Visions of Iron Degan calling in my marker, a toothy grin on his broad face, ran through my mind. “You’d better not die,” I said to Degan. A small smile flickered onto his face, then vanished. “Yes, I’m willing to be bound by all that,” I said.
Degan nodded curtly. “Since the first days of the degans, through to the present, and until our Order is broken and its members turned to dust, so will it be. As I am bound to your service, so are you bound to mine. My sword stands as a symbol of this covenant.”
With that, he turned the sword in his hand so the point was facing up, brought it to his lips, and kissed the steel. Then he held it out to me. I followed suit. The metal was cool on my lips and tasted of oil.
“So be it,” said Degan. He wiped his blade on a sleeve and sheathed it.
We stood in silence.
“That’s it?” I said at last.
“That’s it,” said Degan.
“No clap of thunder, no lightning, no wailing spirits in the shadows? After all you told me, I expected something a little more dramatic.”
“Sorry to disappoint you. Next time I’ll hire a Mouth to fill the streets with fog and glowing lights.”
“Don’t worry,” I said. “There won’t be a next time.”
“There usually isn’t,” said Degan.
I wiped my mouth on the back of my hand to remove the last lingering hints of honing oil. “So?” I said.
Degan turned and resumed walking down the alley, this time slowly. I fell in beside him.
“Iron Degan,” he said, letting the name hang on the air for several paces. “He’s proud. As a man, as a degan. He doesn’t exactly cozen to the idea of some members of the Order selling their swords for coin, rather than solely for the Oath. It’s something most of us have done at one point or another-you have to live, after all, and coin tends to spend better than reputation in the long run. But, except for one or two occasions, my brothers and sisters have been able to keep the distinction between paid work and the Oath separate.”
“ ‘One or two occasions’?” I said.
Degan glanced down at my rapier. “Funny,” he said. “That doesn’t look like a degan’s sword in your scabbard.”
I chuckled. “Right,” I said. “Mind my own damn business. So what would Iron Degan have the Order do?”
“Find a cause and fight for it. Serve a worthy master or mistress. Hold ourselves above petty squabbles and enforcement-for-hire. Iron had his share of clan wars and slaughter-for-profit when he was growing up; he wants to put that behind him. He’d rather serve the goal than the man.”
“So he’s seeking a higher road?”
“As much as anyone can who fights and kills for a living.”
“Which means he’s sworn himself to an idea or a cause, and not just a person, in Ten Ways.”
Degan shrugged. “It’s Iron. He’s given the Oath to someone he believes in. That person either is the cause for him, or his link to it. But whoever that is, they aren’t a run-of-the-mill Kin, or even a promising Upright Man. As I said, Iron is proud, and as a degan, he wouldn’t let himself serve a minor cause. Whoever he’s sworn to, it’s no small player.”
“Bigger than an Upright Man?” I said.
We stopped short of where the Cloisters let out onto Plank Street, keeping to the shadows for a little longer. Ahead of us, the street was filling up with morning light and foot traffic.
“That’s my guess,” said Degan.
I leaned back against the alley wall, feeling the sudden need for support. “Degan,” I said, “are you telling me we’re up against a Gray Prince in Ten Ways? A fucking Gray Prince?”
Degan kept his eyes locked on the street as he said, “Now you understand why I wanted you to walk away.”
I barely heard him. I was too busy contemplating the wall behind my head, wondering how hard, and how many times, I would need to bash my skull against it to make this all go away. No more than five, I decided-maybe six to be safe.
Go up against one of the Princes of the Kin? People talked about them in whispers, spoke about them as legends more than as flesh and blood. How the hell do you take on a legend? Even an Upright Man like Nicco knew better than to cross that line. And here was Degan, who seemed to have figured all of this out before me, agreeing to do it, anyhow-no, not just agreeing, but taking an Oath on it. My friend was insane.
But then what did that make me? Degan had been telling me to walk away, to let it go; yet my gut still told me to follow it through. Why?
Because of the Dark King; because if whoever was backing Iron Degan got his way, he’d bring the empire down on us all over again. I didn’t want to have to face the empire, to choose between fighting or hiding, to have to look over my shoulder for White Sashes for the next five years or give up the Kin life altogether.
And, ultimately, because I was a Nose, I wanted to know what the hell was going on, who was trying to play me, and make them pay. If the empire stepped in, that might never happen.
“Any idea which Prince it might be?” I said. I thought back to the sewers. “Was it the woman we heard with him in Ten Ways?”
“I don’t know,” said Degan. “Maybe, but that could just as easily have been a lieutenant. Gray Princes don’t usually run on raids from what I hear. But I do have a few avenues I can follow, now that I’m committed to the matter.”
There was a resigned note to Degan’s voice. I suspected he was going to tap his resources within his Order, to pry into his fellow degan’s business.
I knew how he felt; as a Nose, I couldn’t help but know. But as a Nose, I also knew that no amount of sympathy or comment on my part would make a difference. So I held my peace and instead pushed myself away from the alley wall.
“Good hunting,” I said.
“What about you?” said Degan.
I looked out on Plank Street again. More people, more light, shorter shadows; it was well into morning.
“I have to go see if I can keep my boss from being drawn into a war he can’t win,” I said.
“Good luck with that,” said Degan drily. I shrugged and headed deeper into the Cloisters. Degan stayed where he was for a moment, then walked in the opposite direction, out onto Plank Street.
A few blocks later, I found a Dancer’s Ladder-a collection of crates and refuse arranged to look like a random pile of garbage. In truth, there were hidden handholds and carefully arranged supports among the debris to allow for a quick ascent to the arches and roofs above. Even with the ladder, though, it wasn’t easy-between the fall down the stairs and the deep bruises and muscle knots Tamas’s rope had caused, I wasn’t moving as easily as I’d like. Every reach and pull and push burned in a different part of my body. When I got to the top, I was gasping.
At least the air up here was still heavy with the smells of the sea that surrounded the city on three sides. As the day wore on, it would be replaced by smoke and dust, but, for now, I took a deep breath and reveled in its freshness. Overhead, the sky was a deep blue, with only the slightest smudge of gray far to the west-rain, but whether it would make it here or not was another matter. The sea had a habit of fighting with the land when it came to who ruled the skies over Ildrecca.
I yawned and slipped another two ahrami into my mouth. They helped, but only just. I could feel the last several days looming behind me, waiting to pounce. Yesterday’s sleep had helped, but that was almost eighteen hours gone. I glanced off in the direction of Stone Arch and my home, then turned away.
One more thing, I promised myself. One more errand, and then I could sleep.
I made it across the Dancer’s Highway more out of habit than out of conscious effort. Peaks and gutters and roof gardens passed in a blur, and before I was fully aware of it, I was scrambling down a drain pipe into a back alley in Silver Disc cordon. I was sweaty, tired, and more than a little ready to say to hell with it. Except I knew I couldn’t.