Steelhands (2011) (51 page)

“Chief Sergeants fight alongside their men,” I explained. He’d probably read about that part, too—or had he conveniently forgotten it?

“That wouldn’t be possible,” Troius replied, looking disappointed himself. “Unfortunately.”

“So, I’d be a mascot,” I said, rubbing at my jaw. I’d been clenching it so tight that
it
felt like iron. “Someone to ride in carriages at parades and let all of Thremedon know this ain’t just some upstart’s idea of throwing his predecessors to the dogs. That this has history; that all they have to do is take a look at the statue to know they can trust their good old hero.”

“I wouldn’t put it exactly like that,” Troius said. “I know it’s a lot to take in at once.”

“Yeah, and I need some time to think it over,” I replied, because it was what he’d been expecting. If Antoinette turned out to be right, then there was gonna be some kind of rescue headed our way, and I needed to be in my cell in order to get rescued.

Then again, knowing what I knew, I didn’t want anyone coming for us. I could only assume these new girls were weapons; those talons looked mighty sharp, and I could tell by Ironjaw’s stink that she was a fire-breather. Whether or not she was a smaller version than the one I was intimate with, I knew firsthand how dangerous she could be.

“Of course you need some time,” Troius said, looking mighty relieved. “I hope you won’t take it personally when I return you to your cell. Proper protocols must be observed, even in these times of upheaval. And you can’t imagine I’d be able to let you go free now after everything I’ve showed you.”

“Not at all,” I said.

Being thrown in a cell wasn’t something I’d chosen to take personally. But having everything I’d stood for resurrected, torn apart, and stitched back together like every nightmare I’d ever had after the war’d ended—that was a different story.

Still, I let Troius usher me out, real polite-like, stopping only to pat his dragon on the head like she was his pet cat. She looked after him, expression unreadable, but she met my eyes when I finally allowed myself to
really
look at her. I couldn’t tell if she was happy or sad, or even if she felt anything.

I didn’t look back again, but the image of her stuck in my mind like a well-aimed dart. It wasn’t until we’d made it back across the bridge that I realized what’d been bothering me about Ironjaw: All that time in the room, and she’d never said a word.

Ex–Chief Sergeant Professor Adamo had been arrested, and I was starting to think it was a miracle we’d won the war at all considering how the rest of the Dragon Corps chose to respond. By doing absolutely nothing.

That wasn’t exactly fair of me—better they come up with some sort of a plan than charge in and make an already bad situation ten times worse—not to mention we didn’t know whether Adamo was being kept in the regular prison or, more likely, somewhere else. But I was feeling so mixed up that being fair was the least of my worries. I was spitting mad, sure, but there was something else going on that made my chest feel tight—and for once it wasn’t an old bodice I’d squeezed myself into. Every man there was feeling turned on his head, but I could tell from a glance around the room that none of ’em was feeling like
I
was. It was part responsible and part awful, and another part I wasn’t willing to examine too closely just yet. It was gonna mean a heap of trouble once the dust’d gone and settled, but it looked like I wasn’t going to have to worry about that for a long time yet. I didn’t even have it in me to stop Toverre from polishing all the spoons in Luvander’s kitchen, though I’d stopped him short of starting on the cupboard handles.

“Now isn’t the time,” I told him a little too sharply.

“It won’t take long,” he hissed back, but he did drop his hands. After that, with nothing to do, he looked like a wilted marsh reed.

But if he got started, I was afraid I’d join him. It was getting that
bad, just sitting crammed in Luvander’s upstairs apartment, which was at least more comfortable than waiting in the stockroom of the hat shop. Only none of us deserved to be feeling comfortable.

I felt like a traitor and a deserter—like we’d all abandoned our captain in the middle of wartime. And he’d taken the heat for us while we sat around polishing spoons and drinking hot cups of tea and talking about the weather.

“It shouldn’t be too long now,” Balfour’d said, but that’d been two hours ago, going by the shrieking clock downstairs. I was keeping count.

With every hour that passed, I felt more and more hopeless.

It was an hour and a half past sunset. If Germaine had sent anyone looking for me at the dorms, then they were shit out of luck since I was spending tonight with my fiancé and what remained of the Dragon Corps. Now,
there
was something to write home to Da about. I was lucky I was already engaged since no man would marry me if he heard about a night like this one.

It certainly sounded a lot like a dream Toverre’d once had. I could tell he was excited, but he was doing his best to tone it down for my benefit.

I wasn’t made for waiting around while somebody else did all the work. Some people got so caught up in worrying about what consequences their actions might have that they never did anything at all, but that wasn’t how Da’d taught me to be, even if he
had
wanted to teach those skills to a son, not a daughter. My personality made it so that I had trouble sitting still, especially when someone I cared about was in trouble.

I could tell the others were starting to get worried about my mood from the way they all kept looking at me like I was a kettle about to boil at any second. But nobody said anything, not wanting to set me off.

The problem was, we couldn’t do anything until Royston came back. To me, it seemed like the regular dungeons weren’t good enough for Adamo, and even if he was there, did I really believe it’d be that easy to get to him? We had to get some information first. The cover of night would be good, too; less conspicuous moving around with a big group in the dark, especially if it turned out our companion Balfour was next on the list of wrongfully arrested.

So it was real nice of Adamo’s friend to help us and all, but I was
starting to think he was talking to everyone in the city with how long he was taking.

And if anything happened to Adamo because he’d needed to tell every story starting from the date of his birth and what the weather was like that night, I was probably going to hit under the belt, whether he was a Margrave or not.

The clock downstairs shrieked for seven seconds, then cut off.

“I’d say it’s time for dinner,” Luvander suggested, clasping his hands together. “I’ll put something together while we wait—no use going into this on an empty stomach.”

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d eaten. Breakfast, maybe; I’d gone to speak with Adamo during lunch, so I hadn’t had time to eat anything then. It seemed frivolous to worry about eating at a time like this, but then again, people were rash and stupid when they got hungry. I’d put food in my mouth, but only if it meant helping Adamo.

“I’m going to have trouble feeding all of you, I can tell,” Luvander added, halfway to the door. “Does anyone here dislike cooked tomato?”

Nobody answered, but that was because I’d heard the sound of a large thud from the room below, and I hushed everyone so fiercely they actually listened.

We were quiet for a few long moments, before Luvander dared to speak up. “Do you suppose that’s the Margrave Royston?” he asked.

“Wouldn’t he ring the bell?” I retorted, which was only what he’d been thinking and wanted someone to confirm his suspicions by saying it.

There wasn’t a single person in the sitting room whose nerves weren’t on edge. Everyone was waiting for something awful to happen—whether it was bad news or soldiers finding out our whereabouts and descending on us without any warning.

I looked around the room for something I could use as a weapon, and my eyes landed on the collection of pokers for the fireplace. There were only three of them, but Toverre probably shouldn’t be given one anyway. He could stay behind and defend the fortress.

“Excellent thinking,” Luvander said, moving quickly and noiselessly to pass them out. “Sorry, young man. It seems you’ve been left out.”

“Too dirty for him anyway,” I muttered.

Toverre delicately wiped his palms on the front of his vest. “I will do what I can to help,” he whispered.

Just then, there was another thud, louder and closer to us. It was coming from the direction of the stairs, I realized, and I drew myself up to my full height, poker in hand.

“I wish I’d thought to lock the sitting-room door,” Luvander said thoughtfully. “How clever that would have been.”

“This reminds me of whenever Rook came back from the ’Fans,” Balfour added; there was a hint of humor in his grimness that I appreciated in a soldier.

“Now, don’t attack all at once, just in case we aren’t under siege,” Luvander suggested. “Then again, what do I know? The targets were all so much easier once.”

“I’ll stand in front,” Balfour offered.

I was about to tell him not to bother when something slammed into the door, throwing it wide-open.

From first glance, I could tell it wasn’t Royston, because whoever it was, he was way too tall. I shouted and Luvander joined me—because he was crazy, I was beginning to suspect—and then I threw myself, with my weapon, at the nearest weak spot. I’d been aiming for the intruder’s head, but because of his height, I must’ve miscalculated, and hit his shoulder instead.

I connected solidly, at least, but the blow merely glanced off the bone.

“See, Raphael?” a deep voice said. “That’s why I went first.”

“Ghislain?” Luvander asked, still wielding his poker—though I could’ve told him it wouldn’t do any good against a giant like this one. He’d ignored mine like I’d hit him with a stalk of wheat.

“I’ve gotten warmer welcomes from merchant ships,” the man said, looking down at me. “And I
rob
merchant ships.”

“You could have rung the bell like a normal person,” Luvander huffed, trying to peer around Ghislain’s shoulder. It was a tough job, seeing as how he didn’t quite come up to it.

“Had a surprise for you,” the giant named Ghislain said.

“Did …” Balfour trailed off, and when I glanced over toward him, he was pale as a ghost. Or maybe like he’d seen a ghost. “Did you say Raphael?”

“Thank the bastion,” came another voice from behind Ghislain’s huge body, which was blocking up the door like a live barricade. “I was starting to wonder if you’d all forgotten about me.”

“Get out of the
way,
” Luvander said, grabbing Ghislain by the arm and pulling him into the room. It looked a lot like a canary trying to move a wolfhound, but to my surprise, Ghislain actually gave way.

Sure enough, there’d been another man standing behind him—like Ghislain needed anyone else for backup, since he was clearly a one-man army. At first glance, the other man reminded me a bit of Toverre, overly thin and pale, with black curly hair that had wiry bits of white in it—the way I’d always imagined Toverre would get someday after a certain amount of time living in the big, dirty world. He cocked his head at me curiously, clearly about to ask who the hell
I
was, then I couldn’t see him at all because Luvander had thrown himself across my field of vision, nearly knocking the other man down the stairs.

It looked like a surprise attack more than an embrace, and when Balfour rushed in, I assumed it was to pull Luvander off. Did they have some history together, I wondered, some kind of blood feud?

But despite having seemed like a sensible enough young man before, Balfour joined in, instead—though with a measure more trepidation than Luvander had shown.

Feeling out of place, not to mention confused, I took a step back and nearly tripped over Toverre, who’d come up behind me like a shadow.

“Watch it,” I muttered crossly.

“Don’t you know who that
is?
” Toverre hissed, eyes on the spectacle by the door.

“Big man called him Raphael,” I said, noticing the big man in question standing to one side of the fray. He wasn’t showing any signs of joining the party; I figured that was probably a good sign since he was big enough to crush the three of them with one arm, and wouldn’t that put a damper on the nice mood? “Guess they know him from somewhere.”

“You didn’t even
look
at those statues once, did you?” Toverre whispered, giving me a look of intense disappointment. “You spent all your time drawing those dragons, but you never
once
put your mind to the men who flew them! Laure, he’s another
airman
. But there were only two more left alive! One of them was Ghislain, and the other—if you’ll recall Balfour mentioning his name—was Rook. Arguably the most famous. Which means—”

“Oh,”
I said, understanding flooding me all at once.

“Ain’t polite to gossip about people when they’re right here,” Ghislain
pointed out, not even looking at us when he said it. Nonetheless, I knew it was directed our way, and I elbowed Toverre lightly in the side, shutting him up effectively.