THE BIDDING WAR

"Seven million, one hundred thousand," said the auctioneer again, as if he could not believe it. "From the Widow of Redwater. Do I hear seven-two?"

The hall was a held breath. I could see faces in the tiers below, white ovals turned upward, a thousand of them, mouths slightly open. I could see Senators craning. I could see the lady in black pearls with her fan frozen in midair. I could see, in the second tier, a heavy gray man lowering his cane an inch, very slowly, to the floor of his box.

"Seven-two," said the Patriarch.

"Seven-three," I said.

I did not say it aloud. I whispered it to Mabel's boy, who stood at my elbow with a pad, and he scribbled it down and ran it to the front of the box, where a clerk with a tin speaking-trumpet relayed it to the stage. This was the custom. The Widow, being anonymous, was never to speak. Her bids came down from the dark in a stranger's voice, as though from an oracle.

"Seven-three, from the Widow."

"Seven-five," said the Patriarch.

"Seven-six."

"Eight."

"Eight-one."

A ripple of laughter began in the stalls, nervous, excited. It spread. Fans fluttered. The Senator in purple was mopping his forehead. A banker in the pit had stood up, to see better, and been pulled down by his neighbors. The auctioneer's face had gone the color of boiled mutton. He was leaning on the podium. His gavel had dropped from his fingers, and he did not seem to notice.

"Eight million one hundred thousand," he croaked.

…

"You do not have it," said the Shade.

His voice was quiet at my ear. I did not turn my head. The curtain stirred. Josie, beside me, had her hands pressed over her mouth, and her eyes were enormous.

"I have a million two," I said, under my breath.

"The crystal is at eight."

"I know."

"If you win it, they will demand payment. Tonight. In full."

"I know."

"I am merely pointing out," said the Shade, "that when you are exposed as a fraud before the Republic, I shall be forced to say that I told you so."

"I won't be exposed."

"Oh?"

"Mabel."

A rustle of black bombazine behind the curtain. Mabel Quinn had come in, silent as a cat, with a folded paper in her hand. She stood at my shoulder, small and upright and pale, her spectacles pushed up on her forehead. She pressed the paper into my glove.

"The Exchange," she whispered, "has just made one point five million on your first lot. Their commission is eleven percent. In the last four minutes, it has made three hundred thousand more on side-bets. In the next ten minutes, if this holds, it will make more than the last decade combined." She tapped the paper. "The directors have met. They are in the back office, in a state of religious ecstasy. They have authorized me to extend you a line of credit."

I looked at her.

"How much?"

"As much as you need."

"On what security?"

"On the strength of the Widow." Mabel's black eyes gleamed. "On the strength of five S-grade pieces. On the strength of what you'll make next. They are betting on your future, my girl. They think you're a gold mine." She smiled. It was an unpleasant smile, a smile with teeth in it. "I told them they were quite right."

I unfolded the paper. It was a bearer note, countersigned by three directors of the Gilded Exchange. It bore a number I did not read twice.

"I will have to pay it back."

"Naturally. In consignments. Three, over the next two years. Fifteen percent over cost." A shrug. "It is a very good rate. I negotiated it myself."

I looked at the note a moment longer. Then I folded it, slowly, and slid it under my glove.

"Eight-two," I whispered.

…

It lasted a quarter of an hour.

I want to say that it was a duel, because it felt like one. But a duel has a rhythm. This had none. It was a hammering, a stuttering, a stampede. Each bid came in the instant the last had died. The Patriarch answered flatly, without hurry, without pause; I heard his voice go on and on in the silence like the tolling of a clock. Each time I answered him, higher, I felt something shift in the house, a kind of vibration, as of a crowd in the grip of a single appetite.

Nine million.

Nine-five.

Ten.

At ten the Senator in purple rose from his seat, shook his fist at the second tier, and stormed out. At ten-two the lady in black pearls laughed aloud, a high, delighted peal, and sat back with her fan to watch. At ten-five, in the box of gold and blue, I saw Torrance Whitlock lean across to his brother and speak urgently in his ear. The Patriarch listened. He did not turn his head.

"Ten-six," said the auctioneer. "Ten-six from the Widow. Ten-seven? House Whitlock, ten-seven?"

A pause.

It was a long pause. It stretched. In the silence I could hear the chandelier ticking faintly, expanding in the warmth. I could hear a woman at the back whisper oh, my God. In the Whitlock box, the Patriarch had put his hand to his brow.

"He has reached his limit," said the Shade.

"How do you know?"

"I have been counting. Everything the Whitlocks can raise. The vaults, the estates, the Manor, the Marshals' pension fund. The number is ten point eight. He will go to it, and no further." A beat. "He is, as you say, a creature of ledgers."

"Ten-seven," said the Patriarch.

His voice was different. It had gone gray and flat. It was the voice of a man at the end of a rope.

"Eleven," I whispered.

The relay boy ran. The clerk bellowed it into his trumpet. And the hall, as the numeral rang out, made a single wordless sound, like the sound of a great creature exhaling.

"Eleven million," said the auctioneer.

In the Whitlock box, Alden had turned to his father.

I could see his face. It was white, pinched, desperate. He was speaking rapidly, low and hard, pointing at the stage. He wanted to bid. He wanted to sell something. I saw his lips shape the Manor, the Manor, sell the Manor. And I saw the Patriarch's big gray hand come up, slowly, and close on his son's wrist.

"No," said the old man.

I could not hear it. I read it.

"No."

"Eleven million, going once," said the auctioneer, in a shaking voice.

Behind the Whitlocks, in the wheeled chair, Cordelia Fairchild had begun to scream.

…

It was a thin sound, hardly audible above the noise of the hall. It was not a scream of anger. It was the wail of a child who has been told that Christmas is cancelled. She was straining against the straps, writhing, her bandaged arms flailing at her sides, her mouth wide, tears pouring down her cheeks. The nurse was trying to hold her. A doctor had leapt from somewhere. Alden turned, half-rose from his seat, and put his arms around her; and I watched her fall against his chest, shaking, sobbing, clutching his coat with her useless hands.

I felt nothing.

I felt a faint flicker of curiosity, like a scientist at a failed experiment. I felt, perhaps, a thread of grim satisfaction. But I did not feel pity. I had looked for it, in the hollow place, and found none. I had given all that I had to give to a girl in a white dress in the Menagerie, and there was no more.

"Going twice," said the auctioneer.

The Patriarch looked down at his hands.

"Eleven million," he repeated, "from the Widow of Redwater, going—"

The gavel came down.

I did not hear the word. It was drowned in a vast, continuous roar, the whole house rising, shouting, stamping, a surf of voices pounding against the walls. The orchestra, in a spasm of ecstasy, struck up a triumphal march. Men were embracing each other. Women were weeping. Someone threw a hat in the air, and it spun, turning, across the vault of the dome and came down in a box on the third tier, on the head of a startled bishop.

I sat in the dark, and breathed, and waited for my pulse to slow.

"It's ours," whispered Josie. "It's ours."

"Yes."

"Tam. Tam, you've beaten them."

"I've only bought a rock."

"You've bought the rock!"

…

They brought it to me in a covered tray, an hour later, in the antechamber behind the box. Two of the Exchange's guards, in scarlet livery, carried it in on a cushion. Mabel's boy took it from them and set it on the table. The lid was lifted.

The Phoenix Blood Crystal lay in its silver cage, pulsing softly, gold and scarlet and warm. It lit the room like a hearth. I could feel the heat of it on my face. I put out a gloved finger and touched the wire.

Instantly the thing in my chest woke.

It was not a surge. It was a recognition, sharp, bright, tender. The Emberheart stirred under my ribs and leaned toward the crystal like a flower to the sun. And the crystal, in its cage, brightened in answer. It pulsed in rhythm with my heart. I felt a warmth rise up my arm, along the line of the golden tree, and the Sigil glowed.

"They are kin," said the Shade, in wonder. "The Phoenix was born of the same fire. It is a child of the First Sovereign's blood."

"It will heal Cordelia."

"It would."

"It will restore her arms. Her channels. Her Sigil." I withdrew my finger. "She will be whole. She'll cast, and she'll hate, and she'll come for me again with whatever she's got."

"Yes."

"I'd rather she didn't."

"I thought you might say so."

I looked at the stone for some time.

Then I turned to Mabel, who was standing in the doorway, counting a stack of vouchers with a frown.

"Madam Quinn," I said. "There are three more lots in the catalog."

"Lot twenty-nine, thirty-one, and thirty-four." She did not look up. "A set of Silver-grade restoratives, a vial of Elder-dust, and a pair of antique healing-rings. Why?"

"Because those are what the Whitlocks came for," I said. "As a fallback."

She glanced up.

"They didn't have enough for the crystal. They knew they might not. So they marked three other lots as second-best: anything that might help the girl. The restoratives. The dust. The rings." I smiled. "I'd like to buy them."

Mabel put down the vouchers.

"All three?"

"All three."

"The restoratives alone will cost two hundred thousand."

"The note covers it."

"My dear girl," said Mabel, slowly, "you are going to ruin them."

"Yes," I said. "That is the idea."

…

We went back to the box for the last of the sale.

I sat with the veil down and Ashbrand across my knees and the Gold Sigil quiet on my wrist, and I bought the three lots without a word. The Whitlock bids came in thin and feeble, then not at all. When the gavel fell on lot thirty-four, the second-tier box was empty. The Patriarch had left. The nurse had left. There was a pool of lamplight on the carpet where Cordelia's chair had stood.

I thought: They will come to me.

I thought: They won't be able to help themselves.

The house was emptying, in a rumble of chairs and a pleasant babble of talk. The orchestra played something soft. Josie was asleep against my shoulder, her mouth open, her hat awry. The Shade stood by the curtain, looking down at the floor with a thoughtful, narrow look.

I rose. I tucked the covered tray under my arm. I lifted the curtain.

And a hand pushed it back.

…

He was standing in the corridor, in the red light, with his chest heaving.

He had run. I could see it. His hair was damp. His coat was open. There was a flush on his cheekbones, bright, febrile, unlike anything I had seen on him. He had followed the clerk. He had bribed a guard. He had come alone, from the second tier to the first, through three corridors, and thrown aside a curtain that said PRIVATE in gold letters.

He stood there, looking at me, at the black veil, at the gray coat, at the Gold tree faintly glowing under my sleeve. I saw the recognition travel across his face in slow stages, like a man stepping into a cold lake.

"It's you," said Alden.

His voice was hoarse.

"It's you."