Red Seas Under Red Skies: The Gentleman Bastard Sequence, Book Two (Gentleman Bastards 2)

The Sinspire bouncer came out of nowhere. He doubled Locke over his knee, knocking the wind out of him in one cruel slam, and hurled him back onto the gravel of the lantern-lit courtyard behind the tower. Locke hadn’t even stepped inside, merely approached the door after failing to spot anyone he could easily bribe for an audience with Selendri—

‘Oof,’ he said as the ground made his acquaintance.

Jean, guided more by loyal reflex than clear thinking, got involved as the bouncer came forth to offer Locke further punishment. The bouncer growled and swung a too-casual fist at Jean, who caught it in his right hand, then broke several of the bouncer’s ribs with the heel of his left. Before Locke could say anything, Jean kicked him in the groin and swept his legs out from beneath him.

‘Urrrrgh-ACK,’ he said as the ground made his acquaintance.

The next attendant through the door had a knife; Jean broke the fist that held it and bounced the attendant off the Sinspire wall like a handball from a stone court surface. The next six or seven attendants who surrounded them, unfortunately, had short swords and crossbows.

‘You have no idea who you’re fucking with,’ said one of them.

‘Actually,’ came a harsh feminine whisper from the service entrance, ‘I suspect they do.’

Selendri wore a blue and red silk evening gown that must have cost as much as a gilded carriage. Her ruined arm was covered by a sleeve that fell to her brass hand, while the fine muscles and smooth skin of her other arm were bare, accentuated by gold and Elderglass bangles.

‘We caught them trying to steal into the service entrance, mistress,’ said one of the attendants.

‘You caught us getting near the service entrance, you dumb bastard.’ Locke rose to his knees. ‘Selendri, we need to—’

‘I’m sure you do,’ she said. ‘Let them go. I’ll deal with them myself. Act as though nothing happened.’

‘But he ... gods, I think he broke my ribs,’ wheezed the first man that Jean had dealt with. The other was unconscious.

‘If you agree that nothing happened,’ said Selendri, ‘I’ll have you taken to a physiker. Did anything happen?’

‘Unnnh ... no. No, mistress, nothing happened.’

‘Good.’

As she turned to re-enter the service area, Locke stumbled to his feet, clutching his stomach, and reached out to grab her gently by the shoulder. She whirled on him.

‘Selendri,’ he whispered, ‘we cannot be seen on the gaming floors. We have—’

‘Powerful individuals rather upset about your failure to give them a return engagement?’ She knocked his hand away.

‘Forgive me. And yes, that’s exactly it.’

‘Durenna and Corvaleur are on the fifth floor. You and I can take the climbing closet from the third.’

‘And Jerome?’

‘Stay here in the service area, Valora.’ She pulled them both in through the service entrance so that tray-bearing attendants, studiously ignoring the injured men on the ground, could get on with earning festival-night tips from the city’s least inhibited.

‘Thank you,’ said Jean, taking a half-hidden spot behind tall wooden racks full of unwashed dishes.

‘I’ll give instructions to ignore you,’ said Selendri. ‘As long as you ignore my people.’

‘I’ll be a saint,’ said Jean.

Selendri grabbed a passing attendant with no serving tray and whispered a few terse instructions into his ear. Locke caught the words ‘dog-leech’ and ‘dock their pay’. Then he was following Selendri into the crowd on the ground floor, hunched over as though trying to shrink down beneath his cloak and cap, praying that the next and only person who’d recognize him would be Requin.