A Little Hatred (The Age of Madness #1) - Joe Abercrombie Page 0,82

her arse by way of light relief. As usual, she struggled with every muscle to look perfectly relaxed and forced her grimace into an ever-brighter smile.

‘He tells me you were raised in Angland,’ she said, trying a different tack.

Finally, Teufel spoke, but only the minimum. ‘I was, my lady.’ She reminded Savine of one of Curnsbick’s engines: stripped back, angular and unapologetic. No unnecessary flesh, no unnecessary ornament, and for damn sure no unnecessary sentiment.

‘You worked in a coal mine.’

‘I did.’ And had not changed her clothes since, by the look of it. A worn shirt with sleeves rolled up to the elbows and those leather braces workmen wear. Coarse trousers tucked into tightly laced work boots, one of which was thrust defiantly out into the centre of the carriage floor, as if staking a claim to the territory. Scarcely a gesture towards femininity anywhere. Had there ever been a woman who took less care over her appearance? Savine subtly shifted her new dress in a vain attempt to move a chafing seam away from her damp armpit. She would never have admitted it but, hell, how she envied her, especially in this heat.

‘Coal is changing the world,’ she observed, nudging the window down to get a little more air in and swishing her fan a touch faster.

‘I heard.’

‘Is it changing it for the better, though?’ muttered the boy, wistfully. ‘That’s the question.’

He glanced up, and a flush spread across his pale cheeks, and his big, sad, frog-like eyes flickered over to Teufel. She gave him the same calm, critical stare she gave Savine. A look that let him judge for himself whether he should have opened his mouth. The lad looked at the floor and folded his arms even tighter about himself.

They certainly made an odd couple. The woman of flint and the boy of wax. She not showing a hint of feeling, he with every emotion written right across his face. They seemed the very last people one would suspect of being agents of the Inquisition. But Savine supposed that was rather the point.

‘Are you expecting trouble in Valbeck?’ she asked.

‘If I was,’ said Vick, ‘I imagine your father would’ve told you not to come.’

‘He did. I ignored him. And I hardly think he would be sending you if there was not at least a little trouble there. Am I right?’

Vick did not even blink. There really was no rattling the woman. ‘Are you expecting trouble?’ she asked, answering a question with another.

‘I find it’s always wise to expect it. I own a share in a textile mill in the city.’

‘Among other things.’

‘Among other things. I have a partner there, one Colonel Vallimir.’

‘Once commander of the King’s Own First Regiment. Too inflexible to work under Mitterick. Is he flexible enough to work under you?’

Apparently, Vick not only knew her own business, but everybody else’s. ‘Where would be the fun in bending flexible people to your whims?’ asked Savine. ‘And partners are useful. Someone to oversee operations. Someone to share the risks.’

‘Someone to take the blame.’

‘You should go into business.’

‘Not sure I’m ruthless enough. I’ll stick with the Inquisition.’

Savine rewarded that with her exhaustively practised spontaneous laugh. ‘The mill was losing money. Troubles with the workers, I expect. I always used to say that textiles are for wearing, not investing in.’ She flicked an infinitesimal speck of dust from the embroidered cuff of her travelling jacket. ‘There are lots of ex-soldiers among the weavers, violent men prone to grudges. When the guilds were broken up, they were left rudderless, injured in their pockets and their pride.’

‘What changed your mind?’

‘The usual. I realised how much money was to be made. And now, of a sudden, I find my mill is in profit.’

‘Which is a wonderful thing, of course,’ said Lisbit, who never had anything worth saying but could never stop saying it anyway, and to make matters worse was saying it in an ever more affected accent since she was made temporary companion. At this rate, Savine would have throttled her before they reached Valbeck, let alone by the time Zuri returned from the South.

‘Which is a wonderful thing,’ said Savine. ‘But profits so fast and so large make me … suspicious.’

‘You should go into the Inquisition.’

‘In this corset? I hardly think so.’

Now Teufel smiled. Just a little curl at the corner of her mouth. Considered, like every expression of hers. As though she had been over her budget and decided she could afford one.

‘You don’t give much away, do