Deception: Rogues of the Red League, Book 1

by Blackburn, Briana

  She sighed again, taking in the face of the twin brother that she wore like a painted-on mask. It sent a pang of dismal longing through her. While she genuinely believed in no gods and no saints, she certainly wished any of them might be with him.

  Because they certainly weren’t with her. Not now.

  She turned back to the man in the chair, wading closer. She lifted one of his lids, annoyed by the thick fan of lashes which lazily came up and revealed the quivering eye beneath.

  Asha hadn’t knocked him out too deeply. Good. She needed him awake for just a little bit longer. Poking around in one of the pockets concealed in the underside of her cloak, she coaxed a small vial out of her pocket. A little slip of the antidote to what she’d poisoned him with earlier would bring him back just long enough for her to get some questions in and then a handy set of instructions. She drew back the lower lip of his stern mouth to let two droplets fall in, then stepped back to watch him jolt to life.

  He twitched in his chair as though he’d been struck by lightning, yet was held firmly in place by the strong bindings Asha had wound around his arms and legs. Wound tightly by the looks of it. Asha could be merciless when she wanted to be. It was one of the things that Tiana liked best about her second-in-command.

  “Welcome back to the land of the living, comrade. So good of you to join us.”

  Bewildered, the man called Steffan blinked ever so slowly. The initial shock to his body had worn off and he was drooping once more. That was exactly what Tiana was hoping for. Guys like this were so much easier to talk to when they weren’t really all there.

  “Whaz happenin’?” he slurred.

  “I poisoned you!” announced Tiana cheerily in the deep voice she crafted; luckily she’d been portraying her brother long enough now that it came quite naturally.

  “Poisoned...me?” he repeated thickly. He squinted at her. “Do you kn..know who I am?”

  “I know that you were poisoned.”

  The man retched dry air.

  Tiana winced. “Sorry about that. Sometimes death doesn’t go down all that friendly.”

  “I—I am Rij...jork Ha..ugen,” he said with a woozy groan. “A..and you’re under a..arrest.”

  Bemused, Tiana leaned back against the desk, her fingers on her elbow, the leather flexing. “Am I now? You’re a bit far from the palace, Your Highness. What would a pretty prince like Roland Haugen be doing in the Sludge? You’re Captain of the City Guard, aren’t you? Shouldn’t you be somewhere…I don’t know…captaining?”

  “I..Ira,” said the man who thought himself the prince. Apparently Tiana had given him a bit bigger of a nip of Yai root than she meant to.

  “Your man Ira is fine for now, as long as he doesn’t do anything stupid. If you follow the same lines, maybe I’m prepared to offer you a deal, Your Highness.”

  “A d...deal?”

  “Yes, a deal. We can even shake on it. Not at this moment of course, but perhaps one day. Presuming you accept.”

  He didn’t look impressed.

  “The way it looks to me, princeling, is you have very little time before you die. And quite frankly, I’m not much of a reader, so I have no clue the precise way, or what to give you to remedy your, hmm, death?”

  “Y..you don’t read..read instructions?”

  “I don’t read anything at all. Except signs. And all signs right now are pointing one way, and that’s down.”

  His eyes were trying so hard to focus that they’d narrowed to near slits of concentration. She almost felt a bit bad for the guy. Only a bit. You didn’t get far in this world if you let every ounce of your bleeding heart peek through. She preferred to let the thing cry in her chest where no one else could see it rather than wear it on her sleeve. It worked out better that way for everyone.

  It also made people follow you just a bit easier when they didn’t really think you had a heart to begin with.

  “First question I have: why were you meeting with the Cricks tonight?”

  “H...hired.”

  “Come now, you can’t expect me to believe that. Try again.”

  It must’ve taken quite a bit of effort but Steffan managed to roll his head back, so Tiana could stare up his nostrils, but he could see her just a bit better. Even now he managed to scowl quite well, considering how he likely couldn’t feel his face.

  “I....keep t..track of n..new gangs.”

  “A babysitter, eh? By playing fun little characters like this one?”

  “Y..yes.”

  “Alright, we’ll omit that question for now, because I don’t think you’re going to let go of your little prince-fantasy any time soon. Now, moving on. What are the Cricks looking to export?”

  “F..fa..fairy.”

  “Ah, the green lady. Any plans for import?”

  “N...no.”

  Tiana bit her lip. That was good, although it simply meant that she would have to keep a tighter eye on the Cricks, which was already proving to be a pain in the Red League crew’s asses. There was, of course, the matter she’d tried addressing to her father months ago, but he’d scolded her for having that idea. Unless she strong-armed him now…

  “Last question,” Tiana sauntering over. She put a finger under Steffan’s chin. She made sure to dig in the head of the needle she kept under the finger of her glove as deep as she could without breaking the skin. “How good are you at keeping a secret?”

  His eyes glowed and she was unnerved by how much clarity existed in his gaze when it shouldn’t. A part of her had the distinct feeling he was playing up the effects just a little bit too. Which, of course, she had to begrudgingly admire. That, among other fine assets.

  “I c...can,” he replied.

  “Right. That’s what I thought you’d say.”

  Then she released the rest of the poison into the artery in his neck.

  He gasped, eyes rolling back. Tiana wasn’t fast enough, nor nearly strong enough, to stop him from tipping backward.

  She winced as the wood splintered and cracked under his weight and he hit the floor hard, the ties on his arms and legs going limp.

  Scowling, she nudged him with her toe to make sure he as good and out before she got any closer in his range. She’d already been pressed up against him once today, at the end of a rather unfun-looking blade, and she wasn’t interested in repeated the ordeal. Not even if he’d smelled abnormally good like this one did. When you spent as much time in the Sludge as she did, not to mention the other sweaty, boozy individuals that lived there, you came to appreciate the clean scent of man.

  Satisfied he was out cold, she crouched beside him and slung one heavy arm over her shoulders. Grunting, she dragged him towards the window, her lungs and hamstrings protesting loudly in her ears. With her shoulder and a palm on a blessedly firm pectoral muscle, she held him to the wall so with her free hand she could unscrew the mechanism on the window. It was a rusty son of a bitch and she cursed foully under her breath until it finally gave way. It released just a little too quickly and she ended up swinging halfway out the window itself.

  Panting, she pulled Steffan’s body against hers, bracing the full weight with her spread feet. It was an odd crab walk sideways, but she finally managed to line him up with the open window, the breeze wandering through and sweeping his musky amber scent all around her.

  Gods, she could gobble that smell up.

  If only she had the time to ask him for his perfume recipe. She scoffed at the very thought. Maybe next she could braid his hair, too.

  Tiana peeked one more time around his bulk, calculating the distance. Satisfied, she slid her palms across his chest, feeling his languid heartbeat as her fingers skirted over it. Counting through her teeth, she pressed her cheek up against him in preparation for as much leverage as possible.

  “Up you get, princeling,” she muttered, and then with one generous heave, toppled him out through the open window.

  He hit the pile of garbage precisely as she planned, though she did not account full
y for the noise. His hand slapped against a metal lip and the clatter rang through the night.

  Tiana heard the scuffle of movement below, someone’s interest had piqued enough to investigate. She hoped Asha would stall them for the next portion of her grand trick.

  Pulling the window shut, she unhitched her pistol from her side. She twirled it once around her finger, so it caught comfortably against the palm of her hand. She thumbed the garnet switch at the side of the barrel. The clockwork inside made a low hissing noise and the garnet switched to brightest ruby, nearly the same color as her hair in the sunlight.

  Grinning, she leveled the barrel with the dilapidated wall she’d scoped out earlier and pulled the trigger.

  * * *

  Sauntering down the stairs, she met a sea of the Cricks’s gaping mouths. Smoke trailed behind her, nipping at her heeled boots as it seeped out of the now destroyed upper office.

  “Where’s the fellow, bossman?” asked Opie, the man closest to the stairs and Asha’s roommate. There was a cigarette dangling from his mouth.

  “Blasted to smithereens with half the office,” she declared, stopping beside him on the stairs. She batted the cigarette out from between his lips. “Careful, those things’ll end you, Opie.”

  He grinned sideways at her.

  “Sorry, Killer.”

  Tiana snorted. “I think you could come up with something better than that.”

  “Don’t got the time, Killian. S’near four in the morning.”

  “Better make this quick then, eh? You have to get up with the kids in the morning don’t you?”

  The other Red League snickered.

  “Ain’t no ladies pinned me down long enough to get those things outta me.”

  “He ain’t lasted long enough for em to try!” cried another Red League, which sent even more spews of laughter.

  Tiana strolled over to where Sam Dandy still sat, his ridiculous plague mask still on his face.

  “Hallows was last month, Sammy,” she said, pulling the long nose of the mask as she ripped the thing off. “Time for masks is over.”

  Sam merely smirked at her; she was certain he’d come out of his mother with that expression plastered across his face. “Good seein’ ya, Killian. You know it’s impolite to kill another man’s muscle without askin’ first.”

  He nodded over her shoulder and Tiana glanced at the merchant, whose face was paler than death. It made no sense why Ira was so distraught over the loss of Steffan. Maybe they’d been lovers.

  Tiana didn’t have the time to comfort him and whisper in his ear that his hulking, lying pretty boy was safe. He’d figure it out come morning when the poor bloke crawled in through the door. Of course, he’d be sick for days afterwards and then weakened for a while longer no thanks to the Yai root, but he’d live. If he’d run into nearly anyone else in the Sludge beside her, might not have been the end of the tale.

  “Don’t worry about Steffan. He’ll be fine,” she said dismissively, turning back to Sam. “It’s you I came here to see, comrade. I came to collect my tribute.”

  “Don’t have it.”

  “Oh, no, Sammy that just ain’t true.”

  “I don’t have any coin this month. We’re just starting up.”

  Tiana tutted. “Should’ve held onto your brother’s coattails just a bit longer, Sammy boy. Mal paid his tribute right on time, even added a little extra for good faith. Too bad he didn’t donate any of that spare change to his baby brother.”

  “I’m not a West Ender no more,” he snapped.

  “Well, you know, I guess we could take something else from you. Something that’ll equal the amount.”

  Sam’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah, Sammy. I’ll let you and your Cricks comrades walk away then. I won’t put your entire crew in early graves. Know what, I’ll even offer you a deal. League’s truth on it.”

  “League’s truth? What kind of deal is that?”

  Tiana chuckled. ‘It’s the kind of deal where you get to keep breathing. I want your allegiance, Sam.” She leaned in close and asked with a goading smile, “Tell me, who’s your Don?”

  “Certainly not your father, you mother fuc—”

  Tiana punched him square across his mouth. It was the best shot for the least impact with the most drama.

  He sputtered, spitting up blood.

  “Who’s your Donny?”

  He coughed, teeth utterly coated in crimson.

  “Don’t expect me to ask a final time.”

  Sam glared, succumbing to the pressure. Tiana almost felt a little bad for the guy. He wanted to be independent. He wanted his own gang. Paying tribute was one thing, which allowed him to get his stuff out of the city. That didn’t happen if de Rossi said no. But declaring allegiance…declaring a Don above himself...

  “De Rossi,” he growled.

  Tiana de Rossi pat his cheek, pleased when he flinched. “Atta boy, Sammy. You can keep your gang. Call yourselves whatever you want, but know who you belong to. Every month, you bring your numbers to Don de Rossi. You lay it at his feet in the name of his son Killian. Can you remember that? We give you what you think you deserve at the end of each month. You get your names as merchants at the best ports. Our ports. Hell, maybe in time we’ll even let you start importing.”

  “Thank you,” Sam said, his eyes burning with fury. “And the tribute?”

  “What’s my name?” Tiana cooed, just because she couldn’t resist.

  “KILLER! KILLER!” howled the fellow Red League who stood at her back. Even Asha was shouting along with them.

  “That’s Don Killer to you, plebeian!” she whispered to Sam.

  Chapter 3

  The halls echoed Tiana’s footsteps as she climbed the stone stairs up the backside of the Castle of Adalin, rubbing the fresh scar on her throat. The rising sun was already peeking through the dusky clouds, the brightness widening to a dim saffron light as the world awoke outside.

  Tiana yawned widely, her jaw cracking as she pushed open the door which would lead her to the corridor of rooms behind the library where the apprentices slept. She slogged her way past the closed doors and the loud snores behind them before slipping into her single room. It was outfitted simply. A bed, a shelf, a mirror above a water basin and a chair meant to be used in quiet reflection. Most of the time, it just held a pile of her clothes.

  Rubbing her bleary eyes, Tiana stripped out of the simple pants and sweater she’d changed into back in the chilly woods outside the castle and slung them on the chair. Next, she wiped the makeup from her face, taking care to scrub the stippled stubble from her chin. Finally, she dunked her head in the basin and scrubbed a hand viciously through her hair. She hissed through her teeth as the frigid water sent trilling notes of shock through her body. With sopping wet locks dangling in her face, she fiddled a small braid down her head before collapsing entirely on the narrow single bed. The iron frame supporting it groaned in protest.

  “Oh, hush, you,” she muttered, rolling on her side and closing her eyes for a few blessed moments. She was just drifting away, nestled down into the enormous bags of bruises beneath her eyes, when the door to her room was thrown open.

  Fingers grabbed her upper arm. Shaking and demanding commenced in her brain; the high pitch of the noise driving her nearly deaf.

  “I’m awake!” she cried, blindly grappling to push the body off of her.

  “Get up. Get up! The master needs you immediately!”

  Tiana glared at the woman she’d thrown off, wrenching clothes from the mountain high chair.

  “Serai, there is no way he needs me this early in the morning,” Tiana hissed, prepared to turn over and drift off. “And in my dirty clothes, no less.”

  Serai wasn’t having it. Her plump friend seized her shoulder and manhandled her into a shirt.

  “Gods! Get off me, woman!”

  “You must get up, Tiana,” she urged. Her eyes had narrowed their hazel depths and were now lined with
red. She herself was only wearing her dressing gown. Silky black hair spilled from the mess on top of her head. Tiana had never seen her so mussed and disheveled. “You are the most well-read in botany in the castle and the Master cannot be of help. He’s had another one of his coughing fits in the night. He’s sent me to fetch your aid. So do as I say and get up!”

  “Alright!” Tiana slid from the bed and pulled on the pants offered to her. She’d barely fashioned them around her waist when her black velvet apprentice robes were launched in her face. “You didn’t even give me underclothes,” she muttered, though obediently pulled it over her head.

  When she cleared the heavy fabric—her head popped through the collar and her arms through the bell sleeves—she squawked to find Serai raiding her private store of herbs.

  “Serai!”

  “I’m sorry!” the woman snapped. “But your breath is horrible!”

  “I’m sure whatever person I am helping in such an emergency will not care how my breath smells!”

  “There is no time to explain,” she said, cramming a cluster of slightly wilted mint leaves into Tiana’s hand. She barely had enough time to touch it to her tongue before she was herded out the door, a medkit thrust in her empty hands. Tiana opened her mouth to demand more than this, but froze when she saw the guards standing outside her door. Breathless, Serai pushed her towards them.

  One of them, the shorter one, with dark skin and a mop of wild hair curling around a grizzled beard, moved in an attempt to steady her, but Tiana was nimble and caught herself. She didn’t need to be saved by a male who resembled a great bear. Or any male for that matter.

  “Sorry for the rush, Miss…?”

  “Tiana,” she said shortly, blowing a piece of damp hair out of her face as she straightened. “No need for the Miss.”

  She knew she should act more gracious and polite. Judging by the surprise on the other guard’s face, he thought so too. The bear, however, merely grinned.