There was a long slit in the wall, a sort of narrow window covered in mesh through which we could look into a luxurious bed chamber, dimly lit and gloriously appointed. It wasn't very tasteful; it practically screamed wealth and power-or at least, wealth. There wasn't a thing, from firetools to candlesticks to bedposts, that wasn't gilded or carved or ornamented in some way.

In his lace and brocade, Lucius Perry looked like yet another ornament, and not a very tasteful one, either. He sat in a chair next to the bed, as still as he had sat by the fountain in the Flower Garden. Gold candlelight on rich hangings made it look like a scene in a painting.

I wondered what he was thinking. Did he know we were there yet? Probably not, or he'd be doing something more enticing, wouldn't he? Why didn't he have a book to read? When would something happen? Marcus shifted in his seat and I moved away from him; there wasn't much room in there, but we were careful not to touch each other.

We both jumped when a knock on the door to the room broke the stillness. Perry turned slowly. A man came in and threw his coat on a chair.

"Well, hello." Lucius Perry smiled.

I peered at his customer. The man was short and a bit stout; he could have been anyone you'd pass on the street without a second thought. He stood staring at Perry as if he couldn't believe his eyes. "Yes," he said. "Yes. God, you're gorgeous. They were right."

"I'm here for you. Name your desire-or better yet, don't name it, just show me." Perry began advancing on him, but the man held up his hand.

"No, wait. I want to look at you." Perry stopped, obedient. "You are...exquisite. But the paint-the eyes, and whatnot-it's a little much. I wonder if you'd mind wiping it off?"

"That," Lucius said, "I cannot do." As the man drew breath to object, he added swiftly, "But why confine yourself to looking, when you can touch?"

"Yes," the man said again. "Yes. Come here, then." He put his hands to either side of Perry's face, and pulled his mouth down, kissing him. He pulled Perry's head back, and traced his eyes, his cheeks...the paint was smeared all over his face, making the mask all the more effective, but the way he held his body-I watched Lucius Perry melting, melting in a fluid surrender, as though sinking into a water of anonymity.... The man's hands were all over him now, opening his jacket, plunging under his shirt, squeezing and pulling on his body, and Lucius Perry flowed with it all, his head thrown back, his eyes closed. He loved being touched. He loved being admired. Glinley's was made for him. But the client wasn't really interested in Lucius Perry's pleasure. He was undoing his own breeches now, and guiding Perry's hands down to where his tool sprang out. I shut my eyes for a moment, and heard moaning. I peeked through my lashes. Lucius was kneeling before him, obscuring the worst of the view.

It was perfectly obvious what they were doing.

"Hmph," Marcus muttered beside me. "He could have had that on the corner for a whole lot less than he's paying here."

"Hush," I hissed. The man dug his fingers into Lucius's hair, and arced his back, and shouted so loud I thought the whole house would come running. But nothing happened. The man subsided onto the bed, and Lucius handed him a towel. The man wiped himself off and started to get up, though you could tell he didn't really want to move.

"There's no hurry," Perry said. "Can I get you something to drink?"

The man drank a glass of wine. From his face, I guessed it was better wine than he was used to.

"Thank you," he said. He began putting his clothing together. "I wish that I could stay, but..." He shrugged. Glinley's was expensive.

Perry nodded. "Come back," he said. "Come back and see me, when you can."

The man smiled. "Don't tempt me. I'll dream of you, first, for a good long time."

He closed the door softly behind him.

So that was it, was it? Did they all do that? A solid hour of this would be the end of me. Our hiding room wasn't very big, and it was dark. I couldn't see Marcus, but I could hear his breathing next to me, shallow and a bit uneven.

"Are you all right?" I whispered. I wondered if we really should have come.

"Fine. Don't fuss."

Lucius Perry was carefully putting himself back together again. Like an actor, he cleaned off his face-and for a moment, I saw the man we knew, his skin pale in the candlelight, his eyes bright. He was staring into the mirror over his dressing table. He turned his face from side to side, examining it as if trying to see what it was that other people saw. He touched his lips, ran his finger down the straight line of his nose, smoothed his eyebrows, stuck out his tongue and laughed. He took out little pots from a drawer and began layering the paint back over his eyes. The colors made him look magical, like a creature in a dream. The last thing he did was his lips, drawing his crimsoned finger across them slowly, savoring the sensation. He rubbed them over and over, until they were saturated with color. If you didn't know about the paint, it was as if he had flushed them with stroking. He picked up a comb and drew it down through his tangled hair, again and again until it lay sleek on his head. Then he peered critically into the mirror and ran a hand through his hair, and looked up.

I had missed the knock. Another man came in. Lucius Perry stood, and bowed to him. The new client was dressed like a merchant, a shopkeeper, perhaps. He looked around the room at the canopied bed, the hearthfire, the tapestry; at one point he even looked straight at us, which gave me a scare, but our peephole must have been part of something like a picture or a hanging, and I suppose he was admiring it.

"Well," he said. "A nobleman's bedroom. I've never been in one of these before." Lucius Perry drawled, "You'll find it's much like any man's." He sounded quite a lot like the duke, actually.

The client's hands were clenching and unclenching. "And are you much like any man?"

Lucius preened. "I'm better. Look at me. Don't you think so?"

"A better man than I? I do not think so."

"Don't you? Maybe you need a better look."

"Anyone looks good with thirty royals' worth of clothing on his back. Take it off."

"How dare you?" Perry said arrogantly. Oh, he was enjoying himself, even I could tell, being just as horrible as the man expected him to be. This was different from the last one. There was a contest here, and a sort of drama. "This coat alone cost fifty."

"I deal in cloth, you slut. I know exactly what that getup's worth. You've probably passed my shop a hundred times and never looked at me. But you'll look at me now. You'll look at me, and like it." He was breathing so hard, I was afraid he was going to hit poor Lucius. But the younger man showed no alarm.

"I'm looking," Perry said.

"Keep looking," the man growled.

"I'm looking." They were both starting to breathe hard.

"What do you see?"

"I see you. I see you, and I like it. You make me want things I shouldn't want."

"Such as?"

"I want to take my clothing off for you. I want you to strip me naked. I want you to see me the way no one's ever seen me before."

"Your noble friends would not approve."

"My noble friends cannot imagine the pleasure. Strip me. Reveal me."

"Strip yourself," the man said thickly. "I want to watch."

Perry lifted a hand to the buttons of his coat and slowly undid them, and his breeches as well, 'til he stood there in his shirt, lovely as ivory, with the silver lace framing his shoulders.

The man watched, entranced. It was like wizardry: Lord Lucius Perry, who wasn't himself but someone else who looked just like him, taking off layers of disguise until he stood revealed as a painted whore, less himself now than when he started fully clothed in noble's garb. That's what I thought, anyway. He wanted to see how far from himself he could go, and this was how he did it. I hoped someday he didn'tlose himself entirely.

The cloth merchant lifted Perry's shirt behind, and stroked him. "Lie down," he said. "You're mine, now."

"I'm yours," Perry sighed, and laid himself facedown on the tasteless, gilded bed.

What they did didn't really seem so terrible, because I couldn't see much, just a back and some legs.

The noise was the worst of it, especially at the end.

Beside me, I felt Marcus turn to the wall. I reached for his hand in the dark, but caught only the edge of his cloak. He was shaking.

The man was already up and buttoning his clothes. "Get dressed," he said curtly. "I'll see you next week. Wear something different, though."

"As you wish."

When he'd left, and Perry was washing himself, Marcus murmured to me, "Well. Now I know how it looks from the outside."

"Outside what?" I whispered.

He pulled away suddenly. "Sorry," he said, and flung the little door open. I tumbled into the hallway after him, and found him kneeling over a convenient basin, puking his guts into it. There were, I saw, many such basins, large and ornamental, placed strategically along the hall. I guessed they were used fairly often, for one thing and another, at Glinley's.

I tried to hold his shoulders, but he waved me away. Of course he had brought his own clean handkerchief. "You need water," I said. "It'll wash the taste out. Was it the wine, Marcus? Did it make you sick?"

He sat all scrunched up with his arms tight around his knees. "No. I'd like more of it, actually." His teeth were chattering. "C-can you find me some?"

I looked wildly up and down the candlelit corridor. "Not a prayer. But-" There was a bellpull. I pulled it. The man who came was the same one who had first let us into the house.

"My friend is ill," I said. "We need to get our things and go. I'm sorry about the mess-"

"That's normal," he said. "A little too rich for your blood, sir?"

"Stuff it," Marcus growled.

"Quit being so uppity," the man said. "You may be the duke's own bumboy now, but I'm an old friend of Red Jack's, and I know what you was."

Marcus seized the sides of the basin again.

"You lay off him," I said to Red Jack's friend. "He can be uppity if he wants to." I heard Marcus laugh-it was an awful sound, in the midst of his retching, but it gave me heart. "Now show us to ourroom," I said, "and make yourself scarce."

The man glowered at me, but when Marcus could stand, he led us back to the room with the couch.

"You won't get much good of him here, my lady," the man said rudely. "Too bad-he used to be the sweetest little tosser on the streets."

"Out,"I said, looking for my sword. He left before I could find it-and without a tip, I need hardly add.

My friend sat shivering on the couch. I put my cloak around him and made him drink some wine. "Never mind," I said. I needed to pace, since Marcus wouldn't let me touch him. "He's just a filthy stupid whoremongering idiot. We'll tell my uncle, and he'll have him thrown out on the street."

"No! Katie, no, you can't ever tell Tremontaine about this,please, Katie, swear!"

"Well, all right," I said. "You're right. I guess it was a bad idea. But it's over now, Marcus; you'll feel better soon. I'm sorry it made you sick. You couldn't know."

"Yes, I could," he said fiercely. "I knew exactly. Don't you understand?" He was shaking so hard he could barely hold the wineglass, so he knocked it back in one gulp. "You heard the man. And I told you that day, in the garden, but you still don't really understand, do you?"

I was beginning to; I just wished I didn't have to. "It's not your fault," I said. "You were just a kid. It was in Riverside, and you were just a little kid and you needed the money, right?"

"I didn't get any money. My mother's man sold me to Jack when she died. Jack gave me food and a place to sleep, and I worked for him. When I stopped being little and cute, he didn't have any use for me. Someone told him the Mad Duke liked them older. So he took me to the duke and sold me to him."

It was true, then, about him and my uncle, what people said and what I'd refused to believe. I swallowed bile. I didn't know how I could stand it, but I was going to have to. Fear is enemy to sword. I listened, and I kept very still, but I couldn't look my friend in the face.

"Tremontaine saved my life. He gave me a room, and a door that locked."

I let out breath I hadn't known I'd been holding, and drank some of the wine. "Oh, Marcus." I wanted to put my arms around him, but I saw from the way he was gripping my cloak around himself that he didn't want to be touched; he wasn't done saying things.

"He gave me teachers, and books, and-well, you know, everything. I owe him like nobody's business.

He's been protecting me all this time; nobody touches me, and oh god god god, after all that-" Marcus was twisting his fingers together-"If Tremontaine finds out I came here after all that, he'll fucking kill me, Katherine. He will. You mustn't tell him!"

"I won't," I promised.

"I mean, it's been all right for so long, I thought I could do this-I didn't think it mattered, it was all about someone else, like I could test myself-just watching Perry-I don't know how he does it, honestly I don't-"

"He's testing himself," I said. "Like a swordsman. It's some kind of challenge for him." "Well, he can have it. He's crazier than I thought."

"Is there any wine left?" I poured us each another glass, and drank. It made me feel warmer and braver at once. "Let's just go," I said. "I think I can find the main door." I buckled my sword on, a little unsteadily.

"Right." He was still shaking. He turned his dark eyes wide on me. "Do you hate me now?"

"Hate you? How could I hate you?" I put my arm around him, and this time he let me. "Come on," I said; "we're going home."

Glinley's smelt of sandalwood and beeswax and smoke and drugs and bodies. We wound our way down infinite identical corridors, trying not to be noticed. Once we actually stood like statues in empty niches as customers passed by. The halls started looking familiar. "Have we been here already?" I whispered. A door opened, and since there was no niche, we flattened ourselves against a wall. It was Lucius Perry, leaving the room where he worked. He was brushed and cloaked, on his way out. We followed him through the house, dropping back far enough not to be obvious. Once he looked behind him, so we quickly seized one another in embrace. I buried my head in my friend's shoulder, and Marcus put his face in my hair until we heard his footsteps fade away.

When we got outside, even the Riverside air smelled fresh.

I began to turn toward home, but Marcus held my wrist. He nodded in the direction of Perry's departing back and raised his eyebrows. I shook my head: enough was enough for one night. Besides, Perry was nearly out of the radius of the house's torchlight-he'd be stopping for a linkboy or his own torch soon, and I didn't fancy trailing behind him in the dark. We stood in the shadows of Glinley's, and watched Lucius Perry walk away into the night.

And we watched two men walk after him, faster and faster, and then we heard a loud thump and an even louder shout.

We ran toward the sound, Marcus with his knife and I with my sword. It was one of those little Riverside streets where the houses nearly touch across. We could barely see the shapes of the two men and one more, whaling on one crouching figure who was not quiet as they laid into him.

"Stop!" I shouted, and to my horror I heard one say, "Is that the girl? That's her!"

"Run, Katie!"

With my sword in my hand, I could not run. I just couldn't do it. I knew I could take them on-they didn't have swords, and I did.

"Katie,please !"

"Get help," I said to Marcus as they came at me, leaving poor Lucius Perry gasping on the ground-but help was already there.

Men from my uncle's house-a footman and a swordsman, not wearing livery, but I knew them well and had never been so glad to see them. They laid into the three bullies, and they were much better trained and well-armed, besides. I'd like to say I helped, but I didn't-everyone was much bigger than me, andit was street-fighting without any rules-I hung back, and it was over so fast, with two of the bullies running away and the third one kept for questions, hands bound behind him. The swordsman took charge of him and the footman picked up Lucius Perry, because he couldn't walk. We went slowly. I felt much better when the Tremontaine swordsman, Twohey was his name, who was having trouble with his prisoner, said, "Lady Katherine, if you could just give him a good jab in the ribs-with your pommel?

Good and hard-that's it, thanks. Come on, you."

My uncle was wearing a bright yellow dressing gown that didn't suit him; I'm not sure it was even his.

He stood blinking in the hall at the top of the main house stairs, having been alerted by what I was coming to see was an admirable network that something had happened.

"For once," he drawled, "I try to get to sleep at a reasonable hour, and you bring me-bodies."

"One for questioning and one for bed, my lord," said Twohey cheerfully.

"Not my bed, I hope," the duke said; "that one's a bloody mess-" He saw who it was. "Oh, god. Get him seen to. Now. What the hell do you think you're doing, holding him in the hall like a package?"