“It was a bit like that.” Kettle kept her eyes on Safira’s.

“Apple poisoned her against me, Nona.”

Nona blinked, surprised to find herself addressed.

Safira continued. “Apple does that. You’ll find out but it will be too late by then. Sherzal is our only hope. Crucical lacks the imagination. Velera is a blunt weapon. We can sink together with the emperor or some of us can swim.”

“Sherzal—”

“Sherzal didn’t order your friend’s death, Nona. Yisht is dangerous but you use the tools you have.” Safira glanced towards her. “I’m not your enemy. The Noi-Guin haven’t forgotten you. That’s a warning from a friend.”

Nona shook her head. “If you’re a friend you can come and tell your stories to the abbess. She’ll know what to make of them.” She moved to the table’s edge, feet careful, avoiding the plates. Ara and Regol advanced too.

“No! Just me.” Kettle’s command was iron. Surprise at such authority from the nun held Nona in her place. Kettle was always smiles and fun. Nona didn’t recognize this Kettle.

In the next moment the two women closed to fight, Safira sweeping her leg to topple Kettle. Both employed the strain of blade-fist favoured by Sisters of Discretion, their combat fluid. Where Sister Tallow concentrated on blocking and on blows aimed to inflict as much damage in as short a time as possible the grey-fist centred on evasion and on unbalancing the opponent, often seeming more of a dance. The two moved in a flowing contest of position and stability, flurries of blows finding nothing but air. It might be a dance, and a beautiful one at that, but Nona knew the form held scores of moves for disabling or killing a less skilled opponent in a quiet and efficient manner, any of which could be used in a heartbeat if either woman gained sufficient advantage.

A quick clash, hands finding purchase, a rapid adjustment of feet, grips broken. Kettle and Safira spun apart, both unbalanced. A moment later they closed again, punches ducked, kicks evaded with the minimum twist necessary, Kettle a blur of swirling habit. Without warning Kettle managed to seize Safira’s trailing plait and, yanking her head back, drove an elbow into her face.

Safira stepped back, panting, wiping the blood from her nose. “As much as I love to play with you, Mai, I don’t have time for this.” She opened her hand to reveal a small leather tube, pitch-sealed. “Grey mustard. Not really the ideal condiment for social gatherings. Perhaps I should just go?”

Kettle stepped back from the door, eyes hard.

Throw yourself on her! You could cut her hand off before she—

No. Nona didn’t know much about grey mustard but she knew it was a poison that Sister Apple didn’t let any novice work with until they reached Holy Class, and then only if they were marked for the Grey.

Safira opened the door and turned in the doorway, finding Nona again. “Tell Zole what I said. Sherzal is bound for greatness and there is a place for both of you at her side.”

A moment later she was gone.

9

ON SEVEN-DAY THEY heated the pool water. With the shipheart gone it now required that coal be burned in a chamber beneath the laundry where the pipes lay exposed. Black smoke belched from the new chimney and the Corridor wind stripped it away. Come evening, after four hours, the water steamed. On some six-days during the freeze Nona had to break a film of ice in the bathhouse, so the seven-day was a blessing. After four hours burning coal the pool was as hot as it would get and almost as hot as in the year she had joined Sweet Mercy.

Nona and Ara had returned from lunch with Terra Mensis in Verity in good time to bathe but Nona left the dormitories late, deep in her considerations. She hadn’t spoken to Zole and remained undecided about what to do with Safira’s message. Probably she should let the abbess decide.

Kettle had been quiet on the journey back, locked in her thoughts. The best thing to come out of the visit had been when, as they were leaving, Ara had asked Terra to let Nona borrow some clothes the next time she was in town.

“It’s a convent thing,” she had said. “A sort of fancy dress. I don’t know what she’ll want.”

“Of course . . .” Terra had seemed uncertain, perhaps imagining her finest dress walking out the door along with borrowed jewellery.

“Servant’s uniform perhaps. Or a wig if you still have some?” Ara had said.

Terra brightened considerably at that. “Arabella! I have so many wigs! Velera wore that silver one three years ago and . . . well, you know . . . but now? Nobody wears them. You can have six if you want, Nona!”

* * *

• • •

THE OTHER NOVICES had rushed off to enjoy the heat, Ara with them, as soon as the message went out that Sister Mop had opened the bathhouse doors. Nona had lain on her bed staring at the ceiling, ignoring Keot’s urgings. He loved the pool.

The holothour filled her thoughts. The memory of that consuming fear. The anger she felt at the shame of it. The creature’s mark on her friends. Of all the novices who came with Nona from the caves that day only Ara would even acknowledge they existed. The others grew irritated if she talked about them and would try to change the subject, and failing that just walk away. Even Ara, though she agreed there were caves, and that a hidden entrance existed, was vague and evasive when it came to talking about what might be down there and whether they had ever explored together.

Take me to the bathhouse!

You just want to see the novices naked.

I am older than your civilization and find your bodies no more attractive than those of spiders.

It’s no big thing to be centuries old if you can’t remember anything further back than a few years ago.

Keot seemed to know very little. He didn’t even know what he was or where he came from. Or if he did he wasn’t telling. He claimed to enjoy the heat of the water, but every time Nona’s attention wandered she would find him trying to creep into one of her eyes to see better.

At last Nona rolled off her bed and left the dormitory. She needed to be free of the day’s grime, not least the sweat of that remembered fear. She also wanted an end to Keot’s moaning. The dorms lay silent. Her feet echoed on the stairs. Nobody stayed long when the pool was steaming.

“I thought you were never coming.” Joeli Namsis stepped into her path in the entrance hall, emerging from the Red dorm. Nona had been too deep in thought to see her until the last moment. Apart from her air of cruelty her appearance—tall, with golden hair cascading around her shoulders—was very similar to Ara’s. “I suppose it must be true. Peasants do like being dirty.”

Two girls, so alike they might be true sisters, came out behind her: Elani and Crocey, Joeli’s constant companions, both hunska half-bloods. Two more exited from Grey dorm. These two, on her right, were from Holy Class, both of them marked for Red Sisters. Elani and Crocey stepped past Joeli, both holding quarterstaffs. Not from the Blade Hall stores but rough pieces of timber that looked to have been looted from the cooper’s yard.

Joeli smiled. “I don’t think you’ll report us however badly we beat you. But I’m quite eager to get into the world and put my skills to use, so being thrown out would be a price I’m willing to pay to see you crawl, Nona.”