Fly By Night

‘My business in the Capital is concluded,’ Tamarind explained. ‘Kindly send a letter to Mr Kohlrabi’s lodgings, telling him that I require his presence as soon as he is back in the city, then bring me a dish of tea, the latest issue of the Gazette and a bag of dead cats.’ Five minutes later her ladies-in-waiting were at her side with the requested items, and together they entered the spire.

One by one the locks slid to behind her with smooth, liquid clicks. The great locks bore the Guarantee of the Locksmiths. This meant that they were of the very finest quality. It meant that if they were broken, the Locksmiths would pay a small fortune in recompense. It meant that word had been put out across the underworld that the Eastern Spire was a no-go area, so that no clear-thinking thief would consider milling the locks, in case the Locksmiths’ dreaded Thief-takers were sent after him.

All of this might have reassured Lady Tamarind, if she had been hoping to lock out anyone but the Locksmiths themselves. She had resorted to other measures to make sure that the Locksmiths could not wander into her apartments and search them at will.

As she climbed the stairs she slid on a long leather glove that reached to her shoulder. At the door of the salon she paused, then drew out one of the dead cats by the tail and carefully flung it towards the middle of the floor. There was a rasp, like the hiss of sand through a straw, and a low, leatherbound river of wickedness snaked out from the darkness below the harpsichord. Its jaw opened impossibly wide, like a lean book crowded with teeth, and caught the cat before it could touch the ground.

The two ladies-in-waiting stayed at the door while Tamarind advanced to examine her pet. With satisfaction she noted its distinguishing features, the dirt-coloured dent above its left eye, and one flattened tooth jutting out from its fellows.

Originally her rooms had been guarded by a Shrieking Foxhawk that would lunge for the eyes of any but herself. One day she had returned to find the hawk strangely docile, and slightly larger than before. Next, she had bought a savage wolfhound to keep intruders from searching her apartments, but she became aware that there had been another switch when Tartar unexpectedly bore puppies. It had taken longer for the Gravyscale Python to be replaced, and after that she had resorted to ever more exotic animals. By the look of things, the Locksmiths had not yet succeeded in finding themselves a substitute crocodile.

As the animal snapped at the carcass with a soft rip like a spade biting through turf, Tamarind settled herself on the window seat and opened her stoat-handled embroidered box. The signet ring she had brought all the way from the Capital was still within, safe from the bloodied hands of highwaymen and the gloved fingers of Locksmiths. The ring had been expensive to fashion in secret. She was all too aware of the consequences, should it be discovered in her possession.

Below her window, Mandelion spread itself like a butterfly of brick and slate. Even from this angle the extraordinary symmetry of the city’s design was obvious. The Eastern Spire had its match in the west, where the Duke of Mandelion kept his quarters.

The thought of her brother’s obsession caused a pulse to flutter beneath Tamarind’s scar. I must be feeling something, she thought. Could it be fear? No, it is not fear. She moved to another window and gazed down towards the pillory and gibbet in the yard.

Far below in the courtyard, a man was on his knees. The constable was selecting a long branding iron from the fire, and considerately dipping it in water before pulling the felon’s hand towards him. Maybe the brand was a ‘T’ for thief, or an ‘F’ for forger. It would be quicker and simpler to hang them outright, Tamarind reflected. Brand a man as a thief and no one will ever hire him for honest labour – he will be a hardened robber within weeks. The brand does not reveal a person’s nature, it shapes it.

With a tip of one long finger she traced a tiny circle around the snowflake on her cheek. Could it be fear? No, not fear.

The house in Jottland where she had been born and spent her childhood had looked over a glade that was set aside for badminton. Too clearly she recalled the last time she had ever played the game. She remembered the glistening of the rain-stricken garden as she dragged her elder brother by the sleeve with all her thirteen-year-old might. She had only hazily understood how deeply his rejection by Queen Peri had cut him. However, she had known that it could not be good for him to sit for hours in his closet, staring at coins, or at two faces in a locket. She had known that it was her task to distract Vocado and draw him out of himself.

Her brother had winced as if the birdsong gave him toothache, and had swiped at the shuttlecock, first listlessly, then so savagely that the fronds enmeshed themselves in the strings of the racket. Tamarind had run to help him disentangle them, but he had shaken off her hand. At her feet, water was puddled in the hollows of the lawn and her reflection had regarded her with delight and surprise.

‘Look, Vocado!’ She had pointed at her reflection. ‘I have a twin!’

A twin. Nothing could have triggered Vocado’s anguish like those innocent words. She had looked to her brother for a smile, just as his racket completed its savage swing at her face…

Down in the courtyard, the constable was lifting his brand away from the felon’s hand, and turning to face the judge. In the spire room one could hear no screams, feel no heat, smell no burning, but Tamarind knew that the constable would be speaking the traditional words as he displayed his handiwork to the gathering.

‘A fair mark, my lord.’

G is for Gentleman’s Agreement

‘Hoi!’

Mosca shifted from sleep to waking in her usual way, flinging out her fists to left and right. On this occasion, she bruised her knuckles on two close wooden walls, and was shocked into total clarity. Above her an unfamiliar set of rafters was looped with long, dusty, cobweb banners. The sound of water nearby made her think herself back in Chough for a moment. But this was a watery voice of a gentlemanly sort, each lap like the idle slap of a horsewhip against a calf.

‘Hoi!’

Mosca’s head was turned to one side at an awkward angle, and her pantaloon-clad knees were hooked over a wooden footboard. Below the rafters was a single window, the grey pre-dawn sky sliced into diamonds by the window leading. Somewhere beyond the window, someone was trying to shout under their breath.

Mosca heaved herself out of the truckle bed, and pulled the window open. Below, a woman with a fat yellow pigtail and a wide, frog-like mouth was hauling her gentleman companion to his feet, her strong, plump arms around his middle.

‘Hey! You up there!’ The woman was using the hoarse, hushed call of one who is trying to rouse the house without waking the neighbours. ‘You does marriages, right? We wants to get married. Don’t we?’

‘Bwuzzug,’ her friend agreed, and smiled at the bottle in his hand.

A little further along the wall, another window opened and a head of wild red hair appeared.

‘You need a marriage done quick?’ The voice was young and as sharp as a thorn. ‘You got three shillings, and sixpence for the late hour?’

‘Right here in me purse.’ The strain of holding her fiance upright was starting to show in the colour of the plump woman’s face.

‘I’ll come down and let you in, then,’ declared the red-haired girl. ‘You’ll have to guide his hand when you’re signing the register, though, looks like.’

Somewhere in the house, a tinder scratched and heavy soles flapped on wooden boards. Then the front door opened and swallowed the woman and her drunken friend.

Five minutes or so later, the other window swung wide again. The red hair had been pushed roughly under a mob cap, and there was a wise, pale face the colour of uncooked pastry beneath it. The face’s owner scanned the windows until she spotted Mosca.

‘Sorry for you bein’ woken, ma’am, I hope you an’ your husband will have no more trouble.’ Mosca could only