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along as witnesses and supporters, trying to engage their eyes and take their
measure: Marya Maryasdottir, the stout master of the weaver's guild, gave her
a cold stone-faced look; the syndic for the gem merchants collective had a
nervous tic jumping frantically in his cheek and refused to meet her eyes; the
big longshoreman's representative gave her a polite, shame-faced shrug.
Cedarbird' face remained darkly serious. "We want to see her."
"No," Taun interrupted. "She's badly hurt. I don't want her disturbed."
Cedarbird snorted. "I say you're lying. You're concealing the fact that she's
dead. If she's dead without heirs, then her property belongs to the city. We
will not allow you to put this off."
"Tagalong always said you were a greedy son of a bitch..." Becca growled.
"She was right."
Cedarbird shrugged off the insult: He was not getting into a shouting match
with a common whore who had been raised above her station. "So do we see Aejys
or do we take the properties?"
"You see Aejys. If she wants to be seen," Becca snarled, "But you leave when
Taun tells you or I put this in your ugly face." She raised her clenched fist
to the level of the syndic's eyes. She had always wanted to take a serious
poke at the haughty merchant.
Cedarbird winced, wondering how Aejys could ever have hired the former
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prostitute, much less raised her to such a high level as seneschal and tavern
master when she clearly had neither manners nor sense in dealing with her
superiors. He had complained before about Becca, but Aejys always brushed him
off with a smile and shrug. If Aejys was dead, then Cedarbird intended to
smash the infuriating whore back down into the gutter where she belonged
hard along with the rest of the riff-raff Aejys had collected. There would
be nothing left when that detestable Tagalong Smith returned in the spring.
"She'll see us or we will be back with the city guard to impound the
properties."
"Wait here."
Taun threw her a glance, pleading not to be left alone with them, but Becca
shook her head. Cedarbird frightened him. He sent a silent plea through his
mind-link with Skree, calling the triton to his aid. The nerien was better at
sending, than receiving, except when he was touching the person, so he did not
know if Skree heard him or not.
* * * *
Aejys and Molly were alone in the bedroom when Becca stalked in, eyes
blazing. "We got trouble," she said.
Aejys levered herself up on her elbows and Molly put aside her embroidery to
shove pillows behind her. Aejys suppressed a groan at the pain in her back and
stomach. Her back had been cut to ribbons of dangling flesh by the lash and
stomach torn open by a blade. The slain lifemages had mended enough of the
stomach wounds to save her life, but healing came slow. Even the smallest
movement or pressure against her back hurt. "What is it?"
"Cedarbird. Says you're dead and wants the properties."
"Wondered when he would show his colors. Any idea where he got this notion?"
"It wasn't our people."
"Send him in." Aejys hated letting any outsiders see how badly off she was,
but there seemed no other choice.
* * * *
Becca found Skree sitting beside Taun. There must have been an exchange of
harsh words as Cedarbird's tame guildmasters and syndics looked uncomfortable.
She gave Taun a quick glance of approval, and then signed the others to
follow. She led the way into Aejys' bedroom with Taun and Skree close beside
her and Cedarbird at her heels, the others in tow.
Molly looked up from her embroidery, throwing a defiant glare in response to
the disapproving gaze of the outsiders at seeing yet another female in pants.
Becca dismissed Molly with a wave. Then she saw Josh sitting in the chair by
the bed. He had not been there when she came in a few minutes ago. She was
uncertain whether his presence was a good thing or a bad thing, but Taun
seemed cheered to see him.
Aejys reclined against the pillows piled behind her. Josh sat beside her,
striking a lucifer to light the pipe she gripped between her teeth. She
shifted the pipe to the side of her mouth to talk around it. "So, Cedarbird,"
she smiled unpleasantly, her expression made still more distasteful by the
swelling, cuts and bruises; her storm grey eyes hard. "What trouble are you
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making for me and mine today? I would rise to greet you, but as you can see I
had a difficult time in Rowanslea."
"Aejys!" He stared in complete, incredulous startlement. "I I... How did
you get here? Bri I was told you were dead."
"My mage," Aejys replied, her face expressionless, her tone tight with an
undercurrent of threat. "I would say the rumor of my death is a trifle
premature or are all your sources as inaccurate as Briarmottë?"
Cedarbird started at the name.
"Tag and I figured him out the first week."
Cedarbird had always been a small thorn in her side, ever since he began to
suspect that she was indeed Aejystrys Rowan, the Lion of Rowanslea, and not
just a down on her luck soldier who had managed to capture a great wyrm's
treasure: He had tried to entice her into Vorgeni politics as his ally as well
as various others ways to put her in his debt, but Aejys had always refused to
be drawn into his plots, plans, and schemes, political or otherwise. Tagalong
had never trusted him, predicting that he would become serious trouble when he
saw she could not be bought. Tagalong had just been proven right.
Cedarbird seemed to squirm for a moment, and then pulled himself together.
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