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

the world, and often treating that world as either an enemy or a pawn. It meant House Traementis had no allies outside their own ranks. And when those ranks began to dwindle, they had no allies at all.

Donaia squeezed her eyes shut and took several breaths, waiting for the heat to leave her cheeks and ears. When she’d calmed enough to keep her voice steady, Donaia said, “Even if Master Vargo can help us, we aren’t in any position to help him.”

“We can help him,” Renata said, with quiet intensity. “I saw his frustration when he invited me to lunch. We have the legitimacy he lacks. He genuinely wants to cleanse the West Channel—for profit, yes, but that doesn’t erase the good it will do—but he can’t, because no one will hear him. As for getting it through the Charterhouse…” Her laugh was breathless, and a little self-mocking. “I believe that is the job of an advocate.”

Renata’s enthusiasm was tantalizing. Once upon a memory, Donaia had been that eager. Now she only sighed. “House Traementis doesn’t have an advocate.” House Traementis couldn’t afford an advocate. Not a good one.

“Then let me try.”

Renata sat silently until Donaia met her gaze. What she saw there was more than mere enthusiasm; it was confidence as unshakable as the stone of the Point. And even as a part of Donaia whispered, She’s been lying to you. She isn’t what she says she is…

A drowning woman would snatch at any straw.

“And what happens when the rest of Nadežra learns of your financial situation, as I have?” she said, gentle now that her anger had been washed away. Wasn’t Renata doing what Donaia had been these many years? Keeping up appearances so as not to sink into the mud. It seemed to be a Traementis trait. “I suggest you concern yourself with your own incoming debts.”

If she’d expected Renata to flinch, she was disappointed. The girl looked annoyed, not guilty. “I should have chosen a more reputable house to bank with—someone who wouldn’t make such errors.”

Rather than asking if the bank story was truth or just a fiction she was clinging to, Donaia said, “You are certainly nothing like your mother.” The idea of Letilia working—much less volunteering to do so—was as improbable as a hardened smuggler caring about the filth he swam in.

As improbable as the decision Donaia came to. She’d walked into her study expecting to shame Renata onto the next ship bound for Seteris. Now…

“Very well.” She held out her hands for Renata to take. “Let us see if we can make use of Master Vargo, Advocate Viraudax.”

7

Seven as One

Charterhouse, Dawngate, Old Island: Equilun 19

Staring up at the spiraling red columns of the Charterhouse, Ren thought, This was supposed to make things easier.

All she wanted was money. Her share of Nadežra’s wealth, which only ever seemed to rise to the top of the city, like cream, instead of filtering down to the people below. By now Ren was supposed to be enjoying the kinds of luxuries Ondrakja had promised her skills would bring. Instead she was still sleeping on the floor of the kitchen, taking the fees Vargo paid her as his advocate and immediately handing them over to House Pattumo as proof that she had money, so they could turn around and pay that money right back to Vargo for the rent on her patch of kitchen floor and the unused remainder of the townhouse.

She was beginning to think it would have been better to make her fortune as a thief. I’ve got the Vigil looming over my shoulder either way.

But if her resolve faltered, all she had to do was look at the common Nadežrans thronging the steps of the Charterhouse, one failed petition away from being thrown in jail for vagrancy, and from there to Caerulet’s penal ships and a life of slavery. She’d been there with her mother. She wasn’t going back.

Setting her jaw, she began to climb the steps.

The entrance hall of the Charterhouse was even more crowded, full of advocates and clerks, messengers and scribes touting for work. Over them towered five statues. A poet, a minister, a merchant, a soldier, and a priest, bearing five mottoes: I speak for all; I counsel all; I support all; I defend all; I pray for all. Below them stood desks for each of the Cinquerat’s five seats: Argentet for cultural matters, Fulvet for civil, Prasinet for economic, Caerulet for military, Iridet for religious. Livery-clad secretaries for each member of the council sat at the desks, looking harassed.

Renata advanced with the confidence of someone who believed she deserved to be at the head of the line. That got her halfway there; she made it another quarter on river rat instincts, finding gaps to ooze through, feet to “accidentally” step on. After that she had to shuffle slowly forward with everyone else, until she finally made it to the secretary and presented her license and her request.

At that point, her expensive-looking clothing and the Traementis name carried enough weight to get her out of the press of public advocates crowding the entry hall and into the antechamber for Fulvet. A bribe—originating from Vargo’s pocket, not Renata’s—moved her name up the list there, but Donaia was right; no one at the Charterhouse was eager to do House Traementis any favors. Renata settled in for a long wait.

She knew a little about the history of the Fulvet office, from the days when it had been held by House Traementis. Letilia’s father, prior holder of that seat, was the man notorious for polluting half the Dežera. Not on purpose; no, it was just Nadežra’s usual graft and corruption, Crelitto Traementis pocketing so many of the funds for a bridge across the river at Floodwatch that the bridge later collapsed. Fifty-three people died, and the bulk of the wreckage washed into the West Channel, where it collided with the enormous prismatium framework of the cleansing numinat…