Obedience shared her bedroom with her sisters, along with its furniture: three beds and two sets of shelves, made by Eloquence before she was born, so they only had eight shelves total. Instead, a wooden box under the bed held her treasures:
Three penny-wides, much worn and loved; a china-headed doll, much chipped, and which was kept out of sight because, having been handed down through all of them, each sister considered their claim to it as good as anyone else’s, now that Obedience was too old to play with it; a wooden comb; a scattering of feather cockades (all of the girls collected them, and some of Obedience’s nicest ones had been taken from her, an injustice which still smoldered like so many others in her heart), and most recently the little heads salvaged in the gallery.
The little mirrored box itself could not be entrusted there. She hid that instead in a niche of the night-closet, despite the pang of consigning it to that odorous little space. As the youngest, its cleaning duties fell her way; she could think of no safer place from the prying eyes of her sisters.
The bedroom’s little window looked out over the street, a much less interesting view than Eloquence’s or her mother’s windows, both of which looked south and out over the harbor, down three terraces towards the sea. The curtains were faded green and red, some Noble’s castoffs that the Tailor had given Grace. That was the sort of apprenticeship one wanted.
She’d thought when Eloquence was back that everything would be fine, that he would make sure that everything was fair, would make sure that her sisters didn’t bully her. But the Eloquence that had returned from the river was not one interested in policing his family, as long as they kept all outrageous acts out of sight. Obedience had bruises all along her ribs from being pinched, and Compassion had taken her only hair ribbon, so she had not been able to braid it this morning.
She’d saved that grievance up, meaning to tell it to him as soon as he asked why her hair was down, but he did not ask, simply launched straightway into scolding her, telling her that a slovenly appearance was displeasing to the Gods, and that he expected much better of her.
Behind his back, Grace smirked at her.
It was too much to bear, and words rushed out of her in response. “But I have no hair ribbon, because Compassion took it.”
“You do not need fancy ribbons to be neat and orderly in appearance,” he said. “A bit of string or cloth could tie it back just as easily. Go upstairs and make yourself presentable.”
She dragged herself upstairs and found a bit of cording. She took her time brushing out her hair and braiding it with angry yanks but that was her mistake, because by the time she came back downstairs, breakfast was over, with nothing saved for her.
Grace pinched her as she passed, and Compassion smirked.
She hated them all, including her brother and mother. Still, when Eloquence went striding out, she followed.
He walked a long way, all the way down near Printers Row, and she worried that this was somehow connected with the trip she and Grace had made to the gallery. Had someone somehow recognized them and complained?
But Eloquence didn’t go as far as that. Blocks before, he stopped and nearly collided in the doorway of a building with a tall woman, dressed in Merchant blue. Obedience couldn’t hear the words they exchanged, but Eloquence followed the woman into the building, whose spidery lettered sign read “Spinner Press.” A building favored by the Trade Gods surely. What business did he have in such a place?
She sat on a cold stone wall and waited. The Duke’s clock tower struck two quarter bells before the door opened again and Eloquence came out. He caught sight of her and smiled at first, then summoned a frown as he came closer.
“You should be at home, working there, not loitering about in the streets,” he said.
She ignored the rebuke. “What were you doing?”
He took her hand. “Ah, your fingers are like icicles. Walk me home,” he said.
After a few steps, his fingers warm in hers, he said, “I am writing a book about what river life is like and hoping the Press will publish it. They publish that sort of thing. The woman I was talking with, she tells them whether or not something is worth publishing.”
“How does she know?”
“She reads it.”
Obedience had rarely seen her brother so happy. She took full advantage of the bliss, coaxing him to talk of his book all the way home. He told her stories of the time river Nixies had stolen all their boots and of the morning he’d seen two distant Dragons circling a mountaintop.
“No wonder she wants your book,” she said when he paused for breath.
His smile faltered. “That remains to be seen.” His lips firmed. “But I will have this. I have decided it and if I am good and proper, the Moons will help me see it through.”
“Why would she not want your book, after reading it?” They went up Eelsy and then ascended a zigzag staircase. The steps were clear of snow, but drifts lay on either side, slumping the bushes.
“She has not done so yet. I did not bring it,” he said.
Obedience frowned. “Why not, if you want her to read it?”
“It is a stratagem. She cannot have it yet, and so she will want it more, and remember wanting it when she finally has it.”
“That is very tricky,” Obedience said. She turned the idea over in her head, trying to figure out how she might apply it to her sisters.
“I will do whatever it takes,” Eloquence said. He smiled sidelong at her. “Fortunately, she is a pretty woman and it is no hardship to be pleasant with her.”
“Does she follow the Moons?” At his headshake, she said, scandalized, “You cannot consort with someone who does not follow the Moons!”
“I know I cannot be truly allied to her, but that doesn’t keep me from pretending,” he said. “Her own Trade Gods preach such business practices, so who am I to countervail them?”
“But that’s against the Temple teachings!”
“You have to be a grownup to understand how it all works.”
But the rest of the way she kept poking at the thought, the idea that sometimes it was all right to pretend not to follow the Moons. The odd thought gave her a weird little thrill, like stealing something and knowing she had succeeded, even though the Priests said that sort of feeling was bad.
Undoubtedly they’d say this one was too.