by K. T. Davies
“That’s fair.”
He spat and lurched towards me. I took a step back because I really didn’t want to kill him. He slipped and fell. I gave him a kick in the ribs— just enough to wind him. “Stay down, Rai,” I said and turned to Tobias. “Come with me.” He shot a terrified glance over his shoulder and yanked the bell chain so hard he pulled it from the gate. “Stop fucking about and come on, will you? These coves want to kill you.”
“I’m a senator! You’ll hang for this, all of you!” he shrieked, clutching the broken bell before him like a talisman.
“I’m sure I’ll hang for something, but right now I’m trying to save your life, so we have to leave.” He threw the bell at me. I ducked aside. “This isn’t how I imagined things would go.” I grabbed him by the arm and began to drag him down the street, watched by residents alerted by the commotion.
“Unhand me!” He dragged his heels, tried to squirm from my grasp. I was about to explain again that I was trying to save his life when a crossbow bolt spanged off the cobbles and sliced my calf on the rebound. The pain was searing. I looked up. Nix was hanging over the parapet, her mask shattered, her face bloody and furious.
Tobias kicked me in the other shin.
“Why do you always make things difficult?” I asked.
“I said unhand—”
Before he could finish, I headbutted him in the face. It wasn’t quite the reunion embrace I’d hoped for. As he collapsed I scooped him up and threw him over my shoulder.
“You’re fucking dead!” Raiber shouted. I glanced behind me, saw Tarby stagger over to him, blood pouring from her snotpipe. On the roof, Nix was spanning the bow.
“Definitely not how I saw this going.”
Tobias looked so peaceful when he was asleep, his pale features warmed by the light of the torch I’d lit in the cellar for his benefit. Granted, the bloody nose and swelling black eyes detracted somewhat from his lean, aesthetic profile, but this was definitely Tobias. The clothes were fancier, the purse heavier— and now mine by right of ‘finders keepers’, but the smell was the same. This was Tobias.
Once I was sure that I wasn’t being followed by Nix or Raiber, I’d borrowed a handcart rather than carry him over my shoulder. Given the lawlessness of the city, no one questioned an angry-looking half-thoasa pushing a wonky cart down the road with an unconscious human sprawled across it. When someone happened to glance at us, I gave a despondent shrug, mimed drinking, and pointed to my charge. As no one stopped me or shouted for the greenshanks, I assumed my mimed explanation had worked.
I saved you. This time, I saved you. I was filled with a feeling I hadn’t experienced for many years, which was somewhere between relief and joy. I reached out, brushed a strand of yellow hair from his face. He stirred, opened his eyes, and jumped, almost falling from the stone shelf, which was the only dry place in the cellar.
He opened his eyes. “Where…?
“The cellar of a burned-out house, just like the old days, eh?” I said, recalling the time we’d hidden out in another version of the city.
His eyes widened. “You!” he yelled and fell off the shelf.
“So much for trying to keep you dry.” I offered him my hand. He recoiled. “Suit yourself.”
“You have made a grave mistake kidnapping me. I am an Imperial Senator.”
“I…what? I know what you are, prickling. And I didn’t fucking kidnap you, I just saved your life.”
“You hit me in the face!” He gestured to his bloody nose.
“You were hysterical. I had to calm you down, or else that very angry assassin would have put a crossbow bolt through you.”
“Calm me…? Who do you work for?” He pushed himself up against the wall. “Speak, damn you, I de—”
I put my finger on his lips. “Hush, now, there’s a good fellow, because if you keep talking, I’m going to hit you again, and part of me doesn’t want to do that.”
He pulled back, furious. “How dare you,” he said, and vigorously wiped his mouth with the same hand that had just been soaked to the wrist in slimy, cellar water, illustrating just how low I stood in his estimation. “Who paid you to abduct me? Was it Avin? Well, was it?”
I sighed. “I don’t work for anyone.”
“I don’t believe you.” His gaze flicked to the stairs.
“I don’t fucking care.” I poked him in the chest. “Actually, that isn’t true. I’m disappointed that you don’t believe me. It bespeaks a suspicious nature, and I thought better of you, Tobias.” I put myself between him and the exit.
His lips thinned to a hard, angry line and he narrowed his eyes. “You’re with the Third Dawn, aren’t you?” Curious as to what he was talking about, I said nothing, giving him the space to run on. “I’ve already told you people; I will work tirelessly for tertiary citizens, but within the law, and by the will of the Empirifex.”
“That’s as maybe, but aren’t you a tiny bit curious as to who tried to slot you?”
“Slot?”
“Mill.” He gave me a blank stare. “Inhume?” Still nothing. “Kill?” I made a stabbing motion.
“Ah.” A smug grin spread across his face. Now there was a look I remembered. “You’ll forgive my skepticism, but all I saw was you and some other citizens brawling in the street. For all I know the fight was staged to draw me to the tertiary cause.” He reached out and almost touched my arm before he caught himself and withdrew.
I had no such qualms and grabbed his tentacle hand. “Listen, patrician. I’m not exactly from around here and haven’t got a fucking clue what ‘cause’ you’re talking about. Also, from where I’m standing, you look like a fucking tert.” I let him go.
He wiped his hand and gave a patronizing smile. “I am indeed a member of the tertiary class, and let me assure you and your friends, despite the slanderous rumors, I have the best interests of all the tertiary citizens at heart, not only patricians.” The smile broadened, but failed to reach his watery blue eyes. It shook me. Where once there had been warmth and compassion, I saw only cold calculation.
“And let me assure you; this isn’t a game. Someone’s trying to kill you, Tobias. So best get some wards up. You can weave wards?”
“What do you mean?”
“Can you use magic? Because if you can, I suggest that you do.”
He snorted as though I’d insulted him. “I’m not a sorcerer.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, quite sure.” His demeanor changed to that of a cove who thought they were dealing with a lunatic and became fearfully condescending. He began searching his pockets. “I seem to have mislaid my coin purse. Nevermind. I can offer, if not coin, my gratitude to you, citizen for doing what you thought was the right thing. Now, if you truly are my savior, you really ought to let me go before a search party comes looking for me, which it will after the er, misunderstanding.”
“I’m not insane,” I blurted and instantly regretted it.
He laughed uneasily and shook his head. “No, of course you aren’t.”
We stood there a while, ankle-deep in water, looking at each other. I don’t know what he saw; a tert, a half-breed, a dangerous, possibly insane sellsword. Behind the nervous smile, I could still see my friend, only this Tobias hadn’t been born into a world with a prophecy and the machinations of Halda the Red Witch guiding his— guiding our destinies. We had no greater calling. We weren’t joined by a higher purpose. He was scared shitless of me, and I was nothing more than a sentimental fool who’d let guilt get the better of good sense. The second I’d laid eyes on him, I’d stopped thinking rationally. I suddenly felt very alone in this world. “You’re…just…you can go.”
He didn’t give a moment’s pause and ran for the stairs without so much as backward glance. I told myself that I should be relieved that he’d gone, that I had enough on my plate dealing with Sakura and Ludo.
But I didn’t feel relieved, I felt bereaved, again. I’d saved a Tobias, but not my Tobias.
20<
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After Tobias fled, I left the hex house to its ghosts and banished all thoughts of the senator from my mind. I had to focus my attention on the real reason I was here and plan accordingly. If I went after Ludo now, half-cocked and unprepared I would die. Given how erratic my powers had been of late I might take him with me, but I might also take out half the city. Tempting though it was, I discovered quite to my surprise that was not the legacy I wanted to leave behind, not after working so hard to save the damn place. And, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that, despite coming ‘home’ to die, I’d gone off the idea and more to the point, Ludo wasn’t worth dying for.
You didn’t fuck around with sorcerers, so in order to get close enough to inhume him I would need wards to protect me from his power. Alas, I couldn’t make them myself, so I’d have to pay someone to do it for me and for that I’d need gold. Lots of gold.
If I say so myself, the plan I sketched as I left the cellar was elegant in its simplicity. I would ingratiate myself with Master Paradoxa, work my way into his crew, and start running some jobs. At the same time, I would relearn the subtle art of sorcery and regain control over that which I had lost. My resolve to follow this plan lasted for the length of time it took me to leave the cellar. Upon emerging from the darkness, a gust of wind whipped through the bones of the building, carrying with it the tail of Tobias’s unmistakable scent.
I stood a moment, savored the taste of it, the memories it conjured, and the truth I had tried to ignore. I hadn’t saved the ingrate; I’d just given him a stay of execution. I should have slotted Tarby, Raiber, and Nix. Now they would lick their wounds and either make good on the job, or inform their employer of their failure and someone else would. Either way, Senator Vulsones was still going to die and I’d gained a few more enemies. Senator Vulsones, not my Tobias. Ah, but he was so very like him.
I kicked a blackened timber. “Just stick to the plan and avenge your fucking mother.” I began to follow the thread of his scent. I would most certainly kill Ludo… just as soon as I’d seen Vulsones safely to his destination. After that, he was on his own. That’s what I told myself as I followed the scent trail to the west.
I caught up with him by a bridge, which spanned a meandering loop of the River Val. I’d lifted a cloak on route and kept far enough back that he wouldn’t see me if he should turn. He didn’t and so, like an angler, I let him run but kept him on the hook of my senses. Oblivious to my presence, my fish swam amid the teeming shoals and made his way from the thronged thoroughfares into the quieter streets of the hills.
The very rich lived above the heat and the stink of the city. Their mansions were clustered on the hills like routs of marble-shelled snails. The home of Patrician Senator Tobias Vulsones stood out from its neighbors not because it was particularly grand or particularly modest, but because it was on fire. I’d smelled the burning long before we reached the house, but by the way he stumbled to a halt before charging off, it had come as a complete surprise to Tobias. I quickened my pace and followed him as discretely as was possible in this neighborhood. The compound gate had been smashed open, and I could see a trio of greenshanks standing by the front door. They were poring over the contents of a broken desk, which along with other household items, had been thrown into the garden. Upon seeing them, Tobias skidded to a halt. Upon seeing him, the greenshanks drew their swords.
“Tobias Vulsones! By order of the Imperial Corrector, you are under arrest. Oi! Hold up!”
Wisely, Tobias set off running with the greenshanks in pursuit. I followed them. The senator had the advantage of local knowledge and wrong-footed his pursuers more than once. They were fitter than him and closed him down the further he strayed from his patch. He finally came undone in a pretty, cobbled square at the center of which was a covered well.
Across the square were two narrow alleys. One was blocked by an urux and cart, the other by a small herd of tuskers and their bored looking keeper. Blowing hard, Tobias skirted the well and began to fight his way through the squealing tuskers.
The foremost Greenshanks pulled up and drew a handcannon from his belt. “In the name of the Corrector, halt!” The strident bellow scythed through the general babble. Everyone within earshot save for me and Tobias froze. I kept running and drew my barker, pausing only to aim upon on the shouting cove. When I’d loaded the weapon earlier I’d double-charged it, just to be sure of a one shot kill. And so I wasn’t surprised when the greenshanks’s head exploded in a hail of burning bone and flash-fried noodles.
The roar made Tobias flinch, but upon realizing that he hadn’t been vented, he fought his way through the tuskers and ran. Horrified and half deaf, the poor coves who’d been in the square minding each other’s business scarpered, leaving me and the two greenshanks. As I’m not a wasteful cove, I threw the still smoking handcannon at the city guard who turned towards me. The butt hit him between the eyes. He pitched backwards, hit his head against the well, and stayed there. The other greenshanks gathered what wits he had and charged me. It was a bold if stupid move. I drew my remaining barker and fired. Nothing happened. The greenshanks came on, swinging his steel with enthusiasm borne of terror. I sidestepped his clumsy slash and his sword struck sparks from the edge of the well. A swift kick in the wotnots took the fight out of him. While he rolled around clutching his swelling jewels, I retrieved my barker and legged it after Tobias.
He was safe from immediate danger, but for reasons I hadn’t bothered to share with myself, I continued to follow him to the gatehouse of a mansion. Concealed behind a verdant hedge of tall trees, copper-skinned towers hinted at the opulence that lay behind the high walls. Tobias rang the bell and paced nervously outside, looking every inch like a wanted fugitive. The run had brought him out in a sweat, and his pale hair was plastered to his scarlet face. It was the first time I’d seen color rise in those cheeks in centuries. And then I had to remind myself; I’d never seen color in those cheeks because I didn’t know this Tobias.
Darkness began to bite into the gilt-edged horizon when the postern opened and an elderly watchman beckoned Tobias inside with his lamp. Neither of them bothered to cast a glance towards the road to see if they were being observed. I was both disappointed and grateful for their lack of caution as I hugged the scant shadows.
Evening wasn’t my time. The throbbing heart of suns’ set belonged to the dips, cutpurses, jostlers. Creatures like me were made for the deeper part of the night, the dead hours where dark deeds went unseen. Feeling exposed, I crossed the street and scaled the compound wall.
Boots crunched on gravel as I hid behind a neat row of artfully pruned bushes. Halfway along a statue flanked path, Tobias was met by an amphibane who regarded the sweating senator with a look somewhere between pity and suspicion.
“Domina Murcatoria will see you in the solar,” he said wearily before escorting Tobias to the house. When the door closed, and the gatekeeper shuffled back to his lodge, I crept closer to the south eastern corner of the classically proportioned Valenese mansion and crouched in the fragrant shrubbery. I let my hearing and sense of smell sketch a picture of what was going on in the great house. Aside of the flustered visitor, from what I could hear and smell it seemed the same as any other great house at this time of evening. The pace was slowing, fires had already been lit and a sumptuous supper already prepared.
On the south side of the mansion, on the second floor, gauzy curtains fluttered from open windows. Given that the Valenese style was boringly predictable that had to be the solar, where the noble family would take their ease after a day of doing not much at all. As I was here, I decided I might as well see why of all people, Tobias had sought sanctuary with the society beauty. The house was too busy to enter on the lower levels, so I skirted a path that wound through the garden until I came to a tall, stout-limbed tree. Whomever was in charge of security had been lax. Although attractive, the tree had been allowed to grow too close to the house. Not only was it a fire risk, but it allowed thieves easy ingress
.
I picked a perch that afforded me an excellent view of what I hoped was the solar’s three, floor-length windows and their wrought iron balconies. As the architect must have intended, I had a splendid view of the city from up here. I also had a clear view of Tobias’s burning house, something I doubt the builder had envisaged. The fire had done its worst to the blackened shell of the building, but it was still furiously hungry. The flames yearned towards a stand of tall, immaculately pruned cypresses, which would go up like candles if the wind shifted. The destruction that would ensue if thousands of fiery needles were loosed upon the overcrowded city did not bear thinking about. It seemed that wherever I went these days, fire followed.
“That will be all.” It was a woman’s voice. As befitted a great lady, there was confidence in her tone, but also the frailty of voice pipes worn thin by decades of use. It certainly did not match the vision of youthful, human beauty I’d seen on the boat. I lay along a branch to get a better view and caught a glimpse of the amphibane as he backed from the room.
“Ah, Tobias…” she said again. Annoyingly I couldn’t see either of them.
Even though I should be content that he was ‘safe’ I did not leave. I shinnied along the branch and leaped across to the balcony of the middle window. Thick, trailing vines muffled my landing.
“I tried to warn you, Toby,” she continued.
“If my father was alive—”
“He would have been arrested and taken to the Leads along with your mother.”
“They’ve taken her to the dungeon?”
“She’s a noblewoman.”
“She hasn’t done anything wrong! I haven’t!” Tobias paced past the window. I crouched behind a terracotta pot.
“You are confusing wrong with…” Whatever she said was stolen by a sharp gust of wind. My view of the drawing room was obscured by folds in the silk drapes, but I could make out Tobias and a dame sitting beside the fire, gowned in samite and wearing an elaborately coiffured wig of tight curls studded with citrines as bright as her wolfish eyes.