Page 61 of Crooked Kingdom (Dregs 2)
Wylan didn’t know what he meant at all, but he felt admitting that would be a bad mistake. “Sure,” he said with as much confidence as he could muster.
The boy cut him a skeptical glance. “We’ll see. Be out front at six bells. And no guns unless you want trouble.”
“Of course not.”
The boy had rolled his gray eyes and muttered, “Kaz has got to be out of his mind.”
At six bells, Jesper arrived to escort Wylan to a bait shop in the Barrel. Wylan had been embarrassed by his rumpled clothes, but they were the only ones he owned, and the paralyzing fear that this was just some elaborate trap concocted by his father had provided ample distraction from his worry. In a back room of the bait shop, Wylan met Kaz and Inej. They told him they needed flash bombs and maybe something with a little more kick. Wylan had refused.
That night, he arrived back at the boardinghouse to find the first letter. The only words he recognized were the name of the sender: Jan Van Eck.
He’d lain awake all night, certain that at any moment Prior would smash through the door and clamp his meaty hands around his neck. He’d thought about running, but he barely had enough money to pay his rent, let alone buy a ticket out of the city. And what hope did he have in the country? No one was going to hire him on as farm labor. The next day, he went to see Kaz, and that night, he built his first explosive for the Dregs. He knew what he was doing was illegal, but he’d made more money for a few hours’ work than he made in a week at the tannery.
The letters from his father continued to arrive, once, sometimes twice a week. Wylan didn’t know what to make of them. Were they threats? Taunts? He stashed them in a stack beneath his mattress, and sometimes at night he thought he could feel the ink bleeding through the pages, up through the mattress and into his heart like dark poison.
But the more time that passed and the more he worked for Kaz, the less scared he felt. He’d make his money, get out of town, and never speak the name Van Eck again. And if his father decided to have him done away with before then, there was nothing Wylan could do about it. His clothes were ragged and threadbare. He was getting so skinny, he had to cut new holes in his belt. But he would sell himself in the pleasure houses of West Stave before he’d ask for his father’s mercy.
Wylan hadn’t realized it then, but Kaz had known his true identity all along. Dirtyhands kept tabs on anyone who took up residence in the Barrel, and he’d placed Wylan under Dregs protection, certain that one day a rich mercher’s son would come in handy.
He had no illusions about why Kaz had looked out for him, but he also knew he never would have survived this long without his help. And Kaz didn’t care if he could read. Kaz and the others teased him, but they’d given him a chance to prove himself. They valued the things he could do instead of punishing him for the things he couldn’t.
Wylan had believed that Kaz could get revenge for what had been done to his mother. He’d believed that despite his father’s wealth and influence, this crew—his crew—was a match for Jan Van Eck. But now his father was reaching out to taunt him yet again.
It was well past midnight when they reached the financial district. They’d arrived in one of the wealthiest areas of the city, not far from the Exchange and the Stadhall. His father’s presence felt closer here, and Wylan wondered why Kaz had brought them to this part of town. Kaz led them through an alley to the back of a large building, where a door had been propped open, and they entered a stairwell built around a huge iron lift that they shuffled inside. Rotty remained behind, presumably to keep watch over the entrance. The lift’s gate clanged shut and they rode it fifteen stories up, to the building’s top floor, then emerged into a hallway laid in patterns of lacquered hardwood, its high ceilings painted a pale, foamy lavender.
We’re in a hotel, Wylan realized. That was the servants’ entrance and the staff elevator.
They knocked on a pair of wide white double doors. Colm Fahey answered, wearing a long nightshirt with a coat thrown over it. They were at the Geldrenner.
“The others are inside,” he said wearily.
Colm asked them no questions, just pointed toward the bathroom and poured himself a cup of tea as they tracked mud and misery across the purple carpets. When Matthias saw Nina, he leapt from his seat on the huge aubergine sofa and clasped her in his arms.
“We couldn’t get through the blockades to Sweet Reef,” he said. “I feared the worst.”
Then they were all hugging, and Wylan was horrified to find his eyes filling with tears. He blinked them back. The last thing he needed was for Jesper to see him cry again. The sharpshooter was covered in soot and smelled like a forest fire, but he had that wonderful glimmer-eyed look he always seemed to get when he’d been in a fight. All Wylan wanted to do was stand as close as he possibly could to him and know that he was safe.
Until this moment, Wylan hadn’t quite understood how much they meant to him. His father would have sneered at these thugs and thieves, a disgraced soldier, a gambler who couldn’t keep out of the red. But they were his first friends, his only friends, and Wylan knew that even if he’d had his pick of a thousand companions, these would have been the people he chose.
Only Kaz stood apart, staring silently out the window to the dark streets below.
“Kaz,” said Nina. “You may not be glad we’re alive, but we’re glad you’re alive. Come here!”
“Leave him be,” murmured Inej softly.
“Saints, Wraith,” said Jesper. “You’re bleeding.”
“Should I call a doctor?” asked Jesper’s father.
“No!” they all replied in unison.
“Of course not,” said Colm. “Should I ring for coffee?”
“Yes, please,” said Nina.
Colm ordered coffee, waffles, and a bottle of brandy, and while they waited, Nina enlisted their help to locate some shears so that she could cut up the hotel towels for bandages. Once a pair had been found, she took Inej into the bathroom to see to her wounds.
When a knock sounded at the door, they all tensed, but it was only their meal. Colm greeted the maid and insisted that he could manage the cart
so that she wouldn’t see the strange company that had assembled in his rooms. As soon as the door closed, Jesper jumped up to help him wheel in a silver tray laden with food and stacks of dishes of porcelain so fine it was almost transparent. Wylan hadn’t eaten off dishes like these since he’d left his father’s house. He realized Jesper must be wearing one of Colm’s shirts; it was too big in the shoulders and too short in the sleeves.
“What is this place, anyway?” Wylan asked, looking around the vast room decorated almost entirely in purple.
“The Ketterdam Suite, I believe,” said Colm, scratching the back of his neck. “It’s considerably finer than my room at the university district inn.”
Nina and Inej emerged from the bathroom. Nina heaped a plate with food and plunked down beside Matthias on the couch. She folded one of the waffles in half and took a huge bite, wiggling her toes in bliss.
“I’m sorry, Matthias,” she said with her mouth full. “I’ve decided to run off with Jesper’s father. He keeps me in the deliciousness to which I have become accustomed.”
Inej had removed her tunic and wore only her quilted vest, leaving her brown arms bare. Strips of towel were tied at her shoulder, both of her forearms, her right thigh and her left shin.
“What exactly happened to you?” Jesper asked her as he handed his father a cup of coffee on a delicate saucer.
Inej perched in an armchair next to where Kuwei had settled himself on the floor. “I made a new acquaintance.”
Jesper sprawled out on a settee and Wylan took the other chair, a plate of waffles balanced on his knee. There was a perfectly good table and chairs in the suite’s dining room, but apparently none of them had an interest in it. Only Colm had taken a seat there, coffee beside him, along with the bottle of brandy. Kaz remained by the window, and Wylan wondered what he saw through the glass that was so compelling.
“So,” Jesper said, adding sugar to his coffee. “Other than Inej making a new pal, what the hell happened out there?”
