“I don’t understand. Why does…that person need a private army?”
“Because Rannit is going to war.” I explained about the cannons, and the Battery, and Prince, and the barges even now bearing their deadly cargo down the Brown toward us. Spilling the whole mess didn’t take three minutes.
Three minutes, and all our lives changed forever.
“So you’re a Captain now.”
I nodded. “So I’m told. So is Evis, by the way. He’s thrilled too.”
“And what does a Captain earn, in this private army?”
It was my turn to blink.
“Earn?”
“Earn. You’re an officer. Officers are paid. You didn’t even ask?”
“It didn’t seem to matter.”
She sighed.
“I could be whisked away again at any moment. War is coming. These cannons scare even Hisvin. I did make all that clear, did I not?”
“You did. And don’t think I’m not scared, to my bones, because I am. But Markhat-if we’re going to make it as a couple, we’re going to have to face things together. Good things. Bad things. Every thing.”
I nodded. Words weren’t coming.
She tried to find a smile.
“You never talk about your parents.”
“Huh?”
“I’m just changing the subject. Tell me about your father.”
“Not much to tell. Dad left Mom to go be a soldier.”
“Did he come home, when he was done soldiering?”
“They sent a letter. Died out West. Mom didn’t last too long after.”
She pushed my hat aside and found my hands and clasped them.
“You are not your father.”
“People get killed in wars.”
“That doesn’t mean we should stop living.”
“I haven’t. Stopped living. But.”
Rannit flowed past us, ogres and cabs and Watchmen, all bellowing and rushing and unaware of what their futures held. We watched in silence for a bit.
“I thought you were getting tired of me.”
I cussed. “Sorry. No. I’ll never get tired of you. I’m not trying to get out of anything, Darla. I just don’t want to leave you a widow.”
“So you’d break my heart instead? You nearly did, you know. Break my heart.”
“I didn’t mean to. I didn’t know what to do. I still don’t. I lived through one war, Darla. Barely. Now I’m older and slower and nobody’s luck holds forever. Does that make sense?”
She just nodded. She nodded and sank her head on my shoulder, and we held hands and didn’t speak.
“You need to ask how much a Captain earns,” she said after a while. “Not because it’s important. But because you need to stop thinking about this as a death sentence. Hisvin needs to know you plan to survive. I need to know you plan to survive.”
“I’ll do my damnedest.”
She snuggled up closer.
“We could run away.” She shivered. It wasn’t cold. “We could run away, right now, tonight.”
“Thought about it. Take you and Three-leg. Run and keep running until we got our paws wet in the Sea.”
“We’d live in a grass hut.” She shivered again. “You could fish all day. I could wear tropical flowers in my hair.”
“I pictured things the other way around.”
She laughed, but her heart wasn’t in it.
“We’re Rannites, born and bred, aren’t we?”
I felt her nod her head yes. I wrapped my arms around her.
“Then we stay. Stay and see it through.”
“As long as we stay together, I don’t care what else happens. We are staying together, aren’t we, Markhat?”
“We are.”
“Then that’s all that matters.”
We rode. Darla cried a bit. Then with one last fierce hug she was my smiling Darla again, fussing with her makeup, gently needling me about needing a haircut and a shave befitting an officer.
We talked about Tamar too. I laid out my meeting with Lethway and my night in jail and my conversation with Pratt. I assured her I would find Carris Lethway before Hisvin dragged me off to war, and she countered by indicating that as long as the war was being directed at Rannit’s walls I was expected home for supper each evening, cannons or not.
I let her out in front of her shop. She hopped down and said goodbye and nothing in her face indicated she’d just learned about a war marching our way.
“See you tonight,” she said. Then she waved and whirled and was gone.
“Where to?” called the driver.
I gave him Tamar’s address. Darla’s perfume lingered in the cab. My shoulder was still damp where she’d cried.
Tamar wasn’t at the shop. Her father was, but so was a crowd of hungry diners, so all I got from him were glares. I’d hoped to chat with him, maybe get him rattled enough to talk about why he hated Carris Lethway. But there are times and there are places, and this was neither.
I did the next best thing and went to the man’s home to sit on his chair and speak to his daughter. Tamar had given me the address, so I settled back into my seat and watched the street from there.
If Mama’s rogue hex casters were following me, they were too good to be seen. I grinned at the thought of the cab fares they’d be racking up, even trying. Keeping up with me on foot today wasn’t going to be possible.
The neighborhoods changed a few blocks from the Fields home, losing the shops and the eateries and the bathhouses in favor of lawns and homes and parks. While it wasn’t the Hill or the Heights, it was nice. Nice and freshly painted and new. The roofs didn’t lean. The walls didn’t buckle. Glass windows weren’t broken.
I spied a white house with blue shutters and a blue door beneath a spreading oak. A white cat lay curled on the porch swing. Two black dogs played behind a picket fence.
Darla would love that place, I thought. I wondered how much it would run, and whether a man on Captain’s pay could afford it.
My next thought was wondering how far from the walls it stood, and would it withstand cannon fire.
I turned away. The driver missed a turn and swung around, and then we were at the Fields home, and I clambered out.
“Wait here a bit,” I said.
“You got it.” He was parked in a patch of shade. He pulled out an apple and began to munch.
I hadn’t taken a dozen steps toward the house when I heard a familiar frenzied yipping, and Mr. Tibbles came charging out of the half-open door.
He saw me. He stopped, yapped furiously for a moment, and then turned and ran back toward the door, barking over his shoulder and watching me the whole time.
Dogs are dogs, even if they’re tiny and done up in ribbons.
I charged the door. I wasn’t hauling Toadsticker around in broad daylight, but I did have a pair of brass knuckles in my left pocket and my Army knife down my right boot. I paused at the door long enough to retrieve both, and then I darted inside.
Mr. Tibbles stopped yapping, but kept his hackles up and growled a low, determined growl. He mounted a carpeted stairway and bounded up it, huffing with each leap. I followed, knife in hand, glad for the carpet and the dog’s sudden attack of good sense. Last thing I needed was a barking dog announcing my arrival.
Halfway up the stair, crashings and screams sounded from above. A man yelled, another bellowed, and then a woman screamed and glass broke.
Mr. Tibbles leaped over the last stair tread. His paws hit a hardwood floor and skittered and slid. He ran in place for an instant, legs pumping, and then he found his footing and raced down a short hall with me on his heels.
At a corner, the little dog yapped. A man shouted “Shut that damned mutt,” and I heard heavy boots come thump-thumping my way as Mr. Tibbles vanished around a corner.
An instant later, he reappeared, airborne and tumbling. The man who’d just kicked the little dog hove into view.
He had time to open his mouth before I punched him in it. The brass knuckles made a mess. Blood and teeth flew.
He had a short wide knife. I slashed first, cutting deep into his wrist. He dropped his blade, and I kneed him in the groin. When he went down I lashed out and landed a good solid kick on his head.