by E. C. Blake
Mara pulled off her own clothes and passed them to Greff. It was cold, standing there in her under tunic and drawers, and she was glad to pull on Greff’s pants and tunic and socks. Despite his thinness, they fit all right—a little tight in the hips and chest, but they had clearly been made for someone heavier than he was.
No, she thought harshly, they were made for him before the Autarch started sucking the life out of him.
Once she had donned the white robe over his clothes, she looked down and thought with satisfaction that there was no way anyone could tell she was a girl just by looking at her.
When they were both dressed, she handed Greff the plain white Mask she had worn as they rode through the streets. “My horse is the roan mare outside,” she said. “You’re me until you’re out of sight of the guardhouse. Then find somewhere secret and put on your silver Mask and my cloak from the saddlebags. I know it’s unusual, a Child Guard leaving the City on his own—”
“Unusual?” Greff said. “It’s unheard of.”
“—but the Watchers are completely dependent on the Masks. If you’re wearing your Mask and you tell them the Autarch ordered you to ride north alone, they will believe you. They can’t imagine a world in which Masks don’t work.”
“I can’t either,” Greff said. “But I hope you create one.”
“There’s one more thing I need from you,” Mara said. She explained her plan for getting into the Palace, through the tunnel down which she had been taken when her Mask failed. “I know part of the Palace well enough, but not where the Child Guard are quartered. I’ll need to get into your quarters, so I’ll be found where they would expect to find you.”
Greff shook his head. “I still think you’re mad,” he said, but he went ahead and provided detailed directions all the same. When he was done, he held out his hand. “Good-bye,” he said. “I fully expect to meet you both again outside Traitors’ Gate just before they strip and hang us. But good luck all the same.”
“Thank you,” Mara said seriously, shaking his hand. “Go home to your parents, Greff. They’re good people, and they love you.”
“I know,” Greff said. He shook Keltan’s hand, too. Then he put on the fake Mask Mara had created, cautiously, as if expecting it to squirm like a new Mask: but it just sat on his face, still looking like Mara. “Not very comfortable,” he said. “It doesn’t match my face.” He took his hand away slowly. “At least it stays on.”
“It’s still magical,” Mara said. “It’s just a different . . . recipe.”
“Maybe you can do this,” Greff said. He hesitated, as though he were going to say something else; but in the end he turned without another word and went out. Mara caught a glimpse of Prilk sitting at his desk staring at nothing, and wondered if she had overdone it in trying to twist his perception. What if I damaged him, like that Watcher in the farmyard?
Remembering Greff’s emaciated body, she couldn’t work up much concern.
“Our turn,” she said to Keltan. “Market Gate, then the warehouse.”
Keltan nodded. “One other thing first.”
She frowned. “What?”
Keltan took off the Watcher’s Mask and set it aside. “This.” He reached out and pulled her to him, and kissed her, long and lingeringly. At first she resisted a little—there was no time!—but somehow that thought vanished as the kiss continued. Her arms went around Keltan and she pulled him tight against her even as his arms tightened around her.
But she could not give herself completely to the kiss, as much as she longed to do so, both because they had no time—and because she could still feel the magic inside him, and still longed to draw it out. Afraid she wouldn’t be able to resist that urge if the kiss continued, she pushed him away before she really wanted to. “We’ve got to go,” she murmured.
Keltan nodded. He stepped back from her almost convulsively, as if breaking free from something. “We’ll, uh . . . explore that further sometime soon. I hope.”
“If we survive,” Mara said. And if I don’t give in to the desire to suck you dry of magic before then.
Keltan grimaced. “You sure know how to spoil the mood.” But then he smiled. “We’ll survive,” he said softly. “We have reason to.”
Mara nodded. But in her heart she knew that was no real assurance at all.
She put on her new silver Mask and pulled the hood of Greff’s robe over her hair. “Let’s go,” she said.
Keltan had already put his Watcher’s Mask back on. He nodded and opened the door.
Prilk still stared at nothing. Keltan went over to him and touched his shoulder. He jerked back to life as suddenly as if waking from a dream, turned to look at them. “Time’s up!” he snapped, then blinked, confused. “Where’s the girl?”
“She already left,” Keltan said. “You must have been too busy to notice.”
“Yes, I must have,” Prilk said, but sounded more confused than ever. “She left?”
“Just a moment ago,” Keltan said. He nodded at Mara, who didn’t dare to speak lest her voice give her away. “Greff has had some very disturbing news and has asked if I will escort him as he takes a walk to clear his head. I have agreed to do so.”
“Oh,” Prilk said. He looked at Mara’s Mask, and she held her breath, but he seemed to see nothing amiss. “Very well.” He waved his hand. “Off you go, then. I have to get back to . . . work . . . ?” He stared at his desk. It was completely empty of papers.
“Thank you,” Keltan said, and led Mara out.
They were both Tamita born-and-bred. Keltan knew the streets on this side of the city better than Mara, at least the streets away from Processional Boulevard, but she knew the streets on the far side of the Palace, along Maskmakers’ Way. Between them they made good progress, choosing lesser-traveled paths where there were fewer people to react to the admittedly unusual sight of a single Child Guard, and the even more unusual sight of a tame wolf. Those who did see them—a baker, a blacksmith, a lamp maker, a handful of children, a few housewives en route to or returning from the market—quickly averted their eyes when their gazes slid from the glistening silver of Mara’s Mask to the stern unmarked black of Keltan’s. Mara got a perverse pleasure out of using the Watchers’ reputation for brutality and infallibility against them.
About an hour after they left the Palace—long enough, Mara thought, that Greff should be safely through the Gate and away—they stood outside the stone fence that surrounded the warehouse that had once been her grandfather’s, the warehouse where she had been dragged on the nightmarish day her Mask had failed. She wondered if the fat warden were still in there, the man who drew pictures of naked unMasked children for shadowy clients in the streets of Aygrima. She hoped so.
But the pleasure of seeing him again under far different circumstances would have to wait. For now, the wall of the warehouse only provided a conveniently shadowed lurking place as they waited for the sun to set. They settled themselves on the cobblestones and watched the traffic passing on the Great Circle Road. There was little of it; the alarm that had closed the main gate had closed the gate to the Outside Market as well. Mara could imagine the consternation that had caused. Mara gazed up at the wall. “I used to sit up there and watch people in the Outside Market.” With Mayson, she thought with a pang of sorrow and . . .
No guilt. No guilt!
“How is the sally port sealed?” Keltan said.
“Barred and padlocked,” Mara said. She patted Whiteblaze’s head. “But I think we can handle it.”
“All right,” Keltan said. He glanced at the sun, which was sinking low in the west. “All we have to do is wait.”
The hours dragged by. The sun set. The Great Circle Road, already unnaturally empty of traffic, cleared completely as the nightly curfew took hold. Masked citizens could use the Great Circle Road at night, but there was little reason for any of them to do so on this side
of the city: only Processional Boulevard and a few other streets with various entertainment establishments were permissible destinations, and all the buildings close to the Market Gate were warehouses and other business-oriented structures.
As darkness closed in, the lamplighter came by, lighting the oil lamps hung on the tall posts at twenty-foot intervals around the Road. Mara’s house had been lit by rockgas, but that was a rare and precious commodity that only the wealthy could afford, especially since the extraction and storage of it in special cisterns beneath the ground required the careful attention of Gifted Engineers.
On the heels of the lamplighter came a Watcher, who went into the tower Mara had pointed out to Keltan and filled and lit the lamps inside it. The top of the wall remained dark, of course, since the sentries patrolling it did not want their eyes dazzled . . . but just as in the mining camp, the sentries mostly turned their gaze inward; a fact of which she had apprised Chell. There had never been a threat to the city, and so the sentries’ primary function was to watch for fires or curfew-breaking children—Mara suspected that was how she and Sala had been spotted swimming in the ornamental pool behind the Waterworkers’ Hall (had that really just been last summer? it seemed a lifetime ago) and hauled home to their families in disgrace.
The lighting of the lamps began the countdown. Bells tolled every hour in Tamita to mark the passage of time, and when four hours had passed, Mara, Keltan, and Whiteblaze at last emerged from hiding. Mara looked both ways along the Great Circle Road to make sure no Watchers were in sight, took a careful look at the top of the wall for the same reason, and at last dashed across to the tower, its interior dimly lit by the flickering lamp just inside the open arch that gave access, but bright enough after their long hours in the dark.
The stairs Mara had so often trotted up as a child spiraled to their left. But the door they wanted was on ground level, in the deep shadow behind the stairs. Mara had discovered it one day when a group of Watchers had barged in just as she was coming down and she’d had to get out of their way. It was just as Mara remembered it: thick black timbers, strong iron bands, massive hinges. A steel bar held it closed, locked in place by a huge iron padlock, so rusted she doubted it could have been opened with the key even in the unlikely event someone in the city remembered where it was.
But she didn’t need a key. She took magic from Whiteblaze, just a little. It sheathed her hand in glowing red. She touched the lock and released magic into it. The hasp simply broke apart, and the ancient lock dropped to the stone floor with a clatter.
With Keltan’s help, she lifted the iron bar out of the brackets bolted to the door and set it to one side. “Here goes,” Keltan said. He tugged on the door. It gave an alarming groan as it opened, and Mara shot a look over her shoulder at the archway and the Great Circle Road beyond, but heard no shouts or sound of running feet.
A dark figure appeared in the doorway, face hidden in the shadows of a deep hood, eyes red sparks in the lamplight. A hand swept up, pulled back the hood, revealing Chell. “No alarm,” he said. “As you said, Mara. The sentries rarely look outside the city.” He entered the tower, and after him came the rest of the small force Edrik had assigned: first Hyram, who nodded at Mara, unsmiling, then Prescox, Danys, and Lilla, the three unMasked Army fighters, followed by the four sailors. Antril brought up the rear. He alone flashed Mara a quick grin. She felt absurdly grateful for that.
“Edrik?” Mara said to Hyram.
“We haven’t seen any sign of the unMasked Army,” he said. “But my father will be where he is supposed to be, waiting out of sight of the walls. He’ll attack the damaged portion of the wall at first light—just as you ordered.” His tone made it clear he resented the fact she was able to order his father to do anything.
“The Watcher Army must be close as well,” Keltan said. “Their messengers arrived yesterday.”
“And our force will be caught like a nut in a nutcracker when they do arrive,” Hyram growled. “Trapped between the Watchers and the city.”
“Then we’d better do our part,” Mara said. “Shut up, all of you, and follow me.” Huh, she thought, surprised at her own forcefulness. Maybe getting walloped with the Lady of Pain and Fire’s soulprint has done me some good. Whether that was where that tone of authority came from or not, it worked. The men (and one woman) fell in behind her as she looked both ways along the road again, then led the force at a run across it—but not into the alley where she and Keltan had lurked earlier. Instead, they entered the alley farther down the Great Circle Road from the Market Gate, on the opposite side of the warehouse from where they had waited. There was a side door in that alley. Mara had not seen it when she was inside the warehouse after her failed Masking, but she’d seen it often enough in her years running these streets as a child.
It was bolted from the inside, of course. Mara paused long enough to remove her silver Child Guard Mask, handing it to Chell, who slipped it inside his pack without a word, then called up red magic from Whiteblaze again, and eased the bolt open. Taking a step back, she nodded to Hyram, who slipped his sword from its sheath, a motion copied by the others in the small force, pressed quietly down on the latch—and then eased the door open.
The room beyond was dark, too dark to see anything. Deep, rumbling snores proved the chamber was not empty, however. Hyram stepped inside, and a moment later the snores choked off and then turned into moans of terror.
Everyone crammed through the door, Mara last. She closed it behind her. She called up a touch more magic from Whiteblaze, just enough to cover one finger with white light, illuminating the room for her alone. Seeing the oil lamp on the wooden table next to the cold fireplace, she reached out to it. The spark of magic from her finger leaped to its wick, and yellow light filled the room.
Wide white eyes stared at her from Chell’s men and the unMasked Army fighters. She ignored them. She walked over to the bed where Hyram was holding a gloved hand over the mouth of the fat man, whose eyes widened as he saw her, and widened further when he saw the wolf at her feet. “Move your hand,” she told Hyram. Then to the fat man she said. “If you shout, my wolf will tear your throat out.” She touched Whiteblaze’s head. “Won’t you, boy?”
Whiteblaze, his eyes never leaving the man’s face, growled even as his tail thumped.
Hyram lifted his gloved hand. Sweat beaded the fat man’s face and there was a dark spreading stain on the blanket between his legs. Remembering her time in the warehouse, she couldn’t summon much sympathy.
In fact, she couldn’t summon any at all.
“You!” the fat man moaned. Whiteblaze growled, and his voice dropped to a strained whisper. “I remember you. The one with no scars . . . I sold your picture for a pretty penny . . . but you went to the mine!”
“I came back,” Mara said. “This is the second time, actually. You may remember a large hole being blown in the wall of the city? The execution of Stanik? The slaying of several Watchers at Traitors’ Gate?” She smiled. “That was me.” She let the smile slip away. “Now where are your keys?”
“Mantelpiece,” the fat man said. “Please, don’t kill me!”
“Not entirely up to me,” Mara said. She went over to the mantelpiece, found the keys. “Bring him.”
Hyram hauled the fat man up. He clutched at his blanket, and Mara realized he was naked beneath it. It seemed fitting.
The inner door of the chamber opened into the warehouse proper. It was not entirely dark. As she had remembered, a couple of lamps were kept burning, presumably so the fat man could check on his charges if he needed to. Everything was as she remembered it: the two rows of cells down the sides of the warehouse, the chair where the fat man sat to draw his prisoners, the table and chests where prisoners took off their own clothes and put on the gray prison smocks.
There was stirring in the darkness as they entered the warehouse. A boy’s voice cried out, “What’s going on?”
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Then a girl, voice shocked, said, “They’re unMasked!”
“Is that a wolf?” said another girl.
All the children were locked up on the same side of the warehouse, Mara realized. She counted three girls and two boys.
More than anything else, she wanted to let them out of their cells. But if they went out into the street and the Night Watchers found them, their precious element of surprise would be squandered. Nor could they afford to leave a guard.
“Listen to me,” she said, standing in front of the very cell in which she had once been imprisoned, now occupied by a slender boy with red hair, his freckled face crisscrossed by white scars from his failed Masking. “If we succeed in what we’re trying to do, tomorrow you’ll be freed to go back to your families, and you’ll never have to worry about Watchers or Masks again.”
“Then let us out!” cried the red-haired boy. “Let us out now.”
“I can’t,” Mara said. “Not now. There’s nowhere for you to go.”
“Then we’ll stay in the warehouse,” the boy said. “Until things change.”
“If they don’t, you’ll just be locked up again.” And then a horrible thought struck her. They had destroyed the Autarch’s mines of magic. There was nowhere for the unMasked to be sent where they could be useful. And before that labor camp had existed . . . those who failed their Masking had just been executed.
She couldn’t leave them locked up. No matter what happened, they were better off trying to escape.
“Listen,” she said. “There’s an open door, in the tower across the street. If you can get into it, you can get out of the city, flee into the fields and woods.”
“We’ll starve out there,” a girl cried.
“I’m not telling you what to do,” Mara said. “I can’t. But you’re right,” she said to the boy. “I can’t leave you locked up, either.”