The Duchess of the Shallows (6 page)

She sat up some unfathomable time later, still sniffling, wiping at her eyes and nose, the faint taste of smoke still on her tongue. As she did so, the coin bag slipped from her hand, its contents spilling out under the light of the slowly sinking moon.

She lay there for a long moment, watching the light glisten along the edges of coins. That purse, she realized, contained more than mere coppers; there lay what she had to show for her time in the Shallows: her wits, and her luck, the nimbleness of her fingers and the quickness of her feet. She'd been attacked by a man who was larger and – possibly in the long run – faster, and she'd bested both strength and speed with her steel and her wits.

She was no true thief, she knew, but on this night she suddenly felt damned close to it. Sweeping up the contents of the purse, she could for the first time truly imagine herself following the same path as One-Penny Will, or even Naria of the Dark.

After awhile she picked herself up out of the mud and headed back to the garret, thinking hard even though her mind seemed as tired as her feet. The task Hector had set her was madness, but perhaps it was a madness she could manage. The risks were great, but so were the rewards, and whether she succeeded or failed, her path was her own. Passing up this opportunity meant only that she'd spend her days waiting for the next pull of the string that would send her life spinning out of control. She was damned if she'd turn back now, she resolved, climbing the rickety stairs to Lysander's door. The only way forward was through.

The night of the fire was not this night, she reminded herself, and one drunken ruffian was no Baron Eusbius. Still, she reflected as she undressed and fell exhausted into bed, everyone started small. With a last glance at the purse she'd taken, she thought it was as good a start as any.

She was soon asleep and dreaming not of fire and flight, but of Noam's kitchen in the early morning. She was searching desperately for yeast, but no matter where Duchess looked she found only flour.

Chapter Five:
A beggar at the gate

Duchess woke early the next morning, still on a baker's schedule, and slipped out of bed before Lysander awoke. He had returned sometime during the night and passed out directly on the straw-stuffed mattress beside her. He looked like a beggar and smelled like a winery. He hadn't bothered undressing, and his booted feet, spattered with mud, hung over the side. She slid out of bed and removed his boots, placing them on the hearth to dry. He rolled over without waking, and Duchess shook her head in amusement. Lysander could sleep anywhere at any time, bedroom or battle. An occupational necessity, he called it.

Even as the morning fog was dissipating, the Shallows were waking and she saw that the usual crowds were gathered in Bell Plaza. Market Gate was open, and busy with the craftsmen and other workers who lived in the Shallows and made their living in the market. They streamed along, men and women who showed the mark of a living made through hard work, carrying sacks and baskets or pushing carts and barrows, and a few leading donkeys. She kept an eye out for Noam or any of his girls, although she didn't know what she'd say if she ran into them.

Beggar's Gate was still closed, but as usual thronged with beggars, standing in a ragged line led by the Old Mater, flanked by a dirty-faced child. The Old Mater was always accompanied by a small child, although the specific child varied from week to week or day to day. For the beggars, this was a daily ritual; those who made their living from the charity of others followed Beggar's Way up and around the hill from the Deeps, through the Shallows and Beggar's Gate until they reached the circle known as the Godswalk, where they would ply priests and faithful alike for pennies, under the watchful eye of the blackarms. At sundown they returned to the Deeps, ending for that day the only civilized, ritualized contact allowed between the city's richest and poorest.

Another group clustered at Beggar's Gate, better dressed but nearly as poor: girls and young women waiting in hopes of hire. One noble or another was always in need of extra help, and Beggar's Gate in the morning was the place to find it. The blackarms on duty had the meager privilege of deciding which girls were worthy of hire and which would be turned away, and their recommendations were rarely ignored. Today it was Beggar's Gate she needed, and she nodded politely at the blackarms on duty. The taller of the two called out, "Aren't you going the wrong way, girl?" Duchess passed old Burrell every morning, although she was normally on her way to Market Gate, and every morning he said the same thing. "Leaving the Shallows is always the right way," she replied, as usual, and he roared with laughter. His tone was amiable enough, but anyone who used Beggar's Gate knew that behind that round, jovial face lurked a nasty temper. Burrell was quick to anger and even quicker with his club, and as a senior officer had final say on which girls would find work for that day and which would return home with empty pockets. A petty tyrant, to be sure, but a tyrant nonetheless, so Duchess always kept a polite tongue around him.

Duchess waited for the blackarms to open the gate, while Burrell joked with the other blackarm on duty, who obviously knew well enough to laugh at the man's jokes, and loudly. She saw that the Vermillion, which faced the plaza, was still open, at least until the last of the previous night's customers collected their clothing, paid their coin, and went on their way. One was leaving now, and Duchess recognized the elderly gentleman who sold scented candles in the market. Years of association with Minette had taught her that while some men bragged about their exploits with whores, others were ashamed. "And you'll never know which is which, my dear," Minette had once said. "At least until you work between the sheets. So it's best to pretend not to notice anyone leaving the Vermillion." Duchess dutifully averted her eyes, examining last night's mud on her new boots, and the candle-merchant reciprocated, moving off into the Shallows.

At last, Burrell and his companion opened Beggar's Gate and stood aside while the beggars filed silently past. Duchess slipped through behind them. She wanted to take a look at the Eusbius estate, and the walk would also keep her busy until Lysander awoke and she could tell him about Hector's test.

Had Duchess been heading to any of the districts near the bottom of the great hill – Shallows, Deeps, or Wharves – she wouldn't need to bother with a gate; the walls separating those areas had long since fallen to ruin. Only the walls that bounded the high districts – Garden, Scholars, Market, Trades and Temple – were maintained, and the gates were guarded night and day. Folk from the low districts could move freely in Trades and Market, but were generally admitted to the other districts only during the day, and even then under suspicion.

The Godswalk was the center of Temple, a broad, whitewashed street that encircled a large, well tended green lawn. This grassy enclosure was cluttered with a thousand statues, shrines and engraved obelisks to a thousand gods both known and nameless. All of them were overshadowed, however, by the three large temples on the outside of the circle devoted to the state-recognized religions of the empire. Each boasted a marble statue that proclaimed its allegiance. There was Anassa, goddess of wisdom and knowledge, who wore an ornate mask and carried a multifaceted shard in the delicate hands she raised above her head. Farther along the walk stood Mayu, goddess of death, birth, justice and all growing things, cloaked and hooded, with a belt of knives and other tools. The third was Ventaris, god of the sun, the stars, and all things that gave light and order, with an outstretched hand and a wheel at his feet. Supplicants swarmed the steps of each temple: some begged Anassa for a prophecy, some pleaded with Mayu for the life (or death) of a loved one (or enemy), and others cried for a blessing from Ventaris, calling him Law Bringer and Father of All.

Guards
in religious livery were posted at each temple, but the Godswalk itself was patrolled by blackarms. Those in Temple were called the Saints, led by Sheriff Takkis, a man of unimpeachable character. The men who served him were reputed to be equally scrupulous. She decided it was best to stay on their good side; if she made trouble here, there would be no talking or bribing her way out of it.

The beggars took position along the inner curb of the walk as custom dictated, crying for alms, each trying to outdo the others with tales of woe. Their efforts did not go unrewarded; in Rodaas, giving alms on the Godswalk was a sign of piety and civic-mindedness. Even at this early hour the whitewashed stone way was crowded: nobles, priests, scholars and messengers all moved about on business, dispensing a coin here or stopping to converse there. Duchess had to step aside to avoid a wagon that forced its way through the crowd to Anassa's temple. The wagon was guarded by a contingent of Whites, an ancient order of warriors who served the imperial family. The crowd watched intently as a group of robed and masked facets, the priestesses of Anassa, emerged from a side entrance. Each carried a bundle of ornate scrolls tied with silver ribbons. Each facet was identical in height and build, and some said, in visage, although their features were hidden by ivory white masks that revealed only a single eye. They moved in an eerie silence, their steps perfectly matched, as they boarded the wagon. According to rumor, the scrolls they carried contained secrets and prophecies they shared with those fortunate or wealthy enough to catch their attention. "In Rodaas, no one ever confuses 'prophecy' with 'charity,'" Minette had once told her with a rich laugh. Judging from the markings on the wagon and the presence of the Whites, the scrolls were on their way to the imperial palace.

Duchess knew little of Empress Violana, who dwelt at the top of the great hill. Her Highness was advised by a council made up of delegates from the higher districts; the Shallows, Wharves, and naturally the Deeps had no representation. The talk in the alehouses was that the council, and not the empress, truly ruled the realm, especially since the deaths of Violana's sons in the War of the Quills. She seemed to recall reading something in her father's library that Violana was a vigorous, decisive ruler but those days, along with that library, her home and her family, were long gone.

Duchess had not often been in Temple District, so she gawked at the bustle like a country noble. She was so distracted that she nearly bumped into a large, round and smiling man – a keeper, she judged from his dark robes and hood – looking like anything but a devotee of the goddess of death. Duchess had heard that the keepers spent most of their time tending the gardens of Mayu, although she was never quite clear why a death cult spent so much time cultivating growing things. According to rumor, the keepers could make herbal remedies, potions and concoctions of all kinds, and some said that their poisons had taken the lives of the Lady Isabel Davari's first two husbands. When she asked Noam if Mayu's followers really made poisons he told her all that mattered was that keepers were bad drinking companions. This one seemed jovial enough, giving Duchess a lecherous wink. He then bowed mockingly to a nearby trio, each wearing a pendant in the shape of a spoked wheel, the symbol of Ventaris. The radiants turned away haughtily and the keeper laughed as only a fat man could. Duchess wasn't privy to the workings of temple intrigues, but everyone in the city knew that while Ventaris was in ascendance, the keepers worked daily to undermine his priesthood. What the facets thought of all this was anyone's guess.

She made her way through the crowds surrounding the walk and headed towards its grassy center, where the lesser gods were honored. There, she accepted a small cake from an acolyte of Naru, the Lord of Feasts, whose followers handed out small gifts of food to the poor, the imprisoned, and others in need. With the florin in her pocket she was hardly in need, but life in the Shallows had taught her never to turn down free food.
Besides, tradition dictated that the gift be eaten in the presence of the giver. The man, his eyes and lips dusted with black soot in the shape of diamonds and surprisingly thin for a follower of the Feaster, grinned as Duchess bit into the soft pastry.

She passed a low wooden altar tended by a withered woman, rocking and whispering in a strange tongue, whose dark brown face and darker eyes were stamped with features that were clearly Domae. She paused; like servants and beggars, Domae were usually considered beneath notice. Being invisible in that way had its advantages; such folk often overheard gossip that others missed. She decided it was worth a few moments, but as she crouched before the altar, her motion became a stumble and she had to catch herself before she fell over.

The altar was carved with many strange symbols, but it was the largest and most prominent that had drawn her eye: a rough circle, broken only by a wide triangle, pointed along its arc. Crudely drawn as it was, she knew that symbol.

A snake, devouring its own tail.

Duchess' stumble had caught the old woman's attention, and she opened two dark black eyes like tiny chips of flint set amongst the wrinkles of her face. Those eyes focused intensely on her, and whip-fast she seized Duchess' hand in one of her own. Old though she was, the woman possessed a wiry strength, and Duchess, still shaken, did not resist as the woman dragged her finger about the circle, beginning and ending at the shape at its top. Three times she traced the symbol." Doh. Mah. Nee."

"Domani." Duchess replied, uncertain what else to say.

The woman released her and closed her eyes, clutching her hands to her chest in sudden ecstasy. "Domani. Paradise. Godshome here upon the earth, here amongst their people."

"Their people? You mean the Domae?" She pointed to the circle. "And what is this?"

The woman smiled mirthlessly. "The mark of He Who Devours, and is reborn, and thus eternal, as Domani is eternal; as we once were and are no longer, but shall be again." Her eyes fixed once more on Duchess' own and she found herself unable to look away from those two dark pools. "But why do you ask such things? Why would a blind, ignorant
Rodaasi,"
the word was poison in her mouth, "care for such things? You are not of the people."