Pratt nodded and grimaced at the effort.
“But I guess anybody that can kill wand-wavers and walk away looking fresh and rested isn’t much worried about the likes of Stricken, are they now?”
“He slipped. I got in a lucky stab. Nothing miraculous about it.”
“Slipped. Sure he did. Just like the pair you dropped in front of me. They found the wand-waver’s body, you know. Burned to a crisp. Still, you could see he had a big hole all the way through him. That’s one Hell of a stab you landed.”
“Guess it was.”
He gave me a wary look. A look that said he once had me figured out, but now he wasn’t so sure.
“I wouldn’t have gotten out of the Timbers if not for you. So I owe you one. Just wanted to make that known.”
I rose. “Thanks. One day soon we need to have a beer.”
“That we do.” He grunted and struggled to his feet. The effort left him pale and shaking.
“You take care, Markhat.”
“Always do.”
I fought my way back through the mob of lazy soldiers and found Darla. Then we elbowed our way through the crowd. The mare looked winded and thirsty, so we ate a pair of apples and had some water ourselves while a stable boy gave our mount a meal and a brushing.
Then we hit the road again. Word among the soldiers was that the mobs had been broken and a rough sort of order once again ruled the streets. I pulled a couple of bright-eyed lads from their nice comfy chairs and ordered them to saddle up.
Time to check in with Evis and see just how bad things were likely to get.
As it turned out, I didn’t need the pair of bodyguards at all.
The fires burned out. Already, crews were pulling down burnt walls and loading debris onto wagons. Many of those doing the pulling and the loading were the looters who’d set the blazes, now working happily to restore the grandeur of Rannit under the watchful eyes of Army bowmen.
Here and there, the corpses of those who had shown reluctance to display such commendable civic-mindedness swung slowly back and forth in the wind. Each bore a sign around their neck, describing their crimes. Most read simply LOOTER. A few bore the title ARSONIST. One hapless fellow was described simply as a MAN OF LOW MORALS.
“Since when did that become a capital offense?”
Darla squeezed me hard and fast, and buried her face in my back as we passed beneath the corpse.
We were challenged, now and then, but with decorum and calm. My name got us through every time. I had mixed emotions about becoming well known as a soldier in Hisvin’s secret army.
Traffic across the Brown River Bridge was packed and slow. The bridge clowns didn’t dance. They huddled together in what looked like prayer.
The Brown below us was empty. Not a single barge, not a lone rowboat, dotted the faraway water.
“I’ve never been up the Hill,” she said, shouting.
“Time you see how rich folks live.”
I felt her shiver.
“They’re just people, like you and me,” I yelled. “Well, except for being dead. But Evis is my friend, and you’re my wife-to-be, so that means you’re perfectly safe.”
“Wife-to-be. Ha. Where’s my ring, then?”
“A good point.” I would need a ring, even for a false wedding. “I might have a few in a drawer somewhere. Trophies of my mis-spent youth. How big are your fingers?”
That earned me a punch in the small of the back.
I saw an opening in the near-motionless line of cabs and gave the mare a gentle nudge. She leaped into it, sidestepped a sleek black carriage, and within moments we were scattering angry clowns and making good time toward the Hill.
Once off the bridge, we were confronted by another barricade, this one erected by a throng of House soldiers, each with the insignia of their House sewn over their hearts. They were polite and efficient and the sight of so many silver-tipped arrows peeking over the ranks of their shields left no one in a mood to bluster.
My turn came and went without incident. A man bearing the Avalante crest took our names and waved us through, and we were let through the line and onto the Hill proper.
The Hill bristled. Each and every House was transformed overnight into its own elegant fortress. Catapults lurked in every ornate rose garden. The oaks sported archers. Lawns were thick with lancers and infantry.
Everywhere, slack-jawed groundskeepers wrung their hands and wept.
If war did indeed come to Rannit, the invaders were going to face a bloodbath, at least on the Hill.
I doubted that the invaders had a foot campaign in mind. If I were in command of a flotilla armed with cannon, I’d simply float a barge down the Brown and bombard the Hill at my leisure, smashing the Houses to bits from a safe distance and trapping the populace between the Brown and the walls.
I shuddered at the thought. Avalante might have cannon of its own, but the pair I’d seen on the lawn would prove no match for a couple of barges bristling with the things.
We rode, challenged but never detained for long. Even houses with no love for Avalante proved cooperative.
Seeing the Houses holding hands and cooing was almost as disturbing as the thought of the cannon.
What was usually a twenty-minute ride took an hour. At last we reached the familiar face of Avalante, and we dismounted while a pair of stable boys led the mare off to Avalante’s stables.
I didn’t recognize the trio of day folk who greeted Darla and I. I did note that they already knew Darla’s name. We were taken immediately to the sitting room, each given cold tea and a decent ham sandwich, and were told we would be seen to as soon as possible.
Darla nibbled. I gulped.
“I expected the House to be darker,” she said, opening her sandwich and inspecting the ham.
I swallowed.
“It’s just ham. We’re guests here. They take that seriously, even if Evis isn’t around.”
She took a healthy bite.
“It’s not bad. Not bad at all.”
“Try to think of them as business associates.”
“I know. And I do like Evis. But—”
The door opened. The door opener wasn’t a day staffer, but Victor, wrapped in black silk and peering at us through black-lensed spectacles.
“Markhat. Miss Tomas.” He executed an old-world bow, obviously aimed at Darla, since he never bothered with such niceties when greeting humble finders. “Be welcome in our House.”
Darla stuck her half-eaten sandwich in my lap and stood, extending her hand. “Thank you,” she said. “A beautiful House it is.”
Victor took her hand, very gently, and shook it twice. Darla beamed.
Victor turned to me. “I regret that we are unable to communicate with our friends on the
Regency
,” he said.
There is nothing gloomier than a worried vampire.
“Why? Problems with the long talker?”
Victor shook his head. “Our technical staff believes the problem does not lie here,” he said. “They are unable to determine the nature of the failure.”
“Could it be the dingus at the other end?”
“The dingus, as you name it, is far less complex than the main device, which resides here. It was designed to withstand the rigors of travel.”
Darla put her hand on my shoulder.
“Surely the House has other means of communicating?”
Victor sighed again. The sound of it was that of long-trapped air hissing from an old dry place.
“These methods, too, have failed. Sorcerous and otherwise.”
I cussed. Darla squeezed my shoulder.
“That doesn’t mean they were overtaken. Could be a lot of things. Maybe the wand-wavers from Prince are just filling the Brown with silence spells.”
“Perhaps that is so,” said Victor. His tone suggested he entertained no such notion. “But we must prepare for the worst.”
“The worst being that the barges made it through, the
Regency
is sunk and four thousand cannon are nearly upon us.”
“Just so.” Victor produced a plain-looking bag from beneath his robes. I took it and nearly dropped it at the unexpected weight.
“More of the explosive rounds for your weapon,” he said. “Also, a contrivance which will allow it to be worn on your waist, much like a sword. The House judges the time for secrecy regarding the weapon to be ended.”
I gently let the bag rest on the floor.
“How many more rounds?”
“A thousand,” he said. “One standard issue.”
“Standard issue? You’re handing these out to the staff?”
“Many have already been trained in the use of small arms. Many more will see training this day. If war comes to Rannit, Markhat, Avalante has no intention of falling.”
Darla tilted her head, curious but unwilling to interrupt.
“You may both take refuge here,” said Victor. “Our chambers are deep. We have long prepared against this day.”
“Thanks. I mean that. But I’ve still got a case to round up, and my client is an unreasonable woman with small regard for petty excuses.”
That earned me another kick in the shins.
“What he’s trying to say, sir, is that we are honored by your offer, and if the time comes, we are honored to fight at your side.”
Victor bowed to her. If he was smiling behind that silk, I couldn’t see it, and didn’t want to.
“As you wish. Good luck to you both. I fear the coming days will be dark ones.”
“Good luck to you, too.”
He bowed again and was gone.
“A thousand what?” whispered Darla. “What contrivance? What weapon? Is that the thing you’ve been hiding in your coat pocket all day?”
“I’ll explain on the way home,” I said. “You need to pick out a dress. I need to polish some shoes. Aren’t we getting married tomorrow? I do seem to recall something about that.”
Darla doesn’t giggle often, but she did then, and we stole a kiss right there inside a house full of vampires.
Some days, you just never know where your path is going to take you.
The rest of that day is, even now, a blur.
I returned my borrowed mare, and in her place I took a sleek black carriage and a pair of sturdy-looking ponies. I repaid a confused shoemaker for the mismatched pair of shoes I’d looted. I sought out a few unsavory acquaintances in search of news of Japeth Stricken, but found my ne’er-do-wells either dead or fled. I even made the long trip to Elfways, hoping Granny Knot had found a pigeon bearing news from Pot Lockney on her windowsill, but found her shack bolted shut and silent
That left nothing to be done but prepare for my wedding.
False wedding, I reminded myself. Sham wedding. An effort to keep Tamar and her young man safe. That, and nothing more.
I watched Darla smile at me from across the cab and hoped she was thinking along the same lines.
As the co-owner of a gown shop, I assumed Darla could simply reach out in any direction and fill her hands with a gown appropriate for a wedding, even a sham one. I assumed some alterations might need to be made, and that would be the business of an hour or so, but I didn’t consider the matter likely to demand more time or resources than that.
Oh, how wrong I was. Within moments of arriving, Darla and Mary and even Martha Hoobin set about conducting what appeared to be a full-on ruthless ransacking of their wares.
Gowns flew. Veils and unmentionables followed. Opinions and judgments came fast and furious, all reduced to a hushed female shorthand—
“This one is too—”
“If only that were—”
“Too light—”
“Too dark—”
I pulled my hat down over my eyes, forgotten in my appointed chair.
I did not sleep. I managed to buckle the contrivance Victor had given me around my waist. The belt held a leather holster for the hand cannon. It was ringed around with clever little leather pockets, each of which held an explosive round. I loaded the hand cannon and filled the belt and put a handful of extra rounds in my pocket just in case those eighty-five weren’t enough.
Darla and Mary and Martha tittered and whispered and plotted. So did I.
I had to have a ring.
Oh, I could just stop by Whistler’s or Trader Mac’s and walk away with a two-penny ring with a bit of sand in the middle. And that would be just fine for a sham wedding.
But I didn’t need Mama to tell me that handing Darla a backstreet petty ring and taking her to a lie of a wedding was going to have repercussions of the negative variety. Soon.
Very soon.
The street outside was all but deserted. Save for the Army, of course. Soldiers marched by in nervous little bands. Lone Army wagons thundered past, sparks flying from iron wheels, bound for destinations on the Wall.
I stood up quietly, so the floors didn’t creak. I unlocked Darla’s door with the stealth of a footpad.
I locked it behind me when I went out. Laid a finger across my lips to the soldiers I left standing there.
She still doesn’t know I left her there, that day.
We all need our little secrets.
One of the mysteries of the matrimonial process is the disparate amount of effort required in the assemblage of the respective costumes required.
By my count, the bare preliminaries involved in getting Darla kitted out for her wedding required seven and a half hours of continuous effort by no fewer than three determined women, each an expert in the field of elaborate costumery. That doesn’t count the night I’m sure Mary and Martha put in, making alterations or creating accoutrements from scratch.
My outfitting, by contrast, took an hour. Mary hemmed up the cuffs on a pair of black pants that sported grey pinstripes up the sides. Martha added fancy jade and silver buttons to a new white shirt, after Darla claimed the green in the buttons complemented my eyes. Darla found an old-fashioned long-tailed jacket, black as a crow’s wing, which fit. A black hat, black gloves, and some shiny black shoes were procured, I was admonished to shave, and I was pronounced worthy of groom-hood.
I did not see Darla in her final fitting. I reminded the ladies that this was not a real wedding, and thus the old superstition about seeing a bride in her bridal gown early did not apply, but Mary slapped my fingers with a fly-swatter and I decided not to push the matter further.
Night fell. My soldiers outside were swapped for fresh ones. I admonished them to resist the temptation to slack off until Darla caught me by the elbow and led me back inside.