“How do I look, Tibs?”
“Pompous and dirty. Same as always.”
“You always know how to lift a man’s spirits.”
“I aim to please.”
Detan glanced at Tibs through the mirror, catching the eye of his reflection. Tibs knew what he was about. Knew that he was going to kick up as much turbulence as possible in poor old Aransa to see what shook loose. Despite all that, the craggy man’s face was as placid as an undiscovered oasis.
Tibs, that old rock, always gave him a measure of calm.
“Let’s go, then,” Detan said.
He led the way out of their shabby inn and up the steps to the next level. And the next. The grey-coated level guards didn’t pay them any mind. Detan and Tibs didn’t look like thieves, after all. They never did.
The sun climbed the horizon, casting toothy shadows across the calcite city as morning rose. People were minding those shadows, picking up their feet a little higher and stepping just a little faster to stay out of the sun as long as possible.
On the warehouse level, he caught sight of a sleek ship snaking its way into port. A Valathean personal cruiser, its darkwood hull gleaming in the growing light. Probably some highbrow ponce in to give Thratia his blessing. Detan smirked. Maybe the ex-commodore had finally given in to a political marriage.
In the road just before Thratia’s compound Detan hesitated, glancing sideways to catch Tibs’s eye. He was well under control, his face steady and his hands still, thumbs hooked in his belt. Tibs gave him a nod, a tip of the head so subtle that any other soul would have missed it. They strode forward, in step, toward the stony arms which encircled Thratia’s home.
Her guards seemed to have expected them, because all it took was a cursory exchange of names to get the gates swung open. They didn’t even get the traditional pat-down, which was well enough, because each of them had daggers tucked in the tops of their boots and hidden away in their sleeves. Spring-releases. Good technology, fresh in from Valathea.
Not that they were any good with them.
The guards hadn’t even found his little jar of sap glue, which he felt made a rather obvious bulge in the side of his jacket. One of the blank-faced guards led them the long way around, through a dim hallway. The lamps were gone, replaced with cheap beeswax candles, and the light they put off was warm and cloying.
Detan frowned at one of those flickering flames, wondering if Thratia kept a hive of the deadly little creatures. It was a common enough pastime for the rich back in Valathea, but here on the Scorched the bees were as big as a fist and made hives as wide as the room they were standing in now. Detan decided that if Thratia were going to keep any kind of bee, they’d be the Scorched variety.
The guard abandoned them in Thratia’s grand hall, promising the ‘warden’ would be along shortly. Detan blinked, too stunned by what he saw to rustle up a response to the guard.
The mélange of the fete’s revelry had been replaced with great iron and wood machines, copper bellies belching steam into the cavernous chamber. Men and women in tight-fitting, sleeveless tunics with their hair pulled back in no-nonsense buns tended the machines, feeding barkboard paper in one end and examining it as it came out the other. Black and blue stains smeared the forearms of each worker, and many sported fingertip-shaped smudges on their cheeks.
Detan crept forward, peering through the obscuring steam to make out what it was they were doing. Piles of posters leaned against the edge of the machines, Thratia’s sharp face obvious even in silhouette. He couldn’t make out the words, but he could guess the meaning easily enough. He flicked his gaze from pile to pile, estimating their number – more than she could possibly need for Aransa.
The ex-commodore stepped between him and those machines, both brows raised in sharp irritation. Detan scrambled to flick her a salute.
“Evening, commodore.”
“It’ll be warden soon, Honding.” She put her fists on her hips and he saw she was dressed much the same as she had been for the party. He doubted she changed for much at all. Detan took a breath, and plastered a big grin right across his face.
“If you can keep the Larkspur to yourself.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Are you attempting to threaten me?”
He opened his arms and spread his hands. “I’m offering you a chance to save face, Throatslitter. I don’t give a shit who ends up warming Faud’s old chair, but I do care very much about losing.”
“What, exactly, would you lose?”
“There’s a doppel in this city, and she is going to steal the Larkspur.”
Detan held his breath while Thratia thought that over, but it didn’t take long. She wasn’t the type to jump to conclusions, and he had given her precious thin information to work with. He was not at all surprised when she cut straight to questions.
“Just how do you know all that?” Her body remained still, her lips working over the words with the fine efficiency of one of her machines. Detan struggled not to scowl. Her body language was more tightly reined than he had remembered.
“You remember Ripka arresting me at your lovely banquet?”
“Yes.”
“And do you remember Ripka keeping an eye on the party all evening?”
“Yes.” She bit off the word, the sharp edge of exasperation creeping into her tone.
“The Ripka who walked me out your backdoor was a doppel, I’m afraid, and I spent an unearned night in the clink because of her. I am not a forgiving man, Thratia. I know her plans, and I want her to fail.”
“And just how do you propose to keep my ship safe from this nefarious creature?”
He dragged in steam-laden air, forced himself to smile and willed himself not to sweat. “Why, you’re going to put me in charge of your security staff.”
She laughed, tipping her head back and baring her teeth to the heavens. The sound raked claws down his spine, rooted his feet to the spot.
“I know full well there is a doppel in this city, Honding. What I’m not buying is that it’d risk getting tangled up with someone like you.”
He grimaced. “I was afraid of that. What if I could produce an independent party who happened to see Ripka in the dance hall at the same time I was being arrested?”
“Really,” she drawled. “Who could you find that’s impartial?”
“Oh, she’s partial, but not in my favor. I want you to send ole Halva Erst a calling card.”
“What will the Lady Erst have to say about it?”
Tibal cleared his throat and shuffled forward a half step on cue. “Lady Erst witnessed my conversation with the watch captain while Detan was being detained.”
“Also, I left her at the altar,” Detan piped up, just to be sure Thratia knew there was no friendship between them.
Thratia grinned. “Oh, this is a lovely way to start the morning.” She snapped for an attendant, “Bring me the Lady Halva Erst. No delays.”
When the lady in question arrived at Thratia’s estate, Detan reflected that he would have had better luck summoning a whole swarm of spiders to his aide. She was positively incensed, her milk-tea cheeks flushed dark as garnet and her lips drawn so thin and bloodless one could mistake her for having none at all.
Upon entering Thratia’s compound, she spied Detan and clenched her lily-soft fists into petal-powered hammers, and flew down upon him.
“You swine! You heartless, chicken-livered, old goat!”