“Why terror?” Mari asked. “Why not joy?”
“Your life is never as precious as when you fear you’re about to lose it. No breath is as sweet as the one you draw after you think you’ve drawn your last. And pleasure and pain have always been close bedfellows. One tends to follow on the other’s heels. No, look around: there’s no wonder to be found here. Living, but no life. No truth.”
“Not like in the fairy tales,” Mari said, recalling Nessa’s condemnation of her coven.
Nessa quirked a smile. “No. Not at all. And those stories are so very important. First, they teach children that the world is a cruel and terrible place, an inarguable fact that should be learned as young as possible. Then, they teach them the rules to survive. Stay to the forest path. Remember your courtesies and your politics. Otherwise…”
“Otherwise?”
Nessa leaned closer to Mari, her smile growing.
“Otherwise, some evil witch might come along and gobble you up.”
Mari tilted her head. “Are…we evil, Nessa?”
“I’ll answer your question with a question: what is evil?”
Mari frowned, searching for the right words. “Well…doing…what you shouldn’t. Breaking rules.”
“And who decides that? There are codes of ethics, like your vows of knighthood, and books of laws, like back home in Belle Terre…or in the Empire’s laws that guided what they did to our people. Not all rules are righteous, are they?”
Mari shook her head. “No, I guess not. But some rules—okay, what about hurting people? There’s one. You shouldn’t hurt people.”
“No?” Nessa chuckled, lowering her voice. “So when you killed the mayor of Kettle Sands and I washed your hand in his steaming blood…was that evil? Because I thought we agreed that his execution was just.”
“It…it was.” Her shoulders slumped.
“The problem, Mari, is that ‘evil’ is a man-made structure imposed upon a chaotic world that has little use for man or his philosophies. Nature, by any ‘civilized’ standard, is pitiless, savage, and remorselessly cruel. So these men, with their green frocks and their incense and their holy books, build the fantasy of a just, good, and divinely blessed universe—while ignoring that the world their god supposedly created for them is, itself, evil incarnate by their own standards.”
Mari fell silent, thinking that over as they walked. Nessa led the way down a quiet side street, breaking away from the swirling chaos of the marketplace.
“So to answer your question,” Nessa told her, “you must understand who and what you are, inside. I am nature. I am her steward and her student, and I act as she does. Now, if men wish to call me ‘evil’ for it, that’s their prerogative, but I have no obligation to accept or care about such an empty word as that. It’s a box with no gift inside.”
“But…what am I?”
Nessa stopped, taking hold of Mari’s shoulder. She pushed her up against a crumbling brick wall, leaning in and lifting up on her toes to look the taller woman in the eyes.
“You are a knight. My knight. Disciplined. Honorable. Courageous. You know your code, yes? You know your duties. And what’s expected of you.”
Mari’s head bobbed, her eyes wide.
“Then you know all you need to. Don’t worry about being good. Don’t worry about being evil. Just be the finest example of knighthood you possibly can. Now come along, I’ve got a present for you.”
“A present?”
“Oh, yes,” Nessa said. “It’s been in the works for quite a while.”
Their destination was a blacksmith’s shop, where a thin plume of gray smoke trickled into the clear blue sky. Mari tensed as they stepped through the door and she saw the sweaty, bare-chested man working at the anvil.
“It’s all right,” Nessa said. “He’s one of mine.”
As Giorgio put down his hammer and mopped the back of his hand across his forehead, Mari frowned. “But…at the coven glade, he was on the other side.”
“Glad I was, too,” he said. The big man shook his head at Nessa. “Ant and Moth didn’t make it. Viper leaped over the fire and cut them both down before they could escape.”
“Damn. Worm and Shrike?”
“Fine. At least, last I saw of them. They said they’ll meet you in Winter’s Reach.”
Nessa let out a tiny sigh of relief, then looked to Mari. “Our friend here has been keeping tabs on the coven for months for me. Ears open for useful information.”
Giorgio spread his big hands and smiled. “Nessa knew I’d be more believable if I acted like I was neutral in this fight. Everyone came to me to talk, assuming it wouldn’t get back to anybody else, and everyone wanted to recruit me.”
“And now I have one more loyal witch in my corner. Are you coming with us to the Reach?”
Giorgio shook his head. “We’d best travel separately. I’ll be a day behind you. And you’d better be on your guard. The coven’s going all-out. Viper and Fox are both trying to track you down before you reach the Misery, and there’s also…the Dire. She’s with Fox and Hedy.”
“With them?” Nessa blinked. “She actually left her tomb?”
“I think you made her mad.”
“Well, this makes things interesting. And convenient. I won’t have to go all the way back to the glade to kill her. Is Mari’s gift ready?”
Giorgio’s face lit up and he beckoned Mari to follow him.
“It is! I’m so happy I got to craft something for one of our own.” He grinned at Mari. “Most of the coven doesn’t have much use for a warrior’s tools, none but Viper and she’s not any fun to talk to. This is a rare treat for me.”
“What is it?” Mari asked.
“Something your mistress asked for, custom made. C’mon, I’ll show you!”
Nessa idled in the shop, studying Giorgio’s handiwork with a discerning eye as she waited. Then the curtain over the back-room door rippled, and Mari stepped out into the light.
Nessa pushed her glasses up on her nose and smiled.
Mari’s ragged and mismatched armor, the pieces she’d cobbled together with her old mentor’s help, was a memory. Now she stood in a vest of sleek black brigandine accented with cold brass, over a blouse and leggings of nightingale blue. High boots, tailored to fit, and sturdy black gauntlets. Mari turned her hands, marveling at them, the oiled leather softly creaking as she curled and opened her fingers.
“Patchwork no more,” Nessa murmured as she approached.
Giorgio shook out a cloak of wolfskin, draping it over Mari’s back. It was cut to hang low at one shoulder, joined by a chain of brass. The clasp was an ornate brooch, like the one Mari had carried with her for so many years. This one, though, bore the stylized profile of an owl. Nessa helped fix it in place, her fingers curling around the brass chain and giving a faint tug.
“My colors and my device,” Nessa said. “Well? Do you like it?”
Mari’s eyes shone, and she smiled like a child on Winter Solstice morning. “I…I love it,” she said, her voice almost too soft to hear.
“But you’re not quite complete, are you?” She gave Giorgio a nod, and he scrambled to fetch a sandalwood box from one of his workbenches.
“Nessa told me you use Terrai fighting batons,” he said, bringing the box over to show Mari. “So you need something similar. Weapons with roughly the same reach and weight, so you don’t have to learn an entirely new style.”
He opened the box. Inside, on a bed of crushed velvet, rested a pair of wickedly curved sickles with corded leather hilts. The blades gleamed, sleek steel polished to a killing edge. Mari reached toward the box, hesitant.
“May I?”
Giorgio’s head bobbed. “Of course! They’re for you.”
Mari took up one sickle, then the other, stepping toward an open spot of floor. Her arms rose in slow motion, turning her grip, moving in gentle, graceful steps. Walking through the first motions, an old exercise meeting new weapons.
Then she exhaled sharpl
y and sliced the air. One blow, then another, and another, each punctuated by a vicious hiss of breath. She spun on one booted heel, dropping low, jumping back up again as the sickles flashed in every direction at once. A dance of razor-honed death.
She marched forward, cutting the air, every motion precise and practiced—then dropped to one knee before Nessa, head bowed, the twin sickles crossed before her in offering.
“Rise. And well done.” Nessa looked at Giorgio. “Both of you. You’ve outdone yourself this time, Bull.”
For all his size, the grin on Giorgio’s face made him look like a puppy. He bowed his head. “I’ll meet you in the Reach. We’ll do great things, all of us.”
“Thank you, again,” Mari said as she rose to her feet. “This…this is more than I could have dreamed.”
“Protect her,” Giorgio said with a nod to Nessa, “and serve her well. That’s all the payment I ask, cousin.”
“Cousin,” Mari replied with a formal bow of her head and followed Nessa to the door.
Nessa’s hand rested on the door, when Giorgio called after her.
“Dire Mother?”
Nessa looked back, a lopsided smile on her lips.
“Yes?”
“Will you lead us to Wisdom’s Grave?”
Nessa nodded.
“Yes. I will.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The Dustmen moved by night. When they reached Mirenze, Lodovico’s mercenaries had shed their knightly raiment, abandoned their holy talismans. Now they prowled through the streets as farmers and artisans, beggars and tinkers, disguised to blend into the crowd. Shadowy men with hard eyes, traveling in groups of two or three, bleeding into the city a few at a time.
They spread out through the streets like a growing stain. An infection in the city’s veins.
Lodovico almost didn’t recognize Weiss. He had that sort of look: one might notice the broad shoulders, the muscular hands made to grip and squeeze a man’s throat, but his bland, agreeable face defied any attempt to remember it. A good trait for a man in the murder business, Lodovico thought.
They met at the Grimaldi estate, on the outskirts of the city. Weiss came alone. He wasn’t the type of person who needed a bodyguard. In the foyer, he clasped Lodovico’s hand in a vise grip.
“Did you have any trouble?” Lodovico asked.
“None. I pulled ninety-six men from the papal manse. Left behind twelve.”
“Is that enough, in case of trouble?”
As they walked along a silent corridor, Weiss shot him a steel-eyed glance.
“To control a rabble of churchmen and a pope who spends every waking hour with a wineglass in his hand? One would be enough. Kappel, my right hand, just got back from Belle Terre. I put him in charge.”
“I hear the Terrai are enjoying their new toys.”
Weiss snickered. “That’s an understatement.”
“Sounds like everything’s proceeding according to plan, then.”
“Not everything, or you wouldn’t have called us here.”
Lodovico shrugged one shoulder. “Certain people are refusing to cooperate and die for us.”
“What luck. Attending to that is my specialty.”
They found Aita in her boudoir, gazing into a trio of standing mirrors. She turned, holding up a shimmering dress the color of spun gold in one hand and a slightly different dress in burnt copper in the other.
“What do you think?” she asked. “For the Governor’s Ball on Saint Lucien’s Night.”
“The copper,” Weiss said with a nod. “It’ll complement the gold in your hair.”
“Thank you,” she said with a slight curtsy. “Lodovico, your guest has a good eye.”
“For more than dresses. Aita, this is Weiss. Master of the Dustmen.”
“Charmed. Just Weiss?”
The assassin smiled blandly. “Just Weiss. Do you have a mask picked out for the ball?”
“I’m going as an angel,” she replied.
“The irony,” Lodovico said, “may cause the ground to split open and swallow us all. Weiss, Aita’s husband-of-convenience has become strikingly inconvenient. He’s assembled a…well, a gang, and he’s preying on her ‘tax collectors.’”
Weiss rubbed his chin. “What sort of men follow him?”
“Enoli,” Aita said, “according to my people.”
“Islanders? Interesting. Does Mirenze have a large Enoli population?”
“Mirenze is the coin purse of the world,” Lodovico said. “We have everything and everyone.”
“Well, we’ll find your wayward husband. Do you want him dead or alive?”
Aita didn’t take long to decide. “As dead as possible, please.”
“Weiss,” Lodovico said, “just one thing. Rules of engagement. This is not Lerautia. This is my city.”
“And?”
He leaned in, eyes hard. “No repeats of what happened in the Alms District. No fires, no massacres. You keep your men on their leashes.”
That bland smile again. An agreeable nod.
“Of course,” Weiss replied. “The client is always right.”
* * *
Cloaked by shadows, Felix leaned against the alley wall like a perching raptor and waited for his prey.
He and his growing band of followers—twelve now, their numbers bolstered by hiring more roughnecks from the docks with the money they stole from Aita’s extortionists—had started taking more than coin from their targets. Information was a more lucrative prize, and while the street-level scum in Basilio Grimaldi’s empire might have been terrified of their old master, they didn’t hold his daughter in the same fearful regard.
“No honor among thieves,” Anakoni murmured at Felix’s side. “Not much courage, either. One hard look and they show us their bellies.”
“Don’t get too confident. Aita’s going to start pushing back. She doesn’t have a choice.”
Their last target had given up a juicy prize: the identity of Aita’s lieutenant in the Lower Eight. He was a direct line between the cutpurses and thieves of the slums and his mistress on high, and he’d be plump with intelligence about both. Most nights, Felix learned, he was deep in his cups at the Sailor’s Ruin until the small hours of the morning.
So they lay in wait in the alley across the street from the dive tavern, listening to disjointed music and the occasional smash of a glass against a forehead. Smoke drifted from a crack in a grimy window, carrying the stench of cheap cigars and bottom-barrel ale.
The doors opened and a figure stumbled out into the night. Felix squinted. The man had a long chin, beady eyes, and a vicious, thick web of scar tissue that ringed his neck like a choker.
“That’s him.” Felix waved the others closer. He had brought three of Anakoni’s men into the alley with him and stationed five more around the corner.
“You’re certain?” Anakoni whispered. Two more men emerged from the tavern, falling into step with the first. Boiled leather, short blades on their hips, and not a drop of liquor in their bellies.
“If that man isn’t Cut-Throat Scolotti, I think the nickname should be his by right.”
“Fair point,” Anakoni put his fingers to his lips and let out a short, shrill hoot, imitating a night bird. Signaling to the rest of their followers.
They clung to the wall and the shadows, letting Scolotti and his bodyguards clomp on by. Then Felix led the way, padding out and after them, weapons at the ready.
Up the street, the second pack of sailors rounded the corner. Scolotti might have been drunk, but the sight of clubs and leather saps in their hands sobered him up fast. He stopped in his tracks and turned to see Felix and the rest coming up from behind.
One of the bodyguards reached for his sword’s hilt. Felix tensed, readying for a fight—then Scolotti reached out, cupped his fingers over the guard’s hand, and shook his head.
“Stand down,” Scolotti said, his voice a gravelly rasp. He looked Felix’s way. “You’re Felix Rossini.”
&n
bsp; He didn’t see any point in lying. “Aita must be spreading the word about me.”
“Show me,” Scolotti said, nodding at the hood of his cloak. “Prove it.”
Felix tugged back his cloak. Scolotti nodded, staring at the scarred nub of gristle where Felix’s ear had been like an appraiser with a piece of fine art.
“Had to be sure,” Scolotti explained. “Thought she might be testing us with a fake. You know, to see who’s still loyal. She’s tricky that way, like her father was.”
“And your loyalty is with…” Felix let the question hang in the air.
“Me. Aita’s ship is sinking. With her father gone and Hassan the Barber dead—nice work on that, by the by—all the old monsters just aren’t around anymore. She won’t hold it together much longer. She’d go down even faster if—just speaking hypothetically—you had a reliable mole inside her organization. Somebody who can feed you information and tell you when and where she’s going to be.”
“And how much would this service cost?”
“Not coin,” Scolotti rasped. “Well, not at first. Nothing stays free forever. No, I need a helping hand. There’s an enforcer on her payroll, goes by the name Maurizio. Big bruiser with a gang of feral street rats watching his back. We’ve got bad blood and I want him gone.”
“Gone?” Felix asked.
“Dead and gone. See, I can’t go after him myself, but everybody knows you and Aita are at war. If you kill him, nobody will suspect I had anything to do with it.”
Felix shifted on his feet, feeling a cold chill on the back of his neck. Stopping Aita and Lodovico—that was justice. It was also self-defense: until they were dead or in prison, neither he nor Renata would ever be safe. Working to break down Aita’s pyramid, all he’d had to do so far was throw a few punches and break a nose or two. Murdering a stranger…that was a new line to cross.
Not the kind you came back from crossing.
“I don’t think you fully appreciate what I have to offer,” Scolotti said. “Aita trusts me. I can draw her out. Set up a nice little ambush for you. This war can be over, just like that. All you have to do is help me.”
Terms of Surrender (The Revanche Cycle Book 3) Page 14
