movement of the crowd. The freeze prided themselves on the uniformity of their costumes, each an interchangeable member of the small army that controlled the city and most of the nation. An ice-gray duster, its upturned collar leading to a matching wide-brimmed hat. A silver-hilted short sword hanging at the belt, both an aesthetic marvel and a perfect instrument of violence. A dusky jewel trapped in a silver frame dangling from the throat – the Crown’s Eye, official symbol of their authority. Every inch the personification of order, a clenched fist in a velvet glove.
For all that I would never speak it aloud, for all that it shamed me even to think it, I couldn’t lie – I missed that fucking outfit.
Crispin recognized me from about a block away, and his face hardened but his step didn’t slow. Five years hadn’t done much to alter his appearance. The same highborn face stared at me beneath the fold of his hat, the same upright carriage bore mute witness to a youth spent in the tutelage of dance masters and teachers of etiquette. His brown hair had retreated from its former prominence, but the curve of his nose still trumpeted the long history of his blood to anyone who cared to look. I knew he regretted me being here, just as I regretted him being called.
The other one I didn’t recognize – he must have been new. Like Crispin he had the Rouender nose, long and arrogant, but his hair was so blond as to be nearly white. Apart from the platinum mane he seemed the archetypal agent, his blue eyes inquisitorial without being discerning, the body beneath his uniform hard enough to convince you of his menace, assuming you didn’t know what to look for.
They stopped at the entrance to the alleyway. Crispin’s gaze darted across the scene, resting briefly on the covered corpse before settling on Wendell, who stood stiffly at attention, doing his best impression of a law enforcement official. ‘Guardsman,’ Crispin said, nodding sharply. The second agent, still unnamed, offered not even that, his arms firmly crossed and something like a smirk on his face. Sufficient attention paid to protocol, Crispin turned towards me. ‘You found her?’
‘Forty minutes ago, but she’d been here a while before that. She was dumped here after he finished with her.’
Crispin paced a slow circle around the scene. A wooden door led into an abandoned building halfway down the alley. He paused and put his hand against it. ‘You think he came through here?’
‘Not necessarily. The body was small enough to be concealed – a small crate, maybe an empty cask of ale. At dusk, this street doesn’t get much traffic. You could dump it and keep walking.’
‘Syndicate business?’
‘You know better than that. An unblemished child goes for five hundred ochre in the pens of Bukhirra. No slaver would be foolish enough to ruin their profit, and if they were they’d know a better way to dispose of the corpse.’
This was too much deference shown to a stranger in a tattered coat for Crispin’s second. He sauntered over, flushed with the arrogance that comes from having one’s hereditary sense of superiority cemented by the acquisition of public office. ‘Who is this man? What was he doing when he found the body?’ He sneered at me. I had to admit he knew how to sneer. For all its ubiquity it isn’t an expression that just anyone can master.
But I didn’t respond to it, and he turned to Wendell. ‘Where are his effects? What was the result of your search?’
‘Well, sir,’ Wendell started, his Low Town accent thickening. ‘Seeing as how he called in the body, we figured . . . that’s to say . . .’ He wiped his nose with the back of his fat hand and coughed out a response. ‘He hasn’t been searched, sir.’
‘Is this what passes for an investigation among the guard? A suspect is found standing beside a murdered child and you converse cordially with him over the corpse? Do your job and search this man!’
Wendell’s dull face blushed. He shrugged apologetically and moved to pat me down.
‘That won’t be necessary, Agent Guiscard,’ Crispin interrupted. ‘This man is . . . an old associate. He is above suspicion.’
‘Only in this matter I assure you. Agent Guiscard, is it? By all means, Agent Guiscard, search me. You can never be too careful. Who’s to say I didn’t kidnap the child, rape and torture her, dump her body, wait an hour, then call the guard?’ Guiscard’s face turned a dull shade of red, a strange contrast to his hair. ‘Quite a prodigy, aren’t we? I guess that set of smarts came stand-ard with your pedigree.’ Guiscard balled his fist. I swelled out my grin.
Crispin cut between the two of us and began barking orders. ‘None of that. There’s work to be done. Agent Guiscard, return to Black House and tell them to send a scryer; if you double-step it there might still be time for him to pick up something. The rest of you set up a perimeter. There’s going to be half a hundred citizens here in ten minutes and I don’t want them mucking up the crime scene. And for the love of Sakra, one of you find this poor child’s parents.’
Guiscard glared at me ineffectually, then stomped off. I shook some leaf out of my pouch and started to roll a smoke. ‘New partner’s quite a handful. Whose nephew is he?’
Crispin gave a half-smile. ‘The Earl of Grenwick’s.’
‘Good to see nothing’s changed.’
‘He’s not as bad as he looks. You were pushing him.’
‘He was easy to push.’
‘So were you, once.’
He was probably right about that. Age had mellowed me, or at least I liked to think so. I offered the cigarette to my ex-partner.
‘I quit – it was ruining my wind.’
I wedged it between my lips. The years of friendship stretched out awkwardly between us.
‘If you discover something, you’ll come to me. You won’t do anything yourself,’ Crispin said, somewhere between an inquiry and a demand.
‘I don’t solve crimes, Crispin, because I’m not an agent.’ I struck a match against the wall and lit my smoke. ‘You made sure of that.’
‘You made sure of that. I just watched while you fell.’
This had gone on too long. ‘There was an odor on the corpse. It might be gone by now but it’s worth checking.’ I couldn’t bring myself to wish him luck.
A crowd of onlookers was forming as I left the cover of the alleyway, the specter of human misery always a popular draw. The wind had picked up. I pulled my coat tight and hurried my steps.
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First published in Great Britain in 2012 by
Hodder & Stoughton
An Hachette UK company
Copyright © Daniel Polansky 2012
The right of Daniel Polansky to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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