“Congratulations,” he said. “You are hereby released from all oaths of loyalty to any other than the Blackguard and the Chromeria.” He smiled at her and patted her hand. “Perk up, why don’t you? You’re free.”

Teia had achieved what she’d yearned for above all else, what she’d sought for years, and she was richer than she’d ever dreamed, but she’d never felt less free in her life.

Chapter 20

Karris took the spy following her on a merry chase through the worst neighborhoods of Big Jasper. She’d walked through the poverty a thousand times, and never felt nervous, but today was different. Without the aegis of her Blackguard garb, she felt oddly vulnerable. She didn’t like it. In fact, she hated it. She nodded to shopkeepers she’d known for a dozen years, and they barely responded. They didn’t recognize her when she was wearing a thobe.

Worse, their heavy-browed sons didn’t, either. She could beat any five of them, of course, depending. But the skirts of a thobe were too easy to snag, and her own experience with getting beaten in that alley not two months ago was too fresh for her to be haughty. She felt a stab of that same feeling of helplessness she’d spent her whole life fleeing.

Someone whistled at her. Her fists clenched. Dammit, all her instincts were wrong here. It was like the world had changed, and no one had bothered to tell her—all because she was wearing a thobe. Going and punching the whistler in the face wasn’t going to get the same cowed reaction that it would have when she was wearing her Blackguard garb. Neighborhoods that should have been dangerous for her prey were instead dangerous for her.

It felt like a failure when she put on her green spectacles to let them know she was a drafter. Thank Orholam she had that at least. At a single disapproving raised eyebrow above those spectacles, the men gathering blanched and disbursed.

It made her wonder. Other women dealt with this kind of thing every day, without bloodshed, without incident—and without a drafter’s spectacles. Karris literally didn’t know how they did it. She wondered if that didn’t make her weaker, somehow, in her strength. Another woman would have defused the situation before it became a situation. Karris only knew how to intimidate, to evince superior power one way or another. She’d had drafting for so long, she wasn’t sure how she would deal with life if she didn’t have it. Humbling thought.

And now, she didn’t have drafting. Not really. She could wear the spectacles, but if she drafted, the White would know. Even if she didn’t know, if she asked, would Karris lie to her?

No. Not to the White.

She was still being followed.

She took off the spectacles and walked straight until she found the alley she’d been waiting for—long, without any other entrances, nor other alleys running parallel to it. If she were to be followed at all, her tail would have to follow down this alley. She stepped into the weaver’s shop on the alley corner. “Scarves?” she asked. “Silk if possible? I’m a wedding guest.” She smiled blandly, and the delighted woman disappeared into the back of the shop, as Karris knew she would, leaving her undisturbed. Karris put a danar on the counter to pay for the deceit and the ambush place, and hid among the free-flowing bolts of cloth hanging from the ceiling.

Her tail passed the doorway blithely.

Karris was on top of him in a moment, side kick—left foot behind her right, power gathered in her hips, and right foot shooting out sideways into the man’s passing shoulder with the force of a horse’s kick. Petite as she was, it didn’t matter, with all her power applied so perfectly. The man shot up to his tiptoes and was thrown sideways. He hit the wall of the alley, three paces away, with a crunch. Before he could even crumple all the way to the ground, Karris was on top of him, fingers locked around his windpipe, pinning him to the wall, fist drawn back.

The man was caught in an awkward half crouch. He groaned. He’d been wearing a hat, and now it lay at his feet. He was perhaps forty, greasy, had sun-dark skin, a messy semblance of an Atashian’s beaded beard.

He grunted. “Tol’ me you might hit me. Thought to myself, little woman like that, how hard can she hit?”

“Who sent you?” Karris asked.

“He’s too careful for that, girl. He told me to tell you, this could have been another rough lesson like the last time. This is mercy.”

“What? Another lesson?”

“When you got beat to hell. And I didn’t have anything to do with that, so don’t take it out on me. Hey, you mind letting me sit down or stand up?”

Karris let the man go.

“My thanks.” He looked at her, and blanched. “Nine hells. You’re the white Blackguard, aren’t you? The girl, changes her hair. That bastard. Sending me after you. You didn’t even draft.”

“Tell me something that convinces me not to hurt you.”

“Fine, hell with him. Didn’t pay me that much. He told me to string you out, make this take as long as possible. He didn’t even set up a time for me to meet up with him again and tell him what I’d learned. You got somewhere else you’re supposed to be?”

Karris didn’t think so. But she didn’t let the man’s words distract her. He could be talking so that his friends could take her unawares. But there was no one else in the alley.

“What’s your name?” she asked.

He grimaced. Gave up. “Dayan Dakan.”

“You owe me, Dayan Dakan.”

“Ah, balls.”

If whoever had hired him wanted this to take as long as possible, she needed to reclaim as much time as she could. She ran, arriving back at the Chromeria sweating in a very unladylike fashion. She’d considered hiring a horse, but figured it would have actually been slower. Not all streets were open to riders, and with the time it would take to hire a horse in the first place, running was faster, even awkward as it was in a thobe. She hopped into the lift, and took it as high as she could.

“News?” she asked the Blackguards at the top of the lift. One was the new boy, Gill Greyling, the other was the tall eunuch Lytos.

They looked at each other. Neither said anything.

“Where’s your escort?” Lytos asked.

Dismissing Samite after going to the Crossroads might not have been the best idea, but she wasn’t going to talk to Lytos about that.

“Gill, you owe me,” she said. “And this won’t even be close to setting us even.”

He sighed. He clearly would have preferred to forget letting that strumpet into Gavin’s room. He cleared his throat and said, “There’s an emergency meeting of the Spectrum. Was supposed to start an hour ago, but Yellow and Sub-red couldn’t make it then. They’re just getting started.”

Lytos looked at the young man.

“What?” Gill asked. “She’s one of us.”

Lytos glowered at him.

“What?”

“Thank you, you’re both lovely,” Karris said. She ducked into Gavin’s room—it was still too strange to think of it as her own room—and tried to decide if she needed to change, or if she could just use some powder to combat the sweat. She looked around for Marissia. For a room slave, the woman didn’t spend much time in her room.

Now I want Marissia to be here. Not very consistent, are we, Karris?