Chapter 16
She slept until midmorning. She stirred, vaguely, as an announcement blared across the street sometime after dawn, then drifted again until she woke up slowly, naturally, to a room filled with warm sunlight.
Her breakfast was simple but filling, and she ate slowly. A few times she glanced to the clock, or towards the front door, wondering when Havelock would come by with the hound, but the exhaustion and catharsis of the night before had her bones and mind in a state of heavy languor. She refused to worry or fret, seemed incapable of it even when it might have been prudent.
Havelock finally arrived somewhere around noon. Callista roused herself from the chair she'd drawn up to a small fire, and set aside her book. She straightened up the sitting room as she walked through it, and made it to the door on Havelock's third knock.
They set Blacky up in a side room she wasn't using. Supplies from Martin had arrived earlier in the day, and Blacky sniffed at the bedding thoughtfully, then settled down on it. It was certainly nicer than whatever it'd had back in the kennels. Callista watched as Havelock crouched down and said a few soft words to the beast, then patted its head. It blinked lazily.
Then he stood and turned to her.
"Your commission?" she asked, hopefully.
"She said she will consider it," Havelock said, then frowned. "And she said that after Burrows whispered in her ear. He will need to be removed."
"Or his influence balanced," Callista said. "And Martin?"
"We had a good discussion. He will be talking with Pendleton today or tomorrow - we've decided that, for now, a noble will do more good than either of us will directly." He glanced around the apartment. "I expected to see you there. Taking a holiday?"
"A brief one, yes," she said, shutting the door to Blacky's room and moving toward the door.
"Don't stay out of the fray for too long, Miss Curnow," he said, hand settling on the door. "It will set your mind afire just as much as being in the center of it. I've seen men go crazy and drown themselves when becalmed."
"I don't intend to make this a habit," she said, and thought idly of Martin, wondering how he would respond if he ever won.
Throw himself overboard, she supposed. She caught herself rubbing at where he had painted her hand, and stopped herself. "If I have trouble with Blacky-"
"I would suggest you keep your pistol handy for the first few days," he said, as if it were wholly natural. "Which I would suggest anyway - you already have enemies, I'd guess."
"Perhaps," she said. The thought worried at the lazy calm blanketing her senses.
He nodded, and looked at what he could see of the apartment one last time. "You have been a very useful go-between, Miss Curnow, and I am glad that your position in the Abbey has allowed you this... secure and comfortable of a life. But if you'll listen to my advice- I'd pull back your involvement. Figure out the minimum of what Martin needs, and keep yourself to that. It will keep you safe. It will... potentially protect you if and when Martin's power falls."
"Thank you," she said, feeling the muscles in her throat and jaw begin to tighten. The advice would have been sound, if she wasn't already in as deep as she was. Geoff, no doubt, would've agreed with his assessment. She could already feel the yawning depths below her. If Martin fell, she would, too. Even if she never lifted a hand to help him again.
They were linked. She and Martin were now expected and able to move in tandem even without knowing the other's plots in full detail. She took a deep breath.
"Good luck, with your commission," she said.
He inclined his head. "Stay safe," he replied, then let himself out.
When the door closed, she locked it, then went in search of her gun.
She didn't go to the Abbey that day, and nobody came for her. Her indolence, however, was short lived. Blacky's presence kept her agitated, and her books seemed bland and empty, or overfull and tumultuous. Her thoughts barely touched upon the events of the day before, but they still spun, wildly at times, just off-kilter at others.
Martin at last sent for her near dusk, by way of a young woman who looked like she probably washed dishes in some other fine Clavering home during the daylight hours. She certainly looked relieved, possibly because the charming Overseer who had sent her hadn't sent her straight into danger. Callista took the missive, and sat down beside Blacky while she read it.
The hound was quickly getting used to her, and had spent much of the day being as lazy and quiet as she had. He jerked away from her attempted touches, but once or twice, when she sat near him on the floor, he shuffled his head closer to her thigh. He hadn't tried to escape, at least, or lunge for her, and so she had decided he was largely content with his new home.
The message from Martin was simple. He didn't need her for work, but he would like to see her, and at Holger, in his office, which likely meant he wanted to keep her updated but uninvolved. She dressed in her uniform, scraping her hair onto the top of her head, and left Blacky with a dish filled with ground meat she'd purchased from the butcher two blocks over when she'd stepped out that afternoon in search of easy, cheap street food.
She walked the half mile to Holger, taking the opportunity to observe the watch houses set up by Reginald Black and his ilk. They were distressingly common, taking up space along the road every two or three blocks. The men inside and patrolling nearby were in good spirits, if slightly dark in their humor, and as she walked and peered over the edge of the street into the lower alleys and gutters, she only saw seven or eight rats.
Several streets over, though, she could hear the bleating alarms of a new wall of light being set up and calibrated. And when she looked up, past the four- and five-story townhouses, the sky looked more smog-clouded than usual. The whaling houses further along the river were probably beginning to process the worst bits of the beasts, wringing out every usable drop of oil and meat and bone from them, unsure of how long the blockade would continue to allow the whaling ships to return to port, unsure of just how many were still out on the waters and afloat.
As she passed through the gate to Holger, she noted the slight differences between the Overseer patrols and the Watch patrols; how the Overseers were more tightly wound, more brutal in their below-breath jokes. She'd caught at least one of the lower watch pissing in an alley on the way over, but the thought of one of the masked men pissing or shitting almost made her laugh. They still didn't seem entirely human, though she'd spent weeks among them.
She'd always, really, been a bit apart.
She considered a detour to the barracks and the back yard to take inventory, but decided that Martin should accompany her when she went.
Instead, she climbed the marble stairs, listening to the wind snapping the heavy Abbey banners above her. She passed from the dusk gloom into the bright wash of the floodlights, and from there into the well-lit entrance. There were a few people there, and Callista heard the soft words of the consulting Overseer, telling them what they wanted to hear, shoring up their internal defenses.
Callista passed into the stairwell and climbed up.
Martin's office door stood open a few inches, and she knocked quietly as she entered. He looked up with an easy smile from the couch near the window, where he sat with his ankle crossed over his knee. He held a cigar between his fingers, and beckoned her closer with it.
"The door?"
"Can stay open," he said. He gestured to the chair across from him, and she settled into it. "How are you feeling?"
"... Better," she said. She glanced to the hall. "It's been a quiet day."
"Good," he said. He leaned forward, uncrossing his legs and settling his good elbow on his knee. He held out the cigar. "Here, for you."
She held up her hand, and had her mouth open to demure when he said, "This is an order, Miss Curnow."
Lips pursed, she reached forward and took it.
"Place the end in your mouth, and don't inhale. You want the smoke to fill your mouth, not your lungs."
She considered the cigar, then tentatively placed the finely-cut tip between her lips. Eyes down, nearly closed, she let the smoke fill her mouth. It tasted like cedar and tea, with the faintest hint of moss - nowhere near as astringent as the cigarettes she was used to.
"I realized that you'd never had a proper lesson in relaxing," Martin said, softly. "There's much to be enjoyed about your position now, you know - it's not all work."
Callista leaned back, taking the cigar from her mouth and letting the smoke curl from her nose and lips.
Martin smiled.
He stood up, rolling his good shoulder and moving over to the sideboard, where he'd already opened a bottle of Tyvian red. "We must, of course, take care not to get lost in such pleasures."
"Of course," she replied.
"But I've wound you up too tight. I think a regimen of indulgence is in order."
She listened to the splash of wine into the glasses, and leaned back, closing her eyes. She took another puff of her cigar, letting the flavor wash over her, the luxuriousness work its way into her mind and untangle her thoughts. Several times, her mind tried to return to its tight, tense fears, but she made it a point to work them loose again.
Distantly, she heard Martin place her glass on the small table between them.
Martin was right, of course - he didn't seek power because it was horrific and terrible, he sought it because of moments like this. Moments she could only have imagined, when she was working for the Pratchetts and had seen all the fine old casks of wine and the boxes of cigars, the fruits of industry and wealth. They were hers, now. That was her reward.
She stirred, and sat forward, moving to pass the cigar back to Martin, but he refused it with a raised hand. Instead, he got a new one for himself, and she watched as he prepared it, using a fine, strange pair of scissors to cut a small hole in the closed end, and using a long wooden match to set the open end to smoldering.
He spoke as he worked, teaching her about cigars and about Cullero, talking about a trip to Serkonos he once made. She doubted half the details were true, but it hardly mattered. From there, their conversation turned to wine, and the drinking of it, and the enjoyment of it.
Dusk slid into night, and she hardly noticed.
"And the hound?" Martin asked, when wine and cigars had been discussed in seven different ways each.
"Adjusting," she said. "He's shown no signs of violence. He appreciates the bedding you sent over."
"Good," Martin said. He stood, picking up the empty bottle and inspecting the label. He pursed his lips. "I've got a bottle of King Street brandy I could get, if you wanted to make a night of things."
"Of course," she said, smiling.
"Ah, let me finish. It's not here- I haven't picked it up yet from the shop I order from. I'd have to go and get it. The owner's still awake, I wager- but it'll take a bit. I'd understand if you're too tired."
"I'm quite comfortable," she said.
"Well then," he said, inclining his head and setting the bottle down. "I will return shortly."
Martin had been gone maybe ten minutes when there was a knock at the office door, which he'd at last closed behind him. Callista frowned, rising from her seat. Her thoughts spun in a wine-soaked round.
"Enter," she called.
An Overseer opened the door. It was hard to judge his reaction, but she expected it was surprise. "Miss Curnow," he said. "The High Overseer-"
"Is indisposed. What do you need, Brother...?" The words came easily, but outside of her control. She frowned, and tugged on her gloves, trying to ground herself.
"Jasper," he said. The attention he came to was woefully inadequate. She couldn't think of a way to chastise him. "We've arrested three men. Thugs. They've demanded to see him."
Callista's frown deepened. "Do we listen to the demands of thugs, Brother Jasper?" He didn't respond. "Well, he isn't available. Describe these men."
"Morlish, all of them. We found them in Bottle Street territory. All have various broken bones."
Morlish. Callista's spine straightened, her blood chilling quickly. If they were straight from Morley, and if Jasper's assessment of them was right, there was a high chance they were the same men who had assaulted Martin.
Which meant they knew Martin's identity, and likely wouldn't hesitate to share it if they knew they were in a position to harm him.
"I'll handle them," she said.
Jasper didn't move at first, even as she rose and approached the door, but whatever disagreeableness was in him faded enough for him to step back when she came within a few inches of him.
"Why are they in our custody, and not the Watch's?" Callista asked as they descended the stairs to the interrogation room adjacent to the library. "Have you seen signs of heresy in them?"
"Their pockets are full of Morlish spirit charms," Jasper said. "But it's a matter of timing. If they hadn't demanded to see the High Overseer, we would have turned them over by now."
"I see," she said, stepping out of the stairwell and into the main hall. "In the future, ignore such demands. They are the grasping attempts of desperate men to make themselves appear larger than they are."
"Yes, ma'am."
Her vision was steady, as was her walk, and she hoped Jasper couldn't smell the wine on her breath through his mask. She walked straight for the interrogation room, then paused as she reached the door.
She couldn't have Jasper in there with her, or any Overseers. It was too dangerous.
"Are they all restrained?"
"Yes."
"Good. You and your men, I want you out of the room. Have somebody on post to send the High Overseer here when he arrives." The words were out of her mouth before she could calculate the risk, before she could realize how suspicious the other Overseers would become. Why would she go in alone? What was so dangerous about these men?
She struggled to find a justification.
"Of course," Jasper said, the words slow and thoughtful.
"They are likely possessed of a lying and deceitful tongue, Overseer Jasper," she said, smoothing the red cloth at her waist, positioning the tail of it, with its Abbey emblem, so it was clearly visible. "And while we have made great progress in Morley, the continuing proliferation of belief in heretical gods and spirits surely sits in every Morlish man's heart, ready to work his body to violence and discord. I would expose as few of us as possible to it until the High Overseer can make his assessment on their potential for danger."
"They're just thugs, Miss Curnow," Jasper said, and she imagined him smirking, mocking her with every thought. "They are pathetic, violent men. Not agents of the Outsider."
"No, but thugs by their nature do not respect the structure of society, and seek to profit from its demise," she said. "And you thought them dangerous and important enough to honor their request to see the High Overseer. If they are restrained, they will pose little physical harm to me, and any harm to my soul cannot be guarded against by more bodies in the room. Are you questioning my orders, Brother Jasper?"
"Of course not," he said, and turned from her to call his men to heel.
Lying tongue, she thought, before escaping into the interrogation room's observation floor.
She watched through the tightly-spaced bars as the Overseers left. One of the Morlish men was bolted into the main chair. The two others were bound, trussed like hogs, and chained by their wrists and neck to the bars behind the chair. They shouted curses, their accents thick and their voices slurred by various injuries.
The one in the chair, however, was silent.
None appeared to see her, and Jasper didn't direct their attention to her before slamming the door shut on them. So Callista backed away from the bars, settling down at the table which held an audiograph already running.
The shouting continued for another minute, then fell off into muttered swears and the harsh, jarring clangor of the men testing their bonds.
"Should've never gone after that fucker," one said at last.
Callista bowed her head, listening.
"Should've gone right after Slackjaw. That was the job."
Slackjaw. Callista frowned. She'd heard that name before, from Geoff. Usually accompanied by several swears.
"Yeah, and let that gobshite keep on drinkin' and whorin' his way to the top? Fuck off."
"Yeah, well, if you all bleedin' gits hadn't mentioned our old friend, then we'd be in a drunk tank and out in the morning," the third one - likely the silent one in the chair - barked. Callista crept closer to the bars, and saw him clenching his fists and jaw, as if in extreme pain. "We coulda got him in a week, two- he keep going by that slag's place, we'll get 'im again. But the prince- hafta be clever with him."
Her face burned. She moved to creep back, glancing to the door, hoping that Martin would come through soon.
Her ankle turned. She slipped, catching herself only after she'd made a small noise, enough to draw the men's attention.
Slowly, she stood up.
"Aye, that one," said one of the men. He glared up at her. "She's the one fuckin his royal majesty the king of dicks."
"I would watch your words, gentlemen," she said, coming to the bars. "It wouldn't be the first time this institution has tortured innocents."
The other of the men chained to the wall laughed and spat. "Yeah? And then we'll scream out all his little secrets."
She looked between the three of them. Beneath their defiance, they were nervous - the man in the chair most of all. He was the leader, and the smartest of the three, and was watching, helpless, as their chances of being let out alive dwindled. He knew, as well as she did, that she couldn't let Martin's secrets out - and that she'd heard the threat against his life.
Callista crossed her arms over her chest.
"Quiet down, boys," he said. He jerked his chin up. "You heard that?"
"Yes."
"You better know your boy has some dark shit behind him. Lots of blood, lots of knives where they don't belong."
"I'm aware," she said.
"You want a piece of advice? Don't ever trust that son of a bitch. He'll slice your throat while he's riding you, and when the cops come for him, he'll cry and say he'd seen your brother come and kill you. And they'll believe him."
Callista was motionless. Was he speaking from experience? Did it matter?
"You let us go, we'll take care of him for you."
"Unacceptable."
"Then you let us go, and we leave him alone. Soul's honor. What do you say to that? We're only here lookin' for another man. It's just, your boy makes us so angry, you hear?" He worked his jaw, thinking fast.
"You're here for Slackjaw. He's- what, head of the Bottle Street gang?"
"Aye. And important, back in Morley. We've come to take 'im home. Isn't that right, boys?"
They both nodded their heads, rattling their chains.
"We ain't heretics. We're good boys. No wandering gazes or restless hands, eh? Just a bad case of the roving feet, and we want to get home, yeah?"
Callista turned from the bars. She went to the desk, looking at the variety of implements on it.
"There is a blockade around the city, if you hadn't noticed," she said, pitching her voice to carry clearly. "There will be no going home, with or without your additional passenger."
Her hands were shaking. She flattened them against the table to still them.
"We got ways. We got in, yeah? Let us go, and we'll be on our way. You can feel free to let him stab you in the back on his own time, that's fine by me. He'll shoot himself in the ass, too, if you let 'im. We just- wanted to hasten things along. But I get it. Not the natural order o'things. You see? We're smart men."
"Yes," she said. "Yes, you are."
She turned from the table. Martin hadn't arrived yet, and it was impossible to predict how long it would take him. Jasper likely waited outside, ready to come check on her at any moment he felt would help him most, whatever his goals were.
So she extended her arm through the bars of the upper floor, and shot the man in the chair three times in the chest.
The two others shouted, screamed, and she missed her next shot from their squirming. The pistol wasn't as accurate over such a range. But the next two shots found their marks well enough, and if the men twitched and gurgled and sobbed with pain, there was nothing she could have done about it.
She returned the pistol to the table.
Jasper's men burst into the room thirty seconds later, Jasper rushing to her aid. She gave him a thin smile. "Simple thugs, Brother Jasper," she said. "No need to give them room or board, or let them find their way back here another day."
"... Just so, ma'am," he said, then swallowed.
She left him staring down at the corpses. The stairs to Martin's office seemed higher than normal, and her steps were uncoordinated as her heart beat rapidly in her chest. Four. There were four dead men to her name now, if she didn't count Corvo and the Pendletons as indirect murders. These three, and the Overseer. She turned the number over in her thoughts, like a coin across the backs of Martin's fingers, as she picked up a fresh cigar. She mimicked Martin's earlier actions, then sank into her chair, letting the smoke fill her nose and mouth.
Four.
Her reasoning was simple. If she'd turned them over to the Overseers, they would have told their interrogators about Martin's past, which would have led to more uncertainty and division within the ranks than either of them needed to deal with - and might have given Burrows the opening he needed to discredit Martin entirely. If she'd let them go, there would have come a night where, maybe drunk or maybe wholly in their right minds, they would have come to her apartment to kill Martin or to have their fun with her. No, there had been no reason to let them live, and no alternative, just as there had been no alternative at the pub.
Maybe that was why she wasn't shaking anymore.
Her cigar was a quarter burned by the time Martin returned. He knocked, then entered and approached carefully, cautiously, no doubt afraid to find her overwhelmed and terrified again. She looked at him levelly, and he looked back, brow furrowing in confusion.
"You've caused quite the stir," he said at last.
"Oh?"
"You and your marksmanship. The last of your victims took half an hour to die."
The fear came back, loud and roaring. "Did he say anything? The one who lingered?"
"No. Your shot through his lungs made sure of that." He ran a hand through his hair, then sighed and dropped into his seat. "It would have been better if you'd gassed them, poisoned them. We've had incidents where heretics have killed themselves rather than speak with us. Nobody would have questioned them. And at any rate, your actions were very nearly for nothing."
Callista sat forward. "What do you mean?"
He undid the toggles at his throat and pulled out the audiograph recording from his jacket. He tossed it onto the table. "If I'd arrived a few minutes later, they would have played this."
She stared at it. Such a simple thing. She'd made the right decision under the circumstances - she knew she had. And yet-
"I was trying to protect you," she said.
"And you did a passable job," he said. "But damn it, Callista- what were you thinking?"
"I isolated them. I- I silenced them."
"And you've got the entire barracks whispering about your violence and potential indications of guilt and now I need to consider if you need to be questioned - and there is no gentle way to question you." He looked at his hands. "What would you have me do?"
"... Smooth it over," she said. "Like you always do."
"And how shall I do that? Act as if you did nothing wrong, like they're all mad to think your response was anything but reasonable?"
"That tactic has convinced many a maid that she deserves to be beaten," she said, softly.
Martin went still.
"Tell them," she continued, "that I was raised by a Watch officer, that I do not have the subtlety that the Abbey expects, and that I will submit to further training. Tell them that I was not authorized to do as I did, but that there is nothing wrong with what I did. Excuse my behavior, and I'll do whatever I need to, to show that it was an error born of poor education and not poor judgement."
She held her breath.
Four. And yet nobody had cared about the first. Nobody had ever brought it up. She'd never even heard of a funeral for the men who had died that day.
"And in the meantime," she ventured, "there's no more connection here to your past. You're safe. I may not be, but-"
"You will be safe," he said, standing up. "Let us hope, though, that Emily Kaldwin's return will regain everybody's attention soon enough, and this will be forgotten all the easier. In the meantime, Miss Curnow- go home for the night. I'll see you in the morning, bright and early. You need to practice with that pistol."