“There might be anyone, anywhere,” she agreed. “Here in this moment, we are probably safe. Now we hide some more.”
The Dancing Mistress began climbing an array of boxes toward one of the grease-smeared windows. I followed her. I wondered where we were going, but did not ask. She reached the window, then stretched tall to touch the ceiling above it. A section of slats slid away to the noisy squeal of wood on wood. I winced at the sound and looked back down for our mythical assassin.
No one was there. Above me, the Dancing Mistress hauled herself into the ceiling. I followed to find us in a much darker space with another ceiling so low that I nearly struck my head.
The roof of the warehouse, I realized: a very low-angled attic. The texture of the shadows suggested that this space was used for storage. Objects bulked dark within deeper darkness. A single window gleamed at the far end, barely brighter than the shadows, as it was so obscured with dust and grime.
“The stairs were torn out fifteen or twenty years ago,” the Dancing Mistress said. “They widened the doors to admit heavier cart traffic with a turnaround, and were forced to give up this space in the process.”
“A waste.” I was focusing on the trivia of where we were.
“Everything has a reason. Right now we are in a hidden location above a building that no one has ever seen us enter. We are safe while we consider what should happen next.”
“Safe?” The panicked laughter began bubbling up within me once more. “I will never be safe again. I will always be trapped by what I have done. I-”
She smacked the top of my head as my voice rose. “Whisper. Even better, think before you speak at all.”
Anger rushed back fast as flame on oil. Mistress Tirelle hit me constantly. Now the Dancing Mistress did the same. Who was she to raise a hand to me?
“You must eat, then sleep,” she continued. “Your fears and regrets are carrying you away.”
“I am afraid of nothing!” I shouted.
Her voice was so soft, I had to strain to hear it. “Right now you are afraid of everything. Or at least you should be.”
I flopped to the floor. Finally still, I realized how badly my body ached. The slip coming off the wall of the Factor’s house had bruised my hips and jarred my back. The run had stretched and warmed my muscles, but here we were quiet and I could feel myself cooling down already. My foot stung where it had clipped Mistress Tirelle’s chin.
“Everything hurts,” I told her quietly.
“Then sleep.” She offered me a piece of crumbling cheese and a wad of leaves.
I took them. The cheese had a deep ammoniac scent, overlaid with salt and the veining mold of a blue. The leaves were dry-cured kale with lard smeared amid the rolled layers.
It all smelled like paradise to my rumbling gut. I ate quickly, then just as quickly was starved with thirst.
“There are water barrels near the window,” the Dancing Mistress said. “They are filled with rainwater collection, and might taste of the roof.” She bent close again. “I must go out and be seen. There can be no suspicion that I am part of what is still happening in the Factor’s house. Will you remain here and keep absolutely quiet?”
“Yes,” I said around a mouthful of kale.
“No matter how angry or despairing you may feel, do not stamp your feet or throw things. Men will be working downstairs on the morrow, and they may hear you.”
I looked at my hands, full of half-eaten food. Mistress Tirelle would never eat again. “No, Mistress.”
“When I can safely do so, I shall return. Probably tomorrow night. Federo may be here as well.”
My heart leapt at that; then I wondered why. Even my friends were trouble for me. “I will remain silent.”
“As best as can be hoped for.” She ran a hand through my hair. “We will do what we can to see that you are well-served. I am not sure how much is left to us, though.”
“Good night,” I said, and then she was gone.
Sleep brought only the memory of death. My relationship with my dreams continues uneasy to this day, but that night was the worst I have ever known. I don’t recall my dreams when Federo first stole me away from Papa. The dreams of small children are said to be as unformed as their thoughts, but that cannot be true. My thoughts were well-formed even then. I knew what I wanted and did not want.
Later I dreamed of the past, Endurance and my grandmother and my little life among the ditches and fields of Papa’s rice. Those were about loss and regret. As I grew older and my training became more complex, I often dreamed of the sorts of things one does then-endless loaves of bread spilling from the oven, or reading a book that bred new pages for itself faster than I could turn them.
That night, though, all I could dream of was death. Perhaps I had once killed my grandmother. How had my mother died? Mistress Tirelle’s head spun away from my kick over and over as her neck snapped. The scent of her voiding her bowels as she died. The way her body collapsed, as if she had already stopped trying to protect herself the way any living person does, with or without training.
How many ways were there to kill? How many ways were there to die? Those questions chased me through the sick regrets of that night, until finally I awoke with the answers ringing in my head.
There are as many ways to die as there are to live.
There are as many ways to kill as there are killers to try them.
My body ached as if I’d been trampled by one of the Factor’s horses. The pallet on which I’d slept was kicked aside, and I was lying on the old wooden floor. I didn’t feel much like a killer, but I knew I was. I also knew that someday I would die. Possibly very soon, depending on whether and how the Factor’s justice caught up with me.
I climbed to my feet, swaying with fatigue and an overwhelming sense of weakness. Last night’s fear and rush had taken their toll.
Morning arrived amid a vague silvery light that struggled through the round window at the end of the attic. The filth on the glass looked to be at least a generation of neglect. I knew exactly what a maid would do to cut it down.
This room was huge, though a tall man could stand only in the center, where the peak of the roof ran. The low edges were filled with odd equipment-the frames from old looms, mechanical devices for which I had no name. All was covered in deep dust.
Finding the rain barrels, I drank from a little tin ladle there. The water tasted of tar and sand. Even at the edge of foulness, it was refreshing after breathing the dry air all night.
Otherwise I had nothing to relieve the itching of my cheeks and ears, and the mix of feelings in my heart. No food, no distractions, nothing.
I spent a long time simmering in my anger before Federo appeared. He surprised me in climbing through the floor in the middle of the day.
“They are at their lunch below,” he explained to my unspoken question. He looked worried, and was dressed like a common laborer of the city. “I have stood the warehousemen a round of ales down the street once a week for quite some time. No one wonders at me in this neighborhood.”
“You are not unusual anymore.” I recalled my lessons at the art of the swift eye.
“Precisely.” He pulled a paper wrapping out of his pocket. “Here is some salt beef with cold roast potatoes. It is the best I could do right now. I will be back with the Dancing Mistress tonight. We need to think on what to do with you next.”
“You will do nothing with me,” I told him coldly. “I will decide what to do with myself.”
He looked unhappy, but retreated beneath the floor.
They would not use me. Not the Factor, not the Duke, not this little conspiracy of child-stealer and rogue Mistress. I spent the afternoon imagining ways to flee, directions to run in, but I knew nothing practical of the city or its surrounds. If I could go back to Endurance, I would, but all I remembered of the way home was that I should cross the water.
At that time, I did not even know the name of my birth country, let alone the village where Papa’s farm lay. I had no money or maps or practical experience of any sort.