Faded Steel Heat gf-9

by Glen Cook

  "What's this?" Morley asked.

  "Glory Mooncalled's been watching," I said. But evidently not closely enough to have seen the truth because that centaur had come inside with no idea whatsoever what he was charging into. He was astounded by the mob looking his way. After toppling the guards he tried to stop suddenly but shod hooves just won't do that on polished stone. He skidded. He howled. He tumbled. He whooped. He reached floor level traveling chin first. His language was enough to make the Goddamn Parrot cover his ears. It wasn't Karentine but every man in the place had been to the land where that language was spoken.

  More centaurs arrived. Each was as surprised as the first. Their faces revealed their determination to free Mooncalled's allies and an equal intent to stifle the man's enemies. But they faced big problems achieving their ends, not the least of which was that they hadn' t come prepared to deal with so many enemies. I got the feeling that they'd expected to just prance in and prance back out. I guessed the first wave of people rushing out had lulled them.

  None of the later arrivals suffered the full ignominy endured by the first. That fellow started getting thumped before he stopped sliding. Funny, though. At first only my friends and Colonel Block's showed much enthusiasm for the sport. You'd have thought the guys from The Call would be particularly unfond of centaurs. Centaurs are the most treacherous natives of the Cantard.

  In a moment the stormwarden had a nebula of slithering lights clutched to his stomach. The ball persisted less than an eyeblink. There was another splat of waterlogged board against stone. The latecomer centaurs got a mighty assist in their efforts to get back out of the house. Sadly, none collided with the doorframe along the way. What must have been sold as an easy massacre had turned into a rout of the killers before they ever got started letting blood.

  I looked around. I didn't need outside help to realize that the centaurs had expected to get support from allies already on the ballroom floor. But nobody raised a hand to help. Which suggested that Mooncalled had staged his rescue in near-ignorance, trusting too much in unreliable allies. Which didn't fit his reputation at all.

  Did I smell desperation?

  Love is blind stupid.

  "Oh, no!"

  Oh, yes, I fear. Your craziest speculation was correct.

  There were more centaurs outside. The uproar out there made that clear. It sounded like a pitched battle. I grinned. My more noteworthy guests must have brought extra help. Just in case.

  It's getting to be a sad old world. People just don't trust each other the way they used to.

  105

  The excitement had ended. The centaurs had fled. The rescue attempt had failed without ever having become clearly identifiable as such to some people. Colonel Block and a badly shaken, poorly focused Marengo North English soon worked out a tentative, fragile alliance. They would work together to catch Tama Montezuma. I suspected that alliance would collapse about as soon as somebody actually caught sight of Tama. Both men had plans.

  Both were counting on me, too. If I couldn't get Pular Singe to track Tama, she might never be caught. She might not be anyway. She was a survivor. She'd had a long time to get ready for the inevitable. I figured there was a very good chance we'd find no trace of her.

  I told Max, "It didn't go the way I planned... "

  "Does anything?"

  "Yes. Sometimes. Sort of. We did get to the bottom of it, didn't we? Sort of." And some good might come of it. Suspicion would attach to The Call for a long time. Plenty of people would believe Marengo was behind everything and had sacrificed his mistress to cover his ass. I planned to keep a foot in that camp myself until Tama offered a public confession, no matter what my sidekick claimed. I had a need to demonize North English, to see him as slicker and slimier than he could possibly be.

  Perilous Spite departed, leaving echoes of sorcery fading in the street. With him went the surviving Dragons and the Wolves. Brief, feeble protests from the rightsists had had no effect. Being a cynic, I suspected the stormwarden's captives might not enjoy the full rigors of justice. A tame shapeshifter would be a handy tool if you were in the sorcery and dark master rackets. Guys like Spite have no interest injustice, anyway. Most are incapable of grasping the concept.

  "Why didn't you do something?" I asked the Goddamn Parrot.

  Perhaps because I had no inclination to become a part of the stormwarden's booty, Garrett.

  I knew that but it still seemed he should have done something.

  I am doing something. Rather more interesting than what you would have me waste myself doing. Spite will reap no benefit from those he has taken into his possession. His conscription was far too public.

  That sounded a lot like one of those circuitous mollifications he always claims I'd misunderstood when things went to hell later. I couldn't recall why I'd been worried about him the past few days.

  My friends stuck around, still hoping I'd give them the chance to beat everybody else to the bad girl. Miss Trim and the crew from Heaven's Gate wouldn't leave. There was still some beer left. I told Saucerhead, "You and Winger and Playmate take the old guys home. Make sure Winger's pockets are clean before she leaves. After you deliver them come back here and help get rid of that settling tank."

  Garrett!

  "Remove the tank, then."

  Kindly get on with your chores. I am expecting company. It will go much easier if the crowd is smaller.

  I threw up my hands in exasperation. That told me that he had managed his end not so he could be a card up my sleeve but in order to hook a fish of his own.

  "Am I going with you?" Morley asked.

  "I'm not going anywhere."

  "Bullshit, Garrett. I know you. You want to duck out with your furry girlfriend so you can get to Montezuma first. Not so you can grab some money but because you don't want the pretty lady to get hurt."

  I'm not as squishy as Morley thinks. I'd done some thinking about that night at The Pipes, about the would-be visitor and the knife or cleaver I might have seen. I wanted to think I'd seen a changer in Montezuma shape. But I was keeping an open mind. My failing to survive that night might have solved several problems for Tama. Particularly if she knew what was supposed to happen to her uncle Marengo up on the edge of Elf Town.

  I was sure she'd known, now.

  She almost certainly did. Will you quit dawdling?

  "What do you mean, almost certainly? You had plenty of time to dig around inside her head."

  Easier said than done, Garrett. Her thoughts were terribly murky. She had some sort of protection.

  "Well, of course." Was he lying? His motives aren't often clear.

  Hell with it.

  I turned to Morley. I don't mind him thinking I'm soft. It's an edge. "You figured me out." I turned away again. "I talk to the wind." That left him looking puzzled. "After all this excitement tonight I thought you'd want to run back to your place and snuggle up with your favorite squash. Unless you're romancing an eggplant these days."

  Winger was leaving with Saucerhead, shooing the old-timers and Quipo, but she wasn't happy or moving fast. She snarled at Block as she passed him where he was hanging around hoping I'd help him. Marengo North English lurked on the balcony above, nursing the same foolish hope. I'd have to ditch them both without being obvious.

  Morley and I had been whispering so Singe hissed, "What do you want me to do?"

  Morley offered a show of teeth, amused. I told Singe, "This's your choice. You want to be independent. To do that you have to make your own decisions." That would be tough. Ratwomen are more oppressed than most human women. They never learn to think in terms of self-determination.

  A smirking Morley Dotes drifted off to send his henchmen home.

  "Do you want me to do it?" Singe asked.

  "Of course I want you to do it. That's why I asked you. What I don't want is for you to decide to do it just because I want it. I want you to make a choice that's your own, made in your own interest." Gah! That sounded like one of Tinnie's ser
pentine evolutions.

  It's certainly easier being the kind of guy who just uses people.

  A stir at the door saved me any more skiprope. A man who appeared to be in his seventies paused to survey the hall before descending to its floor. The guard who should've kept him out seemed not to notice him. Maybe the old fellow was a ghost. He stood stiffly erect, partially supporting himself with a walking stick carved to resemble a fat black cobra. His skin was dusky but not dark like Playmate's or Tama's. His eyes were gray. He seemed to be going blind. He came downstairs slowly, with a marionette's jerkiness, feeling his way with his stick. He looked nothing like the image I'd carried in my head across the years since he'd started acting up in the Cantard. Dammit, this guy was just too old!

  Manvil Gilbey, directing a crew already starting to clean up, asked, "Friend of yours?"

  "Not hardly. Friend of a friend. Maybe. He should be harmless and he shouldn't be here long." I said that directly to the Goddamn Parrot. "Try to work around him. Don't bother him unless he misbehaves." Which didn't seem likely. I could recall no instance when that old man hadn't had somebody else do his dirty work for him.

  Glory Mooncalled walked stiffly to the beer keg. Jerkily, he drew a drink in a mug formerly used by Trail or Storey. A glimmer of fear burned in the backs of his eyes.

  I was sure that a lot of calculation and clever manipulation had gone into making this moment possible. No doubt I'd been played like a cheap fiddle for days just so my pal in the tank could manage a sitdown with his hero. With none of that having any real impact on everything else that I was doing.

  He was good, Old Bones was. Or I was getting too cynical and suspicious.

  It's an occupational disease.

  "That who I think it is?" Morley whispered.

  "I expect so. But nobody's ever seen him. What do you think, bird? Was the mystery man plooking Tama Montezuma?"

  The Goddamn Parrot said, "Pretty boy." With a sneer in his voice.

  "That does it. Into the pot. Singe?"

  "I will help. Not because you want my help but because by doing so I can help myself."

  "Excellent. Makes you just like the rest of the team. Morley!" Damned if he wasn't flirting with Alyx. Or maybe Nicks. Oblivious to the fact that the Weiders, father and son, were looking at him in a way more often seen in rightsists observing nonhuman behavior. "Don't do this to me, Morley."

  He grasped the situation instantly. "You're right. Not smart. But it'll be torture holding back."

  "Tell me something I haven't had to live with for half of forever." I collected Block and joined North English, who still refused to come down from the second floor. "Singe says she might help track Tama. But she refuses to help either one of you." I doubted that she knew who either man was, really, but neither was beloved of ratpeople and a refusal would be no surprise to them.

  "Why is that old man here?" North English asked. I noted he kept his back to the visitor. Did he know the man? Was he afraid he might be recognized?

  The old-timer took his mug and settled into a chair he dragged over beside the settling tank. There was a quiver in his drinking hand. I had a distinct feeling that it would be a long time before Glory Mooncalled was again a major factor in Karentine affairs. After this interview it would take him an age to reclaim his confidence and build a new underground, the secrets of which were known only to his friends. He would have no secrets after this interview. And he looked too old to start from scratch.

  I hoped the bag of bones inside that damned tank had the gods-given good sense to do like I'd asked and rifle the minds of Marengo North English, Bondurant Altoona, and their like tonight. If we robbed them of all their secrets, we could disarm them, too. In fact, if he hadn't been just too damned lazy, he might've spared a mind to sneak a peek at what was going on inside the heads of Block and Relway and maybe even that scab of clabbered misery off the Hill, Perilous Spite. But I doubted he had the nerve to try the latter. Too much personal risk involved.

  "Nobody. Friend of a friend." I went back down to Singe. "Do you have a scent?"

  "Yes."

  She was a marvel, picking it out of the mess that had to be in that hall.

  I was surprised immediately. Instead of heading for any door Tama had marched right into the kitchen, past a flabbergasted Neersa Bintor, into the pantry, and from there had descended to the cellars below the house. Which, I shouldn't have been surprised, connected to the caverns beneath the brewery.

  "This woman definitely had everything worked out ahead of time," Morley said.

  Absolutely. I hadn't known about this way out. Or in, maybe, if you had connections at the brewery end. Had Tama been through there occasionally, say to visit Gerris Genord? Having someone special to protect certainly would explain his stubborn silence. And Tama knew how to get her hooks into a man.

  I wondered what she would've done if Mooncalled's rescue gang had shown up on time. Would she have pretended there was no connection and have tried to stick with Marengo?

  As we dithered trying to get lights for my feeble human eyes the Goddamn Parrot squawked, then abandoned me.

  Garrett. Do not overlook the chance that a great many watchers will be prepared to follow you.

  "A possibility very much on my mind." I ignored the odd looks that remark earned me.

  106

  Morley cursed softly. Somehow, cobwebs had gotten onto the lace of one of his cuffs. Soil was supposed to avoid him. "This isn't the fun it used to be, Garrett."

  "Fun? Fun doesn't have anything to do with it. We're the last righteous men, standing with jaws firm in the face of the chaos."

  Pular Singe giggled.

  Morley cursed again, but conceded, "It is a great way to meet interesting women."

  "Can't disagree with that." Strange ones, too. "What is it?" Singe had stopped. She sniffed. I couldn't see a thing. The one lantern I'd come up with hadn't lasted all the way through the underground passage.

  We were in the wagon lot behind the brewery loading docks, having exited the brewery through the storage caves. I hadn't been able to stop and share a tankard with Mr. Burkel, who'd been disappointed. But he'd told us we were only minutes behind Tama, who hadn't been able to negotiate the tunnels with our ease.

  "She got aboard a wagon," Singe told me.

  There were at least twenty of those crowded into the lot, waiting for sunrise. Morley grumped something about have to search them all. Singe said, "No, the wagon left."

  I glanced back at the dock. There were two dock wallopers on duty, snoozing on stools under a single feeble lantern. Nights, of course, they only loaded independent haulers.

  I woke them up. With sullen cheer they admitted having loaded a small wagon a short time earlier. "One driver," one told me. "Out of Dwarf Fort. They' re fixin' to celebrate one of their holidays."

  "She's on a cart out of Dwarf Fort," I told Morley.

  "Then we'd better move fast." Dwarf Fort wasn't far away.

  "She won't be headed there herself. She knows about Singe and she's improvising. She'll get off before the wagon goes inside."

  Embarrassed, Singe informed me, "I cannot trail her well if she is riding."

  "So how about you follow the wagon? Or the horses, if you can stand the stink? You knew she got into a wagon and there's only been one go out of here lately, seems like you could."

  Singe brightened instantly. That hadn't occurred to her. Yet. It would have. She sniff-sniff-sniffed, then headed out.

  "Not only brilliant and talented and beautiful but fast as well," Morley whispered. "You don't want to let this one get away."

  "Did Marengo North English and Bondurant Altoona rub off on you?" He was ragging me at Singe's expense.

  "Whoa!" He started to argue but decided against. "All right. Let's abuse the parrot." Who, conveniently, wasn't around to defend himself. He'd chosen to stay behind. Apparently. I was always the last to know what that overdressed crow was up to. Or even what that critter who figured everything out for h
im was up to, for that matter. We were in for some headbutting after this mess settled out.

  "Wish you'd decided that a year ago. Then maybe held him underwater to see how long he could go without breathing." Singe flinched. She still wasn't used to our banter. It always took her a moment to realize we weren't really about to skin each other. "I'm thinking about spiking your goulash with catnip. Then you'd wake up married to Winger."

  "Couldn't. She's already got a husband somewhere. And I'm engaged."

  "Really? When did that happen?"

  "Oh, back before I was born. I just don't talk about it much. My grandparents arranged it. They were immigrants. They stuck to the old ways. They still try to."

  "I'll bet you're a major disappointment."

  "They weep human tears at every family gathering."

  "When are you supposed to start making this poor woman miserable?"

  "Oh, a long time ago. But she never showed up for the ceremony."

  "Smart woman."

  "She just hadn't met me. If she had... I don't know if I could've talked my way out of that. The old folks are stubborn as rocks. They still carry on like it was my fault. They can't blame it on Indalir's family. They have royal blood. As if every elf who ever walked doesn't, the way those people tumble anybody who can't outrun them."

  "I'm glad you aren't the kind of lowlife who finds women interesting."

  "Definitely one weakness you can't pin on me."

  Pular Singe stopped. She turned slowly, nostrils flaring. Morley shut up and began searching the night, too. He loosened his swordcane. I said, "I hoped they'd lose us because of those tunnels."

  Singe said, "No. Not watchers. It is the two evil men who escaped. They met the wagon here." She dropped to all fours, circled, sniffed.

  I muttered, "Coincidence? Or prearrangement?"

  Morley asked the important question. "How could they know where she'd be? She didn't know. She was just running."