Thief's Covenant (A Widdershins Adventure) (16 page)

“I think we'll just get rid of that,” the same voice suggested. “Somehow, I think the cost of a new bucket is one I can absorb.”

Adrienne continued to stare at the ceiling, even as she heard the sounds of the door opening and the bucket falling to the side of the road, where it would no doubt provide food for all sorts of desperate scavengers.

“That's a fine sword you've got,” the carriage's other occupant continued conversationally. “Seems I've seen it somewhere before.”

Though it hurt even to
think
about moving, Adrienne tilted her head just far enough to look at the man across from her. Alexandre Delacroix appeared much as he had at the market: hawk-nosed, sharp featured, practically bald…and smiling. Why in the name of all the gods was he smiling?

“Do…” Adrienne squeezed her eyes shut against a sudden wave of pain. “Do you…want it back?”

“I think, child, that it's a small price to pay for you saving my life back there.”

“Just…just repaying a debt.”

The carriage hit another rut, and Adrienne moaned. The older man's features clouded with concern. “I'm terribly sorry about this, child. You, uh, rather startled my guards, leaping from the carriage like that. I'm afraid that Martin hit you harder than he intended. You'll be all right, though. I'll have my best healers see to you personally.

“What did you mean,” he continued a moment later, “about repaying a debt?”

“You…saved me from your man…in the market.”

Delacroix's face twisted in puzzlement, then lit in comprehension. Softly, he chuckled. “I'm flattered you think so highly of me, child, but I fear you ascribe to me motives far more noble than I deserve. You were running smack dab through the middle of a crowded market, and the blunderbuss is not a precise weapon in even the most expert hands. The truth is, I was afraid that some of Claude's shot would strike bystanders in the crowd. If I could have been utterly certain of his accuracy, I'd have allowed him to fire.”

Adrienne's mouth worked, but no sound emerged.

The aristocrat read her mind, or at least her expression. “What happened two years past is just that, child: past. You've saved my life tonight, and that wipes clean a great many sins. You are in no danger from me. After you've recovered, you'll be permitted to leave. Unharmed, I assure you.”

That simple statement, far from bringing the reassurance Delacroix intended, served instead to dredge up the recollection of why she'd run in the first place.

“Pierre…,” she whispered, tears rolling down her cheeks.

Delacroix nodded slowly. “Pierre Lemarche? Yes, I recognized him. I knew his father, before the family's unfortunate decline. I fear he didn't survive the altercation. It looked as though one of the bandits killed him before the attack even began.”

He looked on kindly, sitting silent as Adrienne wept.

Only when the girl had cried herself out did he continue. “I understand,” he said, his tone sympathetic. “My wife passed nearly two years gone. Not long after you and I met, actually.” Another pause. “What's your name, child?”

She sniffed once, trying to focus past the grief and the pounding agony in her skull, wanting nothing more than to drift off to sleep for a very long time. “Adrienne,” she told him softly.

“Adrienne. Adrienne.” He repeated the name, rolling it about his mouth, examining the taste just as he would a fine vintage wine. He seemed to be contemplating something, something beyond the simple presence of the girl before him, and through her pain, Adrienne grew afraid.

But for now, at least, there was little to be done. She couldn't run, couldn't even stand. And so she lay where she was, her head leaning back upon the bouncing bench, with its insufficient padding. And all she could do was pray that this strange aristocrat told the truth when he told her he meant no harm.

NOW
:

Julien Bouniard strode past the ponderous door, rough with age but sturdy as the day it was hewn. He yanked the gauntlets from his hands as he walked, sticking them haphazardly through his belt. His nose wrinkled in distaste beneath the assault of the clinging mildew. Through ugly, claustrophobic corridors he passed, his path illuminated only by cheap lanterns suspended from the ceiling. The damn miserly city bookkeepers wouldn't even spring for decent lighting down here. The lamps were so poor that the light from one barely reached the circle of illumination from the next, and they smoked something awful, a constant irritant to the eyes and throat.

A second door, identical to the first, slowly materialized from the darkness before him. He fumbled at the keys on his belt, clanking them together softly, and unlatched the gargantuan lock with a resounding click.

The room beyond was cleaner than the hall, though this wasn't really much of an accomplishment, and was lit by modern lanterns far more efficient (and far less suffocating) than those in the cramped passage. A faded beige rug—or at least it was beige now, though Demas alone knew what color it might have been when new—covered the stone floor, and several old tapestries partially concealed the walls. An enormous desk occupied the room's far side, a series of cabinets stacked beside it, and yet a third door—not only locked, but barred with an iron-banded shaft as thick around as Julien's calf—lurked beyond.

The fellow behind that desk, garbed in a uniform that mirrored Julien's own, glanced up from beneath an uneven black hairline. He recognized Bouniard, of course, but policy was policy. Instantly he aimed a pair of enormous crossbows, swivel-mounted to the desk, in the newcomer's direction.

“Today's password!” he demanded harshly.

“Holy water.”

The other guard stood and saluted. “Major,” he offered with far more courtesy.

“Jacques.” Julien nodded. “Be seated.” The constable sat, his chair digging furrows in the carpet, and the major was just opening his mouth to speak when his jaw fell ever so slightly agape. Shouts, muffled to the point of utter incomprehensibility, and the clattering of something beating on the bars, penetrated even the heavy door.

“Is there a problem in there, Constable?” Bouniard asked seriously, mustache wrinkling as he frowned.

“Not really, sir. The new tenant's making a racket. Doesn't feel she belongs here, arrested unfairly, all the usual hogwash—but, uh, louder. To be honest, Major, I've sort of drowned it out.”

“I see. And she's been at it since she got here?” He sounded more than a little amazed.

“Well, after a fashion, sir. She's kept it up ever since she woke up, but that wasn't much more than two hours ago. I—”

“Woke up?” Julien leaned forward, hands on the desk. “Was she injured?” His damn ceremonial duties had kept him from hearing more than a perfunctory report on Widdershins's arrest.

“Again, Major, after a fashion. Way I hear tell, she was pretty bad off, but it wasn't our guys who did it. Seems they walked in on her and some big ox of a fellow having it out in the alley.” He grinned. “Seems it was
his
life they saved, too, not hers.”

Julien suppressed a grin of his own.
That
does
sound like her.
Aloud, he said, “I suppose I'd better go see to her, then. She's seen a healer?”

“Yes, sir. He felt that rest would be sufficient treatment.”

“Well, she'll have plenty of time for that here.” He paused. “The other man?”

“Sir?”

“The one she was fighting with.”

“Ah. Couldn't say, sir. I understand he was long gone by the time any of our people got back there.”

“I see. Be sure to get his description and pass it to the men, if it hasn't already been done. I'd like to have a word or two with him about fighting in the streets.”
Especially with a girl.

“I'll see it's done just as soon as I'm off shift, sir.”

“Splendid, Constable. Which cell?”

“Twenty-three, sir. Put her in there alone, since she was hurt and all.”

Jacques muscled the bar from its brackets, letting it thump heavily to the floor, and turned his key in a lock far more intricate than those on the previous doors. It swung open with a ghostly groan, a maw that opened into the depths of hell. With a shrug, Julien stepped through.

Another hallway, mildewed, smoky, and ill-lit with cheap lanterns, but this one was far from featureless. Every ten feet stood a door of heavy iron bars. And behind some of those gates stood, sat, or slept a rogue's gallery of Davillon's more unpleasant (or, in some cases, merely unfortunate) inhabitants. Catcalls, shouts, threats, and pleas rained down in a veritable blizzard as the major strode the hall. He made a clear show of ignoring them all.

Until he reached cell twenty-three, anyway. Widdershins, garbed in the drab brown that was Davillon's standard prisoner's wardrobe, her face marred by a few lingering trails of dried blood, shouted angrily and slammed her prison-issue ceramic mug—now cracking and crumbling into so much powder—into the bars.

“Those cost money, you know,” Julien told her calmly.

Widdershins glowered at him. “You let me out of here, Bouniard! Right now!”

“What's with the hysterics?” he asked, arms crossed over his chest and standing well beyond arm's reach.

“I just wanted to get your bloody attention! Now let me
out
!”

“You know better than that, Widdershins,” Julien told her, not entirely without sympathy.

The young woman sagged, her ruined cup falling from slackened fingers. “Bouniard, I didn't
do
anything!”
This time
, she added silently.

“Maybe, but I know you, Widdershins, and I can't risk assuming that your proximity to the archbishop—to say nothing of the city's rich and famous—was happy coincidence. Besides, I'm told you were fighting.”

“Oh, self-defense is a crime, now, is it?” she barked. “He hit me with a
hammer
, Bouniard! Have you ever been hit with a hammer? It's not actually as funny as you'd think.”

The major raised an eyebrow. “You look like hell, Widdershins, but I don't know that you look as bad as all
that.
”

“I recover quickly, Bouniard. I—” The young woman shuddered once, and Julien saw her eyes roll back in her head. He lunged forward, arms reaching through the bars, catching her just before she would have collapsed in a jellified heap. Gently, he lowered her to the ground.

“Maybe not as quickly as you think,” he told her softly. “You'll be safe here, and you'll have time to heal. Once the archbishop's gone, you'll be free to go.”

Widdershins nodded weakly.

Julien rose and marched back toward the outer door. Was, in fact, reaching out to ring the bell that would alert Jacques he wanted out when he stopped, hand abruptly flying to his belt.

“Widdershins!” His face reddening, he pounded once more down the hallway, skidding to a stop before the young woman's cell. She'd moved back into the center of the room and now stared at him through a mask of pure, angelic innocence.

“Is there a problem, Bouniard?”

“You damn well know there is, Widdershins! Give them back!”

She blinked once. “Give what back?”

“My bloody keys!” Julien snarled, no longer in any mood to be accommodating. Imperiously, he gestured at the manacles that hung from the back wall of the cell. “Put those on, Widdershins,” he ordered. “Now!”

“Wait a minute. I don't think—”

“Put them on, or I'll call a few constables in here and we'll put them on for you! And don't even try to leave them loose. I can tell!”

Muttering, Widdershins rose to her feet, staggered to the rear of the cell, and latched the heavy iron bands to her wrists.

At which point she looked straight at the fuming major and asked sweetly, “How are you going to open the cell door?”

An instant or two of silence, and then, as neighboring prisoners all burst out laughing, Julien cursed, face growing redder still, and left the corridor, returning moments later with a second set of keys.

The lock clicked, the bars swung inward, and the Guardsman stalked across the room, slamming to a halt directly before the young woman. “One last time, Widdershins. Give me my keys.”

“I don't have your stupid keys, Bouniard!”

“Fine. I'll be as professional about this as I can.” He began to search her, thoroughly. Prison garb didn't allow a plethora of hiding places, but Julien checked them all with an expert touch. Widdershins felt herself flush, but, true to his word, he remained professional, neither his eyes nor his hands lingering any longer than necessary.

As Bouniard neared the end of his search, Widdershins twisted her right wrist, just enough so the chain clanked audibly.

Bouniard instantly straightened, casting a suspicious glare first at that hand, and then at her face. “Don't move until I'm done,” he ordered.

By then, of course, it was too late. In the instant he'd turned to her right, Widdershins's left hand had darted out, to the very end of the chain's slack, and snagged Bouniard's keys. She really
hadn't
stolen them when she'd collapsed against him at the bars. She'd simply moved them to the back of his belt, knowing he'd leap to conclusions when they weren't in their accustomed spot. This time, she swiped them properly, allowing them to rest inside the sleeve he'd already searched.

With a curse of disgust, Bouniard stood, graced her with another angry glower and a stern “Don't move,” and unclasped the manacles, backing away swiftly as the iron clamps clicked open. Widdershins watched in mounting amusement as the major stormed from the cell. He slammed the gate with a resounding crash that echoed along the hall, apparently having taken up a formal patrol.

“Maybe you dropped them somewhere,” she offered helpfully.

Bouniard's left cheek twitched twice, and then he was gone, leaving Widdershins once more alone in the dimly lit cell.

“After that,” Widdershins continued earnestly over the rim of her goblet, brimming with a rich red that Genevieve had been saving for a special occasion, “it was just a matter of waiting long enough for the shift change. I just unlocked the cell door, went to the end of the hall, and rang the bell.” She frowned briefly. “The other prisoners wanted me to let them out, too,” she added thoughtfully. “But I just didn't think that would be right. I mean, I didn't want any
real
criminals to escape.”

“Of course not,” Gen agreed, hiding her smile behind her own goblet.
“Some
people
belong
in jail.”

“Absolutely!” Widdershins assented, oblivious. “Anyway, the guard wasn't expecting the bell, since he knew none of his own people were in the prison hall, so he was pretty cautious. Probably should have sent for reinforcements first, but Olgun was sweet enough to encourage him to come and take a quick look before he disturbed the other constables. A gentle knock over the head, a quick rummage through the cabinets to get my stuff back, and here I am!” She spread her arms in a dramatic “taa-daa!” sloshing more than a few swallows-worth across the table.

“And I'm glad you
are
here, and safe,” Gen told her seriously, though she eyed the wine-spattered tabletop with weary resignation. Careful not to spill a drop herself, she put down her own drink and leaned forward, expression somber. “Now let's try to
keep
you that way, shall we? Bouniard won't be happy about this, but if you lie low for a few months, I think the heat should—”

“I can't, Gen!” Widdershins insisted, shocked at such a profane suggestion. “I only have about four or six weeks before the archbishop leaves!”

A horrible suspicion crept up on Genevieve, tapping her urgently on the shoulder, but she refused to turn and acknowledge its presence. “What are you talking about?” she asked, almost sweetly.

Widdershins's face twisted into an ugly amalgamation of devious frustration. “Everyone's so sure they've got the right to walk all over me,” she spat, fingers clenching on the table. “'Oh, Widdershins might get us into trouble while the archbishop's here, better beat her into jam so she can't hurt the guild!' ‘Oh, Widdershins dared appear in the crowd to watch His Holiness arrive, better throw her in jail!' They have no
right
, Gen! None of them!”