The Folly of the World (41 page)

Nothing but silence to that, and Hobbe slouched back in his chair, defeated. Nicely done, Graaf,
very
nicely done. Sander straightened up and cracked his knuckles, looking down at his defeated adversary. Maybe the count didn’t need a beating, after all.

“You are making a
dreadful
mistake, Sander,” said Hobbe wearily. “All I have done for you, all—ah!”

Sander had dropped into a crouch, grabbed one of the front legs of Hobbe’s chair, and upended both man and seat backward. He was on top of the count before Hobbe could even decide between scrambling up or rising in a more decorous fashion. The heel of Sander’s boot rested softly against Hobbe’s throat, fixing the man to the floor. The steadily firming hard-on that act had stirred in Sander’s pouch could plug up a well, or another such wide aperture—some things never changed. Time to lay some truth on this scheming asshole:

“My name ain’t Sander, and it’s you that made the mistake in calling me such. You done shit for me since day one; you’ve only done for yourself, and we both know it. You wanted a Hook you could push around on the island, someone with more coin and influence than that Zoete woman you run with, and if Jan had come back with the ring, it would’ve been him instead of me. Except he would’ve put you where you are a sight sooner than it took me to do it, on account of his not being half the cunt I’ve been down these days since you made me graaf. Well, I’m not your cunt no more, Hobbe, to slap about or finger my purse whenever you get the notion. Long as you acknowledge that, we’ll be just fine, you and me. Just fine.”

Hobbe might have tried to reply, but during his speech Sander had unconsciously begun pressing his foot down, and the count was apparently too dignified to writhe or seize the boot that was crushing his larynx. Instead he just lay there, silently being choked and staring up at Sander with eyes as cold and pale as snowmelt. Eerie, that was, and Sander removed his foot, but
gave the old boy a light kick to the chin before setting it back on the floor beside its mate. “So what say you, Hobbe, are we sorted, or do I need to sort you a bit more?”

Hobbe took the hand Sander offered and rose to his feet, his back or knees or something cracking and popping as he did. Jesus, Sander hoped he hadn’t done any permanent damage to the scoundrel, he was aged and all and—“Graaf Tieselen, I must regretfully take my leave.”

“Yeah, sure,” said Sander with a wink. “When the war’s won and I’m settled back in here, you’ll have to come and have a stay. Good Graaf Tieselen judges a man by his deeds, not if he’s Hook or Cod. In the meantime, enjoy laying low in whatever burrow you’ve carved out and—”

“I will be staying in Dordrecht, after all,” said Hobbe, his eyes flashing like a cat’s from the firelight. Though the shutters were open, it had begun to snow again, rendering the parlor dim enough to make the effect good and spooky. “There is a matter of business that yet needs attending. You have, and I mean this not as a threat but as a statement of simple fact, absolutely
no
comprehension of the forces at work. Of the forces you upset with your proud, foolish resolution to bite at the teat that has nursed you. Even now I would hear an apology and a recanting of your behavior, but should you actually follow through with your boast of raising arms against our countess, well… your final decision is entirely out of my hands, of course, but I promise you this—you will make amends to me, and shortly, or you shall look back on this hour and regret it as you have never regretted anything in the sum of your days.”

A pause, but yeah, no fucking apology for the count, and so he concluded his pretentious little speech: “In any event, I expect to see you again before very long, and, of course, your lovely daughter as well. Good day, sir.”

“Now, Hobbe,” said Sander, placing a hand on the count’s bony shoulder and giving it a friendly squeeze. “You threaten Jo
ever again, and I will pick you up, carry you to that hearth, and hold your face in the fire until you stop moving.”

“I said
good day, sir
,” said Hobbe, wrenching his shoulder free and trying to stride proudly to the door. Pride before a fall, and all, and Sander kicked the count behind the knee. Hobbe stumbled, but before he could regain his balance or topple forward, depending on nature’s whim, Sander stepped quickly behind him and swung his arm in front of the man’s face, catching Hobbe’s neck in the crook of his elbow. He pressed the full weight of his body into the count’s back; it made his erection falter a bit to be ground against so unappealing a posterior, but for the sake of effect Sander tried to keep it solid.

“Hobbe, Hobbe, Hobbe,” Sander whispered in the count’s ear. Up close the man smelled like garlic and aged Edam. “If you think I’m more concerned with keeping my station than getting my vengeance, you’re even thicker than I am. You come at me, and I’ll murder the world just to get at you. I’ll burn this house, I’ll burn Jo, I’ll burn the money and boats and warehouses and dear old Simon inside it, just to put my hands on you.”

Sander paused long enough for Hobbe to start to speak: “All right, you have made—”

“No, I haven’t, because you still think you can talk to me like I’m some cunting coachman, like I’m old Lansloet.” Sander ground his cock into Hobbe’s ass even as he tightened his elbow, and to his satisfaction that got the count squirming, if only a little. “So we’re of an understanding, I’ll say it to you the once more—if I have to put my hands on your slimy skin again, I
will
make it worth my while. We both know what I can do, something you made clear way back in your carriage when we was first sussing out the terms of our arrangement here. So I’ve got a wee promise for you: You so much as give me a shitty look from now until the end of our acquaintance,
Hobbe
, and I will make it my life’s work to take you apart, slow as possible, piece by piece. For days, man, days. Until the notion of dying and being cast into the pit for
Satan’s eternal sport seems a comfort as warm as a kitten dozing in your lap. Now you get
the fuck
out of my house, and don’t you dare knock at my door again until you’ve been invited. Count.”

Sander relaxed his elbow but didn’t drop it entirely, forcing Hobbe to duck out of the hold. The count did not look back as he hustled out through the parlor doors, and Sander smiled to see the man stumble on the stoop in his haste to be away. Yet as soon as the front door slammed shut behind the fleeing noble, the magnitude of his decision began to sink in—Hobbe was anything but stupid, and was like as not angry as a bee-stung hornet. Another reason to be out of Dordt, and as soon as possible—if Hobbe did try to expose them as phonies, he’d be wise to do it before Sander got a chance to leave town.

Hobbe would be making straight for Laurent’s office, otherwise Sander would go and retrieve as much money as he could carry and simply quit the city for good, but in case Hobbe stopped by a gatehouse to fetch a militiaman or three before visiting Laurent for the inevitable pity party… well, Sander would just have to take what he had around the house, and hope that further down the road Laurent was greedy enough to try and work both sides instead of simply backing Hobbe’s play at ruining the Tieselen heirs.

As it stood, war was looming, which was a welcome distraction, and who knew, if Sander made enough of an impression with the local Cod nobles during the campaign, they might back him up upon his return to Dordt, even if Hobbe followed through with his threat. Maybe. Or maybe they would hang him and Hobbe both. Well, worry about how to get that shit off the shoe after it was stepped in. For now he had to get through the rest of the day, which, at a minimum, involved sending the Gruyere brothers out to the warehouse and getting himself in a boat directed toward whatever Zeeland isle was hosting the party. Zierikzee was the port Hobbe had mentioned, wasn’t it?

But what of Jo—could he leave her in Dordt, with Hobbe furious and ready to strike?

Easy enough, he’d take her with him—after the coin he’d dropped on buying her gear and the smashed fingers he’d accumulated from her whaling on him with a practice sword, he was due a return on his investment.

But what of Lansloet and Drimmelin? He wasn’t worried Hobbe would try to fuck with them, but he was definitely concerned that one or both of the servants he had inherited with the house would heed the count before they would answer to good old Graaf Jan. Leaving his home in the possession of people who might work with Hobbe to somehow betray Sander and Jo seemed exceedingly foolish.

Easy enough, take all the servants with them—surely the other campaigning nobles brought their own people to cook and clean for them, yeah? They had to. Better to leave the house shuttered and empty than in control of traitors, which he had always suspected Drimmelin and especially Lansloet of being.

So: book passage to the Rotterdam harbor, rally the entire household to immediately leave for war, send the Gruyere boys to the warehouse to discover and report the dead kids dumped in the mud, and, somewhere in there, grab a bite of dinner—in the madness of the morning he’d missed breakfast. Busy day for the graaf, but he’d had busier, and at least he had already taken care of the items “alienate your only noble friend who also knows your dirty secret” and “get your feelings hurt by your only other friend in town who doesn’t appreciate a nice gift when it’s in his own two hands.”

Righting the upended lounger and wrapping his rat-fur cloak around his shoulders, Sander set off to find Simon Gruyere, his devious brother Braem, and, saints willing, a decent snack.

A
fter a teary parting with Lijsbet at the Dordt harbor (the girls were cheerful and dry of eye, but Lansloet silently wept when he realized the young maid was being left to mind the house while he was forced to accompany his master), Jolanda, Sander, and the two older servants arrived in Rotterdam only to discover they’d missed the last fleet leaving for Zeeland by the better part of a week. Sander couldn’t believe it, and kept saying so over and over, to no resolution. While Sander gnashed his teeth and rent his hair, Jolanda went to the harbormaster and appealed to the man’s higher nature, as well as his thirst. Thinking it might help their heart-to-heart, Jolanda dredged up her old accent to pair with the Tieselen Red, and within an hour of arriving in the Rott she’d found them alternate passage to the islands.

The voyage across the meer and then down the Volkerak to the Grevelingen estuary would have been a mite cramped in the narrow, stunted sailboat even if it had just been the one-eyed captain, his son, and the four members of the Tieselen contingent. Instead, they were tacked in shoulder-to-shoulder, as the vessel was delivering a monk, a nun, and a pair of potted apple trees to the village of Ouddorp on the lonely, windswept islet of Goeree. It sounded like the setup to a bad joke, and so the voyage proved: they spent the bulk of the journey getting on one another’s tits, literally as well as figuratively.

The awkwardness of the situation was amplified rather than mitigated by the merriness of the two clerical members of the crew, who, to extrapolate from their boisterous songs and
less-than-surreptitious fumblings under each other’s vestments after dusk, were in the process of eloping from their respective holy orders. The skeletal apple trees seemed dead, but the captain swore they would bloom again, and to Jolanda’s surprise one did seem to be budding in all defiance of the season by the time they reached Duiveland. They skirted that isle’s northern coast and carried over to the island of Schouwen, at which point the sea became so rough even the captain appeared olive around the gills. Arms linked to keep each other from falling overboard, Sander and Lansloet took to their knees at the edge of the boat, master and servant made equal as they prayed at the altar of Neptune. The ferocious wind carried their half-digested oblations up to paint the sail instead of letting them join the turbulent waters, leading the captain and son to curse like what they were.

As they drew near Brouwershaven, a port north of Zierikzee where the Rotter harbormaster had claimed the Hooks and Cods were engaged, the captain took advantage of a break in the gale to steer them into a small sound. There he deposited them on an ancient pier, having no intention of sailing his ship anywhere near what Sander had been asserting since Rotterdam was sure to be an epic, show-no-quarter-and-take-no-hostages battle. The tide being in their favor, it was a wobbly step rather than a desperate leap onto the pier. While Sander, Drimmelin, and Lansloet picked their way slowly down the rickety structure, Jolanda thanked the captain and his son profusely and offered the clerical couple the best of luck with their future together.

“It’s easy to sail before the wind!” the nun called as the ship circled the sound and back out to sea, the reflection of the setting sun adorning the taut canvas like a great burning eye.

They marched west. Dark as it soon became on the pebbly beach, there could be no doubt they were heading toward a raging combat—the tumult could be heard from afar, and the sky above the town blazed as though someone had set fire to the curtain of night. As they reached a tent city on the strand,
Jolanda cringed to see this side of the encampment unguarded, all available men presumably engaged in the fight, and cringed again to hear the shrieks of pain emanating from the majority of the crowded canopies. Barbers emerged looking even more haggard than their wan charges, dumping out bowls of blood and hanging sodden, unrinsed rags out to dry before calling, “Next!”

As excited as she’d been on the ship and even as they approached along the beach, Jolanda began to feel her eagerness wilt at seeing man after man caked in burgundy sand, at hearing the clash of metal and bloodthirsty cries grow ever louder as they wove their way through the hospital tents. Looking around, as awed and curious as she’d been the first time she’d set foot in Rotterdam, she realized Lansloet and Drimmelin had dipped out at some point, but there was little to be done about that now. Who could blame them? They weren’t warriors, like her and Sander, like all these half-murdered men screaming in the perpetual gloaming of tent-filtered lamplight…