was peaceful.
“She takes a little broth,” Eirual told him.
Seregil took the bowl and spoon from the night table and trickled a few drops of cold broth between Myrhichia’s lips. After a moment she swallowed reflexively, but there was no other sign of life beyond the slight rise and fall of her chest.
Impotent rage rose in Seregil’s heart but he was careful not to show it.
“Can you stay until morning?” Eirual whispered.
“Of course. Come, lie down and try to sleep, love.”
Seregil settled Eirual in bed beside Myrhichia, then stretched out beside her, nodding for Alec to lie beside Myrhichia on the other side, as if surrounding the girl with their shared warmth and hope would be enough to save her. They lay like that all night, Alec and Eirual holding Myrhichia, and Seregil holding Eirual. Alec drifted off, but Seregil remained awake, watching the waxing moon sail past the window and the stars follow. The fifth day would soon dawn.
Brader waited until the others had gone up to bed, then cornered Atre in the front room.
“Have you gone completely mad?” he whispered, furious. “A noble here and there, the old ones, drew no attention, but for the love of Soru,
“What makes you think it was me?” Atre protested.
“Of course it was you. You think I don’t know the signs by now? Important people dropping dead for no reason, and you looking like you do? Even Merina is taking notice. She may not know what it all means, but it’s not like she hasn’t seen it before.”
“First of all, I didn’t kill Alarhichia. That was probably someone from Kyrin’s group, or natural. As for the others? I’m sure the two cabals are convinced they’re killing each other out of revenge.”
Brader took a steadying breath, resisting the urge to pummel his cousin. “Each side knows whether
“Relax, Brader. No one suspects us. This city is too huge to notice what we’re up to. That’s the beauty of it! The vicegerent will quarantine another area of the sleeping death, and the cabals will kill each other off faster than I can. There’s nothing to worry about.”
“I’ve heard that before.”
Atre smiled. “Trust me.”
CHAPTER 32. Stealth and Stones
IT was drizzling when Seregil and Alec entered the Ring again that morning, dressed this time as dirty beggar women. Swords weren’t part of the disguise, but they had knives hidden under their ragged cloaks. Both wore large faded kerchiefs that covered their hair and partially obscured their faces.
It wasn’t Alec’s favorite form of disguise; he felt uneasy with his legs hampered by long skirts, and although Seregil had gone to great pains to teach him how to make his voice lighter and more feminine, Alec always felt a bit silly speaking that way. For this job, however, even he had to admit it was a good choice. They attracted much less attention than they had yesterday.
“Let’s see if we can avoid any more fights,” Seregil murmured, keeping a sharp eye out for danger as they wended their way into a section of the slum they hadn’t been in before.
They did manage to stay out of trouble, but had little luck until it was nearly dark. They were on their way back to the gate, not wanting to get caught here after dark, when Seregil glanced down a side path and saw a stoop- shouldered, bowlegged old man speaking with a young boy and holding something out to him. The man must have been tall in his day, and had a head of wild grey hair that hung to his shoulders, a bulbous nose, and a patch over one eye. His unruly grey beard was stained with something dark at the corners of his mouth.
Seregil caught Alec by the arm and nodded in their direction, whispering, “The one-eyed old man.”
As they watched, the boy took whatever it was and handed the old fellow something back. The man patted him on the head, then stumped away deeper into the shantytown.
“There’s a bit of luck!” Seregil exclaimed softly.
“He doesn’t have anything hanging from his belt.”
“But he made a trade, all the same. You take the boy. I’ll see where the old fellow is headed. If you don’t catch up, I’ll meet you by the fountain in the Sea Market in an hour’s time.”
Leaving Alec to his work, Seregil set off after the old man.
The boy was walking away, looking at something in his hand.
Alec sidled up behind him. “What you got there?” he asked, doing his best to speak with a woman’s voice.
The child whirled around and drew a short dagger. He had a thin, ugly face and a wen on his cheek the size of a sparrow’s egg. “What’s that to you?”
Alec held up his hands, showing that he meant no harm. “Nothin’, except I been looking for one of those raven people and I thought that might have been one you was talkin’ to.”
The boy regarded him shrewdly for a moment, still wary, then said, “What do you want with ’em?”
“I hear they make trades. I was lookin’ to make one myself, maybe. So, was that old man one of ’em?”
The boy’s mouth slanted in a taunting grin. “What’s it worth to you to know?”
Alec pretended to hesitate, then turned away and fished a couple of copper pennies from the small pouch around his neck under his tattered gown. “Will that do?”
“Yeah, he was raven folk,” the boy said as he reached to snatch the coins from Alec’s outstretched hand.
But Alec held them back. “For this, I ’spect more of an answer than that. What’d you two trade?”
The boy opened his left hand and showed Alec a yellow rock crystal. “I give him my hog tooth necklace. Easy enough to come by another. Ain’t seen nothing like this, though.”
“That is fine,” Alec replied. It was a pretty thing, and a far cry from anything the boy was likely to find here. But it was a far cry from a sweetmeat, too.
“Sell it to you.” The boy jutted his chin at the coins Alec still held.
Alec pretended to consider it, then nodded and took out two more coins. The boy tossed him the stone, and Alec handed over the price.
“We finished?” asked the boy, still gripping his knife. “I got nothin’ more to trade or sell.”
“That’s fine.” Tucking the stone away, Alec turned to take his leave, but alert to any sound of the boy coming to knife him. Glancing back, though, he was already gone.
Seregil kept his distance, blending in with the crowd of destitute and cutthroats coming out like bats as the light failed. He dogged the one-eyed man, hoping to see him do another trade, but the old codger seemed to have somewhere to go, for he went on without pausing anywhere, head down and limping a bit. Dressed no better or worse than those around him, he attracted no one else’s attention, and no one greeted him.
It took him a moment to notice the tall, dark-haired man trailing the old one. At first he thought it might be coincidence, but when the old man turned, so did the big man. Seregil frowned; the last thing he needed was for the old man to get murdered in front of him before he could talk to him.
Drifting along behind them, Seregil caught glimpses of the old man’s face when he turned down a byway, and then another. Though the bowed legs could have made him a horseman, a cripple, or just undernourished, he had the rolling gait of a sailor. Perhaps the raven folk did come from somewhere else, by ship, or from a seafaring people.
The taller man’s face was hidden by his cloak hood but Seregil guessed from his stride and those broad shoulders that he was more than a match for the old fellow, and could easily have overtaken him by now, if he’d wanted to. Perhaps Tall Fellow expected Old Fellow to lead him
somewhere? If so, Seregil suspected it might be of interest to him, as well.
Having to keep out of Tall Fellow’s way made Seregil hang back more than he liked, and he nearly lost them both when the old man turned aside and headed deeper into the shack town through a wide place in the path. There were more people here, bargaining with the sellers of bruised vegetables and questionable meat. Seregil had to look over heads and past shoulders to keep them in sight.
And then Old Fellow was gone, along with his tall shadow.
