The Instruments of Control (13 page)

The Seven-Fingered Men broke camp at dawn, tearing down tents and readying the wagons as small cooking fires warmed up last night’s meat for a quick breakfast. A grizzled bandit hauled Renata and Hedy out into the cold, keeping them leashed by their shackles. Renata craned her neck, looking for any sign of Marco.

The big man sauntered by, biting into a charred mutton leg that looked like more gristle than meat. He barely gave them a sidelong glance, but he paused when Renata spoke up.

“You could do better than that.”

Marco scowled. “Better than
what
?”

“That.” Renata nodded at his mutton. “Twenty bandits and not a damn one of you knows how to cook. What’s the point of leading this gang if you eat worse than a Mirenzei beggar?”

“So you’re sayin’ we should kidnap a cook.”

Renata lifted her chin. “I’m saying you’ve already kidnapped
two
. I’ve spent half my life in the kitchens of the Hen and Caber, and my apprentice knows her way around a kettle as well.”

“Point bein’?”

“The point being,” Renata said, “you should make use of that. Let us cook for you.”

The bandit holding their chains snickered, and Marco rolled his eyes.

“Oh, sure,” Marco said, “let a couple of witches prepare my food. That makes all
kinds
of sense.”

“You won’t be eating alone. We’ll have the same, from the same batch we make for you. If we poison you, we die first.”

Marco put one hand on his hip and tore off another bite of mutton, talking as he chewed. “And why would you wanna do that? If you’re trying to get on my good side, forget it. I haven’t got one.”

“Have you seen the slop you feed us?” Renata demanded. “Back home, my
dogs
ate better. It’s simple: by feeding you, we feed ourselves. We all get decent meals and everybody wins.”

The bandit chief gave her a bleary-eyed stare, his gaze slipping from Renata to Hedy and back again. She could hear the rusted gears in his brain struggling to turn, the sprockets slipping.

“Yeah,” he said, “guess that makes sense. Yeah, all right. You’ll get your chance tonight. But it’d better be good. And no funny business.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Renata told him.

They spent another long day marching behind a slow-rolling wagon, but this time there were no ambushes, no sudden flash of violence to break the tedium. Just the road and the long wait for nightfall.

“You really think we can pull this off?” Hedy whispered as they trudged side by side.

“I think we have a chance, which is more than we had before. Just remember everything I told you. We’ll only get one shot at this.”

The band found a clearing to make camp an hour after sunset. Renata and Hedy went largely ignored as the bandits staked tents and built fires; the men had either decided they were harmless, or they’d just gotten used to their presence.
Good
, Renata thought.
The less you pay attention, the more we can get away with.

Renata guessed, from the contents of one open wagon, that the bandits had raided a farm just before capturing them. Produce and wrapped meats piled high in back, half of it already rotten and wilting, and they’d clearly eaten the freshest of the lot first. She wouldn’t have served what remained to her worst customers.

One-Eye waved an irritated hand at the wagon. “There. Boss says
you’re
supposed to cook his dinner. Figure it out.”

“Just him?” Renata said, eyes wide with feigned surprise. “But…I thought we were cooking for the entire camp. What about the rest of you?”

“Boss gets what the boss wants. Ain’t for me to ask.” One-Eye glared at her. “Wouldn’t want anything you cooked anyway. Probably make my guts fall out my arsehole or something.”

Renata held up her manacled wrists. “Can’t cook with these on.”

“Sure you can. Plenty of give in that chain.”

She wanted to argue, but she knew he was right. Besides, she needed him angry at Marco, not at her.

“We’ll need supplies. Utensils.”

One-Eye nodded toward a fire smoldering just outside Marco’s oversized tent. “Right over there. And I’ll be watching you two, every step of the way. Don’t go thinking you can pocket a knife without me knowing.”

Renata led Hedy to the wagon, getting a little distance. One-Eye hung back, his scarred-up arms crossed, frown etched on his face.

“Okay,” she murmured to Hedy, “this is what we have to work with. Remember, it’s got to taste good and smell
great
. Any ideas?”

Hedy’s chains rattled as she pulled over a knapsack perched on the wagon’s lip. “Some cloves of garlic in here. They look edible. A little salt, but no peppers. We don’t have a lot of spices to work with.”

“No shortage of alcohol, though. Maybe we cook something in a red wine sauce?”

“Cheap wine.” Hedy wrinkled her nose. “Wait—beer! Is there any chicken left?”

Renata found what she needed, wrapped inside stained parchment paper. The chicken legs weren’t the freshest, and she’d have balked if her own butcher had tried to push them on her, but they hadn’t turned bad yet.

“Got it,” she told Hedy.

Hedy pried open a small cask, sniffing keenly. “These bandits just drink whatever’ll get them drunk the quickest. No idea what’s really good. Smell that? Oakman’s Fifteen. This cask’s worth more than everything else on this wagon put together. Stout, dark, and thick as syrup.”

Renata rubbed Hedy’s shoulder. “Perfect. Grab the garlic, too.”

A clutter of pans and utensils sat in a wooden crate beside Marco’s fire. Renata crouched to sort through it and waved One-Eye over.

“I need a mortar and pestle for my apprentice.”

“Why?”

She arched an eyebrow at him. “To grind the spice. Unless you want Marco to know he didn’t get the meal he asked for.”

While he went rummaging in the bandits’ loot wagons, leaving them alone for a moment, Hedy slipped the poisonous herbs from her shoe and put them with the rest of the food. To an untrained eye they just looked like common plants. One-Eye returned with a stone mortar and pestle and thrust them at her.

“Thank you,” Renata said and set to work.

While Hedy knelt over the mortar, grinding herbs into powder and creating her deadly concoction right under One-Eye’s nose, Renata cooked like their lives depended on it. Holding an iron pan over the fire, she simmered the chicken with crushed garlic cloves, filling the air with the scent of roasted garlic. Then came the beer, slowly bubbling as the tender meat steeped in its flavor.

One-Eye spent more time, she noticed, watching the chicken than watching her.

At her side, Hedy looked up from her work and asked, “How’s it coming?”

That was the signal they’d agreed upon, letting Renata know the poison was ready. “Almost time for the spice,” she said, just as a spatula tumbled from her fingers to the ground. She scooped it up and looked to One-Eye. “Damn. Could you wash this off, please?”

“Just use it like that.”

Renata turned it, firelight glinting off the metal. “It has
dirt
on it. I’m not getting dirt in your boss’s food. He’d kill all of us, probably starting with you. Please, just wash it off?”

One-Eye snatched the spatula from her hand and stomped off, grumbling. They didn’t waste a second. As soon as his back was turned, Hedy laid out a broad leaf and dumped the mortar’s contents inside, rolling it all up neatly and hiding it back in her shoe. When he came back, Renata gave the chicken a few pointless flips and declared dinner complete.

Marco sauntered out of his tent, sniffing at the air like a wolf. “Smells all right.”

“Better than all right,” Renata said, “and you know it.”

“Maybe so. Proof’s in the taste. Bring it inside.”

One-Eye hovered, his gaze fixed on the pan. “You, ah, need anything else, boss?”

“Yeah. Need you to piss off. C’mon, you two. Inside. Now.”

His cluttered table, piled high with the cream of their plunder, had a space cleared on the end. Just enough room for three plates and three knives. Marco waved for Renata to serve up the meal.

“You first,” he said.

Renata didn’t hesitate. She was famished after the day’s hike, and besides, the food was harmless. She sliced off a generous portion for herself and a bigger one for Hedy, seeing the hunger in the girl’s eyes, and dug in. The juicy chicken exploded between her teeth, bursting with rich, meaty flavor. She’d cooked better meals, she knew, but under the circumstances they’d outdone themselves.

She wondered how long it would take before Marco risked a taste. Given the aroma, not long at all. Only a couple of minutes passed before he grabbed a piece for himself, taking a bite and chewing thoughtfully.

“You really are cooks,” he said.

“Told you so.”

“Good. You got the job. Now get back to your tent.”

Renata gestured at their plates. “We’re not finished—”

He speared her chicken with his knife and dragged it over to his plate. “Yeah, you are. I’ve got a big appetite. Now get gone.”

One of Marco’s men met them outside in the dark, leading them back to their tent and locking their chains to the central pole. They waited, quiet, until the bandit was long gone and the raucous campfire revelry began to fade.

“Did you get enough to eat?” Renata asked, frowning.

Hedy waved a hand and smiled. “When you’re small, you learn to eat fast. How about you?”

“I’ll live. Probably don’t want a whole lot in my stomach for this part anyway.”

Hedy slipped off her shoe and unfurled the leaf. Her bounty glittered inside, a small pile of crimson and ocher dust.

“Renata…are you sure you want to do this? We can come up with another plan—”

“Time’s not on our side here, and I don’t know about you, but I think it’s the best chance we’ve got. Let’s…let’s just do this.”

Hedy picked up a tiny pinch of the dust between her fingertips.

“Okay. Gradual acclimation to hangman’s delight, here we go. Best way to do this is in regular, measured doses, as much as your body can take without permanent damage. You didn’t lie when you told me how much you weigh, right?”

“Hedy—”

“Okay, okay.” She held out her hand. “Open your mouth. Tongue up.”

She spread the powder out under the base of Renata’s tongue, her finger slick. Moving in quick circles to rub it in.

“Fastest way to absorb it,” Hedy explained, wiping her finger off on the hem of her dress.

“Wonderful. So when does it start to—”

That was when the cramps hit her, like someone drove a spear into her abdomen and twisted it around, turning her guts into a bowl of bloody spaghetti. She doubled over, groaning, and Hedy caught her shoulders.

“First time is the worst,” Hedy whispered, clutching her. “That’s what Miss Viper says. First time’s always the worst. Just ride it out.”

She didn’t have a choice. The cramps spread, turning her legs to jelly and rattling her ribs, every breath an agonized wheeze.

“Remember,” Hedy said, “no matter how bad this hurts, what Marco’s got coming to him is even worse. You have to survive to make sure he gets it. You
have
to.”

As she struggled to breathe, her jaw locked and trembling, Renata couldn’t think of anything she wanted more.

The wine flowed like water in Rossini Hall, to the tune of the leaking roof. Raindrops plunged into rusted buckets along the corridors, tap-tap-tapping through the night, as bottles popped and red wine splashed into endlessly thirsty glasses.

Felix didn’t know half the people at his own party. Old friends of Calum’s, mostly, come to reunite with his brother under the guise of a pre-wedding feast. He didn’t mind. They were a likable bunch for the most part, exuberant and generous drunks, and he didn’t feel sociable enough for sober conversation.

He was sober, though. Sober as a stone, despite occasionally lifting a half-filled glass and pretending to drink after yet another increasingly vulgar round of toasts.

“May you always awake at sunrise,” one of Calum’s friends shouted across the dining hall, glass raised to salute the groom-to-be, “because your rooster…um, because your rooster…because your cock is hard!”

“I’m pretty sure you just utterly botched that,” Calum slurred.

“It’s something-doodle-doo, innit?” another man asked, leaning on Calum. “I mean, I know this one. It’s like, rooster, cock, it’s—it’s a funny joke. It’s
really
funny.”

Calum shrugged and reached for another bottle. “Sure, it’s funny when you say it right. He didn’t say it right.”

Felix pushed back his chair and rose, hanging on to his untouched glass.

“To your health, gents. I need a bit of fresh air.”

The rain had slowed to a cold drizzle, kissing his face as he stepped onto the veranda and chilling the marrow of his bones. He leaned one hand against the wet iron railing, looking out over the silent lawns.

The papers for the family merger had been filed that afternoon. Come tomorrow, the Rossinis and the Grimaldis would be one—his fate and Aita’s entwined, and Basilio’s heavy hand upon them all.

Unless he took the biggest risk of his entire life.

He knew what to do. He also knew the consequences of failure if he made a single misstep.
It’s not just my neck on the block
, he thought.
Renata, Calum and Petra, Father…their lives are riding on my shoulders. I can’t get it wrong.

“Hey,” Calum said, standing in the open doorway. “You’ll catch your death out here in the rain.”

“Just thinking.”

“Aw, you’re not nearly drunk enough for that.” Calum walked out and threw an arm around his brother’s shoulders. “Oh, I get it. You’ve got the jitters. Happens to everyone.”

“It’s not that. It’s—”

He fell silent. Calum furrowed his brow.

“What?”

Felix shook his head.

“Father says,” Calum started, his words slurring, “he says you got a fright in you when you went up to Winter’s Reach. That maybe your, uh, your confidence isn’t what it used to be.”

The stump of Felix’s ear throbbed in the cold. “I’m getting past it,” he said.

“Y’know I’m proud of you, right?”

Felix turned to look at him. “Why?”

“Always have been. When Father took ill, you stepped up to take care of the family business. Sure, I helped, but let’s not lie: I’m not half the businessman you are, never have been. It was always you, Felix. And even when we headed for the rocks, I was never worried. Not for one second. I always tell Petra, you know what? My little brother’s got the wheel. This ship’s not sinking.”

Felix smiled a little.

“Thanks, Calum.”

“Wanted to ask you something. About your trip. If that’s okay.”

“Sure.”

“People tell stories, you know.” Calum glanced at Felix’s velvet head wrap. “They say you got arrested, as a spy.”

“I wasn’t one, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“No, no, it’s just…the way I heard it, you called Veruca Barrett a coward. Right in front of the whole town, the Gardener and all.”

Felix shrugged. “And?”

Calum took Felix’s shoulders, turning him so they could stand face to face. He blurted out a laugh.

“Only you.”

Felix squinted. “What?”

“Only you, little brother, could stand up to a tyrant, call her out, live to talk about it, and shrug it off. ‘And?’ There’s no ‘and’ about it.”

“Don’t imagine me a hero,” Felix said. “I was scared to death.”

“Being scared and standing up anyway is what
makes
a hero. And that’s why I think it’s funny that you’ve got the jitters. Compared to what you’ve been through, tying the knot’s nothing to be afraid of. So, uh…what was going through your head, anyway?”

“When?”

“When you called Barrett a coward.”

Felix had to think about it. His gaze drifted out toward the damp grass below. He could still smell the blood in the fighting pit, the puke and the sawdust, could still hear the frenzied screaming of the crowd. He could see their leering faces every time he closed his eyes, if he let himself go back there. What he
thought
, though, what he’d felt beyond the sickening fear and the adrenaline pumping through his veins, that was harder to recall.

“I suppose,” he said, choosing his words slowly, “sometimes you just have to stand up. Because you’ve only got two choices: stand or kneel. We’re Rossinis. We may have fallen on hard times, but if there’s one thing Father taught us, it’s that a Rossini doesn’t kneel for anybody.”

Calum gave Felix’s shoulder a gentle punch.

“That’s my little brother. C’mon back inside.”

“In a minute,” he said, waving Calum off. Alone again, Felix looked up at the night stars. The tension in his stomach melted away, leaving him with quiet certainty.

A Rossini doesn’t kneel for anybody
, he thought.

He already knew what had to be done. Now he had no doubts. He walked back inside and went to find his father.

*     *     *

Felix found Albinus in his study, poring over the family ledgers with a drained glass of port at his side. Felix stood in the doorway and held up two fresh glasses.

“Brought you a refill.”

Albinus waved a tired hand. “Had too much already. Just needed to get away from your brother and the drunken buffoons he calls friends. Go back up, enjoy yourself. Your last night of freedom.”

“It is,” Felix agreed, walking over to the desk and setting the glasses down. “And that is why I’d like to spend some of it with my father. Come on, just you and I. Let’s drink to the future.”

Albinus gave him a wary look, but he relented and raised his glass, clinking it against Felix’s. “Fair enough. Don’t suppose we’ll see much of each other in the next few months, with all the work to be done.”

“I was just thinking back, tonight. Thinking about old times. Family. Tell me about…Mother.”

“She was,” Albinus said, looking to the hearth with distant eyes, “a good woman.”

Then he started to reminisce, and he started to drink, and once he’d had one glass it wasn’t hard to convince the old man to have another. Then a third. He didn’t even notice that Felix’s first glass still sat, untouched and three-quarters full, at his son’s side.

Felix walked him through maudlin memories, through the heartbreak of losing the only woman he’d ever loved, and he pulled Albinus into an embrace as the old man broke down in tears.

“Here,” Felix said, pressing the glass into his hand, “have another. You’ll feel better.”

He caught a glimpse of his reflection in the window glass behind his father’s desk. A ghost of his face, silhouetted by the light from the fireplace bouncing off the outer darkness. Felix wasn’t surprised at the look in his eyes. Half-lidded. Cold. Reptilian.

Basilio Grimaldi’s eyes.

“So glad you’re listening to reason,” Albinus rambled, half asleep and drunk to the eyeballs. “Thought for sure you’d do something crazy, like run off with that dockside whore of yours.”

“No, Father,” Felix responded, his voice soft. “All I want is what’s best for our family.”

“Only ever,” Albinus squinted, “only ever tried to raise you boys right. Did the best I could. I know I wasn’t—know I wasn’t a good father. I know that. But I
tried
. I gotta—gotta get some sleep. How late is it?”

“Late,” Felix said. “But there’s just one thing before you rest.”

He laid a sheaf of papers on the desk.

“Basilio sent over some corrections to the merger paperwork.” Felix dipped his father’s quill and pressed it into the old man’s hand. “These pages need your signature.”

Albinus shook his head, too bleary-eyed to read. “Can’t it wait? I don’t even know what—”

“It can’t wait. They need to be filed first thing in the morning, before the wedding. Please, Father. Just sign on the empty lines.”

As his father scribbled his name on the dense legal forms, muttering incoherently, Felix felt the weight of his treason. It wasn’t painful. It didn’t make him sad or ashamed. It simply
was
, like a gray stone lodged in the meat of his heart. He couldn’t spare emotions on it, not right now. To beat Basilio Grimaldi, he had to become every bit as cold and hard as Basilio Grimaldi.

Strange how easy it was.

And when you learn what I’ve done
, Felix thought, gently taking the quill and the papers away from his father,
you may hate me forever.

But to save your life, that’s a risk I have to take.