Updated_PerilInTheOldCountry_SamHooker_EbookFormatting_Nook

by Peril in the Old Country (retail) (epub)

  “Roman!” Sloot stood up abruptly, which seemed the thing to do in Carpathia when one is upset, based on the events of the evening up to that point.

  Myrtle explained that she’d really wanted to stay, but Roman had convinced her that she wouldn’t be safe in Salzstadt if she were discovered. She’d received one percent of the haul from burgling Whitewood, which was a small fortune by any standard.

  “I suppose that makes sense, but why were you here tonight? At dinner?”

  Myrtle blushed again, a much deeper shade of scarlet this time.

  “Her Dominance,” said Myrtle. “She thought that you’d be happy to see me.”

  “Oh?” Sloot felt himself blushing as well. “I didn’t think she’d care about something like that.”

  Myrtle shrugged. “And are you?”

  “H-happy to see you, you mean?”

  Myrtle nodded. Sloot nodded. Myrtle smiled.

  “Oh, this is ridiculous,” said Myrtle. “You said you’d give us a moment! it’s been a moment. Several, in fact. Well, then take the night off!”

  Sloot sighed. He was burning with embarrassment for having floundered so inartfully through a quasi-romantic encounter, and Arthur was making it unbearable.

  “I suppose I should―”

  “Would you walk me home?” blurted Myrtle, rather more forcefully than she might have intended.

  “Oh, umm … do you think I’m allowed?”

  “You were Vlad’s dinner guest,” said Myrtle. “You’re also an Intelligencier. You’re not being guarded by one of the Lebendervlad, so it stands to reason that you’d be free to leave the castle.”

  Ulfhaven by Moonlight

  Myrtle was right. Sloot was free to leave the castle. He wasn’t a prisoner, but he was free to walk Myrtle home, and that was nearly as bad. At least he had experience being a prisoner.

  This was the sort of anxiety that should have confined itself to his awkward teenage years. Sloot wished that it hadn’t extended so far into his awkward adulthood, despite the fact that not a single wish he’d ever made had come true. At what point does optimism become gullibility?

  There they were, strolling across the cobbles in the dim light of skull-mounted torches and half the moon. Myrtle had hooked her hand through the crook of his arm once they’d walked through the castle’s spiky portcullis.

  Did that mean she’d done this sort of thing before? If so, she had him at a disadvantage. Walking ladies home at night was something he’d always seen himself doing someday, but had never quite gotten around to it, like spending time abroad. He’d just gotten started with that, in fact. He couldn’t be expected to take on too much at once.

  So had she? Had she been walked home on another gentleman’s arm before tonight? He considered demanding an answer. He worked for Uncle now, after all, and one can’t withhold things from Uncle! Then again, he couldn’t be sure, but interrogation through official capacity didn’t seem like the best way to woo a lady. He decided against it.

  The old buildings that lined the streets of Ulfhaven were very different from the ones in Salzstadt. They were considerably farther north, and almost certain to be full of people who’d jump at the chance to be disloyal to the Domnitor, long may he reign. They also looked a lot older. You didn’t see wicked, snarling gargoyles on new buildings, and the rooftops of Ulfhaven were absolutely silly with gargoyles. Though Salzstadt was technically older by a century or so, it was home to an ever-increasing population of architects, which are considered an invasive species of pest by the Salzstadt Historical Preservation Society. They’re absolutely terrible for old buildings.

  They walked across a little stone bridge over a canal, then past a little pub where some old men were having an animated discussion that was completely unintelligible.

  “They’re speaking Olde Carpathian,” said Myrtle. “You don’t hear it much anymore, except from really old people. They like to complain that no one speaks it anymore.”

  “So they don’t teach it in schools?”

  “No, the old people won’t hear of it. They like to complain that no one speaks it anymore.”

  Myrtle pointed out the library as they walked past. It was smaller than the one in Salzstadt, probably due to its lack of funding by the wealthy families of Salzstadt. Score one for the Old Country! Sloot asked if they had both sorts of librarians there, but Myrtle had never been inside.

  “Well, this is me,” said Myrtle as they stopped in front of a big iron gate. A pair of gargoyles snarled down at them, but then, of course, they would. The absence of gargoyles would have been suspicious. Myrtle opened the gate, hesitated, and then took a step to stand very, very close to Sloot.

  “Thank you for walking me home.” She looked up at him with a little smile. “Would you like to come in?”

  Even Old Country accountants have instincts, though they do everything in their power to avoid relying on them. Instincts are base, wicked things that are fine for savages like the Carpathians, but a good salt knows better than to let them run willy-nilly. So when the part of Sloot’s brain that was ruled solely by instinct was figuring out how to say “yes” in a way that seemed casual, the very Old Country part of his brain leapt into action.

  “I shouldn’t.”

  Myrtle sighed. “All right then. Good night.”

  She tilted her head upward and leaned in, her lips pursed. All that Sloot had to do was lower his face by an inch, and he’d finally have a love life! Some proof that he was a gentleman, for having kissed and not told! He thought about that almost exclusively on the long walk back to the castle and cursed himself for being the coward he’d always been. He couldn’t even take consolation in the surprising firmness of the handshake he’d managed instead, as it couldn’t have come off as confidence. Not when paired with the high-pitched warbling noise he made, and definitely not when followed by his sprint back in the direction they’d come.

  When he told Roman about it over breakfast the following morning, he’d been as stone-faced as Sloot had ever seen the bug-eyed old man.

  “Bad luck,” said Roman. “Not to worry though, it sounds like she really fancies you. You’re just a late bloomer, that’s all.”

  “I wish that were true.” Sloot heaped an unidentifiable brown mash onto his plate that he’d been told was the traditional Carpathian breakfast. It was tasty, but he lacked the courage to ask what it was. He was having trouble finding a courage he didn’t lack, in fact.

  “Of course it is,” said Roman. “I told you I’m an excellent judge of character, didn’t I? She likes you, and you’re just having trouble working up your nerve.”

  “It’s more than that. Nothing makes sense anymore! Everything was fine, then I corrected that stupid report and got promoted to Willie’s financier. Every waking moment since then has been a steady decline into the unknown.”

  “That’s just life, that is.”

  “But I can’t live this way! Before I suddenly found myself in the Carpathian Intelligence service, I could have told you what pair of socks I’d be wearing every day for the rest of the fiscal quarter. I don’t even know if I’ll be wearing socks by the end of breakfast now! Do they even have fiscal quarters in Carpathia? When do they do their taxes?”

  “Easy, easy,” said Roman. “I know things are different, but―”

  “But how do I know if I want to pursue a romance with Myrtle if I don’t have my quarterly socks projections worked out?” Sloot was on his feet and shouting in his voice’s highest register. His chest was going tight, and he was having trouble breathing.

  Roman had no confidence in the curative powers of breathing into paper bags, so he opted for a nice hard slap instead. Sloot’s eyes did a little acrobatic routine to regain their focus. He regarded Roman with shock for a moment, then returned to his seat.

  “One thing at a time,” said Roman. “Are you wearing socks right n
ow?”

  “Yes,” replied Sloot.

  “Then you’ll probably still be wearing them by the end of breakfast. Have you neglected to wear socks since you’ve been capable of dressing yourself?”

  “Not once.”

  “Then you’ll most likely manage them tomorrow as well, and the day after that, and the day after that.”

  “Of course you’re right.” Sloot was surprised by how much better he felt. “Thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it. And as far as Myrtle’s concerned, who said anything about pursuing a romance?”

  “She tried to kiss me.”

  “So, nobody,” said Roman. “If the last few months have taught you anything, shouldn’t it be that everything can change, no matter how well you’ve planned things out?”

  “I suppose.”

  “When somebody you like tries to kiss you, you kiss them back. It’s not honeymoons and broom makers yet, and it may never be. You just kiss her back, and see where that goes.”

  “Good advice,” said Vlad, who was surprisingly light on her feet, even in a gleaming suit of steel armor.

  “Thank you, Your Dominance,” said Roman, who jumped out of his chair and gave a bow. Sloot did the same. Vlad waved a hand, and they all sat.

  “Roman tells me this is your first time in Carpathia,” said Vlad. A servant crept in and made an impressive pile of breakfast on her plate. “How do you find our city?”

  “Quite, er, nice, Your Dominance.”

  “You are surprised.”

  “He’s been raised as a true salt, Your Dominance,” Roman explained. “He didn’t even know he was a Carpathian until this year, when he took his mother’s post.”

  “Really?” asked Vlad.

  Sloot nodded, his mouth full of breakfast. It was delicious despite its appearance, and learning what was in it could only take away from his enjoyment. Salts are very good at refusing to learn things not bearing the Domnitor’s seal of approval, long may he reign, so he could expect it to remain delicious in perpetuity.

  “You’ll be a great asset to our cause,” said Vlad between enormous mouthfuls of breakfast. “You just need some time to warm up to your true heritage. You’ll stay for a month here in the castle, free to explore the city as you will.”

  Sloot choked on his breakfast in surprise. “A month?”

  “And then you’ll bring the ransom to the elder Lord Hapsgalt.”

  “But they’ll be looking for him,” exclaimed Sloot. “For us!”

  “Building suspense,” said Roman. “Don’t worry, they’ll rough us up good! Make it look like we barely escaped with our lives.”

  “What?”

  “No broken bones or anything. Well, maybe a finger or two. Have to make it look convincing, don’t we?”

  Sloot tried to take comfort in the fact that he now knew what he’d be doing for the next month, but it was no good. He started to panic. He tried to do it quietly.

  “I’m going to practice.” Vlad rose from her chair. Her plate was empty. Sloot and Roman stood and bowed as she strode from the room.

  “I love to watch her eat,” said Roman in a confidential tone, once he was sure she was out of earshot. “She was raised by wolves, you know.”

  “Raised by wolves? The thirty-seventh of a royal family?”

  “Tradition,” said Roman. “All the Vlads were raised by wolves. She’s spent her whole life fighting something or someone. That’s where she’s going now, to fight with the Lebendervlad.”

  Vlad spent most of her waking hours fighting her departed forebears in the courtyard. Sloot spent several hours watching her from the battlements one day, dispatching the shadowy warriors one by one in puffs of black smoke. They’d coalesce anew from one of the nearby Black Smilers and come at her again.

  She changed weapons frequently. Nicoleta told him that the chaos of the battlefield requires constant improvisation, and swords tend to slip from bloody hands, especially when the battle’s run long and the corpses are waist-high.

  Sloot’s first order of business had been to establish a daily routine for himself. He knew he could only rely upon it to keep him sane for a month or so, but who knew? There just might be the vestiges of an old routine waiting for him in Salzstadt when he returned. So long as he wasn’t dismissed by the elder Lord Hapsgalt and blackballed from working in the financial sector for the rest of his life, he just might be able to forget that most of this had ever happened.

  He started each morning by staring out his window at the Carpathian flag. A red eagle flanked by white wolves on a field of black. There was no paper reproduction of the Old Country flag on his wall, and it didn’t seem right to recite the Loyalist Oath to the Carpathian one, so he just stood there in silence and stared at it. It was a shadow of his customary observance, but it was something.

  Then there was breakfast. It was the one part of Carpathian culture that he felt he’d genuinely miss once he’d returned to Salzstadt, and he looked forward to avoiding learning what was in it every morning.

  As luck would have it, the city was surrounded by a massive wall, and it had a massive southern gate that never opened. If it did, it would open onto the great road that led eventually to the main gate of Salzstadt. He passed it on his after-breakfast walk, placed his hand on it, and while it didn’t make him feel as secure as the one back home, the crows picking the soft bits from the caged corpses along the top of the wall certainly loaned it a sense of foreboding that would keep attackers away. Who would be insane enough to invade Vlad the Invader, anyway?

  He wound his watch. It was still keeping impeccable time thanks to Greta. She’d done an equally impressive job with the clock in the square, which ticked along in perfect synchronization with his watch, day after day. He looked for her a couple of times to thank her, but she spent so much time with Vlad that he never saw her.

  “The two of them are getting awfully cozy,” said Roman with a wink and a pair of eyebrow raises.

  “Wait,” said Sloot, “you don’t mean …”

  “I thought they might hit it off,” said Roman. “I told you, I’m an excellent judge of character.”

  “I can’t imagine that Willie’s very happy.”

  “Oh, he’s fine. He’s got one of the nice suites that were designed just for high-ranking hostages. Fresh linens, locks on the outsides of the doors.”

  “Not that! Greta is supposed to be Willie’s fiancée.”

  “That was never going to work out,” said Roman. “Even setting aside the fact that he’s a china set and three guests short of a tea party, it’s just not meant to be. I’m an excellent judge of character, you know.”

  “So you keep telling me. But Greta and Vlad?”

  “You wouldn’t think it,” Roman shrugged, “but there you are. The warlord and the clockmaker. Stranger things have happened.”

  People are good at coping with strangeness in small doses, but not at the outer limits. Perhaps Roman was worried that someone in the trades becoming romantically involved with the ruler of a warlike nation would be enough to send Sloot careening headlong into madness. If that were the case, sending him to the wizard’s tower was a curious move.

  Everything in the place was a candidate for the strangest thing that Sloot had ever seen, starting with the door.

  “All right now,” it said when Sloot knocked on it. “Try that again, and you’ll draw back a stump!”

  “You can talk!”

  “And you assault first and state the obvious later.”

  “I knocked on the door, that’s all.”

  “He said as though I weren’t here,” said the door.

  “I’m sorry, that’s just … well, it’s what you do.”

  “‘What you do’ indeed! You’re one of them, then.”

  “I’m sorry, who?”

  “Peopleists,” replied th
e door. “If it’s not people, it’s not worth talking to, is that right?”

  “Well, it’s just―”

  “Spare me. How’d you like it if one of my boards lashed out and walloped your front surface every time I wanted something from you?”

  “I wouldn’t like it. I wouldn’t like it at all!” Sloot had never been reprimanded by a door. He was fairly certain that this particular door was unique, but he couldn’t help wondering if it wasn’t. He was going to lose a measure of sleep while indoors for a while, just to be on the safe side.

  There was a rattle, and the door swung inward.

  “I thought I heard somebody,” said Nicoleta. “Come in!”

  “I just … I’m terribly sorry.”

  “Oh, come on,” said Nicoleta. She pulled Sloot through the door and slammed it shut.

  “Easy!” said the door, its voice rather muffled now.

  “Pay him no mind,” said Nicoleta.

  “I didn’t mean―”

  “It’s the downside of being a wizard,” said Nicoleta. “The confluence of magical energies just sort of saturates things over time.” She leaned over his shoulder and shouted, “And if the door has a problem doing its job, I can melt down its fittings and use it for kindling!”

  Silence.

  “That’s better,” said Nicoleta. “Now, into the box with you.”

  She led Sloot past a row of bookshelves and a table littered with glassware in ridiculous shapes and configurations. Strange colored liquids bubbled in some, churned in others, and in one case seemed to be learning to make obscene gestures.

  Standing next to a brazier of purple flame was a roughly human-sized box, which Sloot was failing to refrain from comparing to a coffin. He would have been relieved about the lack of a corpse inside when Nicoleta opened it, but he was too busy cowering from the tentacles that lunged out from it.

  “Oops.” Nicoleta produced a wand from the folds of her garish green robes and started shooting sparks into the box. “Don’t let them touch you!”