"...and it's not yet here, my boy," Eldyn heard Mrs. Haddon whispering to Talinger as they drew near. "But the time will come. Sooner than we all think, I wouldn't doubt. And when it does we'll wonder why we wished for it at all. A terrible thing it will be, a terrible thing. But that's to worry about then. For now we must watch and wait. Do you see?"

Talinger gave her a mute nod. His face, bright with pa.s.sion a moment ago, was now white behind his red beard.

She pinched his cheek, bringing a bit of color back. "There, that's a good lad. You'll be fine if you don't lose your wits. You can take him from here, boys." She gathered up their half-drunk cups.

The message was not lost upon them. They hurriedly rose.

"You fool, you d.a.m.n Westland fool," Jaimsley hissed as he led Talinger toward the door. "And you're a fool as well, Warrett, for encouraging him like that. Do you know what could have happened-what could still happen to us? Just because no one did anything doesn't mean that no one was watching, that they haven't already gotten our names and put them down on a list."

Talinger hung his head and Warrett looked away, and while the words were not directed at Eldyn, they struck him like a blow to the gut. What if someone had watched? What if his name was on a list?

"What is it, Garritt?" Jaimsley said to him once they were outside the shop. "You've gone white as whey. You needn't worry, you know." He nodded toward Warrett and Talinger, who stood a bit apart, looking chastened now. "I was just trying to give them a bit of a scare. There are enough true traitors and spies about these days for the king's agents to concern themselves with. Even if they did see what just happened, the most these two are liable to get is a bit of hard questioning from a captain. And it's not like they have any secrets to spill. Can you imagine either one of them as rebels?"

Jaimsley laughed, and Eldyn made an attempt to follow suit, but a sickness was spreading inside him. Perhaps Talinger and Warrett had no secrets to spill, but Eldyn could not say the same. It was a cruel bit of fate that had made him-the one in their group who had never spoken a word of rebellion-into the one who was now engaged in what was surely traitorous activity. What if the White Lady came and turned her unnatural gaze upon him and the truth of his night work spilled from his lips against his will?

"Are you certain you're well?" Jaimsley asked, laying a hand on his shoulder. "To tell the truth, I've been worried about you, Garritt. You don't seem yourself of late."

"I'm thirsty, that's all," Eldyn said. "G.o.d, I need a drink."

"Yes, and not coffee," Jaimsley said with a crooked grin. He clapped Eldyn's shoulder, then called to the others. "Come on, gents. There will be no lectures at university today. We might as well go to tavern, if you two will promise to behave yourselves."

The promise was solemnly given. They walked down narrow streets and soon became a merry band, for laughter must always follow a close call with danger. However, more than once Eldyn could not help glancing over his shoulder, looking for a pale face behind him.

I N THE NEXT day's edition of The Fox, there was another advertis.e.m.e.nt for pewter candlesticks, silver snuffboxes, and gold thimbles.

As before, deciphering the code led Eldyn to an address in the Old City. It was always a different house and different men, but their eyes were the same: hard and crafty, glancing up and down the street to make sure he was alone. Sometimes the message tube they gave him felt strangely warm, as if it was not ink that sloshed inside the chamber at one end but rather blood. He made his way to Hayrick in the middle of a hard rain and was grateful for the long lumenal that followed, and the chance to get some sleep.

Two editions of The Fox went by with no advertis.e.m.e.nts, and as it was published thrice a week he began to let himself hope his unG.o.dly work was finished. He went for a walk in Gauldren's Heights and fancied which house he would let for himself and Sashie once his returns from the trading company came in. Something more Uphill than Down, he thought: a solid, respectable house.

Except on his way back to the Golden Loom, he bought the newest edition of The Fox from a boy on a corner, still damp off the press. At once he saw the advertis.e.m.e.nt that was, among all the many eyes that read the broadsheet, for his eyes alone. He read the address, then tossed the paper in the gutter. The print had stained his fingers black.

That night was the first night he was forced to release the ink in the tube. He was early to the well, as he always was, for he dreaded to think what they might do to him were he late. The mask he always wore for these meetings chafed against his face. Eldyn had no way to mark the exact time, but at last he became certain that the appointed hour had come and gone, and there was no sign of the red-haired man. As a sliver of moon rose, so, too, a fear rose in him, and he retreated from the well, making for a small thicket of New Forest beech and elm.

And not a moment too soon. A pair of men stepped from the mouth of the lane and into the moonlight by the well. Neither was the red-haired man. They looked around, but Eldyn wrapped the shadows around himself and slunk back into the wood. The two finished their circuit, then went back to stand by the well. One of them carried a club.

The message would not be delivered this umbral. Eldyn forced his way through the thicket, ran across a field where a single cow lowed, and leaped over a stone wall.

"By G.o.d, so the devil comes to me!" a voice hissed, hardly a dozen feet away from him.

Eldyn staggered back against the wall. A man with broad shoulders and bandy legs stood on the road. He wore a blacksmith's ap.r.o.n. There was a hammer in his hand.

"Give me that," he said, gesturing to the leather tube.

Terror gripped Eldyn's heart even as he gripped the tube.

"Here, here!" the man cried out. "To me! I've got him!"

He started forward, hammer raised. His hands were big, the backs of them covered with black hair.

"I said give that up, devil. I know it's to him you were bringing it, but he won't be coming to get it, I can tell you that. Come now, hand it over without any trouble, and I won't have to crack your skull."

The way he tightened his grip on the hammer belied that promise. Eldyn did not wait; what the nature of the message in the tube was, he did not know, only that he was sure it would be his undoing if read before any court of law. He turned the end of the tube, and dark liquid flooded out. In the moonlight it looked indeed like black blood.

The man let out a shout and sprang forward, but Eldyn flung the leather tube at him, striking him in the face. The man dropped his hammer, howling and pawing at his eyes, for the ink had splattered them. Eldyn scrambled back over the wall and ran past the cow to the south edge of the field, which was bordered by another thicket.

This he dashed through headlong. Branches scratched at his face and ripped his clothes, but the sound of shouts behind him and to his right propelled him onward without heed. On one occasion the voices rang out not twenty feet to his right, but then he splashed across a brook, through a hedge, and down a footpath, all the way weaving the shadows around himself and praying to the saints for a cloud to cover the moon.

The next time he heard the voices, they were behind him again and farther away. He kept moving, not south along the main road to the city but east, skirting around sleeping hamlets and farmsteads and slinking along the lines of walls. At last he staggered through the Morrowgate, having gone halfway around Invarel, and found a hack cab. When the driver eyed his torn attire and bleeding cheek, Eldyn made some weak mention of a tavern fight. Coins pa.s.sed hands; no questions were asked. Eldyn made it into the inn and upstairs, unseen.

He was safe. By St. Andelthy, he was safe. Yet no matter how many times he told himself that the message was destroyed by the ink, that he was not caught, he could not stop shaking. When Sashie came from the room, she found him in only his dressing gown, shivering, his hair still wet from a hasty bath. He told her he was ill with a cold.

It was not until two days later that he learned the red-haired man had been taken to Barrowgate.

He read it in The Messenger as he sat in the public room at the Golden Loom drinking a cup of beer. The story described how a villainous rebel had been caught in the village of Hayrick Cross, north of Invarel. His name was Wayt Howburn, and he had been a journeyman at the blacksmith's there: a walleyed man with red hair. It was the master of the shop, a devoted subject of the Crown, who had turned him in, for having grown suspicious he had searched Howburn's room and discovered a bundle of letters.

The letters were written in a code of some sort and had not yet been deciphered, but they could only be the work of spies and traitors to Altania, for who else would compose messages in such an unholy manner? Howburn was in Barrowgate, awaiting trial. That he would hang was all but certain.

Trembling, Eldyn set down the broadsheet and reached for his beer. His hand groped thin air; the cup was not where he had left it. He looked up, and the breath went out of him.

Westen raised the missing cup in a toast and took a swallow. He was dressed in rich clothes, as usual, and wore a look of amus.e.m.e.nt upon his face.

Anger burned away some of Eldyn's fear. "I should think you would not be so gleeful," he said in a low voice, glancing to make sure the few others in the room were not listening. "Your man has been caught, and all the messages with him."

The highwayman set the cup down next to Eldyn's hand. "So the king's men believe. Those who serve the Crown are necessarily idiots."

"But they found the papers."

"They found some papers," Westen said.

A pain stabbed at Eldyn's temples. He wanted to take a swig of his beer but did not. "I don't understand."

The highwayman stroked the line of his smooth-shaven jaw with a knuckle. That he was so good-looking and so finely dressed made the gesture all the more mocking.

Eldyn cast another glance out of the corner of his eye, then leaned in closer. "What were those papers they found?"

"Not the letters you carried, Garritt, if that's what you're thinking. I can only imagine Lord Valhaine will waste days trying to decode them. Of course, when he finally does, he'll find they contain nothing but a rather rude verse concerning the bedroom habits of the king."

"But then Howburn-"

"Howburn was no patriot. He thought he could sell what he knew to the king's men for a goodly sum. But the blacksmith beat him to it and delivered him up to the soldiers for a grand total of a dozen regals. There's a 'devoted subject of the Crown' for you. The only crown he cares about is one stamped on a coin."

Eldyn pressed a hand to his head. "But then the letters-"

"Are safe. They were never in Howburn's possession for long. It was his job to pa.s.s them along."

"And the papers the blacksmith found were fakes," Eldyn said, "planted there to mislead the agents of the king."

Westen grinned, a flash of lightning. "You're far better at this than you give yourself credit for, Garritt."

"But he will hang," Eldyn said. "Whether the letters are false or not, no matter what they contain, in the end he will surely hang." A terrible thought came to him. "What if he accuses us to save himself?"

"And whom will he accuse? He has never seen me in his life, and you wore a mask when you went to meet him, as did the others. Howburn will go to the gallows alone."

Eldyn succ.u.mbed to thirst and took the cup, taking a draft. He set it down. "Either way, it is over."

Westen laughed; the sound gave Eldyn a shudder.

"Over? No, it is far from over, Garritt." He laid a copy of The Fox on the table and tapped a bit of print on the last page. It was an advertis.e.m.e.nt for pewter candlesticks, silver snuffboxes, and gold thimbles.

Eldyn stared at the paper. The beer he had drunk curdled in his stomach.

"It will not be over," the highwayman said, "until the old stag is dead and the people of Altania roast its flesh on a spit."

A dread came over Eldyn. He thought of his near miss with the king's men, of the dog that had attacked him, of the blacksmith and his hammer. He could not do this anymore.

"I am finished." He took a breath, then looked up and made himself meet Westen's gaze. "I have done what you wanted of me. I am finished with this wretched business."

"But I am not finished with you," the highwayman said. He reached for the cup, though Eldyn still held on to it, and their fingers brushed. Eldyn s.n.a.t.c.hed both his hands back and put them in his lap.

"I say again, I have done enough," he muttered. "I am through with this devil's work."

"That was not our agreement, Garritt. I know you are a gentleman of your word. Or do you mean to tell me you are giving me my hundred regals back?"

Eldyn only looked at his hands.

"Then it is as I thought, and our agreement stands." Westen drained the cup and set it on the table.

Eldyn wanted to weep, but he forced himself to stay steady. By G.o.d, to act so unmanly in front of the highwayman would be unbearable. Eldyn, not he, was the lord's grandson.

"I was nearly caught twice. I cannot hope to escape a third time. I have my sister to think of. I cannot do this."

"Not for the sake of your country?"

"I am sure it is better for my country's sake that I not do this."

"You say that, Garritt, but you do not believe it. You see as well as I how ill the magnates use Altania, how ill they use its land, its people, and how the king totters upon his throne and does nothing. A storm gathers. Fly with it, or it will beat you down."

Eldyn made no reply. The highwayman leaned in closer. "I told you that Howburn never saw me in his life, but I wear no mask with you, Garritt. Because what I said before was true. We are alike, you and I. We both want something better for ourselves and for our country. Yet unlike you, I am man enough to do something about it."

"I am doing something about it!" Eldyn said, but the words sounded weak. He hung his head, ashamed of the way his cheeks stung. The bench opposite him sc.r.a.ped against the floor. Boots thumped behind him, and a hand fell upon his shoulder.

"You must choose whether or not to be a man, Garritt." The highwayman's breath was warm against his ear. "Do this for your sake, for your country's sake. And if not for that..." He squeezed Eldyn's shoulder. "If not for that, then do it for the sake of your precious sister. For I know you would never do anything, anything at all, that might cause her to come to harm. Would you, Mr. Garritt?"

The sound of boots retreated. Eldyn sat at the table, staring at his empty cup, and it was many minutes before his legs felt solid enough to stand upon.

E VENING WAS FALLING, a violet curtain that dropped by inches before a long night, as Eldyn raced through the streets of the Old City.

Westen's speech had indeed filled him with resolve, but not the sort the highwayman had intended. Eldyn would choose to be a man, but he would choose in his own way. He was not his father. He was not a highwayman.

And he would not carry more messages for traitors, or for dogs who threatened his sister.

He hurried along a darker part of Durrow Street, past the grog houses, past the beggars and the wh.o.r.es, past the men who huddled around the fires that burned in the street, drinking gin.

"h.e.l.lo there, love!" called out one of the women who sat on the filthy steps of a church. "You're a fine thing to look at. Come on over, and we'll show you something the priests never did." She raised her bottle toward him and hiked up her skirts over her knees.

Eldyn ran past without looking, and their laughter followed him.

"I bet the priests did show him a thing or two. What they got under their ca.s.socks, that's what. And I bet he liked it. Well, you keep on going, love. The theaters are that way, and they know what to do with a thing like you!"

He ignored their catcalls and pressed on, through the worst section of Durrow Street: a quarter-mile length known as High Holy by its denizens-and by those who ventured there seeking its dark and violent pleasures. For though the old chapel on its little hill had been abandoned years ago, the Church still owned it, as well as the buildings around it.

As he left High Holy behind, Eldyn could only admit that some of what Westen had said was true. Altania and its people had been wronged by men of wealth. Nor had the king or the Church done anything about it. Yet that men like Westen could do any better was absurd.

Westen fancied himself a kind of hero, but he was nothing more than a robber and a thief. He stole from the rich because it suited him. However, if men like him ever ruled the country, then they would steal from the poor just as easily. If Altania was to be made a better place, it would not be by the hands of criminals but through honest men.

And Eldyn Garritt was an honest man. He would not go back on his agreement with Westen, however foolishly and in a weak moment it had been entered into. He would pay the highwayman back, and with interest.

It would be simple enough, he was sure of it. His last meeting with Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing had gone exceedingly well. Any awkward or uncomfortable feelings had dissipated at once. The two had accepted his investment of a hundred regals gratefully, even humbly. They had apologized for being so sharp with him, but he understood they had only acted as business required; it was in no way personal. They had in fact always held the deepest belief that he would make good on his word. So he had, and they could not have been more pleased. The trading company was set to depart for the New Lands; his investment had come just in time. His profit of twenty times his investment was a.s.sured.

Eldyn looked at the signs on the buildings as he went, searching for Inslip Lane. He had never been to their place of business before, but he knew the address. He would speak with Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing. They were reasonable men. The trading ships were on their way to the New Lands-indeed, were likely there by now. He would ask them for an advance against his returns. In exchange, he would be more than willing to take a smaller profit, perhaps fifteen times his investment; the remainder of the profit would be theirs as payment for the advance. He was certain there was no way men of such good business sense could fault an arrangement that would cost them so little and that would bring them such benefit.

True, Eldyn would be reducing his own profit. But fifteen hundred regals would still be a large sum of money. And the cost would be worth it to be free of that scoundrel Westen.

Music and laughter spilled onto the street ahead, accompanied by flickering lights of many hues. Eldyn pa.s.sed a row of theaters, their doors flung open to the twilight. Men with powdered faces and powdered wigs and red smiles stood along the street, conjuring flower-laden trees, tiny suns, and miniature dancers who whirled in midair, all in an effort to entice people into the various theaters.

There seemed no lack of patrons. Many entered the theaters with their hats pulled low, while others had no fear of the lights and kept their heads uncovered, laughing boldly if they thought anyone was looking. There were even some women holding on to the arms of men, dressed in silk and glitter and so made up with powders and rouges that they were hardly less things of illusion that what the Siltheri conjured from light and air. One young woman smiled at Eldyn and dipped a finger into the cleft of her ample bosom. He turned away, letting the evening air cool his face.

He found himself near one of the illusionists: a young man nearly as made up as some of the women. He wove slender hands back and forth, and all at once a small unicorn pranced around him, white as milk, a trail of stars cascading from its pearlescent horn.

"You should buy a ticket and come in," the young Siltheri said. "You are sure to find a performance that pleases you at the Theater of the Unicorn." He made a circle with his fingers, stroking the shaft of the unicorn's horn.

Eldyn kept walking, leaving the light and music behind. He reached into his pocket and touched the disk of silver there: the coin that bore the faces of the sun and moon on its two sides. A compulsion came over him to go back to the theaters, to step inside their doors.

There was no time for diversions; he had business of the greatest importance to attend to. Eldyn squinted at signs in the failing light. He could only hope they were still there, that they had not yet gone out for the evening.

At last he found Inslip Lane, nearly at the very end of Durrow Street where it met the wall of the Old City. The odor of the river spilled over the wall; mosses flourished on the stones. He turned down the lane, which soon reached a dead end. He peered at the houses in the sputtering light of a streetlamp. At last he found the numbers painted on a door. A breath of relief escaped him-a light glowed through the panes of the window.

Eldyn rapped on the door, hoping he was not disturbing them. There was no response, so he knocked again. As he did, the door swung open.

The scene he beheld astonished him so greatly that for a moment he could not move. A woman of considerable girth, her frowsy hair spilling out of her goodwife's bonnet, was rummaging through the drawers of a cabinet. Such was her muttering and the racket she was making with the drawers that she must not have heard his knocking. However, a gust of air rushed through the open door, causing the candle on the table to flicker and flare, and she turned around with a gasp.

Taking her for a thief, Eldyn sprang forward and seized her by the wrist, intending to hold her while he called out for a constable. However, she howled and railed as if he were murdering her and jerked her hand with such surprising force that he was obliged to release her, upon which she s.n.a.t.c.hed up an andiron from the hearth and brandished it at him.

"Off with you!" the woman shouted. "Saints mark me, I'll not let another steal from me this day!"

These words so baffled Eldyn that he was forced to consider that he had misread the situation, that perhaps this was not the right house. So he raised his hands, as seemed prudent given her weapon and her apparent willingness to use it, and explained his situation. He had come looking for two respectable men, Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing, on a matter of business; he had thought this was their house.

"No, this is my house," she answered him. Her face had been marred by pox, but he was forced to admit it did not have an evil look to it. "I am the landlady here."