"The airship!" squeaked Bee.
"Why would the mansa send me to marry the Barahal daughter, when so much is at stake? If she is so valuable, why not marry her to one of the magisters born into the house, not some village boy they all look down on? Why would the mansa tell me so little before he sent me out? Why would he not even tell me the single most important thing, that the diviners believed she would walk the path of dragons? The mansa never spoke one word of that to me. That I know anything about the dreams of dragons is because I had begun my training as a hunter, and the first
thing a hunter learns about the bush is that when dragons shift in their sleep, a tide washes the spirit world and obliterates everything in its path that is not warded. Given the risk involved, why would they only give me my orders and send me off? Is it because they knew I would be unquestioningly obedient as I have always had to be as I struggled so hard to meet their expectations and fulfill my promise and protect my village?"
"When you put it like that," said Bee, "it is puzzling."
"Must you agree with him?" I cried, for I am sure I would never have switched sides on her with such alacrity.
"Cat, I do not like Mm any more than you do, for he did try to kill you, and that I can scarcely be expected to forgive. But when you consider the situation rationally, it is puzzling."
"Thank you," he said, looking very irritated and very handsome.
No, of course he did not look handsome. I was merely exhausted from the exigencies of the last few days and made vulnerable to trivial considerations because I was worrying about Rory. One sees strange things in such a state of mind. One might think anything.
"I have been forced to come to the conclusion," he continued, "that the mansa considers me expendable. In rather the same way, I suppose, that the Hassi Barahal house considered you expendable, Catherine."
"Is this an effort to make me feel sympathy for your situation by comparing our plights?"
"Yes." Then he looked startled, as if that was not the word he had meant to say. "I meant, no, not at all."
I had not realized Bee had so many smirks in her. She looked at me in the most annoying way possible, blinking thrice as though to send me a message, which I ignored with a frown I hoped would blister that knowing smile right off her lovely lace.
"Go on, Magister," she said in a tone that invited confidence. "I, at least, am listening."
He had a way, I had come to recognize, of drawing himself up with shoulders braced and chin lifted that made him look exceedingly arrogant, but however vain and arrogant he actually was, there was more to that look than met the eye. "You have no need and certainly no desire to feel sympathy for me, Catherine."
"That's right, I don't," I agreed with a cruel smile. "By any chance is your shoulder paining you?"
"It has healed," he said curtly. "Catherine, I am just trying to explain why you should consider trusting me."
"What has become of the innkeepers and their staff?"
"I found the inn locked up and deserted. Leaving you entirely unprotected, I might add, and quite asleep. I expect they went to the council square to swell the ranks of agitators."
"If the inn was locked up," said Bee, "how did you get in here?"
"I expect he shattered the lock," I said before he could answer.
"Can he truly do that?" Bee asked. "I mean, that's what people say cold mages can do, that you can measure their strength by their ability to shatter iron and extinguish fires, but-"
"Yes, he can really do that."
Her eyes widened as she examined Andevai with an expression that could have been awe, anxiety, or admiration. "Oh."
"Are you done speaking for me?" he asked with a sarcasm I'm sure I'd not earned.
From the other room, a clock ticked over.
As if the clicking of its mechanism were a signal, a hazy thud sounded somewhere outside. Andevai tipped his head back to listen. Bee looked a question at me. A series of rumbling reports rolled like distant thunder.
"Are those muskets?" whispered Bee.
A thunk struck at the front of the inn, causing both Bee and I to skip backward. We heard hacking blows, a man's curse, and the clatter of metal chains spilling to the ground. A door groaned. Feet tapped on slate, and voices spbke from the common room.
"Whsst! Have all the fires gone out? Didn't you bank them properly, lad?"
"I did, maestra!" was spoken indignantly.
"Hush!"
Several people were sniffling or weeping, their gasps flavored with fear.
"Get up, then, to the roof. Keep an eye out. Girl, stop your crying. It does no good." Footsteps split off to pound upstairs.
"That lock was shattered," the man's voice spiked, "but then the door sealed with no lock, like it was frozen shut."
"Not so loud. You two, get the door shut and barred. Julius, you come with me. We left those two girls sleeping in the back. Hurry!"
The innkeeper and her man burst into the scullery, she holding a rolling pin and he an ax.
Andevai turned to face them, but he did not draw his sword.
The innkeeper's eyes widened as she took in first the fireplace's cold ashes, all heat sucked from them, and then Andevai. No one could mistake him for anything but the scion of a wealthy house, yet her tone was more blunt than respectful. "We want no trouble out of cold mages, Magister. It's the prince's corrupt council we're protesting."
From the common room came the squeak of tables being shoved, and thumps as they were turned on their side.
"You shall get no trouble from me," said Andevai. Yet he did not budge, as if, I suppose, he thought he was protecting us from them in a manly and courageous fashion.
Booms shuddered the air, and we all flinched as a shattering fusillade of pops resounded from nearby. A shrill echo of screams and shouts followed.
The innkeeper lowered her rolling pin. "This is no refuge for a high and mighty personage of your sort, Magister."
Two young men appeared, panting and sweaty, gripping iron pokers from the fire. "The militia has gone to war against us!"
The woman nodded grimly "All we can do is lock our doors and tuck our heads under." Another set of reports made a staccato rhythm, interspersed with cries and more screams. "If there's blood on the streets, then there is worse to come."
"Bloody princes!" cursed the man.
"The beast has been roused," cried one of the young men defiantly. "So cries the poet!" The poker in his hand shook as he trembled, watching Andevai as if he expected him to lash out to punish him for such radical words.
Andevai said nothing, nor did he move.
"What beast?" Bee asked. "What do you mean?"
"Many are angry," said the innkeeper, "but now we have found our voice."
As if to emphasize the truth of her statement, muskets fired yet again, closer now, thunder echoing in a closed tin. In their wake swelled a rising tide of voices whose pure intensity reminded me of the hum and ring of the dragon's turning in the spirit world.
Bee stepped out from behind Andevai. "Maestra," she said politely, not begging, "that's a fearsome noise outside. Might we shelter in the inn until the tide has passed?"
The woman sighed as she looked at Bee. Everyone always did.
"He cannot," she said, as if she thought we had invited him in or that we were his companions. "Even if I wished to, which I am sure I do not, I dare not offer shelter to a cold mage. Were he to be found here, they'd burn down my inn."
"Not with me in it, they can't," said Andevai in a tone that made me either want to kick him or to laugh. Because it was true.
"Can you defend yourself against knives and shovels and axes and scythes and whatever other instruments* they will bring to pull down these good timbers and you to lie crushed beneath them?" she asked, not belligerently but not meekly, either. She passed the rolling pin into her other hand and signaled to the two young men to go around us and out the door that led into the side yard. "How many can you fend off before they overwhelm you? Are you willing, Magister, to let strangers die-me and my people-by forcing them to shelter you, who have entered this house without invitation or permission? Whatever you are, I am sure I wish no harm to you in particular as long as you leave alone me and mine. But I will not risk my people and my livelihood for you. No offense meant."