Sworn in Steel (46 page)

He turned it some more. “But you still lied to me.”

“After getting nipped by a couple of Cutters and escorted to your chair? Damn straight I lied.” I stepped forward, leaned in. I could see the stage beyond him, Tobin upon it, the
hired
yazani
controlling the magical effects from a roped-off area just below. “But I wasn’t lying when I said I was here looking for someone, and that I have other reasons for
wanting to stick around.”

“You mean Crook Eye?”

“I mean his routes,” I lied. “I didn’t stab him in the eye on accident, and I didn’t come to el-Qaddice on a whim. I’m still pulling the pieces of his
organization together and bringing his people in line, but it’s only a matter of time until I do. And when that happens, I want to be ready to start moving glimmer. That’s why I’m
here, and that’s why I initially told you to go to hell: I thought I could put things in place on my own with the Kin in the Imperial Quarter.”

“But now you know differently.”

“Now I know differently,” I agreed.

Fat Chair glanced down at the stage and the players upon it. “And them?”

“They got me into the city,” I said. “But no matter how well they do tonight, they’re going to be escorted out tomorrow morning. The fix is in.”

“The padishah?”

“His wazir.”

Fat Chair nodded as if that made perfect sense. “And you don’t want to leave when they go.”

“Like I said, I have other things to do.”

“Such as try to strike a deal with me.”

“That, too.”

The crime lord set the wolf aside and laced his fingers together across the expanse that was his waist. “I assume you have an offer in mind?”

I smiled. “Business as usual.”

Fat Chair blinked. “Which means?”

“Just what it sounds like: You keep sending magic north, I keep sending money south.”

Fat Chair ran his fingers along his knuckles once, twice. “And?” he said at last.

“And what?”

“And what about the Imperial Quarter?”

“What about it?” I said. “Crook Eye didn’t have anyone in the Quarter.” At least as far as I’d been able to find out.

“Exactly,” said Fat Chair. “He never extended his fingers beyond the border provinces. But you? You come to Djan with magic in your pocket; come all the way to el-Qaddice
posing as the patron of an acting troupe, just to avoid suspicion. Why is that?”

I ran a nervous tongue across my lips. “I just—”

“I’ll tell you why,” said Fat Chair. He shifted on the couch, pushing himself into a sitting position so he could swing his mastlike legs over the side. “You don’t
just want to bring our magic north, you want to send yours south. To your people. To your organization in el-Qaddice.” He placed his hands on his knees. “You want to put yourself in a
position to challenge the
Zakur
in the Imperial Quarter. And the first step is to show that you can get magic to your Kin in there.”

“What?” I said. “Do you know how far we are from the Empire? Why the hell would I want to do that? There’s no way I could win.”

“I agree,” said Fat Chair. He took a slow breath, then levered himself to his feet. I took an involuntary step back to give him room . . .

And walked right into the arms of one of his Cutters.

Dammit.

“But,” said Fat Chair, as his man tightened his grip on my arms, “if you had the backing of a
tal
, perhaps? One that has fallen far enough from favor that it would be
willing to help the Kin in exchange for an agreement to supply you with magical baubles once we cut you off? If you could gather enough money and men, not to mention magic, it’s possible you
could make it too costly for the
Zakur
to dislodge you. You could force us to have to deal with you—at least for a time.” He bent over and picked up the paper wolf, held it
before my face. “Your own tiny den in the center of our hunting grounds. It’s an audacious plan, and quite exquisite.” He admired the figure a moment longer, then let it drop to
the floor. “Too bad it will never happen.”

I jerked forward against the Cutter’s grasp, trying to loosen his grip, to push myself past, or at least beside, Fat Chair. To get a view of the stage, so that I might be seen—so
that I could give the signal.

No luck. The Cutter didn’t budge.

I looked up at Fat Chair. He had a bright line across his upper lip again. It nearly matched the gleam in his eye. “Listen,” I said, “I dusted Crook Eye, sure,
but—”

Fat Chair looked past me and nodded. I was taking a deep breath to scream my head off—for the stage, for the padishah’s men, hell even for Wolf—when I heard a low voice mutter
something behind me. A soft weight settled across the back of my neck, and suddenly my muscles decided to stop paying attention to me. My deep breath leaked out in a wheeze.

“Thank you, Nazin,” said Fat Chair. He looked back at me and smiled. “Oh, that’s right—as an Imperial, you’re probably not used to having magicians at your
beck and call, are you? It’s a shame, really—they come in so handy.” To the man behind me: “Since he came to negotiate, he probably has the package on him. Check.”

The hands let go of my wrists and began to go over me, patting sleeves, undoing buttons, checking inside and out. When they came across the long, triangular assassin’s needle I’d
threaded up along the seam of my doublet’s sleeve, their owner whistled in appreciation.

“Clever bastard,” he said as he drew out the eight inches of tapered steel and set it atop his boss’s papers. He resumed his search more carefully after that.

For her part, the
yazani
stepped around to my side and adjusted the glimmered scarf she’d laid across my neck, tying it off and tucking it in, all the while making sure it never
stopped touching my skin. She smelled of tobacco and mint and hummed as she worked.

And all the while, I stood there, breathing (just) and blinking (rarely), staring at Fat Chair because I didn’t have any other choice. He stared back.

“If it were simply business,” he said to me, “I might have let you leave the city, less a finger or four. It was a brilliant plan, after all, and I have no desire to stir up
your people in the Quarter. But you killed S’ad, and I can’t let that pass. He was a distant cousin, but he was still blood, and he was close to me.” He shook his head, almost
sadly. “I don’t look forward to what my fellows will say after I’ve killed you, but clan comes first.”

It was a good thing I was unable to react; otherwise, I might have laughed in his face. He was doing exactly what Mama Left Hand had wanted him to do in the first place, and didn’t even
realize it was the wrong choice. She was right: He was a fool.

Still, I would have given anything just then to be able to talk, to be able to tell him that I didn’t have people in el-Qaddice, that I wasn’t half as clever as he was giving me
credit for, that I really had come down here just to find one man and do a
yazani
a favor. But instead, all I did was stand there, listening to my heart hammer in my ears and wondering
whether or not I’d choke on my own vomit if I threw up like this.

The Cutter found Jelem’s package shortly after that—I’d been planning to hand it over anyhow, so it wasn’t as if I’d hidden it well—and handed the small
bundle off to the
yazani
. After she chanted a few words and rubbed a silvery brown powder over them, the wax seals let off a small puff of smoke and dropped away from the paper.

“Well?” said Fat Chair as the woman unfolded the papers and looked them over.

I saw her eyes widen out of the corner of my own, watched as she whispered into Fat Chair’s ear, causing much the same reaction. He snatched the pages from her, stared at them, and then
turned his eyes to me.

More than just his upper lip was sweating now.

“What . . . ?” he began, but his voice trailed off. He waved the paper at me as if I could answer him.

I blinked.

“I take it back,” he said, his voice little more than a whisper. “You’re not brilliant. You’re mad. Mad, and doomed.” He turned to the Cutter. “Take him
down to the third ring and leave him in the first alley you find. Make sure no one can tell who he was when you’re finished.” He refolded Jelem’s papers and stuffed them into his
sash. “I don’t want anyone to know he lost these for as long as possible.”

The Cutter reached up and touched the back of the scarf along my neck. “Turn around,” he said, “and walk.”

Much to my disappointment, I did so. Smoothly.

He guided me out of the box and along the hall to the narrow steps that led down to the next level. I could hear shouts and applause through the walls, feel the stomping of the audience through
the soles of my shoes. For good or ill, the play was clearly having an impact. I just wished I could enjoy the knowledge more.

We went down the stairs. At the bottom, we found another one of Fat Chair’s men. I’d passed him coming up and left my weapons in his care. He didn’t bother to look up as we
approached. Instead, he sat in his chair, feet crossed at the ankles, his head tilted forward in boredom or sleep.

It wasn’t until we were almost even with him that the Cutter behind me realized his comrade was neither bored nor sleeping, but dead. But by then, it was too late.

Wolf stepped out of the gallery entry we’d agreed he should linger in the day before and silenced the Cutter with a single, clean thrust over my shoulder. I heard the blade pierce skin,
smelled its oiled steel, felt the breeze of its passing, followed by the spray of blood across my back. And still I kept walking.

“Well, that was . . . here, now, where are you going?” said Wolf. He stepped in front of me. I walked into him. He took a step back and held me at bay with one hand.

“What kind of game are you . . . Ah.” He frowned. “Just like the Djanese to use magic when a good gag and a bit of rope will do. Damn show-offs.” He shoved my shoulder,
causing me to pivot to one side. Then he kicked my legs out from under me.

I fell like a tree.

It must hurt to be a tree.

I heard Wolf wipe his blade clean and then slide it home in its scabbard. He knelt down before me. My legs were still moving.

“Apologies for your nose,” he said. My nose? What about my nose? “So, magic.” Wolf studied me. “I’m presuming the one I killed wasn’t the shaman, which
means he’d need something to control you. And that means . . .” The degan cleared his knife, flashed it near my throat, and had it away again, all between one heartbeat and the next. A
moment later, the scarf fell from my neck and my muscles returned to me.

I gasped. I groaned. I curled up on my side. And yes, I reached up and touched my nose.

Not broken, and it all seemed to be there. Just bloody. That was something.

“All went well with the fat one?” said Wolf, standing. He grabbed the dead Cutter by his ankles and dragged him into a space behind the stairs.

“He took the bait, if that’s what you mean,” I said as I sat up. “Although I wasn’t sure I was going to live long enough to see things through, to be
honest.”

“Which is why you should have simply killed him, as I suggested.”

“I told you why that wasn’t an option.”

“Then you should have killed the old woman as well.” Wolf gave the body one last shove and came back out. It wasn’t a perfect fit, but you’d have to look to see the
Cutter in this light.

“Mama Left Hand isn’t someone you just . . .” I stopped, shook my head. Who the hell was I to argue with Wolf about dusting a crime lord? We’d both done it, for
Angels’ sake. Besides, we’d already gone over this when I’d pitched the plan to him and—reluctantly, but what could I do, I was shorthanded—asked for his help two days
back. Despite his concerns about there not being enough bodies on the ground at the end of everything, he’d agreed. “The point is,” I said, “Fat Chair has the packet. Now
all I need to do is give the signal.”

“Then we’d best get to it. We’ve wasted enough time as it is dealing with your distractions.”

“Distractions,” I said. “Right. Because anyone can simply ignore a price on his head, never mind half a criminal organization threatening to come down on him.”

Wolf extended his hand and helped me up. “If it doesn’t involve finding Bronze and getting him back, it’s a distraction.”

“Must be nice to have your life so simply defined.”

“Don’t confuse simple goals for a simple man.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” I brushed off my pants, then poked cautiously at the severed scarf on the floor. My body stayed my own, so I picked it up and used it to wipe the back
of my head. There wasn’t as much of the Cutter’s blood there as I thought. I wiped at my nose as well. “Besides, it’s like I told you: What happens here tonight isn’t
just about the
Zakur
. If things play out like I hope, I may have some good news for you come morning.”

I retrieved my rapier and knives from where the Cutter had set them and started walking. Wolf joined me. “I’d rather I come with and find out tonight,” he said.

I shook my head. “I go alone. That, or you get to find your leads on your own.”

We’d been over this as well. He hadn’t liked the idea of me heading off alone, but I liked the idea of him knowing about Heron, let alone the sword hanging on his wall, even less. No
matter how many times I played the scene of he and I walking into the library together, it never ended well.

Wolf scowled. “Very well. But I want to hear from you first thing if you find anything.”

“Not to worry,” I said.

He grunted, but otherwise didn’t respond. When we reached the bottom of the next set of stairs, we turned and followed an archway that led out to the pit. I stopped just short of the three
steps leading down into the mob and looked across at the stage.

They were deep into the second act. Tobin was offstage just now. Instead, Ezak, in his role as the Caliph Hesad, was striding about, making excuses for Tobin/Abu Ahzred to his councilors.
Surely, he argued, the rumors about such a trusted and valued adviser had to be false? He would not honor them with the gift of belief! And so on and so forth. . . .

I knew this part well. Within the next few minutes, Abu Ahzred would finalize his deal with the djinn and move to throw down the Caliphate. Bodies would fall onstage, magical mock fire would
burn, and the origins of the Despotate would be portrayed in the darkest light that had been seen in a generation. We were, in essence, on the cusp of banishment.