Hearts in Zenith (Four Husbands and a Lover)

21. Even More Reckoning

Pretty much anything beats cockroaches as the first thing to see after you wake up.

The second thing my eyes focused on was a clump of rotten straw right in front of my nose. I felt its squishy, prickly touch on the rest of my body, even where it was still covered by clothes. Even after my night in the gutter, it made me scrunch my nose.

On reflection, cockroaches just edged out the straw in the struggle for my disgust. Weirdly, the nasty things looked so busy with doing their thing, it was hard to stop tracking them with my gaze.

"Ismar?"

Before I registered that I wasn't alone, a torrent of frigid, salty water splashed onto my head.

"Good morning, Miccola," I groaned.

The dirt-beaten floor masked with the pile of straw devoid of country freshness. I had enough of looking at it, even with the puddle rapidly spreading over it. I looked up and my gaze met a rough wooden wall. Further, but not much further, a slop bucket with a streak of brown down its side lodged in a corner. The cramped space smelled of urine, vomit and sweat.

For company, Miccola squatting next to me. Her fingers drummed on the second bucket. It was upturned and, mercifully, not previously used for offal by the look of it. She just carried water in it.

"Deadhead Company have their own prison cell?"

"Where there are soldiers, fights and drinking happen. Sometimes, the troublemakers get a second chance after cooling off in the lock-up."

I picked at the stinging cuts. Someone plastered them over with goo. Disgusting, but it smelled healthy and neither blood nor puss seeped through it. That was quality stuff. Pricey stuff that saved my life. If the Company spent this much on patching me up— and I did do good by turning in that pouch--

Hope surged through my veins, like fire inside the distant mountains. It erupted out of my throat. "Troublemakers like me? Did Captain-Commander accept me?"

"Nope, not like you," Miccola said. "Her Maxima ordered to put you in here, because you'd have bled to death on the way to the city jail. I'm here to protect you against mischief before you're fit to be questioned."

"Mischief? What do you mean?"

She rolled her eyes.

The understanding slowly dawned at me. I saw things clearly, but since nobody else had a full story... Mythra's talons! When I ran into the Deadheads, I had on me a black velvet pouch emblazoned with a scorpion. Inside it was a token with a profile that graced every coin in Palmyr. A much beloved profile, belonging to the highest person in the realm, who spent generously on keeping her subjects happy.

I grabbed Miccola's sleeve. "Is the Queen safe?"

"That's what they'll ask you tomorrow. The city is all topsy-turvy looking for your cohorts."

I blinked. "My... what? I've killed the scorpia assassin at that house! Please, trust me!"

"Ismar, they found nobody suspicious, dead or alive in the whole block. Nobody, that is, except for a girl pretending to be Safic. That girl tried her darndest to join the Queen's personal guard for weeks. And she was cut up ritual-style with a scorpia assassin's misericorde, that she also somehow carried."

Pouch--yes, token--yes, but this other thing? "Miseri-what-now?"

"Misericorde--the mercy-killing weapon."

"Oh! The dagger!"

"The black steel dagger. For all the world, it looks like you are a minion disposed of when the assassin found another way to get to the Queen. Or a punished traitor. Or a sacrifice to the scorpia's cursed Bhuta patron."