“It will take a while; I’ve gotta double back, then get changed, then get into the room. Will you be okay in the cold?”
Rattle clicked once again. “Okay, then. Find somewhere to hide until you see that window open.” With a third click, Rattle fluttered closer to the street and let itself fall heavily into the nearest pile of snow. It burrowed its way deeper into the pile until Skate saw some skittish movement on the other side. A thin leg poked through, pushing some snow out. Rattle had successfully made itself a peephole to wait and watch.
As it put the finishing touches on its snow hole, Skate saw Gherun’s light go out in the window above. She knelt down to where Rattle waited. “Remember, come as soon as the window’s open.” A muffled click let her know that Rattle was as ready as it could ever be. She left it there, hoping to be in position to let it in soon.
Skate went back the way she and the flying eyeball had come, turning down this alley, then the next, throwing any would-be witnesses off of what she was doing skulking through this part of town at this time of night. The Guards were out, though they tended to stay huddled together in their thick cloaks, trying to finish their rounds and get out of the storm. The snow had come down unabated since the previous night and showed no signs of slowing. The Guards probably assumed that any criminals out and about would freeze to death before they had a real chance at hurting anybody or stealing anything.
Gherun’s home stood like a monolith four stories high in front of her. He did not own the whole building but owned space within it permanently, according to Belamy. The bottom floor only had a few smaller rooms for residents; most of the ground floor was occupied by a lavishly decorated common room where the Master of the House organized the affairs of the whole building: managing staff, issuing orders for meals, paying and receiving payments. This would be Skate’s entrance point. At night, the Master’s post was occupied by a stand-in, who was less skilled at the job and seen as mostly ineffectual by the other workers. Eavesdropping through briefly opened windows as workers went about their business throughout the day had told her as much. The scullery maids had very colorful terms to describe the night manager, which was what had planted Skate’s current plan into her head.
The snow crunched softly under Skate’s week-old boots. The ornate wooden doors stood as silent guards at her approach, carrying the universal message of all such doors: “You are not good enough to enter here; be glad that you have the pleasure of even looking at the exterior to such a place.”
Steeling herself with a deep breath, Skate pulled outward on the handles, opening both as wide as she could to make her grand entrance.
The room was empty, save the oft-maligned night manager. This was not unexpected. There were only a few servants active at this time of night to attend to the two dozen or so permanent residents’ sporadic needs. Skate had been counting on the manager’s solitude to better sell her lie.
He looked up from a stack of papers on the expansive serving counter that doubled as his workspace. A confused expression flashed over his face before he consciously replaced it with dignified attention to the unfamiliar girl now in his foyer. The cause of this transformation seemed to be her clothing; his needling eyes scanned her quickly as she stomped his way.
“Good evening, young miss,” he said. His whining voice set Skate’s teeth on edge. No wonder no one likes this guy. “What can I do for you?”
“You can get me into my room, immediately.” She affected the imperious, high-sounding voice she had heard people in the neighborhood use when talking to servants. “My journey has taken hours longer than planned, and I’m very, very tired.” She had concocted her story over the past few days; its success depended entirely on the competence—or rather, the lack thereof—of this second-rate manager.
“I’m sorry, your room?”
“Yes, yes, hurry up! Why are we still talking about this?”
“I—I don’t—who are you, miss?” He added the last word as an afterthought. He was obviously confused and irritated, which was exactly what Skate needed him to be.
With much rolling of the eyes and scoffing, she said, “My word. Are you the owner of this place?”
“No, miss, but I will be glad to help in any way I can. May I have your name, please?” He was being cordial and calm now, though there was still confusion in his eyes.
“Dodonna Malthessier.” The surname was that of one of the more prominent merchant families in the city, one of the cadre of families that acted as bankers and lenders for the elite and powerful. That position gave the family influence and control over most of those who controlled the city; even the Baron himself was rumored to be enmeshed in dealings with the Malthessiers. “My father secured me a room at this location months ago. Are you telling me you have lost my reservation?”
“I—”
“Unbelievable! This is your job, isn’t it? If you’ve given away my room to someone else, Father will hear of it, you mark my words. Do you keep no records?”
“Of course, Miss Malthessier, but—”
“What, you keep them in your head? You have it all memorized?”
“Not at all, but—”
“Then check!” She waved her hand vaguely behind the man, where she assumed the older records were kept separate from the stacks of day-to-day paperwork in front of the manager. “And hurry! As I said, I’m quite tired from my journey, and I need a bath and a bed, and it’s late!”
The flustered man sputtered a bit more before bowing awkwardly and backing into the back room.
As soon as he was out of sight, Skate bolted to the right, where the servants’ staircase was; her spying had paid off. She snuck down the steps. The servants’ door may have been guarded day and night, but the hallway she found herself in was unlit. When she tried the first door, she found what she was looking for. Inside was the servants’ changing room. She left the door open to allow whatever feeble light she could to come in, but she was still essentially groping in the dark until she found her prize.
The laundry basket was stacked with servants’ uniforms. It took her several minutes to find one that fit. The owner must have been a very small woman indeed, because it was not nearly as loose as Skate was prepared for it to be, though the unexpected snugness was likely more a product of the blanket she had wrapped around her stomach than any particular daintiness of the uniform owner. She put her nice clothes in one of the bare cubbies. On her way out the door, she grabbed a mop and empty bucket to complete her disguise. She did not expect to pass anyone this late at night between this room and Gherun’s suite, but better to be prepared and not need it.
The servants’ stairs were an out-of-the way alternative to the central staircase of the building that let off at every floor, allowing the cleaners and couriers to slip in and out of the halls with as little disruption to the tenants and their guests as possible. It was also a very convenient route to go if you were otherwise interested in not being seen, especially late at night when even the servants were not bustling up and down the steps.
The building was asleep around her, all its occupants well tucked in for hours before her arrival; there was no one to mark her passage, and had there been such a person, they would have had no inkling of her existence.