Covenant's End (22 page)

The heavy mists and constant drizzle had finally made good on their threats. Rooftops and cobblestones reverberated with what seemed a million tiny hoofbeats; the rain was thick, drenching, a blanket of wetness trying to stifle the whole world within its folds.

Standing at the roof's edge, water running from the edges of her hood, Widdershins could barely even see the building across the street; it was little more than a darker shape, etched in falling droplets. Between the dark of night and the inclement weather, it might as well have been miles away.

She stared anyway.

How many times am I going to have to do this, anyway? How many—?

“You realize,” Major Paschal Sorelle said from behind her, “that I'm going to need that sword back.”

“Of course. That was the understanding when you lent me one of your Guard-issued blades for the duration of this operation, wasn't it?”

The peculiar sound he made in response to that might have been a stifled laugh or simply an accidental mouthful of rainwater. “Something like that.”

“I mean, it's not as though someone could just take a weapon from under a trained guardsman's nose.”

“Don't push it.”

She finally turned his way, then struggled to repress a laugh of her own. “You're wilting.”

Paschal glared at her from beneath the brim of his hat, which was now heavy enough with rain to fold down around his ears. The normally erect plume dangled and wobbled, a sad, wet rodent's tail.

“I hope you guys are better at keeping your powder dry,” she noted.

“We
have
dealt with weather in the past, believe it or not.”

“Paschal,” she said, suddenly serious, “I can't stress this enough. The idol—”

“I know, I know. You told us. The priestess told us. Over and over.”

“You need to take it seriously. All your people do. It's easy to scoff at the idea of a curse, but—”

“You mean it. I know. You and the others just get us there, let us worry about keeping ourselves alive and, um, un-cursed. If the place is as much of a maze as you've described it—”

“More. And thank you for giving me my turn to interrupt; you went twice in a row.”

“How unchivalrous of me. Widdershins, I'm more concerned about you. Are
you
up to this? Are Lambert and Vernadoe? There are those who would call what you're doing traitorous.”

“Lisette's the traitor. Lisette and anyone who's loyal to her. They can all rot, the seams of breeches.”

“‘Seams of…'?”

Thump-splash-squish
announced the approach of a Guard messenger, sprinting across the rooftop. He skidded to a halt at Paschal's side, spit out a mouthful of rain, then said, “Last team's in position, sir.”

Shins smirked, wondering idly if the rain made her teeth glisten, said, “Try to keep up,” and stepped off the edge.

Nearly blinding, nearly deafening, but even the downpour could not wash away the reek of the alley. Old garbage had soaked into the earth; its stench was baked into the bricks. Burning down the entire block might,
might
have been enough to cleanse the odor.

This was hardly Shins's first time in this specific alley, let alone the many just like it, so she knew she could deal with it. Nevertheless, she gave some very serious thought to asking Olgun to turn off her nose for a bit. She decided, however reluctantly, that he was probably busy enough enhancing her sight and hearing, and didn't need the extra distraction.

Besides, she wouldn't be here long.

She found the sentry more or less where she expected. He appeared to be a beggar, sheltering in a shallow doorway in a futile attempt to escape the elements. Most passersby, if they noticed him at all, would dismiss him just as readily.

Which, Shins knew, was the entire point.

Come to think of it
, she wondered, as she studied the man far more intently than the ambient light and visibility should have permitted,
don't I know him?

“Say,” she said over the rain, stepping out of the shadows, “didn't I once drug you and force you to guide me through the Guild?”

The rather comical, tangled-marionette thrashing as the thief tried to leap to his feet, draw his weapon, and reach for his signal whistle all at once granted Shins more than enough time to act. With an almost casual openhanded shove, she bounced the man's head off the brick wall behind him. Not too hard—she wasn't looking to kill the guy—but definitely more than enough to daze him, at which point she spun him around by the shoulders, wrapped an arm around his neck in a brutal choke hold, and made sure he was down for a good long while.

“You'd probably have preferred the drugs again,” she observed as she carefully lowered him back to the stoop on which he'd sat, watching as the rain swiftly diluted the blood dribbling from his scalp. “Maybe if we ever have to do this a third time, yes?”

From neighboring streets, her god-enhanced hearing detecting the muffled thumps and stifled grunts of other sentries receiving more or less the same treatment from Paschal's men.

The sounds of fellow Finders being silenced, beaten, maybe worse by the City Guard.

I should feel weird about this. I should be at least a
little
conflicted. Shouldn't I?

And yet, nothing. The thought of battling against her former brethren with her former foes, even the possibility of remaining an enemy of the Guild
after
Lisette was gone, scarcely registered. This was what she had to do. For herself, for the people she loved.

This was what Lisette had
made
her do.

She was still lost in thought when the five-hundred count Paschal had allowed for silencing the sentries came to an end. Still lost in thought when something enormously heavy clanked and clattered over the haphazard cobblestones, moving into position directly across the main entrance to the Finders' Guild.

The canon roared. The fortified door disintegrated in a cloud of fire and splinters and smoke. From every visible alley, every street corner, every doorway, soldiers—heavily armed and clad in the black and silver of the Guard—charged their longtime enemy.

Shins charged with them, and there was no more time for thought at all.

Major Sorelle's cannon was not the only one fired within Davillon's borders that night.

Across town, in a district where not only cannon fire but violence of any sort was nigh mythical, one of the walls of the Ducarte estate had come tumbling down at the first shot. Louis Rittier—son of the late and lamented Clarence Rittier, newly risen to the office of the Marquis de Ducarte, had shot from his bed, screaming, at the sudden blast. Sheets and carpet grew thick with rainwater; shreds of silk, all that remained of the bed's canopy, flopped and writhed
like dying worms. He huddled now behind a heavy table, frantically scrambling to don his trousers and sword-belt, while the captain of his House soldiers struggled to report over the twin percussions of rain and gunfire.

“…not just any soldiers, either!” the captain was shouting as he, too, crouched behind the makeshift shelter. “My people are reporting the ensigns of multiple families, including Luchene's!”

“Gods damn it!” She knew. The duchess somehow knew about Suvagne's planned coup and just as clearly knew that he was to have been a part of it. What he could
not
imagine is what could possibly have possessed her to move against them with open violence rather than politically. “Get a messenger to the Guard! Tell Archibeque to get his people over here and restore some semblance of bloody order!”

“My lord, I…. There are guardsmen among the attacking force as well.”

Rittier felt the blood run from his cheeks. “How did this…. How have we heard nothing of this?!”

“It's only possible if they put this together
fast
, my lord. And if we're the first of the Houses they moved against…. If we're to be the example…”

The young aristocrat was nodding, slowly pulling himself together. All right, so…his own House soldiers were gathered in their full numbers on the estate. They'd been intended to
initiate
open action, not defend against it, but they were well armed, well rested, well equipped. Whatever maneuvering Luchene had done to unite the larger houses and the guard, to engage in something of this sort, had to be borderline legal at best. His allies would almost certainly mount a magisterial challenge, and even if they did not, most of the soldiers outside had to be harboring doubts about opening fire on an aristocrat's property.

This wasn't a battle House Rittier could win, but they didn't
have
to win, just endure.

“Captain,” he ordered, finally snapping shut the buckle on his belt, “send a messenger under a flag of parlay. Tell whatever bastard's leading this farce that I do not recognize his legal authority to attack me or mine. Tell him I challenge him to a duel of honor for staining my own, and point out that he'll be saving lives on both sides if he accepts. That should buy us enough time for you to slip other messengers out into the street to inform our allies what's happening.”

“Sir!” The soldier snapped off a salute and scurried out the door at an awkward, crouching shuffle.

Some few minutes later, the firing stopped.

Slowly, suspiciously, the marquis stood, abandoning the safety of cover, and moved to the window to see what he might see. His captain joined him once more just as he twitched the curtain aside.

“Louis Rittier!” The voice echoed from beyond the wall, more solid than the rain, doubtless audible to every man, woman, and child on the street. “Come forth and address me!” A pause, then, “My word that you will not be harmed or touched.”

“Do we trust him?” the soldier whispered.

Rittier grunted. “He gave his word openly, publicly. He'll have issues in his own ranks if he breaks it.” He wiped the last of the crust from his eyes, wished he had the opportunity for a shave, and stood upon the window pane.

“I am Louis Rittier, Marquis de Ducarte!” he shouted back. “By what possible right have you attacked my home? Ordered your soldiers to fire on their fellow citizens?”

“By right of legal writ, authored by Her Grace, declaring House Rittier—among others—traitors to the city and duchy of Davillon!”

“Even if this were true, which I wholeheartedly deny, this is hardly due process! The duchess hasn't the legal standing to make such a declaration without trial!”

“Oh, but she does! In the presence of, and ratified by, a tribunal of House patriarchs, Beatrice Luchene, the Duchess Davillon, has
claimed emergency powers and temporarily reinstated her right to absolute rule by virtue of lands and titles!”

The young aristocrat only realized his mouth hung open when the wind tossed a gulp of rain between his lips. “That authority hasn't existed in generations!”

“That authority hasn't been
exercised
in generations!” the voice shouted back. “It was never legally abrogated! And Her Grace has decided that the conspirators in her domain need to be sent a message.