“He told me he bought it new,” a young voice piped up. The prodigal Grandon stood with her arms crossed and her eyes even crosser. Detan cringed and glanced away. He was no good with children; he couldn’t even puzzle out how old the little thing was. Best to keep focused on the adults of the situation.
“Alas,” he intoned and coughed wretchedly into the crook of his arm. “I am grievously ill, and so I have come to take the flier away before my contagion spreads to you innocent souls.”
“Hah!” Grandon spit when he laughed. “I’m not letting you walk out of here with that flier, cur. I bought it fair and square. It’s my little girl’s, now.”
“Hold, now,” Lady Grandon said. “Just what is your illness, young man?”
“Ugh.” He reached up and shook out his greasy hair with his fingers as if it itched him dearly. Those nearest to him scurried further away, widening the gulf of empty air around him. “Sand scabies, gentle lady. I pray you don’t get too close, in case they decide to make a dreadful leap.”
“Hmm.” She clucked her tongue and produced a pair of fine leather gloves from her pocket, then pulled them on with expert ease. “How long have you had symptoms?”
“They began shortly after I met your husband at the Salt Baths.” Her lips twitched, and Grandon’s face went white. “I am told the nits may have been on me for weeks before. Why, they are no doubt crawling all over the fiber of the flier’s ropes and hosting dinner parties in the crevices of the wood.”
“A reasonable assumption, but I will need to examine you to be sure.”
“I, uh, would prefer you do not risk your safety on my behalf.”
“Nonsense,” Grandon cut in, a smirk on his reddened lips. “My wife is the finest apothik in all Aransa.”
Detan swallowed, and hoped his added pallor would make the disguise more convincing. “Is she now?”
“Oh, yes.”
“Well, then–”
Before he could muster further protest the Lady Grandon crossed to him and caught his chin between iron-tough fingers. She turned his head this way and that, but he was startled to find her eyes did not leave his own. He met her gaze, choked down his fear, and squared his shoulders. He could probably outrun her…
“Definitely sand scabies,” she raised her voice for all to hear.
For one infinitesimal moment, a shiver of terror wormed its way into Detan’s core. Could there have been some mistake? Could a real sickness be lurking beneath his makeup? Damn Tibs and his sand trick, it was working too well. That had to be it.
Lady Grandon shook her head, slow and grave, then released his chin and stepped back. She peeled the gloves from her hands and tossed them in a nearby firepit. Fine leather erupted into little sparking embers, an average miner’s week worth of pay gone up in a flash.
“Well along,” she continued. “I am in fact quite surprised to see a case so advanced still walking and talking. Usually by the time they get this far they can do little more than roll around on their cots and moan. Tell me, do you have any pain?”
“A very great deal of it.”
“Pity. The flier of course will have to be destroyed, we can’t have the evil little things spreading.” She snapped her fingers and a black-jacketed valet appeared at her side. “Go and find the salvage men. Tell them they are needed right away, and that we have a case here for quarantine.”
The valet bowed and scurried off, much to Detan’s relief. It was always pleasant when the mark made the requests for him.
“If the flier is contaminated,” Grandon raised his voice to be heard over the nervous murmur of his guests, “which I’m sure it isn’t, then we should burn it here and now and be done with it.”
Beneath his makeup, sweat crept across Detan’s brow.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Grandon’s wife interjected. “If scabies are aboard that vessel then they will leap to the nearest host the very moment the flames lick them. No, it must be wrapped and disposed of in the middle of the desert where only the cold blood of lizards will be on offer.”
“You are,” Grandon dragged out the words, “quite certain this man is ill?”
Detan froze as the apothik turned back to him, her sharp eyes sweeping him from greased hair to dusty boots. She arched a brow, one only he could see, and gave her husband a curt nod.
“I have never before seen such a sorry case.”
The gate trundled open, and through came the salvage men with the valet at their helm. Detan could only hope the valet hadn’t found their fortuitous proximity suspicious. Each one was dressed in the same moss-green trousers and tunic, and each had a matching scarf wound round their hair and the bottom half of their face to keep both sun and vapors off. Between them they hauled a low cart, its pocked surface smeared with suspicious stains.
To the untrained eye, it was damned near impossible to tell them apart. For Detan, however, the slight swagger and paler hands of Tibs were clear as a candle in the dark. Tibs was also the only one to stop short, stunned, upon sighting the flier.
Detan couldn’t blame him. Pink daisies would break the character of any man.
While the valet directed them about their business, all eyes were drawn to the commotion, and feet were drawn steadily away from it. Detan slunk back, drifting along the edge of the crowd, his way made clear even if those darting from his path pretended to never have seen him.
Contagion was the swiftest way to become both the most ignored and most watched man in the room.
“A moment.” The Lady Grandon intercepted his slow retreat and pulled a palm-sized notepad from her pocket. She gave it a few spirited prods with a pencil then ripped the top page free, folded it, and thrust it toward him. “I insist you go to my clinic so that my people may do what they can to ease your suffering.”
“I will go there straight away, madam, and if I survive this dreadful curse then I will be forever in your debt. I will make certain that all generations to come after me pay homage to your own. I will–”
One of the salvage men let out a howl. He hopped around on one foot, clutching at the other, and the lanky man beside him shrugged a mute apology. Tibs. Detan scowled. Even when relegated to a wordless role, that bastard could be a stern critic.
Lady Grandon cleared her throat. “Brevity, I believe, is prudent in the face of your ill-health.”
“You are as wise as you are generous.” He bowed extravagantly, those nearest to him recoiling a few extra steps.
They would be a while yet moving the flier, and so Detan made his escape into the dusty road, working up a good limp and a soft, painful groan whenever he drew close enough to be overheard. Once he’d shambled past the bright-painted doors of Grandon’s neighbors, he paused to read the note. It was an address all right – but to a posh club upcrust a good few levels. He knew the place. It was carpeted and slung all about with chandeliers, and known for serving the hardest hitting cocktails of those establishments who served them in clean glasses.
Detan chewed his lip and waited for the filthy procession to pass by him. He fell into step behind Tibs and flicked his hood back up.
“What’d the lady pass you?”
“An invitation to drink.”
Tibs sucked air through his teeth and chewed it around a bit. “Going to go?”
“If only to be certain I don’t actually have sand scabies. She damned near had me convinced.”
“Bad idea.”
“Always good to have a lady of the medical profession on your side, my good man.”
He grunted, and they lapsed into silence. The way to the Salt Baths was not long by ferry, but they planned to march the flier all the way down to the desert and then fly it in under its own power, low and slow. There’d be plenty of time to convince Tibs of Lady Grandon’s merits along the way.