The Republic of Thieves

1

“WHY IN ALL the hells do you take this abuse?” said Jean as he and Jenora sat together over coffee the second morning after the arrival of the Gentlemen Bastards in Espara. “Dealing with Moncraine, the debts, the bullshit—”

“Those of us left are the stakeholders,” said Jenora. “We own shares in the common property, and shares of the profits, when those miraculously appear. Some of us saved for years to make these investments. If we walk away from Moncraine, we forfeit everything.”

“Ah.”

“Look at Alondo. He had a wild night at cards and he used the take to buy his claim in the troupe. That was three years ago. We were doing Ten Honest Turncoats then, and A Thousand Swords for Therim Pel and The All-Murderers Ball. A dozen full productions a year, masques for Countess Antonia, festival plays, and we were touring out west, where the countryside’s not the gods-damned waste it is between here and Camorr. I mean, we had prospects; we weren’t out of our minds.”

“I never said you were.”

“It’s mostly hired players and the short-timers that evaporated on us. They don’t have any anchors except a weekly wage, and they can make that with Basanti. Hell, they’ll happily take less from him, because at least they’re sure to play.”

“What happened?”

“I don’t know,” she said, staring into her mug as though it might conceal new answers. “I guess sometimes there’s just a darkness in someone. You hope it’ll go away.”

“Moncraine, you mean.”

“If you could have seen him back in those days, I think you’d understand. You know about the Forty Corpses?”

“Um … if I say no, do I become the forty-first?”

“If I killed people, glass-eyes, Moncraine wouldn’t have lived long enough to be arrested. The Forty Corpses is what we call the forty famous plays that survived the fall of the empire. The big ones by all the famous Throne Therins … Lucarno, Viscora, that bunch.”

“Oh,” said Jean.

“They’re called corpses because they haven’t changed for four or five centuries. I mean, we love them, most of them, but they do molder a bit. They get recited like temple ritual, dry and lifeless. Except, when Moncraine was on, when Moncraine was good, he made the corpses jump out of their graves. It was like he was a spark and the whole troupe would catch fire from it. And when you’ve seen that, when you’ve been a part of it … I tell you, Jovanno, you’d put up with nearly anything if only you could have it again.”

“I am returned,” boomed a voice from the inn-yard door, “from the exile to which my pride had sentenced me!”

“Oh, gods below, you people actually did it,” said Jenora, leaping out of her chair. A man entered the common room, a big dark Syresti in dirty clothing, and cried out when he saw her.

“Jenora, my dusky vision, I knew that I could—”

Whatever he’d known was lost as Jenora’s open palm slammed into his cheek. Jean blinked; her arm had been a pale brown arc. He made a mental note that she was quick when angered.

“Jasmer,” she hollered, “you stupid, stubborn, bottle-sucking, lard-witted fuck! You nearly ruined us! It wasn’t your damn pride that put you in gaol, it was your fists!”

“Peace, Jenora,” muttered Moncraine. “Ow. I was sort of quoting a play.”

“Aiiiiiaahhhhhhhh!” screamed Mistress Gloriano, rushing in from a side hall. “I don’t believe it! The Camorri got you out! And it’s more than you deserve, you lousy wretch! You lousy Syresti drunkard!”

“All’s well, Auntie, I’ve already hit him for both of us,” said Jenora.

“Oh, hell’s hungry kittens,” muttered Sylvanus, wandering in behind Mistress Gloriano. His bloodshot eyes and sleep-swept hair gave him the look of a man who’d been caught in a windstorm. “I see the guards at the Weeping Tower can be bribed after all.”

“Good morning to you too, Andrassus,” said Moncraine. “It warms the deep crevices of my heart to hear so many possible explanations for my release except the thought that I might be innocent.”

“You’re as innocent as we convinced Boulidazi to pretend you are,” said Sabetha, entering from the street. She and Locke had left early that morning to hover around the Weeping Tower, ready to snatch Moncraine up as soon as he was released following his appearance in court.

“He did say some unexpected and handsome things,” said Moncraine.

“You going to call the meeting to order,” said Sabetha, “or should I?”

“I can break the news, gir—Verena. Thank you kindly.” Moncraine cleared his throat. “A moment of your time, gentlemen and ladies of the Moncraine Company. And you as well, Andrassus. And our, uh, benefactor and patient creditor, Mistress Gloriano. There are some … changes in the offing.”

“Sweet gods,” said Sylvanus, “you coal-skinned, life-ruining bastard, are you actually suggesting that gainful employment is about to get its hands around our throats again?”

“Sylvanus, I love you as I love my own Syresti blood,” said Moncraine, “but shut your dribbling booze-hole. And yes, Espara will have its production of the Moncraine Company’s The Republic of Thieves.”

Sabetha coughed.

“I am compelled, however, to accept certain arrangements,” continued Moncraine. “Lord Boulidazi’s agreed to reconsider my, er, refusal of his patronage offer. Once Salvard has the papers ready, we’re the Moncraine-Boulidazi Company.”

“A patron,” said Mistress Gloriano in disbelief. “Does this mean we might get paid back for our—”

“Yes,” said Locke, strolling in from the inn-yard with several purses in his hands. “And here’s yours.”

“Gandolo’s privates, boy!” She caught the jingling bag Locke threw at her. “I simply don’t believe it.”

“Your countinghouse will believe it for you,” said Locke. “That’s twelve royals to square you. Lord Boulidazi is buying out Master Moncraine’s debts to relieve him of the suffering brought on by their contemplation.”

“To wind a cord about my legs so he can fly me like a kite,” said Moncraine through gritted teeth.

“To keep you from getting knifed in a gods-damned alley!” said Sabetha.

“Not that this isn’t miraculous,” said Jenora, “but those of us with shares in the company have precedence over any arrangement Boulidazi might have proposed. Noble or not, we have papers he can’t just piss on.”

“I realize that,” said Locke. “We’re not here to pry your shares out from under you. Boulidazi is giving Moncraine the funds he needs as an advance against Moncraine’s future share of the company’s profits. Your interest is protected.”

“That’s as may be,” said Jenora, “but if this company is back on a paying basis, I want another set of eyes on the books. No offense, Jasmer, but strange things can happen to profits before they reach the stakeholders.”

“The one for figures is Jovanno,” said Locke. “He’s a genius with them.”

“Hey, thanks for volunteering me,” said Jean. “I was wondering when I could stop doing interesting things and go bury myself in account ledgers.”

“I meant it as a compliment! Besides, given a choice, would you rather trust me, or the Asinos—”

“Dammit,” Jean growled. “I’ll see to the books.”

“Master Moncraine,” said Locke, “this, by the way, is my cousin, Jovanno de Barra.”

“The third of the mysterious Camorri,” said Jasmer. “And where are four and five?”

“The Asino brothers are still asleep,” said Jean. “And when they wake I expect they’ll be hungover. They crossed bottles with that thing.” He gestured at Sylvanus. “It was all I could do to keep them alive.”

“Well, then,” said Moncraine, “let us yet be merciful. I’m for a bath and fresh clothes. Someone hunt down Alondo, and we’ll have our proper meeting about the play after luncheon. How’s that sound?”

“Moncraine!” The street door burst inward, propelled by a kick from an unpleasant-looking man. His expensive clothes were stained with wine, sauces, and ominous dark patches that had nothing to do with food. Half a dozen men and women followed him into the room, clearly assorted species of leg-breakers. The Right People of Espara were on the scene.

“Oh, good morning, Shepherd. Can I offer you some refresh—”

“Moncraine,” said the man called Shepherd, “you sack of dried-up whores’ cunt leather! Did you stop at a countinghouse after your escape from the Weeping Tower?”

“I haven’t had time. But—”

“At some point, Moncraine, compound interest becomes less interesting to my boss than shoving you up a dead horse’s ass and sinking you in a fucking swamp.”

“Excuse me,” said Locke, meekly.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize it was the Children’s Festival this week,” said Shepherd. “You looking for an ass-kicking or what?”

“Can I ask how much Master Moncraine owes your boss?”

“Eighteen royals, four fifths, thirty-six coppins, accurate to this very hour.”

“Thought so. There’s nineteen in this bag,” said Locke, holding out a leather purse. “From Moncraine, of course. He just likes to draw these things out, you know. For dramatic effect.”

“This a fucking joke?”

“Nineteen royals,” said Locke. “No joke.”

Shepherd slipped the purse open, ran his fingers through the coins inside, and gave a startled grunt.

“Strange days are upon us.” He snapped the purse shut. “Signs and wonders. Jasmer Moncraine has paid a debt. I’d say my fucking prayers tonight, I would.”

“Are we square?” said Moncraine.

“Square?” said Shepherd. “Yeah, this matter’s closed. But don’t come crawling back for more, Moncraine. Not for a few months, at least. Let the boss forget what a degenerate ass-chancre you are.”

“Sure,” said Moncraine. “Just as you say.”

“Of course, if you had any brains at all you’d never risk the chance of seeing me again.” Shepherd sketched a salute in the air, turned, and left along with his crew of thugs, most of whom looked disappointed.

“A word,” said Moncraine, leading Locke off to one side of the room. “While I’m pleased as a baby on a breast to have that weight lifted, I begin to wonder if I’m meant to be nothing but a mute witness to my own affairs from now on.”

“If you’d had your way you’d be starting your real prison sentence today,” said Locke. “You can’t blame us for wanting to keep you out of further trouble.”

“I’m not pleased to be treated like I can’t handle simple business. Give me the purses you have left, and I’ll dispense with my own debts.”

“The tailor, the bootmaker, the scrivener, and the actors that left for Basanti’s company? We can hunt them down ourselves, thank you.”

“They’re not your accounts to close, boy!”

“And this isn’t your money to hold,” said Locke.

“Jasmer,” said Sabetha, coming up behind them with Jean in tow, “I’d hate to think that you were trying to corner and intimidate one of us privately.”

“We were merely discussing how I might take responsibility for my own shortcomings,” said Moncraine.

“You can hold to the deal,” said Sabetha. “And remember who got you out of the Weeping Tower, and brought in our new patron. Your job is to give us a play. Where that’s concerned, we’re your subjects, but where your safety is concerned, you’re ours.”

“Well,” said Moncraine, “don’t I feel enfolded in the bosom of love itself.”

“Just try not to screw anything else up,” said Sabetha. “It won’t be that hard a life.”

“I’ll go have my bath, then,” said Moncraine. “Would the three of you care to watch, to make sure I don’t drown myself?”

“If you did that,” said Locke, “you’d never have the satisfaction of bossing us around onstage.”

“True enough.” Moncraine scratched at his dark gray stubble. “See you after luncheon, then. Oh, since these are matters relating to the play … Lucaza, get a dozen chairs from the common room and set them out in the inn-yard. Verena, dig through the common property to find all the copies of The Republic of Thieves we have. Jenora can lend you a hand.”

“Of course,” said Sabetha.

“Good. Now, if I’m wanted for any further business, I’ll be in my room with no clothes on.”

2

JUST BEFORE noon the sun passed behind a thick bank of clouds, and its brain-poaching heat was cut to a more bearable lazy warmth. The mud of the inn-yard, late resting place of the very pickled Sylvanus Olivios Andrassus, had dried to a soft crust beneath the feet of the excited and bewildered Moncraine-Boulidazi Company.

All five Gentlemen Bastards had seats, though Calo and Galdo, with dark patches under their eyes, pointedly refused to sit together and so bookended Locke, Jean, and Sabetha.

Alondo flipped idly through a torn and stained copy of The Republic of Thieves. Each volume in the little stack of scripts found by Sabetha was a different size, and no two had been copied in the same hand. Some were marked MONCRAINE COMPANY or SCRIBED FOR J. MONCRAINE, while others were the ex-property of other troupes. One even bore the legend BASANTI on its back cover.

Sylvanus, sober, or at least not actively imbibing, sat next to Jenora. Alondo’s cousin stood against a wall, arms folded.

This, then, was the complete roster of the company. Locke sighed.

“Hello again.” Moncraine appeared, looking almost respectable in a quilted gray doublet and black breeches. “Now, let us discover together which of history’s mighty entities are sitting with us, and which ones we shall have to beg, borrow, or steal. You!”

“Me, sir?” said Alondo’s cousin.

“Yes. Who in all the hells are you? Are you a Camorri?”

“Oh, gods above, no, sir. I’m Alondo’s cousin.”

“Got a name?”

“Djunkhar Kurlin. Everyone calls me Donker.”

“Bad fucking luck. You an actor?”

“No, sir, a hostler.”

“What do you mean by spying on my company’s meeting like this?”

“I just want to get killed onstage, sir.”

“Fuck the stage. Come here and I’ll grant your wish right now.”

“He means,” said Jean, “that we promised him a bit part in exchange for helping us sell off some surplus horseflesh.”

“Oh,” said Moncraine. “An enthusiast. I’d be very pleased to help you die onstage. Stay on my good side and it can even be pretend.”

“Uh, thank you, sir.”

“Now,” said Moncraine. “We need ourselves an Aurin. Aurin is a young man of Therim Pel, basically good-hearted, unsure of himself. He’s also the only son and heir to the emperor. Looks like we’ve got a surplus of young men, so you can all fight it out over the next few days. And we’ll need an Amadine—”

“Hey,” said Calo. “Sorry to interrupt. I was just wondering, before we all get measured for codpieces or whatever, where the hell are we supposed to be giving this play? I hear this Basanti has a theater of his own. What do we have?”

“You’re one of the Asino brothers, right?” said Moncraine.

“Giacomo Asino.”

“Well, being from Camorr, Giacomo, you probably don’t know about the Old Pearl. It’s a public theater, built by some count—”

“Poldaris the Just,” muttered Sylvanus.

“Built by Poldaris the Just,” said Moncraine, “as his perpetual legacy to the people of Espara. Big stone amphitheater, about two hundred years old.”

“One hundred and eighty-eight,” said Sylvanus.

“Apologies, Sylvanus, unlike you I wasn’t there. So you see, Giacomo, we can use it, as long as we pay a little fee to the countess’ envoy of ceremonies.”

“If it’s such a fine place, why did Basanti build his own?”

“The Old Pearl is perfectly adequate,” said Moncraine. “Basanti built to flatter his self-regard, not fatten his pocketbook.”

“Because businessmen like to spend lots of money to replace perfectly adequate structures they can use for nearly nothing, right?”

“Look, boy,” said Moncraine, “it wouldn’t matter if Basanti’s new theater turned dog turds into platinum, while merely setting foot inside the Old Pearl gave people leprosy. The Old Pearl’s it. There’s no time or money for anything else.”

“Does it?” said Calo. “Give people leprosy, I mean?”

“Go lick the stage and find out. Now, let’s talk about Amadine. Amadine is a thief in a time of peace and abundance. Therim Pel has grown a crop of bandits in the ancient catacombs beneath the city. They mock the customs of the upright people, of the emperor and his nobles. Some of them even call their little world a republic. Amadine is their leader.”

“You should be our Amadine, Jasmer,” said Sylvanus. “Think of the pretty skirts Jenora could sew for you!”

“Verena’s our Amadine,” said Moncraine. “There’s a certain deficiency of breasts in the company, and while yours may be larger than hers, Sylvanus, I doubt as many people would pay to see them. No, since our former Amadine abandoned us … she’ll do.”

Sabetha gave a slight, satisfied nod.

“Now, everyone take a copy of the lines. Have them out for consultation. A troupe learns a play like we all learn to screw, stumbling and jostling until everything’s finally in the right place.”

Locke felt his cheeks warm a bit, though the sun was still hidden away behind the high wall of summer clouds.

“So, Aurin falls for Amadine, and they have lots of problems, and it’s all very romantic and tragic and the audience gives us ever so much money to see it,” said Moncraine. “But to get there we’ve got to sharpen things to a fine point … slash some deadweight from the text. I’ll give you full cuts later, but for now I think we can discard all the bits with Marolus the courtier. And we’ll cut Avunculo, and Twitch, the comic relief thieves, for a certainty.”

“Aye, a certainty,” said Sylvanus, “and what a bold decision that is, given that our Marolus, Avunculo, and Twitch all ran across town chasing Basanti’s coin when you took up lèse-majesté as a new hobby.”

“Thank you, Andrassus,” said Moncraine. “You’ll have many weeks to belittle my every choice; don’t spend yourself in one afternoon. Now you, Asino—”

“Castellano,” said Galdo, yawning.

“Castellano. Stand up. Wait, you can read, can’t you? You can all read, I assume?”

“Reading, is that where you draw pictures with chalk or where you bang a stick on a drum?” said Galdo. “I get confused.”

“The first thing that happens,” said Moncraine with a scowl, “the first character the audience meets, is the Chorus. Out comes the Chorus—give us his lines, Castellano.”

“Um,” said Galdo, staring down at his little book.

“What the fuck’s the matter with you, boy?” shouted Moncraine. “Who says ‘um’ when they’ve got the script in their hands? If you say ‘um’ in front of five hundred people, I guarantee that some unwashed, wine-sucking cow down in the penny pit will throw something at you. They wait on any excuse.”

“Sorry,” said Galdo. He cleared his throat, and read:

Calo stood up, straightened his back, puffed out his chest, and began to read loudly, clearly, emphasizing words that Galdo had read flatly:

“Enough,” said Jasmer. “Better. You’re giving it rhythm, stressing the right words, orating with some little competence. But you’re still just reciting the words as though they were ritual in a book.”

“They are just words in a book,” said Calo.

“They are a man’s words!” said Moncraine. “They are a man’s words. Not some dull formula. Put flesh and blood behind them, else why should anyone pay to see on stage what they could read quietly for themselves?”

“Because they can’t fuckin’ read?” said Galdo.

“Stand up again, Castellano. No, no, Giacomo, don’t sit down. I want you both for this. I’ll show you my point so that even Camorri dullards can take it to heart. Castellano, go over to your brother. Keep your script in hand. You are angry with your brother, Castellano! Angry at what a dunce he is. He doesn’t understand these lines. So now you will show him!” Moncraine steadily raised his voice. “Correct him! Perform them to him as though he is an IDIOT!”

“You see us wrong, who see with your eyes!” said Galdo. He gestured disdainfully at his own face with his free hand, and took two threatening steps closer to Calo. “And hear us not at all, though straining your ears!”

He reached out and snapped a finger against one of Calo’s ears. The long-haired twin recoiled, and Galdo moved aggressively toward him once again.

“What thieves of wonder are these poor senses,” said Galdo, all but hissing with disdain, “whispering: this stage is wood, these men are dust, and dust their deeds and thousand … dust their ducks … aw, shit, lost myself, sorry.”

“It’s all right,” said Moncraine. “You had something there, didn’t you?”

“That was fun,” said Galdo. “I think I see what you mean.”

“Words are dead until you give them a context,” said Moncraine. “Until you put a character behind them, and give him a reason to speak them in a certain fashion.”

“Can I do it back to him like he’s the stupid one?” said Calo.

“No. I’ve made my point,” said Moncraine. “You Camorri do have a certain poise and inventiveness. I just need to awaken you to its proper employment. Now, what’s our Chorus doing here?”

“He’s pleading,” said Jean.

“Pleading. Yes. Exactly. First thing, out comes the Chorus to plead to the crowd. The hot, sweaty, drunk, and skeptical crowd. Listen up, you unworthy fucking mongrels! Look, there’s a play going on, right in front of you! Shut up and give it the attention it deserves!”

Moncraine changed his voice and poise in an instant. Without so much as a glance at the script, he spoke:

Moncraine cleared his throat. “There. I have had my plea. I have taken command, shut those slack jaws, turned those gimlet eyes to the stage. I am midwife to wonders. With their attention snared, I give them history. We are back in the time of the Therin Throne, of Salerius II. An emperor who went out and kicked some ass. Just as we shall, perhaps excepting Sylvanus.”

Sylvanus rose and tossed his copy of the script aside. Jenora managed to catch it before it hit the ground.

“Chorus, you call yourself,” he said. “You’ve the presence of a mouse fart in a high wind. Stand aside, and try not to catch fire if I shed sparks of genius.”

If Locke had been impressed by the change in Moncraine’s demeanor, he was astounded by the change in Sylvanus. The old man’s perpetually sour, unfocused, liquor-addled disposition vanished, and without warning he was speaking clearly, invitingly, charmingly:

“Well remembered, I’ll give you that,” said Moncraine. “But then, anything more than three lines is well remembered, where you’re concerned.”

“It’s as fresh now as the last time we did it,” said Sylvanus. “Fifteen years ago.”

“That’s you and I that would make a fair Chorus,” sighed Moncraine. “But we need a Salerius, and we need a magician to advise him and do all the threatening parts, or else the plot goes pear-shaped.”

“I’ll be the Chorus!” said Galdo. “I can do this. Wake everyone up at the beginning, then sit back and watch the rest of you in the play. That sounds like a damn good job.”

“The hell you’ll do it,” said Calo. “You and that shaved head, you look like a vulture’s cock. This job calls for some elegance.”

“You see us wrong,” said Galdo, “who are about to get your fuckin’ ass kicked!”

“Shut up, idiots.” Moncraine glowered at the twins until they settled down. “It would be to our advantage to leave Sylvanus and myself free for other parts, so yes, one of you may have the Chorus. But you won’t scrap for it in the dirt; you’ll both learn the part and strive to better one another in it. I don’t have to make a final decision for some time.”

“And what does the loser get?” said Calo.

“The loser will understudy the winner, in case the winner should be carried off by wild hounds. And don’t worry; there’ll be other parts to fill.

“Now,” said Moncraine. “Let’s break ourselves up and put Alondo and our other Camorri through some paces, to see where their alleged strengths lie.”

3

THE SUN moved its way and the clouds moved theirs. Before another hour passed the inn-yard was once again in the full light and heat of day. Moncraine donned a broad-brimmed hat, but otherwise seemed heedless of the temperature. Sylvanus and Jenora clung to the inn walls, while Sabetha and the boys darted in and out of cover as they were required to play scenes.

“Our young prince Aurin lives in his father’s shadow,” said Moncraine.

“He’s probably glad to be out of the gods-damned sun, then!” panted Galdo.

“There’s no glory to be had because Salerius II already went out and had it,” continued Moncraine. “No wars to fight, no lands to claim, and it’s still an emperor or two to go before the Vadrans are going to start kicking things over up north. As if that wasn’t bad enough, Aurin has a best friend named Ferrin. Ferrin’s even hungrier for glory than Aurin is, and he won’t shut up about it. Let’s do … Act one, scene two. Alondo, you do Aurin, and let’s have Jovanno give us a Ferrin.”

Alondo leaned back lazily in a chair. Jean approached him, reading from his copy of the script:

“What’s this, lazy lion cub?

The sands of the morning are half run from the glass!

There’s nothing in your bed ’tis worth such fascination.

The sun rules the sky, your father his kingdom,

And you rule a chamber ten paces by ten!”

Alondo laughed, and answered:

“Why be an emperor’s son, if I must rise

as though to reap the fields?

What profit, then, in my paternity?

What man lives, who, more than I,

has rightful claim to leisure?”

“He that has given you leisure,” said Jean. “Having carved it like rare meat from the bones of his enemies.”

“Enough,” said Moncraine. “Less reciting, Jovanno. Less formula.”

“Uh, sure,” said Jean, obviously feeling out of his depth. “Whatever you say.”

“Alondo, take over Ferrin. Lucaza, let’s have you see what you can make of Aurin.”

Locke had to admit to himself that Jean was the least comfortable of the five of them with what was going on. Although he was always eager to play a role in any crooked scheme that required it of him, he tended to stay within narrower bounds than Locke or Sabetha or even the Sanzas. Jean was a consummate “straight man”—the angry bodyguard, the dutiful clerk, the respectable servant. He was a solid wall for victims of their games to bounce off of, but not the sort to jump back and forth rapidly between roles.

Locke set these thoughts aside, and tried to imagine himself as Aurin. He recalled his own lack of sweet humor each time he was yanked from sleep early, most frequently because of some Sanza mischief. The memory served him well, and he spoke:

“Would you instruct me in the love of my own father?

You push presumption to its limits, Ferrin.

Had I wished to wake to scorn and remonstration,

I would have married by now.”

Alondo assumed a more energetic persona, more confident and forceful in speech:

“Fairly spoken, O prince, O majesty! I cry mercy.

I did not come to rudely trample dozy dreams,

Nor correct you in honoring our lord, your father.

Your perfect love for him is reckoned of a measure

With your devotion to warm, soft beds

And therefore lies beyond all question.”

“Were you not the great friend of my youth,” said Locke, deciding a laugh would be a good thing to add,

“But the unresting spirit of some foe

Slain in Father’s wars,

You could scarce do me more vexation, Ferrin.

Thou art like a marriage,

Lacking only the pretty face and pleasant couplings—

You do so busy my mornings with rebukes

I half-forget which of us is royal.”

“Good,” said Moncraine. “Good enough. Friendly banter, hiding something. Ferrin sees his ticket to glory lazing around, accomplishing nothing. These two need each other, and they resent it while trying to hide it behind their good cheer.”

“Moncraine, for the love of all the gods, there’ll be no play to see and no parts to act if you explain everything at the first chance,” said Sylvanus.

“I don’t mind,” said Alondo.

“Nor I,” said Locke. “I think it’s helping. Me, at least.”

“Moncraine would teach you how to play every part as Moncraine,” chuckled Sylvanus. “Don’t forget that.”

“Not an actor that lives wouldn’t make love to the sound of his own voice,” said Moncraine, “if only he could. You’re no exception, Andrassus. Now, let’s find some swords. Ferrin talks Aurin into practicing in the gardens, and that’s where the plot winds them in its coils.”

Hours passed in sweat and toil. Back and forth in the sun they pretended to fight, with notched wooden blades musty from storage. Locke and Jean and Alondo rotated roles, and Moncraine even swapped in the Sanzas for variety, until it became a sort of whirling pantomime brawl. Stab, parry, recover, deliver lines. Parry, dodge, deliver lines, parry, deliver lines …

Sylvanus procured a bottle of wine and ended his personal drought. He shouted encouragement at the duelists all afternoon, but didn’t move once from his chosen spot in the shade, near Sabetha and Jenora. As the sun drew down toward the west, Moncraine finally called a halt.

“There we are, boys, that’s enough for a mild beginning.”

“Mild?” wheezed Alondo. He’d kept his composure for a respectable length of time, but wilted with the rest of them as the muttering and swordplay had drawn on.

“Aye, mild. You’re out of condition, Alondo. You young pups have all the leaping about to do, and nearly all the speaking. If the audience sees you sucking air like a fish on the bottom of a boat—”

“They’ll throw things, right,” said Alondo. “I’ve been pelted with vegetables before.”

“Not in my company you haven’t,” growled Moncraine. “Right, all of you, sit down before you throw up.”

The admonition came too late for Calo, already wobbling from his hangover. He noisily lost whatever remained in his stomach in a far corner of the inn-yard.

“Music to my ears,” said Moncraine. “See, Andrassus? So long as I can inspire that sort of reaction in our bold young lads, I believe I may claim not to have lost my touch.”

“What do you suppose for us, then?” said Sylvanus.

“The audience might notice, were the emperor of the Therin Throne such a fine rich lovely shade of brown as myself, that his son ought not be a plain pink Therin,” said Moncraine. “And the part of the magician requires more moving about, so I’ll take it. That leaves you to sit the throne.”

“I shall be imperial,” sighed Sylvanus.

“Good,” said Moncraine. “Now, I need an ale before I’m baked like a pie.”

“Emperor, eh?” said Locke, sinking down against the wall next to Sylvanus. “Why so glum? Sounds like a good part.”

“It is,” said Sylvanus, “for the few lines he has. It’s not the father’s play, but the son’s.” The old man took a swig from his bottle and made no effort to pass it around. “I envy you little shits. I do, though no one could accuse you of any deep knowledge of the craft.”

“What’s to envy?” said Alondo. “We’re out there melting in the heat while you get to sit in the shade.”

“Heh,” said Sylvanus. “Spoken like a true lad of none and twenty years. At my age you don’t get to sit in the shade, boy. That’s where you’re sent to keep out of everyone else’s way.”

“You’re being morose,” said Alondo. “It’s the grapes speaking, as usual.”

“This is the first bottle I’ve touched since my head hit the ground last night,” said Sylvanus. “And for me, that’s as sober as a babe freshly unwombed. No, gentlemen, I know a thing which you do not. Read any script in our common property and you’ll find too many roles to which you’re suited—soldiers, princes, lovers, fools. You could never play them all if you lived to twice my age, which is a frightful number.

“At twenty, you may be anything. At thirty you may do as you please. At forty, only a few doors ease shut, but fifty, ah! Here’s a sting that Moncraine feels for sure. By fifty, you’re becoming a perfect stranger to all those parts that once suited you like the skin of your own cock.”

Locke had no idea what to say, so he simply watched as Sylvanus finished his bottle and tossed it into the leather-hard mud of the yard.

“I used to skim these plays for all the fine young roles my ambition could bear,” he said. “Now I look at the broken parts, the sick men, the forgotten men, and I wonder which of them will be mine. Did you not hear why I’m emperor? Because the emperor need not trouble his fat old ass to move. I am as much entombed as enthroned.”

Sylvanus heaved himself to his feet, joints creaking. “I don’t mean to oppress your spirits, boys. Come find me in an hour or two, and I shall be merry. Yes, I will have quite forgotten anything I’ve said here, I’m sure.”

After Sylvanus had gone inside, Locke rose, stretched, and followed. He had no notion of what, if anything, he should say. In one short afternoon he had grown used to the advantage of having all of his lines scribbled out for him on a piece of paper.

4

“RIGHT,” SAID Jasmer, three hours into their fifth day of practice under the unfriendly sun. “Jovanno, I’m sure you’re a fine fellow, but you’ve got no business saying lines in front of people. I think I can beat your friends into something resembling actors, but you’re as useless as gloves on a snake.”

“Uh,” said Jean, looking up from his script, “what’d I do wrong?”

“If you had any wit for the work you’d already know,” said Jasmer. “Go sit the fuck down and count our money or something.”

“Hang on,” said Locke, who’d been playing Aurin to Jean’s Ferrin. “You’ve got no business talking to Jovanno like that.”

“This is the business of the play,” said Moncraine, “and in this realm I am all the gods on their heavenly thrones, speaking with one voice, telling him to shut up and go away.”

“Agreed, you can order him around,” said Locke. “But mind your manners.”

“Boy, I do not have fucking time—”

“Yes you do,” said Locke. “You always have the time to be polite to Jovanno, and when you don’t, we will pack up and go back to Camorr! Do I make myself clear?”

“Hey,” said Jean, tugging at Locke’s tunic, “it’s fine.”

“No it isn’t,” said Sabetha, joining Locke and Jean in the center of the courtyard. “Lucaza’s right, Jasmer. We’ll slave for you as required, but we won’t eat shit for no reason.”

“Send me back to gaol,” muttered Moncraine. “Fuck me and send me back to gaol.”

“We shall accommodate neither request,” said Sabetha.

“I can use him,” said Jenora, appearing from the door to the inn. “Jovanno, that is. If he’s not going to be onstage he can help me manage the property and alchemy.”

“I, uh, guess I’ve got … no real choice?” said Jean.

“And speaking of the common property,” said Jenora, “I’ve got to tell you now, the mice and red moths have been at it. All the death-masks and robes are too scrubby to use, and most of the other costumes are only fit for cutting up as pieces.”

“Well, then, do so,” said Jasmer. “I’m busy out here turning dogshit into diamonds; it’s only fair you should get to do the same in your line of work.”

“I need funds,” said Jenora, “and we must have a sit-down, all the stakeholders, and decide where those funds are coming from, and how to address the shares of our friends that cut and ran—”

“Good gods,” said Moncraine.

“… and on what terms! And I need to hire someone who can handle a needle and thread.” Jean raised his hand.

“You can sew?” said Jenora. “What, mending torn tunics and so forth? I need—”

“I know hemming from pleating,” said Jean. “And darning from shirring, and I’ve got the thimble-calluses to prove it.”

“I’ll be damned.” Jenora grabbed Jean by the arm. “You can’t have this one back even if you decide you do need another actor.”

“I won’t,” said Moncraine sourly.

“Are we taking a break?” said Calo, sitting down hard.

“Sure, sit on your ass, sweetheart. Those of us still in condition will play for your amusement,” said Galdo. He kicked dirt across his brother’s breeches.

Calo didn’t even waste time on a dirty look. He lashed out with his legs, hooked Galdo below the knees, and toppled him. Galdo rolled over on his back, clutching at his left wrist, and howled in pain.

“Oh, hell,” said Calo, jumping back to his feet. “Is it bad? I didn’t mean to, honest—GNNNAKKKH!”

This last extremely unpleasant sound was forced out of him by a kick from Galdo that terminated in Calo’s groin.

“Nah, it feels fine,” said Galdo. “Just having a bit of acting practice.”

Locke, Jean, Alondo, Jenora, and Sabetha descended on the twins, separating them before Moncraine could get involved in the melee. What followed was a pandemonium of finger-pointing and hard words in which the intelligence, birth city, artistic capacity, work habits, skin color, dress sense, and personal honor of every participant were insulted at least once. Through it all the sun poured down relentless heat, and by the time relative order was restored Locke’s head was swimming. He didn’t notice that someone had come around the corner from the street until they cleared their throat loudly.

“How grand,” said the newcomer, a tall woman of about thirty. She wore a tight gray tunic and baggy trousers, and she was of mixed Therin and dark-skinned parentage, though she was lighter than Jasmer or the Gloriano women. Her black curls were cut just above her ears, and she had the sort of cool self-composure that Locke associated with Camorri garristas. “Jasmer, I’m impressed, but not really in the way I expected to be.”

“Chantal,” said Moncraine, conjuring his dignity with the speed of a quick-draw artist. “A fine afternoon to you as well, you opportunistic turncoat.”

“You were off to the Weeping Tower,” said the woman. “I do like to eat more than once a month. I’ve got nothing to apologize for.”

“What’s the matter, Basanti not handing out charity to any more of my strays?”

“Basanti’s got work for the taking. But I heard some interesting things. Heard you’d found a patron.”

“Yes, it turns out that not all the good taste has been bred out of Espara’s quality.”

“Also heard that those Camorri you promised weren’t a lie after all.”

“They’re all here,” said Moncraine. “Count ’em.”

“And you’re still serious about doing The Republic of Thieves?”

“Serious as a slit throat.”

“Is Jenora finally getting onstage?”

“Gods above, no!” said Jenora.

“Aha.” Chantal strolled toward Moncraine. “By my count, you’re short at least one woman, then.”

“What do you care if I am?”

“Look, Jasmer.” Chantal’s cat-and-mouse smile vanished. “Basanti’s doing The Wine of Womanly Reverence, and I don’t want to spend the summer giggling and flouncing as Fetching Maid Number Four. We’re in a position to help one another.”

“Hmmm,” said Moncraine. “Depends. Did you drag that husband of yours back over here as well?”

As though on cue, a brown-haired Therin man came around the corner behind Chantal. He wore an open white tunic, displaying a rugged physique decorated with dents and scars. Those and the fact that his right ear was half-missing led Locke to guess that he was either a veteran handball player or an aging swordsman who’d seen the writing on the wall.

“Of course you did,” said Moncraine. “Well, my new young friends, allow me to introduce you to Chantal Couza, formerly of the Moncraine Company, and her husband, Bertrand the Crowd.”

“The Crowd?” said Locke.

“He hops costumes from scene to scene like nobody else,” said Alondo. “He’s half a dozen bit players in one.”

“Him I can use,” said Moncraine, “but what makes you think I’ve forgiven either of you?”

“Cut the crap, Jasmer,” said Chantal. “I want decent work. You want a happy audience.”

“Dare I ask if there will be any more reverse defections?”

“Not for a basket of rubies the size of your self-regard, Jasmer. They’re more worried about being taken in as accomplices to assault and sedition than they are about losing their places in your troupe.”

“Well, I say take Bert and Chantal back,” said Alondo.

“Likewise,” said Jenora. “We’ve got parts to fill, and we don’t have time to be choosy. Shall I pry Sylvanus out of bed and see what he thinks?”

“No,” said Moncraine. “He’d say yes just because he can’t take his eyes off her. Fine! You’re in luck, the pair of you, but it’s on wages. No percentage. You know the papers. You lost that when you walked.”

“We might have to argue that,” said Chantal. “Either way, it’s worth it to avoid Fetching Maid Number Four. Believe me, I’d much rather be Amadine, Queen of the Shadows.”

“I’m ever so sorry,” said Sabetha. If the words THAT WAS A LIE had suddenly sprung up behind her in letters of fire ten feet high, the effect could scarcely have added to her tone of voice. “That role is no longer available.”

“Are you kidding?” Chantal strode across the courtyard until she was looking down at Sabetha, who was a hand-span shorter than the older woman. “Who are you, then?”

“Amadine,” said Sabetha coolly. “Queen of the Shadows.”

“Bloody Camorri. You’re young enough to have come out from between my legs! But not pretty enough. You can’t be serious.”

“She certainly can,” said Locke. Heat and frustration mingled badly with his acute sensitivity at hearing a stranger say anything uncomplimentary about Sabetha.

“Jasmer, you’re mad,” said Chantal. “She’s no Amadine. Give her Penthra, by all means, but not Amadine! What is she, sixteen? Sixteen, boy-assed and average!”

“Average?” said Locke. “Average? How the hell do you get around the city with two glass eyes in your gods-damned head, woman? You gotta be stu—”

Before Locke could append the second syllable of that heartfelt but unwisely chosen word, Bertrand the Crowd, true to his appearance, had one rough hand on Locke’s tunic collar and was dragging him toward a rendezvous with his other fist, already drawn back. The world moved in horrifying slow motion; Locke, who was no stranger to a beating, was cursed with an uncanny ability to recognize one just before it ceased to be theoretical.

A miracle the size and shape of Jean Tannen appeared out of the corner of Locke’s vision. An instant before Bertrand could throw his punch, Jean hit him shoulder-to-stomach and slammed him into the dirt.

“Bert!” shouted Chantal.

“Heavens,” said Jenora.

Locke realized he was holding something, and he glanced down to discover that Jean had somehow tossed his precious optics into his hands while separating him from Bertrand.

Jean was a round-bellied, quietly dignified boy of about sixteen. Even his current crop of carefully hoarded stubble failed to lend his aspect any real menace. Bertrand had at least a decade on him, not to mention six inches and twenty pounds, and he looked like he could tear a side of beef in half on a whim. What happened next surprised even Locke.

Punch was traded for punch. Jean and Bertrand rolled around, a furious tangle of arms and legs, swiping and swatting and straining. The advantage shifted every few seconds. Jean got his hands around Bertrand’s throat, only to find the older man hammering at his ribs. Bertrand pinned Jean beneath him, yet the boy somehow kicked his legs aside and pulled him back to the ground.

“Gods above,” said Chantal. “Stop! Stop it, already! We can talk about this!”

Jean attempted to hold an arm across Bertrand’s neck, and Bertrand responded with something fast and clever that flung Jean forward over his shoulder. When he tried to press his advantage, however, Jean did something equally fast and clever that threw Bert into a wall. The two combatants wrestled again, desperately forming and breaking grips on one another, until at last Jean slipped free and rolled clear. This was a mistake; the older man used the space between them to swing a wild haymaker that clipped Jean across the chin and finally dropped him.

A moment later, Bertrand wobbled and fell on his face, just as used up as his younger antagonist.

“Chantal,” said Moncraine, “I would have been happy to tell you that the role of Amadine was beyond negotiation, for several reasons. And hot staggering shit, you cannot expect me to believe that boy can do all that and work a thimble, too!”

Jenora and the Gentlemen Bastards gathered around Jean, while Alondo, Chantal, and Moncraine saw to Bert. Both the fighters regained their senses soon enough, and were eased up into sitting positions against the inn wall.

“Optics,” coughed Jean. When Locke handed them over, he settled them carefully on his nose and sighed with relief.

“Smoke,” muttered Bertrand. Chantal handed him a sheaf of rolled tobacco and flicked a bit of twist-match to light it. Once she’d done this, Bert tore the cigar in two, lit the cold half from the red embers of the other, and passed it over to Jean. The boy nodded his thanks, and the two combatants smoked in peace for a few moments while everyone else watched, dumbfounded.

“You play handball, kid?” said Bertrand. His voice was deep, his Verrari accent thick.

“Certainly,” said Jean.

“Come play with my side on Penance Day afternoons. We play for ale money, two coppins a man to buy in.”

“Love to,” said Jean. “Just don’t take any more swings at my friends.”

“Sure, kid,” said Bertrand. He waved a finger at Locke. “And you don’t talk about my wife like that.”

“Then tell your wife not to insult Verena,” said Locke.

“Hey there, skinny, we both speak Therin.” Chantal poked Locke sharply in the chest. “You got something to tell me, tell me yourself.”

“Fine,” said Locke, matching gazes with Chantal. “Don’t insult Verena—”

“Excuse me,” said Sabetha, pushing Locke aside without humor or delicacy. “Did I turn invisible or something? I’m not hiding behind him, Chantal.”

Locke winced at the unkind emphasis on him.

“You want to fight your own fights, bitchling?” said Chantal. “Good. Anytime you want a real education, you try and throw a—”

“ENOUGH,” hollered Moncraine in a shake-the-rafters voice, pushing the two women apart. “Gods damn you all for shit-witted wastrels! Bring yourselves to order or I’ll go punch another nobleman, I swear it on my balls and bones!”

“Chantal, sweetness,” said Bertrand, blowing smoke, “when Jasmer’s the voice of reason you might have to admit it’s time to calm down.”

“Verena’s Amadine,” said Jasmer. “That’s the way it is! You can have Penthra or you can have Fetching Maid Number Four and shake your tits all summer for Basanti.”

Chantal glowered, then offered a hand to Sabetha. “Peace, then. I just hope that when you’re onstage the sun shines out of your backside, girl.”

Sabetha shook with Chantal. “When I’m finished, you won’t be able to imagine anyone else as Amadine ever again.”

Bertrand whistled and grinned. “Ha! That’s good. Give my wife a couple of days to grow on you, Verena. She’ll make you like her.”

“I’ve had a lot of opportunities in my life to learn tolerance,” said Sabetha with a thin smile.

“Now, if you’re Amadine,” said Bertrand, “who’s Aurin? Who gets to do all that kissing and mooning and staring, eh?”

Locke’s heart seemed to skip a beat.

“That’s what we were in the business of figuring out when you showed up,” said Moncraine. He rubbed his forehead and sighed. “I suppose I might as well make my decision. I’ll hedge our bets. Lucaza, you’ll be Ferrin.”

“I would love to … wait, what?” said Locke.

“You heard me. Aurin’s a role that needs more nuance. I want Alondo to handle it.”

“But—”

“That’s all,” said Jasmer. “That’s it for today. No further discussion. And gods help me, I can quote the company charter as well as Jenora can. Next one of you that lays a finger on anyone else here gets docked. Wages, shares, work time—I don’t give a damn. I’ll spank you like an angry father. Now, go!”

5

“PENTHRA,” MUTTERED Jean, reading aloud from the script in his hands, “a fallen noblewoman of Therim Pel. Amadine’s boon companion.”

“I’ve read the bloody character list, Jean.” Locke and Jean sat in the corner of Mistress Gloriano’s common room farthest from the bar, where Bertrand, Jasmer, Alondo, Chantal, and Sylvanus were drinking up a significant portion of the company’s future profits. Dinner was just past. “Wait, are you trying to ignore me?”

“Yes.” Jean closed his copy of the play with a sigh. “My ribs ache, I got thrown out of the play, I’m now a bookkeeping stevedore, and you’re plumbing new depths of tedium with your moping.”

“But I—”

“Seriously, if you want to kiss her onstage so badly just speak to Jasmer.”

“He doesn’t want to talk about it.” Locke sipped his cup of warm dark ale, barely tasting it. “Says it’s an artistic decision and therefore not subject to debate.”

“Then talk to Alondo.”

“He acts for a living. Why would he give up the plum role?”

“I don’t know, because you tricked him? Because you convinced him? Rumor has it you took some lessons in being tricky and convincing.”

“Yeah, but … he’s a decent enough fellow. It’s not like yanking Jasmer around. Feels wrong.”

“Then listen here, my friend. I’m not an oracle and I’m not going to turn into one no matter how long you sit there crying in your beer. You know I used to think that the Sanzas were the biggest annoyance around? I was wrong. Until you and Sabetha get your shit together, they’re the least of all possible evils.”

“She’s just so gods-damned inscrutable.”

“You were talking to her before, right?”

“Yeah. It was going well. Now it’s all strange.”

“Have you considered extreme, desperate measures like talking to her again?”

“Yeah, but, well …”

“You’ve yeah-but your way to this point,” said Jean. “You’re going to yeah-but this mess until it’s time to go home, and I don’t doubt you’ll yeah-but her out of your life. Quit circling at a distance. Go talk to her, for Preva’s sake.”

“Where is she?”

“She sneaks up to the roof when the rest of us are down here making idiots of ourselves.”

“She won’t … I dunno, it’s not that it’s—”

“Reach between your legs,” growled Jean, “and find some balls, or you do not get to speak to me on the subject of her for the rest of the summer.”

“I’m sorry,” said Locke. “I just hate the thought of screwing things up worse than they are. You know I’ve got talents in that direction.”

“Ha. Indeed. Try being direct and honest. I can’t give you any more specific advice. When the hell have I ever charmed my way under anyone’s dress, hmm? All I know is that if you and Sabetha don’t reach some understanding we’re all going to regret it. But you most of all.”

“You’re right.” Locke took a deep, steadying breath. “You’re right!”

“Pretty routinely,” sighed Jean. “Are you going?”

“Absolutely.”

“Not with that beer, you’re not. Give it over.” Locke did so with an absentminded air, and Jean drained the cup in one gulp.

“Okay,” he said. “Go! Before your so-called better judgment has a chance to wake back up. Wait, that’s not the way up. Where the hell are you going?”

“Just back to the bar,” said Locke. “I have a bright idea.”

6

LANGUID, THICK-AIRED evening had come down on Espara, and the city lights were flicking to life beneath a sky the color of harvest grapes. Mistress Gloriano’s crooked gables concealed a little balcony, westward-facing, where two people could sit side by side, assuming they were on good terms. Locke eased the balcony hatch open carefully, peered out, and found Sabetha staring directly at him with eyebrows raised. She lowered her copy of The Republic of Thieves.

“Hi,” said Locke, much less confidently than he’d imagined he would as he’d climbed the little passage from the second floor. “Can I, ah, share your balcony for a little while?”

“I was going over my part.”

“You expect me to believe you don’t already have the whole thing memorized?”

It was as though she couldn’t decide whether to be pleased or exasperated. Locke knew the expression well. After a moment, she set her book down and beckoned him out. He sat down cross-legged, as she was, and they faced one another.

“What’s behind your back?” she said.

“A small kindness.” He showed her the wineskin and two small clay cups he’d been concealing. “Or a bribe. Depending on how you look at it.”

“I’m not thirsty.”

“If I’d been worried about thirst, I’d have brought you water. I was worried about knives.”

“Knives?”

“Yeah, the ones you’ve had out for a few days now. I was hoping to sort of dull the edges.”

“Isn’t that rather knavish? Plying a girl with drink?”

“In this case it’s more like self-defense. And I did sort of think you might just … like a cup of wine.”

“And then perhaps a second? And a third, and so on, until my inhibitions were sufficiently elastic?”

“I didn’t deserve that.”

“Yes, well … perhaps not.”

“Gods, I forgot that anyone who wants to be nice to you has to get permission in advance and wear heavy armor.” Biting his lip, Locke poured the pale wine carelessly and slid one of the cups toward her. “Look, you can pretend it just appeared there by magic if it makes you happy.”

“Is that Anjani orange wine?”

“If it’s Anjani my ass is made of gold,” said Locke, sipping from his cup. “But it was some kind of orange, once upon a time.”

“And what miracle are you trying to coax out of me, exactly?”

“Simple conversation? What’s happened, Sabetha? We were talking, actually talking. It was … it was really nice. And we worked well together! But now you snap for no reason. You find excuses to cut me dead. You keep throwing up these walls, and even when I climb them, I find you’ve dug moats on the other side—”

“You’re crediting me with an extraordinary degree of industry,” she said, and Locke was delighted to see the tiniest hint of a smirk on her lips, though it vanished between breaths. “Maybe I’m preoccupied with the play.”

“Oh look,” said Locke. “Now the moat is full of spikes. Also, I don’t believe you.”

“That’s your problem.”

“What do you have to gain by not talking to me?”

“Maybe I just don’t want to—”

“But you did,” said Locke. “You did, and we were getting somewhere. Do you really want to spend the rest of our stay here doing this stupid dance back and forth? I don’t.”

“It’s not so much a dance, though, is it?” she said, softly.

“No,” said Locke. “You’re the one that keeps stepping back. Why?”

“It’s not easy to explain.”

“If it was, an idiot like me would have figured the answer out already. Can I sit beside you?”

“That’s putting the cart before the horse.”

“The horse is tired and needs a break. Come on, it’ll make it easier to hit me if you don’t like what I have to say.”

After a pause that seemed to last about ten years, she turned to look out over the city and patted the stone beside her. Locke slid over, eagerly but carefully, until his left shoulder was touching her right. The warm wind stirred around them, and Locke caught the faint scents of musk and sage oil from her hair. A thousand fluttering things burst to life in his stomach and immediately found reasons to run all over the place.

“You’re trembling,” she said, actually turning to look at him.

“You’re not exactly a statue yourself.”

“Are you going to try to make me not regret this, or are you just going to sit there staring?”

“I like staring at you,” said Locke, shocked and pleased at his own refusal to turn from her gaze.

“Well, I like heaving boys off rooftops. It’s not a habit I get to indulge often enough.”

“That wouldn’t get rid of me. I know how to land softly.”

“Gods damn it, Locke, if you’ve got something you want to say—”

“I do,” he said, steadying himself as though for the incoming swing of a wooden training baton. “I, uh, I’m tired of talking behind my hands and dropping hints and trying to trick some sort of reaction out of you. These are my cards on the table. I think you’re beautiful. I feel like I’m an idiot with dirt on his face sitting next to someone out of a painting. I think … I think I’m just plain stupid for you. I know that’s not exactly sweet talk out of a play. Frankly, I’d kiss your shadow. I’d kiss dirt that had your heel print in it. I like feeling this way. I don’t give a damn what you or anyone else thinks … this is how it feels every time I look at you.

“And I admire you,” he said, praying that he could blurt everything out before she interrupted him. This desperate eloquence was like an out-of-control carriage, and if it smashed to a halt it might not move again. “I admire everything about you. Even your temper, and your moods, and the way you take gods-damned offense when I breathe wrong around you. I’d rather be confused about you than stone-fucking-certain about anyone else, got it? I admire the way you’re good at everything you do, even when it makes me feel small enough to drown myself in this wine cup.”

“Locke—”

“I’m not done.” He held up the cup he’d used to illustrate his previous point and gulped its contents straightaway. “The last thing. The most important thing … it’s this. I’m sorry.”

She was staring at him with an expression that made him feel like his legs were no longer touching the balcony stones beneath them.

“Sabetha, I’m sorry. You told me that you wanted something important from me, and that it wasn’t a defense or a justification … so it has to be this. If I’ve pushed you aside, if I’ve taken you for granted, if I’ve been a bad friend and screwed up anything that you felt was rightfully yours, I apologize. I have no excuses, and I wish I could tell you how ashamed I am that you had to point that out to me.”

“Gods damn you, Locke,” she whispered. The corners of her eyes glistened.

“Twice now? Look, uh, if I said the wrong thing—”

“No,” she said, wiping at her eyes, trying but failing to do so nonchalantly. “No, the trouble is you said the right thing.”

“Oh,” he said. His heart seemed to wobble back and forth in his chest like an improperly balanced alchemist’s scale. “You know, even for a girl, that’s confusing.”

“Don’t you get it? It’s easy to deal with you when you’re being an idiot. It’s easy to push you aside when you’re blind to anything outside your own skull. But when you actually pay attention, and you actually make yourself … act like an adult, I can’t, I just can’t seem to make myself want to keep doing it.” She grabbed her wine cup at last, gulped most of it, and laughed, almost harshly. “I’m scared, Locke.”

“No you’re not,” he said vehemently. “Nothing scares you. You may be a lot of other things, but you’re never scared.”

“Our world is this big.” She held the thumb and forefinger of her left hand up barely an inch apart. “Just like Chains says. We live in a hole, for the gods’ sake. We sleep fifteen feet apart. We’ve known each other more than half our lives. What have we ever seen of other men or women? I don’t want … I don’t want something like this to happen because it can’t be helped. I don’t want to be loved because it’s inevitable.”

“Not everything that’s inevitable is bad.”

“I should want someone taller,” she said. “I should want someone better-looking, and less stubborn, and more … I don’t know. But I don’t. You are awkward and frustrating and peculiar, and I like it. I like the way you look at me. I like the way you sit and stare and ponder and worry yourself over everything. Nobody else stumbles around quite the way you do, Locke. Nobody else can … keep juggling flaming torches while the stage burns down around them like you do. I adore it. And that … that frightens me.”

“Why should it?” Locke reached out, and his heart threatened to start breaking ribs when she slipped his hand into hers. “Why aren’t you entitled to your feelings? Why can’t you like whoever you want to like? Why can’t you love—”

“I wish I knew.” Suddenly they were on their knees facing one another, hands clasped, and Sabetha’s face was a map of mingled sorrow and relief. “I wish I was like you.”

“No you don’t,” he said. “You’re beautiful. And you’re better at just about everything than I am.”

“I know that, stupid,” she said with a widening smile. “But what you know is how to tell the whole world to fuck off. You would piss in Aza Guilla’s eye even if it got you a million years in hell, and after a million years you’d do it again. That’s why Calo and Galdo and Jean love you. That’s why … that’s why I … well, that’s what I wish I knew how to do.”

“Sabetha,” said Locke. “Not everything that’s inevitable is regrettable. It’s inevitable that we breathe air, you know? I like shark meat better than squid. You like citrus wine better than red. Isn’t that inevitable? Why the hell does it matter? We like what we like, we want what we want, and nobody needs to give us permission to feel that way!”

“See how easy it is for you to say that?”

“Sabetha, let me tell you something. You called it silly, but I do remember the first glimpses I ever had of you, when we both lived in Shades’ Hill. I remember how you lost your hat, and I remember how your red was coming out at the roots. It struck me witless, understand? I didn’t even know why, but I was delighted.”

“What?”

“I have been fixated on you for as long as I’ve had memories. I’ve never chased another girl, I’ve never even gone with the Sanzas … you know, to see the Guilded Lilies. I dream about you, and only you, and I’ve always dreamt about you as you really are … you know, red. Not the disguise—”

“What?”

“Did I say something wrong?”

“You’ve seen the real color of my hair once.” She pulled her hands out of his. “Once, when you were the next thing to a gods-damned baby, and you can’t get over it, and that’s supposed to flatter me?”

“Hold on, please—”

“ ‘As I really am?’ I’ve kept my hair dyed brown for ten years! THAT’S how I really am! Gods, I am so stupid … . You’re not fixated on me … you want to fuck a red-haired girl, just like every leering pervert this side of Jerem!”

“Absolutely not! I mean—”

“You know why I’ve been dodging slavers all my life? You know why Chains trusted me with a poisoned dagger when Calo and Galdo were barely allowed to carry orphan’s twists? You ever hear the things they say about Therin redheads that haven’t had their petals plucked?”

“Wait, wait, wait, honest, I didn’t—”

“I am so, so stupid!” She shoved him backward, and he crushed his empty wine cup, painfully, by sitting on it.

“I should have known. I just should have known. You admire me? You respect me? Like hell. I can’t believe I was going to … I just— Get out. Get the hell out of here.”

“Wait, please.” Locke tried to wipe away the haze suddenly stinging his eyes. “I didn’t mean—”

“Your meaning was quite plain. Go away!”

She threw her own empty cup at him, missing, but speeding his stumbling escape into the little passage down to the second floor. As he tried to roll awkwardly back to his feet, a pair of strong hands grabbed him from behind and hauled him up.

“Jean,” he muttered. “Thanks, but I—”

The same hands grabbed him, spun him around, and pressed him hard against the passage wall. Locke found himself eye to eye with the new patron of the Moncraine-Boulidazi Company.

“Lord Boulidazi,” Locke sputtered. “Gennaro!”

The well-built Esparan held Locke in place with one iron forearm, and reached beneath his plain, dusty clothing with the other hand. He pulled out ten inches of steel, gleaming in the light from the open balcony door, the sort of knife crafted for arguments rather than display cases. In an instant the tip was against Locke’s left cheek.

“Cousin,” spat Boulidazi. “I thought I’d dress down and come see how my investment was faring. The idiots in the taproom said you might be up here. That’s a fascinating conversation you’ve been having, Cousin, but it leaves me feeling like there’s a few things you haven’t exactly been telling me.”

The knife-tip pressed deeper into Locke’s skin, and he groaned.

“Like everything,” said Boulidazi. “Why don’t we start with everything?”

1

“SOMEONE’S GONNA RECOGNIZE us,” said Locke.

“We look like hell,” said Jean, practicing understatement at the master level. “Just two more travelers covered in dust and shit.”

“Volantyne must have returned by now. Sabetha’s got to have people watching the gates.” Locke tapped the side of his head. “You and I would.”

“That’s a generous appraisal of our foresight.”

It had been a hard four days back to Karthain. They’d looted the wagon and shoved it into a ravine on the second day, needing every scrap of speed they could coax out of their unyoked team. Lashain’s constables were no threat, but the previous occupant of the wagon could always hire mercenaries. There was no law on the long, ancient road between city-states; a column of dust rising rapidly in the sky behind them would probably have meant someone was going to die.

Now the city, finally in sight, had taunted them for half a day with the prospect of relative safety. They’d come up the coast road from the east, through hills and terraced farming villages, their bodies thoroughly punished by the seedy emergency saddles they’d filched from the wagon.

“Maybe you’re right, though,” said Jean. “If we’ve got no chance of hiding ourselves, we’ve got to rely on speed. We get one move, maybe, before she can respond.”

“Let’s go straight for her,” said Locke. His scowl shook little puffs of dust out of the creases of his road-grimed face.

“To do what?”

“Finish a conversation.”

“You in a hurry to get back to sea? I can handle a couple of her people at a time. She’s got more than a couple.”

“Taken care of,” said Locke. “I know a fellow who’ll be eager to help us past the guards.”

“You do?”

“Didn’t you notice that Vordratha favors tight breeches?”

“What the hell’s that got to do with anything?”

“Every little detail matters,” said Locke. “Just wait. It’ll be a fun surprise.”

“Well, shit,” said Jean. “It’s not like I’ve done anything especially smart in months. Why start now?”

2

THEY SLIPPED into traffic and the usual milling semi-confusion of customs inspectors, guards, teamsters, travelers, and horse manure. The Court of Dust, despite the general cleanliness of Karthain, could have been peeled up beneath its paving stones and set down in place of its counterpart in nearly any Therin city without arousing much notice.

Locke scanned the crowds as he and Jean were poked and prodded by bored constables. Sabetha’s spotters would most likely be working in teams, one person on watch while the other was always plausibly absorbed in some trivial business. After counting five possible pairs of watchers, Locke shook his head. What was the point?

Locke felt something else unusual going on, though. A buzz of activity around the court, beyond mundane business. He’d spent too many hours picking pockets in crowds like this not to sense that something was awry.

Jean was alert, too. “What’s the excitement?” he asked of a passing constable.

“It’s the Marrows. You ain’t heard?” The woman gestured toward a crowd forming around a battered statue of a Therin Throne noblewoman. “Crier’s just about to start up again.”

Locke saw that a young woman, a finger’s width over four feet tall, had climbed the statue pedestal. She wore the blue coat of Karthain, and standing below her was a man in the regalia worn by Herald Vidalos, tipstaff and all.

“KIND ATTENTION, citizens and friends of Karthain,” bellowed the woman. Locke was impressed; there had to be more leather lining her lungs than his saddle. “Hear this report of the FACTS as provided and authorized by the KONSEIL! Mendacity will NOT be tolerated! Rumormongers will be subject to INCARCERATION on the PENANCE BARGES!

“Vencezla Valgasha, king of the Seven Marrows, is DEAD! He is KNOWN to have died in the city of Vintila, SIX DAYS AGO. He died WITHOUT ISSUE and without lawful heir! A war of secession is now under way!

“The Canton of EMBERLAIN, easternmost of the Seven Marrows, has EXILED its ruling graf and declared itself to be a SOVEREIGN REPUBLIC! The Konseil of Karthain DECLINES to formally recognize Emberlain at this time, and strongly advises citizens of Karthain to AVOID all travel in the north until the situation stabilizes!”

“Holy hells,” said Locke. “Sabetha was right! The Marrows finally busted up. Gods, what a mess that’s going to be.”

“We won’t be able to pull the Austershalin brandy scam again,” said Jean. “Not for a good long while.”

“There’ll be other opportunities,” said Locke wistfully. “If it’s war, desperate people are going to be moving a lot of valuable things. But come on, we’ve got to move ourselves.”

They spurred their tired mounts down a broad avenue to the west, over a shaking and sighing glass bridge, through the Court of the Divines with its incense haze, and onto the Evening Terrace. It seemed surreal to be back on clean streets, among lush gardens and bubbling fountains, as though Karthain were more of a recurring dream than a real place.

Outside the Sign of the Black Iris, they aroused immediate interest. At least two watchers, unmistakably real, flashed hand signs to dark shapes on roofs. A fleet-footed child darted into the alley beside Sabetha’s headquarters. Locke led their bedraggled horses to a curbside spot more commonly used for carriages, and when he hopped down a cloud of road dust floated off his boots. He wobbled and nearly pitched over before seizing control of himself. His legs felt like prickly jelly. His horse, less than endeared to him, flicked its ears and snapped its teeth.

“These animals are the personal property of Verena Gallante,” Locke said to the anxious-looking footman. “She wants them well looked after.”

“But sir, if you please—”

“I don’t. Get them stabled.” Locke shoved past the man and reached for the door to the foyer, but Jean pushed his hand aside and went first.

Inside were the two alley-hounds Locke had seen last time.

“Oh, hell,” said the closest one. Jean was already inside his guard. A variety of fast, noisy, and painful things happened, none of them to Locke or Jean. As one guard hit the floor, Jean pitched his comrade facefirst through the lobby doors like a battering ram. Then the Gentlemen Bastards followed.

Here was Vordratha, impeccably dressed and with a fresh black iris pinned to his jacket, backed by four guards with truncheons in hand. Better-dressed people scattered for the doors and staircases behind them.

“Gentlemen,” said the majordomo, peering at the guard who’d just landed at his feet, “this is a members-only establishment with firm rules against rendering the help unconscious.”

“Your game now, Lazari,” said Jean.

“Thanks.” Locke put his hands up to show they were empty. “Please take us to Mistress Gallante immediately.”

“Now how can I do that, gentlemen, when you’ll be headed out the alley door presently with bruises on your skulls?”

“We’d really like to see her.” Before the guards could crowd in, Locke moved up to Vordratha, reached down to the man’s breeches, grabbed his balls through the silk, and gave them a considerable twist. “Or we’d like to see your physiker’s face when he gets a look at the bruises from this.”

Vordratha moaned, and his face turned shades of a color rarely seen outside of vineyards at harvest time. The guards edged forward, but Locke held up his free hand.

“Call your friends off,” said Locke. “I’m not a strong man, but I don’t have to be, do I? I’ll twist this thing so tight you’ll piss corkscrews for the next twenty years!”

“Do as he says, gods damn you,” gasped Vordratha.

“Simply take us to Verena,” said Locke, watching as the guards slowly backed away, “and I’ll return your valuable property to you without lasting damage.”

It was an awkward shuffle, with Vordratha stumbling backward and Locke maintaining his tight, twisted grip on the majordomo’s hopes of procreation, but it did the job of keeping the guards at bay.

“Well, how now, asshole?” said Locke. “No little quips for us? I’ve never steered a fellow along by his loot sack before. Sort of like steering a boat by the tiller.”

“Camorri dog … your mother … sucked—”

“If you finish that thought,” said Locke, “I’ll wind your precious bits tighter than a bowstring.”

Vordratha led Locke and Jean up a flight of stairs to the private dining hall where they’d met Sabetha before. The guards maintained a respectful distance, but followed en masse. Vordratha bumped the door to the hall open with his backside, and Locke saw that Sabetha was already waiting for them.

She was dressed sensibly for anything from signing papers to diving out windows, in black breeches, a short brown jacket, and riding boots. Her hair was wound around lacquered pins; doubtless they contained tricks or weapons or both. Behind her were three more guards, armed with coshes and bucklers.

“Hello again, Verena,” said Locke. “We were in the neighborhood and thought we’d investigate persistent rumors that Master Vordratha has no balls.”

“Isn’t this a bit crude, even by your relaxed standards?” said Sabetha.

“I suppose having your boot-print embedded in my ass makes me cranky,” said Locke. “Tell your friends to go away.”

“Oh, that sounds lovely! Shall I tie myself up for you as well?”

“We just want to talk.”

“Release Vordratha and we’ll talk as long as you like.”

“The instant I release Vordratha, all hell’s going to break loose. I’m not stupid. For a change.”

“I promise—”

“HA,” shouted Locke. “Please.”

“We have no basis for trust, then.”

“You’ve given us no basis for trust. I wasn’t the one—”

“This is getting personal.” Sabetha glared at him with real irritation. She was always less in control of herself when pushed, a hot anger in direct contrast to Jean’s cold fury. Locke had spent years desperately straining to read her, and he saw now that she had no clever plan for ending this standoff. His own position—his safety assured only so long as he could keep a grip on another man’s privates—suddenly struck him as painfully ridiculous.

“I want to speak to you,” he said, slowly. “Nothing more. I won’t harm you or try to take you from this place. I swear it absolutely on the souls of two men we both loved.”

“What could you—”

With his free hand, Locke made two of the old private signals.

Calo. Galdo.

Sabetha stared at him; then something broke behind her eyes. Relief? At any rate, she nodded.

“Everyone out,” she said. “Nobody lays a hand on these men without my orders. Release Vordratha.”

Locke did. The majordomo slumped to the ground and curled up in a half-moon of misery. Sabetha’s guards slowly backed out of the room behind her, and Jean crouched over Vordratha.

“I’ll get him out of here,” he said. “I think you two want some privacy.”

In a moment, Jean had carried the slender Vadran out the way they’d come, and Locke was once again facing Sabetha in an empty room.

“We can’t just use those names as magic words every time we find ourselves at cross-purposes,” she said.

“I know. But it’s not my fault I even had to—”

“Spare me.”

“NO!” Locke trembled with hunger, adrenaline, and emotion. “I will not be shrugged off! I will not have my feelings pushed aside for the convenience of whatever pose you think you’re adopting here.”

“Your feelings? We’re in Karthain working for the Bondsmagi, damn it, we’re not children fumbling around in the back of a wagon!”

“You used me.”

“And that’s what we do,” she said. “Both of us, professionally. I tricked you, and I meant to trick you, and I’m sorry that hurts, but this is our trade.”

“Not this. You didn’t just trick me. You used the deepest feelings I have ever had for anyone, and you know it! You exploited a weakness that only exists when I’m around you!”

“Woman convinces man to impale himself on his own hard-on. There’s a very old story! The world didn’t stop just because it happened again.”

“I’m not an infant, Sabetha. I’m not talking about sex; I’m talking about trust.”

“I put you on that ship for your own gods-damned good, Locke. I knew this would happen! I didn’t just need you out of the way and I wasn’t just minding your health. I knew you’d beat your brains out against your stupid obsession.”

“Oh, marvelous. Lovely fucking plan, because I certainly didn’t think about you once during the nine days it took to get back to Karthain.”

She had the good grace to glance away.

“What the hell is this, anyway? First you don’t need to justify yourself at all, and now it was for my own good?” Locke, feeling hot, angrily unbuttoned the stained, oversized riding jacket he’d taken from the stolen carriage. “And you are NOT a stupid obsession!”

“I’m a grown woman who’s telling you we cannot wind the clock back five years just because you can’t work up the courage to make a pass at someone else.”

“Courage? Who the hell do you think you are, telling me about my courage? Courage is what it takes to come after you! Courage is what it takes to put up with your self-righteous gods-damned martyr act!”

“You cocksure, self-entitled, swaggering little ass!”

“Tell me you never liked me,” said Locke, advancing step by step. “Tell me you never found me worthwhile. Tell me we didn’t have good years together. That’s all it would take!”

“Stubborn, fixated—”

“Tell me you weren’t pleased to see me!”

“… presumptuous—”

“Quit telling me things I already know!” They were suddenly less than a foot apart. “Quit making excuses. Tell me you can’t stand me. Otherwise—”

“You … you … whew, Locke, in faith, you reek.”

“Is that a surprise? What was I supposed to do, swim back to Karthain?”

“You were supposed to stay on the damned ship! I gave very specific directions about the availability of baths, for one thing.”

“If you wanted me to stay on the ship,” he said, “you should have been on it.”

“You look ridiculous.” Locke fought for self-control as Sabetha slowly ran two fingers down his left cheek. “You look bowlegged. Gods above, did you leave any dust on the road after you passed?”

“You can’t, can you?”

“Can’t what?”

“Can’t tell me to get lost. Not to my face, not now that I’ve called you out. You don’t really want me to go away.”

“I do not have to explain myself by your terms!”

“Better cinch up that jacket, Sabetha, I think your conscience is showing.”

“We are servants of the Bondsmagi,” she whispered angrily. “We came here of our own free will, and we both screwed things up badly enough that we need this. Our position is precarious. And if we get too friendly, at least one of us gets killed.”

“I know,” he said. “I’m not saying we don’t need to be careful. I’m just pointing out that there’s nothing forbidding us from having a personal life.”

“Everything personal is business with us.” She brushed the dust from his cheek against her coat. “And all of our damned business is personal.”

“Have dinner with me.”

“What?”

“Dinner. It’s a meal. Men and women often have it together. Ask around if you don’t believe me.”

“For this you twisted my majordomo’s balls off?”

“You said we’re not kids fumbling around in the back of a wagon, and you’re right. We’re in charge of our own gods-damned lives no matter how hard we’ve been kicked around. We can set the clock back however many years we like. It’s ours to set!”

“This is crazy.”

“No. Two weeks ago I was begging to die. That’s crazy. Two weeks ago I came this close, this close.” He held up a thumb and forefinger with no space at all between them. “I hit the black wall between this life and the next, believe me. I am through fucking around. Maybe this is going to complicate the hell out of things. So what? You’re the complication I want more than anything else. You’re my favorite complication. No matter what sort of holes you poke in my trust.”

“You know, self-pity is the only thing that smells worse than four days of road sweat.”

“Self-pity is about the only straw left to cling to after YOU happen to a fellow,” said Locke. “We can have this if we both want it. But you have to want it, too. This isn’t me trying to convince you of anything, unless …”

“Unless?”

“Unless some part of you is already convinced.”

“Dinner,” she said softly.

“And a contractual option for … subsequent complications. At your discretion.”

She couldn’t or wouldn’t meet his gaze during the silence that filled the next few seconds. Locke’s blood seemed to turn to gel in his veins.

“Where are we going?” she said at last.

“How the hell should I know?” Relief hit so hard he wobbled on his feet.

Sabetha’s right arm darted out and caught him around the waist. They both stood staring at the point of contact for a long, frozen moment, and then she drew back again.

“Are you all right?” she said softly.

“I, uh, guess I really liked your answer. But come now, how much time have you left me to figure out where anything is in this damned city? You’re morally obligated to pick the place. Tomorrow night.”

“Let it be sunset,” she said. “Do you trust me to send a carriage?”

“Jean and I won’t be together,” said Locke. “We’ll make sure of it. If I don’t come back in a reasonable amount of time, you can face him, pissed off and unrestrained. How’s that for a safeguard?”

“Not trouble I’d invite if I could help it.” She put her hands behind her back and regarded him appraisingly. “What now?”

“Depends. Do I still have an inn to go home to?”

“I’ve left Josten alone. Mostly.”

“Well, then, I’ve got to go soothe my children and, uh, figure out just how the hell I’m going to beat you.”

“Cocksure, infuriating little shit,” she said, without malice.

“Arrogant bitch,” he said, grinning as he backed toward the door. “Arrogant, stubborn, gorgeous bitch. And hey, if I catch one whiff of that perfume you were wearing last time—”

“If I catch one whiff of horses and road sweat, you’re going back to sea.”

“I’ll take a bath.”

“Take two. And … I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

“You will,” said Locke.

He reached the door, crediting himself with enough wits to not turn his back on her, at least not yet. He was about to leave when another thought struck him.

“Oh, you know, we did borrow some horses to get here. We put them in a bad way. Would you mind stabling the poor things?”

“I’ll clean up after you, sure. And …”

“Yes?”

“Is Jean all right? His face—”

“He broke his nose getting off your ship. He’ll be fine. You know what it takes to really slow him down. It occurs to me, though, that you still have his Wicked Sisters.”

“I’ll give them back … soon.” She smiled thinly. “They can be my hostages for your good behavior.”

“If you need hostages, you could always try a gentler version of what I just did to Vord—”

“Get the fuck out of here,” she said, fighting back a laugh.

3

“SO WHAT did you get us?” said Jean.

“Uh, a dinner date,” said Locke. “I think I should be able to discuss drawing a few sensible lines so none of us have to worry about waking up halfway to sea again.”

They’d walked out nonchalantly and claimed the first waiting carriage-for-hire, which was now rattling toward more friendly territory through the slanting late-afternoon shadows of the city’s towers.

“I assume you mentioned my sisters?”

“She’ll give them back if I behave.”

“Fine, then.”

Jean’s voice still had an alarming nasal quality, and Locke made a mental note to have him examined by a physiker whether he liked it or not.

“You’re not mad?” said Locke.

“Of course not. I presume you two idiots hinted to one another about relighting old fires?”

“That was my distinct impression.”

“Well, assuming you don’t let her drug you again, I’m proud of you. I’m the last man on earth who’d discourage you from chasing the woman you adore. Believe me. See to business and then make it as personal as possible.”

“Thanks.” Locke grinned, and enjoyed a brief moment of actual relaxation, one that ended as soon as he blinked and realized that Patience was seated just across from him, lips folded into a scowl below her night-dark eyes.

“I’d say you’re placing an alarming emphasis on pleasure over responsibility, wouldn’t you?” she said.

“Gods above!” Locke edged away from her reflexively, and saw Jean flinch as well. “Why couldn’t you show up on the street like an ordinary person?”

“I’m no good at being an ordinary person. Your recent behavior has been darkly amusing, but I must confess that my colleagues and I are starting to worry about the effectiveness of your overall plan of resistance. If, indeed, such a plan exists.”

“It had to be set aside for a few days,” said Locke. “We did manage to escape total humiliation, no thanks to you.”

“How would you know where the thanks should fall?”

“I don’t remember you offering us a spare boat and a hot meal when we were trying not to drown,” said Jean.

“Unseasonal hard winds blew you off course for most of a week, leaving you within spitting distance of shore, and you didn’t stop to ponder the implications?”

“Wait,” said Locke. “I thought you were strictly forbidden from—”

“I won’t confirm or refute any conjecture,” said Patience, sounding satisfied as a cream-fed cat. “I’m merely pointing out that your vaunted imaginations seem to be flickering rather dimly. Of course it’s possible we aided you. It’s possible the other side had bent the rules as well, and earned a bit of a rebuke. You’ll never know for sure.”

“Damn it, Patience,” said Locke, “you were at pains to assure us that the rules of your stupid contest are ironclad!”

“And you were at pains to insist that you didn’t trust me any farther than you could throw this carriage.”

“Why the hell are you even here? Do you have some message?”

“The message is this: Mind your task, Locke Lamora. You’re here to win, not to woo.”

“I’m here to do both. Carte blanche was the deal. Are you reneging?”

“I’m just relaying—”

“My disinterest in your bullshit is so tangible you could make bricks out of it. Carte blanche, yes or no?”

“Yes,” she said. “But you should be very, very careful how long you test our forbearance. When dealing with a horse that won’t make speed, one tends to apply a whip to its flanks, doesn’t one?”

“You told me you people love to sit back and watch your agents run around entertaining you. So kindly sit back, shut up, and be entertained.”

“I intend to be,” she said. Between heartbeats she was gone, without so much as a rustle of fabric.

“Gods damn it,” said Locke. “Tell me I wouldn’t be such a tremendous pain in the ass if I had those powers.”

“You’d be worse,” sighed Jean. “I’d have killed you myself a long time ago. And you know what else?”

“Hrrrm?”

“Patience can lick scorpions in hell. You and Sabetha take your time and sort out whatever the last five years have done to you. I’m here to mind the shop whenever you’re out.”

4

“OH, GODS,” said Nikoros, who was sitting at Josten’s bar behind a half-finished drink that was a bit too large and a bit too early in the day. “Oh, thank the gods! Where have you two been?”

“On the road, dear fellow,” said Locke, seizing Nikoros around the shoulders and pulling him to his feet. Locke ground his teeth as he noticed the sharp smell of something alchemical on Nikoros’ breath, and his dilated pupils, but there was no time to berate him just now. “Engaged in terribly important secret affairs! Where do we stand?”

“We’re, uh, beset by unexpected complications,” said Nikoros, bewildered. “We’re getting our asses kicked. The bookmakers are projecting a fourteen-seat Konseil majority for the Black—”

“That’s great,” said Locke, flush with the heady exhilaration that comes from absolute freedom to bullshit absolutely. “That’s excellent. That’s the whole point of the exercise! Master Callas and I have been making careful arrangements to create the false impression of a total state of disarray on our side. Get it? We’ve got the Black Iris right where we want them.”

“Uh … really?” Hope brought new color to Nikoros’ face with startling speed, and Locke sighed. Between whatever he’d been drinking and the “adjustments” of the Bondsmagi, Nikoros probably had the free will of a sponge. “That sounds great!”

“Doesn’t it?” said Locke. “Now summon a physiker. Then grab every trustworthy dogsbody and scribe you can lay hands on and bring them up to me in the Deep Roots private gallery in five minutes. Go, go, go! Josten?”

“At your service, Master Lazari.”

“Food for five hungry fat men, in the private gallery, as soon as possible.”

“I gave some orders when I saw you walk in.”

“Bless you. Master Callas will want coffee, too. Hot enough to strip paint. Did you have any problems while we were away? Security trouble?”

“Your people caught half a dozen folks trying to break in. Sent them off with bad headaches. They also tell me we’re being watched from several points around the neighborhood.”

“We’ll tend to that soon enough.” Locke beckoned for Jean to follow, and the two of them passed through the crowd of afternoon businessfolk and traders, exchanging friendly nods with Deep Roots supporters barely remembered from the night of Nikoros’ party. In moments they were up in the party’s private gallery, temporarily alone.

“Is there an actual plan running around in your head?” wheezed Jean.

“Crap sparks until something catches fire.” Locke settled into a high-backed chair and brushed dust from his filthy tunic. “Noise and action to keep Sabetha guessing while we cook up a real scheme. We start with childish pranks and escalate steadily. Gods, I wish we had some proper urchins, some Right People that knew what they were doing.”

Camorri outlaws had never thought very highly of their fraternal associates in other cities, but Karthain was the least-regarded of all. Locke hadn’t once heard of a Karthani gang that had any reach, any of the savage pride or inventiveness that Camorri, Verrari, or even Lashani crews took for granted.

“It’s the Presence,” said Jean. “The Bondsmagi have these people tamed.”

Food and coffee were the first of the commanded resources to arrive. Locke scarfed down meat and bread; neither lingered long enough before his eyes or in his mouth for full identification. Jean sipped coffee and ate a roll, almost daintily, with obvious discomfort.

A few moments later, a dark-skinned woman with neat gray hair came up the stairs carrying a leather bag.

“I’m Scholar Triassa,” she said, frowning at Jean. “And that nose tells quite a story.”

While she began her examination, tactfully saying nothing about the fact that Locke and Jean smelled like goats, Nikoros and half a dozen scribes and assistants came up the stairs.

“Good,” said Locke, gulping a last bite of food. “It’s time to give those Black Iris gits a taste of some friendly piss-artistry. Whet your quills. Scribe everything down exactly. Give your notes to Nikoros when we’re finished, and he’ll handle the actual work assignments.

“I want a letter drafted immediately to the chief constable of Lashain, whoever that is. Tell them that four horses stolen from an armored carriage service bound for Lashain have been located in the stables at the Sign of the Black Iris in Karthain. Each horse has a clearly visible brand on its neck. These horses were received as stolen property and not reported to the Karthani authorities. Sign it ‘a friend’ and get it to the very next ship crossing the Amathel with mail.”

Jean chuckled, then grunted as Scholar Triassa continued her work. Locke paced back and forth as he spoke.

“Tomorrow I’ll secure an addition to party funds. I want a thousand ducats handed out to trustworthy Deep Roots members in increments of five to twenty ducats apiece. I want them all to go out this week and place bets, with anyone taking them, on the Deep Roots winning the election. I want a sudden surge of Deep Roots confidence, so the opposition can have a good hard worry about the possibility that we know something they don’t.

“I want another thousand spent on cakes and wine, rigged up in baskets with green ribbons. Complimentary baskets go to the houses of tradesfolk, merchants, alchemists, scribes, physikers—anyone respectable that isn’t already part of the Deep Roots family. Let’s go wooing new voters.”

“That might, uh, cause a problem with some of the, uh, senior party members,” said Nikoros. “Traditionally we’re very choosy about new members. We have private salons, by invitation. We don’t, uh, sweep the streets for recruits.”

Locke poured a mug of coffee and took a long sip. And for those refined tastes, you idiots have been crowded out hard in the last two elections, he thought.

“Am I in charge here, Nikoros?”

“Oh, uh, gods yes, absolutely sir. I didn’t mean to imply anything other—”

“We will sweep the streets for recruits if it comes to that. I’ll put a bag of gold in the hands of any brick-witted cross-eyed sheepfucker who can mark a parchment. Anytime you want to question me, remind yourself that the opposition doesn’t share your delicate gods-damned traditions. All they care about is winning.”

“Er, of course.”

“The baskets go out. No demands, no obligations, not yet. We just want people thinking kindly of us. Arm-twisting comes later.

“More quietly,” he continued, “hunt down our party members with debts, troubles in court, that sort of thing. Give me a list of their little problems and we’ll send people out to fix them. In exchange, we’ll own their asses and set them toiling.

“Now, conversely. Black Iris party members with weaknesses. Debts, affairs, scandals, addictions, legal entanglements. I want that list! I want to scratch every wound, pour vinegar in every cut, pluck every low-hanging fruit. Constant, total harassment, seizing any opportunity they give us, starting before the sun rises again.”

“As you wish,” said Nikoros.

“To that end … I need a trustworthy alchemist. I need a wagon … a few dozen small animal cages … as many live snakes as we can get our hands on.”

“Live snakes?” said one of the scribes. “You mean—”

“Yeah,” said Locke. “They’ve got scales, they slither around—snakes. Keep up. We only want ’em if they’re not venomous! That means barn serpents, brown marshies, belt snakes. Anything else you have in these parts that fits the bill. Use mercenaries, boys, girls, anyone.… Offer a suitable bounty, but keep it gods-damned quiet. I don’t want word of this little project going too far. Drop the cages in the cellar and keep the snakes there until further notice. How’s Master Callas’ nose?”

“Badly set,” said the physiker. “I gather from your rather forthright aroma that you gentlemen have been unable to rest for several days.”

“Woefully correct,” said Locke.

“It’ll have to be rebroken. It’s plain this isn’t your first such injury, Master Callas, and you’re developing a breathing obstruction.”

“Then do it,” said Jean.

“I’ll need two cups of brandy, some assistants, and some rope.”

“No time for all that,” growled Jean, “and I want my head clear for work. Just do it here and now.”

“Your pardon, Master Callas, but I don’t relish the thought of a man your size lashing out at me—”

“Scholar,” said Locke, “this building is more likely to collapse than my friend is to lose control of himself.”

“I’m doubling my fee,” said the woman sternly.

“And I’m tripling it,” said Jean. “Go on, snap the damn thing to where it ought to be. I’ve had worse, and I’ve had it without warning.”

Triassa placed her hands carefully, as though Jean’s head were a clay sculpture and she meant to pinch the nose off and start over. She applied pressure with one smooth motion; Jean remained still but did indulge in a long, deep, appropriately theatrical groan. The sound of whatever was moving or breaking inside the nose itself made Locke shudder as though his privates had just been dipped in ice water, and a collective gasp arose from the scribes.

“Perhaps just one small brandy,” rasped Jean, barely moving his lips. Tears ran down his cheeks. Locke pointed at one of the scribes; the woman nodded and hurried out of the gallery.

Triassa deftly set Jean’s nose in cream-colored alchemical plasters and wrapped linen around his head. “Keep this in place,” she said. “You’ve danced this dance before, so don’t do anything foolish. Brace your head while you sleep. Come see me tomorrow—I’m across the street.”

“Thanks,” said Jean. A moment later the helpful scribe returned with a glass of caramel-brown liquor, which Jean poured carefully down his throat.

“Well, then,” said Locke. “Now that we’ve all realized precisely how tough we’ll never be, let’s stand on what we have. Pass your lists to Nikoros and he’ll mind the details.”

“Sirs,” said Nikoros as his hands rapidly filled with papers, “I’m pleased to see you back and taking a more active role in our affairs, but, ah, this volume of work—”

“Don’t fret, Nikoros, there’s plenty of time, assuming none of us sleeps before dawn.” Locke gave Nikoros a reassuring squeeze on the arm, then lowered his voice to a private whisper. “Also, if I catch you stuffing another speck of black alchemy down your throat, your job situation is going to be vacant. Understand?”

“Master Lazari, sir, what can I say? I’m ashamed … but you were gone … everything was so confused—”

“Everything is now unconfused. We’re gonna have baths drawn and rejoin civilization. Get to work. Get me that list and get me that alchemist. There’s two ladies in particular waiting to see what we’ve got up our sleeves, and it’s time for things to get hectic.”

“Uh, of course, Master Lazari.”

“Nikoros!”

“Uh, yes, sir?”

“I just had a really exciting thought. Get me the list, the alchemist, and then get me a city constable! A well-bent one. Someone who thinks with their purse and isn’t shy about it.”

“Uh, certainly, but it may take—”

“Tonight, Nikoros, tonight!”

5

LOCKE AND Jean found steaming baths in their suite, along with more food and enough towels, body scrapers, and scented oil jars to supply a rather hygienic harem. Refreshed and repackaged in respectable outer layers, they returned to the Deep Roots private gallery to find Nikoros waiting, new papers in hand. Locke scanned them as rapidly as the crabbed handwriting would permit.

“Good, good,” he muttered. “Debts, lots of debts. Eager little gamblers, our Black Iris friends … Who’d be holding most of these?”

“Most of the debts that aren’t between gentlefolk would involve Fifthson Lucidus, over in the Vel Verda.… Well, he owns the chance houses in the Vel Verda, but he lives somewhere on Isas Merreau.”

“Lovely,” said Locke. “A little duke of the dice-dens. He’s not a big player in either political party, is he?”

“Doesn’t give a damn about the elections, as far as I know.”

“Better and better,” said Locke. “Exactly the sort of man Master Callas and I should see in the small hours of the night, like dutiful physikers paying a house call.”

“Physikers?”

“Absolutely. We want him firmly convinced that if he disregards our advice his health is apt to suffer. Now, where’s my alchemist and my constable?”

“Coming, Master Lazari, coming.…”

6

THE MOONS were shy in just the way thieves prefer, hidden behind clouds like black wool, and the brisk south wind carried the scents of lake water and forge smoke. Banked-down furnaces were faint smudges of red and orange nestled among the shadows of the Isle of Hammers, and the view from the window of Fifthson Lucidus’ third-story bedroom captured it all nicely.

Locke took a moment to properly appreciate the tableau before he turned and woke Lucidus with a slap to the face.

“Mmmmmph,” said the heavyset Karthani. His exclamation was muffled by Jean, who, standing behind his bed, slapped one hand over his mouth and hauled him to a sitting position with the other.

“Shhhh,” said Locke, who sat down at Lucidus’ feet. He adjusted the aperture of his dark-lantern to throw a thin beam directly on the bearded and bleary-eyed fellow, whose face wore the sort of extra years that came out of a wine bottle. “Your first thought will be to struggle, so I’d like you to think about where and how deep I can cut you while leaving you perfectly capable of conversation.”

He unsheathed a long, freshly polished steel blade, and was sure to catch the lantern light with it before he slapped Lucidus’ legs with the flat of the weapon.

“Your second thought,” said Locke, who wore an improvised gray linen mask, “will be to summon that big man who’s supposed to be watching your front door. I’m afraid we’ve put him to sleep for a bit. So now my associate will take his hand off your mouth, and you’ll mind your tone of voice.”

“Who the hell are you?” whispered Lucidus.

“What we are is the important thing. We’re better than you. There’s no defense you can dream up and no hole you can hide in that will keep us from doing this to you anytime we please.”

“What … what do you want?”

“Take a good look at these names.” Locke sheathed the blade and pulled out a torn sheet of parchment with a short list on it. The names had been culled from the larger list provided by Nikoros. They weren’t merely opposition voters, but components of varying importance in the Black Iris political machine. “Some of these men and women owe you money, yes?”

“Yes,” said Lucidus, squinting at the parchment. “Yes … most of them, in fact.”

“Good,” said Locke. “Because you’re about to have some money problems, understand? You’re going to call in your markers on all of these fine citizens.”

“Wait just a— Hggggrrrrkkk—”

This last exclamation was a result of Jean reasserting his presence, without prompting from Locke, via the careful application of a forearm to Lucidus’ windpipe.

“I’m not soliciting opinions,” said Locke, gesturing for Jean to ease up. “I’m giving orders. Yank the leash on these people or bad luck follows. Chance houses burn down. Nice homes like this burn down. The tendons in your legs get slashed. Understood?”

“Yes … yes …”

“About those money issues.” Locke held up a purse, stuffed near bursting with about ten pounds of coins, and Lucidus’ eyes went wide. “A hidden floor panel? Seriously? I was learning how to spot that sort of thing when I was six. You squeeze these people hard, get it? Collect the debts. Do your best and you’ll get this purse back, plus a hundred ducats. That’s nothing to scoff at, is it?”

“N-no …”

“Fuck it up,” said Locke, lowering his voice to a growl, “and this money vanishes. Try to cross me, and I’ll carve you like a festival roast. Get to work tomorrow, and don’t worry about looking for us. When we want to talk again we’ll find you.”

7

“NOW TELL us,” said Jean, staring down at a detailed map of Karthain with all of its avenues and islands, “which districts are usually considered an absolute lock for either party?”

It was deepening evening, the day after their midnight visit to the house of Fifthson Lucidus. Locke and Jean were in the private gallery with Damned Superstition Dexa and Firstson Epitalus. Nikoros, who’d been worked like a clockwork automaton for longer than Locke had intended, had passed out in a high-backed chair. Whether it was honest fatigue or alchemically induced, Locke allowed him to snore on for the time being.

“We’ve got all the right places, dear boy,” said Dexa, pointing to the southeastern portion of the map. “Isas Mellia, Thedra, and Jonquin. The Three Sisters, the old money districts. The Silverchase and Vorhala routinely come back eight-tenths Deep Roots, as well.”

“As for the opposition,” said Epitalus, “they’ve got the Isle of Hammers and the surrounding neighborhoods. Barresta, Merreau, Lacor, Agarro—shop and trade districts, you see.” Epitalus exhaled twin streams of white pipe smoke from his nostrils, and brief-lived cloud formations drifted over the illustrated city. “New men and women. Ink still wet on the receipts for their voting privileges, eh?”

“So it’s five against five,” said Locke, “and the other nine districts are in play?”

“More or less,” said Dexa. “Sentiment across the city—”

“Can go hang itself,” said Locke. “Here’s the basic plan, as much as I can reveal now. We keep most of our money out of the settled districts. We don’t have time to turn the Black Iris strongholds, and we shouldn’t have to worry about them turning ours. We’ll run some misdirection and some nice childish pranks, but most of our leverage gets thrown against the nine in the balance. How busy are you two with Konseil duties?”

“Hardly busy,” said Dexa. “We partly recess during election season. Karthain all but runs itself, barring emergencies.”

Epitalus mouthed something under his breath, and Locke was sure it was Bless the Presence.

“Good,” said Locke. “I’d like you two to do me a favor. Go after some undecided voters in districts outside your own. Make personal calls. Important people, the cream of the middle bunch. I’m sure you can think of a hundred candidates. Charm us votes one by one in the districts where every one of those votes will count. Does that sound agreeable?”

“With all due respect, Master Lazari,” said Epitalus, “that’s simply not how it’s done here in Karthain.”

“I doubt your counterparts in the hierarchy of the Black Iris would quibble at such a task.”

“It’s simply not how things are done where folk of substance are concerned,” said Dexa gently, as though explaining to a very small child that fire was hot.

“We have higher expectations than the Black Iris,” said Epitalus. “Firmer standards. We don’t scuttle about courting just anyone, Master Lazari. Surely you can see that it would make us look beggarly.”

“I doubt that any of the recipients of the solicitations I propose,” said Locke, “would be anything but deeply flattered to receive someone of your stature.”

“We don’t mean them,” said Dexa. “Rather, our fellow members of the Deep Roots. This sort of behavior could not be countenanced—”

“I see,” said Locke. “Never mind that these scruples have brought you embarrassing defeat in the last two elections. Never mind that you will apply your ‘firmer standards’ to a smaller and smaller circle of associates, with ever-shrinking influence, should you blithely allow the Black Iris to best you again.”

“Now, now, dear Master Lazari,” said Dexa. “Surely there’s no cause—”

“I am charged with winning this election,” said Locke. “To do so I will bend every custom that must be bent. If I lack your full confidence, you may have my resig—”

“Oh no,” said Epitalus, “no, please—”

Once again Locke saw the curious working of the arts of the Bondsmagi, as the ingrained prejudices of the Karthani warred with their conditioning to see him as some sort of cross between a spymaster and a prophet. It was something behind their eyes, and though it seemed to be going his way he thought it best to lay on some sweetness for added assurance.

“I would hardly ask this of you,” he said soothingly, “if I didn’t believe that I was sending you out to certain success. Your quality and grace will knock these individuals into our camp straightaway, and since you’ll be choosing them yourselves they’ll bring the Deep Roots nothing but credit. Get us a hundred or so. Winning will be worth it, I assure you.”

Dexa and Epitalus acquiesced. Not energetically, to be sure, but Locke was satisfied that their nods were sincere.

“Splendid,” he said. “Now, I’ve got a dinner eng—er, appointment. Business appointment. Something, ah, that could really work to our advantage. Master Callas will be here if you need anything.”

“I thought you were overdressed for a planning session,” said Dexa.

“What about poor Via Lupa?” said Epitalus.

“Hmm? Oh, Nikoros.… Let him sleep on for a bit. He’ll be up to his ass in baskets and green ribbons tomorrow.”

Locke made several pointless adjustments to his dark blue coat, and brushed imaginary dust from his black silk cravat.

“And if I don’t come back …” he muttered to Jean.

“I’ll knock the Sign of the Black Iris into its own foundation, and put Sabetha on a ship to Talisham.”

“Comforting,” Locke whispered. “Right. I’ve got to go wait for the carriage. Pin a note to Nikoros’ lapel, would you? I’m still waiting on that bloody alchemist and constable.”

8

THE CARRIAGE was on time and comfortable, but Locke rode alertly, with the compartment windows open and one hand in a coat pocket. He could have instantly conjured lockpicks, a dagger, a blackjack, or a small steel pry bar, as the situation required.

However, before any need arose for the tricks in his coat, the ride came to an end beneath a warmly lit stone tower somewhere in what Locke guessed was the Silverchase District. At least a dozen well-dressed gentlefolk were visible, seemingly at ease. A footman in a red silk coat opened the carriage door for him and bowed.

“Welcome to the Oversight, Master Lazari,” said the footman as Locke stepped onto the curb. “Your party’s already waiting, if you’ll follow me.”

Allowing himself to hope that there might be an actual dinner rather than an ambush forthcoming, Locke glanced up, and was startled. Spherical brass cages anointed with alchemical lanterns circled the highest level of the tower. These were suspended by some complex mechanical apparatus and formed a sort of gleaming halo perhaps seventy feet above the ground.

As the footman led him around the tower along a hedged path, Locke heard a muted rumbling from overhead. The cage on the side directly opposite the carriage park descended smoothly and settled into a circle of pavement about five yards across. The footman seized two levers and pulled open the cage’s door, revealing the luxurious interior … and Sabetha.

She wore a buttercream gown under a jacket the color of rich dark brandy, and her hair fell loose past her shoulders. She was seated on a cushion Jereshti-fashion, legs crossed, behind a knee-high table. Dazed by the sight of her and the strangeness of their surroundings, Locke meekly entered the cage and knelt on his own cushion. The footman resealed the door, and after a moment the cage crept upward, worked by some mechanism that was no doubt obsessively oiled in deference to the delicate ears of diners.

“If you’d wanted me to be ready earlier,” he said, “I’d have been happy—”

“Oh, tsk. How could I be properly mysterious and alluring if I wasn’t calmly waiting for you when the door opened?”

“You could manage it, somehow.” Locke studied the cage more closely. Although the table was ringed by gauze curtains, these were presently pulled up to the ceiling and tied in place. The cage was composed of thin bars laid in a grid with spaces about an inch on a side, through which Locke had a view of northeastern Karthain under the gold-red lines of fading sunset. “They punish criminals back home with a contraption like this.”

“Well, in Karthain criminals pay for the privilege of being hoisted,” said Sabetha. “I was told that the Oversight was actually inspired by the Palace of Patience. Something about how the west gentles and perfects the ways of the east.”

“I’ve been out here for several years, and I don’t feel gentled or perfected,” said Locke.

“Indeed, you haven’t even offered to pour the wine yet,” said Sabetha with mock disdain.

“Oh, damn,” said Locke, stumbling back to his feet. There was a bottle of something airing on the table next to a trio of glasses. He did his duty gracefully, filling two glasses and offering one to her with an exaggerated bow.

“Better, but you forgot some of us,” she said, pointing to the empty glass.

“Hmmm?” Proximity to Sabetha was like sand in the gears of his mind. He imagined that he could literally feel them straining to turn as he stared at the empty glass, and then came a warm rush of shame. “Hell and castration,” he muttered as he poured again, and then: “A glass poured to air for absent friends. May the Crooked Warden bless his crooked servants. Chains, Calo, Galdo, and Bug—”

“May they laugh forever in better worlds than this,” said Sabetha, touching Locke’s glass. They both took small sips. It was a good vintage, mellow and strong, tasting of plums and bitter oranges. Locke sat on his cushion again, and they shared an awkward pause.

“Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to give things a melancholy turn.”

“I know.” Locke sipped his wine again, reasoning that if it was drugged all of his hopes and assumptions were useless anyway. The miniature arsenal in his coat suddenly struck him as comical. “So, uh, do you like the flower I brought you?”

“The invisible flower? The hypothetical flower?”

Locke arched his eyebrows and tapped the right side of his coat. Sabetha looked down, hurriedly patted her own jacket, and pulled out an unfurled stemless rose, dark purple petals limned with crimson on their tips.

“Oh, you clever little weasel,” she said. “While you poured the wine.”

“And you were watching the bottle rather than the beau,” said Locke with a theatrical sigh. “It’s fine. My pride’s had all the stiffness trampled out of it already. I hope you like the color, though. Karthani hothouse. It had a stem, but that made it too awkward to carry or palm.”

“I don’t mind at all.” She set the rose carefully in the middle of the table. “Assuming it doesn’t explode or put me to sleep or anything.”

“I’ve forsworn vengeance on that score,” said Locke. “But we do need to talk about that, so we might as well get it over with.”

“What’s to talk about?”

“Kidnapping,” said Locke. “Assault. Exile. Alchemy. Dirty tricks of that nature, aimed at you or me or Jean.”

“We learned a dozen ways to incapacitate someone before we were ten,” said Sabetha. “It’s perfectly routine for us. I agreed to a truce tonight—”

“We should extend the truce permanently,” said Locke. “Mutual immunity from direct personal attack. If we’re going to have this fight, let’s have it mind to mind, plan to plan, and not need to sleep under our beds because we’re afraid of waking up on a ship the next day.”

“I’m not afraid of waking up on a ship.”

“Push your luck, gorgeous, and eventually luck pushes back. I might be dim enough to have dinner with you in a metal cage, but consider Jean. If he’s free to make his own moves he’ll squash your little army like boiled goose liver and you’ll be on your way to Talisham in a box.”

“Fearsome as that, is he?”

“Tell me again how many people you detailed to catch him while you were busy drugging me.”

“And if the Bondsmagi interpret this as collusion—”

“It’s nothing of the sort. Hell, this only increases our entertainment value for our jackass masters. They want us to run this affair in our accustomed style. Skulduggery, not skull-crackery. And you can’t tell me it wouldn’t tickle your own pride.”

“Just to be clear, you’re suggesting that I should discard an approach which has already brought me one considerable success, and continue the fight at a level more suited to the restraints of your own, well, inadequacy, and I should do this because it’ll make me feel the warm glow of virtue?”

“I suppose if you discard the lovely emotional resonance of my suggestion and pin me down on cold hard meaning—”

“How strange. You sound rather like a confidence trickster. But I’ve no objection to ending a little game while I’m one-up on you,” she said with a thin smile. “Truce as discussed, strictly limited to you and Jean and myself, so we can have more time to worry about the proper contest. Will you drink to it?”

“Full glass is an empty promise,” said Locke. Their glasses rang as they brought them together, and then they both gulped their wine to the last drop.

“Doubles or dishonor,” said Sabetha, speedily refilling the wine. Again they raced one another to the bottoms of their glasses, and when they finished her laugh seemed genuine enough to make Locke feel like a fresh wind had blown across whatever was smoldering in his heart.

“You have no idea,” he said, as the warm cloud of wine-haze steadily rose from his chest to his head, “how much aggravation I really am willing to put up with to hear that laugh again.”

“Oh, shit,” she said, rolling her eyes without banishing her smile. “Straight from business to skirt-chasing.”

“You’re the one plying me with wine!”

“Any woman of sense does prefer her men drunk and tractable.”

“And now you’re speaking of me possessively. Gods, keep doing that.”

“This is a far cry from the dusty mess that stormed my inn and accused me of cruelly tugging his heartstrings.”

“You try four days in the saddle without preparation and see what kind of mood it leaves you in.”

Their conversation was interrupted as an iron plank slid out from the tower and locked into place beside their cage. A waiter appeared and opened a door in the brass gridwork, through which he made several trips to deliver fresh wine and starter courses on gilded platters.

“I hope you don’t mind that I ordered for you,” said Sabetha.

“I’m at your mercy,” said Locke, whose stomach now grumbled achingly to life. Fortunately, Sabetha seemed sensitive to the awkwardness of his new appetite. She ravaged their dishes with indelicate gusto that matched his own.

There were the underwater mushrooms of the Amathel, translucent and steamed to the texture of gossamer, paired with coal-black truffles in malt and mustard sauce. There were cool buttercream cheeses and crackling, caustic golden peppers. Spicy fried bread with sweet onions was drizzled with tart yellow yogurt, a variation on a dish Locke recognized from the cuisine of Syrune. Each of these courses was bookended with wine and more wine. Though Locke felt his own wits softening, he was heartened to see the deepening blush on Sabetha’s cheeks and the way her smiles grew steadily wider and easier as the evening wore on.

Purple twilight became full dark of night, and Karthain a sea of half-shadowed shapes suspended between blackness and alchemical sparks.

The main course was a turtle crafted to life size from glazed particolored breads. The top of the starchy creature’s shell was paper-thin, and when punched through with a serving ladle it proved to contain a lake of turtle and oyster ragout. The turtle came under enthusiastic siege from both ends of the table.

“Have you ever had a chance to look out over the Isas Scholastica before?” said Sabetha, recovering some measure of ladylike delicacy by dabbing at her chin with a silk cloth. “That’s it down behind me, just across the canal. Isle of Scholars. Home of the magi, or so they claim.”

“Claim? No, I’ve never had a chance to see it. I can’t see much now, between the darkness and the wine.”

“They don’t seem to frown on people building towers around the edges of their little sanctuary. I’ve been sightseeing up a few. I say claim because I’m not sure I believe they all live happily together like Collegium students in rooms. I think they’re all over the place … I think the Isas Scholastica is just where they want everyone looking.”

“All those parks and buildings and so forth down there are just a sham?”

“No, I’m pretty sure they use the place, just not as a sole residence.” She took a final long draught of wine and pushed her glass aside. “Though I don’t believe I’ve ever seen one down there. Not one.”

“What, would they wear signs or something? Funny hats? They’re easy enough to spot when you can see their wrists and their manners, but at a distance they must look like other people.”

“I’ve seen servants,” said Sabetha. “People driving carts, off-loading things, but those wouldn’t be Bondsmagi, surely. I’ve never seen anyone strolling the Isas Scholastica at leisure, or giving orders, or simply talking to anyone else. No guards, no masters and mistresses, only servants. If they’re down there, they conceal themselves. Even from eyes that are hundreds of yards away.”

“They’re odd people,” said Locke, staring into the pale orange dregs of his own wine. “And I say that as a fully qualified professional odd person of the first degree. I wish they weren’t such arrogant pricks, but I suppose odd people will keep odd habits.”

“I wonder,” said Sabetha. “Do you … do you feel that your … handlers have been entirely candid with you concerning their motives for this contest of theirs?”

“Hells, no,” said Locke. “But that was an easy question. Perhaps you’ve not met my side of the magi family. Why, do you think that yours are—”

“I don’t know,” she said quietly, staring out into the night. “They’ve delivered all the tools they said they would. They seem happy with my work, and I think their promises of consequences are certainly sincere. But their secrecy, their misdirection, it’s just so habitual.…”

“You’re really not used to feeling like a piece on a game board,” said Locke.

“No,” she said, and then she brought her brief moment of wistfulness to an end by sticking her tongue out at him. “I haven’t had all the opportunities you have to get acclimated to the sensation.”

“Oh ho! Serpent in a dress. Well, if only I wasn’t too much the gentleman to flay your spirit with a witty and cutting retort, madam, you’d be … thoroughly … um, wittily retorted at this very instant.”

“If you were any sort of actual gentleman you’d be no fun to have dinner with.”

“You admit you’re having fun?”

“I admit it’s much as I feared.” She looked down at the table for a moment before continuing. “Your presence is … steadily less of a chore and more of a comfort.”

“Well,” said Locke, chuckling, “aren’t I always delighted to be not quite the burden you were expecting!”

“Dessert?”

“Would you forgive me if I begged off?” Locke patted his stomach, which had mercifully reached the sheer physical limit of its gluttony. “I’m stuffed like a grain bag.”

“Good. You’re still too bloody thin.”

The waiter cleared their dishes and left a slate with a folded note pinned to it. Sabetha picked it up and glanced at it idly.

“What’s that?”

“Itemized bill,” she said. “They actually bring it to the table here. It’s all the rage. Lets those that can read show it off in public.”

“Strange,” said Locke. “But that’s the west for you. So what now, Mistress Gallante? A walk, a carriage ride, maybe an—”

“Now we rest on our laurels.” She rose from the table and stretched, revealing how precisely her gown and jacket were fitted to her curves. “Look, it’s not that I haven’t appreciated the break, but some things … just have to go slow.”

“Slow,” said Locke, knowing he was failing miserably to conceal his disappointment. “Of course.”

“Slow,” she repeated. “We’ve got five years and more of sharp edges to file down. I might be willing to work at it, but I don’t think I can do it in one night.”

“I see.”

“Oh, don’t give me that drowning-puppy look.” She touched his waist and gave him a kiss on the cheek that was not quite passionate but a shade longer than merely polite. “Let’s do this again. Three nights hence. I’ll pick some other interesting place.”

“Three nights hence,” said Locke, still feeling the warm press of her lips against his skin. “Three nights. All right. Just try and stop me.”

“I can’t. I seem to have promised to fight clean.” She drew a pair of leather gloves from her jacket and pulled them on.

“Can I at least walk you to your carriage?”

“Mmmmm … don’t think so,” she said mischievously. “I try to live by a cardinal rule of our shared profession, namely, ‘always leave a sucker wanting more.’ ”

She reached under the table and pulled out a coil of demi-silk rope previously hidden there. Locke watched, puzzled, as she conjured a slender metal pick in her other hand and applied it to the mechanism of the waiter’s door. It opened in seconds.

“Hey, wait a minute—”

“It was in case you tried anything tricky. Whether I would have used it to escape or hang you can remain an open question.”

“Are you serious?”

“I wouldn’t say that,” she said with a grin. “But I’m definitely sincere. Thanks for the flower. I left you a little something in exchange.”

Then she was gone. The rope was anchored to a point on the cage beneath the table; Sabetha kicked it out the door and rappelled into the night, without a harness, sliding down on the friction of boots and gloves with her gown billowing like the petals of a wind-whipped flower.

“Gods damn,” whispered Locke as he watched her land safely and vanish far below. After a moment her last words finally squeezed past the film of wine clinging to his brain, and he frantically patted himself down. A piece of paper was in his left jacket pocket. A note? A love letter?

He unfolded it in haste, and discovered the bill for dinner.

9

“MOVE! MOVE! For your life, move!”

Doormen scattered from a snorting pair of barely controlled horses dragging a rickety dray tended by a single wild-eyed driver. The back of the vehicle was loaded with sacks and barrels, one of which had bled an expanding trail of gray smoke all the way down the street. With a lurching crash, the dray broke a wheel against the curb and toppled, spilling its contents in a pile before the front doors of the Sign of the Black Iris.

“It’s alchemy!” The driver, a slender, white-bearded fellow in a voluminous rat-chewed coat, leapt to the ground as smoke billowed past him. Sparks leapt and flickered amidst the spilled cargo, and he unyoked his frantic animals. “Heaps of alchemy! Fetch water and sand, or run for your gods-damned lives!”

Patrons, servants, and guards poured out of the inn to investigate the commotion, only to reel back in dismay as smoke boiled past them into the building. Crackling noises rose ominously within the haze, and fires of eerie colors burst to life. The driver of the crashed dray led his horses across the street, where he found several boys in Black Iris livery watching the unfolding disaster.

“Here,” he shouted, thrusting the reins into one boy’s hands. “Watch my animals! I’ll be right back!”

The bearded man scuttled across the street and into the billowing murk. Green smoke, red smoke, and mustard-yellow smoke uncoiled from the spreading fire, tendrils wafting like sinister serpents of the air. The new hazes bore nauseating odors of garlic, brimstone, and mortified flesh. The entire street side of the Sign of the Black Iris was subsumed in a picturesque alchemical nightmare.

More or less hidden in the rising smoke, through which the masked afternoon sun shone dimly bronze, the driver darted down an alley beside the inn. He threw his coat and hat behind a pile of empty crates, then yanked away his baggy trousers and boots to reveal black hose and polished shoes. The beard was the last to go. Freshly peeled like a human fruit, smooth-cheeked and well-dressed, Locke Lamora strolled casually out the end of the smoky alley and into the court behind the inn.

“Master Lazari. Good-oof-afternoon!”

Sabetha rolled off the lowest eave on the Sign of the Black Iris’ rear side, landed hard, recovered gracefully, and offered a half-curtsy from about ten feet away. Three of her security folk followed her, landed awkwardly, and spread out in an arc around Locke. The window they’d spilled out of remained open, its shutters swaying in the soft breeze.

“Oh, hello, Mistress Gallante,” said Locke cheerfully. “Having problems with your inn?”

“Nothing that can’t be corrected with a little assistance, I’m sure.”

“I do wish I could help,” said Locke. “I just happened to be nearby. Ahhhh! I remember now! You’re having some sort of big Black Iris party meeting today, aren’t you? My condolences! The smoke, the flames … I can only imagine the consternation.”

“I’m sure you’ve imagined it in detail.” Sabetha moved close enough to lower her voice. “Bearded peasant goes in one end of an alley, clean-shaven gentleman comes out the other? Really?”

“It’s a classic!”

“It’s got cobwebs on it. Might have fooled someone who hadn’t seen you do it before. Now, do you want to come with me gracefully or on the shoulders of my friends?”

“I remind you, darling, my person is inviolate.”

“Don’t call me that when we’ve got our working faces on. And nobody’s person is getting violated. But you can’t think I’m going to let you stroll away while a cart full of alchemical crap burns on my doorstep.”

“Of course I can. It’s all perfectly harmless,” said Locke. “Oh, it might smell awful, and some of it reacts badly with water, and there’s just no telling what’s what until you experiment, but give it a few hours, then air your inn out for a day or two. There won’t be any lingering issues.”

“All the same, I think you should sit in a little room and be bored until I’ve got the mess under control.”

“Now, now,” said Locke, “you must credit me with the foresight to have a backup plan in case you decided to take it like this.”

“And of course, you must expect me to have one of my own in case you wanted to play hard to get,” she said.

“Oh, absolutely.”

“Well.” She ran a finger lightly up and down one of the lapels of his jacket. “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”

“YOU! HOLD IT RIGHT THERE!”

The shout echoed down the courtyard as a trio of surcoated constables appeared out of the drifting smoke. The leader, a man with a wheat-colored beard and the aesthetic qualities of a lard slab, touched Locke on the shoulder with a wooden baton.

“As a constable of Karthain, sir, I must formally detain you,” he said.

“How dreadful.” Locke feigned a yawn. “What’s the charge?”

“You resemble a suspect wanted for questioning in a confidential matter. You’ll have to come with us.”

“Alas.” Locke allowed the constables to gather loosely around him, and doffed an imaginary hat to Sabetha as he backed away with them. “Verena, I wish I could continue our conversation, but it seems the deficiencies of my character have become a matter of official concern. Best of luck dealing with your little … conflagration.”

Just before the smoke cloud swallowed him again, Locke rapidly gestured in code: Looking forward to tomorrow night.

Her response was a gesture, though not one originating in the private signals of the Gentlemen Bastards. Still, Locke felt reassured by the fact that she smiled as she delivered it.

The street before the Sign of the Black Iris was a reeking mess. Well-dressed men and women with black flowers pinned to their jackets sought escape, while well-meaning people with buckets of water tripped over one another and tumbled around like billiard balls. The alchemical fires burned merrily on, a partial rainbow of sorcerous lights within the miasma. Locke’s “captors” walked with him for about a block before detouring into an empty, windowless court.

“Beautifully timed, Sergeant,” said Locke, producing three leather purses of equal size. “Worthy of applause.”

“We take pride in the conduct of our civic duty,” said the bearded man. He and his cohorts accepted the purses with wide grins; each had earned three months’ wages for the few minutes spent loitering nearby in case of Locke’s need. It was downright pleasant, thought Locke, to be treading the old familiar realms of avarice after dealing with the eerie malleability of the “adjusted” Deep Roots people.

“Now, none of that stuff is really dangerous, right?” said the sergeant, one bushy eyebrow raised.

“Harmless as baby spit,” said Locke. “As long as nobody’s dim enough to shove their hand into a fire.”

Satisfied, the constables took their leave. Locke had only a few minutes to wait before Jean came strolling down the avenue from the direction of the smoke, several empty sacks flung over his shoulder.

“How’d it go up top?” said Locke as the two of them fell into step together.

“Perfection and then some,” said Jean. “They were all so distracted, bothering to sneak might have been a waste of time. That’s thirty-seven snakes down the cold chimneys.”

“Magnificently childish, though I say it myself.” Locke scratched at his chin to remove a few stubborn flecks of beard adhesive. “Hopefully that’ll keep them uneasy for a few days.”

“And if she responds with more of the same?”

“I arranged to have city work gangs do some unnecessary mucking with the cobblestones around Josten’s for the next few days. No carriages can get closer than twenty yards. Our friends will grumble, but that should keep loads of mischief at a distance.”

As they walked, Locke noticed for the first time that banners had started to appear, hanging from balconies and windows. Here and there were a few brave greens, but in this neighborhood the majority were black. Citizen interest was climbing; half the allotted six weeks was nearly gone. Annoying pranks were a fine gambit, but now it was time to begin truly curbing some of Sabetha’s capabilities.

“Those spies keeping watch on our place …” said Locke. “Fancy a little hospitality visit once the sun goes down?”

10

THEIR SECOND night of upper-story work went as smoothly as the first. They swept the block surrounding Josten’s Comprehensive just after midnight, creeping silently through rooftop gardens and over well-tended slate roofs, using chimneys and parapets for cover.

Not everyone they crossed paths with was in Sabetha’s pay. A drunk woman, huddled in the corner of her terrace, was sobbing over a small painting and didn’t notice them slip past. Two lithe young men wrapped in one another’s arms a few gardens over were similarly absorbed. Locke crept past their cast-off clothes, close enough to sift them for purses, but pangs of sympathy stilled the impulse. Doing mischief to happy lovers might invite a cruel justice to trample his own hopes.

Their first legitimate target was taken unawares, and his possessions made his job plain. He wore a mottled gray-brown cloak ideal for blending into city shadows, carried a spyglass, and the remains of a cold meal were spread beside his hiding place. In an instant, Jean flung him down on his stomach and crouched atop him, wrenching the poor fellow’s arms behind his back. Locke knelt at the man’s head, bemused at how familiar he and Jean were becoming with the old Threatening Voice/Silent Brawn act.

“You try to cry out,” whispered Locke, “and we’ll rip your arms off. Shove one down your throat and one up your ass so you’ll look like meat on a spit. How many of you are watching Josten’s?”

“I don’t know,” hissed the man.

Locke gave him a shove on the back of the head, bouncing his face off the roof tiles. Hard, but not too hard.

“It’s not worth it,” said Locke. “Your employer doesn’t expect life-or-death loyalty, surely. But we will hurt you to send a message.”

“There’s one more,” spat their captive. “One that I know of. Maybe more. Look out past this parapet. Four rows down, roof of the apothecary shop. He’s there somewhere. I swear that’s all I can tell you.”

“Good enough,” said Locke. He pulled his dagger and slashed the man’s cloak into strips. When Sabetha’s agent was gagged and thoroughly trussed, Locke gave him a pat on the back. “Now, don’t fret. Once we’ve finished clearing out all your friends, we’ll tip one of them off and you’ll be collected. Shouldn’t be more than a few hours. Don’t do anything stupid.”

The second agent was crouched atop the apothecary shop as indicated, but he was a touch more alert and met them with a drawn cosh. What followed was a proper scrum, with Locke clinging to the man’s legs while Jean attempted to wrestle and disarm him, hampered by the need to avoid killing him. Such was the fellow’s fighting spirit that they ultimately had to pummel him unconscious before they could have a word.

As they neared the end of their circuit around the neighborhood, perhaps ten minutes later, they found a third and likely final observer, fortunately no more on guard than the first.

“All your friends are dealt with,” said Jean cheerfully as he dangled the man over the back-alley side of the building by his jacket collar. “Trussed up like festival chickens.”

“Great gods, mate, it’s nothing personal,” sobbed the man as he stared into the shadows four stories below. “We’re just doing our bloody job!”

“Find another job,” said Locke. “This is us being very, very cordial. Next time we catch spies lurking in this neighborhood, we cripple them. This isn’t Karthain right now, it’s the sovereign state of Fuck Off and Go Home.”

“But—”

“Take a good look at that alley,” said Locke. “Imagine what those cold, hard stones will feel like when we throw you off this roof. You come round here again, you’d best have wings. Now, your comrades are tied up in their usual spots. Fetch them and run hard.”

“Couldn’t we discuss—”

“Get the dogshit out of your ears, you witless corpse-fart,” growled Jean. “Do you want to do as you’re told, or do you want to kiss that pavement?”

It turned out he wanted to do as he was told.

11

“HAVE YOU ever thought about how badly Chains fucked us all up?”

“Gods above!” Locke narrowly avoided choking on his beer. “How tipsy are you?”

“Not at all.” Sabetha held her own glass rock-steady for several moments to support the assertion.

“I understand your frustration with the way some things played out,” said Locke. “You know I listened to you.”

“I do.”

“And you know I think you had some points. But Chains was a generous man. A generous and caring man, whatever his faults.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about. He wanted a family, very desperately. You’ve realized that?”

“Of course. I never thought of it as a defect.”

“I often think he wanted a family more than he wanted a gang.”

“Again—”

“A conscience is a deadweight in our profession.” She stared into the amber depths of her half-full glass. “Make no mistake, he shackled each of us with one. Even Calo and Galdo, rest their souls. For all that they did most of their thinking with their cocks and the rest with their balls, even they wound up with essentially kindly dispositions. Chains got us all in the end, good and hard.”

Their second dinner, the night following the alchemical “disaster” at the Sign of the Black Iris, was held aboard the Merry Drifter, a flat-topped dining barge complete with gardens and lacquered privacy screens. The barge had floated gently through the heart of Karthain, beneath the strange music of the Elderglass bridges, before finally laying anchor in the Amathel just off the Ponta Corbessa. As the sky had darkened and the alchemical globes flicked to life, little boats had ferried other diners to and from shore, but Locke and Sabetha had held their choice table at the barge’s stern all the while.

“I can’t believe I’m hearing this from someone who came out of Shades’ Hill,” said Locke. “Is that what you would have preferred? Getting beaten and starved? Maybe buggered here and there when it suited him?”

“Of course not—”

“Sabetha, you know how much I respect you, but if you can’t see what a gods-damned paradise we lucked into when Chains picked us, you need to set that beer down this instant.”

“I don’t regret the comforts or the education. He was a faultless provider. Except in one respect … he trained a gentle streak into us and let us pretend it would never cost us.”

“You think we should have been more cruel? Ready to turn on each other like sharks in blood, like every other gods-damned gang around us? I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but that wasn’t weakness he bred into us. It was loyalty. And loyalty’s a hell of a weapon.”

“You have the luxury of thinking so.”

“Oh, not this again. The Jean situation, right? Straight and simple, gorgeous, don’t you dare sit there and hit me with self-righteous envy for a friendship I kept and you walked away from.”

She set her beer down and stared coldly at him. Then, just as Locke’s heart started to sink in expectation of another one of their habitual misunderstandings, the chill thawed, and she attempted a smile. She whistled, mimicking the sound of an arrow in flight, and clutched at an imaginary shaft just above her heart.

“I’m sorry,” they both said, in Sanza-esque unison, and chuckled.

“You’re dwelling on something,” said Locke, reaching across the table to rest his free hand on hers. “Let it go. Just be here. Just be Sabetha, having dinner, floating on the Amathel. Let the world end at the sides of this barge.”

“I am dwelling on something.”

“Well, don’t take such a poisonous view of our upbringing. Come on. We lie for a living; it’s not healthy for us to lie to ourselves.”

“What do we do BUT lie to ourselves, Locke? Aren’t we supposed to be rich? Aren’t we supposed to be in command of our lives, free to go when and where we please, with all the honest simpletons of the world throwing coins at our feet? Here we are, halfway around the world, working for the gods-damned Bondsmagi just to stay alive.”

“You know, Jean’s slapped me out of a lot of moods like the one you’re in right now.” Locke took a long pull on his beer. “You’re taking the world awfully personally. Didn’t Chains ever tell you about the Golden Theological Principle?”

“The what?”

“The single congruent aspect of every known religion. The one shared, universal assumption about the human condition.”

“What is it?”

“He said that life boils down to standing in line to get shit dropped on your head. Everyone’s got a place in the queue, you can’t get out of it, and just when you start to congratulate yourself on surviving your dose of shit, you discover that the line is actually circular.”

“I’m just old enough to find that distressingly accurate.”

“You see? It’s universal,” said Locke. “Of course, I’m a stark staring hypocrite for telling you not to take it personally. It’s easy to prescribe remedies for our own weaknesses when they’re comfortably ensconced in other people. What’s got you dwelling on the past?”

“I don’t like dancing on strings, any strings, even my own. I’ve been … examining some, I suppose. Trying to follow them all the way back to where they began.”

“Ah.” Locke shuffled his glass around idly. “You’re trying to reconcile your contradictory thoughts about yours truly. And you’re wondering what sort of decision you’d be making without our shared history—”

“Gods damn it!” Sabetha punctuated this exclamation by throwing a wadded-up silk napkin at him. “Don’t do that. It makes me feel as though my thoughts are written on my forehead.”

“Come now. Fair’s fair. You read me like a scroll.”

“I tried to get you out of the way—”

“Half-assed,” said Locke. “Very half-assed. Admit it. You made it difficult, but some part of you wanted to see Jean and me get off that ship and come riding back into town.”

“I don’t know. I wanted to see you, but then I wanted you gone,” said Sabetha. “I tried to say no to dinner. I couldn’t. I don’t … I don’t want anyone to be a habit for me, Locke. If I love someone, I want it to be my choice.… I want it to be the right choice.”

“I never felt as though I had a choice. From the first hours I knew you. Remember when I told you, for the first time? You nearly threw me off the roof—”

“I thought you deserved it. You know, it’s an opinion I return to from time to time, whether or not a roof is available.”

“You’re a difficult woman, Sabetha. But then, difficult women are the only ones worth falling in love with.”

“How would you know? It’s not like you’ve ever been after anyone else—”

“That part’s easy. I started with the most difficult woman possible, so there was never any need to look any further.”

“You’re trying to be charming.” She squeezed his hand once, then pulled away. “I choose not to be entirely charmed, Locke Lamora.”

“Not entirely?”

“Not entirely. Not yet.”

“Well.” Locke sighed. The evening might not be ending as he’d dared to hope, but that was no reason to be less than good company. “I suppose I still have two ambitions to mind as long as I’m in Karthain. Dessert?”

“How about a ride back to shore?”

“I’ve been curious about what might happen when you suggested that. Will you be leaving by catapult? Giant kite?”

“One showy exit was amusing; two would be gauche. We can’t let these westerners think Camorri are entirely without a sense of restraint.”

Their ride back to shore was a flat-bottomed boat with velvet cushions, tended by an admirably mum old fellow rowing at the stern. Locke and Sabetha rode side by side in companionable silence, through waters that gleamed white and blue from the lanterns of the dining barge. The air was full of pale, fluttering streaks, pulsing like fireflies, adding their soft touches of light to the canvas of the water.

“Firelight Sovereigns,” whispered Sabetha. “Karthani night butterflies. It’s said they hatch at dusk and die with the dawn.”

“You and I are natives of the dark, too,” said Locke. “I’m glad some of us last a bit longer.”

Two carriages waited above the quayside.

“His and hers, I presume?” said Locke.

“To bear us back to ribbons and duties and dumping carts of burning alchemy on doorsteps.” She led him to the first carriage and held the door open. “The driver has Jean’s hatchets. Safe and sound, to be handed over on arrival.”

“Thanks. So … three nights hence?” He took her hand as he placed one foot on the step, and bit the inside of his cheek to keep from grinning too broadly when she didn’t draw away. “Come on. You know you want to say yes.”

“Three nights. I’ll send a carriage. However, I’m charging you with finding a place this time. You’ve roamed the city enough to have some ideas, I think.”

“Oh, I’m full of ideas.” He bowed and kissed the back of her hand, then climbed into the carriage. “Can I offer you one last thing?”

“You can offer.” She pushed the door shut and looked in at him through the barred window.

“Quit being so hard on yourself. We are what we are; we love what we love. We don’t need to justify it to anyone … not even to ourselves. I seem to remember telling you that before.”

“Thank you.” She did something to the lock on the carriage door. “We are what we are. Now, listen, my driver will let you out when you’re back home. Don’t bother messing with the door; I had the lock mechanism sealed on the inside.”

“Wha … wait a damned minute, what are you—”

“Have a smooth ride,” she said, waving. “And I want you to know that the bit with the snakes was pretty cute. In fact, I took pains to see that they weren’t harmed, because I was certain you’d want such adorable little creatures returned to you.”

She thumped the side of the carriage twice. A panel in the cabin ceiling above Locke slid open, and as the carriage clattered across the cobbles, the rain of snakes began.

12

“PAINT ME a picture,” said Locke, standing in the Deep Roots private gallery two days later. Since his return from dinner with a carriage full of less-than-deadly but agitated serpents, he’d been consumed by the paper chase, poring over maps and allocating funds, checking and double-checking lists, with no chance to engage in more hands-on weasel work.

“Nikoros just went down to fetch the latest reports,” said Jean, blowing smoke from an aromatic Syresti-leaf cigar that would have cost a common laborer a day’s wages. “But our Konseil members here have been chatting their teeth out in all the better parts of town.”

“Successfully, too, I should think.” Damned Superstition Dexa took a sip from her brandy snifter and gestured at the map of Karthain with her own cigar. Asceticism was a virtue the Deep Roots party held in slight regard. “We’ve squeezed a lot of promises out of Plaza Gandolo and the Palanta District. Fence-sitters, mostly. And some old friends we’ve brought back into the fold.”

“Bought back is more like it,” said Firstson Epitalus. “Bloody ingrates.”

“What are you handing out to steady their resolve?” said Locke.

“Oh, hints about tax easements,” said Dexa. “Everyone loves the thought of keeping a little more of their own money.”

“The Black Iris people can drop the same hints,” said Locke. “I don’t mean to tell you your business, but fuck me, if something as boring as tax easements is enough to hook votes, those people won’t care which party delivers the goods. We need some impractical reasons to motivate them. Emotional reasons. That means rumormongering. I want to rub dirt on whoever’s standing for the Black Iris in those districts. Something disgusting. In fact, we’ll completely avoid mud-flinging in a few other spots to make these stand out all the more. What’s guaranteed to repulse the good voters of Karthain?”

“Rather depends on how much vulgarity you’re willing to countenance, dear boy.” Dexa drew in a long breath of smoke while she pondered. “Thirdson Jovindus, that’s their lad for the Palanta District. He’s got what you might call an open-door policy for the contents of his breeches, but he’s also just dashing enough to carry it off.”

“Seconddaughter Viracois stands for them in Plaza Gandolo,” said Epitalus. “She’s clean as fresh plaster.”

“Hmmm.” Locke tapped his knuckles against the map table. “Clean just means we can paint whatever we like on her. But let’s not do it directly. Master Callas and I will arrange a crew. Scary people on a tight leash. They’ll visit some of our fence-sitters in Plaza Gandolo, and they’ll make threats. Vote for Viracois and the Black Iris or bad things happen to your nice homes, your pretty gardens, your expensive carriages.…”

“Well, I don’t mean to tell you your business, Master Lazari,” said Epitalus, “but shouldn’t we be frightening voters into our own corner?”

“I don’t want them frightened. I want them annoyed. Come now, Epitalus, how would you feel if a pack of half-copper hoods barged into your foyer and tried to put a scare into you? Swells aren’t used to being pushed around. They’ll resent it like hell. They’ll mutter about it to all their friends, and they’ll be at the head of the line to vote against the Black Iris out of spite.”

“My, my,” said Epitalus. “There may be something in that. And what about Jovindus?”

“I’ll come up with something suitable for him, too. Let the pot simmer awhile.” Locke tapped the side of his head. “Where’s Nikoros?”

“Coming, sirs, coming!” Long black plait bobbing behind him, Nikoros jogged up the gallery stairs and passed a set of papers to Jean. “Fresh as the weather, all the reports you asked for, and something, ah, unfortunate—”

“Unfortunate?” Jean flipped through the papers until he found one that caught his eye. The furrows in his forehead deepened as he read, and when he finished he drew Locke aside.

“What is it?”

“The official constabulary report on the arrest of Fifthson Lucidus of the Isas Merreau,” said Jean.

“What?”

“It says that acting on a tip from the Lashani legate, a party of constables paid Lucidus a visit and discovered a team of stolen Lashani carriage horses in his private stable, identifiable by their brands—”

“Cockless sons of Jeremite shit-jugglers!” Locke seized the report and scanned it. “That sneaky bitch. That beautiful, sneaky bitch. She just can’t let us feel good about ourselves, not even for a few days. Oh, look, out of concern for the diplomatic aspect of the situation, they’re holding Lucidus in solitary confinement until after the election!”

“Indeed.”

“Some of the Black Iris chicks must have complained to their mother hen about the big bad debt collector. So much for that scheme.”

“We should come back hard and fast.”

“Agreed.” Locke closed his eyes and took several deep breaths. “Keep pushing everyone on that list of vulnerabilities. Send courtesans and handsome lads after all the Black Iris people with wandering eyes. Make sure the gamblers get invitations to high-stakes games. Scatter temptations all around the ones with nasty habits. Pluck the weaknesses of the flesh like harp strings, all of ’em, from every direction.”

“I suppose there’s money in the bank itching to be spent,” sighed Jean.

“That’s right. We’ll spend it down to the dust under the last scrap of copper. Then we’ll sweep up the dust and see what we can get for it.”

“Um, one thing more, sirs,” said Nikoros. “Josten tells me that we’ve got watchers on the surrounding rooftops again.”

“Leave that with me,” said Jean. “We gave fair warning. This time I’ll make some work for the physikers.”

13

COOL GRAY veils of drizzle and fog draped the neighborhood when Jean went out, an hour after midnight, to pay a call on the new neighbors. He moved up to the rooftops as slowly and cautiously as possible, using routes he’d noted on the previous excursion. In this weather there were no drunks or lovers to stumble over, and he was confident that he crept along as silently as he ever had in his life.

His first target was obvious—so obvious that Jean watched for nearly a quarter of an hour, straining his senses to spot the ambush or the trap that had to be there. The watcher sat (sat!) in a collapsible wood-and-leather chair beside a parapet, wrapped in a cloak and blanket. If not for the fact that the seated figure moved from time to time, Jean would have sworn it had to be a decoy.

The tiniest speck of light lit the shadows beside the chair, revealing a spread of gear and comforts, including bottles of wine, a silk parasol, and several different spyglasses. It had to be a joke, or a trap … and yet there was simply nobody else around. He took the opening. It was child’s play to sneak up behind the seated watcher and clap a hand over their mouth.

“Scream and I’ll break your arms,” hissed Jean. The watcher gave a start, but it was plain in an instant that this small-framed and weak body was incapable of serious resistance. Puzzled, Jean scrabbled for the light source, which turned out to be a dark-lantern with the aperture drawn to its narrowest setting. Jean eased it open another few clicks and held it up to his captive.

Gods, it was an old woman. A very old woman, seventy or more, and it wasn’t one of Sabetha’s makeup jobs, either. This woman was genuinely light and frail, her face a valley of lines, one eye gray as the overcast sky. The other one, however, fixed on him with mischievous vitality.

“Oh, hello, dear,” she whispered as he withdrew his hand. “I won’t be screaming, I promise. You gave me a start, though she warned me you’d be up sooner or later.”

“She?”

“My employer, dear.”

“So you admit that you’re—”

“A spy. Oh yes.” The old woman chuckled. A dry and not entirely healthy sound. “A spyfully spying spy. Settled up here all cozy to see what I can see. Which isn’t much, more’s the pity. That’s why I’ve got all the lovely spyglasses. Now, what are you going to do with me, dear? Are you going to beat the hell out of me?”

“Wha … no!”

“Pick me up and throw me off the roof? Tie me up and leave me here for a few hours? Kick my teeth out?”

“Gods, woman, of course not!”

“Oh, that’s exactly what she told me,” beamed the old woman. “She said you weren’t the sort of fellow who’d raise his hand to a helpless old woman. Which, let’s be honest, is what time has made of me.”

Jean lowered his head against the cold stone of the parapet and groaned.

“Oh, come now, son, it’s not a thing to be ashamed of, having scruples.”

“Are all of her new spies as … um …”

“Old as myself? Oh, there’s no harm in saying it. Yes, dear, you’re hemmed in by old women. All of us wrapped up in our blankets, clutching our parasols. We’ve got apartments to use, and people to fetch us things, but we’re doing the watching from now on. Unless you beat us up.”

“Come now,” said Jean. “You know I won’t.”

“Yes, I do.”

“I don’t suppose I could ask you very politely to get down off this roof and go away?”

“Oh, gods no. Apologies, dear, but the money I’m seeing for this … well, I don’t think I can live long enough for money to ever be a problem again.”

“I could make you a better deal.”

“Oh no. No, gods bless you for offering, but no. You’ve got your scruples, and I’ve got mine.”

“I could pick you up and carry you down to the street!”

“Of course you could. And then I’d kick and scream and fuss, and you’d have to deal with that somehow. And when you were done, I’d creep back up here as fast as my joints could take me, and since you won’t just punch my lights out, we’d have to do it all over again.” She punctuated these words by tapping him gently on the chest with a very slender finger. “All over again. And again. And again.”

“Well, shit.” Jean slumped against the parapet, feeling soundly embarrassed. “Don’t, uh, come crawling to us for help if you catch an ague up here or something.”

“Never fret, dear. I can assure you that we’re very well looked after. Just like your inn.”

14

AT THE very moment Jean Tannen was discovering old women on rooftops, Nikoros Via Lupa was knocking at a lamp-lit door in a misty alley behind the Avenue of the Night Singers on the Isas Vorhala. He had a warm, nervous itch in his throat—an itch he had run out of the means to assuage.

The apothecary shop of the Brothers Farager provided the alley door as a discreet courtesy for those in need at odd hours. This included customers in pursuit of substances not sanctioned by the laws of Karthain.

The burly guard behind the door, wrapped in a heavy black coat, was new to Nikoros; the fellow that had always met him before had been older and thinner. The man let him in regardless, gesturing up the narrow steps with a grunt and leaving Nikoros to find his own way to the rear office. There Thirdson Farager sat slumped behind a counter, threads of some floral smoke wrapped around him like a ghostly shawl, idly mixing powders on a measuring board.

“Nikoros,” said the alchemist, glumly. “Thought I might see you, sooner rather than later. What’s your taste?”

“You know why I’m here,” said Nikoros. Thirdson Farager had always been the sole provider of Nikoros’ dust … had led him to the stuff in the first place, in fact.

“Muse-of-Fire,” grunted Farager, setting aside the glass rod he’d been using in his work. “Need some more lightning for those clouds in your head, eh?”

“Same as always.” Nikoros licked his lips and tried to ignore the hollow, dry sensation inside his skull. He’d meant to put off another purchase for a few days, meant to obey Lazari and Callas … but the urge had grown. An initially aimless walk had drawn him here, inevitably as water running downhill.

“Akkadris,” said Farager. “Well, if that’s what you want, let’s see your coin.”

Nikoros tossed a bag of silver on the counter. No sooner had it landed than something slapped him painfully in his left side. Wincing, he turned and found that the burly door guard had crept up to the office after him, lacquered wooden baton in hand. The man’s bulky black coat now hung open, revealing the light constabulary blue of the jacket beneath.

“This is disappointing, Via Lupa. You ought to know a thing or two about the laws concerning black alchemy,” said the constable with a grin. “That’s ten years in a penance barge sitting there on the counter. Confiscation of your goods. Forfeiture of licenses and citizenship. Exile, too, if you live through your ten.”

“But surely,” said Nikoros, fear clawing at his innards, “there must be some, ah, mistake—”

“Yeah, and you’re the one that made it.”

“I’m sorry,” muttered Farager, looking away. “They got onto me last week. I had no choice. I’d be on a barge already if I hadn’t agreed to help them.”

“Oh, gods, please,” whispered Nikoros.

“It was a smart arrangement,” said a woman, appearing from the door behind Farager. She wore a dark hooded cloak, the sort of thing Nikoros might have scoffed at as theatrical, anytime before the Karthani constabulary had threatened to bring his life to an end. “Thirdson Farager made one that got him off the hook. You might be able to do the same.”

The woman pushed her hood back, revealing long, dark red hair. Her eyes glittered as she began to explain to Nikoros what would be required of him.

15

KARTHAIN WAS the most cultivated and manicured city Locke had ever seen, and the Vel Verda, the Green Terrace, was perhaps its most cultivated and manicured district. The manors and promenades of the Vel Verda were walled in by thick strands of poplar, olive, witchwood, pale oak, and merinshade trees, and beyond it all loomed the crumbling shadow of the city’s old walls. In any other Therin city these would have been lit, manned, and obsessively repaired, but the Karthani hadn’t kept theirs up for more than three centuries.

“This is a private manor, not a restaurant,” said Sabetha as Locke led her up a winding black iron staircase. “If you’ve got some sort of half-witted ambush in mind, Master Lamora, I must warn you that I’ll be severely disappointed.…”

“It’s vacant. One of my Deep Roots ladies holds it from a dead cousin. She’s been lax about selling it off since she doesn’t exactly need the money, but she was happy to let me borrow it for a night.”

“Will I be getting a pile of snakes dropped on my head?”

“Ha. No, and thank you for that, by the way. I was ever so worried about those little fellows while they were away from me. No, Mistress of Doubts, I’ve brought you here to this secluded corner of the city for the nefarious purpose of cooking your dinner myself.”

They came to the second floor of the dark, undecorated manor house, and Locke slid a wooden door in the north wall open with a dramatic flourish. Thus revealed was a tiled balcony with a marble balustrade, overlooking the dark tops of countless trees swaying softly in the autumn breeze. Lanterns in semi-opaque paper hoods filled the area with mellow golden light.

“Ooh,” said Sabetha. She allowed Locke to pull out one of the chairs at the tiny round witchwood table in the center of the balcony for her. “Now, this is more promising.”

“I didn’t just choose the setting,” said Locke. “Tonight I’m chef, sommelier, and alchemist, in one very convenient package, and of course available at a staggeringly insignificant cost if it suits the lady—”

“I’m not sure I brought any coins small enough to pay an appropriate price for you.”

“I practice selective deafness to hurtful remarks, young woman. Though I should ask, are we under observation by one of your packs of old women?”

“No, not here. Much as I could have used a chaperone, they’re busy where they are.”

“They’re damned lucky it was Jean that stumbled over them. I don’t have his qualms about punching old biddies in the teeth.”

“Well, then, why haven’t you vanquished them yourself?”

“Some forms of behavior,” sighed Locke, “simply cannot be made to look reasonable.”

“You don’t say! You might have drugged them, of course.”

“Oh, yes,” said Locke. “Throwing alchemy at old women with gods know what sorts of constitutional complaints. If I can’t murder them on purpose I’d hardly let it happen by accident.”

“That thought had crossed my mind,” said Sabetha, grinning.

“Now how’s your candidate for Plaza Gandolo?” said Locke. “What’s her name again … Seconddaughter Viracois? Got taken in by the constables on a pretty serious charge, I heard. Receiving stolen goods? Stolen goods from the houses of Deep Roots supporters? That’s pretty shocking.”

“And pretty asinine,” said Sabetha, feigning a deep yawn. “Her solicitors will have the matter cleared up in just a day or two.”

“Well, no doubt you’re right not to worry. After all, you’ve got quite a slate of replacement candidates if she should be tied up in the courts. As thrilling a collection of ciphers and nonentities as ever stirred the voters to indifference.”

“Now, Locke,” she said softly, “you and I going on like this before the final results are tallied is like peeking at festival presents before they’re opened. This isn’t the game I came to play tonight.”

“Delighted to hear it! Watch, then, and be amazed as I perform the most menial portion of an amazing alchemical process and claim all the credit for myself.”

On the table stood a silver bucket-within-a-bucket, constructed so that there was an open gap of about a finger’s width between the inner and outer walls. In the center bucket, a bottle of pale orange wine stood in water.

Locke uncapped two leather-covered decanters. He poured their colorless contents into the outer channel of the chambered bucket, then juggled the empty decanters hand-to-hand a few times and bowed.

A patina of frost appeared on the outer surface of the bucket, steadily thickening into a wall of crisp white ice. Puffs of pale vapor rose from the bucket’s outer channel, and a jagged crackling noise could be heard. Locke silently counted out fifteen seconds, pulled on a leather glove, and carefully tilted the bucket toward Sabetha. The wine bottle, cloudy with frost, was now immersed in slush.

“Behold! I have chilled the wine. I am the true master of the elements. Bondsmagi across the city are handing in their resignations.”

Sabetha rendered applause by tapping one finger inaudibly against the opposite palm. Locke grinned, withdrew the bottle from its semisolid surroundings, uncorked it, and poured two glasses.

“I give you our first toast of the evening.” Locke picked up his glass and touched it gently to hers. “To crime, confusion, and all arts insidious. To the most enchanting practitioner they’ve ever had.”

“That’s awkward, asking me to drink to my own honor.”

“I’m sure a self-regard as robust as your own can easily bear the strain.”

They drank; the sweet orange-and-ginger wine was cold as a northern autumn. Locke poured them each a second glass.

“My turn,” said Sabetha. “To strange little boys and impatient little girls. May their real mistakes … be gentle and far between.”

“Am I wide of the mark, or are you in a better mood than you were three nights ago?” said Locke as he finished his second drink.

“It was quite a mood, wasn’t it?”

“Did you figure anything out?”

“Only that I wasn’t going to find any real answers in one night of brooding. Besides, packing you off in some sort of richly deserved trap always cheers me up.”

“You might see those snakes again, madam, if you keep up that unseemly gloating. Now, I believe I promised you dinner.”

Off to one side of the balcony was a long oak table and a smoldering brazier. Locke threw more chips of aromatic wood into the brazier and gave them a stir. Pleasantly approaching the edge of muddled as the wine mounted from his mostly empty stomach, he examined the piles of ingredients and utensils he’d set out earlier. There was a tap on his shoulder.

“Now, this is not how it’s done,” said Sabetha. She’d removed her black velvet jacket, revealing a white silk undertunic and a loosely knotted scarf just slightly darker than her hair.

“I haven’t even started cooking yet!”

“Where we come from we didn’t cook for one another, remember? We cooked together.”

“Well—”

“Let’s see what sort of mess you’ve got here.” She bumped him gently aside with her hip. Together they sorted out the components of the meal he’d planned—fennel fronds, onions, sliced blood oranges, pale white olives, almonds and hazel nuts, a chicken he’d plucked and dressed, and enough assorted oils to sauté anything smaller than a horse.

“How strange,” she said, “but it looks as though you’ve assembled some of my favorite things.”

“My life is haunted by wild coincidences,” said Locke.

“I suppose I should admire your constancy in one respect, Locke Lamora. All these years and you’re still beside yourself to tumble a redheaded girl.”

“Oh?” His grin faded, along with some of his wine-induced buoyancy.

He reached out and touched a loose strand of her burnished copper hair. “You know, if you take offense at the notion, you have a hell of a strange way of showing it.”

“ ‘Confusion and all arts insidious,’ ” she said, glancing away.

“Did you really restore that color just to keep me off balance? Make me easier to play games with?”

“No,” she said. “Not entirely.”

“Not entirely.” Locke stared at her, trying to force the muscles of his face, usually so loyal and pliable, to twitch into some semblance of a smile. “You know, I hate the way one of us can say something.… We’re enjoying ourselves for the gods know how long, but one wrong word and suddenly it’s like we’re not even in the same room.”

“ ‘We’ is a tactful way of saying ‘me,’ isn’t it?”

“Only this time,” said Locke, “Sabetha, listen to me. You know what I’m after. My cards are on the table and always have been. Am I fixated? Yes. Absolutely. Am I sorry about that? No. I’m standing here with my intentions plain as the rising sun, waiting for you to convince yourself, one way or the other. And I’ll wait for that. I’ll wait until I’m old and bent and need help spelling my own name. But you know, if I had the luxury of any self-respect at all where you’re concerned, I’d be insulted by the idea that I must think convincing you to spread your legs is the big endgame.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I know. I do know you want more than that, and for all your faults you give more—”

“Bloody right. I mean, who knows, maybe we could sleep together twice.” He drew himself up, thrust out his chest, and stuck out his tongue. “Limitless ambitions, woman! Limitless!”

“Oh, you bastard.” She punched him, but it was the sort of punch delivered with a warm smile. “So, has it … well, how long has it been, for you? Since, you know—”

“You already know the answer,” said Locke. “Very precisely. Think about the day you left. Go back two nights from that, and there you have it.”

“Not even once?”

“I guess it’s fucking ridiculous, isn’t it? But no. I tried. I tried to enlist some help. One of the resident cherry tops at the Guilded Lilies.

Turns out a redhead’s just not a redhead if she’s not, you know, twice as smart as I am and three times as infuriating.”

“Three times as smart,” said Sabetha. “Half as infuriating. And … I am sorry.”

“Don’t be. It wasn’t too bad.” Locke rolled an onion across the table and bounced it off a decanter of olive oil. “She was a friend, close to Chains and me. She knew what my problem was, and that pushing it wasn’t the answer. I got a massage that was worth the price of admission.”

“I suppose I should tell you … it hasn’t been the same way with me these past few years. For several reasons.”

“I see.” He felt cold knots forming in his guts, but fought the sensation down. “I won’t lie. My feelings about you are selfish as hell. I don’t like to think about you with anyone else, but … I wasn’t there. You’re a grown woman and you didn’t owe me anything. Did you expect me to be angry?”

“Yes.”

“I might have been, once. Maybe the one real advantage to getting older is that you have the time to pull your head a little bit farther out of your ass. I don’t want to care, understand? You’re here now. With luck … I really hope you’ll be here later. Besides, it seems safe to assume you weren’t swept off your feet by a handsome young Vadran lord with a castle or two to spare—”

“I had some comfort from it, once or twice.” She reached out and touched his arm, not softly, as though she were afraid he might suddenly decide to be elsewhere. “And the rest of the time, it was to empty some pockets. Or a vault. You know.”

“I do indeed.” He reached out, half-consciously, and started fiddling with another onion, spinning it like a top. “In fact, I’m steadily emptying a bank vault because of you with every passing day.”

“Good. Because I’ve never been what anyone would call easy, and I’m certainly not cheap.” She reached up and took his other arm.

“Sabetha, what—”

“I’m making a decision. Now, are you going to quit playing with that fucking onion and see what happens if you kiss me, or do I have to put a sword to your neck?”

“Promise I won’t wake up on a ship?”

“Disappoint me, Lamora, and I make no promises as to where and when you’ll wake up.”

He put his hands beneath her arms, swung her off her feet, and lifted her onto the table. Laughing, she hooked her legs behind his waist and pulled him close. Her lips were warm and still carried the faint taste of ginger and oranges; he had no idea how long they kissed, arms around each other’s necks, but while they did Locke completely lost track of the fact that he was even standing up.

“Whew,” Sabetha said when they grudgingly broke apart at last. She put a finger against his lips. “And look at that, you’re still conscious. You’re one and one when it comes to kissing in Karthain.”

“That’s a tally I mean to improve … Sabetha? Sabetha, what is it?”

She’d gone rigid in his arms. With his head still spinning from the one-two punch of wine and woman, he slowly turned to look over his shoulder.

Patience was standing beside the little round table, dressed in a carnelian-colored robe with a wide hood.

“Oh, come on,” Locke growled. “Not now. Surely you have better things to do than bother us now.”

“Which one are you?” said Sabetha, calmly and respectfully.

“Archedama Patience. You work for my rival.”

“Patience,” said Locke, “if this isn’t important, I swear to the Crooked Warden, I’ll—”

“It is important. In fact, it’s critical. It’s time we spoke. Since neither of you could be dissuaded from this foolishness, both of you have a right to know.”

“Both of us?” said Sabetha. “What do we have a right to know?”

“Where Locke really comes from.” Patience gestured for the two of them to move away from the food table. “And what Locke really is.”

INTERLUDE:HAPPENINGS IN BEDCHAMBERS

1

“WHAT LOCKE IS,” said Sabetha, “is the man about to cook my dinner.”

“Surely you both saw further than that,” said Patience.

“It’s no affair of yours.” Sabetha slipped out of Locke’s arms, dangerously tense, her air of cautious respect banished. “Locke might answer to you, but I don’t. Best think on how my principals might respond if you use your magic to keep me from dragging you out of this house.”

“Take care when throwing rules at a rule-maker, my dear,” said Patience. “Provoke me outside the bounds of the five-year game and I’m free to respond as I will. And you are quite outside the bounds of the game this evening, aren’t you? Because if you’re not, you’d be perilously close to the one thing you both agreed—”

“Shove your collusion somewhere dark and painful,” said Locke, setting his hands on Sabetha’s shoulders. “You know we weren’t talking business when you appeared. Only a snoop could have such flawless dramatic timing. Why the hell are you here?”

“A matter of conscience.”

“Really?” said Locke. “Yours? You keep alluding to its existence. Somehow I’m not convinced.”

“This interruption is entirely your own fault!” The archedama stabbed a finger in Locke’s direction. “I gave you the clearest, fairest possible warning! I told you to set aside your personal business. To get to work, not to wooing. And what have you done?”

“What have we both done?” said Sabetha. She folded her arms, but Locke could still feel that simmering tension, as familiar to him as her voice or her scent. He tightened his grip, doubting that she had his experience with physically attacking magi. She didn’t relax, but she gave his hand a brief, reassuring squeeze. “Enlighten us, Archedama. And I do mean us.”

“This reckless pursuit of your old romance,” said Patience. “Set it aside. Go back to your appointed tasks. Don’t make me carry out this obligation, Sabetha. Locke is my responsibility now, and there are things about him that you don’t understand. Things you don’t need to understand, if you would only stop here.”

“Stop what? My life?”

“I see I’m wasting breath. Remember that I made the offer, for what it’s worth.” Patience gestured casually, and the balcony doors slid shut behind her. “Locke, you see, is unique. But I’m not merely affirming his egotism. If you would continue pursuing him you have the right to know his true nature.”

“He’s no stranger to me,” said Sabetha.

“He’s a stranger to everyone.” Patience fixed her disconcertingly dark eyes on Locke. “Himself most of all.”

“Enough cryptic bullshit,” Locke growled. “Get to the meat of whatever—”

“Twenty-three years ago,” Patience interrupted him sharply, “the Black Whisper fell on Camorr. Hundreds died, but the quarantine and the canals saved the city. Once the plague burned itself out, you walked out of old Catchfire, recognized by no one. Home unknown, age unknown, parents and friends unknown.”

“Yes, I do bloody well remember that,” said Locke.

“Take it as evidence. Reflect on it.”

“Here’s something you can reflect on, you—”

“I know why you have no real memories of the time before the plague.” Again Patience parried his words with her peremptory tone. “I know why you have no recollection of your father. In fact, I know why you make up stories about how you took the name Lamora. You tell some it came from a sausage vendor. You tell others it was a kindly old sailor.”

“You … you told me it was a sailor,” said Sabetha.

“Look,” said Locke, a serpentine chill creeping up and down his spine, “look, I’ll explain, I just … Patience, how the hell can you possibly know that?”

“Not one instance of the surname Lamora has ever been recorded in a Camorri census. Not in any century since the imperial collapse. You’ll find that we had good cause to check. You brought the name with you out of Catchfire, wholly formed in your mind, though you never knew where from. I do.”

She moved toward them with that uncanny smooth glide facilitated by her elegant robe. “I know that you have only one true and immutable memory glowing dimly in that darkness before the Catchfire plague. A memory of your mother. A memory of her trade.”

“Seamstress,” muttered Locke.

“Yes,” said Patience, gesturing toward herself. “I have, after all, told you what my gray name was. The one I chose for myself, long before I was elevated to archedama—”

“Seamstress,” said Locke, “oh, no. Oh, fuck no. Fuck, no! You can’t be serious!”

2

SHE COMPOUNDED his dreadful sense of shock by laughing.

“I’m serious as cold steel,” she said with a faintly catlike grin. “You’ve made quite an amusing leap to the wrong conclusion, however. I assure you that the Falconer is my one and only child.”

“Gods,” said Locke, gasping with relief. “So what the hell are you on about?”

“I said your memory was immutable and true. But it’s nothing to do with your mother’s trade. In fact, it’s nothing to do with your mother at all. It’s me you remember.”

“And how in all the hells is that even possible?”

“There was once an extraordinarily gifted mage of my order, the youngest archedon in centuries. He earned his fifth ring when he was half my present age, and took on the office of Providence. He was my mentor, my very true friend. He was also blessed in love. His wife was Karthani, a stunning woman with a kind of beauty very rare among the Therin people. They were enchanted with one another. She died … far too young.

“It was an accident,” continued Patience, hesitantly, as though it pained her to produce each word. “A balcony collapse. I’ve told you that our arts have limitless capacity to cause harm, and scarcely any power to undo it. We can transmute; we can cleanse. Your poisoning was an alien condition that we could separate from your body. But against shattered bones and spilled blood, we’re helpless. We are ordinary. Ordinary as you.”

She glared at Locke with something like real anger.

“Yes,” she said, more slowly. “Ordinary as you are right now. The tragedy caused a terrible change in my friend. He made a grievous error of judgment.

“He became obsessed with fetching his wife back. Harsh experience teaches us that we cannot master death. Still, he fell into the trap of grief and self-regard. He convinced himself that such mastery was simply a matter of will and knowledge. Will that none had ever before mustered. Knowledge that none had ever revealed. He began to experiment with the most forbidden folly in all our arts—interference with the spirit after death. Transition of the spirit into new flesh. Do you know what a horror he would have conjured even if he’d been successful?”

“The gods would never allow such a thing,” whispered Locke, not sure he believed it but certain he wanted to. The image of Bug’s dead black sin-graven eyes flashed in his memory.

“For once I agree with you,” said Patience wryly. “But the gods are cruel. They don’t so much forbid this ambition as punish it. Life recoils from necromancy, like the inflammation of flesh from a venomous sting. The working of it produces malaise, sickness. It can’t be hidden. Eventually he was discovered, but the confrontation was badly handled. He managed to escape.”

Patience pushed her hood back. Sabetha seemed as rooted in place as Locke was, spellbound by the tale, barely breathing.

“Before his elevation to archedon, he’d used a gray name from Throne Therin. He called himself Pel Acanthus, White Amaranth. The unwithering flower of legend. It was only natural that after his madness and betrayal, we called him—”

“No,” whispered Locke. The strength went out of his legs. Sabetha wasn’t fast enough to catch him before his knees hit the floor.

“… Lamor Acanthus,” said Patience. “Black Amaranth. I see the name means something to you.”

“You can’t possibly know that name,” said Locke, his voice barely a croak. Even to his ears the denial sounded pathetic and childish. “You can’t.”

“I can,” said Patience, not gently. “Pel Acanthus was my friend, Lamor Acanthus my shame. Those names mean a great deal to me. They mean even more to you because they’re who you are.”

“What are you doing to him?” said Sabetha. Locke clung to her, shaking. His chest felt as though it was being squeezed in iron bands.

“Ending the mysteries,” said Patience, softening her tone. “Providing the answers. This man was once Lamor Acanthus of Karthain, once Archedon Providence of my order. Once a mage even more powerful than myself.”

She held up her left arm and let the robe sleeve fall away to reveal her five tattooed rings.

“I am not a gods-damned mage,” said Locke, hoarsely.

“Not anymore,” said Patience.

“You’re making this shit up!” said Locke, enunciating each word, willing them into some sort of emotional talisman. “So you know a … a name. I admit that I’m astonished. But I am … I don’t know how old I am, exactly, but I can’t be yet thirty. Thirty! This man you’re talking about would be older than you!”

“Originally,” said Patience. “And in a manner of speaking you still are.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Twenty-three years ago, an orphan with no past appeared in the aftermath of a deadly plague. Didn’t I just tell you what happens when our most forbidden art is practiced? A dreadful backlash against life itself. Sickness. The Black Whisper that came out of nowhere. Lamor Acanthus was in Camorr, hidden away in the hovels of Catchfire. That’s where you continued your studies, using the poor and the forgotten as your subjects.”

“Oh, bullshit—”

“We know,” said Patience. “There was a sorcerous event in Camorr before the plague erupted. Several members of my order were near enough to feel it. When the quarantine was lifted, our people were there in force. We sifted Catchfire house by house, until we found our answer. Magical apparatus. The papers and diaries of Lamor Acanthus, along with his body, plainly identifiable by the tattooed rings. And so we thought the matter was ended, horribly, but ultimately for the better.

“Years passed. Then came the unpleasant business involving my son. It brought you to our attention. You and Jean were carefully examined. Particularly Jean, since our possession of his red name made things so much easier. Imagine the intensity of our surprise when he told us that his closest friend, a Camorri orphan, had confessed to the secret name of Lamor Acanthus.”

“You … told Jean your true name?” said Sabetha. Locke desperately insisted to himself that he was only imagining the hurt beneath her surprise.

“I, uh, well … shit.” His wits, smashed to paste, couldn’t seem to make the heroic effort required to rouse themselves. “I always meant to tell you. I just—”

“He told Jean a true name,” said Patience. “But there’s still another, isn’t there? You’ve got gray names under gray names, Locke. Lamor Acanthus no more gives me the key to you than Locke Lamora or Leo-canto Kosta or Sebastian Lazari does. Beneath it all is another name, the one my mentor would never have shared with another mage. So I don’t know what it is … perhaps you don’t even remember it. But you and I both know it’s there.”

“I’m not what you say I am.” Locke slumped in Sabetha’s arms, despondent. “I was born in Camorr.”

“Your body was. Don’t you see? Lamor Acanthus succeeded, after a fashion. That’s why the outbreak of plague was so sudden, so virulent. You tore your own spirit from its old body. You stole a new one. A second youth, a new wealth of years to spend honing your powers. But that’s not how it worked out.… Your memories were fragmented, your personality burnt away. You locked yourself into a body that didn’t have the gift you used to put yourself there. It took more than twenty years for us to see both pieces of the puzzle, but surely you can’t deny that they fit together smoothly.”

“I can,” said Locke. “I sure as hell can deny it!”

“Why do you think I’ve confided in you?” Patience sighed with the quiet exasperation of a teacher drilling a particularly slow pupil. “Told you what I have of magic, shown you what I have of the magi? Did you think I was just being chatty? Did you really believe you were so very special? I do need you in your capacity as my exemplar for the five-year game. But I also used that to justify bringing you here, to give us more time to study you. To give myself time to make this approach.”

“This is some cruel fucking game of yours,” said Locke.

“You’re still one of us, after a fashion,” said Patience. “You have obligations to us, and we to you. One of those obligations is the truth. If the two of you hadn’t rekindled your private affair, I could have postponed this. As it stands, you both have the right to know, and I had the responsibility to tell you.” Patience gently touched one of Sabetha’s arms. “I know the reason, you see, why he’s dreamed of redheaded women all of his—”

“Stop!” Sabetha jerked away from Patience, stood up, and backed away from Locke as well. “I don’t want to hear it! I don’t want to hear any more!”

“Don’t tell me you believe her!” said Locke.

“Coincidence piles on coincidence until the evidence becomes too strong to ignore,” said Patience.

“Stuff it,” growled Sabetha. “I don’t … I don’t know what the hell to think about this, Locke, I just—”

“You do believe it.” Shock turned in an instant to hot anger. Confused and reeling, Locke was primed to lash out at any target he could find. Before he knew what he was doing, he chose the wrong one. “All the things we’ve done, all the time we’ve spent rebuilding this … and you believe her!”

“You told me you named yourself after a sailor,” she said, unsteadily. “Did you believe that? Do you … believe it now? How can you be sure that you weren’t just filling some hole, or having it filled by someone else’s—”

“How can you even think this?” Anger flared on top of anger, hot and sharp as a knife just pulled from flame. “You left me! You manipulated me, you fucking drugged me, and I still came back. But one story from this fucking Karthani witch and you’re looking at me like I just fell out of the gods-damned sky! Wait, no, shit—”

His remorse and better judgment arrived, late as usual, like party guests riding in just after the social disaster of the season has already erupted. Sabetha’s cheeks darkened, and she opened her mouth several times, but in the end she said nothing. She turned with all the awful, decisive grace of womanly anger, threw the balcony doors open with a slam, and vanished into the darkened house.

Locke stared after her, dumbfounded, dully listening to the drumbeat rhythm of the pulse in his temples. A moment later he leapt to his feet, grabbed the silver bucket containing the chilled wine, and flung it with a snarl against the oak cooking table. Ingredients flew, glass shattered, and ice and wine alike splashed into the brazier, where they raised a soft cloud of hissing steam.

“Thanks for your evenhanded fucking presentation, Patience.” He kicked a fragment of broken glass and watched it skitter off the edge of the balcony. “Thanks for all your kind efforts on my behalf, you … you—”

“My responsibility was to tell you the truth, not wrap you in swaddling clothes.” She raised her hood again, half-veiling her face in shadow. “Nor protect you from your own badly aimed temper. Take it from someone who was courted into a happy marriage, Master Lamora. Your style of wooing couldn’t be more perfectly designed to deliver you to a solitary life.”

“Go light yourself on fire,” said Locke, suddenly regretting that he’d smashed the only bottle of liquor he’d thought to set out on the balcony.

“We’ll speak more of this later,” said Patience. “And once the election is finished, we’ll discuss arrangements for the future.”

“I don’t believe a thing you’ve said,” Locke whispered, knowing how little conviction was in his voice.

“You refused to believe that I preserved your life in Tal Verrar for reasons of conscience. Now I give you the self-interested motive you previously insisted upon, and you refuse to believe it as well. Are you really that arrogant, that logic is as optional as a fashion accessory for you? You can certainly choose to believe that we’d entrust a normal man with even the fragments of guarded truth I’ve shown you. Or you can open your eyes. Accept that we’ve given you a chance to solve the mysteries of your past. Perhaps even a chance to redeem yourself for a terrible crime. A crime whose first victim’s stolen body you will wear like a mask until the day you die.”

Locke said nothing, staring at the mess he’d made of the ingredients for the feast he’d been happily planning to cook not a quarter of an hour earlier.

“Brood all you like,” said Patience. “Sulk all night. You’ve an uncanny talent for it, haven’t you? But in the morning, we expect that you’ll be sober, and focused, and working furiously on our behalf. My more enthusiastic young peers imagine that their colorful threats to you have escaped my notice. But now I suspect you understand how little value I place on Jean Tannen for his own sake, and how … discretionary my protection of him might be. Jean’s continued safety is entirely dependent on your discipline and inspiration.”

Patience turned and slowly strolled away into the house.

“Gods save him,” she called over her shoulder.

She left Locke standing alone on the balcony, and didn’t bother closing the doors behind her.

INTERSECT (III): SPARK

THE OLD MAN quietly withdrew the observation spell he’d woven around Archedama Patience, the most complex work of his life, and breathed a long sigh of relief. The strain of spying, and of conveying the results of that spying in thought to his contact on the other side of the city, had tested him sorely.

This can’t be true! He could feel the fury behind the thoughts that hammered him from that contact now. Archedama Foresight was powerful, and her anger came on like the pressure of a rising headache. I’ve heard NOTHING of this! Have the other three gone MAD?

Please calm down, Archedama. I’ve had a difficult evening. They’re not mad … but they have gone too far. You see now why I had to tell you.

How has this been concealed from me?

Patience claimed the right to examine the two Camorri after the Falconer’s mutilation. I never would have known what she’d discovered if I hadn’t been there in person for Jean Tannen’s interrogation. We took him in Tal Verrar, months before the Falconer’s friends were allowed to toy with them. Only Patience, Temperance, and myself have known what Tannen told us. That’s how the secret was kept.

Lamor Acanthus returned! The matter is so huge, I can scarcely begin to ponder it. This question belongs to us all! I’ll break it wide open in the Sky Chamber!

NO! The old man felt beads of sweat sliding down his cheeks and brow. The intensity of their communication was far beyond the usual light touch of mind-speech. Patience and Temperance have too much support in the chamber. Providence will take their side in any argument. You know as well as I that the Falconer’s removal leaves you short of commanding Speakers. Your followers are dedicated, but your numbers are too few to broach this matter without preparation.

If Lamor Acanthus removed his spirit into another body, even an ungifted body, then he achieved something no other mage in history ever has.

In disgrace and disaster!

Yes. All the more reason we must examine him collectively, research his processes exhaustively. The mind and power of one man were not enough to overcome the difficulties. But what could the minds and powers of a hundred magi do? Or all of us, all four hundred? That’s how this MUST be approached!

I agree with you. I owe Patience so much; do you think I’d turn on her for anything less than a truly existential question? Please heed me, Archedama. If you bring this before the Sky Chamber without preparation it will not go well. You must attack from a position of real strength. And to do that … I daresay that we must take unprecedented measures.

Surely you can’t be suggesting—

Never. No blood must be shed, at least not without provocation. But you must assert force. You must … take control of Patience and some of her supporters, for a little while. They count on the balance of power being overwhelmingly in their favor. If you demonstrate that it is otherwise, you can then introduce the question into a genuinely receptive environment. Only that can guarantee the honest discussion this situation demands.

What you suggest could still be construed as a coup.

Only a little one. The old man smiled wryly, and passed the sensation on in his thoughts. And only for a little while. Our very future is at stake. If we let the five-year game play itself out, let Patience and her supporters stay distracted, then … then with my guidance you can move instantly, decisively. The very night it ends. If we take the other arch-magi into custody, we demonstrate power. If we then release them unharmed, we demonstrate good intentions. Then, and only then, do I believe the circumstances will be right for us to confront the mess that Patience has made, and the secrets she’s unearthed.

The night of the election, then.

Yes. The night of the election.

If you really can serve as our eyes, I promise you I’ll find capable hands to do the work.

Archedama Foresight was gone from his mind without a further sentiment, as was her way. Relieved, he rubbed his hands together to calm their shaking.

It was done, then. It was as it must be, and for the good of all his kind, he reminded himself. He’d had a long and comfortable life on account of his rings. Surely if anyone could bear the strain and the burden of what was to come, it was him.

The air of the silent room suddenly seemed to chill against his skin. Coldmarrow decided that he needed a drink very, very badly.

INTERLUDE: AN INCONVENIENT PATRON

1

“YOU’RE AS WELCOME as a scorpion in a nursery,” said Vordratha, meeting Locke with a glare and a wall of well-dressed toughs at his back. As was becoming routine, Locke had been halted before making it halfway across the entry hall of the Sign of the Black Iris.

“I need to see her,” panted Locke. His flight across the city had not been dignified or subtle; he’d stolen a horse to make it possible, and bluecoats were probably scouring the Vel Verda as he spoke.

“Why, you’re the very last person in Karthain who’d be allowed to do so.” Vordratha’s smirk split his lean face like a sword wound. “Her orders were explicit and vehement.”

“Look, I know our last encounter was—”

“Unpleasant.” Vordratha gestured. Before Locke could turn to run, the Black Iris guards had him pinioned.

“Remember, Master Vordratha, that you’d as good as confessed your intentions to have us beaten and left in an alley,” said Locke. “So if our conversational options were narrowed you’ve only yourself to blame!”

“The mistress of the house specifically desires not to see you.” Vordratha leaned in close; his breath was like a hint of old spilled wine. “And while I am charged not to harm you, I’d argue that I’m not responsible for anything that happens between your leaving my custody and hitting the pavement.”

Vordratha’s guards pushed Locke outside and heaved him in an impressive arc that terminated in a bone-jarring impact with the cobblestones. His feelings warred bitterly over his next move, pride and desire against prudence and street-reflexes, the latter winning out only when he realized how perilously close he was to carriage traffic and how many witnesses were on hand to see him get crushed by it. Groaning, he crawled back to the curb.

His stolen horse was gone, and the Black Iris stable boys leered at him knowingly. It was a long, painful walk to a neighborhood where a coach would deign to pick him up.

2

“… AND THAT’S the whole gods-damned mess,” said Locke, his fingers knotted around a glass that had once contained a throat-scorching quantity of brandy. “I found a ride, came straight back, and here we are.”

It was past midnight. Locke had returned, sequestered Jean in their suite, and with the help of large plates of food and a bottle of Josten’s most expensive distilled spirits he’d unrolled the whole tale.

“Do you really need me to tell you that the bitch was lying?” said Jean.

“I know she was lying,” said Locke. “There have to be lies mixed in somewhere. It’s the parts that might be true that concern me.”

“Why not assume it was ALL lies?” Jean ran his fingers rapidly over his temples, attempting to massage away the dull pain still radiating from his plastered nose. “Bow-to-stern bullshit! Gods damn it, this is what you and I do to people. We talk them into corners where they can’t tell truth from nonsense.”

“She knows my name. My actual name. The one I—”

“Yes,” said Jean. “And I know who told her.”

“But I only ever—”

“That’s right.” Disgust burned like bile at the back of Jean’s throat, and he tapped his own chest with both hands. “They said they opened me like a book in Tal Verrar and took everything they wanted. Therefore, I must have given them that name. Think! The rest of Patience’s story was most likely built around it.”

“That leaves the question of the third name.”

“The one Patience claims is deeper than the one you gave me? Is it even there?”

Locke rubbed his shadow-cupped eyes. “I don’t … I don’t know. It’s not a name at all. Just a feeling, maybe.”

“About what I expected,” said Jean. “Do you really remember ever having that feeling, before tonight? It strikes me as a ready-made bluff. I have all manner of strange unsorted feelings in my heart and head; we all must. She didn’t give you half a particle of telling evidence! All she did was plant a doubt that you could gnaw on forever, if you let yourself.”

“If I let myself.” Locke tossed his glass aside. “All my life I’ve wondered where the hell I came from. Now I’ve got possibilities like an arrow to the gut, and I absolutely do not have time to fuss over them.”

“Possibilities,” sighed Jean. “In faith, now, even if they were true answers, would you really want this particular bunch? I realize it’s easy for me to say … knowing when and where I was born—”

“I know where I’m from,” said Locke. “I’m from Camorr. I’m from Camorr! Even if everything she said was true, that’s all I give a barrel of dry rat shit about. That and Sabetha.” Locke stood, the lines of his face grimly set. “That, and Sabetha, and beating the hell out of her in this idiotic election. Now—”

Someone knocked at the door, loudly and urgently.

3

LOCKE WATCHED as Jean unbolted it with customary caution. There stood Nikoros, unshaven, his eyes like fried eggs and hair looking as though it had been caught in the spokes of a wagon wheel. He held a piece of parchment in a shaking hand.

“This just came in,” he muttered. “Specifically for Master Lazari, from a Black Iris courier at the AHHHHHHH—”

This exclamation erupted out of him as Locke darted forward and seized the letter. He snapped it open, noting the quick familiar strokes of Sabetha’s script:

“Ah, damn everything,” Locke muttered, crumpling the parchment and stuffing it into a jacket pocket. “Gods damn everything.” He collapsed back into his chair, brows knit, and let his gaze wander aimlessly over the wall. The most awkward sort of silence settled over the room, until Jean cleared his throat.

“Well, ah, Nikoros. You look like you’ve been thrashed by devils,” he said. “What’s going on?”

“Business, sir, business. So much of it. And I … I … forgive me, I’m going without … the substance we’ve discussed.”

“You’re weaning yourself from that wretched dust.” Jean clapped Nikoros by the shoulders, a gesture that made the smaller man wobble like aspic. “Good! You were murdering yourself, you know.”

“The way my head feels, I half wish I’d succeeded,” said Nikoros.

Locke’s curiosity drew him back to the present, and he studied Nikoros. The Karthani was on the come-down from black alchemy for sure; Locke had seen it a hundred times. The misery would shake Nikoros for days like a cat playing with a toy. It might be wise to cut the poor fellow’s duties … or even to chain him to a wall.

Hells, Locke thought, if I get any more twisted out of my own skin they might have to shackle me next to him.

“Lazari,” said Jean, “now, if that letter’s what I think it is … Is it, shall we say, a finality? Or just an interruption?”

“It’s a knife to the guts,” said Locke. “But I suppose … well, I suppose I can view it as more an interruption.”

“Good,” said Jean. “Good!”

“I suppose,” muttered Locke. Then, feeling an old familiar heat stirring in his breast: “Yes, I really do suppose! By the gods, I need noise and mischief. I need fuss and fuckery until I can’t see straight! Nikoros! What have you been doing all night?”

“Uh, well, I just came back from surveying the big mess,” said Nikoros. “Big and getting worse. Not just for us, I mean. For the whole city.”

“I’m losing my ability to tell one mess from another around here,” said Locke.

“Oh! I mean at the north gate, sirs, and the Court of Dust. All the refugees out of the north.”

“Oh. OH! Gods, the bloody war,” said Locke. “I’d half forgotten. What kind of refugees?”

“At this point, the sort with money, mostly. The ones that fled before the fighting gets anywhere near. And their guards, servants, and the like. All stacking up at inns until they can plead for residence—”

“Refugees with money, you say,” interrupted Jean. “Looking for new homes. Which is to say, potential voters in need of immediate assistance.”

“Hells yes,” shouted Locke. “Horses, Nikoros! Three of them, now! Have a scribe and a solicitor follow us. We scoop up anyone who can pay for enfranchisement; then we find them permanent accommodations in districts where we most need the votes!”

“And they’ll be Deep Roots for life,” said Jean with a grin. “Or at least the next couple of weeks, which is all we give a damn about.”

“I, uh … I will come, sirs, I just …” Nikoros gulped and wrung his hands together. “I need a few minutes of privacy, first, if I might. I’ll, uh, meet you downstairs.”

4

THE NIGHT was cool. They rode through pale wisps of fog coiling off cobblestones like unquiet spirits, past black banners and green banners fluttering limply from balconies, through stately quiet until they reached the Court of Dust. There they found the mess Nikoros had promised.

Bluecoats were out in force, and Locke saw at once how nervous they were, how unaccustomed they must be to real surprises. Wagons were lined up haphazardly, horses snorting and flicking their tails while teamsters and stable attendants haggled. Lamps were lit in every inn and tavern bordering the court; knots of conversation and argument stood out everywhere in the uneasy crowds.

“Where the hells are we meant to go, then?” shouted a long-coated carriage hand at a tired-looking hostler. His Therin was fair, but his accent was obvious. “All these taverns are full up, now you tell me this bloody Josten’s place is closed off for your damn—”

“Your pardon, my good man,” said Locke, reining in beside the fracas. “If you have persons of quality seeking accommodations, I can be of immediate assistance.”

“Really? Who the devils might you be, then?”

“Lazari is my name. Doctor Sebastian Lazari.” Locke flashed a grin, then shifted to his excellent Vadran. “Your masters or mistresses have all my sympathies for the circumstances of their displacement, but they’ll soon find they’re not without friends here in Karthain.”

“Oh, bless the waters deep and shallow,” answered the carriage hand in the same tongue. “I serve the honorable Irina Varosz of Stovak. We’ve been five days on the road since—”

“You’re all but home,” said Locke. “Josten’s is the place for you. Josten’s Comprehensive. I can arrange chambers; pay no heed to what you’ve been told. My man Nikoros will handle the details.”

Nikoros, barely in control of his skittish horse, approached at the snap of Locke’s fingers.

“I’m, uh, not entirely sure where I’m meant to put them,” he whispered.

“Use the chambers I’ve kept empty for security reasons,” said Locke. “We can find other places for them after a few days. Rack your brains for anyone in the party who’s got empty rooms on their hands. Hell, there’s one manor up in Vel Verda that springs to mind immediately. Might as well get some joy out of the damn place.”

Jean was already off plying his own friendly Vadran to other guards, other footmen, other curious and well-dressed strangers with road dust on their cloaks. For perhaps twenty minutes he and Locke worked together smoothly, directing minor cousins of nobility and merchants of assorted quality to Nikoros and thence to Josten’s and the bosom of the Deep Roots party.

There was a fresh stir at the southern edge of the Court of Dust. Massed hooves rang on the cobbles as some two dozen men and women in black livery rode in, led by Vordratha and a few of the bravos Locke had seen hanging around the Sign of the Black Iris.

“That’s a pain in the precious bits,” muttered Locke to Nikoros. “I was hoping for a little more time alone to make new friends. Who told these assholes to get out of bed?”

“Oh, uh, I’m sure it was only a, uh, matter of time,” coughed Nikoros.

“You’re probably right.” Locke cracked his knuckles. “Well, now we play suitors in earnest. Here come that scribe and solicitor I wanted, at least. You ride like hell back to Josten’s and help him stack our friends from the north like books on shelves!”

5

IT WAS past the ninth hour of the morning when Jean’s nagging sense of duty pulled him back to the waking world, feeling like dough just barely baked long enough to resemble bread. He made his toilet indifferently, merely taming and oiling his hair before donning a fresh Morenna Sisters ensemble. Optics in place, nose plaster adjusted, he used his suite’s little mirror to affirm that his powerful need for coffee was plainly visible. Alas. They’d done good work the night before, and their reward for that work would be yet more work today.

Jean pushed the door to the main suite open and found Locke perched over a writing desk, looking even more ragged than Jean felt.

“I would inquire if you’d slept,” said Jean, “but I’ve learned to recognize silly questions before I ask them.”

Locke was surrounded by the detritus of personal and party business: stacks of papers in Nikoros’ handwriting, small avalanches of notes and receipts spilling from leather folios, several plates of half-eaten and now desiccated biscuits, a collection of burnt-out tapers and dimly phosphorescent alchemical globes. Crumpled sheets of parchment littered the floor. Locke peered at Jean like some sort of subterranean creature roused from contemplation of secret treasures by a mortal intruder.

“I don’t much feel like sleep,” he muttered. “You can go ahead and have mine if you like.”

“If only it worked that way,” said Jean, moving to loose one of the window-shades. “Gods, you’ve got these things plugged up tight enough to keep out water, let alone an autumn morning.”

“Please don’t touch that!” Locke shook his quill, and Jean noted that it was distinctly shorter than it had been when he’d trundled off to bed. “Open that window and I’ll burst into flame.”

“What’s got you so exercised?” Jean left the curtains alone and settled into a chair. “Anything to do with the new friends we swept up last night?”

“No.” Locke did favor him with a satisfied grin. “The count, by the way, is seventy-two eligible adults. I’ve got the solicitors lined up to discuss terms with them. Nice and simple. We’ll take them to the relevant offices in groups, hand over a little sweetener money with the fees, and get them registered. They’ll be seventy-two lawful voters by nightfall, and then we’ll decide which districts to settle them in.”

“How many fresh faces did the Black Iris snatch up?”

“Half what we got.” More teeth appeared within Locke’s grin. “I’ve left a reception committee at the Court of Dust to keep the party rolling, and I sent out a little expedition to survey the road. The opposition will still get some, of course, but I think we can safely say that the majority of Vadran expatriate votes will be for the Deep Roots.”

“Splendid,” said Jean. “Now, what’s the business that’s been wearing that quill down?”

“Oh, it’s, you know.” Locke gestured at the arc of crumpled parchment sheets on the floor. “It’s a letter. My letter. To, uh, her. My response. It has a few, uh, sentiments and delicacies yet to be straightened out. I suppose by ‘few’ I mean ‘all of them.’ Say, can I ask you to undertake an embassy to the Sign of the Black Iris when it’s finished?”

“Oh, absolutely,” said Jean, “because I really was hoping to get into another punch-up with Sabetha’s boys and girls as soon as possible, thanks.”

“They won’t hurt you,” said Locke. “Nor make you hurt them. It’s me Vordratha’s got it in for.”

“Of course I’ll carry a token of your obsession into hostile territory for you,” said Jean. “But there’s one condition. Put yourself in your bed and use it for its intended purpose, right now.”

“But—”

“You’ve got bags under your eyes like crescent pastries,” said Jean, feeling that he was being very kind. “You look like Nikoros, for the Crooked Warden’s sake. Like you ought to be crouched in a gutter somewhere catching small animals and eating them raw. You need rest.”

“But the letter—”

“I’ve got a sleeping draught right here, ready to administer.” Jean curled the fingers of his right hand into a fist and shook it at Locke. “Besides, how could a nap to clear your head do anything but improve this epistolary endeavor?”

“Hey,” said Locke, scratching his stubble absently with his quill. “That sounds suspiciously like wisdom, damn your eyes. Why must you always flounce about being wiser than me?”

“Doesn’t require much conscious effort.” Jean pointed toward Locke’s room with mock paternal sternness, but Locke was already on his way, stumbling and yawning. He was snoring in moments.

Jean surveyed the wreckage of Locke’s attempts at letter-writing, wondering at the contents of the crumpled sheets. He settled his left hand in a coat pocket and ran his thumb round the lock of hair concealed therein. After a moment of contemplation, he gathered the balled-up parchments, piled them in the suite’s small fireplace, and set them alight with an alchemical twist-match from an ornate box on the mantel. Locke snored on.

Jean slipped out and quietly locked the door behind him.

Josten’s was in a fine bustle. Well-dressed new faces were everywhere in the common room, and the babble was as much Vadran as Therin. Diligence Josten, jaunty as a general of unblooded troops, was lecturing a half-dozen staff. He clapped his hands and shooed them to their tasks as Jean approached.

“Master Callas,” said Josten, “my procurer of strange clientele! You look like a man in search of breakfast.”

“I have only two wishes,” said Jean. “The first is for strong coffee, and the second is for stronger coffee.”

“Behold my jask.” Josten pointed to an ornate, long-handled copper pot simmering on a glowing alchemical stone behind the bar counter. “My father’s jask, actually. Secret of the Okanti hearth. You poor bastards were still steeping your coffee in wash-tubs when we came along to rescue you.”

The coffee Josten decanted from the jask was capped with cinnamon-colored foam. Jean felt less than civilized gulping it, but his wits needed the prodding, and the blend of fig and chicory flavors hit his throat in a satisfying scalding rush. The room was already looking brighter when he reached the dregs of the small cup.

“Lights the fires, doesn’t it?” said Josten, smoothly refilling Jean’s cup. “I’ve been pouring it into Nikoros for days, poor bastard. He’s, ah, lost a personal buttress, that one.”

“I know,” said Jean. “Can’t be helped.”

Josten politely refused to let Jean go about his business on a breakfast of nothing but coffee. A few minutes later, Jean climbed the stairs to the Deep Roots private section carrying a bowl heaped with freshwater anchovies, olives, seared tomatoes, hard brown cheese, and curls of bread fried with oil and onions.

Nikoros was sprawled in a padded chair, surrounded by an arc of papers and empty cups resembling the mess that had grown around Locke. His stubble looked sufficient to scrape barnacles from ship hulls, and his lids lifted over bloodshot eyes as Jean approached.

“In my dreams I sign chits and file papers,” Nikoros muttered. “Then I awake to sign real chits and file real papers. I imagine my grave marker will be carved as a writing desk. ‘Here lies Nikoros Via Lupa, wifeless and heirless, but gods how he could alphabetize!’ ”

“We’ve overworked you,” said Jean. “And you still coming down off that shit you were shoving up your nose! Hard old days. We’ve been thoughtless, Master Lazari and I. Here, take some breakfast.”

Nikoros was hesitant to do so at first, but his interest grew rapidly, and soon he and Jean were racing one another to finish the contents of the bowl.

“You’re the sinews of this whole affair,” said Jean. “It’s not the Dexas and the Epitaluses that hold things together. Not even Lazari and me. It’s been you, it is you, and it will be you, long after we’re gone.”

“Long after this disaster is past us,” said Nikoros, “and gods grant that we still have any Konseil seats at all five years from now.”

“Here, now,” said Jean. “We’re in the thick of it, no lie. You can’t see the direction of the battle because you’re in the mud and the mess with all the other poor bastards, but it has a direction. You must accept my assurances that I can see a little farther than you can.”

“The Black Iris,” said Nikoros, looking away from Jean, “this time, they’ve … they’ve got … well, they have advantages. At least that’s how it seems to me.”

“They have some,” said Jean with a nod. “We have others. And we’ve come off rather well in this new game of displaced northerners, haven’t we? Six dozen fresh voters to seed wherever we need them. The Black Iris can work whatever cocksuckery they like upon us, but in the end it all comes down to names on ballots.”

“You’re being poorly served by me,” said Nikoros, almost too softly to hear.

“Nonsense.” Jean raised his voice and gave Nikoros a careful, friendly squeeze on the arm. “If you weren’t meeting our expectations, don’t you think we’d have packed you off somewhere out of the way?”

“Well, thank you, Master Callas.” Nikoros smiled, but it was a wan formality.

“Gods, it must be my week to be confessor to the heartsick and weary,” sighed Jean. “You could do with a few more hours of sleep, I think. The sort not spent jammed into a chair. Off to your chambers, and don’t let me see you again until—”

A woman with short curly black hair pounded up the stairs. She wore a traveling coat and mantle, as well as a courier’s pouch and a sheath knife.

“Sirs,” she said, “I’m sorry to come rushing back like this, but I didn’t know where else to go.”

“This is Ven Allaine,” said Nikoros, rising. “Ven for ‘Venturesome.’ She’s one of our troubleshooters. Ven, I’m sure you know who Master Callas is.”

Jean and Allaine exchanged the quickest possible courtesies; then she continued:

“Master Via Lupa sent us out an hour before sunrise, five of us on horseback, north from the Court of Dust. We were supposed to spot Vadran swells on the road. Introduce ourselves, make our offers, get them in the bag for the Deep Roots before they even hit the city.” She pulled her leather gloves off and slapped them against her leg. “We planned to be out until midafternoon, but just after sunup we were overridden by bluecoats, lots of them, not sparing their horses.

“They said they had an emergency directive from the Commission for Public Order. No Karthani citizens allowed more than a hundred yards north on the road, because of ‘unsettled conditions.’ They said we could either ride back under escort or walk back under arrest. So that’s it, and here I am again.”

“Are you sure they were real constables?” said Jean.

“No foolery there,” said Allaine. “They had the papers from the Commission, and I recognized a few of them.”

“You did well,” said Jean. “If you’d tried to argue you’d probably be trudging back home under guard right now. You and your fellows get some breakfast, and leave this with us.” Jean watched her depart, then turned to Nikoros. “The Commission for Public Order?”

“A trio of Konseil members. Chosen by majority vote of the larger body. A sort of committee to run the constabulary.”

“Shit. I suppose it’d be silly of me to ask what party those three belong to.”

“It would,” said Nikoros. “I’m sorry, sir.”

“We’ll just have to continue our diplomatic efforts within the city gates,” said Jean. “No worries. I’ll send Allaine and her crew out to join that party once they’ve eaten. As for you: bed. Don’t say anything, just go to your chambers and go to bed, or I’ll throw you off this balcony. You and Master Lazari both need it. I can call the tune for this dance for a few hours.”

After Nikoros crept gratefully off to his rest, Jean sifted the papers he’d left, noting new developments as well as familiar problems. He wrote orders of his own, passed them to couriers, received routine inquiries, and drank several different varieties of coffee, all freshly boiled and scalding, while the pale fingers of autumn light from the windows swung across the room.

Just after noon, the front doors banged open. Damned Superstition Dexa and Firstson Epitalus swept through the crowd and up the stairs, trailed by an unusually large bevy of attendants. Jean set down his coffee and paperwork, then rose to greet them.

“You!” hissed Dexa as she crested the last step, striding forcefully toward Jean. “You and Lazari have rashly placed us in a position of the most profound and untenable embarrassment!”

Jean squared his shoulders, drew in a deep breath, and spread his hands disarmingly.

“I can see we have a misunderstanding in progress,” he said. “Well, I’m here to instruct and condole. Everyone who isn’t a member of the Konseil is dismissed.”

Some of the attendants looked uncertain, but Jean took a step forward, smiling, and shooed them off, as though dealing with children. In a moment he and the two Konseillors were alone on the private balcony, and Jean’s smile vanished.

“You will never again address me in that fashion,” he said, his voice low and even but not even remotely polite.

“On the contrary,” said Dexa, “I intend to take your skin off by means of verbal vitriol. Now—”

“Damned Superstition Dexa,” said Jean, stepping in to loom over her without subtlety, “you will lower your voice. You will not create a scene. You will not confuse and demoralize the party members below. You will not allow our opponents the satisfaction of hearing about any disarray or dissension here!”

She glared at him, but then, through the force of argument or sorcerous conditioning or both, she caught hold of her temper and nodded, grudgingly.

“Now,” said Jean. “I will listen to anything, even the most vicious chastisement, so long as it is delivered quietly and we preserve our outward show of amity.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “You’re entirely correct. But you and Lazari have loaded our credibility on a barge and sunk it in the lake with this business of collecting strays!”

“Wealthy, well-connected strays,” said Jean. “All of whom will be grateful for their places here, and will show their gratitude by voting—”

“That’s just it,” interrupted Firstson Epitalus, “they won’t. Show it to him, Dexa.”

“We were summoned to an emergency meeting of the Konseil just over an hour ago,” said Dexa, taking several folded sheets of paper out of her jacket and passing them to Jean. “The Black Iris convened it and barely managed to scrape the letter of the law in sending out notices. They pushed an emergency directive through by simple majority vote.”

“In light of unforeseen developments,” muttered Jean out loud as he read the tightly scripted legal pronouncements, “and the influx of desperate and diverse refugees … steps necessary to secure the sanctity of the Karthani electoral process … urgently and immediately bar all such refugees from enfranchisement as voting citizens … period of three years! Oh, those cheeky sacks of donkey shit!”

“Quite,” said Dexa. “Now, proceed to the fine details.”

“All constables empowered …” Jean read, skimming irrelevancies and flourishes, “… therefore this directive shall be considered in effect … noon! Noon today! A few damn minutes ago.”

“Yes,” said Epitalus. “Seems it wasn’t quite such an urgent and immediate need that they didn’t want to be sure all of their own Vadran newcomers were registered first.”

“Hells,” said Jean. “I only sent off about half a dozen of ours. We thought we’d have all day! How many new voters did they buy?”

“Our sources say forty,” said Dexa. “So for all your galloping about in the middle of the night, you’ve earned us six votes and the opposition forty, and now we have six dozen of our cousins from the north to store like useless clothes! How do you propose we get rid of them?”

“I don’t.”

“But that’s simply—”

“We made promises to aid and shelter them in the name of the Deep Roots party,” said Jean. “Do you know what happens when that sort of promise goes unkept? How willing do you think Karthani voters will be to put their trust in us if we’re seen kicking respectable refugees back out into the cold before the eyes of the whole city?”

“Point taken,” sighed Dexa.

“If we can’t use them as voters,” said Jean, “we can still take their money in exchange for our help. And we can use them to grow sympathy. We’ll circulate some exaggerations about these people being chased out of their homes. Families murdered, houses burned, inheritances usurped—all that sort of thing. We’re good with stories, Lazari and me.”

“Oh yes, quite,” said Dexa, all the fight leaving her voice at last. “I wager you must know best, after all.”

Jean frowned. This sort of sudden lassitude had to be some sort of friction between Dexa’s conditioning and her natural inclinations. Now it was time to put her and Epitalus back together.

“You wouldn’t have hired us if you hadn’t wanted the best in a very unusual business,” said Jean. “Now, if you’ve got no further plans for the moment, I could use your advice on some of these situations around the city.…”

Actually, he hadn’t needed anything of the sort, but after a few minutes of smooth fakery he found some genuine questions to apply their nattering to, and after a few more minutes he summoned a stream of coffee, brandy, and tobacco that flowed for the rest of the afternoon. Soon enough any cracks in their working façade seemed plastered over, and Jean found himself practicing dipsomantic sleight-of-hand to avoid having his wits plastered over.

Around the third hour of the afternoon Locke appeared, looking significantly less close to death. He wore a fresh green-trimmed black coat and gnawed with practiced unself-consciousness at a pile of biscuits and meat balanced daintily atop a mug of coffee.

“Hello, fellow Roots,” he said around a mouthful of food. “I’ve been hearing the damnedest things just now.”

Jean passed him the papers from Dexa and explained the situation as succinctly as possible. Locke ate with dexterous voracity, so that he was dunking his last biscuit in his coffee as Jean finished his report with innocuous hand signals:

These two were upset. Fixed now. Used argument and drink. More of latter.

“Alas,” said Locke, “it was a grand old scheme we cooked up, but all we can do now is leave flowers on the grave and move along to the next one. Our Black Iris friends seem to be either sharper or luckier than usual these past few days. Well, leave that to me. I’ve got to hit back.”

He drained his coffee in one long gulp, then motioned for Jean and the two Konseillors to lean in closer to him.

“Dexa,” he said quietly, “Epitalus, you two must know all the other Konseil members fairly well. Which Black Iris Konseillor would you say has the most … mercenary sort of self-interest? The least attachment to politics or ideology or anything beyond the feathers in their own nest?”

“The most aptly suited to bribery?” said Epitalus.

“Let’s say the most open to clandestine persuasion,” said Locke, “by means financial or otherwise.”

“It would have to be a vault-filling sort of persuasion in any case,” said Dexa. “Rats don’t tend to desert a ship that isn’t sinking. Forgive that impression of the Black Iris, Master Lazari, but that’s as I see it.”

“Don’t worry about it,” said Locke. “But is there anyone?”

“If I had to wager something on the question,” said Dexa, “I’d put my money on Lovaris.”

“Secondson Lovaris,” said Epitalus, nodding. “Also called ‘Perspicacity,’ though gods know where that came from. He’s got no real politics at all, near as I can tell. He loves the sound of his own voice. Loves being one of the selected few. Thoroughly adores the opportunities for … enrichment a Konseil seat often attracts.”

“I’m an opportunity for enrichment,” said Locke with a smile. “I need to meet this piece of work privately, as soon as I can, and as secretly. How would you suggest I go about it?”

“Through Nikoros,” said Dexa. “Him and his underwriting for transport syndicates. Lovaris holds part interest in a ship called the Lady Emerald. If one of Nikoros’ contacts carried him a sealed letter on some boring point of nautical business, you’d have his attention and you wouldn’t need to fly Deep Roots colors anywhere near him.”

“That sounds damned superlative, Damned Superstition.” Locke saluted her with his empty mug. “I have my next mission.”

6

THREE DAYS later, a lean and scruffy man in a paint-spattered tunic emerged from the misty greenways of the Mara Karthani, where hanging lanterns swayed in the rain and Therin Throne statues in crumbling alcoves gave themselves up slowly to the elements.

Abutting the centuries-old park on its eastern side was the manse of Perspicacity Lovaris, Black Iris Konseil representative for the Bursadi District. The scruffy man knocked at the tradesfolk entrance and was let in by a dark-skinned hillock of a woman, gray-haired but dangerously light on her feet. The scuffed witchwood baton swinging from the woman’s belt looked as though it had met some skulls in its time.

She led the newcomer, still dripping wet, through the richly furnished passages of the house to a small, high-ceilinged chamber where warm yellow light fell like a benediction. This illumination had nothing to do with the natural sky, of course—it was an arc of alchemical lamps above stained glass engraved with common symbols of the Twelve.

The woman shoved the lean man up against one wall of the chamber, and for an instant he feared treachery. Then her strong, capable hands were sliding down his sides in a familiar fashion. Her search for weapons was thorough, but she was obviously unacquainted with the old Camorri trick of the hiltless stiletto dangled at the small of the back from a necklace chain.

Locke had no illusions of kicking down doors and leaving a swath of dead foes in his wake if complications arose, but even a nail-scraping of an arsenal was a reassuring thing to have on hand.

“He’s not armed,” said the woman, smiling for the first time. “Nor any threat if he were.”

A middle-aged Therin man with pale hair and a seamy pink face entered the room. He and the woman traded places as smoothly as stage actors, and she eased the door shut on her way out.

“You can remove that nonsense on your head,” said the man. “At least, I presume it’s nonsense, if you’re who you ought to be.”

Locke pulled off his sopping wig of black curls and his ornamental optics, thick as the bottoms of alchemists’ jars. He set them down on the room’s only table, which had but one chair, on Lovaris’ side.

“Sebastian Lazari,” said Lovaris as he sat down with a soft grunt. “Lashani prodigy with no genuine history in Lashain. Doctor without accreditation. Solicitor without offices or former clients.”

“The backtrail’s not up to my usual standards,” said Locke. “No loss to admit it, since I didn’t do the work myself.”

“You and your bigger friend are interesting counterparts to the lovely Mistress Gallante,” said Lovaris. “Though obviously not from the same place.”

“Obviously,” said Locke.

“I think you’ve come north from your usual habitations, Master Lazari. I heard rumors a few months ago, when the Archon of Tal Verrar took that long fall off a narrow pedestal. Word was a few captains of intelligence managed to duck the noose and get misplaced in the shuffle.”

“My compliments,” said Locke. “But, ah, you might as well know I didn’t leave anyone behind me interested enough to chase me down, even if your … entertaining theory were to reach the proper ears.”

“Nor shall I waste my time contacting them. The election will be past before a letter could even reach Tal Verrar. No, nothing we say here will be heard by anyone else, save my forebears.” Lovaris gestured at the ornately carved nooks and drawers decorating the walls of the chamber. “This is my family’s memorial vault. Seven hundred years in Karthain. We predate the Presence. As for you, well, I’ve brought you here in answer to your interesting note because I wish to inconvenience you.”

“I’m sure your line hasn’t survived for seven centuries by refusing to carefully examine fresh opportunities,” said Locke. “My note asked for nothing but this meeting. You have no idea what I’m about to offer you.”

“Oh, but I do.” Lovaris smiled without showing teeth. “You want me to consider a turn of the coat. Specifically, you want me to wait until all the votes are safely counted and I’m back in for the Black Iris. Then and only then would I announce that my conscience had forced me to join ranks with the Deep Roots. I understand you’ve promised to invent a convincing story, but you haven’t told anyone else what it is yet.”

Locke wanted to scream. Instead he pretended to study the nails of his right hand and disguised his next deep, calming breath as a bored sigh.

“I’ll have a passable excuse for you,” he said. “And you would find the experience personally enriching.”

“So I hear,” said Lovaris. “Ten thousand ducats in gleaming gold. I supply a chest; you fill it before my eyes. On election night, the chest is to be kept at an allegedly neutral countinghouse by an equal number of my people and yours, until I undertake my public metamorphosis. Once I do so, your people walk away and leave mine the gold.”

“Elegant, don’t you think?” Locke wanted to punch the wall. This was too much. Lovaris had information from confidential conversations with Locke’s half-dozen most trusted associates, information just a day or two old. Still, Locke had stayed calm through worse. “Come now, Lovaris, we both know you’re no ideologue. The whole city knows it. Nobody’s going to be particularly surprised or hurt, and ten thousand ducats will buy an awful lot of anything.”

“Do I look like a stranger to money?” said Lovaris.

“You look like a man of a certain age,” said Locke. “How many more pleasant and healthy years will the gods give you? How much more pleasant and healthy could they be with that extra ten thousand to ease your way?”

“There is a more practical concern,” said Lovaris. “Accepting a bribe is technically an amputation offense, perhaps even a capital one if state interest can be invoked. Nobody pays attention to routine little exchanges, but ten thousand ducats is a very awkward mass of coin, and it doesn’t fit any of the usual patterns. If I did this, I would be hounded by the Black Iris. I’d be the one man in Karthain to whom the bribery laws would be applied! The only place that money could vanish to is my cellars. I wouldn’t be able to join it legally with my countinghouse funds for years, and that’s damned inconvenient. Nor can I simply take a letter of credit, for even more obvious reasons.”

“If you can assume that I’m good for ten thousand in cold metal,” said Locke, “why don’t I leave it to you to dictate how I can best conceal the transfer of funds to you?”

“I think not.” Lovaris rose and stretched. “The most important point to consider is that your little scheme is only worth the trouble if we Black Iris win the election by exactly one Konseil seat. If you win, you’ve no need to buy me at all, and if we win by two seats or more, my turning can’t shift the majority. Frankly, it’s all immaterial, because I don’t believe you’re going to win. I don’t believe you’re going to lose by so little as one seat. You’re correct that I’m no slave to ideology, but it would be tedious and stupid to suddenly find myself on the side of the minority.”

“Many interesting things could happen between now and the election,” said Locke.

“A hazy platitude. You might as well be conducting your business in public squares, Lazari. I’ve revealed how extensive our intelligence is because I want you to understand that you’re over the barrel.”

“Fair enough,” said Locke. “This, then, is the point in the conversation where I say ‘twenty thousand.’ ”

“Ten thousand would be awkward enough. You expect me to be enthusiastic about trying to hide twice as much? The money’s only an enticement if it can reach my pockets invisibly, and if I’m still relevant to Karthani politics after I’ve earned it. No, Master Lazari, I won’t pretend I’m not ultimately for sale in some fashion, but you are not offering any sort of price I’m looking for. Now, before I have you escorted out, do you want a moment to put your wet disguise back on? For formality’s sake, if nothing else?”

7

A LEAN, scruffy man in a paint-stained tunic left the tradesman’s entrance of the manse of Perspicacity Lovaris and hurried west, back into the cool green maze of the Mara Karthani. Subtle signs had been laid since his last passage, knots of brown cloth tied around hedge branches at knee level, and the man followed them rapidly through twistings and turnings, through brick arches hung with yellowing vines, to the statuary niche where Jean Tannen waited.

Jean, clad in a sensible hooded oilcloak, was sitting on a bench beside the likeness of some forgotten scholar-soldier of the old empire, a stern woman carved in the traditional mode, carrying the raised lantern of learning in one hand and a clutch of barbed javelins on the opposite shoulder. Jean pulled out a second oilcloak and swept it over Locke’s shoulders.

“Thank you,” said Locke, pulling off his wig and optics. “We’ve got a serious hole in our security. Lovaris knew I was coming.”

“Damn,” said Jean. “Do you want me to roust those grandmothers Sabetha’s got up on the rooftops after all?”

“Gods, they’re harmless. Just there to taunt us. Our problem is someone inside Josten’s. Lovaris had full details of my plan and my offer, things I’ve only mentioned to a handful of people, in privacy, in the past couple of days! Is there any place an eavesdropper could have their way with the Deep Roots private gallery?”

“I spent hours going over all the cellars, all the bolt-holes,” said Jean. “There’s nowhere close enough, not above or below. And the noise of the place … no, I’d stake my life on it. It’d take— Well, it’d take magic.”

“Then I’m off to hunt the rat,” said Locke. “And since my first approach bounced right off the fatuous fucker’s self-satisfaction, you’ll have to visit Lovaris and try our second approach.”

“Second approach, right.” Jean rose from the bench. “You sure our budget can bear the strain?”

“It’ll take us down to the dregs, and an emergency few thousand, and those donations from our Vadran refugees,” said Locke. “But there’s not much else to spend it on at this point, is there?”

“So be it,” said Jean. “If he bites, I’ll start visiting jewelers tonight. I’ve picked some discreet ones.”

“Good. I’d say diamonds and emeralds, mostly, but you’ve got a sharp eye. Trust your own discretion.”

“And we’ll need a boat,” said Jean.

“Already thinking on it!” Locke tapped his own forehead. “But let’s cover first, second, third, and fourth things before we go chasing down fifths or sixths, eh?”

“Gods keep you,” said Jean. “Don’t trip over your feet on the way home. What are you going to do about our rat?”

“Well, since someone we trust is feeding my confidential instructions to Sabetha,” said Locke, “I reckon I might feed some confidential instructions to all the people we trust.”

8

THAT NIGHT, as a hard rain beat down outside, Locke put his arm around Firstson Epitalus and drew the old man into a whispered conversation in the Deep Roots private gallery.

“You know more about the Isas Thedra than I do,” said Locke. “I need a quiet, out-of-the-way place in your district to store some barrels of fire-oil. A shack, a cellar. Somewhere nobody will disturb, at least not before the election.”

“Fire-oil? What’s this for, Master Lazari?”

“I’m going to see to it that our Black Iris friends have a fairly damaging fire a few nights before the election at one of their Bursadi District properties. I’ll take pains to see that nobody gets hurt. I just want them to lose some papers and some comforts.”

“Capital!” Epitalus thumped his cane on the floor approvingly. “Well, in that case, there’s an outbuilding on my own estate. The old boathouse. I’m not using it at all.”

“Good. One more thing, Epitalus. This is absolutely, vitally secret. Speak of this to no one. Am I clear?”

“As an empty glass, Master Lazari.”

The reference left them both thirsty. They toasted the frustration of the Black Iris with small glasses of cinnamon lemon cordial, and then Jean reappeared from his errand, shrugging himself out of his rain-slick oilcloak. Locke waved Epitalus off, then conversed in whispers with Jean.

“We’re on,” said Jean. “I think Lovaris was perversely pleased by the idea of us doing our part tonight, in the rain.”

“Of course. He’s a miserable sack of smugness. When?”

“Hour before midnight.”

“Not much time if we’re going to be careful.”

“Time enough for me to arm myself with dinner and coffee,” said Jean.

“Then I’ll get the things we need from our rooms,” said Locke. “You plant yourself in front of a fire and eat— Damn, here come Dexa and Nikoros, just the people I can’t miss.”

The two Gentlemen Bastards separated, Jean headed for the kitchens and Locke headed to intercept his targets and guide them up to the private gallery. He begged a moment alone with Nikoros first.

“Look, uh, Master Lazari, here’s the latest reports,” said Nikoros, fumbling with his satchel as Locke pushed him toward a quiet corner. “We had a break-in last night at Cavril’s office in the Ponta Corbessa, nothing major, but I suspect they got away with some confidential minutes and voter lists. Our delegations to the temples paid for a public sacrifice for each of the Twelve. A lash and a silver compass for Morgante, a silk shroud for Aza Guilla, a dove’s heart for Preva—”

“Nikoros,” said Locke, “I’m devout. I know the usual sacrifices. Just tell me there were no complications.”

“Well, ah, the rain probably cut down on the crowds, but they all went well. The whole city knows we’ve done our duty to the gods and asked their blessing.”

“If nobody got struck by lightning, I’m content. Now, I need you to get something for me. A hiding place. A shack, a cellar, a hole, anything, preferably deserted or disused. Near the Vel Vespala, as close to the Sign of the Black Iris as you can safely get. Do you know any spots?”

“I, well, let me think.” Nikoros rubbed his eyes and muttered to himself. “There’s a foreclosed chandlery that doesn’t have a new tenant, about three blocks from the Sign of the Black Iris. What should I do with it?”

“Just get me the place and I’ll do the work,” said Locke. “I’m going to repeat my stunt at the Enemy Tavern, smoke it up with harmless alchemy, only this time it’s going to last hours and it’s going to hit ’em at the worst possible time. I’ll decide when that is, but I need my fire-oil and powders stored nearby. This chandlery sounds perfect.”

“As you wish, of course.”

“And Nikoros,” said Locke, “this is the deepest, darkest sort of secret. Don’t write any notes or take any minutes on it. Keep this between you and me and the gods. Absolutely nobody else. Understood?”

“Perfectly, Master Lazari.”

“Good. Off on your other business, now, and send Dexa over to me as you go.”

“Master Lazari,” she said, waving her cigar at him. “You look busy. Can’t say I disapprove. What did you want to see me about?”

“What we’re going to discuss must remain absolutely confidential,” whispered Locke, leaning in so close he was immersed in tendrils of her smoke. “You know the Isas Mellia better than anyone. I need you to find me a shack, or a cellar, a bolt-hole of just about any sort, where I can store a certain quantity of …”

9

AN HOUR before midnight the rain flashed down like silver harp-strings against the darkness. A lean man and a burly man stood beneath a snuffed lantern at the edge of the Mara Karthani. They watched the manse of Perspicacity Lovaris and shivered under their oilcloaks.

“There she is,” said Locke.

A heavy dark shape, sensibly dressed like themselves, emerged from the tradesfolk entrance and walked away from them, north, in the direction of the city streets.

“And if this is a trap?” said Jean.

“I took a precaution.” Locke knelt to lift a light wooden crate onto his shoulders. Jean picked up another. “There should be a carriage running one green alchemical lamp about a block north of the manse. Two of our drivers and two of our guards watching for trouble. If we come running, they’ll snatch us up and get us home.”

“Good thought,” said Jean. “Assuming we can run. I hope this is the last risky stupidity we dive into before this mess is over. I’m not sure we can get much less cautious than this.”

“May the Crooked Warden bless us for keeping Him entertained,” said Locke. “Let’s go. What kind of house-breakers would we be if we didn’t keep our appointment?”

10

TWO MORE nights and the weather moderated. The sky took back its rain, and the soft brisk wind off the Amathel felt like the kiss of cool silk. Milky moonlight spilled down on the Vel Vespala as Jean Tannen approached the Sign of the Black Iris, calmly and openly.

The foyer guards, not in the market for fresh concussions, actually held the inner doors open for him. Then came Vordratha.

“One of us must be dreaming,” he said, halting Jean three paces into the lobby. “And I’m quite certain I’m awake, so I suggest you sleepwalk your silly ass back to someplace they don’t mind your smell.”

“I’m here as an ambassador,” said Jean. “Touching on a personal matter of Mistress Gallante’s. Of course, I don’t have an appointment, but she’ll want to see me anyway.”

“I’ll tell you what,” said Vordratha, “you’re free to kneel and kiss one of my boots, in which case I might possibly consider relaying your petition.”

“Friend Vordratha,” said Jean with a smile, “in your capacity as Verena’s majordomo and all-around mirthless damp prick, you deserve congratulations. In your capacity as any sort of meaningful opposition to my fists, you’re half a second of easy work.”

“You’re a crude bastard, Callas.”

“And you’re still favoring lamentably tight breeches.” Jean feigned a yawn. “I’ll take the same two hostages my colleague did. I invite you to ponder the difference in our sizes and proportional strength of grip.”

Vordratha showed Jean to the now-familiar private dining hall, warned him that the wait might be lengthy, and slammed the door behind him.

Time passed, and Jean paced quietly, alert for trouble. He estimated it was a quarter of an hour before the door opened again and Sabetha came in.

She was dressed mostly in black, black tunic and breeches under a heavy mantled black coat with silver buttons and chasings. Her hair was loose and wind-whipped, her white scarf hanging in folds around her neck, her boots covered in fresh mud.

Not for the first time, Jean felt a strange sense of displacement as his memories of Sabetha tangled with the woman before his eyes. It was like looking at a reverse ghost, a reality somehow less tangible than the recollections five years gone. He’d lived those five years so gradually, but to his eyes she’d received them all at once, and in studying the new lines time had sketched for her he felt the faint tug of his own passing years, like a weight in his heart. How much older did he look to her?

He took a deep breath, banishing the broody thought. While Jean was often bemused by the philosophical notions that made free with his heart and head, long hours of tutelage in arms had also given him the trick of shoving such notions aside, cubbyholing them for contemplation once he’d survived his immediate responsibilities.

Sabetha pressed herself back against the door, closing it, and folded her arms.

“If this continues,” she said, “Vordratha might become the first man in the history of the world to have himself made into a eunuch for reasons of self-defense.”

“In fairness,” said Jean, “I can’t imagine he’s ever found much use for the blighted things.”

“He’s a devoted father of seven.”

“You’re joking!”

“I was as surprised as you. Seems he’s equally dedicated to his children and his career as a professional asshole. Please don’t actually hurt him again.”

“My oath to the Crooked Warden,” said Jean. He pulled an envelope from within his coat. “Now, to why I came. This— Well, I don’t want to speak for him. But you ought to know it’s taken him a few nights to finish this. Much lost sleep and many false starts.”

“As it was in the beginning, I suppose.” She took the envelope with a hand that shook just enough for Jean to notice, then slipped it into her coat. “And … is that it, then?”

Had the question sounded tired, Jean would have taken it for a dismissal, but Sabetha sounded wistful, almost hurt. He cleared his throat.

“Diplomacy and curiosity don’t always mix,” he said. “We’re not strangers, Jean.”

Jean slipped off his optics and made a show of polishing them against a coat sleeve while he considered his words.

“All I can see,” he said at last, “is two people I care for being divided and ruled by the words of a stranger. This bullshit of Patience’s! I’m sorry. I didn’t come to lecture you. But surely you can—”

“You delivered his letter,” said Sabetha. “Now you’re inquiring into his business. Is Jean even here right now? Jean I could speak to, but Locke’s … legate to my court, that man’s business is dispensed with and the door is open.”

“Again, I’m sorry.” Jean realized that their physical situation had the look and feel of a standoff; so long as they both remained on their feet informality and relaxation would be difficult to kindle. He eased himself into a chair. “You know that I worry about him. I worry about the pair of you. And I regret that I haven’t, ah, exactly paid you a social call since our return. When you first invited us here, I was a little cold.”

“You were preoccupied.”

“That’s kind of you to suggest.”

“And then I dropped twenty hirelings on your head and packed you off to sea.” Sabetha sat down and crossed her legs. “It couldn’t have helped. I hope you don’t think I was pleased you broke your nose.”

“You provided us with a comfortable ship,” said Jean. “Leaving it in the middle of the night was our decision. I was annoyed at the time, but I know it was just business.”

“Maybe there’s been a little too much ‘just business.’ ” Sabetha fussed self-consciously with her gloves. “I kept your hatchets as a sort of assurance, and then as a sort of joke, and then I handed them to Locke like you were some kind of … hireling. I would not have desired to give that impression.”

“Gods, Sabetha, I’m not made of porcelain! Look, we’re not— We haven’t been bad friends, merely absent ones, long apart. And if there are more difficult possible circumstances for a reunion, I’ll eat my boots. Cold. With mustard.”

“Now who’s being kind?” she said. “I’ve missed you. Personally and professionally.”

“I’ve missed you,” said Jean. “Sharp edges and all. Life was always better with you around. Everyone around you catches your light. We’re doing it now, even across the city, working against you. I haven’t seen him like this … well, not for a long while. Sick with worry and totally exhilarated.”

“The conversation turns to our mutual friend again.”

“Yes. I mean— Look. Let me say this much, please.” Jean took a deep breath and pushed on before she could interrupt. “He and I had a dangerous misunderstanding in Tal Verrar. We both looked at the same thing, and we both made bad assumptions that led us in opposite directions. We got lucky, but bad assumptions … they’re a possibility to be aware of, you see?”

“Jean.” She spoke haltingly, each word crisp and fragile. “You must trust … do I seem at ease to you? Do I seem wholly myself? You must trust that I have reasons, urgent reasons for my behavior, and that they are as much to my grief as they are to his—”

“Stop.” Jean raised his hands placatingly. “Sabetha, however damned foolish I think you’re being, you do have a right to your own judgment. I don’t like the judgment, but I’ll respect the right, all the way to my grave. I’ve said my piece.”

“Thank you,” she said, and her smile warmed him like a fire. “It seems you and he have both grown more diplomatic since we parted.”

“We’ve made second careers out of finding excuses not to murder one another. It’s had a salutary effect on our manners.” Jean found his feet again and held out his hand. “Sister Bastard, I’d like to detain you longer and make my job that much easier, but I imagine we’re being watched. We can’t afford to try the patience of our employers.”

“Brother Bastard.” She took his hand and squeezed it. “I wish I didn’t have to agree. Thank you for talking to me.”

“I hope we get to do it again.”

“One day at a time,” she said, softly. “Until we find out what’s waiting at the end of all this. But hope is a good word. I hope you’re right. About everything.”

“Is there any message I can take back for you?”

“No,” she said. “Whatever there is to say, I’ll say it myself, in my own time.”

They embraced, and Jean swept her off her feet. She laughed, and he turned the sweep into a complete twirl that ended with her elegantly set down atop a table. He bowed.

“I return madam to the pedestal on which she usually resides.”

“You cheeky lump! And here I was almost feeling sorry about trouncing the bright red fuck out of you in the election.”

“Tsk. Whatever you are, you’re not the least bit sorry,” said Jean, waving as he let himself out. “As you said … we’re not strangers.”

11

THE ROOM, so warmly lit, so invitingly decorated, felt cold after the door closed behind Jean. Strange how the empty seats and unused tables suddenly contrived to give the place the air of a deserted temple. Sabetha had never felt so isolated here before.

She leapt off the table and landed softly on the toes of her boots, scarf and coat rustling. The envelope was out of her pocket before she knew it, hands moving faster than the thoughts that usually ruled them.

“Of course I’m not alone,” she said. “You’re here.”

The room was still. The bustle of Black Iris business could be heard only faintly through the floor.

“I am a grown woman having a conversation with an envelope,” she muttered several heartbeats later.

He was there like smoke, like a ghost in the room, like a scent in her clothing. It had been so long that she had forgotten the actual scent, only that she remembered carrying it. Remembered wanting it, then not wanting it, then wanting it again despite herself.

There were two Lockes, she thought, turning the envelope back and forth in her hands. Two real Lockes under all the faces he wore in the course of his games. One of them put such a sweet sharp ache in her heart she could scarcely believe that a younger, softer Sabetha had sealed the feeling away and managed to leave. That man broke all the patterns of law and custom and dared the world to damn him for it.

The other Locke … that man was bound tight to those patterns, their absolute prisoner. He would do thus because thus was the way it always had been in Camorr, or the way it had always been for a garrista, or for a priest, or a Right Person, or a Gentleman Bastard. The reasons were endless, and he would cling to them viciously, thoughtlessly, tangling everyone around him into the bargain.

Even his eyes seemed different, when he was that second man. And that was a problem.

If there were two, might there not be three? Patterns behind the patterns, secrets behind the secrets, new strings to dance on, and these ones leading all the way back to the Bondsmagi of Karthain. Another Locke, unknown even to himself. What would become of the Lockes she knew if that stranger inside them was real? If he woke up?

“Which one of you wrote this?” She sniffed gently at the envelope, and the scent of it told her nothing.

Everything about the room was suddenly wrong. She didn’t want to be here in this quiet citadel, this orderly heart of her temporary power. The business between her and Locke was thieves’ business; she needed a thief’s freedom to face it. And a thief’s most comfortable roof was the night sky.

She swept an alchemical globe into her coat pocket and shook her boots off, scattering flakes of drying mud on the floor. Barefoot, she padded to one of the room’s tall windows and cracked it open.

Sabetha had adjusted the lock mechanism herself and rehearsed the process of slipping out many times; she’d mentally mapped four distinct routes around and down from the roof of the Sign of the Black Iris. The stones beneath her feet were cool but not yet unbearably cold.

Up she went, night breeze stirring her hair, soft moonlight showing all her possible paths. The world of streets, alleys, horses, and lamps receded below her, and she grinned. She was fifteen again, ten again, hanging on ancient stones with nothing but skill between herself and the fall.

She was on the roof, quiet as a sparrow’s shadow, heart pounding not with exertion but with the thrill of her own easy competence and the anxious mystery of the envelope.

Her rooftop sentry, crouched in the shadow of a tall chimney, all but exploded out of his shoes when Sabetha’s hand fell lightly on his shoulder.

“Take a break,” she whispered, straining to keep the sound of her smile out of her voice. “Get some coffee and wait below for me to come fetch you.”

“A-as you say, Mistress Gallante.” To his credit, he was tolerably silent as he moved off. Not a patch on a proper Camorri skulker, but willing to make an effort.

Sabetha settled into his spot, pulled the alchemical light from her pocket, and once again turned the envelope over and over between her fingers.

“Get on with it,” she said, knowing it was empty theater for an audience of one. “Get on with it.”

Minutes passed. Silver cloud-shadows moved and blended across the dark rooftops. At last she found her hands taking the initiative from heart and mind again. The seal was cracked before she knew it, the letter slipped out. The handwriting was as familiar as her own. Her teeth were suddenly chattering.

“Dammit, woman, if you’re vulnerable to him it’s because you wanted to let yourself be vulnerable. Get on with it.”

Dear Sabetha, she read:

Sabetha sucked in cool air with an unseemly gasp, suddenly realizing she’d been holding her breath. What had she expected? It certainly wasn’t this.

She turned the letter over, feeling ridiculous, looking for some other note or sentiment or mark. That was all there was; no pleading, no excuses, no demands or suggestions. Everything was now left to her, and that more than anything brought a tight cold pressure to her chest and left her shaking.

Failed her? She supposed that was true, if a touch ungenerous. The natural process of growing up was to stumble from failure to failure, and all the Gentlemen Bastards had been prodigies of survival, not sensitivity. But disappoint her? The trouble with the skinny, bright-eyed bastard was that he kept refusing to do so.

This letter was the work of the better Locke, the learning and giving Locke, the man who listened to her. Listened to her … What a banal sentiment it seemed in itself, but she’d been a woman of the world long enough to learn its rarity and desirability. It was amusing to use men like Catch-the-Duke pieces, but dupes listened with an ear for the main chance, for their own desires to be repeated back to them. After her years in the Marrows and this sojourn among the “adjusted,” by the gods, Locke’s company was more addictive than ever—a man who was proud and unpredictable and framed himself to her desires out of love and friendship, rather than her own subterfuge.

The corners of her vision misted. She rubbed the nascent tears away with her fingers, not gently, and sniffed haughtily. Gods damn this whole stupid mess! Her heart was opened again like an old wound, but what was coming next? What did the Bondsmagi mean to happen to that man she loved?

Was she being selfish in holding him at a distance, or was she being sensible, shielding herself against the worst that might be coming, and soon?

“Crooked Warden,” she whispered, “if your sister Preva has any meaningful revelations that she’s not using at the moment, would you let her know that I’m willing to be moved?”

Sabetha sighed. Be moved, certainly, but not move. Let the night be hers for a few more minutes. Let the business of the Black Iris click on like clockwork. Let the magi sit on their own thumbs and spin. She read Locke’s letter again, then stared out at the city, thoughts churning.

The rooftop tapestry of moonlight and shadows and softly curling chimney smoke comforted her, but it had no answers to give.

12

TWO NIGHTS later, Locke and Jean sat together in the Deep Roots gallery at Josten’s, dining on birds-a-bed (large morsels of several kinds of fowl on flaked pastry mattresses stuffed with spiced rice and leeks, then given “covers” of onion and sour cream sauce). To wash this down they had flagons of sharp ale and piles of the usual notes and reports, which they discussed between bites.

Less than a week remained, and the situation was spiraling appealingly out of control. Offices were being vandalized on both sides, party functionaries harassed or arrested by bluecoats on laughable pretexts, speakers and pamphleteers having shouting matches in the streets. Locke had dispatched a team of black-clad functionaries to hand out commemorative Black Iris treacle tarts in several marketplaces. The alchemical laxative mixed into the treacle was slow-acting but ultimately quite forceful, and many of the recipients had publicly expressed their lack of appreciation for the largesse of the Black Iris.

Despite this, the odds commonly given remained eleven to eight in the Black Iris’ favor. However much Locke would have liked to shift this as far as possible with childish prankery, there was, realistically, nobody left in the city yet willing to accept baked sweets from a stranger.

“Oh, sirs, sirs!” Nikoros appeared, still looking like a man fresh from a sleepless week on the road. “I have … I am so sorry to intrude on your dinner, but I have some unfortunate news.”

“First time for everything,” said Locke lightly. “Go on, then, shock us.”

“It’s the, ah, the chandlery, Master Lazari. The one that you asked me to secure … in the Vel Vespala, and the one where you and Master Callas packed away all the, ah, you know, alchemical items. Two hours ago, stevedores in Black Iris livery entered the place and cleaned it out. They hauled everything away on drays to a location I haven’t yet discovered.”

Locke’s fork hung in the air halfway to his lips. He stared at Nikoros for a second, then shared a brief, significant gaze with Jean. “Ah, damn,” he said at last, and took his bite of chicken. “Mmmm. Damn. That’s a fairly expensive loss. And a fine trick yanked right out of my sleeve.”

“My most sincere apologies, Master Lazari.”

“Bah. It’s none of your doing,” said Locke, wondering just what had made thoroughly subservient eager-puppy Nikoros, of all people, turn coat. Something to do with Akkadris withdrawal? Some failure of Bondsmagi sorcery? Poor old Falconer, tongueless and fingerless and comatose, was something of an argument against their infallibility.

“Still,” Locke continued, “the opposition seems to have a damnable grasp of where we’re hiding our good toys these days. I want you to secure us a boat.”

“Ah, a boat, Master Lazari?”

“Yes. Something respectable. A barge, maybe a small pleasure yacht if a party member has one available.”

“Very, uh, likely. May I ask to what end?”

“We took something from one of the Black Iris Konseil members,” said Jean. “Family heirlooms of significant … sentimental value. We’ll return them after he’s done us a favor.”

“And we need the items in question to be absolutely secure until after election night,” said Locke. “I’m not sure I can trust our current bolt-holes, so let’s try putting them on the water, in something that can move.”

“I’ll get on it immediately,” said Nikoros.

“Good man,” said Locke, forking another bite of chicken. “Minimal crew, trusted sorts. They won’t need to know what the boat is carrying. Master Callas and I will load the items ourselves.”

Nikoros hurried away.

“I wasn’t expecting it to be him,” whispered Jean.

“Nor me,” said Locke. “And I’m dead curious to find out how she did it. But at least we know. And now we pin our hopes on the boat.”

“To the boat,” said Jean. They raised their ale flagons and drained them.

13

THE NIGHT before the election, Locke leaned on a wall high atop the northernmost embankment of the Plaza Gandolo, looking out across the softly rippling water of the river and the lantern-lights running across it like a hundred splashes of color on a drunken artist’s canvas.

To his left loomed the Skyvault Span, swaying and singing suspension bridge, its four anchor towers uniquely crowned with balconies and sealed doors. Those doors were invisible from Locke’s position hundreds of feet below, but he’d listened to Josten describe them not an hour before.

According to the innkeeper, the doors were as impervious to human arts as most Eldren legacies, but a team of scholars and workers had once erected a climbing scaffold and tried to study them closely.

“Hundred and fifty years ago, maybe. Eight folk went up,” Josten had muttered after looking around the bar. “Six came down. No bodies were ever found, and none of the survivors could say what had happened. For the rest of their lives, they had dreams. Bad ones. They wouldn’t talk about those, either, except one woman. Confessed to a priest of Sendovani before she died. Young, like all the rest. They say the magi and the Konseil suppressed the hell out of whatever that priest wrote down. So it’s just as well that Elderglass doesn’t need maintenance, my friend, because nobody in Karthain has climbed the Skyvault Span since.”

“Bloody charming,” muttered Locke, staring up at the elegant dark silhouettes blotting out stars and clouds. Gods, he was reciting horror stories to himself. Hardly suave and collected behavior. He needed to calm down, and he hadn’t had the foresight to bring a quarter-cask of strong wine.

Footsteps scuffed the stones behind him, and he whirled, neither suave nor collected.

Sabetha was alone. She wore a dark scarlet jacket over chocolate-brown skirts, and her hair was tightly bound around her lacquered pins.

“You look as though you’ve been listening to the stories about this bridge,” she said.

“My, ah, tavern master,” said Locke. “When I got your note, I asked him if he knew anything about the spot you picked.”

“Seems it’s not a popular corner of the district.” She smiled and moved closer. “I thought we could do with a bit of privacy.”

“Haunted Eldren detritus does tend to secure that. Sly woman! I would have gone with something like a private chamber at a fine dining establishment, but I suppose I’m hopelessly conventional.” A carriage rattled past, onto the creaking deck of the bridge. “What’s on your mind?”

“I appreciated your letter,” she said, gliding closer with that seemingly effortless dancer’s step that made it look as though a wind had just nudged her along. “And I don’t mean that as the usual oatmeal-tongued sort of polite acknowledgment; I appreciated what you said and how you said it. I’m beginning to think I might have been … hasty in the way I treated you. When you first arrived in Karthain.”

“Well, ah, even if drugging me and putting me on a ship was something of a personal misstep, I think we can agree it was a valid approach from a professional perspective.”

“I admire that equanimity.” She was within arm’s reach now, and her hands were around his waist. He couldn’t have defended himself if he’d wanted to. “I’m not … uneasy with you, you know. It’s not you, it’s …”

“I know,” said Locke. “Believe me, I understand. You don’t have to—”

She slipped her right hand up behind his neck and pulled him so close there wasn’t room for a knife blade to pass between them. Next came the sort of kiss that banished the world to distant background noise and seemed to last a month.

“Well, that you can do,” Locke whispered at last. “If you feel you have to. I’ll, ah, grudgingly refrain from stopping you.”

“It’s nearly midnight,” said Sabetha, running her fingers through his hair. “Not much left now but the casting and counting of the ballots. Were you planning on attending the last big show at the Karthenium?”

“Can’t miss it,” said Locke. “Too many hands to hold. Yourself?”

“There are private galleries looking down on the grand hall. Once you’ve given all your children suitable pats on their heads, why don’t you and Jean join me to watch the returns? Ask any attendant for the Sable Chamber.”

“Sable Chamber. Right. And, ah, now you seem to be wearing that ‘there’s something amusing I’m not telling Locke’ face.”

“As it happens, I did hear the most fascinating thing.” She took his hand and led him to the very edge of the embankment wall. “One of my Konseil members privately complained that someone broke into his manor and, if you can believe it, stole the reliquary shelves from his ancestral chapel.”

“Some people should learn to lock their doors at night.”

“I found myself pondering the purpose of such an unorthodox acquisition,” said Sabetha. “I concluded that it must, in all probability, be an attempt to exercise some sort of hold on a man for whom the theft of less personal trinkets would have no real meaning.”

“I’m disheartened to learn that your speculations took on such a cynical character.”

“Konseillors of Karthain shouldn’t have to worry about outside influence on the eve of an election. Don’t you agree? I felt compelled to make inquiries and issue instructions to the constabulary. Merely as a matter of routine civic duty, of course.”

“Everyone knows your deep attachment to the civic health of Karthain goes back quite a few minutes,” said Locke.

“There it is! Nearly on time.” Sabetha pointed down to the water, where a canopied pleasure barge emerged from under the Skyvault Span. A long black constabulary launch was lashed alongside the barge, and bluecoats with lanterns and truncheons were swarming it. “That’s the Plain Delight. Belongs to a friend of one of your Deep Roots Konseillors, I believe. I also believe that the reliquary shelves in its hold will be back in the hands of their proper owner before the sun comes up. Any particular comments?”

“I can neither confirm nor deny that you’re a sneaky, sneaky bitch,” said Locke.

“You’re my favorite audience.” Sabetha leaned in and kissed him again, then broke off with a grin. “Sable Chamber, tomorrow evening. I can’t wait to see you. And I’ll have a discreet escape route prepared, since I think a lot of irate Deep Roots supporters are going to be looking for you once the ballots are counted.”

INTERLUDE: DEATH-MASKS

1

DARK CLOUDS WERE rolling in from the north, masking the stars. The Karthenium, palace of the long-deposed dukes and duchesses of Karthain, rose above the manicured gardens and broken walls of the Casta Gravina, a dome of rippling jade Elderglass like a jewel in a setting of human stone and mortar. The late-autumn wind flowed past crenellations and etchings on the face of the glass, and the eerie music of a lost race sighed into the night, its meaning unguessable.

Green and black banners fluttered at the edges of every path and courtyard, and a river of torch and lantern light flowed through the gates of the Karthenium, into the Grand Salon, where seemingly endless black iron stairs and walkways spiraled up the underside of the jade dome. Chandeliers the size of carriages blazed, tended by men and women dangling in harness from anchor points on the walkways.

The murmur of the crowd was like the wash and rumble of the sea within a coastal cave. Locke and Jean moved warily through the affair, their green ribbons no protection against being jostled by knots of conversationalists, enthusiasts, and drunks. Black Iris and Deep Roots supporters mingled freely and argued freely in a sprawling pageant of Karthain’s rich and exalted.

In the center of the Grand Salon a raised platform held a number of slate boards and nineteen black iron posts, each topped by an unlit frosted glass lamp. The stairs to the platform were guarded by bluecoats, each sweating under the added weight of a white cloak and mantle trimmed with silver ribbons.

It was the ninth hour of the evening. The last ballots had been cast hours before, and now the verified and sealed reports from each district were on their way to the Karthenium.

“Master Lazari! Master Callas!” Damned Superstition Dexa appeared, dragging a muddled platoon of attendants and sycophants in her wake. Her triple-brimmed hat was topped with a replica of one of Karthain’s Eldren bridges, the towers sculpted from hardened leather, each one flying a tiny green flag. Dexa smoked from a double-bowled pipe, puffing streams of gray-and-emerald smoke from her nose. “Well, my boys, once we’ve gnawed all the meat off the bones of an election it all comes down to this! Count the votes, then count the tears.”

“No tears in your district,” said Locke. “If I’m wrong I’ll buy a hat like yours and eat it.”

“I’d like to see that. But I’d prefer to keep my seat.” Dexa exhaled streamers of jasmine-scented green and spicy gray past Locke. “Will you gentlemen be near the stage? Ringside seats as the returns come in?”

“Somewhere less hectic,” said Locke. “We’ll watch from one of the private galleries, after we’ve had a spin around the floor. Got to make sure everyone’s got their spine straight and their waistcoat buttoned.”

“Very fatherly of you. Well, then, until the cat’s skinned, my regards to our fellow travelers.”

True to Locke’s word, he and Jean bounced around the crowd, shaking hands and patting backs, laughing at bad jokes and offering some of their own, spouting reasoned and logical-sounding analysis on demand. Most of it was bullshit fried in glibness with a side of whatever the listener yearned to hear. What does it matter? thought Locke. One way or another, they were vanishing from Karthain’s political scene tonight and would never be held accountable.

Vast basins of punch made from pale white and bruise-purple wines were being stirred to foam by clockwork paddle mechanisms, operated by impeccably dressed children walking slowly inside gilded treadwheels. Attractive attendants of both sexes worked behind velvet ropes to fill goblets and hand them out. Locke and Jean armed themselves with punch, along with steaming buns stuffed with brined pork and dark vinegar sauce.

Jean spotted Nikoros hovering miserably on the periphery of a pack of Deep Roots notables and pointed him out to Locke. Via Lupa had shaved, which mostly served to highlight his unhealthy pallor and the fresh lines on his visibly leaner face. Unexpected pity stung Locke’s heart. Here was no triumphant traitor, but someone thoroughly roasted on the rack of misery.

Well, what was the use of being able to lie with impunity if you couldn’t use it to take a weight off the shoulders of such a plainly unhappy bastard?

“Look, Nikoros,” said Locke, pressing his untouched goblet of punch into the Karthani’s hand. He spoke softly, for Nikoros alone. “I think it’s time for me to say that I know what it’s like, being pressed by something that rules your conscience against your will.”

“Ah, M-master Lazari, I don’t … that is, what do you mean?”

“What I’m trying to tell you,” said Locke, “is that I know. And I have known for some time.”

“You … know?” Nikoros’ eyebrows went up so far and fast Locke was surprised not to see them go sailing off like catapult stones. “You knew?”

“Of course I did,” said Locke, soothingly. “It’s my job to know things, isn’t it? Only thing I couldn’t figure out is what the lever was. It’s obvious that you’re not exactly a willing turncoat.”

“Gods! I, uh, it was my alchemist. My … dust alchemist. Receiving it’s as bad as selling it. I got caught, and this woman … well, I eventually f-figured out who she must be. I’m sorry. She offered me a deal. Otherwise I lose everything. Ten years on a penance barge, then exile.”

“Hell of a thing,” said Locke. “I’d try to avoid that too, if I could.”

“I’ll resign after tonight,” muttered Nikoros. “I’d wager I’ve, ah, done more damage to the Deep Roots than any committee member in our g-gods-damned history.”

“Nikoros, you haven’t been listening to me,” said Locke. “I told you I knew.”

“But how does that—”

“You’ve been my agent more than theirs. Delivering exactly what I wanted the Black Iris to hear from a source they considered impeccable.”

“But … but I’m certain some of what I had to give them was … it was real, and it was damaging to us!”

“Naturally,” said Locke. “They wouldn’t have listened to you if you hadn’t delivered real goods most of the time. I wrote the real stuff off as the price of feeding them the crucial bullshit. So don’t resign a damn thing. If the Black Iris lose tonight, it’s because you were in a position to serve as my weapon against them. Will that help you sleep a little better at night?”

“I, uh, I hardly know what I should say.” The loosening of the lines of tension on his face was immediate and obvious.

“Don’t say anything. Just drain that goblet and enjoy the show. This conversation will stay our little secret. Have a good long life, Nikoros. I doubt you’ll ever see us again.”

“Unless our employers want to bring us back for the next round, five years hence,” muttered Jean as they walked away.

“Maybe if they all want to end up in a fucking coma like the shit-bucket with the bird,” said Locke.

“And not that I’m against trying to settle the poor fellow down, but how do you think Nikoros will feel about himself if the Black Iris win?”

“Gods damn it, I was just trying to do what I could for the wretched bastard. At least now he can believe I chose to use him as a calculated risk. Come on; let’s find this Sable Chamber and get out of the public eye.”

2

SIX STAIRCASES and three conversations with only partially helpful attendants later, they found Sabetha waiting for them in a balcony room overlooking the south side of the Grand Salon. Some long-dead nobleman stared eerily from a wall fresco, gazing out at a scrollworked metal screen that allowed a fine view of the crowd and the stage below.

Sabetha wore another ensemble more in the fashion of a riding outfit than a ball gown, a tight red velvet jacket with slashed sleeves over a dress of black silk panels embroidered in scarlet astronomical signs. Locke pieced them together in his head and realized she was wearing a sunrise and moonrise chart for this very day, month, and calendar year.

“Like it?” she said, spreading her arms. “In accordance with the instructions of my principals, I did my bit to spend every last copper they gave me.”

“Dutiful to authority, that’s you every time,” said Locke. She offered her hand, and he wasn’t shy in kissing it. The trio made themselves comfortable at a little table provisioned with almond cakes, brandy, and four red crystal snifters. Locke took the lead and seized the bottle.

“A glass poured to air for absent friends,” he said as he filled the fourth snifter and pushed it aside. “May the lessons they taught us give everyone a hell of a show tonight.”

“Here’s to living long enough to appreciate whatever happens,” said Jean.

“Here’s to politics,” said Sabetha. “Let’s never hop in bed with it again.”

They touched glasses and drank. The stuff had a pale caramel color and washed Locke’s throat with sweet, welcome heat. Not an alchemical brandy, but one of the old-fashioned western styles with hints of peach and walnut woven into its vapors.

“Here comes the verdict,” said Sabetha.

Down on the floor the crowd parted for a troop of bluecoats, escorting somberly dressed officials carrying wooden chests and huge brass speaking trumpets like blossoming tulips. These trumpets were secured to projections on the stage, and the wooden chests were set down behind them. A petite woman with thick gray curls cut short at the neck stepped up to one of the speaking trumpets.

“First Magistrate Sedelkis,” said Sabetha. “Arbiter of the Change. Come election season, she’s like a temporary fourteenth god.”

“No representative from the magi?” said Locke. “They don’t even send a plate of fruit and a kind note?”

“I understand they vouchsafe this ceremony,” said Sabetha, “so gods help anyone who tries to adjust the tallies. But they’ll never let themselves be seen.”

“Not unless they’re somewhere private with a target for abuse,” said Locke.

On the platform below, some attendants unlocked the chests, while others took positions near the slate boards.

“Fellow citizens,” boomed First Magistrate Sedelkis, “honorable Konseil members, and officers of the republic, welcome. I have the honor of closing the seventy-ninth season of elections in the Republic of Karthain by reading the results into the public record. The returns by district, commencing with Isas Thedra.”

An attendant took an envelope from one of the chests. Sedelkis tore it open and pulled out a parchment embossed with seals and ribbons.

“By the count of one hundred and fifteen to sixty, Firstson Epitalus of the Deep Roots party.”

Loud applause erupted from half the population of the Grand Salon. One attendant chalked the official numbers on a board, while others lit a green-glowing candle and used a long pole to place it beneath the first frosted glass globe.

“Do you wish to concede, madam?” said Locke.

“I think that one was one of the foregone conclusions,” said Sabetha.

“Damn,” said Locke. “She’s too clever for us.”

“For the Isle of Hammers, by the count of two hundred and thirty-five to one hundred,” announced Sedelkis, “Fourthdaughter Du-Lerian, for the Black Iris party.”

The attendants lit and placed another candle, one that gave off a purple-blue light so dark it was a fair approximation of black.

“Well, how now?” said Sabetha, pouring a fresh round of drinks. “Nothing pithy to say?”

“I would never dream of pithing in front of you,” said Locke.

Seven green lights and four black lights blazed by the time Sedelkis announced, “For the Bursadi District, by the count of one hundred and forty-six to one hundred and twenty-two, Secondson Lovaris of the Black Iris party.”

Jean sighed theatrically.

“That poor man,” said Sabetha. “So nearly victimized by unscrupulous relic thieves.”

“We rejoice at his deliverance,” said Locke.

“For the Plaza Gandolo,” boomed Sedelkis, “by the count of eighty-one to sixty-five, Seconddaughter Viracois of the Black Iris party.”

“Oh, Perelandro’s balls, we filled her house with stolen goods!” said Jean. “She was charged with eleven counts of housebreak or receiving! What possible grease could you apply to that?”

“I came up with a story that Viracois was secretly sheltering a distant cousin,” said Sabetha. “And that this cousin was severely touched in the head. Had a real mania for stealing things. Even hired an actress to play the role for a few days. I had Viracois circulate to apologize personally for the fact that her ‘cousin’ had managed to slip away from supervision, and once all the stolen goods were identified and returned, all those sympathetic people quietly rescinded their charges. And discreetly talked to their friends and neighbors, of course.”

“Rescinded charges.” Locke shook his head. “No bloody wonder paying off the magistrate didn’t get us anything.”

“For the Isas Mellia,” announced Sedelkis, “by the count of seventy-five to thirty-one, Damned Superstition Dexa of the Deep Roots party.”

“Didn’t even bother much with that one,” said Sabetha.

“Well, you did try to bribe her cook,” said Locke. “And her doorman. And her footmen. And her solicitor. And her carriage driver. And her tobacconist.”

“I succeeded in bribing the doorman,” said Sabetha. “I just couldn’t find anything constructive to do with him.”

“At least I won’t have to eat a hat,” Locke whispered to Jean.

“For the Silverchase,” announced Sedelkis, “by the count of one hundred and eight to sixty-seven, Light-of-the-Amathel Azalon of the Deep Roots party.”

That was the last green candle to be lit for a long time, however. The next three blazed black, bringing the total to nine and nine.

“It’s all theater in the end, isn’t it?” said Sabetha. The brandy had brought color to her cheeks. “All our running around in costumes, saying our lines. Now the chorus comes out onstage to recite the moral and send the audience home.”

“Half of them are about to wish they had some fruit to throw,” said Jean.

“Shhh, here it comes,” said Sabetha.

“The final report,” announced Sedelkis, opening the envelope with a flourish. “For the Palanta District, by the count of one hundred and seventy to one hundred and fifty-two, Thirdson Jovindus of the Black Iris party!”

The last lamp flared with dark light.

3

CONSTERNATION ERUPTED on the floor, shouts of joy mingling with accusations, cries of disbelief, and insults.

Sabetha folded her arms, leaned back in her chair, and adopted a wide, genuine smile.

“You boys gave me a closer run than I expected,” she said. “And I did have the advantage of getting here first.”

“That’s a gracious admission,” said Jean.

“Your gimmick with Lovaris would have been magnificent fun to watch,” said Sabetha. “I’m almost sad I had to put my foot down on it.”

“I’m not,” said Locke.

“ORDER,” cried First Magistrate Sedelkis. “ORDER!” The cloaked bluecoats surrounding the stage drove their staves rhythmically against the ground until the crowd heeded Sedelkis.

“All districts having reported, I hereby declare these results rightful and valid. Karthain has a Konseil. Gods bless the Presence. Gods bless the Republic of Karthain!”

“First Magistrate,” came a voice from the crowd, “I beg a moment of stage time to amend the record in one small respect.”

“Oh, what in all the hells …” said Sabetha.

The speaker was Lovaris, who separated himself from a group of happy Black Iris notables, pushed through the cordon of bluecoats around the stage, and took a place beside Sedelkis at a speaking trumpet.

“Dear friends and fellow citizens,” he said, while beckoning for one of the glass globe attendants to approach him. “I am Secondson Lovaris, often called Perspicacity, an honor I cherish. For twenty years I have represented the Bursadi District as an enthusiastic member of the Black Iris party. However, of late, I must confess that enthusiasm has been dimmed by circumstances beyond my control. I grieve that I must discuss this in public. I grieve that I must take corrective action in public.”

“Is anyone else at this table hallucinating right now?” said Sabetha.

“If we are, we’re sharing a lovely fever dream,” said Locke. “Let’s see how it ends!”

“I grieve, most of all,” continued Lovaris, “that I must announce my reluctant but immediate withdrawal from the Black Iris party. I will no longer wear their symbols or attend their party functions.”

“Gods above, are you actually resigning from the Konseil?” shouted someone in the crowd.

“Of course not,” shouted Lovaris. “I said nothing about resigning my Konseil seat! I am the Bursadi Konseillor, validly and rightfully elected, as the First Magistrate just announced.”

“Turncoat!” shouted a man that Locke recognized as Thirdson Jovindus. “You ran under false pretenses! Your election must be nullified in favor of your second!”

“We elect men and women in Karthain,” said Lovaris, and it was clear from his voice that he was speaking through a smirk that would have injured a lesser man with its intensity. “Those men and women declare party affiliations only as a matter of their own convenience. I am not bound to surrender anything. My honorable associate should more closely examine the relevant laws. Now, allow me to finish describing the new situation!”

Lovaris took a pole from the attendant he’d beckoned, then used it to extinguish and dislodge the candle from the middle-most black globe. One blank white glass was left in the midst of nine black and nine green.

“Simply because I have left the Black Iris does not mean that I have necessarily embraced any of the positions of the Deep Roots. I am declaring myself a party of one, fully independent, a neutral balance between Karthain’s traditional ideologies. I am fully willing to be convinced to any reasonable course of action in the Konseil. Indeed, I remind my esteemed colleagues that my door is ever open for your approaches and entreaties. I shall very much look forward to receiving them. Good evening!”

What followed could only be described as the crescendoing clusterfuck of the Karthani social season, as half the Konseillors of the Black Iris party, technically immune to constabulary restraint, attempted to storm the stage through a wall of bluecoats who could neither hurt them nor allow them to hurt Lovaris. First Magistrate Sedelkis demonstrated the co-equality of the Karthani judiciary by kicking a Black Iris Konseillor in the teeth, which brought even Deep Roots Konseillors into the fray to uphold the privileges of their station. Bluecoat messengers raced off to find reinforcements, while most of the noncombatant spectators refilled their goblets of punch and settled in to watch their government in action.

“I don’t believe it,” said Sabetha. “How the hell … I’ve got no more succinct way to put it. How the hell?”

“You warned Lovaris we were coming to try and convince him to change the color of his lapel ribbon,” said Locke. “And you know he didn’t buy that offer for an instant. He chewed on my self-respect for a while, then wiped me away like a turd.”

“But we’d already prepared a second line of attack,” said Jean, pouring himself a fresh finger of brandy. “Ego-fodder. Something designed to appeal to his sense that he ought to be the hinge around which the rest of the world turned.”

“Catnip for an asshole,” continued Locke. “Jean offered the second approach, on the theory that Lovaris might be more willing to parley seriously with an envoy he hadn’t just pissed all over. Turned out to be a good guess.”

“And now Lovaris is the most important man in Karthain,” whispered Sabetha. “Now any deadlock in Konseil is going to have to be resolved by his vote!”

“A possibility he found quite stimulating. The other Konseillors might detest his guts,” said Locke, “but they will be at his door, hats in hand, for the next five years, or until he’s assassinated. Hardly our problem either way.”

“And that’s all it took? A friendly suggestion?”

“Well, obviously, he agreed to go through with it only if the numbers added up,” said Locke. “If you’d had a wider margin of victory, he would have stayed silent. And there was one hell of a bribe to sweeten the deal.”

“He settled for twenty-five thousand ducats,” said Jean.

“How does he expect to hide it?” said Sabetha. “The Black Iris are going to rake him over the coals! His countinghouse will be watched, his business dealings will be dissected, any fresh property that turns up will be beaten like a dusty carpet for clues!”

“Hiding it’s not the issue,” said Locke, “since you already safely delivered it to him for us.”

Sabetha stared at him for a moment, then whispered, “The reliquary boxes!”

“I quietly boiled twenty-five thousand ducats down to precious stones, mostly emeralds and Spider’s Eye Pearls,” said Jean. “A lightweight cargo to stash in the bottom of the drawers. Your constables were much more squeamish about digging through the dust and bones of Lovaris’ forebears than he was.”

“I’d thought you’d taken them to hold hostage for his cooperation,” said Sabetha.

“It was the sensible conclusion,” said Locke. “We didn’t feel comfortable hauling a fat bribe to his manor ourselves; too much of a chance someone in your pay would notice us. Maybe even someone working for his household.”

“Try about half his household,” said Sabetha. “So you needed that treasure delivered to Lovaris, and you fed me its location on that boat … gods! How long had you known I had Nikoros under my thumb?”

“We found out nearly too late,” said Locke. “Just about everything he gave you before the boat was legitimately at our expense.”

“Hmmm. To give him the word on the boat …” She rubbed her temples. “Ah! That alchemical store I relieved you of in the Vel Vespala—that tip came from Nikoros. You … you must have given everyone you suspected word of some different juicy target!”

“And the target you stepped on told us who the leak was,” said Locke, grinning. “You have it exactly.”

“You impossible assholes!” Sabetha leapt up, moved around the table, pulled Locke and Jean from their chairs, and threw an arm around each of them, laughing. “Oh, you two are such insufferable weaselly shits, it’s marvelous!”

“You weren’t so bad yourself,” said Jean. “But for the grace of the gods, we might still be cruising the Amathel.”

“So what have we done?” said Sabetha, her voice full of honest wonderment. “What have we done? I suppose I won the election, but … I’m not sure if winning it for about thirty seconds is winning it at all.”

“Just as I’m not sure that nudging a victory into a tie is really the same as winning for our side,” said Locke. “Nor is it quite losing. A pretty mess, isn’t it? One for the drunkards and philosophers.”

“I wonder what the magi are going to say.”

“I hope they argue about it from now until the sun grows cold,” said Locke. “We did our bit, we fought sincerely, we perverted the final results just enough to eternally confuse anyone watching—what more could they possibly want?”

“I suppose we find out now,” said Jean.

“Did … Patience give you any instructions or hints about what to do once the ballots were counted?” said Sabetha. “Not a word,” said Locke.

“Then why don’t we all get the hell out of here and let our employers find us in their own time?” Sabetha tossed back the last of her brandy. “I’ve got a safe house just off the Court of Dust. Rented it for a month, had firewood, linens, and wine laid in. I’d say it’s as comfortable a place as any to rest and figure out what we’re going to … do next.” She ran her fingers lightly over Locke’s left arm.

“Any plan to sneak us out of here without getting swept up in a brawl?” said Jean.

“New skins.” Sabetha produced a scalpel-thin dagger from somewhere in a jacket sleeve and used it to slit one of three paper parcels stacked beneath the chamber’s unnerving fresco. “Much as I hate to take this dress off display, I thought we’d find our exit that much easier if we dressed like the enemy.”

4

AT THE tenth hour of the evening, a trio of bluecoats pushed through the curious crowds at the main entrance to the Karthenium; a slender watchman and a sturdy watchman, led by a woman with sergeant’s pins on her lapels. They disposed of the last few people standing in their way with a combination of shoves and ominous mutterings about official business.

Locke and Jean followed Sabetha about fifty yards west, to a branching side court where a carriage waited. The night had darkened considerably, and as he opened the carriage door Locke’s eye was caught by an orange glare somewhere to the south.

“Looks like a fire,” he said. The conflagration rippled, gilding the shadowy buildings of what must have been the Palanta District with its light.

“Damned big one,” said Jean. “I hope it’s nothing to do with the election. Maybe these Karthani play harder than I ever gave them credit for.”

“Come on, you two, let’s not linger long enough to get noticed by anyone who might outrank us,” said Sabetha.

They all clambered into the carriage together. The driver, obedient to whatever orders Sabetha had given her earlier, shook the reins, and they were off, leaving the results of their tampering with Karthain’s electoral process behind them. Genuine bluecoats were still arriving in force, truncheons and shields drawn, as the carriage rattled over the paving stones, away from the Karthenium.

INTERSECT (IV): IGNITION

“THE FIRST MAGISTRATE has just read the final district report,” says one of the young men, his voice dreamy, his eyes unfocused. Coldmarrow knows from long experience that the more tenuous and subtle mind-to-mind connections are the most demanding to sustain. Any damned fool can blaze their thoughts into the night for magi far and wide to receive like buzzing insects. The intelligence network now flashing thoughts across the city is straining itself to be utterly silent.

“The last district is Black Iris …” whispers the young mage.

“Black Iris victory,” says someone else. “By the skin of their teeth.”

“It seems that Patience’s vaunted Camorri were no match for ours,” smirks Archedama Foresight. She wears a leather hood and mantle, a dark linen mask, a mail-reinforced cuirass. Like all the men and women in the second-floor solar of Coldmarrow’s Palanta District house, she is dressed for a fight. “We’ll deal with them last, after all the other satisfactions of the evening have been dispensed with.”

“Necessities, let us rather say,” coughs Coldmarrow, taking deep, steady breaths to help rule his anxiety. The air is close, and it smells of all these magi, their robes and leathers, the wine on their breaths, the oils in their hair, their nervous, excited sweat.

“Why not both?” says the archedama.

“There’s a disturbance at the Karthenium,” whispers the young man who has been reporting on the election. “Someone … Lovaris of the Bursadi District. Some sort of announcement. He may be … ha! He may be switching sides!”

“Damn,” says Archedama Foresight. “But it seems to me that there’s no time like the present. All our targets must be absorbed in the distraction.”

“Oh, they are,” chuckles Coldmarrow. “It couldn’t be working better. Are your people in their proper positions?”

“All of them,” says Foresight.

“Then here’s to necessity,” says Coldmarrow, his mouth suddenly dry. “And to the future of all our kind.”

Coldmarrow speaks a word.

The word becomes fire.

A spark flashes in the dark heart of a jar of fire-oil, one of a hundred, tightly sealed, placed in the space beneath the floor of the room a month before. This jar is half-full, containing just enough air for the flame to breathe the vapors of the oil. The explosion is white-hot, shattering the clay vessels, sucking air and oil into the roaring, all-devouring blast.

Not even magi can move faster than this, or protect themselves with so little warning. The floor moves beneath Coldmarrow’s feet, then comes sharp dark heat, stunning pressure, and sudden silence. Coldmarrow dies taking fourteen magi with him, including Archedama Foresight. He has no time to feel either regret or satisfaction; it will simply have to be enough.

The war lasts nine minutes. It is utterly one-sided, the only possible war magi can wage with any hope of total victory against others trained in the same traditions, to the same standards.

Archedama Foresight’s people discover that their own ambush is stillborn, their positions ready-made traps. They have always been outnumbered by the larger faction of magi they derided as meek, and now those opponents apply their numbers to disproving the slander.

No quarter is given, no fair fight allowed. Strength is brought against weakness. Across rooftops, within lamp-lit gardens, inside the halls of the Isas Scholastica and the private homes of sorcerers, the assault is quick and silent and absolute.

As the tipsy, confused politicians of Karthain clamber over one another in a comical brawl at the heart of the Karthenium, seventy magi die in the dark places of the city, taking only a handful of their killers with them.

Navigator finds Patience alone in the Sky Chamber, staring at the bowl of the artificial heavens, currently mirroring the actual sky over Karthain, the rolling dark clouds summoned to lock the light of moons and stars away. Shadow has been drawn over the city like a cloak, to better hide the evidence.

“It’s over,” says Patience. She speaks real words to the air; the silver threads of thought-speech have unraveled unpleasantly across Karthain; cries of pain and betrayal, cries for help that will never come, and Patience has hardened her mind against most of the noise. “Now we have to live with ourselves.”

“Tell our troubles to the shades of Therim Pel,” says the one-armed woman. She wipes a tear from her cheek.

“We are each one in a thousand thousand,” says Patience. “We have destroyed some of the rarest and most precious things in the world tonight. Our distant inheritors may curse us for what we’ve done.”

“We already deserve their curses, Archedama.”

“So long as there’s still a world left for them to curse us in. Come now; help me do it.”

The two women bow their heads, move their hands in perfect concert, and speak words of unweaving that tear at their throats like desert air. The beautiful conjured heavens of the Sky Chamber fade like the memory of a dream, until there is nothing but a dome of plain white stones, grayed with the patina of old smoke.

“Do you wish to see your son now?” says Navigator.

“No,” says Patience, suddenly feeling every one of her years, suddenly wishing for the touch and the laugh of a man who was taken by the Amathel half her lifetime ago. “I’ll speak to Lamora first. But for now I want to be alone for a while.”

Navigator nods and quietly withdraws, leaving Patience alone in the silent vastness of a room that will never be used again.

One final duty remains at the end of this long campaign, and Patience does not yet have the heart to face it.

LAST INTERLUDE: THIEVES PROSPER

1

THE SMELL OF her, the taste of her. Locke awoke in darkness, still awash in those things. His sweat, their sweat, had cooled and dried on his skin, and the bed … he ran his hands over her side of it and found it empty, the blanket thrown back.

He remembered where he was. The upper room of Sabetha’s house off the Court of Dust, the one with the expensively luxurious mattress and the Lashani silk sheets. He couldn’t have been asleep for long.

There was someone in the darkness, watching him, and he knew in an instant it wasn’t Sabetha, knew with every fiber of his intuition who it must be, standing by the faint gray cracks of light at the window.

“What have you done?” he whispered.

“We spoke,” said Patience. “I showed her something.”

Soft silver light filled the room—the cold alchemical globes, in response to a mere gesture of Patience’s. Locke saw her hands moving as his eyes adjusted, saw that she wore a heavy traveler’s cloak with the hood thrown back.

“Where’s Jean?”

“Downstairs, where you left him,” said Patience. “He’ll awaken soon. Do you want to get dressed, or are you comfortable speaking like this?”

The cold Locke felt had little to do with the mere fact that he was naked. He slid from the bed, not caring that he concealed nothing from Patience, and dressed in what he could only hope, ludicrously, was somehow an insolent fashion. He donned trousers and tunic like armor, threw a simple dark jacket on as though it could keep Patience and her words out.

Locke saw that there was something leaning against the wall behind Patience, a flat rectangular object about three feet high, covered in a gray cloth.

“She tried to write you a note,” said Patience. “It was … beyond her. She left half an hour ago.”

“What did you do to her, Patience?”

“I did nothing.” Her dark eyes caught him, seemed to pierce him. Those hunter’s eyes. “To my arts, Sabetha Belacoros is a puppet waiting for a hand, but it would have been meaningless, had I done anything. She had to choose. I gave her information that led to a choice.”

“You utter bitch—”

“I also saved your life tonight,” she said. “For the second and last time. This is our final conversation, Locke Lamora, if that’s what you still choose to call yourself. I’ve come to render all dues and finish my business with you.”

“Do you want to kill me yourself, at last?”

“Certainly not.”

“And … you mean to keep your word? Money and transportation to see us on our way?”

“There’s no money and no transportation,” said Patience, laughing without humor. “You’ll receive nothing else from us. Your countinghouse contacts will no longer recognize you, and your Deep Roots associates already think of Sebastian Lazari as a gray ghost of a memory. Wherever you gentlemen choose to go next, I suspect you have a long walk ahead of you.”

“Why are you doing this to us?” said Locke.

“The Falconer,” she said.

“So revenge was the game after all,” said Locke. “Well, a creature like the Falconer deserved every second of hurt I ever gave him, and fuck you if you expect me to think otherwise!”

“You can’t understand what you took from him,” said Patience, her words hot and thick with scorn. “Your flesh is inert; magic is nothing more than the sound of the wind to you. You can never feel it, feel the words leaving you like fire, like arrows from a bowstring! To know that power welling beneath you and bearing you like a feather on a wind. You think I’m selfish for this? Cruel? It’s less than you deserve! Killing him would have been mercy. I’ve killed magi. But you stole his hands and his voice. You took the tools of magic from him and smashed him like a priceless work of art. You stole his destiny. The archedama Patience could forgive you. The mother and the mage cannot.”

“I refer you to my former statement,” said Locke, his voice trembling.

A heavy tread sounded on the stairs. Jean burst into the room, slamming the door aside without knocking.

“I don’t understand,” he panted. “I was just … You fucking did something to me again, didn’t you?”

“A brief slumber,” said Patience. “I wanted time with Sabetha, and then with Locke. But you might as well hear everything else I have to say.”

“Where’s Sabetha?” said Jean.

“Alive,” said Patience. “And fled, of her own accord.”

“Why do I—?”

“You’ve got nothing more I want, Jean Tannen,” said Patience. “Interrupt me again and Locke leaves Karthain alone.”

Jean balled his fists but remained silent.

“I’m leaving Karthain too,” said Patience. “Myself and all my kind. Tonight ends the last of the Five-Year Games, and our centuries of life here. Whenever the Karthani find the nerve to enter the Isas Scholastica, they’ll find our buildings empty, our tunnels collapsed, our libraries and treasures vanished. We are removing all trace of ourselves from Karthain down to the dust under our beds.”

“Why on the gods’ earth would you do such a thing?” said Locke.

“Karthain is the old dream,” said Patience. “It’s served its purpose. We have gathered strength, honed our skills, and collected the wealth we need to do what we must. There will be no more contracts. No more Bondsmagi. We are retiring from the public life of this world. Never again can we allow such an institution as this to arise.”

“That … that danger you spoke of?” said Locke, unnerved and startled by the magnitude of the changes Patience’s words implied.

“There are things moving and dreaming in the darkness,” said Patience. “We refuse to risk any further chance of waking them up. Yet human magic must survive, so we must learn how to make it as quiet as possible.”

“Why run us through this damned election?” said Locke. “Gods, why not just put us in a room and tell us this shit and save us all so much trouble?”

“Wise members of my order a century ago,” said Patience, “foresaw our direction beyond a shadow of a doubt. We used our contracts to enrich ourselves, but they also made us arrogant. They fueled the impulse to dominate, to see our powers as limitless and the world as our clay.

“These wise men and women knew that a crisis would break, a time for blood, and the only way to win would be to achieve surprise. They envisioned a disruption of our ordinary lives so profound and yet so routine that it could conceal preparations for a fight when the time came. The Five-Year Games became a regular part of our society, a pageant and a release. But a few of us were always trusted with the original intention of the games, and the knowledge that we might have to employ it.”

“So it was all just … a monumental misdirection?” said Locke. “While we danced for everyone’s amusement, you sharpened your knife and stuck it in somebody’s back?”

“All those magi that I once described as exceptionalists,” said Patience. “All those brothers and sisters. I mourn them, even as I know there was no convincing them. They will stay in Karthain forever. The rest of us go on.”

“Why tell us any of this?” said Jean.

“Because I value your discomfort.” Patience smiled without warmth. “I described the conditions of your employment very succinctly. We are not vanishing from the world, merely from the eyes of ordinary people. Share our business with anyone and you are always in our reach.”

“Ordinary people,” said Locke. “Well, how ordinary am I, really? What’s the truth of all the tales you spun about my past?”

“You should look at the painting I brought for Sabetha.” Patience tapped the wrapped object leaning against the wall behind her. “I’m leaving it here, though in a day or two it will be nothing but white ash. It’s the only portrait of Lamor Acanthus ever painted during his life. I ought to tell you, the likeness is impeccable.”

“A simple answer!” shouted Locke. “What am I?”

“You’re a man who doesn’t get to know the answer,” said Patience, and now her smile was genuine. She was shaking with the obvious difficulty of containing her laughter. “Look at you. Camorri! Confidence trickster! You think you know what revenge is? Well, here’s mine on you. Before I was Archedama Patience, I was called Seamstress. Not because I enjoy needlework, but because I tailor to fit.”

Locke could only stare at her, feeling cold and hollow to the depths of his guts.

“Live a good long life without your answer,” she said. “I think you’ll find the evidence neatly balanced in either direction. Now, one thing more will I tell you, and this only because I know it will haunt and disquiet you. My son preferred to mock my premonitions, but only because he didn’t want to face the fact that they always have substance. I shall give you a little prophecy, Locke Lamora, as best as I have seen it.

“Three things must you take up and three things must you lose before you die: a key, a crown, a child.” Patience pushed her hood up over her head. “You will die when a silver rain falls.”

“You’re making all this shit up,” said Locke.

“I could be,” said Patience. “I very well could be. And that’s part of your punishment. Go forth now and live, Locke Lamora. Live, uncertain.”

She gestured once and was gone.

2

JEAN REMAINED at the door, staring at the gray-wrapped package. Finally, Locke worked up the nerve to seize it and tear away the cover.

It was an oil painting. Locke stared at it for some time, feeling the lines on his face draw taut as a bowstring, feeling moistness well in the corners of his eyes.

“Of course,” he said. “Of course. Lamor Acanthus. And wife, I presume.”

He made a noise that was half dour laugh and half strangled sob, and threw the painting on the bed. The black-robed man in the portrait looked nothing like Locke; he was broad-shouldered, with the classically dark, sharp aspect of a Therin Throne patrician. The woman beside him bore the same sort of haughty glamour, down to her bones, but she was much fairer of skin.

Her thick, flowing hair was as red as fresh blood.

“I’m everything Sabetha was afraid of,” said Locke. “Tailored to fit.”

“I’m … I’m sorry as hell I got you into this,” said Jean.

“Shit! Don’t go wobbly on me now, Jean. I was as good as dead, and the only way out of this was to go through, all the way to Patience’s endgame. Now she’s played it.”

“We can go after Sabetha,” said Jean. “She’s had half an hour, how far could she get?”

“I want to,” said Locke, wiping his eyes. “Gods, I can still smell her everywhere in this room. And gods, I want her back.” He slumped onto the bed. “But I … I promised to trust her. I promised to … respect her decisions, no matter how much it fucking cut me. If she has to run from this, if she has to be away from me, then for as long as she needs, I’ll … I’ll accept it. If she wants to find me again, what could stop her?”

Jean put his hands on Locke’s shoulders and bowed his head in thought.

“You’re gonna be fucking miserable to live with for a couple of weeks,” he said at last.

“Probably,” said Locke with a rueful chuckle. “I’m sorry.”

“Well, we should case this place and pack everything useful we can lay our hands on,” said Jean. “Clothes, food, tools. We don’t have to go after Sabetha, but we’d best have our asses on the road before the sun peeks over the horizon.”

“Why?”

“Karthain hasn’t kept up an army or maintained its walls for three hundred years,” said Jean. “In a few hours, it’s going to wake up to discover that the only thing keeping it protected from the world at large has vanished during the night. Do you want to be here when that mess breaks wide open?”

“Oh, shit. Good point.”

Locke stood up and looked around the room one last time.

“Key, crown, child,” he muttered. “Well, fuck you, Patience. Three things must you kiss before I let you spook me for good. My boots, my balls, and my ass.”

Locke pulled his boots on and followed Jean down the stairs, impatient to have Karthain at his back and slowly sinking into the horizon.