Chapter 16 - Reap and Sow

They left through an ivy-covered gate in the back garden, Kit trotting beside her on deft paws. Eda refastened her mantle, mindful of the leather-bound plans folded inside her cloak pocket. She blabbered as they walked, if only because he couldn’t interrupt her.

“It might actually work. I mean, these are genuine historical documents. Over two hundred years old! The governor mentioned security protocols, too, which will be immensely helpful. The fact that he even let us have this—” She paused. In the shadow beneath an overstreet bridge, Eda regarded her feline companion warily. She’d almost forgotten why the governor had given them such valuable papers. “You didn’t mean it, did you? When you threatened his children.”

Kit transformed in a swirl of smoke. “It worked well enough.”

Indignation stirred. “That doesn’t answer my question.”

“Abelard believed I’d hurt them, if I felt I had to.”

“And would you?”

His expression was unreadable. “If I felt I had to.”

“I don’t believe you. I don’t believe you’re so—so unfeeling, so brutal—”

“The world is a brutal place to children. Yours and mine both.”

Eda’s stomach turned as she thought of the little girl butchered on the street. “All the more reason not to add to its cruelty. Between them, the High Governor and Tenelle might be able to expose Bishop Fane. All of this madness will stop.”

“Will it? Florian Fane is just one thorn on the stem of history’s bad characters. My brother can always make more deals. As long as demons like him are free to roam the mortal world, lives will be destroyed.”

“I know that. I only meant that someone should stand against people like the bishop. At least he’s mortal. He can be stopped.”

“And would that person be you, darling? Fancy yourself some sort of folk hero?” He sneered. “Very interested in the bishop all of a sudden. Have you suddenly acquired a working moral compass?”

She bristled. “That’s not—I hardly think wanting to see Fane undone makes me a hypocrite, if that’s what you’re trying to say. It would benefit me too.”

“Mortals suffer every day, whether it’s a child butchered on the street or quietly starving in a drafty house with too many mouths to feed. The only difference is that you actually had to look at the former, and so now it’s riled you up into a sanctimonious fever.” His vitriol was palpable. “Powerful people like my brother and the bishop, even Abelard Wolfram—they’ll only do the right thing if it benefits them. The justice you seek is doled out by the powerful, and the powerful got where they were by looking out for themselves. You want to parry with the likes of them? Forget honor and mercy, for they’ll give you neither.”

“And that excuses you, does it? Threatening children rather than saving them is fine, because it’s just the done thing?”

“Why not?” he hissed. “No one saved me. No one tried to rescue me.”

Eda’s words died. Looking at him now, his fists clenched, she suddenly understood. Her spouting of heroic ideals had rubbed salt in a very old wound. Her anger wavered. “I’m…sorry for that. For whatever Baelion did to you, growing up. I’m sorry no one protected you. They should have.”

Kit stilled, looking vaguely thunderstruck. Eda’s chest tightened. Was a kind word really so foreign to him?

He gathered himself. “It’s no matter. ’Twas all a very long time ago.”

Not to you, she thought sadly.

“What about yourself?” His eyes flitted intently between hers. “Your conspicuous lack of venom for my brother is rather misguided. Are you not angry for your own lost childhood?”

“It was my father that got us in this mess.”

“Ah. So he is the real villain.”

She sensed he was mocking her. “After what he did to my mother, to us—”

“That wasn’t his work. You think your grieving sire knew what he was getting himself into when he made that deal with Baelion? You said he asked for his wife back. Baelion knew reviving her as she’d been was impossible, but he took on the Pact anyway. A lie by omission is still a lie.” His lips thinned. “Seems to me your father’s only crime was loving his wife so much that he forgot all sense. Forgot you. Blame him for that, but not for what your mother became. That particular cruelty is all my brother’s.”

Eda looked down at her boots, swallowing. She’d only ever seen the greed and weakness of her fellow man, but how many, like herself, made deals out of sheer desperation? The mother of the little girl killed by the fiend—would Eda honestly blame her if she begged whatever power that listened to give her daughter back?

She considered her father. That he might be as much of a victim as any of them. Lawrie told her Oswin acted out of love; had she not bargained with Kit for just the same reason? Mr. Night would have derided her for it—and not so long ago she would have sneered, too. The thought shamed her.

Eda pinched her nose. Mortifying tightness swelled in her throat. “It’s my fault, anyway. All of it. Sometimes I think my birth was a bad omen. I killed my mother in the childbed. I got Ben and Lawrie captured.” She laughed, hollow. “If Mr. Night is at fault, so am I.”

A hand snatched hers without warning. Eda jerked.

Kit glared down at her. “Never,” he snapped, “compare yourself to him. You’re worth a thousand of that arsehole.”

She stared. His hand was very warm, smooth and free of calluses. Never seen a hard day’s work in your life, have you? she might have jibed, but her tongue was unresponsive. Long fingers curled over hers. His thumb moved against her palm, discovering the creases there.

Eda couldn’t recall ever being so affected by a person’s proximity. His scent, the brush of his clothes against hers. The way his eyes flayed her to the bone. She felt seen.

Kit’s gaze dipped to her mouth. It was shocking somehow. Heat pooled low in her belly.

Enough.

Eda cleared her throat. “That is…very courtly of you to say. Never been told I’m worth a thousand arseholes before.” It was supposed to be teasing. She feared she only sounded like a winded frog.

Nevertheless, the spell was broken. Kit blinked and released her. Took half a step back. There was nothing courtly about the way he’d just been crowding her, and he must have known it. He had the grace to look flustered. “Yes, well. Don’t get used to it.”

Eda smiled without knowing why. That only seemed to disturb him more.

“Moral compasses aside, I’m still not sure I agree with you on the merits of human taste. Especially not here. Most people consider Blackbridge a bit of a shithole, unless you live in Cannington or Bellmoor Heath.”

“Don’t act as though you wouldn’t occupy the handsomest parts of the city if you could, darling. You won’t get any apologies out of me for enjoying my wealth.”

“The High Governor’s wealth, you mean.”

“Semantics. Anyhow, there are pleasures to be found in all corners of Blackbridge if you only know where to look. It’s everywhere—art, music, literature. Wonders without end right beneath your nose.” Something nearly boyish crossed his face, a genuine excitement she had no idea he was capable of.

“Surely Alderport has more to offer.”

“I visited the capital often when I was young. That’s where the Ansellis mirror would spit me out for a time: some grand warehouse owned by a smuggling ring. Lovely chaps. One of them taught me to play cards, though I think he was frightened I’d kill him if he didn’t.” He smirked at her astonished expression. “The mirror moved about often before your father got ahold of it. I saw much of Weslic cities. But Blackbridge was my favorite. Something about the architecture and general air of debauchery…”

“So you chose to settle here.” Eda’s head reeled. “You don’t have any arts back home?”

“Infernus is not my home. And no, not as such. If sculptures are not carved to honor the might of a duke or penmanship not learned to convey orders, it’s of little value. Music, for example, has barely changed over the centuries. There are too few who bother to study it. A luxury reserved for entertaining nobles.”

“No puppet shows and jugglers, then.”

His laugh was bark-like. She couldn’t help but thrill to cause it. “Reenactments of great battles are the closest I’ve ever seen.”

“So they’re good? The theater shows here?”

“You’ve never been?”

“We couldn’t afford to waste coin on that sort of thing.”

Kit shook his head in despair. “The enrichment of one’s very soul is not a waste of anything. I’m actually offended by your lack of artistic inclination.”

She stifled a laugh. He sounded just like Lawrie. “You believe in souls?”

“A turn of phrase, you little heathen. But that settles it. Come on.”

Eda hurried after him. “Where are we going?”

“To further your cultural education. Would be cruel not to, given that you’ll be a penniless outlaw soon enough.”

“That’s not funny.”

Judging by his cackle, it was.

* * *

They ventured southeastward into Pitchford. It wasn’t until they passed various showhouses, guildhalls, and tradesfolk that Eda realized they were in the Commons: a high street known as the lower city’s answer to refinement. All manner of entertainment could be found here, if not quite so polished as those found north of the Waterway. There were mismatched stalls tended by craftsmen and artisans, musicians playing for coin, and children gathered around a wooden booth where painted marionettes danced on strings.

Most conspicuous were the crowing peddlers pushing vials of so-called colloidal silver. More than Eda had ever seen. They’d be fined, should the Blades get wind of it, but that had never stopped them before. She supposed the recent attackers were proving excellent for business.

Crowgate was only half a mile west. Home. Was the shop boarded up, watched by the Blades day and night, a source of local gossip? An empty shell, gutted of its many treasures so painstakingly gathered over the years?

The shop had been her mother’s dream. Now what would become of it?

“There are far too many people here,” Eda hissed, trying to keep up with Kit’s long strides.

“All the better to get wonderfully lost.”

“We have the layout plans. We should be planning how to get Ben and Lawrie out. Wolfram said they’ve only a week or so until…” She could not say it.

“Don’t trust everything Wolfram says. He’s a politician, which is twat spelled backward. Anyhow, do you intend on breaking into the keep this very evening?”

“No, but—”

“Then don’t be dull. An hour longer in the city won’t hurt.”

She couldn’t believe his cavalier attitude. “They could be mistreating them right this minute. Beating them. Torture, even!”

“What a depraved mind you do have.” He pushed through the crowd. “The bishop might have been rough in his treatment of your kin, but now they’re under Martine Tenelle’s beady eye. By all accounts, she pisses honor, no? A woman like that won’t suffer needless brutality in her prisons.”

“Even if she thought forcing information out of them might protect innocents?”

He turned in place, walking backward. “That’s why I said ‘needless.’ Your brothers have no information Tenelle wants. She’ll figure that out quickly.” His expression turned eager. “Come. We’re almost there.”

Kit led her to one of the widest buildings on the street, tall and sagging under its own weight but solidly built. Its face curved outward like the rounded bow of a ship, replete with crisscrossing timbers. The doors were open. A crowd gathered there, being admitted by a youth taking coppers. Above, a painted sign read Maiden’s Lyre Playhouse.

It was familiar. She’d likely passed it before and never paid any attention. “A play?”

Her incredulous tone didn’t dissuade him. “You said you’ve never seen one. Don’t you want to?”

She hadn’t. She did. Eda bit her lip. “What if someone recognizes me?”

“You have the mantle. But we won’t be sitting with the riffraff anyway.” He held out a hand.

Accepting it, here in full view of everyone, felt weightier than the other times she’d done so. Kit wiggled his fingers.

This isn’t what you’re here for, that silky voice whispered. You cannot indulge selfish pleasures, Eda. You are better than that.

But Eda suspected she wasn’t. It was Mr. Night’s voice she heard whenever her thoughts turned to disdain and resentment—he had long been the one to feed them. How much had she not seen, not done, not allowed herself to feel, all in pursuit of his whispered words of praise? She’d held herself apart from her fellow man out of misplaced pride. But what did she have to show for it? Mr. Night had used her for his own ends, as he would any other mortal.

Then there was Kit. Eda saw understanding in his eyes—a fondness, if she dared label it such. She’d balanced on the edge of tears back under that bridge, and Kit had seen. Now he was doing something about it by means of distracting her. Eda did not want his pity, but she also sensed his eagerness. A rare and genuine excitement in sharing something he cared about with her. She wondered if he’d ever brought someone to a show before. If she was the first.

If he felt as lonely as she.

Eda wanted so badly to see this world as he did.

She took his hand. An hour, I can spare an hour.

Kit led her down the side of the playhouse. He shifted into a little black mouse and scurried over the threshold of a side door. A man with a powdered face and vibrant costume sat there, smoking a pipe. He didn’t notice Kit, and his eyes slid over Eda as if she’d been a mere breeze.

A thrill ran through her. She’d often lamented moving unseen about the world, but there was no denying the power in going unnoticed and unbothered. Maybe that was why Severin Lich conducted his affairs belowground.

Inside it was noisy, full of bustle and costumed actors muttering lines. They were in the wings, she realized. The pungent mixture of body odor, face powder, and animal hair fabrics was cloying. A long stage with drawn curtains hid the growing audience beyond. The atmosphere hummed like bottled lightning. How exciting!

Eda hardly knew where to look, but she couldn’t risk losing Kit. She hurried after him up a set of winding stairs.

A boy in a blushing pink dress clipped her shoulder and jerked, as though she’d appeared from nowhere. “Oi, you one of the seamstress’s ladies? You seen my wig?”

“No, sorry.”

“Shit.” He hurried away. A handbill fluttered in his wake. Eda picked it up.

Viola and the Viscount.

She glanced at Kit on the step above. “A comedy? I thought your tastes more refined.”

He bared little—and disconcertingly sharp—teeth at her, then scurried onward. At the top of the stairs, a narrow walkway hung suspended above the stage. Kit ran down the walkway and veered left, crossing an even narrower wooden beam that extended down the middle of the amphitheater…directly over the audience.

Eda’s stomach dropped. “No. Come back!” But her frantic whispers went unheard.

I bet he’s enjoying this. With no choice but to follow, she stepped onto the beam with a muffled curse. Eda tried not to look down. Each step made her knees wobble. Below, the seats were almost full. The amphitheater echoed with the buzz of excited conversation and the rustle of handbills. She doubted anyone would bother to look up and notice her, even without the mantle, but they’d certainly know about it if she fell and splattered on top of them.

“If you let me fall, our contract is very much void,” she growled. This fact alone gave her the confidence to continue. She trusted Kit’s self-interest if nothing else.

He waited for her in mortal guise upon a ledge at the back of the hall. The roof of the gallery, she realized. Box seats were reserved for those with coppers to spare, like merchants or minor gentry. Within the gallery, she spied movement: the rustle of a rich wool skirt as a lady took her seat.

Kit had secured them the best seats in the house for free.

She sat next to him in a breathless heap. His hand found her arm, steadying her, but she was too annoyed to appreciate the concern. “You could have warned me about that bit.”

“You’d never have agreed to come.”

True enough. She kicked her legs over open air. High above the tallow candles on the walls, Eda and Kit were cast in shadow. Even the actors wouldn’t spot them, but they had a clear view of the stage. Her nerves eased into something fizzy and exhilarated. “I’ll admit the view is marvelous.”

“You expected any less?”

“Considering the generosity of the High Governor’s purse, I assumed you usually paid for box seats. You blend in with the other patrons well enough.”

“Quite. But I’d rather sit here with you.”

Eda’s mouth flapped. She was relieved when the lamps were suddenly doused, if only to conceal her pinkened cheeks. The crowd hushed into excited titters. “Is it starting?”

“Yes, so quiet, or else you’ll miss it.”

She wiggled in anticipation. Kit smiled.

With the audience shrouded in shadow, the stage alone remained well lit. A stout man in vibrant doublet and feathered cap appeared from between the curtains. He held out his arms.

“See now a tale of unlikely lovers, on foreign shores do we lay our scene, where lady fair bemoans a fate most foul, and makes a bargain most unclean.” His voice echoed crisply throughout the amphitheater, a spellbound hush following in its wake. “Enter then a rake of ill repute—a viscount of great ambition—to spare the maiden from unwanted suit, and ensure his enemy’s perdition. Together they doth plan and plot by clever wile, but hark! For true love is no one’s fool, and never shall it bend to mortal guile.” With a dramatic bow, he retreated through the curtains, chased by applause.

Eda clapped numbly. Where lady fair bemoans a fate most foul, and makes a bargain most unclean. She squinted at Kit. The play was brand-new, or so the handbill claimed. Surely he hadn’t seen this production before? She wouldn’t put it past him to bring her here on account of that line alone. Probably found it funny.

Two new actors entered. One was the boy she saw earlier in the pink dress—in possession of his elusive wig—and a man dressed as a lady’s maid. The latter said in a ludicrously high voice, “Good lady, thine intended awaits, and your lord father will bring you hence himself if you do not come!”

“Would that my feet could carry me thus, Nurse, but for their quaking. Should my father walk in mine own shoes, he would surely run from this place in all haste.”

“Impossible, my lady. His Lordship would never fit in thine silk slippers.”

The crowd tittered. Eda barked a laugh herself, surprised. She covered her mouth and glanced sideways. Kit’s eyes slid away from her. His throat might have bobbed—but it was hard to tell in the dark.

The story played out. Young Viola was a lady of high standing in danger of being promised to the brutish Baron of Greaves. When the rakish Viscount, Crispin, returned from a tour abroad, his and Viola’s old rivalry was reignited. But despite their dislike of one another, the two decided to make an alliance and pretend they were courting in order to spare Viola from an unwanted match and help Crispin get closer to the Baron, his long-standing enemy.

Eda found herself laughing at the antics of the comically blunt lady’s maid. Gasping when Crispin and the Baron nearly came to blows. Even sighing, despite herself, every time Viola and Crispin traded barbs as thinly veiled flirtations. Toward the end of the production, when Viola was to wed the Baron despite all their efforts, Eda clutched her cheeks in horror.

The budding lovers met on the shore the night before the wedding. They stood close. Crispin gripped Viola’s hand and knelt before her, his torment convincing even from a distance. “Long have you vexed me, Viola, as none other has vexed me! You are as much the scornful thorn as the charming flower, the bitter poison and sweet nectar both. You are the source of all my suffering…and all my longing.”

The audience sighed. The darkness was thick enough to trick one into thinking the outside world did not exist at all. In here, it was nighttime on a Forisian coast, stars spiraling overhead like fairy dust. Eda could almost hear waves rocking on a summer’s shore.

Her heart pounded. What would they do? How would Viola get out of the wedding? She had to—she couldn’t actually marry that brute!

“I hope they get to be together,” Eda whispered. “I hate sad endings.”

Kit said nothing. The silence stretched on long enough that she tore her eyes away from the stage, only to swallow.

He was not watching the actors. He was watching her. She had an odd feeling that he’d been looking for some time.

He said lowly, “Would you wish you had not come, if the ending saddens you?”

Below, Viola pulled away from Crispin, tearfully proclaiming that their time together was nearly done.

“No. It’s wonderful. I’m glad you brought me.”

She’d not meant to say something so earnest.

Kit’s eyes were liquid fire. He shuffled closer until their shoulders brushed. His scent! How she loved it—wine, rain, lightning. “I could show you far more than this,” he whispered in her ear. “There are grander playhouses than the Maiden’s Lyre. Productions a hundred times more extravagant. Comedies, romances, adventures, tragedies—”

“No tragedies.”

“No tragedies,” he corrected. “Concerts too. Symphonies to rattle the bones. And poetry. Poetry that could make the hardest heart weep for the beauty of it.” His body was close enough to warm her side. “Do you like poetry?”

He sounded like he truly cared to know. She curled her fingers in her lap. Suddenly, Eda wasn’t sure what any of the actors said. “I…don’t know any.”

“Perhaps you are more muse than poet.”

“A muse?”

“One who inspires the words.”

Eda chuckled. “That doesn’t sound like me.”

“Yes,” he said at once, “it does.”

She turned. Their faces were inches apart. Eda had never seen his eyes so dark—the molten irises nearly swallowed whole by black pupils. Such a look would have frightened her not so long ago. It should certainly frighten her now.

The fact that it didn’t was most unnerving of all.

Below, the music swelled as the actors changed scenes. The audience clapped. Kit’s gaze fell upon her lips. His own parted, as though he meant to say something that simply would not come.

A lash of heat set her trembling inside her own skin. To think that such a creature might find her attractive was absurd as it was thrilling. He’d enjoyed the attentions of other mortal lovers, Eda was sure. No doubt they were all great beauties—willowy and tall and fine-boned. Noble, like him. Eda was not those things.

Was it a trick? A clever humiliation? Perhaps he liked the idea of bedding her, only to lord it over her later. One more thing he might boast she’d willingly given him. What could she be, after all, but a temporary diversion?

Eda forced herself to breathe and look away. Remember where you are. Who he is. “I shall never be a muse nor a poet, Lord Ansellis. I don’t expect to live long enough for either.”

She felt the way he tensed, heard his breath stop short. He drew back a fraction. Good, she told herself. If she could not forget her circumstances, neither could he.

Someone screamed.

Eda jerked to attention. She scanned the stage, wondering what she’d missed to cause a character to cry out so terribly, but the actors were frozen in place. She and Kit looked at each other, bewildered. The crowd murmured in confusion.

Another scream. Many, in fact, rising like a wave. It came from without the amphitheater—muffled through the walls. Some of the audience stood and looked about in fright.

A man stumbled onto the stage, nearly falling in his haste. “Lock the doors!” he cried. “It’s a demon! A demon!”

Then all was chaos.