one

Our first job was to learn the city. Our second, to find a hideout.

Deon knew her way around already, from running messages for Derek, but she contained herself as Innon made us walk the full length of the main street. Before we split up, he said, “If you get lost, head uphill until you can see the palace, and you’ll be able to figure out where you are.”

Bren took the west side, nearest the palace. If he was recognized, he’d be remembered as kitchen help. Deon took the north, Innon the east. We agreed to meet outside the Three Princes Inn—no longer the Freedom Alehouse—at sunset.

I explored the twisting streets of the south end, marking the turns and landmarks and noting the guardhouses. Masons, bricklayers, carpenters, and glaziers were rebuilding—but not, of course, in the poorer sections.

All the streets had been cleaned. The foul smell was gone, now that the Wand Guild was back at work. Some merchants had tents or makeshift storefronts; others had combined their shops. Patrols moved at a deliberate pace, watching everything.

Almost all of the revolutionary slogans had been whitewashed over, and I imagined Uncle Darian’s well-trained city guard marching with buckets and brushes, their mail-coats jingling, as they solemnly painted out all the references to “Dirty Hands.”

The sun was setting when I returned to the Three Princes. I found Deon playing a game with a few local kids, while Innon scouted the big shops nearby.

Bren came rushing down the hill when it was almost too dark to see and torches were being set out along the main street. Just as he reached us, a patrol rode into the wide, three-way intersection, and other riders and pedestrians scrambled out of the way.

“Curfew!” a warrior shouted. “Return to your homes! Everyone indoors by evening bells, unless you have a pass!”

“I’ve got a lot to report,” Bren said breathlessly.

“And I found us a place,” said Innon. “Come on, we’ll have to leg it.”

We sprinted downhill to the east side, the poor area of Miraleste. Soon I had a stitch in my side. All that flying had been nice, but I’d gotten out of the habit of running!

By the time he led us into a narrow, deserted alley, the evening bells were ringing. We skirted broken stone and burned timbers and stepped in under the warped, smoke-blackened sign of a candle shop.

Ash and cinder had been swept up against what remained of the counter. We climbed a set of narrow, rickety stairs to a loft. Innon lit a candle from his pack, and we were able to study our new home. “The entire alley is deserted,” he said. “No one will hear us here.”

“It doesn’t smell like fire,” Bren said.

“I think it happened a long time ago. You can see how the alley ends at the burned-out wagon yard.”

“Looks good.” Deon nodded. “Nobody around, already been looted. I like it. Let’s stay.” Bren and I agreed, to Innon’s obvious relief.

“I swept downstairs so we won’t leave footprints. If we fence off this loft, we can have light, since there are no windows up here.”

“So let’s use the glowglobe,” Deon said, taking it out.

As Innon hesitated, I said, “They’re spelled to last for years. I don’t think we’ll use up the magic that fast.”

He snuffed the candle, and we set up the glowglobe on a wooden box. The light made the loft seem almost cozy. Then we unloaded our packs. I picked a spot close to the edge so I could keep an eye on things, then folded my blanket into a makeshift pallet. Better to sleep uncovered than to lie on the hard wooden planking—but I said nothing, because Deon would be sure to make a comment about nobles and weakness.

After we were settled, we divided up the last of our stale bread and dry cheese.

“Water,” Bren managed before he started coughing.

“Communal well just up the street,” Innon said. “We’ll have to get a bucket with a clean-spell—either steal it or work for it, because they cost a lot.”

Bren turned to me. “Can you get one from the palace?”

“Me! I’m not going near the palace! I thought you would spy there.”

“It has to be you.” As he talked, he drew idle shapes in the dust. “See, I went to the kitchens, and Mirah-cook is there. She’s not Derek’s contact, but she’s one of us—she was helping Lizana save people. Mirah remembered me. She told me that they need a spit-boy they can trust. I’d do it, Larei, but you know your way around the palace much better than I do. More important, you know some of the secret passages.”

“And look where they got me,” I said flatly. “Besides, I don’t know anything about spits.”

Bren pretended to crank one. “All you do is turn the handle until someone tells you to stop.”

“You won’t be stupid again and walk right into Dirty Hands.” Deon leaned forward eagerly. “Look, none of us knows the palace like you—not even Innon.” Innon nodded in agreement. “Think of the adventure!”

Bren said, “You’ll wear palace gray. And like you told us, no one looks at servants’ faces.”

I groaned.

Deon gave me a look. “If,” she said, “we really mean to be the Sharadan brothers—which was your idea—and build a reputation, and help, then we have to take some risks.”

The boys waited, Bren still drawing, Innon studying the ladder as if it was about to sprout wings.

I choked down the last of my bread. “First thing in the morning.”

Deon nodded, then continued, “Anyway, the servants count everything at the palace, that much I know. I’ll find a bucket with the clean-spell on it.”

“I’m going to keep exploring,” Innon said. “I have an idea.”

• • •

AT DAWN I trudged up the servants’ road into the palace. Barking dogs chased around as I joined a long line of servants and delivery people waiting to pass the guards. I scuffed through the dust covering the old paving stones and tried to look bored.

When it was my turn, I said, “Mirah-cook expects me. New spit-boy.”

I was waved in by a big mail-gauntleted fist and sped straight to the kitchens, head down. I was terrified that Uncle Darian was at some window, watching me.

Mirah-cook was a tall, long-nosed woman with hair the same color as mine. As soon as she saw me, she asked, “Who are you?”

“Bren sent me,” I said, my heart pounding. “Larei the spit-boy.”

She eyed me sternly, then said, “Sit here. Turn the spit slow and even until these chickens are done. I’ll tell you when.”

I sat on a stool next to a deep-set fireplace with a big wheel of iron spits and cranked the wooden handle, unnoticed in the constant swirl of activity. There was a bucket of fresh water nearby, with a ladle in it, for me. This was thirsty work.

Mirah was one of seven cooks, each overseeing different things, from the delivery and preparation of fish and fowl, baked goods, vegetables, and desserts to the final arrangements of cooked food on fine dishes. Pages arrived and left, carrying the same silver trays I remembered from before the revolution. Someone had managed to hide them.

I kept turning the spit until Mirah appeared and motioned me to stop. As a young man in an apron began to slide the cooked chickens onto serving platters, she led me to a small room. “We’ll get you a proper uniform,” she said.

She took a gray tunic from the linen closet and sized it against me. “That should fit. Now, what’s your name again? Can you come every day?”

“I’m Larei. As for coming every day, I—I don’t know,” I hedged.

She peered at me closely, as if she wished she could see inside my head. “Who sent you, again?”

“Bren.”

She eyed me—clearly she wanted something more than Bren’s name. “He was vouched for by . . . two people.”

“Derek,” I said carefully. She nodded, but she still seemed to be waiting. For what? I remembered our arrival at the beginning of summer. Bren was pretending to be the page to . . . “Lord Peitar Selenna,” I added, very softly.

Her face cleared. “Good! I hoped so. This is very important. I need someone trustworthy to listen to a very important meeting and report back about what they say, but none of us will fit into the hiding place that we managed to put in just last week. You know where the blue dining room is? Not the old formal one, it’s still under reconstruction, but the smaller one next to it?” I nodded and pulled the tunic over my clothes. “You do? Good. Under the table, wall end, there’s a door hidden in the baseboard carving. Crawl in there and pull it shut. One of us will let you out when it’s safe. Take this and scoot.”

She indicated a silver tray laden with bowls of nuts and grapes that someone had set on a cart. I hefted it and raced down the servants’ corridors, past palace buildings that had been completely cleaned. Most of the walls were still bare; I wondered if artisans were working on new tapestries and statuary.

The blue dining room overlooked the lake and the garrison. Everything was new and smelled of fresh paint. I set down the tray, then ducked under the table and felt along the carved leaves and vines along the baseboard. It was impossible to see, and I had to go over it three times until a section clicked and a small square of wall opened.

I saw what Mirah meant. As small as I was, I just managed to fit inside. With the door shut, tiny holes in the carving gave me bits of view. A short while later, people entered. There was the clink and tinkle of silver, plates, and wineglasses being set out. Mouthwatering smells came next.

All but one of the servants withdrew. Then the door opened again, and I saw three sets of heavy blackweave military boots, followed by a pair of green court shoes with emerald and diamond clasps.

There was the sound of pouring, and then, “Begone. We can wait upon ourselves.” It was a fussy courtier’s voice—the owner of the expensive green shoes.

After the servant left, closing the door behind him, Fussy-Voice said, “Benoni. I trust you’ll have a better report today.” Benoni! I knew who that was—Petran Benoni, the army commander!

“No,” came a deep voice. “Same.”

Another voice, higher and more sarcastic, observed, “Are you worried about your own report, Flendar?”

Without warning, a pinched, aristocratic face appeared upside-down in front of me. I held my breath. Just as well I couldn’t move, or I would have betrayed myself.

The pale gaze swept this way and that, and then the face disappeared.

A snort from Benoni. “Expecting spies under the table, eh? Do you check under your bed at night?”

“It’s my job,” Fussy-Voice—Flendar—said officiously, “to see to it that the only eavesdropping is done by us. If you’d done your job, we wouldn’t all be sleeping in camp quarters while the rabble that half destroyed the palace laughs behind our backs.”

A fourth voice said with good-natured humor, “Oh, give it over. Petran jokes us all—”

He stopped as the door opened. I heard another pair of boots. From the silence, I knew they had to belong to my uncle. I’d planned to stay away from him—and here we were, in the same room, my second day in Miraleste!

Cramped as I was, I wormed my fingers under all those clothes to close comfortingly around Tsauderei’s ring as my uncle said, “Sit down. Serve yourselves. Benoni, your report.”

“There’s trouble all along the east. I’ll give you the details when we meet with the couriers. We’re pretty certain it’s Bernal Diamagan and his old contacts, though everyone we talk to insists they’ve never heard of him.”

“Then you should be executing the town leaders as an example,” Flendar cut in.

“No,” my uncle said. “At that rate, half the populace will be gone. Anyone you catch, send to me. Anyone you suspect, send to me. No more summary hangings, unless you apprehend them in the act of sabotage. Flendar, your report?”

“I’m up to thirty couriers, but recruitment is necessarily slow. I have to be very careful, I’m certain you’ll agree—”

“Your command structure is?” Uncle Darian interrupted.

“All any of them know are two others. They report to me, and I tell Leonos where to send a patrol.”

“Have you given their identities to Leonos?”

“No,” said the third man, obviously Leonos.

Flendar’s tone was ingratiating. “You yourself ordered—very wisely, I might add, Your Majesty—that you wished their identities known to as few as possible. We don’t know how many of the city guard have relatives among Diamagan’s rabble, for example.”

“Yes, yes. So there is an identifier?”

“Everyone outside of my staff here in the palace wears a heron signet, all copies of my own.”

“Leonos?”

“Aside from the fact that the loyalty of my guards has never been questioned, it works so far.” Leonos sounded slightly hesitant.

“But?” Darian prompted.

“Most haven’t the stomach to be putting civs to the question, especially children or the elderly.”

“Flendar?” Uncle Darian’s voice was sharp.

“It seems more efficient to conduct my own investigation . . .”

“You heard me: hold them. If they have to wait a week—a month—so be it.”

“As you wish, Your Majesty. I take it, then, you’ll want to make time for the old man we found this morning? He’s been positively identified as one of Diamagan’s messengers.”

“What have you done with him?”

“Well, we used the knouts. His attitude was defiant, and it was necessary to remind him who holds the whip-hand these days.”

“Go. Find out his status. If he’s alive, send word to me, and I’ll interview him myself.”

“But . . . now?”

“Yes. We all agree that the sooner we tie Diamagan by the heels, as well as my enterprising nephew, the sooner we’ll have peace, do we not?”

Scrape of a chair, and footsteps. Door shutting.

Benoni said, “I don’t like Flendar being able to whistle up our own people whenever he thinks he’s flushed some spy—either he or his thirty ‘well-trained’ minions. He’s trying to interfere with our own orders.”

Uncle Darian said, “We all know he’s a lying, sneaking weasel, but I want such moling done for me, not for Diamagan. Just see to it that he doesn’t get an opportunity to exercise his taste for torture. He’s to spend his time finding spies. And we need that done, because surely Diamagan has people moling here. There are probably two or three of them in the kitchen or making beds right now.” I held my breath. “Let Flendar sniff them out. You, Therian, are to continue trying to find my nephew.”

The fourth man said, “Understood, Your Majesty.”

The clink of a wineglass.

Then, without any warning; “And what is the progress in locating my little niece, Lilah?”