by Morgan Rice
She burst into the courtyard, and her heart fell to see her sister being pinned down by two boys while another fumbled with her dress.
Kate knew exactly what to do.
A primal rage overcame her, one she could not control if she wished, and Kate rushed forward with a roar, swinging the poker at the first boy’s head. He turned as Kate struck, so it didn’t hit him as well as she wanted, but it was still enough to send him sprawling, clutching at the spot she’d hit.
She lashed out at another, catching him across the knee as he stood, making him tumble. She struck the third in the stomach, until he keeled over.
She kept hitting, not wanting to give the boys any time to recover. She’d been in plenty of fights in her years at the orphanage, and she knew that she couldn’t rely on size or strength. Fury was the only thing she had to carry her through. And thankfully, Kate had plenty of that.
She struck and she struck, until the boys fell back. They might have been prepared to join the army, but the Masked Brothers on their side didn’t teach them to fight. That would have made them too hard to control. Kate struck one of the boys in the face, then spun back to hit another’s elbow with a crack of iron on bone.
“Stand up,” she said to her sister, holding out her hand. “Stand up!”
Her sister stood numbly, taking Kate’s hand as though she were the younger sister for once.
Kate set off running, and her sister ran with her. Sophia appeared to come back to herself as they ran, some of the old certainty seeming to return as they raced along the corridors of the orphanage.
Behind them, Kate could hear shouting, from boys or sisters or both. She didn’t care. She knew there was no way but out.
“We can’t go back,” Sophia said. “We have to leave the orphanage.”
Kate nodded. Something like this wouldn’t earn just a beating as punishment. But then Kate remembered.
“Then we go,” Kate replied, running. “First I just need to—”
“No,” Sophia said. “There’s no time. Leave everything. We need to go.”
Kate shook her head. There were some things she couldn’t leave behind.
So instead, she raced in the direction of her dormitory, keeping hold of Sophia’s arm so that she would follow.
The dormitory was a bleak place, with beds that were little more than wooden slats sticking out from the wall like shelves. Kate wasn’t stupid enough to put anything that mattered in the small chest at the foot of her bed, where anyone could steal it. Instead, she went to a crack between two floorboards, worrying at it with her fingers until one lifted.
“Kate,” Sophia huffed and puffed, catching her breath, “there’s no time.”
Kate shook her head.
“I won’t leave it behind.”
Sophia had to know what she’d come for; the one memento she had from that night, from their old life.
Finally, Kate’s finger’s fastened around metal, and she lifted the locket clear to shine in the dim light.
When she was a child, she’d been sure that it was real gold; a fortune waiting to be spent. As she’d gotten older, she’d come to see that it was some cheaper alloy, but by then, it had come to be worth far more than gold to her anyway. The miniature inside, of a woman smiling while a man had his hand on her shoulder, was the closest thing to a memory of her parents she had.
Kate normally didn’t wear it for fear that one of the other children, or the nuns, would take it from her. Now, she tucked it inside her dress.
“Let’s go,” she said.
They ran for the door to the orphanage, supposedly always open because the Masked Goddess had found doors closed to her when she visited the world and had condemned those within. Kate and Sophia ran down the twists and turns of the corridors, coming out to the hallway, looking around for any pursuers.
Kate could hear them, but right then, there was only the usual sister beside the door: a fat woman who moved to block the way even as the two of them approached. Kate flushed red as she immediately recalled all the years of beatings she’d taken by her hands.
“There you are,” she said in a stern tone. “You’ve both been very disobedient, and—”
Kate didn’t pause; she hit her in the stomach with the poker, hard enough to double her up. Right then, she wished it were one of the elegant swords that courtiers wore, or maybe an axe. As it was, she had to settle for merely stunning the woman long enough for her and Sophia to run past.
But then, as Kate passed through the doors, she stopped.
“Kate!” Sophia yelled, panic in her voice. “Let’s go! What are you doing?!”
But Kate couldn’t control it. Even with the shouts of those in hot pursuit. Even knowing it was risking both of their freedom.
She took two steps forward, raised the poker high, and smashed the nun again and again across her back.
The nun grunted and cried with each blow, and each sound was music to Kate’s ears.
“Kate!” Sophia pleaded, on the verge of tears.
Kate stared at the nun for a long time, too long, needing to ingrain that picture of vengeance, of justice, into her mind. It would sustain her, she knew, for whatever horrific beatings might follow.
Then she turned and burst out with her sister from the House of the Unclaimed, like two fugitives from a sinking ship. The stink and noise and bustle of the city hit Kate, but this time she didn’t slow.
She held her sister’s hand and ran.
And ran.
And ran.
And despite it all, she took a deep breath and smiled wide.
However short it might be, they had found freedom.
CHAPTER TWO
Sophia had never been so afraid, but at the same time, she had never felt so alive, or so free. As she ran through the city with her sister, she heard Kate whoop with the excitement of it, and it both set her at ease and terrified her. It made this too real. Their life would never be the same again.
“Quiet,” Sophia insisted. “You’ll bring them down on us.”
“They’re coming anyway,” her sister replied. “We might as well enjoy it.”
As if to emphasize the point, she dodged around a horse, snatched an apple from a cart, and ran across Ashton’s cobbles.
The city was bustling with the market that came to it every Sixthday, and Sophia looked around, startled at all the sights and sounds and smells. If it weren’t for the market, she’d have no idea what day it was. In the House of the Unclaimed, those things didn’t matter, only the endless cycles of prayer and work, punishment and rote learning.
Run faster, her sister sent.
The sound of whistles and cries somewhere behind them spurred her on to new speed. Sophia led the way down an alley, then struggled to follow as Kate scrambled over a wall. Her sister, for all her impetuosity, was too quick, like a solid, coiled muscle waiting to spring.
Sophia barely managed to clamber over as more whistles sounded, and as she neared the top, Kate’s strong hand was waiting for her, as always. Even in this, she realized, they were so different: Kate’s hand was rough, calloused, muscular, while Sophia’s fingers were long and smooth and delicate.
Two sides of the same coin, their mother used to say.
“They’ve summoned the watchmen,” Kate called out in disbelief, as if that somehow wasn’t playing fair.
“What did you expect?” Sophia replied. “We’re running away before they can sell us off.”
Kate led the way down narrow cobblestone steps, then toward an open space thronging with people. Sophia forced herself to slow as they approached the city’s market, holding onto Kate’s forearm to keep her from running.
We’ll blend in more if we aren’t running, Sophia sent, too out of breath to speak.
Kate didn’t look certain, but she still matched Sophia’s pace.
They walked slowly, brushing past people who stepped aside, obviously unwilling to risk contact with anyone as lowborn as them. Perhaps they thought that the two
were released for some errand.
Sophia forced herself to look as though she were just browsing while they used the crowd for camouflage. She looked around, to the clock tower above the temple of the Masked Goddess, at the various stalls, and the glass-fronted shops beyond them. There was a group of players in one corner of the square, acting out one of the traditional tales in elaborate costumes while one of the censors looked on from the edge of the surrounding crowd. There was a recruiter for the army standing on a box, trying to recruit troops for the newest war to take hold of this city, a looming battle across the Knife-Water Channel.
Sophia saw her sister eyeing the recruiter, and pulled her back.
No, Sophia sent. That’s not for you.
Kate was about to reply when suddenly the shouts began again behind them.
They both took off.
Sophia knew that no one would help them now. This was Ashton, which meant that she and Kate were the ones in the wrong here. No one would try to help two runaways.
In fact, as she looked up, Sophia saw someone start to move into their way, to block them. No one would let two orphans get away from what they owed, from what they were.
Hands grabbed for them, and now they had to fight their way through. Sophia slapped away a hand from her shoulder, while Kate jabbed viciously with her stolen poker.
A gap opened up in front of them, and Sophia saw her sister running for a section of abandoned wooden scaffolding beside a stone wall, where builders must have been trying to straighten a façade.
More climbing? Sophia sent.
They won’t follow us, her sister shot back.
Which was probably true, if only because the chasing pack of ordinary people wouldn’t risk their lives like that. Sophia dreaded it, though. Yet she couldn’t think of any better ideas right then.
Her shaking hands closed around the wooden slats of the scaffolding, and she started to climb.
In a matter of moments, her arms started to ache, but by then it was either keep going or fall, and even if there hadn’t been the cobbles below, Sophia didn’t want to fall with most of a mob chasing after her.
Kate was already waiting at the top, still grinning as if the whole thing were some game. Her hand was there again, and she pulled Sophia up, and then they were running again—this time on rooftops.
Kate led the way to a gap leading to another roof, hopping into the thatch as if she didn’t care about the risk of going through. Sophia followed her, biting back the urge to cry out as she nearly slipped, then leaping with her sister onto a low section where a dozen chimneys belched out smoke from a kiln below.
Kate tried to run again, but Sophia, sensing an opportunity, grabbed her and yanked her down into the thatch, hidden amongst the stacks.
Wait, she sent.
To her amazement, Kate didn’t argue. She looked about as they huddled down in the flat section of roof, ignoring the heat coming up from the fires below, and she must have realized how hidden they were. The smoke blurred most of what was around them, putting them in a fog, further hiding them. It was like a second city up here, with lines of clothes, flags, and pennants providing all the cover they could want. If they stayed still, no one could possibly spot them here. Nor would anyone else be foolish enough to risk treading on the thatch.
Sophia looked about. It was peaceful up here in its own way. There were spots where the houses were close enough that neighbors could reach out to touch one another, and further along, Sophie saw a chamber pot being emptied into the street. She’d never had a chance to see the city from this angle, the towers of the clergy and the shot makers, the clock keepers and the wise men rising up over the rest of it, the palace sitting in its own ring of walls like some shining carbuncle on the skin of the rest.
She hunched down there with her sister, her arms wrapped around Kate, and waited for the sounds of pursuit to pass below.
Maybe, just maybe, they’d find a way out.
CHAPTER THREE
Morning faded into afternoon before Sophia and Kate dared to creep out of their hiding place. As Sophia had thought, no one had dared clamber up onto the rooftops to search for them, and while the sounds of pursuit had come close, they’d never quite come close enough.
Now, they seemed to have faded entirely.
Kate peeked out and looked down at the city below. The morning’s bustle was gone, replaced by a more relaxed pace and crowd.
“We need to get down from here,” Sophia whispered to her sister.
Kate nodded. “I’m starving.”
Sophia could understand that. Their stolen apple was long gone, and hunger was starting to gnaw at her stomach, too.
They lowered themselves to street level, and Sophia found herself looking around as they did. Even though the sounds of people hunting for them had gone, a part of her was convinced that someone would leap out at them the moment their feet touched the ground.
They picked their way through the streets, trying to keep out of sight as much as they could. It was impossible to avoid people in Ashton, though, because there were simply so many of them. The nuns hadn’t bothered to teach them much about the shape of the world, but Sophia had heard that there were bigger cities beyond the Merchant States.
Right then, it was hard to believe it. There were people everywhere she looked, even though most of the city’s population had to be inside, hard at work, by now. There were children playing on the street, women walking to and from markets and shops, workmen carrying tools and ladders. There were taverns and playhouses, shops selling coffee from the newly discovered lands past the Mirror Ocean, cafes where people seemed to be almost as interested in talking as in eating. She could hardly believe to see people laughing, happy, so carefree, doing nothing but idling the time and enjoying themselves. She could hardly believe that such a world could even exist. It was a shocking contrast to the enforced quiet and obedience of the orphanage.
There’s so much, Sophia sent to her sister, eyeing the food stalls everywhere, feeling her stomach pain grow with each passing smell.
Kate was looking around it all with a practical eye. She picked one of the cafes, moving up toward it cautiously while people outside laughed at a would-be philosopher trying to argue over how much of the world it was possible to really know.
“You’d have an easier time if you weren’t drunk,” one of them heckled.
Another turned toward Sophia and Kate as they approached. The hostility there was palpable.
“We don’t want your sort here,” he sneered. “Get out!”
The sheer anger of it was more than Sophia had expected. Still, she shuffled back to the street, pulling Kate with her so that her sister wouldn’t do anything they’d regret. She might have dropped her poker somewhere in running from the mob, but she certainly had a look that said she wanted to hit something.
They had no choice, then: they would have to steal their food. Sophia had hoped that someone might show them charity. Yet that wasn’t the way the world worked, she knew.
It was time to use their talents, they both realized, nodding to each silently at the same time. They stood on opposite sides of an alley and both watched and waited as a baker worked. Sophia waited until the baker could read her thoughts, and then told her what she wanted her to hear.
Oh no, the baker thought. The rolls. How could I forget them inside?
Barely had the baker had the thought than Sophia and Kate burst into action, rushing forward the second the woman turned her back to go back inside for the rolls. They moved quickly, each snatching an armful of cakes, enough to fill their bellies almost to bursting.
They both ducked behind an alley and chewed ravenously. Soon, Sophia felt her belly full, a strange and pleasant sensation, and one she’d never had. The House of the Unclaimed didn’t believe in feeding its charges more than the bare minimum.
Now she laughed as Kate attempted to shove an entire pastry into her mouth.
What? her sister demanded.
It’s j
ust good to see you happy, Sophia sent back.
She wasn’t sure how long that happiness would last. She kept an eye out with every step for the hunters who might be after them. The orphanage wouldn’t want to put more effort into reclaiming them than their indentures were worth, but who could tell when it came to the vindictiveness of the nuns? At the very least, they would have to keep clear of the watchmen, and not just because they’d escaped.
Thieves, after all, were hanged in Ashton.
We need to stop looking like runaway orphans or we’ll never be able to walk through the city without people staring and trying to catch us.
Sophia looked over at her sister, surprised by the thought.
You want to steal clothes? Sophia sent back.
Kate nodded.
That thought brought an extra note of fear and yet Sophia knew her sister, ever practical, was right.
They both stood at the same time, stuffing the extra cakes in their waists. Sophia was looking about for clothes, when she felt Kate touch her arm. She followed her gaze and saw it: a clothesline, high up on a roof. It was unguarded.
Of course it would be, she realized with relief. Who, after all, would guard a clothesline?
Even so, Sophia could feel her heart pounding as they clambered up onto another roof. They both paused, looked about, then reeled in the line the way a fisherman might have pulled in a line of fish.
Sophia stole an outer dress of green wool, along with a cream underdress that was probably the kind of thing a farmer’s wife might wear, but was still impossibly rich to her. To her surprise, her sister picked out an undershirt, breeches, and doublet, which left her looking more like a spike-haired boy than the girl she was.
“Kate,” Sophia complained. “You can’t run around looking like that!”
Kate shrugged. “Neither of us is supposed to look like this. I might as well be comfortable.”
There was a kind of truth in that. The sumptuary laws were clear about what each grade of society could and couldn’t wear, the unclaimed and the indentured. Here they were, breaking more laws, tossing aside their rags, the only thing they were allowed to wear, and dressing better than they were.