A Throne for Sisters

“Milady D’Angelica,” she said. “Forgive me, but she said to hurry. The ball – ”

“Will not start in earnest for another hour or two, and I doubt your mistress will want to be there until the moment to make an entrance,” the dressmaker replied. Her tone was a little less harsh now, although Sophia suspected that was only because of who she was pretending to serve. The other woman pointed. “Wait there.”

Sophia waited, although that was the hardest thing in the world to do right then. It gave her a chance to listen, at least. The servant at the palace had been right: people did speak differently away from the poorest parts of the city. Their vowels were more rounded, the edges of the words more polished. One of the women working there seemed to have come from one of the Merchant States, her accent making her r’s roll as she chattered with the others.

It wasn’t long before the original dressmaker came out with a dress, holding it up to Sophia for inspection. It was the single most beautiful thing Sophia had ever seen. It shone silver and blue, seeming to shimmer as it moved. The bodice was worked with silver thread, and even the underskirts shimmered in waves, which seemed like a waste. Who would see them?

“Milady D’Angelica and you are the same size, yes?” the dressmaker demanded.

“Yes, ma’am,” Sophia replied. “It’s why she sent me.”

“Then she should have sent you in the first place, rather than just a list of measurements.”

“I’ll be sure to tell her,” Sophia said.

That made the dressmaker pale with horror, as if the sheer thought of it were enough that it might give her a heart attack.

“There’s no need for that. It’s very close, but I just need to adjust a couple of things. You’re certain that you are her size?”

Sophia nodded. “To the inch, ma’am. She has me eat exactly what she does so that we stay the same.”

It was a wild, foolish detail to make up, but the dressmaker seemed to swallow it. Perhaps it was the kind of extravagance she believed a noblewoman might stoop to. Either way, she made the adjustments so fast that Sophia could barely believe it, finally handing her a package wrapped in patterned paper.

“The bill to go on Milady’s account?” the dressmaker asked. There was a note of hope there, as if Sophia might have the money on her, but Sophia could only nod. “Of course, of course. I trust that Milady D’Angelica will be pleased.”

“I’m sure she will be,” Sophia said. She practically ran for the door.

Actually, she was sure that the noble would be furious, but Sophia didn’t plan on being around for that part.

She had other places to go, for one thing, and other packages to “collect” on her “mistress’s” behalf.

At a cobbler’s shop, she collected boots of the finest pale leather, set off with etched lines showing a scene from the Nameless Goddess’s life. At a perfumer’s shop, she acquired a small vial that smelled as though its creator had somehow distilled the essence of everything beautiful into one fragrant combination.

“It is my greatest work!” he proclaimed. “I hope that Lady Beaufort enjoys it.”

At each stop, Sophia picked a fresh noblewoman to be the servant of. That was simple practicality: she couldn’t guarantee that Milady D’Angelica had been to every shop in town. With some of the shops, she picked the names from the owners’ thoughts. With others, when her talent wouldn’t come, she had to keep the conversation hovering until they made assumptions, or, in one case, until she could steal an upside-down glance at a log book over the shop’s counter.

It seemed to get easier, the more she stole. Each preceding piece of her stolen outfit served as a kind of credential for the next, because obviously those other shopkeepers wouldn’t have given things to the wrong person. By the time she arrived at the shop where they sold masks, the storekeeper was practically pressing his wares into her hands before she was through the doors. It was a half mask of carved ebony, scene after scene of the Masked Goddess seeking hospitality set off with feathers around the edges and pinpoints of jewels around the eyes. They were probably designed to make it seem as though the eyes of the wearer were shining with reflected light.

Sophia felt a small flash of guilt as she took it, adding it to the not inconsiderable pile of packages in her arms. She was stealing from so many people, taking things that they’d worked to produce, and that others had paid for. Or would pay for, or hadn’t quite paid for; Sophia still hadn’t wrapped her head around the ways in which nobles seemed to buy things without quite paying for them.

It was only a brief flash of guilt, though, because they all had so much compared to the orphans back in the House of the Unclaimed. Just the jewels on this mask would have changed their lives.

For now, Sophia needed to change herself, and she couldn’t go into the party still filthy from sleeping beside the river. She walked around the bathhouses, waiting until she found one with carriages waiting by the door, and which advertised separate bathing for ladies of quality. She had no coins to pay, but she walked to the doors anyway, ignoring the look the large, muscular proprietor gave her.

“My mistress is within,” she said. “She told me to fetch everything by the time she was finished bathing, or there would be trouble.”

He looked her up and down. Again, the packages in Sophia’s hands seemed to work like a passport. “Then you’d better get inside, hadn’t you? The changing rooms are over on your left.”

Sophia went to them, putting her stolen prizes down in a room that was hot with steam from the baths. Women came and went wearing the winding sheets that served to dry them. None of them looked twice at Sophia.

She undressed, wrapping a sheet around herself and heading into the baths. They were set out in the style they favored across the water, with multiple hot, warm, and cold pools, masseuses at the side, and waiting servants.

Sophia was all too aware of the tattoo on her ankle proclaiming what she was, but there were indentured servants there with their mistresses, there to massage them with scented oils or scrape combs through their hair. If anyone noticed the mark, they obviously assumed that Sophia was there for that reason.

Even so, she didn’t take the time to luxuriate in the baths that she might have. She wanted to get out of there before anyone asked questions. She dunked herself under the water, scrubbing with soap and trying to get the worst of the dirt from her. When she stepped from the bath, she made sure that her winding sheet reached all the way to her ankles.

Back in the dressing room, she pieced her new self together one step at a time. She started with silk stockings and underskirts, then worked up through corsetry and outer skirts, gloves, and more.

“Does my lady require assistance with her hair?” a woman asked, and Sophia looked across to see a servant watching her.

“If you would,” Sophia said, trying to remember how nobles talked. It occurred to her that this would be easier if no one thought she was from around there, so she added a hint of the Merchant States accent she’d heard at the dressmaker’s. To her surprise, it came easily, her voice adjusting as quickly as the rest of her had.

The girl dried and braided her hair in an elaborate knot that Sophia could barely follow. When it was done, she settled her mask in place, then headed outside, making her way among the carriages there until she spotted one that wasn’t taken.

“You there!” she called, her newfound voice seeming strange to her ears right then. “Yes, you! Take me to the palace at once, and don’t stop along the way. I’m in a hurry. And don’t start asking for the fare. You can send the bill to Lord Dunham and he can feel grateful that it’s all I’m costing him tonight.”

She didn’t even know if there was a Lord Dunham, but the name felt right. She expected the carriage driver to argue, or at least dicker over the fare. Instead, he just bowed.

“Yes, my lady.”

The carriage ride through the city was more comfortable than Sophia could have imagined. More comfortable than jumping on the back of wagons, certainly, and far shorter. In a matter of minutes, she could see the gates approaching. Sophia felt her heart tighten, because the same servant was still working on them. Could she do this? Would he recognize her?

The carriage slowed, and Sophia forced herself to lean out, hoping that she looked as she should.

“Is the ball in full swing yet?” she demanded in her new accent. “Have I arrived at the right time to make an impact? More to the point, how do I look? My servants tell me that this is suitable for your court, but I feel I look like some docksides whore.”

She couldn’t resist that small revenge. The servant on the gate bowed deeply.

“My lady could not have timed her arrival better,” he assured her, with the kind of false sincerity that Sophia guessed nobles liked. “And she looks absolutely lovely, of course. Please, go straight through.”

Sophia closed the curtain to the carriage as it drove on, but only so it would hide her stunned relief. This was working. It was actually working.

She just hoped that things were working out as well for Kate.

CHAPTER SIX

Kate was enjoying the city more than she would have thought possible alone. She still ached with the loss of her sister, and she still wanted to get out into the open countryside, but for now, Ashton was her playground.

She made her way through the city streets, and there was something particularly appealing about being lost in the crowds. Nobody looked her way, any more than they looked at the other urchins or apprentices, younger sons or would-be fighters of the town. In her boyish costume and with the short spikes of her hair, Kate could have passed for any of them.

There was so much to see in the city, and not just the horses that Kate cast a covetous eye over every time she passed one. She paused opposite a vendor selling hunting weapons out of a wagon, the light crossbows and occasional muskets looking impossibly grand. If Kate could have snatched one, she would have, but the man kept a careful eye on everyone who came close.

Not everyone was so careful, though. She managed to snatch a hunk of bread from a café table, a knife from where someone had used it to pin up a religious pamphlet. Her talent wasn’t perfect, but knowing where people’s thoughts and attention were was a big advantage when it came to the city.

She kept on, looking for an opportunity to take more of what she would need for life out in the country. It was spring, but that just meant rain instead of snow most days. What would she need? Kate started to check things off on her fingers. A bag, twine to make traps for animals, a crossbow if she could get one, an oilskin to keep the rain off, a horse. Definitely a horse, despite all the risks that horse thievery brought with it.

Not that any of it was truly safe. There were gibbets on some of the corners holding the bones of long dead criminals, preserved so that the lesson could last. Over one of the old gates, ruined in the last war, there were three skulls on spikes that were supposedly those of the traitor chancellor and his conspirators. Kate wondered how anybody knew anymore.