“It’s not all that encouraging a story, actually,” Sarah said, coming to sit beside Gyre as yet another toast was proclaimed. “From our point of view, I mean.”
Gyre glanced at her. She and Nevin had been sitting in a corner for some time, pressed close and lips locked, pausing only long enough to down the drinks Ibb kept bringing them. “What happened to your boy?”
“Having a piss, I think. Or losing his dinner.” Sarah gave a cheerful shrug. “You don’t look like you’re enjoying yourself.”
“It’s dangerous to be out in public like this, even in the tunnels.” Gyre watched Yora shake a gnarled old man’s hand, nodding as he told her some story. “I’m just not sure it’s worth the risk.”
“It lets the tunnelborn know someone’s fighting for them,” Sarah said. “That’s worth something, I think.”
“To them?”
“And to us, if it means a friendly hand or a sympathetic ear when we need one.” Sarah raised an eyebrow. “Seriously, what’s eating you? You’re not usually the worried one.”
“Just thinking too much,” Gyre muttered.
“I know what’ll fix that,” Sarah said, pushing his mug toward him. Gyre took a drink, to appease her, and changed the subject.
“So did you get a chance to look closer at the loot?”
“Only a little.” Sarah’s eyes lit up. “One piece is a secondary actuator, which looks intact. It might have come off a skyship, but more likely got broken off from—”
She was interrupted by Nevin, returning from the toilet apparently none the worse for wear. Sarah bounced off to meet him, leaving Gyre alone once again with his thoughts.
Enough. Gyre downed the rest of his wine and got to his feet, waving off Ibb’s offer to get him another. He stalked out through the now-crowded pub, emerging into the darker, quieter tunnel outside the door with a deep feeling of relief.
Thinking too much. You can say that again. For a moment he hesitated. He badly wanted to be back in his own bed, but fading adrenaline had left him with aching limbs and a throbbing headache. Maybe I should find a flophouse and head back in the morning.
The door opened behind him, and Gyre turned to find Yora, hands in the pockets of her tunnel coat. She caught his look and raised an eyebrow.
“Tired of playing host?” he said.
“A bit.” Yora had unpinned her hair from the tight bun she kept it in on jobs, and it hung in waves down the back of her coat, gleaming in the faint torchlight like liquid gold. She ran a hand through it and sighed. “Half of them want favors, and the other half just want to tell me how they supported my father all along.”
“Easy to say, after the fact,” Gyre said.
“I know. If half the people who say they were with him now had been willing to stand up …” Yora shook her head, and there was a hint of pain beneath her usual stoic mask. She’d been ten when her father had died, Gyre remembered. Barely older than I was when the Order took Maya.
“Sorry,” Gyre muttered. “Didn’t mean to stick my finger in old wounds.”
She waved it away, then said, “Sarah’s worried about you. So’s Ibb. Usually taking down a bunch of Auxies is what cheers you up.”
Gyre snorted. “Let me guess. They think I should come in and get roaring drunk?”
“They mean well.” Yora stepped closer, leaning one shoulder against the rock wall. “What’s wrong, Gyre?”
Gyre blew out a deep breath. “That Legionary was waiting for us.”
“Raskos can’t know exactly what we were going to hit. I bet he scattered a squad across a few likely targets.”
“Even so. He wants us badly.”
Yora nodded. “We’re hurting him. And the best part is, he can’t go crying to the Order for help. The last thing he needs is for some centarch to start poking around.”
That was true enough. Among the dux’s responsibilities was suppressing the trade in dhak, which in the modern Republic meant anything Elder, ghoul, or Chosen that didn’t come through the Order. Most of Deepfire’s duxes had taken advantage of their position to line their pockets with a little light smuggling, from what Gyre had read, but he suspected none had gone quite as far as Raskos Rottentooth—the man had his own warehouse. So he can’t exactly complain to the Order that his illegal shipments are going missing.
“Right,” Gyre said. “So he’ll do what he can to stop us—Auxies, Legionaries, mercs, whatever it takes.”
“And we’ll keep getting past them,” Yora said. “We managed tonight, didn’t we?”
“Barely.” A week of careful planning and smooth execution had nearly been ruined by a single soldier. “But let’s say we do. Then what?”
“Eventually, Raskos goes down,” Yora said. “He seems strong, but he’s on a narrow base, with the tunnelborn on one side, the Republic nobility on the other, and the Order looming over his shoulder. Keep shaking him, and he’ll lose his footing.”
“And then what?” Gyre growled. “We take the city? The Republic will send a hundred Legionaries through the Gate and take it back. Or a centarch wanders through and blasts us back into our holes without breaking a sweat. We had one Legionary come after us, and that was almost too much. How are we supposed to fight back?”
“This isn’t about taking on the whole Republic,” Yora said, her tone stiffening to anger. “This is about bringing down Rottentooth and getting justice for the tunnelborn. When the city rises and the dux falls, the Senate will negotiate.”
Negotiate. Gyre closed his eye, breathing deep, and said nothing.
“I know,” Yora said, after a moment. “It’s not enough for you. You want to burn the whole thing to the ground.”
Gyre held his silence, and Yora sighed again.
“You’re good, Gyre. There’s no one I’d rather have at my back in a fight, and no one who works harder once we have a target. The tunnelborn are starting to talk about Halfmask the way they talk about my father, and that’s worth something.”
“Not when the centarchs come for us,” Gyre whispered.
“Let’s focus on tomorrow.” Yora’s voice had softened again, and she patted Gyre on the shoulder. “And the next day, and the next. When we win, and Raskos has fallen, if you want to take your share of the loot and keep pushing, I certainly won’t stand in your way.” She smiled—not a false smile, but not genuine either, the practiced expression of a leader who knew how to deploy it to encourage the troops. “Until then, I hope you’ll stay by my side.”
“Of course,” Gyre said. He pushed away from the wall. “Like I told Sarah. Just thinking too much.”
“You should—”
Gyre raised his only eyebrow. “Get roaring drunk?”
“I was going to say ‘get some rest,’” Yora said.
“Probably a better plan,” Gyre muttered. He pulled his coat a little tighter around his shoulders. “Send for me when you’ve got the next target.”
“You know I will,” Yora said. “Good luck, Halfmask.”
*
“There you are,” said Lynnia Sharptongue from the seat in front of her worktop. She didn’t look up from whatever she was mixing. “I was starting to wonder if Raskos’ idiots had finally caught up with you.”