The Robin And The Kestrel

She stared across the table at him. 'How?' she whispered, rather certain that she was not going to care for the answer.

She didn't.

'Burn it down,' he replied, succinctly, and a chill left her frozen in her place. 'An' thas' why I'm leavin', soon's I can. Tomorrow, mebbe next day, at th' latest. Out through the Back Door, what I tol' you about.'

The Back Door was a way out of the city via the sewers. Only the desperate took it, but it did avoid the Guards at the gates, who were stopping not only those going into Gradford, but those trying to leave. If things had gotten bad enough that Donnar was going to take the Back Door out, then they were bad indeed.

And the average citizen is probably pleased with all the new Constables to guard him and his property_so pleased, he doesn't realize he's been locked into a prison he can't escape.

She thanked him, in a daze, and went back out into the street. She still had a few errands to run; things to buy_

Like a couple of sets of lock picks. She hadn't wanted to bring any into the city; there was only so much she could fit into the hems of her clothing. But there was certainly a locksmith here in the Warren, and in the Warren, he wouldn't be selling just locks, he'd be selling the means to open them.

It took her a while to find the man she wanted, but for once in Gradford, her sex worked for her in convincing him that she was not an agent of the Guard or Constables. Apparently, no woman would ever be considered by Padrik's people for any important job.

The lock picks were expensive, but some of the finest she had ever seen_and if it turned out that they needed them, they would have been worth any price.

Those she hid under more prosaic purchases of food and drink_as she had expected, the food in the inn was dreadful, and the beer was worse, awful beer to start with, now gone flat and stale.

While she walked back to their inn, Donnar's last words kept coming back to haunt her. He was right. If Padrik didn't care about how much damage was wrought, or how many people died, that would be the easiest, perhaps the only way, to 'cleanse' the Warren. All he had to do would be to set Guards in the streets to arrest anyone boiling out of the district, then set fire to buildings in a ring around it. With real mages working with him, the fire could probably be confined to the Warren and perhaps a few buildings nearby.

Padrik could even have the fire set 'accidentally' and the Guards stationed there 'coincidentally.' Or, for that matter, he could have one of the mages create that Cathedral-tall angel, and this time, give it a sword of flame, and make it appear that the Sacrificed God Himself had set the blaze going.

And the average citizen would think him a hero, for clearing out all the 'criminals.' It won't occur to the people that the same weapon could be used to threaten his home, his family, if he ever opposes Padrik.

She shivered inside her shabby, warm coat. Padrik had already proved, many times over, that he cared for nothing except the path to power. She could only hope this scheme had not yet occurred to him; that he was whipping up a state of panic in the Warren by spreading rumors with no substance behind them.

And meanwhile, now that their best plan for uncovering the High Bishop's fraud had gone awry, she and Jonny would have to think of something else....

There had to be something, some solution. There was always something else that you could do.

Wasn't there?

In the next several days, they spent most of their time in their room, trying to think of that 'something else.' In the meantime, the rumors of the cleansing of the Warren had not yet come true_

But the Cathedral-tall angel put in his appearance, right on schedule.

Neither of them was there to see it, but while the vision had many people who had seen it speaking of it in awe, there were some who were just a trifle less than enthusiastic.

This was the first time that Robin had ever heard Padrik's devotees speak of him and his works with a little less than full enthusiasm and belief. Evidently Padrik had overstepped himself this time, for the angel only called to mind other illusions that these folk had seen, put on for the purposes of spectacle at festivals and other city-wide celebrations.

And when they were asked to describe what it had looked like, they told the tale in just those terms.