Joanna Bourne: The Black Hawk

Her breath caught in her chest with a rattle. Then silence. Cold sluiced over him. Time stopped . . . till she grabbed air again and settled to a slow in-and-out.

Not dying. She wasn’t dying. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

“She hurts,” Doyle said. “They do that when they hurt. It doesn’t mean anything.”

A friend always lies to you.

She muttered something—he couldn’t make out the words—and turned her head on the pillow. She was shaking in all her muscles, as if the pain were trapped inside her body, trying to get out. He said, “This isn’t sleep.”

“No.”

“I used to watch her sleep sometimes, back when I knew her that well.” He’d get out of bed after they made love and go stoke up the fire. He used to stand in the cold, naked, looking down at her, thinking how perfect she was. Not quite believing it was real. “She falls in deep, every muscle loose. It’s the only time she’s not a little watchful. Then she wakes up all at once, all over, smooth as a cat. Probably there’s cat in her ancestry someplace. Those old noble French families . . .”

“No telling, with the French. Inventive people. And she is still strolling about armed to the teeth, even in these piping days of peace. We took a gun out of the pouch in her cloak. Loaded. Not fired recently.”

“I keep telling her—” He steadied his voice. “I used to tell her, you can always trust your powder in the rain. It’s reliably wet.”

“Might be why she had that knife in her hand instead of a gun and she ain’t dead. She was also carrying this.” Doyle took out a handkerchief and unwrapped it carefully to show a soggy, square mass, layer on layer of thin paper, pale pink with dilute blood. “Newspaper clippings. Unreadable at the moment.”

Wet paper. That would be fragile. He didn’t touch. “That would be the papers she’s talking about. Somebody thinks the popular press is worth killing over.”

“Might be the Times . Might be the Observer . This had the bad luck to fall in an inch of water. We’ll dry it out and separate the sheets and see what we got.” Doyle refolded the handkerchief. “It’ll take a few hours.”

“She’ll tell us when she wakes up. Shouldn’t be long.”

Doyle nodded. He gave a last long look at Owl before he walked over to the window. He was dressed like a laborer today . . . a big, ugly, thuggish, barely respectable giant in sturdy clothes. His hair was wet and the gray streaks didn’t show. The scar that ran down his cheek was fake. The imperturbable strength wasn’t. “Still coming down like all the saints’ frogs. Hope the basement doesn’t flood.”

Good weather for killing. Nobody would have seen Justine or the shadow that stalked her. Back when he hunted men, he’d chosen this sort of day.

“I sent word to Sévie. She’ll want to be with her sister.” Doyle started to close the curtains.

“Leave the curtain. It’s still light out. She likes light.” Then he said, “She’s shivering.”

“The room’s warm enough. The chill’s coming from inside her.” But Doyle went to nudge at the fire basket with the toe of his boot. Sparks shot up the chimney and out onto the hearthrug.

Soft thuds on the stairs turned into clicks headed down the hall. Muffin had attached himself to one of the agents, keeping him company, making him conspicuous.

A minute later Pax came in, carrying a tray. Muffin, a dog the size of a small pony, his rough, gray, untidy coat glazed with drops of water, followed. “Broth. Luke says to spoon this into her, if she can swallow.”

“Set it down.” Doyle stripped down to shirt and waistcoat and slung his wet jacket over a straight-backed chair. He rolled up his sleeves, looking ready to hold off a few bruisers, barefisted.

Pax said, “Fletcher and his crew are working their way out from Braddy, asking questions, trying to pick up her trail. We think she may have come directly from her shop. Stillwater and a half dozen are searching the square. Everybody else is in the study, dripping on the rug, drinking tea.”

The men and women who belonged to him were gathering. They’d want to see how he was taking this. Want to lay down the words people said at times like this. They’d need orders. “I’ll be down in a minute.”

Muffin came over, looking worried, and nosed in under an elbow to stick his big square head up to the pillow to sniff over Justine’s hair, memorizing her. He approved of the Justine smell. Didn’t like the blood and antiseptic of the bandage. A few more whuffles up and down the bedcovers and he was satisfied. He clicked across the room to assist Doyle.

Doyle was hunkered down to lay coal on the fire, piece by piece, acting like his hands didn’t feel flame. When he was through and stood up, Muffin took his place and thumped down in front of the fire, taking one end of the hearth to the other. The coal scuttle rattled. He stretched his chin on his paws and curled the great plumed tail to his side.

“I brought the knife.” Pax set bowl and spoon from the tray on the table beside the bed. “Luke says it fits the wound.” He looked at Justine soberly.

“Show him.” Doyle motioned.

Pax had brought it up on the tray. He passed it over, hilt first. “Fletcher found this under a ledge, thirty feet from the blood. Tossed in on purpose, looks like. Don’t touch the edge.”

The knife was a flat, matte-black, deadly curve, elegant as a crow’s wing.

He knew it, of course. “Another of my children has found its way home. What well-trained knives I have.” The weight of it, the balance of it, were completely familiar. He turned it over in his hand. “And look. Somebody’s engraved it for me. The letters A and H . . . for Adrian Hawkhurst. That does make a truly personal gift.”

“From someone who does not wish you well,” Pax said dryly.

“They’re not friendly to Justine, either.”

“It’s yours? You’re sure?” Doyle said.

“Mine. Without doubt. See this?” He ran his thumb on the shaping of the swage. “That was supposed to steady the turn in flight. It didn’t, so I only made an even dozen. I gave one to Justine.” A glance at Pax. “You got one. Fletcher got one. I gave Annique one and she immediately misplaced it, careless woman that she is. I lost two in France, sticking them into people. And I left three behind with my baggage when I fled in undignified haste from . . .” he had to think, “Socchieve, in Italy.”

“So they’re spread broadcast over Europe,” Doyle said.

“That’s nine.” Pax was never happy till the numbers added up. A shop clerk at heart.

“There’s three tossed in a drawer in the workshop downstairs.”

Doyle hooked a finger in his waistcoat pocket and curled out with a pocket lens. Typical of Doyle that he walked around with a magnifier. Wordlessly, he handed it over.

Under the glass . . . “No wear on the edge, for all it’s sixteen years old. A few nicks, probably where it fell today. We have lots of dried blood, just turning brown. That’s an hour old, at a guess. And . . .” There was a white film, as if somebody had drawn the blade through milk and let it dry. Nobody ever put friendly things on a knife. “The blade’s dirty. Poison.”

Pax said, “Luke thinks so. He doesn’t know which one.”

Damn and bloody codswallowing hell. Poison. He dropped the knife down. Took the three steps to the bed. Pulled the blanket off Owl. He’d reopen the wound. It wasn’t too late to—

“Hawk—” Pax caught his wrist. “Hawk. Leave it. It’s clean. You didn’t see. She left a trail of blood all the way back to Braddy Square. Anything that was in there washed out.” Slowly, Pax let go. “There can’t be much poison left in her.”