Fray

by Rowenna Miller

  “But—” I protested as she laid the clothes out with dainty, precise movements. “I shouldn’t be seen, really.”

  “You’ll be seen regardless. This way you’re seen by a lot of people who have no idea who you are.” She paused, and added with a dimpled smile, “Think about it—it’s far easier to go somewhere unquestioned if you walk out your door in broad daylight rather than if you crawl out of a window at midnight.”

  “I suppose that’s true,” I admitted.

  “And this is the same. If I tried to hide you in the back, and you were found? Questions. If I put you right up front, no questions. A finely dressed woman conversing with one of my best—quite in keeping with the ordinary. And of course, no one asks what anyone else is doing here, because they have no interest in revealing what they are doing here themselves.”

  Her logic made sense. I picked up the corset, examining its deft construction. Aside from a pair of steel bones reinforcing the front and back lacing, it was stiffened with intricate cording, almost like embroidery, the soft orange silk crisscrossed with yellow stitching. It was meant to be seen, unlike Galatine corsets. I let the Mistress, whose name I neither knew nor asked, help me to dress in the evening clothes of an upper-class Serafan plantation owner or merchant’s wife.

  “This is the best plan we could manage,” Mairti assured me. “Kristos will have the rest arranged soon.”

  “And Theodor?” I asked. We were supposed to leave, together, soon.

  “We’ll arrange it,” Mairti said. I had to trust her; there was no other option save take to the streets myself and hope that the a’Mavha didn’t find me before I found Theodor. I took a deep breath, then nodded my agreement. Worry built like the pressure of the corded corset against my ribs, but I sighed, shaky, and resolved that I only needed to get through one evening. Even that felt daunting, so I made a pact with myself: one hour at a time.

  “Now, you ought to get back to your shop,” the Mistress said to Mairti. “Go out the back. If anyone sees you, you’re trying to sell me your wine.”

  Mairti grasped my hand in farewell and slipped back out through the kitchens. I was alone.

  I took stock of the house as I followed the Mistress to the stage she had set for me. It was a sprawling villa, one story, with rooms branching off one another like tributaries of a stream, double doors and archways connecting separate rooms. The scholar who owned this house must have been very high-ranking, I thought as I spied marble statues, silk wall hangings, and thickly woven carpets strewn, haphazard, through the house.

  In each, small groups and couples gathered on cushions dotting the floor, low settees, and couches. I couldn’t tell who was the guest and who was the courtesan in most cases. In one room, a lively game of dice was orchestrated by a Serafan girl with a mischievous smirk; in another, an Equatorial man with pockmarks played an instrument not unlike a large mandolin.

  “I had to find someone who spoke Galatine well enough,” the Mistress said as she showed me my place for the evening, a quiet antechamber of one of the main rooms, partially hidden by a screen. “I hope you find him as charming as most of my clients do.” She straightened, reciting my instructions in a manner not unlike a military leader assigning duties. “You will be served drinks, food if you like. You will converse, pleasantly, quietly. You will drink, but not too much. At the end of the evening, you will retire to the room appointed for you.”

  “And then?” I asked.

  “I would highly encourage a nap,” she said.

  She left me alone, and I finally thought to take a deep breath, clearing my head. This was not so different, I considered, than the game I had played at Theodor’s side as his betrothed—the game of pretending to fit in among nobles, to have a nice time while I fretted and worried over doing something uncouth or unusual, saying something that would give me away. The stakes were different; we’d changed the wager. But the way the cards were dealt, the order of play—these hadn’t changed.

  I sat, grateful that someone had already left a carafe of cold water and glasses on the table. The water tasted faintly of lime and mint, refreshing and bracing.

  “Miss?”

  We ought to have agreed upon an assumed name to use, I fretted as I turned to greet my companion for the evening. “Yes, I—good evening,” I finally sputtered.

  “And to you,” a tall, lithe Serafan replied. He was exceptionally handsome, though I had expected that, given what I had seen thus far of the Warren. What I had not expected was the scar meandering from his temple to his chin, a white line tracing some old story across his clean-shaven cheek.

  “I am…” I began to introduce myself but second-guessed my impulse. Did he know my name? Was he supposed to know my name?

  “I have been made aware of certain… biographical details,” he said with a faint laugh. The scar on his cheek creased when he smiled. “You may call me Sianh.”

  “Is that your name?” The question was bold, but I wanted to test this new territory, stamping my inquiry on it like a boot on uncertain ice.

  My companion didn’t crack. “It is my given first name, and what I am known as here. I wouldn’t want to embarrass my parents with my clan designation. Can I send a server for something stronger than water to drink?”

  I hesitated; I had no taste for strong drink and certainly wanted to keep my wits about me. However, the Mistress had suggested it, and as I caught glimpses of others at the Warren past our carved screen, I saw that most sipped from flutes sparkling with wine or etched glasses of clear liquor. Following the way my glance darted around the room, my companion laughed. “You will want me to have a bottle brought if you want to fit in. I would make a wine recommendation, but a Galatine like you must surely have a better appreciation for vintage than I do.”

  I managed a smile. “Something light,” I said. “An early harvest Lienghine, if there is one.”

  “You do know your wine,” Sianh said. I wasn’t nearly as well versed as the nobles I knew, who would have requested a particular year and estate if given the opportunity. He waved to a white-uniformed servant and relayed the order in a soft voice.

  “And now.” He leveled his gaze at me, reminding me more of the intelligent, demanding eye contact of a business partner than the softness of a paramour. For that I was grateful. “We are supposed to converse pleasantly. What do you wish to speak of?”

  “I’m not sure I can think of anything pleasant to talk about,” I answered, my voice breaking slightly.

  “Fair enough given your circumstances. But still. We must at least appear to be making conversation.”

  “Who is paying you to keep me company?” I asked bluntly, but with a delicate flick of my wrist and a coy smile that, to anyone out of earshot, transformed my impertinent question into a flirtation.

  Sianh returned the charade with a lilting smirk. “I believe I was paid my usual fee by your brother.” By Penny, then, and it probably wiped out their savings. “A most charming conversationalist, by the by. He and I have spent many evenings engaged in the great classic ethical debates. A Serafan pastime, you see.” Our wine arrived, well chilled and resting in crushed ice. When the server retreated, Sianh continued, “And I’ve been promised a substantial bonus from the Galatine prince provided you take leave of my charge unharmed.”

  My breath skipped and I remembered to maintain a pleasant, neutral expression. “He knows where I am?”

  “I doubt so. You see, he didn’t personally agree to the terms. Your friend the Kvys made the assurance that he would be most grateful. And that if he was not, she would make up the difference from her own house’s coffers.”

  I didn’t know if Alba meant her personal assets or that of her religious order, but the thought was somewhat unsettling. What value did I have that she would leverage her finances for me? Still, I nodded as though I had expected this. There was no reason to trust Sianh, a courtesan hired with some silver who could doubtless be bought by someone else with more. He was a professional, carefully t
rained and practiced in the art of making men and women comfortable in his confidence.

  Nonetheless, my next question startled him. “Where did you get that scar?”

  Given the fashion in Serafe, he could have worn a beard, but he bore the mark openly. Even so, his hand flew to the ridged skin as though by instinct. He traced it near his chin, letting his hand fall into his lap as he replied, slowly, “I was in the army. Ten years’ service.”

  “That hardly answers the question,” I replied, this time with a genuine smile.

  He shifted, lifting his wineglass and staring at the pale gold liquid for a long moment before downing half of it. “Ten years is a long time,” he said. “Near half of my adult life. Yet I rarely have cause to discuss it.” I waited. “The very first years of my service we were in the midst of the—I believe the Galatines term it the ‘Oriole Uprising.’”

  The name was familiar, but all I recalled of the conflict was something having to do with an island south of the Serafan mainland. “I confess that I am as educated as your average Galatine seamstress in the conflicts of foreign nations,” I replied.

  “Your honesty is refreshing,” Sianh said. “Most pretend to know things they do not in order to impress even a whore. The Orioles—Bhani in Serafan—are a religious minority in most of Serafe, but not on the islands in the southern sea. They asserted that they ought to have their independence.”

  “And West Serafe was disinclined to give it?”

  “To put it mildly. It was put down very quickly. It doesn’t help their cause that the Orioles’ convictions demand a nomadic existence nearly devoid of property. It is the way all the clans in Serafe used to live, but only the Bhani cling to it completely today, and it’s very difficult to match a large nation’s military without fortresses and cannon. They had excellent cavalry, though. Which brings me to this,” he said, mirroring the curve of the scar with his little finger. “Bhani saber.”

  “I see,” I said. “These Orioles—they are still there?”

  “Of course.” He refilled his wineglass. “And they pay their taxes and are included in the draft and have the protection of the Serafan Navy—citizens like they’ve always been.”

  “Their grievances were addressed? Or they’ve given them up?” I pressed my fingers into the mother-of-pearl inlaid in vines and flowers on the table. “You must understand, Galitha is in the midst of some unrest, and I cannot imagine the calm ten years might bring.”

  Sianh sighed. “The uprising was devastating to the Orioles, and their acceptance of defeat therefore necessary to their survival. But the situation—it was much different from yours. Their beliefs were driven by religious zealotry, and their defeat taken as the will of their gods. I cannot see the same patterns in the uprising of your people.”

  I didn’t stop to dissect what he might mean by your people. Galatines, merely, or common Galatines, or reform-minded Galatines? Pellian-Galatines, even. I might be any or none of these to an outsider. “I suppose not.” I hadn’t touched my wine, but now I lifted the glass and inhaled the flower-and-herb scent Lienghine was known for.

  “If we are being so bold as to inquire after personal histories, I must confess that I am intrigued by yours,” Sianh said.

  “There’s not much to know,” I replied honestly.

  “No, nothing of import at all.” Sianh laughed. “However did you manage to meet a prince? Do Galatine commoners frequent the same circles as nobles?”

  “Not overmuch,” I said. “Wealthy merchants, elite tradesmen—to some degree, they are acquainted with nobles. I was only acquainted with the nobility, and very minor nobility at that, professionally.”

  “You made them clothing,” Sianh supplied.

  “Yes. Until I met Lady Viola Snowmont, and she invited me to spend time in her salon…” I remembered those first visits, the beautifully appointed salon, the delicacies laid out on fine china, the foreboding hanging over the city. There was too much to explain, too much I couldn’t translate into words. “Theodor also regularly visited her salon.”

  “And yet, at the same time, your brother was planning his death. You must see how it reads like the plot of an overdramatic opera.” He paused. “The Serafans love their opera.”

  “Kristos…” I searched for words to excuse him, but of course there were none. Even if he didn’t, initially, include Theodor’s death in the mechanics of revolt, that potential eventuality was implicit all along. “Yes, it does sound like a ridiculous melodrama, doesn’t it?”

  “Yet the best operas are thus.” He shrugged. “It is too bad you are not staying longer in Isildi. You might have gone to the opera house. It is beautiful, of course—the marble colonnade, the mosaics, the stage itself like a great, jeweled oyster revealing its pearl—but it all pales to nothing when the singers begin to tell their stories.”

  “I’ve never seen an opera,” I said.

  “I am not surprised—they are not often staged in your country. Galatines do not seem to care for them,” Sianh said. “Nor the Fenians, nor the Pellians. I’m not sure if they truly like them in the Allied States, or if they are merely being polite.”

  “And the Kvys?”

  Sianh laughed. “The Kvys—they don’t like anything civilized, let alone the high arts like opera. A whole country of tundra-oafs.”

  From what I had seen, this was far from true—Pyord, for all his faults, was the furthest thing from an oaf I could imagine. Alba, too, was intelligent and quick. “I wonder what the Kvys say of the Serafans.”

  Sianh shrugged. “It’s not my business what petty names rats have for the cats,” he said. “Come, now. Your glass is nearly empty.”

  “And ought to stay that way,” I replied.

  “If you wish.” Sianh sighed. “I know you have no reason to trust me or, truly, anyone else in this city.” He hesitated, and added, “Even your brother. If what I know of that particular history is correct—if he wished, truly, the death of those you knew personally? Of friends?”

  He didn’t know the half of why my trust in my brother was cracked and broken like so much fragile glass. “He did truly wish that. But he did not know their relationship to me, not with any real understanding.”

  “Even so. I know him now—he is a remorseful man. We have a word in Serafan, for one who has seen and done much he now wishes to undo and cannot. It means, roughly, a river turning against its own current.” Sianh met my eyes, demanding I do the same. “You needn’t trust me, but know that he is fighting, always, the current of his own history.”

  I nodded, slowly, wanting very badly to believe him. “And should I trust you?”

  “A trustworthy man need not be asked,” he said ruefully. “Here, a man who has seen and done what I have in the service cannot be trusted. He knows violence and it is part of him now. Part of the undercurrent that guides his life. He cannot resist it forever.”

  “That cannot be true,” I scoffed.

  “It may not be true that it is part of a man. But it is very true that Serafans see it as such.”

  “Rather hard on all of you who give them protection and serve their interests, if you return and aren’t trusted, isn’t it?”

  “Better to not return,” Sianh replied with a wry smile. “But you ask if I can be trusted. I can’t answer you. I am paid for an illusion of trust. Every day.”

  Sianh, for all his elegant speech, didn’t strike me as a clever, conniving sort. It could all have been an act, but the hesitation in his fingers as they traced his scar, the long-established ache in his voice as he described the current of a man’s history—I didn’t think that these could be counterfeited.

  The room was emptier than it had been when I had joined it. Couples and groups had retired to other rooms. The candles were burning low, and half the lamps had been extinguished.

  “If you are tired, we need not sit up any longer,” Sianh said gently.

  I drank the last of my wine. “I am very tired.”

  43

  WHEN I W
OKE I FELT AS THOUGH I HAD BEEN ASLEEP FOR DAYS, but the morning had only begun to press against the windows, painting strips of light across the bed. I blinked sleep from my eyes, and I found Sianh, standing next to the door.

  He shifted, and the early sunlight from the window glinted off something in his hand. A blade, thick and heavy. I stiffened.

  The bedclothes rustled lightly, and Sianh turned. He pressed a hand to his mouth, and then slowly, clearly, pointed to the door. He was not threatening me.

  Someone was outside.

  I forced my breath as quiet as possible, training my ears to the sounds outside of the room. The soft creaks and sighs of the breeze rearranging the branches of trees in the garden, a night bird of some sort speaking a low, mournful language to its partner. And then, as distinct as the report of a cannon in the silent house, a footfall in the corridor.

  I suppressed a shake. It could be anything, a patron of the Warren in search of some necessity or pleasure, a courtesan on official business for the Mistress. Sianh was merely taking precautions. Perhaps something of the military did flow through him, prompting action when others would roll over and go back to sleep.

  The footsteps resumed, slow and methodical, and I heard a creak like a door opening. Someone searching, I thought, and the way Sianh poised himself beside the door’s hinge, his hand confirming its purchase on the long knife in his hand, told me he discerned the same.

  My door inched open. A shaft of brighter light pierced the room, sunrise’s pink and gold. I didn’t move. I didn’t even make a sound, and neither did Sianh, but it was clear that whoever was searching had discovered what they were looking for. The door swung wide, and the figure in the fresh wash of light was tall, male, and armed with a slim blade.

  Sianh was on him in a moment, the gentle curve of his knife pressed firmly into the throat of our intruder. I tumbled off the bed, and before my feet hit the floor I recognized the figure.