Drago was a city on a hill.

  The hill rose above the sunken, winding streets of the lower city, teeming with shuffling crowds of weary, bent heads going from tenement to factory and back to tenement. Oily smoke from banked fires and the cngs of hammers and tongs hung in the dirty, tepid air like a pall.

  The hill loomed over the salt and guts stink of the dark harbor water, where hordes of ships and boats rode in the flood tide and waited in moorings for the ebb. The early morning fog that rose from the harbor muffled the alchemical glow of streetmps and muffled the distant spsh of oars and cries of dockworkers.

  The upper city sat hunched on its hill, behind miles of looped razor wire and wrought iron bars and alchemical spotlights, tensed and prickly, and brooded and waited for the sun to rise, again. Or perhaps that was just the state of mind of the person who was watching from a third-floor window as yet another militia patrol stomped down the street below.

  Countess Sasha Monir let the shade go and turned to pace the study again. It wasn’t a rge room—fifteen paces, wall to wall. The building that housed her embassy jostled shoulder-to-shoulder with rows of identical, narrow houses that marched up and down both sides of the cobbled street below, like canyon walls. She felt like a caged leopard.

  There was a smart rap on the study room door.

  “Enter,” called Sasha.

  A young woman, with short-cropped, dark hair, dressed in riding leathers came in, closed the door, took three steps and stood at casual attention. Her face was carefully composed, attentive.

  “You wanted to see me, ma’am?”

  Sasha gave her a small nod of satisfaction. “Yes, Mariah. I’ve just received a missive.” She turned and gestured to the desk, and the torn envelope and folded letter that y on it. Next to the letter was a freshly marked up sheet of paper. “Please.”

  Mariah went to the desk, examined the letter first, then the scribbled paper. “The transcription?” She murmured, gncing at Sasha for permission.

  The Countess waved impatiently, watched Mariah scan the paper, watched her eyes widen.

  “But, this is from—”

  “My daughter, yes.” Sasha watched her secretary’s face carefully, saw the flicker of longing, followed by loss, followed by the reassertion of controlled bnkness. Restraint. Discipline. Good.

  “Roxa,” added Sasha, to see if the name would evoke any more turmoil. When it didn’t, she nodded. “What do you make of it?”

  “Her report cks any code phrases that signal operational compromise. She doesn’t appear to be under duress.”

  “And yet?”

  Mariah frowned in concentration. “She’s hiding something.”

  Sasha nodded in approval. “How do you know?”

  “She’s proposing an alternate route back to the Duchy, aboard a ship.” Mariah gnced up, shaking her head. “The Roxa I know would never pass up a chance to be atop a horse. She’s a rider—she’d go fifty leagues out of her way for a chance to be in the saddle.”

  Sasha smiled. She enjoyed the cleverness of her young secretaries. She chose them for their cleverness, after all. And, just as crucial, their loyalty. Mariah was one of her favorites, a promising young orphan she’d taken into her household and trained for a while alongside her own daughter.

  “What do you make of her request?”

  “For one of Countess Mora’s cutters, disguised as a fishing craft, to lie in wait offshore? She’s made enemies at school. Or perhaps she anticipates trouble from Ministry agents. She wants a trump card in her pocket, some kind of leverage.”

  “Oh my wayward daughter, what have you done?” Sasha murmured, grimacing.

  Mariah drew herself up. “Ma’am?”

  The Countess smiled at her, the long-suffering smile of a weary mother. “I fear that Roxa has strayed, Mariah. It is hard for me to let myself believe it, and yet I must act in the interest of the Duchy in all matters, personal and political. We can ill afford your loss here, at such a grave and chancy moment in our negotiations. But my sworn duty to our mountain home compels me to turn to someone I can rely on. Are you that woman?”

  “Yes, ma’am!” Mariah fairly vibrated with willing eagerness.

  Sasha closed the distance between them, csped Mariah’s hands in hers, looked deep into her secretary’s striking gray eyes. “Thank you, Mariah.” Would a welling tear or two be a little too much? The Countess judged it so, and refrained. “I trust you will make haste to Harmine, observe my daughter’s condition, and report back to me through the usual channels. If necessary, you have my full permission to use my name and power to bring her to heel.”

  Even with her hands unavaible, Mariah managed a little bow. “I will not disappoint you, ma’am.”

  Sasha favored her with a proud smile. “I know, Mariah. All speed to your mount, all light to your eyes. Dismissed.”

  Her secretary closed the door smartly behind her and Sasha heard her boots clicking away down the hallway.

  A mild voice came from behind her. “Quite the performance. Do you think she’ll be able to do it?”

  Sasha turned and pursed her lips, as Luka, her spymaster, stepped out from a hidden alcove. “Get the upper hand on Roxa? It’s not that hard to do, surely.”

  “I think perhaps you’ve made a habit of underestimating her, Sasha.”

  The Countess waved this away. “For all her intelligence, my daughter is still entirely too predictable, old friend. Mariah has proved her competence as an operative to me many times over, and she knows Roxa’s fws all too well. Best of all, she’s loyal. We can trust her to ascertain whatever truancy Roxa is up to and find a way to weave it into our overall strategy here, even given the recent compromises we’ve had to make.”

  Luka sighed. “I just hope she will forgive you eventually. And me.”

  “I hope she learns her duty,” snapped the Countess. “I’ll take that over personal forgiveness, thank you very much.” She took a deep breath. “Now, speaking of strategy, I want to go over those trade concessions once more before I have to go toe-to-toe with that horrible little man and his chinless chief of staff again today.”

  Her spymaster closed his eyes and bowed his head briefly, then straightened. “Of course, ma’am. I’ll pull the files.”

  ChaoticArmcandy