“Now?” Enard asked.
Tibal strolled back over to Honey’s side and made quick, easy work of removing the spoon and tying off the wound with a few leftover scraps of cut-up sheet. “Got a place to go to ground?”
“Yes,” Ripka said, unwilling to elaborate while the guards were within earshot.
“Right. Lass is good to walk, but you’ll be hurting a bit, won’t you, dear?” He helped Honey to her feet and she shifted her weight over to her injured leg experimentally. Her grimace was all the answer any of them needed.
“I’ll carry her,” Enard said, “she’s light enough.”
“Good man.” Tibal stroked his chin, eyeing both women. “New Chum and I can stroll out of here without raising any eyebrows, but you two look a mess.”
Ripka flicked the bloodied hem of her nightshift. “I doubt either of you could walk out of here. They saw us all walk in, remember? And who knows who’s on staff this morning. We’ll need to harness the same confusion – use the shock of the blood to our advantage.”
“The uniforms?”
“Perfect.”
It wasn’t easy going, stripping the guards of their uniform jackets, but between the four of them – and a carefully applied knife by Honey to gain compliance – they managed to get all the coats clear without letting either of the guards get too close to escape.
“Sorry about this,” Ripka said as she peeled the sleeve off the last of them. The sharp edge to the woman’s muffled voice told her all she needed to know to understand her apology was most certainly not accepted.
“You boys,” she chucked the coat to Enard, as Tibal was already donning the man’s jacket. “Make a good show of things, eh?”
Tibal and Enard shared a grin, and went to work.
They burst down the stairs of the hotel, Tibal dragging Ripka by falsely bound wrists. Her blood-spattered nightshift stuck to the tops of her thighs as she snarled and twisted, making the best show she could of trying to break free of Tibal’s hold while he swore under his breath and dragged her along. Her bare feet skidded on the floor, and she was glad the hotel went to the trouble of keeping it swept clean. She was even gladder to know that underneath Tibal’s coat was a sack of the woman’s clean clothes.
“Make way!” Tibal barked.
Patrons screamed, swore, and generally made a mess of things as they leapt from tables and scurried to the sides of the room, cleaving a wide path down the center of the hotel’s common room.
“What is the meaning of this?” A woman with finer clothes than the regular barmaids stalked toward them. She caught sight of Ripka’s bloodied clothes, hesitated a step, then pushed herself forward. Respectable, if irritating, woman.
“Got a fight on our hands,” Tibal snapped, holding his head to the side and keeping his hat tucked down. “Move off now, injured girl coming.”
The woman stepped to the side, peering up the stairs. “Injured? Shall I send a runner for the apothik?”
“A runner!” Tibal spun on her, yanking Ripka’s wrists as he did so. “This woman is bleeding, ma’am, she’d be bone dry by the time your runner got there and back. We’ll take her ourselves, it’s faster. But mark me, don’t you dare touch a thing in those rooms upstairs. The two remaining prisoners are restrained, but that’s an active crime scene! Touch nothing until after the watch arrives to begin their investigation, and then only after they have told you it’s all right to do so. Do you understand?”
“Ye – yes? You’re leaving, with prisoners still locked up here?”
“They’re contained, I swear it. Touch. Nothing. Now move!”
Their patroness paled and scurried away as Enard stomped down the stairs. He carried Honey in his arms easily. For all that muscle, the woman was surprisingly light. As he strode into the common room gasps sounded all around, every last eye glued to the figure being carried, not to the man carrying her. If they were lucky, no one would realize the two guards who had checked in were a man and a woman, not two men, until they were well away.
Honey mustered up a little groan so pitiful Ripka wondered if the pain was finally starting to get to her. Enard didn’t hesitate a breath. He strode right past Tibal, hustling as if the woman’s life depended on it, and kicked the door of the hotel open into the brilliance of the day.
The street in front of the hotel was lightly trafficked, and every eye that landed on them was quickly averted. The black cloak of the Honding family’s private guard was enough to grant them some degree of anonymity. No one would look too hard at a Honding guard, and they certainly wouldn’t stop to question one.
Still, as they progressed through the neighborhood, Honey whispering subtle directions into Enard’s ear as he held her, Ripka’s skin began to itch with the attention they were drawing. A palace guard may be untouchable, but the presence of two in the city was something to remark upon. And two of them escorting two bloodied women even more so. She imagined rumors spreading outward from their position like wildfire, and shivered.
“This can’t hold,” she whispered to Tibal.
He nodded, grim-faced. Probably he’d realized that from the second they stepped into the street, maybe even before. This type of game was his speciality, after all.
“We’ll find a quiet place to adjust in,” he said, then coughed subtly to alert Enard to fall back to his side.
They abandoned the path toward Latia’s house, winding though it was, and decided to veer in the opposite direction, lest the rumor of their presence eventually lead their future pursuers to Latia’s doorstep. At the first sight of a narrow alley free of windows and nearby pedestrians, they ducked down the shadowed street, and took a moment to catch their breaths.
Ripka and Honey changed as best they could, covering their nightshifts in long, thin robes that they’d found in the hotel chests. They didn’t look like proper day clothes, but they covered the blood well enough, and neither one of them had anything to wash with.
“The jackets?” Enard asked.
“Ditch them,” Ripka said. “They draw more attention than we’d like.”
“The four of us draw more attention than I’d like.” Tibal stripped off his jacket and tossed it in a heap against the alley wall. The men, at least, wore thin trousers and shirts, if not any shoes. Luckily going barefoot was not an uncommon sight in Hond Steading – their streets were smooth and free of firemount glass.
“You’ve a point,” Enard said. “Especially with Honey’s injury and both of your, ah, appearances. Forgive me.” He flushed.
Ripka snort-laughed. “We’re a mess, it’s true. All right. Honey and I know where we’re going, so we should split up with you boys. Honey, Enard’s about your height, do you think you can walk if he gives you his shoulder?”
“That’s fine,” she said, poking at her leg absently.
“Don’t overdo it.” Honey just looked at her, doe-eyed, so Ripka turned to Enard and said, “See that she doesn’t overdo it.”
He gave her a flimsy salute and offered his arm to Honey, who hobbled over to accept it. Tibal watched her intently, no doubt understanding that she’d split them this way to keep him by her side. She had no reason to doubt Enard and Honey’s loyalty, but Tibal was another story. Despite his recent interest in her plans, he could just as easily disappear into the city right now.
And if he did that, she knew deep down that she’d never see him again.
“See you there,” Enard said, oblivious to the tension thickening between her and Tibal. The pair shuffled their slow, painful way out into the street.