Nightsworn | The Whispering Wall #2

Thirty Seven: Disobedience

Arlen didn't normally have to conceal his dislike for someone. Fear had once been motivation enough for a Devil to do as he suggested, and it didn't matter how dark-damned rude he was. He supposed it was a sign of his change in fortunes that he was forced to sit across the table from a grubby urchin girl half his age and pretend he didn't hate her guts.

Ashe was smiling like she knew it, sipping at the brandy he'd had to buy to even get her to agree to the meeting. It wasn't begging yet, not quite, but so close to it that he felt ill.

"Look," he said, forcing his tone to be even, "it's not a big job. It'll take an hour or two of your night. All you've got to do is sit in a bar and talk to the girl, and then bring me back whatever she says. The pay's not even conditional on her saying anything useful."

"But it is conditional on not repeating anything to Gelert," Ashe said, dark eyes glittering. "That's punishable, Arlen."

"I added a bonus to account for that," Arlen replied sourly. "I'm not adding more. If you won't do it for what I'm offering, I'll have to find someone else." He scowled. "And charge you for the brandy."

"It wasn't a gift?" Ashe simpered, clutching the bottle to her chest and then cackling. "And how do you suppose you'd get it? Throw your leg at me?"

A huge hand fell on her shoulder from behind. Arlen smirked as Ashe instantly sobered under Usk's glare. "It's an injury, brat, not a free pass to mock a man who first killed before your mother even bent over. A reminder that he's still second rank. Not Gelert. Certainly not you." He leaned in. "I'd like to see you execute the highest-profile murder in over a century without finishing up jerking on the end of a noose."

Arlen watched Ashe's face over his ale. She caught his look and glared, but found no answer. She sat back in her chair, sulking, as Usk pulled one from another table and sat himself beside Arlen.

"Any luck?" Arlen said.

"Bare as the bloody Barrens in that place," Usk muttered. "I'll have to go back, the occupant returned while I was in the middle of it."

Arlen caught Ashe's unabashedly curious gaze.

"House-robbing now?" she said, but her voice had lost some of its bite. The dynamic had changed considerably with Usk at the table. Arlen rankled at the fact that his presence alone was not enough anymore, rankled that he had even come to rely on Usk as a defence. As soon as he had this new, more efficient leg, things were going to change.

"You make that sound like it's unusual," Arlen said.

Ashe gave a simpering little shrug, some of her confidence returning as she splashed more brandy into her glass. Arlen glanced around the taproom as she did so, because he'd seen how Ashe got when she was properly soaked, and he didn't want her shouting their business to the whole tavern. It was a seedy dive on a backstreet in Bisa, and scantily dressed men and women weaved between the tables offering every service imaginable, and some he would have been hard-pressed to think of on his own. It wasn't a place where everyone's business was honourable, but there was that and then there was asking for trouble. A place that catered to those sorts often catered to the sorts who'd sell your name to the guard for a stone Flint and a pat on the head.

"I just thought you were angling for bigger fish these days, Arlen," she said. Her eyes glittered over her shot glass before she threw down another drink. Arlen stilled Usk with a touch on his arm.

"I am," he said. "Everyone likes a bit of bar money on the side. Look, are you going to do this dark-damned job or not?"

She deliberated, sucking in her lower lip and then pushing it out in a thoughtful pout. She wore men's clothes with style, and her long dark hair was always artfully messy. She had an elfin face with large, guileless eyes – when she wasn't spearing you with them, that was. She might have been beautiful if she hadn't been such a spiteful little demon at the same time. He supposed some men might get into the danger of constantly finding explosives in your pockets or under the bed, but it wasn't something he'd be looking for. He'd already lost one limb.