threw the pilings of the bridge and the house by the pier into an unnatural
blink of day, exposed a bridge vacant of traffic.
“There,” said the slave, “there, that was the place-“
“Better stay back here,” Mradhon said.
“It’s quiet,” Moria said. Her voice shook despite herself. “Man, hurry up.” She
pushed at him and got shoved in turn. He caught a fistful of her shirt and
jerked at her.
“Don’t shove. Get your mind working, woman, cool down, or I’m off this.”
“I’ll get round by the windows,” she said, shivering. “I’ll find out. But if you
run out on me-“
“I’ll be working up the other side. Haught and I. If it’s even odds we take
them. If it isn’t we pull off, hear, and refigure.”
She nodded and caught her breath, trotted off with a looseness of her knees she
had not felt since her first job; felt as vulnerable as then, everything gone
wrong. She sorted her mind into order, pretending it was not Mor-am in there, in
that long quiet, where screams had been before.
She took a back alley, disturbing only an urchin-girl from her rest, going round
the long way, where boards might gape and afford sight or sound, but none did.
She kept going, focussed now, lost in the moment-by-moment calculations, and
found the windows she hoped for, shuttered, but there was a crack.
She listened, and something went twisted inside. It was a quiet voice, that
described streets with deadly accuracy, a strained voice that told no lies.
… Mor-am’s. Giving away all they had.
And more than three of them in there.
“There’s another house,” her brother volunteered all too eagerly, “by the west