City of Night (60 page)

“But—”

“She’s twice the fighter
I
am. She’s ten times the fighter you are—more, in your shape. If she can’t take him,
none
of us can. We’ve got to
go
. Finch!” He gestured with his dagger.

Arann hesitated. Blood reddened his lips and his teeth; it darkened his brows, sticky and wet across his forehead. He turned, once, to look back through the streets. Duster’s name left his lips in a whisper that was, in its own way, almost a scream.

“Arann,” Finch said, taking his sleeve in one hand and looking at his face; it was white, except for the gash along his forehead, and those lips, that trickle of his own blood. “Arann,
please
.” Some of it dripped onto the shoulders of his shirt. She pulled at the sleeve, and he looked down at her, his eyes narrowing as if he found it hard to focus. He wanted to say no. They all saw that.

Finch said quietly, “I won’t go if you won’t.”

He closed his eyes for a few seconds, and then he nodded and followed, stumbling over the larger gaps between stones that were so common in this holding. And in the next two, truth be told—but they were staying in the twenty-fifth. Jay was still here.

The den turned at the crossroads.

They ran, but it was hard; Arann was slow and in obvious pain. Something was wrong with his breathing; Finch asked Angel, and Angel, remembering his father’s words, said nothing. “Just get him to the trough,” he told Finch, trying to keep grim out of his voice. “Get him to Jay. We can figure out where we go from there.”

The unspoken
nowhere
hung in the air.

Arann had taken no obvious life-threatening wounds; the man had held no knife. The gash across Arann’s forehead, while it might scar, wasn’t going to kill him. But wounds or no, it was obvious that he was in pain, and it was not the type of pain that sleeping for a day would cure. It was the type of pain that cried
doctor,
or worse,
healer,
and they didn’t have enough money to eat, let alone pay for either.

“Duster said he wasn’t human,” Finch whispered to Angel, when they turned a corner and almost collided with the stream of people moving toward the Common. They were heading toward the river, and they were moving against the crowd. Running wouldn’t be a problem—if they didn’t have Arann.

Arann stumbled; Angel caught him and they both almost went down. “Angel,” Arann said, wheezing, “leave me. I’ll catch up. I’ll be right behind you. Get the others to Jay.”

But if Angel had seen the wisdom of leaving Duster behind, he
would not
leave Arann.

Arann knew. “You left her,” he whispered, “because she had to stay. Leave me.”

Finch shook her head, almost mute.

“It’ll kill Jay,” Angel told Arann. “I won’t do that to her. We
all
go, from here on in.”

“You think losing Duster won’t hurt her?” He coughed, choking on the last word.

“Yes. It’ll hurt. But Duster did this so the rest of us could escape. We owe it to Duster.
You
owe it to her. Come on. We can see the river,” Angel added, his tone as encouraging as he could make it.

Jester was watching the streets; Teller was standing beside Finch, clutching the iron box to his chest. It made a
lot
of noise when he moved. Angel almost told him to drop the damn thing; there wasn’t all that much in it anyway.

But it was all they had, and if Arann needed anything—anything at all—the scant hope of its contents couldn’t be abandoned.

“Break’s over,” Angel’s voice, terse. Steady. “Jester?”

“We’re clear.” Jester hesitated. “From what I can see, we’re clear. You should be watching the back.”

“I—” He broke off, nodded. He’d trained with Carver and Duster at Rath’s. Jester hadn’t, much.
Carver, damn it.

Arann coughed, straightened. He glanced at Angel and said, with a grimace that was only part pain, “I’ll take the lead.”

“I’ll pull up the rear.”

 

The river had never seemed so far away. Not even on days when Angel was on laundry duty and had to lug a basket full of clothing from the apartment to the water, which wasn’t hard, and back, which was, because it was all wet.

He walked alongside the den, close to Jester, who walked behind Finch and Teller. Jester had given him point, but he helped where he could; they ran in spurts because that was all Arann could handle, but they took advantage of the breaks to scan the street. It was messy. If anyone was following them carefully, neither Angel nor Jester was going to catch them. Duster would have.

Duster.

Angel swallowed. Straightened. This wasn’t the first time that he’d let someone else do the fighting; it wasn’t the first time that that someone else had died because of it. He’d never expected to be faced with the same damn choice in the City of Averalaan. Dens, yes. Street fights, yes. But those weren’t the same.

This was like Evanston.

Angel shoved the thought as far out of his mind as he could when Arann rose and began to move again. He kept his eye on the crowds, looking for the sudden moving ripple that would speak of pursuit. Watching, and dreading it. Because if he didn’t see it, it meant that there was still some hope for Duster.

Hope? he thought bitterly, as Arann staggered and coughed. Her dagger had
bounced
.

Angel, grim, straightened his shoulders. One way or the other, they were going to make it to Jay. That was what Duster had stayed for, and that was the only thing he could do for her now.

It had been the only thing he could do for his parents: survive, when they hadn’t. Help the others survive. It was what they’d wanted; the last thing they’d probably even thought. It was also the only thing that his Free Town parents and the volatile, violent Duster had in common: They’d paid the price for his passage.

 

The den made it to the river, and then, along the riverside to the magelights that girded the river side of the street on their thick poles. It was cold enough that no one was playing in the water; it wasn’t cold enough that people weren’t trying to wash things at its banks.

They stopped just to one side of Taverson’s. “Arann,” Angel said quietly, “go in. Find Jay; ask her what she wants us to do.”

Arann hesitated, and Angel added, “I’ll keep watch out here. One of us has to.”

“Send Teller.”

Angel shook his head. “Go. If we have to, the rest of us can scatter.”

“And you can run faster without me.” No question there. Arann took a breath, wincing, his hands holding his side.

Angel kicked the door open, and Arann moved just enough to catch it before it slammed back on its hinges. Angel watched him leave, and then turned his gaze to the streets, his hand on his dagger, just as Duster’s often was.

No one spoke. Jester scanned the street as well; Finch and Teller huddled together, Teller’s arms clutching that damn box as if it were a baby. He’d taken it; he’d left the cat. Judging from the look on his face, he’d actually had the time to make that choice. Angel touched his shoulder briefly.

“Where will we go?” Finch asked. It wasn’t directed at Angel; it wasn’t really directed at all.

“Let’s see what Jay says. If she’s still here.”

Finch nodded. After a pause, she said, “This is where Jay found me. Taverson’s. I was running. That way.” She lifted a slender arm, and pointed more or less into the middle of the busy street.

“It saved your life,” Angel replied, for he’d heard the story before. “Let’s hope we get lucky twice.”

The tavern door swung open, and Carver stood in its frame. He glanced at them all. “Duster?” he asked Angel. His gaze skirted the streets, and the people moving through them.

Angel shook his head, realized that Carver wasn’t looking at him and couldn’t see the gesture, and spoke instead. “She’s not coming. Is Jay—”

Carver swore. Two brief words. “Get in,” he told them. “Now.” He turned on his heel and vanished back into the tavern.

Angel held the door just long enough for Finch, Teller, and Jester to slip inside, and he followed them, wondering who—or what—Carver had seen.

 

Jay stood to one side of Arann, or they would have missed seeing her at all. Arann turned as they pressed around; he was white, and the single gash was livid; his eyes were also bruising. Carver glanced at Arann, but otherwise ignored him; his lips were thinned, and he spoke tersely.

“Jay, we’ve got to run.”

Jay forced herself to look away from Arann. “I know. Did any of you bring the box?”

Teller stepped around Arann, and lifted his arms; the box was still nestled there, and it clinked as he shook it slightly. He was rewarded by the sharp exhalation of her relief; she had no joy to offer any of them.

“Good. We’re going to need it. We’ve got to get a carriage.”

Angel’s eyes widened—and they weren’t the only ones. Jay and her den didn’t
do
carriages; no one who lived in the twenty-fifth holding did. Carriages did pass through, although they weren’t as common as wagons, and Angel knew that some of the older people did call them and did climb into their cramped, odd cabins; none of those people had ever been den.

No one, however, said this.

Jay turned to Arann, her voice dropping. “Arann, can you run?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.”

They turned to head out into the streets. They stopped before they’d gone five feet.

Standing in the door, blocking all light—or perhaps absorbing it—stood a man that Angel recognized. Old Rath. His gaze scanned the crowd—and for midday in the holding, it
was
crowded—before settling on Jay. On the den.

Jay did not, by any stretch of the imagination, look happy or relieved to see him.

 

She cursed under her breath, which was all the breath she spared for useless words. Her hands went to the daggers she hardly ever used. She squared shoulders and took a step to the side, her gaze never leaving Rath’s face. Angel drew a dagger, motioning Finch and Teller to someplace behind Jay. Jester went as well, shadowing Finch, as he often did when there was trouble.

“Carver,” Jay said grimly, “get going.”

Her grim was not a match for Carver’s. “No.”

“I said, get going. I’ll take care of this.”

“
No.
Duster couldn’t do it. You can’t.”

Unspoken truth, there: Duster had
always
been their best in a fight. Always. Carver? Second best, by a notable margin. Angel was almost Carver’s equal, although they had different styles of fighting.

Carver, therefore, drew a dagger. The innkeeper, who wasn’t Taverson at this time of day, hadn’t noticed yet; he would soon. This much steel? But Jay came here often, and they knew her well enough not to actually pay much attention until there was a real fight.

Carver stepped in front of her, aiming himself at Rath; he didn’t run to him, and didn’t otherwise move, but his intention was clear. Angel looked at Arann, at Jay, at the rest of the den. At Carver.

Time,
he thought,
to stop running
. He lined up behind Carver, and Jay grabbed his arm, pushing him to the side. He stumbled; Teller caught his sleeve, drew him back, almost dropping the box in the process.

Jay opened her mouth. “Fire! FIRE IN THE KITCHEN!” Her voice was high and clear, the syllables knotted by the very obvious fear she felt. Using the fear, fanning a different fear in the men and women who might have been onlookers, and who, by her words, became instant participants.

Angel winced. They were so screwed if the innkeeper caught them.

But if that occurred to Jay at all, it didn’t slow her down; she reached out, kicked the side of Carver’s knees hard enough to make him stumble, and dragged him around, holding him as people began to look for smoke. The more timorous of the inn’s occupants didn’t bother with looking; they leaped from their seats, and began to stream toward the entrance.

Toward Old Rath. They were a moving wall, and they weren’t a particularly peaceful one either; everyone knew what a fire could do in this part of town, and they knew how
damn fast
it could do it.

Carver righted himself, and looked at Jay; his ferocious focus broke into a very slight grin. He nodded. “Back alley?”

She shook her head. “They’re not stupid. Come on.”

 

She led them—quickly—through the kitchen and up the back stairs that Taverson’s maids and wife used. Above the tavern were a few rooms that could, and did, double as guest rooms if people were willing to pay for them; she hadn’t gone that route. Instead, she’d pushed herself through the doors and up the much less accommodating stairs toward the small rooms in which Taverson, his wife, and their children sometimes lived.

“Roof?” Carver asked.

Angel had never been up this way, and judging from other expressions, neither had most of the den.

Jay nodded. “We can climb down from there, if we have to.” She didn’t point out that the alley was a bad place to be caught, if a pursuer was too damn close. They all knew it.

Carver glanced at Arann, and lifted his hand in brief den-sign.

Jay didn’t reply. She didn’t need to.

But Angel signed to Carver, and Carver nodded; they looked at Arann, and said nothing.