The Proposal Game

by Megan E O'Keefe

  That left the Hondings, the first of the Landed. But they were small in number, their male members all either too young or old—except... Halva’s brows furrowed. The heir.

  "Detan Honding," she whispered to Silka.

  "Bah, could be any random bastard. Those Landed families drop trou more often than dancing girls."

  Halva rolled her eyes, and endeavored to educate her friend on the finer points of noble politics. "Bastards may abound, but Dame Isla Honding brands only those she claims, and the Rinstons and Kaliads have taken her practice to heart."

  Silka squinted at her, incredulous as always. "Are you sure? Thought the Kaliads hated the Hondings. Didn’t Lord Kaliad set Isla Honding’s dress on fire once?"

  "Hate doesn’t keep a family from adopting a good idea when they see one. And yes, I’m sure. I can’t imagine who else. He’s the right age, and is known to travel the continent on occasion."

  "Because he’s useless. Lost his common sense when he lost his sel-sense."

  Halva rolled an indifferent shoulder. "He survived a rather tragic mining accident, or so the rumors say. I imagine that would break the mind of any man."

  "And make him mad enough to lose his fortune at ten tiles?"

  Halva grunted assent. "It does seem a bit much."

  Silka touched her fingertips lightly to Halva’s arm. "He’s being watched by more than us."

  Halva followed Silka’s slight head tilt to spy a spindly man sitting in the back of the tavern, a table and a tankard all to himself, his broad-brimmed hat doing a poor job of hiding a roving gaze that alighted upon Detan more often than not.

  "A bodyguard?" Halva whispered.

  "They’re usually cleaner."

  "So are Lords."

  Together they watched the Honding man for a while, pretending to be deep in private conversation while they sipped their drinks. It was not long before she grew to loathe him. His easy laugh rang throughout the tavern, bright and joyful, despite the fact he peddled away a smaller family’s fortune.

  That man—that glassy-eyed moron—was just the type of man Halva’s daddy wanted her to marry. His birth was impeccable. Not only was he of a Landed line, but one that bore sensitives more often than not. He was orphaned, both of his parents lost to bonewither, and his matriarch aunt was said to adore him. Being no longer sensitive himself, he was free from Valathean-compelled selium work and his inheritance would no doubt see him into a comfortable dotage.

  Of course, he was also a man renowned for his loose morals and lack of conviction. Lazy and, evidently, completely idiotic. Halva suspected that even her daddy would look past his gentle breeding to keep his girl away from a man who lacked the wherewithal to purchase a decent coat. Perfect on paper, terrible in reality.

  She shook her head, then froze.

  "Silka... I have an idea."

  Halva drank deep the last of her nameless liquor, then stood and squared her shoulders.

  4

  Tibs tapped Detan on the shoulder, light enough not to disturb the hidden pocket of false grains sewn within his left sleeve. A tingle of relief plied its way through Detan’s muscles—he was beginning to worry that Tibs would let him run with the thing long enough to get them both caught.

  Not that Tibs was in any danger of being caught. He’d spent a pleasant evening sitting on the other side of the tavern, pretending for all he was worth he’d never seen Detan before in his life.

  Affecting a tipsy sway, Detan turned around in his chair and squinted up at Tibs... Who was not Tibs at all. The light tap had belonged to a much lovelier face than Tibs could ever claim to have owned.

  "My Lord Honding?" the woman said, raising delicate brows high to indicate the question.

  He took her in, sweeping her from head to toe, using his feigned insobriety to cover the slowness of his wits. Did this woman know him? And if so—how? For all her soft smile and kind eyes, Detan was certain he'd never seen her before in his life. He'd remember her—she was too exquisite to be forgotten.

  She had clearly put some thought into dressing down for this outing. And though her dress was plain in cut and fabric, the russet hue suited her tawny cheeks and tea-dark eyes well. She brushed shining mahogany curls from her shoulder and pursed her lips, impatience folding a crease between her brows.

  "The skies above know how strongly I wish I was the lad you were looking for, my dear, but I'm afraid not. Name's Wenton. Wenton Dakfert." He tried out a smile, locking eyes with her while he pleaded in silence: please don't push the matter, not now.

  "Forgive me, Mr. Dakfert. You have the look of... an old friend." Her small face lit up as she smiled, and she reached forward to slip her hand into his and give it a warm squeeze. Detan wasn't surprised at all to feel the scrap of paper she passed him.

  "Think nothing of it, Lady. I hope you see your friend soon."

  "As do I." She inclined her head to him and swept from the room, joining arms with another woman before exiting the Blasted Rock.

  Detan turned back to his gambling companions and let loose a low whistle. Much to his relief, the others laughed. "Well now, that was the closest thing to luck I've had all day."

  "Maybe your luck has turned," the dirt-crusted man to his left said. "Ready to try it out?"

  The man gestured to the center of the ten tiles table, where wagers were to be placed in the square called the vault. Detan licked his lips, guessing at the weight of the real grains in his right sleeve. It was enough to see him and Tibs back to Hond Steading, his Auntie’s home, in comfort if not style—but enough to purchase her a proper gift so that he could keep his head upon arrival? He couldn’t be certain.

  But if that woman had been a herald for the changing of his luck, then his head might very well be in danger at this table. Detan cleared a rasp from his throat.

  "I fear the joy of it may have left me with the Lady’s leaving." He stood as they groaned their disapproval. "I would wish you all luck, but I’m certain you don’t need it."

  The muttered complaints shifted into rueful chuckles. Detan took the opportunity to tip his hat—carefully, as to not cause the money secreted in his sleeve to jingle—and slip away.

  Out on the street he ducked his head and shoved his hands in his pockets, his walk brisk but not urgent, his back stiff but not defensive. It was a special sort of saunter he’d practiced, and employed, many times. The kind of stride that could carry him from a scene without anyone who saw him finding him memorable enough to remark upon the direction he’d gone.

  The meeting place he’d arranged with Tibs was a dingy little tea shop, down two levels and well back from any main thoroughfares. As he walked, he wondered at the lovely-faced woman and what she had meant approaching him in such a way. Clearly, at least to his eye, she didn’t belong in a place like the Blasted Rock. And she had known it, too, or she wouldn’t have put in the effort to conceal her station and yet, she'd dared to address him by title and name. Which mean what—exactly?

  Detan scowled to himself, taking the steps down two at a time, no longer mindful of the jingling in his sleeves. Had she known he would be there, and waited for him? That didn’t make much sense—he hadn’t even known he’d be there himself until a scant half-mark before he’d walked in the door.

  A chance meeting, then. He gnawed on his lip, letting the copper-tinged saliva of an abused mouth sharpen his mind. She had known him, his true name, but he was certain he’d never seen her before that moment. Nor her friend, for that matter, the militarily attired woman who had taken her arm as she left. Detan stopped short, and someone behind him cursed him for a sandblasted-idiot, but he scarcely heard the abuse.

  The other woman had been dressed much in the same fashion as members of the Valathean Fleet… Did she know him? And if so, why not arrest him on the spot? Maybe she wasn’t sure it was him, and had sent the pretty woman to try and trip him up—to make him show off by using his family name to impress her, and then the military woman could have moved in, sure of his identity, an
d made the arrest.

  Detan growled to himself, feeling the fine grain of the thick paper in his hand. Whatever it was, it could at least wait until he had a good cup of tea in his hand.

  The tea shop marked the end of a truncated alley, its mudbrick walls doing little to hold back the stifling heat. Detan pushed aside the curtained door and stood squinting in the gloom until his eyes adjusted. No proprietor greeted him, which was some small comfort. Detan had never had the patience for an overly chatty shopkeep. He liked to be the only fast-mouth in the room.

  Pallet-wood tables and splintering chairs the proprietor had no doubt dug out of the backs of other alleys crowded the room. Detan wasn’t surprised at all to find Tibs sitting already, a lopsided clay cup clutched between his tree-branch fingers. That old rat was never more pleased than when he beat Detan to the punch.

  After giving the chair opposite Tibs a futile wipe, Detan sat and rested his forearms on the table. They clanged softly.

  "How much?" Tibs asked.

  "Enough to get us back to Hond Steading with full bellies."

  Tibs’s brows shot up. "And then you’ll gift the Dame the treasure of your company?"

  "I’ll figure out something on the way." He waved a dismissive arm.

  "You said that last time, and she kicked us out before I’d even gotten a bite of cake."

  The proprietor arrived and sat the malformed twin of Tibs’s cup on the table. Detan squinted at the dubiously thick, brown liquid and gave the air above it a hesitant sniff. Nothing smelled like rot, or poison, though it didn’t smell particularly pleasant either. Detan handed the proprietor a half-copper grain and the man stomped off.

  "We going to keep talking around it?" Tibs asked, covering his expression by taking a drink of tea. He didn’t choke immediately, so Detan decided to give his own a taste—it was bitter and over-steeped, but still a balm to his dust-tired throat.

  "I don’t know who she is," Detan said.

  "Her friend looked martial."

  All the thoughts that had been rattling through his own tired mind surfaced. He shook his head to clear them and stuffed his hand into his pocket, digging around until he found the thick slip of paper. He laid it out on the table between them, smoothed away the creases with the side of his rough thumb.

  A calling card. The cream-hued rectangle was edged with some vine or another, the blossoms all turning their sunny faces toward the name in the center. Lady Halva Erst. Detan blinked, shuffling through foggy memory. Nothing came immediately to mind.

  "I don’t know her," he insisted.

  "Told you to grow your hair out," Tibs said.

  Detan cringed, instinctively reaching back to rub his neck where his family’s crest had been scarred into his flesh as a young man. The Scorched Continent was a wild place, and though its roots were ostensibly grounded in the traditions of their parent empire, the cities of the Scorched lacked a great deal of the social structure which made it impossible for impostors to move within society.

  Here, more obvious measures were needed to sort the cream from the water. Family crests could be faked, of course, but the penalty for such a thing was always death—no appeals, no leniency.

  "Erst… Erst…" Detan muttered to himself, something about that name tingling the far reaches of his memory.

  "Diviners," Tibs said. "Historically, anyway. Don’t know what good they’ve been doing lately. The Lord Erst had a brain-fever, rumor is he can’t sense a buoyancy sack right in front of his nose. Just like you."

  Detan cringed. "But I suppose his affliction is… real."

  "I suppose so."

  Tibs made a study of sipping his stone-cool tea, nothing but the usual wrinkles on his face.

  Detan pitched his voice low, just in case the proprietor was lingering nearby. "Think she means to turn me in?"

  "You are a grand ol’ idiot, sirra."

  "Her friend did look the lawful type."

  Exhaling a weary sigh, Tibs leaned forward and fixed his beady brown eyes on Detan. He tapped the table with one finger, punctuating each point. "First—the Lady’s not nearly connected enough to know about your little escape from a Valathean prison. That’s not something the empire would share with just anyone, and news takes a snail’s time in filtering from the Valathean archipelago to us down here on the Scorched."

  "They mean to retake me—"

  "Of course they do. Don’t mean they want the whole of the Scorched knowing they’ve lost control of one measly noble brat, eh? They sure as shit don’t want anyone knowing just what happened with your sel-sense. Second—the Lady’s family is in decline, and though you yourself are not a prime example, you may have noticed that the Honding name carries a certain amount of respect."

  "Just because we’re Landed doesn’t mean—"

  "Yes. Yes it does. Your people own the land these people pay parcel leases on. Sure, the Hondings don’t own Aransa, but Hond Steading is the biggest blasted settlement on the Scorched. Or haven’t you noticed?"

  "Ultimately it all belongs to the Empire," Detan protested.

  "Sure, sure. But it’s Dame Honding who has her hands on the reins."

  "I don’t see how—"

  "Third—The Lady Halva Erst is unmarried."

  "How could you possibly know—?"

  "Sweet skies, sirra, she still calls herself Erst."

  "Then…"

  "Yes."

  "Oh."

  Detan stared into the murky depths of his tea. It fit—all of it—he was annoyed to discover. The Lady’s subtle smile, the tilt of her head. Her friendliness had felt false to him at first, a cover for the trap she was no doubt planning to spring… But, no. There was no trap, unless one counted love as such. The gentle woman had just been attempting to flirt. With him.

  He hadn’t even bathed this week.

  "Sweet skies," he muttered.

  "I hardly understand it myself," Tibs agreed.

  Detan swirled his cup, feeling the weight of the silver grains he’d switched for the tin-plated marbles in his other sleeve. It wouldn’t be long until that particular deceit was discovered, and then they’d have to clear out of Aransa for a time. Maybe if they stayed upcrust, where the Ersts of the world moved through life, they could avoid stumbling across those they’d swindled. It’d drain their silver, but...

  "Diviners, you said?"

  "Yes."

  "A good long line of them?"

  "Quite long."

  Families like that carried their history like a shield. Parlors filled with artifacts to prove their lineage, walls lined with maps and treaties and particularly groundbreaking trade agreements. All things his dear, sweet Auntie might take an interest in. She and her fellow ladies had spent the last three seasons tittering on about their adoration for historicals, and he knew she was always itching to wow her hangers-on with some new trinket of obscure provenance. Trinkets which could not be purchased, no matter how much gold he managed to peel away from the pockets of the unwary.

  Detan ruminated, tipping his head to the side. Halva surely meant to use him to lift her family’s name, he was certain she had no interest in him as a man aside from the scar on his neck. It would do no harm for him to meet with her. To see where her intentions lay—and what objects in her household might tickle the fancy of dear old Auntie Honding.

  "I suppose," Detan said, "we had best seek rooms at a more agreeable address."

  Tibs snorted. "I thought you might say that."

  5

  Silka squeezed her arm so hard Halva feared the blossom of a bruise. With nary a word of polite explanation, Silka hustled them up the streets of Aransa as if she feared murderers nipping at their heels. Halva’s breath shortened, a stitch wormed its way into her side. With an annoyed grunt she stopped hard and wrenched Silka’s grip away.

  "Are you trying to tear my arm off?" Halva straightened her shirt and smoothed the rumples free.

  "Are you out of your mind? You couldn't possibly be interested in Detan Honding! Cransto
n may have a weak chin, but that man is a complete disaster."

  "His chin is not weak. And of course I'm not interested in Honding. Sweet skies, did you smell him?"

  "Everyone could smell him." Silka threw her hands in the air. "Then why even approach him?"

  Halva was unable to keep a small grin from traipsing across her lips. "Because, my dear friend, Cranston is away until next week. And as soon as Daddy meets the young Lord Honding, he will find him just as reprehensible as we have."

  Understanding lit bright in Silka's eyes. "But he's perfect on paper."

  "Forcing daddy to see the error in his... requirements."

  "You're mad, my dear. But I do love it so."

  Arm in arm they took up the walk back to Halva’s home, though this time at a much more decent pace. The sun was fading by the time they reached her front step, and fearing remonstration from her mother for being out past the falling of the dark, Silka kissed Halva farewell and stole away once more. Halva watched her go, loping down the nearly empty street, and admired for the first time the practicality of her split skirt and tights. They seemed much easier attire to run in.

  Halva laid her palm against the smooth, green-painted door of her home, not understanding the hesitation in her own feet. The ancestral shadow fell across her, twisting the shade of their door-awning into the deep purple of a bruise. She glanced up at the jute-woven cloth, noting the frayed edges and falling hems. She’d have to have that fixed—it wouldn’t do to have their guests wait even a breath under the full light of the sun.

  A traitorous little snort escaped her lips. Have it fixed. What was she thinking? More than likely she’d have to take a needle to it herself. Her family could afford no seamstress.