Chapter Four #7
“I was given your name,” I began, looking around to make sure no one was listening.
“Oh yes?”
She clearly wasn’t going to help me.
“By a traveling magician … I, er …” I was floundering. Luckily, though, that word seemed to have sparked her interest.
“A magician, eh? Hmm.” The woman poked the coal a little with her finger, careful not to touch the flames. “Name?”
“Persinette.”
“The magician’s, not yours. But that’s a mouthful, while we’re on the subject.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. His name was Patrick. And everyone calls me Netta.”
She had become very still. The movement of her hand on the knife had ceased.
“And this magician … What did he tell you?”
“He gave me this.” I handed over the token, and she turned it between her fingers. “And told me to find you. He said you were a friend. I was hoping you might give me a place to stay. Just for the night,” I added hastily.
“Do I look like an innkeeper to you?”
“No, but …” You are a woman and therefore automatically safer than others I might encounter here.
You have kind eyes. You are clean, which tells me you do not sleep out here, and potentially know somewhere where I might take a bath.
All these thoughts ran through my head, but I did not know how to voice them.
While my mind raced, my Hair wound loose from my neck and sent tendrils drifting towards Mieka like hands raised in supplication.
I grabbed at them and yanked them down, but Mieka had seen it.
Her brown eyes widened as she looked from the Hair to me.
“It’s …” I began, and then stopped.
“I know what it is,” said Mieka. She gave me a sharp-eyed glance. “You in trouble?”
I hesitated, wondering how much to tell her. “I think so,” I said at last.
“Watch trouble, or Temple trouble?”
“Both? I think.”
Mieka sighed. “You can come inside,” she said. “The fire is almost out, anyway. But”—she held up a hand in warning—“you’ll need to pay your way. Understood?”
“I don’t have much money.”
“There are other ways.” Well, that was ominous. “Just know that it’s not a free ride.”
I bit my lip. I could figure this out later. The important thing, for now, was to live long enough to see the morning. “Thank you.”
Mieka stood and stamped the fire into ash as I watched, then secreted the knife and strap somewhere about her person, and held out her hand in a beckoning gesture. “Come on.”
Baldbeak, apparently deciding that now was the time to introduce a giant black bird to the conversation, swooped down onto my shoulder.
Mieka raised an eyebrow. “Friend of yours?”
“Er … yes.”
Mieka pounded on the metal door once, twice, setting it rattling in its hinges. It opened a crack, a chain rattling across the opening, and a nose poked out.
“It’s me,” said Mieka.
The door closed again, and I heard the sound of the chain being removed. When it opened again, another girl, much younger, stood on the threshold, frowsy-headed from sleep.
“Who’s this?” asked the girl.
“Netta. She’s new.”
“And what’s that?” Her eyes rounded as she spotted Baldbeak.
“A raven,” said Mieka briefly.
“Are you sure? I’ve never seen a raven that big before.”
I was always the biggest of all my brothers and sisters, he said, pleased. I learned to fly first, too.
“I can’t leave Baldbeak out here,” I said. “He’ll freeze.”
Mieka sighed. “Is he house-trained?”
“Yes,” I lied, giving him a stern look. He rattled his feathers.
“He’s enormous,” said the younger girl, still wide-eyed.
“He can stay on the curtain rail, for now,” said Mieka. “But first sign of bird shit, and he’s out.”
I will try to hide it, Baldbeak said to me, fluffing himself up and trying to look innocent—difficult for a hulking black bird with enormous claws. I supposed that was the most I could expect.
Mieka stamped her feet to get the worst of the water off her boots and went inside.
Baldbeak and I followed suit, and the door clanged behind us, sounding both ominous and decidedly final.
I hoped that the magician had truly been helpful in sending me to Mieka, because I didn’t see any graceful way out of the situation now.
It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the candlelight, but when they did, I saw a low-ceilinged room with curtains draped across at intervals.
Piecemeal rows of shelves and bunks were visible behind, and a low wooden table squatted in the center.
There was a chaos of boots and slippers all over the floor by my feet—a dozen pairs at least. Baldbeak flew from my shoulder to the top of one of the flimsy curtain rails, making it creak ominously with his weight.
Mieka unlaced her boots. I knelt down and tried to do the same, but my fingers shook with cold, and I couldn’t manage the laces. She turned to me and started untying my boots with deft, rough tugs.
“Is she staying?” said the girl who had answered the door, standing on one leg and observing me with suspicion. She was several years younger than me—fifteen? Sixteen? It was hard to tell—and very small, but her face was as sharp and cynical as an old woman’s, giving her a ferretish look.
“Yes,” said Mieka briefly. She had finished with my shoes and rocked back on her heels.
Other faces had started to peek out from behind the curtains—curious or irritated, depending. Ferret Girl was definitely more irritated than curious. All girls and young women, not a boy among them. An unwelcome suspicion started to rise.
“The girls,” said Mieka briefly, waving a hand at them in vague introduction.
“What is this place?” I asked slowly.
“You’re not in any position to be picky.”
“No, but I am in a position to worry about being recruited to a brothel, if that’s what this is.”
Mieka snorted and gave me a look that made me want to shrivel down into my boots. “A brothel? Hardly. Although what would be so wrong with that? Do you think you’re better than that work?”
I flushed. “No.”
“Because you’re not. It’s honest work. More honest than what we do here.”
“I’m sorry. But … then what is it?”
“A workshop.”
“What kind of workshop?”
“An illegal one.” She raised an eyebrow, studying my face for my reaction.
“… Oh.”
“We take in goods and … improve them before selling. Is that going to be a problem?”
“No,” I said quickly. “I mean … I don’t think I understand.”
“Have you been living under a log your whole life?” She sighed.
“We’re on the river here, and we’re a trade hub, right?
So we get people coming in from all over.
They need goods to buy, and places to drink and entertain themselves.
Goods to buy—that’s where we come in. Little stuff—jewelry, fine clothes, trinkets.
Places to drink and entertain themselves, well.
There are two, maybe three big players who own all the gentleman’s clubs, gambling hells, casinos, and theaters in the city, and control the black market.
Ladran is the biggest. They have the Watch in their pocket, for the most part, and the Temple turns a blind eye if they pay their tithe—and a bit extra.
Then there’s us. We’re like … the dog under the table, waiting for crumbs to drop.
It means we only get crumbs, but it also means we never get into too much bother. Not like the bigwigs.”
Another young woman entered the room: beautiful, enviably so, with the out-in-out curves of a fuchsia blossom.
She wore a full-skirted coat, cinched in at the waist with a sash, and a pair of boots so exquisitely shaped that they could have been displayed as a piece of sculpture.
Her eyes sought me out as soon as she entered, but she shrugged off her coat and removed her boots before she spoke.
“A new one?” she said to Mieka.
“Found her outside,” said Mieka. She turned to me. “This is my partner, Zlata.”
I started to speak, but Zlata cut me off.
“Who sent her?”
Mieka produced the token I had given her. Zlata took it from her hand and examined it, then snorted and threw it onto the table, where it landed with a dull clunk.
“I thought we were done with him,” she said, her lip curling.
“With whom?” I asked. “Patrick? Who is he? Is he someone I need to be wary of?”
“Yes,” said Zlata, at the same time as Mieka said, “No.”
Mieka sighed. “Be grateful that he helped you, that is all.”
“He doesn’t help people without a reason,” said Zlata.
“Well, who knows what his reason was? She’s a pretty enough girl. Perhaps that was it.”
“Like he cares about that.”
“Who is he?” I burst out.
“Trouble,” said Zlata briefly.
“Look,” said Mieka. “In our line of work, we have reasons for keeping our names and business private until we absolutely need to share them. Got it? All you need to know is that he brought you to us, which was undoubtedly a charitable act, for whatever reason”—this last part was directed with a glare at Zlata—“and I doubt you will ever see him again. Your paths crossed, and he chose to be helpful rather than … anything else.”
“As far as we know,” muttered Zlata darkly.
“And that’s all I’m going to tell you, so you had better be satisfied with that,” Mieka finished. “All right?”
I hesitated, then nodded. That seemed to be the end of it. Zlata fished in one of the pockets of her coat and brought out a paper bag of hot rolls, tipping them out onto the long table. The girls reached out to grab one each. They smelled like heaven, yeasty and steaming. I hesitated.
“Go on,” Mieka said, nodding to me, and I took one gingerly.
It was almost hot enough to burn, but I did not care.
The first taste of the fresh bread seemed to open a pit in my stomach, and I finished the whole roll in seconds.
To drink, there was a pitcher of water that the girls poured into tin cups, so brackish on the tongue that I half expected tadpoles to be swimming in it.
Zlata drank something from a flask at her hip.
I couldn’t see what it was, but it smelled of blackcurrants.
When we had all eaten, Mieka steepled her fingers and peered at me over them.