‘Bury this in the files somewhere. Say nothing of it to anyone. Is that clear?’
He could have thrown himself at the Alarum’s feet, so grateful he felt in that moment. The relief that flooded him was like a flush of sexual pleasure.
‘Of course, spymaster,’ Pedero replied as he hurriedly bent and scooped the sheet of paper from the floor.
‘And – Pedero?’
Breathlessly: ‘Yes spymaster?’
‘What does this Diplomat look like?’
‘I believe his description is in his file.’
‘Bring it to me.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
Assassin
Ash failed to notice the batwings flying towards him at first, for they were mere specks in the distant haze above the city.
He was working through a series of stretching exercises beneath the warming morning sky, loosening his muscles and easing the aches of his knees and back in preparation for what was to come, for he knew, deep in his guts, that today she would be coming out from her high raven’s nest at long last.
His attention was wholly focused on his movements, and on the sound of his own deep from-the-belly breathing. Ash was paying little mind to the sky, never mind to the noisy streets below him, even though they were thronged with people in their thousands. The early light seemed harsh to his eyes, the onset of another headache, he knew. He hoped it would not be a major one.
It was when he squatted down to stretch his ham and back muscles that at last he spotted them, a formation of batwings gliding low over the rooftops towards the Temple District, ranged across half a laq. He stayed low as one of them soared directly overhead, so close that he caught a glimpse of the rider slung underneath the wing and heard the rattle of metal and harnesses before it was past. It left a little stirring of air that narrowed his eyes.
Ash caught a flash of white in the edge of his vision, off to the left where a building rose opposite the western side of the playhouse. He ducked even lower, and sidestepped across until he was pressed against the parapet for cover. He raised his head slowly and ventured a look.
An Acolyte was moving on the far building, a longrifle perched over his shoulder as he strolled around the rooftop, occasionally stopping to look down on the streets below. Ash turned around, surveying the other nearby roofs on the other side of the playhouse. On many of them, those which were flat, he saw white-robes emerging into the daylight.
Before him, the door began to squeal open.
Ash froze on the spot.
The door of the playhouse roof was located in the great concrete hand that stood at its centre, and on the far side from where he was squatting. Ash glanced to the base of the hand, where his spare cloak lay wrapped around his weapons.
An Acolyte stepped out into view from behind the hand. His back was to Ash, and he held a longrifle fitted with an eyeglass in one hand, and a pistol in the other. The white-robe shifted his balance as though to turn around.
Ash acted without thinking by flinging himself over the parapet.
A moment of vertigo passed through him as he hung by his fingertips from the side of the building. His legs dangled into space above the much lower roofs of the original playhouse below, and the thousands of heads bobbing through the streets. The sounds of the crowds were loud in his ears now, like an ocean removed of all sense of harmony, ragged and crashing against itself.
What am I doing down here? he wondered, as he gripped with all his strength the rough concrete edge of the parapet.
A scrape of feet sounded overhead. He looked up to see the Acolyte looking down at him, only his eyes visible through the mask. A breeze tugged at the edges of the figure’s cloak; its curious patterns of silk glimmered in the daylight. In his mind, Ash saw the pyre burning again, and the white-robed Acolytes gathered around it, watching Nico burn.
‘Give me a hand there,’ Ash said to the man in Trade, and released the precious grip of his left hand to hold it out for him. It was not a request, but a command.
The Acolyte shifted uncertainly. His eyes darted to the offered hand. Ash could feel the fingers of his other hand starting to burn, knew that soon they would go numb altogether. He thrust his free hand once more towards the Acolyte.