purple, steaming pits, I am going to find them, no matter what it—”
“You, there! Halt where you are!”
Had the racket she'd made up in the apartment carried? Had someone in the building actually gone for help? Or was their appearance here sheer happenstance? Didn't really matter, she decided. Whatever drew them, here they were: a half-dozen guards, tromping around a distant corner and down the street toward her.
And they were proper guards, this patrol, not private house soldiers as some of the prior squads had been. During most of Shins's life, that wouldn't have been a good thing, but at the moment, it made them a tad more predictable, if nothing else.
Actually, come to think of it…
Shins held her hands to her sides, not a posture of submission or surrender, and not only made no effort to flee into the Davillon night, she actually began walking toward the oncoming guards!
“We'll let them do some of the work for us,” she responded to Olgun's bewildered squawk. “I doubt they'll find anything, but if they're taking care of all the little details of an investigation, we can focus on more important stuff.” Much louder, she politely announced, “I'm so glad you're here, officers. I need to report a crime.”
“In this neighborhood? Who doesn't?” They crashed to a halt a few arms-lengths away. Their leader, the absolute spitting image of what a guard “should” be—his black and silver tabard flawless, his medallion of Demas polished to a shine, his hair and thick mustache meticulously trimmed—advanced an extra step and touched a finger to the wide brim of his hat in a polite but perfunctory greeting. “Kindly identify yourself, mademoiselle?”
“Clarice deMonde,” she responded immediately. Not one of her usual or preferred aliases, but it was the false name under which she'd rented this festering roach-trap of a flat. And her preferred alter ego, Madeleine Vallois, wouldn't have been caught dead thinking of a neighborhood like this one, let alone in it.
Granted, any false identity would have been more believable if she wasn't still wearing road-dusted leathers, but…
“And what appears to be the trouble, Mademoiselle deMonde?”
“Well, uh…Constable…?”
“Lieutenant,” he corrected.
When it became clear that he was not, in fact, going to append a name to that title, Shins continued. “Right. Lieutenant, someone broke into my rooms and left…” She choked off, very much not part of her act, overwhelmed again for an instant at the thought of Alexandre's desecrated rest.
In that window of opportunity, one of the younger guards called out. “Excuse me, Lieutenant Donais?”
The patrol's commander sighed and only half turned. “Can this wait, Constable? I'm just in the midst of something.”
“Uh, I don't think so, sir.” Clearly tentative, nervous, but he didn't let that stop him. “Please, sir, I just need a moment.”
“Very well.” Another cursory hat tip—more of a hat nudge, really. “Your brief pardon, mademoiselle.”
“Of course.” She barely waited until his back was turned before calling on her god in the faintest breath. By the time Donais had reached the young soldier who'd called to him, Shins was able to hear their words clearly, despite the distance and the low whispers.
“Sir, I think it's her!”
Well, figs. That wasn't a hopeful start.
The lieutenant, it appeared, had little more idea of what his underling meant than Shins did. “Her who, Constable?”
“From that notice Maj—I mean, Commandant Archibeque was passing around a few weeks ago. She's wanted…”
What? I shouldn't still have any warrants!
“…for murder,” the young constable concluded.
Shins's throat did something that, as best she could tell, was an attempt to swallow her ears in shock.
“Now that you mention it—” Donais began.
I don't think I'm going to stick around for explanations, the thief decided. “Olgun? Bang.”
At the rear of the patrol, one unfortunate soldier's bash-bang discharged; it'd been trickier than normal, as the hammer wasn't cocked, but Olgun had long since mastered the technique. The flintlock launched itself from the bandolier, going one way, while the ball tumbled off in the other. Slightly singed by the flash and startled so severely his first child would be born quivering, the constable screamed, high and piercing.
More than enough, the lot of it, to attract the sudden and complete attention of every man and woman in the patrol.
Widdershins bolted like a kicked cat, her skin humming and prickling with Olgun's magics.
Her tenth step (or so) came down on a remarkably solid chunk of nothing whatsoever. Boosted by her deity's will, she leapt from that impossible spot, easily clearing the first floor of the nearest building. Tucking in tight,