Rook(45)

“Can Tom wait that long, Sophie?” said Spear. “And how long will Jen last?”

“They are sacrifices now,” René countered. “They must walk to the scaffold. And if you go before you are ready, perhaps you will not be able to stop them from walking to the scaffold. Or the Razor from coming down for their heads.”

“If you wait two weeks, you leave no room for mistakes, Sophie.”

“That wound must heal, Mademoiselle.”

Orla picked up her sewing, keeping her opinions in her head, while Sophia stared down at the printed words of the newspaper. Death for two out of three. What would LeBlanc do? Draw lots? Number them randomly? René leaned forward again, elbows on knees, almost coming out of his chair.

“Take your best chance and I swear that I will help you. Do you believe me?”

She met his eyes again. Whatever else he might be, she did believe that he would help her in this, especially where it concerned his mother. But René could not know that in the past ten heartbeats, her thinking had changed.

She got up and went to the hearth, running a finger along the steel girder, a part of some long forgotten, Ancient building incorporated into the new. But what she was seeing was cell number 1139. Not only had the Bonnards been there, blinking and starving and dazzled by her dim lamp, but a teacher who would not repeat the oath of Allemande, a smith who had taken five francs to repair an undermarket clock, along with four of his grown children, who had apparently done nothing at all, and a set of grandparents unlucky enough to have raised their children in a moderately nice flat near the top of an Upper City building. A flat someone else wanted.

Sophia felt her anger rise, a pressure cooker of rage that had been simmering inside her every day since the first time she entered the Tombs. Now it was turning her resolve into something diamond hard. She hadn’t been able to turn the lock on the people of cell 1139, and she would not leave two-thirds of the prisoners to their deaths this time, either. It might kill her. It probably would. The land would be gone, there would be no respite for her father whether he got better or no, and nothing left for Tom. The Bellamys would be undone, but she wasn’t sure that mattered anymore, not in the light of LeBlanc’s planned bloodbath. What was the point of emptying three small cells? She was going to walk into the Sunken City and empty every stinking hole in the Tombs. Let LeBlanc’s Goddess explain that to the mob.

“Spear,” she said slowly, “when was the last time you went to Mainstay?”

“Yesterday. For supplies. Why?”

“Then we’d better go into Kent. Is the woman who forges our paperwork still in Brighton?”

“As far as I know. But, Sophie …”

“Would you be able to go to the undermarket? I’ll have a list, and I can’t run into Mr. Halflife. We’re supposed to be in the Midlands.”

Spear’s shoulders sagged just a little. “Yes, I can go.”

She turned to René, and again met his gaze. She had a feeling his had never left her. There was a grin beginning to show on one side of his mouth. “Do I remember that you have a ship, Monsieur?”

“Yes. I do have a ship.”

“And do you have two ships?”

“Yes, I do.” The grin had stretched to both corners before he added, “Mademoiselle.”

“Sophie?”

She looked around to Spear. He was leaning back on the door frame, holding a mug gone cold, blue shirt tucked into darker blue pants, not one hair straying from its fellows. He would try to stop her if he knew what she was going to do. He probably should. The whole idea was ludicrous.

“You’re sure this is what you want?” he asked.

“No, I’m not sure it’s what I want. But it’s what I think I should do. And, yes, I am absolutely certain about that.” There would be two plans: the one everyone knew, and the one known only to her. Spear was still gazing down into his mug, wrinkles in the marble of his forehead.

“Are you with me, Spear?” she asked. When he didn’t answer immediately she said, “You don’t have to be. Hasn’t that always been our bargain? Your choice, either way, and no blame.”

Spear’s face showed her nothing. “I’ve always been with you, Sophie. You know that.”

She hid her breath of relief. For a moment she’d been afraid Spear wasn’t coming. And she was going to need him; she’d never been to the Sunken City without him.

“Then we should plan to be in the city in something like twelve days. Orla, would you mind popping up to my room and getting Tom’s maps, since you won’t let me on the stairs?” Sophia was already sitting carefully at the low table, moving her knife and mangled boot and swiping away the bits of leather heel, purpose making her movements swift. “Spear, why don’t you come and sit down. And you, Monsieur,” she said, “what can you tell me about smuggling?”



Sophia did not have to force herself to remain at Spear’s table until highsun; she was still there at dusk, and long after nethermoon, sometimes with Orla, sometimes Benoit, always with René and Spear. Spear’s table was littered with sketches and lists, mugs and plates, but there was an acknowledged plan now, simple yet elegant. And there was an unacknowledged plan, too. Perhaps just as elegant, Sophia thought, but not at all simple.