happen, don’t let it happen here where the whole damned city can watch. Long, fast strides, her thighs pulling against the fabric of her dress to gain every inch. She reached the mazework streets. She found an alleyway, followed its turns and windings to a shadowed corner, and squatted there on the filthy paving stones. She couldn’t stop the sobs now, so she pressed her arm against her mouth to keep them quiet.
She’d lost. All of her expectations, all of her plans, and she’d lost. They’d given her contract to someone else, and left her a stupid, ugly half-breed slut crying herself dry in an alley. How had she thought she could win? How could she ever have believed?
When the worst had passed, she stood again. She wiped the tears and snot on her sleeve, wiped the grime off her dress, and began the walk to her rooms. Humiliation rose on her shoulders and whispered in her ear. How much did Qahuar tell his partners? Did he brag about getting her legs apart? That old Cinnae mercenary had likely had every part of her flesh described to him before she’d walked into the room. Qahuar had known everything she’d done before she did it, planned it. Had his servants been warned not to interfere with her late-night invasion of his office? Had they been watching from the shadows, laughing at the idiot girl who thought herself clever?
At the bank, she heard the voices of the guards-Marcus and Yardem and the new Kurtadam woman-through the door, neither angry nor laughing. The tulips bobbed in the breeze, their petals broken and splayed, the red turning black at the base. She wanted to go in, but her hand would not reach for the latch. She stood for what seemed like hours, willing herself to go in to the nearest thing she had to friends or family or love. Her employees. She wanted Yardem Hane to come out and find her. For Cary to come walking down the street. For Opal to rise from her ocean grave and choke her to death where she stood.
Cithrin went upstairs. She stripped off her dress and sat on the bed in her shift. Her sweat wouldn’t dry, wouldn’t cool her.
She’d lost. Even now, it didn’t make sense. She couldn’t quite bring herself to believe it. She’d lost. The weeping was gone now. The pain was gone, though she had the sense that it was only resting, sleeping like a hunting cat after a kill. It would be back. For the moment, she felt nothing. She felt dead.
She’d lost. And the auditor was coming.
The sun traced its arc through the high air. Cithrin sat. The sounds of the street changed, the heat-dazed traffic of the day slowly giving way to the brighter, more energetic voices of evening. She needed to piss, but she put it off. Impossible to think there was any moisture left in her after soaking in sweat and tears. And still, her body performed its functions whether she approved or not. When the urging became too much to ignore, she found her night pot and used it. Once she was in motion, it was easier to move. She pulled off her shift, leaving it puddled on the floor, and found a light, embroidered dress, more attractive because it was already in her hands. She pulled it on, walked down the stairs and out into the street without bothering to lock the door behind her.
The taproom had all the shutters open, the sea breeze passing through it. No candles or lanterns were lit to keep even that slight additional heat away, so the rooms were dim despite the sunlight. The servant girl was one she recognized, thick-faced with night-black hair down to her shoulder blades. A tiny dog pranced nervously around the girl’s ankles. Cithrin walked toward the back table, her table. Someone was there, half hidden by the rough cloth.
Qahuar Em.
Cithrin forced herself to walk forward. She sat across from him. A loose shutter clapped against its frame twice and went quiet. The man’s expression was mild and rueful. A half-empty tankard of ale rested on the table.
“Good evening.”
She didn’t answer. He clicked his tongue against his teeth.
“I was hoping I might offer you a meal, a bottle of wine. An apology. It was unkind of the governor to bring you in that way.”
“I don’t want anything from you,” she said.
“Cithrin-”
“I don’t want sight or sound of you ever again for as long as I live,” she said, each word cool and sharp and deliberate. “And if you come near me, I will ask my captain of guard to kill you. And he’d do it.”
Qahuar’s expression hardened.
“I see. I admit I am disappointed, Magistra. I’d thought better of you.”
“ You’d thought better of me?”
“Yes. I hadn’t imagined you the sort of woman to throw tantrums. But clearly I’ve misjudged. I would remind you that you were the one who put yourself in my bed. You are the one who crept through my halls. It’s mean and small of you to blame me for anticipating it.”
You don’t know what this was, Cithrin thought. You don’t know what it meant for me. They’re going to take away my bank.
Qahuar stood and placed three small coins on the table to pay the taproom. The light caught the roughness of his bronze skin, making him look older. This summer was her eighteenth solstice. It was his thirty-fifth.
“We’re traders, Magistra,” he said. “I very much apologize that the delivery of the news was unpleasant, but I cannot be sorry that I can take this agreement to my clan elders. I hope you have a more pleasant evening.”
He pushed back the bench, wood rasping against the stone floor, and stepped around her.
“Qahuar,” she said sharply.
He paused. She gathered herself. The words were cast in lead, almost too heavy to pull up her throat.
“I’m sorry I betrayed you,” she said. “Tried to betray you.”
“Don’t be,” he said. “It’s the game we play.”
Some time later, the taproom’s servant came, took up the coins, and cleared away Qahuar Em’s drink. Cithrin looked up at her.
“Your usual?”
Cithrin shook her head. Everything from her throat down to her belly felt solid as stone. She lifted her hand, surprised to find her soft cap still there. She pulled it off, let down her hair, and held the silver-and-lapis pin up. It seemed almost to glow with its own light in the gloom. The servant girl blinked at it.
“That’s very beautiful,” she said.
“Take it,” Cithrin said. “Bring me what you think it’s worth.”
“Magistra?”
“Fortified wine. Farmer’s beer. I don’t care. Just bring it.”
Geder
The high priest-Basrahip or possibly the Basrahip, it was hard to tell-leaned back on his leather-and-iron stool. His thick, powerful fingers rubbed at his forehead. Around them, the candles flickered and hissed, their smoke filling the room with the smell of burning fat. Geder licked his lips.
“My first tutor was a Tralgu,” he said.
Basrahip pursed his lips, considered Geder, and shook his wide head. No. Geder swallowed his delight and tried again.
“I learned to swim at the seashore.”
The broad head shook slowly. No.
“I had a favorite dog when I was young. A hunting beast named Mo.”
The high priest’s smile was beatific. His teeth seemed almost unnaturally wide. He pointed a thick finger at Geder’s chest.
“Yes,” he said.
Geder clapped his hands and laughed. It wasn’t the first time the high priest had made the demonstration, but it was always a source of amazement. No matter what the lie, no matter what voice Geder told it in, how he held his body or changed the pitch of his voice, the huge man knew which words were false and which true. He never guessed incorrectly.
“And it’s really a goddess that lets you do this?” Geder said. “Because I never came across a reference to that. The Righteous Servant was supposed to have been something Morade created, like the thirteen races and the
