You will know the price, Eiswald whispers in my memory,of being wanted.
Considering the first thingItried to do was pry the ruby off my own face, I suppose I could have seen this coming.
There is precious little point in struggling against a Low God who has you by the jaw, but Yannec is just a man, and a greedy, desperate one at that. I thrash until his grip loosens, then sink my teeth into the web of skin between his thumb and forefinger. He howls and lets go completely.
I stumble back, wiping blood from my teeth. Ragne is chirping her alarm in my hood, but I ignore it. “Are youmad?” I sputter. “I don’t want to do this, Yannec!”
He points the knife at me, grip shaking. There’s a sheen of fine powder along the edge.
Suddenly I know why he’s so eager to try pulling a shell game with my money. For a horrible second, I fear the powder is witch-ash—but if it was, I’d already be turned to stone or the like.
“Give it to me,” Yannec half sobs, half snarls. “Why won’t you justgive it to me?”
No, he’s not looking for power, just the escape of poppy-dust. Eightygildenwill buy enough to keep him in dreams for the rest of winter. The ruby teardrop will buy even more.
Sweat’s breaking out on his upper lip, a symptom of withdrawal, along with paranoia and violence. I should have noticed the signs, and now I’m about to pay the price.
He stumbles around the desk, and I dart to try to keep it between us. “Stop! We can talk this through!”
“I’ll cut it out if I have to,” he whispers. Belatedly I realize I’ve made a terrible miscalculation: He’s standing between me and the door back to the kitchen. I can still reach the door to the alley, but by the time I can work the heavy bar free, he’ll be on me.
There’s a sudden weight around my neck, and claws dig briefly into my shoulder. A black cat springs off me and lands on the desk, tail bushed out and lashing to and fro.
“She told you to stop,” Ragne yowls in that horrid, screeching cat voice.
Yannec gapes at her, then sweeps his knife in an unsteady arc. “Get back, devil!”
“Stop helping, Ragne.” I try to catch her by the scruff, but she twists free, shooting me a bewildered and indignant look. “Your mother—”
“You’re in league with agrimling?” Yannec’s face is slick with sweat now.
“You are insulting me, stink man,” Ragne hisses. “I am nogrimling. Give the Vanja what you owe her.”
“I’ll not pay a red penny to a wicked creature”—Yannec slashes the knife Ragne’s way, but misses by a country mile—“nor itsthrall!”
He lunges for me. Ragne leaps off the desk in a swell of black fur, landing between us as a bristling wolf. Her teeth snap a warning in the air. Yannec flounders back, stumbles, topples to the floor—
—then goes horribly still with a choking gasp. The hilt of his own knife protrudes from his chest.
Ragne sits on her haunches. Then she cocks her head, one wolf ear flat against her skull, the other perked up. “Oh! I think he is dead now.”
Her dog voice is even worse than her cat voice.
I slide down the wall, and for a moment all I hear is the pounding of my own heartbeat. Then I see the hilt of the extra knife the guards gave me peeking over the top of my boot, and let out a laugh of disbelief. I’d completely forgotten it was there.
Not that it would have helped any more than the other knife hidden in my bootheel. Poppy-starved men will walk over broken glass for another taste. Men starved of anything, really. Especially gold.
Death appears over Yannec’s hunched body, paying no heed to the spreading pool of blood. Ragne’s teeth bare in a canine grin. “Hello! It is good to see you again so soon.”
“Likewise,” Death answers. I feel her eyes on me.
I slide my hands down my face. “Idon’tneed your help.”
By the time I look again, she’s gone. I brace myself against the desk, staring at the lump on the ground far, far too close to me.
Yannec is dead. Yannec, who I did not love and who did not love me, but he was my last link to Castle Falbirg. At least, the last one I still speak to.
Spoketo.
