by Rob J. Hayes
The second man was undoubtedly the owner of the harsh voice. He sat in the very chair Jacques had recently purchased for himself and placed in front of the fireplace. The man was facing away from Jacques but he could see a head of thinning hair and an ornate wooden cane leaned against the chair.
The third man…
“Dear Maker, you’re a woman!” Jacques exclaimed.
It wasn’t that she was overly masculine, but more that she dressed much like a man and perched on the window ledge in a particularly unfeminine fashion. She wore a suit of brown, much the same as the man by the lamp, and carried a brace of pistols. Her hair too was of a similar length to the man’s, but her features were far softer and more delicate. She was, Jacques had to admit, quite pretty.
“How rude, dear,” Isabel said from beside him, her hand resting lightly on his arm. “We should make every courtesy available to our intruders. Tell me, would any of you like a drink? I believe we have some distilled nightshade I think you’ll all enjoy.”
“How droll,” said the man from the chair, glancing back over his shoulder. He had a round face with plump cheeks, a bulbous nose covered with a scattering of freckles and small, beady eyes that reminded Jacques of nothing so much as a rat staring at a morsel of food. The rest of the man’s body was of a similar shape; short but round with the distinct suggestion that he had once been a powerful man but, as years advanced upon him, had let much of that power turn to mere bulk. “I believe we may be able to do away with the pleasantries.”
“We should speak more plainly then,” Isabel said with a smile. “Please, get out.”
The man in the chair sighed. “Monsieur Jacques Revou, Mademoiselle Isabel de Rosier, please,” he gestured to the couch opposite Jacques’ chair, a couch that until recently had been stationed by the window, “sit.”
Jacques looked at Isabel. Isabel looked at Jacques. They shrugged in unison. There was something about the way the old man talked that demanded obedience and it was not just because he knew their real names, a secret they kept as guarded as secrets came. With a wary look at the unfeminine-yet-pretty woman and the square-jawed man, Isabel and Jacques both came to the conclusion they should take to the couch and hear the man out. It was safe to say he didn’t want them dead or they would both no doubt already be so, but in their line of profession there were worse things than dead, or at least Jacques firmly believed that any sort of prison would most definitely be worse than dying. He couldn’t abide being locked into anything let alone a cell.
“Do you know who I am?” the old man asked through steepled fingers as Jacques and Isabel took their appointed seats upon the antique couch. It might have been comfortable once but Jacques could swear the ruby red cushions had been stuffed with needles.
“Should we?” he asked, shifting on the cushion a little and placing a hand on Isabel’s knee. As always, no matter how uncomfortable, she was the very height of composure.
“No. You should not. So let us start with some introductions.” He looked at Isabel. “You are Isabel de Rosier; daughter of Sarah and Pierre de Rosier. A stage brat, you learned the trade of acting from your parents as they toured Sassaille and Arkland with la troupe de Zelaine.”
The old man shifted his gaze to Jacques. “You are Jacques Revou orphan of nobody from nowhere. You spent your childhood being bounced from orphanage to orphanage in an attempt to stop the other inmates from killing you, for stealing from them. Shall I continue?”
Jacques cleared his throat. “No.”
Isabel gave the old man her very best level stare. “I’d rather you didn’t”
“Good. My name is Seigneur Renard Daron, the man behind you is Amaury Roache and the lady you rudely insulted is Franseza Goy. I presume you have never heard of me?”
Along with the idea of being trapped, one thing Jacques truly hated was being toyed with and right now he had the distinct feeling that both he and Isabel were very much the mice to Seigneur Daron’s cat. “I presume we should not have heard of you?”
“Indeed,” the Seigneur continued without pause. “The fact that you have not is evidence of just how proficient I am in my role. I am shadow conceiller to King Felix Sassaille.”
Jacques opened his mouth to speak, realised no sound was escaping his lips and promptly closed his mouth again. He looked over at Isabel sitting next to him, if she was surprised she was showing none of it; her deep blue gaze remained even and the set of her jaw was stony and cold, to say the least. As always, even if Jacques should lose his cool, Isabel was ever the consummate professional.
“Should we be impressed?” Isabel asked from the other side of the couch. “Should I swoon? I’m certain I have that one in my repertoire.” She looked at Jacques; it was enough to snap him out of his shock.
“I’m sure if you don’t, my dear, I do.”
“You always were a much better swooner than myself.”
Jacques affected a shocked gasp. “You might be amazed how many places a good fainting can get you as a man.”
“More than a woman?”
“Most assuredly. Why rarely a fancy shindig goes by without a woman fainting, either from drinking too much or eating too little…”
“Not to mention the dresses,” Isabel pointed out.
“I’ve heard they can constrict the airflow, although I personally have never had occasion to test such a claim. Now men, on the second hand, never should have cause to faint. It is, in fact, considered to be quite the feminine pastime and, therefore, when one does faint; most witnesses are completely unable to formulate a plan of action. One well-timed suggestion of where to put the emasculated fellow, and what to do with said fellow, and it becomes something approaching gospel.”
Jacques and Isabel both stopped talking and looked at Seigneur Daron in unison. “I presume,” Jacques started, “being a man of standing, you are also a man of wealth and, therefore, not here to rob us…”
Franseza Goy laughed from her perch by the window.
“He would not find anything of worth here even if he were,” Isabel concluded.
“So why are you here, Seigneur?” Jacques asked.
The old man smiled wide and leaned forward, resting heavily on his cane. “Indeed I am not here to rob you but rather to inform you that I have already done so. Everything you own, as it happens.”
“Barring the clothes on their backs,” said Amaury Roache from behind the couch.
“We could always take those too,” finished Franseza Goy.
Jacques affected the most nonchalant smile he could, given the news he had just received, and leaned back into the couch which was not, he had to admit, as comfortable as he would have liked though he also had to admit that it could be the situation that was unfathomably uncomfortable. “That is a bold statement, Seignuer Daron but there’s no way…”
“You might be surprised at just what there is a way for me to do. Your bank accounts have been frozen.”
Jacques refused the urge to throw something at the old man and kept up his bravado. “You could not have found all four of them.”
“In point of fact, Monsieur Revou, I have found and frozen all six of them.”
“Oh.”
“We still have the house,” Isabel pointed out, picking up right where Jacques left off. “Bought and paid for and a nice sum it will fetch.”
Again the old man grinned and his dark eyes twinkled in the lamp light. “Bought and paid for and signed over earlier today to one Seigneur Renard Daron. I may keep it as a fourth home, but more likely I will see just how nice a sum it will fetch.”
Isabel leaned back into the couch next to Jacques and glanced up at him. “What do you want, Seigneur?”
The old man nodded slowly as if the question had always been a foregone conclusion and, by the looks of things it had. “I want to hire you both.”
“We’re retired,” Jacques complained with little to no conviction.
“Not anymore.”
Jacques looked at Isabel to find her
already looking back. He could see in her eyes the same thought he was considering. Both of them were nimble and quick and strong. No doubt they would lose any sort of fight with the man Amaury and his counterpart Franseza, but Jacques would bet everything he had left, which was approaching little to nothing, that they could outrun the two. It would not be an easy thing to start over again from broke but they had done it once, and he was sure as the sunrise, they could do it again.
“I’m afraid I do have one more little surprise,” the old man said. “Amaury, if you will.”
“With pleasure.” The square-jawed Amaury approached the fireplace and Jacques noticed two nails hastily hammered into the plaster that were definitely not there before. He had memorised every inch of the house when they had moved in and those nails were new. Amaury hung two sheets of high-grade paper on the nails and stepped back.
Isabel and Jacques’ own likenesses stared back at them from the paper and Jacques had to admit the likeness was more than a little compelling.
“Crude illustrations, I know,” said Seigneur Daron. “More than enough to identify the both of you, however. If either of you should run, these two portraits will be sent to every family and every law office in the country. There will be no where you can run where my hand cannot reach out and crush you. Do we have an understanding?”
Jacques cleared his throat. “So you have a job for us? One, I understand will have a fairly substantial payment attached to compensate us for the money you claim to have stolen.”
The old man pulled out a kerchief and coughed into it, Jacques couldn’t help but notice it came away spotted with red. “Upon completion of the job I will unfreeze your accounts and you will be free to leave Rares.”
“My favourite type of job,” Isabel said with a sigh. “One where we aren’t paid at all. Why us, Seigneur?”
“Because you’re the best at what you do,” the old man said in a voice as cold as the grave, “and right now I have need of two people who do what you do.”
“What we do is steal things,” Isabel said hesitantly.
The old man smiled. “What you do is convince people you are something you are not. Now I must retire, I have other matters to attend to. Amaury here will take you to your new home and there you will wait. We will discuss the particulars of the job another time.”
As the old man stood, Franseza rushed forwards and took his arm, helping him towards the doorway. Jacques glanced at Isabel, she was watching Amaury warily.
“This way, if you please,” Amaury gestured towards the rear of the house with a dark grin.
“What if we don’t please?” Jacques asked.
Again that dark grin. “Then I get to make you.”
Jacques nodded, fairly certain Amaury could easily best them both and just as certain even if he couldn’t then Seigneur Renard Daron had them well and truly under his thumb. “Fairly compelling reason to please then, don’t you think, dear?”
Isabel flowed to her feet and curtsied, her face lighting up into a smile. “I do believe it would be our pleasure.”
Chapter 4 – Residential Uprooting
Isabel had expected Amaury to take them to a hovel, a lie-low to put them up in and keep an eye on them. Whatever Seigneur Daron had planned for them, it was now obvious his schemes were far grander than the mundane. Amaury took them to a mansion.
Under cover of darkness; lit only by the intermittent flashes of colour from straggling firerockets as the first night of the festival began to wind down; Amaury Roache stole into the mansion with both Jacques and Isabel, now feeling as curious as she was cautious, in tow. The grounds were luxurious, gardens and flower beds and even a quaint fountain, all surrounded by waist-high walls with head-high iron bars atop. The gate into the grounds was left curiously open, a fools mistake even on a night such as the beginning of the festival. Amaury took only a moment to nod towards the front door, an ostentatious metal thing far larger surely than any door needed to be, with an odd design set into its façade. Isabel heard Jacques inhale sharply but when she looked back he merely waved her on despite wide anxious eyes.
Amaury led them around the grounds to the back of the not unsubstantial mansion, which looked to be three floors high and at least three times the size of the house they had just had stolen from them. He led them to a small wooden door, no doubt the servants’ entrance, and produced a heavy iron key, which he deftly slid into the lock, despite the general darkness, and with a turn and a push the heavy slab of iron-bound wood slid inwards. Amaury, not a small man, ducked in through the doorway and disappeared into the gloom. Jacques looked at Isabel and shrugged; Isabel looked back and sighed as she followed their guide into the mansion, trusting Jacques would follow closely behind. She wasn’t sure if they were about to take up residence or rob the place blind, but she was definitely sure she wanted Jacques with her every step of whichever way it turned out to be.
“Close the door,” came Amaury’s voice from an Amaury shaped patch of black amidst the darkness.
Jacques cleared his throat and then Isabel heard him give the door a shove, it banged back into place with a noise that seemed unnaturally loud. A moment later Amaury laughed and struck a match, lighting what appeared to be a wine cellar in a soft glow. He passed the little flame over an oil lantern and the glow became brighter as the wick took to the fire. Shadows danced in the wine cellar giving the entire space an indefinably eerie air.
“Very well stocked,” Jacques said in a light tone. Isabel turned to find him examining a bottle. “Falen winery, twenty years old. A bit dry for my usual palate but then I’ve never really been one to say no to a twenty year old wine.”
Again Amaury laughed. “My dramatics didn’t scare you then?”
“They were amateurish really,” Jacques said.
“This is a nice house,” Isabel pointed out.
“Your new home, until Seigneur Daron says otherwise.”
“Is that really a Lindle clockwork lock on the front door?” asked Jacques.
“Installed by Dominique Lindle herself.”
“That must have cost a small fortune.”
Amaury nodded, an amused grin on his square features. “The Seigneur is very particular about his particulars. Likes everything to be just right. You’ll see when he comes for you.”
“You must know what he has planned for us,” Isabel chimed in. “How about a hint? I’d be ever so grateful.”
Amaury snorted and started towards them, leaving the lamp on the cellar table. “Make yourselves at home Monsieur Revou, Mademoiselle de Rosier.” He held the door key out to Isabel and waited for her to take it. “The Seigneur will be back in a couple of days to tell you what you need to know. The house staff will be here in four days and you’ll arrive a day after them.” Isabel opened her mouth to ask a question but Amaury ploughed straight on. “Feel free to leave tomorrow; I expect you’ll want to check your accounts to make sure they’re frozen. I assure you they are. Please use the back door and be discrete, it just wouldn’t do for the neighbours to see you so early. You already know what will happen if you try to run. I advise against it. In the meantime, enjoy your new home.”
“Is that it?” Jacques asked as Amaury opened the door.
The big man looked back, laughed and stepped outside pulling the door closed behind him.
Isabel stood there in silence for a few moments, listening to the hiss and pop of the lantern in the grim darkness of the wine cellar. Jacques turned to her with a shrug. “What should we do?”
She made a show of looking around. “I suggest we drink to our lost fortune.”
Chapter 5 - One More Last Job
Renard strode along the tunnel in near darkness with Amaury close behind and Franseza dictating pace ahead. He was shorter than them both and the years had deigned to give him a pot belly but he was far from the cripple he led people to believe and more than able to keep up at a brisk walk.
Rats scattered as they approached, disappearing into holes in the stonework.
Water dripped onto stone continuously providing a nauseating backdrop of frustratingly rhythmic sound. Something flat, slimy and eyeless slithered away from his boot and contrived to make an angry hissing noise despite having no mouth to speak of. Some of the creatures that called the tunnels under Rares their home were not to be trifled with, but Renard was not without his own defences and right now that included two of the most dangerous people he had ever had the fortune to meet.
Franseza, he had found duelling in a flea-ridden arena in south Arkland near the Hermes temple. Renard had never been taken with killing people for money, there were after all far more important reasons to kill, or in his case, to have people killed, but sometimes and for some people there was no other way to make a few ducats. He had watched her kill a man in single combat and had decided to procure her services there and then; only later had he found out she was also something of a crack shot with both pistol and rifle. Building loyalty into the woman’s list of attributes had been an easy task; all it took was money, respect, trust, and more money.
Amaury was a different kettle and a far harder one to make loyal though now he had, the man’s loyalty was unwavering. Amaury had been a soldier on the frontier across the Brimstone Seas, one dishonourable discharge later and the man had found himself back in Sassaille. He had been destitute and hopeless, scrounging for ducats and working for a thug in Thethingnan collecting protection money from local businesses. It just so happened that Renard had cause to have dealings with the thug and along with letting the unscrupulous man live, he took Amaury’s services. That had without a doubt been one of Renard’s best deals ever made. He was fairly certain the one he was about to make would be even better.
Of course the two charlatans had checked their accounts, just as Amaury had suggested, and they had found them just as frozen as Renard had proclaimed. He was not one to make idle threats. His spies had followed them all of the previous day and had reported every conversation; every shop, house and bank visited; every flared temper and every tempered resignation. He had them well and truly over a barrel, as the popular saying went, and now that they realised just how over he had them, it was time for the next phase.