In the end, the Lady thought, I am a collector of stories. Sad stories, stories of loss or love turned cold. Some stories that were blood red and full of fire, others cold and distant, told through eyes that stared into the Lady’s back and through her. They came to tell her a story and hope for a place, and perhaps the Lady could give them one.

  They called her Leech, and for all its worth she could see truth in it. She pulled the filth from them, sterile drawing out, a bleeding of the last dregs of their Life Before. Some healed under her care and some starved, but she was nothing if not fair. The work to be done was work that any woman born could perform, and while many questioned her choice to not hire the most beautiful or most pleasant, the Lady had her methods of choice.

  The girl in front of her wasn’t telling her whole truth. The Lady knew the whole story; it was written across her body in the ink of bruises and cuts, a simple story that was as old as cruel men and foolish women. He was a sailor, a docksman, a merchant, a lord, and she had thought his hardness pressing into her was a second heart begging her to take it. She had claimed her belly to stop the last beating, and it had not been successful. And once the Lady’s attendants had cared for her, shown the girl that the Ward wasn’t the worst place to be, wasn’t all the stories their mothers had warned of, of daughters caught in moonlight abductions and gangs of men breaking spirits, she had come to the Lady.

  “You come to me, a bruised apple of a Barrow tree, and ask me for a favor. Is that what you are trying to get at, my sweet?” Leech smiled, and if the girl had the talent to notice cues she’d have seen the hardness behind the eyes.

  “Y-yes my Lady. I can cook, and clean. I have sewn, though I was fired from the seamstress for a claim of destroying a garment. I can skin a rabbit, pluck a dove or chicken, make pillows and — ” the Lady stopped listening. She did not keep scullery maids, though the sewing may prove useful. Leech had decided as the darling came in, not for her earnesty but the swell of her breast and hips. The girl had blossomed beautifully, and with some cleaning up she would be useful to the Lady’s business. Lady Leech made a motion with her hand and the gruff man who had come for work tried to earn good faith by escorting the young girl out. She knew her sad little storyteller would be praying to the Mother for her aid tonight, a sad little prayer in unneeded hope of gaining a job as a whore.

  Fools pray, the wise wait for no god, child. The thug who had come to her rooms didn’t wait. He was a man who took charge, made plans, and showed his worth directly. Tan, her assistant, had come to the Lady covered in blood and begging sanctuary at any cost, but she had wanted in. Leech hoped that she was wrong about the girl with the unlikely name of Goshawk, but these years told her she knew her businesses well.

  She had known the man from a life before any man called her Lady. Martin the Red. A brawler, probably one of the best of his age. But while the Lady had grown old in the Grope, Martin had disappeared from the Barrow. Rumor said he was in the King’s army, and she had thought him gone to the grave years before. He still had those hands, and the shoulders so broad, but age had made him slack, a fat belly lay over the muscles he had shown the ladies he fancied. Even his beautiful auburn hair had run away from him, what whiskers he kept now the grey of flagstones. If he had come to the Lady for work she knew her worries had filled the wrong ears as much as the right ones.

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  The war had done her business a blow. Men were being pressed into service off the streets, and even a man who freely signed and was given the king’s gold tucked that Barrow fortune away for his family. Bread was twice the cost of last year, and the thieves roamed further afield to not bring down the ire of their own people. Her cohort, the Ladies Crow, Dawn and Hill, could accept some losses as they tended to their work, but Leech peddled only in flesh. She could stand some lean years, but it was the principle.

  “Lady? If you would like I can return at a later time. You seem to be lost in thought.” Martin’s tone was soft, his gravelly voice barely a whisper. Where had the brash man she had known as an acquaintance gone! The same place the beauty he had once chased like a dog scenting a bitch in heat had gone.

  “No, no. Sit down. I was thinking of my last appointment. Tell me, Martin Stone, does she look fit enough to ply my trade?” she asked him with a true smile, hoping to get a rise out of the once bashful boy.

  “She’s a beauty, ma’am. I know she would bring trade, though sewing is a skill as useful for your other work. A lot of folks with cuts these days, nasty ones from hooked knives.” he grimaced, sipping the drink Tananger had given him as he waited.

  “You seem to know my mind, my friend. There is an individual who has been causing me some concern. Takrim, his name doesn’t matter. He keeps girls in a warehouse in the Tannery. If only I knew a strong man to help a damsel in distress…” she winked at him, remembering old games between them those years ago. There, that’s the blush I was looking for. It feels good to know I still have it.

  “I promise to do the work for you, if you ask. I request lodging here at the Ward, copper and silver for a few men and an outfitting. I have my own, though it has seen better days and needs repair. A man can do work with a basher, but certain work is best done up close, with harder tools.”

  “Of course. Say, 3 gold for the provisions, given in silver and copper. A gold coin a day for yourself, ten copper for each men. And a silver per Takrim or retainer who is taught the error of their ways.”

  “Two.” Martin grinned, finishing the rest of his drink and tapping a finger on it.

  “One and seven, with four and seven for the place burning to the ground.”

  “Fair enough. For blood?”

  “Two and two for any common man you lose, to their wives and children, and five copper a month to each child until they are of age. Four and three and ten to a talented man. No skimming, Martin Redbeard, or I’ll bend you over my knee.”

  “Was a time I would have bent you o’r mine and enjoyed the chance to do it.”

  The Lady laughed, getting up from her overstuffed chair to close the deal with the mercenary. They shook, Martin kissing her hand as if she truly were a Lady. Flattery was not unheard of in her position, though it was nice to see someone who observed proper decorum.

  “I hope you will be ready to do the deed as soon as possible?”

  “I can be ready within the week, if you so desire ma’am.”

  “Let it be, then. Now, I have other business to attend to, if you please.”

  Martin stood, looking at the woman before him. Their histories apart had not changed their opinions of each other, and the Lady wondered if perhaps she had misjudged his seeming disinterest in her long ago.

  “The woman I know wouldn’t have been so quick to call for blood.”

  “The woman you knew, fool Martin, left along with you. And so here I remain.”