by Ari Marmell
“Wow.” She squeezed his hand in hers. (And oh my gods, when did I even take his hand?!) “I bet that was really, really hard for you to say, you righteous Guardsman, you.”
“Not as much as you'd expect,” he said, sounding vaguely bemused.
“So…What now, Julien?”
She knew it was coming, saw it in his face the instant she asked. Something akin to terror ran its fingertips down her spine as he leaned in, and she was frozen, trying to decide which way to run, when his lips touched hers.
At which point all thought of running-at which point all thought-was utterly lost, trampled into the dust beneath the sudden violent pounding of her heartbeat. She knew she made some sort of sound, though whether it was a cry or a gasp or a moan or some bizarre crossbreed of all three she couldn't possibly tell. And then there was nothing but his taste on her tongue, the fabric of his tabard and the muscles of his back beneath her grasping hands.
Where things might have gone from there, Widdershins had no notion-and, she realized with another surge of strangely delicious fear, didn't care-had Julien himself not pulled away after about two or three decades. “We're, uh, not exactly alone,” he whispered with a peculiar hitch in his voice.
“What?” she asked dreamily, her expression utterly unfocused. And then, with a quick blink, “Oh! Um…I, um…”
As Widdershins appeared to be too busy turning red to actually form a cogent sentence, Julien simply smiled, gave her hand a final squeeze, and moved to rejoin the others, all of whom were very palpably not looking in the couple's general direction.
Widdershins coughed once, ran her fingers through her hair (which didn't need brushing), told Olgun to shut up (though he wasn't saying anything), and, shoulders straight and chin jutting, strode over to the others.
Had she been less preoccupied with what had just happened, or with covering for what had just happened, or with the homicidal faerie haunting the city, she might have noted Renard grinding his teeth, or Robin's red-rimmed eyes-but odds were that even if she had, she'd never have correctly interpreted them.
“So,” she said, dropping into an empty chair and practically daring anyone to comment. “Have we decided anything?”
“Um…” Igraine coughed delicately. “His Eminence and I have discussed the magic in question, and we're fairly certain that you could briefly share a portion of your-that is, Olgun's-gifts with someone else.”
“Well, that makes things easier! I mean, I'm not sure that even two of me would be enough to take on Iruoch, but it's certainly-”
“There's also substantial risk,” Sicard interrupted, “that whoever linked with you would also suffer irreparable damage in the process. He'd be tapping into a divine power that wasn't intended for him. It's not inconceivable that it could cause the body to burn from the inside out, or become so stressed that even a small scratch could prove fatal.”
“Oh. Uh, that's less good, then.”
“It is.”
“Then what-”
“I'll do it,” Brother Ferrand said softly. Then, after giving the chorus of objections and protests a moment to subside, he continued, “I'm aware of the risks I'm taking. But you must understand, I've been part of this from the beginning. I aided His Eminence in his efforts. If there is any blame to be had for calling Iruoch to Davillon, I share in it. Bishop Sicard must cast the spell; he cannot be a part of it. I can.”
“Ferrand,” Sicard said, “are you certain?” He sounded as though he might cry again.
“I am, Your Eminence. I must do this. Please.”
Sicard bowed his head. Widdershins felt a gentle waft of sorrow from Olgun. “It won't be your fault,” she assured him. “All of which is well and good,” she continued more loudly, with a brief smile of respect to the monk, “but it's not sufficient. As I was saying, even two people who can do what I can do may well not be enough. We need more.”
“I can only link people in pairs,” Sicard said. “If we had others with your abilities-or even others who were more highly skilled than we are-I could work with that, but I cannot join more than one person to you.”
“Can we just overwhelm the creature?” Constable Sorelle asked. “I saw him take injury from a pistol, if only briefly. If we were to gather enough Guardsmen-or even Guardsmen and Finders together…”
Igraine and Sicard both shook their heads. “If Iruoch is drawn to emotion, as we believe,” the priestess said, “then he's certain to sense people's presence, however well hidden. If he feels there are enough of us to threaten him, he'll simply wait for a more opportune time. We have to keep the group small. Major Bouniard, have you any particularly skilled fighters in the Guard? Anyone whose presence might make a difference?”
Julien frowned. “My men and women are good, no doubt, but…Well, none that are so dramatically more skilled than myself that they'd tip the balance.” He shrugged. “Guards have to fight, but it's not all we do, so we can only train so much….”
“I know who we need,” Robin told them weakly. “So do you.”
Widdershins, at least, did Robin the courtesy of not pretending any confusion as to whom she meant.
“Are you completely out of your mind?!” she demanded (which, honestly, probably wasn't substantially more courteous than if she had pretended confusion as to whom Robin meant).
“Can you tell me I'm wrong?” Robin asked.
“Yes! Yes, I can. You're wrong! You're so wrong, there aren't enough syllables in the word ‘wrong’ to encompass how wrong you are!”
“Um, what are we talking about, here?” Sicard asked mildly. The two young women ignored him, if they even heard him at all.
“I'm not,” Robin said, “and you know it.”
“Robin…” Widdershins stood and put her hands on the younger girl's shoulders. “He's our enemy. He hates me. Gods, he kidnapped you!”
“No, really,” the bishop said. “Who are we-?”
“And he was going to let me go,” Robin reminded her.
“That doesn't excuse-”
“No, it doesn't. Shins, I'm not suggesting that he's suddenly our best friend or anything. But I spoke to him. I listened to him. I don't pretend to understand his code of honor, but I know he has one. Under the right circumstances, I think he can be trusted.”
“Under the right circumstances, so can the average trapdoor spider!” Widdershins snapped. “What does that-?”
“How many people told you about him, did you say? Said that he's one of the greatest duelists alive today? Not just in Davillon, but in all Galice? If you're looking for someone good enough to make a difference, while keeping the group small, you know you won't find anyone better suited.”
“Ugh!” Widdershins threw up her hands and began to pace, just a couple of steps in each direction, before her friend's chair. “Robin, I don't think you know what you're asking.”
“Is anyone going to fill the rest of us in?” Sicard asked, his tone starting to grow petulant. Renard leaned over and began whispering in his ear.
“I know this is more important than anyone's personal grudges,” Robin continued relentlessly.
“Yes, but-”
“It's more important than your pride, Shins.”
“This isn't about pride! This-”
“It was important enough that you sent someone else to save me.”
Widdershins stumbled to a halt, nearly tripping over her own feet.
Was that what this was really about? Was Robin testing her, to see if she'd do as much as she'd demanded of others, put the needs of the moment above her own feelings? Was the girl maybe even punishing her, if only a little?
And…After all that had happened, didn't she have the right to want to know?
“All right.” The words were bile on her tongue, actually burned the back of her throat, but still she coughed them up. “All right, Robin. I'll try to convince him. But if he kills me, you're the first one I'm haunting.”
Robin smiled, if only faintly.
“Sta
rt planning,” Widdershins told the others. “I'll be back soon.” One last, brief glance-lingering, perhaps, on Julien's troubled brow-and she was gone.
That this particular suite of rooms was nicer than the average house in Davillon would have come as no surprise to any visitor. Quality (read: ostentation) was the hallmark of the Golden Sable mansion block, located at the fanciest end of Rising Bend, scarcely more than a bowshot away from the estates of Duchess Beatrice Luchene herself. What might have surprised such a hypothetical visitor was the size of the suite; it was substantially larger than those same average houses. A combination sitting and dining room opened up into numerous hallways, which in turn led to almost a dozen additional chambers. The carpeting was thick and plush enough to have silenced the hoofbeats of a mule (and yes, said mule could potentially have fit through the door, while carrying saddlebags stuffed with unnecessary luxuries). Chandeliers hung from the ceiling, their glass and crystal adornments glinting like stars in the light of their many candles, and the overall stench of the city was cloaked by pomanders hanging near the numerous doorways.
One of the rooms farthest from the front door, however, was utterly unlike the others. In this chamber alone, the carpet had been pulled up, the bulk of the furniture removed, the window covered by a sturdy square of wood. Several straw-stuffed mannequins stood along one wall, and heavy bags of sand hung at random intervals from the ceiling. Through it all, currently clad only in a pair of heavy hose, Evrard d'Arras twisted and spun, lashing out with rapier and dagger (the former of which was rather less ornate than the one he'd so recently lost). Straw flew and sand poured in torrents, yet so precise were his strikes that the bags barely swung or twisted as they opened to his blades. Sweat poured from Evrard's face, but he found that the growing knot of frustration-and, if he'd been more honest with himself, confusion-in his belly refused to loosen.
Finally, cursing in disgust, he stalked across the room and grabbed up a pair of towels-the first for his face, the second to ensure that no particles of sand clung to the steel.
“Jacques!” Evrard hadn't brought any of his family's servants with him to Davillon, but the Golden Sable included a few valets and maids as part of their amenities. “Jacques, some wine!”
He'd completed cleaning the weapons and replaced them on the wooden rack, present beside the door for just that purpose, before it occurred to him that his shout had not been answered.
“Jacques?”
Another pause, another failure to respond. Evrard frowned thoughtfully. He'd never been particularly fond of the valet with whom he'd been provided, but neither had the man ever failed in his assigned tasks before today. The fellow probably just hadn't heard him-but then again, despite the size of the suite, it'd be the first time, were that the case.
Casual and unhurried, Evrard finished toweling off, retrieved the frilled tunic he'd left hanging on the edge of the rack and pulled it over his head, and once more lifted the rapier from its niche. Blade held before him, relaxed but ready, Evrard proceeded into the hall.
His footsteps, utterly silent on that veritable lawn of carpeting, had carried him past the bedroom, the bathing chamber, the dressing room, and several closets when he found himself in one corner of the sitting room. To his left was a mahogany table on which he kept a great many of his items for going out: rings, buckles, his hat, and several pistols. Beyond was a hallway leading farther back into the apartment, boasting doors to either side, culminating in a large window.
Leaning against the wall beside that window was a chair that someone had dragged from the dining room. And seated casually in that chair, her ankles crossed before her…
“Hello, Evrard,” Widdershins said.
She couldn't help but smirk, even through her simmering anger, when the aristocrat jumped-however faintly-at the sound of her voice. She saw his entire body twitch, subtly but vaguely in the direction of the table.
“No point,” she told him. “I unloaded them.”
He froze, glanced at the flintlocks, and nodded. “Of course you did.” He flexed his wrist, just enough to tilt the rapier in his fist. “I can be down that hallway in seconds.”
“Yep. And I can be out that window in less. At which point, I haven't wasted anything but time and breath, and you never find out why I'm here.”
“I suppose you expect me to believe that it's not to kill me?”
“Kind of a stupid way to go about it if I were, yes? Announcing myself and putting you on your guard?”
“Maybe. Maybe not. Honestly, I don't understand you at all, Widdershins.”
“That,” she hissed through clenched teeth, “is an understatement.”
They both waited, letting their glares conduct the duel that their bodies were avoiding.
“How did you find me?” Evrard finally asked.
Widdershins scoffed. “You're a visiting blue blood who spends more on a month's rent than the Flippant Witch pulls in over a good couple of years. How did I find you? I asked.”
“Ah. And Jacques?”
“Tied up in the kitchen. Unless you're talking about a different stuck-up servant, in which case I have no idea.”
“Ah,” he said again, then gestured with his chin. “And my sword? Are you planning to return that?”
“This?” Widdershins's hand dropped to her waist. “This isn't your sword.”
“No? It looks an awful lot like-”
“Your sword,” she explained patiently, “had a ruby in the pommel. This one doesn't. Ergo…”
“I see.” A scowl, and then more silence. Finally, “Why are you here?”
“I-Did you really set out to destroy my life, and to kill me, over a theft?” she demanded.
It was clearly not what she'd been about to say. “It wasn't just ‘a theft,’ damn it! You broke into my family's ancestral home! You took heirlooms that had been with us for generations!”
“And which you hadn't touched, or even looked at, in over a decade,” she pointed out.
“Utterly immaterial. This was about family honor!”
“Oh, I see.” She couldn't possibly have masked the scorn in her voice, even if she'd bothered to try. “So threatening to take away my dead best friend's tavern, kidnapping an innocent girl…These are about honor, are they?”
Evrard's face flushed, but he couldn't quite meet Widdershins's eyes. “Why,” he growled again, “are you here?”
“I need your help.”
Evrard burst into a belly laugh, doubling himself over-it was probably more luck than anything else that he didn't stab himself in the forehead with his rapier-and even Widdershins couldn't quite keep the grin off her face. “Yeah,” she said when his fit had finally subsided. “I know.”
“All right,” he said, wiping away tears of near hysteria with the back of his hand. “I'm listening.”
So he did, and Widdershins spoke. She didn't keep much from him-only some of the details of Olgun and their relationship-and over the course of her narration, the last of the humor faded from his face.
“There are some,” he said carefully, “who would call me crazy for even considering that you might be telling me the truth.”
“There are,” Widdershins agreed. “There are also some who would call me crazy for coming to you with this kind of story if it wasn't entirely true.”
“There is that. But-”
“And if you'll trust me just long enough to come with me, His Eminence, the bishop, should confirm it. Unless you think I've got him in my pocket, too.”
“Suppose,” he said slowly, “I'm not prepared to trust you even that far?”
Widdershins sighed loudly. “Do you think I want to be here, Evrard? Do you think I want to be talking to you, instead of dropping something heavy on you from a very great height? We need you!”
“Why should I help you?” He asked it as an honest question, with no challenge in his tone.
“You're not. You're helping all of Davillon. You're helping a whole bunch of people who'll be slau
ghtered by this creature if it's not stopped.”
“And why do you think that matters to me, either?”
“Because you care about your family's honor. And because you were about to let Robin go.”
“Damn it…” She knew she had him wavering, could literally see the indecision working its way across his features. “Widdershins, I don't know…I-”
“When this is all over,” she pressed, “assuming we're all still around, I'll challenge you to your stupid duel.”
“Will you, now?”
“I swear it. Time and place of your choosing.”
“And my rapier?” he asked, apparently just to be ornery.
“This isn't your rapier. But if I'm dead, you're welcome to take it.”
“All right…All right.” He somehow seemed to nod with his entire body as the decision was made. “Just let me get properly dressed.”
Widdershins smiled brightly. “Don't forget to untie the valet on your way out.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“I don't know,” Widdershins hedged, her fingertips trailing across a dusty stretch of old, cracked marble. “This is starting to feel a little disrespectful, don't you think?”
Sicard turned slowly away from his painstaking preparations, accompanied by a melodious popping in his back and cracking in his knees, and sighed. In the tone of a man repeating himself for the umpteenth time, he said, “The creature is most uncomfortable on hallowed ground, so we require just such an advantage. A cramped space, with lots of surfaces to climb, favors him over us, so the church would be inappropriate, even disregarding the danger to innocents. This truly is our best option, Widdershins. I think the families would understand-and I know the gods will.”
Widdershins frowned even as she nodded, glancing around once more at the array of tombstones and burial plots stretching away in every direction. They had set up shop at a crossroads of the footpaths that wound between the rows of resting dead, and Julien had stationed members of the Guard at the entrance to dissuade mourners and visitors from entering, but she still didn't feel as though they were even remotely alone.