She looked into his face and caught an ugly, intelligent grin. He threw another punch, wider than the others, and she dodged it only to realize too late that his target was not her head, but her hair. He wrapped his fingers in it and yanked her down, hard, bringing her down on one exquisite red knee. She hoisted Menace toward the arm, sharp end this time, no more playing, but she was off balance and too close, and he caught her small hand in the expanse of his. Her tailor had warned her time and again about the hair, had even demonstrated the hold, but Ivette had refused to let sense trump good fashion.
And she had made the deadly mistake of underestimating an opponent.
“That enough of a game for you, girlie?” the big man growled. His breath stank of old meat. Behind her, the second thug groaned up to a semi-crouch, clutching his bleeding face. In seconds, they could kill her, or worse.
This was why she called the dagger in her boot Mademoiselle Surprise. In one red flash she pulled it with her free hand and drove it into the wrist that gripped her sword. The man holding her let go and staggered back at the free and swinging blade. She pulled the dagger back and threw it hard into the arm of the man struggling to rise. He rolled away with a howl. In truth it would not be enough to stop him if he put his mind to beating her, big as he was, but it was enough to make him fear her, and he was fleeing as she put her epee’s point under the chin of the man who’d held her hair.
“You have three seconds to make the smart choice,” she growled. She could hear the silence as the bloodthirsty crowd held their breath. The bandit made a choking sound.
“Three.”
Ivette could no longer hear the footfalls of his running accomplice. The man swallowed, and the sword point drew a wet ruby from his adam’s apple.
“Two,” she said, but he had already turned and fled.
The crowd cheered and whistled. Someone threw anemic little underflowers to her and she blew an indiscreet kiss. She’d have to replace her dagger, but by the time the story reached the Imperial Court, it would probably be a gang of a dozen that the Crimson Kestrel had taken down. She pried herself from her public to inspect whoever she happened to have rescued.
Her heart stopped in her chest.
The denizens of the lower levels always had a patina of mud and detritus, and the foreign and colonial merchants were little better, their film of grime compounded by their distasteful bourgeois ambitiousness. This man was immaculate; doe-brown hair finely trimmed and coiffed, wearing a delicate perfume of roses, wine, and something else subtle, unnamable and intriguing. The smooth angle of his jaw suggested he could have grown a beard but elected to keep his face so smooth it must feel like silk, and she found her hand twitching to confirm with a touch. His dark green clothes were not ostentatious, but any well-bred eye could apprehend the skill in every stitch. He wore a signet ring and a gold chain at his throat. It was no surprise his pursuers had come after him, but they must not have truly understood what they were chasing. His eyes were the wide, sweet, extravagant brown of imported chocolate, and his lips....
Ivette realized she was staring and raised a hasty hand to check her mask.
“This is hardly the place for... one such as you.” She felt her hips swing a bit more than necessary as she stepped toward him. She did not sheathe her epee.
“Nor one such as you, mademoiselle.” She could see his hands shake, but his voice sounded smooth and elegant as smoke, the way cultured men were meant to sound. “But I am lost in a strange place, and you seem to know your way... intimately.”
Ivette pointed Monsieur Menace at his chest and thrilled at the way his eyes widened as he stepped back.
“I have three demands,” she said.
The stranger bowed, as one courtier to another, no less schooled and subtle than she had expected. “I am clearly at your mercy.”
“As a lady in the presence of a man of breeding,” she said, loud enough to provoke jeers from above. “I demand suitable flattery.”
His delicious lips fell open in confusion. “I....” He frowned, and the shift from a private demeanor to an actor on a stage seemed to cost him verbal footing.
She gave her head a coquette’s tilt as she rolled the point of her sword over his heart. “Really, monsieur, I begin to feel most neglected. At this rate I shall soon decide you don’t like me at all.”
“Hardly possible!” he replied, and this time his bow was sweeping as any harlequin’s. Did he dabble in playcraft as well? “I can honestly say, of all those who have ever threatened me with death, yours is by far the hand I would least like to die by.”
“That’s not much of a compliment.” Ivette let her weapon sag slightly in disappointment.
“Mademoiselle, if I die here, even the gardens of heaven will seem a wasteland for knowing how long I must wait to see you again.”
For a moment she had no rejoinder and did not move except to draw a fluttering breath. The groundlings cheered encouragement and his smile widened, like a fencer gloating over a clean hit.
“You had two more demands?” he whispered, leaning in slightly.
Ivette flicked her epee up, caught the fold of his kerchief and launched it into the air like a silk butterfly. She plucked it from the air in a single graceful movement that brought her half a step closer. “As your rescuer, I’d say I’m entitled to a token of your favor.”
“Of course.” He licked his lips and pursed them slightly, as if in anticipation. Cheeky bastard, Ivette thought. “And... the third?”
She stepped closer. The air around him smelled like roses. “As the person with the sword,” she purred, “I’ll be taking your jewelry.”
He staggered in surprise, the groundlings cackled, and Ivette felt her mask digging into the edges of her grin. “That’s what you get for presuming,” she whispered. He gave her a small shake of the head and a smile that looked impressed as he denuded himself of the gold chain and ring, his fingers brushing hers as he dropped them into her hand. She would look at his signet later, when she could do it less obviously. He was close enough to rush her, if he chose, but she did not think he would. She could not deny, however, the way the thought of the weight of his body pushing her back against the wall made her pulse quicken. She stepped back and swept her sword at the crowd in something like salute.
“Take this man to the stair gate on Rue Vanite and present him to the guards,” she said. “Do not mistreat him. He is under my protection.” She dropped her voice and whispered sincerely, “can you make it yourself from here?”
“Odd question from a robber,” he said, but there was no sting in it. His perfect mouth had posed up into a wry grin she suspected served him well with the ladies.
“It was a dance. Who can wish ill to someone they’ve twirled with?”
He dipped his head in acknowledgment, and she kissed the air in his direction. “Welcome to L’Echelle,” she said, and threw down a flash pot. She set off at a practiced run, scooping up her rope from where it had fallen, the end cut smooth by the patrolling constructs above. They never wasted much time. She ducked into an alleyway and listened for the sounds of pursuit in the chaos. No one seemed to be following, but she could hear the sounds of several of the low folk helping the young man to the stair gate, where he could make his case to the guards that he should be somewhere safer, cleaner, and more stylish. She flipped the ring up in her finger. Du Lambert; noble, but unfortunate. Still, it meant she would likely see him again.
She pushed her way through the twist of trash-strewn alleys to one of the chimney passages, nestled behind an abandoned church. These holes, smooth by design, slick with the moisture and smoke of a human city, and full of overhangs and sharp curves, were, despite intuition, the best way up. Ivette opened a bag and drew forth the best of her tools: three modified spider constructs of the kind that guarded the outer walls, fitted with straps for both her hands and one of her knees. She had no idea how her mentor had secured them, but she would have been lost without them.
As soon a
s she touched the wall they secured, as if hooked into invisible cracks, and began to mindlessly ascend, propelling her back to where she belonged—to a white powdered wig and jealous soiree guests who would be sure to remark on her fashionably long absence.
* * *
The old tailor woman turned the ring over in her long fingers, and the wrinkles around her mouth deepened in a frown. Ivette tapped her foot.
“It’s a fake,” the old woman said.
“Surely not!” Ivette’s turn was sharp enough to dislodge the rainbow samples of silk pinned to her petticoats. “Old Madame du Lambert acknowledged him as her nephew from Des Forets—she’s even throwing a party in his honor! And it must be him, for he’s recounting the whole affair quite accurately.”
The tailor sniffed. “I’d heard the words ‘exquisite red angel of vengeance’ were used.”
“That’s accurate!”
The woman gave her a severe look. “I also heard they grabbed your hair.”
Ivette hunched her shoulders and declined to answer. The tailor tossed her back the ring.
“It’s a fake. Shoddy etching, and all the du Lambert rings have an interior divot to guard against forgeries. This does not. His story is probably more credible with it stolen. Think, girl.” She tapped her chin, seeming to talk to herself as much as Ivette. “Du Lambert rarely leaves L’Echelle, and this ‘nephew’ of hers is a young man. An imposter would have only to bear a passing resemblance to some gangly child she ignored at a sister’s garden party years ago.”
Ivette stewed. Her tailor was right of course, but it galled her that the woman should take such liberties in speaking to someone so far above her station. But then again, this was the woman who had taught her to use a sword, to swing through the sky, to read the muscles in an opponent’s stance; who knew her secrets and furnished her her tools. Ivette would have had none of it without her. “Why impersonate a du Lambert at all?” she said, giving in and breaking the silence. “It’s well known Madame has run through all her money, and she’s getting too old to seduce anyone to pay for her ghastly party gowns.”
The tailor tapped her teeth. “She must have something he wants.”
“What possible thing?” Ivette attempted to look as petulant as possible, but it was hard not to feel a thrill at the mystery of it.
“I suppose that’s what we must learn. All we know now is he is a liar and a cheat. Possibly even a danger to the Imperium itself—”
“He’s not!” Ivette retorted, with more passion behind the words than she’d intended. The tailor looked at her and she shook her head. “A liar and a cheat, maybe, but I am certain he is not so vile as to threaten the Empire. I cannot imagine him engaging in rebellion, or sedition, or....”
The old tailor picked up her shears and spun them like scimitars, and not for the first time, Ivette wondered who she was, really. How many secrets about the rings of noble houses and the workings of guardian constructs did she possess? Why had she mapped out the chimneys and taken an apprentice noble girl? Was she one of the Imperium’s secret agents? An old privateer gone into hiding? Was she, despite her cultured poise and her knowledge of the noble houses, from somewhere outside the Diamond realm?
The tailor gave her a warm smile as she chalked out the lines for a skirt for du Lambert’s ball, and one part of Ivette’s soul warmed as if her grandmother had brought her a warm plate of petite chou. A smaller part reminded her she had entered into a bargain with this strange woman, and nothing had been asked in return... yet.
The metal arms of the old woman’s scissors closed around the thick red fabric, leaving one half neatly severed from the other. “My dear,” she said, with a grin full of teeth that seemed sharp in the candle light, “you’re going to look ravishing.”
* * *
The du Lambert emblem was the blue hyacinth, so Ivette came in imperial rose red. The fête, such as it was, was cramped and wretched, the estate’s larger ballroom having fallen into disrepair beyond Madame’s financial means to rectify. The smaller ballroom opened to a wide balcony vista of the honeycomb of petty nobility estates below the Emperor’s storey; as much a shaded porch as a true hall.
Du Lambert’s aging intimates composed the bulk of the guests—old men of the trade companies with gold canes, and generals of the last war stooped under the weight of pressed uniforms and fading medals so that they shambled like peasants under a heavy yoke. Ivette danced with a few of these out of pity— General Troussard in particular, with his clouded eyes and his embarrassing gratitude at her touch. What few young people du Lambert had managed to draw in were low bores, dutiful grandchildren, and total society unknowns, with two gentleman even having come in suits with black mink collars that looked like they had been locked in a trunk since before the Croviata embargo—unpatriotic, and worse, unfashionable in the extreme.
Her quarry was now late well beyond the indulgence of style, though du Lambert herself was mercifully absent as well. To tide her guests, she had hired patisseries, jugglers, magicians, and poets to entertain the crowd. Ivette received a villanelle comparing her to the red gardens of pagan gods, wilderness and divinity barely contained by walls or dresses. The poet wrote it on a slip of paper which the magician, without touching her, made appear from the curls of her wig. Much as Ivette hated to credit du Lambert with anything, her stalling entertained far better than her presence.
It was not to last. Ivette flinched as the crowd went silent and du Lambert appeared at the head of the steps in a powder blue confection of ribbons and frills that would have stretched good taste on a debutante at her first presentation, never mind a lady of du Lambert’s advanced years. The makeup meant to make her look untouched gave the pallor of a drowned woman, and her breasts were buttressed up so high as to lie flat like a shelf of flesh. Surely she must know better, Ivette thought. The august noble ladies of the Imperium were formidable as sharks in their own right, snapping up what beautiful men they pleased through practiced wit, experience, and position. None of them sank to such grotesque parodies of youth.
Still, the old men muscled themselves to attention, trying to be young soldiers for this woman who was trying to be a young maiden.
Ivette retreated from the spectacle to a table full of strawberries dipped in white chocolate to hide that they were past their prime.
“It’s hard to let go of,” said a smooth voice behind her. She whirled and came face to face with the ‘nephew’. How had he gotten so close without alerting her? A man who could do that should not have been at the mercy of back-alley thieves. He raised a champagne flute to his lips and smiled. “Their youth, I mean. Can you blame them for wanting it back.”
Ivette thrust out her chin. Was this pretender trying to call her out on her moral status? “I’m a noble lady of the Imperium, monsieur,” she said, turning as if his presence barely held her attention. “I think you’ll find I can blame as I like.”
“And do quite any number of things you like as well, I assume.” His dress coat and his smile were both of a perfect cut. His voice was a whisper, not for the stage now, just for her. He held out a hand. “Will you dance, Mademoiselle?”
“Monseuir, I would be enchanted.” She took his hand and let him lead her out. He twirled her at the edge of the balcony, by banks of potted hyacinth, over the killing drop. His steps were light and purposeful; his movements had the grace of hard training. A soldier? A spy? One of his warm hands cradled hers as the other crept into the valley between her skirts and her corset. She parted from him as the dance demanded, but always they came together and her heart quickened. She turned her face away as if watching the shambling crowd and tried to affect an air of cultured disdain. Old Troussard was gone at least, the poor thing.
“You don’t seem as impressed with me as I am with you,” he whispered, his hand drifting rather more boldly than was proper and dangerously close to her skirt’s quick-release. She clucked her tongue at him.
“It’s only that I find it frightfully crass when peo
ple presume things to which they have no claim.” She gestured around the room with a slight nod to their host. “Ages, fashions... names.” She gave him a knowing smile, enjoying both the dances. Let him try to make excuses here, in a crowded room. Let him try to guess how she knew.
His grin was sharp and fine as a knife. He brushed his lips close to her ear and added: “...jewelry.”
For a moment she wondered what he was talking about, then the realization hit her like upward rushing ground. He drew up into a proper dancing stance and twirled her again, his manner betraying nothing but the joy of a delighted party guest. His eyes were keen and perfect, his body warm and graceful.
“I’d like my ring back, my little bird of prey. I don’t think you’d enjoy explaining to the party why you have it.”
Ivette felt as if she were dangling over the balcony again, this man and his arms around her more dangerous than any drop. It felt glorious. No masque had ever been this thrilling. She affected a laugh no less joyous than his.
“You have me at a disadvantage! You know who I am, but I haven’t even so much as your name.”
His eyes scanned the fête and he danced her toward a less populated alcove. “Of course you have it. Alexandre du Lambert. This party is in my honor.”
“No, no, my dear sir, I mean your rea-mph!”
His lips were over hers before she finished the word; a warm, delicious indignity. Her plays at pushing him away were more show than force, as well as a fine excuse to have her hands against his chest. His lips, soft as she had imagined, tasted of strawberries and champagne. The kiss obliterated all that had come before, and when he broke for breath and explanation she almost pulled him back down into it.
“Listen,” he whispered, close and urgent, all seriousness now and none the play that had captivated her before. “You can scream or slap me if you want propriety, but please, it’s important and I’m begging of you, on my soul and your loyalty to the Emperor, say nothing of it, if only for tonight.”
She her eyes were on his lips, and it took a few seconds before his words penetrated the warmth in her face. Loyalty to the Emperor? Was he a spy? It explained the ruse, but what could old Madame du Lambert have worth investigating? And why the lie of being her relation?
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