Gregory did not like the sense of loss he felt at the removal of Gwen’s warmth pressed to his side. He frowned at her, but she was too busy staring with wonder at the machine that loomed over them. “I, however, have no compunction in denying the term ‘thief’ as applied to me. I am a Traveller.”
“A thief, yes, that’s what I said. It’s a fine beast, isn’t it?” Aaron turned to Gwen to ask the question of her. Pride was evident in both the satisfied expression on his face and the fat note of congratulation in his voice. “It’s been seven years in the making, but at last it’s about ready to be unleashed. Behold, thief and the other one: the Piranha Mark Five.”
Gregory dragged his gaze away from Gwen and studied the machine for a few minutes. Its shape bore a vague resemblance to a giant elephant, with a thick, bulbous head, a rounded back, and four girders for legs, but unlike the actual animal, this was made up of metal struts, cogwheels, pistons, and valves. A little hiss of steam emerged from the nearest valve. The man next to Aaron shouted and pointed at it, sending a worker to scurry over and give the round control a twist.
“It’s very large,” Gregory said, since obviously the king was expecting some sort of comment. “Why do you call it a piranha when it resembles an elephant?”
“It’s bitey,” Aaron said. “Also, once it has my enemies in its dread maw, it will consume them with much gnashing of its internal shredding blades.”
“Ew,” Gwen said, giving the king a disgusted look. “That’s just mean, even for the Underworld.”
“I have been sorely grieved,” Aaron said, turning when his man said something. “Yes, yes, go attend to the lubrication of the pistons. We must have it working no later than tomorrow. Oh, no, not now.”
The man made an abbreviated move to collect his hat, now serving as a cat container, grabbing his cane instead as he trotted off to yell and gesture and assumedly order the workers about. Gregory turned to see what Aaron was frowning at. The blonde from the day before tripped lightly down the hill. She was escorted by a semicircle of cats, each of which wore a golden collar equipped with bells that tinkled gently.
“Arawn! I want to talk to you!”
“Ignore her,” Aaron said, turning his back to the approaching woman. “If you don’t speak to her, she’ll get angry and go away. That gentleman was my chief engineer,” he added, waving at the man who was now yelling at some workmen.
“Arawn!”
Aaron strolled to the second table, where he pulled out a blueprint from under two cats, both of which got up and leaped off the table to join the approaching feline guard. “A solid man, but not brilliant, if you know what I mean. We’re having a bit of a problem with one of the legs. It wants to move out of rhythm from the others.” He looked up at them. “You’re
“None,” Gregory told him. “Nor, I believe, does Gwen.”
“My Google Fu is very strong, though,” she added. “I’m a whiz at looking up information.”
“Will you stop behaving like an infant!” Constance reached them with a swirl of cats. She glared first at Gwen, then Gregory, and finally settled on Aaron. “What are the prisoners doing out of the dungeon?”
“Hmm? Oh, it’s you.” Aaron shook his blueprints and pretended to be absorbed. “I’m busy. Go away.”
“The prisoners!” Constance snatched the blueprints from him. His resulting scowl was fierce enough that Gwen took a step closer to Gregory.
He smiled at her.
“You could have told me you were having them executed! You know how I always enjoy a good morning execution! It’s just like you to be so completely selfish as to keep it to yourself.” She glanced around, her lips a thin line. “Where’s the executioner?”
“We don’t have one,” Aaron said, and tried to reclaim his blueprints. “Release my plans, woman!”
“What did you do with him? We had one a little while ago. I remember distinctly that we had one. There was that pesky demon who infiltrated his way into Anwyn, and you gave me a grand execution of it as a birthday present.”
“That was centuries ago. Jabez, the executioner, turned out to be a first-rate blacksmith. He’s at work in the foundry now,” Aaron said through clenched teeth, still trying to wrestle the plans from Constance. “Release your hold, besom! This paper is worth more than your life!”
“Don’t be a bigger fool than you already are,” she snapped back. “If there’s no executioner, then you’ll just have to kill them yourself.”
Aaron looked horrified at the idea. “I am not a killer!”
“You’re the head of the Underworld,” she answered, releasing her hold on the blueprint. Aaron staggered back a couple of steps at the unexpected move. “Of course you’re a killer. You’ve murdered countless people over the centuries.”
“Those were during wars. Everyone kills other people in wars. It doesn’t mean you’re going to volunteer the next time a couple of prisoners need their heads lopped off.” Aaron glared at the nearest cat, which had plumped down on half of the plans that were draped across the table. “Move it or lose it, furball.”
“Fine!” Constance drew herself up and looked down her nose at Aaron. “Be that way! Ruin all my fun, just as you always do. Get an ice pick and I’ll do the job myself.”
“Whoa now!” Gwen protested. “We are not going to allow you or anyone else to execute us! We haven’t done anything wrong!” She paused a moment, slid Gregory a look from the corner of her eye, and amended that statement. “Not lately, anyway.”
“No one is going to harm us,” Gregory told her with much calmness and serenity. He didn’t like to see Gwen with that hint of fear in her eyes. He much preferred her trying to deny her attraction to him. “This woman is all bluster.”
Constance gave him an almond-eyed look. “Give me an ice pick and you’ll find out for yourself.”
Gwen gasped.
“Go!” Aaron ordered, jerking the blueprint from under the cat so that he could wave it at his ex-wife. “Leave. Begone. You are not wanted here.”
“But I want to see the ex—”
“Leave before I feed those beasts to my Piranha!” he roared.
Constance opened and closed her mouth a couple of times before leveling him with a look that Gregory felt could well have brought down an entire skyscraper. “Fine! Take all my fun, you selfish, irritating man! Come, my children. We will seek out Daddy’s shoes and piddle in them!”
“I do hope she’s talking only about the cats and not herself,” Gwen said sotto voce as Constance spun on her heel and marched off accompanied by most of the cats.
“There are days when I have my suspicions,” Aaron said darkly, then frowned at them, seeming to recollect why they were there. “Since my executioner is at present busy making a new knee strut, and also since you can’t make yourself useful to me by working on the Piranha, then you shall have to do so by other means.”
“What other means?” Gregory asked, suspicion gripping him in its sticky embrace.
“You’re a thief,” Aaron said, frowning slightly at the plans as he read them over. “You will steal for me.”
“I’ve told you: I’m not a thief. I’m a Traveller.”
“And Travellers steal time,” Aaron said without looking up. “So it should be no problem for you to take a few things that I want. After all, they were mine to begin with.”
“What things?” Gwen asked, leaning against the table, one hand stroking the nearest cat.
“My dog, my deer, and most of all, my bird.”
“Your what now?” Gwen’s nose wrinkled in a delightful manner that wholly enchanted Gregory. He wanted to kiss her nose. And her lip. And, if he was honest with himself, the rest of her.
Aaron looked up and gave her a dissatisfied look. “My bitch, my white roebuck, and my lapwing. They were stolen from me by that fiend Ethan and his trickster brother.”
A memory smote Gregory alongside his head. “Ethan? Would that be Amaethon ab Don?”
“That’s the fellow, the devil blast his hide.” Aaron’s expression turned highly incensed. He shook the blueprint at Gregory. “He stole them and then when I tried to get them back, he declared war against me.
“Yes, but I admit that I’ve also heard about this. My partner was reading me something about Anwyn before
