paper. He’d been keeping it close to him, all these years, moving it from secret drawer to safe to hidey-holes far and near.
When the pair of toughs had been threatening to cut off small but valuable bits of his person earlier, the very thing they sought was lying two steps from them, covered only by a baking tin.
But now it was mine. Two ledger books-one a copy of the book the Army had received-the other the real book, showing who got what, and when. Accompanied by receipts and signed orders and even a series of handwritten letters the Colonel had, in some moment of daft bravado, signed with his name and seal.
What lay between those covers was a hanging, even for a man of Lethway’s post-War stature.
I had to admire Fields' ingenuity. The ledgers proved Lethway made himself rich during the war, at the expense of the taxpayer. They only showed that Fields had carried out the orders given him.
If things came to a Court, Fields would likely claim he had no choice. And a jury might just buy that.
Clever little move, for an honest little baker.
The first thing I meant to do was stash the bulk of the evidence somewhere safe. I planned to take a single signed letter with me when confronting Lethway. That would be enough to establish the existence of the rest without risking the whole batch to a grab. I figured stashing the ledgers at Avalante would put them well beyond the reach of even a Lethway, so that word was on my lips when I stepped into the street to hail a cab.
I was in such a hurry to get to Avalante I didn’t pay nearly enough attention to the people on the street. Oh, I had eyes for the pair who’d fled the bakery, all right, but no one nearby fit the requirements of a pair of murderous musclemen. No, it was nannies out walking with kids and bankers out for a bit of air and ladies in hats out walking to be seen.
But at the moment, they weren’t walking. Instead, they were clustering around a barker, who was in turn passing out handfuls of handbills. People were taking them and then walking into each other as they backed away, their eyes on the paper they held.
A lady walked past, her skirts whipping, such was her hurry. I planted myself in her path and gave her my warmest, most winning smile.
She frowned and tried to dart around me. I sidestepped, still smiling, and she thrust a handbill at me.
“Take it, I have two.”
And then she was away.
WAR, the handbill read. WAR COMES TO RANNIT.
I cussed and stuffed the awful thing deep in a pocket and stopped the next cab I saw.
No one, not even the Regent and the Corpsemaster and the Army, can keep a secret forever.
Especially not when half of the secret is heading south toward you with mayhem on its mind and the other half is being built at night all around the city walls. The handbill had lots of it wrong, but it had enough right to convince me the proverbial cat was out of the metaphorical bag.
The Watch would go after the barker and the handbill printer, of course. I doubted they’d catch either. But even if they did, the word was spreading, and I figured by tomorrow even the weedheads would know the peace was broken.
NINE CITIES ALLY AGAINST RANNIT, cried the handbill. ARMY OF A HUNDRED THOUSANDS ON THE MARCH AGAINST US NOW!
Wrong on both counts. But the numbers weren’t going to matter. Not with the cannons in the mix.
I hope Evis and his-well, our, I suppose-plan to render the Brown impassable to barge traffic hadn’t been tossed aside by his superiors in the House. I had little faith the scheme would actually accomplish more than making a lot of noise and ruining some good timber, but already I was not only grasping at straws but throwing the weight of my hope upon them.
That’s what war does to people. Makes them cling to any hope, no matter how empty it may be in the harsh bright light of day.
I slept most of the way to Avalante, despite having gulped down coffee all afternoon. My dreams were troubled and brief. I didn’t even awake, claimed the cabbie, when a bridge clown reached inside and tweaked by nose.
Jerle, the day man, let me in and took my coat. The old boy insisted on peeking inside the cover at the ledgers, just to make sure I wasn’t trying to smuggle in a trio of Troll assassins, but he was quick and professional about it and he even offered me a seat while he looked.
I didn’t think I’d catch Evis awake at such an unvampirish hour, but Jerle told me he’d been left word to show me right in if I happened to stop by. So I made my way to Evis with barely a yawn or stumble.
The first thing I heard when I drew near to Evis’s door was female laughter. I stopped dead in my tracks, wishing for the first time that a suave halfdead was gliding silently at my side, so he could knock at the door and make sure Evis wasn’t occupied before I barged in.
But I was alone, and Evis had left word, so I walked right to the door to knock.
The woman laughed again before I could lift my hand. I heard Evis speak, his words not quite clear, and the lady laughed again, and there was a tinkle of glass on glass and a slosh of liquor.
I knocked. If Evis was pitching woo he could always tell me to go away.
“Come on in, Markhat,” called Evis. “We were just talking about you.”
The door swung inward, meaning Evis had touched something behind his desk.
I stepped inside.
Gertriss was seated across from Evis, trying to decide whether to hide her cigar or take a puff. She’d already managed to put her glass of brandy down on the corner of Evis’s desk. I knew she’d done that in a hurry because she’d missed the cork coaster and even sloshed a bit of brandy on the polished wood.
Something squealed and caught me across my knees. I tousled Buttercup’s hair, and she greeted me by leaping up and wrapping her arms around my neck before sliding around to ride on my back.
“Boss,” said Gertriss. Her cigar trailed up a damning swirl of smoke. “I was just waiting for you.”
I trotted a half-circle around the room while Buttercup giggled and squealed.
“I see. Did Buttercup decline to smoke, or has she finished hers already?”
“Oh, knock it off, Markhat. The banshee is older than all of us put together, and you know it. It’s not like she’s never seen people have a smoke or a drink before.” Evis leaned back in his chair and blew a smoke ring. “Anyway, your junior partner here is helping me celebrate. We got the go ahead from the House. We’re going to blow the bluffs.”
Gertriss cringed. I disengaged Buttercup and sat her on the floor. I wasn’t happy with Uncle Evis, but when vampires babysit banshees, I suppose hoping for nursery rhymes and games of dolls and houses is a bit too much.
Evis reached behind him and groped for a moment amid the sorcerous knick-knacks he keeps in those huge glass cases of his. When he withdrew his hand, he held a glowing orb that trailed twisting wakes of dancing light.
“Here you go, kid. Play with this.”
He tossed it to Buttercup, who snatched it out of the air and began to coo and mutter over it, engrossed.
I pulled a chair beside Gertriss. “What’s that thing you just gave her?”
“Damned if I know. We’ve had it for a couple hundred years. Maybe she can figure it out. Did you hear what I said? We’re heading up the river. Going to stop the War before it starts. We’ll be heroes. Probably have a parade. Brass statues, for sure.”
I tried to take the luminous sphere away from Buttercup, but she did a little banshee hop-step and appeared all the way across the room.
“Oh, calm down, finder. Trolls could blast the House down around us, and we both know the banshee wouldn’t suffer a hair out of place.”
Gertriss handed me a cigar, and a flame appeared in her hand.
“Boss. It’s all right. Tell us what you’ve been up to. And what’s that you’re holding?”
I sucked in a long draw of very expensive tobacco.
“This is the stuff of Lethway’s nightmares. Evis, I’d like to keep this here. But before we get into that, tell me about the celebration.”
