Never Knew Another (16 page)

“It isn’t polite to push your name on someone who doesn’t want it,” she said.

With a recklessness she didn’t feel, she picked up the soup bowl and threw it back like medicine. Soup spilled on her face and a little on her collar. He held up the handkerchief for her with a smile. She accepted it, unsmiling. The handkerchief smelled like soap. This wasn’t the place for those kinds of handkerchiefs.

Rachel did a mental check for her money. She didn’t have much, and she still felt it in the crease of her clothes. She put the handkerchief into the pocket where she kept her coins.

“I’m keeping this.”

She slipped the coins out from underneath the handkerchief, and hid them in her palm. Then she reached down to adjust her boot, dropping the coins down inside, where she’d feel them against her heel all night. Her scales and claws wouldn’t chafe.

Salvatore smiled lazily. “Want to dance?”

“Yes,” she said. “But I can’t. I don’t know how.”

He laughed at her. He pulled her arm, and she let him drag her up from the bar to the center of the crowd. He was a drunk enough that he kept laughing too long even if it wasn’t so funny.

Rachel let him spin her around the room. He had a stiff back, but he was light enough on his feet to keep her from falling back into anyone. She clenched at the feeling of his hand against the small of her back. She hoped he wouldn’t notice the strange clicking of scales beneath the cloth. She hoped he wouldn’t step on her toes, either, and then she might have to explain the bumps where her talons hid in her boots.

Salvatore spun her around, and threw her backwards in a deep dip.

He was handsome enough for one dance, and he hadn’t stepped on her foot, yet. Rachel kept one hand on his back, and the other trapped in his palm. His skin reeked of smoke and soap, and his hands were too clean. The song ended. She gestured with her head to tell him to stop.

He led her back to their seats. Her soup bowl had disappeared before she could drop it on the floor to try and break it. He bought her a new drink. She thought about leaving.

“Why?” she said.

He grinned. “No reason.”

She was thirsty enough from dancing to want it. She didn’t want to make a scene with this man, whom she would be leaving as soon as she was done with the drink. She wanted to be polite, so she could leave without a scene. He stared at her. She drank fast.

She cocked her head. “So say something.”

He laughed. “I never know what to say.”

“Don’t just sit there like a snapping turtle,” she said. “It’s uncomfortable.”

“I’m trying to think of the right thing to say. I think I got it. Your eyes are like two bright shiny coins. You dance like a silk ribbon.” He bought her a fresh drink. Her mug was gone to the dishwater behind the bar, and she thought maybe her soup bowl would be all right there.

“I do not. Be careful what you wish for…”

“I just might get it?”

“No,” said Rachel, “Let me finish. Be careful what you wish for when a woman’s involved, because she’ll probably get what she wishes for instead and you won’t like it.”

“What is it that you wish for?”

“Better company.” Rachel pulled her chair away from him. “I’m leaving.” She stood up, and walked to the front where Djoss stood glowering at everyone. She handed her glass to him.

“Hm? Oh, thanks.” He tossed the glass back.

She walked out the door, and waved over her shoulder to her brother.

“You just got here!” he called out to her.

“Be safe,” she shouted.

Alone, Rachel walked carefully along the way her brother had shown her. The odd merchant was still open, shouting at a man nearby. Rachel went to the back side of his cart and slipped a jar of pickled eggs from the display, holding it to her side while she walked away.

She turned down the road to the bakery, cradling the eggs. She couldn’t remember if she liked pickled eggs or not. If she didn’t like them, she could give them to Djoss. He ate anything. They’d both gone hungry too many times to care much about liking the food they had.

Inside her room, with the door locked, she listened to the sounds of the night. A voice cried out a woman’s name, and someone pounded on a building wall. Then it was quiet again.

In the morning, she decided she was going to find Turco. She needed to get out, get working, like her brother did. The fear remained, always, but it couldn’t be the only emotion she allowed herself to feel.

***

Jona had seen it all that night. He never told her about that. He had watched her, with Salvatore, not knowing who or what she was—who she was going to be. Jona thought a Senta ought to know better when a demon child was touching her hand.

Salvatore was a fool for pursuing someone that might see through him, but Salvatore was lost in his own habits and loving a woman who didn’t quite fit among the people in the room around her, in the taverns of the night, or the secret temple.

Jona followed Salvatore out of the tavern, into the street. He watched the thief walk up the same road after her. Watching this, disdain swelled up like an acrid belch from Jona’s heart. Salvatore had already forgotten Aggie.

Salvatore was at the baker’s door. He was reaching for the handle. Jona shouted Salvatore’s name. Salvatore turned, startled, and Jona shook his head.

The thief slammed the wall with his blackjack —then took off, running.

***

The second time Jona saw Rachel, she was walking through the Pens, stopping at every servant’s door and asking for work. She looked familiar, and he couldn’t place her right away, in the daylight and a crowded street. How much love begins with déjà vu?

Jona waved off Tripoli, and said he’d be back in a minute, he thought he recognized someone. Jona ran a little farther down the road. He saw her walking up to a man with a long moustache loitering at a red door. That red door wasn’t the kind of place Jona would go without a whole crew behind him, ringing bells and enough solid evidence to arrest everyone inside.

The red-dressed man in the red door smiled like he knew her, but that’s always how these things were. Jona had seen these sorts of greetings. In a city street, anything could happen. A man could stand with a giant slab of meat on his leg on a street corner for hours. People could be running from nothing and everything. Tiny sparrows could be walking around among the legs of people as sure of step as if they were six feet tall. Jona saw a beautiful woman he thought he recognized in Senta leathers talking to some street gang’s watch-out man. It was so normal, but it was so strange. She didn’t like him, but she talked to him. He wouldn’t leave his place casually, because he was the watch-out man, but he got up for her and walked her down the street.

Tripoli saw it, too, and took up step after Jona even though he’d been waved off. The two king’s men nodded at each other. Watch-out man walking anywhere got their attention, and he wasn’t leading another troublemaker. The crowd parted for them, but the two they followed didn’t seem to notice. Jona and Tripoli walked along behind the pair a while, watching from a distance.

The watch-out man wore nothing but red. He was easy to spot in a crowd of so much dirt browns and burlaps. He walked her to a door. It was a brothel door. Sentas didn’t work brothels, and if she was a working girl, she was overdressed and not wearing any rouge or powder.

Tripoli shook his head. “What do you think that’s about?”

“Don’t know. Don’t like seeing watch-out men walking around like that. Don’t he care for what his people think?”

“Probably nothing. His sister or something.”

“Don’t see Sentas here much,” said Jona. “Never seen one with a watch-out man.”

Jona felt the tickling of memory in the back of his mind. The tavern had been dark. The street had been dark. He had been too busy watching Salvatore to get more than a passing glance. Come daylight, she could have been anyone to him. She didn’t have to be anyone.

If he had gone further, he’d have seen the Senta in a broom closet, going through the brushes and the rags. Then, he’d see her pulling sheets from a line. Turco took a cut of her first few weeks’ pay.

That’s the story of her day, when she tells him about it. She worked a few nights, then moved on to a new brothel. Then another, when she thought the hallways were too bright during the day, and wanted to work at night. Her shadow was harder to miss at night. She stayed at that one a while, but Turco found out and he was taking a cut of her pay because he got her the job in the first place.

Everybody needed another maid. Anyone who could would get more coin working in the bed than cleaning it, and it wasn’t so hard to lie back and encourage a man.

By the time Jona remembered who she was, she had long since drifted into new jobs, and there was no finding her without raising people’s attention about it. She wasn’t with Salvatore, Jona knew. She was just a woman in the street, with a life as mysterious as anyone’s.

CHAPTER XI

S
ergeant Calipari had his feet up on his desk, and a page torn out of an accounting book in his hands. He didn’t look up when Jona drifted in from the street. “Corporal Jona Lord Joni,” said Calipari, “You’re late.”

Jona grunted and snatched the page from Calipari. “What’s this?”

“Nothing, if the fellow I took it from is honest. A few missing digits, though.” Calipari leaned back in his chair. He shook his head at his Corporal. “You need to get more sleep. You look like you were out all night.”

“Got drunk,” said Jona. “Threw rocks at ships. What’d you do?”

“Franka’s boy came in town working for a fellow with some new horses. I took him to the dog fights. Kid lost big. I lost less,” Calipari said with a smile.

“What’s going down today?” Jona gestured at the empty desks. “I don’t see the scriveners.”

“They weren’t late. Got them on the rounds like anybody. Get the privates some experience for when they rank up to corporal. Sunshine’s good for their health.”

Jona scoffed. “That’s a bad idea, Sergeant. You think they all come back in one piece?”

“Maybe. Lieutenant wants us to head to Lord Sabachthani’s place. Trouble with some noble. You’re a noble, he says, so send you. Small stuff. Ain’t worth his time.”

“You’d think he’d be falling head over heels to help her.”

“You’d think,” said Calipari. “I heard she requested you personally. You making friends, Lord Joni?”

Jona sat down. He didn’t like anything about being requested by Sabachthani. “I had tea with her once or twice.”

“Big favor,” said Calipari. “She collects.”

“I may be a lord, but I’m just a corporal. Can we at least get the Lieutenant?”

“Huh, right, let me just ask him real nice…” said Calipari. “Nobody wants to get closer to Sabachthani than they have to. I’m coming with you. Nobody’s ordered me on it, but you can’t handle this by yourself.”

Jona believed this was a set-up, but he couldn’t prove anything. The carpenter would think nothing of throwing Jona to the wolves. Sabachthani was more dangerous than wolves. Perhaps it was an accident of his time with Lady Sabachthani, but that was even worse. He didn’t want her attention. Either way, Calipari’s presence should have been a relief, but under the circumstances it worried Jona more than any conspiracy against him by man or bad luck.

***

The doorman bowed and spoke into a tube that sank into the ground at his feet. He pressed his ear against the tube until vague sounds emerged from the tube that sounded almost human. The doorman bowed, and waved the two city guards up the main door.

Jona tossed the fellow a coin. The doorman winked, and slipped the coins into a hidden pocket. Bribing the doorman was how Jona snuck into the parties during the dry season.

Calipari hadn’t even seen it happen. He was busy trying to sneak a peak at the monsters hidden in the willow grove. They were barely visible behind the trees. A trail of mud was trampled down in the grass where the heavy things walked back and forth

to the gate.

In the yard, there was a conspicuous absence of birdsong.

Calipari looked up at the house. “Do you think it was a servant?”

“Maybe,” said Jona, “We’ll see. Do you know what got stolen?”

Calipari shrugged. “Nope,” he said. “Bet it was a servant.” He gestured with his thumb at the willow grove. “Bet it was those things.”

“You want to handle that hanging?”

Calipari chuckled.

Jona stretched his neck straight. He twisted his natural scowl into a big, fake smile. “You ready to introduce yourself?”

Calipari smiled, too. He and Jona pulled little cards from pockets, printed with name, rank, and station house. Jona’s was grimy, and bent in the corner. Calipari’s was clean and white. Jona reached up to the main door and grabbed the knocker. The knocker was carved like whale’s open jaw and Jona pounded its heavy tongue.

The doors swung inward. A butler bowed. “Guardsmen?” he said. “From the king?”

“Sergeant Nicola Calipari, by your request.” The sergeant held out his card in one hand, offering the other for a shake. The butler took the card, and ignored the hand.

“Lord Joni,” said Jona, his own card out and hand extended. The butler shunned even his card.

The butler turned to Sergeant Calipari.“My Lord Sabachthani is indisposed. Perhaps the Captain could come calling tomorrow.”

Jona snatched the butler’s hand and forced a quick shake. He shoved his card into the man’s lapel. “I was requested by Lord Sabachthani himself, and I’m here.” said Jona. He’d explain this to Calipari later. You can’t let the help push you around—they’re only the help. If you’re worth anything it’s
your
right to push.

The butler turned to Jona. “I was addressing the commander.”

Calipari barely hid his laugh behind a frown. “I’m no commander,” he said, “I’m just a sergeant. The estate asked for some king’s men, and we came. Can we help you, or not?”

The butler gestured into the entryway. Jona and Calipari stepped inside.

The butler left the two in the drawing room and disappeared. Calipari made to sit down on a giant leather divan, but Jona stopped him, pointing to the window. From here, the insect leg of one of a guardians could be seen jutting out from the willow grove.