“I made us a ladder. Tonight, I ripped our dresses. I ripped our sheets.”
“But I can’t go tonight. I’m too tired.” Rani thought of Sin Hazar, remembered his lips brushing across her palm. “It’s too late.”
“Don’t be a fool!” Mair hissed. “Of course we have to leave when it’s late. That’s our only hope. And going tonight, when they think you’ve drunk enough to knock out an entire garrison, that might even work to our advantage.”
“But what about your arm? You can’t climb with a broken arm.”
“It’s better than I’ve made it out to be. I cinched your dress, didn’t I?” Rani could not argue with that. She let her fingers gingerly test her waist. She’d be bruised in the morning, from the nareeth. “Come on, then,” Mair grumbled. “Let me show you what I’ve done.”
As Rani watched, Mair stepped back from the bed, pulling the knotted cloth with her. Hand over hand, she extracted the twisted fabric. Rani was amazed that there had been so much cloth to tear, so many sheets and skirts to turn into a rope. “But what about the lock? They chained the door this afternoon.”
“I’ve picked it.”
“You’ve what?”
Mair scrambled about the pillows, now shed of their satin coverings. She produced some ragged bits of fabric, stitched to gold braid. Rani recognized the headdress that she had worn only that afternoon. Mair twisted the cloth scraps and revealed the long metal strip that had anchored the ornate decoration. “I picked it. That was the hardest part, shifting the chains without their hearing. Easier to pick a lock, though, than to dispatch a guard. That’s why I pushed Bashi so hard this afternoon. I had to get that guard off the roof.” Mair dropped the remnants of the headdress. “Men place too much credit in iron and locks.”
Rani could do little more than gape. “Mair, this is madness! We can’t just throw ourselves over the palace wall!”
“That’s exactly what we can do. Those carts that you were watching are packed and ready to go. They must be planning to leave at dawn. All we have to do is hide beneath the load.”
“All? Mair, you can’t be serious!”
“I’ve never been more serious in my life, Rai.” As if to underscore her words, Mair crossed to the fireplace, picking up a thin stick that was charred black on its end. “And if we’re to succeed, we’ll have to look the part. Close your eyes.”
Uncertain what else she could do, Rani followed the command, shutting her eyes and catching her breath. The room tilted unevenly, but not as badly as it had done in the great hall. Water and fresh air and time were working their magic; the wine in her veins was being pushed aside by anticipation. By fear.
Even with her eyes closed, Rani sensed Mair moving closer, and then she felt the end of the pointed stick, sketching across her cheek. She only opened her eyes when Mair ordered her to do so, and she found herself staring into a mirror. Her face was reflected in the wavy surface, but now she sported a rayed sun, spreading under her left eye. “A sun!”
“Aye. We’d be suspicious as swans, and neither of us is fit to be a lion. I certainly don’t know enough to be one of their owls. Besides, we’ve only seen a handful of those. There are bound to be a number of suns in the countryside, going about the business that keeps this palace running.” As Mair spoke, she tilted the mirror toward her own face. She drew her own tattoo with quick, steady motions. “Try not to touch it. It’ll rub off soon enough, but it might help us if we’re stopped near the city. We’ll have to re-draw it often.”
“Near the city? Where are we going, Mair?”
“I don’t know yet. First, we’ve got to get out of here. Sin Hazar isn’t about to hand us over to Halaravilli any time soon. We’re more valuable to him as captives, Rai. We’re hostages.”
“But his feast was lovely tonight!”
“Aye, and a nightingale’s cage is made of finest gold.”
Rani drew a deep breath to protest, and she felt the sore flesh beneath her ribs. Staring at the length of cloth rope, Rani realized that she and Mair truly had no choice. There would be no way to explain their shredded clothing in the morning, no way to justify the ruined sheets. The suns in Sin Hazar’s employ would certainly report the escape attempt, even if the girls took no further action. Mair had decided for both of them.
“Give me your balkareen, Rai. I’ll add it to the end here.”
Rani handed over the fabric mutely, watching as Mair tore the cloth into thick strips, knotting them securely to the end of her rope. “What if it’s not long enough?”
“It has to be. One way or another.” Mair tugged the new length tight, barely favoring her bad arm. “All right, then. Anything that we should take?”
Rani glanced about the chamber and shrugged, seeing it with a clarity born of Mair’s matter-of-fact determination. Certainly the bed had been comfortable. The chair was nicely carved. The threads of Rani’s stitchery glimmered in the firelight. But there was nothing of true value in the prison room – no weapon, no coins, nothing to help two girls flee from the king of all Amanthia. Rani shook her head.
“Very well, then.” Mair reached for her cloak, where it hung on a peg behind the door, and she offered Rani her own garment. “It’ll be cold, tonight. We’ll find better clothes on the outside.”
Rani pulled the cloak over her thin linen kirtle, clasping it at her neck with a mechanical precision. She did not speak until they stood at the door. “Wait! Mair, we can’t do this! We’ll be up on the tower! You can’t face the height!”
“I’ll do what I have to do.”
“But Mair – ”
“Ye’re wastin’ time, Rai.”
Rani swallowed her protest and took one last look around the room. Nothing. Nothing to keep her here. She nodded at Mair, who eased the door open.
The girls made their way up the stairs in silence, feeling for each stone step cautiously. The staircase twisted about itself, and after only one turn, Rani could no longer make out the light from the guards’ flickering torches, now two levels below. She found herself leaning into the wall, fearful that she would miss the narrow inner lip of each step above her. Some were carved at irregular heights, and once she fell hard, banging her knee. She managed not to cry out, though.
Mair was true to her word – the lock had been cleanly picked. Mair guided Rani’s hands over the iron chains, showing her where they lay, where she must step to avoid toppling the links. Then, before Rani could lose her nerve, the Touched girl eased the door open.
Mair only left them a crack to slip through, as narrow as possible, to keep from disturbing the torches several levels below. Rani caught her breath at the freezing air, but she stepped swiftly to the side so that Mair could close the door behind them. She shivered as the Touched girl darted to the edge of the parapet. In the starlight, Rani could make out her friend tossing the rope about the first merlon from the wall, cinching it secure. Better that they descend the tower in its own shadow. Better that they hide in the darkness.
Rani heard Mair grunt as she pulled the last knot tight, and then the Touched girl stood by the embrasure. She waved her arm once, looking like a ghost in the eldritch light. When Rani drew near, she saw that her companion was as pale as the linen strips she had tied together. Mair’s breath came quick, and her palms were slicked with sweat as she pulled Rani’s hand over to test the knot that secured the rope.
Rani lifted the cloth and fed it through her hands, taking a deep breath to prepare for stepping over the stone wall. “No.” Mair spoke close to Rani’s ear, her voice scarcely audible. The Touched girl panted as she said, “I’ll go first. In case th’ knots dinna ’old. In case I dinna ’ave th’ strength.” Mair flapped her injured arm like a wounded wing.
Rani argued, “But I can anchor it for you once I’m on the ground. I can make it easier.”
Mair shook her head furiously, barely mouthing, “I’m the weakest. Let me go first.” When Rani still refused to step back, Mair leaned closer still and hissed, “It ‘as t’ be
done. If I’m to fall, don’t let me go, knowing that I’ve brought you down as well.”
It has to be done. Mair was terrified, injured, and no doubt exhausted, but there was no other means of escape.
In the starlight, Rani could just make out Mair’s progress down the rope. She saw how the Touched girl used the knots to support herself, how she found anchors with her feet and her fists. More than once, Mair let herself swing back toward the palace wall, easing some of the pressure of her descent by settling her back against the stonework. Slowly, painfully, she made her way down.
Twice, Rani saw Mair start to slip, both times when she had put too much weight on her injured arm. Once, the Touched girl hissed between her teeth, loud enough that Rani could hear. Apparently no soldiers did, though, for no alarms shattered the wintry night.
Once Mair reached the ground, she tugged three times on the rope. Rani caught her breath and threw one leg over the embrasure edge. As she gathered the first knot between her fingers, she realized that she could not remember the name of the god of ropes. “Help me, Roan,” she improvised, speaking to the god of ladders instead. “Help me to descend this crafting, made in your name and to your glory.”
The prayer was unsettling, though, not least because Rani feared that the god of ladders would take offense that his special province was being impinged on by a hastily knotted cloth contraption. Rani settled her prayer into a simpler sentence: “It has to be done.” She repeated the five words again and again, stretching for foot-holds, squeezing her hands together for a better grip.
She almost screamed when Mair’s hands closed around her calves, but she managed to swallow her surprise and drop to the ground. She stumbled forward a step and was surprised to see that a few coils of the rope lay upon the ground – Mair’s improvised creation had been more than long enough. Rani took only an instant to be grateful that she had not needed to cling to the slippery silk of her balkareen.
Before Rani could look back up at the tower, Mair tugged her deeper into the shadows. Rani followed obediently, skirting the foot of the building until they reached the courtyard. The drays were standing where the soldiers had left them, waiting for the oxen that would drag them out of the city gates.
The first three wagons that Rani checked were lashed down, with tarps stretched tight over the clear forms of barrels and boxes. Before Rani could despair, though, she heard Mair hiss from the next cart.
Rani could smell the autumn fragrance even as she approached. The wagon-bed was deep, filled with new-harvested hay. The grass had dried partially in the field, but it still gave off the heady aroma of autumn.
Mair grinned at Rani and gestured toward the dray. Rani took only a moment to gather her cloak close about her flimsy garments, and then she pulled herself up onto the wheel, throwing first one leg and then the other over the side of the wooden cart. She hoisted Mair up beside her, tugging hard on her friend’s good hand, and then both girls were burrowing deep into their fragrant bed, creating a nest that was warm and safe and secure from the king’s wrath.
Chapter 7
Shea settled her hands on her hips, glaring at the carters. “You took your time getting here, didn’t you?”
The leader flicked his gaze toward her sun tattoo; the man’s own rayed mark was small and high on his cheekbone. “This entire journey has been cursed, goodwife. We were late leaving the city. The king’s lions made us repack our entire load.”
“That was a week ago! Couldn’t you make up time on the road?”
The man bristled, and for a moment, Shea thought that she might have prodded him too hard. They were both suns, though. They both should have known their place beneath the sky. She should not need to fight with one of her own kind, just to do her own work, just to serve the Little Army.
The carter glanced at his men, who were unpacking barrels and crates from the wagons, and for just an instant, Shea thought that he might order them to stop their work. The man only shook his head, though. “Don’t complain to us, goodwife. There were troops moving north, troops getting ready to sail east. We had to clear the road every time they came by.”
“Well I’ve got troops here, too – hungry mouths to feed. I hope you’ve brought us enough supplies. My lions work up quite an appetite.”
“There are no lions in Sin Hazar’s Little Army.” The man’s flat statement deflated Shea. Of course there were no lions among the children. Their tattoos had all been carved away. They’d all been turned into casteless rogues, children without homes, without families. They were vicious little creatures fighting for their proper place in the world.
Not for the first time, Shea wondered if she were lucky that Davin had permitted her to stay. That strange old man had fed her potions mixed from herbs she’d never heard of, counting her pulse until he declared her cured of the strange heart-gripping pain that had felled her on the road. She’d thought that he would throw her out then, force her back on the road, with or without Crestman.
He’d done nothing of the sort, though. Instead, he’d muttered that she could sleep in an abandoned hut, one of a half dozen crumbling buildings that ringed his own sorry cottage. He’d accepted Crestman’s strange story about how a captain in the Little Army came to be on the road, traveling with the king’s old nursemaid. The ancient man had accepted Crestman’s rank, too, and he’d ordered the other boys to give way to their new captain. Davin had not turned the pair over to King Sin Hazar’s men – neither to the Little Army nor to the grown soldiers who rode through irregularly. Davin had chosen not to label Crestman a deserter; he kept both of the newcomers alive.
Shea had returned the favor by doing a sun’s work, trying to straighten the old man’s cottage into a decent space. She had whipped up clouds of dust and swept up droppings from that terrifying talking bird. She had sorted through rolls and rolls of parchment, trying to separate them into military projects and landscape sketches and endless pages of writing. She found herself baking bread for the boys, using their fine-ground flour to relieve their dull menu of gruel and salt beef.
Throughout the commotion, Davin ignored her, poring over his books and charts and muttering strange words to himself. Three nights in the past week, he’d stayed in the blacksmith’s forge behind his cottage until dawn, shouting orders to the mute giant who pounded away at the iron, trying to match his master’s strange specifications.
Every morning, Shea awoke, remembering that she had planned on fleeing south with Crestman. She had planned on escaping Amanthia, on leaving behind the famine, and the war, and a king who was desperate enough to impress children into his army. She was a sun after all – affairs of state were none of her business. But then, every morning, Shea remembered the Swancastle.
The castle was just beyond the fringe of Davin’s forest, an easy walk from Shea’s little hut. The first time she had emerged from beneath the trees to see it, she was overwhelmed by its glistening snowy walls. The castle towered above her, easily the height of ten men. The building itself was at the top of a steep hill; Shea remembered the stories she had heard of suns toting cartload after cartload of earth to the building spot. The walls gleamed in the morning air, capturing sunlight and fracturing it into a thousand thousand prisms.
Shea had fallen on her knees as she stared at the edifice that had sparked the rebels during the Uprising, the building that would have been a peaceful home to her own swangirl, to Larina, if only the war had never begun. Even now, even knowing what the castle had cost her, Shea was bound to the ghosts of the swans who had lived there, the swans who had rebelled against Sin Hazar and dragged their province to defeat.
Thinking of the waste caused by her province’s rebellion, Shea felt the familiar weakness seize her chest, and she gasped for breath. What was she doing here, arguing with carters in front of the Swancastle? She should have been home in her own cottage. She should have been surrounded by her own children, by their children. Her greatest concern should have been whether or not to give a grandson a bite of
honey bread before supper. She should not need to worry about feeding dozens of ravenous boys, about filling their bellies so that they would have the strength for their next maneuvers in the service of their king.
Shea shook her head. She was lost in the past. Again. She’d get nowhere by fighting King Sin Hazar’s cartman. “Go ahead, then, man. All of you, get your supper, round the castle. On the far side, there’s a cook-tent. I’ll unhitch your oxen.”
The carter seemed willing enough to yield his argument, with the prospect of hot food nearby. He whistled his handful of fellows across the grassy slope, and Shea turned toward the beasts of burden. The oxen hung their heads low, snorting as if they were disgusted by the trip they had taken.
“Crestman!” Shea called, seeing her charge loitering near the haphazard tents that housed the division of the Little Army. “Give a hand, boy! Unhitch these beasts!”
The lionboy ignored her, pretending that he hadn’t heard. Shea had seen his shoulders tense, though, and she scarcely hesitated before storming across the short distance that separated her from the children. She leaned close and whispered, barely taking care to keep the other boys from hearing. “I’ll take away your toys, boy! I’ll break that bow over my knee and toss it into the woods, even if it was made by your precious Davin!”
Crestman shrugged as if he did not care, but he left the ragtag group of boys. He preserved his dignity by taking his time to saunter with Shea, sighting at various birds and blades of grass with his wrist-braced bow. When they were out of earshot, though, he cast a quick glance over his shoulder, making sure that his fellows weren’t watching. Then he hissed, “You can’t do that! You can’t order me around in front of my men!”
“Don’t tell me what I can and cannot do, boy. You swore your loyalty to me, remember! You said the words easy enough when you thought your life hung in the balance.”
“Hush!” Crestman hissed, with another backwards glance. “There are two score members of the Little Army encamped here. If even one of them finds out that I deserted, do you think we’d last long enough to explain away our lies?”
Glasswrights' Progress Page 15