Chapter 17

Ness slipped out of bed on bare feet, and moved toward the inner bedroom door across wood floors, worn smooth by years and hundreds of different guests' boots. She had kept one of the towels tied around her as a makeshift dress before bed, hesitant to sleep naked in an unfamiliar place— their clothes were not meant to be returned until some time in the morning. She was grateful for that choice.

She could discern the faintest glow of moonlight around the edges of the inner door, and she could tell the new scents originated from that direction, too. The door to the bedroom was a simple but heavy and well-built slab of dense wood— oak, she thought; but she was unsure if the trees here were the same as on Earth. She shoved on it with all of her strength.

The next few seconds were chaotic.

The door swung open quickly and smoothly, the hinged well-oiled; but stopped halfway open with a solid thunk, shortly followed by a yelp of pain and surprise. Ness kept shoving, pushing back whoever or whatever was on the other side, and forced her way through the door.

The room beyond was marginally brighter and easier to discern; her eyes were very dark-adjusted, and the open window admitted enough moonlight that she could make out a tangled figure on the floor just past the door.

A smaller figure— a woman with short hair, silvery-white in the darkness, was standing over the bed, holding a small rod about the size of a roll of quarters, which was glowing dully in shifting colors that wandered between red and the dark violet of a black light. The woman held it poised above the bed where Mira slept, like a dagger she meant to plunge into the woman.

Time seemed to stretch for long seconds while Ness took in this tableau, but the woman’s head had already turned her attention toward the door from the thunk and the yelp, and the person on the ground was shouting in a language that Ness did not understand.

“Ow, shit, that fucking hurt—”

“Shut up,” the platinum-haired woman snapped at him in a low voice, a harsh whisper, and turned back toward the bed.

Mira was already wide awake; it was their first night sleeping in civilization, and she was still primed for the dangers of sleeping rough during their travels. She moved to roll away from the side of the bed where the woman was standing, at the same time that the woman lowered the cylinder to strike. Mira unconsciously threw her arms up to defend herself, and with a clang, the cylinder struck one of the iron bands around her wrists.

There was a loud snap, a burst of light like a camera flash, and a pair of thumps. Ness was blinded momentarily by the flash, but she could make out that Mira and her attacker had been hurled apart by whatever happened.

Mira was tangled in a pile of blankets and bedclothes at the far side of the bed, and the other woman landed on her feet— barely, and stumbled backward. The floor in front of her was gouged with ten parallel lines where her long, curved toenails had caught and scraped.

As Ness’s dark vision returned more fully, she could see that the other woman had cast aside the dull-grey metal cylinder. She was muttering angrily as one hand groped through her bag and the other rubbed at her eyes.

“What the fuck?” Mira shouted.

She had extricated herself from the pile of blankets, and stood naked, the silvery moonlight just illuminating her soft pale skin and a sparse scattering of dark hair.

At the sound of Mira’s voice, the standing figure paused. The man on the ground had started to disentangle his limbs and stand, one hand held to his face.

“…Mira?” The platinum-haired woman asked.

Ness recognized the name as she spoke, as well as the tone of confusion and disbelief in her voice. The woman had drawn a second glowing cylinder out of her pack, but she held it limply at her side, staring at the dimly-lit nude woman in front of her.

“Phaine? What the fuck? How did you even find me? What, once again, the fuck?”

“Mira? You know these people?” Ness asked from the door, warily eyeing the grimacing Rist a few feet away. He glared daggers back at her while he clutched his forehead, a dark trickle of blood on his face.

“Find you?” Phaine replied in disbelief, “you’re not supposed to be here. Where is Hender?” Her tone darkened. “Are you working for that slimy bitch?”

Mira sighed; she crouched down to the pile of bedclothes and pulled out a sheet to wrap around herself. Phaine watched her dress with a smirk; Rist was too distracted by the already-blossoming bruise on his forehead to pay attention.

“This is my room,” Mira explained, annoyance and defensiveness starting to filter into her tone. “I don’t know who Hender is. Give me some credit, you know I don’t work for the sort of people you’d be after. Do you have a match?”

“Do I know that?” Phaine threw back at her, but she dropped the second cylinder back into her bag, and dug around for a few more moments.

She extracted a small, cylindrical wooden case, and from that drew out a thin length of wood, narrower than a pencil but about as long. She snapped it in half, and flames rose from the breaking point on both pieces. There was no striking or sputtering like the matches Ness was familiar with— the flames simply ignited, as if on their own. Like magic. Oh, right. Magic, Ness remembered. Phaine held one of the burning splits out to Mira.

The flickering lights illuminated the room only slightly more than the moonlight, but it was enough to locate the cluster of candles on the bedside table, which raised a flickering yellow glow that was enough to see by; and another few on the writing desk, which brought the illumination up enough to be comfortable.

“Hey, Mira…?” Ness asked, from the door.

“Remember the ex I mentioned to you?” Mira replied, while she fiddled with the sheet, trying to tie it like she had seen Ness do with the towel. She gave up after a moment and just held it closed around herself with one hand.

“Who’s the new girlfriend?” Phaine asked. Ness had no idea what she said, but she could pick up the sarcastic tone easily enough.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Mira shot back, annoyed. “Who’s the boyfriend? He’s bleeding, by the way.”

“Don’t be disgusting,” Phaine replied, “This is Rist, my apprentice. We’re here on Guild business. Where’s Hender?”

“Hey!” Rist interjected, finally keying into the conversation the three women were having.

“Shut up,” Mira and Phaine both told him, simultaneously.

“I told you, I don’t know who Hender is. Wait a minute, were you about to brand me? Phaine, what the fuck?” A note of fear had crept into Mira’s voice.

“I— okay, look. It was dark, and Hender was supposed to be in here, not you.” Phaine gestured toward Ness, and added “…with a bodyguard.”

Ness still looked baffled, understanding only half the conversation.

“She had been in this room for weeks—” Phaine started saying.

“—but she just demanded a different room, the same night you showed up,” Mira finished her sentence. “Sounds like someone tipped her off. Can you just go, and let me get back to bed?”

Ness didn’t understand Phaine’s words, but she could see comfortable old patterns in the way the two women traded off— and sense an old pain behind Mira’s attempted dismissal. She leaned against the wall with a sigh, resigning herself to only getting half the conversation.

“She’s pretty. If she’s not your girlfriend…” Phaine said, her voice low, with a glance toward Ness. The thin towel tied around her body had slipped off the girl’s thigh a little, as she leaned back, showing a pale expanse of upper thigh.

Mira glanced over at Ness as well, as Phaine spoke, and frowned, some combination of emotions that Ness could not quite decipher. Jealousy?

“No,” Mira replied, opaquely. “Okay. Bye.” She gestured toward the open window that Phaine and Rist had climbed in through.

“Wait, wait. Listen. We were watching the doors, and we know Hender didn’t leave. She’s still here— but she knew we were coming. So… she’s prepared for us.”

“Sounds like another failed mission for you, then.”

“Not if you help us. I know how you work— you only get a bath when you just got back from finishing a job. So you’re available to hire.”

“No, no. No no no no no.” Mira glanced quickly over at Ness. “No, this isn’t a good time. It’s complica—”

“Ten percent of the take. Hard to beat that for a morning’s work.”

Mira paused, and her look turned calculating.

“What did she do?”

“Stole a trade caravan she was supposed to protect, and then had the audacity to go back and ask for hazard pay. I’d be impressed if it wasn’t six months' exports for an entire village. Complicated? Did you get her pregnant?” Phaine inclined her head towards Ness.

“Fifty-fifty. Maybe.” Mira ignored the jab.

Rist made a noise that promised to be an angry interjection at the suggestion of splitting the take, but any words died before they could escape his mouth from the venomous looks that both Phaine and Mira directed his way.

“Fifty-fifty,” Mira repeated, with her eyes narrowed. “What do you need, exactly?”

“I need to know what room she’s in, and if she knows we’re coming she might have set defenses. Rist is—” Phaine sighed, unhappy to say the words, “—pretty good with mechanisms, but neither of us can deal with magic.”

“Fifty-fifty, plus you pay for our next night’s stay here since you fucked up my sleep, and one more snide remark about Ness and it’s sixty-forty. And you owe me a favor.”

“Fifty percent is plenty. You’ll make a wonderful mother, Mira.”

“Close the window behind you, please.”

“Fine, fine. It’s a deal. No more jokes about your gi—” Phaine paused, seeing Mira’s menacing eyebrow raise. “…your friend.”