“I was trained to endure hardship, but I agree.”
She and Alain stopped to hoist their packs, waiting while the other passengers went past them and a few people came forward to meet some of the arrivals. Mari ignored them all, knowing no one should be expecting them in Pandin. A moment later, her expectations proved wrong.
“Lady Mechanic.”
It took Mari a moment to realize that the man who had walked up to stand nearby had addressed her in a voice just loud enough to be heard by her. Then it took another moment to recall that she wasn’t wearing her Mechanics jacket. She looked directly at him, not speaking, ready to run or fight if he proved to be from the Mechanics Guild. “Are you talking to me?”
Alain moved slightly to one side, giving him a clear shot at the man. Mari noticed him tensing the way he did before casting one of his spells. She glanced around, trying to spot any other people who might be working with this man, but couldn’t see any.
The man smiled slightly. “I know you. I know you’re a Mechanic. Let’s not play games.”
“Are you with the Guild?” Mari asked calmly. She searched the area again for signs of Mechanics ready to arrest her, looking for possible escape routes. Her hand twitched, wanting to reach for her pistol in its shoulder holster under her coat, but she held it down at her side. It seemed best not to reveal that she was armed, not until she understood what was going on.
Alain was waiting silently. Mari knew that if the man made a wrong move, Alain would strike.
The man shook his head. “No. I’m not with your Guild. If you’d like to know how I know you, and what I can do for you, come along.”
“Why should I trust you enough to come along with you?”
“You wouldn’t like the alternative.” The man’s smile was unpleasant this time.
Mari thought quickly. She and Alain were very exposed out in the open. If anyone had crossbows, or rifles, trained on them, both she and Alain could be killed very quickly. “All right. I’ll follow, but you won’t like what happens if you try to betray me.”
The man looked over at Alain. “I saw you talking to him. You were with him at Umburan.”
They had been watched for a while, it seemed, but whoever this man represented hadn’t tried anything at Umburan. The Mechanics Guild wouldn’t have hesitated, meaning this man didn’t work for the Guild. “That’s right,” Mari said. “We’re partners.”
“Trying to build your own mob?” The man showed his teeth in a derisive smile. “Fine. We can always use another Mechanic.” The man tilted his head to one side. “This way.”
Mari glanced at Alain, trying to convey that he should pretend to be a Mechanic, and the Mage nodded back, indicating he would follow her lead.
Mari let the man lead her and Alain out of the large courtyard where carriages dropped off and picked up passengers. Once surrounded by buildings, she casually checked out the windows looking down on their path, trying without success to spot any snipers.
They followed the man all the way down the street, around a corner, across the next street, and into a restaurant with a discreet sign advertising its presence. Looking around offhandedly as they walked upstairs to the second floor, Mari realized that this was one of those places which catered to people who wanted privacy. Dining booths lined the walls, each having solid backs going up to the ceiling and each boasting a heavy curtain which could be drawn if desired. The man led her and Alain all the way to a booth against one back wall, then sat down.
Alain halted Mari as she started to follow, instead sliding in first so he was against the wall. Not certain why he had done that, she sat down next to Alain, looking coldly at the man. “What’s this about?” she asked in a quiet voice.
The man shook his head, waiting until the waiter had asked for an order, then waiting again until wine arrived. He poured from a single bottle into glasses before himself, Mari, and Alain, then sat back. “I first saw you in Dorcastle,” the man remarked.
“Oh?” Mari tried to look disinterested, pointedly ignoring the wine glass in front of her. “Were you a dragon?”
“I was helping with that little plan, yes,” the man answered in a placid voice. “It was working pretty well, but then something happened to the warehouse we were using.”
A Dark Mechanic, then. If nothing else, this contact confirmed for Mari that the Dark Mechanics had been watching her since at least Dorcastle. “Too bad it didn’t work out for you.”
He smiled back at her, but it was a thin-lipped smile lacking in any humor. “Yeah. Some nosy Mechanic found our barge, then some Mages attacked, then the whole warehouse blew up. But you wouldn’t know anything about that.”
“I might,” Mari admitted, saying nothing else.
“We haven’t figured out how the Mages found us,” the Dark Mechanic continued, “but we think you were somehow involved in that, too. We lost some of our members and a lot of equipment. There were plenty of people who just wanted to get rid of the Mechanic who caused us so much trouble. You understand.”
“I do. A couple of them took shots at me in Edinton.”
Another insincere smile from the man. “They got disciplined for trying to nail the Mechanic without orders, and for missing their shots. Sometimes you can’t win. But even though we had plenty of reasons to get rid of that Mechanic for good, a number of people thought that somebody with her smarts and her guts might be a very useful member of our organization, especially since she’s having some problems with her own Guild.”
“Problems?” Mari asked.
“Arrest order, as I’m sure you’re already aware. It’s funny to think that I could pick up a nice piece of change from the Mechanics Guild for hauling you to them.”
Mari gave the man her own artificial smile. “If you tried, you might find that earning that reward isn’t all that easy. You want me to join your organization?”
“It would be a mutually beneficial decision,” the man observed, studying his fingernails.
That she hadn’t expected. A recruitment offer. Mari wished she could look at Alain to catch his reaction, but didn’t want to take her eyes off of the Dark Mechanic. “What organization is this?”
“The Order.”
“The Order of what?”
The man shook his head. “Of nothing. Just the Order.”
“And what does the Order do for a living besides tearing up things while making ransom demands?”
“Protection,” the man explained smoothly. “We were asking for Dorcastle to pay us money to protect them from dragons or…other problems. There were negotiations under way with the city. The city was getting ready to pay a very nice sum when you ruined everything.”
Mari gave him another insincere smile. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am. You were blackmailing Ringhmon, too, weren’t you?”
“That cost us a lot. We were ready to pay you back after you messed up our deal in Ringhmon. It’s a shame our attempt to eliminate you failed.”
“An attempt involving a wrecked train trestle?” Mari asked, thinking of how close the locomotive she was riding had come to going off the destroyed bridge. “I’m not that easy to eliminate.”
A glint of anger showed in the man’s eyes. “No, you’re not. The Order decided to give you a chance to work with us instead of against us. You might want to give it serious consideration.”
Mari nodded, thinking furiously about how to learn as much as possible from this man before trying to get out of this restaurant in one piece. “I’d need to know more about you. What does this Order do? What’s its reason for existence?”