About an hour later, Norah and I were on our way into town. She insisted I ride on her old mare while she guided the reins, and I was too grateful for her help to argue. We didn't get very far down the road when we came upon a long queue of carriages, lined up all the way into the city.
"That's where they're checking papers," Norah said, resting her hand on the horse's nose.
I craned my neck to look ahead, spying two guards inspecting a carriage. I chewed my lip—would they check my slingbag, and, if so, would they let me inside the city with all my weapons? My mind spun through scenarios until I saw a woman with small children.
As casually as I could, I pulled my slingbag off my back and snuck it under the hem of my tunic. Then I adjusted the cloth so that it looked smooth and settled back in the saddle. The only one who'd noticed my movement was Norah, and she nodded once, turning toward the front.
I kept my head down as we approached the guards at the gate. There were a pair of young Forcadelian guards there—barely older than I was.
"Just me and my sister," Norah said, handing them papers. "Be careful of the baby when you search her."
"Okay, dear, come on down." A Forcadelian guard stood to my right. His voice was kind as he held out his hand. "This won't take long."
I took his hand, thinking quickly. "It's been such a long journey." I whimpered. "I'm a little faint." Then, with a sigh, I fell forward into his arms, making sure to keep my "belly" away from him. "I'm so sorry."
"It's quite all right," he said. "You can get back on the horse."
"Thank you, kind sir," I said as he almost picked me up and seated me. I chanced a look at his face and my heart stopped in my chest—he looked so much like Felix. Before he met my gaze, I averted my eyes, covering my face with my hands in mock embarrassment.
"Oi," his partner barked. She was Severian. "You can't do that. She needs to be inspected."
"I inspected her and she's fine," he barked back. "And if you got a problem with that, you can go talk to Maarit."
Once we were given the all clear to go, and we were out of earshot, Norah chuckled. "You might not be the princess, but I'm glad the Mother told me to help you. You have a look of hope about you."
I merely smiled. I had a sinking suspicion that she still considered me to be the lost princess, but I hoped that she would keep that.
Norah and I parted ways once I was safely inside the city, and she promised that her house would be available if I ever needed a place to sleep or hide.
"Just up the northern road," she said. "Turn left at the patch of yellow flowers. It will always be open for you."
Once she was out of sight, I turned my attentions on the city at large. Aware that I might be recognized, I kept my face down as I perused the vendors in the central town square—or lack thereof. More than one booth was completely empty, with a sign that indicated the owner would be back when the blockade ended. I thought about the bushels of apples rotting on the side of the road in Kulka, and a fresh surge of anger coursed through me. I stopped at a booth proudly displaying baskets full of root vegetables and made a show of poking through the produce.
"It's a silver per pound," the woman said, chewing on what appeared to be a stick.
"A silver?" I quirked a brow. "Seems high. And you don't have a lot of produce."
"My family's gotta eat," she said. "My sister usually brings her produce from Kulka, and since that blockade, things have been tight."
I nodded, picking up a potato and examining it. There were spots on it—it wasn't even fresh. "When do you think the blockade will be lifted?"
"Who knows," she said with a shake of her head. "But if you ain't going to buy anything, move along."
I thanked her, even though she was rude, and continued along the promenade. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted three Severian guards entering the market. With light footfalls, I kept close behind them, pretending to stop at a booth nearby when they stopped.
"Need to see your papers," the older one said, picking up a rhubarb from a nearby vendor's booth. "These look a little too much like Kulkan produce."
I made a face. How could he tell that? But everything from the strawberries to the lettuce seemed a few shades greener than anything else around it.
The old man paled but handed over a weathered document. "It's all on the up and up. Just had a nice harvest this year. We're right on the border, you see, so—"
"I don't buy it," the head Severian said. "You're under arrest for selling illegal wares from the nation of Kulka."
My jaw fell open as the other two guards grabbed the man by his frail arms and yanked him over the booth, clapping thick irons on his wrists and dragging him down the street. The senior officer tore up the paper and let the pieces float to the dirt floor.
"Let that be a lesson to the rest of you," he barked. "There's no fooling the royal guard of Forcadel."
In the first place, neither guard was Forcadelian, and something scratched inside my mind at the thought of them declaring themselves as such. I cast a look around at the neighbors who wore similar looks of loathing their faces. Yet none of them had done anything to save their friend. They were angry, not stupid.
"Does that happen a lot?" I asked the man at the booth.
"More often now," he said. "Maarit, she's got this place on lockdown. Curfews every night, random inspections. Some of the farmers have taken to leaving their best-looking produce at home so that it doesn't get mistaken for Kulkan produce."
I glanced down the line of vendors, noting more than a few empty tables. "Is there enough to go around?"
"Well, since we can't get the Kulkans in the city, we've lost about half our customers. If we don't make money, we can't buy from our neighbors." He sighed wearily. "It's a mess."
Mess, indeed. I placed a gold coin on his table. "Thanks for the info."
I didn't see any more incidents like the one in the farmer's market, but there was clearly a simmering resentment of the occupiers in the town. That was good—I could use that. But whether I could twist that from disliking the Severians to accepting the Kulkans was another story.
When dusk fell on the city, the Severian guards began to bark about curfew, and the vendors and shopowners closed their doors. The soldier presence would probably double around dusk as they herded villagers into their homes for the night, so I scaled a two-story building and settled in on the roof.
My plan was to stay there for the duration of dusk, but exhaustion finally caught up with me, and I fell right to sleep.
When I awoke next, it was dark and there was a nasty crick in my neck. I lay there for a little while, resting my body, but my mind swam with eagerness. I only had a few days to get an idea of the city before I had to get word back to Ammon.
I slid my cloak over my shoulders and put the slingbag in its place. Finally, I pulled out my mask, tying it around my head with a satisfied smile. Cracking my neck, I set off into the dark city.
The rooftops here were similar to Forcadel, and I was almost immediately back in my element. The Severians moved at a leisurely pace, but they spoke very little. When they'd pause to take a break, I'd whip out my map and orient myself.
Voices echoed up from one of the alleys, and I turned my head to listen, mostly out of habit.
"You! Boy! Stop!"
The boy dashed into the open street then froze as the two Severians surrounded him. He was barely thirteen and carrying a bag in his hand. Silently, I slid my bag off my back and crept to the ledge. I didn't want to intervene, but I'd be ready if I had to.
"You know the rules," the female Severian—she had a beak nose, so I'd call her Beaky—said. "Nobody out after dark. Means you, too."
"I wasn't doing nothing wrong," the boy said. "I had to stay late at the smithery. Couldn't leave until now. Please, I'm just trying to get back home."
"What do you have in the bag?" Beaky said, pulling it from him and dumping out the contents. A loaf of bread, some fruit, and a coin purse.
"P-please, that's all we got for the week," he said.
"Where'd you get this apple?" the male Severian guard—he had a mole on his right cheek, he was now Mole—asked, plucking the fruit from the ground. "You know Kulkan produce is strictly outlawed."
"I didn't know it was Kulkan," their supposed victim said. "I just bought it from a vendor today. Thought it was a Forcadelian apple, honest."
Beaky snatched the coin purse from the ground and dug through it. "Suppose we could let you off with a warning. We'll take this, though."
I chewed my lip as the boy begged, crying about his sick mother and younger siblings. He couldn't have been older than fourteen, and the ash smudges on his face told me he was telling the truth about coming home from work.
I rose, gathering the edges of my cloak in my hands as I prepared to jump. With a loud breath, I leaped off the building, comforted as the air gathered in the pockets around me. Landing softly in the alley between the guards and the boy, I stood slowly, giving the Severians my most terrifying glare.
"Is there a problem here?" I asked, lowering my voice.
Mole snorted. "And who are you?"
"Some freak walking around in a mask and cloak, huh?" Beaky chuckled. "Forcadelians are idiots."
"I'll give you one last chance," I drawled, flashing them the two knives at my side. "Let him go, or you'll bleed."
They barked a laugh as they ambled toward me. As Mole swung, I ducked, and his fist landed square in his partner's face. I swung my leg around to kick him in the back with my knee, sending him flying forward. Beaky was screaming, furious and bleeding from her nose, as she came for me again. My right fist connected with her stomach, my left into her cheek, and I grabbed her by the scruff of her neck and tossed her over my shoulder into the brick wall.
Mole had recovered and came for me, so I grabbed my weighted twine from my belt, swung it around to gain momentum then released it. The balls wrapped themselves around his arms, and again, he fell forward. With a kick to the face, he was out as well.
"Holy Mother…"
The boy had pressed himself against the wall, eyes wide and mouth open.
I walked over to him and held out my hand. "Are you okay?"
He nodded. "T-thank you."
"Get home," I said, handing his coin purse and bag to him. "And try not to stay out after hours, mmkay?"
He dashed out into the alley just as a set of hoofbeats approached. With the boy safely disappeared into the darkness, I made a break for the rooftops, scampering out of the way just as the first three guards arrived. I tried to avoid feeling too good about what I'd done.
The night was still young, but I was tired and not in the mood to sleep on the roof again. So I found a small inn, The Wicked Duck, and palmed the few precious coins I had. Inside, there was a single woman at the counter who gave me a curious look when I entered.
"How much for a night and a meal?" I asked.
She surveyed me suspiciously. "Are you visiting?"
Remembering what Norah had said, I forced a smile onto my face. "Just need a night, then I'll be on my way."
She sighed and pulled out a thick book. "I gotta know where you came from, how you got here, and what your business is in town. For Captain Maarit."
"Really?" I frowned, as if this was new information to me. "Why does the captain want to know who's staying in the inns?"
"Who knows? But if I don't report every stay to her, she'll take ten gold coins from my coffers. So, again," she picked up a quill and leaned over the paper, "where'd you come from, how'd you get here, and what's your business?"
"Wow," I replied with a shake of my head. Luckily, I had a ready-made story. "Name's Larissa. Coming from the village of Kutei. Here to fetch some produce for my ma and I lost track of time."
Kutei was the small village outside Celia's fortress, and the produce line was one she'd told us to use if the guards were getting too curious. I supposed some things were just ingrained.
The woman wrote down all the lies I fed her. "That'll be one silver," she said. I handed her the gold and she quirked a brow. "Farm girls don't usually carry this much gold around on them."
"It was a good day," I replied with a smile.
She handed me a key and a bowl and directed me toward the back room where an old pot of stew was bubbling. I ate my fill and drank so much water it sloshed unhappily in my stomach as I climbed the stairs to my room for the night. It was a modest place, with a single bed in the corner and the dying sunlight streaming onto the covers. Without even removing my boots, I flopped into bed.
Sleep tugged at my consciousness, but just as I was drifting off, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. Voices, footsteps—it was too late (or early) for either.
My things were still in a bag by the door, so I climbed out the window, hanging by the sticky gloves and waiting to hear if I'd just been paranoid, or if someone was really coming to my room.
The door opened and I cursed silently.
"I promise you, there was someone here," the innkeeper said. "I did as you told me. Anyone from Kutei, call the guards."
He grunted, and I wrapped my hand around my knife, readying myself to come to the woman's aid. I didn't fault her for giving me up.
"The Veil was seen tonight," he said.
"The…Veil? The actual Veil?" The woman sounded shocked. "Where?"
"Two of Maarit's guards said she interfered with an arrest."
"Why would she do that?" the woman wondered.
"No idea. All I know is that if I bring her to Maarit, I can retire from the service and get outta this country before the Mother burns it to the ground."
"If I see her again, I'll tell you."
Silently, I climbed up to the roof and sat on the ledge, cursing myself and my inability to let anything go. I should've let that boy…what? Get his money stolen and his food ruined? All because he was out too late? It wasn't fair.
But if I didn't change my mindset, I would get caught. Already, my cover had been blown. If Maarit knew The Veil was in town, Ilara would know as well, and then everything would be much worse for me.
And now, I was out one coin and still had to sleep on the roof again.