Venture said, “I hope so.”
“They’d have a less refined approach, too,” Dasher said. “This is Crested, all the way through.”
“The Longlakes,” Venture ground out the name of his local enemies.
Earnest looked away, to hide the fact that he knew just how personal Venture’s suspicions had become.
“Maybe,” said Dasher, who’d heard the stories of how Prowess Longlake, and then his son Hunter, had marched into Beamer’s when Venture was a trouble-making young boy and demanded that Beamer expel him from his center. “Or someone further away. Higher up.”
Venture doubted it. “So now what?” he said.
Earnest clapped a hand on Venture’s back. “Now we train harder.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Venture waited under the plum tree for Jade. The last of its remaining leaves fluttered in the breeze. Everything was ready. The best carriage had been shined and the horses brushed. Silver baubles tinkled on their bridles as they shifted their feet and shook their glossy black manes. He focused on the dark, heavy front doors of the Big House, on the carving of a rose in full bloom, which spanned the greater portion of both doors. It had been commissioned for Jade’s grandmother, by her husband, before their wedding, as his way of making his family home hers as well.
The rose carving parted down the middle and Jade stepped out, followed by Grant. The weather had warmed considerably over the last few days, and it was a cool, but fine afternoon, as beautiful weather as one could expect in Autumn’s Third Month. Jade, too, was as beautiful as he could’ve expected. She was always beautiful, but today she’d put some real effort into it, with stunning results.
Not for him. For Hunter.
“I’m fine, Father,” Jade said. “You don’t need to follow me to the carriage.”
“Venture, you take good care of her.”
“I’ll do my best, sir.” Venture tried to sound reassuring, and not like he was about to snap.
Grant ducked back into the house, shaking his head, too caught up in his own concerns about Jade to notice Venture’s mood.
“Hello, Venture.”
Jade’s greeting was stiff. The wind picked up, loosening a few wisps of her hair from the thin magenta ribbon she’d tied at the nape of her neck and dusting her shoulders with a few dark purple leaves.
In spite of the autumn wind, Venture was sweating already. Given Grant’s generosity in allowing him to be away for the better part of the year and funding his training, a part of him wondered how he could think of doing the sort of things he was thinking of doing, how he could think of causing Grant such frustration and humiliation by pursuing the heart of his only daughter. But then, how could he not?
“Hello, Miss. Are you doing well this evening?” His greeting was polite, but his manner of looking at her, of following her gaze even when she tried to avoid his sharp eyes, betrayed his mood.
“I’m just fine, thank you. How do I look?” Jade shot him a look of her own that said, Okay, I’ll take you on.
Venture looked her up and down thoughtfully, as though he hadn’t had ample opportunity to see her the whole time she made her way along the winding walk to the carriage.
“Very . . .” He looked meaningfully at her cleavage before finding the right word, “fashionable.”
“I meant for you to comment on my dress, or perhaps my hair.” Jade’s eyes narrowed at him.
“I thought I was commenting on your dress, which looks fine, although I prefer your hair down.”
“Stop that!”
“Stop what, Jade?”
“Looking at me like I’m some little tart for you to devour.”
Venture raised his eyebrows and grinned. Did she honestly expect him to comment on her taste in choosing this latest of Illesian-inspired fashions, with the silk ruffle they liked to call a neckline plunging entirely too far from her actual neckline, nearly to her midsection?
She blushed deeper and turned away, but not before he saw the hint of tears in her eyes. He felt a stab of guilt, a hint of warning, but just as quickly his pride and anger flared back up. She was the one with two of her best features on full display, about to fall out of her dress, as though he—or, God forbid, Hunter—might at any moment have to catch them in his hands. How could she expect him not to notice? Not to care?
“I’m sorry, Miss,” he said sarcastically, “I’m always forgetting my place.”
“Your place? This has nothing to do with your place!” She flung the carriage door open herself, saying, “You are a stupid boy, Venture Delving! I take back anything I ever said otherwise!”
With that, she climbed into the carriage unassisted and settled herself on the cushioned seat.
Fuming, he ignored her last remark. “All set to go then?” he asked with mock politeness.
Her eyes flashed at him in return, and he carefully closed the door, climbed onto the driver’s seat, took another deep breath, and mumbled a halfhearted prayer that he’d make it through this without killing anyone, namely Hunter Longlake. And then he called to the horses, and with a jingling of bells and a clomping of hooves, they were off.
He slowed the carriage to a stop in front of the Gilded, Twin Rivers’ best inn, leaped down from the driver’s seat, and opened the door for Jade. The Longlakes had lived in the High Judge’s Residence in Twin Rivers when he was younger, but now Prowess Longlake was Governor of the Western Quarter, and he lived in Lightward, while Hunter occupied the family estate, clear over in the northernmost corner of the county, too far away for him to make the trip home after spending an evening with Jade. Since Grant wasn’t foolish enough to invite Hunter to stay the night at the Big House, he’d become a frequent guest of the Gilded.
With the carriage door blocking the view of any curious onlookers, Venture leaned down, his face close to Jade’s—too close, closer than a servant’s ever should be—searching for words, searching his mind for a way to stop this. She was right; he was being an idiot earlier. A part of him just wanted to say he was sorry, for what, he didn’t care. Just beg her to forget about Hunter and to wait for him.
Jade shot him a fearless look and stood her ground. “I said stop looking at me like that, Venture Delving.”
“Why?”
She shook her head sharply, as though she couldn’t find the right words to say what she was thinking any more than he could. She gave him a shove instead. Startled, he stepped back to let her out. Though he held out his hand, predictably, she refused it.
“Why should I sit at home and wait for a man who wouldn’t do the same for me?” she said once she was on her feet. “Getting to know Hunter a little better is much more enjoyable than sitting home like an old maid.”
“You’ve been seeing him for a while, then?”
“Of course. Why do you think Father insists on sending you to drive me now that he has the chance? He thinks of you as his most loyal servant when it comes to protecting his daughter’s honor, regardless of whether she wants it protected against a particular gentleman or not. Hopefully he’ll never find out that you have no honor. It would break his heart.”
“Stop talking, Jade, before you say anything more that you’re going to regret!”
“Why would I regret it?”
She knew very well why; she knew how his mother had always urged him to be a man of honor. She knew how he feared disappointing her just as well as she knew how he needed Grant’s respect.
“I may be a stupid boy, but you’re being a foolish girl.”
“I’m being foolish?”
The memory rushed to his mind, of finding her under the willow tree when they were just fourteen. Kissing her forehead. This, he’d said between kisses, is pure foolishness.
“We were both foolish once.”
“Yes,” she said, taken aback. She remembered. But then she stiffened again. “We were, until you decided to keep your promise to Justice instead of keeping me.”
“There you are, Jade!”
Ventur
e took a step back, swallowing his retort and following the voice. Hunter was making his way down the steps toward them. Now in his mid-twenties, Hunter was as handsome, as tall as he remembered, though now Venture was taller.
Hunter held Jade’s hand and sprinkled her with flowery flattery with the ease of a gentleman very much accustomed to beautiful young ladies. Venture wondered if he took such a refined approach to the common girls he fooled around with.
Jade reentered the carriage, gladly accepting Hunter’s assistance. Venture shut the door after him. He exercised every bit of his willpower in order not to “accidentally” slam it on Hunter’s leg.
He drove them to the theater, for Hunter had tickets for a showing of the ever popular love story, “Rich and Sage.” The leading actor, Den Cloud, was said to make half the women swoon by the end of each performance, while the female lead was played by Violet Heights, who’d given half the professional fighters in the country private performances.
Venture was in no mood to make small talk with the other drivers parked along the street after he delivered them to the theater, and unwilling to lose sight of the exits in order to drive around town as he might have done if Jade had been in other company. So he stood with his arms crossed, leaned against the carriage, glowered at the empty stone steps, and tried to remember his plans to show Jade who was the better man.
Neither Hunter nor Jade paid him any attention when they finally poured out of the theater with the rest of the crowd and reentered the carriage; while this was an intentional effort on Jade’s part, he was just plain invisible to Hunter, who, typical of his class, acknowledged servants only when necessary.
When they arrived back at the Gilded, he could hear them laughing as he turned the handle of the carriage door. Hunter emerged and helped Jade out, and Venture had no choice but to step aside. He tried to reason with himself that he shouldn’t do anything stupid. There was only the farewell left for him to endure, and then he could stuff her back in the carriage and get her home.
He stayed by the rig while the two of them stepped up the curb and onto the stone slab walk in front of the inn. Seeing Jade’s hand in that of any other man made him ill. In Hunter’s, it made him want to throttle someone like never before. The pair made their way up the steps hand in hand, but instead of parting at the door, Hunter, still without a look at Venture, raised a hand in his direction and waved it toward the carriage.
He just shooed me! Venture couldn’t believe it. “Sir!” he called out.
Hunter had pushed the door open and Jade’s foot was poised to step inside. They both stopped, turned around, and looked at him.
“Sir, this won’t do.”
“What won’t do?” Jade’s cheeks flushed with anger.
“Jade, my dear, why don’t you stay there for just a moment while I have a word with your servant.”
“Of course.”
Venture waited while he trotted back down the steps. For the first time, Hunter looked him straight in the face.
Venture saw the recognition dawn in his eyes. “It’s you. Delving,” he said in a low voice.
“Yes, sir.”
“Venture Delving, the bonded servant who likes to play at being a fighter. Remember your place for once, and stay out of this.”
Venture shook his head at the thought of Hunter’s empty room upstairs, of the ways he might persuade a foolish girl to put herself in a dangerous situation. “Sir, if she goes in there, I go in there. That’s how her father would have it.”
“He is not here. I am here, and I say she is coming inside with me. I am sure you have some idea how much I care for what her father thinks.”
“Sir—”
“Look, let’s not make a scene out of this and upset the lady. Let’s not let our—disagreement—get in the way of what could be a profitable transaction for both of us.”
“I’m not sure I understand what you mean, sir.”
“You give us an hour, and there will be a handsome reward in it for you.”
Hunter withdrew a bag of coins from his pocket and tucked them into the inside of Venture’s coat. As he did so, he whispered a few comments about the desirability and the pleasures of Jade’s unclothed body.
A part of Venture began to panic, wanted to scream. You’ve seen her? You’ve touched my Jade? You’ve been with her? He pressed it down, refusing to allow himself to feel the meaning of this just now. Right now, he had to deal with this bastard. He was about to snatch the bag out and fling it back in Hunter’s face, but thought better of it. He knew just what he was going to do with those coins.
“You think this lady’s honor is for sale?”
“Oh, no,” whispered Hunter. “It’s your cooperation I mean to buy. The other I will get for free. I always do.”
“I’ll be driving the lady home now,” Venture said with such an intentional thread of threat that most gentlemen would have been only too glad to leave his presence.
But Hunter was a man of no weak will himself, especially when it came to dealing with his lessers. “No bondsman stands between me and what I want.”
“I do.” Venture said gladly, unblinking.
“Fine.” Hunter removed his jacket, and, to Venture’s surprise, his sword.
Venture took off his coat too.
“Hunter! Vent! What are you—”
Hunter was quick, but Venture could see a swing coming at the first tensing of muscle and move in the blink of an eye. He dodged Hunter’s right, but his left came immediately, hard and low, right in his side. Venture kept his posture and his composure, absorbing it as though it were a minor nuisance and not the sort of blow that would have him peeing blood the next day.
With one arm behind Hunter’s waist and the other grasping a leg, he picked Hunter up high and ran him right into the ground. Hunter fought it all the way, and it was an ugly, awkward fall. Sensing little movement beneath him, Venture got up and took a step back.
Hunter let out a wheezy breath, then wobbled to his feet. He glared at Venture and went to get his coat. Good. They were done. Venture turned to get his coat, too. He’d take Jade home and—
“Hunter, no!” Jade screamed.
Hunter hadn’t picked up his coat, he’d picked up his sword and raised it in the air, ready to slash right at Venture’s head. At Jade’s scream, Hunter started, and that hesitation was enough of an opening for Venture to let his fist fly with the perfect combination of fury and precision, striking Hunter right under the jaw with a tremendous cracking of bone. Venture ducked swiftly to the side to avoid being hit in the face with Hunter’s feet or his blade as they flew up in the air on impact. Somehow he mustered the will to catch the bastard’s head just before it could smash on the cobblestone. The sword flew out of Hunter’s limp fingers and clattered to the ground next to him.
In an instant Jade was there, screaming, leaning over Hunter, cradling his bleeding face with her hands, calling his name.
Upstairs, windows flew open. Down the street, figures broke into a jog, heading in their direction.
“What did you do?” Jade gasped. “Venture, what did you do? Did you kill him?”
“He’s just knocked out. Move out of the way,” he said urgently. He had to get him out of here, quick, before the lawmen came.
Jade’s dress and her trembling hands were streaked with blood from Hunter’s broken mouth. “Why, so you can finish him off?”
Venture stopped and waved to the men. “No problem,” he called. “Just a bit too much to drink.” The figures slowed and nodded. “I’m taking him to Healer,” he told Jade. “Get out of the way.”
Reluctantly, she stepped aside. He hoisted Hunter up, and almost staggered at the burden of the utterly limp body of a man his own size. He put him across his shoulders, ran to the carriage, then tipped him off onto the carriage floor.
“You’re not even going to put him on the seat? What kind of brute have you become?” Tears streamed down Jade’s cheeks.
“Shut up! Do you really want
me to hang? Just get in. We have to go!”
She glared at him, gathered Hunter’s coat and sword, and got in. He was careful to drive fast, but not fast enough to draw attention.
The carriage arrived at the healer’s house, a compact but handsome sandstone dwelling conveniently located on the north side, near Beamer’s and several other popular gathering places known for the occasional brawl. Venture was relieved to find Healer—whose family had been healers since the days when men were named for their professions—at home. His wife, Daisy, hurried Jade off into one room while the men hefted the still unconscious Hunter out of the carriage, up the steps, and inside, into another room positioned just off the entryway for situations such as this.
The walls of this room were lined with shelves, which held jars of ointment, syrups, and herbs, and baskets brimming with rolls of clean bandages. Below the shelves was a cupboard whose sliding doors were kept closed in order not to frighten patients; Venture knew that it held a variety of sharp instruments used for piercing, cutting, clamping, and sawing.
“What happened here?” Healer said as he helped lay Hunter down on a specially built bed, which held the patient at waist height. He bent to examine Hunter’s rapidly swelling face.
“We got in a fight, sir.”
The wrinkles of concern on Healer’s brown face fell into dismay. “You got in a fight with a Crested man?” He mumbled to himself, “Beat a Crested man, just like that.”
Hunter blinked up at Healer. He mumbled answers to Healer’s questions about who he was, what year it was.
Healer scratched his graying, curly black beard and muttered under his breath. After a few more moments of examination, he said, “I expect he’ll live.”
Venture relaxed a little. At least he wouldn’t hang, then.
“The jaw’s broken. And he’s lost two teeth, right in front.” He dabbed at Hunter’s wounds and looked around in his mouth, then retrieved the missing teeth and laid them on a side table. He straightened up and eyed Venture seriously. “I suppose you know the penalties for a bondsman injuring a gentleman like this—and a Crested gentleman at that.”
Venture Unleashed (The Venture Books) Page 12
