The King's Blood

when she remembered the words and the scorn that soured them.
    “There’s little going on in the coldest months,” Cithrin had said, cursing herself silently for the apology in her tone.
    “For you, I’d guess that’s truth,” Pyk said. “I’ve got work to do. You want to bring me the books here, or is there someplace you do the real business?”
    Every day since had been another minor humiliation, another opportunity for the notary to remind Cithrin that she controlled nothing, another scathing comment. For weeks, Cithrin had swallowed it all with a smile. And for months after that, she’d at least borne it. If there had been even a pause in the assault, a crack in the dismissive façade, she’d have counted it a victory.
    There had been nothing.
    “Did she say why?” Yardem asked.
    “She won’t deal with Southlings,” Cithrin said. “Apparently a pod of them killed some part of her family in Pût nine or ten generations ago.”
    Yardem turned to her, his ears shifted to lie back almost flat against his skull. Cithrin drank deeply from her beer.
    “I know,” she said. “But what am I supposed to do about it? No negotiations without the notary present. I’m not permitted to sign, even. And if she doesn’t cut thumbs on it, it doesn’t happen.”
    As part of her bargain, Cithrin had surrendered all the leverage she had over the bank. If Pyk sent a message back to Carse saying that Cithrin was a liability to the bank, Cithrin had nothing that would keep them from separating her from the business. She broke off a crust of bread, chewing on it absently. It could have been spiced with dirt for all the pleasure she took in it. Yardem pointed at the plate, and she pushed it toward him. He pinched a corner from the cheese and popped it into his mouth. They chewed in silence for a long moment. The fire murmured in its grate. From the alley, a dog yelped.
    “I have to go tell him,” Cithrin said, then took another long drink.
    “Company? I’m stood down for the day.”
    “He won’t get violent,” Cithrin said. “He isn’t like that.”
    “Could offer moral support. Encouragement.”
    Cithrin laughed once, mirthless.
    “That’s why I’m drinking,” she said.
    “I know.”
    She looked over at him. His eyes were deep brown, his head broad. He had a scar just under his left ear she’d never noticed before. Yardem had been a priest once, before he’d been a sellsword. The beer sat in its tankard. One wouldn’t do much. Two would leave her feeling looser and less upset. But it would also tempt her to reach for a third, and by the fourth she’d be ready to postpone the unpleasant until tomorrow. Better, she thought, to end it quickly and sleep without dreading it in the morning.
    She pushed the tankard back, and Yardem stood to let her up.
    The boarding house was in the middle of the salt quarter, not far from the little rooms Cithrin, Yardem, and Marcus Wester had hidden in during their first days in the city. The salt quarter streets were narrow and twisted. In some places, the streets were so narrow that Cithrin’s fingertips could have brushed the buildings on both sides. Everything stank of raw sewage and brine. By the time they reached the whitewashed walls and faded blue windows of the house, the hem of her dress was black and her feet cold and aching. She pulled her shawl closer about her shoulders and went up the two low steps to the common door. Yardem leaned against the wall, his expression empty but his ears high. Cithrin knocked.
    She had hoped that someone else would answer. One of the other boarders or the man who kept the house. Something that would postpone the actual conversation for another minute or two. Luck wasn’t with her. Or, more likely, he’d been perched by the door, waiting for word from her. His ash-grey skin and the oversized black eyes of his race made him seem childlike. His smile was bright and tentative at the same time.
    “Magistra Cithrin,” he said, as if her appearance were a delightful surprise. Her heart thickened. “Please come in. I was just making tea. Have some, have some. And your Tralgu friend.” Cithrin looked back at Yardem. She thought there was pity in his expression and she wasn’t certain who it belonged to.
    “I’ll be right back,” she said.
    “I’ll be right here,” he rumbled.
    The common sitting room smelled damp despite the little stove that kept the air almost uncomfortably warm. The high, wailing voice of a colicky