Cary frowned and peered into the darkness.
“They’ve got God’s own bonfire at the Lord Marshal’s revel,” Cary said. “And there’s more traffic than I’d have thought on the bridges.” She smoothed back her hair. There were a few strands of white at her temples that hadn’t been there last year. “That’s not what it is, though, is it?”
“Dawson Kalliam tried to kill Palliako. Armed men came into the revel. I don’t know whose they were, but what’s going on there isn’t a celebration. It’s a civil war.”
Cary’s face went cool. In a conversational voice, she said something profoundly obscene.
“And the two men hiding in my cart?” she said.
“The Lord Regent and the prince,” Cithrin said.
“Well of course they are.”
The clatter of hooves came from the great span of the Autumn Bridge, growing louder and louder until they threatened to drown out the voices of the players. Torches appeared at the crest, and moments later a dozen men in the colors of House Kalliam and House Bannien pelted into the street.
“Treachery!” one of the men shouted. “Fire and treachery!”
The audience was on its feet. Cithrin could almost see the fear moving through them, a ripple on a pond. The riders went on, driving their horses deeper into the city. Someone shouted, catching sight of the billowing smoke to the north. The crowd scattered like startled birds, leaving Hornet and Sandr standing forgotten on the stage.
“Pack it in, boys,” Cary shouted, striding back into the yard. “We’ve storm weather coming, and we’re staying small until it passes.”
A round-faced girl peeked out from the back of the stage. Charlit Soon. She was pretty in a full-cheeked way, and her eyes were wide with the first echoes of panic. Sandr and Hornet looked at each other, and Sandr shrugged.
“Some nights it’s a good show, some nights it’s a good story,” he said.
“What’s the plan, Cary?” Smit called from the back.
“Pull up the stage, get the cart into the stable, and let’s not have any political opinions for a while,” Cary said.
“And our guests?” Charlit Soon asked, her voice fluting up to a bird’s chirp at the end.
“We haven’t got any,” Cary said. “Now move.”
Sandr hopped off the stage and started hauling the chain. Hornet disappeared in the back. Mikel appeared in an over-sized black cloak and a false stomach that left him looking pregnant.
“Cithrin,” Mikel said. “Welcome back.”
I
n the back of the stable, by the light of a hooded lantern, Geder Palliako and Price Aster became different men. They tried Palliako in four different costumes before settling on Father Hope from The Midwinter Princess, the brown robes and crooked stick making him look older than he was. Aster only took a pair of old breeches tied tight around his waist, a stained shirt, and dirt ground into his hair and skin. Cithrin changed into a peasant dress made for a Firstblood woman and too wide for her hips and bust, but Charlit Soon threw stitches on to bring it closer.
“Can’t do anything with the hands,” Cary said, surveying the work. “Anyone looks at their palms and you’re caught.”
More fires were dotting the city, towers of smoke rising higher even than the Kingspire and windblown so that they seemed always falling.
“I have to thank you,” Palliako said. “All of you. The danger you’re putting yourselves in for me…”
“Feh,” Mikel said with a grin. “Sometime we’ll tell you about the first time we worked with Cithrin. Made a play about it.”
“Let’s get our heads out of this noose first, shall we?” Cary said smartly.
“If we stay here, they’ll find us,” Cithrin said. “One side or else the other.”
“If there’s only two sides,” Smit said. “Lot of times these things wind up more complex than when they start.”
Sandr rolled his eyes.
“Oh, worked a lot of insurrections, have you?”
The city was in the grip of riot, the two most powerful and important men in Imperial Antea huddling in fear of their lives before him, and Sandr was peevish at having been upstaged by Cary.
“Didn’t I tell you about being in Borja when the plague winds came?” Smit asked. “That was when I’d only just met Master Kit. I must have been twenty, twenty-two. Right in there, and—”
“Gentlemen?” Cary said.
“Sorry,” Smit said and lapsed into silence.
The stable reeked of piss and horse shit, and beneath that a growing scent of smoke. Camnipol, burning. Cithrin’s gut was a solid knot. She knew that if she ate now—or even if she drank—she’d vomit it all back up. And also, she was exhilarated. She wondered where Paerin Clark was right now. She had faith he’d survived the initial attack and that, barring the mischance that came with the violence, he would be able to find a place of relative safety. But she wouldn’t go looking for him, and she was certain he wouldn’t come looking for her. He’d be too busy making his soundings of the tactics and politics.