Chapter Eleven

T hey left the unhappy little cottage, emerged into the bright, clean sunshine, and took two steps in the direction of the carriage before the cry cut through the air.

"Stephen!"

"Oh God ," said Stephen.

All four turned to see a short, fat woman marching up. Her bonnet was slightly askew, and her face was red with exertion and anger.

"Stephen Day! What's this I hear?"

"I'm working, Aunt," Stephen said quellingly, to no effect.

"Working for the Vaudreys?"

"No, working . At my profession."

"There is no justice that you can bring to this," said Mrs. Talbot through her teeth. "Have you gone mad? Your father—"

"My father has nothing to do with this," Stephen snapped. "And nor do you, Aunt."

She took a deep breath, swelling. "When I hear of my own nephew grovelling to the Vaudreys—"

"Oh, for God's sake," said Crane.

" You ," began Mrs. Talbot with loathing.

"Nan..." Miss Bell interrupted, and there was a clamour of voices.

"I will not— "

"Listen, please—"

"This ridiculous business—"

"Everybody be quiet," said Stephen, in a normal speaking voice that managed to deaden the sound of all the rest. "Aunt, if you want to speak to me, we will do it in private. Lord Crane, wait for me please."

He went back into the cottage without waiting for answers or permission. Annie Talbot gave Crane a long, nasty look before following her nephew in. The door slammed.

Crane let rip a sentence that would have cleared rooms in Shanghai, and stalked away towards the graveyard. Merrick didn't follow. As Miss Bell, hesitating, started to turn away, he touched her arm. "Got a moment, ma'am?"

"What is it?"

"D'you know who I am?"

Miss Bell frowned. "You? You're Lord Crane's servant, ain't you?"

"I'm Frank Merrick." Miss Bell's puzzled expression didn't change, so he added, "Twenty years ago I was up here, courting Amy Pessell. If you're from round this way, you might remember about that. She lived on a farm just a mile or so down the road."

Her face changed, slowly, two decades of memory shifting.

" You were Amy Pessell's beau?"

"That's right."

"The man who knocked Hector Vaudrey's teeth out," said Miss Bell. "That was you?"

" One tooth," Merrick said. "That's all I got, then he gave me a hell of a drubbing. Then I got a flogging, after. Then Amy stood up in front of the old lord in court and says it's all lies and Hector never touched her—"

"She had a big family," Miss Bell said. "No father. She couldn't take the risk of crossing him."

"I know. So the old lord gives me a choice, right? Ten years hard for grievous assault or , he says, I can take a post as manservant to his rotten younger son what he's sending to China. Seventeen years old and bad to the bone. Needs a keeper. Right? And I say yes to that, because there's not a lot else for me except breaking rocks. And then, day before we go, I get a message from one of his men, and he says, if Lucien Vaudrey happens to fall overboard, no need to worry anyone'll blame me for it, and I can just disappear in Shanghai, no questions asked. Right?"

Miss Bell straightened her back. "His father said that?"

"It came from him. Yeah. And I think, well, the old lord wants Hector alive and Lucien dead. So Lucien must be something special, one way or the other. And I think, I got the whole voyage to China. I'll just see what kind of bloke he is before I shove him over the side." He nodded slowly, lost in the memory. "And he's a snotty, arrogant little so-and-so who needs keeping on a leash till he grows up, but what I can see pretty quick is, he ain't Hector. So I think, I got nothing better to do, let's see where this goes. Right?"

"Right," said Miss Bell, hypnotised.

"Twenty years ago, that was. We started poor as hell. You would not believe how poor you can be in the slums of Shanghai. Didn't think we'd live through the first winter. But he never let me down. He got me through smallpox, and made a shaman, that's one of your lot, take a curse off of me, and that cost him. I smuggled him two hundred miles in a silk caravan to get him away from a warlord, and you don't want to know about that , never seen a carry-on like it. Twenty years, Miss Bell. I know that bloke inside out, good and bad. You lot down here don't have a clue."

"Well." Miss Bell was nonplussed.

"Took me five days on that ship to make sure of him. Mr. Day got his measure in an hour, if you ask me. And if ever a man had a right to hate the Vaudreys, Mr. Day does, but here he is, and fighting for my lord. Think on it, Miss Bell. We need a bit more thinking round here."

Miss Bell nodded, slowly. "I will. "

"Good. Oh, and if you happen to be putting the word round like Mr. Day said, there's just another thing, if you got a chance to mention it as well?"

"What's that?"

"The next bloke takes a swing at my lord, I'm going to break both his arms," said Merrick. "And that'll give him trouble when he tries to pick his teeth up. That's all. Nice talking to you, ma'am."

He strolled over to Crane, who was propped against the lychgate. Miss Bell stared after him.

The cottage door opened. Stephen stalked out, stiff-legged and flushed. Mrs. Talbot followed, an ugly shade of angry crimson. Stephen went over to Crane without looking at anyone else.

"I dare say I've wasted your time," he snapped. "Jack's maker's dead, no need for me to protect you. I'm going to walk back."

"Do you want company?"

"No."

"Bad luck," said Crane amiably. "Merrick, can you drive back and see about Mr. Day's clothes for tonight?"

"Sir," said Merrick, flipping a cheery wave to Miss Bell, who was being buttonholed by Mrs. Talbot, as he got into the carriage.

STEPHEN SET OFF AT a rapid, angry pace down the leafy lane. Crane, whose extra height was mostly leg, kept up effortlessly with long, casual strides. It was very hot now, but the trees above shed welcome green shade, and magpies cawed and chirruped overhead. Their feet echoed slightly on the dry packed earth.

"Do you want to talk about it?" asked Crane.

"No."

They paced on for a moment.

"What's a justiciar? "

Stephen stared ahead. "You asked who enforces the laws surrounding practitioners. Justiciars do."

"And that's what you are."

"Yes."

"A secret policeman."

"It's not a secret."

"You didn't tell me."

"You're not a practitioner."

"Justiciar. Judge and jury?"

"If you like."

"So what's the penalty for killing someone with a Judas jack?"

"My job is to stop practitioners hurting people," said Stephen irritably. "I'd have stopped Gammer Parrott by whatever means necessary."

"You killed that warlock last winter," Crane observed.

"That was necessary."

"Judge, jury and executioner. What about Miss Bell? What's the maximum sentence for aiding and abetting murder?"

"It doesn't work like that. My job is to stop practitioners hurting people, and I do that however I have to."

"So you left Miss Bell disinclined to hurt me, by bullying and threatening her."

"If you want to put it like that," said Stephen, tight-lipped.

"Until you forced me and her into alliance. So I stood up for her, more or less proving she was wrong about me as I did so, and left her far better disposed towards me. I can feel my local reputation improving as we speak."

Stephen looked slowly round. Crane grinned at him. "Nicely played. Although when you're relying on my intervention, I'd rather you warn me in advance."

"I wasn't relying on anything. You had every right to demand redress, and I'd have supported that. Though I did think—hope—you might react as you did," Stephen added, slightly less stiffly. "It was...fair. And I'm glad of it. It's best for everyone to get her back on the straight and narrow."

"You've got that authority, to let her off?"

"Well, yes. Judge and jury."

"That's quite a responsibility."

"It's how your ancestor set it up," Stephen said. "The Magpie Lord founded the justiciary, he made the rules. Of course, he thought it would be an appointment of honour, not a job you give the misfits and the ones who can't pay for training."

"Not a popular job, then."

"No," Stephen said, with some emphasis. "Nobody likes the justiciary, sticking our noses into other people's business and telling our betters what to do. They can't stand us, right up till the moment they come up against someone stronger and more ruthless, and then they start clamouring for help and asking why we haven't done our jobs before." He kicked a stone into the white-blossomed hedgerow. "It's harder out here. In the cities, there's more danger but that means people understand more. Here, they just do what they like and treat the law like it's for other people."

"That attitude seems fairly common round here. I take it your aunt wasn't sympathetic."

"My aunt," said Stephen viciously. "Dear Aunt Annie. Apparently the fact that she's my father's sister gives her the right to decide what he'd have thought about any situation. Apparently, she knows the definition of justice better than I do. Apparently, any friend of hers, such as Gammer Parrott, is above the law. Or rather, it's impossible that dear Edna could have done a bad thing, therefore you must deserve the fate of the other Vaudreys regardless of evidence, and therefore there's only one reason for me to prevent you being murdered, and it has nothing to do with law or justice."

"And that is? "

"Well, let's see," Stephen said. "You're notorious for unspeakable vice. You've put me up in what ought to be your wife's bedroom. And Graham saw— saw —me commit an abominable act on you in the garden last night. So why don't you take a guess."

"Shit."

"I just want to know how exactly you've made sure everyone in Lychdale knows who you go to bed with," Stephen snapped. "You've only been in the country four months! Do you even stop to sleep? And between your abysmal reputation and a pair of damp trouser knees, Mr. Graham seems to have conjured up a story out of Sins of the Cities of the Plain , which allowed my aunt to accuse me of gross depravity with, more or less, my father's murderer."

"The bitch. Stephen—" Crane reached for him. He slithered sideways, away, and started walking again, a fast, angry march.

"It's what she wanted to hear," he went on. "It confirmed that she was quite right not to offer to house me when my father died, which she's been trying to justify for the last twelve years. It's entirely reasonable to abandon a homeless boy if he grows up to be a sodomite, especially with a Vaudrey involved. And I could hardly make a convincing denial of anything going on, could I?"

Crane put a hand through his hair. "I'm extremely sorry. I can probably make Graham recant—"

"It won't change her mind. I don't care anyway." Stephen halted abruptly. "Do you want me?"

"What?"

"Well, if I'm going to get talked about and screamed at and accused anyway... You can have me. Now. If you want."

"Out here?" Crane said incredulously. "Did they change the law without telling me?"

"There's nobody within a quarter of a mile."

"How can you possibly— Do you actually know that?"

"Yes," Stephen said. "For God's sake, do you want to do it or not? "

Crane grabbed the back of Stephen's head and tilted it back as he bent to force his mouth onto the smaller man's, hard, feeling him gasp. They stumbled to the side of the road and a few yards into the woods, lips awkwardly locked, and Crane pushed Stephen up against a tree. Stephen pulled at his shirt, and Crane grasped his wrists and shoved them back, either side of the tree trunk, pinioning him, feeling the shudder of response.

"I'm in charge," he said.

Stephen nodded, closing his eyes. His lips were reddened, but his face was rather pale.

Crane's hand slipped to Stephen's waist, unfastening buttons rapidly. Stephen was only semi-hard, but that changed rapidly as Crane went on his knees and took him in his mouth.

He licked and sucked with well-honed skill, using teeth and lips and tongue, and Stephen gripped his scalp desperately. Crane felt the prickle of those magical fingers as Stephen's arousal built. He brought him off quickly, not allowing him time to think, ignoring Stephen's warning groan and taking the magician's come in a salty rush to his mouth as Stephen jerked and spasmed against him, his electric fingertips sparking in Crane's hair.

Stephen slithered down the tree trunk and ended up sitting on the moss, mouth open, eyes shut.

"God," he said eventually. "You're very good at that."

Crane wiped his lips. "Practice makes perfect."

Stephen was still for another moment while his breathing returned to normal. He squared his shoulders slightly as he opened his eyes to meet Crane's. "How do you want me?"

"Uh-uh," said Crane. "Another time."

"What?"

Crane leaned over and kissed him, deep but gentle now, letting Stephen feel his own salty sweetness on his tongue. At last he pulled away and rubbed Stephen's swollen lower lip with a light thumb. " When I have you, sweet boy, it will be because you want me to. Not against your better judgement, not in spite of my surname, and definitely not to annoy your aunt."

Stephen went red, but his voice was defiant. "Well, what was that, then?"

Crane shrugged. "You seemed tense."

Stephen gave an incredulous choke of laughter. His head whipped round. "Blast. Stay still."

His hands gave a quick jerk in the air, and he gripped Crane's arm, holding him steady, as two labourers strolled round the bend. They walked together, chatting idly, completely ignoring the two men sprawled together a few yards from the road, and disappeared up the lane. Crane stared after them until Stephen released his arm.

" That is useful," Crane said. "But, rather than using it again..." He got to his feet and pulled Stephen up, gently brushing his cropped hair for bark as Stephen rearranged his clothing.

"Look, Crane—Lucien—are you sure—"

"Yes," Crane said. "Don't worry, I'll take it out on you soon enough. Come on."