He held the box up for her, and she unhooked the little brazen latch and opened it. A soft ah! escaped her as she looked within. It was a ring, but of a size to fit around her neck rather than a finger, glowing against the dark velvet that lined the interior of the box; a torc, the ancient royal emblem of the Gael, the gold of it worked in a delicate tracery of leaf and vine. The open ends swelled into a lunar disk and a flame-wreathed sun opposite each other, carved of moonstone and amber.
"Nigel, it's beautiful!" she cried softly, and took it up. "You really thought about this, didn't you?"
His smile was shy, oddly charming on the weathered, middle-aged face. "I tried."
Juniper started to put it around her neck, spreading the soft metal a little, then hesitated. "This is meant as an engagement torc, isn't it, Nigel my heart?"
"Yes, my dear. I hope it'll do, until I have a wedding gift-besides myself, that is."
Her smile broadened. She settled it around her neck; it was snug when she let the circle close again with the Sun and Moon on her right and left collarbones. The metal was surprisingly heavy for all its delicacy, and a bit cold. It warmed quickly; she felt her breath grow a little short, and more so after she leaned forward and took his face between her hands and kissed him.
"Then I'll take it in the spirit it's given," she said after a moment. "Beauty, and love, and friendship."
They clasped hands and looked at each other, then laughed. Her smile grew impish for an instant. "The child will need a father, after all."
She laughed delightedly at his astonishment. "No, I'm not, not yet-that would be a miracle, and from the wrong mythos! But I'm still under the Moon, and I always wanted three, you know! For the symbolism? And this time I get to keep the man to help with the chores, which will be a nice change."
"My dear: darling Juniper: you've made me a very happy man, and I hadn't expected to be happy again, you know."
"Not nearly as happy as I intend to make you!" she went on, standing and taking him by the hand. "I've waited long enough."
"And so have I," Nigel said.
He moved with a lithe suddenness and she was swept up in his arms; she could feel the compact strength in his chest and arms.
"First door on the right," she murmured.
Second roof to the right, Tiphaine thought.
The Hatfields had built their business up gradually, and the result was a complex of boxlike buildings joined to each other higgledy-piggeldy, each with its own tin roof, or covering of salvaged asphalt roofing tile. She avoided the metal as much as possible; even in her soft-soled climbing boots, it was hard to avoid making noise on it, and it was dangerously slippery when wet-and during a Willamette Valley winter, it would be wet about ninety-nine percent of the time. Luckily the Hatfields hadn't skimped, and the roofs had solid, heavy-duty plywood or planks nailed to the stringers beneath the waterproofing layer, so they didn't creak much. The sky was overcast, and the streetlights were turned down with dawn near. That made it near enough to pitch-dark up here as no matter, and in her matte-black outfit she was effectively invisible. Everything was covered save for a slit in the tight hood that let her see, and the skin around her eyes was blackened with charcoal.
Katrina had said once that made her look like a raccoon. She stopped for an instant; let the fury wash through her and over her without tensing her muscles or disturbing the even tenor of her breathing. Then she went on, walking step by step, careful to keep below the ridgeline. She crossed it flat on her belly, moving with cautious speed. Sir Jason Mortimer was in a second-story storeroom on this side, with only two guards, according to what the consulate knew. Nobody in Corvallis knew how to keep their mouths shut, evidently.
Yes.
Everything looked the same as it had through binoculars from a taller building not far away. Her chamois-gloved fingers went to her belt. The sling was of leather like her gloves, equally butter-soft, yearling doe hide tanned with brains. The cup at the bottom was just the right size for the projectile, an egg-shaped thing of sand molded with wax. Lead or stone were too likely to kilclass="underline"
I miss my crossbow, she thought, as she systematically tightened and relaxed muscles to keep them limber while she crouched in the near-freezing dampness.
She had a little beauty, a pre-Change model with a 7x scope and a built-in crank for reloading, its skeleton body all synthetics and carbon composites, half the weight of a standard modern wood-and-steel military model and just as powerful. Out of the question to use it here and now. This was taking a long time, but it all depended on how big the guards' bladders were. Hopefully they wouldn't come down to pee in chorus, but that wasn't likely. One would stay by the door at all times; from the files, Hatfield didn't hire incompetents. Right now that would help her. They were concentrating on keeping Mortimer prisoner, not on protecting him.
Ah. Her mind slipped effortlessly back into full alertness. A door swung open, then banged shut again as a spring took it. She looked away to make sure the momentary glow of lamplight through it didn't lessen her night vision, then back. I was right. The man unbuttoned and let loose on a heap of straw and manure near the center of the L formed by the two buildings, with his back to her. There really wasn't much point in staying inside and using a pot, when there was a dungheap so close, and only the house here had a connection to the city sewer system. It was another two hours before either man was due to be relieved.
The stream of urine smoked in the cold, wet air. Tiphaine took the ends of the sling in her right hand and the cup in her left, holding it taut but not tight. She kept the position while the man shook off and buttoned back up; it would look suspicious if he wet himself. Then :
Up from the crouch, smooth and steady. A single sweep around her head, and release. Cloven air hummed, a subdued whirr and swish. Then a dull, wet thump.
Bull's-eye, the huntress thought.
The man fell limp as a half-full sack of grain. Behind the mask the Association warrior's lips skinned back from white teeth. She waited nonetheless, counting the seconds against her heartbeat-which was a useful technique for keeping calm in itself. A half minute passed, and another. The quiet remained absolute, the loudest sound a dog barking for a few moments. She started to move, then froze: footsteps on the street outside, beyond the fence to her right, loud and careless. Her head turned; just a flicker of motion through the boards of the fence, a rhythmic tapping Watchman on patrol, she thought; that was a nightstick. No, they call them police officers here. He didn't call the hour, or that all was well, either, as he would have in Portland, or check non-nobles for their night-pass. Sloppy.
The steps faded off into the distance. She waited only a few seconds beyond that; much longer and the guard's partner would come to see what was going on. A rope and grapnel were looped around her shoulder like a bandolier, and she set the two rubber-sheathed hooks on the guttering, over a bracket where the thin metal would be strong enough to bear her weight. The rope dropped twenty feet to the brick pavement of the yard, and she slid down it with the cord locked between her shins. A flick, and the grapnel came loose and fell into her hands.
Half a dozen strides took her to the fallen man. She checked his breathing; it was slow and natural, and the shot had only broken in three pieces when it flattened against his skull, which made it easy to pick up. He hadn't injured himself falling, which was to be expected-most people fell much more skillfully if they were completely limp. Then she peeled back the eyelids to confirm that she hadn't scrambled his brains either; knocking someone out and not doing lasting harm was a lot more difficult than you might think, hard enough with a cosh, requiring real skill with a sling.