Mosca scowled at nothing and nibbled soot from her fingernail while she thought.
‘Child,’ Clent added quietly, ‘you and I have at least the dubious privilege of having been educated in the world. Whips and briars have been our nursemaids, kicks and cuffs our tutors. Life has whetted our wits and toughened our hides – our kind stand at least a chance of surviving in Toll-by-Night. Miss Marlebourne quite simply does not.’
Miss Marlebourne’ll survive, all right, said the bitter voice in Mosca’s head. She’ll survive because she’s worth something to somebody alive. They know what they can get for her; they won’t so much as crush a ringlet or stain a satin shoe. But in her mind’s eye she was seeing again Beamabeth’s frightened face as she talked of her fears that the night town would reclaim her.
‘Oh…’ She meshed her fingers in her ragged, abused hair and tugged it until her scalp ached. ‘Oh, crabmaggots. I’ll do it, I suppose. Sir Feldroll, this reward – there needs to be some left over for some other folks we made promises to, and who need it as much as their necks. Oh, and my goose! Saracen comes with me.’
‘I do not think,’ Sir Feldroll remarked, with an uncharacteristic quirk of humour in the corner of his mouth, ‘that you will have any trouble persuading the mayor of that at all.’
If the mayor’s staff had been any happier to lose Saracen and regain their second pantry, they would probably have broken into a caper.
They were clearly less jubilant at the idea of having Mosca back within their walls once more, though it would only be for a few hours. However, there was nowhere else Sir Feldroll could take her, since he was staying at the mayor’s home. The mayor himself was out, thankfully.
The smell of porridge banished all fear, anger and thought in a moment. The mayor’s footmen watched with a mixture of fascination and distaste as Mosca demolished three bowls of it so fast that her tongue burned and her stomach cramped. As soon as she had finished, the exhaustion that she had been holding at bay refused to accept any further argument.
She did not remember drooping into sleep at the table, but a few hours later she woke to find herself in a little nest of blankets by the hearth, watched by a maid who stood against the wall, just where Mosca had been placed with her tray two nights before. Saracen slept in a basket beside her. With a sinking of the heart, she saw that the sky beyond the window was dulling to violet.
‘Where’s Mr Clent? I need to speak to ’im.’
Leaving Saracen to his grain-filled dreams, Mosca went to find Clent and tracked him down in the library. To her surprise, he was pacing, his wig slightly to starboard, his fingers knotted behind his back. When he saw Mosca, he came to an abrupt halt. For a few seconds his fingers fretted at the frayed ends of his cravat. Then he spread his arms in an expansive shrug and let them fall with a slap.
‘It was all I could think of,’ he said simply. ‘The only plan that would tweak you out of that lousehouse. I dropped my bucket into the well of my invention to the rope’s extent, but could pull out nothing better. I am… truly sorry.’
‘Well, you chose a rosy time to run out of ideas,’ muttered Mosca, sitting on one of the ornate library chairs and pulling up her feet to sit cross-legged.
‘Here.’ Clent placed a bundle on the table before Mosca and opened it. Inside lay a small purse, a knife in a leather sheath, some bread and cheese wrapped in a handkerchief, a reed pen, a bottle of ink and a wallet full of blank writing paper. ‘Not much… but our Sir Feldroll seems loath to gild your pockets too heavily lest you pay your way out of Toll and escape into the heather. Nonetheless, this might be of service to you.’ It was a map, with the words ‘The Faire Citie of Toll’ looping rather pompously along the top.
‘This is a map of Toll-by-Day,’ Mosca said, scowling at the fine, spidery names that sidled down the streets.
‘I know. Many of these streets will not be there come the dusk. But these will.’ With a careful fingertip he touched an image of a spire, a sketch of a tree, the Clock Tower, the castle turrets. ‘High points. Look for these above the roofs and you can recover your bearings. And this will not change.’ He drew his finger along the sweeping arc of the town wall. ‘Mosca – if all else fails, look for this wall and follow it until you find the house of that redoubtable midwife. She at least does not appear to be an urchin-eating ogress, and if she has tolerated you once she might do so again. And… you can leave letters here -’ Clent tapped the map again – ‘inside the mouth of the statue of Goodman Belubble that is built into the town wall. I will… There will be letters for you as well.’
Mosca nodded, and swallowed a gulp of coarse, dry nothingness. There was a silence.
‘For Beloved’s sake, try to keep track of your bonnet,’ Clent broke out at last. He pulled Mosca’s bonnet from a chair and dropped it on to her head. ‘Running about bare-headed like a ragamuffin…’ His voice trailed off.
‘You’ll need to find somebody else to tell you when your plans are bleedin’ stupid,’ Mosca said gruffly. ‘Not that you ever listen to me when I do.’
‘How I shall survive without the perpetual barbs of your conversation I cannot imagine,’ mused Clent with a little frown, as he set Mosca’s bonnet straight.
Just before dusk, Mosca and Clent were escorted by several of the mayor’s men to the Committee of the Hours.
Day air had a smell, Mosca realized as she walked with Saracen in her arms, even chilled late-autumn afternoon air. The flowers had long since died, but the cold sun still drank dew from leaves, drew tartness from withering crab apples. Daylight cooked the sullen sludge in the roadways, the fierce green moss on old roofs. There was the nose-pinching cold smell of gleaming linen flapping itself dry on lines between the balconies.
A sunstruck spiderweb was silver embroidery against the darkened gable beyond. A robin throbbed on a hitching post, looking as if it had been dipped in tomato soup. Dead leaves flared underfoot in ginger, purple and lemon yellow.
Mosca realized that she could not imagine never seeing the sun again. It felt a bit like going blind. She did not look at Clent’s face, but watched his battered boots striding alongside her, taking one pace to one-and-a-half of hers.
The evening side of the sky was greening over and dulling like old ham, and there a few knifepoint stars were gleaming. Soon the sky would be prickling with them.
The Raspberry looked up when they arrived in the office of the Committee of the Hours, and his eyebrows climbed and tipped a fraction.
‘Ah! Yes…’ His eyes narrowed. ‘We were told to expect you both. Kenning, the boxes!’ Kenning obediently scampered away, returning with two boxes. One appeared to be full of light-coloured badges, one full of black wooden ones, and it was into the latter that the Raspberry now peered. ‘Ah… there.’
He pointed carefully into the box, and Kenning obediently fished out one badge with tongs and held it towards Mosca at arm’s length as if it was hot. She gingerly took it in her hands, half expecting it to burn. It was a jet-black badge with a fly carved on it, without the coloured border of the visitors’ badges.
The Raspberry spent a long time staring into the dark-badge box, then Kenning politely reached past him to the other box, pulled out a light wooden badge and placed it in his master’s hand. The Raspberry stared at it in some surprise, beckoned Kenning closer and whispered into his ear. Mosca caught mere fragments.