The Damsel and the Daggerman

.3.

The next morning, Jacinda stepped down from the ringmaster’s wagon, pulling her glove back on and feeling very peculiar indeed. Her notebook and pen were under her arm, the large metal dog waiting for her at the bottom of the stairs. After Lady Letitia’s strange behavior, she was more intrigued than ever to finally walk among the carnivalleros.

The fortune-teller’s manners and accent had been strange, and touching the bare skin of someone who wasn’t a lover had been a puzzling experience.

“Oh,” was all the glancer had said at first.

“Oh?”

Letitia’s other hand clasped warmly around Jacinda’s. “I’m sorry. About your husband.”

Jacinda straightened her shoulders and struggled to hold in that one damnable tear that threatened to wiggle out every time she talked about Liam. “I am, too.”

Letitia leaned in closer, patting Jacinda’s hand excitedly. “It’s going to get better—I promise you. You’re going to have some amazing adventures.” An impish smile told Jacinda that the glancer was keeping secrets, but knowing her future made her queasy, so she didn’t use her uncanny ability to winkle things out of loose lips. She’d never placed much faith in fortune-tellers, but if Letitia’s blessing was necessary for her admission to the caravan, she was willing to undergo the glancer’s scrutiny. And pity.

“Does that mean I can write the book?”

Letitia grinned. “Of course. Don’t worry about Criminy and his threats. He’s just a puppy, really.”

One eyebrow shot up as Jacinda thought about the ringmaster’s fangs. “A puppy?”

“A wolf puppy, maybe.”

“Then I owe you my thanks, Lady Letitia.”

“Please, honey. Call me Tish. And promise me you’ll be careful.”

The older woman’s nervous concern made Jacinda really study her. Fine lines webbed Tish’s eyes, and strands of white threaded her dark hair. The woman’s energy, strangely accented voice, and entire mien were of a younger woman, and yet she had to be at least ten years older than Jacinda. The outside did not match the inside. Something odd was going on here.

“So what’s your story, Tish?”

A coy smile told Jacinda she was about to get the brush-off. “Let’s just say my story didn’t really start until I got to the caravan. Besides, fortune-tellers are always more intriguing when they’re mysterious. Now, forget about little old me and go talk to the carnivalleros.”

With the glancer’s blessing, Jacinda was free to explore the caravan, yet she didn’t know where to start. Each lacquered wagon was painted a different color, most of them with beautifully calligraphed words proclaiming the talents of the denizens within. But no one was walking around or practicing in the weak morning sunlight, so Jacinda tapped her hip and began to explore the perimeter of the circle of boxcars with the mechanical dog clicking at her heels. It didn’t take long before she realized where all the action was: inside the circle, beyond the large clockwork animals that stood in the spaces between cars. A soaring patchwork tent, ragged but beautiful and open on the sides, was the source of the laughter and burbling voices that carried over the wind. It reminded her of the desert caravans she’d once traveled with at Liam’s side. She froze, seeing beyond the clockwork kangaroo to a past she couldn’t forget and couldn’t escape, to words shouted in anger and a heavy thump and the sudden silence, after.

“Can’t find your way in, eh?”

Jacinda turned to the aggressively dressed girl who had materialized by her side. Black-rimmed eyes hooded with glittering blue shadow glared back at her. In her younger days, the journalist would have felt the sting of otherness, of knowing that she didn’t belong among the brightly painted circus folk. Now the difference between her own serviceable adventuring costume and the girl’s lurid pink and green getup only made Jacinda feel more powerful. She didn’t need paint and gimmicks to get what she needed.

“No, I’m afraid I’m quite new to all this.”

The girl’s smile curled like a cat’s mouth barely containing feathers. “Always glad to help the new girls. I’m Emerlie, by the by. Tightrope walker. I’ll show you the way, shall I?” She took off, and Jacinda had no choice but to follow, her eyes dancing with spots from the vibrant acid green of Emerlie’s tutu.

“So you’re the tightrope girl?”

The tiny hat bobbed. “Tightrope, unicycle, juggling, bit of this and that. Been with the caravan forever. What’s your act?”

“Oh, nothing so impressive. I’m a writer. A journalist, to be exact.”

Emerlie dropped back, her expression avid. “You here to talk to Marco, then?”

“Marco?”

The girl’s shoulders shivered in excitement. “You don’t know? The new knife thrower—Marco Taresque? He’s a murderer.” But she didn’t look disappointed by the fact. Far from it.

“A murderer?”

“That’s what they say down south. Story goes, him and his lovely young assistant disappeared one night, and all they found the next morning was a wagon splattered in blood.”

“Interesting.” Jacinda opened her notebook and began scribbling. “Do you know Mr. Taresque personally?”

Emerlie gave a sly wink over her shoulder. “We don’t talk much. But he knows how to stick a dagger, I’ll give him that.”

“Is that supposed to be a euphemism?”

The girl spun around. “A what, now?”

“Are you implying that you’ve bedded this murderous knife thrower?” Jacinda held her pen poised over the page expectantly.

Emerlie sneered. “You calling me a liar?”

“I’m not calling you anything. But I have a reputation for printing the truth, not wishful thinking.”

“It’s not wishful!”

Jacinda sighed and closed her notebook. “The only thing the knife thrower’s ever stuck you with was a mouthful of disappointment.” The look of outrage on Emerlie’s face was enough to make Jacinda giggle behind her glove.

“Find him yourself, then, cow!”

The girl flounced away, her tiny top hat bobbing over pin-curled blond hair, leaving Jacinda alone before a clockwork bird in the space between two wagons. Jacinda coughed down the rest of her giggles. Even if Emerlie was the reticule of gossip in the caravan, gently flattering half-truths out of the little ninny would have been immensely annoying, compared with going directly to the source. And now she had a lead on the sort of juicy story every journalist dreamed of nailing.

Jacinda glanced up at the awkwardly dancing bird. As she ducked to move past it and into the tented space beyond, the machine’s head shot around, blocking her way. Shoving it did nothing to discourage it, and no matter which way she moved, it wouldn’t let her pass. When a small syringe appeared in its beak, she decided she’d had enough and removed a small metal device from the bag at her belt.

“That’s enough out of you.”

Holding the gadget as close to the bird as she dared, she pushed a red button, and a blue spark arced to the bird’s copper body and raced over its surface like a wave devouring sand. The thing went still, a slender curl of smoke rising from its eye. Tucking the disruptor back into her bag and rucking up her skirt, she slid under the bird’s now-still neck and entered the circle beyond the wagons. Useful things, disruptors.

Laughter, murmurs, and the occasional thunk carried from under the patchwork tent. Not wanting to encroach on what was clearly a personal space, Jacinda sent Brutus back to her wagon and kept to the circle of weak sunlight just beyond the tent’s shadow, skirting the wagons as she navigated around the spaces set up for practice or work. The strong man nodded to her warily, a two-headed Bludman leered at her, and the lizard boy raised an appreciative eye from where he snoozed in a lone sunbeam that fell through a rip in the tent. She nodded politely but didn’t stop to begin her interviews. She was too avid to reach the source of the repetitive thunking noise. All she knew about this Marco Taresque was that he was a knife thrower, a possible murderer, and someone with whom Emerlie desperately wanted to be physically linked, and that combination intrigued her in more ways than one.

When she walked up, the subject of her inquiry was pulling a bouquet of knives from a scarred wooden target painted in rings of red and white. She had a moment to study him before he noticed her, and she realized immediately why Emerlie had been so very keen. Marco Taresque was a damn fine specimen of a man, dark and angular and as sharp as his knives, with thick, wavy hair that trailed down his back like brambles, making him seem half wild. She couldn’t help staring, willing him to face her while still enjoying the elegant but powerful movement of his shoulders and arms as he unconsciously went through his routine.

Like most men, he wore a white shirt that had seen better days, but the sleeves were more fitted, while the collar was uncharacteristically loose, especially when so many Bludmen were near to hand. He wasn’t wearing a coat, which was expected for such an unusually warm day. But his midnight-blue waistcoat was of a cut she’d never seen before, thick and tight, with boning similar to that of a lady’s corset and lacing up the back. It sharpened the lines of an already sharp man, setting off the wideness of his shoulders and the way his shirt stretched across well-muscled arms. As he pulled the knives from the wood, he slid them one by one into invisible slots in his vest, where their black handles disappeared against the velvety fabric. She counted twelve, six on each side, before the target was cleared. The daggerman spun around, saw her watching, and froze.

Feeling the full strength of his violet eyes, she froze, too. For a moment, they stood that way, and Jacinda was wildly aware that he could have reached down and stuck her with every knife in his vest before she could spin and run away. She felt like the target, like a solid thing, painted and waiting to be pierced. Despite a leather corset designed to repel attacks, she had never felt so vulnerable, not in seven years of traveling the most removed, dangerous cities of Sang. She imagined a black dagger flipping end over end, as quick as a bird, to strike her directly in the heart with a wooden thunk.

And then he smiled, a quick, wry thing that was gone instantly, replaced by a dark scowl.

“I should have known you’d find me.”

His voice was gravelly but musical, with an accent at once unfamiliar and enticing, and his eyes settled on the notebook and pen held, limp, in her hands. She dipped her head in acknowledgment but not acquiescence.

“You’ve heard of me, then, Mr. Taresque?”

Looking down, he ran a hand through his hair. He walked toward her, every step deliberate, boots crunching on dead grass already trampled. As he passed close enough for her to feel the air stir from his sleeve, he said, “No. But I know your type. You’re not the first. You’ll not be the last.”

He kept walking, and as she’d promised to obey Criminy’s rules, she had no choice but to watch him go. His snug-fitting trousers had fine pinstripes that disappeared into high black boots. The man bristled with so many knives she wasn’t sure how he sat without cutting himself to ribbons.

In her years first as a student, then as a journalist’s assistant, then, most recently, as a solitary adventurer, she’d met thousands of men. Heroes, villains, brigands, jackals, shamans, monsters, soldiers, weak-chinned milksops, and even uncivilized madmen. But the strange push and pull of Marco Taresque was a first for her. Aloof but magnetic. Wild but carefully contained. Dangerous to a fault but in no way overtly threatening. Dark but oh so appealing. As soon as her feet caught up with her heart, she was following at his heels, pen and notebook in hand, hoping Criminy didn’t have spies lurking about.

“Mr. Taresque, would you be willing to tell me your story?”

He didn’t turn. Didn’t break stride. Said nothing.

“It’s not just you, of course. I didn’t come here to find you personally. I’m writing a book on the caravan. With Criminy Stain’s blessing.”

Again, no response. Just steady, confident, angry steps, faster and faster so that she was almost jogging to keep up. She was starting to feel desperate and resorted to a journalist’s last resort: accusation.

“I’ve heard that you’re dangerous. That there was blood everywhere.”

He had reached the clockwork bird she’d recently deactivated. A begoggled artificer and a woman in a frumpy coat were fussing with the wires in an open compartment, arguing over the cause of the automaton’s malfunction as he held a screwdriver and she held a book. Without a word, Marco took two fast steps, planted a boot on the man’s back, and catapulted himself over the bird.

“Dammit, man! These are fragile instruments,” the artificer growled, but Marco ignored him and kept walking.

“Oh, Henry. That’s your best vest,” the woman said, fussing at the bootprint.

Jacinda tried to get around the pair and the collection of tools, books, and wires arrayed on the ground, but there was no clear path, unless she went over, which even she wouldn’t risk in such voluminous skirts.

“Are you hiding something, Marco Taresque?” she shouted at his rapidly disappearing back.

He stopped and turned, hands on hips bristling with knives. Did she imagine the smile tugging at his lips?

“Of course I am!” he shouted back.

And then he was gone.