“Well. I suppose not. We’re done here?” He motioned to the door. I shook my head.
“You’re with a whore. Give it a little time, unless you want everyone making fun of you.”
He frowned, then sat on the bed, folding his hands across his knees. “You’re new. Never worked with you before.”
“No, I’m not. But you’ve never worked with me because this isn’t my usual thing.” I put my hands in my pockets and leaned against the wall opposite the bed.
“Drugs?”
“Talking to people.” I grinned.
He shifted uncomfortably and looked away. We sat like that for a minute, long enough that he was on edge.
“What do you know about five bullets in a gun? Five bullets and an empty chamber?” He jumped, but not in the way I was hoping.
“Sorry, I don’t understand. Is that some kind of threat?”
“Twice tonight, people have asked me that. Twice. All the years I’ve been doing this, you think people would know when I’m making a threat.”
“So… so it’s a threat.”
I sighed and flipped my hand at the door. “Long enough. Get out of here, Register.” He nodded sharply and got out. I locked the door behind him, in case some other affectionate couple thought about using the room immediately. Wanted a few minutes before I returned to the hall. I had just turned from the door when the knob rattled, very quietly. Someone trying to open the door without making a racket.
Drawing the pistol, I turned and backed to the other door, the one that led to the service corridors. I opened it as quietly as I could and stepped inside. This hallway was plain and warm, but the floor was thickly carpeted to allow butlers and maids to slip through the house without bothering their betters. There was no one around at the moment, so I pulled the door nearly closed and waited.
Whoever was trying to get in was insistent. When the door didn’t immediately open they hesitated. A second later there was a scratching sound, and the knob began to hum. That was a keygear, tumbling the lock hard. These doors weren’t made to withstand that kind of attention and it popped in no time.
The door slid open, just a little, just enough to reveal a sliver of face and an eye, cloud blue. His hand rested on the doorknob. The cuff was dark blue; an Artificer’s cuff. He looked around the room, saw that it was empty, and disappeared. I stayed long enough to see an officer enter a minute later, each arm around a girl. I left them to it, pocketed the pistol and crept down the service corridor, eventually returning to the hall by way of the kitchens.
I made a slow circuit of the main hall, looking for my light-eyed admirer. Most folks were milling about, talking in tight clusters or roaring drunkenly at the bar. The Corpsmen were the worst off; the night was in honor of a dead zep, after all. They were nervous, and making up for it with drink and song. I understood. I had spent a fair amount of time lost in drink. Less song, but that was my merciful side showing.
He was nowhere to be seen. There was no one in an Artificer’s uniform anywhere in the room. I thought he might have dumped the outfit, so I paid close attention to people’s eyes. That almost started a couple fights. I still came up empty, and now the night was winding down, drunks wandering off to their rooms and servants scurrying about to clear the detritus.
“Councilor Burn, is it?” A voice behind me asked.
I turned. There was a man standing against the wall, a glass of whiskey in his hand. The ice in his drink had melted and separated, the thin amber of the liquor at the bottom, water at the top of the glass. The man’s suit was impeccably tailored; all black, with velvet cuffs and links of silver polished white. It was civilian garb, but he held himself with military precision. His eyes were dark and his head was bald. When he smiled it was without emotion; it was like watching a puppet smile.
“I am not,” I said. “Though my father holds that title. And you are?”
“Apologies, sir.” He tipped his head and offered a hand. He was wearing thin leather gloves, soft as a lady’s cheek. We shook. There was surprising power in his grip. “I am Malcolm Sloane. Your father may have spoken of me? No?” he said, without waiting for a reaction. “Perhaps not. But we are acquainted. You must be his son, then. Jacob. The interesting one.”
I adjusted my coat, flashed a bit of the pistol, enough to let him know he was talking on unfriendly ground. His smile became genuine.
“My. Yes. Interesting one, indeed. I must say, Mr. Jacob, I’m surprised to see you here.”
“I was invited.”
“Of course. I mean, just,” he waved his hand at all the people around us, most of them in uniform. “You’re not a very popular man with the Corps. You don’t worry about that?”
“I should worry?” I asked.
“Well, I mean. A lot of young recruits, all of them drinking. You aren’t worried that one of them will drink a bit much. Talk too much, maybe dare too much? Try to start a fight.”
I snorted. “Fights start sometimes. I can handle myself.”
“Oh, I have no doubt. Still. It’s something to think about.” He smiled coldly and looked out at the crowd. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe none of them have the balls.” He said that word strangely, like a very proper man trying to swear to fit in with the rough crowd. “But maybe they do something cowardly, hm? In the dead of night. A gun.” He turned back to me. “You are, after all, a very unpopular man.”
“How did you say you knew my dad?”
“Acquaintances. Old acquaintances. So.” He set down the glass of liquor and patted my arm. “Just be careful, Mr. Jacob Burn. There are some desperate people here, I think. Ah,” his eyes narrowed as he looked across the room. “You’ll pardon me.”
I turned to see where he was looking. Angela Tomb was making her way through the partygoers, trying to wrap things up for the night. When I turned back the strange Mr. Sloane was gone.
I sighed and finished my drink, then found Harold and plucked at his sleeve.
“Sir?” he asked.
“Those Guildsmen, the Artificers. Did they already head home?”
“No, sir. They’ve been made comfortable.”
“Where?”
“Sir?”
“Where are they staying? What room?”
“The, uh. The entertainment, sir, does not usually mingle with the guests.”
“Just tell me what room, okay?” I slipped the only hard currency I had brought with me into his palm. “Let’s just say I’m a curious guy.”
“Of course, sir. They are housed in the servants’ quarters, near the zepdock.”
“Stairs down somewhere?”
“Near the kitchens, sir. Just this side of the theater.”
“Thanks.” I cuffed him on the shoulder, then headed to my room. Didn’t want to look too anxious.
The storm kept going, maybe even got worse. Angela had given me a third floor room with a window. Not a benefit on a night like this. The room had been closed up all winter, only opened hours earlier by the servants. The air was stale, and the sheets smelled like dust and cobwebs. The heavy curtains gusted with the storm outside, evidence of drafts in the old walls.
I lay in bed, fully clothed, until I figured everyone else was asleep or passed out. I took the pistol out from where I’d hidden it, checked the load again, then snuck out into the hall.
The lights in the hallway were dimmed. The carpet swallowed my footsteps as I crept downstairs. I got down to the servants corridors without anyone seeing me. It was quiet down there too, and dark. No windows out, just cold stone floors and wood paneling. I crept along, quiet as a cat. There were a lot of doors down here. Perhaps I could have gotten a little more detail out of Harold for my money.
I didn’t have to look long. They left the lights on, and their door open. It was around a corner from the main stairs, away from the rest of the servants. Not unusual… people got nervous around Artificers. All those bugs and their history of heresy. I came around the corner and smelled it, that heat-stink of fear and shit, like a slaughterhouse. I took out the pistol and thumbed the hammer up.
They were dead. It happened quietly, no mess, no fuss. They had been sleeping, the Guildsmen all in one room on tiny bunks. The master was in a different room off to one side. Each had a stab wound, straight into the heart. I didn’t check them all. I got the idea, after the first couple. There was another room, opposite the master’s bed, where the Summer Girl had slept, probably. She was gone. Signs of a struggle in here, piss on the floor, some blood on a broken bottle. She had swung at her attacker. Probably woke up while her keepers had been breathing their last. Tried to defend herself. Where was she now? And why kill all these folks? Not like it was self-defense.