by D. J. Butler
Kinta Jane shook her head and concentrated on the conversation at hand.
“Hope is too grand a word,” Wilkes said, “for my flicker of willingness to believe there might be a possibility that the man who killed Hannah Penn would recognize and take up his ancestors’ fight.”
“There’s no audience to bow for here, Wilkes. Use fewer words. He told you to go to hell.”
“Tried to kill me, actually. Tried to kill us.”
Stuyvesant lifted his candlestick to get a good look at Kinta Jane. “You’re from the New Orleans cell, aren’t you? I’m sorry about the challenges you’ve had. I knew Jackson.”
“She didn’t,” Wilkes said.
“My brother was René du Plessis.”
“Ah.” Stuyvesant set down his candlestick again. “Poor bastard. Sorry to hear about him, too.”
Kinta Jane mumbled inarticulate thanks.
“You ride north, then?” Stuyvesant asked.
“Anak and Odishkwa may yet remember their obligations. Can you help us?”
“I’ll send Dockery with you. He’s a solid frontiersman, years with the Dutch Ohio. Take all the supplies you need, and I’ll send money as well.”
“How prospers the Dutch Ohio Company?” Wilkes asked.
“Poorly.” Stuyvesant harrumphed. “Elbows have always been sharp between us and the Imperial Ohio, even when it was just the Penn Ohio, but in the last decade the Imperials have gone from shoving us aside to stabbing us in the back. Slander, theft, destruction of our vessels, warehouses burned. The board and I claim compensation, but we are forever delayed in the simple battle to determine whether the case should be heard in Philadelphia or New Amsterdam—we never even get to the evidence or the real legal arguments. The shareholders have been patient, but the truth is the Dutch Ohio Company is going out of business.”
“Is it bad enough that the Company is tempted to join in with the Pacification?”
“The bigger profits are always on the smuggler’s side,” Stuyvesant said. “So are the bigger risks. And yes, more than one member of the board has expressed the view that we should be offering to cooperate with Thomas rather than compete with him. Indeed, some think that’s what his man Temple Franklin is coming to New Amsterdam to offer us this week.”
Wilkes sat up straight. “Franklin?”
“I assumed you knew, since you just came from there. Maybe you outran the news. The board has agreed to a meeting with Franklin the day after tomorrow. He’s specified that I’m to be there.”
“Do you think he knows you’re a brother?”
“To my knowledge, neither Franklin’s son nor his grandson ever lifted a finger to bear Franklin’s burden. I would be shocked if this has anything to do with the Conventicle.”
“What, then?”
Adriaan Stuyvesant shrugged, a rolling gesture that shook his entire body. “The lawsuits were what the message referenced. But I assume the timing has to do with the Assembly’s passage of new imposts and authorizing a Levy of Force. Thomas makes war on the Firstborn, and it grows expensive. Settling the lawsuits and ending the fighting will mean more profit in his company as well as mine.”
“Will the board entertain offers to settle?”
Stuyvesant snorted. “They leaped for joy to hear Franklin was coming. I think if any sort of decent offer is made, I’ll be hard pressed to resist it, or even delay acceptance.”
They sat in silence for a moment.
Wilkes asked, “How can we get into that meeting?”
* * *
Sarah walked to the edge of the plaza atop the Great Mound, Sherem half a step behind her. The chill wind blowing over the city from the north warmed slightly around the Temple of the Sun, so with the step to the top of the slope, she felt the cold burn the skin of her face.
She looked eastward, over the massed Imperial forces. Were they growing? She huddled deeper into the Imperial dragoon’s coat she still wore. Alzbieta and Maltres had both repeatedly offered her Cahokian-style cloaks and tunics, as well as knee-high boots and leggings, and she had turned them down. She liked her moccasins—she could feel the earth through them. She liked the coat; it reminded her of her uncle’s threat to her, and her claims against him.
She had acquired the coat at the junction of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, at the grave of her father. It reminded her of him.
“Tell me what the arcane resources of the city are,” she said. Hearing the harshness of her own voice, she added, “Please.”
“There is no organization,” Sherem said. “There is a small group of Polites, strictly informal. There are individual priests of the Basilica and Temple priestesses with some ability, none especially great. Some of the great families have magician retainers, scattered here and there. The city has a few eccentric individuals who have pursued magic for their own reasons: for commerce, as a personal interest, or a spiritual discipline. All together, they come to approximately thirty wizards. And there is Luman Walters, the Imperial hedge wizard. Or former Imperial, perhaps.
“And we have you.”
“Are any of them by chance really powerful?”
Sherem scratched his head. “I don’t know how to measure that. Six months ago, I would have told you I was one of the better wizards in the city. Maybe the best. And you snapped me like a twig, so that doesn’t bode well for us.”
“I caught you by surprise, Sherem. It was luck.”
“No, Beloved. There was no luck involved.”
Sarah sighed. The guilt didn’t dissipate.
“I don’t think we have the strength for a frontal assault,” she said. “But maybe we can use our magicians as heralds. Maltres tells me Chicago has traditionally been our ally. Surely the kings of the other six sisters share our interest in rebuffing the Imperial fist.”
“The sisters share our interest, yes. They also share our poverty. In fact, our location on the far side of the Ohio from Thomas Penn may mean we’ve suffered the least from raiders and pillagers. Chicago may come, and he is closely allied with some of the Algonk peoples.”
“Might Memphis be willing to help us?” Sarah thought out loud. “Or the Cotton League? Or the Free Horse Peoples? They’re all within striking distance.”
“They are,” Sherem agreed. “I wonder how much they suffer at the hands of the Heron King’s beastkind.”
“There’s the Chevalier of New Orleans,” Sarah said.
“Beloved,” Sherem said. “There is a possibility for increasing our magical strength in battle.”
“Or what about Zomas?” Sarah asked. “I understand there’s bad blood, and believe me, in Appalachee we know about bad blood. Still, no matter how many horses the other family has stolen or how many of your cousins they’ve killed, sooner or later it comes time to bury the hatchet.”
“Do you know the story of Jock of Cripplegate?” Sherem asked.
Sarah shook her head, but then remembered. “Wait…he’s the one Cromwell experimented on. A thief, right?”
“A burglar. Cromwell killed him and demonstrated that Firstborn souls could be exploited as magical energy.”
“I don’t like where this conversation is headed.”
“There’s a Basilica priest named Josiah Dazarin. He’s been preaching a devotion to St. Jock of Cripplegate.”
“Thinks we should all become second-story men, does he?” Sarah bit her tongue. “Flippancy comes easy to me, Sherem. I apologize.” She took a deep breath. “Does Dazarin suggest we should execute our criminals to fuel magical attacks?”
Sherem nodded. “Our criminals. Or our slaves. Or volunteers.”
“We ain’t there yet,” Sarah said. “I hope we never get there, but for sure we ain’t there yet.”
She wasn’t at all sure they wouldn’t get there eventually, and maybe soon. The city had food for a few weeks at best—Maltres was still counting and calculating exactly how long the stores would last—and the ring of black fire encircling the city suggested that Hooke’s sorcery was not finish
ed yet.
The Imperial army was definitely getting larger. Larger, and more military-looking. The militiamen were being joined by regular soldiers, and behind the trenches, here and there, Sarah saw the noses of artillery pieces pointing at her walls.
“Chicago,” she said. “And the sisters. And I want to talk to Gazelem Zomas as soon as possible—please find him for me.”
She needed to talk with Montserrat Ferrer i Quintana, too. The pirate queen who had sneaked into the besieged city could help her to sneak out. Sarah didn’t want to flee, but she wanted to speak with her father.
He might have keys to help her.
“And gather up all our gramarists. It’s time we made a decent counterattack.”
“We’re not Appalachee here, you know,
we don’t kidnap our women.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Jacob Hop found himself placing the cards around his plate. He’d managed to leave the Tarocks in his pocket through the hearty plate of stamppot—potatoes mashed in with cabbage and served alongside boiled sausages—but when the dried apples, raisins, and jonge kaas came out, and he no longer needed one hand for the knife and the other for the fork, he began dealing the cards out onto Lotte’s best tablecloth in four columns. He was sorting the cards face-up—when he drew them randomly, only the Major Arcana appeared.
“You were possessed,” Ambroos insisted. They spoke English for the benefit of Nathaniel Penn, who seemed to be paying close attention despite occasionally breaking into short bursts of hummed music.
“Ja, that’s why I need your help.”
“Only you weren’t possessed by de duivel. You were possessed by a giant bird.”
Ambroos’s two daughters openly snickered, but Lotte looked troubled. Ambroos had three sons as well, but they were all serving their turn in the city watch this night.
Jake looked up at the blunderbuss Ambroos kept over his fireplace. The firearm was almost certainly loaded. Fortunately, it was out of Ambroos’s reach.
“You’ve heard of the Heron King,” Jake said. “I know you have.”
“Naturally, yes. He’s supposed to be some kind of creature who goes around the Ohio cursing people. But that’s just an old Haudenosaunee story, Jacob, or maybe an Algonk tale. There’s no such person.”
“I think I prefer that you call me ‘Jake.’”
“My aunt and uncle named their son Jacob.”
“But Jacob was a deaf-mute. I am not completely that person any longer.”
“So not only were you possessed by de duivel—you can stop right now this stront talk about the Heron King—”
“Ambroos!” Lotte flashed fierce eyes at her husband.
Ambroos paused, looked heavenward, and then crossed himself while his daughters pretended not to be amused. “Not only were you in Satan’s grip, but you view that as some kind of baptism. Satan has made you a new person. Apparently one who can speak and hear.”
“You see why I need your help,” Jacob said quietly.
“I’m a healer.” Nathaniel Penn looked down at his plate.
Jake had completed his four columns. He looked at what appeared to be four stories, laid out completely in pictures. The suit of Swords showed a man in hunter’s garb, who traveled through the forest on a twisted path, crossed a stream, climbed a hill, stood in a ditch, and then embraced an unseen person. The suit of Lightning Bolts showed a man with the same face (and it looked a little like the face of Calvin Calhoun), or perhaps the same man, undertaking a different journey. This journey had him climbing a high mountain, and dealing with such trials as climbing a cliff, jumping a ravine, and taking eggs from an eagle’s nest, he reached the top of the mountain and sat upon a throne. The suits of Cups and Shields showed strikingly similar journeys, only the protagonists depicted in these images were women.
Jacob still held all the Major Arcana apart in one hand; he had deliberately held them apart.
“You’re a healer?” Ambroos pressed Nathaniel. “But you look like an orphan drummer boy. An hour ago you were telling me you and Jacob were looking for your sister.”
“I am an orphan,” Nathaniel said.
“Ambroos,” Jacob said. “Would you not consider an exorcism? At this moment, beyond this table and those sitting around it, what I see is a bload-soaked scene of sacrifice and pillaging.”
“I would want to bring together the community of faith.” That was what he called his congregation. The Dutch had a habit of fragmenting into small church groups and arguing vehemently over religion. Ambroos, no sooner had he finished his studies, followed in that well-worn traditional groove. “If what you tell me is at all true, this is a serious matter and I should not attempt anything alone. I will begin my fast immediately.”
Ambroos pushed his plate of apple slices and kaas toward his daughters, who fell on it like jackals.
“I will fast as well.” Jacob pushed his last morsel of sweet white cheese to Nathaniel.
“It won’t be tomorrow,” Ambroos said.
“You have to gather the community?”
“Yes. And also, I have a board meeting.”
“A board meeting. You mean that your community of faith has a board meeting?”
“No, the Ohio Company has a board meeting. I’m a director.”
Jacob smiled, ignoring the black slivers he saw raining from the sky all around him. “A preacher and a trader, too. You must be busy. We’re lucky we caught you at home.”
“No, it’s part of Van Heusen’s reforms. All chartered companies above a certain size have to appoint independent directors. Clergymen and news-paper publishers are preferred, though why we should be lumped together with those schurken is a little beyond me. I’m one of the Hudson River Republic Ohio Company’s three independent directors. I get paid from the Republic’s coffers.”
“Three is not a majority, hey?”
“No. The expectation is not that we will be able to outvote the others, it’s that we will be able to report any secret wrongdoings.”
“You were chosen because you’re a professional loudmouth,” Jacob said. “Like a news-paper man.”
“Ja, dat klopt.” Ambroos smiled.
“What do you do at the meetings? Set the price of beaver pelts? Decide wages?”
“Sometimes,” Ambroos admitted. “And before you say anything, you’re right, I know very little of the subjects with which we deal.”
“But you know much of the heart, corruption, probity, and repentance.” The Major Arcana felt like a brick in Jacob’s hand. They wanted to be played on the four journeys, but Jacob didn’t know how.
“But tomorrow’s meeting is different. The Emperor Thomas has sent up a legate. We haven’t heard his proposal yet, but we think the Emperor wants to drop a lawsuit. And possibly also wants to stop the underhanded methods of his traders that caused the lawsuit at the same time. Both things would be good for the Republic.”
“I am certainly grateful that no Dutch trader ever engaged in underhanded methods.” Jacob leaned over to Nathaniel and spoke in an exaggerated whisper. “This way, we always have the upper hand in these conversations.”
“Don’t worry, Jake,” Ambroos said. “I’ll be there to make certain the board behaves honestly.”
* * *
The challenge of the disguise was that Temple Franklin had seen his face before. Perhaps that had been a mistake; perhaps he should have arranged matters so as to be invited into Horse Hall wearing a false visage.
But he hadn’t.
Isaiah Wilkes’s solution was to dress himself as a woman. Slight padding in the hips—too much would push the disguise into a grotesque parody and make him more visible, rather than less—and a more feminine walk comprised most of the disguise. He also thickened his eyelashes, made his complexion more Dutch, the color of spring cream, and shortened his height by adjusting his posture and walking with bent knees, hidden under a heavy skirt. And he wore scent, naturally, borrowed from Mevrouw Stuyvesant herself. It smelled like apple
liqueur.
He also uglified himself with a false nose. Surely, Temple Franklin would have more interesting things to look at than the serving-women, despite his notorious lechery.
At Isaiah’s request, Adriaan Stuyvesant promised that all the other servers would be nubile and lovely.
And tall. It wouldn’t do for Isaiah to hulk over all the other servers, after everything else.
These were the skills Isaiah had learned for the stage, first as a standing-ticket punter in between grueling shifts setting type or hanging printed sheets for his exacting first master, the future Lightning Bishop, and then treading the boards himself. But they were the skills of the stage applied by a master hand to a more exacting standard than any stage could require, and with higher stakes.
He was awake all night with the patient work.
He didn’t have the time or the need to do the same work on Kinta Jane. Instead, he hid her in an apartment not far from Wall Street in a hotel called De Zwaard van de Stathouder. The Stadtholder’s Sword—it seemed appropriate enough.
The apartment belonged to Adriaan Stuyvesant. It contained both a well-appointed office—with paper, pens, and ink in abundance, though no record books of any kind in evidence—and a luxe bedroom, with a downy feather mattress on the four-poster bed beside the broad fireplace.
Isaiah didn’t ask what Adriaan kept the apartment for, and Adriaan didn’t offer any explanation. “I know you will be discreet,” was all the Dutchman said.
Kinta Jane looked perfectly happy to take a nap.
And the staff of the Zwaard treated Isaiah Wilkes with the casual contempt that told him his disguise was effective.
The Hudson River Republic Ohio Company headquarters was less luxurious than Adriaan’s rented chambers, though considerably more defensible. The building was a three-story fortress built of stone. Its walls came to a parapet two stories up, which was patrolled by Dutchmen in polished breastplates and helmets, with long muskets. This guard paced around a penthouse level set back from the outer wall for protection. The penthouse consisted of a single large room with wood-panel walls and tall windows. Through the windows, Isaiah could see the Hudson River and Pennsland on the other side, and in the other direction the wilds of Brooklyn.