Herb-Witch (Lord Alchemist Duology) (39 page)

Her
eyes went wide, only the dim light saving him from the full force of
her glare. "You blighted bastard," she whispered, the
effect spoiled by chattering teeth.

She's
feeding someone she thinks needs it more.
He held the basket
steadily.

She
took it. "Blight you."

"I
hope not." He smiled wryly. "I've no fit heir yet."

Kessa
glared at him again (an animal's hungry snarl in the lantern-light)
and clawed her hood further over her face. Basket in hand, she strode
off down the street. It was not, quite, a run.

Dayn
asked, "Home, m'lord?"

Iathor
nodded. "Yes, please. I'll hope I didn't ensure I'll be up till
midnight for nothing."

Chapter
XL

K
essa
stood before an amber-brick house, its windows curtained, and thought
of walking back home.

"Kessa,
you should go,"
Laita'd laughed.
"He'd have grabbed
you already if he were going to, and besides, we'll know where you
went."

She'd
found Tag.
"Dunno, Kellisan. He's not been to Cat nor Birch
recently. I'm looking into something . . . Should be
safe enough."

Even
Tych, Tag's roof-rat messenger, had asked,
"Gonna find us
more warm places for the winter?"

So
here she was, despite being cold, tired, nervous, and annoyed. She
walked to the side instead of the front door. It wasn't the largest
house, but was big enough for this part of town. A short brick wall
was out front, with a curved path for carriages to bring guests to
the very doorstep, but where those carriages might go next . . .
Behind the house were stables, a small carriage house, and a properly
winter-tended garden.

Also
an ironwork gate across the path, closed for the night. Kessa pushed;
it swung for a thumb's length.

The
hinges were behind decorative wooden planks on the other side,
farther than her arm could reach. Her fingertips brushed the end of a
wood bar: too thick to break, unlikely to wiggle free.

She
wandered back across the front. The windows were glass. The shutters
hadn't been closed. It was dark in most of the rooms, behind the
curtains, but one . . . A banked fireplace, she
thought, not Incandescens Stones. She went to the house's other side,
through evergreen laceleaf bushes. (Small amounts were good in
curatives, but needed boiling for a long time to release the
bittersweet alchemy.) The wall continued to a corner, with a narrow
space between it and the next estate's wrought-iron, barred fence.

That
other fence was more decorative than useful, though its bars were
close-set enough to keep a child from squeezing through – or a
dog. She heard deep barking coming closer.

She
slipped away again; no use climbing the iron fence to get over the
brick one, with no sleeping powder for the dog.

Back
beside the gate, she ran cold hands over the bricks and called
herself a freezing idiot. It wasn't far from midnight. But the mortar
between the smooth, amber bricks wasn't flush everywhere. She could
probably
scale it, if she went barefoot . . .

A
throat was cleared on the other side of the gate. "Door's over
there, if you're planning on knocking."

She
leaned her forehead on the bricks, tucking her hands under her
armpits. "Good evening, Brague."

"We've
dogs of our own, this side. Coming in?"

Yes.
No.
"I don't know."

"I'll
open the front door."

Kessa
thought of staying put till someone fetched her, and decided not. So
when the front door opened, she was sitting on the stoop, hair out of
its tie and hanging as straight as she could finger-comb it. She
looked up, sidelong through her hair; it was only Brague, with a dim
Incandescens Stone. "I can go back, if it's too late."

"He's
asleep in the sitting room. There's a plate on a warming stone."
Brague stood aside.

She
went in. The hall was dark, but warm with amber brick and wood as
well as Stones or fireplaces. "I shouldn't wake him."

Brague
shrugged. "If you do, you do. If not, then . . .
not."

"I'm
sorry I woke
you
."

Again,
the dramsman shrugged. "I'm awake odd times. Better than letting
the dogs run loose inside."

"Ah."
She looked up at the walls with their hooded lanterns. Light seeped
through the fabric; bright Stones, no doubt. They might be made of
shaped glass, if she remembered what Kymus'd said when trying to
distract her from moon-flow pains.
What'm I doing here?
Maila'd not owned so many Incandescens Stones.

Kessa
supposed Laita was as interested in getting a patron for
Kessa
as vice versa, but as she followed Brague, she didn't yearn for the
luxuries around her. She only felt lost.

They
passed through one sitting room and into another, with the fireplace
casting the dim light she'd seen outside. A short-legged table, level
with the three wide-cushioned couches around it, held the promised
plate. The far couch held the threatened alchemist. Rather than
propped up, head back or crooked over, he lay as a child would: head
on a cushion, robe draped over him like a blanket. Gray-hosed feet
were tucked against the couch-arm, while house-shoes rested on the
floor at the couch's corner.

Brague
was as cunning as his master, bringing her here without rousing him.

Quietly,
so as not to wake Kymus, she said, "I did have to see people
before I came."

"And
I do walk the house at odd hours," he replied, equally softly.
"Jeck, Loria, and Tania . . . They're the ones
who sleep and wake closer to the sun's sleeping and waking."

"Not
Dayn?"

"Not
so much. He'll be bodyguard after me."

She
looked over, combing her hair into a veil with her fingers. "I
thought there were potions . . ."
. . . to
preserve youth, for decades.

"I
don't like potions." His voice was low, but flat like his
expression.

She
whispered, "Why'd you drink?"

He
glanced at her sharply. "He's never asked me."

"I'm
sorry." She looked away. "I shouldn't have."

He
was silent long enough that she sat on the couch opposite the
sleeping Kymus. The room's heat had finally worked through her cloak,
through her tunic, and begun to warm her flesh.

Brague
said, softly enough that she had to turn to listen, "I killed a
man. For money. The watch thought it a drunken fight, but I'd have
been in the work-gangs for years anyway. M'lord's father, Iaren
Kymus, wanted a bodyguard for his son. He thought I moved like
someone who . . . knew how to fight."

If
he'd been Burk, or Tag, or Jontho, she'd have gone and wrapped her
arms around him. Instead, she just watched, the darkness hiding her
eyes. He was looking into the fireplace, ruining his dark-vision.

"He
said there'd be a salary, room, board, and all I had to do was drink
the loyalty potion. No work-gangs. It was dead of winter. My father'd
thrown me out in summer, and wouldn't have brought clothes or extra
food."

She
knew it could be all a theater script, its playwright feigning sleep.
Still, she went to sit by Brague's feet, the hearth's stone hard
against her knees.

His
voice went lower. "It's a better life here. I don't regret it."

But
you can't regret it.
Kessa leaned a little against his leg.

"Bad
as Jeck's hounds," he muttered; she wasn't sure she'd been meant
to hear. A bit louder, he said, "I'll go in the other room, if
you want to wake him."

I'd
rather talk to you. I understand you, a little.
"'Sall right
if he sleeps. We'd probably just argue."

The
dramsman sighed, somehow like a hound himself. "If not for
him . . . I'd not think you should wed even a minor
merchant, m'self."

Much
less his master, the Lord Alchemist? She snorted silently, trusting
he'd feel how her body moved against his leg. "I'd no plans for
even low-marriage. I learned my place long ago. Too dark for decent
folks, and barbarians . . ." She shook her head.

Brague
sat beside her. "They don't like half-breeds either?"

Kessa'd
not've taken offense at the question, for its tone, even if she'd not
owed him a matching answer. "I was a little brat, mayhap knee
high to a horse. I saw a man in a market-square. Black hair, skin
like dark-stained wood, darker than mine. I ran up, calling I don't
remember what. He turned . . ." She was silent,
some heartbeats, but Brague let her be. "His eyes were the most
beautiful, yellow amber. I've never seen the color since, not even in
colored glass or paints. And he looked down at me, just a moment
surprised and curious. Then he curled his lip and shoved me away.
Walked off on his own errands." She shrugged.

After
a moment, Brague awkwardly put his arm over her shoulders. It was
what Burk'd done, when she'd told him. The best thief of them all,
and the one with the kindest heart, free with his hugs and fastest to
defend even the crèche's ugliest child.

"Oh.
Oh, blight." She sniffled, and wiped at her eyes. No. No, she'd
not cry on Brague's shoulder. Not for her, not for him. "I
suppose Kymus'd say I'd not eaten."

"He'd
be right, eh?"

"Aye.
Blight it."

The
dramsman stood and offered her a hand up. "If you told him who
you're feeding, he could help."

In
the warm and dark, she wanted so much to believe. But if she were
wrong . . . The hostages her family might be . . .
"I can't," she whispered, bowed over his hand, and wondered
why it sounded as if her heart were breaking.

He
sat her down on a couch, closest to the one where Kymus slept. "Eat.
Rest a while. I'll wake you before morning, if you want."

Likely
he would, and she'd find someone'd put a blanket over her and set out
breakfast.

No.

"If
I stay . . . I'd stay too long."

Brague
lifted the plate's cover: meat and crisp-looking vegetables, with
gravy and bread. "Eat. I'll come back after I've walked the
house and grounds again."

She
whispered
Thank you
as he left.

It
was good food, even after sitting: warm from the heating Stone, and
under the cover it hadn't dried out much. The vegetables were softer
than they'd looked, but not wilted. She wasn't sure how they were
kept so fresh; they didn't taste of alchemy, and she thought their
best season'd gone by.

Perhaps
he hid a glass-house in his back gardens, that she hadn't noticed.

When
she finished, she spent some time just watching Kymus. Asleep, he
looked at once older and younger.

Tanas'd
slept like a spirit of the sun, golden hair a curled light-halo
around his face. Maila'd slept like a cheerful drunk, without
dignity, limbs flung about the bed.

If
I wake him, I'll tell him too much.
It was that time of night,
when people got stupid because everything seemed a dream.

She
took the hair-tie from her pocket and drew it through her fingers.
She considered cutting a lock . . . But that was
foolish, and drawing her dagger here would upset Brague. She set the
tie on the table, beside the empty, licked-clean plate.

When
Brague got back, she was sitting in the first room's archway, back
against the wall and knees against her chest.

He
let her out with but a murmured, "Good morn to you."

"And
you," she said, wishing she could meet his eyes and show him a
sympathetic soul.

But
the only soul her eyes showed was blighted. She had to hope her voice
carried her emotion alone.

Chapter
XLI

M
id-morning
light shone through Kessa's store windows. The day was warmer than
it'd been for some days now. Autumn leaves burned in everyone's
braziers or fireplaces, for good fortune in winter, and the crisp
scent filled the air outside. She'd not even seen her Guild Master
outside of yesterday's lesson.

Inside
her shop, Kessa said, flatly, "You did what?"

Burk
and Tag grinned at her while Tag plundered her breakfast basket.
"Isera said it was fun," Burk said, "She learned
things."

With
his mouth full, Tag added, "An' she didn' even hafta go lookin'
for him!"

Kessa
tried to glare, but Burk continued, "We told her, hey, we were
thinking 'bout Laita meeting him, but woah, found he visits
those
places?"

"Laita
thought it was clever," Tag said, catching the tale before Kessa
could break in. "Jontho wasn't so keen, but Laita said you
wanted to set her up already, and should
she
go, or the girl
Burk's body-guarding?"