Endurance (47 page)

No, of course not. I had refused this exact choice, turned away from this opening of the mind and soul. It would have torn me apart surely as any coney in the talons of some great falcon. Mortal women were not meant to be vessels of such power.

I hurried through the evening's sleet and freezing rain. It was a proper storm, too, much to my disgust. The Tavernkeep's place abided, awaiting my small pleasure as my choices narrowed toward nothing. The midnight hour would bring me to some end.

*   *   *

No watchers lurked in the alley. I sighed at that, realizing that I'd been looking forward to taking my frustrations out on someone properly deserving. On the other hand, it meant I would be out of the nasty weather all the sooner. Pushing within, I saw that almost no Selistani remained in the tavern. I wondered where they all were. Then I realized that Mother Argai had likely chivvied more of them out to stand watch. A rescue was needed, and I was sending them, if not real troops, at least walking armor under the leadership of Archimandrix. That boy knew this city far better and deeper than did either my allies or my enemies.

Pardines there were in plenty, though. Revanchists, from their half-wild look, and city-bred alike. Somewhat to my surprise, I did not glimpse the bulk of the Rectifier. Perhaps the old rogue was off haunting the twins' warehouse. That thought distressed me.

One thing at a time.

The Rectifier might not be present, but the Dancing Mistress nodded at me from near the fire. She knew me as well or better than anyone alive. I imagined that she could read my entire errand from the set of my shoulders, the cast of my mouth. I found I no longer cared. Stepping to the bar, I sat myself heavily in front of my host.

“I am short of funds tonight.” Nothing remained to me except my weapons, the clothes on my back—the outer robe itself stolen—and the child within. “But if you can see your way to a bit of credit, I could stand a good bowl of whatever curry is on the fire in the kitchen.”

The Tavernkeep gave me a long, slow look, with a secretive smile at its heart. “Your word is always good here, Green.” He stepped into the kitchen, his tail flicking back and forth.

Binding my slashed palm with a bit of rag, I found my mouth watering to the smell of Selistani cooking. Even the pardines seemed to have taken to it. But there was a musk in the room tonight, something stronger than the odor of wet fur and winter on the backs of these strangers. Was it the scent of a Hunt coming together?

Did I care about
that
?

I turned to scan the room. The Dancing Mistress caught my eye. Between us, pardines shifted their chairs, or stood to find other places in the room. A lane was being cleared. Perhaps we were to fight.

On my best day, I could do no more than battle her to a draw. Now, pregnant, bruised, battered, and tired, I would not even think to stand to the combat. If she wanted to take me down, she could. Rangy strength and an intimate knowledge of my own weaknesses as a fighter were a combination I didn't care to challenge.

Besides, I held secret what she most desired. The Rectifier still carried the Eyes of the Hills for me. The old rogue, priest killer and historian of his kind, was as close to an unbeliever in the human sense as I had ever known a pardine to be. He understood the power in the Eyes of the Hills. He simply did not care.

Was all of this what Erio had feared? The larger circles of plot that spun around me were so vast, the entire fate of Copper Downs was but a cog in their gearing. I could fight only one battle at a time.

Well, perhaps as many as three or four.

The principle was the same.

A bowl clicked on the bar beside me. I turned away from the burgeoning challenge and began to eat my supper.

Behind me, the noise of the tavern resumed.

The door banged open. Wind howled for a moment, pushing a frosty gust through the room before being cut off again. The murmur of voices did not die this time, so I was willing to take it on trust that no maniac was charging me from behind with a naked blade. Besides, the Tavernkeep had not lowered his ears.

The meal was hot, and spicy. Someone had found a selection of actual Selistani vegetables—roots and peppers that could have been harvested from any garden in Kalimpura, though here they must have traveled across the Storm Sea in the hold of a ship. Wasteful but delicious. The meat was Stone Coast mutton, unfortunately.

Still, it was a taste of home. Of my other home.

I realized all over again that I would never settle the question of home. Not in my mind, not in my heart. I promised my child she would not ever be so beset by confusion. Even to my own thoughts, the statement seemed hollow, for all my intentions.

First, survive the night. Second, stop these plots and counterplots. Third, keep my child disentangled from them all. Fourth, free Corinthia Anastasia and my fellow Blades. Perhaps my priorities were backwards.

Or perhaps not.

As I finished my bowl of bastard stew, I resisted the temptation to put aside my knives. I would not fight the Dancing Mistress, not now, not ever. And it was not in my desire to battle anyone else tonight. But there was violence to come. Some of it would surely be directed at me. What could I do but respond from my place at the heart of the storm?

I wiped my mouth on a bar rag, smiled at the Tavernkeep, then slipped from my stool and turned to face my old teacher. As I did so, the gentle buzz of voices died once more.

They'd all been waiting for this, pardine Revanchists and city pardines. Likewise the Selistani onlookers. I suppose I had too, ever since that day when she and I had defeated Federo, our co-conspirator from the earliest times.

Now was a time to pass over our differences. I did not need pardine power loose in the city, least of all a Hunt. But I badly wished to give her a reason to return to her groves and mountaintop meadows.

And I had one.

I walked toward the Dancing Mistress.

She rose from her table, stepped around her supporters, and stood before me.

“Green.”

I nodded sharply. “Dancing Mistress.”

Her tail whipped back and forth, but her ears did not lie flat. This evening she was wearing loose leather, almost armor. So unlike her city ways from the whole time I'd known her and held her as my teacher, let alone our brief period of being lovers. That bond had fallen dormant under so much else that had passed since.

She spoke next. “We search.”

“I know. And I have found.” I let a smile slide across my face. She would understand the expression. The Dancing Mistress had been as citified a pardine as I'd ever met.

“What?” she almost whispered. “What have you found?”

The silence around us deepened. So many in this room were Revanchists.

“Back in Kalimpura,” I said, “I killed a man named Michael Curry for the gems that he carried. I did not know then what stakes were in play. Surali of the Bittern Court brought those gems back across the sea here to Copper Downs. She had planned to barter them for more power, but I have taken them away from her.” I looked around the room, catching in my own gaze glittering pardine eyes with their barred pupils. “They were not hers to sell.”

“Nor are they yours,” breathed the Dancing Mistress.

“No. Neither are they mine.” I sighed. Here was the play I needed to make, the edge I had been forced to approach. “So I gave them away.”

The sigh ran around the room as if one breath from several dozen mouths. Muscles rippled, chairs scraped. It seemed the whole pardine nation was ready to spring upon me.

“I gave them away,” I continued, interrupting whatever words were forming on the Dancing Mistress' lips as her claws flexed, “because I gave them back to you.”

“Do not toy with me,” she snapped. Her ears had lain back flat. The Revanchists at her table were all on their feet, tails flicking.

“No. I will tell you of the meaning of my actions, but I ask a bargain.”

“None will bargain in ill faith,” growled a male beside her.

“This is not your soulpath.” I bared my teeth at him.

“What bargain?” The Dancing Mistress ignored her fellow.

“This one: That you take the Eyes of the Hills…” I paused, to let another sigh ripple through the room. I had their attention even more fully now, if that was possible. “Take the Eyes of the Hills back to their shrine and trouble this city no more with dreams of lost power. Every measure of that dance has long since been trodden. You will not find your elder days amid our ruins, nor in the promises of southerners bearing lost treasures.”

“You make promises now,” she said.

“No.” I spread my hands. Empty, weaponless, softly blunt-fingered as any human being's. “There is nothing I promise. All I do is deliver. Deliver, and ask you to walk away from a fight that was never yours.”

“They stole…” the male began uncertainly.

I focused on him. “They did. How shall I redeem that theft now? How can more death reclaim what was lost? Besides, what I have heard is you gave away power as much as it was stolen from you.”

“We could not be who we were,” the Dancing Mistress said. “We can only become who it is left to us to be. If that is a twilight people, so it is for us.”

“Have we a bargain?” I asked.

“Show your terms.”

I waited a long beat. “Have
we
a bargain?” I stared intently into her eyes, willing the old trust between us to spark back to life.

“
We
have a bargain,” she said slowly. I knew she'd taken my meaning.

Another long, quiet moment passed. The musk in the room seemed to thin a bit. A few pardines relaxed; one or two even took their seats again.

“The Eyes of the Hills are safe.” I looked around at all of them. “I gave the gems to the Rectifier. He will guard them for you. What you make of the Eyes of the Hills is between you and him.”

The Dancing Mistress shook her head, then snorted, that almost-sneeze that passed for laughter among the pardines. Amusement, self-mockery, a lightening of the heart, I could not say. “You gave the most sacred stones of our people to a priest killer?”

“Who better? He of you all knows best the weaknesses of that sort of faith.” And they were
welcome
to try to take the gems from him. I could not have found a safer hiding place in a bank's strong room.

“You spin the divine the way some people spin wool.”

“Never!” I took a breath, calmed myself. “The divine clings to me the way wool clings to some people, perhaps. It is my business now and again to brush it off.”

Her amusement melted into sadness. “And so we depart, taking our power and our anger with us.”

“Well, yes. You have achieved what you came for. There is no need for further threat.”

“All well, Green, all well.” Her eyes narrowed, her ears flicking. “But for one thing.
Where is the Rectifier?
”

Every plan had a flaw. She had found the flaw in mine.

“He dogs a pair of god killers for me,” I said, speaking honestly. “I go now to resolve that fate.”

Her voice was cool now. “You sent the Eyes of the Hills into the hands of god killers?”

“I placed the Eyes of the Hills into the hands of the Rectifier.” My ground felt less certain now. My foolishness was laid clear.

“We will depart when he comes to us and shows what he carries.” She sat down, her stare narrow and emphatic. The tension melted from the room to be replaced with a wary waiting.

“Then I shall see to him.”

I had definitely outstayed my welcome here. Glad I'd eaten on my arrival, I slipped back into the driving sleet of the evening.

*   *   *

The time had come for me to confront Iso and Osi. I had broached all the allies I could. The Rectifier was dogging them or he was not. Archimandrix would succeed in overwhelming the Selistani embassy or he would not. Mother Iron, in her new guise, would support me or she would not. Endurance had given me as much blessing as I might have hoped for from my ox god.

Later on, if need be I would turn my face away from Blackblood, and even the Lily Goddess. Tonight I would defend them, so that when I did walk free of their influence, my escape would be on my own terms. With my child free as well.

Such foolish hopes I had then.

The storm was breaking up as I hurried toward the twins' warehouse lair. The clouds spread ragged across the sky, and a tired moon glimmered down. My feet slipped on icy cobbles, and I felt so huge, so unbalanced, like a tree on the edge of falling. I had no idea what I hoped to accomplish now—all my plans seemed to have flowed out of me, leaving only a curious admixture of determination and fatigue.

But I knew that I must face down the twins, and trust Mother Iron and Endurance to stand at my back when I needed them most.

Nothing moved on the streets. The wind still knifed. All sane persons were long indoors. By the time I reached the warehouse, stars stabbed the night sky, and the moon had found a sliver of her usual courage. If anything, the air was even colder.

I didn't bother with the roof. I recalled all too vividly what had happened the last time I tried that route. Not so many days ago, but the baby kept changing me. Robbing my lithe balance to feed her growth. What could I do but honor that? I could hardly postpone protecting her.

That left the side, where I'd exited from my previous raid here. And where
was
the Rectifier? I'd expected him somewhere around the area, since he hadn't been at the Tavernkeep's place.

Or there was always the front entrance. Big, rolling doors meant to admit heavy freight wagons. I wished one or another of my little divine interventions had left me with some pyrotechnic magic, but the gods seemed far more interested in annoying me than gifting me.

Such an entrance would certainly make an impression.

I looked up and down the street. Several unloaded wagon rigs were parked for the night, but their teams were safely stabled out of the horrid weather. While I could in theory roll a wagon through the doors, the practical mechanics of accomplishing that were a bit beyond my current resources. Still, the idea of a dramatic attack certainly appealed to me far more than breaking in through the entrance they'd be watching most closely.