When she stepped into the shop, she ran her fingers through her wet hair, clawing it out of her face. “Well, not the worst practice I’ve ever—” she began, and then stopped abruptly.
The man in gray was there.
In the shop.
He had no pack, but it was him, she’d swear on all the Eight. That pale blade of a nose, the tattered no-color cloak. His hood was thrown back, and his hair was white and receding, gathered into a queue. Something about his eyes—pale and rheumy—made her skin prickle, and the wet hair against her shoulders felt like ice. She could see a blue vein pulsing in his cheek as he glanced at her.
His gaze was speculative. After a long look, he dropped his hand from the shelf and tucked it inside his cloak.
“Oh! I didn’t hear you come in,” called Fern as she hurried down the hall, refastening her cloak. “I stepped out back to—”
Potroast exploded into the room. His sharp, hooting barks had a ragged edge to them as he barreled toward the gray-clad man, who whirled in surprise.
The gryphet leapt, and almost quicker than Viv could follow, the stranger slapped the creature alongside the head, dashing him to the floor.
Potroast fell in an ungainly tumble, feathers and fur flying, and his hoot strangled into a startled squawk. Viv immediately moved toward the man, shifting the stick higher in her grip.
“What in the fuck do you think you’re doing!” cried Fern, storming up to him.
“Apologies, ma’am,” said the man, bowing his head. “A startled reaction. I was only surprised.” His voice was calm and drier than desert sand. He gestured to the gryphet as he struggled to his feet. “It seems no harm was done. Again, my apologies.”
“I don’t give a flaming—” began Fern as she hurried to check on Potroast. The man was already turning toward the door. He glanced up at Viv again, noted the grip on her staff, then smiled, and his smile was wrong in every tooth.
Every instinct in her snapped awake, like a burning beneath her skin.
She almost growled at him, a buried, primal urge that she couldn’t recall feeling outside of battle. Her arm wanted nothing more than to crack the man across his chin with her staff and lay him low. But she bested it, and by the time she did, he was past her and out onto the boardwalk, as if time had sped him on by.
“Who in the eight fucking hells was that?” spluttered Fern.
Viv leaned out the door and discovered that the man was already twenty feet down the thoroughfare.
“I don’t know,” she snarled. “But I sure as hells am going to find out.”
12
Maybe it was the sword forms she’d practiced earlier. Maybe it was a pent-up need to move, to act, after so many idle days. Maybe his casual cuffing of the gryphet, or the way he made her every instinct sting. Maybe it was all of those things and more.
Viv emerged onto the boardwalk, staff clenched tight. She bitterly regretted leaving her saber in her room, but she was weapon enough on her own. Or she used to be.
She’d seen no blade on the man, but she knew well enough how little that could mean. Everything about him had screamed threat from the first moment she’d seen him, and she’d never been more than passingly acquainted with hesitation in the face of such a thing.
She strode after him, shedding idleness and physical fragility like an ill-fitting coat. Viv felt herself filling her own skin for the first time since she’d come to Murk, near bursting out of it. Distant thuds of pain echoed in her thigh, but they got farther away by the second.
Part of her mind reminded her of the headlong charge that had landed her in Murk in the first place, but caution was even farther away than the pain.
The man in gray was several shops down, but her strides were much longer, even using the walking staff. She chewed up the distance between them in moments.
Viv’s breath came sharp through her nose, and her lips drew tight against her fangs. For the first time in too long she felt powerful and purposeful in the way she was accustomed to.
He sensed her before she reached him and came to a casual stop. His hands were buried in his cloak.
“Hey,” she said. She let the head of the staff drop as she towered over him.
Slowly, the man turned, that white wedge of a nose swinging around like a knife blade. “Ma’am,” he said, with toneless politeness.
“Don’t fucking ma’am me,” she snarled.
“Have I done something to distress you?” he asked, his pale eyes amused.
“What were you doing in there?” Her voice came out grim and flat.
“My dear, I believe you’re letting your baser nature rule you.” He withdrew both hands from his cloak—Viv tensed as he did—but they were empty, and he splayed them in supplication. “I was only browsing. Hardly a crime. The beast caught me unawares. An honest reaction, and no harm done. Now, you must excuse me, as I—”
“I can smell it on you. Something …” There was a scent. One she recognized. She couldn’t seem to place it, but—
As she uttered the words, something in his eyes changed. The light went flat, like a fog rolled over it. His hands disappeared inside the cloak, and Viv knew with absolute certainty that when they reemerged, they wouldn’t be empty.
She eliminated the distance between them in two strides, casting the walking staff aside. It would only get in the way. Planting her left foot, she reached for him. His false smile fragmented into a snarl, and the icy glint of a blade was already half uncovered.
Viv jammed one forearm against his and brought her other hand looping up behind it, twisting sharply until the dagger spun away. From the corner of her eye, she spied the bloom of his cloak where his other arm was rising, doubtless with another knife at the ready. She brought her hand back to intercept it, curling the fabric in her fist to foul his strike. But his left foot kicked out, hooking around the heel of her damaged leg.
Before she’d been stabbed, it would’ve been like trying to move a mountain, but her knee folded, and she stumbled against him. She gave up all attempts at deflection and seized him around the middle with both arms as they fell, crushing him so flat against her that he’d not be able to bring a blade to bear.
Then they were on the ground in a spray of sand and a tangle of cloak, and the agony in her thigh burned bright again. Even so, she spun him over and straddled him, pressing his arms flat, ignoring the sizzle of pain all through her leg. She growled at him, and that smell assaulted her—cold and wrong and so familiar. Not precisely the same, but a cousin to something deadly, if only she had a moment to place it.
The man in gray bared his teeth at her in savage effort, and she felt his hand twisting, his fingers contorting. With his cloak flared to the side she could see a magestone belted to his hip, and her eyes widened as it glowed with heat. A sudden impact hammered into her, as though she’d slammed into a lake spread-eagled. Viv was blown back and across the street, smashing against the edge of the boardwalk.
Now she wished she had the staff.
This was the moment where hesitation meant the end of things. She felt the wound in her leg pull and tear, along with a rush of warm wetness as she scrambled to him on all fours. Before he could recover, Viv lunged for the magestone in his cloak. Her fingers caught in his belt and yanked as they both went over again. A satchel went flying from his shoulder and tumbled across the sand. When he struck the earth, she heard the breath blow out of him, but his hands were moving again, and she couldn’t get the belt off him.