The Dragon's Path

when he said that the two of you comparing notes would only make the auditor’s job harder. Accused Yardem of accusing her of something.”
    “I’m sorry about that,” Cithrin said. “I’d stop this all if I could.”
    “I know.”
    Cithrin pulled her cloak closer around her and turned away from the limitless sea back toward the city. Her city. She wasn’t sure when it had become hers.
    “With luck, we’ll be back to normal before long.”
    He fell in at her side. She couldn’t say if she matched his stride or if he matched hers.
    “You still have the option of walking away,” he said. “I can go get the key back. You can reclaim the box from the governor’s palace. It wouldn’t be so bad. Carse is a decent enough city. Even if there is trouble with the succession, you’d be safe there. No one tries to put Carse under siege. Give it a year, take your money. You could do anything.”
    “I couldn’t do this,” Cithrin said.
    “Fair point.”
    They walked down long, whitewashed steps and along the wall toward the salt quarter. Somewhere along the way, they passed the spot where Opal had died, but she didn’t recognize it and she didn’t ask. A small wire-haired dog trotted by, yipped at them, and sped away when Marcus pretended to reach down for a rock to throw.
    “Notice you haven’t been drinking,” he said.
    I would drown a small child for a bottle of wine,
Cithrinthought,
but I am going to need my wits, and there won’t be any warning.
    “I don’t miss it,” she said.
    “You haven’t been sleeping.”
    “Don’t miss that either.”
    The inn that had become their home while the bank itself remained under occupation sat at the corner of two of the larger of Porte Oliva’s narrow streets. Its white walls and wooden roof looked cold under the low clouds. As they came near, a man stepped out of the doorway. She saw Marcus become alert without changing his stride. She felt a low burning in her throat.
    The man came toward them. One of Paerin Clark’s guards.
    “He wants to see me?” Cithrin asked.
    “Same as always, miss,” the guard said. “I think he’s finished up.”
    Cithrin took a deep breath. The time had come.
    “May I bring the captain along?”
    “Don’t see why not.”
    The walk back to the bank was short, but Cithrin felt every step of it. It occurred to her that the dress she was wearing was the first she’d bought when she came to Porte Oliva, the one she’d invented Hallskari salt dyes for in exchange for a five-coin reduction. The dress of a truly dangerous woman. She tried to take it as a good omen.
    A Kurtadam boy walked by selling paper funnels with honeyed almonds, and Cithrin stopped to buy one. She popped two in her mouth, gave one to Marcus. Paerin’s guard waited, and she tipped the paper toward him. Smiling, he took two. So he was willing to accept gifts from her. That meant he was either a cold bastard to the bone, or the news from theauditor was good. No, she thought, it meant the guard
believed
it was good.
    For twenty days, she had been denied her room. Walking back up the stairs, she was prepared to choke down outrage, but when she reached the top, everything was precisely as it had been. Paerin Clark might have been a ghost for all the trace he left of himself.
    The man sat at her desk. He was writing now, the illegible symbols of cipher coming from the nib of his pen without need of a code book. He nodded to Cithrin and then to Marcus, finished the line of script, and turned to them.
    “Mistress bel Sarcour,” he said. “I had one last question for you. I hope you don’t mind.”
    His tone had changed markedly. She could hear the respect in it. That was fair. She’d earned it.
    “Of course.”
    “I’m fairly sure I’ve guessed the answer, but there’s a sum placed aside in the most recent books. Six hundred twelve weight of silver?”
    “The quarter’s profit for the holding company,” she said.
    “Yes,” the auditor said. “That’s what I thought. Please, have a seat both of you.”
    Marcus gave her the stool, choosing to stand behind her.
    “I have to say, I am impressed with all this. Magister Imaniel trained you very, very well. We have, of course, suffered some loss. But in the main, the contracts you’ve made seem sound. The city fleet project was, I think, ill-advised, but since they refused your offer we don’t have to concern ourselves with that.”
    Cithrin wondered what it was about the fleet that the auditor