The Queen's Necklace (27 page)

“Nick Brakeburn,” Will said hoarsely. “What are you doing here?”

“I beg your pardon,” Lili's cousin replied, with a flash of even white teeth. “I would hate to think I had intruded on a private quarrel.” He put away his sword, wadded up the bloody handkerchief in his fist, and extended the other hand to Wilrowan.

Will summoned up a weak, shaky grin of his own. Accepting the offered hand, he wobbled to his feet. “You don't intrude at all. By what trick of luck or the gods did you manage to happen along at just the right moment?”

Young Brakeburn lifted a broad shoulder under the wine-colored coat. “I saw you turn down this alley and I saw the two men follow you. As I didn't care for the look of the place or of them, I decided to watch what happened.

“Although, if you will pardon my saying so,” he added, as he bent at the waist, picked up the fallen pistol, unfolded his long lean body, and handed the firearm back to Will, “you don't look like someone who has anything worth stealing—or was this a personal matter, after all?”

“I have no idea.” Pocketing the pistol, Will prodded one of the bodies on the ground with the toe of his boot. “Since neither of these fellows appears to be capable of answering any questions, I suppose their motives must remain a mystery.”

With an effort, he stooped and rescued his hat, which had fallen off during the struggle and was lying in a muddy puddle along with
some fish heads, a rotting cabbage leaf, some potato peelings, and one or two other things better not identified. He put a hand to his aching head. Was it possible he had picked up some piece of information today that was far more valuable—and therefore far more dangerous—than he knew?

He turned over the smaller of the two bodies and bent to examine the face. The process made him wince with pain. “I'm not acquainted with either of these men. Are you?”

“No, I am not,” said Nick, with evident distaste. “Leave them be, Wilrowan! You've gone most damnably pale, and I wouldn't be surprised if you have a concussion. Let me hail a chair and send you home—where, if you have any sense at all, you'll send for a doctor.”

“Very well.” Painfully assuming an upright posture, Will followed Nick out of the alley. He had to agree that there was nothing to be learned by lingering over the bodies, for what could those men have intended except to rob him? He had his ring, his pistol, and his pocket-watch, all worth stealing; these attacks were far from uncommon.

So why did he continue to harbor an uneasy feeling there was something out of the ordinary about this one?

N
ick hailed a chair and watched, with a solicitude very much in contrast to his usual brisk manner, as Will climbed inside. With a combination of bribes and threats, he convinced the chair-men to carry Wilrowan as far as the palace. A silver coin changed hands, and subsequently found its way into a dirty pocket.

“And for the love of Heaven, go straight to bed,” Nick admonished. “I daresay you have a lump the size of an egg under that ginger thatch of yours.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” Will said dryly. “I'll attend to the matter at my earliest convenience.”

Nick grinned and sketched a salute. Then he stepped back as the chair was lifted and the bearers set off at a brisk pace. Will leaned his head against the padded silk interior and closed his eyes for the entire journey.

By the time the chair-men let him off near the Volary, he was feeling a little revived, at least sufficiently so to make his way through the front gate and then through a maze of courtyards and rooms to the queen's apartments. He had, however, a villainous headache. Arriving outside Dionee's bedchamber, he was directed to the Music Room.

Over the last two weeks, while Will was plumbing the depths of Hawkesbridge society, Dionee had dined, danced, gone riding, attended the opera, the theater, and the ballet with the ambassadors from Kjellmark, Lichtenwald, Winterscar, Tholia, Montcieux, Chêneboix, and Rijxland—in short, with every foreign dignitary in Hawkesbridge that winter, except for Thaddeus Vault, the ambassador from Nordfjall. With a seemingly artless ingenuity that would have left a less experienced charmer breathless with admiration, she had conversed with each of these gentlemen on a variety of subjects, finally bringing the conversation around to her recent terrifying experience at the hands of robbers—all with an idea of gauging the ambassadors' reactions. She had left Lord Vault for last, when in fact he had been her first object, not wishing to appear to single him out. When Will arrived in the Music Room, he found her playing at cards at a round boulle table with that worthy gentleman.

The Music Room was vast and splendid—yet somehow oppressive. The walls were covered with a rich red brocade, the gold threads that made up the pattern growing a little tarnished; a crystal chandelier, too large for the room, hung down from the coffered gold ceiling. As neither the king nor the queen was musically inclined, this was no longer a room devoted to the performance of music. It had become, instead, a museum for queer old instruments: bombardes, armonicas, and zithers; violins carved with grotesques; virginals painted with landscapes; pandurinas, seven-stringed lira, and hurdy-gurdies; even (the pride of the collection) a glass pianoforte. When Dionee caught sight of Will, standing just inside the double doors with his disreputable hat in his hand, she rose from her seat in a flutter of violet silk, begged the ambassador to excuse her, and tripped lightly across the floor.

“Wilrowan,” she said with mock severity. “You really ought to know better than to come here!” Officially, Will was in disgrace, still in command of Her Majesty's Guard but banished from the royal
presence—supposedly because of his scandalous arrest, and for the bad luck of not being on hand to defend the queen when she was robbed, but actually as an excuse for his extended absence from the palace. Dionee lowered her voice. “What have you learned? Oh, please tell me you have discovered something, for I have accomplished nothing here.”

There were lavender shadows under her eyes. Will knew that she had been wearing herself out with worry and guilt; for one moment, he considered telling some comforting half-truth. But then he hardened his heart. She was responsible for what had occurred, and who should suffer if not herself?

“Not a breath, not a whisper,” he said with a shake of his head. “I did think your diamonds might be found, and I could wring information from the scoundrel who had fenced them—but they seem to have disappeared as effectively as the Chaos Machine.” He made an impatient gesture. “Believe me, the sums I have offered and the places I have offered them, I ought to have heard
something
.” Nor had the ravens been able to report even a snatch of incriminating conversation.

He looked over her shoulder and across the room, watching the ambassador, who had risen when the queen did, but had by now quietly resumed his seat at the table, where he was picking up the thin pieces of painted ivory and fanning them out in his hand. “He looks ill at ease, and that's not like him. He's the most polished man I know. He watches us, too, though he pretends only to be counting the pips in his hand.”

Indeed, Lord Vault's scrutiny appeared to be more than ordinary curiosity; there was a strained intensity to his sidelong glances.

Dionee sighed. “He has been playing very badly all afternoon. And when I spoke of being robbed—” She stopped and stared at Will. “My dear, is that blood?”

“But not my own. Pray, don't regard it. You were about to say—?”

“I was about to say—” Dionee interrupted herself again. “Will, you have gone all white around the mouth. What have you been doing to yourself?”

“It is all part of an ingenious disguise.” He made another impatient gesture. “You were saying that when you spoke to Lord Vault about being robbed—?”

“Oh, but they
all
ask such searching questions. The ambassadors from everywhere. Of course, they may only be concerned for their own safety, thinking the footpads have grown so bold.”

Wilrowan experienced an uneasy twinge. There was something very wrong here: the thieves of Hawkesbridge so ignorant, the ambassadors so interested. “I wonder if everything is quite as it ought to be in Chêneboix, Nordfjall. Winterscar, and those other places? I wonder if Rodaric is the only one who is missing something of inestimable value.”

Dionee opened her eyes very wide. “Please don't say that; you will give me nightmares. The king has people in all those places; if there were really anything wrong, surely we would have heard
something
?”

“Perhaps. Yes, we must have done.
They
all know something is amiss
here
, even if they don't know what.”

When Will opened the door to his chilly attic room, he was surprised to see that somebody else had already been in to light the candles. He hesitated in the corridor, sniffing the air for perfume. There was a certain Letitia Steerpike, the boldest and most predatory of Dionee's women, who had taken to paying him unexpected visits, despite the cool reception he always gave her. There
was
a faint scent, but of neroli rather than jasmine, and as Will entered the room, a figure gorgeously attired in plum-colored velvet and silver lacings rose slowly from a chair and favored him with a long hard look through a jeweled eyeglass.

“I had almost given you up for dead. But I see you are strong of wind and of limb—it is only your memory that suffers.”

Will responded with a sheepish grin. “You are undoubtedly going to tell me I've forgotten some engagement. I beg your pardon, Blaise, but whatever it was has slipped my mind.”

Trefallon dismissed his apology with a graceful gesture of one white hand. “We were to hire a carriage and visit my family at Crowsmeare. Don't let it trouble you, I beg you. No doubt whatever appointment you had in the stews was far more pressing.”

Will groaned, tossed his hat on the floor, and collapsed into a chair. “And you've wasted the entire afternoon waiting here for me to return and explain myself.”

The worst of all this secrecy was that Will had not been allowed to tell Blaise about the missing Jewel. “
I have nothing against young Trefallon,
” the king had said. “
But I don't see how he can possibly be of use in recovering the Chaos Machine
.” Lacking any explanation, Will could only imagine what his friend must make of his present behavior.

“I think I'd rather feed than revile you, Wilrowan. I don't know what you have been doing to yourself, but you have a certain lean and wolfish look that I find altogether distressing. Come with me to the Imp and Bottle, and I will buy you supper.”

Will considered this offer. He wanted his bed almost as much as he wanted his supper. And while a meal at an inn like the Imp—famous for its ale and for immense sea-pies stuffed with shad, haddock, cod, salmon, sturgeon, and lampreys between thin layers of pastry—would be far superior to anything he might find here at the barracks, he could hardly put in an appearance as he was now. “Oh, very well,” he said at last. “It's very good of you, Blaise. I'll ring for Young Swallow and try not to keep you waiting too long.”

He crossed the room and gave a hard pull on the velvet bellrope, then he shrugged out of his coat and tossed it over a chair. When he
looked back up, Blaise was watching him with an expression of intense concern on his face. “What is it now?”

“You're bleeding. Fiend seize you, Wilrowan, didn't you even notice?”

Will looked down at his right sleeve, where he had knotted a strip of dirty muslin some twelve hours earlier. There was a fresh red stain. “Oh—did that start again? But I expect it's already stopped; it was never more than a scratch. I was in a knife fight last night.”

“You were—in—a knife fight?” It was evident from Trefallon's voice that he did not believe a word of it. “My dear Blackheart, since
when
do you carry a knife?”

“I will after this. I was forced to borrow some damned clumsy thing from somebody else. Please don't concern yourself on my account. It was done for a wager, and no serious harm done on either side.” He did not like to mention the scuffle in the alley, which had probably started the bleeding again. If Blaise knew, he would undoubtedly side with Nick and call in some cursed saw-bones.

Resuming his seat, Will was still struggling out of his high boots when Blaise picked up a folded piece of paper from a table by the door and examined it with his glass. “What is this? It looks to be of some importance.”

Will put out a hand to take the letter, turned it over to look at the seal. The thick red wax was imprinted with Rodaric's cypher. “I wonder how long it's been waiting.” He broke the seal, unfolded the heavy sheet of embossed paper, and read the contents with little enthusiasm.

It was a request to attend the king—not in his own apartments at the palace, but at the home of one of the two Malachim professors the chancellor had recommended. To arrange a meeting had been far more difficult than either Wilrowan or the king had imagined, as both men were out of town. Now it appeared that one or both of them had finally returned.

Will's fingers closed around the letter, crumpling the paper.
Weary and out of sorts, he had no desire to spend what remained of the day in the dry, repressive company of two Hawkesbridge dons. Even under the best of circumstances, it was a meeting he would have given worlds to avoid.

But unfobbing his pocket-watch, flipping open the cover and taking note of the hour, he saw the time was just after six. Rodaric was expecting him to appear between five and eight.

“I'm sorry, Blaise, but it looks like I've been invited to a damned supper party at the university!” He picked up one of his boots, knocked it against the floor to remove some dried mud from the heel, and pulled it back on again.

“But Will—no really, Wilrowan! Surely you don't intend to go dressed as you are?”