"She's not jealous of me leaving the caste, is she?"
"Of you, sweetness?" Her father's eyebrows rose. "Lady, no. She thinks you've a dismal enough life, full of long days and risky work and not a decent man in all those crowded eyries of yours."
"There are too decent icarii!" Taya protested, shooting her oblivious sister an annoyed look.
Her father chuckled and moved away to talk to his guests.
Taya stuck it out for another hour, exchanging polite inconsequentials with childhood acquaintances who came up to ask about the wireferry wreck and touch her wings for good luck. They were all famulates, and Taya felt the familiar discomfort of having left her birth-caste behind whenever the conversation faltered or turned to local affairs. A few children, clearly on the verge of their Great Examinations, asked her how to become an icarus, but she couldn't give them much advice. She knew that being small and not being afraid of heights were important, but she couldn't begin to guess what other variables the Great Engine calculated when it made its decisions.
Decatur Forlore would know
, she thought, then smiled at herself and dismissed the thought.
At last she kissed Katerin and Tomas good-bye and left the party with a distinct sense of relief.
Tertius sprawled at the base of Ondinium Mountain, where it primarily housed members of the famulate caste — miners and metalworkers, engineers and smiths — and those foreigners who'd managed to purchase a labor or residency license, or who were visiting the city on business or out of curiosity. Even during the day, the streets of Tertius were shadowed by the network of wireferry towers and girders that surrounded the mountain with a metal web, and darkened by the ever-present blanket of smog from the factories that turned the sector's sky a sickly yellow and covered everything in a thin layer of soot.
Taya looked up but couldn't make out the stars, only the lights from Secundus and Primus. Returning to Tertius always gave her a twinge of nostalgia for the sights and smells she'd left at age seven, but her father was right — she didn't belong here anymore. Icarii moved between all the castes but fit in well with none of them, a social position that could be as awkward as it was liberating.
Breathing in the smoky, metallic air, she walked through dark, narrow stone streets toward the Great Market. When she'd been a child, she hadn't noticed how dirty everything was on Tertius, or how shabby.
The Great Engine ensured that nobody starved in Ondinium, but the difference between the heart of the city's industrial zone and the luxury of Oporphyr Tower was inescapable to someone who moved freely between them every day.
Still
, she thought, Ondinium is better than most countries.
It might be dirty and crowded, but she'd rather breathe a little soot than hunt and skin her own dinner, like the residents of neighboring Demicus.
Civilization had its price, but it also had its advantages.
Lost in thought, Taya was about to pass beneath the broad stone arch of a footbridge she had played on as a child when she heard footsteps scrape on the cobblestones behind her.
She turned.
Two men stood under a gas lamp, five yards away. One was tall and fair-haired: a Demican, wearing his people's rough native garments. The other was shorter and had the stocky build and bright vest of an Alzanan. Their faces were uninked. Foreigners.
"Can I help you?" she asked, trying to sound confident. Her gaze flickered to the sky. The way was clear enough, although she hadn't had to take flight from a flat run for years. But flying meant locking her arms into her wings, and she didn't want to make herself that vulnerable unless it became necessary.
"We am lost, Icarus," the Alzanan said, struggling with Ondinan. "How we go Blue Tree Hotel?"
The Blue Tree Hotel? That was a nice place… too nice for them.
Still, they might be meeting someone there
, she told herself, trying to keep an open mind.
Then the thought flickered past:
This could be one of those secret diplomacy tests.
"It's on Jasper Street in Secundus," she said, speaking Alzanan. "This bridge goes up to Secundus, and you can ask the guard at the sector gate how to get to the hotel. You'd better hurry, before the midnight lockdown."
"This bridge?" The Alzanan began walking forward, his neck craned. His tall companion followed, wearing the flat, stoic expression Demicans cultivated. "How do we get up to it?"
"Go back a block and turn right on Damper, then right again on Alumina. There are access steps on Crate Street. Look for the signs directing you to Whitesmith Bridge."
"But we were on Crate Street, and we didn't see any way up," the Alzanan protested in his own language, still advancing. Taya touched the utility knife strapped to her chest harness.
"Please don't come any closer, gentlemen," she said, still speaking Alzanan.
The two men paused.
"You don't need to be afraid of me." The Alzanan looked hurt. "I'm just asking for directions."
"Go back a block. Make two rights." Taya's heart was pounding. This could be a test, but it could also be the prelude to mugging. She was on Tertius, for the Lady's sake — people were attacked down here all the time. "Please go."
"Can I touch your wings for good luck?" The Alzanan took another step forward. Taya stepped backward, her hand tightening around the knife grip.
"I'm sorry, but I—"
Then she heard the scrape of metal against stone above her. Instinct took over and she threw herself forward, but heavy coils of rope hit her, jarring her wings and dragging at the metal feathers. Taya staggered, off-balance, and looked up. A second Alzanan leaned over the side of the bridge, leering down at her.
A net. Taya swore, feeling it encumbering her wings, its awkward weight threatening to pull her on her back.
This isn't a test!
The first Alzanan and the Demican lunged forward. Taya yanked at her harness buckles with one hand, slashing out with her knife when the Alzanan drew near.
"Help!" she shouted, feeling a buckle give way beneath her fingers. She began pulling at the next. The Demican drew a dagger from the back of his belt, his face hard.
They were going to kill her.
"Help! Guards!"
The Alzanan darted in like a knife-fighter, a thin blade materializing between his fingers and snapping across her harness. Its razor-sharp edge cut the backs of her fingers. Taya stabbed at him. He danced backward. A small nick marked his bare forearm.
The second buckle opened and her wings slid to one side across her shoulders. Taya tugged at the buckle around her waist, her fingers slippery with blood. If she could get out of the armature, she'd be able to fight. But right now her wings were nothing but deadweight.
"Guards!" she shouted again, angry. "Dammit, somebody get help!"
The Demican shoved his partner aside, stalking forward with menacing intensity. Taya worked harder to pull the waist strap open. Demicans were hunters and warriors, hardened by their nomadic life outside civilized lands. And this one was about two feet taller and wider than she was.
"What's going on here?" a hard voice snapped with authority.
The two men looked around, and Taya abandoned the buckle, taking the moment's opening to even the odds. She lunged forward and thrust her utility knife through the Demican's wool shirt and into his chest.
He roared with anger, grabbing her wrist and yanking her aside. The net tangled her feet and she sprawled, losing her knife. She wrenched her waist buckle open with both hands and twisted aside as the warrior's knife slashed down. The point of the blade caught her shoulder as she rolled away, leaving the net behind her.