by Patty Jansen
"In here?" he whispered.
"Yes."
He turned around and signalled to Dalit in the tree. Mikandra could see the red light of the interruptor flashing between the branches. Something buzzed near the window.
Jocassa started working at the corner of the window with his knife. He prised it at straight angles between the frame and the glass. Bits of cement fell onto the balcony.
He whispered watch it and the next moment, there was a small snap and a glass pane came out. He caught it in his hand as if he did this every day.
So he wasn't a burglar, right? Like she believed that.
He reached into the window and undid the lock. It opened outwards. Silently, Jocassa climbed to the windowsill, gave her the thumbs up and vanished inside the room.
Mikandra followed him, not half as quick and graceful as he had been.
In the dark, it was hard to see anything in the office except the desk that stood immediately inside the window.
Jocassa's disembodied voice said, "Do youz know where this thing is that you're looking for?"
Mikandra flicked on her light and walked quietly to the shelves against the back wall. The book stood where it had been when she had been sitting there on the other side of that glass partition. She took it out and slipped it in her bag.
The book next to it was indeed a copy of the Trader manual. What was that doing here?
She took it from the shelf and opened it at the first page.
A label was affixed to the page like she had seen at Lihan's house. A gift from the Trader Guild to apprentice Daya Ezmi on the completion of his academy training.
Crap.
Daya had been to the academy. Traders swore loyalty to each other. They swore to uphold the truth. What if he . . . told her the truth when she had been sitting there?
Jocassa whispered, "Can youz hurry up? I want t' get out before someone comes."
"Yes, coming."
She slung her bag over her shoulders and ran back to the window.
Chapter 28
Mikandra climbed on the windowsill, onto the balcony. Up the railing. Whoa, it was a long way down there. She turned around and dangled her legs over the railing. One foot found a rung.
Jocassa had picked up the glass pane and was sticking it back into the window with a couple of globs of putty.
Mikandra shifted over the railing until both her feet were on the ladder. She put her full weight on the rung and climbed down. Her hands trembled.
Thasep whispered from the bottom, "Hurry up."
Jocassa swung himself onto the ladder above her. His movement made the ladder shake.
The light went on in the room upstairs, flooding the yard in light.
Jocassa swore.
Mikandra reached the bottom, and ran for the shadow of the tree. A small light blinked amongst the greenery where Dalit sat. He'd already let down the knotted rope. Thasep pushed her up the rope ladder. Dalit stuck out his hand and helped her onto the tree branch.
There she sat, panting, while Jocassa and Thasep scrambled up.
Two guards had come into the office and walked around. Both were Coldi and looked female. Mikandra shivered. Because Jocassa had stuck the glass pane back, they hadn't yet seen that someone had come in through the window, so the guards stood at the door into the foyer, studying the panel next to the lock.
Thasep pulled the rope ladder up and undid the knot. Dalit was already on the other side of the wall and dangled off the branch by his hands. He let himself drop and hit the ground with an oof.
"Shhh!" Jocassa hissed.
The guard who had been outside the main entrance to the building was coming in their direction.
"Come." Thasep reached down and pulled Dalit up again with one arm.
The guard, a solid-built keihu man, walked past. He glanced up into the tree. Dalit pressed himself against the trunk, and Mikandra was squashed up between him and Jocassa.
She held her breath.
The man stood very still as if he was listening, then he turned around and walked back to the building's entrance.
Phew.
"Quick, let's go," Jocassa whispered.
Thasep dropped out of the tree and helped Dalit down. Then Jocassa.
A light went on in the ground floor of the building, casting a yellowish glow in the courtyard. Someone opened a door. Two people came into the yard, one of them with a torch, which he directed up to the top of the wall.
In panic, Mikandra let herself drop from the tree. On the way down, she hit a branch which snagged on her shirt. Something ripped. She landed hard on her feet. Ouch, her ankle.
"Run."
Jocassa didn't wait for the others to act on his command.
They ran. Pain spiked through Mikandra's ankle. With every step, it felt like she trod on knives. She clamped her teeth to stop herself from screaming. She didn't look back, but ran. Her whole future hinged on getting out of here without being caught.
Around the block, into Market Street. They stopped to catch their breath at a bench between a couple of large trees.
"We did it." Jocassa laughed. "We did broke into th' council!"
He clapped Dalit on the shoulder and then Mikandra. "Youz were a real pro. Are youz sure you've never done this before?"
"What are you taking me for?"
But actually, she had done this before. She'd climbed the kitchen roof and down to the back gate to sneak out of the house to see Lihan. Most Endri kids, especially girls, were half-decent at getting out of places without anyone seeing them.
"Eydrina, look at youz." Jocassa laughed. Thasep laughed, too.
Mikandra looked. There was a huge rip in the front of her tunic, showing her skin.
"Oops." She pulled the sides together.
Jocassa laughed harder. "We's a bunch of real bunglers 'n' we even fooled th' guards."
Even Dalit was laughing. "You should have heard Thasep's squeak when the guard looked up in the tree. It was something to behold."
"Come on, let's go 'n' celebrate." Jocassa started moving again.
Mikandra clutched her bag with the book inside. She was so happy that it had been successful and that it was over.
"What's wrong with yer foot, Eydrina?"
"It's not so bad. It twisted when I fell out of the tree. I'll be fine." She tried to demonstrate, but within a few steps it was clear that she was not fine.
"Let me help you." Dalit took her arm.
Walking up the steps into the guesthouse, Mikandra was struck by the odd feeling that she felt happy for the first time since leaving Miran, and possibly a long time before that. This odd band of men and their unconditional camaraderie was growing on her. From the moment she had met him, Jocassa had been helpful. Sure, he probably hoped to gain something from his association with her, but he'd been friendly. Not once had either of the men ogled at her or made lewd remarks.
In the courtyard the usual party was winding down. Many people had already gone to bed, with just a band of diehard drinkers remaining. The musician on one of the tables, playing chords on his badly-tuned lute.
"It think this deserves a drink," Jocassa said.
"All right, I'll go get th' bottle," Thasep said.
Mikandra felt like saying no. Her skin crawled at the idea of having to drink brew again, but she knew she couldn't. These men had trusted her and she should repay that trust.
"I'll get changed into something that doesn't have big hole in it."
Thasep grinned a gap-toothed smile.
She turned to the stairs, which proved more of a challenge than she thought. Pain spiked through her ankle with each step. Ouch and ouch.
She stumbled up to the balcony and into the dormitory. A group of people must have gone out, because it was quite empty apart from the Kedrasi women, already asleep. Jocassa and Dalit must have joined the group in the courtyard, because the sound of Jocassa's laughter drifted up from below.
Mikandra picked up the box from under her bed that contain
ed her possessions and sat down on the bed with it, rummaging for a new tunic. She put the bag with the book next to her, pulled the ripped tunic over her head and slipped on the new one. Then she put her bag back onto her shoulder. She was not leaving it unattended. Her hand closed on the book inside. If only she could have a look. Surely, Jocassa wouldn't mind if she came a bit later? She took the book out of her bag and opened it on her lap. But damn, the pearl had almost run out and she needed to take the stand onto her bed to still see something. It wouldn't stay up by itself, so she had to use her bedsheet to try and prop it up—
The floor creaked. Mikandra gasped and looked over her shoulder. There were heavy footsteps behind her and a hand clamped over her mouth.
Mikandra struggled, trying to twist out of the person's grip, but the arm that held her was much too strong. Another hand—gloved—grabbed her upper arm just under the shoulder. She was pulled up and backwards off the bed.
Ow, her ankle.
Mikandra tried to look over her shoulder, but all she could see was dark clothing. The hand across her face felt very warm, like the high body temperature of the Coldi. Oh damn, this was one of those ex-Hedron guards.
There was a second person in the room, also Coldi and dressed in black. As with many Coldi, it was impossible to determine gender, even by voice. This person picked up the book.
Mikandra tried to scream.
Please, she needed that book, or everything she had done in Barresh would be for nothing. She thumped her good foot on the floor as hard as she could, relying on the guard's grip on her arm to keep her up.
People were always going in and out of this room. There were usually people on the veranda. Surely someone would hear it, walk in, or wake up and disturb these thug guards? Where was Jocassa?
The guard pushed Mikandra out of the room, across the gallery and down the stairs. Her ankle hurt with each step.
Jocassa, Dalit and Thasep sat at a table in the middle of the courtyard surrounded by a few more guards, in a pool of light cast by a couple of light pearls carried by guards. Everyone else—mostly curious regulars from the guesthouse—stood in the shadow of the overhanging balcony. They were Mirani youths and their keihu and Pengali girlfriends, Kedrasi guest workers, Damarcians, Indrahui, Coldi. One look at their blank faces and Mikandra knew that none of these people would help her. As they had done when the thugs came to take away the Pengali woman, they would prefer to watch and keep themselves out of trouble.
The guards pushed Mikandra to the table. She met Jocassa's eyes. His expression was apologetic.
Someone else waited in the darkness, flanked by two enormous Coldi mountains of muscle, a tall figure in a light-coloured tunic with a hood covering the head and hair.
Mikandra held herself straight and proud. Whoever this person was, either Daya or the lady, she knew one thing: she would never make it out of this courtyard alive. Bakimay had said that Aghyrians with strong abilities and good training could kill a person just by looking at them. Maybe she was going to be subject of a demonstration.
The person came forward and lowered the hood.
It was Anmi, her face emotionless.
Mikandra held her breath, waiting for the inevitable. Her heart was thudding like crazy.
Anmi spoke, soft but commanding, in a language Mikandra didn't recognise.
From between a gaggle of guard came second person. Daya Ezmi. He replied to her in the same language and the melodic tone of the words belied the meaning Mikandra detected behind the words. Are you going to kill her or do you want me to do it?
Someone muttered, "Oh, crap." It sounded like Jocassa.
Daya glanced at Jocassa, a bemused look on his face.
The thugs made Mikandra sit down on a chair. The guard released her mouth, but both guards remained on either side of the chair, holding her shoulders.
A few onlookers tried to leave, but the whole courtyard was full of guards and all the entrances were shut off.
Anmi came closer, pulled back another chair at the table and sat down. So this was one of the buried children? For that she would have been born thousands of years ago and lived in stasis all that time, she looked strangely normal, and was much younger than Mikandra had expected, maybe even younger than herself.
She looked met Mikandra's eyes with a penetrating look that made her shiver. The irises were the blackest of black. Her skin was pale and almost translucent.
One of the guards handed her the book he'd taken from Mikandra. She opened it and flicked through. A frown crossed her face.
"I'm puzzled by you. You have been following us for quite some time now. You asked around town about my former lover. You asked about the history of the city and you asked about us. We cannot detect any signs that you are a spy. Only yesterday we decided that you were harmless and were going to ease off on the surveillance. But now this. What are you doing here and what do you want?"
"Am I not allowed to visit and work?"
"And steal things? Is this book worth breaking into the Chief Councillor's office for?"
"I haven't stolen anything." But she was talking nonsense and she knew it. These people knew precisely what she had done, either through their surveillance or other means.
The lady gave her a hard look. Mikandra went dizzy again. She recognised the feeling and this time knew it for what it was: the probing of mind reading. She shivered, but couldn't look away from Anmi's eyes.
She continued, her voice intense. "My partner became interested in your story, because it confirmed something that is very important to us. We had not spoken to anyone from Miran who had been taken into the chambers under the Foundation monument, because Mirani people we have spoken to are older and when they were at school, the chamber was still being excavated and restored. He showed you the chambers on Asto, which have sacred values to us. But it seems your interest in history masked a different agenda. Who are you and who do you work for?"
"I work for myself. My name is Eydrina Avarin."
"That is a lie." Her voice was soft and menacing. "I checked after you first came in. There is no such person as Eydrina Avarin. Not in Miran, not in Bendara as you've told everyone."
In the darkness, Jocassa said, "That's fine. No one here talks about who they are. 's self-protection—hey, ow! Keep yer hands off me."
"Leave my friends alone. They have done nothing and they are not involved with any of my business."
"They're accomplices."
"I paid them. Let them go." Mikandra stared back at her, defiant. "And don't try to intimidate me. There is no way you can know that there is no Eydrina Avarin unless you have access to the Mirani population registry, and there was no way Miran would give you access to that from here. You're lying."
"You're a Mirani spy."
"If I wanted to be a spy, then why would I be so obvious about it? I'd pick a name and identity with a history. I left Miran because I fled a marriage with an old man. I came here and I was robbed on my first night in Barresh. I have no money to go back home and my ID was in the same bag that was stolen. I'm working to earn money. You can ask anyone at the guesthouse. That is the truth."
"Yes, your ID was taken." Her voice was chilling. She took something from her pocket and flipped it in the air. The light reflected in the shiny surface of an ID card, which she put on the table. "Enough with the lies now, Mikandra Bisumar."
"Bisumar? Oh crap!" Jocassa squeaked.
A ripple of talk went through the curious onlookers. Several people looked at her with wide eyes. She could see what they thought, that she was a spy for the council. With her name, with her family, she had to be.
Mikandra's head reeled with anger. She'd spent all her time in Barresh gaining the trust of these people. "You sent the thugs who stole my money? You, as official of the Barresh council. You dare call me a criminal?"
"The guards arrested your attackers soon after they must have robbed you. They recovered most things."
"I went to the guard office the next day.
They said nothing about it. They didn't even talk to me properly."
"A supervisor took your things to the council as a matter of security. You were at the Exchange asking questions. We did not know who you were, except that your name is marked with the Trader Guild flag."
Another gasp from people in the audience. Murmuring voices, the tone not friendly. Out there in the dark space underneath the gallery, there were a lot of people who would now be angry with her. Even if she could escape the thug guards, she would probably not be safe. She heard Iztho's words people trying to screw you because they think you're rich, or people thinking you're trying to screw them because they think you're rich.
She didn't dare meet Jocassa's eyes.
Sweat ran over her back.
"I have nothing to hide and I did nothing wrong." Oh, ancestors, this would not end well.
"Obviously you do. So I'll ask the question again. What are you doing here? Specifically, what do you think you'd find in that book?"
"The truth." And then she added, because everything was lost anyway, "Out of all things, proof of your son's birth."
"My—" She frowned, no longer looking unequivocally angry.
"Your son. My sponsor's son, who is the heir of the family. Iztho Andrahar's son."
The murmur of voices increased.
The lady let a small silence lapse. An expression of confusion came over her face. Had she seriously thought that no one would notice the boy's dyed hair?
When she next spoke, her voice was soft. "Wait—you say you're working for the Andrahar Traders?"
"Yes." Mikandra straightened her back. "I'm Iztho Andrahar's trainee. Iztho got framed for smuggling menisha fungus into Barresh, which he didn't do. The Andrahar licence is suspended and Iztho is missing. That's why I came here: to look for him. The remaining brothers are fighting this in court very soon. They have no proof of his innocence." Panic clawed at her. The trial would begin the day after tomorrow, and she was back to having nothing and would be lucky to get out of this alive. "No one knows where Iztho is. His family is in chaos and mourning. I was accepted as apprentice just before all this happened. I am due to start at the academy this coming intake. The Andrahar Traders are the backbone of the free trade movement in Miran. The Mirani chapter of the Guild is split over this issue. Everyone is afraid for the future. Some Traders—" Lihan Ilendar, the bastard "—have already left. This is more than just a court case, it's a political fight, for my aunt, who's trying to uphold sanity in the Mirani council, for the Traders, who want proof that justice still exists. If Nemedor Satin gets full control of the country, what will Miran do? He's hardline and he will not let Barresh be happily independent. I thought you in Barresh knew that well enough before you started framing people who could have been supporters for a peaceful resolution. You do not want a war. Miran does not want a war." She glanced at Daya. He had gone through the academy?