The Winner's Crime(40)

Kestrel swung the pommel of her dagger at the back of his head.

*

The bookkeeper whistled. “You do surprise a girl.” She touched the emerald on Arin’s palm. “How do I know it’s real?”

“That’s your risk. My offer’s good for tonight only. Take it and give me what I want … or doubt me, and I’ll walk away.” He closed his hand around the earring. Arin could tell the bookkeeper was hungry for the sight of it again. She looked exactly how he felt.

“Earrings come in pairs,” she said. “Where’s the other one?”

“Gone.”

“Got any more surprises like these?”

“No.”

Her black eyes were bright in the rushlights. Even though the Broken Arm tavern had in fact grown louder since they’d started speaking, Arin had the sense of things quieting: a muffling of the world, a breath held as the bookkeeper made her decision. He desperately hoped she would say yes. He desperately wanted her to say no.

“Give it here,” she said.

Arin’s hand didn’t move. Then, slowly, he loosened his hold on the jewel. He let it slide, green and glowing. He held the memory with the bare tips of his fingers: his mother’s face in the nighttime, hung with twin green stars. She rested her palm on his forehead and said the blessing for dreams. She lifted her hand away, and Arin opened his, and dropped the earring into the bookkeeper’s waiting grasp.

*

Kestrel dragged the harbormaster’s unconscious body. Her arms burned, her bad knee screamed in protest, but Kestrel dug her heels into the rocks and pulled until the man was hidden behind the house where the shadows were darkest. Then, her breath sharp and thin in her throat, she stepped inside, locked the door, and went to the ledger open on the man’s desk.

She flipped back to entries from earlier that winter. She found the Senate leader’s ship—the Maris.

Point of origin: the southern isles. Goods: none.

Kestrel let go of the page. It sighed down.

She’d been wrong to suspect that the Senate leader had traveled to Herran instead of the isles. Here was the proof of it.

What else might she have gotten wrong? Her pulse sped with fear of herself, fear of her choices, her certainty. Kestrel’s heartbeats flew, one right against the other, like flipped pages of a book.

Were all her lies to Arin worth it, if she couldn’t see the truth? Kestrel had thought she’d known what was best for Arin. Perhaps her greatest lies were the ones she’d told to herself.

But then …

Kestrel paged again through the ledger.

What if the Senate leader had lied to the harbormaster? What if the harbormaster had lied to his book?

She found the latest entries. The Maris was docked in the harbor now. The ledger listed the number of its pier.

Kestrel left the book open on the desk exactly as it had been. She riffled through desk drawers until she found a purse filled with silver. She pocketed it, pulled out the drawer, and dumped it and its contents on the floor.

Did you hear that the harbormaster was attacked? she imagined city guards saying. A case of petty thievery.

Kestrel left the house and headed for the piers.

*

“You understand,” the bookkeeper said as she tucked the emerald away, “that you can’t make any bets after you look in my book. Not with me, not ever.” She sat more seriously now, all business, the four legs of the chair firmly on the floor. She pulled a slim book from her inner jacket pocket. “Got something in particular you’d like to see?”

“Show me the entries about the wedding.”

The bookkeeper raised one brow, which made Arin wonder if she knew who he was. She found the list and held the book out to Arin, her thumb wedged in its open seam.

These bets concerned the wedding night. They went into great detail. The wagers showed a breadth of curiosity and imagination that made Arin wish he’d never looked.

“Not that,” he said. “That’s not what I meant. I want to see bets about the dress.”

Both of the bookkeeper’s brows were arched now, this time in disdainful boredom. She turned a few pages and offered the book again.

Arin saw the Senate leader’s bet. It was in the middle of several entries that concerned the dress. Others had guessed the same color the Senate leader had wagered on—red—but no one else had bet on the number of buttons, the neckline, the length of the train, the style of the scabbard …

Arin examined the pages again. He’d been mistaken about something. He’d gone through the dress wagers too quickly before, racing to find the Senate leader’s name and to escape the memory of the first set of bets he’d seen. He saw now that the Senate leader wasn’t the only one to have gone into careful detail about the wedding dress. Another person had bet in the exact same way, and more recently.

Arin tapped the name. “Who’s that?”

The bookkeeper peered. “A palace engineer. She works on water. Aqueducts. Canals. That sort of thing.”

Arin closed the book and handed it back.

“That’s it?” she said.

“Yes.” He added, “If you want a tip, that bet’s the correct one.”

The bookkeeper drew up her boot so that it was planted on the seat of her chair as she sat, one leg dangling down, the other bent into the perfect position for her to prop an elbow on the knee, drop her chin onto her fist, and look up at Arin. “I think you’ve overpaid me. How about I give you something extra before you go?”