“How is that better than the lamb chunks we already vetoed?” Maldynado asked.
“I wasn’t sure if it was chunks specifically you had a problem with,” Amaranthe said, “or all permutations of the word.”
Basilard lifted his hands and, in his Mangdorian hunting code, signed, I could make a real meal if we had access to a fire.
“Alas,” Amaranthe said, “I don’t think the engineer would have kind words to say if we showed up at his furnace with frying pans in hand.”
“He might if all he’s been eating are meat chunks dubiously made in some squalid factory.” Books lifted his newspaper again. “These are strange times we’re living in. Every technological advancement removes us further from nature.”
“Beans sound good to me,” Akstyr said, hoping to interrupt whatever lecture or diatribe Books might be working himself up to. The man had some gray at his temples, and was probably in his forties, but sometimes he acted like the doddering geezers who played Stratics in the park and whined about wayward youths.
Sicarius removed a package from his rucksack and unwrapped his supply of bricks. That’s what Akstyr called them anyway. They were some sort of dried fat and meat concoction Sicarius pounded into bars for traveling. Akstyr doubted the starving people on the streets where he grew up would eat them unless the rat supply was extremely low.
Sicarius offered a bar to Amaranthe. She glanced back and forth from the can of beans to the proffered brick while wearing the pained grimace of someone deciding between torture by branding irons and torture by toenail pulling.
Sicarius looked in Akstyr’s direction. Akstyr pretended to be engrossed in his book, but he could feel that stare upon him anyway, about as friendly and warm as a piss pot frozen over in winter. Sure, Sicarius always looked at people that way, but Akstyr couldn’t help but worry. Sicarius knew more about the Science than most Turgonians, and maybe he knew a few practitioners’ tricks himself. Like mind reading.
Though Akstyr appreciated that Amaranthe watched his back, and nobody here cared that he studied the mental sciences, he figured it would be better for his health if he got out of the area sooner rather than later. And far out. Far enough that Sicarius wouldn’t bother coming after him if he ever learned the truth. Some place like the Kyatt Islands. They were way out in the middle of the ocean, and they were known for their Science practitioners. Maybe Akstyr could even go to school at their Polytechnic and finally learn what texts alone couldn’t teach him.
“Huh.” Books’s paper rattled. “Look at this. We’re mentioned.”
“Oh?” Amaranthe had a couple of cans in her lap and was digging out an opener. “I thought you were researching links to Forge people, not reading the exploits of a heroic and wrongfully accused band of outlaws.”
“It’s a tiny piece,” Books said, “tinier, I see, than this editorial on a perceived cat overpopulation problem in the city. But listen to this: Eye witnesses claim that Amaranthe Lokdon and the group of mercenaries calling themselves the Emperor’s Edge defeated notorious murderer and gang leader Bloody Batvok last week, ending his illegal taxation-for-protection stranglehold on the merchants and grocers working along Thistlemount Avenue. Local enforcers offer no comment. The group consists of a former warrior-caste fop, Maldynado Montichelu-”
“ Fop? ” Maldynado asked. “Who wrote that?”
“-gang member, Akstyr, last name unknown,” Books went on without a glance at Maldynado, “former professor Marl Mugdildor, and a Mangdorian named Temtelamak.”
Basilard rolled his eyes at his moniker. Maldynado had entered Basilard into the Imperial Games with the name of an old war general who’d been known for his bedroom exploits. Apparently, it had stuck.
“The assassin Sicarius is also believed to have been there,” Books finished.
Amaranthe grinned and shared a long look with Sicarius. “Not exactly front-page fame-and it’s hard to compete with feline population problems for attention-but at least someone’s writing us up now. That’s not even The Gazette,” she said, naming the paper where she’d made friends with that journalist, Deret Mancrest.
Akstyr felt satisfaction of his own because he’d helped take down Batvok. The thug had been from a rival gang that had always been trying to stomp out the Black Arrows when Akstyr had been a member. Too bad he didn’t have any aspirations to be famous. Given his hobby of studying the illegal and forbidden mental sciences, it was best for him to be invisible in the empire. Fame would only-
His thoughts hiccupped.
Maybe this was his way out of the empire. Everyone knew about the million-ranmya bounty on Sicarius’s head, and now that Akstyr’s name had been mentioned alongside Sicarius’s, people might know that Akstyr ran with the infamous assassin. There was no way Akstyr would try to kill Sicarius himself, but what if he didn’t have to? What if he just sold information to someone on how to find Sicarius? Akstyr didn’t need a million ranmyas to get out of the city. If he had twenty or thirty thousand, that’d be plenty to buy a train ticket, a steamship ticket, and maybe even pay for his tuition at the Polytechnic. Hairy balls, it might even buy him food and a place to stay while he studied. His heart swelled at that idea of himself as… well, as a wizard. Sure, only Turgonians called practitioners that, but he had to admit it sounded brilliant. It sounded more than brilliant.
“Beans?” Amaranthe asked, touching Akstyr’s arm.
He flinched in surprise, and his elbow bumped against his lantern. It toppled, and he lunged to catch it. In the process, he lost his book and slid down the pile of greenhouse kits. He ended up wedged into a gap that left his knees pressed to his chin.
“Sorry,” Amaranthe said, though her eyebrow quirked in amusement. “I didn’t realize you were so engrossed in your book.”
“My book?” Akstyr asked blankly.
She lifted the tome and handed it to him.
“Oh, right. My book.” Akstyr swallowed. Idiot, he cursed himself. All he’d done was think about his plot, but he was already acting suspiciously.
“Maybe he’s just that excited over the idea of sausages chunked and formed,” Maldynado said.
“Yeah, that’s it.” Akstyr laughed. Did it sound nervous? Or forced? He hoped not. He accepted the book and the food.
Amaranthe smiled, but Akstyr felt Sicarius’s gaze upon him again. Emperor’s warts, Akstyr was acting suspiciously. He was no good at lies.
In that second, Akstyr decided he’d be a fool to actually betray Sicarius. Maybe he’d sell false information instead. False information on Sicarius’s hideouts and the best way to capture him. Thanks to the newspaper, people should believe he had that information. He still knew gang members who might put him touch with those who could afford to pay well for a chance at a million ranmyas, and by the time everyone figured out what he’d been up to, he’d be out of the city and on his way out of the empire forever. By winter, he’d be on a tropical beach on Kyatt, enrolled in school to learn about the only thing he truly loved.
What could go wrong?
Chapter 2
On the last night of the three-day train journey, Amaranthe woke to a touch on her shoulder. She remembered not to sit up straight, because the ceiling of the freight car was only a couple of feet over her head, and merely opened her eyes. Cold air whistled through the open trapdoor in the ceiling. A dark figure knelt between it and her.
“Sicarius?” Amaranthe guessed.
Books and Basilard were pressed against her on either side, and she heard Akstyr and Maldynado snoring on the other side of Books. A chill marked the autumn nights, and the train lacked any sort of insulation, so most of the team was sleeping wedged together to share body heat.
“We’re slowing for a stop,” Sicarius said.
Amaranthe rubbed sleep from her eyes. “Early?” According to the schedule, the train should arrive at its final stop at noon, not in the middle of the night.
