The Robin and the Kestrel

by Mercedes Lackey

  "I can o-only h-hope," he laughed, and followed her down the stairs, closing and locking the door after her. And wisely, very wisely, he said nothing else.

  Practice made perfect, and that was as true with handicrafts as it was with music. They were much faster making this new batch of Stars than they had been with the first batch. Gluing bright glass beads to the ends of the crossbars of the miniature Stars was a good idea; it made them look more like jewelry. Stringing them on chains of matching beads was another wonderful notion.

  And the best part—so far as Robin was concerned—was that no one else would have anything like them in the market. Once again, they would have a monopoly of sorts. While they were not here to make money, no Gypsy worth the name would ever have turned down such a golden opportunity.

  And if any of the street preachers questioned the presence of the beads, she could blithely point out that there were no colors in the miniature Stars to indicate what the owner's intention-prayer was. The beads served that function, of course.

  If they can use their twisted logic to prove that nonhumans are demon-inspired, I can use the same rules to my advantage, she thought, making the final wrapping on a miniature Star of copper with red and gold beads. Let the rooster crow all he wants; it's the hen that lays the eggs, not him.

  They had gotten up early perforce, awakened by the morning bells, but they'd put the time between breakfast and lunch to good use. And when they came down to lunch, the innkeeper himself sauntered over to their table with a note in his hand.

  He looked only mildly curious. "This's from m' old friend Donnar," he said. "It come this mornin'. He doin' well?"

  "As well as can be expected," Robin replied, opening the sealed note. She noticed with amusement that Donnar had sealed it with a blob of candle wax and the impression of a coin. A rather unusual coin. It was, in fact, one of the silver coins she'd given him in exchange for his information and help, an ancient piece bearing a strange bird with two tails.

  "Sometimes I wish I'd'a followed his advice," Wylie said wistfully, without elaborating on what the advice had been; then he shrugged, and took himself off.

  The note said simply, "Go to Threadneedle Street, to the shop of Ardana Bodkin. Say, 'I've come to order an alabaster alb and an ivory altar cloth.' Don't bring instruments. It's been taken care of." There was no signature, which was wise on Donnar's part.

  Robin memorized the code-phrase, and burned the note in the candle at their table. "Are you tired of making Stars?" she asked. "Could you use a break?"

  Kestrel nodded.

  "Good. So could I." She stood up, and brushed her skirts off. "Let's go for a walk."

  He took her arm and paid their reckoning, and they walked out into the street. "Are w-we g-going where I th-think w-we're g-going?" he asked cautiously.

  "Well, probably; since you got to see Threadneedle Street yesterday and I didn't, I thought it would make a nice walk," she replied. "There might be something down there I could use that you didn't notice."

  "Ah." Jonny made no other comment, but his hand tightened on her arm. But he looked a little relieved; evidently he felt a bit better about visiting a House if it wasn't in the Warren.

  Well, so did she! Donnar's protection notwithstanding, she did not want to visit that place after dark. There really was no such thing as "honor among thieves," and she did not trust anyone in that place once darkness fell.

  Ardana Bodkin was the only seamstress prospering at all—the shop front was swept and newly painted, the windows filled with color, silk and satin, and two young women stitching away at crimson velvet inside. But that was only natural—since from the window display, Ardana Bodkin specialized in ecclesiastical robes.

  The place was a feast for the eye after the browns and grays of the drab clothing outside. The crimson satin robes of a Justiciar sparkled with rich gold bullion embroidery; the vivid blue silk robes of an Intercessor boasted cutwork of impossible intricacy. Next to that, the emerald green robes for the Service of Vernal Equinox shone with lacework dyed to match. And there were, of course, dozens of the white robes favored by High Bishop Padrik and his Order, all brilliant with embroidery, lace, cutwork, and gems.

  "May we help you?" asked one of the young ladies, a plain-faced blonde, as Robin gazed with hungry eyes on all the vivid, soul-satisfying color. She had not realized how much she missed her Gypsy finery.

  "I've come to order an alabaster alb and an ivory altar cloth," she said carefully—and a little regretfully. A pity to have to leave all this color . . . .

  But the young woman smiled, and said, "Please follow me," then led them both through the back room where a single woman stitched gold bullion to white satin, to a small door hidden behind a swath of velvet. She knocked twice, paused, and three times; the door swung open, and she motioned for Robin and Kestrel to go inside.

  The moment they did, Robin swallowed; somehow, Donnar had made a horrible mistake! They were in the receiving room of a convent!

  The room held about five or six lovely young women dressed in the robes of the Sisters and Novices of a religious Order; she didn't recognize the pearl gray and white of their habits, but they were clearly religious robes. The room itself was as stark as any in a convent; a few benches, plain white walls, a single bookcase full of books. The young ladies all turned to stare at the intruders.

  "I—" she gasped. "Excuse us, we—"

  The woman who closed the door behind them laughed. She too wore the robes of the Order, whatever it was, but her chestnut hair was left to stream unbound down her back, like a maiden's, confined only by a headband.

  "You think you made a mistake, yes?" she said, in a rich contralto. "But you are Robin, and you, Kestrel; you play the harp, both, and you come from Donnar, yes?"

  At Robin's dumb nod, she laughed again. "You have made no mistake. This is the House of the Penitents, and I am Madam—ah, rather, I am Sister-Mother Ardana."

  Robin blinked—and then she took a second, closer look at the "habits" of the putative Sisters. They were cut to fit like second skins down the line of the torso. The robes left nothing and everything to the imagination, and were certainly teasingly erotic.

  "But—why all this?" she asked, as Ardana led them across the room to the door on the other side.

  "Well, it is very convenient, for one thing," she replied, tossing her rich brown hair over her shoulder as she opened the second door. "If the authorities were ever to come to this part of the shop, they would find that all of the ladies here are seamstresses—or, at least, they can sew enough to convince a fool Constable of the fact! We have everything in place to make it at least look like a convent, so long as we have time to clean the private rooms. There are many convents in Gradford these days, many women establishing their own charitable Orders which support themselves by a trade or a craft, since the miracles began. I have heard that one or two are even genuine."

  The door she led them to opened onto a corridor, as austere as the receiving room, with doors on both sides. "Why so many new Orders?" Robin asked, puzzled. "I thought you had to get the permission of the Church to establish an Order."

  Ardana laughed again, a good-natured chuckle. "Oh, my dear, no. The Church is indifferent—so long as the Orders find some means of supporting themselves. If they do not attempt to appoint or ordain Priests, collect alms, or usurp any of the privileges of the Church, the Church permits them to do what they will. So many single women in various trades have discovered it is a good thing to form an Order. They need not find convenient men to 'help' them with their businesses, if they do not choose to do so."

  Robin exchanged a knowing look with Kestrel. So, it seemed that single women were already under a great deal of pressure here, as she had suspected might happen. And at least some of them had realized that it might not be too long before they lost the right to practice trades or crafts, or to run a business without a man—

  —or without the blessing of the Church. Very clever.

  "My las
t set of musicians was arrested for street-busking and sent out of the city," Ardana said, as she opened another door, this time to a nicely appointed office, furnished well, and comfortably, and decorated in a modest rose-pink. There were two small harps standing in the corner, beside two chairs. "Donnar said you were looking for a way to pick up information about Padrik; well, many of my clients are either in Ins employ or in his Order. If any of them are likely to let information slip, it will be here."

  She gestured to the two harps. "Consider this your audition," she told them. "If I like what I hear, I will hire you for a few hours in the evening to play in the 'chapel'; you may keep your ears as wide open as you like, and I will tell my ladies to let you know if they hear anything."

  She sat down behind her desk, as serene as the statue of Saint Hypatia in the Cathedral, and with that same hint of an amused smile on her lips. Robin passed one harp to Kestrel; she plucked a set of strings experimentally, but someone had done a good job of keeping them in tune. She looked over at him, and somehow, in spite of the tension, they both grinned.

  " Th-the S-saucy P-Priest?' " he suggested.

  Ardana laughed.

  Kestrel had been very uncomfortable from the beginning about this; when they passed their audition, and Ardana hired them on the spot, he didn't lose any of that discomfort. In fact, it got worse.

  It was worse still when Ardana led them to what she referred to as "the chapel," a room furnished with soft couches and cushions in jewel-bright satins and velvets, and tiny marble tables, where the "Sisters" lounged about in semi-transparent or very abbreviated versions of their "habits." This was where customers came when they wished some entertainment before or after the—main event.

  Kestrel had never been in a House before, and he frankly did not know where to look. Or not look. And the ladies obviously noticed; they whispered to each other behind their hands, and cast measuring glances at him that made him flush uncomfortably.

  He tried to confine his attentions to the harp that Ardana had loaned him—

  Clever of her to know that carrying an instrument openly through the street would get us in trouble, he thought, staring at the ornamental bird-head carved into the support-post of the instrument, as he and Robin put the two harps into perfect tune with each other. Forethought to the rescue again.

  By mutual consent they had decided to play only instrumental; voice might give their identities away. And they would try to avoid speaking if they could. Ardana had given them robes that matched the ones the ladies in the receiving room wore, though not so tight across the body; those robes were very effective disguises. Kestrel was so small and clean-shaven he might even pass as a very plain, flat-chested girl.

  Which is only fair, since Rune disguised herself as a boy to play . . . .

  When the harps were in tune, Kestrel started a tranquil, calming piece; "Fortune, My Foe." Robin joined in on the second verse, playing a lovely descant. He relaxed against the back of his chair and let himself forget his surroundings in the music.

  So effective was his effort that he woke from his self-induced trance with a start, as one of the "Sisters" touched his elbow and offered him a silver-plated goblet of fruit juice. He accepted it, but could not help the blush that burned across his face at the sight of her.

  She chuckled, and he burned an even deeper and more painful red. But then she put one hand on his arm, and he raised his eyes to her face, to see that her expression was one of sympathy and not mockery.

  "We assumed that this is the first time you've ever been in a House, Kestrel," she said, using his Free Bard name. "It's perfectly fine to feel out-of-place, embarrassed, in fact. I did, the first time I came here. We would much rather see a charming blush than a knowing smirk. You assume the best of us, and you blush for our sakes as much as your own. The man with the smirk assumes the worst of us, and can't wait to prove it."

  Robin grinned at her, and she grinned back, a surprisingly gaminlike grin, full of mischief. "Both of you, consider yourselves as one of us; we're glad to have you," she finished. "I'm Sister Tera; if I can help you in any way, please let me know."

  And with that, she delivered the second water-beaded goblet of fruit juice to Robin and took herself out of the room entirely.

  The rest of the ladies were clearly "with" someone; offering them bits to eat, filling goblets, entertaining them with conversation. Somehow they had all come in without Kestrel even noticing.

  "Don't worry," Robin whispered to him. "You were off in your usual trance, but I've been listening. You wouldn't believe how many of these men are associated with the High Bishop or the Cathedral!"

  He gave the clients a second look; they were a well-fed lot, and wore self-satisfaction as if it were a garment. While that particular expression was not exclusive to the clergy, it seemed the exclusive property of the clergy in Gradford.

  "I g-guess we've d-done the right th-thing," he whispered back, finishing off his juice and setting the goblet down beside his chair.

  "I am very relieved to hear you say that," Robin replied with a sigh. "I was afraid you'd think I'd gotten us involved with something really repugnant."

  He shrugged. "I'm always w-willing t-to l-learn," he told her philosophically. "Now. L-let's p-play."

  "Promise not to go off into one of your trances again," she countered. "We're both supposed to be keeping our ears open, remember?"

  He plucked the first few notes of "My Lady Spy" by way of an answer, and grinned. She returned it, picked up the tune within the first bar, and they were off again.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Their next several days settled into an odd routine; a routine Robin even felt marginally comfortable with. So long as she didn't listen too closely to the High Bishop's sermons, that is, and avoided street preachers entirely. They played in the "chapel" by night, and sold their trinkets in the market square by day. Early in the week, Robin took note of the fact that Kestrel had a shrewd business sense. She would not have expected that from someone who had grown up in the Bardic Guild Hall and had been born a Prince. His estimation that they would soon find others duplicating their God-Stars for a lower cost was right. They sold off all their wall-Stars at the same price that the new folks had set and did not bother to make any more. Instead, they concentrated on the miniatures; few people had a delicate touch with the fragile wire, and of those few, no one made them with beads or crystals hanging from the webs or mounted as end-caps on the crossbars.

  They began to sec the more expensive versions of the Stars on the breasts of wealthy folk in the Cathedral. They even began to see those same expensive Stars coming into Ardana's "chapel" at night. Many of them stayed with Ardana's ladies, gifts from grateful clients.

  They were able to gather quite a bit of information about Padrik and his "special healing services" simply by listening. The most important bit of information came by accident—when one of the people Robin suspected was a Priest let it slip that Padrik had some "special helpers" who were the only ones permitted to assist him in planning the "healing services."

  After that, they attended every one of the "healing services" until they began to be able to recognize certain faces, despite disguises. They were even able to put a name or two to those faces, by waiting at the entrance and listening carefully while these "postulants" talked among themselves.

  That was when Robin realized that the man who specialized in "being possessed by demons" was a regular client at Ardana's!

  She was certain enough that she was willing to put it to a test, the fourth night that they played Ardana's chapel, but she waited until that morning so that she could confirm it with Kestrel.

  Robin figured that they were due for another "demon possession" at the healing service—probably today—and she was not disappointed. As they brought the man up to the front, spitting and sweating and breathing fire, she nudged Kestrel in the ribs. "Wasn't he the one with Sister Krystal last night?" she whispered.

  Kestrel narrowed his eyes with c
oncentration, and finally nodded. "I think so," he whispered back, "but wait until I get a better look at his face."

  It wasn't until "the demon had been cast out" that they both got a really clear look at the man, but the smirk he wore as he was "helped" out of the Cathedral only made the identification surer. He had worn that same smirk last night.

  The chapel was empty of clients; a good time to consult the statuesque Sister Krystal. "The client last night?" Sister Krystal wrinkled her aristocratic nose with distaste. "His name is Robere Patsono. Is he one of Padrik's 'special helpers' you were looking for?" At Robin's nod, she grimaced. "I wouldn't be the least surprised to find out he was involved with Padrik's 'miracles.' He's always hinting about how important he is to the High Bishop, but he gets very coy about it when one of us tries to find out exactly what it is he does."

  "If his name is Patsono, then he is one of the ones setting up the miracles," Robin replied grimly.

  Someone lit a sweet-scented candle, and the smell of roses filled the chapel. Krystal tossed her long, ash-blond hair over one shoulder, and pursed her lips with speculation. "Do you think you might be able to—well—put a spike in Padrik's wheels?" she asked, hopefully. "Things were better when the Houses and the Guild were legal."

  "Things?" Kestrel asked. He looked puzzled, although Robin had a notion what Krystal was talking about.

  Krystal's reply confirmed her guesses. She sighed, and closed her gray eyes for a moment. "Now—well, things can happen to a lady, and the only recourse we have is for Ardana to ban them from the House. She can't always do that, even, because if the client is important enough, he could threaten to turn us over to the Cathedral Constables."

  "The Guards of Public Morality?" Robin said, with heavy irony. "Very nice. As if they weren't violating the laws themselves. I've seen plenty of them in here too."

  Krystal shook her head, and toyed with the silken folds of her robe. "Of course you have. But that wouldn't stop them from arresting us if they were ordered to. They don't care; why should they? We aren't important to them. They can always find another House."