Winter's Reach (The Revanche Cycle Book 1) (26 page)

All of Mirenze flooded the streets for the Feast of St. Scarpa. Scarpa was a martyr, his legacy a grim tale of penitence and pain, but all that mattered to most of the city was that he was Mirenzei. He was
their
saint, compared to the hordes of dour-faced Murgardt that looked down from every church fresco, and by the Gardener they’d celebrate his day as they liked. Over the years, the holy occasion had given way to a raucous, merry carnival, an easy excuse for the rabble to shed their inhibitions and their sobriety in one wild, mad night.

Gangs of youths walked the streets in leather masks and brightly colored sashes, declaring themselves the “official and royal army” of their home neighborhoods. When rival gangs met in the streets, the outcome could be anything from ear-blisteringly vulgar but cheerful insult wars to all-out battles with fists, rocks, and branches. On the north bank, packs of self-appointed scholars and troubadours accosted the unwary, demanding gifts of beer and wine. If refused, the empty-handed unfortunates were either subjected to improvised and insulting verse or put through the “learned man’s gauntlet,” a barrage of questions about Mirenzei history—where errors meant a sacrifice of clothing and dignity.

The upper classes had their own parties, more expensive but no less drunken, celebrating up on feast-hall belvederes, where they could look down on the city below from opulent platforms. That was where Felix found himself that night: on the green and gaily appointed rooftop of the Duke’s Bequest, clutching a wine cup in one tense hand as servants lit torches along the ivory-inlaid balustrades to push back the growing shadows. He stood off along the edge of the rooftop, with the other wallflowers, while a few daring couples took to the center of the platform in their finery and danced to a reeling bit of lute song.

On the far side of the rooftop, Aita Grimaldi stood in a gown of spun silver silk, surrounded by a small gaggle of admirers.
My bride-to-be
, Felix thought bitterly and tossed back another swig of red wine. It tasted like ashes in his mouth.

“Hmm?” he said, realizing someone was talking to him. Terenzio, the tannery master, was already half past drunk and slurring his words. He nodded at the sash that wrapped around Felix’s head under his cap, covering the stump of his ear.

“I asked if it hurt,” Terenzio said.

“Now, or when it happened?”

“Wounds are funny things. One of my men, he did some soldiering years back, helping the Empire beat down those Terrai savages. Got his hand lopped off at the wrist. Funny thing, he says it didn’t even hurt when it happened. The next morning, long after they’d burned the stump closed and wrapped it all up neat as a present,
that’s
when it started to hurt.”

Felix stared at his cup.

“It hurt plenty,” he said.

“And yet you returned home, in honor and strength,” said Lodovico Marchetti. He approached with a small box in his white-gloved hands. He held it up, showing off the delicately carved sandalwood. “We may be rivals in business, Felix, but courage is something I greatly respect. I’ve heard the whole story about your little adventure in the frozen north—you know how people talk in this city. Few men have the stones to make a move like you did. I only wish you’d have come to me first. My family investigated that rumor about the alum mines years ago. I could have saved you all that trouble.”

Who had the best motive to send an assassin after me?
Felix thought as he looked into Lodovico’s eyes.
Who benefits most if my family falls?

You do, Lodovico. You do
.

He took Lodovico’s hand and gave it a firm, slow shake.

“I wish I had, too. Have you ever been to Winter’s Reach?”

Lodovico shook his head. “I haven’t, no.”

“They say it changes a person.”

Lodovico looked into Felix’s eyes and hesitated, frozen for a moment. Then he cleared his throat and held out the box in offering.

“A gift. Dried salamander root, from the Oerran Caliphate. Mostly for the relief of joint ache and gout, but it should help speed your recovery along quite nicely.”

He leaned in and cupped his hand to one side of his mouth as he added softly, “And if you steep a piece in wine for about half an hour, then drink the wine? It’s an experience not to be missed, trust me. You’ll thank me later.”

“Lodovico, good Lodovico,” Terenzio said, nearly spilling his cup as he tried to bow. “Could I steal you away for a moment?”

“Of course. Good seeing you again, Felix. Please, enjoy the gift, and welcome home.”

Felix nodded tightly and forced himself to put on a pleasant smile. The second Lodovico’s back turned, the smile vanished.

A footman wearing the black-trimmed tunic and crest of the Grimaldi family approached Felix with a decanter of wine. He filled Felix’s cup, then reached over with his other hand to press something into Felix’s palm. A folded scrap of parchment. Sensing the need to be discreet, Felix edged over to the railing, put his back to the crowd, and hunched his shoulders a little while he unfolded it and read.

“We need to talk. Tonight, midnight, room 8 at the Guildsman’s Seat. Tell no one. Come alone.”

He looked across the rooftop. Aita stared back at him. She gave one long, slow nod, her eyes grave, then turned away.

*   *   *

It took an effort for Lodovico to wear his easygoing smile as Terenzio led him away. He hadn’t known what to expect when he’d brought Felix his little make-peace gift. A broken man, maybe. A whipped dog, drowning in failure.

Instead, for a heartbeat—just a heartbeat—he thought Felix might lunge for his throat. A new darkness was hiding behind Felix Rossini’s eyes, the kind of darkness that drove a man to extremes.

He knows
, he thought,
and if he doesn’t know, he suspects. Damn it all, Simon!

Terenzio threw an arm around Lodovico’s shoulder. Lodovico tried not to wrinkle his nose. No matter how much Terenzio scrubbed and perfumed himself, the odor of the tannery still clung to him, buried deep in his pores.

“Just wanted to say, m’boy, you’re doing a bang-up job with the Banco Marchetti. Your father would be proud.”

“I hope you’re not just saying that because you need another line of credit,” Lodovico said with a chuckle. He spotted his mother on the edge of the crowd and took the opportunity to politely extract himself from the tannery master’s clutches. “Mother! You made it!”

Sofia approached them and gave Lodovico a kiss on each cheek. Her lips were as cold as her eyes. The obligatory show of affection complete, she turned her attention to the other man.

“Terenzio,” she said, favoring him with a nod. Terenzio took her hand and bowed, brushing his puffy lips against the backs of her fingers. He inhaled the scent of her perfume like it was a glass of pure springwater, and rose.

“I was just telling your son that I’m sure your husband would be proud, seeing his family thrive so.”

“Thank y—” Sofia started to say, but Lodovico cut her off.

“We’re not really
thriving
yet, though, are we? Terenzio, I understand there’s a vacancy on the Council of Nine.”

Terenzio ran a finger along his collar. “That, ah, that is so, yes. But we shouldn’t talk of business at a celebration like—”

“I assume that I’m in the running,” Lodovico said. “The Marchetti family hasn’t been represented on the Council since my father’s death. There’s hardly anyone in the city better qualified for the post.”

“Of course, of course,” Terenzio said, nodding quickly. “In fact, I sponsored your nomination myself.”

Lying prick
, Lodovico thought.

“Excellent,” he said. “And do you know when the Council will be making its decision? I assume it’s only a formality.”

“At our meeting next month. I’ll actually be out of the city for a couple of weeks, leaving tomorrow morning. Trade run to Murgardt, sourcing some new suppliers for hides.”

You mean the Caliphate
, Lodovico thought,
trying to cut me out of the alum market. But I’ll smile and nod and pretend I’m the ignorant pawn you think I am.

You think my father would be proud of me, Terenzio?

You haven’t seen anything yet.

*   *   *

Felix wasn’t coming. That was the fact Renata finally had to face. He’d been back in the city. He’d had every opportunity to come see her at the Hen and Caber or any of the secret nooks they shared, but he hadn’t. And if he hadn’t by now, he wasn’t going to.

That wasn’t the Felix she knew.

Something had to be keeping him away, but what? He’d risked his father’s anger and the disapproval of “polite society” in the past, and he’d done it with a wink and a laugh. What could have changed? She’d heard rumors about his trip to the Reach—that he’d been hurt, cut up, but she was the last person in the world who would turn him away. He
knew
that.

The servants at Rossini Hall barred her path at the door. Felix was only to have visitors under the strictest supervision and the approval of his father, they said. He had a wedding to plan for, after all.

Renata was trudging off, at a loss for answers, when a matronly woman in a flour-stained apron caught up to her on the walk.

“You’re her,” the Rossinis’ cook said, “aren’t you? The one Felix used to sneak out at all hours to see? He doesn’t think we know, but…we know.”

She nodded simply. “I am.”

“Side door. Five minutes.”

The cook let her in, shooting a furtive glance over her shoulder, and hustled her through the run-down kitchen to the pantry.

“We have to be quiet. I’ll lose my job, or worse, if anyone finds out I helped you, but…oh, miss, there’s some terrible trouble afoot.”

“Trouble?” Renata’s slippers paced across chipped ceramic tiles painted with swirls of deep blue on faded white. “What kind of trouble?”

“Felix hasn’t been himself since he came home, but that’s not the worst of it. Our head butler, Taviano. The constables found him in an alley. Murdered. Stabbed right through the heart, they say. No one will—”

They heard the rattling of the front door, a brisk slam, and the thumping of footsteps. “Hide!” the cook hissed, pushing Renata into the walk-in pantry. She waited in the dark, still and silent, ears perked.

“—don’t have time for dessert,” she heard Felix say. “Honestly, I’m grateful, but I have another appointment this evening and I can’t be late—”

That was when the cook opened the pantry door, shoved him straight into Renata’s arms, and shut it behind him.

Their lips met by surprise. They stayed there deliberately. His arms tightened around her, like a drowning man clinging to a life preserver, and she knew he hadn’t abandoned her.

“You can’t be here,” he whispered. “You’re in danger—”

“I’m not afraid of your father, Felix. You never were either. What happened to you? Was it this?”

She reached up, her fingers gently brushing the velvet band over his missing ear.

“
Was
it this?” she said. “Because shame on you, Felix Rossini. You could have come home with worse scars than this, and you’d still be handsome in my eyes.”

“It’s not…it’s not the wound, and it’s not my father. It’s Basilio Grimaldi, Aita’s father. He knows about us, about everything. The wool business is just a front. He’s some kind of criminal, and he wants to use my family in a scheme. He told me that if I don’t marry Aita and do as he says, he’ll hurt my brother, my father…he’ll go after
you
, Renata. He said that if I had any contact with you, you’d pay the price for it.”

She took a half step back, realization dawning. “That’s why you didn’t come back to me. You were
protecting
me.”

“As best I can. And I always will. Listen, Renata, I’ll find a way out of this. We
will
be together. I promised it then and I promise it now. But for right now, I have to play along and find out how powerful Basilio really is. I can’t be reckless. There’s too much at stake.”

He took her hand.

“Renata, I learned something in the Reach. I stood up to someone more powerful than me. I stood up to an entire city. And sure, I lost. I got beaten down. I got a scar to remember it by, but that’s not what I learned. What…what I learned is that I
can
. I
can
stand up. I can
fight
. I bled in Winter’s Reach, but I didn’t die.”

“What are you going to do?” she whispered.

“As long as Basilio Grimaldi draws breath, you’re not safe. So I’m going to find out what he’s capable of, what makes him tick, how to get at him.”

“And then?”

“And then,” Felix said, “I’m going to kill him.”

Renata swallowed hard. She nodded. His eyes were bright and sharp, even in the gloom.

“Aita wants to meet me tonight,” he said. “Like father, like daughter. I expect she’s got some threats for me too. I’ll pretend to be intimidated. For now, I want you to leave Mirenze. It’s not safe for you here, not until this is dealt with.”

“What? I’m not leaving, Felix. Not if you’re in danger. We’ll face it together.”

“You’d be in more danger than me if you stayed. If something happened to you…Please, I just need to know you’re out of his reach.”

He kissed her again, breathing her in.

“I’ll use some of the money we’ve saved up,” she said. “I’ll head to—”

He held up a hand. “Don’t tell me. Just in case…just in case Basilio tries to get it out of me. It’s safest if not even I know where you went. Once you hear that Basilio is dead, you’ll know it’s safe to come home.”

“I’ll meet you here, then.”

He shook his head and gently touched his fingers to the bottom of her chin, lifting her face to his.

“No,” he said. “Kettle Sands. Our
new
home. I’ll meet you there. The plan hasn’t changed, Renata, not one bit. We just have to work a little harder to get there.”

Renata smiled in the dark.

“I’ll meet you on the seashore, then,” she whispered.

“Meet you on the seashore,” he said and kissed her one last time.

“She’s out of control,” Bear said, pacing his cluttered workroom. Frost kissed the windows, painting them with ivory spiderwebs.

“I think your perspective is a bit biased,” said the slender man in the water’s reflection, hovering in the brass bowl. He wore a fox-shaped mask, complete with little bone bristles for whiskers, framed by his groomed and oiled-back silver hair.

“You know what I mean. She’s acting like
she’s
the Dire Mother. Ordering us around, commandeering coven resources. It’s not fair! I make one little mistake in Reinsgrad, and the Dire all but sells me to Veruca damned Barrett so I can keep an eye on some forgotten mine shafts. The Owl
loses
an
apprentice
, and does she even get a slap on the wrist?”

Fox stroked the bristles of his mask. His eyes smiled.

“I love you, brother, but let’s be honest. It was hardly a ‘little mistake.’ And you know exactly what’s in those mines. They
need
guarding. Speaking of commandeering resources, I just spoke with Mouse—”

“I know,” Bear said. He peeled off a strip of gauze, winding it around a fresh, shallow cut on his tattooed arm. “She told me she was going to send Mouse sniffing around that banker to find out where he learned about the mines.”

“Seems she changed her mind on that one. No, Mouse has been sent to Lerautia to hunt for a needle in a haystack. She’s supposed to find some woman based on her description and the initials L.S.”

“That’s ridiculous. You told Mouse to ignore her, right?”

Fox shook his head. He touched his fingers to the mask’s muzzle, contemplating.

“No. I told her to go but to report her results to
me
, not to the Owl. I want to know what this is all about.”

The memory of their last conversation, the slip of the Owl’s tongue, swung sharply into Bear’s mind.

“The book,” he said. He broke out in a toothy smile. “I don’t think Squirrel’s notebook was ever recovered. Not long ago, the Owl led an attack on a smuggler’s house in Lerautia. I’d bet good silver she thinks the book is floating around on the black market.”

“Interesting.” Fox’s voice had a high, nasal hum. “Who helped her with the attack? Maybe they’ll tell us more.”

Bear sighed and patted the gauze down on his arm. “Several, but the only brethren who were told anything at all were Shrike and Worm. They won’t say anything. They’re the Owl’s pets; she taught them. They’ll do anything for her. Still, what else could it be? Squirrel’s book is out there in the wild.”

“And if we find it first,” Fox mused, “it will be proof positive of the Owl’s incompetence. Allowing coven materials to fall into the hands of the cattle…that’s a serious offense. With a serious penalty.”

“The highest penalty. And we’ll move up in the Dire’s eyes for exposing her. What do you say, brother? Are we partners in this? We can’t lose!”

Fox didn’t answer for a moment. His image bobbed in the mold-flecked water, hazy and distant.

“That last part, that’s not entirely true. If the Owl finds out what we’re about, we’ll have her rage to contend with.”

“So?” Bear said. The big man slapped his palm against his robed chest with a meaty thud. “Let her come! What are you worried about? She’s just one woman.”

Fox chuckled and shook his head.

“Ah, my dear, impulsive friend. Do you know why the Owl is the apple of our Dire Mother’s eye?”

Bear shrugged. “No, why does it matter?”

“You haven’t belonged to the coven as long as some of us. We know the stories. We’ve seen the aftermath. When the Dire wants someone found, she sends Worm and Shrike. When she wants someone dead…well, at the risk of braggadocio, she usually sends me.”

“And?”

“And,” Fox said, “when she wants someone destroyed, she sends the Owl.”

Bear leaned closer to the brass bowl, looming over the reflection.

“Destroyed?”

“Oh yes,” Fox said. “Lives ravaged,
souls
ravaged, dynasties obliterated, and bloodlines burned to ash. When pain is not enough, when
death
is not enough, when the Dire dreams of a river of bitter tears and a wind borne of anguished wails…she sends the Owl. And the Owl enjoys her work. I’ll tell you what I believe, old friend. I don’t think our Dire Mother keeps the Owl close just to stroke her feathers. I think the Dire is
afraid
of her.”

Bear didn’t answer right away. When he spoke, he cursed himself for the tremor in his voice.

“I am not afraid,” he said.

“Then I will have to be afraid for both of us,” Fox said. “Very well. We’ll chase the book. See if we can’t clip the Owl’s wings. But if those great pitiless eyes turn upon us…I’m blaming everything on you. Agreed?”

“Deal,” Bear said.