A Clean Death is the fourth in the Tales of The Lesser Evil and this is the seventh chapter.
This is a fantasy series—not quite grimdark, but dark nevertheless—with complicated and believable characters doing their best to survive in a world simply indifferent to their existence.
To read an introduction to this novella, and the backcover blurb, click here.
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A Flicker of Irritation
Hedda was enjoying herself.
She had been cleaned and steamed, enjoyed a massage, her skin scented and smooth with incredible perfumed oils, then she had retired to one of the large chambers offering food and refreshment.
The wines looked expensive and wonderful, but she knew she had to maintain a clear head, instead choosing a freshly pressed fruit concoction to wash down her grilled fish, the thick sea-salt coating and the herbs packing its stomach cavity perfectly balanced, making the whole utterly delicious.
When she was in Eastsea it was rare she paid much attention to food, perhaps because she had so much training to do. Along with helping her mother and Guin with the business, it left little time for pleasure. She could not help but think that this needed to change when they returned, suggest to Pepper that a thorough examination of international cuisine, beyond the reading she had already completed, was not only sensible but crucial.
As she ate, she watched the others in the room over the top of a book she had selected from the shelves lining the walls. She flicked through the pages and found herself thinking of the man she had killed and her reaction.
She felt nothing but happiness that it was not her who was laid in the shit of an alley. She knew others would be shaking in shock, the horror at taking a life as terrible as the fact someone had tried to take theirs.
The more she tried to find some empathy, some kinder reaction to the death, the more that seemed foolish. It was him or her. The simplest of all equations. She had survived, he had not.
Who was he? How had he managed to track them, despite all their precautions? It made little sense—unless he had travelled with them on the Southspray Maree.
She was suddenly glad she had spent so much time with her head in a bucket, the door to the small twin cabin she had ostensibly shared with Pepper locked to stop the Captain checking on her all the time. Perhaps it made more sense to kill in the city—fewer witnesses who would ask questions in a crowded city of mask wearers. The more she thought about it, the more she was sure she was right—the man must have been on the same vessel. She shut the thought away, saved it for later.
The robe was so comfortable Hedda was thinking of asking if she could purchase one to take home with her. The chair she sat on was padded and embroidered, a style different to those she knew, which encouraged a more reclined pose and was also almost too comfortable.
The book she had chosen was fascinating, a bestiary of the incredible, a series of illustrations of different species from the lands surrounding the Horned Sea, each with a description of their habits, habitats and valuable attributes. She had studied several others, Pepper and her mother keen that she learn as much about the world as possible, but this book was better than those. She made a mental note of the author, perhaps they would be able to find a copy before leaving Youlmouth.
She ordered another dish, some sort of richly-scented rice, draped with strips of marinated fish and an accompanying bowl of dipping sauce, all washed down with a second fruit juice, wondering how they had fresh raspberries this late in the season. She was already feeling full before she was halfway through the bowl and set it aside, flicking over another page, the snarling face of a greatwolf staring back. Habit making her look up at movement by the door, as someone else entered the room.
Rinc the Fourth glanced back at her and then went to sit in the corner, waving over one of the staff and loudly demanding a flagon of wine. He spoke in the language of Eastsea and, when the man he had summoned looked confused, he merely repeated what he had said, only louder. He was bright pink, clearly having spent time in the hottest parts of the steams, hiring someone to scrub every inch of his body.
Hedda knew she was lucky. If she had missed him, the consequences would have been dire. She felt a flicker of irritation at herself, for having been lulled into a too-comfortable position by the opulence of her surroundings.
Her heart fluttered. Now she was faced with the moment, the thought of killing Rinc seemed quite different to that she had trained for, especially after the fight earlier. She forced herself to calm down and continue looking through the bestiary.
Another page, another illustration, this time some sort of hairy elephant from the north, taller than those she had seen herself, vast curving tusks useful for sweeping aside snow, or fighting, she suspected.
Rinc belched loudly and scratched at his hairy, naked chest; everyone else kept their robe tightly closed when they were not in the baths or the steam rooms. For some reason the sight offended her and, with it, any remaining doubts disappeared.
Rinc, son of Rinc. The last surviving heir of the Rinc family. Remove him, remove the power of the unimaginably-named clan entirely. The last name on the list Pepper had been working through for over four moons.
Hedda knew there were scant few options as to how to kill him. She had her hands, but he was much bigger and more powerful than she was. To strangle him, or break his neck, would be difficult, even with the element of surprise. It would also be obvious as murder. She could stun him and drown him, but that might also leave too many marks or be witnessed—and there was no guarantee he would return to the water. She could not flee as fast as she would like and the people here knew her face, her clothes, her mask.
Perhaps the best thing would be to follow him back to where he was staying, kill him there later, but that would also be fraught with problems—to lose him in the crowds, or for him to realise he was being followed? Neither was appealing.
Which left the long pin holding her hair. It was the only thing she had managed to bring into the steams, all her other weapons left with her clothing. It would also leave a mark, but only a tiny one, something that might easily be overlooked.
Pepper had commissioned the piece for her on her fifteenth birthday, a beautiful twist of ivory, spiralled and carved with climbing vines. Give it a tug and a twist, whilst pushing on the right leaf, and it came apart, the thicker end holding a narrow, hollow metal needle, the other a reservoir of a toxin she had replaced that morning from a wax-sealed glass bottle. The difficulty came with the placement of the needle. It needed to be deep enough to enter the bloodstream, which required surprising force. In her experiments with an unfortunate goat, she had realised just how easy it was to have the needle slip in her grip and fail to penetrate deeply.
It would still have to do. Somehow.
Hedda waited, eating the rest of her food, reading the book, outwardly relaxed but inwardly poised. She knew she had to be ready to move as soon as an opportunity presented itself.
Rinc did not seem to be in a hurry, continuing to belch and scratch at his pink skin. Other guests moved away from him, the staff exchanging glances with one another, unsure what to do without causing offence.
To Hedda, it seemed Rinc might not be missed if he met with an accident. The observation made her think: why did certain people, Names in their city or neighbourhood, think that this power translated everywhere else? Why did they assume they could get away with talking loudly and slowly in their native tongue in a city where few spoke it? The answer, she knew, was money and wealth and the perceived power and security this brought. Not for the first time, she wondered if the world would be better off without it, but there was little she could do to advance this idea.
Instead, she would remove one of those irritants from the world. As she looked from the disgusted faces of other customers to Rinc picking at his nose and examining whatever he had excavated, the thought of cold-blooded murder seemed less like a killing and more a simple chore, a part of her job which, she realised, it was.
Rinc would die. She not only knew she could do it but also knew it was the right thing to do. A small voice at the back of her head whispered that getting paid to murder someone did not truly justify the death, but she quickly dismissed it. Hedda had trained for this, for years, and it was long overdue. By the time she went to bed that night, she thought, she would have killed two men.
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