The Smoke Thief d-1

by Shana Abe

  “Only the people you don't like. Think of how much it will simplify things.”

  A man in a sailor's coat appeared from behind a willow down the path; as he lifted a tankard of ale to his mouth his eyes met theirs. Kit gave a scant nod of acknowledgment, and thedrákon guard drifted back into the trees. Rue followed his shape until he was gone.

  “Did you even like the necklace?” Kit asked, to distract her.

  “The Duchess of Monfield has a rather reliable tendency to overdress. It's one of the reasons I befriended her as the comte.” They passed by a pavilion surrounded with candytuft and budding lavender; a shadowed couple on a bench traded whispers within. Rue never gave them a glance. “Why did you?”

  “Did I what?”

  “Befriend Her Grace. Or dare I guess?”

  He felt his jaw tighten, and willfully relaxed it. “We're not friends.”

  “Ah.” And then, “I begin to understand Melanie a little better now.”

  “Is that so?”

  “It cannot be pleasant, knowing you can be so readily replaced.”

  He absorbed the sting of that, surprisingly poignant, but managed an even tone. “I had no idea you thought so little of me.”

  “I beg your pardon.” They approached a tiered fountain of mirrors, every inch of it covered in glass. The water lifted and fell in diamond sparkles, nearly too bright to behold, reflecting out points of silvery brilliance that bleached the colors all around. Rue spoke to the ground.

  “Did you have a look at the painting in Her Grace's boudoir? I was astonished. Watteau is so out of fashion of late.”

  “I did not. As you surely must know.”

  “I know hardly anything, Lord Langford,” she replied, very serious, and came to a halt within one of the deeper spots of dark. Her arm withdrew from his. “Don't you realize that? All I really know of you are rumors and memories—little more than witless Letty—and very old dreams.” She gave a low, unhappy laugh. “And now you're introducing me as your wife.”

  Kit glanced around them. Ahead were only more fountains and people, couples and foursomes and a rowdy knot of youths rounding the bend in the footpath. But there was an obelisk to their left, rising snowy and straight from a thick bed of ivy. He pulled her over to it, crushing vines underfoot. When they were out of sight of the others he dropped her hand.

  “I've grown a trifle weary of being constantly cast as your villain, my love. I am only what I've been forged to be. Not evil, and perhaps not especially good. I care for a very few things—the tribe, my name, my position. And you. If it pleases you to roll stones into our path, go ahead. At least I know my own heart, black as it may be. I make no apologies for my past, Rue, so don't expect any. I won't demand them of you either.”

  He could barely make out her face. They were deep in the long, unbroken shadow, shielded from the torches and mirrors, only the faint babble of fountains and people a reminder they weren't truly alone. But he could hear her breathing. He could feel her mounting tension, drawing keen and tight.

  “Stones,” she muttered, after a moment. “I think they're rather more boulders.”

  Christoff softened his voice. “You know me, mouse. You might not entirely like what you know, and you might not like to admit it, but you do know me, as deeply and completely as I do you. It's our way. With or without a church or banns or witnesses, we are wed because we're the same. Same essence, same soul, same hell-born command. But I can't change a single second before this moment. You're not Melanie, or Letitia. Not the stars but the blessed night, remember? Just to be drastically clear: that makes you—utterly—irreplaceable.”

  He thought he could see her a little better, now that his eyes had adjusted. She was still only a suggestion of a girl, doe eyes, an oval face, an expression that could have held wonder or pleasure or burning disdain.

  He bent his head to hers. He touched a hand to the ivory curls at her shoulder and found her mouth, exhaling softly over her skin, his tongue slipping between her lips. She tasted of rouge and lilies and the cool-tinged sweep of evening. Kit withdrew before he forgot himself, monitoring his breath, running his palms lightly up and down her arms.

  Not now. Not here. But soon—

  “I don't want you to fight him,” Rue whispered, gazing up at him. “The runner. I don't want you to get hurt.”

  “Now you truly wound me. Do you think I wouldn't win?”

  “I think,” she said slowly, “that you would win at all costs.”

  “There. You know me better than you thought.”

  “Christoff.” She gripped his arms but said nothing more, only her fingers closing and opening over his sleeves.

  “It's who we are,” he said gently. “It's how we must be. You are Alpha. And because I know you, Rue, your sovereign heart—I know you understand.”

  She reached up and put her arms around his neck, pressing her mouth to his, pushing him back against the hard stone. She kissed him deeply, using the lessons he himself had taught her to pique his blood, her tongue and hot caresses and her teeth drawing at his lower lip. He wanted to touch her; he was afraid to. She was slight and fierce, clothed in silk that would tear like a cloud under his hands. But he wanted to. With her chest against his, her gown stiff and unyielding, her mouth all softness and heat . . . God, he wanted to.

  Light sparked behind his lids. Kit opened his eyes; her face was revealed in the dying light of a fire sun, smoking into cinders far above their heads.

  Rue lifted her chin, watching the ashes sift down to the trees. Before they dissolved completely, a second firework ripped high and burst into light. From the center of the park came the sound of rousing applause.

  Kit smiled down at her, running a finger over her lips to smooth out her rouge again.

  “Our time has come,” he murmured. “Lady Langford, shall we take in the show?”

  She was jealous. Jealous of stupid, pretty Letitia, who had picked up all the little bones Rue had tossed her as the comte as eagerly as could be, compliments, flowers, courtly gossip and dances. The duchess had proven to be as shallow as a puddle. Why did it hurt that Christoff had once enjoyed that?

  Because she loved him. Because Letty was all that Rue was not, fair and forward and tinkling bright. Because, in the darkest chambers of her heart, she was afraid it was still all he wanted, and ultimately he would be disappointed with what he would get. He said he knew her. How could that be, when she hardly knew herself?

  She had worked hard at her successes. She had gambled large and largely won. The thought of leaving London, her home, her life, was a bitter one. But the thought of living without Kit was like poison in her throat.

  He stood benignly at her side in the midst of the sizable audience attending the show. He kept his hand cupped on her elbow and looked perfectly convincing as a gentleman who had nothing better to do than admire colorless lights exploding against a very smoky sky. The smell of gunpowder fell about them like snowfall.

  She tried to imitate his ease. She tried to not notice the other drákon in the press of bodies, faces she hardly recognized but scents, vibrations, energies—almost overwhelming. In the sudden next flash of light she saw Kit as the boy he had been once, gazing up at the stars; then the memory was gone and he was looking back at her without turning his head, taking note of her scrutiny.

  Rue returned her gaze to the sky.

  Fire suns, fire trees, exploding round balls that looked to her like Scotch thistles, torn apart by the wind. There was a quartet of strings playing gamely in a roped-off little square—no viola—and the booth by the rose garden was doing a brisk business in shucked oysters and beer.

  In the pit of the amplitheatre, twin showers of sparks erupted into columns of tall, white-hot glitter, throwing the figures of men working there into sharp relief, their coats unbuttoned and their ears wrapped with cloth, soot streaking their hands and faces. Everyone applauded, even after the pillars died.

  Fire suns. Fire trees.

  The workmen s
weated and toiled, passing long rockets from hand to hand, the scorched clay dais they used for the launch, the smoldering orange tip of the torch they used as a light, a procession she had seen more times than she could count—rocket, dais, torch, stand back—but she found herself watching it again anyway. There were four men doing the job of five; she wondered where the fifth might be, and then, as musicians started up a country jig and the next thistle popped, she saw the small, set face of Zane in the crowd beyond the dais. There was a man standing behind him, right behind him, with his hand on the boy's shoulder. The man was scanning the people around them, but Zane, incredibly, was looking straight at her.

  Everything inside her began crumbling into a slow, sinking abyss. Heart, stomach, lungs, sloughing off into the void. In their place came fear, licking through her veins. Zane was expressionless, white face, dark face, as the rockets were lit and lit. The runner holding him—Williams, Tamlane Williams,circled her mind,had she ever even seen him at the shire? Had he been kind? Had he been cruel? —was still searching the crowd, but when Zane tried to move, she saw the man's hand press down at once and the glint of something that might have been metal at his back. A pistol, or a knife.

  Rue glanced at the marquess, who was still observing the show. She lowered her lashes and pulled the mantlet closer around her and felt his immediate attention, even though he never moved a muscle.

  He would do anything to win. He'd promised to protect Zane, but she knew, deep down, he'd do anything.

  “I need to visit the tavern,” she said under her breath; embarrassing, but all she could think of. Christoff looked at her fully.

  “Come with me, if you like,” she said. “But it's just around the corner there. I'll be right back.”

  Without bothering to reply he began to make a path for them through the people, moving easily along with her in tow. The tavern was perilously close to Zane, but it also extracted her from the thick of the assembly; the fewer witnesses, she reckoned, the better. She began to count the tribesmen they passed and had gotten to fourteen by the time they reached the pergola that marked the beginning of the path to Delilah House. Crystal lustres dangled from the crossed slats overhead, turning slowly, twinkling light. Green leaves and tiny jasmine petals littered the lanterned walk like fallen stars. Rue stopped.

  “You should remain visible. I'll meet you here.”

  “I think not, love.”

  “You still don't trust me?”

  Christoff's smile was narrow and gleaming. “Not tonight. Not in the least.”

  “You can't follow meall the way in,” she said, disguising the fear with indignation.

  He shrugged. “Perhaps not. We'll see. You'd be surprised what a guinea will buy.”

  “Kit. I'll be right back.”

  “No, you won't, mouse. You'll be right beside me.”

  Damn it. She was going to have to leave her gown behind. Rue ducked her head in false acquiescence, beginning down the path. One, two, three—at five she would do it—

  “My lord!”

  They both turned to the new voice, the man hurrying toward them. It was the squire, the heavyset one who'd guarded the museum door that day at the Stewart.

  “Rufus thinks he's seen him, my lord,” said the man, lowering his voice. “Felt him, rather. Vague, indistinct. But he looks like us—”

  “Where?” demanded Kit.

  “He last saw him by the amphitheatre, but the chap's moving off. He's got someone with him. A child—”

  Kit swung back to Rue. She Turned, no grace, no subtlety, leaving the men behind her swearing, because just then a parcel of revelers had opened the tavern doors and staggered out into the light, and it was all the delay she needed. She whipped away into the gray dust of gunpowder and smoke.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Fire tore through her. It was instant and excruciating, a faint dry whomp of air and then the rocket and raging light, worse than lightning. Golden sparkles shimmered and burned in countless black streamers; Rue rushed away from them, gathering herself, finding Zane below her in the hundreds of faces looking up, being pulled out of the light and into a thicket of exotic eucalyptus and myrtles.

  Just before he disappeared, Williams looked up too, noticing her. She hoped he knew it was her, and not Kit or a guard. She recognized his scent, so surely he'd recognize hers.

  Please, please, God, please—

  Rue dropped down past the peeling boughs. She didn't see anyone else about, neither drákon nor Others. There was only the runner and Zane and the crunch of curled bark that had fallen to the grass. She materialized behind them and the man pivoted at once, yanking the boy with him, an arm around his throat.

  “Your coat,” she said, and held out her hand.

  “What?”

  “Give me your greatcoat.”

  Rockets howled; the sky flashed. Zane was turning every shade of red. Despite the pistol and the arm at his neck, he had leaned away to stare hard at the ground.

  “He won't flee from you,” said Rue, as calmly as she could manage. “Promise him, Zane.”

  “Aye,” choked the boy.

  “But I need your coat, Tamlane Williams. Now.”

  Still he hesitated. Rue lost her calm.

  “Do you want them to come upon us and see us like this?” she hissed. “Langford will kill you before you can blink.”

  Williams shoved the pistol into his waistband—it was a pistol—and shrugged out of his greatcoat, tossing it to her. She slung it over her shoulders.

  “All I wanted,” began the runner; his voice broke. He paused, clearing his throat. “All I ever wanted was to be left alone.”

  “I'm sorry,” Rue said, and meant it.

  “Why have you done this?” Anguish threaded his tone. She'd never realized he was so young. He'd vanished after she had; they'd never openly met. But he'd been here nearly as long as she. He must have been barely older than Zane when he'd escaped Darkfrith.

  Williams took the pistol from his waist and clutched the polished handle. In his waistcoat and sleeves she could more easily see the unnatural stiffness of his right hand, frozen in his glove.

  “It's who we are,” she said to him. His padded coat was unwieldy over her shoulders; she held the lapels closed at her chest. “We can't escape it. I lived here for nine years before they found me. But I always knew, Tamlane, that one day they would find me. I think that somewhere inside you, in that place that remembers the shire, you must have known it too.”

  “No.”

  She let his denial die into silence. Another rocket burst. Rue remained very still.

  “Let the boy go. We can talk, the two of us. We don't need him.”

  Williams gave a queer laugh. “I can't go back there. You must know that. They'll kill me.”

  “I'll speak with them. I won't let them.”

  “You! What could you say? I pleaded and pleaded with them. My mother begged—” His voice cracked again. The pistol began to quake. “Ah, God, why did you do this? Why did you join them?”

  With his head still bowed, Zane raised his eyes to hers, holding her in that pale wolfish yellow. She couldn't tell what he was thinking but she recognized his stance. He was preparing to fight.

  Rue tried a cautious step forward, willing Zane not to move. “I thought it would purchase my freedom. The council demanded at least one of us, and at the time I had rathered it be you. I regret that now. And I realize—it doesn't matter. Regret, remorse, all the fine apologies in the world.” Rue took another step. “You're using a child as your shield. Don't you see? You can't remain here. You're a danger to yourself, and to the tribe. You need to come home.”

  An extra-bright explosion blanched the sky beyond the trees. Leaf shadow tilted harsh over them all, highlighting bark and grass and stones before fading down into black.

  “I won't,” Williams said. “You don't understand.”

  “Actually, I do.”

  “It's so easy for you! Look at you! But if you're different th
ere, if you're born different—if you're poor and peculiar, if you don't think like the rest of them—the things they do to you . . .”

  “Teach them,” she said. “Teach them how they're wrong.”

  He drew a trembling breath. “God help me. I'd rather end it here.”

  “If that is your wish,” said Christoff, walking silently among the leaves, “I can certainly arrange it for you.”

  Zane lifted his head; Williams ceased trembling and Rue shattered in two. Protect Zane. Protect Christoff. Zane was closer; if she Turned she could reach him first, but Kit would come to her—

  “Well, lad? What shall it be?” He had paused by the pale trunk of a myrtle, leaning his shoulder against it, an apparition of gleaming satin and gold-buckled shoes. Christoff smiled his gentle smile. “You seem a man of uncommon clear will. I feel quite prepared to respect your decision.”

  The runner leveled the pistol straight at Rue. She stared back at him, unflinching, as his thumb cocked back the hammer.

  “Wrong decision,” said Christoff, and straightened from the tree.

  Williams's eyes held hers, bitter, burning blue. He squeezed them closed and then rolled his gaze skyward, Turning in a haze of pale smoke, flying up through the leaves. Zane dropped to his knees, snatching up the pistol, spinning wildly about to take aim at the empty air.

  “Stayhere , damn you,” Kit snarled at Rue, and followed the runner as smoke up into the night.

  “I'm sorry.” Zane was standing in a pile of shredded bark with the pistol in his hand. He began to pant, his words tumbling, his voice thick with tears. “I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I came to help, he found me before I even knew he had it—”

  She went to him and closed her hand over his mouth, her face raised sharply to the sky. Fireworks, more applause. The spritely final bars of a galliard from the quartet.

  She dragged him, her hand still over his face, to the break of the trees, keeping them both well behind the trunks. Together they looked out at the sea of animated faces, men and women laughing and talking and drinking as the show wound up to its radiant finale.