“We’re eating in your room?”
Rawk smiled but she quickly looked away. “No.” There was one more flight of stairs beyond his door and it led all the way to the roof. Not long ago it had given access to a small attic but the dwarves had changed everything when they put the huge water-tank on the roof.
Rawk walked around the tank, running his hand along the smooth, even stone. “This stuff is amazing,” he said. Part way around was a smaller, insulated tank that had a hearth beneath and a pile of wood beside.
Celeste nodded. “Concrete is easy to make; there are only a couple of ingredients and it comes out like a paste.”
“You take all the romance out of it.”
“I didn’t know you were the type to worry about romance.”
“I don’t worry about it, as such,” Rawk said, “but in my line of work it isn’t something that can be ignored.”
He finished half a circuit of the larger tank. Katamood was laid out before them, a sequined blanket folded and crumpled on the end of a bed. The river was a dark line with just a few spots of light where ships were taking advantage of the tide, to come or go or whatever it was they were doing. The canal and the accompanying work sites were even darker. Idle machinery dotted the length like grazing animals but all was quiet. Overhead, the night sky was lit by the brilliance of the stars. He heard Celeste gasp. She moved to the rail and looked out silently at the lights.
“It’s beautiful,” she said eventually. She took a deep breath, eyes shining.
Rawk looked up at the stars of the Swarm, curving away above their heads, and down at the lights of the city. “Between heaven’s stars above and the life sparks below,” Rawk quoted, quite proud of himself.
Celeste turned to look at him. “You read Kepler Venagoon?”
He shrugged and cleared his throat. “I own a book shop now, remember.”
“You also own a tavern but I don’t see you drinking lots of ale.” She smiled and Rawk couldn’t look away.
“I do sometimes, just to keep my cover.”
They stood silently for a while, between heaven above and the sparks below.
“It wasn’t like this before the tank was installed. It was just roof and there wasn’t any easy way up.”
“I’ve never seen Katamood like this. It looks different. It looks clean and full of possibilities.”
Bree would have loved it on the roof; Rawk could imagine her dangling her feet over the edge and shouting challenges at the night. But even knowing that, he still couldn’t imagine that she would embrace it with such openness. “This is the best view in the city. Weaver got a higher spot, but he sees ocean and farmland more than anything else. I’m blocking his view of the city.”
“He wouldn’t be very happy about that?”
Rawk laughed. “He pretends he doesn’t care. But I’m annoying him more than usual at the moment, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he comes and steals the Rest just so he can kick me out.”
“Can he do that?”
“Ultimately, yes, but it would be very bad for business and he knows it. Businesses and investors are unlikely come knocking if they think he’ll just come and take what they work for. If he knew I owned it, that might be a different matter.”
“How have you kept it secret all these years?”
“I’ve kept a lot of secrets. Business secrets are due mainly to Yardi. She worked everything out right from the start. I just supplied the money. I wouldn’t have much at all without her.”
Celeste turned away from the view to look at him. “She is a good friend?”
“The best.”
And back out at the city “Never anything more?”
Rawk glanced at her. “Long ago, when we were kids. Then I left to be Hero and that was that.”
“Your wandering must have made things difficult.”
“Lots of people wander and still manage to have adult relationships. I think I was using it as an excuse most of the time.” He cleared his throat. “Here, eat this before it gets cold.”
He handed over one pastie and opened the other as he made himself comfortable on the bench Travis had somehow lugged all the way up the stairs.
“Do you come up here often?”
“Not as often as I would like. Never with someone else.”
“This is delicious,” Celeste said around a mouthful of food.
Changing the subject? Rawk wondered.
After that they ate in silence for some time, staring out over the city as it lived and breathed below them.
Rawk was just breaking the seal on his cider when a noise disturbed him. For a moment he thought it was an exot and he wished he’d brought his sword, but he saw the same black kitten he’d seen earlier in the day. He stared at it, and it stared back. And when he recognized it he laughed loud enough to nearly scare it away.
“What’s so funny?”
“It’s the demon, I’m sure of it.”
Celeste eyed it suspiciously.
“Don’t worry, it isn’t an actual demon.” He waved his hand. “A while ago some people wanted me to evict a demon from their attic. Turned out it was just a kitten yowling because it was trapped under some stuff.”
“And you rescued it?”
“Well, I certainly didn’t kill it. And now it seems that he’s found me.” Rawk dug a bit of meat out of his pastie and blew on it to cool it down. When he was satisfied, he held it in his palm and reached out. “Come on Demon. I won’t hurt you.” The kitten backed away and wouldn’t come closer, so Rawk put the meat down nearby then backed away as well. The kitten crept forward to eat the food, and delicately took the next bit from Rawk’s fingers before skittering away nervously.
While he watched the kitten, Celeste returned to the rail and look out over Katamood. “What is that noise? Can you hear it?”
Rawk went to stand by her side. There was a rumble of sound, a roar, coming from the far side of the river.
“It’s a riot,” Rawk said. It was hidden, wherever it was.
A few minutes later there was a spark of color, a flash from down where the makeshift city filled the square. And a minute later the spark had become a fire.
“Fire breathes new life into the forest.” He thought that Words of Wisdom might have been a bit less literal than that.
“Pardon?”
“Nothing.”
The blaze grew quickly, hungrily licking at the old buildings. Rawk could hear bells.
“That’s the...” He waved his hand as he tried to think. “The dwarves who put out fires.” Did they realize there was a riot? They were likely to get themselves killed before they managed to put out any fires.
“The fire department.”
Rawk shrugged. He could hear shouts and screams. The clash of weapons.
He wanted to go and help, but he was a long way away. He moved a little bit closer to Celeste.
“I’ve got to go,” she said suddenly.
“What? Why?”
“I have to make sure my grandmother is all right.”
“Where does she live?”
“With me, half a mile from the square.”
“I’ll come with you.”
-O-
Rawk hurried over the bridge, panic growing. The world to the east had fallen strangely quiet just a few minutes earlier, not like any riot he’d heard before. The rumbling and the shouting had been moving as they made their way down the hill. First tumbling out from beside the river, then climbing the side of Mount Grace. Now to the east, now to the west. Once, the clatter and din had died down to almost nothing though the orange glow of the fire had continued to spread. Smoke was tightening its grip on the sky, slowly squeezing all the air out of it.
Celeste was struggling to keep up and he forced himself to slow down. And he still didn’t have his sword. They’d already been out the door of the Rest and a block down the hill before he realized, though he’d missed it just minutes earlier when disturbed by Demon. How could he not notice when he’
d carried a sword on his hip for most of the last forty years?
But it had been too late when he first realized and it was even more too late now. His dagger would have to do.
The ramshackle, flotsam town in the square was half a mile away, if it still existed, but the riot had passed along this street not too long ago. There were no people left now, none that were still standing anyway. In the flickering darkness it was hard to tell how many of the sprawling figures were still alive. His dagger felt ridiculous in his hand, given the circumstances. Rawk muttered to himself as he moved slowly forward. He wanted to tell Celeste to stay where she was, to go back to the Rest, but he was worried that the safest place was where he could keep an eye on her.
Further down the street, they finally found some people. There were about a hundred locals— rough, desperate people with nothing to lose— who were staring down at least three score of armed, trained warriors. There could not be many City Guard left to actually guard the city. Rawk wanted to say something, he wanted to stop what was about to happen, but he knew there was nothing he could do. It was just a matter of who was going to blink first in the thickening smoke.
Rawk called out as the soldiers charged. And a moment later he found himself face to face with one of them. The man had a wild look in his eyes; he knew he wasn’t looking at a soldier, and that was all he cared about.
Rawk waved his dagger and stepped around a loose, wild attack. “Do you know who I am?” he shouted.
The man wasn’t thinking well enough to look.
“Weaver won’t be happy if you kill me.” Rawk ducked another attack and spun in close. He rammed his elbow into the man’s kidney, then straightened and struck again on the side of his face. There was a crunch and a groan. Rawk didn’t have time to worry about the details. He looked around for the next threat, almost panicking, seeing enemies in every shadow, expecting an attack with every noise or movement.
The number of civilians quickly diminished leaving more of the City Guard to battle those who had any fighting ability at all. Rawk temporarily disabled two more before Celeste called out. A man twice her size closed in on her with a calculating smile on his face. Rawk ran, slashing at the guard’s hand as he reached out. The man bellowed with pain and backhanded Celeste out of the way, flinging an arc of blood, before turning to Rawk.
“I’m going to kill you for that...” The man hesitated as he recognized who it was. And Rawk ran him through with his little blade.
He grabbed Celeste’s hand and pulled her to her feet. She gasped and he turned to see another soldier behind him.
“Rawk?” the man said. But it didn’t seem to matter because Rawk found himself stepping in close to block his opponent’s arm with his own, even as he was nodding in reply. He slashed with his dagger. The blow struck home and Rawk turned and grabbed Celeste’s hand before he saw the result. He didn’t want to know the result. He ran. Her hand was warm in his, sweaty, surprisingly soft. She struggled to keep up but didn’t complain. Rawk finally stopped in the shadows by the mouth of an alley. The sounds of the riot continued, though it seemed that it would not last much longer. The billowing smoke diffused the glow of the fire.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
Celeste nodded as she tried to catch her breath. There was a bruise growing on the side of her face, a huge blue and black swelling that went from her eye to her ear to her chin. A line of blood was dribbling away from a cut lip, down her chin and neck.
Rawk looked at her hand, still in his, and decided he should let go. “I killed a soldier,” he said. “Maybe two.” ‘Maybe two’ was worse than ‘Definitely two’ because that last man might be the only witness to what had happened. I should have made sure of it. One or two would not make any difference in the end. Unless, of course, someone witnessed the second killing and not the first. Rawk reined in his roiling thoughts. He could go forever like that and it still wouldn’t help. The dice were thrown now and could not be called back.
Celeste took his hand again. “You had no choice.”
Rawk grunted. “Do you think the other guards will see it that way? Do you think Weaver will?”
“Weaver is your friend.”
Rawk shook his head. “I’m a criminal now.” But he had done similar things, killed people, in a dozen different situations in the past. He wondered why it was this instance that bothered him so much. He swallowed, took a deep breath. “Weaver and the Guard may not know it yet, but that doesn’t change the facts. Come on.”
They kept to the backstreets. Several times they hid in the shadows as groups of locals rushed past. They hid a couple of more times, in deeper shadows, when troops of soldiers went past. And once they skirted around a small, narrow street where a barricade had been set up. But mostly it was quiet. Mostly, people stayed inside and hoped the trouble passed them by. But Rawk wondered what would happen tomorrow. He doubted it would be long before Weaver sent trouble knocking on doors.
Celeste took him to building around towards the western side of Mount Grace. A small, plain door divided a group of shops on one side and a weaving factory on the other. Rawk could hear the clacking and clicking of the looms. The workers probably didn’t even know what was going on outside their doors.
“Does that go all night?” he asked. The sound had set his nerves on edge even before they reached the door. Admittedly, his nerves were pretty close to the edge before that anyway.
Celeste shrugged. “Sometimes. Not often though.” The bruise on the side of her face was a livid purple stain, even in the thin overlay of light from the distant street lamps. She had wiped the blood from her chin and it now marked the sleeve of her tunic. Her face was wet with tears.
She opened the door with a shaking hand and led the way through. Beyond, they climbed some steep, narrow stairs that creaked alarmingly, then followed a hallway past at least ten doors on each side and right to the end. Inside, the room was smaller than the rooms that Rawk had given to Biki. There was two yards of kitchen bench with a sink and tap at one end and a pile of clean dishes at the other. The table, which was pushed against the wall, had flowers carved into the corners. The bed, against the other wall, had another bed built over the top of it. If Rawk had Kaj he’d be able to touch one wall with his fingertips and the one opposite with the tip of his sword.
An old fermi woman, with a bent back and bright eyes sat at the table peeling carrots. She barely looked up from her work until she noticed Rawk had come in with her daughter.
Celeste’s shoulders slumped and she hurried to sit down at the table, as if it had been nothing more than the tension that was keeping her upright. “Are you all right, mab?”
The old woman continued to stare at Rawk for a moment before turning to Celeste. “Of course I am,” she grunted. “Who is he? What happened to his arm?”
Rawk looked at his arm and saw that the sleeve of his shirt was covered with blood. The wound was stinging but he hadn’t thought it all that serious. Seeing the blood, he wondered if he should get it looked at.
Celeste gasped and hurried to pull a box down from the shelf above the kitchen bench.
“I saw you once,” the old woman said, looking at Rawk. “You were sitting outside a tavern down by the river as if you owned the place. People fawning all over you.”
“Maybe I did own it.”
The woman squinted as she looked at him.
Rawk shrugged. “I didn’t, but I could’ve.”
That earned him a smile. “You can call me Matilde. So, what are you doing here with my Celeste?”
“We came to check on you.”
“What for?”
“There’s a riot.”
Matilde looked around the room.
Rawk looked as well. “Obviously it isn’t here exactly, but we didn’t know that at the time and you don’t know where those things end up anyway.”
The old woman pointed to a cudgel, lumpy and dark, leaning in the corner behind the door. “I’m too old to let things like that
worry me.”
“We’re all too old,” Rawk offered.
“You aren’t old.”
“Matilde, you have no idea.”
“What? You’re knees ache? It takes you five minutes just to decide you do really need to get out of bed in the morning? When the weather is cold you can barely move your fingers? You can’t see properly?”
“Well, yes.”
“Just because you can’t go around killing people like you used to doesn’t mean your life is over. I used to dance at the Mesiarne you know? They paid me a fortune. The crowd used to throw coins and flowers.”
“People throw walnuts at me.”
“Really?” Matilde smiled.
“Apparently it doesn’t mean what they think it means.”
Celeste finally got the box back onto the shelf and brought a bandage and a small jar back to the table. “Take off your shirt,” she said. Rawk did as he was told, carefully peeling the sleeve away from the wound. Celeste gasped then started to dab at the ragged cut.
“I still dance, Rawk. I just do it at home. Or in the little dance hall just down from... Well, it isn’t there any more, is it.” She gestured to the club. “Just because you’re old, it doesn’t mean you have to go quietly. It doesn’t mean you can’t dance whatever dance you want. I’ll beat the stuffing out of anyone who tries to tell me otherwise.”
“Remind me not to sneak in here at night.”
Matilde smiled. “You wouldn’t have to sneak; I’ll leave the door open for you.”
“Mab!” Celeste had finished with the ointment, whatever it was, and started working on the bandage.
“How long have you been living with Celeste?” Rawk asked.
“Only a couple of weeks. I just need to find some work.”
“You still work?”
“Of course. You think I sit around here all day peeling carrots?” As if reminded of her task she started peeling again.
“What do you do?”
“I used to work in a laundry but Weaver knocked that down for the damn canal as well.”
“You can’t blame Weaver for the canal. Apparently it was Thacker’s idea. Or a dwarf’s, at any rate.”
An Army of Heroes Page 11