“They’re saying a thousand. They’re saying every woman in the city. It was two hundred. The Third Eye saw it herself. She counted them. It was a quick vision, though, she might have been off by ten or fifteen.”

“And you’re certain she’s telling you the truth?” Liv said.

“She has told me hard truths. I trust her entirely.”

“Fealty to One, huh?” Liv said bitterly.

“Indeed. But my ultimate fealty is not to her.”

“Nor is it to me!” Liv had to work hard to keep her voice down. As it was, people were already staring.

“No, it’s not. Fealty to your own family is the smallest possible circle beyond the self. To hold fealty to your own and to call it a high virtue is ludicrous. Even animals protect their own. It is a good, but it is a common good, an easy one. It’s a miser who says he grows rich not for himself, but for his children. His vice is not thus magically made virtue. Fealty to One is the expression of a high virtue. It is what sets Danavises apart from those who take easier roads.”

“It doesn’t set you apart if you take your fealty from one man and give it to his mortal enemy.” It wasn’t fair, but Liv didn’t care about fair. Her father was saying she was supporting a monster. That all she had done, all she had worked for, was worse than nothing.

His fingers flexed hard around his mead. For a long moment, he said nothing, but when he did speak, his voice was quiet. “Even if your father is a hypocrite of the lowest form, Aliviana, your problem isn’t his choices. It’s your own.” He drummed his fingers on the tabletop and then stood. “I have to go. My wife said I may still save her life if I don’t tarry.”

“Wait. What?”

“She’s a Seer. She can tell all sorts of things. But there’s an order of assassins that wears these special cloaks. It makes them invisible to her gift. She’s seen that in many futures she dies, but she can’t see how, which has never happened to her before. So we believe one of these assassins must be after her. Me coming here likely means that the woman I love will die. That’s how much I care for you. I came for you, knowing it might cost me her. Fare well, daughter. Orholam’s light shine upon you.”

“I’m sorry, father, I—I didn’t even congratulate you. A satrap, that’s—”

“No time,” he said, glancing down.

And he left. His people swarmed around him, and they were gone. Without so much as a parting embrace. Liv was stunned. She felt hollowed out, and suddenly more alone than she had ever been. What if she’d done the wrong thing? She’d been hasty. She’d been young. She hadn’t known—she hadn’t known much of anything.

She’d done the best she could. Better than anyone could have expected of her. Isolated and afraid, she’d chosen the best of bad options.

Hadn’t she?

And what the hell was it with her father tonight, fidgeting, acting—

She looked at the tabletop as Phyros came over to sit with her again. She tightened her eyes for an instant. On the tabletop, written in spindly superviolet luxin invisible to any eyes but hers, was a message: “Under the table. Hide it in your left boot. Tell no one.”

Phyros sat and rested his arms on the table, setting down his drink. The motion broke the fragile superviolet luxin and it disappeared. “You good?”

“It was upsetting. But I’m fine.”

“I found us a crew,” he said. “You ready?”

“More than ready.”

Phyros stood, and as his back turned, she slid her hand under the edge of the table and found it. A knife. A knife? When she had four pistols, a sword, and another knife on her belt? This was what her father gave her? Nonetheless, she swept it into her hand, palming it, and followed.

Chapter 69

“They tell me you’re good,” Murder Sharp said. He’d taken residence upstairs in a midtown porcelain shop. The large, round room had lots of windows, and Master Sharp had lots of roses. Blooming roses, at this time of year? That meant he either could draft green, or had access to the services of someone who did. He was watering the roses as Teia came in.

Teia mumbled something under her breath.

“I lied,” Sharp said. “They don’t tell me you’re good.”

She looked at him, a quick flick to his disconcertingly intense gaze, then away. What was his problem? He turned back to his watering. He wasn’t, as it turned out, bald. He’d merely kept his carrot-red hair shaved in a pattern to make it appear he was. Then he’d cut it all off so it could grow in together, without drawing attention to his old disguise. So now it was boyishly short. It made him look young.

“Truth is,” he said, putting down the watering can and turning to study her, “they tell me that you’re better than I am.”

This time when her eyes flicked up, his amber eyes were waiting, and they held her like a fish on a line.

“Do you know why they’d tell me such a thing?” he asked.

She shook her head. Was he even telling the truth?

“They hope I’ll kill you. They hope I’m that vain.” He slid knives home in his belt. “And you know what? I am.”

Her breath was suddenly short. She glanced toward the door. No. If he was going to kill her, it was too far away. And who was to say he’d use a knife? He was watching her eyes, waiting for her to widen her pupils to look into paryl.

The whole room was probably full of paryl. Her heart sank. But she tried to keep her voice light. “Why not just do it themselves?” she asked.

“You don’t know the Old Man. If they kill you out of hand, they’ll have to answer to him. Killing a paryl lightsplitter? He’d be furious. And when he’s furious, people die. On the other hand, if they take in a spy, he’ll be even more furious. He’ll wipe out the whole mission here as traitors or incompetents. But … if they get me to kill you, it becomes my problem. And the Old Man isn’t likely to kill me. I’m too valuable.”

I didn’t even think of fighting him.

The thought pissed Teia off. She was a Blackguard. Near it, anyway. People feared her. Should, anyway. And she was thinking of running, of letting herself be pulled down from behind? Like what? Like prey. She wasn’t prey. She wasn’t a slave who had to curl into a ball while her mistress beat her, only defending, forbidden to answer rage with rage.

I am not a slave, not even to fear.

“So what’s it going to be?” she asked. “You wouldn’t be telling me if you were really going to kill me out of hand. You’re too careful for that. And I’m too dangerous.”

“Are you?” he asked, bemused.

“I am.” She smiled, and her rage smiled with her. Test me? Please do.

“I’ve half a mind to take your dogteeth for that impudence,” Murder Sharp said. He fingered his necklace, showing her the glittering pearls-that-weren’t-pearls.

“Come get ’em,” Teia said. She told herself that it was because a spy would be obsequious, desperate to do anything to get in. By putting on a mask of rebellion, she’d be above suspicion.

But that wasn’t really true, because fuck him.

“You’re not afraid of me?” he asked, smirking.