For Want of a Fiend (11 page)

“It’s time.”

With a final wave to the crowd, the royal family trooped back inside the palace, glad-handing nobles as they went. When they were halfway back to the royal apartments, Reinholt pulled up short. “We always wander through the crowd.”

“Not after Roland,” Katya said.

Reinholt sneered at her. “You may be head of the Order, Little K, but I outrank you.”

“You don’t outrank me, my boy,” Da said quietly. His tone was soft and fatherly, but his posture was made of steel.

Reinholt’s nostrils flared, and his eyes turned fearful for a moment, but he stood his ground. “Brom’s gone, Da. I just need a little normalcy.”

“Under guard,” Ma said softly.

After an unblinking moment, Da nodded. “With Katya, her team, and Lord Vincent.” He stepped close to Reinholt, and Katya didn’t catch every word, but enough to know that he wanted Reinholt to take Katya’s orders when it came to staying safe.

Katya bent close to Starbride’s ear. “Gather the Order and meet me in front of the palace in five minutes.”

Starbride’s mouth turned down, no doubt at the idea of spending time with Reinholt and Lord Vincent both, but unlike Katya’s churlish brother, Starbride didn’t argue with her duty. She nodded and hurried away.

Katya nodded to Reinholt, tried to summon up some sisterly feelings, and tried on a grin. “We’ll collect Lord Vincent on our way.”

He smiled at her, a ghost of his former self but better than a sneer. He even offered his arm, which she pushed away with a laugh.

“Would you throw your body into the path of an assassin’s knife?” he asked.

Katya blinked at him. “Of course, Rein.”

He stared at her for half a second, but said nothing. Lord Vincent joined them, and when they reached the main hall, Starbride waited with Dawnmother and Averie. She tilted her head to both sides as if stretching. Katya got the message. Brutal and Pennynail were around.

Reinholt took the lead with Lord Vincent at his side. Katya followed close behind them, her arm entwined with Starbride’s. Dawnmother and Averie brought up the rear, both carrying baskets should anyone decide to make a purchase. They wandered through the main market and down several side streets, following the line of booths. The festival had spread through the streets like a giant, many-armed monster. In one square, the booths sat in front of closed shops and homes. The people played games, bob for apples or splat the rat. In a corner, a troupe put on a puppet show for a gaggle of children, some of them wearing finery and others dressed in homespun smocks.

Starbride and Katya put their heads together and tried to look as if they made idle conversation as they traded information. “On our right, thirty feet, blue hat,” Katya said.

Starbride looked in the indicated direction as if searching the booths. “He’s waving at someone behind us.”

As they wandered from the square and into another street, the booths began to thin. Katya pulled Reinholt’s arm and leaned close as if to share a joke. “I think we should find another way.”

“We can cut through this small street to a broader one,” he said, not bothering to keep his tone low.

Katya fought a frown and laughed instead. “True enough,” she said loudly. Then in a lower tone she said, “That doesn’t mean we should.”

He shook her off, and the look he cast her from the corner of his eye said he’d welcome trouble if it found them. Blood pounded in Katya’s temples, and she ached to grab his arm and pull it behind his back until he lifted onto his toes. But she couldn’t brawl with him in public. Katya glanced around the narrow street and then toward the more jovial streets they’d left behind. If they wandered farther from prying eyes, maybe she
could
beat some sense into him.

A couple of drunks staggered into the street from the side door of a tavern. Katya put a hand on her rapier. Lord Vincent stepped in front of Reinholt and mirrored Katya’s posture.

“Wha’s this? Who’s that?” one of the drunks slurred. He peered at them in the torchlit gloom.

Katya opened her mouth to say they should turn around, but Lord Vincent spoke first. “Out of the way, good peasants,” he said in what he probably thought was a complimentary manner. “Your prince needs egress.”

Katya nearly groaned. She could have talked their way through without the two drunks knowing who they were. She glanced behind and saw no one else, but two fake drunks would be the perfect cover for a robbery. Starbride, Averie, and Dawnmother backed up a few steps and watched the rear.

One of the drunks burst out laughing. “He needs what? Wha’s that he needs?”

“Egress? That a bird?” the other asked, stepping closer.

“Get back,” Lord Vincent said.

“Vincent,” Reinholt started.

“Is the prince!” the closer drunk said. “Fuckin’ prince on our street!”

“Watch your tongue,” Lord Vincent said.

“It’s all right.” Reinholt waved the words away. He dug in his pouch as if he’d pay the drunks a toll to get by.

“Just go around them,” Katya said.

“Didn’t your wife run off?” the drunk in the rear asked. “Ran back to her father?”

“S’right,” the lead one echoed. He nodded like a bobbing apple.

Reinholt stiffened into stone. “Get the hell out of my way.”

The drunk in the rear stepped up, and Katya got a better look at him. Unlike his friend, his coat had a hint of brocade. “Reinholt,” she said, “go around them.”

Reinholt sneered. “Move these people, Vincent.”

Lord Vincent shoved the drunks away. The one in brocade pushed back, face purpling. “Who the hell do you think you are?”

The one behind him laughed. “He’s the prince!” he shouted and almost fell over guffawing.

Lord Vincent hustled Brocade Coat to the side. “Give way, man!”

“Not our fault your woman couldn’t stand you,” Brocade Coat said. He probably thought it was a mumble, but it came to Katya’s ears as clear as glass.

Katya’s fingers closed over Reinholt’s arm just as Reinholt called, “Kill the slanderous dog!” He drew his sword.

Katya hauled back on his arm and used the momentum to launch herself forward, but Lord Vincent moved almost as fast as a Fiend. He drew his blade and ran Brocade Coat through the heart.

Time seemed to slow. Brocade Coat toppled as Vincent whipped his sword back. The other drunk knelt and entreated his friend to rise. Reinholt had gone wide-eyed and pale.

“You killed him!” the man on the ground wailed. “You killed him.” His cries grew louder, becoming full-throated sobs.

Lord Vincent looked over his shoulder, no remorse in his eyes, but a definite question. “No,” Katya said, answering his silent entreaty about whether he should kill the other man. Lord Vincent’s eyes shifted to her and then back to Reinholt.

Katya stepped in front of her brother and pulled him close. “Don’t say a damned word, Rein! By all the spirits, you will not make this worse.”

He glared at her, but he obeyed. She whirled to Lord Vincent. “Sheathe your sword.” He did so, obeying royal commands immediately. Too damned immediately.

“Katya,” Starbride said. She gestured over her shoulder and then pointed in front of them. A crowd began to gather at both ends of the street, drawn by the drunken man’s wails. Too late to cover things up, then, even if Katya wanted to, and suddenly, she didn’t want to. The days of the nobility killing whoever they liked were long gone, and more than that, she didn’t believe royalty had the
right
to do whatever it liked.

“You there,” Katya said, pointing into the crowd. “Fetch the city Watch.”

After one last peering glance, the messenger took off. Katya stepped close to Lord Vincent. “Escort the prince back to the palace.”

Lord Vincent stepped to Reinholt’s side. Reinholt hadn’t stopped frowning, and now his arms started to cross. “Go, Rein,” Katya said. “Please, go.”

He snapped around on his heel and left. At the end of the street, he passed Brutal among the crowd. Katya nodded after her brother, and Brutal stayed with him.

Katya tilted her face up and tapped her temple, signaling Pennynail to stay put, wherever he was. There wasn’t a damn thing he could do for them unless the crowd decided to rush them. She only wished he’d been fast enough to stop Lord Vincent somehow, but what was done was done.

The drunk on the ground was still wailing, but no one stood close enough to know what had happened. Reinholt had been removed from the situation; that was another mark on their side. The Watch was on its way to keep order, and no high and mighty champion was shouting about peasants.

“Stand back,” Katya shouted as the crowd edged forward, eager to see a dead man.

Starbride drew a pyramid. Katya nearly warned her that it wasn’t time to use a flash bomb or anything deadly, but Starbride merely held the pyramid aloft. It brightened and sent light dancing off the walls. Starbride acted as if it had nothing to do with the crowd, as if she was using it to see better, but the crowd crept back all the same.

“Give way, give way!” a group of men and women called from the end of the street, and then it filled with the dark blue uniforms of the city Watch. Unlike the king’s Guard, the Watch wore chainmail instead of polished breastplates. Katya was glad of that, less showy.

A woman stepped to the front, the stripes of a captain on the collar of her coat, above her chain shirt. She pushed her metal helmet back and smoothed dark blond strands of hair away from her face. “Is the man dead, Sergeant Rhys?”

One of her men knelt beside Brocade Coat and gently pushed the wailing drunk away so he could feel the corpse’s neck. “Dead as a coffin nail, Cap.” He rolled Brocade Coat flat and peered into the dead man’s face.

“Well, now, miss, I’m Captain Ursula Laurent.” She looked Katya in the face and paused. Starbride brought the light closer, the easier to see Katya’s features as well as the hawk and rose on her coat. “Attention!” Captain Ursula cried and stiffened just as her men did. “Truly sorry, Highness.”

Katya waved the attention away. “Do you know who this is?”

“It’s Georgie!” the drunk said. He wiped his nose and sniffled. “My own brother Georgie Appleton.”

Several of the people in the waiting crowd sucked in a breath, and even Captain Ursula seemed startled. Sergeant Rhys nodded from where he still knelt beside the corpse. “He’s Magistrate Anthony’s assistant all right, Cap.”

Katya’s stomach dropped. A magistrate’s assistant, and not just any magistrate, but a man whom Katya had heard called the champion of the poor. Now his assistant had been struck down by the champion of the crown.

“Highness,” Ursula said. Her eyes had gone from surprised to calculating, as if she wondered whether she dared draw steel if Katya refused whatever she was about to say. “Respectfully, you should come with me.”

The crowds murmured and shifted. News of who the dead man was spread so quickly it was almost visible in the air. They couldn’t
know
what had happened, but they’d make something up. Katya guessed someone was already flying to tell Magistrate Anthony.

“Captain,” Katya said. “I think coming with you is a wonderful idea.”

Ursula let out a breath before she snapped off a salute. Katya took a firm grip on Starbride’s arm and followed in Captain Ursula’s hurried footsteps. Averie and Dawnmother stayed close, still silent, though Katya imagined they were as tense as she was.

Some of Ursula’s squad surrounded them. Sergeant Rhys and another officer stayed with the body and with the witness. At a wave from Ursula, the rest strode toward the nearest Watch house and bellowed for the crowd to give way. In the light of the pyramid, the faces in the crowd seemed angry, grimacing like faces in a nightmare, but they obeyed Ursula’s thundering presence, though how long that would last, Katya couldn’t say.

Starbride clamped her lips together to keep from shouting, “Katya didn’t do it!” The city Watch clearly thought she did. No doubt the crowd did, too. Katya’s jaw clenched so tightly her tendons stood out. She’d take the blame for Reinholt no matter what the surviving drunk said. If he was
led
to a conclusion by the Watch, the drunk could suddenly “remember” anything.

Starbride wouldn’t stand for it. She’d shout the truth to the rooftops, no matter what the Umbriels wanted. She wouldn’t let them sacrifice Katya, wouldn’t let Katya sacrifice herself for the sake of the spoiled brat Reinholt.

Another glance at Katya’s stony face told her it wouldn’t be easy. Katya was tied up in obligation, in responsibility, something Reinholt didn’t understand. She would put duty first, and Starbride had agreed to be part of that duty, part of the Order. Could she turn her back on everything Katya believed in?

Yes, she told herself. She’d break her oath for Katya. Starbride swore at that moment that she’d do whatever it took—including kidnapping—to make sure Katya didn’t take responsibility for this crime. She wouldn’t see Katya imprisoned or, Horsestrong forbid it, hanged.

Captain Ursula led them into a cramped Watch house and through to an even smaller office, all polite bows and offers of whatever meager repast the house could provide. Averie and Dawnmother were left to wait in the hallway, right outside the office door.

Ursula smiled, but it didn’t have friendliness behind it. Katya returned Ursula’s stares with half-lidded looks, neither of them giving anything away, content to sit in silence until Starbride wanted to scream.

“They’ll be bringing in the drunk,” Ursula said.

“To tell his side of the story,” Katya replied without skipping a beat.

Starbride nearly smiled. If this woman thought to intimidate Katya, she might as well try to frighten the wall.

Ursula did smile, a slow look that had seen it all. She took her helmet off, smoothed out her rumpled hair, and rested the helmet on a battered wooden desk. “Good time for you to tell me what happened, Highness.”

Not, your side of the story, but
what happened
, implying that whatever Katya spoke would be the truth. Starbride crossed her arms. Flattery was another interesting tactic, but it also wouldn’t work.