by Scott Lynch
“You proclaimed love for one another! I heard your quarrel!”
Too late, Boulidazi seemed to remember that he hadn’t yet professed his interest in Verena to Verena herself. Dismay spilled across his face like paint splashed across a blank canvas, and Sabetha didn’t neglect the opening.
“It was an acting exercise, you lout! An improvisation! And why should it concern you, were it otherwise?”
“An … improvisation?”
“I asked Lucaza to follow my lead and improvise a scene!” She pushed Boulidazi’s arm firmly away from Locke’s throat. “A scene you interrupted! We might be the ones dressed as commoners, Baron Boulidazi, but you’ve bested us for coarse behavior!”
“But …”
Locke admired the ingenuity of Sabetha’s ploy, but perhaps she was pushing it too far. They needed Boulidazi controlled, not crushed. It was time to resume his role as advocate. He rubbed his aching throat.
“Cousin Verena,” he coughed, “what Gennaro means is that I told him about my own betrothal. So, when he overheard our exercise, why, he had good cause to suspect some deceit.”
“He had no cause to lay hands on your person!”
“Cousin, be sensible. We discussed this before we set out. We knew that living incognito would require us to surrender some of the dignities of our true station.”
“Yes, but—”
“Furthermore, there are no other witnesses, so I feel no need to require satisfaction.”
Locke tried to sound as natural and confident as possible, though he suspected Boulidazi would rate the prospect of a duel with him as a physical threat on par with a difficult bowel movement. The thought of alienating Verena, however …
“I seem to have made a mistake.” Boulidazi sheathed his knife. The cold anger of moments before was put away just as thoroughly. “Verena, I apologize for the misunderstanding. Tell me, please, how can I recover your good opinion?”
Locke blinked at the solitary direction of the apology and the rapid shift to a smooth, wheedling manner. He’d pegged Boulidazi as sincere and straightforward, even a bit of a yokel, but the Esparan had obviously relegated the “noble” Lucaza to the role of a tool in his designs on Sabetha. That and his ease with violence hinted at dangerous depths.
“For one thing,” said Sabetha, “you can cease this unseemly scuttling in shadows. You’re a lord of Espara and the patron of this company. I’d prefer to see you come and go openly in a manner befitting your blood.”
“Of … of course.”
“And if you want to make yourself genuinely useful, you could secure us a more appropriate rehearsal space. I’m growing tired of Mistress Gloriano’s inn-yard.”
“Where would you prefer—”
“I’m told we’re to use a theater called the Old Pearl.”
“Oh. Naturally. Well, that’s just a matter of a gratuity for the countess’ envoy of ceremonies—”
“See to that gratuity, Baron Boulidazi,” said Sabetha, subtly softening her posture and tone of voice. “Surely it’s a matter of little consequence for you. It will be a boon to the company to be practicing on our real stage as soon as possible. Do this, and I’ll be pleased to call you Gennaro again.”
“Then consider it done.” Boulidazi bowed to her with gallant over-formality, gave Locke a perfunctory clap on the shoulder, and went away in haste. His footsteps receded down the passage, and the door to the inn’s second floor banged shut.
“That was close,” whispered Locke.
“Our patron is starting to assume possessive feelings toward his noble cousins,” said Sabetha. “He’s more shifty than I realized.”
“My neck agrees.” With the threat of Boulidazi temporarily quelled, Locke’s thoughts returned to the conversation the baron had interrupted. “And, uh, look, you and I have had—”
“Nothing,” hissed Sabetha. “Evidently I was wrong to say what I did, and wrong to feel those things in the first place.”
“That’s bullshit!” Barely feeling the ache across his throat for the new sting of her words, Locke shocked himself by grabbing her arm and pulling her back out onto the balcony. “I tripped over something. I don’t know what it is, but you owe me an explanation. After everything we just said to one another, I will not let you push me aside just because you’re pitching a fit!”
“I am not pitching a fit!”
“You make the Sanzas look like bloody diplomats when you do this. I’ll run after Boulidazi and pick another fight with him before I’ll let this rest. What set you off?”
“You cannot be so wholly ignorant … Do you know what they pay for red-haired girls in Jerem? Do you know what they do to us if we’re pristine? The Thiefmaker did—and it’s so awful it was too much for his conscience. Understand? That ghoul would tongue-fuck a dead rat if there was silver in it for him, but selling redheads was too vile. He’s the one that taught me to keep my hair dyed and wrapped.”
“I’ve heard about these things, but I never, I never thought of you—”
“First they cut,” said Sabetha. “Right out of a girl’s sex. What they call the sweetness, the little hill. You’ve been around Calo and Galdo long enough, you must have heard a dozen names for it. Then, while the wound is gushing, they bring in the old bastard with the rotting cock or the festering sores or whatever he wants miraculously cured, and he does his business. ‘Blood of the blood-haired child,’ is what they call it.”
“Sabetha—”
“And then, even though most of the miracle is already used up, they bring in the next hundred men that want a go at the bloody hole, because it still brings good luck. In fact, it’s especially good luck if you’re the one riding her when she finally dies!”
“Gods.”
“Yes. May they all spend ten thousand years drinking salted shit in the deepest hell there is.” Sabetha slumped against the rear wall of the balcony and stared at their discarded wine cups and scripts. “Damn. I am pitching a fit.”
“You have some cause!”
She gave a sharp, self-disgusted sort of laugh.
“How was I supposed to know all this the first time I ever laid eyes on you?” said Locke. “I remember that first glimpse as though it happened yesterday. But that’s not the only thing I think about … if it really bothers you that much—”
“My hair doesn’t bother me,” she said forcefully. “It’s the stupid bastards who’d put me in chains on account of that nonsense about it. I’ve had to mind this every day of my life since I went to Shades’ Hill. Every day! All the hours I’ve wasted peering at my hair in a glass, slopping it with alchemy … someday I’ll be old enough that it won’t matter anymore. Someday not soon enough.”
“What about before Shades’ Hill?”
“Nothing before the Hill matters,” she said quietly. “I was protected. Then I was an orphan. Leave it at that.”
“As you prefer.” Slowly, hesitantly, he leaned against the wall beside her. Stars were just beginning to pierce the bruise-colored sky above them, and the faint, familiar whispers of evening were rising—the hum of insects, the clatter of wagons, the din of eating and laughter and argument.
“I’m sorry, Locke,” she said after a few moments had passed. “It’s stupid and unfair to be so upset with you. I’ve insulted you.”
“Absolutely not.” He put one hand on her arm and was encouraged to find her resuming the habit of not flinching away. “I’m glad you told me. Your problems should be our problems, and your worries should be our worries. You realize how rarely you bother to explain yourself?”
“Now, that’s a load—”
“A load of straight truth! You could give inscrutability lessons to the gods-damned Eldren. You know, it’s sort of frightening how you’re actually starting to make sense.”
“Is that meant to be complimentary?”
“Maybe toward both of us,” said Locke. Her weather-like mood swings, the brief seasons of warmth followed by withdrawal and frustration, her urge to contro
l everything in her life with such precision and forethought; behavior that had mystified Locke for years suddenly had a context. “I honestly don’t care what color your hair is as long as you’re under it somewhere.”
“You forgive me for being … unreasonable?”
“Haven’t you forgiven me for the same thing?”
“We may find ourselves once again in serious danger of a happy understanding,” she said, and the way her smile reached her eyes made Locke’s pulse race. Suddenly they seemed to be competing to see who could bring their lips closer to the other’s without appearing to do so—
The sound of a rapid, careless tread echoed from within the passage, and they sprang apart in instinctive unison. The passage door slammed open, and Alondo Razi stumbled out, red-cheeked and sweaty.
“Alondo,” said Sabetha with plainly exaggerated sweetness, “would you consider yourself at peace with the gods?”
“I’m sorry,” he panted, his voice slurred. “I don’t mean to barge in on you, but I can’t find Jovanno. It’s the Asino brothers. Need help—”
“Don’t tell me they started a fight,” said Locke, straining to banish the sudden mental image of a Sanza insulting Lord Boulidazi, and all the intersections of flesh and steel that might result.
“No, gods, no! Sylvanus bet that they couldn’t chug the Ash Bastard. Nobody can chug the Ash Bastard. So they tried, and got what was coming. Ha!”
Locke seized Alondo by the sweat-stained collar of his tunic and briefly forgot that the Esparan had half a decade of growth on him. “Razi,” he growled, “what the cock-blistering hell is an Ash Bastard?”
“Come down,” said the unsteady young actor. “Best see for yourself.”
Locke and Sabetha followed him to the common room, where they found the company and the evening ale-swillers even more scattered and dissipated than usual. Calo and Galdo were lying on their sides, artfully symmetrical, in the middle of a slick black-red puddle. The smell in the air was somewhere between wet animal fur and an unwashed torture chamber, but all the non-Sanza onlookers were quivering with mirth. Mistress Gloriano was the only exception.
“I said take it out to the yard! Idiots! Pink-skinned Therin infants!” She noticed Locke and Sabetha, and encompassed them with her glower. “What kind of fool tries the Ash Bastard indoors?”
“What the hell are you people talking about?” said Locke. He knelt beside Calo. The twins were alive, though they were liquored out of their wits and had clearly lost a fight with those potent joint antagonists, vomit and gravity.
“The Ash Bastard,” said Jasmer, who was leaning against a nearly comatose Sylvanus, “is that ghastly spittoon.”
Locke glanced where Jasmer pointed, and saw a tar-colored cask about two feet long resting sideways on the floor. The stuff spilling from it looked like campfire ashes after a hard rain.
“It’s a quaint ritual of the house,” smirked Jasmer.
“Performed in the yard!” bellowed Mistress Gloriano.
“True enough. But the gist of it, dear Lucaza, is that the Bastard collects tobacco ash and spit for weeks, when people remember not to use the floor. We test the mettle of brash young pickle-wits like your friends there by challenging them to chug the Bastard, which means we fill it to the brim with a hideous black juniper wine Mistress Gloriano imports directly from hell. We swirl it around and make them drink the slurry.”
“That’s idiotic,” said Sabetha, who was making sure Galdo still had a pulse.
“Completely,” laughed Jasmer. “No one in the history of the company has ever chugged the Ash Bastard without hucking it right back up. And lo, the Bastard is victorious once again!”
“Jasmer,” said Sabetha, lowering her voice, “not to put too fine a point on it, but we need these two unpoisoned if they’re going to keep rehearsing. In fact, we need everyone! Can’t you idiots dry out a bit—”
Sylvanus, though he seemed barely aware of the existence of his own face let alone the world beyond it, gave an elephantine snort.
“Green gills or no,” said Jasmer, “the company always takes the stage, my dear. Besides, this can hardly even be called a proper debauch by our lofty standards. Your friends hold their liquor like sieves, is the problem.”
“Sorry to make this your trouble,” said Alondo, sinking into a chair, “but we needed some help with the floor, and moving the Asinos, and we’re all too blotted to be much use, and we can’t find Jenora or Jovanno … Hey, did you two see Lord Boulidazi? He was here, too!”
“We know,” said Sabetha. “Mistress Gloriano, we need some water buckets. Lucaza, we’d better drag these two out to the yard and get to work. They’ll be stuck to the floor like barnacles if we let them alone.”
“I was going to thank you again for prying me out of Boulidazi’s grasp,” whispered Locke, “but now I think I’ll wait and see how the evening ends first.”
“How do you think I feel?” She squeezed his arm and flashed him a hint of a smile, like a fellow desert traveler sharing out precious water. “Now, pick arms or legs. Let’s heave this one outside.”
“Where the hell is Jovanno?” muttered Locke.
2
JEAN HAD watched Locke ascend the stairs, skin of wine in hand, with a mix of relief and annoyance. It was past time for Locke and Sabetha to sort themselves out, or pitch themselves out of a high window. Jean’s own peace of mind would be the benefactor in either case.
He closed his eyes, leaned his head back, and let the wall do the job of holding it up for a moment. What a time he must be having, when merely sitting alone and not pretending that his bruises didn’t hurt felt like an immoderate indulgence.
When he opened his eyes again, Jenora was smiling at him from two feet away.
“I’ve found a threadbare boy!” she said. “Let me help you back up to your room.”
“Oh, uh, my room?”
“Trust me,” she said, hauling him to his feet. “Until the rest of the company’s too drunk to move, you never want to be the first to fall asleep around ’em. Gods know what mischief you’ll wake up to.”
There was a strange heat on his cheeks, like the warmth of too many ales. Jenora’s hand was around his waist as though it were the most natural thing in the world, and together they made a quick exit from the common room.
“So what are you not telling me, Jovanno?” She closed the door to Locke and Jean’s chamber softly, then put her arms on his shoulders.
“Not telling you?”
“Oh, come now.” Her fingers began to work the knots between his shoulder blades. “You read, write, and figure, but scribes don’t get muscles like this pushing quills. I know you speak Vadran as well as Therin. You can handle a needle and thread. You fought a grown man to a standstill … not just any man, but Bert. Bert’s a scrapper and a half.”
“I’ve had a, ah, strange education,” said Jean, feeling his wits loosening as agreeably as his muscles under Jenora’s ministrations.
“You’re all strange, you Camorri. And strangely educated.”
“It’s nothing sinister. We’re just …”
“Slumming, hmm? Isn’t that what they usually call it when someone dresses down and plays beneath their station?”
“Jenora!” Jean turned around, grabbed her hands, and halted the massage. His well-soothed wits grudgingly rose to the occasion. If she’d been snooping on them a flat denial would probably be useless. “Look, imagine whatever you like, but please believe me … everyone is better off just taking things at face value.”
“Is there some sort of danger in my being curious?”
“Let’s just say there’s absolutely no danger in not being curious!”
“Rest easy. It’s an informed guess, Jovanno. Your cousin Lucaza, well, he seems a little surprised every time he notices that the world isn’t revolving around him. And Verena, she’s no scullery maid, you know? Manners, diction, learning, poise. Then there’s swordsman’s calluses on these hands of yours.” She ran her fingers lig
htly over his palms, and the sensation made Jean’s blood run hot in more than one place. “The gods put you all together from odd parts. There’s a story to be told.”
“There isn’t. There are so many trusts I’d be breaking … Jenora, please.”
“All right,” she said soothingly. “I can live with a bit of mystery. Let’s work on what ails you, then.”
“What ails … I don’t … oh, well, ha—”
She slipped her hands under his tunic and ran them up his back, where they started to gently but firmly put his sore muscles into something resembling their proper order. This had the natural effect of bringing them together; her breasts were warm against his upper chest, and her lips were parted in a half-smile just in front of his nose.
“Heh.” She blew playfully on his optics, fogging them over. “Not frightened of older, taller women, are you?”
“I, uh, wouldn’t really know what to be frightened of.”
“Oh? So you’re an untapped vintage, hmmm?”
“Jenora, I’m not used … surely you can see that I’m not thought of as, uh, you know—”
“You know what I don’t like, Jovanno?” She moved her hands and teased the thin line of hair that ran down his stomach. “Stupid men, weak men, illiterate men. Men who can’t tell a play from a pile of kindling.”
Their lips came together, and as they kissed she slowly, deliberately guided one of his hands until it rested atop a breast. She squeezed for both of them, pushing his fingers, and Jean felt his awareness of the world narrowing to the delightful corridor of heat that seemed to be rising between them.
“Lucaza,” he whispered. “He might—”
“I have a feeling your friends are going to be up on the roof for a very long time,” she murmured. “Don’t you?”
Soon enough, by some process halfway between legerdemain and wrestling, their clothes were off and they fell into his bed. Jean could barely tell where light skin ended and dark skin began. He lay wrapped in the taste and smell and warmth of her, with smoke-colored hair falling around him like a teasing shroud. Jenora seemed very much at ease taking the lead, staying on top of him, alternately slowing and quickening the rhythm of their coupling. All too soon he reached the limit of his untrained endurance, and with a joyful, aching eruption there was one less mystery in Jean Tannen’s life.
