Chapter Fifteen
Spiderbite
1
“CAN YOU ASSURE me,” said Ibelius, “that you will take better care for yourself than you did previously, or that your friend Jean has taken for himself, this past week?”
“Master Ibelius,” said Locke, “you are our physiker, not our mother. And as I have already told you a dozen times this afternoon, I am entirely prepared—body and mind—for this affair at Raven’s Reach. I am the soul of caution.”
“La, sir, if that is the case, I should hope never to meet the soul of recklessness.”
“Ibelius,” groaned Jean, “let him alone; you are henpecking him without having the decency to marry him first.”
Jean sat upon the sleeping pallet, haggard and rather scruffy; the darkness of the hairs thickening on his face only emphasized his own unnatural pallor. His injuries had been a close thing. A great wad of cloth was tied around his naked chest, and similar bandages wrapped his leg beneath his breeches and his upper right arm.
“These physikers are handy things,” said Locke, adjusting his (formerly Meraggio’s) coat cuffs, “but I think next time we should pay a bit extra for the silent version, Jean.”
“And then you may dress your own wounds, sir, and apply your own poultices—though I daresay it would be quicker and easier for the pair of you to simply dig your own graves and take your ease in them until your inevitable transition to a more quiet state of affairs!”
“Master Ibelius,” said Locke, grasping the old man by the arms, “Jean and I are more grateful than we can say for your aid; I suspect that we would both be dead without your intervention. I mean to repay you for the time you’ve endured with us here in this hovel; I expect to come into a few thousand crowns in very short order. Some of it is yours; you shall have a new life far from here with very full pockets. And the rest will be used to put Capa Raza under the earth; take heart. Look what Jean has already done to his sisters.”
“A feat I’m in no condition to perform again,” said Jean. “Take care of yourself, Locke; I won’t be able to come running to the rescue if something goes awry tonight.”
“Though I have no doubt you would try,” muttered Ibelius.
“Don’t worry, Jean. It’ll be nothing but a routine evening with the duke and his entire fucking court, assembled in a glass tower six hundred feet in the air. What could possibly go wrong?”
“That sarcasm sounds halfhearted,” said Jean. “You’re really looking forward to this, aren’t you?”
“Of course I am, Jean. Chains would be beside himself with glee if he were alive; I’m going to play Lukas Fehrwight in front of the gods-damned duke, not to mention all the other peers of our acquaintance. The de Marres, the Feluccias, old Javarriz…Glory to the Crooked Warden, it’s going to be fantastic fucking fun. Assuming I’m on top of my game. And then…money in our pockets. And then revenge.”
“When are you expected at the Salvara manor?”
“Third hour of the afternoon, which means I’ve no more time to dawdle. Jean, Ibelius…how do I look?”
“I would hardly recognize the man we laid on that sickbed not so many days ago,” said Ibelius. “I’ll confess, you’ve a surprising degree of professional skill; I’d never conceived of such a thing as this false-facing of yours.”
“That’s to our advantage, Master Ibelius,” said Jean. “Very few have. You look ready for the evening, Master Fehrwight. Now, you’re going to take the long way round to the Isla Durona, right?”
“Gods, yes. I’m only mad to a certain measure. I’ll go north through the graveyards and up through the Quiet; I expect I won’t see a soul once I’m out of Ashfall.”
As he spoke, he draped himself with the oilcloak Jean had brought back from his encounter with the Berangias sisters, despite the sweltering heat. It would conceal his fine garments from sight until he reached the Hill of Whispers. A man dressed in evening best might attract too much attention from some of the lurkers in the dark places of Ashfall.
“I’m for Raven’s Reach, then,” said Locke. “Until much later, Jean; rest up. Master Ibelius, favor Jean with your motherly attention; I hope to return with very good news.”
“I shall be grateful if you return at all,” said Ibelius.