Teia had heard this story before, though somehow Murder Sharp had forgotten telling her—and she certainly hadn’t heard about it from this perspective.
“He gave me the Biter—you know, that tooth-breaking tool? Oh, right, I showed it to you with the Old Man. Well, he gave me a job to do with it. I was supposed to find this noblewoman, orange drafter, break all her teeth, then kill her. Felia Dariush her name was. I’ll never forget that night. The Old Man told me she’d infuriated some rival who wanted to marry the same man. The Old Man said it was hard to find people who were willing to kill drafters, hard to find people willing to kill women, and hardest to find people who’d take dangerous assignments on short notice. This job had to been done immediately. Course, he didn’t tell me what he meant by ‘immediately,’ but I knew it was my chance—maybe my last chance—to work my way into his good graces.”
“Shit,” Teia said. She didn’t want to, but she felt a kinship for him. The job assassinating the Nuqaba had been like that.
“Yeah. I botched the job. I wonder how different things would be if I hadn’t. Not just for me, either.
“She was staying in a part of Big Jasper I didn’t know well back then. I asked directions from some idiot kopi seller, and he told me the wrong street, gave me directions to Farhad Street instead of Farbod Street. Maybe I misunderstood his accent, or he mine. I broke into the house, and there was no young woman there, but there was a bed and a woman’s clothing in the trunk, so I waited all night for her to come back, thinking I was at the right place. Some tavern girl comes back after dawn, and it’s not her. Description is totally wrong. I ask someone else out in the street and figure out what I did wrong—and I run. I get to Felia’s house and she’s gone. I’m reckless as all hell—knowing this might mean my death if I fail, and I figure out she’d gone to the harbor. I got that feeling in my gut the whole time I’m running there—and I get there in time to see her ship disappear on the horizon. I ask where the boat’s going. I ask for other boats going the same way, though I have no way to pay for passage. It turns out her rich daddy’s boat is one of the fastest around, and no one knows where it’s headed anyway. I ask if there’s a boat heading for her home port, because I know I’m in it deep. I’m willing to gamble going to the wrong port on the bare chance I can fix it. But there isn’t. Not for a week. And I know the Old Man won’t let me live that long if I don’t meet him when I’d said.”
Holy hells, Teia thought.
“No matter how I practiced it in my head, it all sounded like a lame excuse, an unforgivable failure. The Old Man’s not a fool. He doesn’t expect perfection. He tolerates failure from those valuable to him. But this? A rich woman allowed to escape, when the Old Man was already suspicious? I’d look untrustworthy. And that he doesn’t tolerate. So it was life-or-death. Do you know I didn’t really have good teeth beforehand? Didn’t even think about my smile. Didn’t take care of myself. I’d probably not choose to keep a single one of those teeth now. Not like you. Very fortunate, you are.”
She did not want to hear him rhapsodize about her teeth, not right now. Not ever. “That’s . . . that’s not the story you told in the Mirror Room,” Teia said.
“Well, all that was a lie. I was trying to scare you into not getting distracted or greedy when you’re on a job. The real problem with taking a bribe is that every delay gives your target more chances to get away or be saved. Don’t do that.”
Please stay utterly un-self-aware, Teia thought. “So, how am I supposed to know that this story is true this time?” she asked, trying to change the subject.
“Does it look like I’m trying to amuse anyone?”
“So that’s why you broke all your own teeth? Because you were afraid the Old Man would think you’d taken a payoff to let that girl go?”
Too late, as he sucked air through his perfect dentures, she realized she shouldn’t have said he was afraid. How could you call a man a coward who had shattered all his own teeth in order to live?
“I’m sorry—”
“Point is,” Murder Sharp cut her off angrily, “I never had a choice. Not from the moment I was born with a paryl talent I didn’t ask for. Elijah ben-Kaleb didn’t have a choice who I would kill for the Chromeria, and Murder Sharp didn’t have a choice who to kill for the Order. They’re just the fuckin’ same.
“Maybe that’s what she meant,” he mumbled. “Weird fuckin’ lady. No coward, for sure, but she didn’t even fight. Couldn’t figure that out. ‘Son of Separation.’ Maybe this is how I separate myself from them.”
He looked up at Teia with sudden resolve. “That’s why I ain’t killed you yet. Not fondness. Not weakness, for sure. You’re gonna be my proof. I’m better than them. Better than your master, better than mine. Better than Orholam Himself, if He’s up there, who didn’t give me one choice since He cursed me with a talent for paryl. I, Elijah ben-Zoheth, am the god who holds you in his hand. I will give you the choice no one ever gave me. You read this folio, and you make your choice. Join us for real, or fight me, or run.
“You join the Order for real, and I’ll never let ’em know you were a spy from the get-go. Or you can run. As long as you leave a trail so it’s clear that you’re running far away, the Order doesn’t have anyone to spare right now to send after you. Or if they send me, now or later, I won’t find you, on my honor. Or, if you’re just that damned stubborn and stupid, and you want to fight . . .” He paused.
He sucked spit through his teeth a few times.
“Tell you what, I’ll be as, uh, what-you-call-it? fair? sporting? generous? as I wish they would’ve been to me. You choose to fight, I won’t tell them even then, unless you blow your own cover. You aren’t supposed to be on the Jaspers at all. I haven’t reported you—and I won’t. But if you side with the Chromeria, I’ll hunt you down myself, and I’ll kill you. No mercy, no second chances. So I guess you’ll have to try to kill me first. It can be a little hunt. That could be fun. We’ll getta see who’s best. Maybe I’ll have a real challenge for once.
“So you choose. You want to join the Order for real, you show up at the Great Fountain tomorrow at noon. If you want to run, you best be on a boat off the Jaspers by then. If you want to fight me, uh . . . hmm . . . don’t do either of those, I guess? Because if you’re not at the Great Fountain at noon, the next time I see you, you die.”
“I understand,” Teia said.
He loosed her bonds, and she rubbed feeling back into her limbs. “Eyes,” he said.
She made sure he could see her eyes weren’t flared to paryl.
“Now, go,” he said, handing her the folio. “You have some reading to do.”
Teia took it carefully.
“No, wait,” Sharp said suddenly. “Uh, if you run, I can’t risk you using one of your old codes in the note, so just address it to your handler and, you know, ‘I’m sorry’ or something. Nothing else. No secret ink or codes or any of that. I’m ready to give you your life, but I don’t need you endangering mine. So just leave that in your old bunk, under the pillow.”