk.
“I,” he said, his voice abruptly calm, “am this close to wringing out your brain and using it as a sponge. At which point, I should point out, it will probably become more useful than it is right now. Are you hearing me?”
Squirrel nodded. Widdershins, deciding that safe was definitely better, at the moment, than sorry, nodded too. Just in case.
“If you'd killed any of the nobles,” Remy continued, “we'd probably have handed you over to the Guard ourselves. We sure as hell wouldn't even be considering paying bail for your idiot friends.”
Squirrel's eyes brightened, perhaps reflecting the escape route he suddenly saw for himself. “Nobody would've been caught at all if it wasn't for her,” he spat, pointing. (As if there were any other “her” in the room to whom he could have been referring.)
“Oh? And how's that?”
“She helped them, Remy! Helped the damn Guardsmen grab some of my boys!”
“That so?” he growled, turning once more.
Widdershins sat straight in the chair, refusing to cringe or even so much as frown. “Not initially. I actually got involved, even after Squirrel and his nuts messed everything up, to keep them from getting arrested.”