The Gentleman Bastard Series (186 page)

“Blood for rain!” hollered the leader of the priests once again, and initiates behind him held baskets out to the passing crowd. It was a mobile sacrifice, then. For every coin tossed into a basket, the caged prisoner would receive another painful but carefully measured slash. That man would be a resident of the Palace of Patience, worming his
way out of something harsh (judicial amputation, most likely) by offering his body up for this cruel use. Locke had no further thoughts to spare the poor fellow, for the two girls in dark red dresses were vanishing around the far left side of the procession. He ducked wide around the opposite side, just in case another ambush was in the offing.

The girls weren’t troubling themselves; they were headed straight for the Bridge of the Seven Lanterns, and were close enough that Locke dared not close the gap. While the bridge was wide enough for two wagons to pass without grinding wheel-rims, it was narrow indeed compared to the plaza, with nowhere to duck and dodge if the girls tried anything clever. Locke matched their pace and trailed them like a kite, fading back to a distance of about thirty yards. Halfway to the end of the contest, and he hadn’t actually gained a foot!

The Bridge of the Seven Lanterns was plain solid stone, no unnerving toy left over from the long-vanished Eldren. Its parapets were low, and as Locke moved step by step up the gentle arch he was offered a fine view of dozens of boats moving sluggishly on the canal below—a view he ignored, focused as he was on the slender red shapes of his two rivals. There was no wagon traffic at the moment, and while Locke watched, the dress-wearers separated, moving to opposite sides of the bridge. There they paused, each one turning her body as though she were gazing out over the water.

“Hell shit damn,” muttered Locke, trying for the first time in his life to emulate the lengthy chains of profanity woven by the few adult role models he’d ever had. “Pissing shit monkeys.” What was the game now? Stall him indefinitely and let the sun cook them all? Looking for inspiration, he glanced around, and then back the way he’d come.

A
third
girl in a cinnamon-red dress and gray veil was walking straight toward him, not twenty yards behind, just at the point where the cobbles of the plaza met the bridge embankment. Locke’s stomach performed a flip that would have been the highlight of any court acrobat’s career.

He turned away from the newcomer, trying not to look too startled. Crooked Warden, he’d been stupid not to check the whole area where Sabetha had picked up her first decoy. And now, yes, his eyes weren’t merely playing tricks—the two girls in front of him were slowly, calmly, demurely edging in his direction. He was trapped on a
bridge at the center of a collapsing triangle of red dresses. Unless he ran like mad, which would signal to Chains and Sabetha alike that he’d broken character and given up, one of the girls would surely manage to count his buttons.

Sweet gods, Sabetha had outwitted him before he’d even woken up that morning.

“Not done yet,” he muttered, desperately scanning the area for any distraction he could seize. “Not yet, not
yet
.” His vague frustration had flared up into a sweat-soaked terror of losing—no, not merely losing, but failing by such an astounding degree in his first contest against a girl he would have swallowed hot iron nails to impress. This wouldn’t just embarrass him, it would convince Sabetha that he was a little boy of no account.
Forever
.

As it happened, it wasn’t fresh and subtle inspiration that saved him—it was his old teaser’s reflexes, the unsociably crude methods he’d used to create street incidents back in his Shades’ Hill days. Barely realizing what he was doing, he flung himself down on his knees against the nearest parapet, with his brass buttons scant inches from the stone. With every ounce of energy he possessed, he pretended to throw up.

“Hooouk,” he coughed, a minor prelude to a disgusting symphony, “hggggk … hoooo-gggghhhhkkk … HNNNNNN-BLAAAAAARGH!” The noises were fine, as convincing as he’d ever conjured, and he pushed hard against the parapet with one shaking arm. That was always a great touch; adults fell hard for it. Those that were repulsed would back off an extra three feet, and those that were sympathetic would all but tremble.

He stole quick glances around while he moaned, shuddered, and retched. Adult passersby were swinging wide around him, in the typical fashion of the rich and busy; there was no profit in attending to someone else’s sick servant or messenger boy. As for his red-dressed nemeses, they had all halted, wavering like veiled apparitions. Approaching him now would be suspicious and dangerous, while standing there like statues would rapidly invite needless attention. Locke wondered what they would do, knowing he had merely succeeded in restoring a stalemate, but that was certainly better than letting their trap snap him up.

“Just keep retching,” he whispered, and did so. As far as plans went,
it was perhaps the worst he’d ever conceived, but now it was up to someone else to make the next move.

“What goes?” A woman’s voice, brimming with authority. “Explain yourself, boy.”

That someone else was, as it turned out, wearing the mustard-colored jacket of the city watch.

“Lost your grip on breakfast, eh?” The guardswoman nudged Locke with the tip of a boot. “Look, just move along and be sick at the end of the bridge.”

“Help me,” whispered Locke.

“Can’t stand on your own?” The woman’s leather fighting harness creaked as she crouched beside him, and her belt-slung baton tapped the ground. “Give it a minute—”

“I’m not really sick!” Locke beckoned to her with one hand, concealing the gesture from everyone else with his body. “Bend down, please. I’m in danger.”

“What the hell are you on about?” She looked wary, but did come closer.

“Don’t react. Don’t hold this up.” In an instant, Locke had his little purse of silver coins, thus far unspent, transferred from his right hand to her left. He pushed the woman’s fingers gently closed over the bag. “That’s ten solons. My master is a rich man. Help me, and he’ll know your name.”

“Gods be gracious,” the woman whispered. Locke knew that bag of silver represented several months of her pay. Would she bend for it? “What’s going on?”

“I’m in danger,” Locke muttered. “I’m being followed. A man wants the messages I carry for my master. Back on the plaza south of here, he tried to grab me twice.”

“I’ll take you to my watch station, then.”

“No, there’s no need. Just get me to the north side of this bridge. Pick me up and carry me, like I’m being arrested. If he sees that, he won’t wait around. He’ll go tell his masters the watch has me, and once we’ve gone a little ways, you can just let me go.”

“Let you go?”

“Sure, just set me down, let me off with a warning, talk to me sternly.”

“That’d look damned irregular.”

“You’re the watch. You can do what you like and nobody’s going to say anything!”

“I still don’t know.…”

“Look, you’re not breaking any law. You’re just lending me a hand.” Locke knew he nearly had her. She had already taken his coin; now it was a matter of notching the promised reward up a bit. “Get me off this bridge and my master will double what I’ve given you. Easily.”

The guardswoman seemed to consider this for a few seconds, then rose from her crouch and seized him by the back of his jacket. “You’re not sick,” she yelled. “You’re just making a gods-damned scene!”

“No, please,” cried Locke, praying that he was, in fact, witnessing a purchased performance and not a sudden change of heart. The guardswoman lifted him, tucked him under her left arm, and marched north. Some of the well-dressed onlookers chuckled, but they all moved out of the way as Locke’s improvised transportation carried him away from the scene of his near-humiliation.

He kicked and struggled to keep up his end of the presumed deception. Some of his squirming was only too real, as the woman’s baton handle kept jabbing him in the ribs, spoiling what was an otherwise surprisingly comfortable ride. At least he was being carried with his all-important buttons facing the guardswoman’s side.

Locke scanned his tilted field of vision and saw, to his delight, that the two red dresses in front of him had darted far to the left and were keeping their distance from him and his temporarily tame yellowjacket. Would Sabetha believe he’d really been seized against his will? Probably not, but now she’d have to sort out a new plan of attack with her accomplices, whoever they were.

His own plans were developing speedily as he pretended to fight back against his captor. Once he’d gotten well ahead of the girls, he could cut off their progress to the final choke point, Goldenreach Bridge. And while his ultimate position there would find him once again outnumbered three to one, at least he would have more time to play spot-the-real-Sabetha.

Kicking, snarling, and shaking his fists, Locke was carried at last down the opposite side of the bridge, onto the northern plaza. Here the real powers of Coin-Kisser’s Row were situated, houses like Meraggio’s
and Bonaduretta’s, whose webs of coin and credit reached out across the continent.

“Don’t make me knock your teeth in,” his guardswoman growled down at him as a particularly large group of onlookers moved past. Locke could have applauded her theatrical sense; yellowjacket or not, the woman had good instincts. Now, all they had to do was find a decent spot to set him down, and he was as good as—

“Oh, Constable, Constable,
please
wait!” Locke heard the soft sound of running feet even before he heard Sabetha’s voice, and he squirmed madly, trying to spot her before she arrived. Too late—she was at the guardswoman’s other side, veil flipped back over her four-cornered hat. She was holding out a small dark pouch in her right hand. “You dropped this, Constable!”

“Dropped what?” The woman turned to face Sabetha, swinging Locke into position to look directly at her. Her cheeks were flushed red and, inexplicably, she was letting her open satchel just hang there. Locke stared openmouthed at the four tidy little rolls of silk tucked therein—red, green, black, and blue.

“You must be mistaken, girl.”

“Not at all. I saw it myself. I’m
sure
this is yours.” Sabetha pressed the little pouch into the constable’s free hand, precisely as Locke had just moments earlier, and in so doing she moved closer and lowered her voice. “That’s four solons. Please, please let my little brother go.”

“What?” The constable sounded thoroughly mystified, but Locke noticed that she slipped the pouch into her coat with smooth reflexes. He was beginning to suspect that this yellowjacket had some prior experience with making offerings disappear.

“I’m sure he didn’t mean to cause a scene,” said Sabetha, letting a note of desperate worry break into her voice. “He’s not supposed to be out on his own. He’s not quite right in the head.”

“Hey,” said Locke, suddenly realizing that knowledge of the silk colors wouldn’t mean much if he let the situation spin further out of his control. What the hell was Sabetha doing? “Wait just a minute—”

“He’s a
total
idiot,” Sabetha whispered, squeezing the constable’s free hand. “It’s just not safe for him to be out without an escort! He makes up stories, you see. Please … let me take him home.”

“I don’t … I just … now, look here—”

One or more wheels were clearly about to fly off the previously smooth-running engine of the guardswoman’s thought processes, and Locke cringed. Suddenly a wide, dark shape insinuated itself between Locke’s constable and the cinnamon-red figure of Sabetha, gently pushing the girl aside.

“Ahhhhhhhhh, Madam Constable, I am so utterly delighted to see that you’ve retrieved the two parcels I misplaced,” said Chains. “You are a jewel of efficiency, excellent woman, a gift from the heavens. I beg leave to shake your hand.”

For the third time in the span of a few minutes, a tiny parcel of coins slipped into the palm of the now utterly dumbstruck watch-woman. This exchange was faster and smoother by far than either of those effected by the children; Locke only saw it because he was being held in just the right position to catch a tiny glimpse of something dark nestled in Chains’ hand.

“Um … well, sir, I …”

Chains leaned over and whispered a few quick sentences in her ear. Even before he finished, the woman gently lowered Locke to the ground. Not knowing what else to do, he moved over to stand beside Sabetha, adopting a much-practiced facial expression meant to radiate absolute harmlessness.

“Ahhh,” said the constable. Chains’ new offering joined the previous two inside her coat.

“Indeed,” said Chains, beaming. “Blessings of the Twelve, and fair rains follow you, dear constable. These two will trouble you no further.”

Chains gave a cheery wave (which was just as cheerfully returned by the guardswoman), then turned and pushed Locke and Sabetha toward the east bank of the plaza, where stairs led down to a wide landing for the hiring of passenger boats.

“What happened to your little accomplices?” whispered Chains.

“Told them to get lost when I went after that yellowjacket,” said Sabetha.

“Good. Now, shut up and behave while I get us a boat. We’d best be anywhere but here.”

All of the nearby gondolas were departing or passing by, save for one bobbing at the quay, about to be boarded by a middle-aged man
of business who was fishing in a coin purse. Chains stepped smoothly past him and gave the pole-man a peculiar sort of wave.

“I say,” said Chains, “sorry to be late. We’re in such a desperate hurry to reach a friend of a friend, and I just knew that this would be the right sort of boat.”

“The rightest sort of right, sir.” The pole-man was young and skinny, tanned brown as horse droppings, and he wore a sandy-colored beard down to the middle of his stained blue tunic. Charms of silver and ivory were woven into that beard, so many that the man actually chimed as he moved his head about. “Sir, I’m apologetic as hell, but this is the gentleman I’ve been waiting for.”

“Waiting for?” The man looked up from his coin-counting, startled. “But you only just pulled up!”