To his immense relief, she relaxed. "It was wrong to come, I know," she said sorrowfully, then looked at him with forlorn hope. "But you'll help, will you not?"
"Of course I will," he assured her, and began herding her to the door. "Now you must go; I'm expecting someone who must not see you."
"I'll go. I must to th'Orb in any case." Without warning, she flung herself at him and kissed him soundly, feverishly, letting him go reluctantly. "Grace you, Master," she said, and slipped out the door, her large, promising eyes turned over her shoulder at him until she was out of sight down the stairs.
Liam let go an explosive breath, and walked shakily over to his chair to collapse. While she was there, he had been aware of her closeness only because of the stupid desires it had raised. Now his chest throbbed painfully where she had hugged him. He could not slump, because it bent tortured muscles, so he had to sit upright. Instead, he heaved several sighs.
Gods, I'm a fool, he thought, a lucky fool, but a fool nonetheless. He offered several undirected prayers of gratitude that Boult had not walked in on the middle of the conversation. He had no idea what he would tell her if he could not prove Lons innocent, and could only hope it would not be necessary.
To avoid wondering about it, he forced himself to think about the night's business. If he could find out who Necquer' s mistress was, it might give him a start. He doubted it, but would not allow himself to consider the doubt.
The hooded woman was pregnant, most likely by Necquer. She had told Viyescu she would go to Tarquin, and then done it, speaking to the wizard in a seductive voice. She had presumably commissioned a spell, an invisibility spell that would have been cast on the Teeth, because there was no other model in Tarquin's workroom.
That, he thought with consternation, made little sense. Whether Lons had intended it or not, it was the spell cast for him that had saved Necquer' s life. If the hooded woman wanted Necquer dead, why not just entice the wizard to cancel the spell entirely? Why choose another spell that would make it look like Lons's had worked? And where had the virgin's blood come from? A pregnant woman would obviously not have any virgin's blood around her. He imagined the woman as he pictured her, nine months gone, handing Tarquin the decanter over her swollen belly and calmly proclaiming it virgin's blood, and her own.
Liam listened to his own laughter, and was scared to detect a note of hysteria in it.
Two hard knocks on his door steadied him, and he took a deep breath before granting entry.
Boult came in, dressed in a heavy riding cloak and high boots, as unconcerned with showing his unhappiness as before. "There's still a heavy storm, and the gutters run like a river in spate. Y' are sure you wish to attempt the Warren this night, Questor Rhenford?"
"Questor?" He was used to the indiscriminate way the people of Southwark flung titles about, but he had never heard this one attached to himself before. Questor was an old name used for special agents of the king in Torquay; it had lain unused for decades. As long unused, Liam realized, as the title Aedile.
"Aedile Coeccias said I was to call you that, for that it signified you were an officer of his, and gave you the right to command me." Boult could not possibly have cared less, and Liam found he liked him for it. He was almost perfectly average for Southwark-black hair shorn to just below his ears, neither short nor tall, skinny nor fat, with a blank face and heavy-lidded, black eyes. He looked bored, in a way that suggested he could be put to better use.
"Well, I'm afraid there's nothing for it, Boult. There's something I need to see in the Warren, and the good Aedile doesn't think I should go there without an escort."
Boult shrugged, with more than a hint that Coeccias might be right.
"I appreciate your confidence, Boult," Liam said sarcastically. "Let's go." Secretly, he was delighted with the taciturn, insolent Guardsman: He would not be the sort to talk about what he saw.
Boult had exaggerated his report of the weather: the gutters were full, but not overflowing, and the storm had resolved itself into a steady, icy downpour. The drumming gave rhythm to the gurgling melody of the rushing gutters. Snug in his cloak, with the Guardsman at his side holding a shielded lantern, Liam was strangely elated. The prospect of discovering just who the hooded woman was filled him with excitement. He began to feel confident that it would solve the mystery to his satisfaction, and he would be able to fulfill his obligations to Coeccias, to Rora, and to Fanuilh. He envisioned the explanation in vague terms, and saw himself giving it to each in a suitably modest way. He smiled behind the hood of his cloak.
The rain, though still thick, allowed the light of the lantern and the glow from the occasional window to play over the street. There was· no one to be seen, and the hissing and drumming of the water closed in on his ears, shutting off all other noise, but twice he faltered, an itch between his shoulder blades. He felt watched, but put it off to the rain and the dark, and submerged the anxiety in thinking of what was to come.
Once they reached the Warren, Boult let him take the lead and the lantern, winding through the streets heading for the courtyard. It seemed to take longer than he remembered, and he was afraid he had gotten them lost in the maze of streets, when suddenly the swinging beam of the lantern showed the mouth of the alley he remembered from the afternoon. Breathing his relief, he turned down the alley, Boult at his back.
Lights
