A Hazardous Engagement Read online

  A HAZARDOUS ENGAGEMENT

  Gaie Sebold

  NewCon Press

  England

  NewCon Press Novellas

  Set 1: Science Fiction (Cover art by Chris Moore)

  The Iron Tactician – Alastair Reynolds

  At the Speed of Light – Simon Morden

  The Enclave – Anne Charnock

  The Memoirist – Neil Williamson

  Set 2: Dark Thrillers (Cover art by Vincent Sammy)

  Sherlock Holmes: Case of the Bedevilled Poet – Simon Clark

  Cottingley – Alison Littlewood

  The Body in the Woods – Sarah Lotz

  The Wind – Jay Caselberg

  Set 3: The Martian Quartet (Cover art by Jim Burns)

  The Martian Job – Jaine Fenn

  Sherlock Holmes: The Martian Simulacra – Eric Brown

  Phosphorous: A Winterstrike Story – Liz Williams

  The Greatest Story Ever Told – Una McCormack

  Set 4: Strange Tales (Cover art by Ben Baldwin)

  Ghost Frequencies – Gary Gibson

  The Lake Boy – Adam Roberts

  Matryoshka – Ricardo Pinto

  The Land of Somewhere Safe – Hal Duncan

  Set 5: The Alien Among Us (Cover art by Peter Hollinghurst)

  Nomads – Dave Hutchinson

  Morpho – Philip Palmer

  The Man Who Would be Kling – Adam Roberts

  Macsen Against the Jugger – Simon Morden

  Set 6: Blood and Blade (Cover art by Duncan Kay)

  The Bone Shaker – Edward Cox

  A Hazardous Engagement – Gaie Sebold

  Serpent Rose – Kari Sperring

  Chivalry – Gavin Smith

  First published in the UK by NewCon Press

  41 Wheatsheaf Road, Alconbury Weston, Cambs, PE28 4LF

  July 2019

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  A Hazardous Engagement copyright © 2019 by Gaie Sebold

  Cover art and internal illustration copyright © 2019 by Duncan Kay

  All rights reserved, including the right to produce this book, or portions thereof, in any form.

  ISBN:

  978-1-912950-23-2 (hardback)

  978-1-912950-24-9 (softback)

  Cover art and internal illustration by Duncan Kay

  Cover layout by Ian Whates

  Minor Editorial meddling by Ian Whates

  Book layout by Storm Constantine

  One

  Madis Defranthea was poking around the market in Greater Quat as she waited for the passenger boat to Brute Rock. A last minute expedition, partly to calm her nerves before embarkation, partly on a hunch.

  The stall that caught her eye held what could only be described as religious bric-a-brac. Books and beads. Little god-statues, incense to light for them and burners to burn it in. In a tiny scarlet dish in front of a lidded glass jar of such deep green it was almost black, a lit cone sent up a thread of sweet smoke. Something tugged at her. She settled her current persona more firmly around her and moved close.

  The stallholder was a large, dark person, with the kind of stillness that is accustomed to waiting. Her abundant black hair was done in elaborate coils, threaded here and there with scarlet and gold. Her clothes were loose and white with orange and gold embroidery thick on the neck and cuffs. She wore a stone the size of a baby’s fist and the colour of fresh meat on a thick gold chain at her neck, and another, smaller but still of that same disconcerting shade, set in a thin silver ring on her left middle finger. She nodded at Madis, once, as though any more would have been excessive, perhaps rude.

  Madis was impressed despite herself. Such a sense of quiet dignity, suggesting power held in check, was hard to get right. She peered and poked at the things on the stall.

  “Please be careful of the jar,” the stallholder said.

  Madis snatched her hand back. “Oh! Is it... is that your god?” A little pompous, a little silly. Probably no one was watching. Everyone else was almost certainly waiting for the boat. But it was far safer not to let the mask slip.

  “Not mine, no,” the stallholder said.

  Her voice was deep, but quiet, forcing Madis to lean in to hear her. Oh, that was good, she’d try that voice herself if she could pull it off. She wondered what was really in that jar – she could see something shifting in there. “Then what god is it?” she said.

  “A river god. Just a little one, but a god, all the same.”

  Madis let a little of her cynicism show. “However did someone catch a god in a jar?” she said.

  “I don’t know. I didn’t catch it.” Good answer.

  “Why would someone want the god of a river?”

  “Fishing.” The stallholder paused a moment. “Or drowning.”

  Madis bit her lip. Something was definitely pulling at her sleeve.

  “I have to travel, soon, by boat... Would...”

  “Fifty.”

  “Fifty?” The squeak in Madis’ voice was not entirely faked.

  “Fifty.” The studied indifference of a practiced bargainer. “And if it is restless, top up the jar. But only fresh water, always fresh water.”

  Eventually Madis walked away, forty Nobles poorer and one jar of something or other richer, hoping that her intuition wasn’t playing her false.

  Normally, she was more confident that a last minute impulse like this would be worth it, would give her an edge, some small but essential extra, or just the necessary sense of luck. This time, the doubts had started almost as soon as she had let the coins out of her hand.

  And she would have to tell the others – Alina, at least. After all, if it really was a god, however minor, it added an unpredictable element to an already complicated situation.

  If it wasn’t a god, Madis had let herself be fooled, and that really wasn’t how things were supposed to go.

  The passenger boat was pulling into the dock; the Baridine arms (red and purple lilies on a dark blue ground) adorned the sail and the livery of the servants. Madis’ ‘maid’, Alina, was waiting for her, luggage piled about her feet. In contrast to Madis’ lean height and dark skin, she was short, curvy, and pale as the moon, with thick black curls currently jammed out of sight under a modest servant’s bonnet.

  Madis hurried to the dock, more than usually aware of her ridiculous boots and obviously, verging on ostentatiously, expensive robes.

  She was taller, darker, and at least twenty years younger than the woman she was currently impersonating, but the current fashions made everyone look larger and taller than they were, though her boots were a careful inch shorter than was absolutely the thing, and her paint a good deal thicker.

  She dug in the velvet pouch that hung from her waist and pulled out the heavily gilded invitation stamped with the Baridine seal.

  The waiting passengers squawked and fussed like a pen of fancy poultry as the boat was tethered, a gangplank laid down, and the Castle’s Constable took his place at its head. His livery was very fine, until one got close enough to see the fading, patching, and loose threads wavering in the onshore breeze.

  “My lords, ladies,” he called. “If you would kindly present me with your invitations, then you and your servants may proceed aboard.”

  “Girl, where is my hat-box? Did you remember my evening scarf?” Madis fussed and chattered while Alina made soothing noises and a series of nobles, grumbling at the massive inconvenience of one of their servants having to produce a piece of paper, made their way on board.

  “I can’t imagine why they want us to show our invitations,” a ruddy-faced woman in ill-chosen yellow velvet fussed.

  “Baridine seems very determined to keep his wedding exclusive,” said her companion, brushing off the sl
eeve of his purple coat. “Considering who he’s marrying, you’d think he’d want as many guests as possible, to make it all look more the thing, but this is a very small wedding. Almost as though he’s embarrassed.”

  “Well who wouldn’t be?” Yellow Velvet woman snickered. “She’s practically a barbarian.”

  Madis and Alina were the last aboard. Madis thrust the invitation at the Constable. “Here, I kept it myself, my girl there is so forgetful.” Before he could do more than glance at the document, she said, “Do tell me, is the boat quite safe? It seems such a long way!”

  “It will take us no more than an hour to reach the Rock, madam,” the Constable said, trying to return the invitation to her. “We’ll be there in time for luncheon. Now if you would take a seat...”

  “What if there should be a storm? I’m sure I heard someone saying there might be a storm...”

  The Constable glanced around at the clear, sunny sky and flat calm. “I assure you, Madam, we will be quite safe in the Castle long before any such thing could reach us. Now, if you would...”

  “Oh, girl, my shoes! Do be careful!”

  Alina, laden, struggled after her. The Captain ordered the gangplank lifted, the hawser was cast off, the rowers strained at the oars, and the boat headed out across the glimmering water to Brute Rock where Castle Baridine glowered over the bay.

  The boat was crowded to the verge of discomfort. The usual jostling for position was, of necessity, kept to a minimum, even the servants saving their rivalries for disembarkation.

  “You know the story of Brute Rock?” The speaker was a man of middle years, decked in plum-coloured velvet, and a large and excessively feathered hat. “It’s quite fascinating.”

  “Oh, little gods, it’s Lord Mendir,” Madis muttered. “He trapped me at a ball last year for a whole turn of the clock, talking about the new carriage he’d just ordered. I nearly stabbed him out of sheer boredom.”

  “Any chance he’ll recognise you?” Alina said.

  “Under this makeup? Besides, his eyes never got as far as my face.” She caught Alina’s expression and laughed. “It was the Fantine ball, remember?”

  “Oh, that ball. Ah, that was fun. And surprisingly profitable.” Alina sighed. “I don’t get the feeling this will be nearly as much of a laugh.”

  “The siege of Baridine!” A woman in dove-grey silks leapt in to Lord Mendir’s monologue. “My husband’s father, Lord Lavian, was actually there! Can you imagine how thrilling?”

  Her attempt to capture the audience failed as Lord Mendir simply rolled on “Oh, this was long before the Glass Wars,” he said. “That,” he made a grandiose gesture towards the Rock, “is the Brute of Quat Bay. A leviathan of great and terrible power, who challenged the Sky God, I can’t quite remember why, some rivalry over a female perhaps – you ladies, always causing trouble, eh?”

  Madis noticed that the jar in her hand was trembling. She lifted it up, and peered at it. Inside there was an agitated swirling, and for a moment she caught a glimpse of something that looked a great deal like a small, annoyed, piscine face, with fringed lips and glaring, ruby coloured eyes. So she really had bought something other than coloured smoke. “Are you bored too?” she muttered. “Calm down. I’ll get you some fresh water when we land.”

  Lord Mendir went on, “....in any case, he rose up out of the waters to challenge the Sky God... Huge waves, storms, lightning, all that sort of thing, and... Oh, yes, very dramatic, you know... and as the Brute rose up in his pride he was struck with lightning and turned instantly to stone! And there he is! Brute Rock. So perish all who challenge their betters,” he added, to a murmur of approval, or perhaps relief.

  At that moment a sharp breeze whisked across the bay, fluttering lace and scarves and whipping Lord Mendir’s hat from his head. It flew as though its many feathers had rediscovered flight, before landing on the water, where it bobbed jauntily. “My hat!” he wailed, as the rest of the nobles laughed behind their hands. “Send someone after it!”

  “We’ve no dinghy, my Lord,” the Constable said.

  “Well isn’t there someone who can swim?”

  “Your Lordship isn’t that familiar with Quat Bay, I take it?”

  “What has that to do with anything?” Lord Mendir snapped, staring at his still floating hat.

  Just then, something rose from the water. It was large and finned and a bilious shade of greenish grey, except for its teeth, which were black, sharp, and numerous.

  The hat disappeared into its maw with a clop.

  One slimy dark eye rolled towards the ship, as though marking it for later, and the creature submerged.

  Lord Mendir backed away from the rail, swallowing. “Oh, well, it was not my best hat, after all,” he said.

  Madis glanced at Alina, who tilted her head, with a faint but reassuring smile.

  Castle Baridine rose from the craggy slopes of the Rock as a stark, uncompromising set of walls, broken only by archer’s slots and heavily barred windows. Here and there the blunt roofline was adorned with a frivolous, half-completed spire, or a scatter of fancy plasterwork. The effect put Madis in mind of someone trying to prettify an axe with silk ribbons.

  The water gate was heavily barred and watched by guards whose armour and weaponry, Madis noted, were not in much better condition than their livery – although still perfectly adequate for putting a large, unpleasant obstacle in one’s day. From the dockside a torchlit passageway, cut into the rock, sloped up towards the interior of the castle. After some jostling for position which almost sent some luggage – not to mention a lapdog and two servants – into the dock, nobles, servants and baggage made their way up the passage, excited chatter echoing oddly from the ancient walls.

  The room Madis had been assigned was at the end of a long corridor, at the Western side of the castle, with faded hangings, a rusted window catch, a chipped ewer and a truckle bed for the maid.

  Alina fussed about, twitching at curtains, arranging furniture (such as it was), and piling up bags and boxes.

  “Help me out of this, girl,” Madis said.

  “Yes, madam.”

  The boots had a great many buckles – considerably more than were actually required, and the gown had a great many rustling petticoats and tinkling accoutrements, not to mention a corset that could, when required, be made to creak like a marshful of frogs.

  The resultant genteel racket was enough to cover Alina muttering: “Haven’t found any peepholes, only wards, so far, but a fair few of them. And I don’t like the feel of the place. It’s not a happy house, it’s got my back hairs properly up. Whatever you’ve bought, I hope it’s useful.”

  “It’s a god. Allegedly.” Madis stretched her toes. “Ayay, that’s better.” She lifted off the elaborately dressed wig that covered her own straight brown hair, which she kept close-cropped, the easier to wear wigs or pass for a man at needed. Being lean in the hip and broad in the shoulder helped with that.

  “You bought a god?” Alina yanked on the corset ties so hard Madis gasped.

  “It was an impulse. It’s only a little one, supposed to be a river god. Could be useful. Could just be some sort of weird fish, of course.”

  “Dammit, I wish you’d asked me!”

  “There wasn’t time.”

  Alina finished tying the corset with unnecessary vigour. “Your impulses are going to get us all dead. Or worse,” she hissed under the chorus of creaks.

  “Alina...”

  “At least try not to do anything impulsive at lunch, for the love of all the little gods. I’ll have a look at your god. Fish. Whatever it is.”

  “You worry too much.” Madis grinned.

  “Someone has to.”

  “I’m more worried about that thing in the bay.”

  “Hah.” Alina snorted. “My people fished in the Copper Sea. I’ve seen my Ma yank her catch out of the teeth of bigger things than that.”

  “You sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  The go
wn Alina helped Madis into was far more elaborate than the previous one, and so thickly embroidered it could almost stand unaided. The shoes that went with it – thank the gods, river or otherwise – were lower than the day-boots, and easier to run in if necessary.

  Beneath the gown, the new corset was a miracle of engineering. Lockpicks, knives, a little sleeping powder for humans and a different one – with packaging that would allow questing fingers to differentiate in the dark – for dogs. Although she’d seen no dogs except a wheezing sleeve-dog or two.

  Everything one might need to pull off an extremely cheeky robbery.

  With luck.

  Two

  Two Months Earlier

  Madis clung to the windowsill, the toes of her boots digging into the brickwork below. Above her head pigeons fluttered and fussed, though not as much as the woman in the room. How long could it possibly take someone to choose a pair of earrings, for the love of all the little gods?

  Finally – after Madis’ hands had begun to cramp – there was the sound of a closing door, and silence. Madis eased herself over the sill, and made her way to the jewellery box lying open on the dresser.

  She was leaving by the rather less awkward method of the door to the stable-yard when a figure that had been lounging against the wall straightened, brushed at the shoulders of his extremely well-cut coat and said, “Really, Madis? Hardly an ambitious target.”

  “Arden?” Of course, if anyone was nosing into her business, it would be her brother. “What are you doing here?”

  “I have a proposal for you. Rather more profitable than robbing some matronly bourgeois of a garish trinket or two.”

  That was not, in fact, what Madis had been doing, but she had no intention of telling Arden that.

  “Nice inn,” Madis said. It smelled of fresh herbs, good food and clean linens, and the public room rustled with silk and clinked with gold. She sipped her beer. That was good, too. “You don’t stint yourself, do you?”