I. Not Rodentish At All

I. Not Rodentish At All

He ran into a very drab, very exhausted Callista Curnow on the stairs. She was almost a floor above him, but climbing slowly with her hand braced against the railing. It wasn't quite dawn yet, and he was only up because of dreams that wouldn't let him sleep, and a rampant curiosity about the Natural Philosopher they had chained up like a dog downstairs and about what the Abbey was up to, in its long deliberations. Why she was up was something of a mystery, but he took the meeting as a blessing.

Callista Curnow presented a very welcome distraction. What he had told Corvo the night before still stood - Callista Curnow was rather fetching, even with dark circles forming under bloodshot eyes, even dressed all in the sort of rat-brown that the whole world seemed to be dyed in these days.

"Miss Curnow," he said, softly enough that he wouldn't wake up Cecelia or Lydia or (please no) Wallace. Her hand stilled on the bannister without too much surprise. Good. She'd heard his footsteps, then.

Or she'd smelled the whiskey on his breath wafting on up to her, but that was hours old now. He was probably good.

She looked over her shoulder at him. Her face was all angles and shadows, but, he thought, Havelock had been wrong. She wasn't rodentish at all. At least not in this light. In this light, she looked tired, but thoughtful and more than a little pretty, the way her hair was just starting to come down from its high bun.

"Yes, Overseer?" she said, and there was only weariness, not wariness in her voice.

"Not an Overseer currently," he said, climbing a step to put them a little closer to level, a little closer together. "What has you up at this hour?"

"… the Lady Emily was tossing and turning with bad dreams most of the night. She's finally resting soundly."

"That seems to call for turning into bed," he said, climbing another step. She wasn't retreating. Experience told him that this was a good sign. Now, if he just had the courage, and she had the generosity… "Not making the trek from your tower to the kitchens."

"Soon," Callista said with a faint smile. That helped quite a bit with the severity of her features. "I needed some air first, though. Each time she woke, she insisted I keep the lamps on. I've been breathing in burning whale oil all night."

"And are you through with your walk?" he asked. Perhaps he should have let her go rest, but he could use the conversation and the exercise, and she was a grown woman who could make her own decisions.

She hesitated a moment, then shook her head and descended a step, putting their faces at the same level. "I could stand another turn, I guess."

He had to bite back a grin.

As they walked, he kept her well away from Piero's workshop. The last thing either of them needed was that odd little man peeping out at them or, worse, offering tips or asking to join. Ah, getting ahead of yourself again, Teague.

And then there was Sokolov's pen to avoid. And Samuel's nest beneath that old boat. Which left only the distillery, the grounds at the base of the tower, or the beach. (The riverbank here was a miserable excuse for a beach, and not conducive to the mood he was trying to pursue at all. But getting closer to harsh metal or to a sleeping girl-)

They went with the beach.

"I believe I overheard Admiral Havelock saying that you are going to depart shortly, to attend the Feast of Painted Kettles again?" Callista said after a moment.

Pig-offal. She was making this about business! Though, if he thought about it, she was rather desperate in the way she clung to propriety, and what she knew of how to be proper. He went back through what he knew of her. Geoff Curnow's niece, no known family besides that, worked as a governess for merchant families like the Pratchetts' (before the wife had been divorced and the children sent off to Whitecliff). She'd never worked for the Pratchetts though, of course not. No, this was her big break.

He'd have to be careful not to make her think he would use that against her. That wasn't what he was after, not at all.

"Yes," he said after probably too long of a pause. "Though it is not a certainty. That I'll manage it, I mean."

"Using the names in that book of yours," she said, clasping her hands primly- behind her. Good sign! Not guarding herself, then.

"You've heard quite a bit."

"Havelock doesn't always seem sure about how much he wants to tell me. Tell me- is it usual for Overseers to gain power through blackmail?"

"Two is the beginning of a trend, I'd say," he said, with an honest sigh. "Though I do hope to not need it, eventually."

"How do you learn to do that?" she asked, stopping just where the Wrenhaven began to cut a shelf instead of a sandy slope. "I mean, do they teach you how to lie and cheat? In the Abbey?"

"They teach that in the world," he said. "I haven't always been an Overseer. And Campbell… knew enough of the world in his own way."

By Corvo's accounts, the beds hadn't even had sheets on them.

"And what were you before?" she asked, looking up at him with- yes, rather lovely eyes. He stepped closer again, like they'd been on the stairs, and again she didn't retreat.

"… Many things," he settled on. She didn't need to know his crimes, not right now- or ever. "A man, for one," he said, pitching his voice a little lower, and searching her eyes for a response.

There was a flare of interest, there, in the widening of her eyes, the parting of her lips- and then it was all closed away with a swallow and a deep breath.

"I'm- I may be misinterpreting, but-"

"You aren't," he said, but didn't quite reach for her hip. Her hands were unclasped now, and could come around to cover her at any moment.

Callista looked away. Not that scared, then, that she couldn't take her eyes off of him for fear of what he might do.

"The… plague," she said.

"I'm not a plague rat," he said, mock-offended, and she looked at him with a glare. Petulance! There was something beneath that propriety and that grasping, striving rightness, that fear of failure! (Come to think of it, there was rather a lot to her. He'd have to be careful. Nuanced women were a weakness of his.)

"I never said that. I only meant that, with the deaths, the conspiracy, with Emily upstairs, I don't- we shouldn't-"

"Not even for one night?" He glanced at the horizon. An almost finished night. He could use that. "Not even for one night that's almost over, and will soon be in that grey hour that doesn't seem to exist at all?" Now, he tried to rest a hand on her hip. She let him. "It could be," he said, voice dropping at last to a rough whisper that he could see affected her, "our own private Fugue Feast."

"I don't participate in those," she said, swallowing again.

"Of course not." He smiled a little wider. "Then, consider it a furthering of your education. To teach an Empress, you'll have to be flawlessly learned. And I think I can teach you a few things."

Her eyes darted back and forth as she looked him over, no doubt searching for some last excuse or objection, but then, with one shaky motion, she nodded and shifted her weight against his hand.

"Though," he murmured, drawing her against him, "there is a slight problem."

"What?"

"… I don't have a bed of my own. In a private place, I mean."

"Neither do I."

"Exactly my point." He tapped a finger against her hip, then nudged her back against a piece of metal forming a makeshift wall against potential flood waters. It was clear of any barnacles or rough bits that he could make out. "Allow me," he said, and dropped to one knee.

"What are you-"

"First lesson. There are things we can do that don't require a bed." He winked at her, then unlaced the front of her knee breeches and tugged them down, fast enough that she couldn't protest except to squeal as her bare skin brushed back against the cold metal behind her.

—

Later, with the taste of her still on his lips and with her still shaking (not just from pleasure, sadly, the woman was asleep on her feet now), he led her up the stairs, her hand tucked against his elbow. She hadn't spoken after she'd cried out his name loud enough that Samuel, at least, must have heard. His grin after that probably hadn't helped matters, but he hadn't expected her to come apart quite that nicely.

Given time, and a bed, and some breathing room for her-

"Martin," she said, and he found himself correcting,

"Teague,"

without actually thinking about it.

"… Teague," she said, and it had been quite a while since he'd heard his given name on a woman's lips, and yes, he'd have to make her cry out that name, too. "If that was supposed to be a lesson, for Emily's sake…"

She trailed off.

Martin choked a little.