The Steel Remains

“No, you listen to me.” There was a cold, hypnotic quality to Ringil’s speech that Milacar didn’t remember from before. “That’s where I woke up the morning after Seethlaw. Replete Cargo Street. I thought at the time it seemed familiar, but I didn’t make the connection. Stupid of me really—you even told me you’d hung on to your old address, that first night I came here to see you. It took me awhile to sort all this out in my head, Grace, try to put it all together, decide what was real, what wasn’t. But you see, I’ve had awhile. I’ve had a long leisurely journey back here to think it all through. And you and the garden and the old place, that was real. It felt different from all the other stuff. I remember that now. Only thing I can’t figure out is whether it was Seethlaw’s idea, or whether you suggested it to him. Care to tell me?”

He met Grace’s eye. Milacar sighed and slumped back on his propped elbows. He looked away.

“I don’t . . .” He shook his head wearily. “Make . . . decisions where Seethlaw is concerned. He comes to me. He takes what he wants.”

“Kind of exciting for you, huh?”

“I’m sorry, Gil. I didn’t want you hurt, that’s all.”

Ringil’s voice hardened. “No, that’s not all. You didn’t want me in Etterkal, just like everybody else. Or if I went—because you knew damn well they wouldn’t be able to stop me—you wanted Seethlaw to know and have it covered. You sold me to him, Grace, you told him where to find me. Had to be you, no one else knew I’d gone to Hale’s place.”

Grace-of-Heaven said nothing.

“Back before I had to kill him, Seethlaw accused me of interfering with his affairs, and what he said was quite specific. You brought your blade and your threats, he said, and your pride that no beauty or sorcery could stem your killing prowess. He heard me say that to you, that first night here, out on the balcony. He was here, in your house, wasn’t he? And then later he followed me home, along with a couple of your more inept machete boys. I scared them off easily enough, but Seethlaw stuck around to laugh at me. Can’t blame him for that—you were both on me from the start. Cozy as fucking spoons in a drawer, and both laughing. Are you in the cabal, Grace?”

Milacar chuckled and shook his head again. There was more energy in it this time.

“Something amusing you?”

“Yeah. You don’t get it, Gil. The cabal touches us all, you don’t have to be in it for that to happen. The cabal is Findrich and Snarl and a few others in Etterkal, a handful in the Chancellery, a couple more up at the Academy. But that’s just what’s at the center. Beyond that, anybody and everybody with an ounce of power in this city has their feet in cabal mud. Just a question of how far up your legs you let it creep, how much you want, and how much you want to know. Me, Murmin Kaad, even your own fucking father. One way or another, we’re all beholden. The cabal reaches out for what it needs.”

Ringil nodded. “Needs a traitor in the Marsh Brotherhood, does it? You want to hear what happened to Girsh?”

“I know what happened to Girsh.” A long sigh. “I’m in the middle here, Gil. I try not to get too deep in on any one side, try not to get too committed or locked in. It’s politics. You get used to that.”

“Seethlaw wasn’t politics, though, was he?”

“Seethlaw.” Grace-of-Heaven swallowed. “Seethlaw was—”

“Beautiful. Yeah, I know, you told me that. Of course, you also told me it was secondhand knowledge, but that was just the quick lie to cover your arse. Couldn’t really admit to me you were fucking the fabulous dwenda in Etterkal, that would have ruined everything. I just wonder why you bothered mentioning him in the first place.”

Milacar bowed his head. “I thought it might scare you off.”

“Yeah? Or you thought I might be competition you could do without?”

“I just didn’t want you hurt, Gil.”

“So you keep saying. Look at my face, Grace. I got hurt.”

“Yeah, well I’m sorry.” Sudden, flaring anger. “If you’d fucking stayed out of it like I told you to, maybe you wouldn’t have that ugly scar now.”

“Maybe not.”

Silence, like a shared flandrijn pipe between them. The shape of what was coming began to emerge in the quiet.

“He took you to the gray places,” Milacar said finally, bitterly.

“Oh yeah.” And though, just from looking at Grace-of-Heaven’s eyes, he already knew the answer, Ringil asked the question anyway. “You?”

Milacar stared off across the room, into the dark corner Ringil had come from. “No. He talked about it, but . . . I don’t know. Never the right time, I guess.”

“Don’t feel bad. You don’t know how fucking lucky you got.” Ringil leaned forward and tapped the scar along his jaw. “You think this is ugly? You should see what I’m carrying inside.”

“You think I can’t?” Milacar looked at him again, and now he was smiling sadly. “You need to take a look in a mirror sometime, Gil. How did you kill him, then? The gorgeous Seethlaw?”