“Kadakithis?” Zip guessed. “But isn’t he your cousin?”
She spat. “He’s going to marry that fish-eyed slut, Shupan-sea, in defiance of
Rankan law. Bad enough that he allowed them to land here without a fight. Bad enough that he beds the silly carp. But to marry one? To make her part of the royal family, a princess of Ranke?” She spat again. “Blood is only so thick, lover.”
“I’d ‘preciate it if ye’d stop that,” Mama Becho snapped. “Someone’s gotter mop up when yer gone now.”
Zip shifted beneath her, locking his hands together behind his head, an arm cocked around her dagger. He tried to look innocent and almost achieved it. But his face was full of suspicion. “All right, lover,” he mocked her. “What you got in mind?”
She pulled the dagger from the floorboards and returned it to her boot, rose, and extended a hand to help Zip to his feet. Unsurprisingly, he declined her offer and got up on his own. He made a show of brushing Mama Becho’s dust from his clothing.
“Tomorrow night,” she told him, “meet me with as many of your men as you have the entire PFLS-at the old stables near the granaries.”
Zip frowned, bent down, and picked up the mug of wine that yet remained on the floor. He turned it in his hands without drinking. “That’s right across from the dungeons.”
Chenaya taunted him with a nasty grin. “Don’t get nervous, Zip. I heard you were a man of action. Well, action is what I’m going to give you.” Let him interpret that as he wished, she thought wickedly. “I happen to own the guard who works the Gate of the Gods tomorrow night-he has a very expensive krrf habit-and a word from me will open that passage. It’s a very brief run from there to a side entrance into the palace itself.” She pushed back her hair with one hand, raised herself from the floor with the other, and poured the last of her own bitter wine down her throat. Her hand opened then, and the earthen mug shattered at her feet.