The Thief Who Pulled on Trouble's Braids (15 page)

Chapter Twenty-Seven

There wasn’t much chit-chat in the hack on the way to Daruvner’s. Holgren had taken the toad, no longer trusting the security of his sanctum, but left Bone.

I prodded Kettle to tell me what he knew.

“Bollund staggered in the eatery at supper time, blood gushing out’n him. Looked like he’d been speared in the guts. Looked like he was holding ‘em in with his hands, truth be told.” Kettle shuddered. “We got ‘im into the back room, an’ he was goin’ on about a giant metal spider and askin’ after you. Fengal sent me off to fetch a physicker from down the lane, and when I’d got back with ‘im, Bollund was passed out and Fengal told me to go an’ fetch you two.”

“So Bosch is back,” I said to Holgren, and he nodded.

“Who’s Bosch?” asked Kettle.

“A giant metal spider,” I replied, and his eyes got big.

“I thought he was just delirious.”

“Sadly, no,” said Holgren.

Kettle didn’t seem to want to talk much after that, and I didn’t want to talk too much about what might be going on in front of him, so the rest of the ride was silent. When we got to Fengal’s, Kettle paid the hack off and unlocked the door to the eatery. If I’d doubted it was serious before, I didn’t now. Fengal never closed, except for private parties, which he almost never hosted.

Kettle led the way back past empty tables to a storeroom off the kitchen.

Bollund lay on a makeshift cot, covered with an old horse blanket. He wasn’t conscious. He was very pale, lips ashen. Daruvner was sitting in a chair near him. When he saw us, he got up and ushered us back out into the dining room.

“So Bosch attacked Bollund?” I asked him.

“No doubt. Speared him through the back and out the belly.”

“What the hells for?”

He shrugged. “Because he’s a nasty little git?”

“No, why did he attack
Bollund
?”

“He knew Locquewood was Corbin’s fixer, and assumed Locquewood, and by extension Bollund, would know how to contact you.”

“Me?”

“Of course. He wants the toad. Bollund said he’s got Locquewood hostage in his shop. He sent Bollund out to tell you to bring him the toad. Alone. If you don’t, he swears he’ll start killing everyone you know, starting with Locquewood.”

“But I don’t even like Locquewood.”

“That’s not funny, Amra,” chided Fengal.

“I just meant it’s not like he’s got my lover or a family member held hostage.”

“Do you happen to have a lover, or any family to take?” Holgren said.

“Well no, but—”

“Locquewood was the easiest to get to, of all the people Bosch can connect to you. I was more than his match before he entered his present state, Baron Thracen is amply protected, and Inspector Kluge is quite adept at staying alive. In any case, he knew exactly where to find Locquewood, having dealt with him for the original commission. Locquewood was low-hanging fruit.”

“You need to go rescue him, Amra,” said Daruvner.

“Weren’t you the one who told me not to be a hero?”

“I didn’t tell you to be heartless, either. Bosch is your mess to clean up now.”

“I’m not saying I don’t want to deal with Bosch. I have scores to settle with him. I’m just saying I’m not doing it for Locquewood. Kerf’s balls.”

“Well, now that we’re clear on that,” said Holgren, “let’s be on our way, shall we? Like him or not, the longer Locquewood is subjected to the attentions of Bosch, the less likely he is to survive them.”

“You’re coming with me?”

“Of course. I too have unfinished business with Bosch.”

~ ~ ~

Kettle whistled up a hack for us. I was amazed he found one as quickly as he did, that late at night. The ride to the Dragon gate was a short one, but by the time we got there Holgren had already sketched out a plan.

“Don’t enter the shop,” he said as he passed me the toad. “Just call out to him, and show him the statue if you must. As soon as I can see him, I promise you he won’t be in any condition to cause further trouble.”

“Well that sounds simple enough,” I replied. But I privately doubted it would be so easy. Bosch was mad, but he was cunning. I couldn’t see him presenting such an easy target for Holgren to destroy. I would have said so, but Holgren had displayed some seriously disturbing abilities in the way of making things dead. So I kept my mouth shut, and hoped he was right.

We alighted at the end of the deserted, lamp-lit street. Locquewood’s shop was in the middle of a commercial area, high-end, and nobody bought expensive trinkets like his in the middle of the night. Holgren put a hand on my shoulder, then crossed the street. We walked the rest of the way up the slight incline to Locquewood’s shop.

There were no lights on in the expensive glass display windows. The door was closed. I glanced back across the street. Holgren was nowhere to be seen, but I didn’t worry that he’d taken off. Much.

I put a hand on the knob and tried it. Unlocked. I pushed it open.

“Hey, Bosch,” I called. “I hear you wanted to talk to me.”

Silence, then a low groan, somewhere far back in the shop.

“Anybody home?” I called.

“Come in, Amra.” That pipe organ voice. “I hope you’ve brought me my trinket.”

“I think I’ll stay right here, thanks. Why don’t you come and get what you wanted?” I held up the toad.

“Bring it to me,” said Bosch. “Now.”

“No.”

Locquewood screamed. Quite a lot.

“My new limbs lack digits, but they are the very thing for poking out eyes, I’ve found.”

“What the hells is wrong with you, Bosch?”

“Having my body disintegrated has made me churlish. Now bring me the toad, or this dandy will lose his other eye. And I should warn you, my limbs are not really suited for fine work. It’s entirely possible I’ll poke too deep.”

“Kerf’s crooked staff,” I swore. I shoved the toad inside my jacket and pulled out my knives. And entered the spider’s web.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“You might as well let the dandy go,” I said as I stepped into the dark interior of the shop. “It’s you and I that have this dance.” I walked slowly past rows of precious gewgaws and delicate frippery, giving my eyes time to adjust to the gloom. The shop wasn’t all that big; I was certain Bosch and Locquewood were in the back room. The muted witchlight that pulsed erratically from the dark interior was another clue.

“All right,” he said. “Mister Locquewood, if you would care to depart, be my guest.”

A dull whimper was the only reply.

“It seems Mister Locquewood prefers sitting in a puddle of his own blood, Amra.”

“Come out here, Bosch, and get your toad.” Here at least there was some light from the street. The storeroom was windowless.

“Come back and hand it to me.”

“Let’s stop the games. You plan on killing me and Locquewood both, and taking the idol. I’m willing to try and save him, but not at the cost of my own life. I’m more than willing to meet you half-way, though, if you come out here now and face me. Then whoever’s left standing does whatever they want.”

“So you aren’t going to come back here to save this wretch’s life?”

I didn’t like where that question was headed. “Are you afraid to face me?”

There was a jarring series of notes that I decided was Bosch’s new laugh.

“I’ll take that as a no. Come out. We’ll settle our difference. Since you’re certain of the outcome, you can always go back and finish Locquewood off after you’ve sorted me out.”

“That would just be extra work,” he replied, and then I heard a wet tearing sound, and a agonized scream that abruptly cut off.

“Oh, dear,” said Bosch. “Clumsy me.”

One of the things I was taught, long ago in the back alleys of Bellarius when Theiner, my friend and protector was teaching me to fight with knives, was to never, ever lose your temper in a fight. Of all the knife fighting techniques he drilled me on, that one was the most crucial. It was a hard lesson for me to learn—for any child to learn—but learn it I did.

Beneath the hot splash of rage at Locquewood’s death, that detached, emotionless part of my mind began to churn out bare facts in rapid succession.

Locquewood was almost certainly dead or on the way. My reason for being in this trap had expired. Time to leave. Holgren could burn the place down once I was out of it.

I turned and ran. Not a moment too soon, as it turned out.

Bosch had kept control of one of his hellish pets. It had been above me the entire time I was talking, waiting to drop down on me.

As I turned, I caught the barest flicker of movement from above, and then its talons raked my back, ripping my jacket and the shirt and skin beneath to ribbons. The daemonette that had retrieved Bosch’s head from Gavon’s. The shock of it forced a cry of pain out of me, but I kept moving. Holgren, and light enough to see my enemy, were just outside the door.

I heard a hiss and a scrabbling of talons on the hardwood floor. I knew the thing was disgustingly fast. Probably fast enough to get hold of me before I made it outside. No time to turn and cast a knife. So I turned my lunge into a sort of pirouette as I reached the door, knife arm extending out to where I imagined it would be.

I got it in the throat.

It ripped my forearm all to hells, and when we landed in the street, it was on top of me. My knife in its neck kept it from biting my face off, though it still strained fiercely to get its slavering, beetly jaws on me. Its claws were starting to do to my front what they’d done to my back, though, scoring lines of blood and fire down my chest and belly.

I got another knife into its side with my left hand. Using the two knife hilts as handles, I rolled over and arched my body away from its talons. However fierce it was, I had the weight advantage. I got it mostly on its back. Carefully, I put a boot to its neck and put my weight down on it as it twisted and writhed.

Then I pulled out both my blades and with speed and precision borne of long, long practice, I planted one in each of its faceted eyes, until the tips grated against the back of its skull.

“That’s for Locquewood, I suppose,” I panted, then sprang back, knives in hand. It thrashed a moment more, and was suddenly still.

Bosch faced me from the doorway.

“Impressive,” he piped. “I would clap, but, you know.” He raised his two blood-stained forelimbs, waggled them back and forth. Then he attacked.

I remember thinking
where the hells is Holgren
as I parried one of his limbs. The other tore a bloody gash along my thigh. Then I was under him, and eight metal stakes were rising and falling all around me, striking the cobbles with enough force to shatter them as Bosch did his best to impale me without actually being able to see me. It couldn’t have lasted more than a half dozen heartbeats, but for that brief eternity I was certain I was going to die as I twisted desperately to avoid being punctured.

And then there was an enormous
KRUMP
sound. Above me, Bosch’s body crumpled inward as if a hundred war hammers had struck it all at once.

Bosch staggered drunkenly away, the weird lights that played upon his now twisted body dimming. When they died out, he fell, motionless, to the cobbles.

“Sorry I was late,” said Holgren as he staggered up to me, clutching his side. “Bosch evidently expected me as well, and prepared a reception.” I looked past him, down the street, and saw a wet lump about as big as a horse but covered in scales, ichor still spurting out of it in time to a slowly fading heartbeat.

“Better late than never.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Both of us were tired and bleeding, and I had only a bare hour or so before I was supposed to give the toad to Heirus. But we couldn’t just leave the hell-spawned mess that had been Bosch and his daemonette lying there on the street. I ripped my ruined jacket into strips to bind up the worst injuries while Holgren did some magely thing to get hold of Kluge involving a prism–apparently they’d exchanged some sort of magical calling card that let them contact each other.

Once I’d stopped my blood from watering the cobbles, I offered to do the same for Holgren, but he waved it away.

“I’m going to check on Locquewood,” I said, and he nodded.

“I’ll wait here, and keep an eye on these things.”

I found and lit a lamp in the front of the shop, then carried back to the storeroom.

He was dead. And mutilated. It was about as bad as I had expected. I hadn’t known him well, but I don’t think he would have wanted to survive what Bosch had done to him.

Most of him was sitting in a delicate chair behind a delicate desk. I made a mental note to ask Bollund if he’d had any family. If Bollund lived.

I was about to turn and go back out to Holgren when the package caught my eye.

About the size of my fist, it lay on the floor, half-smashed, obviously knocked there in the scuffle. Its beautiful wrapping was spattered with Locquewood’s blood. I looked closer and saw my name written on the sky-blue paper it had been wrapped in. It looked like a feminine hand, one not terribly accustomed to writing.

I picked it up, heard the tinkling of broken glass from inside it. Carried it and the lantern back out to the street.

Holgren was bent over Bosch’s remains, trying to wrench off the amber block that held Bosch’s head.

“Souvenir?” I asked him.

“Ha. I want to retrieve it before Kluge arrives, which should be quite soon. Gavon will demand proof if you want the contract cancelled and your money back. Or had you forgotten?”

“Actually, I had.” Hopefully Heirus had cancelled the contract, but a little insurance was welcome.

With an audible crack the head came free. “There, that’s got it.” He turned to hand it to me, saw my hands were full.

“What have you got there?”

“The answer to a mystery, maybe.” I told him about Estra Haig’s girl looking for me, leaving a package for me with Locquewood.

“Why Locquewood?”

“I don’t know. Maybe the answer’s inside.”

“So why aren’t you opening it?”

“I don’t know. I’ve just suddenly got a strange feeling I won’t like whatever it is.”

He just looked at me.

“Alright, alright.” I put the lamp down and tore open the wrapping, exposing a square little rosewood jewellery box, sadly splintered in one corner. I lifted the latch.

Inside was a scented piece of paper, folded small to fit, and bits of colored, broken glass. Broken glass I recognized from part of one green wing and from the delicate head and long, thin beak.

The hummingbird that Holgren had swiped from me the day before he died.

I fished out the note and set the box down. Unfolded the stiff, scented paper:

Madam Amra,

Corbin told me the bird had come from you, so I return it, and to show what I next write is the truth.

Corbin was my man. Madam Estra holds my indenture, and he was going to pay it, to buy it out so he and I could be together. But Madam Estra didn’t like it, hated it in fact, that Corbin had chosen me to love.

I know Corbin is dead and gone. I knew it as soon as you came into the Dream to tell Madam Estra. His name on your lips and the look on your face told me all. But you didn’t know about him and me. And I couldn’t tell you, not there under her roof. So I want to tell you that if Corbin came to a bad end as my heart tells me he did, it was Estra Haig that did the deed, or had it done rather, because that last night before Corbin never came back to me, she told me he never would. She told me I was hers, her property, and I could no more take her man than her hairbrush could, or her dog. And when I told her that was for Corbin to say, she laughed and told me Corbin wouldn’t be saying anything anymore.

Corbin told me you were a fierce one, and that if I was to find myself in trouble, you was the one to find if I couldn’t find him. I’m not asking for anything, except for Corbin. If you’re looking for the one who laid him low, then now you know.

I leave this with Corbin’s ‘connection’ as he never told me where to find you.

Sincerely,

Lyra Juvis Blackdaughter

“That bitch.” I hissed.

“Which bitch would that be?” Holgren asked, but I only half-heard him.

“She sat there, twisting her napkin in despair, offering me assistance in hunting down Corbin’s killer, the fucking
picture
of sorrow!” I kicked the jewellery box down the street, scattering bits of colored glass along the cobbles.

Holgren carefully took the note from me. Read it. Handed it back. I crumpled it in my fist, then forced myself to calm. I smoothed out the letter, folded it back up carefully and stuck it in my pocket.

“So you’re going to kill her?” he asked.

“Me? I’m a law-abiding citizen, Holgren. Especially when there’s an inspector in the vicinity.” I pointed my chin down the street, where a carriage had just turned the corner, with a dozen city watch trotting behind, armed with pikes.

“There’s late, and then there’s too late,” I muttered.

Kluge didn’t have anything to say to me, which suited me fine. He listened to Holgren’s statement, then made a brief inspection of the shop and the corpses.

“Where’s this one’s head?” he asked when he got to Bosch.

Holgren looked like he wanted to feign ignorance, but he pulled his cloak back and showed the grisly trophy.

“Is there a particular reason you want that?” Kluge asked him.

“Yes.”

“Do I want to know what that reason is?”

“Not really, Inspector.”

Kluge let out a sort of disgusted sigh and said “Get out of my sight, both of you.” Then he gave his men some instruction regarding Bosch’s corpse. They got busy wrapping the thing in a canvas tarp while Kluge set about burning the demon corpses with magefire.

“You heard the Inspector,” I said to Holgren.

The sky was beginning to pink with dawn as we hobbled away towards my meeting with Red Hand.