Brian Staveley - The Providence of Fire

Without a score of palace guardsmen to clear a path, the walk took longer than Adare remembered. Though she stood taller than most women, almost as tall as Birch, she lacked the bulk necessary to force her way through the press of bodies. Fulton seemed to grow more tense, more wary, with every step, and Adare was starting to feel nervous herself, the relief of having slipped the noose of the red walls replaced by the constant pressure of sweating bodies all around her, the jostling and shouting, the hammering of a thousand voices.

By the time they broke into the relative tranquillity of the broad plaza facing the Basin, Adare could feel sweat slicking her back. Her breath was all bound up inside her chest and she let it out in a long, uneven sigh. Compared to the lanes fronting the canal, the plaza was wide and relatively empty, a huge sweep of stone flags dotted with knots of men and women. She could see more than two feet in front of her. She could move, breathe. How she would have managed the walk without Fulton and Birch she had no idea.

Well, you’d better figure it out soon, she told herself. You can’t take them with you .

She glanced out over the Basin, the wide semi-lake where the Atmani Canal ended after hundreds of miles, ramifying into half a dozen smaller conduits that would carry water and boats to the various quarters of the city. Scores of narrow long-keels swung at anchor, divesting their cargo onto smaller rafts or bobbing barrel-boats, then topping up on stores for the return trip south toward Olon and Lake Baku.

For a moment Adare paused, eyeing those craft. Her journey would be so much simpler if she could just choose one, step aboard, pay a captain for food and a luxury cabin, then spend the trip south rehearsing her meeting with the secretly reunited Sons of Flame and their shadowy leader, Vestan Ameredad. In many ways, the boat would be safer than taking her chances walking the long road-no prying eyes, no brigands, almost no human interaction. The prospect was so alluring.… Alluring and utterly stupid.

Even at a distance, Adare could make out tax inspectors in their stiff uniforms, members of her own ministry, moving up and down the quays, looking over the off-loaded barrels and bales. She stood far enough off that there was no chance of discovery, but she shrank back into her hood all the same. Within a day Ran would discover that his tame pet had gone missing, and when he came after her, he would expect her to think like a pampered princess. By the next morning, the kenarang ’s minions would be crawling through all the most expensive inns and guesthouses in the city. They would be interrogating ship captains down in the harbor, and they would be all over the Basin asking questions about a young woman with coin in her pocket and hidden eyes.

Adare’s shoulders tightened at the thought of pursuit, hundreds of il Tornja’s men scouring the city for her, and she almost yelped when Fulton stepped closer, taking her firmly by the elbow.

“Don’t look over your shoulder, Minister,” he said, voice low. “We are being followed.” He glanced at his companion. “Birch, take second point, eyes on the northeast quadrant.”

Adare started to turn, but Fulton jerked her forward ungently.

“Don’t. Look,” he hissed.

Tiny barbs of fear pricked Adare’s skin. “Are you sure?” she asked. “Who is it?”

“Yes, and I don’t know. Two tall men. They just stepped into a ta shop.”

Instead of glancing back, Adare stared at the crowd moving and shifting around her. She had no idea how Fulton had picked two faces out of the chaos. There must have been thousands of people in the wide plaza-porters, bare-chested and bent nearly double beneath their loads; knots of garrulous women in bright silk, down from the Graves to pick over the newest goods before they reached market; beggars prostrated beside the fountains; wagon-drivers in broad straw hats prodding indifferent water buffalo through the press. Half an Annurian legion could have been following her through the crowd and Adare might not have noticed.

“There were hundreds of people moving west along the canal,” Adare whispered. “This is the busiest hour for the Basin. It doesn’t mean they’re all stalking us.”

“With due respect, Minister,” Fulton replied, herding her surreptitiously to the south, toward one of the smaller streets leading out of the broad square, “you have your business and I have mine.”

“Where are we going?” Adare demanded, risking a glance over her shoulder despite the Aedolian’s orders. Birch had taken a dozen steps back, his boyish face serious as he scanned the storefronts. “We’re headed south, not west.”

“We’re not going to the Lowmarket anymore. It’s not safe.”

Adare took a deep breath. Her entire plan hinged on going west, on getting through the broad plaza, then over the large bridge spanning the Atmani Canal. The fact that someone might have seen her leaving the Dawn Palace, that men might even now be tracking her through the city streets, only increased her urgency.

“Well, if someone is following, we have to go on,” she said. “We can lose them in the Lowmarket.”

Fulton glared at her.

“The Lowmarket is an assassin’s dream-constant crowds, miserable sight lines, and enough noise that you can’t hear yourself talk. I didn’t want you traveling there in the first place, and you’re certainly not going now. You can have me removed from my post when we return to the palace. Have me stripped of my steel, if you want, but until we return, until you do, it is my charge to guard you, and I intend to keep that charge.” His grip tightened on her elbow. “Keep moving. Don’t run.”

He glanced over his shoulder toward Birch, who flicked a series of hand signs, too quick for Adare to follow. The younger Aedolian looked grim and Fulton nodded curtly as he shepherded her toward the nearest street.

“Where are we going?” Adare hissed again. A return to the Dawn Palace was impossible. Il Tornja would hear of her departure and the strange conditions surrounding it. He would learn that she had been disguised, that she had insisted on a minimal guard, and he would want answers she was ill prepared to give. Even if, through some miracle, Adare was able to keep the abortive journey a secret, the Aedolians would never allow her outside the red walls without a full escort again. “Where are you taking me?” she demanded, vaguely aware of panic fringing her voice.

“Safety,” Fulton replied. “A storefront nearby.”

“We’ll be trapped in a ’Kent-kissing storefront.”

“Not this one. We own it. Run it. Called a rabbit hole-for situations like this.”

From out of the press, a vendor stepped toward them. He was a fat, genial man smiling a crack-toothed smile as he reached into the bulging cloth bag at his side.

“Firefruit, lady? Fresh from the Si’ite orchards and juicy as a kiss.…”

Before he could proffer the fruit in question, Fulton stepped forward. The Aedolian hadn’t drawn his blade, but he didn’t need to. His fist smashed into the vendor’s soft throat, and the man crumpled.

Adare pulled back, aghast.

“He was just trying to sell me something,” she protested.

The fruit seller rolled onto his side, a broken gargle escaping from his windpipe. Pain and panic filled his eyes as he tried to drag himself away on his elbows. The Aedolian didn’t spare him a glance.

“I didn’t swear an oath to guard his life. We are undermanned and far from the red walls. Keep moving.”

Behind them, Birch flicked more signals with one hand, the other ready on his sword. Adare felt her breath thicken inside her chest, her stomach churn. In a city of a million souls, she was trapped. Fulton’s firm hand on her elbow had seen to that. Once they left the plaza, there would be no way forward or back, nowhere to run. The Aedolians were only trying to keep her safe, but …