“What’s in it for me?”
“I’ve already promised you the Commander of the Armies position,” Ravido said. “What more do you want?”
“You could send a few of the younger, more buxom women in that business organization to warm my toes at night.” Horat chuckled. “No, I jest. I’ll talk to Father. But you better figure out if the boy is really back in the city. With your family connections, you could have most of the votes from the Company if you could prove he’s dead, but if he’s not…”
Amaranthe’s kerchief stilled. The boy. Sespian.
“If he was dumb enough to come back here, he won’t be alive for long. If my men don’t get him, there are others who will. Besides, my contacts said he’s not even the legitimate heir.”
Horat let out a low whistle. “Truly?”
“I’m surprised the papers haven’t run the story yet. They-”
“Lords General?” came a solicitous call from a few racks away. “I have those uniform designs ready for you to look at now.”
“Good,” Ravido said.
As the two men walked away, the last thing Amaranthe heard was Horat saying, “You better find something you like this time. Those gutter-swinging gang brats can do better than sashes tied around their arms.”
“One can’t rush fashion decisions, old boy,” Ravido said, for a moment sounding exactly like Maldynado. “An impeccably dressed army is full of pride-it makes your men fight better.”
If Horat had a response, Amaranthe didn’t hear it. A pair of alligator-skin boots with lizard-riding spurs clanked into view behind her. She vaguely remembered Maldynado mentioning the Kendorian attire was growing popular in the capital. It hardly mattered. She took the foot traffic as a sign that it was time to scoot out of the shop before someone spotted her. She turned about, preparing to scurry to the next rack as soon as the man passed, but a silver ranmya coin clunked onto the wooden floor and bounced under the rack with her.
She stifled a groan. If he noticed and stopped to hunt for it…
The alligator boots halted, and the man turned around. A knee came into view, then a hand touched down, patting the floor not inches from Amaranthe’s legs. For lack of a better idea, she picked up the coin and rolled it back out into the aisle. Maybe he’d think it had bumped against the rack stand and was coming back of its own accord-his lucky day.
The hand jerked back as the prize rolled out. The blunt, stubby fingers made a grasp, but missed, only bumping the coin and causing it to spin out of sight beneath the trouser rack on the opposite side of the aisle.
A head wearing an outlandish ostrich feather hat dropped into Amaranthe’s view. If she hadn’t known Maldynado was in the building next door-and wearing different clothes-she might have thought it was he. It certainly seemed his style of clothing. But, no, he had better reflexes. He would have caught the coin.
While the man patted around beneath the opposite rack, Amaranthe eased backward, thinking she’d risk slipping out that way, even if it wasn’t far from the front window. She could take a side aisle toward the rear of the store. But a fresh pair of boots came into view over there. It had to be lunch hour or something. Or this was the trendiest military clothier in the capital. Given that Maldynado had chosen the shopping district, it might very well be true.
She scrunched up into a tiny ball, hoping the shadows would hide her if Alligator Boots looked her way. He was fishing all over for that cursed coin. Couldn’t someone who could afford to shop in Millinery Square afford to lose a coin?
Finally, he knelt back with the ranmya in his hand. He glanced under Amaranthe’s rack. She froze, holding her breath. There were shadows. Were there enough? Now and then, Ravido’s voice drifted up from the back of the store-it wasn’t safe to be spotted yet.
The man squinted into her gloom. What was he doing? Hoping there were more lost coins down there?
He must have seen her, for he parted the trousers, letting light beneath the rack.
With no other options, Amaranthe scrambled out. She stayed on her knees, so nobody in the back of the shop-or standing in the street beyond the window-would see her and waved her kerchief up at the man.
“Those are fine ones,” she said. “I’ll only charge you five ranmyas if you’re interested?”
The man rose to his feet, the ostrich-feather hat shadowing his features, but not quite hiding his blinks of confusion. “For… what?”
“Your boots, of course.” Amaranthe waved the kerchief again, hoping the dust smearing it made it look authentic. Of course, boot polish would be better, but she hadn’t come that prepared. “A shine. It won’t take long.”
“You work here?”
Right, her ruffled dress didn’t exactly say shoeshine girl. “During my lunch break,” Amaranthe said, though she couldn’t imagine what sort of daytime job she might claim while wearing the childish dress. “A girl’s got to make a ranmya when she can. For a handsome gentleman such as yourself, I’ll do your boots for four ranmyas.” She beamed a smile up at him and gazed into his eyes-hadn’t Sicarius said something about her eyes being warm and innocent once?
The ostrich-hat turned toward the back of the shop. “Murkos, do you know there’s a shoeshine girl trying to home in on your customers?”
In the seconds his head was turned, Amaranthe slithered under another rack and into the aisle along the wall. Staying low, she darted for the curtain in the rear.
“A what?” came the return question. “No, there shouldn’t be. Grab her, will you?”
Not likely. Amaranthe reached the back curtain, belly-crawled under it so she wouldn’t disturb the fabric, and popped up. Yara was still there, though she stood by the back exit, the door ajar as she peered into the alley.
“We need to go,” Amaranthe whispered.
“My oaf is outside chatting with a squad of soldiers,” Yara said.
“Chatting?”
Yara closed the door. “Chatting at gunpoint.”
“Their gunpoints, I presume.” As much as Amaranthe appreciated the idea of Maldynado surrounding a squad of soldiers by himself, she doubted it was the case.
“Yes, and they’re right in front of the door. Any chance we can go out the front?”
“No, Ravido is still out there.”
“Where’d she go?” a familiar voice demanded from somewhere in the middle of the store-the miserly ostrich-hat man who couldn’t let a coin go.
“Also, it’s possible I’d attract attention going that way.” Amaranthe slipped past Yara. She wanted her own peek outside.
Unfortunately, her peek didn’t reveal anything more appealing than Yara’s. Eight burly soldiers surrounded Maldynado, four on each side of him, trapping him in the narrow alley. Though he was amiably talking and gesturing as they searched his shopping bags, there were no less than six guns pointed at his chest. The men’s white armbands proclaimed the squad belonged to Ravido, detached from the group out front most likely.
Amaranthe closed the door. Yara was right; there was no way they could walk outside without being seen. If they caught the soldiers by surprise, she, Yara, and Maldynado might get the best of eight men in a fight, but with twenty more waiting out front, she didn’t like the odds overall.
“I don’t suppose telling them that their general is in here buying them new uniforms would excite them to the point of forgetting about us,” Amaranthe muttered.
Yara’s only response was a withering look. Probably a no.
Amaranthe peered about the back room, searching for inspiration. The recently tailored uniforms hanging on the wall and the cloth swatches on the worktable might be flammable, but she couldn’t picture creating anything spectacularly explosive using them. Aside from scissors and needles, there wasn’t much else to note. A couple of featureless ceramic busts held wigs, while others supported fur caps in the middle of receiving embroidered designs that signified prominent battles the owner had served in. Amaranthe touched one of the wigs. Explosions might not be the only way to escape.