There were no windows in the bunkroom, and the doors were shut at night. Only a flickering band of torchlight came in at the threshold.
All she needed to do was find a way to get Sethennai past the fortress without being noticed by the soldiers. They had been right to assume there was no use trying a direct approach. There must be another way. The fortress was older than the city itself, Sethennai had told her, and there were strange things under the earth: secret ways, secret rooms, and caves that reached deep beneath the desert.
She would need to use every moment she could to explore the fortress, to learn its ways and routines. There would be some way to sneak Sethennai through. She would do what she always did: she would work, and watch, and listen, and wait.
Once everyone else was asleep she unstrapped the knife from her leg and hid it under her mattress in the bunkroom. Just in case.
* * *
By the end of the first week everyone seemed to have accepted Csorwe’s presence. After three years travelling with Sethennai, Csorwe thought she might have forgotten how to deal with girls her own age, but it was just like being back in the House of Silence. She was used to living like this, elbow to elbow. It had its constants. Aggravation, thwarted hope, and gossip: each fed the other like the three-headed snake that had been advertised in Grey Hook’s Market of Curiosities. Most of the others were from poor families out in the sticks. They weren’t very interested in Csorwe, but they were grateful to her for taking on the duties they disliked, mostly carrying barrels up and down the stairs. Even better, they were busy enough not to notice that Csorwe was the first to take on any task that involved visiting restricted or inaccessible parts of the fortress.
Taymiri was the leader of the bunkroom, it turned out, because she had been there longest, and was both calm and ruthless. She liked Csorwe, or at least she liked Csorwe’s efficiency. She had ambitions beyond the kitchen, and saw Csorwe as a useful cat’s-paw, or even an ally.
Csorwe learned that Taymiri’s mother had been cut off by house and Church in Qarsazh for conceiving Taymiri while still unmarried. Taymiri’s ambition was to become rich enough that she could find her grandparents in Qarsazh and throw them out in the streets.
One afternoon, Csorwe was napping in the bunkroom, enjoying her allotted half hour’s rest before preparations for dinner. Taymiri came to Csorwe’s bunk and shook her briskly awake.
“Shh!” said Taymiri. “Come with me. I don’t want the others in on this.”
Csorwe dressed hurriedly and followed Taymiri out of the bunkroom to the winding darkness of the corridor. All the passages were close and narrow and uncomfortably warm. Csorwe wished too late that she had brought her knife, just in case, but there would have been no way to hide it from Taymiri.
“What’s happening?” she said, once they were clear of the bunkroom.
“Some of the General’s table staff are sick,” said Taymiri. “There’s a big dinner on and they need two from the kitchens to fetch and carry plates.”
Csorwe nodded, suppressing her excitement and alarm. Sethennai had told her to stay out of General Psamag’s way. But then … she had never seen the General’s quarters, and she needed more information if she was going to make progress. She had explored the fortress as thoroughly as she could, from the cellars up, but she knew there were regions that were closed to her. There were undercellars, and caves beneath the undercellars, and hollow passages in the walls that seemed to have no openings. It might be risky to cross paths with the General, but it would be idiotic to miss this opportunity to cover new territory. As a waitress she would be virtually invisible, and perfectly safe.
Taymiri was as agitated as Csorwe had ever seen her.
“And I’m not that type of girl, of course, but if I’m going to catch anyone’s eye I don’t see why it shouldn’t be one of the General’s officers,” said Taymiri as they hurried toward the stairs to the upper levels.
“Right,” said Csorwe. Stranger things had certainly happened.
“Maybe we can even find one for you, Soru,” said Taymiri, becoming magnanimous. This was what they all called her, an amendment of her real name, which suited the Tlaanthothei accent. It meant “sparrow.” “What kind would you prefer?”
Csorwe did not know what to say. She considered what Taymiri wanted in a man. “Rich?”
Taymiri slapped a hand over her mouth to stop the sound of her laughter ringing out in the hall. “Obviously. But apart from that!”
“I don’t know,” said Csorwe. After a pause: “Tall?”
For a while, back in Grey Hook, Csorwe had thought it was possible she was interested in one of her tutors, a broad-shouldered ex-mercenary with a pleasant smile. However, after careful observation she concluded that he was interested only in young men from the Pretty Birds Gentleman’s House of Entertainment.
“They’ll all be tall,” said Taymiri, and seemed to give up.
In a back pantry, Csorwe and Taymiri were met by an official, hardly any older than they were, who gave them a change of uniform.
The official was Tlaanthothei, like Sethennai, with dark brown skin, pointed leaf-shaped ears, and close-cropped curly hair. He had the basic shape of a wrought-iron railing and a look of focused, furious anxiety. His ears twitched every half a minute or so.
“General Psamag has certain requirements of his waiting staff,” he said, sounding like he had a cold, and glaring at Csorwe and Taymiri, plainly doubting their ability to meet those requirements. There followed a lecture on the placement of cutlery, delivered in a monotone. “There will be drinks, the General is going to make a speech, and then there will be three courses, like I explained. Any questions?”
“Think you’ll have any luck marrying him, Taymiri?” said Csorwe, once he had gone.
“That was Talasseres Charossa,” said Taymiri. “He is a puckered arsehole. Or, I guess, he’s our liaison from Chancellor Olthaaros. He’s here to try and tell the General what to do, even though everyone knows if General Psamag wanted to, he could throw Olthaaros out on his face, like they did with the old Chancellor.”
It was lucky for Csorwe that she was good at keeping a straight face.
“Did you say Charossa?” she said, after a decent interval. “Isn’t that the Chancellor’s name?”
“Oh, yes,” said Taymiri. “He’s his nephew. Probably why he got the job.”
Csorwe tucked that little piece of knowledge away for later consideration. Maybe it meant she ought to avoid Talasseres Charossa. Or maybe she ought to stay close and try to find out whom he spoke to, in case he gave anything away? Without Sethennai’s guidance she felt adrift. There were endless choices to make, hundreds of possible directions.
She reminded herself that she did have a plan. Tonight she was going to stay in the background and get a sense of the main players at the fortress, their loyalties and alliances. That was a useful place to start, and it would keep her safe and inconspicuous. Sethennai couldn’t object to that.
The upper levels of the fortress were surprisingly beautiful. Here the floors were of polished hardwood, the walls were hung with fine tapestries, and the dust sparkled in beams of sunlight from above. From somewhere close by, Csorwe could hear the sound of a woman singing. It was not at all how she had imagined the General’s personal quarters. It was almost disappointing.