While by no means one of the biggest families in the silk trade, Abasi’s name is known among the street merchants, and it’s laughably easy to beg directions to his house.
He lives in a steady, older neighborhood, composed of two-story buildings that often house two or three generations together. Abasi’s home is a good size, with the traditional double wooden doors painted a vibrant blue and set within an ornate frame with a central divider. A gorgeous latticework balcony graces the second story. Two other homes sit in close proximity on either side, leaving only the front door as a point of entry. I follow the houses along and turn at the end of the road to see what alternate entries and escape routes I can find. Just as I hoped, a narrow alley runs behind the buildings, providing easy access to the small, walled yards.
I walk the alley, inspecting each of the houses in turn. From what I can tell over the tops of the high walls, the houses are all about the same in terms of wealth. Chickens cluck behind the walls of a few, a goat bleats somewhere to the right, and twice I catch the sound of women talking, perhaps washing dishes or hanging wet laundry in the yard. My mage sight shows me nothing of concern—no wards, no protections, no niggling little spells I don’t want to meet. Nothing. All I sense is the faint flow of magic in the world itself, nothing more than a glow permeating the earth, whispering on the wind, which is nothing to worry about.
The second house down, adjacent to Abasi’s, sports a row of mango trees growing against the inner wall, their fruit still hard and green: the perfect place to hide my valuables. I make a running jump for the top of the wall. On my second attempt, my fingers close over the edge, and I haul myself up. I crouch there a moment, rubbing the grit from my hands and inspecting the raw tips of my fingers. Then I take my package from my pocket and hide it among the branches, snugging it tight so that it won’t fall.
Satisfied, I drop to the alley and return to Abasi’s house, rapping on the back door. Eventually, a tall woman in a lovely yet well-worn orange and yellow day dress opens the door. Her hair is wrapped in a matching swatch of fabric, and her hands drip soapy water.
“Ehh, boy, what do you want?”
I dip my head meekly. “Please, auntie, would you have some work I could do in return for a meal?”
“Not today,” she says firmly, stepping back to shut the door.
“I haven’t eaten since yesterday,” I say in a small voice, hoping to stir her pity. “I know it’s hard to trust a boy you don’t know, but I’m small and quick and can work hard, if you might spare a bit of bread for me. I can scrub, or shell peas, or wash clothes, if you wish.”
She hesitates.
“Just a bit of bread, auntie,” I say, hating that I have to beg.
She heaves a sigh and steps to the side. “If you try anything, I’ll have Jelani whip you. No stealing, no wandering around. Understand?”
“I understand,” I say somberly, though I want to protest. When I ask for work, it’s because I’m trying to avoid thieving. And yet these are almost always the words I’m welcomed with.
She grunts and leads me over to the washing tub. I push up my sleeves and set to scrubbing the clothes while she brings out a basket of corn and a metal bucket for the husks. Her name, she tells me, is Chiku, and she has been working in Master Abasi’s house for twenty years.
“Twenty years,” I marvel, wringing out a pair of pants. The water dribbles down my elbows, soaking my own pants, but they will dry soon enough in the island heat. “I’ve only been in Karolene three years.”
She eyes me askance. “Is that so? What brought you here?”
I keep my eyes on my washing. “I came here with my mother. She was ill, and we were seeking a cure. She went out one day and never came back.”
Chiku pauses in the act of husking an ear. “She disappeared?”
I’m running a risk sharing this, but if she doesn’t sympathize with my words, that will tell me a lot. “I don’t know. My mother wasn’t so ill that she could have died that day. She left to meet with Arch Mage Blackflame and didn’t return.”
“Oh, child,” Chiku says, her voice soft with sorrow. “Have you no other family here?”
I look up, a pained smile on my face, as if it were an easy truth when we both know it is not. “No.”
Families in Karolene are big and connected. They take care of each other. It’s rare for a family feud to progress so far that a complete split results, and almost unheard of to have no family at all. Without a family, you have nothing—no support in times of need, no safety when trouble comes knocking.
Chiku returns to husking her ear of corn, frowning. I’ve managed to gain her sympathies on a deeper level than I did at the door. Now I only need to work into the conversation the questions I want answered without arousing her suspicions.
I sort through the remaining clothes, thinking quickly. I need to find a way to ask about Blackflame, but jumping in directly after what I just shared will look suspicious. My hand closes on a child’s tunic. Perhaps establishing the family's connection to the court will help—that's where Blackflame is most active, and where much of Abasi's custom will come from. But to get to that, I'd best start with Chiku.
“Does your family work with you here?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “No, I go home to my family at night.”
I look at her in surprise. It’s relatively common for at least a smaller family unit to work together for the same master, or even live in attached quarters. “But—do you take care of this whole house yourself? Master Abasi and all his family, too?”
Chiku reaches for another ear of corn. “There is Jelani. He does the cleaning and driving. I only have to cook and wash.”
“Driving?” I echo.
She catches my quizzical glance about the small yard and smiles. “Oh, the master rents space at a stable down the road.”
I wring out a child's soapy tunic, drop it into the tub of clean water, and start rinsing. “Cooking and washing can be big jobs. Is it a large family that lives here?”
She clicks her tongue. “No, just Master Abasi and his wife, their daughter and her husband, and their two children. I started here back when Master Abasi was planning his wedding. His parents both lived with him then, of course.”
“Ah,” I say. “He has only one daughter?” That’s a small family, by any standard.
Chiku sighs and sets aside the last ear of corn. “He has a son as well. Young master Kito was invited to court by a friend among the nobility.”
I brighten. “How fortunate for the family!”
Chiku gets to her feet. “It seemed so at first. But lately,” she shakes her head. “I would not speak ill of the boy. Why, I half raised him myself!”
“But you are worried?” I ask, willing her to stay. "It seems like a closer connection to court could only benefit the family."
She studies me a moment, and then says, “Last month he negotiated a bit of ongoing business on his father’s behalf with the Arch Mage himself.”
“The—Arch Mage Blackflame?”
“There isn’t another arch mage on the islands, is there?”
No, there isn’t. “How fortuitous,” I manage, my mind racing.
“Your mother disappeared,” she says, voice sharp. “You need not pretend, child. I have been thinking all this last month that I should find a different house to work for.”
“But … if it is just business,” I say hesitantly. Abasi seems wise enough not to refuse a business deal with someone as powerful as Blackflame when anyone who crosses the man disappears. Did he tell Tendaji, though? Or is there more to it than business?
“My cousin disappeared three months ago,” Chiku says, voice hard. “And I’ve had to serve tea to the man myself.”
“He came here for tea?”
“And to discuss their business,” Chiku says, flicking her hand dismissively.
I don’t believe it. Nobles don’t visit their silk merchant’s house to discuss what they want; they expect merchants to bring sample wares to them. While not actually a noble, Blackflame would count among the aristocratic class that expects house calls. If Blackflame came here, he had a very good reason to do so.
“I’ll not serve him again,” Chiku says. She stares across the yard, her gaze focused on the middle distance, but her voice firm. “My cousin, your mother … I won’t support the man, and I won’t support anyone who does.”
“Careful,” I say before I can help myself.
She blinks, looking down at me, and nods, accepting my word of warning for what it is. If someone overhears her—well, it’s better not to say such things aloud.
She turns toward the door.
“When you’re done, hang the clothes on the line there. I’ll get a plate together for you.”
I quickly finish the last of the washing and haul the heavy basket of wet clothes over to the clothesline. By the time I’m done hanging them, Chiku has come back out from the kitchen with the promised plate.
“You may sit on the step to eat, and then off you go,” she says, handing the plate to me. “And remember, that’s all the work we have for you. No coming back tomorrow.”
“No, auntie. Thank you,” I say, reaching for the plate. In addition to the bread, she’s given me corn mash and a generous spoonful of curried vegetables. I look up at her, beaming. She turns away as if she hadn’t seen my smile, but I catch the faint crinkle of crow’s feet by her eyes.
“Go on, eat,” she says, and returns to the kitchen to work.
I eat quickly, the food delicious and gone all too fast.
“It looks cleaner than if I’d washed it,” Chiku says, taking the empty plate from me as I stand in the kitchen doorway.
“Thank you, auntie.” I don’t have to pretend my gratitude. “It was wonderful.”
“Off with you then,” she says, and shoos me out the back door and into the alley.
I walk along with a bounce in my step, my stomach comfortably filled. As I near the wall below the mango trees, I slow with surprise, for there, watching me, sits an adorably rotund golden dog. Its ears are twin triangles poking up from its ruff, and a dark mask of fur lies across its eyes. In similar contrast to the honey tones of its shaggy coat, its legs are slim and dark-furred. It also looks decidedly unfriendly.
Perhaps my package can wait until later.
“Good dog,” I murmur and shift course to walk along the opposite wall, keeping as far away as possible from its small, sharp teeth.
It turns its head, watching as I pass, its thick, dark tail curled around its haunches. Just as well to keep away from it. I continue on, listening for the telltale sound of claws clicking against the cobblestones while hoping to God the dog stays put.
“That was stupid of you,” Kenta says from behind me.
I twist around with a cry, staring. Where the dog sat moments before, Kenta now stands, his eyes blazing with anger.
I stare at him, stunned for the space of a heartbeat, and then realize what I’m looking at and clap my hands over my eyes. “Where are your clothes?”
A brief silence follows, in which I wonder if I should attempt to peek at him over the top of my hands or if that will still show me too much.
Then Kenta lets out an exasperated chuckle. “I am wearing pants.”
“Tight pants!”
“They’re still plenty—”
“And you’re a dog,” I add, risking a glance at him over the tips of my fingers. It’s just enough to see him from the shoulders up.
“Tanuki,” he clarifies.
Unfortunately, that word means nothing to me. I’ve met a lycan before, able to shift into the form of a wolf, but I’ve no idea what a tanuki is other than the fluffy black-masked dog I saw a moment before.
“What were you doing in there?” he demands. “Hamidi told you to stay away.”
“No,” I say, careful to keep my view of him blocked with my hands. “You told me to stay safe, and he said he’d let me know if he needed me. I was perfectly safe earning my dinner.” It’s hard to smile smugly when hiding behind your hands. “I also found out something.”
“Found out what? And what were you doing to earn your dinner?”
What does he think I was doing? Turning cartwheels? “I was washing clothes. The housekeeper told me Abasi is conducting a business deal of some sort with Blackflame. I’m not sure what, exactly, but his son negotiated it for him.”
“How would she know that?” Kenta shakes his head. “Are you sure she wasn’t making it up to impress you?”
“She didn’t need to impress me,” I assure him. “Blackflame stopped in to discuss their supposed business, and she had to serve him tea. Which, I might point out, is not how most wealthy folk conduct business with their merchants. But a business dealing isn’t really proof of betrayal, is it? Hamidi will want more.”
“Not from you, he won’t.”
I throw up my hands in frustration and get a clear view of Kenta, bare chested and in tight leather pants that start below his navel and certainly don’t reach his knees. With a yelp, I whirl around, clapping my hands over my eyes again for good measure.
Kenta makes a choking sound.
“Are you all right?” I ask, not daring a look.
“Fine,” he says, his voice not quite steady. “Give me a moment and I’ll get the rest of my clothes.”
“You have more clothes?” I demand. “Why in the Eleven Kingdoms haven’t you put them on yet?”
“Just wait,” he says.
I hear the distinct sound of Kenta scraping his way up the wall and then jumping down again a moment later, followed by the rustle of clothing.
“All right, I’m clothed now. Though really, it's not anything you haven’t already seen among the fishermen and dockworkers.”
I fix him with a glare as I turn around, glad to see him in both a tunic and a pair of pants. “They wear loose pants. Past their knees.” His pants had been so tight they didn’t leave much to the imagination, and I have no interest in imagining such things in the first place. “And they don’t turn into dogs.”
“Tanukis,” he says, still looking entertained. “Here, catch.”
He tosses my package to me. I jump to catch it, my heart giving an unpleasant thump. “How did you find that?”
He taps his nose. “I tried tracking you once I’d been to see Kibwe. I wanted to make sure you were all right after this morning. I lost you after you returned your clothes.”
Must be convenient to have a dog’s sense of smell, at least when it comes to finding people. “What did you find out about Kibwe?” I ask.
“He’s been ill the last five days or so, unable to leave his bed. His wife’s been worried about him. The neighbors haven’t seen any unusual visitors stopping by to see him.”
“Not even a healer of some sort?” I ask, half-worried even though I don’t know the man.
“They didn’t have the coin for one. I gave them a bit from that pouch Abasi gave us for the prison guards.” Kenta pauses, as if regretting having shared that much.
“I’m glad,” I say. “If he betrayed Tendaji before he got ill, it wouldn’t have taken the soldiers this long to make the arrest.”
“I know,” Kenta says. “It wasn’t Kibwe.”
“So, did you come here to look for me or check on Abasi?”
“Both,” he says. “Once I got here, I scented your bundle of things and heard you chatting in the yard. I decided I’d better wait and make sure you made it out safely.”
At that point, he must have stored his clothes and shifted into his tanuki form in the hopes of remaining unnoticed while he waited. To make sure I got out all right. “Thanks,” I finally say, warmth filling me. “For waiting and trusting me to get out on my own.” And trusting me with his ability to shift, though I’m not yet ready to say that last out loud.
He shrugs. “What else was I supposed to do? Now that you’re out, though, we should leave before we’re noticed.”
I purse my lips, studying him. He’s intent on getting me away. No argument I could make will sway him. Just like Hamidi. Well, what they don’t know, they can’t argue with. So, I merely sigh and nod. “All right,” I say.
“All right?” he frowns, taken aback.
“Yes, all right.” I turn toward the main road. “I’ve got to move if I’m going to have somewhere to sleep tonight. You’ll let Hamidi know what I found out about Abasi?”
“Yes, but aren’t you…?”
“I’ve got my own affairs to take care of,” I say coolly. “Hamidi can let me know if he needs me.”