Dragon's Run Page 14

  “Drosa, if I touch you…” Ishe warned.

  “You said I pretty. Then you walk all day no shirt and now you say no touch. You…ah… Is flirt the word?” Drosa paused.

  A laugh bubbled up from Ishe, a soft thing that might flee at any moment. “Right word. But I’m not trying to flirt with you.”

  “Not like girls? Want the stick between legs that make men stupid?” Drosa’s voice climbed high and teasing.

  “No!” Ishe barked, and laughed as a memory struck her. A stinging cheek where Mother had slapped her. Madria had told her she was too ugly to attract a husband, and Ishe had grinned like a fool and asked, “Can I take a wife instead, Mother?” She had been nine, a year after Yaki had maimed her lip with the hot poker, and the scar had persisted even with the highest-quality medical crystals. Too puffy to hide, no matter how thick the makeup. “Never cared for men.” She told Drosa.

  “Good Eyah not wrong, then. Say you make big moon eyes at me when my back turned.”

  “What?! That’s not fair!” Ishe sputtered as she thought of the places her eyes had roamed while Drosa had led.

  “Eyah see where you look when he with you.” She laughed again, a beautiful thing that sounded musical and a little harsh all at once.

  “Why did you come with us?” Ishe asked, trying to shift the conversation before she was forced to admit how she’d been attracted to the hunter the moment she’d wrestled the knife away from her. “Once Hawk took on Yaz’noth, you could have gone back home.”

  She sighed, “And let you melt into the Black? Naa. Too late for me. I tried to kill you. Would have stopped everything right there. I failed. Either way, I must go. Murderers not welcome among Two Herds. Through the Maw or over it, I going. If I go into world beyond Valley, best to walk with one who knows it.”

  A firm squeeze hugged Ishe’s midsection, and soft lips on her spine triggered a fresh shiver.

  “You brave in heart,” Drosa said as Ishe still fumbled for her own words. “No thought, just do. I watch you do it for Hawk, then for Catter.”

  “It wasn’t smart. I nearly lost it when I jumped after Catter,” Ishe said. Mother’s voice had chided her; remembrance sent by Coyote? Or had it been the voice of memory?

  In response, lips caressed the small of Ishe’s neck and made her cheeks flush with an uncomfortable crawling heat that she didn’t want to stop.

  “Tell me about Golden Hills?” Drosa whispered.

  “Heh.” Ishe gathered her thoughts. The last time she’d seen the city rose into her mind. Its walls encircled a series of hills of increasing heights until it met the base of the imperial mountain. Anchored to the top of one of the smallest were the airship docks, a maze of liftwood planks that extended out and over the walls of the city. The docks were always shifting and changing to accommodate more and differently sized ships. Ishe always wondered what they’d look like the next time she visited. “You know that little bridge Yaz’noth loads his airships on? Wait till you see what they do in the Golden Hills…”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  It is important to have goals in life, girls. Otherwise, the four winds can bandy you about and never go anywhere. But! Keep in mind the costs of ambition, for as lowborn women, you will pay them double.

  Madam Mana, Headmistress of the School of the Cultured Lady

  Yaki woke up the next day feeling ravenous. Not an unusual occurrence as of late, but the source of painful pangs was not in her stomach but nestled between her breasts. Her heart was hungry, radiating a warmth that threatened to edge into pain. Apparently, this new detente between her body and the thing inside it would come to a screaming halt if she didn’t give it what it wanted. She dug into the bottom of her belt purse and opened the pocket she’d stitched into the bottom. She felt the half dozen lumps sandwiched between the leather and fabric, each the size of a plump housefly. How long had it been since her last one? At least a day. Maybe two? She squeezed open the gap in the stitching and extracted a lump of gold.

  She examined it, a pellet of gold like the ones jewelers bought to recast or hammer into pretty shapes. She’d paid at least double to keep the transaction off the books and out of Guro’s hands. It wasn’t particularly pure, but Yaki had no idea how she knew it. Smell? Or was the yellow luster wrong somehow? She placed it on her tongue and rolled it around in her mouth, sweet but not overbearingly so. It had a savory element to it. If it were truly pure, would it be like chewing on sugar cane? Her torii pendent had been slightly sweeter before she’d swallowed the entire thing.

  A knock sounded and she heard Guro grumble from the next room. Yaki swallowed and felt the warmth in her chest contract, focusing down to an intense point right above her heart. Heaving a sigh similar to one after a good meal or stretch, Yaki breathed out a small plume of smoke. For a moment, she allowed herself to enjoy the pleasant warmth that the foreign heart sent rolling through her body.

  A piggish grunt sounded. “Mitsuo is here,” Guro announced.

  Swearing under her breath, Yaki fanned the smoke cloud to a light haze. “Let him in. I will be out in a moment.” Checking herself in the room’s tiny mirror, she saw enough to make her wince. She looked like a hag from a fairy tale. The ruined makeup combined with tangled hair for a horrifying result. She probably smelled like a crypt or worse. Trusting her nose was out of the question. A polluted sewer might smell like a hot bean bun if had been constructed from iron pipes.

  “Badger, we need to talk,” Mitsuo called through the paper divider that separated her “room” from Guro’s. His shadowed hand reached for the handle.

  “Open that door and lose your hand,” Yaki snapped in an irritated tone. His form froze and Yaki bit back another curse. Think Lady Cat, she scolded herself, a cat that wants affection. She continued in a much sweeter tone. “Last night’s sleep was the opposite of beauty rest. I’ll be with you in a few moments.” Wetting a cloth in the basin, Yaki scrubbed at her face and added a visit to the baths to her list of things that must be done today.

  The shadow on the door relaxed and ran its hand back over its head. “Sure you are not a kitsune frantic to hide her tails?”

  Yaki gave a small laugh. “I think you’d know by now if I had anything of the sort.”

  “It doesn’t hurt to double-check once in a while.”

  “You stay right there, Mitsuo. A lady doesn’t let a gentleman smell her after she’s been crawling around the sewers. Had to meet with Simon’s boss last night.”

  He hissed as if Yaki had stabbed him with something sharp. “Are you all right?” A hand pressed up against the screen as if he was prepared to claw it open.

  “I’m fine, although the way they seal their deals is messy and gross.” Yaki thought of the spiraling madness that Simon’s eye socket now contained.

  “You didn’t let them infect you with anything, did you? It’s not contagious, is it?” His voice warred between disgust and concern.

  Yaki forced a high, tittering giggle. “Nine hells, Mitsuo! I’m fine. I’m no more afflicted than I was before.” Yaki tried to hurry, giving up on removing every trace of her eyeliner and dipping the corner of her towel into the basin for a quick body wipe-down. “Now. what’s this we need to talk about? It sounds ominous when you phrase it like that.”

  Silence came from the other side of the door for a moment. “I think I know how to get us into the Foundry.”

  “I’m hearing a rather large but in your voice,” Yaki said, finally freeing her hair from its tangled braids and grimacing at the pain that brushing it out would produce.

  “I can get us past the guards. The human guards, but the ancestors that guard the vault are much harder. We need documents,” he said.

  Yaki bit back a growl as her comb snagged on a knot. “You’re a scribe. Forge them.”

  “I’m a student. I don’t have access to the inks, and besides, kami can always tell who signed something.”

  “So, trick your grandfather into signing something with removable ink and the
n forge the paperwork around it.” Yaki rolled her eyes; didn’t Mitsuo read any adventure novels while at the gentlemen’s school? It was the oldest trick in the books when you needed approval from haughty heads of noble houses.

  “That doesn’t actually work, you know. Removable inks are never nearly as removable as they’re supposed to be, and anyone with half a wit can tell when paper’s been washed.”

  “Will a spirit actually care?” Yaki let her exasperation leak into her voice. She just wanted it to work. Why was he bothering her with these details?

  “That’s not the point! They can be forged but I can’t forge them. Not if we’re going to do this within a week.”

  “So, hire somebody who can.”

  “Yoshiaki won’t want money,” he said. “He’ll want—”

  The name triggered the memory of Mitsuo’s cousin’s eyes leering at her suspiciously. “I’m not sleeping with him!” she called back, a shiver of disgust shaking her body at the thought of even pretending to like the little weasel.

  The moment of silence outside sent little quivers of rage through her arms as the comb finally made it through her long hair in a single stroke. As far as she was concerned, the biggest upside to Mother’s death was that she didn’t have to sleep with anyone she didn’t want to. Yoshiaki wasn’t much of an improvement over incontinent old men.

  “I wasn’t suggesting that,” Mitsuo said, far too late for Yaki’s liking. “But we’ll have to convince him. Make sure it’s worth his while.”

  “Good.” Yaki found herself seething, her mind imagining Mitsuo offering her up to his cousin on a silver platter, dressed like a roasted bird. Her trembling hands made it difficult to braid her hair. “And what will he need in return?” she said as she willed herself to be calm; he hadn’t suggested that. And really, what if he had? It would make it easier to do what she had to do, wouldn’t it?

  In the meantime, she could practically hear the whine of Mitsuo’s brain overheating like an overtaxed power crystal before it explodes. “Uh... I think... We’ll have to scare him.”

  Yaki tied off her braid with a green strip of cloth and took a deep breath. There would be no point in letting Mitsuo know how angry she was with him. No point in getting angry with someone you planned to backstab later on, good reason or not. I should be happy, she told herself. Good lovers don’t try to trade you to their cousins for favors. Yet the rage, hurt, and guilt about what she planned to do to Mitsuo all continued to happily coexist within her alien heart. Yaki turned and opened the screen just enough to glare at Mitsuo. “So, what we actually need to discuss is how my mother could make his life a living hell if he doesn’t cooperate.”

  A wince flashed across Mitsuo’s handsome features. “Yes. He’ll need both a carrot and a pretty big stick to scare him more than Ryouta’s mother does.”

  Yaki pulled the screen aside. “Then let’s figure that detail out.”

  Yoshiaki walked like a mouse through a cat’s territory, eyes constantly shifting through the crowd before him. One hand gripped the handle of his large satchel as if it might escape at any moment. At the intersection, he glanced back down the way he had come. Yaki had to admire the way Mitsuo chose that exact moment to slip from the alley in Yoshiaki’s blind spot. Casually, Mitsuo slid an arm into the crook of his cousin’s arm. Good thing, too, because as soon as the weaselly scribe realized he wasn’t alone, he popped into the air like a surprised cat. Only Mitsuo’s grip stopped him from slamming into a cart of pots. She could not hear the exchange between the two men but saw Mitsuo bring his lips to Yoshiaki’s ear. He stopped struggling and clutched his bag to his chest as a child hugs a teddy bear for comfort. Mitsuo continued to talk in his ear, and the words seemed to make Yoshiaki fold in on himself further. Finally, with the weakest of nods from Yoshiaki, the pair approached the building where Yaki perched in a rooftop cafe. Yaki flagged a down a willowy serving woman and ordered three teas before hiding her face behind a cheap folding fan she had picked up on the way there. The stench of Passing Night’s charm would attract more attention than it dispelled in a place like this. Only prayers to Grandmother Willow and Death Panther protected her from any priests seeking her. Hopefully, they had given up seeking her by now, but a chance encounter with a priest could renew the hunt.

  So, she watched the crowd for anyone who did not fit in among the traffic. Yoshiaki’s fine scribe robes had been partially out of place. Three blocks away was the tavern where the three cousins held court and she’d been ambushed by the priests. There was no sign of them this afternoon, and as far she could tell, Mitsuo had gone unharried by them outside his household. Perhaps his grandfather really had forced them to back off. A decision he’d come to regret.

  “This opportunity better be good, Mits.” Yaki’s ear snatched the grumble from the din of the crowd and caught Mitsuo and Yoshiaki weaving toward her through the clusters of teahouse patrons. She continued to watch the crowd, spotting several people who wore the earth-toned garments common more to the industrial district than among this bustling market. One woman, a head taller than most everyone else, seemed to be stalking through the crowd in a way that seemed familiar.

  “I would never waste your time dear cousin,” Mitsuo said as the chair across from her scraped against the wooden roof of the building.

  Yaki felt Yoshiaki’s squinting eyes on her and studiously ignored him. “Who that’s?” he whispered with more than a trace of fear. Yaki smiled to herself that he hadn’t recognized her immediately. She had traded her dueling dress for a simple blue-and-yellow kimono wrapped with a red sash tied with a bow on her back. The colors clashed but it fit in perfectly with the petite girls who manned many of the vendor stalls in the market.

  “Sit down. We don’t need a scene.” Mitsuo laid a hand on his cousin’s shoulder and used a bit of force to push him into the chair. Yoshiaki yielded with a glare and then shrugged the hand off.

  “Why couldn’t we just do this at our usual spot?” he asked.

  Yaki, figuring that was as good an entrance as any, snapped her fan closed. “Because your tavern produced a sour tang in my mouth last time, and I’d rather do this without having to spill any more blood, priest or not.”

  Yoshiaki’s eyes bugged; he glanced at his cousin, who grinned widely, and then scanned the teahouse in such an obvious way that Yaki nearly struck him with her fan. Only the fact he sat inches out of range saved him. Seemingly seeing no one watching him, he hunkered down in his seat and hugged his bag. “Nine bells in hell, Mits! Why is she here?! Didn’t the priests put you to question over her?!”

  Mitsuo waved a hand as if it had been no big deal. “Fortunately, I didn’t know anything at the time.” He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial tone. “But I know now and we are in deep shit, cousin.”

  “What does an unclean tribal slut have to do with us?!” His whisper went so high, his voice cracked.

  Yaki gave him a glower and cursed herself for not positioning herself closer to him. “When the tribal slut’s mother is Admiral Madria, maybe you should give her a little more respect. It’s very hard to make warships without the iron to armor them or the bolts to hold them together.”

  Yoshiaki looked for all the world like he had swallowed a turd.

  “Say you’re sorry, cuz”—Mitsuo elbowed him—“and she might not cut off your balls while you sleep.”

  “I’m, uh, s-s-sorry,” he stammered, then immediately turned to Mitsuo and hissed, “She’s an exile!”

  “Which is why she’s sitting here with us instead of lounging in the garden with Grandfather and Grandmother. Nobody can see their hand in this.” Mistuo smiled in that sly way that made his eyes sparkle as if he knew the world’s greatest secrets.

  “You talked to Grandfather about this? About her?”

  Mitsuo let one eyebrow float upward. “Well, you know how Grandfather is, always worried about what happens if a bidding war over the tribal ore breaks out. High Tree is raising their prices, and if the Low River mines b
ecome blockaded…”

  Yoshiaki glared at Yaki and she did her best innocent-wolf impression. “Well, if the Steward would stop farting around with my family’s pardon, we wouldn’t be in this situation. Mother misses having a fleet and she’s going to get herself one. Those that help will be remembered. Those that don’t… Well, they’ll pay much more later.” She grinned hungrily; he had a gold-and-silver necklace that she imagined being quite tasty.

  “Nishamura won’t be blackmailed. Grandfather would rather die.” Yoshiaki’s gaze shifted to Mitsuo. “And why do you care? We’re bottom of the bottoms.”

  “Because we going to invest in Madria’s fleet in the name of our house. And skim a bit off the top. More than enough to finish equipping the little business venture you’re setting up with your part of Ryouta’s hobby.”

  Greed flashed in his little eyes. Mitsuo bent forward and began to detail the plan, and soon, Yoshiaki was pulling away, sweat breaking out along his narrow brow. “Steal from the foundry? You’ll be caught!”

  Mitsuo grabbed one wrist and Yaki the other, preventing his escape. Time to show the stick. “Well, you better hope that I’m not caught, because thanks to Mitsuo, I know all about your forgery studio. And we both know how much the Steward likes having his personal seals faked.”

  “I haven’t faked his seal!” Yoshiaki squirmed in their grip.

  “Yet! Think what else is in the vault, cousin, beyond the metals,” Mitsuo whispered.

  The captured forger lapsed into silence for a moment. Then his head jerked up and he looked at Mitsuo. “You don’t mean…”

  Mitsuo returned the stare with a smile. “That’s where they store it. We’re already grabbing several tons; can’t be too hard to slip out an inkwell.” Yaki noticed Mitsuo had released his cousin’s wrist and followed suit. He saw her confused expression. “Yozi ink. My father had a bottle and Grandfather took it. It’s the only place the priests are not allowed to search.”