Thief's War: A Knight and Rogue Novel

by Bell, Hilari

  No guard was set on my door that night—which told me that even if I escaped, Michael was out of my reach.

  And looking out my window at the guards who patrolled the grounds all night, just getting myself out of the house might be tricky. Tony Rose appeared to have an unlimited supply of guardsmen, and I wondered what they were there to protect. We hadn’t found out where he kept his money. But the thought of lifting a bit of that vast fortune had barely passed through my mind before I rejected it. Which tells you what a tight spot we were in.

  On awakening, I opened my shirt collar to make sure the glowing stone was visible, and then went down to the kitchen to ask about breakfast. None of them followed me, but every guard I passed looked at my throat.

  By the time I reached the kitchen my appetite was fading. It all but vanished, when the cooks told me I was to join “the boss” for breakfast.

  I followed a tray of jam-filled pastries up the stairs to, not a dining room, but to Tony Rose’s office. Unlike the carefully staged study, this was a room where work was done. The massive desk was covered with correspondence, bills of lading, and what looked like the text of a city ordinance. Several changes had been marked in the margins.

  The boss was working as he ate, his plate on top of a stack of letters. Jack was still in attendance, and so was another man, with the rugged face and wiry build of a dock worker. His worn leather vest and boots resembled that of the guardsmen, but despite the scars across his knuckles his hands were stained with ink, and he’d abandoned his own plate to take notes for his employer.

  Roseman waved me toward half a dozen trays that sat on a chart table, which was almost as cluttered as the desk so the trays rested on scattered city maps, books, and more loose papers.

  I picked up a plain pastry and a cup of tea, and listened till the Rose finished giving orders for the food trains to purchase fifty more oxen, and arranged to meet with a rope maker to see if the man could justify the price he was charging for cordage.

  The rope maker would no doubt be charging less by the interview’s end.

  I expected the secretary to rise and leave when he finished making notes, but he put down the pen and reached for his cooling plate.

  The Rose pointed to a chair, and I sat.

  “This is Ugg Wiederman.” He nodded to the stranger, whose mouth was full. “He’s in charge of my operations here in the city, just like Jack’s in charge of operations outside. First, you take my orders. Second, you take theirs. Got it?”

  Jack had said he was “an expediter” for his employer. No wonder he’d felt free to offer me a job.

  “Suppose their orders contradict each other?” I asked. If the one who wasn’t top dog resented it, rubbing a little salt in that wound might be useful.

  “Then you’ll take Jack’s orders. Your job is at the port, but it deals with outside operations. So Jack’s in charge of you.”

  “Will he be punished if I fail? What a tempting thought.”

  Jack grinned at me, and for a moment years and betrayal all fell away. I’d forgotten that rare, open grin.

  “Jack’s not the one who’s hostage for your good behavior.” Roseman eyed me critically. “I don’t mind smart-ass cracks, as long as they amuse me. When I stop being amused…”

  I nodded and took a bite of pastry, mostly to show him I wasn’t intimidated. My throat was so dry I had to wash it down with a sip of tea.

  “So, what is my job?”

  Tony Rose was still staring at me, in a way that was cursed unnerving.

  “Some of my ship captains are spending more money than they’re making,” he said finally. The fact that he knew that much about his employees was a warning in itself. “I think they’re skimming. Not on the cargoes—I’ve got clerks with them who keep track of that. But the captains dispose of smaller items for me, in sales that don’t usually have receipts. You know what I mean?”

  He meant loot from people like the wrecking gang who had sunk so many ships in Keelsbane Bay. Loot from bandits, burglars, and other criminals all over the south coast. Maybe the whole United Realm.

  My estimate of the Rose’s fortune grew yet again. Knowing that the goods you stole will never be traced back to you is worth a considerable cut of the take.

  “Have you sent a clerk to audit their ledgers?” I asked.

  “Not yet,” said the Rose. “Because I don’t employ idiots. They’re going to have a second set of ledgers for those transactions—or if they’re really smart, no records at all. Skim a bit of profit off the top, tell me they got the best deal they could, and put what they’re giving me down in the books. Just a bit of extra coin in their purse, that’s all. Though the way some of them are spending, it’s more than a bit.”

  “That’s an amateur’s mistake,” I said. “They should spend it in other ports. Or better, bank it in some other city, under another name, and leave it untouched till they’re ready to quit and claim it.”

  “Yeah, well, they’re ship captains,” said Tony Rose. “At scamming, they are amateurs. Which is where you come in.”

  Because I wasn’t.

  “You want me to find their real ledgers? Assuming they kept them.”

  “I’m assuming they didn’t keep records,” the Rose said. “They may be amateurs, but I don’t hire fools. I want you to go in as a clerk, new to my employ, running a standard audit. I audit people all the time, so they won’t find that suspicious. When you find something wrong in the ledgers—every ledger has something off in it, even if they’re honest—I want you to make a big deal out of how you’ll report it, and what I do to men who cheat me.”

  “Ah.” The light dawned. “You want them to bribe me.”

  “Accomplishes two things,” said the Rose. “If they come to me and report you, I’ll be pretty sure they’re honest after all. If they don’t, that means they have something to hide.”

  I thought that even an honest man might not want to bet on the Rose’s mercy—but this was one of those times when a smart crack wouldn’t be wise.

  “If they don’t report you,” the Rose went on, “once you’ve taken their bribe you can work your way into their organization. Demand to know what’s going on, tell them you can help them get better deals in several ports, offer—”

  “I know how to work my way in,” I said. “When I know the whole set up, everyone involved, then I report back to you?”

  It wasn’t a bad scheme. I bet I knew who’d come up with it, even if Roseman thought it was all his own idea.

  “You’ll tell them you’re new to Tallowsport,” Jack added, confirming my suspicion. “That I brought you in from the outside. Because no one Master Roseman hires would ever take bribes.”

  He even kept his face straight when he said it.

  Unfortunately, the Rose was watching mine. “That’s true, even if you don’t believe it. I’m loyal to my people, and I demand their loyalty in return. If they’re not…”

  I was actually glad he chose not to finish that sentence.

  “What about your shackle?” I reached up to touch my collar. “It kills the image of trusted clerk, don’t you think?”

  “Turn the stone to the back and keep your jacket on,” Roseman said. “It won’t show through thick cloth.”

  I wondered how he knew that, but he was probably right so I went on, “If I do this, if I find out who’s cheating you and how, is there any chance you’ll let Michael and me go?”

  “Not yet,” said the Rose. “But you’ll go on breathing. And if you do a good job on this, next time you’ll get a bonus.”

  I took a deep breath and made up my mind. I was going to get us out of this. Somehow, I was going to get both Michael and myself out of this, and bring Atherton Roseman to his knees.

  Though how I was going to do it, without taking Jack down too, escaped me.

  “All right,” I said. “It’ll take me a while to study your ledgers, but once I—”

  “What?” Roseman asked.

  I gave him my best
look of mild surprise, the one even Jack had never seen through.

  “How can I spot discrepancies in their ledgers if I haven’t seen yours first? And it has to be your real ledger, with accounts of everything they’re involved with. Or I won’t be able to recognize a problem when I see it.”

  Yet another thing Jack had taught me was how to forge a ledger.

  “Pox,” said Tony Rose. “You’re right.”

  His eyes turned to Jack.

  “Can I trust him not to be stupid about this?”

  “As long as you’ve got your hostage, yes,” Jack said. “But you’ll have to keep guards on Fisk, and they need to be smart. Not tough. Fisk’s no killer.”

  The word “soft” hovered in the air between us.

  “I’ll see to the guards.” Wiederman had finished his breakfast as we spoke. “I’ve got plenty who are smart and tough.”

  The boss shrugged and rose to his feet, but instead of going to the shelves near the table, which appeared to be filled with ledgers, he unlocked a door on one side of the room and went in. I wondered if that room had another door that opened onto the corridor, or if this was the only way in. Either way, a locked second office, when you already have a perfectly good unlocked one, implies something interesting inside. Unfortunately, Jack knows me well.

  “It’s better guarded than it looks. That lock and key are magica, courtesy of Tony’s tame madman. You could try to pick it for years and you’d always fail. I tested it for him.”

  That ended my newly hatched plan for tonight’s entertainment—Jack’s a better hand at locks than I, though he can’t pick pockets at all.

  Roseman emerged with an armload of big, leather-bound books. He had to jostle them into one arm to relock the door, and watching him go through those awkward steps confirmed that Jack had probably told the truth about the lock…and that there was something worth seeing beyond it.

  No one had only one key for an important lock. And I could guess where he kept the backup.

  Roseman handed the ledgers to a guard. “Take him to the study; he can work there. You don’t leave him alone, you don’t leave these books alone, and you don’t leave him alone with the books. Aside from that, get him anything he needs.”

  This might have sounded contradictory, if I hadn’t known my warden could pick up more guards on our way down the hall.

  I wouldn’t mind being watched while I worked…all right, it was going to drive me half mad having them all standing around staring at me, but that didn’t matter. I didn’t intend to do anything to the books, to do anything at all, until I managed to contact Michael. Tony Rose was a smart, cautious man, and the safest and smartest place to keep another magica key would be out of town, in his country house. But more urgent even than that, I had to get in touch with Michael to make sure that my plan—once I had a plan—and whatever lunatic scheme he was hatching didn’t trip each other up.

  I have learned, over the years, that it’s a really bad idea to underestimate Michael’s craziness.

  I had been at the estate for three days when Atherton Roseman arrived. When the carriage with the rose crest on its door rolled through the gate, surrounded by a ridiculous number of guards, I was on my knees in the mud.

  I’d spent most of those days looking for magica plants. Finding magica is easy for me, since they actually glow to my sight. Ordinary herb talkers must start by looking for plants that grow in the perfect shape for their species, that neither bugs nor grazing animals will touch. Only when they draw very near, will their sensing gift reveal the palm-prickling presence of magic.

  I didn’t have to look so closely, but there was still the difficulty of finding sleep-inducing plants growing in early Grassan.

  Another thing my search taught me was that as long as I stayed inside the wall that surrounded the formal grounds, I could wander at will. But if I let myself out the gate into the wilder part of the estate or its attached farm fields, soon one of the guards would come after me. He wouldn’t try to stop me. Wouldn’t even approach to see what I was doing. But he’d follow me up hill and down dale, letting me see that if I should vanish, a message would shortly be on its way to Master Roseman.

  Fortunately, I’d found a patch of magica chamomile sprouting early in a sunny corner of the kitchen herb garden. The glow around the new sprouts told me that the dried blossoms from the previous summer would possess the magic I needed—and the gardeners and cooks must have been warned of its nature, for a wire mesh prevented unwary hands from plucking it.

  It had taken me the better part of the previous day to make the leaf and moss mulch that chamomile prefers for its sacrifice, and the season was early enough that I could churn it into the whole herb bed. I carried the buckets to water it in with my own hands, and those same hands were carefully plucking the dried blossoms when I saw Roseman’s traveling caravan coming up the drive.

  Harvesting magica isn’t a task to leave half-finished, but I picked the rest of the chamomile quickly, then hurried in the back door and up a flight of servants’ stairs. I was just in time to look down into the entry, as the Rose and his guards rolled into the house like an avalanche.

  Most of the upper servants were there to greet him. Hovering in the shadows, I should have been unnoticed, but his gaze was sharper than I’d expected.

  “Master Sevenson.” He took in the bundle of greenery in my hands, and my muddy boots and britches. “I’d not have taken you for the gardening type. It’s a good thing I brought your clothes along. I expect to see you at dinner.”

  He turned back to the housekeeper after giving me my orders, and I wondered how he’d come by clothing for me.

  But magica must be attended to promptly, so I went to the still room, crushed my dried blooms properly, and then set a kettle on to boil. Only when I’d poured hot water over the strainer, and left the first batch to cool and steep, did I return to my room to find my own pack sitting on my bed. It contained all the possessions I’d left at the chandler’s shop, except my sword.

  After so many years of traveling, even my best clothing wasn’t up to the standards of a man as wealthy as Atherton Roseman—but I’d no desire to please him, anyway.

  * * *

  Only one end of the long table had been set with plates tonight. Just four, so it appeared that the guardsmen didn’t dine in state when the boss was here.

  Roseman was already seated at the head of the table, with a rough-looking man I’d never seen before at his right hand.

  Mistress Lianna, eyes on her plate like a shy schoolgirl, sat on his left. I’d have liked to sit beside her, to lend the poor woman some support, but the last plate had been laid to the stranger’s right.

  Roseman glanced at my worn, brown velvet coat. “If that’s the best you can do, it’s just as well you’ll be gone when my guests arrive.”

  “You’re throwing a party?” I refused to give him the satisfaction of asking where I was going.

  Lianna’s eyes flashed to me in alarm, but I had no assurance to offer her. If Roseman wanted me gone, I’d have to go.

  “Yes, I have several guests coming,” said Roseman. “The first race of the year is week after next, and they were curious to see how my horses are shaping up. Mistress Dalton here will make herself scarce. But as for you, I’ve found something you can do for me after all. When Fisk sent for your clothes, his note told the shop boy to keep the place running, and to hire some men who wouldn’t run off on him this time. Which made me wonder, how did you come to hire that savage brat pack?”

  If it was only me, I’d have risked keeping silent to protect the orphan’s hiding place. But Fisk’s life was now bound to mine, and he might not be willing to take that risk. He wasn’t even willing to sacrifice Jack. On the other hand, one of Fisk’s rules is to tell an enemy nothing you don’t have to, so I might get away with a small lie.

  “They’d heard that your men were driving the chandler out, and came to see if they could help him and his family escape,” I said. “The chand
ler’s workers had fled, and the children needed the money. I found them good workers, myself. Very bright and determined.”

  Pricking at this man would likely do no good—but I couldn’t see it would do any harm, either.

  The servants brought in the soup as I spoke, but Roseman never took his eyes off me.

  “For the honest man I judge you to be, you’re not a bad liar. If I didn’t have a report from the men who chased you into that alley, I might have believed you.”

  There seemed to be nothing to say to that.

  “I think that’s close to the truth, anyway,” Roseman went on. “I think they did see my men, and decided to help—not the chandler, but you. They’ve done it before, you know. Interfering in my business, vandalizing my cargoes, meddling with my collectors.”

  “Bright and determined,” I repeated. “Good for them. But I don’t see how I can help you. Or why I should.”

  “You should,” said the Rose, “because even though your friend is working out so far, he’d go right on—maybe even work better—if I break one of your legs.”

  ’Twas not thought of the pain that made my blood run cold, but the thought of how such an injury would demolish any escape plan. Roseman knew it, of course. The grin that spread over his face made Mistress Lianna shudder.

  I took a spoonful of soup, though I’ve no memory of how it tasted. “What do you think I can do for you?”

  “I’ve actually considered burning down that warehouse,” the Rose said. “That’s how obnoxious those feral little gnats have been. But a blaze big enough to destroy the warehouse might spread to the docks. When I send my men in the front door, even if there are others guarding the side doors, it’s always empty. They’re slipping out some hole, like the rats they are. A hole into that alley where you ‘vanished,’ Master Sevenson. You’re going to show my men where it is, and then you’ll go around to the front door and distract the brats while my men go in the back.”

  I could try to stall him for a time, tell a few lies…but as long as he held Fisk’s life in his hands, I had no choice.