by Taven Moore
All because of this man. It was his fault.
A lump of emotion rose in his throat, and he forced it aside. No, not now. Later, Hank would grieve.
Right now, Paladin Gerard wanted justice.
The small, emotional part of his psyche stepped aside and allowed the stone wall more room. What did it matter, without Bones? What did anything matter?
He lifted the hammer again, chest heaving.
A small, irritating, sensible, feminine voice interrupted. “Captain Hank Daniel McCoy, you will stop what you are doing this very instant, or I shall never forgive you!”
28. Remora’s Plan
Remora ignored the bloody mess of the man on the floor. She didn’t know who he was or what he’d done, but she had never seen Hank this way before.
She hoped never to do so again.
A bright white light shone, not just from the hammer, but from Hank, as well. The glow crept up his arms, like moss growing across the face of a stone.
Disturbing as the sight was, it was nothing compared to the look in Hank’s eyes. Most of his expression was hidden behind that leather Paladin mask of his, but the pain and rage in his eyes was so bald she didn’t need his whole face to see it.
“Honestly,” she said, thrusting away the tight knot of confused emotions she was feeling with practiced ease, “you look like some kind of monster. What would Bones say if he saw you now?”
The rage instantly shifted to grief, and the glow intensified, as if she’d thrown oil on a fire.
Her heart froze. The rage, she could handle. Deflect. Understand.
That grief, though. That was something else. Something she did not want to touch.
Her eyes, unable to maintain a lock with his, flicked across the room, cataloguing everything. Something was amiss, here.
One of her tutors had called her memory “remarkable.”
She remembered things. Things she’d read, and the page of the book she’d read it on. Formulas. Facts.
There was nothing remarkable about it, not really. Facts were . . . precious. Like delicious little bits of fruits you were able to store away and pull out whenever you wanted to enjoy them again.
Really, it had been more disappointing to learn that other people didn’t remember facts. What did they do with all that brain capacity, then? It was a mystery.
Still, if her ability was at all extraordinary when reading, she found it sharpened under pressure. Currently, she found herself under a singular amount of pressure, with a corresponding increase in the number of details she noticed.
The guards in the room were as guards always were—businesslike and unimaginative. Armed, frowning, awaiting orders. The one on the left had crumbs and a light red stain on one sleeve. He must have a sweetheart in the kitchen staff, or possibly a sister.
She forced herself to stop paying attention to the guards before she continued down the line, cataloguing. They weren’t interesting enough.
The room itself was remarkable enough to warrant a closer look. Skycities dated back to before the Great War, so of course the building was old. Almost alien, really. Back in Westmouth, the oldest buildings shared a . . . well, a flavor. A shape, or idea behind “how things should be done” that seemed completely different here. The room itself was a single spire, scraping the heavens. She could look up and see forever, it seemed. The walls were lined with statuary, most so far away that they could only be for the amusement of a winged race, like the Seraph themselves.
The entire structure seemed designed to make someone without the power of flight feel insignificant, and it worked. Her own wings twitched once in the confinement of her corset and she ignored them. Even if they were large enough to allow flight (which they were not), now would be an inappropriate time to investigate statuary.
Two of the shadows above were not quite consistent with the angle and brightness of the light. One of them, she was fairly certain she recognized as Mosley, the black and purple shonfra who had gone with Jinn to hunt down Snow and Percy. He perched on the shoulder of one of the stone statues above, and unlike the statue’s shadow, he did not flicker with the motion of the gaslight.
Granted, from this position, she could only assert that it was a very dark shonfra, but something about the way he held himself, the angle of his perch, matched that of Mosley.
The other shadow was much larger, and much better hidden. If she hadn’t seen Mosley, she might not have even spotted it, but there was a too-dark shadow in the alcove behind a particularly splendid statue above.
If the shonfra was Mosley, the other could only be Jinn.
Immediately, she felt more secure. If Jinn were here, then surely everything would turn out.
If he were hiding, he would not appreciate the attention, so she shifted her gaze away.
The seated dinner guest was intriguing. A Shinra’dor, pale of skin and with leathery wings draped to either side of his chair back, the man’s red eyes surveyed her with avid interest. She noted the signs of his beatings without really intending to. Bruising in multiple places, a broken horn, the obvious bandage around his throat. He wore a simple white gown, the sort prisoners wore in public. Two guards stood slightly closer to him than anything else in the room.
Definitely a convict. Interested, she peered closely at his face, matching his features up against what little she could see of Jinn’s face through his black wrapping. The eye shape, nose structure, and cheekbones matched, even if the skin color and horns did not. Jinn’s brother, then. The one that had been caught while he and Jinn liberated Snow.
Her heart hiccupped. Jinn had been so certain they could not rescue his brother. Perhaps she could keep her promise to him after all.
Remembering the scene at the docks, she forced herself to calm. Whatever game was being played here, the Seraph still held the upper hand.
She returned her attention to the room, filing away a million tiny details about the layout and decorations. The thread count on the tablecloth appeared to be unusually high, particularly for something whose drape and slight gleam indicated it was made of silk. The silverware was gold alloy, and every place setting was precisely duplicate. No matter how dedicated the staff, one might find at least one fork placed a millimeter or so too far to the left for a true match, but there was no such flaw here.
Everything was pristine. Not even the tiniest bit out of place, out of synch, out of perfection.
The part of her mind that noticed when things were not perfect found it all rather soothing.
The man’s body on the floor, however? That was not soothing, or perfect.
It was unpleasant. Chaotic.
The woman standing a few feet away was a Seraph. Lady Vakaena, no doubt.
Remora had seen Seraph before. This one was darker in complexion than the two she had already seen, but no less imposing.
As it had every time, her heart quickened with a traitorous hope. Her eyes scoured the woman’s beautiful face, seeking any sign of resemblance. The curve of a cheekbone, the tilt of a nose, the angle of a brow—anything, which might make sense of the fact that Remora was half Seraph. That she might in some way be related to these unbelievable creatures.
She saw nothing.
It seemed a joke. An insult, that she might be compared to one of the Seraph.
She turned her morbid curiosity away from the Seraph woman, continuing her scan of the room.
It was then that she noticed it. The thing she had seen from the beginning, but her mind had shied away from, even more strongly than she had avoided the body of the crushed human.
A ticker’s head, lying on the floor, as if it were trying to escape the mess of the body without truly succeeding.
Bones.
It was Bones.
Of course, it was Bones. What else could make Hank react that way? What else could make him lose such control?
Her scan complete, she allowed her eyes to move back to Hank. Almost no time had passed, though her mind had been so busy that it seemed that surely it had bee
n ages.
“Is that what this is about?” she asked the still-pained eyes of Hank.
She strode forward, lifting her skirts if she came too near the growing pool of blood beneath the still-gasping body nearby. Leaning down, she retrieved Bones’s head, tucking it gently beneath her arm. She kissed it gently on the forehead, though she knew there was no way it could possibly feel anything.
Bones had been a ticker. A cogsmithed man. Everything he was, is, or could be had been not in his head, but in his source. That vial of cogsmithed liquid and elements which drove him.
His heart.
“We can fix him, Hank.” Remora took a step closer to the captain. “I can fix him.”
A new voice cut across the room, like oil sliding along a water’s surface. “Oh, I’m afraid not. He was abomination. You won’t be doing anything at all without this, and I have no intention whatsoever of giving it to you.”
Remora looked up, to see the Seraph woman reach into her robes and pull out a fat glass bottle.
The liquid in the square-bottomed vial was a deep purple hue. Something floated inside, like bits of torn fabric, but it was too small for her to truly identify.
Vakaena placed the bottle on the dinner table, and Remora’s eyes followed it, horrified.
She had seen it once before, when Bones had loaned her his trench coat. After he’d found out her secret. After he’d become the first person to know everything about her. To treat her the same both before and after. To find out about her death, and to care.
To regret.
To mourn.
That square-bottomed bottle? That was Bones’s source.
That was the thing which made him Bones.
This woman . . . this thing . . . had unmade Bones.
Something small blossomed in Remora’s chest. Something both bright and dark at the same time.
She would find a way to unmake this woman.
First and most importantly, she would save Bones.
She walked forward, still holding Bones’s head, and placed her hand on Hank’s still-glowing wrist. She looked up into Hank’s green eyes and squeezed his wrist as hard as she could, forcing him to look down at her.
She smiled at him, then pressed Bones’s head into his hands. “It will be okay.” She squeezed his wrist again, making sure her nails pressed into his skin hard enough to make his brows draw together. She brightened her smile, but dare not wink at him. “Do take your seat, Hank. You are making a scene.”
For a moment, she thought he might fight her on that, but he must have caught something in her eyes, because finally he nodded and the glow faded from both his hands and the hammer. She steered him to the seat nearest Vakaena and sat him down, as carefully as if he were an unruly child.
She then turned that same smile on the Seraph, undiminished and unfaltering. “Might I visit the powder room, Dame Vakaena? I hate to impose, but I’m afraid your footman was quite insistent that I come right away.”
The Seraph paused a fraction of a second, but finally nodded. “Naturally, Lady Price.”
A guard snapped to attention, making as if to move forward. Remora lifted an eyebrow to him. “If it would please you, Dame, I propose that I have no need of a guard. I have hardly put forth any sort of struggle to this point. Do you really think I need a nursemaid to ensure my continued good behavior?”
Vakaena smiled, as if she found Remora’s words very amusing indeed. “Truth. Stand down. She’s a useless bastard, a mosquito. She was named well. Swims with sharks, but isn’t one herself. Go. Return with haste, as I have great plans. The way you came, down the hall to the left.”
Remora curtseyed, more to avoid looking at the suddenly avaricious gleam in Vakaena’s eyes than out of courtesy, before she turned and walked away from the gruesome mess on the floor, the strange Shinra’dor, Jinn, Mosley . . . and worst of all, a grieving Hank, who had very little reason to believe she could deliver what she said.
Silly man.
How often would she need to save him before he would begin to truly trust her?
On the way to the bathroom, she stopped to admire a lovely purple-leafed plant in the hallway. When she continued onward, the plant had five fewer leaves, though the casual observer would likely not have noted the loss.
She would save Bones.
That fact burned in her mind and heart, even more strongly than her need to prove Starbirth.
29. The Source of the Scent
Someone tapped politely at the bathroom door.
Remora cleared her throat. “Just a moment longer!” she called out.
Out of time. What she had would simply have to do.
She turned on the faucet to cover any sounds she might make, then scooped the remains of the crushed leaves into the dustbin. The bottles of ointments, tinctures, powders, perfumes, and lotions, she hurriedly shoved back into the courtesy cupboard without taking the time to arrange them precisely as they’d been when she arrived. With luck, no one would notice or consider it remarkable until they were long gone.
An entire bottle of rather expensive perfume oil had been sacrificed down the drain. Perfume being what it was, this meant the entire room now suffered an intense miasma of citrus and thick, cloying florals which might have been pretty in a very small dose. Given a choice, she would have preferred to use something less . . . potent, but unfortunately none of the other bottles had been even remotely the correct size or shape.
She picked up the final, remaining item on the marble counter and compared it to her mental image.
The perfume bottle was imperfect. It would easily pass a casual inspection, but the beveling on the face was entirely the wrong angle, and an artisan had worked a design of flowers and vines upon the bottle’s neck which was clearly visible in the right light.
She had managed to achieve precisely the correct shade of purple on the bottle’s contents, thanks to the plant leaves she’d snatched. The liquid inside the original had been slightly viscous, and she’d had to add too much soap to the mixture. A few bubbles clung to the inside of the glass, stubbornly refusing to deflate, but the oily, silky texture of the liquid fit her memory.
The scraps of cloth or paper inside had been easy. A few bits of petticoat and a sheaf of privacy paper provided a wonderful layer of pale bits, dancing in the purple haze.
She frowned. This would never fool her. After all, it also smelled overwhelmingly of flowers.
The knock sounded again, this time at a less polite pitch.
It wasn’t as if she’d ever conjured up an imitation ticker source before. She was limited to a few leaves and what she could find in a bathroom, for Starbirth’s sake.
She turned off the water, tucked the bottle into her sleeve, and reached for the door, just as the knocking sounded again.
As the door opened, the knocker reeled back, ears pinned flat against his head and eyes first widening with horror, then squinting in pain. His pink nostrils flared, and he hissed, lifting a hand to ward her away.
Her heart thrilled. He wasn’t warding her . . . he was cringing from the smell!
Relief coursed through her, a rush of sweet giddiness that almost made her laugh.
She was worried over nothing. It wouldn’t matter that the bottle smelled. After all, she was practically swimming in the odor. No doubt the Seraph would be unable to separate the two scents in time to recognize her deception.
Patting her hair, Remora schooled her features into disapproval. “I wish to report a problem in that powder room. I do not know what sort of terrible odor the previous tenant was attempting to cover up, but they have clearly gone too far.”
The cat dresl nodded, eyes still watering. It was the same cat who had escorted her from the auction. Poor fellow. He was having quite the adventure today.
He gestured weakly to the dining room, and she nodded at him.
“Oh, I wouldn’t miss this dinner party for the world, dear chap,” she smiled at him, then walked back to the dining hall, the fashionably o
versized sleeves over her gown hiding the trembling hand holding the false source.
This was for Bones. She could do this.
She entered the room, ignoring the rippling gasps of shock and disgust as her scent billowed into the room around her.
Snow had joined the strange Shinra’dor at the table, sitting next to him with her eyes lowered and her hands on her lap. Her thick, fluffy tail drooped to the floor, where it lay listless and unmoving.
Remora’s heart thudded. Poor Snow. All she’d wanted, all this time, was to escape. Yet here she was, in the one place she wanted least to be.
“Remora, what in the Roith’delat’en hells is that smell?” Hank, alarmed, had actually risen from his chair and stared at her as if he’d never seen her before.
Even Dame Vakaena took a horrified step back.
Hank reeled, the scent penetrating even his Paladin mask as she approached. “What happened? You didn’t . . . did you try to bake again?”
Remora smiled a tight smile at him, but her eyes shot daggers. Really? Did he think now was an appropriate time for joking? She was a perfectly adequate cook! It wasn’t her fault she lacked experience. He was the one who had banned her from the kitchens!
“There was a spill,” she explained, moving closer to him. “Do stop behaving so childishly, it’s not that bad.”
A few chairs down, the smell finally hit Snow. Her tail fur puffed up until it was three times its normal size, each hair standing on end.
Okay, perhaps it was rather bad.
She lifted her chin. It wasn’t as if she could simply wash it off. It was a perfume oil. She would need baking soda and vinegar.
Besides. This was for Bones.
She could smell like a cheap harlot for Bones, even if it was perfectly galling to do so.
As she approached Hank, he made as if to get up and give her his seat.
“Nonsense!” she said hurriedly, moving to push him back to his chair and giving him a severe look. His brows drew together, and she moved her hand down to his wrist under the table. “That is perfectly darling of you, and very sweet, dear Hank, but you are the captain of the ship and I believe that means you outrank me. This should be your seat.”