kicking his feet until he was standing in guard the way she wanted. They went through the same thing every day, practising simple blows, a cut or thrust, a parry and a riposte, the sort of thing he’d been doing with Master Sy for the last year. It was humiliating. Tasahre could have done it blindfold. Now and then she stopped and told Berren all the things he was doing wrong. Sometimes she’d stand right behind him, her legs pressed against his, chest against his back, hands on his wrists, pushing and moulding him into the stance she wanted. The sensation was odd and strangely intimate.
For those hours in the late afternoon they worked alone, Berren and Tasahre. The other monks paired up around them and simply pretended he didn’t exist. The elder dragon sometimes stopped to watch, but he was watching Tasahre, not Berren. He was watching how well she adjusted to the unwanted burden she’d been given. In the odd moment when he wasn’t busy resenting being taught by a girl his own age, he almost felt sorry for her, although he’d have felt a lot
For the last hour of the evening the monks all sat in a circle, taking it in turns to fight one another. Everyone fought everyone else, one bout only, and Berren was no exception. While the others fought with light padding and steel swords, Berren fought with his waster. Most of them simply batted him aside, clocked him on the head and withdrew before he even knew what was happening. One or two made a point of hitting him in a particularly exotic way, but after the first few days they grew tired of showing off and dispatched him with the same disdain as the others. Tasahre let him come to her and simply battered his attacks away without moving from where she stood until they both agreed he’d had enough. Still, he enjoyed watching the monks fight each other. He began to see who favoured what approach, which combinations, who was a sliver quicker and who was a fraction stronger. Tasahre, he saw, was usually beaten by most of the monks. Usually but not always.
At the end of each day he staggered back to the thief-taker’s house as the sun set. He chewed through whatever crusts of bread were left and drained the bowl of lukewarm gruel that the thief-taker had left for him, barely noticing what was in it, and then went to bed. Usually the thief-taker wasn’t there; even when he was, Berren was asleep before he could ask what Master Sy had been up to. He was exhausted, every single day. As he fell asleep, though, he found himself thinking of the scent garden over and over again, of the silhouette he’d seen clambering over the wall and of the strange black-powder smell the assassin had carried with him.
On Abyss-Day, the temple classes were closed, the monks spent their time at prayer and in meditation, and Berren finally got some rest. Abyss-Day was the day that thieves and snuffers claimed as their own. It was the day of delving into the deep, the day of blindness and ruin. No one did business on Abyss-Day; even most of the market and harbour traders stayed at home. It was the day of mischief and mayhem, before the light and truth that Sun- Day would bring; for Berren, though, Abyss-Day was the blessed relief of a lie-in in the morning, a few hours of dozing and stretching and moaning about how much all his muscles hurt, and then, when his stomach finally took charge, of eating. He eased himself down the rickety stairs and into the kitchen, lured by the smell of bread that wafted through the thief-taker’s house. There was fruit, too — Master Sy always liked his fruit if he could get anything fresh.
‘Morning, Berren.’ The thief-taker was sitting in a chair in his parlour, feet up on the table, massaging his knee.
‘Master.’ Berren helped himself to an entire loaf of bread. He sat down on the floor across the parlour and tore into it until his stomach stopped growling. Then he looked up and smiled brightly. ‘So?’
‘So?’ Master Sy smiled and shook his head. ‘So I’m fast losing my appetite for long stairways.’
‘I was thinking of that fellow on the roof with the bow. So is it right then? The man we’re looking for is in the Two Cranes?’
‘The man
‘And?’
‘Watching and waiting, lad.’ The thief-taker shook his head. ‘Watching and waiting.’ Which was the thief- taker’s way of saying he was up to
‘Was me that caught him,’ he muttered. ‘You remember that, master. When there’s more than watching and waiting to be done, I want to help.’
Master Sy smiled. ‘I’ll do that. For now you can help by keeping well out of the way. Not something to mess with, this one.’
‘I’m not a boy any more, master.’
‘Maybe not, Berren. When there’s more than watching and waiting to be done, you can be a part of it. But for now there isn’t, so you stick with your sword-monks. Was you that tipped him over the edge so we couldn’t ask him any questions, you just remember that too.’
Berren finished his loaf of bread and wandered back to the kitchen looking for more. He came back with a couple of apples. They were soft and mushy and not crunchy at all. He made a face.
‘Late harvest from up north.’ The thief-taker shrugged. ‘They’ve been kept half-frozen in an outhouse for the winter and then sat on a wagon for a week and a ship for another. They’re not exactly fresh, but then what do you expect for apples in spring? Was thinking of boiling them up and making a paste but I suppose I’ll not bother now.’ He watched as Berren devoured the apples, core and all, and then sat, looking around the room as if searching for more. ‘You’re not still hungry are you?’ He shook his head. ‘They not feed you at the temple?’
‘Not much, no.’
The thief-taker got up. He winced as he put weight on his knee. ‘Here, then.’ He threw his purse to Berren. ‘Go feed yourself. There’s not much in it. I’m off to bed. Up all night watching the Two Cranes. Don’t forget to go and get water.’
A squeak of protest got as far as Berren’s mouth. He swallowed it back down and looked into the purse instead. A handful of pennies and that was all, not even a single crown. And he’d been looking forward to spending the day with his master, wandering the city, telling him all about the monks in the temple and asking questions, lots and lots of questions.
‘Said there wasn’t much.’
‘Master?’
‘Lad?’
‘I was thinking …’ How to ask without sounding like an idiot?
‘Usually a good way to start that, yes.’
‘Well, as well as the man with the bow, I was thinking about the assassin who wanted to kill Prince Sharda.’
The thief-taker shook his head. ‘Drop it, lad. It’s not a place you want to go.’
‘But-!’
‘No, no.’ Master Sy waved his hands dismissively. ‘I know that look on your face. That’s the hunter’s eye, that is. You’ve got scent of something and now you want to track it down. You’re thinking we should go after whoever it was, right?’
‘Well …’
‘Thought so. The answer’s no, it’s a bad idea and we’re not going anywhere near it. Another time I might humour you for something to do, but I’ve got my business to attend to and you’re not to go near that one on your own.’
‘But-!’
Master Sy sat down again. ‘Think, lad! First thing, there’s no money in it. If you found out who it was, then what? Who’s going to pay you for that?’
‘The Justicar?’
The thief-taker roared with laughter. ‘Kol? Why? It’s thieves he’s after, anyone who pricks the skin of the merchant guilds enough for them to notice, that’s all. He’s theirs. The only time he’ll care about a murder is when it’s one of those fat pigs we saw in the Golden Cup.’ The thief-taker leaned towards Berren. ‘I’ll tell you who’d pay you for that: whoever did it. They’d pay you handsomely to keep you quiet and then they’d have you killed. What sort of person, do you think, tries to have an imperial prince murdered?’
Berren’s eyes lit up. ‘Someone in the temple! Everyone knows the priests there don’t like the Emperor and his house one little bit. And it was the night the sword-monks came. What if it was one of them?’
‘No!
