by Paula Guran
It opened. Sophonisba’s painted face stared down at her; a torrent of abuse poured sewer-fashion from the dewy lips, and Jensy’s dirty-scarfed head bobbed up from below the whore’s ample bosom.
“Come on,” Gillian said, and Jensy scrambled, grimaced in pain, for Sophonisba had her by the hair.
“My cut,” Sophonisba said.
Gillian swallowed air, her ears alert for pursuit. She fished the two coppers from her purse, and Sophonisba spat on them. Heat flushed Gillian’s face; the next thing in her hand was her razor.
Sophonisba paled and sniffed. “I know you got better, slink. The whole street’s roused. Should I take such risks? If someone comes asking here, should I say lies?”
Trembling, blind with rage, Gillian took back the coppers. She brought out the purse, spilled the contents: lead cylinder, parchment, three coins. “Here. See? Trouble, trouble and no lot of money.”
Sophonisba snatched at the coins. Gillian’s deft fingers saved two, and the other things, which Sophonisba made no move at all to seize.
“Take your trouble,” Sophonisba said. “And your brat. And keep away from here.”
Jensy scrambled out over the sill, hit the alley cobbles on tier slippered feet. Gillian did not stay to threaten. Sophonisba knew her—knew better than to spill to king’s-men . . . or to leave Jensy on the street. Gillian clutched her sister’s hand and pulled her along at a rate a twelve-year-old’s strides could hardly match.
They walked, finally, in the dark of the blackest alleys and, warily, into the Sink itself. Gillian led the way to Threepenny Bridge and so to Rat’s Alley and the Bowel. They were not alone, but the shadows inspected them cautiously: the trouble that lurked here was accustomed to pull its victims into the warren, not to find them there; and one time that lurkers did come too close, she and Jensy played dodge in the alley. “Cheap flash,” she spat, and: “Bit’s Isle,” marking herself of a rougher brotherhood than theirs. They were alone after.
After the Bowel came the Isle itself, and the deepest part of the Sink. There was a door in the alley called Blindman’s, where Genat had sat till someone knifed him, She dodged to it with Jensy in tow, this stout door inconspicuous among others, and pushed it open
It let them in under Jochen’s stairs, in the wine-smelling backside of the Rose. Gillian caught her breath then and pulled Jensy close within the shadows of the small understairs pantry. “Get Jochen,” she bade Jensy then. Jensy skulked out into the hall and took off her scarf, stuffed that in her skirts and passed out of sight around the corner of the door and into the roister of the tavern.
In a little time she was back with fat Jochen in her wake, and Jochen mightily scowling.
“You’re in trouble?” Jochen said. “Get out if you are.”
“Want you to keep Jensy for me.”
“Pay,” Jochen said. “You got it?”
“How much?”
“How bad the trouble?”
“For her, none at all. Just keep her.” Gillian turned her back—prudence, not modesty—to fish up the silver from her blouse, not revealing the purse. She held up one coin. “Two days’ board and close room.”
“You are in trouble.”
“I want Nessim. Is he here?”
He always was by dark. Jochen snorted. “A cut of what’s going.”
“A cut if there’s profit; a clear name if there’s not; get Nessim.”
Jochen went. “I don’t want to be left,” Jensy started to say, but Gillian rapped her ear and scowled so that Jensy swallowed it and looked frightened. Finally a muddled old man came muttering their way and Gillian snagged his sleeve. The reek of wine was strong; it was perpetual about Nessim Hath, excommunicate priest and minor dabbler in magics. He read, when he was sober enough to see the letters; that and occasionally effective magics—wards against rats, for one—made him a livelihood and kept his throat uncut.
“Upstairs,” Gillian said, guiding sot and child up the well-worn boards to the loft and the private cells at the alleyside wall. Jensy snatched the taper at the head of the stairs and they went into that room, which had a window.
Nessim tottered to the cot and sat down while Jensy lit the stub of a candle. Gillian fished out her coppers, held them before Nessim’s red-rimmed eyes and pressed them into the old priest’s shaking hand.
“Read something?” Nessim asked.
Gillian pulled out the purse and knelt by the bedside while Jensy prudently closed the door. She produced the leaden cylinder and the parchment. “Old man,” she said, “tell me what I’ve got here.”
He gathered up the cylinder and brought his eyes closely to focus on it, frowning. His mouth trembled as did his hands, and he thrust it back at her. “I don’t know this seal. Lose this thing in the canal. Be rid of it.”
“You know it, old man.”
“I don’t.” She did not take it from him, and he held it, trembling. “A false seal, a mask seal. Some thing some would know—and not outsiders. It’s no good, Gillian.”
“And if some would hunt a thief for it? It’s good to someone.” Nessim stared at her. She valued Nessim, gave him coppers when he was on one of his lower periods: he drank the money and was grateful. She cultivated him, one gentle rogue among the ungentle, who would not have failed at priesthood and at magics if he did not drink and love comforts; now he simply had the drink.
“Run,” he said. “Get out of Korianth. Tonight.”
“Penniless? This should be worth something, old man.”
“Powerful men would use such a seal to mask what they do, who they are. Games of more than small stakes.”
Gillian swallowed heavily. “You’ve played with seals before, old man; read me the parchment.”
He took it in hand, laid the leaden cylinder in his lap, turned the parchment to all sides. Long and long he stared at it, finally opened his purse with much trembling of his hands, took out a tiny knife and cut the red threads wrapped round, pulled them from the wax and loosed it carefully with the blade.
“Huh,” Jensy pouted. “Anyone could cut it.” Gillian rapped her ear gently as Nessim canted the tiny parchment to the scant light. His lips mumbled, steadied, a thin line. When he opened his mouth they trembled again, and very carefully he drew out more red thread from his pouch, red wax such as scribes used. Gillian held her peace and kept Jensy’s, not to disturb him in the ticklish process that saw new cords seated, the seal prepared—he motioned for the candle and she held it herself while he heated and replaced the seal most gingerly.
“No magics,” he said then, handing it back. “No magics of mine near this thing. Or the other. Take them. Throw them both in the River.”
“Answers, old man.”
“Triptis. Promising—without naming names—twenty thousand in gold to the shrine of Triptis.”
Gillian wrinkled her nose and took back parchment and cylinder. “Abhizite god,” she said. “A dark one.” The sum ran cold fingers over her skin. “Twenty thousand. That’s—gold—twenty thousand. How much do rich men have to spend on temples, old thief?”
“Rich men’s lives are bought for less.”
The fingers went cold about the lead. Gillian swallowed, wishing Jensy had stayed downstairs in the pantry. She held up the lead cylinder. “Can you breach that seal, old man?”
“Wouldn’t.”
“You tell me why.”
“It’s more than a lead seal on that. Adepts more than the likes of me; I know my level, woman; I know what not to touch, and you can take my advice. Get out of here. You’ve stolen something you can’t trade in. They don’t need to see you, do you understand me? This thing can be traced.”
The hairs stirred to her nape. She sat staring at him. “Then throwing it in the river won’t do it, either.”
“They might give up then. Might. Gillian, you’ve put your head in the jaws this time.”
“Rich men’s lives,” she muttered, clutching the objects in her hand. She slid them back into the purse and thrust it within her blouse. “I�
��ll get rid of it. I’ll find some way. I’ve paid Jochen to keep Jensy. See he does, or sour his beer.”
“Gillian—”
“You don’t want to know,” she said. “I don’t want either of you to know.” There was the window, the slanting ledge outside; she hugged Jensy, and old Nessim, and used it.
3
Alone, she traveled quickly, by warehouse roofs for the first part of her journey, where the riggings and masts of dockside webbed the night sky, by remembered ways across the canal. One monstrous old warehouse squatted athwart the canal like a misshapen dowager, a convenient crossing that avoided the bridges. Skirts hampered; she whipped off the wrap, leaving the knee breeches and woolen hose she wore beneath, the skirt rolled and bound to her waist with her belt. She had her dagger, her razor and the cant to mark her as trouble for ruffians—a lie: the nebulous brotherhood would hardly back her now, in her trouble. They disliked long looks from moneyed men, hired bullies and noise on dockside. If the noise continued about her, she might foreseeably meet with accident, to be found floating in a canal—to quiet the uproar and stop further attentions.
But such as she met did not know it and kept from her path or, sauntering and mocking, still shied from brotherhood cant. Some passwords were a cut throat to use without approval, and thieves out of the Sink taught interlopers bitter lessons.
She paused to rest at the Serpentine of midtown, crouched in the shadows, sweating and hard-breathing, dizzy with want of sleep and food. Her belly had passed the point of hurting. She thought of a side excursion—a bakery’s back door, perhaps—but she did not dare the possible hue and cry added to what notoriety she already had. She gathered what strength she had and set out a second time, the way that led to the tinsel shrine and one house that would see its busiest hours in the dark.
Throw it in the canal: she dared not. Once it was gone from her, she had no more bargains left, nothing. As it was she had a secret valuable and fearful to someone. There comes a time, Genat had told her often enough, when chances have to be taken—and taken wide. It was not Sophonisba’s way.
Panting, she reached the red window, rapped at it; there was dim light inside and long delay—a male voice, a curse, some drunken converse. Gillian leaned against the wall outside and slowed her breathing, wishing by all the gods of Korianth (save one) that Sophonisba would make some haste. She rapped again finally, heart racing as her rashness raised a complaint within—male voice again. She pressed herself to the wall, heard the drunken voice diminish—Sophonisba’s now, shrill, bidding someone out. A door opened and closed.
In a moment steps crossed the room and the shutter opened. Gillian showed herself cautiously, stared up into Sophonisba’s white face. “Come on out here,” Gillian said.
“Get out of here,” Sophonisba hissed, with fear stark in her eyes. “Out, or I call the watch. There’s money looking for you.”
She would have closed the shutters, but Gillian had both hands on the ledge and vaulted up to perch on it; Gillian snatched and caught a loose handful of Sophonisba’s unlaced shift. “Don’t do that, Sophie. If you bring the watch, we’ll both be sorry. You know me. I’ve got something I’ve got to get rid of. Get dressed.”
“And lose a night’s—”
“Yes. Lose your nose if you don’t hurry about it.” She brought out the razor, that small and wicked knife of which Sophonisba was most afraid. She sat polishing it on her knee while Sophonisba sorted into a flurry of skirts. Sophonisba paused once to look; she let the light catch the knife and Sophonisba made greater haste. “Fix your hair,” Gillian said.
“Someone’s going to come back here to check on me if I don’t take my last fee front—”
“Then fix it on the way.” Steps were headed toward the door. “Haste! Or there’ll be bloodletting.”
“Get down,” Sophonisba groaned. “I’ll get rid of her.” Gillian slipped within the room and closed the shutters, stood in the dark against the wall while Sophonisba cracked the door and handed the fee out, heard a gutter dialogue and Sophonisba pleading indisposition. She handed out more money finally, as if she were parting with her life’s blood, and closed the door. She looked about with a pained expression. “You owe me, you owe me—”
“I’m carrying something dangerous,” Gillian said.
“It’s being tracked, do you understand? Nessim doesn’t like the smell of it.”
“O gods.”
“Just so. It’s trouble, old friend. Priest trouble.”
“Then take it to priests.”
“Priests expect donations. I’ve the scent of gold, dear friend. It’s rich men pass such things back and forth, about things they don’t want authority to know about.”
“Then throw it in a canal.”
“Nessim’s advice. But it doesn’t take the smell off my hands or answer questions when the trackers catch me up—or you, now, old friend.”
“What do you want?” Sophonisba moaned. “Gillian, please—”
“Do you know,” she said softly, reasonably, “if we take this thing—we, dear friend—to the wrong party, to someone who isn’t disposed to reward us, or someone who isn’t powerful enough to protect us so effortlessly that protection costs him nothing—who would spend effort protecting a whore and a thief, eh, Sophie? But some there are in this city who shed gold like gods shed hair, whose neighborhoods are so well protected others hesitate to meddle in them. Men of birth, Sophie. Men who might like to know who’s paying vast sums of gold for favors in this city.”
“Don’t tell me these things.”
“I’ll warrant a whore hears a lot of things, Sophie. I’ll warrant a whore knows a lot of ways and doors and windows in Korianth, who’s where, who has secrets—”
“A whore is told a lot of lies. I can’t help you.”
“But you can, pretty Sophonisba.” She held up the razor. “I daresay you know names and such—even in the king’s own hall.”
“No!”
“But the king’s mad, they say; and who knows what a madman might do? What other names do you know?”
“I don’t know anyone, I swear I don’t.”
“Don’t swear; we’ve gods enough here. We improvise, then, you and I.” She flung the shutter open. “Out, out with you.”
Sophonisba was not adept at ledges. She settled herself on it and hesitated. Gillian thought of pushing her; then, fearing noise, took her hands and lei her down gently, followed after with a soft thud. Sophonisba stood shivering and tying her laces, the latter unsuccessfully.
“Come on,” Gillian said.
“I don’t walk the alleys,” Sophonisba protested in dread; Gillian pulled her along nonetheless, the back ways of the Grand Serpentine.
They met trouble. It was inevitable. More than once gangs of youths spotted Sophonisba, like dogs a stray cat, and came too close for comfort. Once the cant was not password enough, and they wanted more proof: Gillian showed that she carried, knife-carved in her shoulder, the brotherhood’s initiation, and drunk as they were, they had sense to give way for that. It ruffled her pride. She jerked Sophonisba along and said nothing, seething with anger and reckoning she should have cut one. She could have done it and gotten away; but not with Sophonisba.
Sophonisba snuffled quietly, her hand cold as ice.
They took to the main canalside at last, when they must, which was at this hour decently deserted. It was not a place Gillian had been often; she found her way mostly by sense, knowing where the tall, domed buildings should lie. She had seen them most days of her life from the rooftops of the Sink.
The palaces of the great of Korianth were walled, with gardens, and men to watch them. She saw seals now and then that she knew, mythic beasts and demon beasts snarling from the arches over such places.
But one palace there was on the leftside hill, opposed to the great gold dome of the King’s Palace, a lonely abode well walled and guarded.
There were guards, gilt-armed guards, with plumes and cloaks and more flash tha
n ever the rufflers of midtown dared sport. Gillian grinned to herself and felt Sophonisba’s hand in hers cold and limp from dread of such a place.
She marked with her eye where the guards stood, how they came and went and where the walls and accesses lay, where trees and bushes topped the walls inside and how the wall went to the very edge of the white marble building. The place was defended against armed men, against that sort of threat; against—the thought cooled her grin and her enthusiasm—guilded Assassins and free-lancers; a prince must worry for such things.
No. It was far from easy as it looked. Those easy ways could be set with traps; those places too unguarded could become deadly. She looked for the ways less easy, traced again that too-close wall.
“Walk down the street,” she told Sophonisba. “Now. Just walk down the street.”
“You’re mad.”
“Go.”
Sophonisba started off, pale figure in blue silks, a disheveled and unlaced figure of ample curves and confused mien. She walked quickly as her fear would urge her, beyond the corner and before the eyes of the guards at the gate.
Gillian stayed long enough to see the sentries’ attention wander, then pelted to the wall and carefully, with delicate fingers and the balance Genat had taught, spidered her way up the brickwork.
Dogs barked the moment she flung an arm over. She cursed, ran the crest of the thin wall like a trained ape, made the building itself and crept along the masonry—too much of ornament, my lord!—as far as the upper terrace.
Over the rim and onto solid ground, panting. Whatever had become of Sophonisba, she had served her purpose.
Gillian darted for a further terrace. Doors at the far end swung open suddenly; guards ran out in consternation. Gillian grinned at them, arms wide, like a player asking tribute; bowed. They were not amused, thinking of their hides, surely. She looked up at a ring of pikes, cocked her head to one side and drew a conscious deep breath, making obvious what they should see; that it was no male intruder they had caught.
“Courier,” she said, “for Prince Osric.”
4
He was not, either, amused.
