The Aeronaut's Windlass (9 page)

“We should issue
tickets
to this duel,” he said. “Reggie could spend his life trying and still not live it down.”

“I beg your pardon?” Bridget repeated. “Whatever do you mean?”

“The duel,” the young man said. “He challenged you, which means that you have the right to choose the location of the duel and the weapons to be used.”

“How nice for me,” she said. “But I still don’t follow.”

Benedict pushed himself back up to his feet, smiling. “You don’t choose a weapon at all. You make it an unarmed duel.”

Bridget tilted her head. “That does seem less likely to result in someone being maimed or killed for no good reason. But I don’t know how to fight that way.”

“I do,” Benedict said. “The basics are reasonably simple to learn. And you’re strong enough.”

Bridget frowned. “But . . . presumably Reggie has had a great deal more training than I have. And while I am quite strong for a woman, I am surely not much stronger than he is. Would that not mean that he would have little difficulty in overcoming me?”

“That depends on what path you take,” Benedict said.

Bridget felt her frown deepen. “My path . . . You aren’t going to attempt to convert me to your religion, are you? I hope you are not, sir. That would be awkward.”

Again, that easy laugh rolled forth. “Those who follow the Way have no need to proselytize. One does not convert to the Way. One simply realizes that one already follows the Way.”

“God in Heaven, not that speech again,” came a new voice. Gwendolyn Lancaster appeared from the gloom, dressed in the plain grey exercise clothing of the Guard, just as they were. It was difficult for Bridget to reconcile the absolute confidence in the noblewoman’s stance and voice with her utterly diminutive size. Bridget felt quite certain that even without training, she could break Miss Lancaster like a ceramic doll.

“Dearest coz,” Benedict said, his voice turning even more pleasant. “You are looking . . . particularly
Gwennish
today.”

Gwendolyn arched one dark brow sharply at that statement and then said, “What are you doing on the ground?”

“She threw me here,” Benedict said, his tone pleased.

Gwendolyn frowned at him, and then her eyebrows lifted. “
Did
she?” Her eyes turned to Bridget. “She doesn’t look warriorborn.”

“She isn’t,” Benedict said. “But she works in a vattery. I don’t suppose I weigh too much more than a side of red meat, do I, Miss Bridget?”

“Not much more at all, sir.”

Gwen narrowed her eyes. “Oh, you aren’t thinking . . .”

“For Reggie? I most
certainly
am,” Benedict said. “It’s perfect.”

“Stop it,” Bridget said at last, exasperated. “Both of you. Stop it this instant. It’s like you’ve both read a book that I haven’t and you won’t stop talking about it. It’s most impolite.”

“I’m sorry,” Gwendolyn said. “I take it you weren’t raised to be as underhanded and devious as Benny and me.”

Bridget blinked. Goodness, that the noblewoman would just
say
it outright like that seemed very, very bold. But at the same time . . . somewhat reassuring. Gwendolyn Lancaster might have been many things, but at least she didn’t seem as smugly capable of self-deception as many of the other children of the High Houses. “I would not care to make such a judgment of your families,” Bridget said carefully. “But . . . no. It would seem not.”

Rowl came padding out of the darkness, silent, as always, offering no explanation of where he had been, as always. Bridget bent one of her knees slightly, hardly needing to think about it, and he used it as a springboard to hop lightly into her arms and then flow up onto one of her shoulders. The cat nuzzled her cheek and she leaned her head in toward his slightly.

“Listen carefully, Littlemouse,” Rowl said, in an almost inaudible tone. “I have sought word upon these two. They are dangerous.”

Bridget flicked her eyes toward the cat and gave a tiny fraction of a nod to tell him that she understood. Being called “dangerous” by a cat could mean a great many things, but it was generally delivered as something of a compliment. She thought the two nobles to be rather self-involved and entirely overflowing with arrogance they hardly seemed to know existed, but she had learned long ago not to treat a cat’s opinion lightly.

So she said to Gwendolyn, “Please excuse me, Miss Lancaster. You were saying?”

Gwendolyn had tilted her head, her bright eyes studying the cat sharply. “I was saying that if you can come near to matching Reggie in physical strength, then you can fight a duel he cannot win.”

“I don’t really care if anyone wins,” Bridget said. “I just want everyone to walk away alive, and for this nonsense to be over.”

Gwendolyn blinked and suddenly flashed Bridget a smile that looked as warm and true as an aeronaut’s sunrise. “You have an absolutely wretched attitude about fighting a pointless duel for the sake of pride. Did you know that?”

“Thank goodness,” Bridget said.

“The point is,” Benedict said, rising easily to his feet, “that if you can offer him anything like a real fight, there’s no way he can win the duel. If he defeats you bare-handed, it likely won’t be by much, and he looks like a brute and a bully. And if you defeat him, he’ll forever be the Astor who was beaten soundly by—” Benedict broke off and gave Bridget a slight smile.

“By the vattery trog,” Bridget said. She smiled slightly. “That . . . would be quite the vile thing to do to him.”

“Wouldn’t it, though,” Gwendolyn said, beaming.

“But . . . I’m not going to do that,” Bridget said.

“Why under Heaven would you not?” Gwendolyn asked. “He more than has it coming.”

“Possibly,” Bridget allowed. “But to humiliate him would be to invite some other kind of indirect reprisal—if not upon me, then upon my father. My father is a good man. I won’t see that kind of mischief brought to him because of me.” She looked at Benedict. “Is there some weapon that we could use that would allow him to win without slaughtering me or looking like a fool?”

“There’s no weapon, tool, or clockwork in the world that could make Reggie not look the fool,” Gwen said in an acid tone.

“I don’t care about victory,” Bridget said. “I don’t care about making him look bad. I just want to move on with my life as if we’d never traded words.”

“You’re right, coz,” Benedict said, nodding slowly. “She has a wretched attitude about dueling for pride.”

The two traded another, longer look, which again made Bridget feel that she’d skipped the necessary background reading needed to understand.

“Food?” Gwendolyn suggested suddenly. “The two of you came out here so early, you’ve missed breakfast call. Inquisition class is in half an hour, and you don’t want to run on an empty stomach after that.” She looked up at Rowl and added, “And for you as well, Master Cat. I’m buying.”

Rowl said smugly, “This one has her priorities well sorted. Tell her my favorite food.”

“Rowl,” Bridget said. “That is not how one goes about such things.”

She looked up to find both of the Lancasters staring at her.

“You speak Cat,” Benedict said. “I mean, I’d heard that some people claimed to do it but . . . For goodness’ sake, you sounded exactly like a cat just now.”

“He has no idea how terrible your accent is,” Rowl observed.

Bridget rolled her eyes at the cat and said to Benedict, “Yes, of course. Do you . . . not have any cats in residence at House Lancaster?”

“Certainly not,” Gwendolyn said. “Mother wouldn’t hear of it.”

“We do, actually,” Benedict said, cutting over Gwendolyn smoothly. “The servants have an arrangement with several cats to handle vermin. But as far as I knew, it’s an old understanding, and no one there has ever actually communicated directly with a cat before.”

Gwendolyn blinked several times. “How is it that you know that when I do not?”

“Because no one tells you anything, coz,” Benedict said. “Perhaps because you spend so much time with Lady Lancaster and often do not pause to think before you speak.”

Gwendolyn tilted her head to one side as if to acknowledge a fair point. Then she blinked again and said, “Then I am afraid that I have been quite rude. I have neither introduced myself to your companion nor sought introduction to him. Please convey to him my apologies, if you would, Miss Tagwynn.”

Bridget looked carefully at Gwendolyn for a moment, waiting for the flash of mockery that would appear in her eyes, as they would have in Reggie’s, but it didn’t come. She seemed sincere. Imperious and obsessed with protocol—but sincere.

“What is this she asks, Littlemouse?” Rowl said, leaning forward to peer intently at Gwendolyn.

“She seeks an exchange of names,” Bridget told him, in Cat. “Human names, not cat names. She feels she has wronged you by not seeking it sooner.”

Rowl stiffened in indignation. “Has she?”

“Perhaps not intentionally,” Bridget allowed. “She wasn’t sure what to think of a cat appearing among humans. I suspect she genuinely seeks to avoid giving offense.”

Rowl’s tail lashed back and forth. “What would Wordkeeper say of her?”

Bridget smiled slightly. She knew precisely how her father would treat Miss Lancaster. “He would ask her to tea and extend all courtesy.”

Rowl nodded his head sharply, once, a very human gesture. “Then I will also extend courtesy. Tell her my name, and that she has not yet earned a cat name of her own, but that breakfast is a good start.”

Bridget turned to Gwendolyn and said, “Miss Lancaster, this is Rowl of the Silent Paws tribe, kit to Maul, chief of the Silent Paws.”

“A prince of his house, as you are of yours, coz,” Benedict noted.

Gwendolyn evidently had the grace to avoid looking skeptical at this pronouncement. She gave Benedict a decidedly unreadable look, which only made him smile.

He had, Bridget thought, a very nice smile.

Gwendolyn turned back to look at Rowl seriously and said, “Welcome, Sir Rowl, to . . . the human part of Habble Morning. It would please me very much to buy you breakfast, if you would permit it.”

Rowl promptly plopped down into Bridget’s arms, his throaty purr needing no translation. “A
very
good start,” he murmured.

“Yes, Miss Lancaster,” Bridget said. “That would be fine.”

Chapter 6

Spire Albion, Habble Morning

R
owl watched Littlemouse and her fellow humans behaving foolishly, and wondered how soon she would need him to intervene and set things right.

Once more they had slept less than all the humans in the Spirearch’s Guard, and once more the human Gwendolyn and her half-souled cousin thought that they were preparing Littlemouse for some kind of combat, which was ridiculous. The best way to prepare for fighting was to fight. Any kitten knew that.

Currently Benedict was having Littlemouse practice falling, which was similarly ridiculous. One didn’t
practice
falling. One simply landed on one’s feet. Yet over and over, Littlemouse fell from her feet to her back, sometimes alone, sometimes helped along the way by Gwendolyn or Benedict. Rowl had been suspicious of this activity at first, assuming that it would be used as an excuse for Gwendolyn to eliminate a rival female, or for Benedict to claim mating rights with Littlemouse. But over the past few days it had proven to be more foolish than nefarious, and did not seem to harm Littlemouse to any significant degree, so Rowl permitted it to continue.

It seemed a shame to waste so much of one’s time—and to miss so much sleep—in such a fundamentally stupid activity. If they’d only asked Rowl about it, he could have explained it to them.

Benedict began to show Littlemouse how to make him fall to the floor. What was the point of learning to do such a thing slowly, and obviously with considerable cooperation from Benedict? Did Littlemouse think that a foe would behave in such a way?

Rowl sensed a pressure change in the air against the fur of his flank and his whiskers, and lazily tilted an ear in that direction. There was a whisper of motion, utterly inaudible to anyone but a cat, with all the commotion the humans were making to cover it, and Mirl emerged from the shadows.