“I’d want to know what you were doing in the Tip then,” Salina said. “And why did a bunch of children try to murder you?” I didn’t say anything while she studied me for a long moment. She cleared her throat. “I’ve heard you’re quite popular with them, the urchins, for reasons I can’t fathom, so I’ll ask again: What do you mean?”
“I sometimes forget how intelligent you are, Salina,” I told her. “If you’d been half as arrogant as you were when we first met, you might have kept me from the Board after all. I mean that as a compliment, by the way,” I added.
Salina shook her hair. “I stand by my original impression, Buc.” She grinned. “You really are the most perfect arsehole.”
“Guilty,” I admitted. “You ask what I mean, but let me ask you a question: Do your walls have a rodent problem? One that comes and goes and you never know if they’re gone or still there, listening? Through the walls?”
Salina had been about to take another sip of tea, but froze at my question, the cup seemingly motionless in her hand; with Sin’s magics I could see the slight tremble there. She set the cup down carefully and sat back in her chair, though I could see the whites of her knuckles as she clenched the gilded arms.
“If I take your meaning aright, and I think I do, then I’ll say this: these do not, but my family built this palazzo nearly two centuries before. The original architecture in the center? That’s been around for nearly as long as Servenza herself.”
“I see,” I said.
“Do you, Buc?” she asked, almost as if asking herself rather than me. Salina crossed her legs, crimson and pale rose skirts flashing. “Do you really? Well, then, let me tell you a story.
“My family sat on the Board since the Kanados Trading Company’s founding, bankrolled the first plantation that grew kan. My father was nearly made Chair despite his extreme youth until Servenza intervened and the Chair got it instead … but it was a close-run thing despite that. Something the Chair never forgot.”
“I’ll bet she didn’t,” I agreed. “The bitch keeps receipts.”
“In triplicate.” Salina’s smile was unamused. “Under her reign, the Company expanded exponentially, but that required capital, which required taking on more shareholders, more debts, and the Board began to grow worried. Opposition coalesced around my father—I was just a child, but I remember the late-night dinner parties—and when word came that some of the kan plantations had a blight … well, things looked grim for the Chair.”
“And yet she’s still the Chair,” I said.
“And yet.” Salina sighed. “Father went to see the plantation personally, nominally at the Board’s request, but all knew if he returned with word the kan was failing it would bring about a vote of no confidence in the Chair.” Picking up her cup again, she took a long swallow, then set it down, empty. “They said it was a storm, one of those hurricanes that gave the Shattered Coast its name. None really know, though, because nothing was ever found save part of the figurehead from the prow.”
“You think he was murdered?”
She hesitated. “It would take much for someone to send an entire ship and her crew to the depths over one man, but—”
“If that one man could unseat one of the most powerful women in the world?”
“Aye,” she said sourly. “After that, I was promised his seat as heir, but the Chair convinced the rest of the Board that the stakes were now too high, given the Company’s success, to trust a seat to mere inheritance. It grew easier once more favorable reports on the kan’s yield began coming in, but even so I found myself forced to prove my worth to obtain that which I was owed. Last summer was supposed to be my chance.”
“Then you’re welcome,” I said.
I could hear her teeth grinding together. “It didn’t look as if you were going to deliver, Buc. Recall that you came in at the very last moment?”
“But I came,” I added, holding back the double entendre that leapt to mind. Salina seemed a bit on edge.
“You did come,” Salina said after a pause. “After I’d already made alternate arrangements.”
“To get your seat on the Board?”
She nodded.
“Which would require someone outside the Board,” I said slowly, everything sliding together in a flash. She nodded again. “You said before that Servenza intervened to keep your father from the Chair. Did Servenza intervene again, this time against the Chair?”
“Aye,” Salina whispered. “So I have my seat and with it the knowledge that should I fail, they will blot me out like one does an ant scurrying across the page and pay more mind to the ink marred than the ant’s death.”
“I see,” I said. And this time I did. I wasn’t the only one who’d made alliances, or, as they were likely seen, deals, debts incurred to be held for future interest. “Whose ship did your father sail on, Salina?”
She closed her brown eyes and when she opened them again they were filled with anger and unshed tears.
“One of Servenza’s. One of the Doga’s own.”
We sat in silence for a time, me mulling over what I’d learned while Salina collected herself. The Doga had moved against Salina’s family twice, but then had helped her when she was at her most low—a position engineered by the Doga in the first place. In the end, none of what Salina told me surprised me, just that if both of us were ensnared by the Doga—and in my case, possibly the Chair, as well—who else was? I said as much and Salina shrugged.
“Not Lucrezia. She’s got her father’s estates to fall back upon, which makes her powerful enough to be her own woman, though she doesn’t seem to realize it. Likely the one or two others of her stature are free as well. After that, it’s anyone’s guess.” She met my eyes. “I’ll just tell you this, Buc: you can bargain with the Doga, but you must be careful to never owe her. Once you find yourself under her thumb, it will be too late: her kind never relax their hold.”
“I’m not one to just bend over and take it,” I muttered.
Salina smirked. “Now there’s the woman I met this summer.”
“Maybe once I’m through with them, they’ll be the ones bent double and me behind.”
I made a gesture, Salina snorted, and we both began laughing. I felt something loosen in me, something that had been drawn taut around my heart after this afternoon’s mess. It’d felt like a wire cutting into me, one that had been there since Eld and I lost our way, only now it was slack and I could breathe. And feel. And laugh. As I wiped tears away, I finally realized what had been strange about Salina. Not that she wore makeup or had her hair styled, but that her dress looked uncomfortable for sitting, the skirts too extravagant, too long, especially given the latest trend of jacket and trousers.
“Y-you’re wearing a ball gown?” I shook my head, still giggling, “at this hour? Do you sleep in the damned things?”
“I do not,” Salina said quickly, blushing. She shook her head. “And there are some newer dances that are especially made for the latest fashions, but that’s not what tonight is for.”
“Dances?” I frowned. Suddenly the sums were beginning to add up to a figure I didn’t like. “And just what is tonight for?”
“Well,” Salina said, her eyes sparkling, “that’s why I was so surprised to see you. I thought for sure you’d blow this off, too.”
“No,” I groaned.
“Aye, we’ve another dancing lesson for the Masquerade,” she said, pushing herself to her feet. She opened the door and called past me, “Mara! Were you able to find a gown for Signorina Buc?”
“Aye, signora!” Mara’s voice echoed from down the hall. “And the maestro has just arrived, so there’s still time for her to change. I’ve got the powders and irons ready!”
“Instruments of torture, more like.”
“Up,” Salina commanded. “We’ve work to do.”
I groaned, but let her draw me up and followed her toward the door. I glanced at Quenta’s lifeblood dried on my sleeve, and for a breath, that wire was back and cutting hard. “You
never asked me about the blood,” I said quietly.
Salina glanced back. “I didn’t. You would tell me or you wouldn’t, Buc. I was just here to listen.”
“And then did all the talking,” I said.
“Maybe that’s what you wanted?” She smiled. “Isn’t that what friends are for?”
“Friends?”
The word caught me off guard and she smirked at the look on my face. “If you came here after what happened, what else are we?”
“Aye,” I said slowly, wondering what this new sensation was. I’d never had any friends other than Sister or Eld. I’d never felt the lack, either; people were weak in the end, waiting to buckle when you needed them the most. Though without Eld to talk to and with Sin trying to convert me every other moment, I could use an ally or three.
“You’ve the power of the Gods, Buc,” Sin said quietly. There was an urgency to his voice. “That’s all you need.”
I brushed him off, but I couldn’t help thinking about someone else who’d had the power of the Gods and tried to use that and their wit to play all sides off one another. It hadn’t ended great for Chan Sha. There was an itch between my shoulder blades, almost as if I could sense the blade coming. I shivered instead.
Allies?
“Friends,” I said out loud, and reached for Salina’s hand. She took it and shook it seriously before a teasing grin swept across her features. I met that grin with one of my own as I let her shepherd me down the hall toward the waiting horrors of learning to dance from an aging maestro who barely came to my chin. That word kept reverberating through me. Allies. But I’d had another name for it over the summer. One I should have warned Quenta about.
Cannon fodder.
16
Eld let Glori shut the copper-and-leather embossed door to his bedroom behind him. The servants who didn’t reside in the palazzo were long gone to their homes; those who lived in had gone to bed hours before. Guilt for keeping the old woman up rather than any real desire for sleep had driven Eld from the drawing room and its flickering fireplace. Buc was still out; Salina had sent a note that Buc had decided to take tea with her. A rather late tea, and something Eld had trouble imagining Buc being interested in.
Was Buc changing or was Sin changing her?
A chill gripped him at the memory of Sin’s deeper voice coming from her mouth. Afterward she’d seemed fine, right up until they ran into that ambush. For a moment there—more than a moment, really—she’d seemed completely confused, unsure where they were or what they were doing. Like before. Only, before had been worse. Far worse.
He slipped out of his robes and made for the bed, taking care not to extend his right arm too far. It ached with the promise of a bruise on the morrow, though in the moment he hadn’t felt it any more than he had the flash of flame that had nearly engulfed him. He’d looked a sight when he found Govanti, right where Buc had said he would be—the lad had taken one look at him and lit out like a seal before a shark. I was in a singed jacket speckled with blood. He smiled ruefully and scratched the stubble on his chin with his good arm. Luckily the past few months had forced him to find distractions in reading and, more often, in swordplay and calisthenics. He was in the best shape of his life, while Govanti was still young enough to be more limbs than dexterity. He’d caught the boy easily.
Eld eased down onto the edge of the bed, hearing the frame creak from his weight. Eventually the lad realized Eld wasn’t trying to kill him—an interesting conversation, that, involving a blade and the inside hem of Eld’s trouser. Buc had clearly shown the boy a trick or two. Once Govanti knew he was safe, the boy had practically begged Eld to take Govanti back with him. He would have, too, if he hadn’t promised Buc he wouldn’t run her informants. Taking Govanti in wasn’t quite that, but given the tension between them, he couldn’t risk it. Not without checking with her first.
He couldn’t keep the growl in the back of his throat. Someone—likely Glori waiting to see his lamp go out—shifted on the other side of the door. Eld levered himself into bed and rolled over, blowing out the gilded lamp on the bedside table. Darkness consumed him and with it came Govanti’s stories. About gang leaders found brutally murdered, entire gangs disappearing, mages in corners of the city they’d never been before, and the whispers of a flaming-eyed demon who burned their enemies alive and laughed and danced over the ash heaps of corpses. Fanciful stuff, but Govanti was no child … he’d grown up on the streets, same as Buc. Buc wouldn’t have believed the half of it. Not then. Not now. Still, something had scared the lad.…
The air kissed his skin with a chill and Eld pulled the blankets up, thinking of another kiss. Was it so wrong to want more? More than just a friendship? To have that I’ll have to tell her. Everything. Do that and I might lose her. Do that and she might lose herself.
The pressure of all the lies felt like a weight on his chest, threatening to cave his lungs in, so heavy he was continually surprised his ribs didn’t crack.
“Without you, I wouldn’t be alive today and without me, you might not have made it out alive today.”
His tongue tripped over the lie. She’d been more than capable, enough that had he not put his brace down, she’d likely have torn the pair of would-be assassins to shreds with her blades and carried on without a thought. Magic. His skin pebbled for another reason. Perhaps the young woman whom he had always known didn’t need anyone, had finally realized that truth herself? It’s what Sin believes. Not that he trusted Sin, but he had to trust a little or else none of the past few months made sense. He missed the time when sense was something that existed in his world. Now everything was smoke and lies, blood and betrayal. Buc’s facing something larger this time. Not Chan Sha, bereft of her crew, not a Ghost Captain with a mindless army. She just had to manipulate two compromised people. Now she’s compromised, even if she doesn’t realize it. Worse, the Gods know her name. So do the Chair and the Doga. And if it’s not one of them trying to kill us, someone else knows her name as well. This summer we were an unknown, often overlooked quantity, but no one’s pulling any punches now.
Eld rolled onto his back, stared up at the inky blackness above him, and bit his lip. If she’s compromised, then I have to be the rational one, even if it’s at a remove. I need to find out who wants us dead so badly they tried to incinerate us in broad daylight, same as the Doga. Before our luck runs out. There was a saying in the army about luck only applying to grenadoes and mages, and he had a feeling they were facing both.
Tomorrow.
He didn’t expect to sleep, but the decision released some of the weight from his chest and he slid below the covers and into dreams before he realized he was tired after all.
Dreams of dancing on the sand, lungs full of hot coals as his breath came in gasps. His limbs felt like water, yet he forced the blade in his hand to strike like a sand adder, darting in and out, the charred pirate queen before him struggling to keep his steel from her throat despite her magic and twin blades. Each blow reverberated through him and he saw her movement, felt her intent, let her catch his shoulder, and fell, hand vainly trying to staunch the wound. She stepped past him and he let go of himself, let the blood flow freely, and hacked at her leg. Chan Sha cried out, fell back, and the dead swarmed over her like a skeletal wave.
Dreams of dying on the sands, waiting for Buc as his flesh flayed itself from the inside out, blackening with rot and decay. In this dream she never returned and he heard the Ghost Captain’s chortle at what a fool he was to trust that slip of a girl. Eld opened his mouth to tell the Dead Walker he was a fool, but the only sound that came out was a dried hiss from his long-since-desiccated tongue. There was a voice, bright in his mind, familiar, reminding him he was a Shambles now and that he lived to serve. He drew his arm back, saw the rusted blade clutched in his fist, and studied the thin, black girl in rags at his feet. She looked up, unkempt braids twisted and tangled, a bruise marring her cheek. Her green eyes were bright in the island sun. There was no question in their dep
ths, simply calm assurance.
Buc.
Again that laugh, but this time a different tone, deeper than he remembered.
Sin.
The sword moved of its own volition, struck with the weight of a monsoon. Eld, blind panic exploding through him, fought the momentum with every decaying fiber of his decrepit being, but the sword only moved faster, his limbs trembling, dried tendons cracking from the force of the descending blow. The blade hummed as it scythed through the air and Eld wanted to tear his eyes out, but he was a prisoner chained within his own body and Buc’s gaze held him fast. The blade flashed between them and his mind screamed until everything burst in an impossibly bright white flame. The world tore apart and rained black ash down, and darkness consumed all save for two gems, shining in the black ink.
Emeralds.
17
“Smoke filled the alley from the shot,” the man said quickly. “Couldn’t see arse nor shit, but that demon fired some pistole what made no sound. Was her shot that lamed me,” he added, pressing a hand against the dirty linen bandage that covered his leg above the knee.
“But not so lame that you couldn’t run away when it was over, eh?” she asked.
“Maestra?”
She growled in her throat, saw her gleaming eye of fire reflected in the man’s terrified gaze, and spat. “Use my name, that’s honorific enough.”
“S-Sicarii—please!” He shook his greasy locks and wiped at his forehead, leaving a bloody smudge across his tanned features. “By the time I got to my feet it really was over. They was all dead or dying an’ the only reason I got away was because she was too busy turning that lass you paid off into a pincushion.”
She studied the man for several moments, letting the silence build and, with it, the tension. Silence was something oft undervalued, something she’d not realized the importance of herself until it was nearly too late. Here, it was a tool, to let the man’s imagination run until he was convinced she was going to slit his throat. Then—when she didn’t—he’d talk and the truth would come. But was it the same truth as what he told the first time? Or something else? And if else, would she kill him or not? With his shattered leg he was useful for little more than begging, but beggars had proved their worth already, hadn’t they? Sicarii chuckled and the man winced at the sound of her harsh voice.
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