The Shadow Throne: Book Two of the Shadow Campaigns

by Wexler, Django

  “It’s good that you ran away,” Jane said, still staring at her glass and oblivious of Winter’s moral crisis. “I wouldn’t have wished you another minute in that fucking place. When I got back there, though, and they told me that you were gone, and no one had any idea to where . . .” Her grip tightened on the glass, as though she meant to shatter it against her palm.

  “I’m sorry,” Winter said, in a whisper.

  “No. I told you, I don’t blame you for anything. You did what you had to do.”

  “I’m sorry.” It felt like all Winter could do was repeat it. “Jane, I’m—”

  “Would you stop apologizing?”

  “But—”

  Jane turned, grabbed both of Winter’s shoulders, and jerked her close. Winter shut her eyes and cringed, in automatic expectation of a blow, but received a kiss instead.

  It went on for a long time. She could taste the wine, smell the sweat on Jane’s skin, feel a tickle where a tear had run down Jane’s cheek and ended up hanging from the tip of Winter’s nose. Jane’s hands slid down to the small of her back, drawing them together, and Winter could sense the warmth of her through layers of leather and linen.

  Jane finally pulled away, breathing hard, but she kept her arms wrapped tight. Winter’s whole body tingled, and her head swam as though she’d had considerably more than one glass of wine.

  “It’s all right,” Jane said. “You’re here. That’s all that matters now.”

  Winter, staring into those hypnotic green eyes, nodded.

  Eventually the moment ended, as all moments do. A muscle in Winter’s leg, weary from the long day of walking around the city, chose that moment to register its complaint with a vicious cramp, and Winter stumbled and nearly fell. Jane took her weight and swung her toward the mattress, where Winter sat with a thump. Jane flopped down beside her, stretching her arms above her head and arching her back like a cat.

  “God,” she said. “Just talking about it makes me feel better, you know?”

  “I should . . .” Winter shook her head, still dizzy. The softness of the mattress was suddenly unbelievably attractive. “Sleep, I think. It’s been a long day. I don’t suppose you could spare a bunk for me?”

  Jane looked at her sidewise. “I can have them make up a room. There’s plenty of space.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Or,” Jane said, “you could stay here.”

  “Here?” There was a long, stupid moment while Winter cast about the room to see if there was another bedroll tucked away somewhere. Then, belatedly, she understood. “Oh. Here, with you.”

  Jane smiled again. “Here, as you say, with me.”

  Some part of Winter wanted to. Her body fairly ached where Jane had been pressed tight against her, in ways that had nothing to do with hours of walking around town. But she couldn’t stop the panicky feeling that welled up when she thought about it, the ground-in need to flee from even the possibility of contact.

  “I . . . can’t,” she said, after a moment.

  Jane nodded levelly. Winter searched her face.

  “It’s not that I don’t want to,” Winter said. “I do. I mean, with you. Just not . . . now. It’s hard. I’m sor—”

  “I told you to stop apologizing,” Jane said. “It’s all right, really.”

  “I’m just . . . tired.” Winter took a deep breath and got a grip on herself. “Just give me some time to get used to things.”

  “Of course.” Jane stood up and extended a hand. “Come on. We’ll find you a room.”

  Winter took her hand, tentatively, and allowed herself to be led out into the hall, wobbling like a drunk on her way home from the tavern.

  She barely remembered the room they’d put her in, or undressing. It might have been the best night’s sleep she’d ever had, dark and silent and blessedly free of dreams.

  MARCUS

  The heavy Armsmen carriage rumbled down Fourth Avenue, toward the intersection with Saint Dromin Street. Marcus twitched aside the curtain to look at the houses going by and wondered what the hell he was doing.

  Here, at least, he didn’t require an armed escort. This was the far north of Northside; too far from Bridge Street and the Island to be truly fashionable, but well insulated from the teeming crowds of Southside and the poverty of Oldtown. It was a neighborhood of big, low houses with well-landscaped grounds, with flower gardens and small groves of birch and willow. The buildings were set back from the street, behind screening trees and gravel drives flanked by stables and carriage-houses. The people who lived here were moderately well-to-do merchants, as Marcus’ father had been, or the upper crust of well-payed artisans and professionals.

  Marcus was accompanied only by his driver and Staff Eisen, fresh from the cutters’ care. The young man looked only a little the worse for their attentions, with his left arm neatly trussed in a linen sling and swathed in bandages. Looking at him reminded Marcus of Adrecht, who’d lost an arm to a similar wound at Weltae-en-Tselika. He suppressed a shudder.

  “You’re certain you want to take up your duties so soon, Eisen?” Marcus said. “If it’s a matter of money, I can make sure—”

  “No, sir. I mean, yes, sir, I am, and it’s not about money. I don’t like sitting around, sir.” He touched his bound arm. “The cutter told me it wouldn’t be a problem. No bones broken. Not much of a wound at all, really. I oughtn’t to have passed out.”

  “Just shock,” Marcus said. “It happens, if you’ve never been shot before. Not your fault. And you still didn’t have to come all the way out here with me.”

  “Vice Captain Giforte assigned me to look after you, sir,” Eisen said, as though that explained everything.

  Marcus wondered if the Staff’s enthusiasm was genuine, or if he was simply buttering up the new captain. He’d never been good at telling the difference. Another new problem—nobody had bothered to cozy up to him in Khandar. He shook his head and looked out the window again.

  “Did you grow up in the city, Eisen?”

  “Yes, sir,” the Staff said. “Not so far from here, as a matter of fact.”

  “Really?” Marcus glanced at him. A position in the Armsmen, especially starting from the bottom, was an odd choice of career for the son of a wealthy family.

  Eisen cleared his throat. “Servant’s boy, sir. My mother was a housemaid; my dad was a coachman. I used to help out with the dogs until I got sick of it and signed up to wear the green.”

  “I see.” Marcus paused. “How old are you?”

  “Twenty-three, sir.”

  That would have made him four at the time of the fire. Just about Ellie’s age. The carriage lurched as it turned the corner onto Saint Dromin Street, revealing—

  History. The street unrolled in front of him like a memory, as though it had been days instead of years. The landmarks of his childhood flashed past the windows—the beech he’d fallen out of when he was ten and nearly cracked his head open, the raspberry bushes where he’d found a mother cat watching her kittens, the stretch of cobbled street where he’d first learned to ride—

  He rapped on the wall, and the carriage slowed to a halt. Before he was quite aware of what he was doing, he’d hopped down, with Eisen following awkwardly behind him.

  It even smelled the same. Marcus took a deep breath, inhaling the mixed scents of cut grass from the lawn and fresh dung from the horses in the street. Carriages rattled past, giving the Armsmen vehicle a wide berth, and a few pedestrians looked at him curiously. Marcus ignored them.

  “A long time since you’ve been home, sir?” Eisen said, at his shoulder.

  “Nineteen years,” Marcus said. “Give or take.”

  Eisen gave a low whistle. “Think you can still find your way around?”

  “Of course.” Marcus pointed. “Our place was just up this way, past those beeches.”

  There were thr
ee of the trees instead of four, and they were a bit larger, but there was no mistaking them. They’d belonged to the Wainwrights, whose children had played with Marcus nearly every day in the precious few hours between lessons and dinner. Veronica Wainwright had been the first girl he’d ever kissed, in the darkness behind her father’s woodshed, the day before he left for the College at sixteen. There had been tears in her eyes, and he’d promised he’d come back and marry her when he finished his training and became an officer.

  He hadn’t thought about that in years. Hadn’t thought about any of it, in truth. After the fire, he’d walled off that whole section of his memories, shut them away and thrown away the key, hoping to keep out the pain. Coming back here had opened it all up again, and he was surprised to find that it didn’t hurt as badly as he remembered.

  Marcus hurried down the street, past the beeches, until what had been the d’Ivoire estate came into view. Two visions of it competed in his mind. One was the real thing, as he’d last seen it, with ivy creeping up the stone walls and the ancient leaded glass his father preferred to the modern kind. The other was something he’d constructed in his mind over the intervening years, a blackened ruin of scorched beams and tumbled stone.

  Instead he found himself looking at another house entirely. It was squarer, larger, higher-ceilinged than his old estate, with big single-pane windows and a high, arched doorway. The grounds were the same—even the ancient oak, its limbs spreading above the roof—but someone had replaced the house itself with an imposter. Marcus stared at it for a moment, blinking.

  Of course it’s different. He’d been stupid. The old place had burned, but prime land in Vordan City never went idle for long. Someone else had bought the property, cleared the ruin, and put up their own house. He’d had the vague idea that he could poke around, discover something in the wreckage that everyone else had missed, but of course that was ridiculous. After this long, it’s not even wreckage anymore.

  Ionkovo told me to come here. Why? The Black Priest agent might have just been having a laugh at Marcus’ expense, of course. But he doesn’t seem the type. He wanted me to find something.

  “So what the hell am I doing here?” Marcus said.

  “Sir?”

  He shook his head and looked at Eisen, embarrassed to have spoken aloud. “Nothing. I thought there might be something left, but that was stupid.”

  “I’m sorry, sir. It must be difficult.”

  Marcus turned, scanning the surrounding houses. “I can’t imagine many people still remember much of the fire, either.” So what’s the point? He felt like going back into the cell and throttling the smirk off Ionkovo’s face. He knows something, but all he’ll give me is riddles.

  “Are you looking for information on what happened, sir?”

  “I suppose.” Marcus shrugged, feeling defeated. “I’m just not sure there’s anything to find.”

  “I think,” Eisen said, “I may have an idea.”

  —

  The Fiddler occupied a dignified space at the corner of Fourth Avenue and Saint Dromin Street. It was not a tavern or a wine shop but a true public house of the old school, less a business establishment than a club for the respectable men of the neighborhood. The building was old brick, patchy with overlapping repairs, and twined here and there with climbing ivy. The front door was open, but Eisen, leading the way, stopped beside it and pointed with his good hand.

  “You see, sir?”

  Marcus peered closer. A small brass plaque, much tarnished, read 17TH ROYAL VOLUNTEER FIRE COMPANY, HEADQUARTERS. EST. 1130 YHG.

  “My uncle was in the Twenty-fourth Company,” Eisen said, “over by the Dregs. He always said it was mainly an excuse to spend evenings away from the family. Not as many fires as there used to be, north of the river. But he told me every company has one old bastard who’s been a member for fifty years and can tell you every house that ever burned down on his watch.”

  “Worth a try,” Marcus said, though privately he thought it was a bit of a thin reed to hang any hope on. “Let’s see if we can find them.”

  Eisen led the way into the common room. It was a long way from the Khandarai taverns Marcus was used to, with a feel closer to a family sitting room—big, solid tables, polished to a blinding sheen, and genuine carpet underfoot instead of boards and sawdust. Marcus paused, embarrassed, and backtracked a step or two to make use of the boot scraper by the door.

  It was midafternoon, and only a few of the tables were occupied, mostly by small groups of older men who looked as though they never left. Eisen went to the bar, a vast expanse of scarred wood dark with resin and polish, and talked for a moment with the bespectacled gentleman behind it. When he came back, he was smiling.

  “We’re in luck, sir. He knew exactly who I wanted to talk to. Come on.”

  They went through a doorway into another room, lined with bookshelves bearing weather-beaten, mismatched volumes. There were more tables here, but only one was occupied, three men sitting at a big round table much too large for them. Another small plaque marked it as reserved for the Seventeenth Company.

  Two of the men were younger than Marcus, in their twenties, but the third matched Eisen’s description almost exactly. He was bent over a tall pint glass, head bowed as though his neck didn’t want to support its weight, and the fingers that curled around the drink were stick-thin and mottled with liver spots. The dome of his head rose through a crown of snow-white hair, like a mountain pushing up past the tree line. When Marcus stood in front of the table and cleared his throat, the old man looked up, and his deep-sunken eyes were dark and intelligent.

  “You’re the Seventeenth Fire Company?” Marcus said, feeling awkward.

  The old man pursed his lips but said nothing. One of the younger men got to his feet, taking in Marcus’ uniform, and nodded respectfully.

  “We are, though we’re not on duty at the moment,” he said. “Is there a problem?”

  “I’m not here officially,” Marcus said. “I was just hoping I could have a word about an . . . incident. Something that happened quite a while back.”

  The young man looked at his older companion, who caught Marcus’ eyes and held them for a moment. When his voice emerged, it was surprisingly deep and smooth, as though polished by the years.

  “You’re the new captain of Armsmen, then? D’Ivoire.”

  Marcus nodded. The two young men exchanged a look—they obviously hadn’t recognized his rank.

  “I wondered if you might come around,” the old man said. “You may as well sit down.”

  “Staff Eisen,” Marcus said, “would you please buy these gentlemen a drink?”

  “Of course, sir.” Eisen extended a hand, and with a last look at Marcus the two young men followed him. Marcus pulled back one of the heavy chairs and sank into the ancient, cracking leather.

  “Marcus d’Ivoire,” he said.

  “Hank,” the old man said. “Or Henry, if you’re feeling formal. Henry Matthew.”

  “You said you were expecting me?”

  “Just a thought.” The old man shrugged. “I saw your name in the broadsheets, and I figured you might come looking. It’s been a long time.”

  “I’ve been away,” Marcus said. “Khandar.”

  Hank nodded. “And it’s not like there was much left for you to come back to. It was a terrible business.”

  “You were there?”

  “I was. That was back when I went out on calls. Now I sit here and let the young’uns buy me drinks, and tell stories.” He tapped his half-empty glass, and gave Marcus a crinkly smile. “Not a bad life, to be honest. But yes, I was there.”

  “What happened?”

  “Didn’t they tell you about it?”

  “Not much. Only that it was an accident, and that nobody . . . got out.” Marcus’ voice hitched. He swallowed hard, irritated.

  Hank pe
ered at him kindly. “You want a drink?”

  “No, thank you. Just tell me what happened.”

  “Well. It’s not easy to say. When a house burns, ’less everyone’s asleep, usually somebody notices. They run from the flames and come out the other side, you see? Sometimes if a place is a real tinder trap, it’ll go up all suddenlike, and sometimes there’s no other way out and people get trapped. That’s bad luck.”

  Marcus remembered the Ashe-Katarion fire, the swarms of determined people pressing tighter and tighter to get through the gates into the inner city, or throwing themselves into the river to drown instead of burn. He swallowed again. “I’m not sure what you’re getting at.”

  “The d’Ivoire place—your place—it was old, but it wasn’t a tinder trap. It took time to burn. And there were plenty of doors. So how come nobody got out?”

  Marcus shook his head. He didn’t even know if the fire had been during the day or at night, he realized. No one had volunteered any information, and he’d been just as happy to avoid the details.

  “When we got there,” Hank went on, “it was obvious there was no saving the place. I led my boys in as soon as we could, but that fire burned hot. We never found more than bits and pieces of the folk who lived there.” He caught Marcus’ eye and shook his head. “Sorry. Shouldn’t have said it like that. What I mean is the fire was odd.”

  “What do you mean, odd?”

  “As best we could tell, it started in three places at once. Oil lamp by the front door, fireplace near the back door, spark in the straw by the stable door. Three doors, three fires. That’s real bad luck.”

  There was a long silence.

  “You’re sure about that?” Marcus said, voice dull.