Steelhands (2011) (47 page)

Margrave Royston blinked. He looked completely awful—the way Thom had, sometimes, when the rest of us had been out on a raid and he’d been alone in the Airman, waiting up all night for news. He must have been with Adamo when it happened. Either that, or he’d had exceptionally fortuitous timing to enter the scene at the very last second.

“Are you referring to Margrave Germaine?” he asked Laure.

“Who else?” Laure said, throwing her hands up in the air. “She started all this, mark my words. Ain’t nothing good that’s ever come of her that
I’m
seeing.”

Luvander sighed, rubbing his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. Without its usual lively animation, his face simply looked tired and much older than I remembered. I wondered if I shouldn’t be the one bringing
him
lunch every now and then, if only to keep things even between us. Just because I’d suffered the most obvious injury didn’t mean the others hadn’t. His throat had been stitched up with a needle and thread. And, as he said, he wasn’t the sort of man to be taken down by a “wee infection,” but he worked hard at his shop, from sunup to well past sunset. Not to mention all the energy he used up with his complicated monologues. It was a wonder he didn’t eat like a horse, just to keep up his strength.

“That may well be the connection, now that you mention it,” Margrave Royston said, smoothing the hair at his temple as though he needed something to do with his hands. I recognized that impulse; only a moment ago I’d been wishing for my gloves to toy with. “I am
not
saying it’s your fault, so please cease looking as though you’ve not made up your mind whether to strike me or not. All I mean to say is
that if Owen
had
been meeting with his fellows previously, at no great detriment to his personal freedoms, then perhaps it
was
his sudden interest in Margrave Germaine’s business—which is
the Esar’s
business—that suddenly landed him in trouble. If it was his investigation into what Margrave Germaine has been doing and not your little meetings of the minds, then … I do detest speculation, but it would explain why Dmitri hasn’t turned his sights on this shop yet, and
we
are all safe and sound while
he
is not.”

“Isn’t
that
a comfort,” Luvander said, standing up at once. “Well, dear friends, as they say when mired in the filthy muck that passes for water down by the Mollydocks: We’re all in deep shit now.”

“Still, better off than Adamo,” Laure muttered, looking quite content to start a fight with anyone who disagreed.

No one dared. We veterans could smell a battle coming and knew how to avoid it altogether.

“I looked into Germaine’s business, myself,” Royston said thoughtfully. “But I suppose the gossiping of the Basquiat doesn’t concern him as much at present. It’s more what Adamo
represents
, I believe. There isn’t any statue of
me
in the middle of the most popular street in Thremedon.”

“Do you think we might at least be able to see him?” I asked; someone had to be the man to get his hopes up, after all. “Perhaps the Esar—he
must
see reason. We’ve done nothing wrong. As far as any rational man is concerned, we’ve done nothing at all.”

We’d all agreed to let the Esar act first for this very reason. I didn’t think anyone had ever dreamed
this
would be the first action he’d take—especially when the most Adamo could be accused of was forcing me to eat breakfast when I wasn’t hungry. Some mornings it seemed like a crime, but it was hardly an arresting offense.

“You’re assuming this is a man with whom one can reason at all, by this point,” Margrave Royston said, still looking grim. “After the war—not to mention what happened to our diplomats in Xi’an—his state of mind has been increasingly … fragile. No; that isn’t the word.
Suspicious
. Antoinette can barely get him to agree to see her these days, and all because she practically runs the Basquiat. He doesn’t want her to know his thoughts; I doubt he wants anyone to know them. He doesn’t
trust
anyone anymore, and like it or not, Owen cuts a rather threatening figure.”

“That he does,” Luvander agreed, tugging at his scarf. “What’s more, he’s
our
threatening figure. Surely you don’t mean to suggest we do nothing at all? As much gossip as we’ve heard about you, I’m sure one or two stories about the Dragon Corps and its complete lack of common sense must’ve reached your ears in return. That’s not exactly how we play it, diminished numbers or no.”

“When did I insinuate that? Such a course of action is hardly what I’m counseling,” Margrave Royston said. If the reminder of his past stung, he didn’t mention it. Thremedon rarely forgot its scandals, but at least it did stop caring about them after a while. “All I meant was that we have to be cautious, for Owen’s sake. And to remind impetuous youth that, according to law as it stands, the Esar does not
technically
need a reason to arrest anyone. People tend to forget that. He is the Esar, and if he wished, he could arrest anyone wearing blue on a Saturday. The people wouldn’t like it, and he’d never be so careless with their support, but it
is
possible.”

“Someone oughta change that law,” Laure said.

“It’s in place from the war,” I found myself explaining. When I’d been learning all the rules and provisions that comprised Volstov’s system of government, in order to be ready to take my place with the other diplomats, I’d found most of the memorization boring, but at least the knowledge had stuck. And now, here it was, proving useful in a most unexpected way. “I … suppose that, what with one thing and another, and the continued threats from the Ke-Han, they never got around to rewriting it.”

“Rather convenient for the Esar,” Toverre murmured, deep in thought.

“And inconvenient for us,” Royston agreed. The two seemed similar in some way though I couldn’t put a metal finger on it.

I felt indignant all of a sudden, for Adamo most of all, but also for my friends, and lastly for myself. We’d spent so many years fighting against an external threat—fighting for Volstov, our home, in the face of a deadly horde—that it had never even occurred to me Thremedon might one day turn around and betray us, like a favored pet suddenly turned rabid.

Once again, I had to think that Ghislain and Rook had been the smartest, realizing the climate in Thremedon didn’t welcome living heroes and getting out while they still could.

“Hm,” I said, as something further occurred to me.

“What is it?” Luvander asked.

“Before I realized what any of this meant, I’d been planning on sending a letter to Thom about all this,” I explained as quickly as I could, leaving out that it was something of a custom between Thom and me to write each other whenever things got rough. We told each other about the most awkward, embarrassing things that we’d recently undergone, and—through the exchange—they no longer seemed so terrible to either of us. “I was writing a letter to him about all of this, just to get it off my mind. About how I’d run out of the bastion, humiliating myself in front of everyone, and how I had been hearing things—those voices. I’d written about everything, really. I never sent it, but if we
are
coming under suspicion, it seems like it might be a good idea not to leave it lying around.”

“You’re not thinking of leaving now?” Luvander asked, looking aghast. He glanced about the room, then cleared his throat. For a moment, it seemed as though he’d forgotten he was speaking in front of an audience—and that it was up to us to represent Adamo’s training to the best of our abilities. “In fact, allow me to rephrase that: As the senior member of the Dragon Corps in this room, I
forbid
any of you to leave this haberdashery until otherwise notified of your freedom. Do you follow?” To me, he added, “How was that? Did it sound very Adamoesque?”

No matter how grave the danger, at least he was still capable of making
himself
laugh. By now, I knew better than to give him any such encouragement.

“Do those orders apply to all of us?” Laure asked. Her face was slowly losing its angry red coloring, and she seemed somewhat more composed than she had been before. It reminded me of a calm day in the countryside, just before a downpour. “Or only them that actually signed up for the corps in the first place?”

“All of you, I should think,” Luvander said with a sniff. “Excepting, of course, the illustrious Margrave Royston, who will no doubt very soon regret having come to inform us of our situation when
he
is implicated in our nefarious dealings. How many exiles will this next one mark, Margrave Royston?”

“At least you didn’t call me Mary Margrave,” Royston said, rubbing at the back of his neck the way Adamo did when he felt uncomfortable,
with a toothy smile that was so far from any of Adamo’s habits I had to wonder why they were friends at all. Adamo had never explained the matter to us, and it seemed rude to pry. “So I suppose we’re getting friendly, aren’t we? Since you are so clearly about to ask a favor of me.”

“For Adamo’s sake,” I said, ever the diplomat these days. “The letter is the stupidest thing I could have written. It implicates all of us, and if for some reason they should search my apartment …”

“If I
am
exiled for my pains,” Royston said, “and not imprisoned, or worse, I sincerely hope the rest of you are there to suffer along with me.”

“Think of it like a vacation in the countryside,” Luvander suggested.

Margrave Royston cringed. “Please, do not mention that,” he said, voice pained. “Just give me the address and I’ll be off on this madcap errand.”

I did as he asked, writing the address down on the back of a caterer’s business note card he had with him. He left immediately after that, and only the four of us remained in Luvander’s kitchen.

“Don’t worry too much,” I told Laure, as Luvander took off his apron and moved in the direction of his shop. “Where are you going?”

“To open the store, of course,” Luvander replied, “so that no one thinks anything is amiss. If you want, you can go upstairs. There’s a game Ghislain sent with very dirty illustrated cards, which I’m sure will make the conversation among the three of you quite interesting.”

“Well,”
Toverre said, after Luvander had breezed out of the room.

“He’s used to another kind of people,” I explained. “Like he said before—we really are lucky Rook isn’t here. However uncomfortable you feel now,
that
would make things a thousand times worse.”

“So now we just wait, is that the idea?” Laure asked darkly. I could tell by her expression that was her idea of a terrible plan, and while I knew it was our only one, that didn’t mean I had to like it, either. Every mission needed a bit of reconnaissance, but since I was usually the man conducting it, I felt all wrong just sitting there.

“I suppose we do,” I confirmed.

No one suggested we look into whatever lewd card game Luvander had mentioned. The mean-looking clock that made such awful sounds on the hour chimed unexpectedly, making us all jump again, but other than that, no one spoke. Toverre poured himself another cup of tea, then began to polish the handle of the teapot with his napkin; soon, he
moved on to one of the saucers, and he was eyeing my stained gloves with a distressed expression. Finally, before his eyes popped out of his head completely, I forced myself to be the first to say something.

“Are you all right?” I asked, managing not to comment on how the others would’ve torn him apart if this had been the Airman.

“They’re going to stain if you don’t soak them,” Toverre said all at once. He’d been holding it in for a long time, it seemed. “I know a few tricks. Would you mind terribly if I tried to clean them?”

“I don’t see why not,” I said. “You couldn’t possibly make them any worse.”

“Oh, but I could,” Toverre told me, sweeping them off the table and heading to the sink. “Not that I
will
, mind you, but it is possible.”

“Can’t believe you’re thinking of a stain at a time like this,” Laure muttered.

“What better time to think of a stain?” Toverre asked. He began to pump the water into the basin, and Laure rolled her eyes but chose not to argue with him.

Over the duration of time that followed, I discovered something that might have been perfectly obvious to the others all along: I was complete shit at waiting.

I’d checked the clock at least fifty—probably closer to a hundred—times when the door connecting the shop and the back room finally opened. The sound of Luvander chatting with a group of customers filtered in, then was cut off abruptly when Royston entered, shutting the door behind him.

He held a white box in one hand, wrapped with one of Luvander’s garish ribbons, and he looked extremely put out.

“The sly dog made me buy a
hat,
” he explained, dropping the box onto the table and loosening his scarf. “There was a group of customers, and I know
why
he was doing it, but the damn thing cost thirty chevronets and I don’t even have a ‘lady friend’!”

I wondered if I could have guessed, when we were first introduced, that Luvander would make such a shrewd businessman.

“Never mind my considerably lighter wallet,” Royston continued, fishing some papers from his pocket. “I did as you instructed, and I tried not to read your personal correspondence—though if I had, it would be all you deserved for leaving incriminating documents lying around. Apparently there’d been another visitor for you not half an
hour earlier. But,” Royston added, looking like a satisfied cat, “he wasn’t as persuasive with your landlady as I was. She didn’t let him in, despite the fact that he threatened to come back with some of the Esar’s men. I suppose we’re lucky I got there before they did.”

“Thank you for retrieving them,” I said, somehow not as relieved as I could have been. I didn’t like the idea of anyone’s returning to my room with the Esar’s men. Especially since, if Royston hadn’t brought me those letters, I might well have been the next ex-airman arrested.

That, at the very least, would have made for an interesting letter to Thom.