Текст книги "Rook"

Автор книги: Sharon Cameron

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Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 27 страниц)

“No. But if Maman is out of LeBlanc’s reach, there may be things we can do. I could force my claim, make LeBlanc fight me. But what do the laws of the Sunken City mean now? LeBlanc may take it anyway. Or it may be that we gather our assets and flee. But I will not do so without Maman. She is head of the family. The flat, the ships, they are in her control.”

Ships. Maybe that was how he’d gotten the physique of a sailor. “But if she gets out? What then? The assets that are in her control, without the money. Would it be enough for the fee?”

René met her eyes. “I do not know. Possibly.”

But still, “possibly.” Then getting Adèle out could save her father, and Bellamy House. Possibly. And what would she do, what would she risk, for even the slimmest chance to set all this right?

“Mademoiselle,” he said. “Sophia.” She watched him hesitate. “I would suggest that we leave the discussion of our marriage until after your brother and my mother are out of the Tombs. There is much here that is not known. Do you agree?”

Sophia looked down at her own hand, showing creamy tan against the rolled-up edge of the gold brocade. Two weeks ago she would have never believed that she would go to such lengths to marry anyone, especially an admitted liar and thief with a half grin and hair that shone like dark red fire in the candlelight. She knew she couldn’t believe a word he said. She nodded.

“And Adèle?” he asked.

Maybe René could be trusted where his mother was concerned, but for everything else, she would have to be on her guard. The truth was that she found him fascinating, down to the tiny little pulse that she could see beating at the base of his neck, just beyond the open collar. And he could trick her so easily. He already had. She needed him, but she was vulnerable, and she could never let him know it. She could not allow him to manipulate her. She looked up.

“Yes. Help me get Tom and Jennifer out, and I’ll get your mother, too.”

This smile came slower onto René’s face. He took her free hand and lifted it to his lips, like he was the one wearing the gold brocade, like they were standing in the Bellamy ballroom. His mouth was warm on her hand. “Agreed,” he said. “And you may even enjoy it, Mademoiselle …”

Sophia jumped hard as the door to the bedroom flew open. René’s gaze darted up, and Spear stood looking in at them, a stampede that had come to an abrupt halt in the doorway. Feathers from the decrepit pillow floated gently to the carpet. Sophia pulled her hand from René’s and pushed herself upright.

“Spear, we …”

But her irrational need to explain was interrupted by Mrs. Rathbone forcing her way around Spear, a feat that took considerable strength, especially considering the size of her flower-trimmed hat. A Wesson’s page seventy-four.

“Right! You said there were voices, and … Well, really!” exclaimed Mrs. Rathbone, taking in the room, the bed, and specifically Sophia’s attire, which obviously all belonged to René. Then she dismissed the situation with a wave of the hand. “Sophia. I had no idea. But I’m sorry to say I was only too happy to be part of Tom’s schemes, not knowing it was Tom, and that I would do it again. So to say the truth, not sorry at all.”

Sophia laid down her head.

“And now I think it might be good for my health to visit my sister in the Midlands, don’t you think? And you should come with me. Especially now …” She gave René a sidelong glance. He came across the room and bowed over her hand, the man of the magazine despite the disarray.

“You bring spring into the autumn,” he said, the heavy Parisian accent back. Sophia saw Spear’s eyes open wide before she threw an arm over her head.

“I’ve always said you were a charmer,” Mrs. Rathbone giggled. “Remember that I was the one that said it. Now listen to me, Sophia. People are going to be beastly. They were holding off on the beastly before, but now that Tom is caught it’s ten times worse and there will be no holding back at all. And Mr. Halflife was here, wanting you to march down the stairs and sign over the deed—at once, I should say. I know you won’t. Not yet. That’s why I’ve come to say that I think you should sell me the house.”

Sophia moved the arm from her eyes.

“I can’t give you near what it’s worth, of course, but I think you could come close to the debt and keep Bellamy out of jail. We can’t have the whole family locked up. It would be indecent. Especially with the state your father’s in …”

Sophia sat up instantly, gasping as she pulled on her stitches. She looked to Spear. “What about Father?”

“That’s why I’ve been trying to find you, Sophie. Orla says you need to come. Now.”

“F ather?”

Bellamy sat in the armchair of his bedchamber, facing the window that looked out over the sea. There was nothing there to see but blackness. His hair, once exactly like Sophia’s and Tom’s, was a thin, disheveled mass over his head, his hands folded carefully on top of the blanket Orla had laid across his lap. But his room was destroyed. The furniture toppled, pictures flung from the walls, broken glass crunching into the rugs beneath their feet. Sophia had put on Bellamy’s slippers just to enter. Now only his breath and the occasional blink showed that he was even alive.

Sophia knelt on a pillow beside him, a hand on his arm. Orla stood just behind her, Spear near the door, hands in pockets, towering over a tearful Nancy. Sophia said his name again, but Bellamy didn’t respond.

“It’s Sophie, Father. I just want you to tell me that you’re all right.”

Bellamy never took his eyes from the window, but this time rasping words came from his mouth. “You did this.”

Sophia looked around the room and then up at Orla, perplexed. Orla’s heavy brows were pushed together. Bellamy spoke again, his voice as broken as the glass.

“You think because I do nothing that I know nothing. You think that I don’t know what it means when your face doesn’t appear for days, that I believe every lie Orla tells me. That I don’t know what is happening when footsteps run across my roof. That when I read that foul Parliament newspaper, I don’t know where you’ve been.”

“Father, I …”

“And now they will kill my son, the last of the Bellamys.”

“Father …”

“They will kill him because of you. Everything is lost because of you.”

If he had slapped her, Sophia could not have felt more of a blow. She sat back on her heels, breathing hard.

“And what would you have had me do, Father? Take up painting and visit the neighbors while the people of the city suffer and die?”

“I would have had you remember your duty! Tom always remembered what he owed to his family.”

The injustice of this cut through the reserve that usually stilled her tongue. “How dare you remind me of my duty? I have not forgotten what I owe my family. I was sacrificing my entire future for this family. And that is your fault, Father!”

Bellamy did not answer, only moved his arm away from his daughter’s hand.

“You sold me off because you did nothing. Nothing! For me or Tom! And what duty did you remember when Aunt Francesca was taken to the Tombs? Mother’s own blood! You would have let them cut off her head!”

His face crumpled. “It is my own son’s head they will take now. My dear son’s …”

She stood up, holding her hand against her side. “I am not like you. I can’t sit in my chair, doing nothing. Wasting my days wallowing in grief. I will not …”

“I will always grieve.”

“You have thought of nothing but your grief since Mother died. But you have children, Father. Two of them!”

“I have only one child now. And he is to die.”

Sophia stepped back, feeling every ounce of force from this second intended slap. Bellamy stared out the blank window, a single tear rolling down his cheek.

“Say to your mother that I have sent you to your room,” he said. “And that she is to tell Orla you’re to have no dinner. Mind that you do that, Sophia! Tell your mother I said you must do as you’re told!”

Sophia felt Orla’s hand on her back, tugging gently on the musty blanket she still held around the gold jacket. “Come away,” Orla whispered. “Come, child.”

Sophia turned away from her father and walked carefully through the debris, Orla’s arm around her waist. Spear moved toward them but Orla held up a hand. “Let me,” she said simply. Spear stepped back, running a hand over his unmussed head. Nancy was still standing in the doorway.

“I’ll watch over him tonight, Miss Bellamy,” Nancy whispered. “And, Miss Bellamy …”

Sophia looked up. Nancy had been cooking her meals since she was eight years old, her face as much a part of Bellamy House as the red and white bricks.

“I just wanted you to know that it’s a shame … a terrible shame that I couldn’t hear a word that was said just then.”

“Thank you, Nancy,” Sophia said, kissing her once on the cheek. She hadn’t done that since she was little.

Orla guided Sophia away from her father’s room and through the dark hallways of Bellamy House, walking slowly. Neither of them spoke for a long time, until Orla said, “He doesn’t know what he’s saying. He hasn’t been right since your mother died. His mind has been failing for a long time, and this business has pushed things to the edge. You know that’s so.”

Sophia nodded. Knowing did not make the pain of it any less. “What do I do?” she whispered. “I don’t know what to do.”

“First is to eat. Second is to sleep and let that cut heal,” Orla said sensibly, her no-nonsense approach to life unshaken. She pushed open Sophia’s door. “I’ll sit by your bed until you do. And third, we’ll just see about bringing him his son back.”

LeBlanc pushed open the door to Tom Bellamy’s cell. The sound of Jennifer Bonnard’s screaming rang from her prison hole, echoing through a round, open space carved deep within the Tombs. There were just five cells here: Fate’s special place for special prisoners.

LeBlanc waited, examining his manicured nails as Tom Bellamy struggled down a long winding set of stone stairs, his bad leg bloody, only kept from falling by the two gendarmes that were escorting him. It took a long time before they got Tom to the open cell door and tossed him through. He landed on his bloody leg with a grunt. When he was shackled LeBlanc shut the door and Gerard turned the key.

But LeBlanc did not go. He stood still, frowning at the sandy floor while Jennifer cried and Gerard and his gendarmes waited. Renaud, standing just a few steps behind, ran a nervous finger beneath his collar, sensing the disquiet.

LeBlanc said, “I think I would like to hear again from our informant in the Commonwealth, Renaud. Send the message tonight with the fastest rider we have, and I will require an immediate reply. And, Gerard, have one of your gendarmes quiet that girl.”

Gerard nodded to his men, Renaud bowed, and LeBlanc seethed until well past nethersun the next day, when the answer from his informant arrived. He read the contents, read them again, then hurled the message into the fire, watching the paper writhe until it blackened and disintegrated into ash.

He walked out his office door, waving Renaud away, and stepped into the lift, taking it all the way down the center of the white stone building, through the ground level of the Upper City and down through the cliff itself, where it stopped at the first level of the Tombs. He walked alone through the tunnels, listening to the burble of misery that was the music of the prison, and unlocked a metal door. Down the steps, down and down again to Fate’s special cells, savoring the quiet in which he would vent his anger. He turned the key, and the door of Jennifer Bonnard’s prison hole swung open.

Spear pushed open the door of his farmhouse, hinges creaking in the dim. He strode forward to light a lamp while Sophia waited, the others filing in behind, bringing the sharp air of an autumn night with them.

When Sophia had finally opened her eyes earlier that day it was to Orla packing her things in the light of a sun that was long past its height. Her fiancé, Orla had informed her, had not slept the day away. Instead he had met early with Spear, and then had a talk with Mrs. Rathbone, asking the woman to do him the personal favor of letting it be known that Sophia Bellamy and Monsieur Hasard would be traveling with her the next day to her sister’s home in the Midlands—when, in fact, they wished to remove to an undisclosed part of the Commonwealth to “discuss their options.”

Mrs. Rathbone had been more than happy to be included in one more piece of subterfuge, René had reported, especially if it meant keeping Sophia away from Mr. Halflife. If Mr. Halflife couldn’t find Sophia, then no deeds could be signed, and Sophia could consider Mrs. Rathbone’s offer to buy Bellamy House and its lands.

“She’s better off selling it to me than giving it to Halflife,” Mrs. Rathbone had said, “but don’t forget, there’s not many days left, and they’ll take Bellamy to prison no matter what he says or what he doesn’t …”

Bellamy had stopped speaking, Nancy had said, and did not move from his chair.

“… and she can’t hide forever. So don’t be away for long! You leave at dawn, I presume? Or middlesun? And where are you going again? I can recommend some excellent little places in Manchester …”

But René had only smiled, not choosing to divulge that “remove to an undisclosed part of the Commonwealth” meant a mile trek down the A5 in the dead of night, taking the turn onto Graysin Lane, and stepping through the door of Spear Hammond’s farmhouse.

Light blossomed from the lamp in Spear’s hand, showing a strong, plain sitting space, low-ceilinged and timbered, an Ancient piece of steel girder forming the fire lintel. A fishing rod hung across the chimney, hawk feathers gathering dust in a vase in the window. Very much a man’s room. Spear stood with the lamp in one hand and now a candle in the other, shifting his feet while the sound of Cartier riding a horse with padded hoofs thudded softly away down the lane. Orla had insisted that Sophia should not walk. She was probably right.

“Wait here, Sophie, and I’ll go light the bedrooms,” Spear said finally, leaving the candle and taking the lamp.

Orla and Benoit followed, arms laden with bags, St. Just’s claws skittering after them up the stairs. Sophia sat straight-backed on the overstuffed couch, making a study of her hands while René dropped into a cushioned chair beside the hearth. He had his hair tied back, unpowdered, and she wondered vaguely where the plain black jacket and tall boots he was wearing could have been hidden when she searched his room. Was this version of René the real one, she mused, or just another persona he took on and off with the season? It was still safer not to look at him.

“So, Mademoiselle,” he said into the quiet. “You have made your grand escape. Now tell me what you are thinking. How long will we need to prepare before we sail to the city?”

“I need the numbers of the prison holes. Two days, maybe three, and we should know where they are.” The normal waiting period for execution was fourteen days, to extend the period of misery and suffering, Sophia supposed. She wanted her brother out in five. The thought of Tom in a prison hole was unbearable.

“You have ways to get this information, I assume.”

“Of course. The message went on the dusk boat.”

René had his brows drawn down. “You will need more time than that to heal, Mademoiselle.”

She lifted a hand to the bandage under her shirt, just above the waistline of her breeches. She was sore, scabbed, and a little swollen, though not in terrible pain, not as long as she was tightly bound. And the knot on her skull was shrinking. But it was true that as the Rook, she would be limited. She went back to studying her hands. The things she’d seen in the Tombs were true, too, and she’d not forgotten Jennifer’s arms. Time for her to heal might not be a luxury that either Tom or Jennifer, or perhaps even Madame Hasard, could afford.

René leaned forward in his chair, elbows on knees. “Allemande is a man of … let me think of the words … a man of standards. He cares for the look of things. Murder is all well, as long as it has the appearance of the law, yes? And the execution of the Red Rook, that will be an event for everyone’s eyes.”

Sophia looked up. René was telling her that no matter what happened, LeBlanc would have to ensure that Tom looked well enough for a public scaffold.

“Have you ever been inside the Tombs?” she asked. He shook his head, and Sophia kept her silence. There were many, many things that did not show. It was good of him, she supposed, to try to reassure her. She would be smarter to discern his motive, not trust in his goodness.

René’s fingers tapped restlessly on the chair. They could hear Spear moving about upstairs, and Orla and Benoit. “How long has he lived here?” René asked. He meant Spear.

“Since birth, I think.” Spear’s father had put back money for his son very early. Between the two of them, Spear had saved enough to prove his fitness for inheritance on the day he turned eighteen. “But he’s spent most of his time at our house since his father died. Father practically raised him.” At least as much as Bellamy had raised anyone.

“Ah,” René replied.

Sophia felt the little line forming between her brows. “ ‘Ah,’ what?”

“Raised like your family, but not your family. That would explain it.”

“Explain what?”

“Why he thinks that you belong to him, Mademoiselle.”

That made her lift her gaze. “He does not think that.”

“I only talk of what I see.”

Sophia opened her mouth to protest further, but then heavy steps came down the small staircase. Spear and his lantern were back. He was huge in this room, Sophia realized. He had to stoop strategically to avoid the ceiling beams. Spear set the lantern on the mantel and came to the couch with her shawl in his hand, the same one he’d fetched during the disastrous dinner with LeBlanc.

“Orla said to bring you this until we’ve got the fires going.” He laid the shawl on her shoulders, his hand lingering, brushing across her bare neck before he moved away.

Sophia shivered, though not with cold. She watched as Spear moved about the room, a small smile on his statuesque face, setting this and that to rights, putting an extra cushion on the couch. For her. Sliding a bowl of shelled nuts a little closer on the table. For her. Now moving down the passage and into the kitchen to boil water for willow bark tea. For her. Just as he’d always done.

Her eyes went to René, who was uncharacteristically still in his chair, the deep blue of his eyes watching her think. Sophia stood suddenly, letting the shawl cascade over the cushions.

“Would you tell Spear I’m going to bed?”

René’s expression was inscrutable. “Another grand escape,” he said. “Perhaps I will try going to bed myself, the next time I wish to run away.”

She had absolutely nothing to say to that. She was nearly to the stairs when Spear called out, “Sophie, wait.” He had come down the passage from the kitchen, ducking under the door frame. “Let me … Orla says you have to drink this tea. For pain.”

“No need. I’ll have some in the morning.”

“Then I’ll show you your room.”

“It will be the one with Orla and a fox in it.”

“But …”

René leapt to his feet. “Monsieur Hammond, if you wish to speak to Miss Bellamy, please do not let me stop you. I will give you my chair.” He was across the floorboards before Spear could answer, pausing beside her at the bottom of the stairs. “I think I should go to bed,” he said near her ear, “as fast as I can. Don’t you think I should, Mademoiselle?”

Then he was away and Spear was waiting. Sophia went again to the couch, wrapping herself in the shawl before sitting back down. It was awful when the people you didn’t want to be right always were. Spear sat in the chair René had vacated. It looked too small for him.

“Thank you for the use of the house,” Sophia said before he could start.

“I’m glad to …”

“Did I tell you the Bonnards were safely delivered? They will be called ‘Devereaux’ now.” She did not mention their pleas for their daughter.

“Yes, I …”

“Durant—or the former Ministre of Defense—is only a few miles away. I’m glad they will have at least one person they know. They …”

“Sophie, it seems like you don’t want to hear what I have to say.”

She bit her lip and lowered her eyes.

“I wanted to tell you that I spoke with Tom. Before he left.”

Her gaze jumped up to meet Spear’s. His face was so extremely perfect she found herself wishing it had a blemish.

“We only had a moment, but he told me about getting the marriage contract broken. In fact, he told me to make sure it was broken. No matter what I had to do.” He paused, gauging her reaction before he said, “And it makes sense, Sophie. You can see that, can’t you? Tom said to tell you to let the estate go. To break the contract, so we can start fresh when this is over.”

Something about the word “we” made her look at Spear sharply. “Is that what he said? That ‘we’ will start fresh?” Sophia waited while Spear looked uncomfortable. “Tom meant all three of us? He knows I’m coming to get him?”

“I think he assumed you couldn’t be stopped, Sophie. But he meant … I think he meant just in case … things don’t work out.” Spear reached out and took her hand. “Actually, when he said ‘we,’ Sophie, he meant you and me.”

Sophia stared at her hand in Spear’s, numb with surprise.

“And that makes sense, too, don’t you think? I think it does.” When she didn’t say anything, he continued, “And I’ve been thinking that if all that’s so, then there’s no need to include Hasard in any of our plans now. You don’t owe him anything. Or his mother. We can get Tom and Jennifer out without him.”

“But …”

“The last thing Tom said to me was that Hasard couldn’t be trusted. He’s a liar, and he’s playing his own games, Sophie. Let’s get Tom, and let the rest of it go. There’s still this house, and the farm. We’ll move on, like Tom said … together. You know that would be … a good thing. Don’t you?”

“Spear …” She shook her head, gently removing her hand and putting it in her lap. “Listen to me. If Tom said that, then … he was talking out of turn. I’m not …” She took a breath. “I don’t think now is the time to be talking about it.”

“You know it’s what everyone expects.”

Sophia felt her eyes widen. Did they? “Spear, I gave my word to René, to help him get his …”

“You gave your word,” Spear repeated. The acid in his voice took her by surprise, just as much as the way he’d held her hand. “And what about the marriage? Did you give your word on that, too? Because I thought that was Bellamy’s doing.”

Sophia stood up a little too fast. She wrapped an arm tight around her wounded side. “Actually, Spear, I don’t particularly fancy marrying anyone at the moment. And I think you’ll find that my fiancé was no happier about being engaged to me than I was to him. But I don’t intend to discuss it again with anyone, not until Tom, Jennifer, and Madame Hasard are out of the Tombs. Is that clear?”

Spear didn’t answer. He was still, fingers tented over his perfect face. He looked so cast down, like when she was small and had acted unreasonably petulant because he’d won their race to the top of the oak tree. She’d felt guilty then, too. She softened her tone.

“I have to concentrate on getting them out. Nothing else. Surely you can see that?”

Spear looked up. His eyes were a cool, clear blue, as far from the smoldering fire of another set of blue eyes as could be. And they were very sincere. “Let’s go on our own,” he said. “Like we always have.”

“I’m not going to break my word. Not without reason.”

Spear sat back, chair creaking in the quiet. The look on his face made her heart twist. Tom was a brother to him, too. He couldn’t be worried any less than she was.

“But I will be careful. Very careful. I can promise you that. All right?” She waited, and when he didn’t reply, she put a hand on his shoulder and kissed the top of his head, the same as she’d done after the incident of the oak tree. She left him in his chair, taking the stairs as fast as she could with heavy limbs, hand against the pain in her side.

She made the turn at the narrow landing and saw a figure in the dim, hair so red there could be no wondering who it was. René leaned against the wall at the top of the staircase, arms crossed, waiting for her. She came up the last step before she whispered, “You were eavesdropping, weren’t you?”

“Yes. But I am a very honest eavesdropper, as you can see.” He was also holding his voice low, but she could hear the anger in it, loud and clear, like she’d heard in the dilapidated bedroom. “Do you think I am lying to you?” he asked. “Do you?”

“Yes.” She was surprised by the question. He had to be lying about something.

He took a step closer, voice a growling whisper. “I had a part to play, Mademoiselle. As did you. But I am not playing one now, and I have told you nothing that was not true. I swear that.” The fire-blue eyes searched hers. “Do you believe me?”

She didn’t know what she believed. She was tired, and upset, and this anger of René’s seemed to have come out of nowhere, just like the direction of Spear’s conversation below.

“Do you believe me?” he said again.

The only light was from a ceiling lamp hanging farther down the corridor. Much of his face was in shadow, but something about the line of his jaw was making her thoughts pause, like in the sanctuary, when she’d forgotten pain in favor of inquisitiveness. She wondered what stubble would feel like beneath her palm.

“Listen to me. I told you once that you do not see because you will not look. Open your eyes. Why might Hammond tell you Tom said those things? What does Hammond want? Think!”

She shook herself awake, wishing she could take a boot to her own shin. What was wrong with her? “Spear would not lie to me. Not about Tom.”

A smile moved across René’s mouth, a smile that did not do one thing to lessen his fury. She was instantly angry that she’d noticed it at all. “Then tell me this,” he said, the words barely a whisper. “If I handed you your precious marriage fee right now, would you take it? Or no?”

She met his gaze. “No.”

“Then I would say, Miss Bellamy, that between the two of us, I am not the liar here.”

And now it was anger rather than embarrassment heating her face. “I think you should listen to me, Monsieur, and let me give you a word of advice. You wish to be believed? You wish to appear trustworthy? Then maybe you should get out of my bloody way and stop listening in on other people’s private conversations!”

She pushed past and marched down the corridor, opening the first door she came to. When she found St. Just inside, she turned and slammed the heavy oak behind her, shaking the walls. In another moment, René had done the same to his door directly across the hall. And done it a little more thoroughly.

The floorboards shuddered beneath Benoit’s feet as he peeked out his door. His questioning gaze met Orla’s, who was just emerging from the dark end of the corridor, where the hanging light could not reach, a water pitcher in her hand. They considered each other in silence, and then together looked down the hallway, toward the two doors that had slammed.

“Ce sera une longue séjour,” said Benoit, who spoke no Commonwealth.

“I agree, Mr. Benoit,” said Orla, who understood no Parisian. “I think we are in for a very long stay.”

Spear stayed in his chair for a long time after the doors above him had slammed, watching his hands, where a piece of paper, much folded and marked with the seal of the Sunken City, now rested between two fingers. He turned the paper over and over, thinking of lips in his hair, listening to the groan of Sophia’s footsteps moving across his ceiling.

LeBlanc pulled the heavy wooden door of Jennifer Bonnard’s prison hole shut, listening to it echo in the Tombs. An unfamiliar shudder traveled down his limbs. It was unthinkable that this was fear. The girl must be lying; what she had said wasn’t possible. It was inconceivable that he, Albert LeBlanc, could have made such a mistake. And if he had? Surely Fate had not removed the blessing of Luck from him?

He dropped to his knees, disregarding the filth and his pressed suit, and drew a hasty circle with his finger in the sandy, torchlit dirt. From his pocket he removed a coin and a small stoppered vial, then pulled the cork from the vial, hands shaking, and tossed Jennifer Bonnard’s blood across the circle. He held the coin between two clasped hands, bowed his head in supplication, and flipped it high into the air. The coin turned, LeBlanc watched, breathless, and then the coin landed, the bronze relief of Allemande’s profile looking up at him from the blood-spattered dirt. Face. Fate’s answer was yes.

LeBlanc dropped to his elbows in the bloody, dusty grime. Luck was still with him; his mistake was not insurmountable. But he would need to retain the Goddess’s favor. From now on he would be careful. He would inquire often. And he would take Bellamy blood as well, so that such a misstep could never be repeated.

He shuddered again as he stared at the coin. Fate was not a merciful Goddess. But if he moved forward with his plans to honor her, to give her all the Sunken City as her own, with victims and destinies to choose, if he brought the Red Rook to her altar, then surely Fate would not fail to bless him further still.

Perhaps she would even give him Allemande.