“That’s what they say. That she might be an incarnation of a death spirit. A real shinigami. Look, I’m pretty sure this tournament was a jackleg operation from the get-go, a case of incompetent ambition driving the halt and blind in a scheme fancied up by a brain-dead sociopath born with no imagination.”
The dogs stopped to stare.
“Be sure you let us know what you really think, old buddy.”
“The only reason we haven’t buried the whole mess already is that it’s so stupid we can’t figure it out.” Or maybe because there was more than one thing going on and I kept pounding square pegs to make it a solitaire.
“Uh . . . way to make yourself clear.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Actually, I do. It’s like trying to find a serial killer. They aren’t usually smart, they just don’t have any obvious connection to their victims, and the logic driving them is alien.”
“That’s kind of basically it.”
“Here’s an odd thought. Assuming you’re figuring on heading on back home. How about we visit Playmate?”
“It needs doing. It would do wonders for my attitude if he turned out spanking good. But there is the matter of pending excitement at Chattaree.” And of my ever-growing inclination to go see Strafa.
Something was going on way down below the surface of my mind. I couldn’t get it to come out, but I had experience enough with me to know it was coming. To suspect that seeing Strafa might break it loose.
I couldn’t shake Shadowslinger’s dread prophecy about an onrushing deadline.
Morley grumbled, “There is Chattaree, yes.” After a dozen steps, he mused, “Maybe it would have been wiser to swallow your pride and hand it off to the tin whistles.”
Whoa! “Damn! I did waste a fat opportunity when we had Scithe right there. We had one of Block’s top boys and Relway’s own cousin besides. What more could I ask?”
“So we’ll see Play on the way back from Chattaree.”
I like how he remains optimistic.
“Seen the blond kid around?” I asked.
“Not since Beifhold’s Mill. But don’t bet a rusty Venageti fil that she isn’t watching.”
My own thoughts exactly.
102
The stroll to the Dream Quarter took us into a new climate zone. The sun there was trying to break through the overcast. Then the ground quivered gently, weirdly, just as a sunbeam pierced the clouds and stabbed Chattaree, painting the masonry bone white and pale golden.
“Somebody got all busy with the whitewash,” Morley said.
“Yeah. I didn’t notice the other day. But the light was bad then.”
Clouds above went on about their celestial business. The sunbeam perished. Chattaree lost its glow.
Morley quipped, “That couldn’t last.”
“Looked too much like a blessing.”
We came to the bench that Moonblight and I had exploited before. I decided to repeat the exercise, though the east end was occupied by a derelict. A little guy, he had not yet chosen to make the bench a bed. I scooted over enough to make end room for Morley, then leaned back and considered the cathedral, wondering, now that I was there, what I could actually do.
Brownie and the girls showed a strong interest in the bum. He was not happy about that.
Most of us have trouble seeing the unexpected. I didn’t expect to be sharing a bench with Niea Syx, cathedral gatekeeper, so I failed to recognize him for half a minute. Of course, he had recognized me as we approached and now wanted to remain unnoticed, which he might manage if he didn’t make a run for it.
“Niea. My man. How you doing?”
Not so good, his body language suggested.
I could not recall the circumstances of his exodus from the Macunado House. I hadn’t put him out the door. Maybe Penny did. “How come you’re out here?”
He gave me a hangdog look worthy of Number Two at her most artfully pathetic, rubbed his left biceps, looked like he blamed it all on me, whatever “it” might be, and said nothing.
I got some mental exercise by jumping to a wrong conclusion. “They busted your ass because we took you when we dragged Almaz and his thugs off.”
Sigh. “No, sir. I got thrown down the steps when those men showed up looking for Magister Bezma. They wouldn’t believe that he isn’t there.”
“Everyone knows the Leading General Select Secretary for Finance never leaves his quarters.” Just trying to be helpful.
“True. Insiders. Which they were not. I thought I was lying. It turned out that I was telling the truth. I think.”
“There it goes again,” Morley said, nervously.
The earth shrugged the tiniest bit, a slight roll more perceptible than before but still barely enough to tweak the nerves. There was no sound with it, neither of breakage nor of panic. It was for sure no serious temblor.
TunFaire hadn’t experienced one of those in decades.
“Wonder what that’s about,” Morley said. I thought he meant the shaking till I noted that he was staring at Chattaree, where tobacco-brown dust had begun to roll out of the windows and doors.
Guard whistles sounded from several directions, the extended “Woo-he-up!” indicating an emergency in progress. A Guardsman needing help puffed on his whistle in shrill blats.
Niea grumbled, “Now they’ve done it.” With no explanation of what “they” might have done. “I don’t want to be anywhere near here when the red tops start picking up the pieces.”
“Damn!” I said, with feeling. Threads of lightning had begun prancing inside the roiling dust, which seemed no less dense despite its expansion outward.
The ground moved again.
“And here come some piece picker-uppers,” Morley breathed. Or maybe he had made a pun and said “peace.” Sometimes he can’t help himself.
Tin whistles, some of them Specials, flickered into existence on all sides, rushing the dusty excitement. None of them, management or honest laborer, seemed especially motivated, however.
They had survived strange stuff in the Cantard. They were alive to see this strange stuff because they had taken time to think before dealing with that strange stuff, back in the day.
The brown dust rolled closer. I suggested, “Why don’t we not stick around for a closer look at that?”
The vote of confidence in my leadership was unanimous. Even Niea joined the rout—though we didn’t run. We strolled briskly, good Karentine subjects who had recalled urgent appointments elsewhere.
The lightning kept playing inside the dust as the cloud spread and became shallower. It crackled and popped behind us as we made with the heels and toes. Fingers of brown, just two inches thick now, caught up and oozed past. The brown remained dense and roiling under a slick surface that recalled liquid mercury. Two-leggers and four, we all avoided contact.
The red tops followed our lead.
Came a fourth tremor, like the involuntary shudder after a sudden, inexplicable chill. The brown began to retreat, ignoring physical law. It left a one-mote-thick walnut discoloration that behaved more like a stain than a layer of dust. It didn’t puff up or transfer when disturbed.
Morley and I watched bolder folks experiment. The girls stayed back, the most unhappy of them still offering soft growls of displeasure and discomfort.
Niea Syx seized the afternoon and made like the good shepherd. On discovering his sudden invisibility, I shrugged. I doubted that he had anything useful to tell us. And we knew where to start a track if we needed to see him.
He would have been handy as a guide had we gone on with the proposed incursion. I took that off the table. There was too much excitement inside the cathedral already. Plus, red tops were gathering in numbers. Whole battalions would be getting in each other’s ways soon.
I offered an alternate proposal. “Let’s leave this to the incompetents already here and yet to appear.” If Barate and friends were in there and stayed healthy, they could get by on Hill privilege. I shouldn’t put
my cream-of-the-rabble self out for notice by offering unneeded assistance.
“Then let us be off and away,” Morley said. “And keep putting on a show that will thrill Jon Salvation when he turns it into a drama.”
For a moment I thought he had our red top audience in mind; then the direction of his gaze indicated the little blonde on the parapet of a temple a block east of Chattaree.
Curiouser and curiouser, she.
103
Playmate was fine. He was in his little office with Kolda, playing a simple rummy game that, never mind, I couldn’t figure out by watching. Naturally, once I confessed to that, I was invited to open my purse and buy myself a learning experience. Kolda was hiding out from his wife. Playmate fussed over the dogs and gave them treats they didn’t need. Then we moved on, me still thinking about visiting Strafa.
I shifted course to cut through Prince Guelfo Square, to get me a hot sausage. Franklejean was hard at it selling nothing from under a giant knockoff umbrella built with brighter fabrics than anything in the Amalgamated inventory. He had made it himself. He was unapologetic. Amalgamated wouldn’t produce umbrellas in the size he needed.
“I saw nothing. And nor will I ever—unless you try to sell them.”
“I just don’t want to get rained on while I’m working.”
He had nothing interesting to report. In fact, he pressed me, hoping I had something he would find interesting. I gave up the name Orchidia Hedley-Farfoul. That left him puzzled. He knew nothing about her.
My four-legged girls loved the visit. They piled sausage in on top of Playmate’s treats. Vegetarian boy Dotes, though, could work up no enthusiasm for the pork. He claimed, “You’ll have these mutts too fat to waddle.”
“They’re like bears getting ready for the winter.”
Which was true, in a way. Strays have to devour whatever they can whenever they can get it. Who knew when they might eat again?
“Winter is always around the corner. And, speaking of, what corner will you head around once we’re done here?”
For the moment I lacked any urgency. I had this ever-expanding feeling that what I most wanted right then was a nap. Failing that, I wanted to see Strafa. “I don’t know. I’ve lost my train of thinking. Where were we headed after we checked on Playmate?”
“Here, it looked like, then your place, I thought. Don’t ask me, though. I’m just here to keep the pixies off your back.”
While he let some problem with his sweetie cool down. Or fester.
“I think I’ll go to the cemetery.”
“Or to your house.”
“Dollar Dan will do that once he sees where they take Orchidia. Hell, he’s probably there already.” I hoped Singe would find it in her heart to pretend to show some sympathy. “You can go if you want. Belinda might be waiting.”
“I’ll stay with you. The fact that you haven’t been murdered today doesn’t mean that people who hope to see you dead have given up trying to arrange it.”
I started to argue. Contrary had become the Garrett ground state, it seemed. But my butt, with all its marvelous attachments, would have been well and truly deep in a sling repeatedly if people had given me the room I kept whining about wanting.
I’m overly inclined to think that I am as bad as I want to be bad. That I can handle anything that comes my way. But today had shown me that nastier things than me, by miles, were hoofing it around my town, and the tournament was all about bringing the nastiest ones out.
“Garrett shutting up on the macho teen posturing,” I announced. “If you really want to hang out amongst the headstones.”
“Oh yes. Definitely. I’m all about graveyards. I’m looking forward to being a resident someday myself.”
Sarcasm did not become the pretty boy.
The dogs were worn down, but they agreed with Morley. They would stick to the end. Or at least until they dropped.
So we headed south and west, alternately, block by block, till we hit Old King’s Way, which we followed till it T’d at First Wall Road. Once upon a time that had run along the inner foot of the original southern city wall. The cemetery had lain outside. The wall had been demolished long ago. The cemetery was well inside the city now. The sun was out down there, burning dark orange beneath the edge of the remaining overcast.
Morley indicated the sun. “How long will it be before we get another good look at that beast?”
There was that feel in the air. The break in the weather wouldn’t last.
104
Ancient sextons cursed with interacting with the ever-troublesome living strained to conceal their displeasure at having to do something once black-hearted me forced them to put aside their tea and chessboard. Not a word of protest was spoken, though. One remembered me from the funeral. I was an Algarda. He was old enough to walk, meaning he knew that regular folks don’t mess with Shadowslinger’s kids.
The other one was more interested in the dogs than me.
Morley noticed. “Do you know these ladies?”
Obviously, the man thought that he did—though they were cleaner and fatter than he remembered.
Morley said, “There isn’t much keeping our friends busy right now, Garrett.” He gestured at the man from the funeral. “You and him go see your wife. This gentleman and I will enjoy a game of chess, a glass of tea, and some conversation about dog breeding.” The old edge was in his voice.
“You’re all back.” It hadn’t been so long since I’d sat a death watch beside his bed.
He had a way to go physically. I still saw the winces and slackenings that betrayed deep pain.
“Forget the wise guy stuff. Do what you have to do.”
He was feeling the pain right now. No doubt pain lay behind the resurgent steel. He wanted to get done and get back. It would be a while yet before he could enjoy my adventures completely. If ever that had been the case, or could be.
“I’ll keep it as short as I can.” Though I had been considering taking several hours just to sit with Strafa, to talk to her, maybe to bleed off the grief and anger I’d been keeping contained.
My companion donned his rain hat and waterproof coat, impatient to move along, be done, and get cozy with his tea and his game again. A fruity odor suggested that he and his associate laced their tea with brandy.
I gestured, go. He went, cooperative because I was an Algarda. I considered letting him know he was too old and stringy for Shadowslinger’s palate. Didn’t seem like he would be amused, though.
The dogs spread out ahead, concerned about something. They dashed back and forth, continuously consulting. The sexton wasn’t sure about them. They kept him muttering in a foreign language. His cursing increased exponentially when a dozen more dogs showed up, growling and greeting and socializing with my girls. The stay-at-homes were pleased by what they heard from Brownie and Number Two but had things to say themselves that were not so replete with positivity.
Some noise audible only to canine ears suddenly had every head and ear up, the latter twitching. The entire pack began to growl.
My companion became alarmed, too. He charged ahead, as much as an old man’s body would permit. I followed, not in haste.
I had some serious aches and pains.
Cresting a slight rise, we found four unhappy men surrounded by twenty feral dogs. One dog was down, having taken a serious blow from a tool. The men all carried tools.
The dogs were not best pleased. They were reverting to pack-in-the-wild mode. Those men would be more unhappy if I couldn’t get the critters calmed down.
105
“They’re trying to break into your tomb,” my companion gasped, astonished that anyone would commit such an atrocity.
“I know who the old guy is.” Magister Bezma’s sidekick and possible brother. I was surprised to see him, though the timing was right if he had collected his thugs and headed here after he and Bezma finished their business with Trivias Smith and Flubber Ducky. But why?
The henchmen were immigrant day
laborers taking what work they could get to keep body and soul and family together.
Our advent, reinforcing the dogs, was all the encouragement they needed to start running. I hoped they could pawn their tools.
The dogs let them go but not the older man, whom they backed against the mausoleum door. He swung a crowbar menacingly, to little point. He survived on sufferance.
I warned, “Don’t run! I can’t save you if you give them a quarry.”
My own old man bleated in misery when he saw the damage to the mausoleum door, forced open a crack but not enough to admit anyone. Its hang had been ruined.
Number Two and several friends squeezed inside once I pushed the burglar out of the way.
I told Brownie, “Keep this fool from running but don’t hurt him,” then dropped to a knee beside the injured mutt, an ugly mix of bulldog and beagle. “We’re in luck. Doesn’t look like any permanent damage.” I fought the temptation to touch, to pet. She was wild. She was hurting. She was handling that by showing her teeth and threatening to use them.
I went to the tomb door. Squatting some, grasping its edge, hoisting, shoving, taking baby steps, I moved it enough to let me get by. My sidekick said, “There are lamps and lighters in the alcove to your right.”
I eased inside. He faced off with the captive, whose body language suggested abject surrender. He had had enough. He hadn’t wanted to be involved in the first place. He was just plain thrilled to be out of the game.
He wasn’t so done that he was ready to lie down and die, though, just to where he was ready to let the world get on without his participation.
I lighted a lamp. The folks in charge had been on the job. There were five of those, all with fuel reservoirs full and wicks trimmed with military precision. I let the old man know that I was impressed.
“How about you reward me by hurrying it up, then, Slick? It’s cold out here and I’m too friggin’ old to be dancing with the bad guys, even when they’re feebler than me.” He indicated the captive in case I was too dim to grasp the insult.