Wicked Bronze Ambition

100

“That would appear to be the place,” Morley said, less fiercely than you would expect of someone who had just discovered the base of a long-sought and troublesome adversary.

Mud Man and crew were not to be seen. Dollar Dan, still tagging along, was worried. The mutts smelled something to make them nervous, too.

Adversary? Did we have that kind of relationship with Min?

I didn’t think so.

I shared Morley’s mood. The trouble in troublesome felt likely to shift and make for challenging footing.

This Vicious Min hole-up was sadder than the last. It was a literal hole in a wall, the sort of place an outcast, later to become known as Vicious Min, might have spent a grimly impoverished childhood.

The hole had been hollowed out of the downhill-side foundation of an enormous windmill crowning a rock upthrust that rose twenty feet above street level on that side. The mill no longer worked but did have strong wards against the usual threats of thievery, scavengers, and squatters. You could smell the sorcery like garlic in a century-old tenement. The air crackled, but the protective spells didn’t reach down to the foundation on this side. Someone had figured that out and had removed blocks of stone one by one to create a man-made cave underneath the mill.

This was Beifhold’s Mill, a notorious landmark from the last century. It had the protection of the Crown and city because it was unique and storied but not enough so that anyone wanted to invest in upkeep. The last maintenance I recalled was a whitewashing the year before Mom passed away. Nothing else had gotten done since the last Beifhold died in the Cantard.

The cave entrance didn’t look big enough to pass someone Min’s size, which might explain her need for that other place, which she hadn’t shared. She did not appear to be around now, but someone was sitting outside, bent over his lap in the rain, unconscious or sleeping. He could be Min’s little brother-though he still went twice as bigger than me. The dogs didn’t like him. They showed a lot of teeth, for no obvious reason.

Morley opined, “It looks like a whole family lives there.”

“Sad, huh? Maybe that’s deeper than it looks.”

“Yes. And yes, it is about as sad as I can imagine anything being.”

I said, “I see why Min would get into something sketchy.”

“The price of keeping body and soul and family together.”

“Um. But I won’t forgive her. However much I understand. Is that creature even alive?” I checked to see what Preston Womble and his henchwoman were doing. Whatever that might be, I didn’t catch them doing it. They had become invisible. We hadn’t caught a whiff of them since the encounter with Scithe. Speaking of which, what had become of Lurking Fehlkse? Even Dollar Dan hadn’t caught wind of him lately.

At the moment he was sniffing after Mud Man. He said, “The creature is breathing, but it may be damaged or drugged.”

The character beside the cave mouth was less active than a decorative gargoyle. Not only had he not moved; I couldn’t detect his breathing. Had the Black Orchid gotten here already? Shouldn’t there be more blood?

“See no evil,” Morley breathed as a woman approached from our left, strolling toward the cave, not obviously interested and in no great hurry. She had acquired an umbrella. She stopped just out of reach of the sleeping giant-using giant loosely, descriptively instead of ethnically-and began speaking too softly to hear. She folded her umbrella as she did.

Giant Boy didn’t twitch when she poked him.

Brownie made a snorting noise that I expected to give us away. Orchidia didn’t react. The giant toppled, then slowly relaxed into a half-fetal position, on his right side, still showing no sign of life.

A chubby raindrop got me on the left cheek despite my waterlogged hat, which drooped around the brim. I glanced up. Behold, there was the blond child sitting on the hub between two sails where they were rooted in the axle that transferred wind energy to the innards of the mill. Just sitting there. Watching.

Orchidia surely sensed me, Morley, Dan, and the dogs, but she had no clue about the child in the sky. She focused on the unresponsive big boy.

That was bizarre. I had a hard time keeping my yap shut. Dollar Dan Justice had as hard a time not fussing about the absence of Mud Man.

Keeping her umbrella aimed at her victim, Orchidia moved to the cave. With her other hand she conjured one of those glow balls beloved of her kind.

She took a close look at the sleeper, her head sideways to the cave.

A fist shot out. It clipped her despite a reflex move so fast that master martial artist Morley Dotes gasped in admiration.

Orchidia staggered a dozen feet, collapsed to one knee. Morley and Dollar Dan both snagged my arms so I wouldn’t go all white knight, but I had no intention of rushing in.

The big thing who ran with the blonde emerged from the cave supplely as a snake. At that range and in that light, I saw a definite resemblance to Vicious Min.

He thumped Orchidia again, deftly bound her with cords hanging ready at his belt, gagged her, stuffed her into a big jute gunnysack handed to him by another big thing who emerged from the cave after him, this one old, stooped, arthritic, and one-eyed, with a left leg that had been broken below the knee and never properly set. Old One tossed Sleeping Boy onto a shoulder, started limping. Blondie’s friend tucked his sackful of Black Orchid under his left arm and followed. Neither ever looked our way.

Morley said, “Let’s don’t ever mix it up with those people.”

“Not without me bringing my siege engine.” I looked up. Sure enough, Little Bits no longer decorated the windmill hub.

Dollar Dan said, “I’m on it,” and headed out after the big folks.

“Be careful,” Morley told him.

“Let’s see what’s in the cave,” I said.

“Like maybe another one of those things?”

“We should look because we came here to look instead of heading straight for the smith’s.”

“I’ll haunt you forever if something mashes my head in.”

The hole-up was empty and sad. Min’s people did not live a good life.

“We know one thing for sure now,” I said, eyeing the squalor. “Neither Min nor that other one qualifies as a Dread Companion.”

“There’s a blessing. Min was here.” He indicated a bloody rag.

“I never doubted that. Mud Man followed her here. Dan will probably find her wherever those people go.” I hoped he looked up once in a while. The girl was sure to notice him. “Let’s go see what the smith has to say.” Then maybe I would sneak off to see Strafa.

“Look here.” He picked up Orchidia’s umbrella, which the big folks hadn’t taken along. “Not all the news is bad.”

Brownie and the girls seemed to know where we were headed right away. Brownie stuck by me, as always, while the others ranged ahead.

They didn’t turn up anything. Not a Lurking Fehlkse, a Preston Womble, nor even an Elona Muriat.

We made the journey quietly. I brooded on what we had learned.