"Gods," Locke muttered as they trudged along beside the road, "I'm getting too tired to think straight. I really have let myself slouch out of condition."
"Well, you're going to get some exercise these next few days, whether you like it or not. How" re the wounds?"
"They itch," said Locke. "This damn mush does them little good, I suspect. Still, it's not as bad as it was. A few hours of motion seems to have had some benefit."
"Wise in the ways of all such things is Jean Tannen," said Jean. "Wiser by far than most; especially most named Lamora."
"Shut your fat, ugly, inarguably wiser face," said Locke. "Mmmm. Look at those idiots scamper away from us."
"Would you do otherwise if you saw a pair of real slipskinners by the side of the road?" "Eh. I suppose not. Damn these aching feet, too."
"Let's get a mile or two outside town, then find a place to rest. Once we've put some leagues under our heels, we can ditch this mush and pose as respectable travellers again. Any idea where you want to strike out for?"
"I should" ve thought it was obvious," said Locke. "These little towns are for pikers. We're after gold and white iron, not clipped coppers. Let's make for Tal Verrar. Something's bound to present itself there." "Mmm. Tal Verrar. Well, it is close." "Camorri have a long and glorious history of kicking the piss out of.? our poor Verrari cousins, so I say, on to Tal Verrar," said Locke. "And glory." They walked on a way under the tickling mist of the morning drizzle. "And baths."
CHAPTER TWO
Requin
1
Though Locke saw that Jean remained as unsettled by their experience in the Night Market as he was, they spoke no more of the matter. There was a job to be done.
The close of the working day for honest men and women in Tal Verrar was just the beginning of theirs. It had been strange at first, getting used to the rhythm of a city where the sun simply fell beneath the horizon like a quiescent murder victim each night, without the glow of Falselight to mark its passing. But Tal Verrar had been built to different tastes or needs than Camorr, and its Elderglass simply mirrored the sky, raising no light of its own.
Their suite at the Villa Candessa was high-ceilinged and opulent; at five silver volani a night, nothing less was to be expected. Their fourth-floor window overlooked a cobbled courtyard in which carriages, studded with lanterns and outriding mercenary guards, came and went with echoing clatters.
"Bondsmagi," muttered Jean as he tied on his neck-cloths before a looking glass. Til never hire one of the bastards to do so much as heat my tea, not if I live to be richer than the Duke of Camorr."
"Now there's a thought," said Locke, who was already dressed and sipping coffee. A full day of sleep had done wonders for his head. "If we were richer than the Duke of Camorr, we could hire a whole pack of them and give them instructions to go lose themselves on a desolate fucking island somewhere."
"Mmm. I don't think the gods made any islands desolate enough for my tastes."
Jean finished tying his neck-cloths with one hand and reached for his breakfast with the other. One of the odder services the Villa Candessa provided for its long-term guests was its "likeness cakes" — little frosted simulacra fashioned after the guests by the inn's Camorr-trained pastry sculptor. On a silver tray beside the looking-glass, a little sweetbread Locke (with raisin eyes and almond-butter blond hair) sat beside a rounder Jean with dark chocolate hair and beard. The baked Jean's legs were already missing.
A few moments later, Jean was brushing the last buttery crumbs from the front of his coat. "Alas, poor Locke and Jean." "They died of consumption," said Locke.
"I do wish I could be there to see it when you talk to Requin and Selendri, you know."
"Hmmm. Can I trust you to still be in Tal Verrar by the time I finish?" He tired to leaven the question with a smile, only partially succeeding.
"You know I won't go anywhere," said Jean. "I'm still not sure it's wise. But you know I won't."
"I do. I'm sorry." He finished his coffee and set the cup down. "And my chat with Requin isn't going to be all that terribly interesting."
"Nonsense. I heard a smirk in your voice. Other people smirk when their work is finished; you grin like an idiot just before yours really begins."
"Smirking? I'm as slack-cheeked as a corpse. I'm just looking forward to being done with it. Tedious business. I anticipate a dull meeting."
"Dull meeting, my arse. Not after you walk straight up to the lady with the brass bloody hand and say, "Excuse me, madam, but…"
2
"I have been cheating," said Locke. "Steadily. At every single game I" ve played since my partner and I first came to the Sinspire, two years ago."
Receiving a piercing stare from Selendri was a curious thing; her left eye was nothing but a dark hollow, half-covered with a translucent awning that had once been a lid. Her single good eye did the work of two, and damned if it wasn't unnerving.
"Are you deaf, madam? Every single one. Cheating. All the way up and down this precious Sinspire, cheating floor after floor, taking your other guests for a very merry ride."
"I wonder," she said in her slow, witchy whisper, "if you truly understand what it means to say that to me, Master Kosta. Are you drunk?" "I'm as sober as a suckling infant." "Is this something you" ve been put up to?"
"I am completely serious," said Locke. "And it's your master I would speak to about my motivations. Privately."
The sixth floor of the Sinspire was quiet. Locke and Selendri were alone, with four of Requin's uniformed attendants waiting about twenty feet away. It was still too early in the evening for this level's rarefied crowd to have finished their slow, carousing migration up through the livelier levels.
At the heart of the sixth floor was a tall sculpture within a cylinder of transparent Elderglass. Though the glass could not be worked by human arts, there were literally millions of cast-off fragments and shaped pieces scattered around the world, some of which could be conveniently fitted to human use. There were Elderglass scavenging guilds in several cities, capable of filling special needs in exchange for exorbitant fees.
Within the cylinder was something Locke could only describe as a copperfall — it was a sculpture of a rocky waterfall, taller than a man, in which the rocks were shaped entirely from silver volani coins, and the "water" was a constant heavy stream of copper cenrira, thousands upon thousands of them. The clatter within the soundproof glass enclosure must have been tremendous, but for those on the outside the show proceeded in absolute silence. Some mechanism in the floor was catching the stream of coins and re-circulating it up the back of the silver "rocks". It was eccentric and hypnotic… Locke had never before known anyone to decorate a room with a literal pile of money. "Master? You presume that I have one." "You know I mean Requin." "He would be the first to correct your presumption. Violently."
"A private audience would give us a chance to clear up several misunderstandings, then."
"Oh, Requin will certainly speak to you — very privately." Selendri snapped the fingers of her right hand twice and the four attendants converged on Locke. Selendri pointed up; two of them took firm hold of his arms, and together they began to lead him up the stairs. Selendri followed a few steps behind.
The seventh floor was dominated by another sculpture within an even wider Elderglass enclosure. This one resembled a circle of volcanic islands, again built from silver volani, floating in a sea of solid-gold solari. Each of the silver peaks had a stream of gold coins bubbling from its top, to fall back down into the churning, gleaming "ocean". Requin's guards maintained a pace too vigorous for Locke to catch many more details of the sculpture or the room; they passed another pair of uniformed attendants beside the stairwell and continued up.