Bounty (15 page)

“
Ah yes, you are still full of resentment for your calling.”

“
I have no calling.”

Mastodon settled back as the smoky incense began to drift through the air, closing her eyes and breathing deeply of its essence. “You are in denial, Godren.”

“
I was under the impression that the only relevant thing was that I am in your debt.”

“
So long as you’re not in denial about that, I suppose we’ll get along well enough,” Mastodon agreed, closing the touchy subject. “Did you have a pleasant childhood?”

“
As much as anyone,” he replied, not knowing how to go about speaking of these things to Mastodon. How did you react when a dark, ruthless woman was candidly interested in your childhood? “Did you?” he turned the question on her, deciding that if they were on friendly questioning terms, he might as well test the strange waters.

“
I had no childhood,” Mastodon replied. “Was plunged straight from the womb into the corruption of the streets. My father was in the business, and my mother was dragged helplessly along until the poor thing dropped dead, bless her weak soul. Well, to be honest she didn’t drop dead straight off. She went a bit loony and wasted away into frail decay before she was murdered down some dark alley. It was inevitable. Feeble things like her don’t last in this business. I was hardened as an infant and keenly pegged to inherit the trade when my father passed on.”

“
When was that?”

“
When Damious assassinated him.”

Godren blinked. “Did you hire him?”

“
No, Godren, I’m not quite that treacherous. Not that I cared much for my father, but there was loyalty among the family. No, Damious was hired by the queen herself. For you see, my father was near as infamous as I am today, though of course it was across the border where the royalty was bolder in its intolerance for the likes of us. And Damious was quite a reputable professional. But that’s how I met him, you see, when I found him standing superior over my father’s corpse, and that grade of power attracted me.”

“
What attracted him to you?”

“
The irony, I imagine. Like I said, he had something for that. But my youthful beauty helped, too. Believe it or not, I was quite a stunner in those days.”

Actually, Godren could imagine it. Though she showed age and was not done any service of appearance by the consuming corruption of her dark deeds, he could imagine her years ago, an exotic creature in the prime of her youth. Her dark hair wouldn’t have been course then – or graying – and it would have framed her face in midnight waves. Her clever eyes wouldn’t have been so hardened – and clever eyes are very attractive things when balanced and soft. If not wrinkled, you would notice the lovely shade her skin was, and since she was only slightly broad as a woman, sitting still and idle behind her desk all the time, surely she would have been a fine sight rising through the stimulating stages of her life.

“
So you did not love each other at all?” Godren asked, but it was more of a statement.

“
We had two black hearts, Godren. Oh, I loved his smile and humor, and he loved my eyes and my determination, but underneath it all, what was there to love?”

Godren looked at her, wondering at her perspective. She knew exactly what she was, acknowledged the sacrifices she lived and the emptiness she sought. Yet she had no intentions of ever changing. It was all she’d ever known, and though it didn’t bring her joy, she seemed perfectly content with pleasure.

“
Do you entertain dreams of love yourself, Godren?” Mastodon asked curiously. “In this world?”

Godren blinked away a flitting image of him kissing the princess, not allowing himself to even think of it in Mastodon’s presence. It was entirely too treacherous a thought. “I suppose I’ll grow out of it one day,” he said.

“
After you realize how unrealistic they are, those dreams gradually dissipate into inconsequential ashes and die in the back of your mind. You’ll become disillusioned, and you won’t mind – in fact, you’ll welcome that. Pursuing this business, you quickly learn to cut out your own heart and bury it in the street.”

“
So what street is yours buried under? As your sworn protector, shouldn't I be informed?”

For the first time, Mastodon took her eyes off of the engrossing smoke wafting about the room and glanced slyly at Godren. “If I told you that, you’d dig it up, now, wouldn’t you?”

Godren was going to ask if he struck her as that type, but then he realized he might find it in him to do just that, so he kept his mouth shut and looked up at her, trying to keep the lost look off his face. It felt like it lingered a bit in his eyes, but she looked away and focused back on the smoke, and he was left to himself. Suddenly weary, he fell desolately into brooding as the clock took up the silence again.

The smell of the incense reached Godren a moment later and drew him out of his deepening thoughts, and he resurfaced before he could lose himself in them. From then on the scent was thick and strong in the room, and kept him not only focused but also aided in chasing away the predawn drowsiness threatening to creep up and seduce him. He couldn’t sleep a wink, he told himself, knowing this Damious fellow would choose the exact instant he nodded off to make his appearance. Irony like that would tempt
fate
, with Godren’s luck, and knowing Damious’s apparent character only guaranteed that that would be how it played out.

The rain held off, and he held off sleep, and so Damious didn’t come that night. The next day passed inconsequentially as well, and Bastin finally relieved him so he could shut his eyes awhile, but by that evening the clouds were looking heavier than lead and Godren didn’t trust the situation to stay peaceful for very much longer. Seth hadn’t come in from the walls yet, either, and so before returning to his personal post, Godren called him back.

Seth didn’t look like he’d slept either, and his balance was doing strange things, as if he were trying to find his sea legs. He’d been on the walls too long.

“
You should have checked in before now,” Godren said, looking his worn friend up and down. “Gods, Seth, it’s a wonder you haven’t fallen yet.”

“
I would have come in this morning, but Ossen appeared on my wall, pushed by and nearly sent me over the edge, and then climbed down and said he was taking a break. I haven’t seen him since, and I wasn’t going to leave the walls empty.”

Growling, Godren pushed past Seth and stalked through the corridors toward Ossen’s niche. His stride was heated and his head dizzy from lack of sleep, and his destination swam into his sight with jarring glimpses at the end of the last passage. Ossen, he found, had the nerve to be there. He was in the middle of doing something or other, but Godren didn’t pause to note what it was.

“
What are you doing on the ground?”

“
Technically, Godren, we’re
under
ground,” Ossen pointed out.

“
You have a shift to attend.”

“
I just finished a shift,” Ossen objected.

“
Not a regular shift, Ossen – an extended one. When we sur
vive
is when you get to take a break.”

“
More like when I die. Would you have me fall off the walls when I fall asleep mid-shift?”

“
I frankly don’t care, so long as you’re doing your job. I’m only concerned for Mastodon’s safety.” Only then did Godren notice the overpowering smell occupying the stony niche. Ossen reeked of roses, and Godren’s brows drew together in a dangerous expression. “And what do you abandon duty for – drenching yourself in perfume? What is this, Ossen?”

Ossen’s face immediately turned defensive. He was no longer so partial to Godren sharing his corner.

“
Climb a
wall
, Ossen. And
stay
there,” Godren ordered. “We’re encountering a shortage of surveillance as it is – don’t make me have someone keep an eye on
you
.”

“
You wouldn’t – not really. If there’s a shortage, you can’t afford to. You know that. I know that.”

That was enough. Worth it or not, Godren could not let Ossen dance around so freely. “Alright. You two are switching posts every quarter hour,” he assigned Ossen and Seth. “Cross paths at the central bridge and exchange reports. Think you can handle that?”

Ossen’s face was decidedly unhappy. He didn’t say anything, but it was evident that he desired to. Of course, what he wanted to say was clearly the opposite of obliging, and since he
didn’t
oblige, Godren drilled his eyes into him, waiting.

“
No?” Godren challenged.

Ossen visibly gritted his teeth.

“
Take the first shift yourself,” Godren detailed, since Ossen wasn’t speaking. “Seth will join you. If he doesn’t find you there, you’d better be far away.”

With that, he began turning to leave, letting Ossen make what he wanted to of the threat.

“
Your threats,” Ossen stopped him, “don’t mean anything to me.”

Godren glanced over his shoulder. “
Be
there, Ossen.”

“
I won’t be.”

That stopped him completely, and he faced his rival again. “Do not,” he said very evenly, “risk your position, let alone Mastodon’s own neck, for the sake of defying me, Ossen. It is not worth it.” That seemed to at least register, and Godren wondered if it was enough. “For the sake of us all, be on the walls tonight.”

Godren could hear Ossen’s teeth gritting behind him as he turned away again, and he could feel those mordant eyes searing holes in the back of his skull.

“
I’m
busy
,” Ossen maintained through clenched jaws, voice hard and full of resentment.

Pausing under the arch of the corridor, Godren glanced a little wonderingly over his shoulder. “With what?” he asked, interest pricked.

“
With none of your business, that’s what.”

Godren recalled his absence last night as well, and wondered what he was getting up to away from Mastodon’s domain. “Tell that to Mastodon,” he said, and then he walked away.

“
Am I going back out?” Seth asked, right behind him.

“
Get some sleep first,” Godren directed.

“
I thought you only cared about Mastodon.”

“
Don’t quote me, Seth. You know you’re a special case.”

“
How much time are you giving me?”

“
An hour. Make the best of it.”

They parted ways, and Godren returned to his post by Mastodon. In the back of his mind, he wondered if Ossen would bother to heed him or not, but his main focus stayed attentive to his own position.

Two hours into his return shift, the rain started. He and Mastodon listened to it begin to hammer down on the ground above their heads, saying nothing. The clock was drowned out, and Godren watched the silent hands, as if it meant their wait was up. No longer would the seconds be measured and counted – it was soon time.

The blood hummed in his hands as he watched the doors, his fingers hovering over his sheathed weapons.

The whispering drone of the rain assaulted his ears, severing his ties to all sound outside the study. His nostrils burned with Mastodon’s incense, and his eyes burned from lack of sleep. His senses, so on edge and tuned toward the things coming, were stunted and overburdened by the things around him, and his prudence was wasted.

“
Any minute now,” Mastodon murmured as midnight passed. Godren glanced at her. She didn’t offer anything more, and he absently traced the edge of his blade with a restless finger.

Just listening to the rain made him feel like he should be drenched. He was so used to not being sheltered, so used to having nowhere to keep the weather at bay. Any other time, rain like this would mean being soaked to the bone. He wanted to shiver, but then wondered if that was just nerves.

As he watched the silently significant hands make their little jerking rounds about the clock face, it seemed that time lengthened between counts. Was time slowing down? Or was the clock just about to die? That would be a decidedly foreboding effect.

The rain came down harder over their heads. Mastodon sat still as a statue in her chair, a mask of utter cool fallen over her face.

Suddenly, the doors burst open.

In flourished a dramatic figure swathed in a wetly-billowing cloak, though how he managed to make it billow like that while sopping, Godren didn’t know. Dislodged water was flung all around him, and his upset cloak only fell away from its swirling and revealed his face, dark hair plastered all to it, when he was halfway through striding down the steps that led to Mastodon’s lower level.

Godren tensed, but did not jump up to intercept him. Mastodon still had on her mask of cool, and Damious had no weapons in his hands – though Godren didn’t trust the concealing way his cloak flourished and fell around him.

Damious did not pause when he reached Mastodon’s desk, but vaulted cleanly over and landed in a bowing crouch by her chair, presenting himself with all the dramatic graciousness in the world.

That did it. Whatever his intentions were, vaulting over the desk was much too aggressive a move for Godren’s taste. Damious was suddenly much too close, and Godren was on him in an instant. The assassin had just opened his mouth when the dark blur that was Godren intervened and flung him aside, cutting off his attempt at words.