She was a thin creature with dark hair that was a few degrees less lank than might be expected, more roundness in her cheeks and breasts than perhaps the average. Asa didn’t think she was a beauty for the ages, and certainly not the winter dawn translated to flesh, but pretty enough and capable of smiling. Her eyes had what might or might not have been intelligence but was at least cunning. If there was royal blood in her, it was well hidden.
“What is it to you?” she asked.
“In line for the workhouse?”
“If they ever open the table and start hiring,” her father said.
“Hiring? I’d have thought buying was the verb.”
“Well, no one fucking asked you, did they?”
Asa turned to the girl, but before he could speak, a familiar voice called from the alley behind them. Josep Red staggered out, waving his good hand and grinning like he’d just found a pearl in a night pot. “Excuse me,” Asa said, eyes locked on the girl’s in a way that might seem meaningful. She scowled, then smiled uncertainly and turned away.
“So, Asa, you wasted spunk,” Josep said as they walked a little distance from the line together. “I been looking for you.”
“Flattered.”
“You still in the market for news about hunters?”
Asa hoisted an eyebrow, and the old man cackled.
“Yes, I am still in that market. What have you got?”
“Two magistrate’s men came down the wall last night. They’re wandering in Hafner’s Choke, asking people about a picture.”
Asa spat, looked back at the line of men and women, the half-built pen, the girl whom Prince Steppan had decided he loved. Can’t expect me to do everything at the same time. Asa pressed a copper coin in Josep’s unscarred hand.
“How about you show me?”
The magistrate’s hunters weren’t dressed for subtlety. They both wore boiled-leather armor with the scales-and-axe sigil of the high council carved into the breast, and the swords at their sides would have bought food for a week to anyone with the courage to take them. They walked with a firmness that carried the right of way along with it, and they ignored most of the people on the street, accosting only the better-dressed men and women, and speaking even to them in sharp, condescending tones. Asa and Josep Red watched them for a time without being seen, and nothing that they saw made Asa think well of the men.
“Who’s the picture of?” Asa asked.
“Think they’d show it? Beneath their kind, me.”
“What are they asking people?”
“ ‘Have y’seen this man?’ ”
Asa’s belly sank. If the Council of Nevripal had taken it into their heads to side with Steppan’s enemies, things were about to become unsupportable. Josep nodded as if in agreement. Five escape plans already in place, Asa stepped smiling into the street and walked toward the hunters. Their eyes were as hard as slate and one of them put a hand on the hilt of his blade.
“Morning. Heard you strapping young men were looking for something and thought I might be of use.”
“And you are?”
“Asa.”
The hunters looked at each other as if unsure whether to be insulted or amused. For a tense moment, no one spoke. The one took his hand from the sword and pulled a curl of thick paper from his belt. He held it before Asa’s eyes like he was pressing a scent to a hunting dog’s nose. Instead of Steppan’s thin nose and wide-set eyes, the inked face that looked back at him was broad and long and perfectly familiar. Asa’s eyes narrowed to cover the relief.
“Chancellor Rouse?” Asa asked, faking incredulity.
The hunters exchanged a look that meant they had just become rather more interested in Asa than they’d been before. “You know him?”
“Of him. Enough to say you’d be better off searching the graveyard. He died six years ago.”
“He didn’t,” the second hunter said. “Used a potion to feign his death and buried a servant in his place. Now we’re come to pick up where they left off.”
“Have you seen him?” the first asked. “Does he live here?”
“If he does, I haven’t seen him. And … All respect, but Chancellor Rouse defeated Sarapin’s army and killed seventy people with his own hands. If he were living around here, he’d be running the place by now, and we’d all be drilling in his army come mornings. At least, that’s the way I’ve heard it.”
The hunters looked at each other in disgust. “We’ve reason to think he’s here. And if he is, we’ll find him.”
“Godspeed to both of you,” Asa said. “I’ll ask around, and if I find anything … Well, if I do, is there a reward?”
Fifteen minutes later, Asa was headed back to the quay. The pens were built and the overseer squatted behind his purple desk. No slaves had taken their places behind the pen’s bars yet, but that would come soon enough. Zelanie and her father were nowhere to be found, and Asa had no way to know if they’d been turned down by the workhouses, if an agreement had been made, or if old Jost was holding out for a better price on his daughter’s future. For the greater part of the day, the line of men and women inched forward, but those particular two didn’t return. Eventually Asa gave up, spent a shaved coin in a filthy kitchen by the water, and went back to the little room carrying a burlap sack of cooked pigeons.
Steppan sat by the brazier, feeding the fire with twigs and tiny lumps of coal. The light flickered in his dark eyes as he looked up at Asa. The smoke and warmth gave the room an uncomfortable close feeling. From beyond one of the thin walls, a woman’s wailing came like the mating song of a great hunting cat. A gray cloth bundle lay on Steppan’s mattress. Asa dropped the feed bag and sat on the mattress beside it.
“How was your day?” Steppan asked.
“Interesting. I saw your ladylove. You’re right, her father’s looking to sell her.”
“And?”
“And Brother Rouse down at the Temple’s about to have a more interesting life. His past is sniffing at his heels again, though I don’t see how that affects us. Also I thought we’d agreed that should stay hidden.”
The prince looked at the cloth the way a mouse might eye a placid snake. “There may be a need for it.”
Asa drew out a pigeon and took a thoughtful bite. The meat was on the dry end, but it was spiced with pepper and salt that forgave it. Steppan took a bird for himself in one hand and unwrapped the cloth bundle with the other. The scabbard was green enamel and as ostentatious and gaudy as everything the hunters had worn put together. Steppan drew the blade.
“So, which need was it you had in mind? Planning to go slaughter all the workhouse crews? Or maybe her father?”
“She is being sold,” Steppan said, “and so I must be in a position to buy her. If I can better the price of the workhouses, I can claim her and set her free.”
“I don’t think you can sell it for that much. Not in our markets.”
“That wasn’t my plan.”
Asa took another bite, then put the bird’s carcass down on the mattress. Steppan looked away, caught between bravado and shame.
“Why don’t you tell me what the plan is, then?” Asa said, pronouncing each word carefully.
“Everyone knows Sovereign North Bank is the haven of outlaws and thieves. I can’t call it a crime to steal from the stealers. The crime lords meet in the Salt. That’s what you told me. Surely there would be enough gold there to buy her freedom.”
“No. That’s not going to—”
“Stop it!” Steppan shouted, and when he turned, the blade turned with him. The tears in his eyes stood witness to the fact that he knew how bad the plan was. “You have been my companion and my only friend, and I will be in your debt forever, but you can’t tell me to abandon her. You can’t tell me not to try.”
“You won’t help anyone dead. And there’s another way.”