Foxhunt Page 8

  Rivasoa shot her a grateful look, almost more surprised than grateful, as though Orfeus were incapable of doing anything thoughtful or kind.

  The transport manager brightened again, and with a flourish produced a lumpen orange fruit, fuzzy and large. “Freshly engineered just this week,” they said proudly. Not quite what she had been aiming for. Rivasoa placed it carefully in her bag with a nod of thanks.

  The transport manager beamed and turned to the next would-be passenger, whistling cheerfully through the neck, one possessive hand laid over their new book.

  Farflung’s flyers were made for transport of goods, not people. They were beautiful, glimmering with gold, solar foil etched as circuity across the cockpit and wings. Orfeus and Rivasoa undertook the journey tucked in at the side of the small cabin alongside the trade goods, machinery parts and looped lengths of cable. Perhaps some of this was destined for Threadgall at the Tinctora Hub.

  Travel by flyer was dizzyingly, nauseatingly fast. Orfeus sat with her arms folded over her stomach, and they did not exchange much conversation.

  This wasn’t how she often travelled. If she had a week free just for her and the road, she would walk, if she didn’t have an Elder following in her footsteps and a Wolf who knew how many steps behind.

  The flyer wasn’t headed to Tinctora, but the small town of Rountree, midway between it and Hollyhock. Orfeus stood on the blessedly solid ground and stretched extensively, as the flyer pilot hopped out and set to unloading.

  Rivasoa came out a moment later. “Where is the wayhouse?” she said.

  “It’ll be somewhere. There’s always a wayhouse,” Orfeus said. She looked around, because this would be an embarrassing time for that universal truth not to be true. There it was, the building a little way behind the tall tree that gave the town its name. No outward sign distinguished it as a wayhouse, but conversation spilled out from the invitingly open doors.

  “I know,” Rivasoa said, warmly. Orfeus hadn’t expected her to be so approving of anything as social and chaotic and loud as wayhouses. Perhaps the spirit of hospitality that shone out of them warmed her soul, or perhaps she’d been more thrown off by the quick flight than Orfeus knew.

  A glance around the town before they entered showed squared-off buildings similar to Tinctora’s. The gardens looked tidier, and the rowan tree grew from a circle of tall grasses in the centre area, near the Hub with its gleaming fins and busy activity around it. No wolves lunged out from the dark. Orfeus told herself that Faol would have no way of knowing she was here this quickly.

  The wayhouse operator was as friendly and hospitable as they always were. Rivasoa, in contrast to her demeanour up in Farflung, was utterly polite. They settled at a table to await their basic meal.

  Rivasoa wrote in her book a while, stylus moving over the pages. Orfeus set her herbs on the table, rearranged them to make up for the stock she’d traded and then repacked them into her bag more efficiently. Rivasoa put her book away and said, “You talk to your guitar.”

  Orfeus stowed her bag under the table, straightened. “Artists are eccentric,” she said. Possibly she leaned too heavily on that. “Yes, I suppose. You must bear in mind that I’ll talk to most anything. I’ll talk to a tree if there’s no proper company around. I’ll talk to you.”

  Rivasoa’s face showed no sign of insult. “I am just curious,” she said.

  Of course she was. Curiosity seemed Rivasoa’s defining trait, rather to the exclusion of all else. Orfeus should approve of her, but something about the woman just grated her wrong. Maybe it was the pinprick that she imagined she could feel in the crook of her arm, where her blood had been stolen as she slept.

  Their food arrived, bowls of rice and beans and a pitcher of water. Orfeus poured them each a glass and took a sip. Ooh, there was a hint of lemon to it. “My guitar’s name is Galahad,” she said, resignedly. Rivasoa looked at her. “Galahad? The ancient Alban knight. She fell in love with Lancelot, but Lancelot had two loves already. So she wandered, singing of her heartbreak, and all who heard her were so moved by her song that they could not help but rally behind Arthur.”

  Even just saying the rhythms of the old story set Orfeus at ease. She almost didn’t feel the need to turn her head over her shoulder and scan the room for any hulking Wolf-like figures, though she still did.

  Rivasoa smirked a bit. “That’s not right.”

  The words stung, but she shrugged. “Who says what’s right?” Orfeus said. She loved stories, but Rivasoa was not the one who got to dictate what the true tale was. This was the story as she’d learned it at her mother’s knee.

  Rivasoa shook her head. The slight traces of smile on her lips were amused, comfortably superior. “Do you even know your namesake’s story?”

  “Orpheus?” Orfeus said. She scooped up some rice deftly with a bean. “He was a singer who went into the underworld.”

  “And?” Rivasoa said.

  She shrugged. “Presumably, he came back up.”

  That night she sat on the edge of her cot beside the row of other cots, though at least hers was under a window. She didn’t feel like playing to earn a nicer room today. She didn’t want a big profile, for once.

  Wayhouses were comfortable, safe, home. Sanctuary after a long tiring day on the road.

  Orfeus sat up, Galahad sitting in its case beside her, and watched out the window. Every shadow, every shift of the moon seemed to show lupine figures lurking outside.

  They arrived at Tinctora a little after nightfall. Walking home felt like walking into a bear trap, and even passing through the fringes of forest that ringed the township of Tinctora, Orfeus kept glancing over her shoulder. Surely it had been enough time for the Order to have picked up her tracks. No one seemed to be following …

  Orfeus realised her mistake as soon as she stepped into the centre of town and smelled the thick, roiling scent of some type of gas. If the Elders knew her well enough to know her Farflung contacts and family history, the Order was at least smart enough to figure out what she valued most.

  She’d counted on them coming after her, not her home. Threadgall was in danger now, and Linden – and, gods, Primrose.

  “Orfeus,” Rivasoa said. “Is something wrong?”

  There, across the street. A hulking shadow with the pricked ears of a wolf. “Get to safety,” Orfeus said urgently, turning to Rivasoa. Rivasoa was tall, maybe strong, certainly strong in the Blood. Orfeus didn’t trust her an inch, but she was at least pretending to be an ally, and Orfeus would use what she had. She corrected her previous statement to: “Get people to safety.” She mistrusted that whiff of gas on the air, which didn’t seem the Wolf’s style.

  Rivasoa’s brows arched, but after a moment she nodded a fraction.

  It was enough. Orfeus turned and stepped in front of her to draw the Wolf’s attention, but their attention was fixed on her anyway. They strode forward to her across the square like iron drawn to a magnet.

  But not like they were in any hurry. Alright. Orfeus knew how to deal with arrogant people.

  “Evening, Wolf!” she called. She was aware of Rivasoa moving away from her, and kept her eyes fixed on the Wolf, who didn’t seem to notice the other woman. “Are you a she or a he today?”

  Faol looked startled, like her unexpected knowledge had slipped past their armour like no blade could. “He,” he said. Then he shook his head, hunkering his shoulders. “I’m not here for conversation,” he growled.

  “I think you’ll find—” Orfeus said, but he was already coming at her with his sharplight blade drawn.

  Fast and intent, this time he didn’t look like he was going for just a blow to the head. “Deadly force,” Orfeus said, realising, and she turned and ran like hell, cloak billowing behind her. In the worst case scenario, the fabric might turn a blade. Maybe. People didn’t normally come after her with knives.

  Mostly she had to get him away from other people. The Hub was right there, lights off for the night, the sides of the building ridged w
ith fins and ledges. Orfeus sprang at it and started clambering up, breathing hard, cramming her boots into any toehold she could find and tearing her fingernails on the metal in her haste.

  She heard a grunt from behind her, which sounded more like exasperation than exertion. Faol could probably scale this wall with ease. She had to move fast.

  Scrambling, adrenaline rushing through her veins, Orfeus wrapped her hands at last around the lip of the roof and hauled herself up. Her arms burned, and she lay there for a moment to pant.

  The Wolf appeared over the edge a moment later, animal-masked and grim as a spectre. Orfeus swore under her breath and rolled away and stood, stumbling over her cloak in her hurry.

  “Wait,” she said urgently, but evidently he’d meant it when he said he wasn’t in the mood for conversation. He held out his arm and his shining claws sprang out from what looked like some type of gauntlet. Sharplight, yes. Oh, very sharp.

  He dived at her and she dove out of the way of the glinting claws – right into his other hand, which fisted in her cloak. Orfeus fumbled out her taser and shoved it at him.

  The electricity fizzed off his armour, but it did pass into flesh. He went rigid. The jolt didn’t drop him like it would someone without augments, but for a moment he was frozen. Beyond the eyeholes in his mask she saw his eyes were wide with pain.

  Brown eyes, of course, that wasn’t surprising. There was no proper reason why she hesitated and stared at him for far too long, long enough he grimaced and shook off the effects. He reached out his hand, nearly catching her, and she came to her senses and vaulted away.

  Orfeus dropped the taser and pulled out the device she’d got at the market in Farflung, the thin rectangle of transparent plastiglass called a portable hub or porter. She swiped at it hastily, and symbols and letters came up. She swiped it again, and it beeped an affirmative red.

  And then Faol caught her and wrapped his unclawed hand around her throat, and started choking her.

  Orfeus spluttered. “Wait,” she said. “Stop.” She clawed at his wrist. Her hands seemed to have no strength at all.

  The Wolf stared at her, eyes fixed on her mercilessly as he tightened his grip around her windpipe, nearly lifting her up with the hold. She choked. Seeing his eyes didn’t help.

  She could not bring the breath to her tongue to speak, but she could still move. With a frantic flare of her fingers she signed, energy, and with that kick of adrenaline she slapped her other hand over his back and sent out a jolt of sparks. They passed through him and into her, rattling her teeth. He didn’t release her, but his hold loosened for a moment.

  “Stop!” Orfeus grated. It felt like speaking with a throatful of glass. “Your contract is cancelled! Look!”

  He shifted his grip, no longer tight enough to choke but nothing she could escape from. His eyes bored into her, but he lifted his other hand, claws retracting back into his gauntlet. He tapped at one ear: through the strands of his black hair she saw he wore a silver earring, shaped like a fang.

  Whatever he saw or heard made him blink. He stared at her like she’d grown another head.

  “You can let go now,” Orfeus said helpfully. He shook his head.

  “How did you …” He shook his head again, staring. She wondered if he’d actually forgotten he was in the middle of choking her to death. His voice was quick, gruff, business-like. “You cancelled the contract. How?”

  “I’m your client,” Orfeus said.

  “We don’t have clients,” Faol said automatically. His fingers flexed against her throat. “…what?”

  “I hired you to kill me,” Orfeus said, a little out of breath. She felt at her throat and winced. He stared at her incredulously, and she frowned back. “I do realise now that nonlethal means might have been wiser. I was in a hurry.”

  “You…” The Wolf’s head tilted back. He gazed up at the night sky, and closed his eyes. He breathed out, and breathed in. She felt he could have picked a better time for breathing exercises.

  He looked back at her. “Alright,” he said. “Fine, singer. Why? Are you mocking me?”

  “No,” Orfeus said. “You’d know if I was mocking you. Trust me on that.”

  The silvery wolf mask covered the upper part of his face, but from how his mouth drew down she could tell he was frowning, like he wasn’t sure whether she was mocking him this very moment.

  Orfeus gently slid her fingers under his and pried them away. After a moment he let her, withdrawing his hand from her throat. She drew in a huge breath, then coughed and drew in another. He took a step back.

  Orfeus, sufficiently recovered, blinded him with a grin. “You’re here for conversation,” she said.

  He let out a groan.

  Orfeus laughed. Adrenaline still sang through her, and her starveling brain greedily drank in oxygen. She gestured expansively, and started to pace. “Everyone kept saying that the Order of the Vengeful Wild never share details of who contracts them. Alright. Fine. So I went to the source.” She pointed squarely at his chest and got some enjoyment from how his shoulders tensed, like he expected an attack. Faol didn’t seem to be the sharpest. This was what she’d been living in fear of? “Which is to say, you. Who hired you?”

  Faol answered calmly, as though he hadn’t been trying to kill her a minute before. “I don’t know,” he said simply. She narrowed her eyes, and he rolled one shoulder in a shrug. “I am the Wolf and go where I’m sent. You would have to ask the Leader of the Wild. My leader. Luga.”

  Disappointing, but at least it was something. She memorised the name like she’d carved it into her brain with a glowing poker. Luga. So that was who she had to get answers from. Orfeus had given her name when she took out this contract, so whoever was after her must’ve given a name too, or at least something.

  Faol whipped his head around, staring. A moment later Orfeus heard it too: a soft purr, the same sound his hoverbike had made, coming from a little to the side of town but getting louder fast.

  “Someone else is here?” Orfeus said, questioningly.

  Faol shook his head. “We’re not the only ones with bikes,” he said, but he frowned in the direction of the noise.

  “If you don’t know the client, can you at least tell me if they took the contract out again?” Orfeus said, and that was enough to draw his attention away from the noise.

  “No one tried to renew the contract after my initial failure,” he said, very quietly. His gaze dropped.

  “Oh, I weep for you, I really do,” she snapped. “Terribly sorry that you didn’t succeed in killing me. I know it wasn’t a kill contract,” she said, as he opened his mouth to speak. “If you’re not out to kill someone, don’t hit them on the head—”

  Something shot past Orfeus, bolts of brilliant blue light. She twitched back, but Faol took a full step away, shoulders tensing. Whatever that was, it had been dangerous.

  “You’re sure no one renewed it?” Orfeus said urgently. Answers were important and all, but right now she had to make sure these people didn’t hurt anything she cared about.

  “Yes,” Faol said at once. “Or.” He touched his fang-earring communicator, frowning at whatever he heard or didn’t hear. “I… No one told me…”

  “I thought the Wolf was meant to be the best of you,” Orfeus bit out, and he turned to frown at her. Then he leaped away, rolling out of range fast. The blinding blue lights arced by again and hit her in the arm. It only tingled, painless, but when she tried to move her arm she couldn’t.

  She had to hope it was only temporary. Had to get out of her position silhouetted in plain sight before she was hit full-on. She took a step, and then something slammed into her and she hit the ground, breathing hard.

  Orfeus turned, able to turn, able to move. The burst of blue had missed her, and it shouldn’t have. Faol got off her but stayed hunched low, his eyes gleaming in the darkness.

  “We have to get out of sight,” he said.

  She stared at him. “I’m not going anywhere with you.�
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  “I’m going to get you to safety,” he said impatiently. “You’re no longer a contract.” His teeth showed briefly in what could have been a snarl or a grin. “Or no one has told me otherwise. So you’re an innocent bystander, and must be protected.” He trailed off and put a finger to the shining tooth earring. Cocked his head, listening.

  Orfeus rolled away from him and hunched to her feet and ran, heart pounding. Two hunters after her now; this had been a bad plan. He didn’t call after her.

  Climbing down from the roof was a quick, mad scramble, her one working hand scrabbling at the wall as she nearly slid down. She hit the ground hard and fell on her hands and knees for a moment, then pushed herself up, tucking her numb arm to her side, and ran blindly. She had only contracted the Wolf. Had this Leader sent more to finish the job? But she’d cancelled it. How many people could possibly be after her head?

  Orfeus leaned out from around the Hub, trying to get a good view.

  Two figures stood where the shots had come from, on the other side of the square. They stood there openly. None of these Wild folk seemed to feel any need to be subtle.

  One, wearing a mask not unlike Faol’s that showed some animal that was spotted and snarling, lifted a long-muzzled wand and pointed it. More beams of cold blue light shot out in the direction of the roof where Orfeus had been. The person shooting the wand laughed the whole while, a wild, raging laugh. Not a wand, a gun, like some horror from the ancient times.

  The other person lifted a hand and rested it on the shooter’s shoulder, perhaps to calm them. They were more slender, draped in belts of unknown equipment with a bag slung over their back. Their mask showed the fanged mouth of a shark in grey and white, with pitted black eyes.

  “These people are awful,” Orfeus whispered. She felt a laugh bubbling up in her chest. “This’ll make a hell of a song!”

  The person in what Orfeus thought was a hyena mask shifted the angle of their gun, and began firing the blue numbing bolts indiscriminately into the square and the street and the facades of buildings. Orfeus abruptly lost the urge to laugh.