He tensed, preparing to push Gatai away should he need to free himself. “Has auntie moved my rooms?”
“Not at all. But Cook Rachie has sweated all morning over your favorite handpie, and I won’t see her effort gone to waste. The pantry, if you remember, is this way, young master.”
“I remember.”
Which was, of course, an understatement. If his room had been his sanctuary, the pantry had been his hideout. He didn’t care to remember the amount of times Gatai had found him there as a young lad, escaping punishment, or hiding away so that the staff of the palace would not see his tear-puffed eyes. It was not exactly an auspicious place to hold a meeting. But it was the quietest room in the palace, a place where a young boy had once secreted himself away to cry and rail at the frustrations of his mother’s illness.
Gatai, that clever old goat. He had something to tell Detan. Something he didn’t want half the household eavesdropping on.
Buried beneath the palace, the pantry never quite shook off the cold of the earth. Detan shivered, glad of the fine coat Thratia had given him – then desired nothing more than to rip the garment off and set it alight. He crossed his arms to still his hands while Gatai assured himself the place was empty and the door securely latched.
“This place has grown ears,” Gatai said.
“That’s a biological impossibility.”
“You know very well what I mean, young master.”
Detan paced a tight circle around a fig barrel. “I expect no less from my dear auntie and Thratia both. I’ve assumed myself eavesdropped upon from the moment I…” Bent knee to Aella. He swallowed, waved away the rest of his sentence as if it didn’t matter. “I am used to playing a part, Gatai. Don’t worry about this rockbrain.”
“You do not understand.” Gatai wrung his hands together, the most worried gesture Detan’d ever seen from the usually composed chap. “It is more than the usual listening – yes, and more than Thratia’s spies as well. Ranalae has threaded her own people throughout the palace, throughout the city. Nothing happens here nor out there that she does not know about. Young master, forgive me, but… What are your intentions for Hond Steading?”
Detan swallowed. He’d already been less than enthusiastic with Gatai regarding his entanglement with Commodore Throatslitter, but to reveal all just might see him bound by a noose instead of a wedding band. Gatai’s forehead furrowed in worry, re-creasing familiar lines. Lines Detan himself had given the poor man.
“To see it safe.”
“Define safe.” His old eyes hardened. He’d always made Detan say what he meant, instead of his usual dance around the particulars.
“No Thratia. No Ranalae.”
“You?”
“I would prefer my auntie continue as she has, until she no longer can.”
“And then?”
He hedged a glance toward the door, imagining the scuffle of feet, the rustle of cloth as an ear pressed against the door. Paranoia, plain and simple. The servants held this part of the house, and unless things had changed drastically since Detan’s time, they were all fiercely loyal to their keymaster.
“I don’t know. I suppose I’ll ask the people, when it comes to that.”
Gatai smiled slowly, and a tremble in his hands that Detan hadn’t noticed before stilled. He was not asking Detan of his plans out of old friendship, then. He was asking because he had a daughter. Trella. Detan committed the name to memory.
“I always knew there was more than gravel between those ears of yours,” Gatai said.
“Yeah, piss.”
Gatai snort-chuckled and shook his head. “Language, young master. And be assured, the staff here is with you in whole. None of us wish to see a changeover in power, and we are all quite certain the majority of the city feels the same way. No one wants a coup into the hands of the likes of Ganal, or that Ranalae woman – she disturbs us all.”
Detan went cold. “Has she harmed you, or any of the staff?”
He shook his head. “Not to my knowledge. It is not what she’s done, so much as…” he waved a hand. “The way she looks at the world. It is difficult to articulate with care. Cook Rachie said she ‘gives her the heebies’, and that is as succinct as I can make the matter.”
“If she shows too great an interest in any of the staff, alert me immediately.”
Gatai bowed his head. “You have experience with this woman?”
“Experience I would like to forget.” Detan shook off the shadowed claws of Ranalae and pivoted focus to the slim glimmer of hope in his life. “There are two women on the Dread Wind, prisoners of Thratia’s assistant, Aella. She has kept them as leverage against me and I – I have promised to see them freed, if I can at all manage it. Their names are Forge and Clink, and they are, to the best of my knowledge, the only prisoners traveling with Thratia’s fleet. I need to find out where they’re being held.”
He bowed. “Consider it done. If they are in the palace, we will find them.”
Relief washed through him. “Thank you. I will need them both, if anything I attempt to do here is to work.”
“And what is it you will attempt to do?”
Detan cast his gaze around the spacious pantry, taking in the barrels of staples and delicacies both. Foodstuff that would soon be repurposed for his wedding feast. At least the booze would be good, Auntie Honding always stocked the best stuff. He blinked, staring at a barrel of mulled cider, the edges of an idea taking shape in his mind.
“I have a few options.” He flashed Gatai a grin, but the stodgy old man seemed unimpressed. “Once you find the women, Gatai, if you could…” he swallowed, fearful of asking. “Do you think it possible you could find my friends? The ones auntie tried to lock in the Cinder?”
Gatai frowned. “Searching outside the palace is more difficult, especially for a group of people who have, no doubt, gone into hiding. I will send feelers out, and let you know what is discovered. Do not pin your hopes on the results, young master.”
Detan sighed until he was completely deflated. “I am just so tired of working alone.”
Gatai squeezed his shoulder. “Young master, you’re not alone any more.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Pelkaia dropped, feather-light, from the rope ladder dangling off the side of the Larkspur and stifled a wince as her bones jolted from the impact. Cursed city had to go and pave all its roads and walkways with the stone they’d carved out to make room for homes. She missed the soft dirt roads of Aransa. Bad for heavy carts, but at least they’d been kind to her joints.
Above her the crew of the Larkspur slept, and before her the nightlife of Hond Steading thrummed. In the wake of the warden of Aransa’s death, that city had gone quiet – the citizens scurrying to their homes as quick as they could, doors locked and windows shuttered. This city, this place that had remained independent from Valathea and had its own long pride, went out to dance in the shadows of their invaders’ ships.
Pelkaia prowled amongst them, wearing a stranger’s face. She’d gone to a lot of trouble to get the set of her cheekbones just right, the tilt to her eyes and the small pucker of her false lips, hair carefully scraped back so that she didn’t have to worry about it brushing her skin. She’d gone for forgettable, indistinct. But the truth was she couldn’t shake the firmness of her walk, the confident lift of her shoulders.
It wasn’t her own body language seeping through. She’d always been a furtive woman, careful and secretive. Such things had been required to survive as an illusionist so long in a society wherein that inborn talent meant death.