Return (38 page)

They all blinked at me, confused. Nobody
answered, so I kept going.

“You thought you could sail right up with your
band of prisoners, and the Deliphine slavers would just hand you a
mountain of gold, but that’s not how it works. The Council got away
with it because they were supposedly selling convicted criminals —
and that’s fair game, as far as the slavers are concerned — but if
you try to sell a whole batch of people who already have a slave’s
mark and you don’t have any paperwork to back you up, they’ll
arrest you as grabbers and hang you from Dead Man
Bridge.”

“It’s a lie,” Jemal scoffed. “There’s no
paper—”

“It’s the truth!” one of the free slaves
called, and several more took up the cause.

“Have to show papers—”

“I saw one hang myself—”

“Almost be worth being sold again to watch the
sorry bastards swing.”

“And as for the Dollhouse,” I cut in, “they
haven’t stayed secret this long by dealing with scum off the
street. Ask a surgeon of the Guild. They’ll tell you the Dollhouse
is without scruples. They follow no laws, and they’re utterly
ruthless. Once they’re done with you, you’d wish they’d hung you
instead.”

Jemal didn’t believe me, I could tell. He
thought I was pulling his leg, but it didn’t matter. What mattered
was, most of his men did. All but a few were young and green.
They’d banded together only because they were scared and couldn’t
come up with a better idea on their own, but they had no desire to
hang for Tino or Jemal’s crazy schemes. They mumbled their
uncertainty, scooting nearer each other, glancing nervously between
me and the men at their backs.

“Let’s just let them go,” one of them
said.

“It was a stupid idea anyway.”

“I never felt right about it—”

“Enough!” Jemal bellowed at them, and they all
shrank as if they’d been slapped. Jemal sighed and turned to me.
“We were only trying to make some money.”

“By following the biggest fool in Davlova,” I
said.

All of Tino’s men — all but Jemal, at least —
glanced his way, waiting for him to react. Hoping maybe he’d make a
stand, but he didn’t, and I could tell Jemal wasn’t surprised. Tino
had gone white. His eyes were wide. He’d gambled, and he knew he’d
lost. My blade was still at his throat, and I could feel him
beginning to shake. For all his blustering, the man was a coward,
and that was in my favor. He’d managed to keep his band of men
together by playing on their desperation, but once they saw how
weak he was, it’d be over.

And like a lighthouse shining through the fog
over the calm waters of the sea, I saw the way out.

I moved the point of my knife to the soft
flesh at the side of Tino’s neck and pushed — not enough to do any
real damage, but enough to pierce his skin. Blood welled from the
cut, running down the blade.

Tino whimpered, and half a second later, I
smelled the warm tang of fresh urine. Men on my side began to
laugh. Men on Tino’s side shook their heads, turning
away.

I smiled into Tino’s face as the wet stain
spread farther down his legs. Maybe I shouldn’t have enjoyed
humiliating him so much, but I did. “Tell me about the special ones
again,” I whispered to him, leaning close and letting a bit more
blood flow. “Go ahead and call Ayo my whore. Tell me how you’ll
fuck him. Give me a reason to kill you, you sorry piece of
shit.”

Tino closed his eyes.

That was all it took. Any loyalty his men
might have had left disappeared. In that one second, I knew we’d
won. I laughed and let him go. He sank to the floor, his head
bowed.

For a moment, there was nothing but silence. I
glanced around, catching Lorenzo’s smirk and Uri’s proud nod in my
direction. I didn’t care about any of it. I only wanted to get away
and make sure Ayo was safe.

Finally, Frey stepped forward. “We done here?”
he asked, addressing his question to Jemal instead of Tino.
“’Cause, frankly, I could use a drink, and I don’t think I’m the
only one.”

Jemal turned and surveyed his men. Nearly half
had moved to our side of the standoff. A few still stood on his
side, but none of them looked like they wanted to fight. He sighed
heavily, turning at last to stare at Tino, who sat shamefaced on
the stable floor.

“We’re done,” he said. “Take your slaves and
go.”

I should have felt better, knowing Tino had
been beaten. The mood was certainly festive enough as we made our
way back to the inn, with Benny and Hugo calling me a hero, and
Lorenzo and his buddies griping good-naturedly about not getting
the fight they’d been promised. But the unease that had troubled me
since our return to Davlova wouldn’t abate.

“Why didn’t you kill the bastard?” Uri asked
me over a drink that night. Frey and I weren’t the only customers
in Uri’s tavern — it felt like half of Lower Davlova was trying to
celebrate with us — but we’d managed to secure a somewhat secluded
spot at the bar.

I didn’t have a ready answer. Even I wasn’t
sure I’d made the right decision.

“He didn’t have to,” Frey answered for me.
“Now, one of two things will happen.” He held up one of his
slender, heavily-ringed fingers. “One: Tino will realize he’s lost
face, and he’ll settle for being Jemal’s second, in which case the
slaves are safe because Jemal won’t want any of his men to think
he’s following Tino’s advice. Two: Tino will try to take charge of
his gang again.”

“And what if he succeeds?” Uri
asked.

“He won’t,” I said, finishing my drink. “He’ll
wind up in the canal with his balls in his mouth and a fat slit in
his throat.”

“You’re saying Jemal will kill
him?”

“That, or have him killed.”

“Whatever happens,” Frey cut in, “he won’t let
anybody think he’s taking orders from Tino again. Tino showed his
belly today, and you can’t do that in the trenches.”

I knew he was right. Tino was no longer a
threat. Still, when I finally climbed into bed with Ayo that night,
I felt dread gnawing at my gut. I wrapped my arms around him and
held him tight.

“I was terrified when Ceil told me they’d
taken you. I thought I’d never see you again.”

“I wasn’t afraid at all. I knew you’d find
me.”

I shook my head, unwilling to accept his blind
faith. “What if I hadn’t?”

“But you did.”

“I was so worried they’d hurt you, and
then—”

“I didn’t give them any reason to hurt me.
Benny and Hugo fought, but I heard Agnes tell Karina to go quietly,
even though Karina’s never been a slave. Agnes said, ‘don’t do
anything to draw their attention. Just keep your head low and your
mouth shut, and they won’t have any reason to hurt you,’ so that’s
what I did too.”

Smart thinking on Agnes’ part, especially with
regard to Karina. Being the daughter of a noble, she'd been lucky
to get away with nothing more than stolen jewelry. They could have
done much worse. I shuddered at the thought. I pulled Ayo close,
kissing him — needing him — letting all my fear and doubt and rage
burn away in the heat of our passion.

I was left sated and exhausted, but no less
worried.

***

The next day the plaza buzzed with the story
of freed slaves and Tino’s humiliation. I figured fewer than fifty
people had actually witnessed the incident inside the stable, but
by the time the temple bells tolled the dinner hour, there didn’t
seem to be a single person in Lower Davlova who hadn’t heard the
tale. People flooded into Ceil’s inn. Some only wanted to see Ayo,
to ask if he really was a Dollhouse slave. Ceil told them they were
damned fools to believe everything thing they heard and sent them
on their way, but others had more noble intentions. They showed up
by the droves to thank me or to congratulate me. Freed slaves
clutched at my hands, many of them crying, practically bowing
before me, begging me to tell them some task they could do to repay
me. I tried to be gracious, but the attention made me
uncomfortable. It didn’t seem to matter to anybody that I didn’t
want accolades or gratitude or repayment. All I wanted was a bit of
peace for Ayo.

In the end, I assured the regular residents
that the rumors of my deeds in the stable had been vastly
exaggerated. I gave the freed slaves each a bit of iron to pay for
their tattoos to be inked over, proving they were free citizens of
Davlova, should anybody ever ask.

I hoped like hell that would be the end of
it.

Benny and Hugo finished the repairs to Ceil’s
inn and moved on to the carpentry job at the hatmaker’s. They told
me they’d negotiated what they felt was a fair deal: room and board
for all four of them in exchange for their work. They were sleeping
four to a room, but they had a real bathroom and three square meals
a day, and more importantly, they no longer worried about being
rounded up by Tino.

After my humiliation of Tino, the plaza began
to buzz in a new way, a soft undercurrent of hope trying to take
shape. I wanted to nurture it, but my own misgivings wouldn’t wane.
Each night, Ayo clung to me in our bed, whispering that it was all
about to end. More than once, he reminded me of my promise to kill
him if the Dollhouse came. Whatever had dogged our heels since
Deliphine, I felt it inching closer.

A week after the confrontation in the stable,
the storm blew in.

It was evening when it began — a sudden gust
of wind from the west that rattled the windows in their panes. The
inn smelled of turnovers Ayo and Ceil had baked that morning and
sold in the afternoon. Outside, in the plaza, the vendors began
packing up their wares, glancing warily at the low, heavy skies. In
the quiet of our room, I unlatched the shutters and stared into the
oncoming night.

“A storm,” Ayo said quietly behind
me.

“A big one too.”

“We could use the fresh water.”

True enough, but the tension in the air filled
me with a dark sense of foreboding.

I heard the bell on the front door of the inn
jingle as somebody entered. Heavy footsteps made Ayo and me both
tense.

“It’s starting,” Ayo whispered.

I glanced out our bedroom window toward the
plaza, the hair rising on the back of my neck. The air was charged,
tingly with electricity. Wind gusted through the burned buildings
of the flattened fourth quadrant, but no rain fell yet. I listened,
halfway expecting some kind of ruckus to break out downstairs, but
there was only the soft, slow tread of Ceil climbing the stairs.
She knocked on our door.

“Visitor,” she said.

Ayo’s eyes were wide with horror. “Don’t
go.”

His unease worried me, but I did my best to
smile. “Don’t worry.”

I went downstairs, my heart pounding and Ayo
trailing slowly behind, but it was only Frey, leaning casually
against the counter. Ceil stood behind it, glowering at
him.

“Hey stranger,” he said. “You’re the talk of
the town. Has the fame gone to your head?”

“I’m beginning to wish I’d just killed Tino
and been done with it.”

Frey’s smile faded a bit. “You have a
minute?”

“For you? Of course.”

But I was keenly aware of Ceil’s eyes on us,
and of Ayo’s discomfort. “Don’t you still have laundry on the
line?” I asked Ceil. “Might want to bring that in before it blows
away.”

She glared at me, but only for a moment. She
jerked her head in a nod. “Come along then, boy,” she said. “Seems
we have to let the men speak in privacy.”

She placed a bit too much emphasis on the
“men,” and I saw the way Frey’s jaw clenched at the intentional
slight.

I waited until they were gone, then gestured
to one of the rickety tables. “Have a seat.”

He did, flipping one of the chairs around to
sit in it backwards, and I sat opposite him.

“Something tells me this isn’t a social
call.”

“It isn’t.” Frey twisted the rings on his
fingers. “Anzhéla sent me.”

I’d halfway been expecting it. I’d told her
I’d consider her job offer, but I’d barely even thought about it
since that day. I suddenly wished we had a decent bottle of whiskey
to drink, but Ceil had long since run out of everything.

“We should go to Uri’s,” I said. “At least
then we could get a drink.”

Outside, the wind picked up, hammering against
the walls of the inn. Frey shook his head. “If I start drinking
now, I may not stop.”

I leaned back in my seat, studying him,
wondering at the sudden darkness I saw in his eyes.

“She wants you to come for dinner tomorrow.”
He glanced toward the back of the inn. “You and Ayo both. She wants
to meet him.”

“I see.”

“Will you come?”

“I guess I better. It’s the least I can do,
right?”

He sighed and rubbed his hands through his
short-cropped hair. “No matter what she did for you in the past,
you’re under no obligation to her now. You know that,
right?”