Afterward Khembold escorted Méarana back to her assigned quarters. On the Great Square, the auditorium announced a public lecture for the coming evening: “Implications of Potency and Act for Being as Such.” A small group of villagers were chaffering with the philosopher, who stood in sandals and a long brown robe at the open door. His hood shadowed his features, but he glanced up as the harper walked past.
“Be of good cheer, sister!” he called. “I hope to see you tonight!”
Good cheer, indeed, she thought, and realized a third reason. Krakens did not come off moors!
“Perhaps,” murmured Khembold when they had reached the door, “I might come in with you for a time. There are things you need to know about how matters stand here.”
The sun had gone down and Ravn’s arm had gone numb. Gidula’s shuttles had soared off to rendezvous in orbit at Gidula’s slider. Good-bye, Donovan, she thought as they rose. I suppose we shall not be such good friends now.
No one would be coming up to the Nose to look over the edge in the expectation of a dangling Ravn. Or rather, those who did expect it would not be disposed to come. She amused herself for a moment with the list of those who might be in the Old One’s confidence. The list was a curiously short one, Gidula not being widely known for his trust, and most of those were to have been left behind to staff the Forks.
With her right foot, Ravn felt out another ledge to relieve the strain on her left. But the thin shelf crumbled under her and her arm twisted. The cliff was limestone and sandstone and unaccustomed to such strenuous duty. Rock fragments clattered and bounced on their way to the river, where a narrow shelf marked the track of an ancient road. A road paved of bones now, she supposed, but she did not look down to confirm this deduction.
How many others had Gidula tumbled off this cliff? And what had Magpie One done to earn the Old One’s disfavor? Or had it been the Old One who had earned the magpie’s disfavor? Perhaps there had been some disagreement over loyalties. Judging by how long One had been on “detached duty,” he had been removed about the time Gidula began planning the assault on the Secret City.
Was it true, as she had heard, that Donovan had given Five a name? And did he realize the significance of the act? Likely so. Donovan knew more than he let show and played a deep game, deeper perhaps than even Gidula suspected.
But delivering the harper to the Forks had put Donovan off that game. Dancing nimbly around threats against himself, he had been caught by threats to his daughter. Certainly Donovan had understood Gidula’s tacit warning.
Everyone had been underestimating Gidula. Dawshoo had treated him as a wise counselor, but past his prime; Oschous and Manlius had openly mocked him. But there was play in the old limbs yet. It was clear to Ravn now that he had violated the traditions of kaowèn precisely because he had known it would drive her to attempt his assassination and so provide him with a traditional excuse for her summary execution. And free him of an affection that might bind him in the future. That he had allowed her to dangle here rather than daze her and watch her fall was a mark of his cruelty.
And his confidence that she could not climb up.
How justified was that confidence? She was rock bound at three points. The small ledge that supported her left foot; her right fist jammed into a crack in the rock; and the cable whose pistol-end she clenched in her left fist. She thumbed the reel and the cable taughtened as it tried to haul her up. But the piton slipped and a shower of stones pelted her. The rock in which the spike was embedded was no more secure than any other spot on the rotten cliff face. It would hold, but not hold her entire weight.
If she could not climb up, then might she climb down? But the sun was low, casting the face of the cliff in shadow. It was hard to see where hand or foot might nestle.
There was a way down. It was fast and certain, but it was also final.
A face peered over the lip of the Nose silhouetted against the westering sky.
“That was hardly a textbook assassination,” it said.
“Gwillgi Hound!” said Ravn. “What game are you playing?”
The Hound rubbed his mustache with the side of his finger. “If I lifted you up, it might be only that I was inclined to throw you back down.”
“You once gave succor to Domino Tight.”
“Domino Tight did not place Méarana ban Bridget into the hands of our sworn enemies.”
Domino Tight’s face appeared next to Gwillgi’s. “Pay him no mind. He is only entertaining you while I finish anchoring the rescue line.”
“His wit o’erwhelms me,” said Ravn. “Domino Tight, my sweet … What are you doing here! You were to guard Méarana after I had left with Gidula and the others!”
“You didn’t leave with Gidula and the others,” the other Shadow pointed out. “Gwillgi Hound was right. I have seen better assassinations. Beside, Khembold Darling has charge of your harper; and Gwillgi tells me that Khembold is a devotee of Geshler Padaborn.” A cable with a loop in the end snaked over the cliff and dangled by her free foot. She slid her boot into the stirrup and, pulling her arm from the crack, she wrapped it around the cable with no little relief.
“Who told Gwillgi that?” The two men at the top of the Nose began hauling her up. Ravn started to twist but used her other hand to steady herself against the cliff.
“Donovan himself,” said the Hound, “when he and I met in Prizga.”
“Ooh, Doonoovan was a busy buoy, I see. But he is deceived. Khembold’s father was one of those who betrayed the Rising. And the son has no more scruples. Believe me. When the Old One told him to ‘take care of’ the harper, Khembold knew what was required of him. Once he had secured Donovan’s submission, Gidula had no more use for her. She will live only so long as need be to maintain that submission, which means for so long as Donovan might reasonably expect to contact her from the ship and receive a living answer.”
“Then,” said Domino Tight with a grunt as he pulled Ravn over the top of the Nose, “we have several days while they crawl up to the coopers.”
Ravn staggered to her feet, stumbled a bit from the pain in her left leg. “Maybe. Donovan has too many genuine partisans aboard ship. An open break would mean a large war in a small space. If Donovan suspects the harper harmed, he may sacrifice all for wild vengeance. Oh, Domino, you should have let me dangle—or even fall—and not abandoned the plans we laid.”
“Can I let a gozhiinyaw fall to her death if I can stop it? I thought that—”
“Yes, yes, and if I had thought the same, I would have done the same. Come, we can only play the game from where we stand now—and hope that Khembold toys with her first.”
The three of them set off at a jog, pacing one another. Gwillgi laughed. “He may find the toys a little sharper than he expects.”
But Ravn shook her head. “He knows about the hideout knife she keeps up her sleeve.”
Méarana was her mother’s daughter. There are no dangerous weapons, little one, Bridget ban had once told her. But there are dangerous men. And in the hands of a dangerous man, anything may be a weapon.
Little Méarana had drunk it all in wide-eyed. Perhaps even so long ago, her mother had esteemed a time when enemies might strike at her through the child.