“Did you see the light, Mrs. Devlin?” asked the man. He ran a finger down the bridge of his nose, but didn’t turn away from the window. When he refolded his arms he pulled them even tighter than before, if that were possible.
Mrs. Devlin wrinkled her own nose. “The light, Mr. Devlin?” Of course she hadn’t seen any light. Her husband was making things up, as usual. Transforming the ordinary into the extraordinary.
Although there was no need for such exaggeration today. Because she’d seen it. They both had. Not light, as Mr. Devlin said, but something else.
A glimpse of the numinous.
“Such lines,” said Mr. Devlin. “He didn’t just move, he danced. Danced in the blue light, every muscle in perfect harmony, every element a beat in the music of the Void.”
Mrs. Devlin lifted an eyebrow. “A sonnet, written in fracturing bone, my dear,” she said, but she said it cautiously. She thought back to the scene they had just witnessed. The clockwork soldiers and the demise ofthe Sixways Gang, although somewhat spectacular in its visceral nature, was not of the least interest to her.
No, it was the bearded man with the hooded green jerkin that had had their attention. They had listened to the conversation between him and Jack down in the bar via the speaking tubes that were secreted throughout the Suicide Hall, but while they had gained little intelligence they didn’t already possess, the overheard discussion had at least confirmed their own suppositions.
The bearded man—their quarry—was indeed looking for the artifact, following the rumors across the Isles, the stories that had led him to Dunwall. Stories that the Devlins had themselves heard as they had tracked their prey, keeping their distance, patiently gathering intelligence, trying not just to discover what he was doing, but to predict his next moves. That, perhaps, was the secret to their success as the greatest manhunters the Empire had ever known—their ability not just to track their quarry, but to analyze them, understand them, and to use their observations and data to make calculated predictions on decisions that had yet to be made, paths that had yet to be taken.
Because if you got there first, the quarry would come to you.
They had lost him after the factory, but that was but a minor inconvenience. They knew he was looking for the artifact, and they knew he knew Dunwall. Which meant his next port of call was always going to be Wyrmwood Way—the Sixways Gang. So they got here first and installed themselves in the Suicide Hall, Eat ’Em Up Jack’s cooperation ensured by some long-held but very convenient debt to their leader back in Morley.
“Interesting, wasn’t it?” asked Mr. Devlin. He glanced at his wife, the back of one finger tapping the end of hisnose. “Those abilities he possessed. The way he could disappear and reappear like that. A fascinating power.”
Mrs. Devlin nodded. “Quite fascinating, my dear Mr. Devlin. It seems the legends were rather more factual than I supposed.”
Mr. Devlin frowned in quiet appreciation. “Indeed, my dear Mrs. Devlin. There is nobody in all the fair Empire of the Isles that has powers like that. No bonecharm, no artifact could confer such power.”
Mrs. Devlin smiled and drew in a mouthful of smoke. “He was remarkable, wasn’t he?”
“Remarkable. Exquisite.”
“Absolutely exquisite.”
“Such skill. Such talent.”
“Never a truer word has passed your lips, my dear Mrs. Devlin,” said Mr. Devlin as he unfolded himself from the window and brushed down his thick velvet jacket and straightened his cravat in what little reflection there was in the glass in front of him. Apparently satisfied, he turned and gave a short bow to his wife, his heels clicking together, the sound echoing off the wood-paneled walls.
Mrs. Devlin lifted an arm, checking the red velvet of her trouser suit for ash and brushing the sleeve even though it was entirely spotless. Then she moved to her husband and laid her hand on his shoulder. Mr. Devlin sighed.
“I do wish you wouldn’t smoke that stuff, my dearest. The smoke is so difficult to get out of one’s clothes.”
Mrs. Devlin laughed and replaced her hand on his shoulder with her chin. “You know Wyrmwood Way is quite simply the best place to obtain this particular herb, my dearest.”
Mr. Devlin frowned. “The delights of Dunwall know no bounds,” he said. Then he moved over to his wife, and grinning, gripped her by the waist. Mrs. Devlin restedboth hands on her husband’s shoulders and hummed as they swayed their hips and danced in a slow, gentle circle in the center of the room.
“This coup, though,” said Mrs. Devlin, stopping her humming only for her husband to take up the tune himself without missing a beat. “Dreadfully inconvenient, it must be said.”
Mr. Devlin pursed his lips. “Perhaps, but an inconvenience that is none of our concern and most certainly not part of our assignment.”
“Don’t you find it odd that the League had no forewarning of such an event? The organization exists to protect the imperial throne, and yet the very thing it was created to prevent manages to occur without any apparent hindrance.”
“As I said, my dear, this is not our concern. Our services are offered to the highest bidder. Whether the League is capable or not—or whether they decide to share any intelligence they may have that lies outside the purview of our assignment—is not our problem. All that matters is that they pay us for a very particular job and that we fulfill the terms of that contract.”
“You are, as always,” Mrs. Devlin said, “a font of wisdom and insight, my dear Mr. Devlin.”
“Think nothing of it, my dear Mrs. Devlin.” Mr. Devlin led the dance back to the window. Down in the Sixways intersection, the clockwork soldiers now stood as still as they were able, their frames vibrating slightly, their bladed arms twitching in unison as the squad of Grand Serkonan Guards searched through the piles of dead bodies scattered across the street, overseen
