Scavenge the Stars (Scavenge the Stars #1)(51)

If Boon were here, she had no doubt he could have gotten an answer by now. After all, what it did cost men like these to lie to a frilled-up countess? If she had been conducting these interviews as Silverfish, she could have just cut straight to the matter using the tactics she’d learned from observing Zharo for seven years.

Amaya shook her head. Zharo was dead. So was Silverfish.

Instead, she would use what she had learned from Boon in the months before coming to Moray.

“Manipulation is about more than just lies and tricks,” Boon had once said as they strolled down a narrow cobblestone street in Viariche one evening. He had often kept to the ship, but sometimes meandered the outermost quarters of the city during dusk and dawn and the dark cover of night. “It’s about really gettin’ into the act, to the point where you almost believe the things you’re saying.”

Boon had pointed out a woman down the street. The woman had been standing before the window display of a haberdashery, despite the hat of rich felt and ribbon atop her curls.

“Go get me that hat,” Boon had ordered.

“Huh? Why?”

Boon had clicked his tongue a few times. “’Cause then I’ll have something nice to wear while I dine with the queen,” he’d growled. “Just go talk that lady outta her hat.”

“But I don’t know how to do that!”

He’d sighed and straightened his new jacket, thankfully not yet torn or stained, the buttons gleaming silver in the gloaming. “Fine, then. Watch me.”

So she had tucked herself into a stone niche and observed as Boon made his casual way over to the woman. He stood a distance from her at first, hands in his pockets, shoulders relaxed, as his gaze roamed the wares on display.

“That one would look great on you,” he said eventually, indicating the hat the woman pined over. The woman had a hand curled wistfully at her throat, but at Boon’s voice—less harsh than it normally was; Amaya supposed that was acting—she started and dropped it to her side.

“Oh,” the woman had said in a throaty accent, “do you—you think?”

“Absolutely. I got an eye for this stuff.” Boon had flashed her a wide smile that nearly bowled Amaya over with the level of charm behind it. Where had this man come from? Where was the disgusting, eccentric Landless rogue she had come to know?

The woman flushed and ducked her head. She touched her hat uncertainly.

“I bet you deserve to do somethin’ nice for yourself,” Boon had said, practically a croon as he edged a little closer to the woman. Amaya had tensed, as if watching a shark approach a seal. “Buy yourself a little present.”

“I don’t know…” the woman had murmured.

“C’mon, there’s no harm in it. In fact, I’ll help—why don’tcha give me the hat you have on now? Then you’ll have an excuse to get that one.” He’d winked. Boon had actually winked.

The woman had blushed harder with a giggle. Amaya had rolled her eyes; how did people give in to their baser urges so quickly? Still, it was effective, since the woman slowly removed her felt hat with its shiny ribbon and shyly presented it to Boon.

“There, y’see?” he said with another damn wink. “Now go treat yourself.”

He had come back to where Amaya had been watching and plopped the hat on his head once the woman was in the shop. “Easy,” he’d said, offering her his arm. “Now let’s find you a young chump to dupe. It’ll be good practice for the Mercado lad.”

But Cayo Mercado was not the person she was dealing with today. Liesl brought in the next debt collector, who eyed Deadshot as he passed her. Deadshot’s hand strayed toward one of her pistols, but a warning quirk of Amaya’s eyebrow made her drop it.

He was taller than Vedasto, and thinner, though he had formed a small gut that came from frequent drinking. His brown eyes were bloodshot, but he was mostly clean shaven, his brown hair swept away from his face in a queue.

Amaya forced herself to put on the bland smile of the countess as Liesl directed him to sit on the chaise opposite from Amaya’s chair. Like Boon, she had a part to play. She had to believe it if she wanted the man before her to believe it as well.

“Good day, Mr. Melchor,” Countess Yamaa said.

“Suppose it is,” he said with a barely concealed leer at Liesl, who had gone to stand attentively at the drink cart. Unlike her lover, Liesl was good at schooling her emotions so her disgust didn’t show. “Especially if I get money out of it.”

“Then we both want the same thing. For if you meet my requirements for this job, it’s yours. You just need to answer a few questions first.”

“Sure.” He leaned back with his arms and legs spread wide, as if determined to take up as much room as humanly possible. “Got the time.”

Amaya swallowed her grimace. “I’m so glad.”

The interview went on as it had for the others. Christano Melchor had worked as a debt collector for twenty years; he had been recommended by a friend who had worked for Mercado; he had semiretired a mere six months ago and was now only looking to take on commissions.

Remembering the name that had been written next to his on Zharo’s list, Amaya fought not to follow Deadshot’s example and reach for the knife hidden behind her. Fera. She must have been Melchor’s last job before his retirement from the debt collectors. She tried to imagine his wide, scarred hands on Fera’s small shoulders and felt a shiver of revulsion and fury go through her.