The Mask of Mirrors by M. Carrick; (lightest ebook reader txt) 📗

their trio had always been as their conscience and their heart. Now she nudged Ren and said, “Things were a success with Leato, too? One Traementis down, two to go?”

“I wouldn’t say that,” Ren said, “but yes, it went… well.”

Tess immediately caught her pause. “What else happened?”

She shivered when Ren told her about the dead child. Tess’s earliest years had been in Ganllech, passed from relation to relation, but she’d spent enough time with the Fingers to have heard tales of the zlyzen. She’d been the one to put a red thread around Ren’s pallet, even though Ren knew Ondrakja would mock them when she found out.

Rather than invite more nightmares by dwelling on it, Ren shared the patterner’s readings for Leato. “Thank the Faces that he wasn’t warned away from you,” Tess said, scooping the counted coins back into the purse.

Ren picked up Leato’s glove, smoothing out fingers curled from the shape of his hand. Leato’s reaction to the reading wasn’t the only strangeness of the evening. “He was late in meeting us. But I saw him coming out of the Uča Tromyet near the Lacewater Bridge—and acting like he wanted no one to see him.”

Tess frowned. “Is that brothel still there? Maybe he was having a spot of fun before he joined.”

It would fit with the stories she’d heard about Leato while preparing for this con—but he hadn’t looked like a man fresh from some night-piece’s bed. “I doubt it. On the other hand, I cannot imagine what other business he could have in that corner of Lacewater.”

She folded the glove carefully. In Renata’s accent, she said, “I think I should take a closer look at Cousin Leato.”

4

The Kindly Spinner

Plaza Coscanum, the Pearls: Suilun 8

As his chair swayed along the streets of the Upper Bank, Vargo reflected that Alta Renata Viraudax was the most interesting thing to come to Nadežra in a long time.

She’d piqued his interest when she first arranged to rent that house in Westbridge, simply because not many Seterins visited Nadežra if they didn’t have business there. When he discovered her connection to House Traementis, he’d decided she merited a closer look. Her performance at the Gloria set Nadežra’s elite afire with gossip—and then the encore that night, in Lacewater…

The sedan chair lurched to a crawl. A glance out the curtains revealed a plaza congested with traffic. Bearers did their best to nudge through the clusters of people on foot, and everyone parted around the occasional carriage trundling along like a sunning river turtle. Plaza Coscanum was always like this around sixth sun. That was why Vargo had chosen it when he invited the alta to a late lunch: the better to be seen entertaining Nadežra’s newest curiosity.

He knocked on the roof of the chair with the head of his walking stick. “I’ll get out here,” he said, tucking a folder of papers under his arm and pulling on butter-soft leather gloves. Vargo didn’t give a toss about the Liganti obsession with covering their hands, but it kept his own clean, and he only broke the mores when he had something to gain from it. He carried a cane for the same reason. The law forbade him a sword, and a visible knife might remind folk of a past he’d prefer they forgot.

That the solid blackwood cane was a sturdy weapon on its own didn’t require comment. That it sheathed a blade as supple and strong as any nobleman’s rapier, Vargo judged it best not to mention.

The cane’s tip clicked on the plaza tiles as Vargo strolled to the ostretta on the far side. He’d considered well before suggesting the Heron of the South Wind for their meeting. Instead of Seterin, Liganti, or even the varied hybrid that was Nadežran cuisine, it served Vraszenian food—a high-end version of it, anyway. Vargo hoped a woman savvy enough to excite gossip by baring her arms at the Gloria and inciting the Rook to a duel in exchange for a glove would appreciate the furor such a choice would provoke.

The host led him to a semi-secluded table on the second-tier gallery ringing the main floor. Setting the folder on an empty chair, Vargo arranged himself in the seat that gave him the best view of the door, and waited.

And waited. No surprise that she made him cool his heels; he’d expected it. Don’t ask someone to dance unless you know the steps, Alsius had once told him. After Vargo joined the dance of Nadežran power and politics, he made certain to learn every step. Forcing someone of inferior status to wait was one of the most basic maneuvers.

Fine. Let her think she was leading this dance—that the szorsa working at his card house hadn’t reported everything she’d learned while patterning Renata and Leato Traementis. If he could convince her that doing business with him was a choice rather than her only option, all the better. People who felt trapped tended to struggle, snarling everything around them. He’d learned that from Alsius, too.

When she finally appeared, she mounted the stairs and approached him with as much speed as she could muster without endangering her dignity. “My apologies, Master Vargo—I didn’t mean to keep you waiting. I asked some sedan bearers how long it would take to get here from Westbridge, but their estimate was not accurate.”

“They never are.” Vargo stood and bowed over her hand. “I consider myself fortunate that you agreed to make time for me at all. I imagine you’ve become quite popular since your debut at the Gloria—not to mention your encounter with the Rook.”

“How could I turn down an invitation from the man who showed me such generosity and welcome?” She managed to sound sincere, with the apology and the flattery both. “And until I acquire more servants, I suspect I’ll continue to dine out more often than not. My maid is a lovely girl, but her talents lie with dressmaking, not cooking.”

Dressmaking, and finding fabrics on the