by Hilari Bell
“That’s not fair to Arisa,” Weasel protested.
“It’s not about fairness,” said Justice Holis. “It’s about not adding fuel to a fire, in the hope that it will go out instead of raging out of control.”
If she told them about Master Darian, if she started making accusations she couldn’t prove, Arisa would be throwing lamp oil on the blaze.
“I’ll still be able to talk to you in court,” she told Weasel and Edoran. “And we’ll see each other in lessons as well. I’ll be all right.”
And with her afternoons free, she could go back to that tavern and find the proof she needed!
CHAPTER 9
The Four of Stones: growth.
You must make an effort to achieve your goal.
Several days passed before Arisa could go back to the tavern, because Weasel and Edoran rode in the afternoon despite the rain. And Katrin, whom the Falcon had appointed Arisa’s chief jailor, wouldn’t even let her out to walk when there was a chance she would encounter the prince unsupervised.
Arisa knew that the Falcon and Holis, and even Katrin, were right—but they evidently didn’t realize that in saving her reputation they were taking serious risks with her sanity! Because if she didn’t get some exercise soon, she was going to go stark raving mad.
When she snarled at Weasel during their dance lesson, he gave her a sympathetic smile and missed the next turn, wrecking the pattern of the set.
But he must have understood, for that afternoon he and Edoran rode to the university, and Katrin grudgingly permitted her the freedom of the park, to walk or ride as she chose.
Arisa put on her old britches and coat—if Katrin assumed that was from spite, so much the better! Moments after her release she was through the woods, scrambling over the old wall as if she’d been doing it for years.
This time of day the shops were open, and as she neared the rougher neighborhood where the tavern was, several used-clothing shops appeared.
Arisa went into one and purchased a skirt and blouse, which were so well worn that the clerk’s brows rose in astonishment. She explained that she needed some clothes for a bit of hard, dirty work—the truth, after a fashion.
The drizzle cut down on traffic, and Arisa soon found a place, in a small alley between two stacks of crates, where she could change into her “new” clothes. The skirt was too short and the blouse too big—as if she’d both grown taller and lost weight, which would make the story she was about to tell even more convincing. Her rough coat wasn’t so fine as to look out of place over the rest, so she tied her britches and shirt into a bundle and carried them with her.
On a rainy afternoon the neighborhood appeared less threatening, more poor than criminal, although Arisa knew that the two often went hand in hand.
It wasn’t difficult to find the main street down which she’d followed Katrin—Dock Street, as it happened—but she’d also gone through four small side streets, and the entrance to the lane that housed the tavern was so narrow she almost missed it.
She’d only traveled down it for a dozen yards when she saw the sign, as gray and drab as the street around it: King’s Folly. The letters were almost too faded to read in the daylight, but the sign, like the tavern, had seen better days. The edges were cut into decorative curves, with flecks of gilt paint still clinging there. And instead of the usual iron rod attaching the sign to the beam above it, an old sword had been thrust through the iron rings. It had probably been intended to continue the kingly theme, but the peeling paint that covered the blade seemed far more symbolic of the tavern’s current decrepit state. If Arisa wanted to learn anything more, she had to get inside.
She drew a deep breath and knocked. Several moments dragged past before the door opened and Arisa found herself staring, not at the formidable Stu, but at a girl not much older than she was.
“We aren’t rightly open,” the girl told her. “Not till the end-of-shift bell rings. But we might hustle up a sandwich if you’re…” Her voice trailed off as she took in the patches on the knees of Arisa’s skirt. “You’re not looking to pay for lunch, are you?”
“No,” said Arisa, in a soft country accent. She knew she couldn’t reproduce the accent of the city’s poor, but she could easily have come from the country, seeking a more exciting life, and fallen into trouble. According to Weasel, there were many who did.
“I’m looking for a bit of extra work,” she went on. “Washing dishes, scrubbing floors, whatever you need. Problem is, I can’t come t’ you regular. I work mornings for a laundress.” She held up her bundled clothes, in illustration. “She sometimes needs me afternoons and evenings for deliveries, but there’s times I’m off, and I thought… A tavern’s not like a mill, where you got t’ have someone on their shift every day. Thought maybe a tavern could use a hand, just now and then.”
Looking cold and hopeful wasn’t hard, for she was cold, and she was praying to any god who cared to listen.
The girl looked doubtful. “You’ll probably have to talk to Pa about that, and he’s out, bargaining for kegs. But… Here, come out of the wet, at least. Mama! Can you come out for a bit?”
The taproom was dark on this gloomy day, but the big hearth pumped out heat and the air smelled not only of beer and brandy but also of soap and wax. The long tables that filled most of the room were clean.
A door behind the bar opened and a woman emerged. Mama, no doubt; her body was plumper than the girl’s and her face rounder, but they had the same mouse brown hair and the same soft mouth.
Her brows rose in astonishment at the sight of Arisa. “What’s this? You picking up rags for Farley, girl? It’s not our usual day.”
“No, Goodwife,” said Arisa humbly. “I’m looking for work.”
She repeated the story she’d told the girl, and the woman frowned. “The One God knows we could use a hand. Most evenings we’ve enough work to keep three of you busy! It’s paying you that’s the problem.”
“Always is,” said Arisa. “But I wouldn’t expect as much, since I can’t come regular. I just need t’ make a bit on the side, when the laundress has a light wash day and lets us off.”
“Hmm. I think we could stretch to five brass droplets an hour, whenever you show up. Though there may be days we don’t need you.”
“I’d expect that,” said Arisa. She didn’t care what she was paid, but the girl she was pretending to be would. “But five droplets is too low. I’d work hard for you, truly I would. I was hoping for a flame an hour.”
“Pa won’t like us hiring on a stranger,” the girl murmured. “Not now.” But she cast Arisa a sympathetic glance.
Arisa felt a prickle of excitement—of course they wouldn’t want to hire strangers, with conspirators meeting here!
“Your pa’s not the one who’s trying to keep mud off the floors, or washing dishes and providing food for several score of cold, hungry men! But there’s no way he’ll spring for a flame an hour,” the tavern mistress added, turning to Arisa. “I wouldn’t myself, and it’s me you’ll be helping out. I’ll go to six droplets, for you look like you need it and the One God teaches charity to those in need.”
They settled on seven droplets, with Arisa free to show up when she was available, and the tavern mistress, Mistress Mimms, free to send her away if they had no work that day. But Arisa didn’t think that would happen often. Seven droplets wasn’t much, and the work of keeping the tavern running must be considerable. The floors and the bar were also clean, despite their age and wear.
Arisa hurried back to the palace, not stopping to change into her britches till after she’d climbed the wall. It might be tricky to get away—soon she’d have to tell Sammel something to explain why she wasn’t riding anymore. But by the time the conspirators met again, Arisa would be a familiar part of the tavern, as invisible as the long benches and the chairs by the hearth. She had taken the first step!
That evening in court Weasel told her that she’d probably be free to walk or ride on most afternoons for som
e time to come.
“Justice Holis isn’t finding tutors as easily as he’d hoped,” he confided to Arisa.
Edoran was being badgered by a woman who wanted her daughter’s husband to inherit their estate, instead of the cousin to whom the law said it should go. She was currently explaining, in detail, why it wasn’t her fault that she’d borne no sons, or that her oldest daughter had yet to bear children at all. Edoran’s face was soberly polite, but his ears had begun to turn pink when Weasel pulled Arisa away.
“The justice is being fussy about who he hires,” Weasel went on. “Which is good. But most of the men he wants are already employed, and it will take them a while to get out of their jobs.”
“Why does that leave me free to walk?” Arisa asked. “Doesn’t that mean you and Edoran have even more time to ride out?”
“No,” Weasel told her. “Because I talked Edoran into continuing our search of the archives. That’s better than riding at the best of times, much less in this filthy weather. It hasn’t stopped raining for three days.”
“It’s winter,” Arisa told him impatiently. “It always rains in winter. Edoran can probably tell you when it will stop. By the way, did he sense that second pirate raid?”
“No,” said Weasel. “I asked about that. He did his usual I-don’t-know-what-you’re-talking-about dance, but he finally admitted that he didn’t sense the second raid. He says his ability, or whatever it is, works erratically. Which is another reason he’s still not admitting it exists!”
“I can understand that,” Arisa said slowly. “Though it frustrates me too. It would be harder to make people believe you if it didn’t work all the time.”
Impossible, in fact, because the first thing anyone would do if you claimed such a gift was demand that you prove it. And if you failed…
“Anyway,” Weasel went on, “Justice Holis thought research was a fair substitute for lessons. And seeing the records of the investigation of that so-called burglary gave Edoran an idea. He’s been looking at the records—”
“Of the investigation into his father’s death,” Arisa finished. If you knew Edoran, that conclusion was obvious—as inevitable as the tides.
“That’s probably a good thing,” she added. “Maybe the written record will convince him it was an accident.”
“It’s hard to convince someone who doesn’t want to be convinced,” said Weasel. “He’ll probably spend the rest of his life in those archives. And he’ll probably drag me with him!”
“Better than riding,” Arisa reminded him. “And while he’s doing that, you can look for the sword.”
Weasel moaned, and several courtiers stared.
“Stop that,” Arisa told him sharply. “You enjoy that kind of thing, freak that you are. And you really are good at it. If we could find the sword, it might help my mother and your justice. And then they might loosen up on us.”
“If we find it?” Weasel asked. “You just dumped the whole thing on me!”
But Arisa knew he’d look. He was good with detailed paperwork, no matter how much he complained. And he loved Justice Holis enough to do anything to help him—even work.
Arisa showed up at the tavern the next afternoon, and although Master Mimms grumbled, he agreed to let her stay. He was a burly man, with whiskers growing down onto his cheeks and an apron his wife struggled to keep clean. But as Arisa soon learned, “struggled to keep clean” applied to everything in the tavern. She scrubbed the floors. She scrubbed the bar, and the tables, and the front step, and the hearth, and in between she scrubbed the dishes. It was the hardest work she’d ever done, harder than any training her mother’s men had given her—but she couldn’t complain since the girl, and her mother, and her aunt and cousin Stu, all worked right beside her.
“It’s always hard the first few days,” the girl, whose name was Baylee, murmured sympathetically as Arisa rubbed her aching back. “Any job is. But you’ll soon get used to it.”
As the next few days passed it did grow easier, but Arisa found she’d miscalculated on one thing—in the afternoon the tavern had no customers, and thus no conspirators would meet then. She would never learn anything, working afternoons.
So the next day Arisa told Katrin that she was sick of going out in the rain, and would nap that afternoon instead. Everyone in the city was tired of the rain, which whether light or heavy hadn’t let up for the last week, so Katrin didn’t find that odd. In fact, napping in the afternoon was a ladylike thing to do, and lulled by the patter of drops against the window, Arisa even managed to get some sleep.
Court that evening was horribly dull, and lasted far longer than Arisa thought it should. Then she had to allow Katrin to undress her and put her to bed, to lie in the darkness, waiting till the light under the door that connected her room to Katrin’s vanished. Wait till she was certain her maid was asleep.
Then she leaped out of bed. Rearranging a few pillows and fluffing up the blankets where her legs would be produced a reasonable facsimile of Arisa asleep. One close look would give it away, but glancing through rain-splattered windows into a dark room, Katrin would see nothing odd. And if for some reason Katrin did come into her room, well, who said Edoran was her only lover!
Fortunately, given the Falcon’s likely reaction to that tale, Arisa didn’t think Katrin ever checked on her after she went to sleep. Her maid, she had slowly realized, thought of Arisa as a temperamental, undisciplined child—a lady, in short. She didn’t see Arisa as a person who could work and fight and plan, so she’d never suspect anything.
Arisa scrambled down the vines and made her way to the old tree where she’d found a hollow place to hide her tavern clothes. The rain was colder, and the streets darker and emptier than they’d been the night Arisa had first found the tavern. But when she drew near she saw firelight in the windows, and heard a dull roar of conversation.
“Laundress kept us late today,” she told Stu when he opened the door. “She’s getting lots of wash with all this mud. But I still need the extra coin. Is there work for me this evening?”
Stu, whose broad shoulders and fierce face concealed a butter-soft heart, smiled as he ushered her in. “I’m sure there is. Folks are getting restless in this weather, but they don’t want to be out in the wet, so they’re coming here.”
Indeed, the benches were crowded with bodies, and the air was thick with pipe smoke and brandy fumes. Arcanara games were in play at several of the tables.
Mistress Mimms was less inclined to question Arisa’s presence than to thank the One God for it. She set Arisa to cleaning the mud in front of the door, then to picking up empty crockery from the tables, and then washing the dishes she’d just picked up. And then it was all to do over again. Baylee was busy carrying bowls of stew from the kitchen and beer from the bar, but she flashed Arisa a delighted grin.
As the night wore on, Arisa grew both tired and sleepy, but she wasn’t sorry she’d come. It seemed Master Mimms was a man with political opinions—and he’d no qualms about sharing them.
“It’s the regent’s fault, these pirate raids,” he grumbled to a cluster of men at the bar. “He shorts the navy the men they need, keeping stout sailors out of work so he can deck his woman in gewgaws and candies.”
Arisa, who was hauling dirty mugs back to the kitchen at the time, stumbled and almost dropped her tray. Justice Holis had no woman at court or, to the best of her knowledge, anywhere else. And though she might not have known about it, Weasel certainly would, and he’d have told her.
“But the navy’s the same size now as it was under the old regent,” one of the men at the bar protested. “No one added, but none taken away.”
“Then why isn’t he adding more?” the tavern keeper demanded. “Why isn’t he building up the ranks, with the pirates growing so much bolder?”
If any of the men had an answer to that, Arisa didn’t hear it.
She worked until they locked the front door and Baylee’s mother passed out whatever food they had left to the b
eggars who hovered around the back.
“You mind if I come in the evening again?” Arisa asked when the tavern mistress returned to the kitchen with her empty kettle and basket. “With all this mud, the laundry keeps—”
“Come whenever you can,” Mistress Mimms told her. “You’re a good worker. And we need your hands at night more than any other time.”
Though it felt much later, it was only a few hours past midnight when Arisa finally made her way to her own bed. Most of the tavern’s customers were working men, who had to rise in the morning themselves. She was exhausted, but her heart was light. The tavern staff had accepted her presence in the evening without suspicion. The next time the conspirators met, no one would think twice about Arisa’s presence.
The persistent rain helped, giving her an excuse to nap the next few afternoons as well. Though “nap” might not be the right word— Arisa fell into bed after her etiquette lesson and slept till Katrin awakened her to eat dinner and dress for court.
She found herself growing accustomed to this schedule, and more important, her aching muscles began to toughen up. She was feeling almost cheerful about going to the tavern that evening, despite the drenching rain, and was just slipping on her coat when she heard a soft click from behind Katrin’s closed door.
She froze for only a moment before leaping down behind her bed, then rolling beneath it. The wood floor was hard under her knees and elbows as she slithered to the other side to peer out.
Her heart skipped a beat. Her maid was already on the balcony, pressing her face against the glass with her hands sheltering her eyes. Arisa held her breath—if Katrin came in to check on her…
But the dummy in her bed must have been good enough. Katrin turned and climbed over the balcony railing. What would take her out on a night like this? There was nothing happening at the tavern tonight. At least, nothing they’d told Arisa about. And it wasn’t that late, several hours earlier than the last time Arisa had followed Katrin to the tavern.