Steelhands - Jaida Jones [152]
“Gaeth heard voices, too,” I said. On instinct or habit, I touched his letter through the fabric of my vest pocket, which was where I always kept it—in case someone should be snooping through my things and find it by accident. It seemed necessary somehow for me to protect him this way from those who would believe he was a madman and a simpleton, when I knew he was neither.
“And who is Gaeth?” Luvander asked. “Your other fiancée?”
“The student who went missing,” I replied. “He left behind a letter—it described the same phenomenon.”
“I wonder if this is the way the magicians felt, during the fever,” Balfour mused, looking distant again. Memories of the war could have been nothing but painful for him, I assumed, and here there was no hiding from them.
“Yes, but where in bastion’s name is Adamo?” Luvander asked. He checked the clock for the hundredth time, fiddling with the knot in his scarf. All at once, the clock began to chime—a horrible, squawking noise that sounded like a bird being murdered. Even Laure jumped a little. I could feel my heart move in my throat, and Balfour’s hands gripped the lip of the table so tightly that, when his fingers came away, they’d left little indents in the wood.
“Why do you own such a horrible timepiece?” Balfour asked. “I’ve kept quiet about it for this long, but it’s worse than hearing voices!”
“Ghislain sent it to me,” Luvander replied, somewhat sulkily. “It was a gift. I’m certain he murdered pirates for it. You really don’t like it?”
Balfour opened his mouth to reply when I heard the faintest of bells ringing somewhere behind me, within the shop.
“Someone’s at the door,” I said, for that was the only assumption I could draw from the sound.
“The shop is closed,” Luvander replied. “I understand that my wares are in high demand, but for once I agree with Adamo—there are more important things than hats. Don’t tell anyone I said that.”
“Mightn’t it be Adamo at the door?” Laure asked. “Who knows how long he’s been ringing, with us yapping like this.”
“I told him to come around back,” Luvander said. “But he’s getting old, isn’t he? Perhaps his memory’s failing him. I’ll go see to it.”
He stood, the chair scraping beneath him, and headed to the door. It swung open without a creak, swinging back and forth on well-oiled hinges. Luvander’s disappearance left only Balfour, Laure, and me together—the most awkward of trios. None of us wished to be the first to speak, and so we sat in uncomfortable silence. I could tell that Balfour and Laure wished to question each other in more detail about their similar symptoms, but neither of them felt comfortable doing so in front of me. And so I was the third wheel, I realized. But I could never have left Laure alone with Balfour, impeccable manners or no.
“Well,” Balfour said at last. “Do you remember what it sounded like?”
“Metal,” Laure replied. “All whirs and grinding gears. Kind of what I’d imagine those hands’d sound like, if they were three times as big.”
“Incoming,” Luvander said from behind the door, and barged in a moment later.
Behind him—in a moment of utter, bizarre coincidence—was the older man I’d seen with Hal on more than one occasion—the one who I could only assume was his lover. He was alone, without Hal, and I knew immediately from the expression on his face that something was amiss.
“I’ve come on Owen’s behalf,” he said, “since the man in question has just been arrested.”
ELEVEN
BALFOUR
Once, in the middle of the war, I’d seen Cassiopeia set light to a store of powder. Everything had happened as if in slow motion—the yellow flames arcing through the night, one moment of perfect silence suspended in the air before Ivory’s target caught flame. It’d sent explosions ripping fiercely through the battlefield, nearly knocking me off Anastasia, since I’d been closer to the ground doing my usual reconnaissance.
The effect Margrave Royston’s announcement had on the room was quite similar to that experience. Everything went still and cold. Then, abruptly, the