If Sicarius’s glare grew any frostier, it would leave icicles dangling from Maldynado’s lashes. Or perhaps an ice spear thrust between his eyes.
“It’s likely another trap,” Sicarius told Amaranthe.
“This Mancrest thing isn’t the priority now,” Amaranthe said. Eager to change the subject, she added, “I’d like you gentlemen to get out of the boneyard before the enforcers amble through. Please assist Books and Akstyr in their research. Sicarius and I have something to do tonight and may be back late.”
“Nothing that will make Deret jealous, I hope.” Maldynado snickered, as if he had made some fabulous joke.
* * * * *
The building trembled as a locomotive rumbled into the station down the street. From the darkness of The Brewed Puppy rooftop, Amaranthe watched a tenement building across the street while she waited for Sicarius to join her. The stench of burning meat wafted up to her, mingling with an omnipresent thick yeasty smell oozing from the building’s pores, and Amaranthe judged the old woman’s dismal opinion of the eating house’s quality to be accurate.
With her elbows propped on a low wall and a spyglass raised to her eye, she checked each window, searching for a man with a woman and two young boys. She did not know if she would recognize Raydevk based on a vague memory of the man’s father, but if she found the right combination of people...
She paused. Could that be it? Beyond a third-story window, a woman sat, knitting on a couch in a clutter-filled, one-room flat. Toys littered the floor at her feet. While Amaranthe was trying to judge if the carved wood blocks and automata represented boys’ or girls’ playthings, two youngsters scampered into view from behind a room partition formed by furniture draped with clothing. They chased each other around the woman’s chair, but an upraised hand and word from her halted that. She thrust a finger toward another clutter-partition, this one with a curtain hanging on a rod to delineate a door. The children disappeared into the dark space. Their sleeping area, Amaranthe assumed.
Voices sounded below as a couple exited the eating house, and she shifted her elbow to move the spyglass from her eye. Something gooey made her sleeve stick. She drew her arm back with a grimace and picked off tar.
She yawned and glanced around her rooftop perch, thinking of Sicarius’s warning to check her surroundings frequently. Moonlight gleamed against a stovepipe and provided enough illumination to confirm nothing stirred nearby. No doors led to the lower levels of The Brewed Puppy—she had climbed up via a drainpipe—and she doubted anyone except Sicarius would sneak up on her. She returned her attention to the brick building across the way.
“Is he there?” came Sicarius’s voice from behind her.
Amaranthe almost dropped the spyglass.
“Not yet,” she said, putting her back to the wall so she could face him.
It took her a moment to pick him out, standing in the shadows of a chimney. Had he just arrived? Or had he been testing her? Seeing if she would notice him before he announced himself? And why did she always feel like he was an army instructor, bent on training her to be a better soldier?
“You found a uniform?” Amaranthe asked.
He glided out of the shadows, soundless, like a haunting ancestor spirit. The moonlight did not reveal the color of his outfit, but it appeared less dark than his usual black, and she thought she detected familiar silver piping and buttons. A boxy cap covered much of his blond hair.
“Yes,” he said.
She touched his sleeve when he knelt beside her, and her fingers met the familiar scratchy wool of an enforcer uniform. She wore hers as well, the only article of clothing she had retained from her old life.
“Did you...uhm, where’d you find it?” Amaranthe had asked him not to maul anyone for a uniform, though he did tend to do things his own way.
“Clothesline.”
“Oh, good.” Her hand bumped an enforcer-issue short sword hanging from his belt. He had not found that on a clothesline, but it was a typical part of the uniform, so she decided not to ask. She wore one, too, as well as handcuffs. She pointed at the window she had identified earlier. “I think I’ve spotted the wife and children. Maybe we should...interview her before the husband gets home.” Yes, “interview” sounded friendlier than interrogate. “She might know what he’s up to. I can talk to her, see what I can learn, and you can snoop and see what you can learn.”
“Too late,” Sicarius said. “The husband has arrived. Or an enthusiastic lover.”
“Huh?” Amaranthe lifted the spyglass to check on the flat again, but jerked it from her eye as soon as the scene came into focus. “Ugh. I don’t want to walk in on that.”
“They’ll stop.” Sicarius started for the drainpipe leading to an alley below.
“Maybe we should wait until they’re done,” Amaranthe said.
“Why?”
“I’m sure he’ll be in a better mood afterward. Would you want to be interrupted in the middle of...stoking the furnace?”
He said nothing. He probably thought it ridiculous to worry about such a thing.
“We’ll just wait here and...” She groped for a way to pass time that would not make Sicarius balk. Chat? No. Draw a grid and play Dirt Defender? No, not enough light. Emulate the people across the street? Hah. Sure.
“Watch?” Sicarius said when her silence went on.
“What? No! I used to arrest people for that.”
Grunts drifted up to the rooftop. The lovers had clambered out of their window and were undressing each other on the fire escape. That was one way to avoid waking the children, Amaranthe supposed. Though the neighbors might not appreciate it.
“We could discuss the team uniform,” she said, joking.
“The what?”
“Maldynado thinks we should have a team uniform.”
The long silence that followed said plenty about his opinion of the idea. She collapsed the spyglass, tucked it into a pocket, and moved away from the edge of the roof so she could not be seen from the fire escape. “We’ll just take our time getting over there,” she said.
“The plan?” Sicarius asked.
Yes, it would not be as easy for him to snoop with two adults in the room. “Back to the original.” Amaranthe patted a pocket that held a forged document neatly folded into quarters. “It seems we have the magistrate’s permission to search the premises.”
“If they recognize one of us?” Sicarius asked.
“I doubt they will. Miners don’t get much time off to roam the city and peruse wanted posters.”
“If your source is correct, this one does.”
“We’ll adjust the plan if need be,” she said.
“It would be far simpler to go in, grab him, and force him to answer questions.”
“Sicarius...” Amaranthe hung her head. “Sespian is never going to want to get to know someone whose solution for every problem is torturing people. I know it’s efficient, but I don’t think he’s someone who can respect a man who isn’t humane.”
“Humane,” Sicarius said flatly.
“Yes. At least in one’s actions. Nobody can be judged for what’s in his thoughts, eh?”
“And the humane thing to do is to disguise ourselves as enforcers and lie to these people to obtain answers.”
Er, she hated it when she was trying to be morally superior and someone pointed out that her idea was only slightly less sketchy. “I think it’s a...humane option, yes. If all goes well, nobody will be hurt. Is it ideal? Perhaps not, but I don’t know of an ideal situation. I’m beginning to think our circumstances preclude those. But maybe it’s always been that way. If the legends are anything to go by, being a hero doesn’t mean being perfect. Being a hero means overcoming those imperfections to do good anyway.” There that sounded plausible. Or pompous. Was she truly comparing the two of them to the great heroes of old? “Anyway, I think Sespian is far more likely to admire someone who eschews the easy solution, however efficient, in favor of the one that does no harm. I’m sure of
it.”
Sicarius said nothing at first, and she winced in anticipation of a cold reaction. Surely the philosophizing of a twenty-six-year-old woman could only make him snort in derision. Inwardly anyway. He would never deign to be that expressive outwardly.
“I see,” Sicarius finally said. “And are you?”
“Am I what?” she asked. Her own thoughts had sidetracked her.
“More likely to admire someone like that.”
Huh. Did he care what she thought of him? Enough that he might make a humane decision instead of a practical one? For her? She found herself reluctant to test that hypothesis, for she might be disappointed—and hurt—if it proved false down the road. “I know it’s the nature of women to try and change men, but you don’t have to do anything on my behalf. I’m just trying to help with Sespian. In my arrogance, I think I’m more like him than you are, and I may have more insight into what would make him...interested in knowing you.”
“Not arrogance. Fact. They’ve completed their coitus. Let’s go.”
Amaranthe blinked at his abrupt switching of topics, but she recovered and jogged after him. They skimmed down the drainpipe, waited for a couple of locals to enter the eating house, and crossed the street to the apartment building. She slipped past Sicarius to open one of the double doors and step inside first.
Nobody occupied the shabby parlor, and half of the gas lamps on the walls were out. She headed for a hallway at the back. Doors lined both sides, and the staircase she sought rose at the far end. A faded gray runner had collected so much dirt, she barely recognized the repeating sword pattern. She did know it had been one of the early themes woven on the first steam looms, making it a testament to the rug’s age.
At the base of the stairs, she stopped near one of the working lamps, intending to check Sicarius’s uniform. She trusted him to get the details right, but she needed to know if he had any rank pins or badges that would mark him her superior. If so, she would have to amend her spiel to pretend she was taking orders from him. But, when she saw him in the light, she froze and stared.
Clad in the crisp, clean lines of a gray enforcer uniform, he looked...good. Handsome, yes, but heroic, too. Not like some assassin who lurked in the shadows, ready to jab a dagger into someone’s back, but like someone noble who helped people.
It’s just fabric, girl, she told herself, but the thoughts brought a lump to her throat nonetheless. What might he have been had his childhood been different? Normal.
“Something inaccurate?” Sicarius asked.
“No.” Amaranthe cleared her throat. “No, you’ve got it right.” She lifted a foot and placed it on the first stair, but paused again. “Do you—or did you ever want to be something else? For an…occupation? When you were a child maybe?”
Anyone else would have given her a perplexed frown over such a random question. He...gazed at her without a hint of his thoughts. Floorboards creaked in a room nearby. A muffled conversation went on behind a door. In the hallway, he neither moved nor spoke. She searched his eyes. Did he spend even half as much time wondering what she was thinking as she did wondering what he was thinking?
“Never mind,” Amaranthe said. “I just meant you’d be...believable as an enforcer.”
She headed up the stairs.
“A soldier,” Sicarius said quietly.
Amaranthe halted. “You daydreamed of being a soldier?”
“When it was necessary for my focus to be elsewhere, I thought of it occasionally.”
He caught up with her and kept climbing, perhaps considering the conversation over. Focus to be elsewhere. As in to block out the pain of some torturous childhood training session? He did not expound, and she did not ask. She matched him, and they ascended the steps side by side.
“Like Berkhorth the Brazen?” she asked, wanting to leave him with better thoughts than of some past need to will his mind elsewhere. “The third century general who was so gifted with a blade that an entire city surrendered en masse when they saw him walk up with a single squad of soldiers?” They rounded the second-story landing, and she kept talking, warming to the idea of Sicarius as the legendary hero. “The man so fearsome that none of the soldiers guarding that city realized his squad was covered in blood and wounds and had only a single, battered sword between them because they’d just escaped capture and torture?”
Sicarius slanted her a faintly bemused look. “Starcrest.”
Her toe bumped a step, and she caught herself on the railing. “Fleet Admiral Starcrest? Really? I picture you more as a warrior general than a brilliant naval strategist.”
They reached the third floor and another empty hallway.
“You believe I lack intelligence?” Sicarius asked.
Amaranthe jerked a hand up. “No, no.” It had been some time since he had thrown a knife at her, and she did not want to give him a reason to consider it again. “It’s just that...ah, you lose to me three out of four times when we play Strat Tiles.”
“Because you cheat.”
“How do I cheat?” she asked, trying to read his face to see if he was irked or merely giving her a hard time. She never should have given him permission to tease her.
“You talk,” Sicarius said.
“Talking isn’t cheating.”
“It is when you seek to wheedle my strategy from me under the guise of learning from my greater experience.”
She blushed. She hadn’t realized he saw through that so easily. Though it had worked.… Several times.
“I should be flogged, no doubt,” Amaranthe said.
A rare gleam of humor entered his eyes. “Perhaps.”
Amaranthe counted doors until they reached the flat she had been observing, the one she hoped belonged to Raydevk and his wife. The building could very well house other families with two young sons.
She pressed an ear against the door before knocking; she did not wish to interrupt a second round of lovemaking. Voices murmured, male and female, the words too low to make out. They did not sound ardor-filled.
She knocked. Out of habit, she straightened her uniform and patted down her bun. Looking the part of a professional enforcer might no longer be a requirement, but some tics failed to die.
The door opened, and a moon-faced woman leaned into the gap. When she spotted the uniforms, her eyes bulged. Even a rookie could have interpreted the guilty we’re-caught expression.
Amaranthe stuck her foot into the gap, lest the woman’s first instinct be to slam the door shut and lock it. The woman stepped back, but bumped against one of the piles of furniture, boxes, and clutter that were used to delineate separate spaces in the single room.
“Peaceful evening,” Amaranthe greeted. “I’m Corporal Lokdon.” The name was sewn on her name tag, so she dared not change it, but she said it quickly on the chance the woman read the newspapers. Amaranthe nodded to Sicarius. “And this is Corporal Jev.” Or so his uniform said. “We have a few questions for your husband, ma’am.”
“Who is it, Pella?” a man, presumably Raydevk, asked. “One of the boys? They weren’t supposed to come until nine.” He snickered. “Or is it old Ms. Derya complaining that the fire escape isn’t a suitable place for sex play? Again.”
Since the woman—Pella—seemed stunned with indecision, Amaranthe pushed the door open. The smirk on the miner’s face dropped. He held a book—a journal?—in his hands, and he hid it behind his back. Yes, the guilt hung in the air like smog around a factory. Though that meant it was probably good that she had come, it also made her fairly certain these weren’t the masterminds behind...anything.
“Mister Raydevk?” Amaranthe asked. “We have a few questions for you.”
“I’ve done nothing illegal,” he said.
“Good.” She smiled. “Then we’ll be able to finish quickly.”
“Uh, right.” Raydevk eyed several of the cabinets and clothing-draped stacks. Seeking somewhere to stash his journal?
“Mind if we come in?” Amaranthe asked.
&n
bsp; Sicarius invited himself in, slipping past Amaranthe to stand inside the doorway. Pella stepped, no, stumbled backward. Hm, Amaranthe might find Sicarius’s appearance heroic in the uniform, but he still intimidated others. The cold unwavering stare perhaps.
“Thanks,” Amaranthe said brightly. She strolled in and displayed her warrant oh-so briefly to Pella. “Corporal Jev has orders to search the premises. I hope this won’t inconvenience you terribly.”
“Search?” Raydevk’s voice squeaked. “What for?” His eyes darted about in his head, searching again. Still trying to get rid of that journal? He focused on a credenza in a corner by a cook stove. “Can I get you a drink?”
“No, thanks,” Amaranthe said.
Regardless, he darted for the credenza, opened a door, and withdrew glasses and a bottle of applejack. “I’ll just have a taste, if you don’t mind.”
Loosening one’s tongue was not a particularly good idea for a liar—a possibly criminal liar—faced with enforcers, but Amaranthe saw no reason to object. Raydevk met his wife’s eyes, widening his own in some signal.
“Why are you folks here?” Pella asked.
“A group of miners has been implicated in a conspiracy against the athletes at the Imperial Games,” Amaranthe said, trying to surprise reactions out of Pella and Raydevk. She did not truly expect these people to have much—if anything—to do with the kidnappings, but one never knew. “The missing athletes, to be precise.”
Pella glanced at her husband and rushed to say, “We don’t know anything about that.”
Raydevk had his back to everyone, ostensibly preparing a drink, but he froze at Amaranthe’s words. He jerked his head at Pella and she burbled on, giving some story about the men winning time off at a company lottery and simply going to the Games to relax.
Amaranthe barely listened. She was watching Raydevk. Still fiddling with his drink, he tried to hide his actions as he set the journal on the credenza and opened it. He coughed to cover the noise he made ripping the top sheet off. He used the movement of returning the bottle to a shelf to slip that page into his pocket.