Nobody spoke.
Drugh opened his mouth. “You . . .”
“Go home and console your wife,” Reynald said. “And I will forget you were ever here.”
Drugh stood up, nodded, and marched out of the room. His backup fell in behind him without a word. The door swung shut.
Wow. I knew Reynald had a reputation. I just hadn’t realized the full meaning of it.
I leaned forward and peered at Reynald’s face. His expression was calm and relaxed. He looked like himself.
“I’m so impressed,” I said. “How?”
“The Dargans did some business with the King’s Army,” Reynald said.
“We’ve met before.”
“Wow.”
Reynald refilled our cups. “This is tea is expensive. Might as well finish it.”
I drank my tea and exhaled. At least my fingers hadn’t shaken this time. Maybe I was getting better at handling the life-and-death pressure.
“This was your plan?” Reynald asked.
“Drugh was raised to be a Conqueror Knight. They’re all about loyalty to their own. He respects that. Killing me would bring too much scrutiny, and he isn’t the kind of man who would murder a woman he just met in cold blood. It would be different if I came at him with a sword, but I was armed with a teacup.”
I took another sip.
“Also, Drugh knows Filderon would sell his own mother for a noma. They’ve been estranged, so he isn’t sure what his mentor has been up to, but he’s sure it wasn’t good. I told Drugh a lot of personal things I wasn’t supposed to know. He must wonder what other secrets I keep. Dargan Company and Hedena’s weaver shop are thriving. Like you said, Drugh knows what a dead mercenary is worth.”
“Two boots and a sword,” Reynald said, his face thoughtful.
“And Filderon’s boots were shit.”
I drank my tea and looked outside the window. We’d handled Drugh.
If only the Butcher would be as easy to deal with.
CHAPTER21
PLANTER19
There was a fish on my desk. It was a foot long with a blunt snout, small eyes, jet-black body, an asymmetric tail, and bony plates on its head. It looked prehistoric. I had known something wasn’t right when I came up the stairs after breakfast and saw a trail of wet spots leading across the hallway to my rooms.
I picked up my reed pen and poked the fish with it, trying to get a look at the gills. Yep, pink.
The trail of wet spots stopped on my desk, right on the stack of cheap paper. I had started hiding the paper after the second fish, but we had had a late dinner last night because of the whole Drugh thing, and I’d forgotten to put it up. The stack was soaked through.
I picked it up, wrapping it around the fish, and took it downstairs, to the kitchen.
“Blackfin,” Shana declared.
“Is it delicious?”
“Yes. Where do you keep getting them?” Shana asked.
“I don’t know. I thought they were pranks at first. But now I think they’re gifts.”
