Tricksters Queen (21 page)

Passing the mages' workroom, she saw that the door was open. She looked inside. A footman who served in Kadyet House across the street was seated on a stool. His breeches were dusty, and he sported a swollen gash over one cheekbone. His shirt was off, revealing a spreading bruise over his ribs. Ochobu worked at the counter behind him, mashing herbs and oils in a mortar as silver wisps of her power rose from it.

"Bacar, what happened?" Aly asked, leaning against the doorframe, turning slightly so that her sarong hugged her curves. She knew this man well enough to flirt with him. "From the look of it, somebody doesn't like you."

He looked at her and winced, trying to cover his face with one hand and his ribs with another. "Bright Eyes, I hate your seeing me when I'm not at my best," he complained. "Couldn't you come back after Duani Ochobu here makes me presentable?"

Aly smiled. "Even bruised, you're a treat with your shirt off. So what happened?"

He let his hands drop into his lap. "I said the wrong thing to one of the King's Watch at the barricade to the slave docks. They burned, you know. The docks and fifteen ships. They might be able to repair the other two ships.
Might"

Aly widened her eyes. "Who would be mad enough to do such a thing?" she asked. Since they both knew the other worked for the rebellion in some form, he knew she was joking. "So what did you say to the Watchman?"

"The same thing you asked. What happened? For that I got a double kiss from those cursed clubs they carry, and the threat of Kanodang hospitality if I didn't carry my lazy rump elsewhere." He smiled, his eyes dreamy. "You should see it, Bright Eyes. All three docks and all those ships, burned right down to the waterline. Whoever did it was an artist." Quietly he added, "There's a fifty gold Ian reward for information leading to the capture of those who did it."

Ochobu turned with a handful of glop and motioned for Bacar to raise the arm on the side of his bruised ribs. Bacar did so, wincing. Ochobu spread the mixture on the man’s torso.

Aly whistled at the reward amount. It was more than any five families in all Middle Town made in a year. "They're dreadfully excited for just a loss of wood."

"Well, the ships' captains are screaming to be paid for their vessels, but that's not it." Bacar lowered his voice. "See, somehow the slaves in the market got wind of the fire. They rioted. Some made it out of Dockmarket before the collars choked them till the catchers found them. And they killed three guards, mauled five more. I got it from some lady friends who work near there." He and Aly smiled at one another. Both knew what kind of "lady friends" Bacar would have near the slave markets. If the information came from them, it was accurate.

"Anyway, the ladies patched me up enough so I could come back here without the Watch arresting me, and I knew my master would have plenty of questions if I came in all battered. Thank the gods for Ochobu here."

The mage spread more of her glop on Bacar's face. Ochobu said, "It'll fall off when it dries, and you'll be good as new. Go beg some food from Chenaol. It'll be dry by the time you're done eating."

Bacar hopped down from the stool. "Thanks, Duani Ochobu," he said. "You just saved me some unpleasantness with my lord Kadyet."

He advanced on Aly, the arm on his undamaged side snaking out for a grab. She let him get just close enough, then swung out of his reach. "Naughty," she teased. "Besides, Lady Dove tore out her hem and I have to mend it before the callers arrive today."

"But what about my being shirtless?" he asked, woebegone, as she sauntered down to her workroom.

Aly looked back over her shoulder at him. "I got an eyeful," she replied, and winked. Strolling into her office, she closed the door and went to her desk. As she'd expected, it was piled with slates and paper.

She picked up a report verifying that there had been a revolt in the slave pens, as Bacar had said. There was more, the writer being employed at the slave pens. The brokers had sent a hysterical delegation to the harbormaster, begging that they be granted ships to carry their current lot of slaves to Carthak. The harbormaster had said he would send the request on to the minister of trade.

Aly smiled, a very different smile from the one she had given Bacar.

During the afternoon rest, Aly took reports from anyone who came into the meeting room. Between guests, she read the information that was piled on her desk across the hall. She also consulted with Trick, who had news from the darkings. The one Aly had left in the shop of Dove's bookseller friend, Herbrand Edgecliff, revealed that the bookshop was a nest of raka sympathizers, including Herbrand himself, who never had fewer than three fugitives from Crown law in the shop's basement. Edgecliff and his wife, both pure-blood luarin, belonged to the raka conspiracy, which made Aly happy. Every instance that luarin could work with and help the raka was a brick in the wall between quiet coexistence and massacres. All of the darkings buzzed with word of people's reactions to the duke's arrest and the burning of the slave docks. So much of it was the same that Aly asked Trick to tell her only important things she hadn't heard yet.

There was no word from Tongkang or from Nawat. It was much too soon. Even flying, it would take time for him to reach the island and find the rebels. They wouldn't get reports from him for another day or so. Aly tried not to dwell on it. You told him you had to concentrate on the rebellion— well, concentrate on it, her reasonable self said.

The resting time was nearly gone when a recruit who worked for seamstresses in Middle Town came to the meeting room to speak with Aly. She was a slender young raka woman who wore a baby in a sling on her back as she carried a basketful of dye powders. "The cockerel crows at noon," she said, giving the code phrase for the tier of agents recruited by Aly’s pack.

"Then it's the cockerels time to be put in the pot." Aly gave her the counterphrase that meant the recruit could pass information to her safely. She hadn't seen this young woman before. It was possible she didn't even know who Aly was, except that she was in the right room, and she knew the right countersign.

"Late this morning, when the King's Watch came to arrest Duchess Nomru and her family, they were gone," the seamstress said. "There was no sign of them. The servants and slaves were gone, too, every last one. The Watch took what valuables were left, but the lady's jewels and the family coin were all missing."

"Is there anything else?" Aly inquired.

The seamstress nodded. "Five arrests, two of ‘em luarin accused of selling books on poisons and death magic to raka, one for taxes, one a printer who had funny pictures of the regents hid away to be placed about the city later, and one of the raka nobles, Meipun Kloulechat. No one knows why. The paper for his arrest has the black seal on it."

Aly knew what that meant: the noble had been arrested on a royal warrant obtained with information from Topabaw. Delivery of such a warrant gave the recipient a chance to kill himself honorably rather than suffer the humiliation of questioning and the execution that usually followed.

Maybe this will teach the raka nobles they might lose everything if they
don't
become involved, she thought. "Is that all?" she asked her informant.

The woman nodded and shifted the sleeping baby. "That I know of. But the city's crawling with King's Watch, all in a vicious mood, and the regents have ordered a company of the Rittevon Lancers to patrol Middle Town and Market Town. Stay out of their way if you see them. They like getting us to move with their riding crops."

Aly had noticed the red welt on the woman's arm. "Two doors on the other side of the hall from me, on your way back, is our mages' workroom," she said. "They'll give you something for that."

The informant shrugged. "I get worse if I fray the material I sew. May your troubles fly away on the wings of crows." She touched her fist to her forehead in a raka salute and left the room.

Aly sat back, considering what she had just learned. Nomru's family and household not only had knowledge of his arrest, but they'd managed to flee the city, or to hide within it in full daylight. They were connected in no way to the raka, so someone else had warned them. She suspected it was a noble who'd been present when the princess had called for Nomru to be locked up, which meant that the warning must have come from a luarin.

The city's bells rang out, signaling the end of the quiet time. Aly went to dress Dove for the afternoon.

Guests descended on Balitang House once again. There were more today, a number of young men and women and their parents. The heirs of three noble families made for Sarai, while their mothers draped themselves between Nuritin and Winnamine.

At first everyone gathered in the big sitting room or at the pool courtyard just outside. Despite the nobles' apparent quiet and lassitude, tension hummed in the air. Every time a young mans voice began to rise, a parent's fan opened with a loud snap of warning, and the errant son went quiet. The girls chattered a little too much, except for Sarai. She remained cool and gracious, as if a man they'd all thought untouchable were not in prison. She had to know as well as anyone that Nomru had helped her mother to resist Imajane's request that Sarai and Elsren move to the palace, but she acted no differently than usual.

Not long after Winnamine's father, Matfrid Fonfala, arrived, the duchess stood. "My friends, I believe the Teak Sitting Room may be somewhat cooler. I am sure our young people would prefer that we were elsewhere. I should think their attendants would be chaperons enough, wouldn't you?"

Idly, as if only the promise of a breeze tempted them, the older members of the gathering followed the duchess. Aly watched as they left. She was fairly certain those people were the core of the luarin conspiracy. In any case, she would soon know for certain, because the darking Feather occupied the Teak Sitting Room.

Aly had expected Dove to follow the older nobles, but she didn't. Instead she talked with Zaimid, who, with a kind man's sharp eye, had noted she sat alone while Sarai's friends jockeyed around her. Once again Aly added a point to the Carthaki healer's score. Zaimid and Dove were soon so deep in a discussion of the emperor's creation of charity hospitals that Aly would have bet that Dove noticed nothing else. She would have lost. When the footman announced Imgehai Qeshi, a priestess of the Black God who served at the city's biggest temple, Dove politely broke off her conversation to introduce her to Zaimid. The priestess wore her habit, but her hood was off, indicating she was not there on spiritual business. After she, Zaimid, and Dove had chatted for a few moments, Dove excused herself and the newcomer to Zaimid and led the priestess away. Aly watched Zaimid’s gaze follow them, his brown eyes alert and interested. Then he managed to step out into the pool courtyard in time to be at Sarai’s side as she left the sitting room for the garden.

A moment later Trick murmured in Aly's ear, "Feather say Dove and Imgehai have come." Aly twiddled her thumbs. The priestess stood high in the temple hierarchy. She would be a powerful ally.

It was funny. Old King Oron had banished the Balitangs on suspicion of treason. Everyone had thought it was one of his mad ideas. It seemed he'd been right all along. Still, he had to have been mad to consider their group a threat, thought Aly. Obviously they've been talking about this for a while, and they haven't done anything. That will have to change, she decided. If they're to be of any use at all, they'll have to stop talking and start doing.

Ferdy Tomang's raised voice caught her attention. "...can't forget who guards their backs!" A number of his friends begged him to lower his voice.

"Don't worry," Sarai told them airily. "There are so many secrecy spells around this place you could start a war in here and the Crown mages would never know."

Aly winced. Apparently it had not occurred to Sarai that secrecy spells were best left secret. If Topabaw had any spies among her friends, he would know by sunset that the place was more than usually well guarded. She reminded herself to warn Ochobu and Ysul and thanked the gods that Sarai did not know about the plans made on her behalf. And Aly was forced to think her more than a little foolish for speaking as she had. Anyone with any sense of self-preservation in the Isles knew better than to speak so carelessly about the Crown unless that person was
very
sure of the listener's loyalty.

Ferdy lowered his voice, but only slightly. "It's time we taught them a lesson," he said, looking at the young noblemen who stood around him. "I say we wait until tonight and ride to Kanodang. Everyone knows that if you spend enough in bribes you can get inside."

"We can break out Nomru." Druce Adona's cheeks were flushed.

Another young man added, "Show the regents they are nothing without the luarin nobility."

"Teach them a lesson," said another. "And if we have to fight our way out, we will." He set his hand on his sword hilt.

Idiots, thought Aly as she listened to them rant, working themselves into a state of fury. These men were filled with youth's righteous anger, ready to start killing anyone in their path. Only Zaimid said nothing, but stood there, arms crossed over his chest, with the courtier's expression of polite interest. The young noblewomen's faces were a study in contrasts, from those who showed fear to those filled with the men's enthusiasm.

At first Sarai showed polite interest, her expression like Zaimid's. She nodded when comments were addressed to her, smiled when anyone looked at her. Then, as the men began to discuss meeting places and who else they might recruit, a new look crossed her face, one that was half slyness and half contempt. It was replaced by lowered eyelashes, a subtle step on the back hem of her cream-colored gown so that it pulled tight to emphasize her figure, and a pouting lower lip.

"That's all very well and good," she murmured. "But I think it's very silly, and useless, and tiresome."

"But we're standing up for one of our own!" protested Ferdy. "He's a luarin, a noble! They can't treat us this way!"