Soldier of Fortune: A Gideon Quinn Adventure (Fortune Chronicles Book 1) (26 page)

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY
-E
IGHT

IT HAD GONE
full dark by the time Ellison, carrying an overlarge burlap bag, entered the boathouse where, until about three hours past, his hive used to reside.

The decrepit building was black as pitch, but for the wavering circle of light provided by the lantern Ellison had lit upon entering. Since the lamp’s crystal was old, the illumination it provided was uncertain, shrinking or expanding at random, so Ellison’s view of the boathouse varied by the moment.

Not that it mattered, he thought, carrying both lantern and bag to the center of the room, as he knew every inch of the place by heart. 

The bag had ceased bucking sometime during its trip in the stolen Comet’s boot. Once he dropped it onto the warped boards however, it immediately commenced wriggling again, so he gave the sack (liberated from the Rand stables) a touch of his own boot.

He was gratified to see the little shape curl up on itself with a soft whimper.

“There’ll be more o’ that and you don’t mind yerself,” he told it. “You savvy?”

The top of the bag gave a subdued nod. Satisfied, he set the handheld lamp on a crate that had, like the rest of the boathouse, seen better days.

Then he opened the sack and pulled Mia out by the hair.

“You and me,” he said, kicking the sacking aside, “we’re gonna have us a little talk.”

“About what?” she asked, arms crossed in front of her, defiance trembling in every bone.

“All kinds o’ things,” he said, looming over the dodger. “Like ingratitude—“

“Sorry, didn’t I thank you for the back of your hand last night?”

For which he, of course, was forced to give her the back of his hand, again.

“Now, now,” a dry voice reproved from the darkness, “that’s no way to treat your dodgers.”

Ellison and Mia both froze.

“Who’s there?” the fagin asked, drawing a blade from his belt with one hand while the other snagged Mia by the throat.

“That is a question," came the unhelpful response.

Ellison cursed and turned to the left. Hadn't the speaker had been on his right a second ago?

Mia tried to take advantage of the distraction by slamming an elbow into Ellison’s gut but she hadn’t enough force to penetrate the layers of clothes, fat and muscle.

“Ease off, girl,” he snapped, knocking her up against the crate with enough force to daze.

A heart-beat later he was ducking as something screeched and dove at his head so fast it registered to Ellison only as fury on the wing, then sped past to knock the lantern to the floor, where it gave a last, valiant sputter before fading to black.

Ellison silently cursed the moment he’d ever set eyes on that draco.

“I hear you met Elvis, already,” the taunting voice said. “Which means you should have figured out he doesn’t like people messing with kids.”

A screech from the pitch darkness above confirmed this.

“I don’t like when people mess with kids, either,” Quinn’s voice (because who else could it be?) continued.

Except now he was behind Ellison.

Ellison spun, lifting Mia up as a shield and pressing the blade against her throat. “Back off, Quinn, if you don’t wanna see how much blood’s inside this little girl.”

“What did I just say about messing with kids?” Quinn asked.

“Not just a kid,” Ellison said. “A dodger — my dodger.”

“Not anymore,” Quinn said, then waited a beat. “Tell you what, you put her down right now, and I’ll let you walk out that door.”

“Or,” Ellison said, “you walk out that door right now, or I give the poppet a Midasian necktie.”

There was a pause, just long enough to be gratifying to the fagin.

“Huh,” the voice said at last, “guess you've shown me who's boss.”

“Damn right, I have. So unless you want to see this bit o’ gutter filth bleedin’ out onna floor, you’ll be handing over that draco of yours and backing outta here.”

“And then you’ll let Mia go?”

“Mia, is it?” Ellison’s grin slid into a leer. “Looks like I was right about her bein’ ripe enough for the night trade…”

His dark words (and darker thoughts) were cut off as a flash of light, just a brief prick of brightness in the black, seared his eyeballs. The sudden, unexpected glare froze him and left him momentarily blind (or, more blind, being besieged by little white dots, rather than big black shadows), so he never saw the blade that flew from behind all those white dots, but he sure as comb felt it.

With a gurgle of pain, Ellison dropped the girl and slumped to his knees. His own small knife slid from numb fingers to clatter on the floor as his left hand rose to find the wedge of a Corps combat knife buried in his shoulder.

He tried to speak as a deeper shade of dark filled the air in front of him, but could only emit a guttural denial. This had to be the worst pain he’d ever known.

No, he realized as a tall shadow yanked the blade out, with just enough twist to graze bone, this was the worst pain he’d ever known.

The shriek barely had time to die down before his unseen nemesis re-activated the pocket torch he’d used to blind Ellison.

He gave Ellison a look, then handed the torch to Mia, already sitting up.

She took the light, but was staring at Quinn. “You came after me?”

“Of course I came after you. Well, technically Elvis came after you and I followed him. You okay?” he asked.

She gave her head a testing shake. “I dunno,” she pushed herself to her feet. “Does right pissed count as okay?”

“Under the circumstances, yes.”

Ellison, through the film of pain saw the other man’s smile, a brief flash of teeth in the torch’s light.

Then he saw Mia look down at him. “You gonna kill him, then?”

Ellison felt himself shrinking under that unforgiving regard.

“That,” the man said, “is up to him.”

“To him?” Mia asked.

“T-to me?” Ellison asked at the same time.

Gideon, still looking at Mia, didn’t answer right off. Only when Ellison, unable to contain himself any longer, let out a desperate whimper did he respond. “It may be,” he said, glancing down, “that Fagin Ellison has an urge to relocate.”

“M-m-maybe?” Ellison stuttered, grasping at any possible future that had him in it.

“Far away from Nike.”

“I hear Tendo’s nice, this time of year.” Ellison suggested.

“Farther,” Gideon prompted.

“I’ve — always wanted to see Stoli in winter?”

“In which case,” Gideon said with a nod of approval, “I don’t see the need for another death, today.”

“Another?” Ellison’s brain appeared to sputter over the thought of any deaths that day. “No. No need. None,” he agreed.

For her part, Mia looked as if she had another view, but then Elvis swooped down from the rafters, buzzing the cringing Ellison to land on her shoulder. To the fagin’s desperate relief, the cold fury in her eyes seemed to abate under the draco’s calm regard.

“I suppose not,” she said, finally deigning to spare a glance for her newly former fagin.

“So it’s all settled,” Ellison said. “Soon as I liberate my hive from them Keepers—“

“Your hive is forfeit,” Gideon said shortly. “Not a one of those kids is going with you. Consider it an early retirement,” he suggested with a lightness that belied the weight of the knife in his hand.

“But, I’ll have nothing!”

“You’ll have a pulse,” Gideon reminded him.

Which, as far as arguments went, Ellison had to admit was a good one.

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY
-N
INE

LATER, GIDEON AND
Mia watched as Ellison, still with his pulse, steamed away on the Amber Queen.

The crew of the riverboat, including Juban, their  friend from The Old Man and the Sea, weren’t particularly impressed by the fagin, but allowed that he could work off his fare to Upper Allianz, which was as near to Stolichnaya as the Queen sailed. Once Ellison was aboard, Gideon took Juban aside and asked which Avonian cities the Queen would be stopping at along the way.

As the boat followed the river’s curve under Dickens bridge and out of sight, it was Mia who spoke first. “So,” she said, looking up at Gideon, “now what?”

“I think,” Gideon said, turning to where a Corps grey sedan with CIOD insignia was pulling up at the end of the pier, “that’ll be up to them.”

At his side, he could feel Mia stiffen with the dodger’s instinctive response to authority. He couldn’t say much, though, as he was just as tense as she was. Even Elvis, back in his habitual spot on Gideon’s right shoulder, had gone still.

The three waited, a triad of anxiety, as the car came to a stop at the end of the dock, just outside the pool of light provided by a  lonely lamppost. Scanning the vehicle,  Gideon felt a tug at the corner his vision when his eyes passed over the silhouettes in the front seat, but then General Satsuke was emerging from the back, along with DS Hama, pulling his attention from the featureless shape of the officer riding shotgun.

“I see you found our young friend,” Hama called as he jogged up to the waiting threesome, leaving Satsuke delivering an order to someone inside the car. “Tiago would not have been forgiving, were I to have lost his friend,” he told her with a formal little bow before turning to Gideon. “Dare I ask what became of the fagin?”

“By all means,” Gideon said, “dare.”

Hama waited but when it appeared Gideon was waiting for his cue, he sighed and asked, “What happened to the fagin?”

“He just shipped out on the Amber Queen, sailing northeast to Upper Allianz,” Gideon replied.

Hama stared. “Did it not occur to you that by allowing him to escape you are also allowing him the opportunity to set up a new hive elsewhere?”

“It did,” Gideon agreed, “but as the Amber Queen will be stopping in Faraday in two days, I’m sure the local police will be able to collect him on your behalf.”

At this point, Mia made a noise that almost managed to sound like a cough.

Hama ignored her. “Would it not have been simpler to hold him here, that the Nike police might take him under warrant?”

“Simpler, yes,” Gideon said, looking out over the dark ribbon of the Avon. “But this way Ellison has two days of hope, two days to plan how he’s going to start over and where. He might even set a few brain cells to contemplating a return to Nike to even the score.” He turned back to Hama. “And after two days of building up his ideal future, the Queen will dock in Faraday and he’ll find the police waiting and realize that future is never going to happen.”

At which point Hama hoped never to be on Gideon Quinn’s bad side. “Perhaps,” he said after a beat, “this conversation should also have never happened.” At Gideon’s raised eyebrow he shrugged. “I want nothing to add to the amount of paperwork your presence has already generated.” As he spoke, he heard the tread of boots on the dock and looked to see General Satsuke approaching. “Speaking of paperwork,” he continued, “I don’t see my cycle anywhere, and you’ve no idea what the requisition forms are like, should I need a new one.”

“No worries,” Gideon said, tossing the magnetic key to the detective, who not only hadn’t objected to Gideon haring off after his frantic draco after Mia had gone missing, but had loaned Gideon his own official vehicle to do it. “Parked her between the incoming cotton and outgoing steel, and Mia has the torch.”

“My thanks,” Hama said, pocketing the keys, then looked to his left, where Satsuke was now waiting. “Perhaps Mia can use the torch to show me where it is?”

Mia gave a start, then looked at Gideon.

“It’ll be okay,” he said, trying hard to mean it. “Elvis can go with you,” he added, and, with a click and a gesture, sent the draco hopping from his shoulder to Mia’s.

As before, the draco’s presence seemed to steady her, enough that she was willing to head out with the detective.

Gideon, in his turn, strode over to where Satsuke waited. “If you want your knife back,” he said, referring to the combat blade she’d handed him as he raced off in pursuit of Mia, earlier, “you might want to wait until all the fagin’s been cleaned off.”

She didn’t even miss a beat. “Consider it a gift,” she said, then she simply stood, watching him.

“So,” Gideon said after a suitably tense silence, “now what?”

“A loaded question, Mr. Quinn,” Satsuke replied. “But to begin, there is this.” She held out a lump of fabric which, when Gideon took it, turned out to be his coat.

“You found it,” he said, staring down at the battered fabric.

“One of my officers did,” Satsuke told him. “It was in a chest at the foot of Rand’s bed, along with a few other — souvenirs — from her various conquests. A lucky discovery for us, as many of those items are unique enough to be traced to their owners.”

“I’m not sure they were conquests so much as victims,” Gideon said, looking up. “Given her abilities, manipulating emotions the way she did, how much  chance did they have against her?”

“As much as you, at least,” Satsuke pointed out. “And regardless of where the blame falls, these people have all been compromised.”

There wasn’t much Gideon could say to that though he wondered, if she’d been on the receiving end of Celia’s focus, if Satsuke would find the issue so cut and dried.

Either way, it was out of his hands so instead of pursuing the matter, he slid into the coat. The second it settled over his shoulders, Gideon felt himself relax for the possibly first time since  he’d settled into a bathtub at the Elysium.

Then again, if he were really being honest with himself, he’d not been truly relaxed for close to seven years, but that was just too depressing a thought to dwell on, now the real Odile had been uncovered and his name cleared.

Assuming his name had been cleared, that is.

He looked up to see Satsuke watching him and her expression said she’d not only followed his entire thought process, but anticipated it.

“There is also this,” she said, holding out a folded document, several pages thick and bearing the seals of the Corps Internal Operations Division and United Colonial Judicial System.

He looked from the document to the general, but didn’t reach out for it. He was, perhaps, less relaxed than he’d originally thought.

“Trust me,” she said, “you’ll want to take this.”

He wasn’t so sure he trusted her, but he did take it. Holding his breath, he broke the seals. It was a long time before he let that breath out.

“It’s a bit late, but I hope you will accept this full acquittal and the accompanying reinstatement of your rank and all honors earned in the service of the United Colonies,” General Satsuke said formally, while he stared down the document. “There is also a provision for six years of back pay, to be delivered upon your acceptance of the terms.”

“Terms?” he asked, staring at the repeal of every crime for which he’d been convicted, all laid out in black and white, then he looked up.

“The unwritten terms,” she said.

“Which are?”

“No one can know the truth about Odile.”