The Gentleman Bastard Series (226 page)

“Knives?”

“Yeah, the ones you’ve had out for a few days now. I was hoping to sort of dull the edges.”

“Isn’t that rather knavish? Plying a girl with drink?”

“In this case it’s more like self-defense. And I did sort of think you might just … like a cup of wine.”

“And then perhaps a second? And a third, and so on, until my inhibitions were sufficiently elastic?”

“I didn’t deserve that.”

“Yes, well … perhaps not.”

“Gods, I forgot that anyone who wants to be nice to
you
has to get permission in advance and wear heavy armor.” Biting his lip, Locke poured the pale wine carelessly and slid one of the cups toward her. “Look, you can pretend it just appeared there by magic if it makes you happy.”

“Is that Anjani orange wine?”

“If it’s Anjani my ass is made of gold,” said Locke, sipping from his cup. “But it was some kind of orange, once upon a time.”

“And what miracle are you trying to coax out of me, exactly?”

“Simple conversation? What’s happened, Sabetha? We were talking, actually talking. It was … it was really nice. And we worked well together! But now you snap for no reason. You find excuses to cut me
dead. You keep throwing up these walls, and even when I climb them, I find you’ve dug moats on the other side—”

“You’re crediting me with an extraordinary degree of industry,” she said, and Locke was delighted to see the tiniest hint of a smirk on her lips, though it vanished between breaths. “Maybe I’m preoccupied with the play.”

“Oh look,” said Locke. “Now the moat is full of spikes. Also, I don’t believe you.”

“That’s your problem.”

“What do you have to gain by not talking to me?”

“Maybe I just don’t want to—”

“But you did,” said Locke. “You did, and we were getting somewhere. Do you really want to spend the rest of our stay here doing this stupid dance back and forth? I don’t.”

“It’s not so much a dance, though, is it?” she said, softly.

“No,” said Locke. “You’re the one that keeps stepping back. Why?”

“It’s not easy to explain.”

“If it was, an idiot like me would have figured the answer out already. Can I sit beside you?”

“
That’s
putting the cart before the horse.”

“The horse is tired and needs a break. Come on, it’ll make it easier to hit me if you don’t like what I have to say.”

After a pause that seemed to last about ten years, she turned to look out over the city and patted the stone beside her. Locke slid over, eagerly but carefully, until his left shoulder was touching her right. The warm wind stirred around them, and Locke caught the faint scents of musk and sage oil from her hair. A thousand fluttering things burst to life in his stomach and immediately found reasons to run all over the place.

“You’re trembling,” she said, actually turning to look at him.

“You’re not exactly a statue yourself.”

“Are you going to try to make me not regret this, or are you just going to sit there staring?”

“I like staring at you,” said Locke, shocked and pleased at his own refusal to turn from her gaze.

“Well, I like heaving boys off rooftops. It’s not a habit I get to indulge often enough.”

“That wouldn’t get rid of me. I know how to land softly.”

“Gods
damn
it, Locke, if you’ve got something you want to say—”

“I do,” he said, steadying himself as though for the incoming swing of a wooden training baton. “I, uh, I’m tired of talking behind my hands and dropping hints and trying to trick some sort of reaction out of you. These are my cards on the table. I think you’re beautiful. I feel like I’m an idiot with dirt on his face sitting next to someone out of a painting. I think … I think I’m just plain stupid for you. I know that’s not exactly sweet talk out of a play. Frankly, I’d kiss your shadow. I’d kiss dirt that had your heel print in it. I
like
feeling this way. I don’t give a damn what you or anyone else thinks … this is how it feels
every time I look at you
.

“And I admire you,” he said, praying that he could blurt everything out before she interrupted him. This desperate eloquence was like an out-of-control carriage, and if it smashed to a halt it might not move again. “I admire everything about you. Even your temper, and your moods, and the way you take gods-damned offense when I
breathe
wrong around you. I’d rather be confused about you than stone-fucking-certain about anyone else, got it? I admire the way you’re good at everything you do, even when it makes me feel small enough to drown myself in this wine cup.”

“Locke—”

“I’m not done.” He held up the cup he’d used to illustrate his previous point and gulped its contents straightaway. “The last thing. The most important thing … it’s this. I’m sorry.”

She was staring at him with an expression that made him feel like his legs were no longer touching the balcony stones beneath them.

“Sabetha, I’m sorry. You told me that you wanted something important from me, and that it wasn’t a defense or a justification … so it has to be this. If I’ve pushed you aside, if I’ve taken you for granted, if I’ve been a bad friend and screwed up anything that you felt was rightfully yours, I apologize. I have no excuses, and I wish I could tell you how ashamed I am that you had to point that out to me.”

“Gods damn you, Locke,” she whispered. The corners of her eyes glistened.

“Twice now? Look, uh, if I said the wrong thing—”

“No,” she said, wiping at her eyes, trying but failing to do so nonchalantly. “No, the trouble is you said the right thing.”

“Oh,” he said. His heart seemed to wobble back and forth in his chest like an improperly balanced alchemist’s scale. “You know, even for a girl, that’s confusing.”

“Don’t you get it? It’s easy to deal with you when you’re being an idiot. It’s easy to push you aside when you’re blind to anything outside your own skull. But when you actually pay attention, and you actually make yourself … act like an adult, I can’t, I just can’t seem to make myself want to keep doing it.” She grabbed her wine cup at last, gulped most of it, and laughed, almost harshly. “I’m scared, Locke.”

“No you’re not,” he said vehemently. “Nothing scares you. You may be a lot of other things, but you’re never scared.”

“Our world is this big.” She held the thumb and forefinger of her left hand up barely an inch apart. “Just like Chains says. We live in a hole, for the gods’ sake. We sleep fifteen feet apart. We’ve known each other more than half our lives. What have we ever seen of other men or women? I don’t want … I don’t want something like this to happen because it can’t be helped. I don’t want to be loved because it’s
inevitable
.”

“Not everything that’s inevitable is bad.”

“I should want someone taller,” she said. “I should want someone better-looking, and less stubborn, and more … I don’t know. But I don’t. You are awkward and frustrating and peculiar, and I
like
it. I like the way you look at me. I like the way you sit and stare and ponder and worry yourself over everything. Nobody else stumbles around quite the way you do, Locke. Nobody else can … keep juggling flaming torches while the stage burns down around them like you do. I adore it. And that … that frightens me.”

“Why should it?” Locke reached out, and his heart threatened to start breaking ribs when she slipped his hand into hers. “Why aren’t you entitled to your feelings? Why can’t you like whoever you want to like? Why can’t you
love—
”

“I wish I knew.” Suddenly they were on their knees facing one another, hands clasped, and Sabetha’s face was a map of mingled sorrow and relief. “I wish I was like you.”

“No you don’t,” he said. “You’re beautiful. And you’re better at just about everything than I am.”

“I know that, stupid,” she said with a widening smile. “But what
you
know is how to tell the whole world to fuck off.
You
would piss in Aza Guilla’s eye even if it got you a million years in hell, and after a million years you’d do it
again
. That’s why Calo and Galdo and Jean love you. That’s why … that’s why I … well, that’s what I wish I knew how to do.”

“Sabetha,” said Locke. “
Not
everything that’s inevitable is regrettable
. It’s inevitable that we breathe air, you know? I like shark meat better than squid. You like citrus wine better than red. Isn’t
that
inevitable? Why the hell does it matter? We like what we like, we want what we want, and nobody needs to give us permission to feel that way!”

“See how easy it is for you to say that?”

“Sabetha, let me tell you something. You called it silly, but I
do
remember the first glimpses I ever had of you, when we both lived in Shades’ Hill. I remember how you lost your hat, and I remember how your red was coming out at the roots. It struck me witless, understand? I didn’t even know why, but I was
delighted
.”

“What?”

“I have been fixated on you for as long as I’ve had memories. I’ve never chased another girl, I’ve never even gone with the Sanzas … you know, to see the Guilded Lilies. I dream about you, and only you, and I’ve always dreamt about you as you really are … you know, red. Not the disguise—”

“What?”

“Did I say something wrong?”

“You’ve seen the real color of my hair once.” She pulled her hands out of his. “Once, when you were the next thing to a gods-damned baby, and you can’t get over it, and that’s supposed to flatter me?”

“Hold on, please—”

“ ‘As I really am?’ I’ve kept my hair dyed brown for ten years! THAT’S how I really am! Gods, I am so stupid … . You’re not fixated on me … you want to fuck a red-haired girl, just like every leering pervert this side of Jerem!”

“Absolutely not! I mean—”

“You know why I’ve been dodging slavers all my life? You know
why
Chains trusted me with a poisoned dagger when Calo and Galdo were barely allowed to carry orphan’s twists? You ever hear the things they say about Therin redheads that haven’t had their petals plucked?”

“Wait, wait, wait, honest, I didn’t—”

“I am so, so
stupid
!” She shoved him backward, and he crushed his empty wine cup, painfully, by sitting on it.

“I should have known. I just should have known. You admire me? You respect me? Like hell. I can’t believe I was going to … I just— Get
out
. Get the hell out of here.”

“Wait, please.” Locke tried to wipe away the haze suddenly stinging his eyes. “I didn’t mean—”

“Your meaning was quite plain.
Go away!
”

She threw her own empty cup at him, missing, but speeding his stumbling escape into the little passage down to the second floor. As he tried to roll awkwardly back to his feet, a pair of strong hands grabbed him from behind and hauled him up.

“Jean,” he muttered. “Thanks, but I—”

The same hands grabbed him, spun him around, and pressed him hard against the passage wall. Locke found himself eye to eye with the new patron of the Moncraine-Boulidazi Company.

“Lord Boulidazi,” Locke sputtered. “Gennaro!”

The well-built Esparan held Locke in place with one iron forearm, and reached beneath his plain, dusty clothing with the other hand. He pulled out ten inches of steel, gleaming in the light from the open balcony door, the sort of knife crafted for arguments rather than display cases. In an instant the tip was against Locke’s left cheek.

“
Cousin
,” spat Boulidazi. “I thought I’d dress down and come see how my investment was faring. The idiots in the taproom said you might be up here. That’s a
fascinating
conversation you’ve been having, Cousin, but it leaves me feeling like there’s a few things you haven’t exactly been telling me.”

The knife-tip pressed deeper into Locke’s skin, and he groaned.

“Like everything,” said Boulidazi. “Why don’t we start with
everything
?”

CHAPTER EIGHT

THE FIVE-YEAR GAME: INFINITE VARIATION

1

“SOMEONE’S GONNA RECOGNIZE us,” said Locke.

“We look like hell,” said Jean, practicing understatement at the master level. “Just two more travelers covered in dust and shit.”

“Volantyne must have returned by now. Sabetha’s got to have people watching the gates.” Locke tapped the side of his head. “You and I would.”

“That’s a generous appraisal of our foresight.”

It had been a hard four days back to Karthain. They’d looted the wagon and shoved it into a ravine on the second day, needing every scrap of speed they could coax out of their unyoked team. Lashain’s constables were no threat, but the previous occupant of the wagon could always hire mercenaries. There was no law on the long, ancient road between city-states; a column of dust rising rapidly in the sky behind them would probably have meant someone was going to die.

Now the city, finally in sight, had taunted them for half a day with the prospect of relative safety. They’d come up the coast road from the east, through hills and terraced farming villages, their bodies thoroughly
punished by the seedy emergency saddles they’d filched from the wagon.

“Maybe you’re right, though,” said Jean. “If we’ve got no chance of hiding ourselves, we’ve got to rely on speed. We get one move, maybe, before she can respond.”

“Let’s go straight for her,” said Locke. His scowl shook little puffs of dust out of the creases of his road-grimed face.

“To do what?”

“Finish a conversation.”

“You in a hurry to get back to sea? I can handle a couple of her people at a time. She’s got more than a couple.”

“Taken care of,” said Locke. “I know a fellow who’ll be eager to help us past the guards.”

“You do?”

“Didn’t you notice that Vordratha favors tight breeches?”

“What the hell’s that got to do with anything?”

“Every little detail matters,” said Locke. “Just wait. It’ll be a fun surprise.”

“Well, shit,” said Jean. “It’s not like I’ve done anything especially smart in months. Why start now?”