Foundryside: A Novel (The Founders Trilogy)

by Robert Jackson Bennett

  Stay here, he pleaded with his mind. Stay with me…

  Another shrieker ripped through the walls of the living room as Gregor crawled forward. Hot ash and smoking debris rained over him once more. He knew now that there was a third man in the hallway, armed with a shrieker, and he must have decided to use it when he heard the fight and his two compatriots did not emerge.

  But this should have been impossible. For a shrieker to work, you had to have a nearby lexicon that would permit it. And that was strictly outlawed in Tevanne. A shrieker brought within Tevanne should have been just another piece of dumb metal.

  What is going on? How is any of this happening right now?

  Gregor finally made it into the living room, exhausted and battered, still crawling forward with Whip in one hand. He crawled to the center and looked out the front door.

  At first, the way out was clear. But then a man stepped into the doorway, dressed in black. Balanced on one of his arms was a huge device made of metal and wood, like a monstrous, handheld ballista. Nestled in the pocket of the ballista was a long, slender iron arrow. It seemed to be quivering slightly, like a furious animal on a leash.

  The man pointed the shrieker at Gregor. Gregor, coughing and disoriented, stared at him.

  In a low, growling voice, the man asked, “Is the thief here?”

  Gregor stared back, unsure what to say.

  But then something flew in through the open balcony door. It was small and round, and it flew over Gregor’s head and landed just before the man with the shrieker.

  Then the world lit up.

  It was like someone had turned on a thousand lights at once, a sort of brightness Gregor had not known was even possible—and then there was a tremendous, earsplitting, earth-shattering bang.

  Gregor almost lost consciousness from sheer oversensation—or perhaps that was due to the blow to the head he’d taken.

  The light and sound faded. Gregor’s ears were still ringing, but his eyesight returned. He could see the man with the shrieker was still in the hallway, but he’d dropped his weapon and was rubbing his eyes, evidently as blinded as Gregor had been.

  Gregor rolled over and looked at the balcony door, just in time to see a very short girl dressed in black drop in out of nowhere, stand on the balcony, lift a pipe to her lips, and blow.

  A dart flew out of the pipe, zipped across the room, and hit the man with the shrieker in the neck. His eyes went wide. He pawed at his throat, trying to pull it out, but then he turned a dull shade of green and toppled over.

  Gregor’s savior put away the pipe and ran over to him. She looked at his Waterwatch sash, sighed, grabbed him by the arm, and hauled him up. Even though his hearing was still scrambled, he could hear what she said: “Come on, asshole! Run! Run!”

  * * *

  Gregor staggered through the alleys of the Greens, one arm thrown on the shoulders of his small but surprisingly strong rescuer. If anyone saw them they’d have assumed it was a friend helping a drunk get home.

  Once they were safe, she stopped and shoved him to the ground. Gregor tumbled over and crashed into the mud.

  “You,” said the girl, “are scrumming lucky I happened to be watching! What the hell is the matter with you? You and those other fools practically blew up the whole building!”

  Gregor blinked and rubbed the side of his head. “Whu…What’s going on? What was that back there?”

  “It was a stun bomb,” said the girl. “And it was damned valuable. I’d barely had it for more than an hour too. And a fat lot of good it’s done for me, after you’ve scrummed everything up!” She began pacing around the alley. “Now where am I going to get money? Now how am I going to get out of the city? Now what do I do!”

  “Who…Who are you?” asked Gregor. “Why did you save me?”

  “I wasn’t even sure I was going to,” she said. “I saw those three bastards watching the room and decided to hold off. Then I see you come and jump from balcony to balcony like a damned fool and break in. And then they see you and try to blow you to smithereens! I think I mostly did it so that one mad bastard would stop shooting up the Greens!”

  Gregor frowned. “Wait. What was it you said? Where are you going to get money? You…You mean you came to Sark’s for…”

  He stared at the young woman in black, and slowly realized that this person, despite having saved him, was likely one of Sark’s thieves.

  And, knowing it was Sark, it was suddenly likely that this young woman was the person who had robbed the Waterwatch and burned down the waterfront.

  Without another word, Gregor rose and tried to dive at her—but between her stun bomb and the damage the shrieker had done to him, he could barely walk in a straight line.

  The young woman danced aside and kicked his feet out from under him. Gregor tumbled down into the mud, cursing. He tried to stand up, but she put a boot in his back and shoved him down. Again, he was surprised at how strong she was—or maybe he was just that weakened.

  “You burned down the waterfront!” he said.

  “That was an accident,” she said.

  “You robbed my damned safes!”

  “Okay, well, that wasn’t. What did you find in Sark’s?”

  Gregor said nothing.

  “I saw you reading. I know you found something. What?”

  He considered what to say—and then he considered her behavior: how she’d acted, and what she’d done, why she was here. And he started to develop an idea of her circumstances.

  “What I found,” he said, “is that you have either stolen from, or stolen for, some of the most powerful, merciless people in the city of Tevanne. But I think you knew that. And I think your arrangement has gone quite wrong, and you are now desperate to escape. But you won’t. They will find you, and kill you.”

  She pressed harder into his back and crouched down. He couldn’t see her face—yet he could smell her.

  And strangely, her smell was…familiar.

  I know that scent, he thought. How odd…

  He felt something sharp being drawn along the side of his neck. She showed it to him—another dart. “Know what this is?” she asked.

  He looked at it, then looked her in the eye. “I am not afraid to die,” he said. “If that is your intent, I suggest you hurry it along.”

  She paused at that, clearly surprised. She tried to gather herself. “Goddamn it, tell me what you fo—”

  “You are no killer,” said Gregor. “No soldier. That I can see. The wisest course of action here is to surrender now and come with me.”

  “What, so you can have me harpered?” asked the girl. “This is some shit negotiation you’re trying.”

  “If you surrender,” said Gregor, “I will plead mercy for you personally. And I will do everything I can to prevent your death.”

  “You’re lying.”

  He looked over his shoulder at her. “I do not lie,” he said quietly.

  She squinted at him, surprised by his tone.

  “Nor do I kill anymore,” said Gregor, “unless I have to. I have had enough of that for one life. Surrender. Now. I will protect you. And though I will see justice done, I will not allow them to kill you. But if you do not surrender—I will not stop coming for you. And either I will catch you, or they will kill you.”

  She seemed to be considering it. “I believe you,” she said. She leaned close. “But I’m still willing to take my chances, Captain.”

  There was a sharp pain in his neck. Then everything went dark.

  * * *

  When Gregor Dandolo awoke, he was no longer convinced that consciousness was the best choice for him. It felt as if some foundryman had swung by, opened up his head, and filled it with smelted metals. He groaned and rolled over, and realized he’d been lying facedown in the mud for what must have been hours, since the sun was now out.
It was a miracle someone hadn’t cut his throat and robbed him blind.

  But then, it did look as if the young woman had covered him in trash and refuse so no one could see him. Which he supposed was a generous gesture—even if it made him smell like a canal.

  He sat up, whimpering and rubbing his skull. Then his thoughts turned to the young woman, and he remembered how she’d smelled.

  Her odor had been distinct. Because it had smelled like she’d been in a Tevanni foundry, or near a foundry’s smokestacks.

  And as Ofelia Dandolo’s child, Gregor knew a great deal about Tevanni foundries.

  He laughed to himself in disbelief, and stood and hobbled away.

  10

  The next morning, Gregor held his head high as he walked through the southern gates of the outermost Dandolo Chartered wall. As he moved from Commons to campo, the change was abrupt, and severe: from muddy pathways to clean cobblestone; from the odor of smoke and dung and rot to the faint aroma of spiced meat being grilled nearby; and then, of course, there were the people in the streets, whose clothing changed to being clean and colorful, whose skin became clear and unblemished, who suddenly walked without any ailment or deformity or drunkenness or exhaustion.

  It never failed to amaze him: you walked exactly one dozen feet, and fell out of one civilization and into another. This was the outer campo too, not even one of the nicer parts. Behind each door, he thought, another world waits. And another and another and another…

  He counted his steps as he walked across the threshold. “One,” he said. “Two…Three and four…”

  The guardhouse door popped open, and a Dandolo house guard in full scrived armor trotted up to keep pace with him. “Morning, sir!” called the guard.

  “Good morning,” said Gregor. Four steps—they’re getting slow.

  “Going far, Founder?” asked the guard. “Would you like me to call you a carriage?”

  “My formal title, lieutenant,” he said, glancing at the guard’s helm for his rank, “is Captain. Not Founder.”

  “I see, Foun…I mean, I see, sir.” He coughed nervously. “But the sachet you carry, ah, it notified us tha—”

  “Yes,” said Gregor. “I know what my sachet told you. Either way, there’s no need for a carriage, lieutenant. I am content to walk.” He bowed to the man, touching his brow with two fingers. “Good morning!”

  The guard, confused, stopped and watched Gregor leave. “Good day, sir…”

  Gregor Dandolo walked from the outer campo wall to the second wall gates. And, again, he had to turn down another offer of a carriage—as he did at the third wall, and the fourth, penetrating deeper and deeper into the Dandolo Chartered campo. The guards offered the carriages with a nervous eagerness, because Gregor’s sachet was flagged as founder lineage—and the idea of founderkin just walking around the campo on their own two feet was unthinkable to most Tevannis.

  The truth of it was, he would have loved a carriage ride—his head still ached from that poison that girl had put in him, and he’d already walked damn near across Tevanne the night before, looking for Sark. But Gregor ignored all offers. He ignored them just as he ignored the flocks of floating lanterns that coiled above the Dandolo campo streets, and the bubbling fountains, and the tall, white stone towers, and the beautiful women picking their way through the campo parks, adorned in silk robes and sporting faces painted with intricate, curling patterns.

  This could have been his—as the son of Ofelia Dandolo, he could have lived in these gleaming streets like the most pampered princeling in all the world. And maybe, once, he would have.

  But then Dantua had happened. And Gregor, and perhaps the world, had changed.

  Though from the way everyone on the Dandolo campo was acting, maybe the world had changed again, just last night. People looked grave, solemn, and shaken, and they talked quietly, in hushed, anxious tones.

  Gregor understood how they felt all too well. Scriving was the foundation of their entire society. After the blackouts last night, they were no doubt worrying their entire way of life could crumble to pieces, much like the Zoagli block, and take them with it.

  Finally he came to the campo illustris—the administrative facility, where the elites governed all merchant house duties. It was a massive, white structure, with a huge, vaulted ceiling supported by a curling vanguard of riblike buttresses. Countless officials trotted up and down the clean white steps at the front, gathering in clumps to discuss business in hushed tones. They stared at Gregor as he walked by, tall and only somewhat washed and wearing his leather armor and Waterwatch sash. He gave them no notice, leapt up the steps, and strode into the building.

  As Gregor paced through the illustris, he reflected that the whole place felt more like a temple than an administrative building: too many columns, too much stained glass, too many floating lanterns drifting amongst the vaulted ceilings, suggesting a divine light above. But perhaps that was the intended effect: perhaps it made those who worked here believe they worked the very will of God, rather than the will of Gregor’s mother.

  It could be worse, he thought. It could be like the Mountain of the Candianos, which is practically its own damn city, if not its own nation.

  He trotted up the back spiral staircase until he came to the fourth floor, where he took a winding hallway to a huge, imposing wooden door. Gregor hauled it open and walked in.

  The room within was long, ornate, and it ended in a huge, grand desk that sat before an undistinguished door. A man sat at the desk, small and plump and bald, and he looked up as Gregor entered. Even though Gregor was quite far away, he could hear the man’s miserable sigh at the sight of him: “Oh, for God’s sakes…”

  Gregor walked across the room to the desk, glancing to either side as he did. The walls were covered with paintings, and he knew most of them by heart, especially the more recent ones. He eyed them as he walked through the room—he’d been so distracted with his case, he’d forgotten to prepare himself for this.

  The painting he most dreaded sat at the end of the room, behind the desk. It showed a man, nobly built, nobly arraigned, and nobly positioned, standing behind a chair with his chin and chest thrust out. In the chair sat a tall, handsome, dark-skinned woman with curling black hair. Beside her stood a young boy of about five, dressed in black velvet, and sitting in her lap was a fat infant, wrapped in gold robes.

  Gregor stared at the painting—especially at the woman in the chair, and the fat infant. His gaze lingered on the baby. That is how she still thinks of me, he thought. Despite all my deeds and scars and accomplishments, I am still a fat, gurgling infant to her, bouncing in her lap.

  His eyes moved to the boy in black velvet—his brother, Domenico. He looked at the face of the painted boy, so earnest and hopeful, and felt a shard of sorrow somewhere within him. The child that had posed for this painting could never have known he’d die in less than ten years alongside his father in a carriage crash.

  The bald man at the desk cleared his throat, and said, “I…assume…that…” The words seemed to reluctantly drip out of him, like poison from a wound. “That you wish to…see her.”

  Gregor turned to him. “If I could, sir,” he said chipperly.

  “Now. You want to see her…now? Of all times?”

  “If I could,” said Gregor again. “Sir.”

  The bald man considered it. “You are aware,” he said, “that we have had a major scriving incident just last night. One we are still recovering from.”

  “I did hear rumor of that, sir.” Gregor smiled at him. He kept smiling, showing all of his large white teeth, while the bald man glowered back.

  “Fine,” said the bald man, exasperated. “Fine, fine…” He sat forward and rang a bell. The door behind him opened, and a young man of about twelve dressed in Dandolo house colors popped out.

  The bald man opened his mouth, but struggled with what
to say. He gestured to Gregor, then at the door, and, seeming to surrender, wearily said, “You see?”

  The boy nodded and ducked back into the doorway. They waited.

  The bald man glared at Gregor. Gregor smiled back at the bald man. Then, after what felt like hours, the boy popped back out again.

  “She will see you, Founder,” he said, his voice low and passive—the tone of someone used to being spoken over.

  “Thank you,” said Gregor. He bowed to the man, and followed the boy into the sanctum beyond.

  * * *

  To be the descendant of a merchant house founder was to wield an almost incomprehensible degree of wealth, power, and resources in Tevanne. One of the Morsini sons only took meetings in his private gardens, while mounted atop a giraffe bedecked in a jeweled saddle cover and bridle. Tribuno Candiano’s sister had apparently had a silk dress designed for each day of the year: each gown was labored over by dozens of seamstresses, worn once, and then promptly disposed of.

  So it was probably inevitable that Ofelia Dandolo, as not only of founder lineage but also head of the house itself, was a supremely impressive person. But what Gregor found most impressive about his mother was that she actually worked.

  She was not like Torino Morsini, head of Morsini House, who was hugely fat and often hugely drunk, and usually spent his time trying to stuff his aged candle into every nubile girl on his campo. Nor was she like Eferizo Michiel, who had retired from the burdensome life of responsibility to pass his days painting portraits, landscapes, and nudes—quite a lot of nudes, actually, Gregor had heard, chiefly of young men.

  No—Ofelia Dandolo passed her days, and indeed most of her nights, behind desks: she read and wrote letters behind desks, sat through meetings behind desks, and listened to her countless advisers prattle on and on from behind desks. And since that madness in Foundryside and the Greens last night, Gregor was not at all surprised to find her seated behind her desk in her personal office, reviewing reports.