by Jay Lake
I had loosed a pair of god killers on the trail of Blackblood. They might just be warding him away from me, but what could I trust? The prospect made me ill.
My own doubts had tried repeatedly to alert me, but I had failed to listen to myself. Fool, fool, fool!
Worse, what if Surali was in league with them? No wonder the Lily Goddess had feared a fate emanating from here across the Storm Sea in Copper Downs. I could easily believe the Bittern Court woman to be plotting against the Lily Goddess Herself. It all made sense. And all of it tied back to the Eyes of the Hills. Even my old crime of slaying the Duke.
The truth fell upon me like bricks collapsing to spontaneously form a wall.
Having first used me to wrest the Eyes of the Hills from Michael Curry-and to whom had he meant to sell or give them, anyway?-Surali brought the stolen gems across the sea to buy off not the pardine Revanchists, but the twins Iso and Osi. All in pursuit of the Bittern Court’s vendetta against the Lily Goddess. God killers pursuing daughter-goddesses across the plate of the world to satisfy an ancient vengeance would have any number of uses for such artifacts. Even with their power stripped away, like me, the gems were a conduit to the divine. As I’d been reminded so forcibly, much as small children who would not release a favored plaything, what the gods had once touched they would touch again far more easily than not.
No wonder Desire had pressed theogeny on me. She must have seen me as someone who could stand against the threat of the twins.
The sheer scale of the plot was sickening. Likewise my part in advancing it. Shame bloomed within me at being so readily gulled, until I myself had become a weapon in the hands of my enemies. Easing Ilona under a blanket, I hurried from the tent to see what I could salvage of both error and vengeance before the day grew any shorter.
***
I passed urgent words with Ponce about the need to care for Ilona, and keeping her quiet for a while. He was shamefaced as I lectured swiftly in a hard tone. When I finally wound down, his only response was apology. “I am sorry, Mother Green.”
“For what?” Anger still boiled, but there was little point in allowing it to spill on him.
“That we do not fight.” His voice was stark. “A man-a person, excuse me-should defend himself. Herself.”
“A person should live in peace.” My own words surprised me. Perhaps I had been listening to the god Endurance.
With those words, I took my leave. My heart had been seized with a burning desire to look into the house of my enemies. I knew where they were, and I knew more of their rented mansion than my countrywomen there realized, thanks to my studies of architecture. What I did not know was where within that place they were holding Corinthia Anastasia.
Below would not be a sensible approach. For one, I doubted that I could gain interior access to the house from the sewers. Neither did I want to do a reconnaissance from the street. The gate guards would see me, and report to Surali.
It came down to some sneaking by the back wall, and possibly grabbing hold of someone from within the household to question. Both of these things I could do.
***
The grounds of the embassy’s rented mansion met another property along the back. These were not true fortified walls, such as had surrounded the Factor’s house in my youth, just masonry courses designed to keep stray animals and undesirables like me from wandering across the lawns. No guards here, or even empty guard stations. I glanced around to be sure I was unobserved, then took a running leap to grab the top, using my momentum to hoist myself up and over.
The mansion adjacent to the Selistani embassy was in sore need of a groundskeeper. This was fine with me, as it meant the wisteria along their side of the common wall had grown quite wild. That is not the easiest plant to move through, but at least it only grips at one’s ankles, rather than slashing with thorns or spreading poison from its leaves.
I skulked along the wall inside the shelter of the thin wooden whips of the overgrowth. The midpoint would give me the best vantage to study the rear of Surali’s mansion. I already had some good notions of the layout of the front, and the public rooms.
Not for a moment did I imagine that Corinthia Anastasia would conveniently leave a banner or some other signal from an upper window, but I wanted to see whatever was to be seen. Perhaps certain rooms were sealed, or there would be balconies I could climb to-unlikely as that was in the Haito style.
Mostly, though, I needed to visualize a target for my wrath. I could hardly set fire to the house with the hostages within it. Though the idea was still tempting, especially if I nailed the doors shut first. The whole neighborhood could burn for all I cared.
When I reached the midpoint of the dividing wall, I scrambled up under the cover of the wisteria to see what I might learn.
The rear of the house opened in two wings flanking a paved court or terrace. Low windows among shrubbery and vines indicated a basement, likely servants’ territory for kitchens, laundry, maids’ quarters, and so forth. Two main floors with high ceilings rose above that, then a lower-ceilinged third storey that tucked into the roofline. The uppermost floor would be suites for senior servants and junior relatives.
If I were holding a hostage here, I would keep her in either the basement or the top floor. That would simplify the guard rota, as well as reducing the possibility of accidental exposure to visitors.
There were a number of paths to access the house. No balconies, unfortunately, as I’d figured. The grounds between the terrace and the wall were lightly wooded. Oaks and maples widely spaced, with cropped lawn and patches of leaf-covered loam between them. No cover. The only bushes were those in the beds lining the house.
Even worse, if we had more snow, my tracks would show up like lines on a map.
I very much wanted to know whether Corinthia Anastasia was in the basement or on the top floor. Good money would bet on Surali choosing to go high, but I couldn’t tell from out here. And entering the house to gain the uppermost floor was probably beyond me acting alone in this moment. Surali would have dozens of Street Guild men in there. I could not fight them all by myself.
There were other ways to see inside a building.
I retreated down the dividing wall to the corner by the street, to watch in unaccustomed patience. I kept an eye on the front gate to see who came out. I resolved not to pursue a target should they turn left instead of right out of the front of the grounds. Instead I waited for someone to walk down Knightspark Street, past my watchpost.
***
Over the course of the next hour, a pair of servant girls came by. They carried baskets, giggling together as they went marketing for something needful that must not have been delivered by the purveyors who normally supplied great houses. They were Petraean, and I did not think they would likely have the information I wanted.
More to the point, I did not want these poor girls to pay the price I would be exacting for that information.
My patience was rewarded in the second hour when a Street Guild thug strode quickly out of the house, then chose to walk my way. This was someone with whom I could deal in whatever fashion I chose.
I chose to slip over the wall as he passed me by, and take him from behind with the butt of my long knife to the base of the head. Knightspark Street was fairly quiet, but I could not count on much uninterrupted time. Neither was I prepared to haul him back over the wall.
He groaned and slumped to the cobbles. I bent close, pressing my short knife into the soft skin behind his left ear.
“Where is the northern girl being kept?” Speaking Seliu, I kept my voice fierce.
“You will not-” he began. I sliced off his earlobe, then punched him in the mouth with the knife hilt when he began to scream.
“Be advised that I am short on time and shorter on patience.”
“Green.” The Street Guildsman made my name a curse.
That was fine with me. “Unless you want me to be the last person you ever meet in your life, you will tell me where s
he is kept.” I once more set the blade against the spot beneath his ear. “Or I am done.”
“They will be killing me.” He almost made it a sob.
“ I will be killing you now. Your choice.” I poked the knife in until blood ran freely. He stifled another scream. “Three… two…”
“Upstairs,” he gasped. “West end of the top floor.”
I clubbed him harder, banging his face into the cobbles, and left him there unconscious with a bloody nose. “You may keep your life by way of my gratitude,” I told him, though he could no longer hear me.
***
Feeling much better informed, I cleaned my knives then hurried toward the teahouse that had become my favorite. Once again I approached without passing by the Textile Bourse. I found my seat in the shaded table hard by the front of their little store. My friend the cinnamon-skinned woman brought me cardamom rolls without my asking, and a rich cup of kava. This time the dark beverage had been foamed with milk and cinnamon. I asked her politely for some meat and cheese to accompany it all, then applied myself to the serious business of eating and thinking while the afternoon of the city flowed past.
My angry fantasies aside, I could not simply snatch Corinthia Anastasia from the Selistani embassy. They would be prepared for any such attempt. This took more planning.
In any case, I had to be sensible. The girl was already hidden away behind stout walls and numerous guards. Rushing headlong to rescue her might have made sense if I’d known before her captors returned to Copper Downs, but not at this point. Far more significant now to stop what pieces of this plot I was able to, my pieces, and set in motion such counterplot as I could manage.
Did I dare try to speak to Iso and Osi? I suspected they would realize at the mere sight of my face that I had finally grasped a corner of their truth. Whether or not their graceful economy of motion truly reflected a battle readiness I had not been willing to see until now, I suspected I would not easily walk away from them if they were determined to stop me.
But I’d left the Rectifier with the twins. Not that he needed rescuing, not exactly, but the Rectifier in possession of all the facts as well as my informed speculation was a far more useful ally to me than the Rectifier plotting the downfall of a god I’d wrongly set him against.
My next step would be to spy out whether the pardine rogue was with the twins now. I would not by myself beard Iso and Osi in their warehouse den, but I might be able to approach them if the Rectifier was there.
If I did not see him with the twins I’d have to go hunting at the Tavernkeep’s place. Given that I’d last left there under the cloud of a riot, my welcome back might not be as open as I would have liked.
Still, one thing before the next. As always.
***
I realized that before I headed out on a new round of potentially deadly errands, I would be needing my leathers back. And my good fighting boots. Raiding wasn’t so much an option in the corduroy trousers and canvas shirt of an errand boy, no matter what coat I wore. I dug my bundle out from where I’d hidden it amid the scattered stones behind the tents and tried to change right there in the field.
The tunic fit my shoulders but would not close over my belly. The trousers were impossible. Frustration nearly made me cry.
They smelled bad, they were in need of cleaning and oiling, and worst of all, they did not fit. The baby had stolen my body from me.
I went stalking off after Ponce, suddenly very conscious of how large I’d grown, how foolish and ungainly I had become.
When I found him, the boy was engaged in close discussion with a quarryman. Or at least, someone with a great sheaf of papers and a wagonload of various small stone slabs in different colors and textures.
“Now,” I said roughly, grasping at Ponce’s arm.
“My pardon, Lucius,” he told the merchant as I dragged him away.
Lucius just stared a moment before shaking his head and laughing.
When I’d gotten Ponce to a quiet space between two tents, I shoved the leathers into his hand. “If I were home-in Kalimpura at the temple, I mean-I could get another set.”
“Of what?” He turned the leathers over as if he had never seen them before.
“Of those.” I patted my belly, growling at him. “I have grown too fat for them. But I need working clothes.”
“C-could they be let out?” He stopped at the look in my eyes, before gathering his courage and trying again. “We have nothing like this here. This is a temple, of a peaceful sect.”
“I know whose temple this is.” I narrowly avoided calling him a fool. “But I need something better, now.”
“We could find sturdy canvas trousers,” he said dubiously. “Some among the young men would have them to fit you. Sister Gammage could take up the cuffs. As for the shirt… more canvas? And maybe a leather vest?” In a careful voice, he added, “From among the men, obviously.”
It was a terrible solution. But my other options were worse. I’d already learned the foolishness of working in a robe, and my borrowed boy’s clothing would not suit for heavy fighting. “Dark as it can be, black if possible.”
“We are not carrion birds, to dress like shadows.”
“I am a night hunter.” I almost snarled in my frustration.
***
Several hours later, I was off through the streets. My clothes were still damp from the swift, cheap dye job, and I had best not sit on any pale furniture for a while. At least I had something sturdy to work in.
Even so, my clothing bore its disadvantages. The Velviere District was no place to walk around looking as if one advertised for work as a housebreaker. Likewise, because of the wide lawns, roof-running was useless here. I needed the crowded parts of the city, narrow alleys, with little bridges where barrels or bales passed over traffic from one warehouse to another. There I could take to the roofs once more.
So I found them. Once I’d scrambled up a black iron drainpipe, I felt much safer. Atop a red-tiled roof that sloped down toward Theobalde Avenue, I crouched and watched the street.
My sense of being followed tingled. This was the same feeling I’d had when I thought I’d spotted Skinless. I didn’t see how Blackblood’s shambling avatar could move through the daylit city unimpeded. On the other hand, if the twins were able to cloak themselves from the eyes of a god, it was logical enough that a god could cloak his minions from the eyes of men.
I studied the scene awhile. People walked with a bit of an edge, something disturbing their movements without interrupting them. As travelers along a country road might circle round the reek of a hidden corpse without ever quite knowing why. Horses, though, being essentially stupid, were much harder to fool. None of the teams being driven down the street would have anything to do with an alley mouth a block up from me. They shied, they bucked, they stopped.
Staring for a time told me little except that my eyes ached, which was not exactly news. Still, something was in there. I was pretty sure it stared back at me, for all that I was a curved shadow among some chimney pots. I was almost certain Skinless was below. So certain that I flicked a wave of my hand before bounding away.
The avatar was welcome to try following me over the roofs if he pleased. We were not Below this afternoon. This was my country now, the land of water tanks and air vents and lopsided little sheds scattered with empty bottles reeking of gin or wine.
I led a merry chase, not bothering to see if he was behind me. Likely enough both Skinless and Blackblood understood where I was headed. The twins’ warehouse wasn’t difficult to locate from above. I’d been in and out of there the better part of a week without taking great care to obscure my movements.
Spying within would be a greater trick, for the building lacked convenient windows. I was perfectly confident that I’d solve that problem soon enough. When I reached a rooftop across the street from my goal, I settled in behind a decorative false parapet and simply watched awhile.
Of course no one came and no one went. We’d used
a side door that from this vantage I could barely glimpse in the narrow close between their warehouse and the next. A watchman’s entrance, that bypassed the great loading doors fronting onto Theobalde Avenue. I studied the grimy mouth of the alley until I thought I could spot my own footprints leading in and out. A pretty muddle, mine mixed with several others. Had the Rectifier been here recently?
An hour passed quietly. No movement, no evidence of movement. That was fine. I’d expected nothing more. Then I slipped back across my chosen roof and detoured several blocks so I could approach the twins’ warehouse unseen from behind.
I would have bet good money they had the doors warded, but the roof might have received lesser diligence. At a minimum, it would not be seen as such a danger. Iso and Osi had taught me something of passing by scrutiny, things I had not known for myself before. For example, a curving approach to a numinal boundary provided no angle for the magic to act against. As with any weapon, magic requires leverage. Likewise, holding power beneath your tongue or within your fists could distract a warding sigil.
It was hard to cross roofs in that fashion. I gave the process a try. One of the Eyes of the Hills fit into each hand as I stepped drunkenly along the roof of the building behind theirs. There was a gap of about eight feet. Their roof stood a few spans higher than the one I was on.
This was the first test. Could I make the jump without alerting the twins either magically or through sheer misplaced balance? I patted my abdomen, whispered, “Not yet, baby dear,” took a deep breath, and sprinted into the leap.
My takeoff was perfect. I’d trained for this over the years, both with the Dancing Mistress and among the Lily Blades. My kick and follow-through, and the arc of my jump, were all as should be. My mistakes were being over half a dozen pounds heavier and off my usual center of balance.