'Lucky…'
From the bitterness in his voice, Miri realized he wasn't talking about the cut.
'I'm sorry the plan didn't work,' she said. 'It nearly did. If the wizard hadn't been there…'
'Even though he was,' Aeron said, 'we almost saved my father. Another couple paces, and I would have picked him up in my arms. Then the fog came, and it panicked us. We turned tail and left him lying there.'
'We didn't have a choice.'
'You can't be sure of that. Maybe we still could have gotten him out. We'll never know, because you said we had to run, and I listened.'
She stared at him, then said, 'So it's all the fault of my cowardice that things didn't work out.'
'I didn't say that.'
'Not in so many words, but… Listen, when we fight your fellow cutthroats, all they do is try to club you unconscious, or cut a leg out from under you. They're out to kill me. So I'll be damned if I understand where you find the gall to question my courage.'
'I said we both panicked. I didn't mean to put it all off on you.'
'I'm a scout of the Red Hart Guild,' Miri replied. 'I have honor. You're a common sneak thief. You don't. Be thankful I'm willing to dirty my…'
She felt the clench in her muscles and heard the shrillness in her voice. She took a long breath.
'Never mind,' Miri continued. 'I shouldn't have said that I'm frustrated, too.'
For a few heartbeats, Aeron just stared out at the night as if struggling to swallow his own anger.
Eventually he said, 'For all we know, he could be dead now.'
'I don't think the mist would kill him,' Miri replied, 'and I didn't see any fresh blood on him when he was lying on the floor. I think the one Red Axe just knocked him out with the flat of his blade, or his fist.'
'That could have been enough to kill him, sickly as he is. Or maybe, after what happened, the Axes decided I'm never going to trade the book, and they stuck a knife in him.'
'I doubt the wizard would let them do anything rash,' said the ranger. 'He strikes me as too canny.'
She reached out to give Aeron a reassuring pat on the shoulder, but he irritably twisted away from her touch.
'You don't know that, either,' he said. 'All we do know is that we wasted our one chance to sneak into Kesk's house. We'll never get inside a second time.'
'Then it's time to try it my way, isn't it? Seek help from the Bouquet’s rightful owner, and the authorities.'
Aeron scowled and said, 'I explained to you why that wouldn't work.'
Despite herself, Miri felt her own hostility welling up anew.
'While painting our faces green like clowns in a pageant works brilliantly,' she said. 'I think you won't turn to the law just because it is the law. It would tarnish this notion you have of yourself as some sort of master rogue, and you couldn't bear that. You'd rather let your father die.'
'That isn't true. It just wouldn't help.'
'What is the answer, then?'
'I don't know,' he said. 'Shut your mouth for a while, and maybe something will come to me.'
Kesk's mood was already sour from several fruitless hours of hunting Aeron through the Underways, and it curdled into cold fury as soon as he tramped into the solar and saw his henchmen. It was obvious from the way they quailed from his gaze, as much as their fresh splints and bandages and the sooty fire damage around the far doorway, that some new fiasco had occurred in his absence.
Ambling closer, his cane tapping the floor, the wizard took it upon himself to explain how Aeron and a female accomplice had entered the house in disguise to spirit Nicos away.
'We would have captured them,' the wizard added, 'except that Dark Sister Sefris burst in to snatch them away. Evidently she'd been tracking them or something. While we all fought over Master sar Randal and his ally, they escaped. It's rather ironic when you think about it.'
Kesk trembled. At that moment, he would dearly have loved to split the rich man's masked face with his axe.
'You think it's funny, do you?' the tanarukk asked.
'Mildly,' the wizard replied. 'Now, don't glare at me like that. Aeron didn't rescue his father, which means that except for a few casualties, which you, with your horde of underlings, can readily afford, we're no worse off than before.'
'And no better.'
What truly infuriated Kesk wasn't the wear and tear on his henchmen. Those too weak to defend themselves deserved whatever they got. What nettled him was that, by arranging the raids on his various enterprises, Aeron had successfully concealed his true intentions. In other words, made a fool of him. Kesk wondered which of his other foes or rivals were actually responsible for the harassment his operation had suffered earlier in the evening, at the same time the redheaded thief was invading his home. He vowed to find out, and pay them back triple, but supposed it would have to wait until he settled the maddening business with the black book.
'If,' the wizard said, 'Aeron could be convinced we'll make a fair trade, give him Nicos and a reasonable amount of coin, too, and not come after either of them later, don't you think he'd agree to it?'
Across the room, bound to his chair, Nicos laughed feebly until an orc silenced him with a slap.
'I suppose that is the proper response to my suggestion,' sighed the small man. 'Aeron would have to be mad to trust us at this point. Your malice and bungling saw to that.'
Kesk glared.
'Get it straight once and for all,' the tanarukk grumbled. 'I'm not your lackey, and I don't take orders from you. I did what I thought best.'
'And look how far it got us.'
'As far as your nimble-fingered wizardry and magical toys.'
' 'Toys' you extorted from me after I spent years collecting them,' the mage countered. 'I wouldn't care if it had done some good. But even equipped with enchanted gear, your Red Axes can't lay their hands on one lone-wolf cutpurse. Instead, he's made you look like a dunce in front of the entire city.'
Kesk had been thinking something similar himself, which only made the magician's taunt rankle all the more. For a second, he was so angry that it choked off the words in his throat, and the merchant saw something in his face that made the eyes above the lemister scarf widen in alarm.
'Well,' gritted Kesk when he was able, 'I'm not going to look foolish for much longer. Tomorrow I'm going to put an end to this business.'
'How?'
'My people will spread the word that if Aeron doesn't hand over what I want by midnight, I'll chop his father's head off and dump the sundered pieces in Laskalar's Square.'
The wizard shrugged and said, 'You've been threatening Nicos's welfare right along. How will this be any different?'
'Because of the deadline, my promise to display the corpse to the whole city, and the fact that my men will repeat it to every robber, slaver, and whore they can find. Aeron will know I have to follow through. Otherwise, I'll lose respect.'
The magician cocked his head and asked, 'You mean, if things don't work out as planned, you actually mean to do it?'
'Yes.'
'Then we lose our hold on Aeron, don't we? With Nicos slain, what's to stop him from fleeing Oeble with The Black Bouquet still in his possession?'
'Nothing, I guess. At least I'll be rid of him,' Kesk replied, 'and you.'
'Without me for a partner, you'll never rise any higher than you have already.'
Kesk sneered and said, 'Maybe it doesn't look like it to you, but since the day I first came to Oeble, with nothing but this axe to help me carve out a life, I've climbed pretty high already. If I never go any farther, that will be all right.'
'You don't mean that.'
