Rook(50)

And like a shadow where it shouldn’t be, Benoit also entered the woods, his eyes on Spear Hammond’s back.



It took the better part of two days to make the preparations for Spear’s trip. None of the rest of them could be seen outside the house, not a terribly difficult thing on Spear’s isolated farm, but they couldn’t just pop over to Forge for bread, either. So Sophia wrote lists and instructions, planning for their needs both now and in the Sunken City, and all the while Spear had not been exactly forward, but behaving as if things were … settled between them.

She’d thought she’d been right not to tell him, that the whole tangle of the future could wait until she brought Tom home, as René had suggested. Tom would be on her side, she knew that, no matter what Spear thought her brother had said. And if she didn’t come back, there would be nothing to tell Spear anyway, would there? Now she was thinking that this perfectly logical line of reasoning was really nothing more than an excuse. An excuse for being a bloody coward.

She watched Spear gallop his horse down Graysin Lane, carrying her list, money, and a letter to their forger, the back of her hand still warm from his kiss. It was a relief to have him go, which made her sad. And guilty. She’d never been glad to see Spear’s back before. But wisdom or cowardice either way, for however long Spear took in Kent, she would not have to look into his sincere eyes and think about how she would hurt him.

“So tell me about the water-lift shaft,” Sophia said.

It was nearly middlesun and she stood at the sink, washing the pan she’d been frying eggs in, all the dishes they hadn’t done the night before teetering in a pile to her left. She was feeling rather cheerful about doing dishes. It was uncomplicated work, with no expectations she could not fulfill, results seen instantly in a growing stack of clean plates. St. Just prowled about her feet, devouring scraps, and Orla was behind the toolshed, plucking a duck for their dinner, well away from the laundry blowing in the autumn wind. Benoit had not shown his face. Probably following Spear, if Sophia had to guess.

René sat at the kitchen table, writing out the invitations to their second engagement party, this time in the Sunken City, all one hundred and thirty-eight of them. The invitations were his curse for having the best handwriting in Parisian, and they had to be in the post by the next highsun. He leaned back, stretching ink-stained hands behind his head and into the air, left cheek just showing a faint bruise. Sophia’s scrubbing slowed. René was definitely a filcher of purses today, working his way up to daughters. She went back to her pan before she got caught staring.

“The water-lift shaft,” he replied, still stretching, “is twelve floors down and narrow. You will be able to get your back and feet on the walls, if you wish.”

“It will be dirty,” she said, considering.

“Very. But you will enjoy it, Mademoiselle, especially if the bucket on the other side is full.”

“What do you mean?”

“Because if one bucket is full, and you are certain to take the opposite rope, you will get such a ride to the bottom! Just do not stand on the bucket.”

Sophia smiled, amused. “And why ever not?”

“Because then you will get such a dunking at the end of your ride! And LeBlanc will track your wet footprints right across the Lower City.” He leapt up from his chair. “Here, give me that towel. If I do not do something else, I will explode.”

“You want to dry dishes?”

“I have done it before,” he said, expression serious. “It was Maman’s most particular punishment.”

“You must have done it every day, then.”

“Once again, you wound me. It was only five or six times a week.”

She laughed before she could help it and tossed him a towel, which he caught on his way to the sink. “Have you ever been down it?” she asked, going back to the water lift.

“What do you take me for, Mademoiselle? I have climbed both up and down, though not for some time. There has been no need of escaping my tutors.”

“And the rope?” she asked, handing him a dripping plate.

“It is replaced from time to time. But it should be tested, I think, before you go down.”

For a little while there was just the slosh of water and clink of stacking dishes, until René said, “Tell me what you are thinking of.”

Sophia had been watching the wisping steam rise off the water in the rinsing bucket, and realized she’d been smiling. She ran the dry part of her arm over her forehead, pushing back hair gone mad from the heat, and shook her head. “Nothing.”

“It is not nothing. Tell me. I am suffering.”

Nothing made René Hasard suffer more than information he could not have. It was a good thing he wasn’t aware of just how much she denied him. She let him fidget for another few moments before she said, “It’s just that I was nearly killed by an old rope once, that’s all.”

“And this makes you smile?”

“Yes.” She bit her lip, smiling even more. She knew she needed to be careful, that she was vulnerable, that keeping René at arm’s length and focused only on the business at hand was the best thing for her. But one glance at the grin in the corner of his mouth and she succumbed.

“Tom stole a rope once. He was going to bring it back, of course, but he wanted to measure exactly how far the Sunken City had sunk, to know how high the cliffs were for our map.”